Destiny's Road

by Larry Niven

  Willya, what's the date? Rafik? I've lost track myself."

  "We can't wait," Willametta said.

  Rafik said, "We'll find someone on the Road. Ask."

  "Uh-huh. Then we'll know if we're between caravans. That could take months."

  Murderous silence.

  "Of course we might outrun a caravan. They can't move faster than a chug. But you didn't even know that much, did you? What you don't know, doesn't it scare you?

  "Now, if there's a caravan, and if fourteen of us could take it, you'd lose some wagons just by shooting them up. Bullets kill chugs too.

  That gives you a short wagon train, and maybe eight or ten left alive to run it, and nothing to sell-"

  Andrew released a bit of his fury. "Hold it, you son of a dirty bird! Why nothing to sell?"

  "Andrew, a caravan full of trade goods is on its way to meet the other caravan! They stop on the Neck, nose to nose. They transfer all the yutzes and throw a big party. They see we're fakes and shoot us all dead.

  "So you can't stop the outbound caravan. You could stop the caravan that's coming back and turn it around, but it'll be full of stuff they bought on the Road, and every little town along the Road is going to notice one caravan following another. With not enough people to defend it. And that, Andrew, is when your pitiful few survivors of that last fight get to die at the hands of bandits. By the way, there's no point in negotiating with bandits. They're speckles-shy. By then, I guess we'll be too."

  Barda Winslow stood. She said, "Go away."

  Jemmy went.

  Hot water flooded over him. He stopped trying to think. Just let it happen. Ancient luxury. The water never had run like this at Bloocher Farm.

  A voice shouted "Hey!" and a hand touched his arm. Then the twins were under the shower with him. He laughed and shouted into an ear, "What if someone wants the men's room?"

  "Amnon's guarding."

  "We asked Willya. She said you could use a distraction."

  "If anyone else comes in, we break this up."

  "Rita's mostly here to take care of me. Some men, they'd get rough."

  They connected, he and Dolores, sitting in a thundering flood of hot water. Rita was massaging his back and shoulders, and that felt good.

  Jemmy found he could still shout. "Trying to get a free ride out?"

  "Yeah!"

  They rode.

  In the aftermath glow he reached up along Rita's leg. "Hey. If Dolores gets pregnant but you don't, would they take her but not you?"

  "Girl, move over. Hey, yutz, you got any of that left?"

  "Weeks. I was saving it-" for Loria. "Well, save it no more."

  Then someone did come in, and the women rolled to either side and were on their feet, and Rita turned off the shower while Jemmy lay bedazzled and bewildered.

  Three shadows seen through fog. "Just us. Down, Rita! Jeremy, we've talked. Can you join us?"

  "Sure."

  Barda and Rafik and Henry emerged from the steam. He was still short of sleep, he thought, but there wasn't any way to rest now. "Barda, do we have time to talk? If I thought of looking for windbird blood on Shimon's shirt-"

  "They won't find it," Rafik said carelessly. "Come on."

  Jemmy got his shorts on. He was talking as they walked toward the airlock end. "I shot both birds. Then they both chewed Shimon up. They must have gotten their own blood all over him. The proles will think of looking. The question is, did it wash off?"

  Henry began swearing. Rafik's glare was the kind that kills. Barda took Andrew aside and began to whisper.

  They broke. "All right," Andrew said, "we have to go. I have to go.

  I killed a prole tonight for that gun. Jeremy, for Earth's sake, when did you think of this?"

  "Came to me while I was in the shower."

  "What can we do? Steal one wagon? Do they ever separate?"

  "They can be separated. There are stories. You need more than fourteen people for a bandit gang, though. Yet again, Andrew, what would you do with it? Even if we could peel off a wagon and kill everyone in it and take all their yutz guns, we wouldn't have enough firepower to hold off shark attacks. We'll lose our chugs in the first week! That's why they take so many wagons."

  "Well, if it's that hopeless, there's no point in any of you going.

  I'm a trusty. You c-"

  "I'm coming," Barda snapped without looking up. She was rolling the biggest of the kitchen knives into a pair of shorts.

  "You couldn't have stopped me doing anything," Andrew told her.

  "Didn't know I was out there killing a prole and I~iding the pack wagon.

  Can't stop me now, 'cause I'm holding that damned hose of a prole gun.

  So, Jeremy, do you have anything to say that isn't 'We're all gonna die'?"

  Jemmy said, "I think we can become a restaurant."

  *23*

  The Run

  Old sun, old planet, means less 0f heavy metals and radioactives. The crust is too th~~k for plate movement and mountain building. Destiny doesn't really have more water than earth, b~t it covers nearly every±hing.

  -Henry Judd, Planetologist

  Andrew stopped them just outside the stormlock in the flapping white light of the electric banner. "I forgot something." He grinned, and turned to go back in.

  Jemmy had him by the poncho. "No you don't. Amnon!" he bellowed.

  The snout of the prole gun pushed into Jemmy's throat. Andrew almost-whispered, "Just what d-?"

  Jemmy screamed, "He's going to kill the ones who stayed!" The crowd of refugees melted. Jemmy couldn't tell who ran or where they hid, but Barda and Willametta moved immediately to Andrew's side. They whispered urgent remonstrances, their hands caressing his arms, while Amnon stepped up behind him and wrapped his big arms around Andrew's head.

  But Andrew pushed the prole gun hard under Jemmy's chin, and Jemmy didn't try to move.

  Amnon's arms began to tighten and twist. He asked, "The twins too, you birdfucker?"

  "We can't leave them to talk!"

  Barda was holding the point of the biggest of the kitchen knives just under Andrew's eye.

  Andrew cursed and released the gun. Jemmy caught the heavy thing and cradled it, pointing it at nobody. A tiny green light twinkled in the butt. He said, "You never did have a plan, did you? Just kill and kill until something stops you."

  "Nooo."

  "Jeremy. Jeremy! Give me the gun a minute."

  "What?" Jemmy swung round; the gun swung too. One of the twins shied back.

  "Just give me the gun for a breath," she pleaded, laughing.

  "I don't think so."

  "Then you do it. Shoot up the toolhouse a little."

  "Bad idea, Rita."

  "Dolores. But look-"

  Willya shouted, "Barda, don't cut him, it's all right! Let him go.

  Now what, Andrew?"

  Andrew snarled like a beast.

  "Plan," Jemmy said in disgust. Without Andrew the rest had no direction, but Jemmy Bloocher might as well be lost on another planet.

  He said, "Push anyone stupid enough to trust you until he drops out, then kill him for it. Kill proles till they shoot everyone who's still with you. Keep it up till there's nobody left. Plan?"

  Andrew wrenched himself loose, and they let him do it. He shook himself, and strode off shouting, "Follow me!"

  The flapping yellow blaze dwindled into black rain.

  In the rain and the thunder there was a rustling too, and motion that wasn't just trees in the wind. A big bird dropped from the sputtering sky and lifted again with a turtle-shape in its four sawtooth-edged feet.

  Andrew had told them to keep their ponchos. He was right. The night was alive.

  Rafik Doe recognized tree roots strangling a sharp-edged boulder, and fished Jemmy Bloocher's pack from underneath. Those on the short list stripped and donned the swim trunks and windbreakers from Carder's Boat, then wore their firebird colors over them. Jemmy gave his prole gun to Amnon before he pulled a windbre
aker over his head, then his own old and battered pack. Amnon handed the gun back, somewhat to Jemmy's surprise, and got himself dressed.

  They'd walked halfway back to the field where Shimon died. In a sputter of lightning they watched a battle between shadows of birds.

  Rafik complained in a continuous drone, until others took up the theme too.

  "Here!" said Andrew.

  He meant a line of spiky black-and-bronze foliage dug into the crack that ran up a near-vertical rock face.

  There were exclamations and protests, and then they climbed. Jemmy waited to help the laggards.

  Shar Willoughby got ten meters up and froze.

  Jemmy climbed up to show her which plants would hold, where to place her feet. She shook her head and wouldn't look or move. "Get me down. Just get me down."

  Andrew and Barda were high above him. He couldn't ask: Do we need Shar? She was wearing shorts and windbreaker! But she'd never make it, and she was blocking the path.

  A ten-meter fall would break bones. He guided her down, letting her stand on his shoulders when he had to. She knelt at the bottom, panting like a dog. He made her strip and took her shorts and windbreaker.

  The others were climbing. Shar plodded back toward the barracks.

  Jemmy pulled himself along a row of Destiny plants. Or was it all one plant? He couldn't see a break, just a line of roots prying a mountainsized rock apart.

  Before that crack ran out there was another.

  The world was all tilted surfaces, black and lightning-white, and roar of thunder. He remembered wandering in a daze, mostly blind and mostly deaf, pulling himself from nowhere to nowhere just because he wasn't dead yet. .

  But this night was very different from the night he'd abandoned Carder's Boat. He'd been fed and succored, and twelve people had given their lives into his hands. . . gloves. Nobody else had gloves.

  The plants ended suddenly. Other climbers started having trouble.

  Jemmy had to double back a few times to guide the others to foot- and handholds. The prole gun's strap left Jemmy's arms free. He could see Andrew watching from far above.

  If Jemmy slipped, Andrew would have the gun again.

  "Here," Andrew bellowed. "The ledge. Leave your ponchos here.

  Firebird shorts too. Use rocks to weigh them down."

  Rafik exclaimed, "Now what on Earth are you playing at, Andrew?"

  "Do it right!" Andrew bellowed. He'd left his own clothing where he was, fifty feet above the ledge, sleeves spread and wedged in cracks.

  "They can't see through unless the clouds break!" He scrambled back and helped Rafik, then Willametta, then Amnon place rocks to display flame-colored ponchos and shorts against dark wet rock. The others were getting the idea.

  Andrew was painting a picture of climbers scattered over a cliff face. "We're halfway up and frozen in fear, right? And that's the way it is until they get here themselves, and look. Right?"

  "Andrew," Jemmy asked, "do you think they can see us?"

  Andrew's teeth flashed in lightning. "Not yet. All set? Come!"

  "Andrew, there's too many!" Andrew looked at him, and Jemmy shouted, "Me! I'm one too many! They're looking for thirteen ponchos, not fourteen, and if we meet a spectre or something, someone has to pose!"

  And after they found Shar they'd be looking for twelve ponchos, not thirteen. . . still one too many. . . unless Shar talked.

  Andrew said, "One of us should have started naked. Damndamn. Ansel, you look cold-"

  Ansel Tarr dressed again in flame colors.

  Jemmy looked arouhd at them. "Willya?" He gave her Shar's swim shorts and windbreaker. She looked no more skeletal than the rest.

  Andrew led off again, leaving twelve posed ponchos.

  The ledge was straight, hard to lose in the flashing dark, but it wasn't a split in rock. It was a frozen flow of lava, naked of plants, and slippery. There were holes etched by rain for handholds and footholds. Jemmy stayed on hands and knees even where he could stand, because those behind him were copying his style.

  Jemmy, Henry, Andrew, Willametta, Barda, and Amnon wore swim trunks and windbreakers. Ansel wore the last poncho. The rest were naked and not liking it.

  He barely heard the scream, but he turned quick and shouted down.

  "Who fell?"

  He heard: "I caught something. Caught a plant." Amnon's voice.

  "Thorn."

  "Can you climb up?" Oh, Earth and Moon, Amnon was in a windbreaker and trunks! If proles found those on a gatherer's corpse, they'd guess there were more.

  "I can't move! It's like two handfuls of hypo needles!"

  "I've got rope, Jeremy." Andrew hurled a coil of rope at him. He leered atJemmy and said, "Anchor me." Plan? Where's your rope?

  Jemmy tied the rope to a low, knotted Destiny tree. He could hear Amnon whimpering. The rope didn't seem to be finding him.

  The sky lit like a sun.

  It hurt the eyes. . . like the light that burned over the speckles field after Shimon's death. Jemmy blinked. "What on Earth-?"

  "Quicksilverrr!" Andrew's bellow was all triumph. He trolled the rope toward Amnon, who was clinging to a double armful of thorn on a sixtydegree slope. The rope was too short. "Jeremy!"

  It was long enough when Jemmy had untied it from the tree, but the only anchor now was himself and Andrew. Amnon didn't want to let go of the bush.

  Andrew shouted, "Take it, you damned fool!"

  Amnon moaned and snatched at the rope, lost his grip and had only the rope. He clung and swung while Andrew and Jemmy pulled hand over hand. At the end he lay sobbing at their feet, his hands full of needles and blood.

  And Jemmy asked again: "The light?"

  "It's Quicksilver, you Crab-shy dropout! And the date is late summer, and Quicksilver rises just an hour before sunrise. And we are right on schedule, Jeremy, but we should move!"

  "Quicksilver's bright, but this bright?"

  "Settler magic. That's what you call it, isn't it? Argos flew past Quicksilver. They dropped a metal and plastic turtle-I've seen pictures-it makes solar-electric plates, and lasers to beam the power, and more little mining turtles. Now it's hundreds of years later and Quicksilver's covered in solar collectors. That's why it's so bright."

  An entire planet covered in Begley cloth.

  Jemmy began to understand that DestinyTown had power undreamed by the towns along the Crab. They could light up a mountain range. Launch ships into space. Andrew had known. Did they all know? Did they all take this for granted?

  Lightning flickered dimly against a sky like a hazy noon. The rock slope was etched in detail. It looked to be four hundred meters to the ridge, and there, that crack might be a way up.

  But-"They're looking at us. How?"

  "Amnon? Got your nerve back? Ready to move?"

  "Dammit, Andrew! How are they watching us? From the sky?" Light like this had burned behind them this afternoon, lighting the proles'

  investigation of Shimon's death.

  The others gathered around Andrew and Jemmy and Amnon. Andrew said,

  "All right, Jeremy, but we don't have forever. Now, that light isn't for us. They're looking for firebird ponchos-Ansel, get that off now, ball it up and hide it!-and those are upRoad. They're looking through video-you understand video cameras?"

  "In Spiral Town we still have a few that work."

  "Video from orbit. So they can't see us unless the clouds break, but there's a way to split light into colors. They'll look for firebird colors. They'll match every firebird in the area, but firebirds don't gather the way Our ponchos are gathered-"

  Willametta said, "Andrew?"

  "The light's on us. It isn't on the ponchos. Can't you see? The mountain's lit up all around us, but it fades going back toward the barracks. Fades toward the fields too."

  The others murmured. Jemmy saw that she was right. But Andrew said,

  "You're imagining that. Why would they be looking at us?"

  "I thought they might be focusing
on this." Jemmy held up the prole gun.

  "Why?"

  But Willametta asked, "Jeremy, how long has that light been blinking?"

  A blinking green light in the butt of the gun. Jemmy said, "It's been doing that all along. Why? Because they wouldn't want a gun like this wandering loose! If they've got phones-"

  "Prole guns don't blink when we're harvesting. They didn't blink after the proles shot the birds," Willametta said. "Andrew, when did it start blinking? After you killed a prole for it?"

  "Maybe. Damndamndamn. It's sending a help call, isn't it, Willya?"

  "Throw it away, Andrew!"

  "Daaamn! Damn. Jeremy, do it."

  Jemmy hurled the evil thing back the way they'd come. It flew not far, struck bare rock and spun away downhill. Andrew screamed at the sky.

  Andrew climbed as if possessed. This part of the range was new to them all. The plants were gone; it was naked rock. In the weird light they could see him far above, while Jemmy moved about helping the slower climbers and the ones who froze in fear.

  Dennis Levoy was sliding. He'd lost the crack they were following.

  It was out of his reach now and he couldn't even scream. Jemmy scrambled down to reach him, but Dennis was sliding faster now, still silent, naked against a slick slope that wouldn't hold him. In the acid light Jemmy saw Henry flatten himself to avoid being knocked off. Dennis bounced against him and snatched at Henry's ankle. Henry kicked him free. He was falling, falling, gone.

  Dennis had been naked. Jemmy felt shamed that he'd thought to look, but he looked around and ticked them off: his own and five other sets of windbreakers and shorts, all climbing well.

  A rift in the blazing clouds showed as a black canyon and a terrible light within. Blinded, they froze against the hillside, under a blazing eye in a black sky.

  The rift closed before they moved again.

  As they climbed, the light crawled away from them, back toward the firebird ponchos.

  Andrew was coming back down. "Not this way. Stop them." He edged sideways along the hillside and trie.d another path. Jemmy got the rest of them to where they could cling, and they waited until Andrew shouted.

  Now the sky blazed upRoad, above the ponchos they'd left behind, lighting them until proles could come to see what they were. That ought to take hours. The Windfarm's felons climbed in the fringes of the light, with no firebird colors to mark them.