by David Brin
Of course there were a few bold heretics — even among the Galactics — who held that the old Earthling theories were actually true, that it was somehow possible for a race to Uplift itself… to evolve starfaring intelligence and pull itself up by its bootstraps out of darkness and into knowledge and maturity.
But even on Earth most now thought the idea quaint. Patrons uplifted clients, who later took their own turn uplifting newer pre-sentients. It was the way and had been ever since the days of the .Progenitors, so long ago.
There was a real dearth of clues. Whoever the patrons of Man might have been, they had hidden their traces well, and for good reason. A patron race who abandoned a client was generally branded as an outlaw.
Still, the guessing game went on.
Certain patron clans were ruled out because they would never have chosen an omnivorous species to raise. Others were unsuited to living on Earth even for short visits — because of gravity or atmosphere or a host of other reasons.
Most agreed that it couldn’t have been a clan which believed in specialization either. Some uplifted their clients with very specific goals in mind. The Uplift Institute demanded that any new sapient race be able to pilot starships, exercise judgment and logic and be capable of patron status itself someday. But beyond that the Institute put few constraints on the types of niches into which client species might be made to fit. Some were destined to become skilled craftsmen, some philosophers, and some mighty warrior castes.
But humanity’s mysterious patrons had to have been generalists. For Man, the animal, was very much a flexible beast.
Yes, and for all of the vaunted flexibility of the Tymbrimi, there were some things not even those masters of adaptation could even think of doing.
Such as this, Robert thought.
A covey of native birds exploded into the air in a flurry of beating wings as Robert ran across their feeding grounds. Small, skittering things felt the rumble of his approach and took cover.
A herd of animals, long-legged and fleet like small deer, darted away, easily outdistancing him. They happened to flee southward, the direction he was going anyway, so he followed them. Soon Robert was approaching where they had stopped to feed again.
Once more they bolted, opened a wide berth behind them, then settled down again to browse.
The sun was getting high. It was a time of the day when all the plains animals, both the hunters and the hunted, tended to seek shelter from the heat. Where there were no trees, they scraped the soil in narrow runnels to find cooler layers and lay down in what shade there was to wait out the blazing sun.
But on this day one creature did not stop. It kept coming. The pseudo-deer blinked in consternation as Robert approached again. Once more, they arose and took flight, leaving him behind. This time they put a little more distance in back of them. They stood atop a small hill, panting and staring unbelievingly.
The thing on two legs just kept coming!
An uneasy stir riffled through the herd. A premonition that this just might be serious. Still panting, they fled once more.
Perspiration shone like oil on Robert’s olive skin. It glistened in the sunlight, quivering in droplets that sometimes shook loose with the constant drumming of his footsteps.
Mostly, though, the sweat spread out and coated his skin and evaporated in the rushing wind of his own passage. A dry, southeasterly breeze helped it change state into vapor, sucking up latent heat in the process. He maintained a steady, even pace, not even trying to match the sprints of the deerlike creatures. At intervals he walked and took sparing swigs from his water bag, then he resumed the chase.
His bow lay strapped across his back. But for some reason Robert did not even think of using it. Under the noonday sun he ran on and on. Mad dogs and Englishmen, he thought.
And Apache… and Bantu… and so many others…
Humans were accustomed to thinking that it was their brains which distinguished them so from the other members of Earth’s animal kingdom. And it was true that weapons and fire and speech had made them the lords of their homeworld long before they ever learned about ecology, or the duty of senior species to care for those less able to understand. During those dark millennia, intelligent but ignorant men and women had used fires to drive entire herds of mammoths and sloths and so many other species over cliffs, killing hundreds for the meat contained in one or two. They shot down millions of birds so the feathers might adorn their ladies. They chopped down forests to grow opium.
Yes, intelligence in the hands of ignorant children was a dangerous weapon. But Robert knew a secret.
We did not really need all these brains in order to rule our world.
He approached the herd again, and while hunger drove him, he also contemplated the beauty of the native creatures. No doubt they were growing rapidly in stature with each passing generation. Already they were far larger than their ancestors had been back when the Bururalli slew all the great ungulates which used to roam these plains. Someday they might fill some of those empty niches. Even now they were already far swifter than a man.
Speed was one thing. But endurance was quite another matter. As they turned to flee him again, Robert saw that the herd members had begun to look a little panicky. The pseudo-deer now wore flecks of foam around their mouths. Their tongues hung out, and their rib cages heaved in rapid tempo.
The sun beat down. Perspiration beaded and covered him in a thin sheen. This evaporated, leaving him cool. Robert paced himself.
Tools and fire and speech gave us the surplus. They gave us what we needed to begin culture. But were they all we had?
A song had begun to play in the network of fine sinuses behind his eyes, in the gentle squish of fluid that damped his brain against the hard, driving accelerations of every footstep. The throbbing of his heartbeat carried him along like a faithful bass rhythm. The tendons of his legs were like taut, humming bows… like violin strings.
He could smell them now, his hunger accentuating the atavistic thrill. He identified with his intended prey. In an odd way Robert knew a fulfillment he had never experienced before. He was alive.
He barely noticed as he began overtaking deer who had collapsed to the ground. Mothers and their fawns blinked in dull surprise as he ran past them without a glance. Robert had spotted his target, and he projected a simple glyph to tell the others to relax, to slip aside, while he chased a big male buck at the head of the herd.
You are the one, he thought. You have lived well, passed on your genes. Your species does not need you anymore, not as much as I da.
Perhaps his ancestors actually used empathy-sense quite a bit more than modern man. For now he saw a real function for it. He could kenn the growing dread of the buck as, one by one, its overheated companions dropped aside. The buck put in a desperate burst of speed and leaped far ahead. But then it had to rest, panting miserably to try to cool off, its sides heaving as it watched Robert come on.
Foaming, it turned to flee again.
Now it was just the two of them.
Gimelhai blazed. Robert bore on.
A little while later he brought his left hand to his belt as he ran, and loosened the sheath of his knife. Even that tool he chose with some reluctance. What decided him to use it, instead of his bare hands, was empathy with his prey, and a sense of mercy.
It was some hours later, his stomach no longer growling urgently, that Robert felt his first glimmerings of a clue. He had begun making his way southwestward, in the direction Athaclena had hoped would lead him to his goal. As the day aged, Robert shaded his eyes against the late afternoon glare. Then he closed them and reached forth with other senses.
Yes, something was close enough to kenn. If he thought of it metaphorically, it came as a very familiar flavor.
He headed forth at a jog, following traces that came and went, sometimes cool and sentient and sometimes as wild as the buck who had shared its life with Robert so recently.
When the traces grew quite strong, Robert foun
d himself near a vast thicket of ugly thorn bush. Soon it would be sunset, and there was no way he would be able to chase down the thing emanating those vibrations, not in this dense, hurtful undergrowth. Anyway, he did not want to “hunt” this creature. He wanted to talk to it.
He was sure the being was aware of him now. Robert halted. He closed his eyes again and cast forth a simple glyph. It darted left, right, then plunged into the vegetation. There came a rustle.
He opened his eyes. Two dark, glittering pools blinked back at him. “All right,” he said, softly. “Please come on out now. We had better talk.”
There was another moment’s hesitation. Then there shambled forth a long-armed chim, hairier than most, with thick brows and a heavy jaw. He was dirty, and totally naked.
There were a few stains that Robert was sure came from caked blood, and it had not come from the chim’s own minor scratches. Well, we are cousins, after all. And vegetarians don’t live long on a steppe.
When he sensed that the comate chim was reluctant to make eye contact, Robert did not insist. “Hello, Jo-Jo,” he said softly, and with sincere gentleness. “I’ve come a long way to bring a message to your employer.”
81
Athaclena
Its occupant — naked, unshaven, and looking very much the wolfling — stared down at Athaclena with an expression that would have burned even without the loathing he radiated. To Athaclena it felt as if the little glade were saturated with the prisoner’s hatred. She planned to keep her visit as short as possible.
“I thought you would want to know. The Gubru Triumvirate has declared a protocol truce under the Rules of War,” she told Major Prathachulthorn. “The ceremonial site is now sacrosanct, and no armed force on Garth can act except in self-defense for the duration.”
Prathachulthorn spat through the bars. “So? If we’d attacked when I planned, we’d have made it before this.”
“I find it doubtful. Even the best plans are seldom executed perfectly. And if we were forced to abort the mission at the last minute, every secret we had would have been revealed for nothing.”
“That’s your opinion,” Prathachulthorn snorted.
Athaclena shook her head. “But that is not the only or even the most important reason.” She had grown tired of fruitlessly explaining the nuances of Galactic punctilio to the Marine officer, but somehow she found the will to try one more time. “I told you before, major. Wars are known to feature cycles of what you humans sometimes call ‘tit-for-tat’ where one side punishes the other side for its last insult, and then that other side retaliates in turn. Left unconstrained, this can escalate forever! Since the days of the Progenitors, there have been developed rules which help keep such exchanges from growing out of all proportion.”
Prathachulthorn cursed. “Damn it, you admitted that our raid would’ve been legal if done in time!”
She nodded. “Legal, perhaps. But it also would have served the enemy well. Because it would have been the last action before the truce!”
“What difference does that make?”
Patiently, she tried to explain. “The Gubru have declared a truce while still in an overpowering position of strength, major. That is considered honorable. You might say they ‘win points’ for that.
“But their gain is multiplied if they do so immediately after taking damage. If they show restraint by not retaliating, the Gubru are then performing an act of forbearance. They gather credit—”
“Ha!” Prathachulthorn laughed. “Fat lot of good it’d do them, with their ceremonial site in ruins!”
Athaclena inclined her head. She really did not have time for this. If she spent too long here, Lieutenant McCue might suspect that this was where her missing commander was being hidden. The Marines had already swooped down on several possible hiding places.
“The upshot might have been to force Earth to finance a new site as a replacement,” she said.
Prathachulthorn stared at her. “But — but we’re at warl”
She nodded, misunderstanding him. “Exactly. One cannot allow war without rules, and powerful neutral forces to enforce them. The alternative would be barbarism.”
The man’s sour look was her only answer.
“Besides, to destroy the site would have implied that humans do not want to see their clients tested and judged for promotion! But now it is the Gubru who must pay honor-gild for this truce. Your clan has gained a segment of status by being the aggrieved party, unavenged. This sliver of propriety could turn out to be crucial in the days ahead.”
Prathachulthorn frowned. For a moment he seemed to concentrate, as if a thread of her logic hung almost within reach. She felt his attention shimmer as he tried… but then it faded. He grimaced and spat again. “What a load of crap. Show me dead birds. That’s currency I can count. Pile them up to the level of this cage, little Miss Ambassador’s Daughter, and maybe, just maybe I’ll let you live when I finally break out of here.”
Athaclena shivered. She knew how futile it was to try to hold a man such as this prisoner. He should have been kept drugged. He should have been killed. But she could not bring herself to do either, or to further- prejudice the fate of the chims in her cabal by involving them in such crimes.
“Good day, major,” she said. And turned to go.
He did not shout as she left. In a way, the parsimonious use he made of his threats made those few seem all the more menacing and believable.
She took a hidden trail from the secret glade over a shoulder of the mountain, past warm springs that hissed and steamed uncertainly. At the ridge crest Athaclena had to draw in her tendrils to keep them from being battered in the autumn wind. Few clouds could be seen in the sky, but the air was hazy with dust blowing in from faraway deserts.
Hanging from a nearby branch she encountered one of the parachutelike kite and spore pod combinations blown up here from some field of plate ivy. The autumn dispersal was fully under way now. Fortunately, it had begun in earnest more than two days ago, before the Gubru announced their truce. That fact might turn out to be very important indeed.
The day felt odd, more so than any time since that night of terrible dreams, shortly before she climbed this mountain to wrestle with her parents’ fierce legacy.
Perhaps the Gubru are warming up their hyperwave shunt, again.
She had since learned that her fit of dreams on that fateful night had coincided with the invaders’ first test of their huge new facility. Their experiments had let surges of unallocated probability loose in all directions, and those who were psychically sensitive reported bizarre mixtures of deathly dread and hilarity.
That sort of mistake did not sound like.the normally meticulous Gubru, and it seemed to be validation of Fiben Bolger’s report, that the enemy had serious leadership problems.
Was that why tutsunucann collapsed so suddenly and violently that evening? Was all that loose energy responsible for the terrific power of her s’ustru’thoon rapport with Uthacal thing?
Could that and the subsequent tests of those great engines explain why the gorillas had begun behaving so very strangely?
All Athaclena knew for certain was that she felt nervous and afraid. Soon, she thought. It will all approach climax very soon.
She had descended halfway down the trail leading back to her tent when a pair of breathless chims emerged from the forest, hurrying^ uphill toward her. “Miss… miss …” one of them breathed. The other held his side, panting audibly.
Her initial reading of their panic triggered a brief hormone rush, which only subsided slightly when she traced their fear and kenned that it did not come from an enemy attack. Something else had them terrified half out of their wits.
“Miss Ath-Athaclena,” the first chim gasped. “You gotta come quick!”
“What is it, Petri? What’s happening?”
He swallowed. “It’s the Villas. We can’t control ’em anymore!”
So, she thought. For more than a week the gorillas’ low, atonal music h
ad been driving their chim guardians to nervous fits. “What are they doing now?”
“They’re leaving!” the second messenger wailed plaintively.
She blinked. “What did’you say?”
Petri’s brown eyes were filled with bewilderment. “They’re leaving. They just got up and left! They’re headin’ for the Sind, an’ there doesn’t seem t’be anythin’ we can do to stop “em!”
82
Uthacalthing
Their progress toward the mountains had slackened considerably recently. More and more of Kault’s time seemed to be spent laboring over his makeshift instruments… and in arguing with his Tymbrimi companion.
How quickly things change, Uthacalthing thought. He had labored long and hard to bring Kault to this fever pitch of suspicion and excitement. And now he found himself recalling with fondness their earlier peaceful comradeship — the long, lazy days of gossip and reminiscences and common exile — however frustrating they had seemed at the time.
Of course that had been when Uthacalthing was_whole, when he had been able to look upon the world through Tymbrimi eyes, and the softening veil of whimsy.
Now? Uthacalthing knew that he had been considered dour and serious by others of his race. Now, though, they would surely think him crippled. Perhaps better off dead.
Too much was taken from me, he thought, while Kault muttered to himself in the corner of their shelter. Outside, heavy gusts blew through the veldt grasses. Moonlight brushed long hillcrests that resembled sluggish ocean waves, locked amid a rolling storm.
Did she actually have to tear away so much? he wondered, without really being able to feel or care very much.
Of course Athaclena had hardly known what she was doing, that night when she decided in her need to call in the pledge her parents had made. S’ustru’thoon was not something one trained for. A recourse so drastic and used so seldom could not be well described by science. And by its very nature, s’ustru’thoon was something one could do but once in one’s lifetime.