Ascending lop-5
Page 24
"Opinions differ," Festina said. "Now, if you’d like us to introduce ourselves—" "No," Lady Bell interrupted. "You’re slaves. You have no names. You may think you do, but we’ll soon wipe that out of you."
"Before you do anything irreversible," said Festina, "we’d like to talk to your prophet about ransom."
"Would you really?" Lord Rye asked. "Then go ahead. I’m the prophet."
Vexatious Bickering
Lady Bell whirled on him. "No," she snapped. Many of her mouths made sharp under-hisses. "Today I’m the prophet."
"You’re mistaken, darling." The word "darling" was stressed most oddly; as with the Cashlings’ attempt at laughter, I got the impression Lord Rye was endeavoring to imitate something he did not understand. "You were the prophet yesterday. At that rally on Jalmut."
"That was two days ago, darling. Therefore you were prophet yesterday, and it’s my turn again."
"But I didn’t do anything prophetic yesterday — we spent the whole day just getting free of Jalmut airspace. Darling."
"That’s not my fault, darling darling. You had plenty of time to do holy work. You could have whipped up a sacred revelation."
"One doesn’t whip up revelations," Lord Rye said with many supplementary hisses. "They’re supposed to come naturally. And they haven’t of late." He made a whining noise. "I think I have prophet’s block."
"Then I definitely should be prophet today." The lady turned to us all, sweeping her hands outward in a gracious gesture. "My friends — by which I mean, my worthless alien chattel — I am the Exalted Prophet Bell. Just a moment."
She reached to the neck of her spacesuit, slipped some sort of latch, and removed her helmet. Underneath she looked exactly like her suit… which is to say, frost green dappled with violet bits. The bits were not clean-edged pictures like the ones on her clothes, but they were similar in size and color. Either the woman had tattooed herself to match her suit, or the suit had been decorated with little images that were chosen to be close matches for the natural spottles on the lady’s skin.
She had no discernible eyes, nose, or mouth… or rather, she had numerous pocks and indentations all over her head which probably served as the usual facial organs, but when a creature has dozens of small eyes instead of two normalsized ones, it is just not the same at all. How, for example, can one tell where the person is looking? And how can one read emotional expressions when the alien’s face cannot smile, pout or frown? Perhaps that is why the Cashlings always moved with extravagant gestures, waving their hands and bobbing their bodies — with no facial features to convey emotion, they were forced to act everything out.
"That’s better," Bell said as mouths all over her face sucked at the Hemlock’s air. "Now you wished to discuss ransom? I’m amenable. Your Outward Fleet has notoriously deep pockets."
"We don’t need to bring the Admiralty into this," Festina replied. "I can pay all our ransoms with property I have ready to hand."
"Property?" Bell repeated. "You have no property, slave. The ship is ours. Its equipment is ours. Even your clothes are ours… although Miss See-Through Savage can keep her flea-bitten jacket. Dis gust ing."
"I was thinking of a different sort of property," Festina told her. "Intellectual property."
"Oh merde," said Lord Rye, with many mouths sighing. "You aren’t going to offer us military secrets, are you?" By now, he too had removed his helmet; unsurprisingly, his head was striped red-and-white like his suit. "Some crusade thirty years ago accepted military secrets as a ransom, then couldn’t sell them to anyone. Nobody cared."
"Don’t be ridiculous, darling," Lady Bell told him, "that’s a complete myth. A legend. Probably started by the Outward Fleet itself to discourage espionage." She turned back to Festina. "What kind of military secrets are we talking about? Access codes? Crypto algorithms? Names of spies in Cashling space?"
"I didn’t say I was offering military secrets," Festina replied.
"Then what are you offering?"
"Military secrets. But not the kind you think. These secrets are fat, wet, and juicy. The kind a news agency would pay millions for. And it’s all yours if you’ll let us go."
Festina began the story of Alexander York and his expose. Since I had heard this tale before, I did not pay attention; instead, I looked for something in the transport bay I might find amusing. There was very little there — I could not spot the Pollisand hiding in tree paintings, and the rest of the room was bare… except for the people, of course: Festina, the Cashlings, Aarhus, Uclod, Lajoolie… and Nimbus.
The cloud man was floating some distance away from the rest of our party. He had clearly been offended by Rye dismissing Zaretts as a vassal race; therefore, Nimbus had withdrawn, hovering like a storm cloud against the rear wall of the chamber. As his sibling-in-Shaddillhood, I did not like to see him upset… and anyway, it was tedious listening to Festina speak of things I already knew, so I sidled away from the group and went to offer Nimbus some sisterly consolation.
Umushu
"Hello," I said softly. "How are you feeling?"
Since he did not have eyes, Nimbus could not glare in bitter remonstrance; but the shudder that went through his mist conveyed a similar response. "Why should you care about the feelings of a vassal race?"
"Do not blame me for an alien’s words." Lowering my voice, I added, "In my opinion, these prophets are arrogant and hurtful. Are all Cashlings like that?"
"They’re all fools," Nimbus answered in a fierce whisper. "Dangerous ones."
I looked back at the Cashlings’ spindly bodies; they had shown they could move most quickly, but they did not look strong enough to punch with any great effect. "How are they dangerous?" I asked.
A tendril of his mist swirled toward me, brushing my cheek like tingly dust. "They’re umushu," the tendril whispered softly into my ear.
"What is that?" I whispered back.
"A fictional monster from Divian folklore. A corpse whose spirit has departed but who doesn’t fall down. Going through the motions of life, but no longer truly conscious."
"Lord Rye and Lady Bell are zombies?" I asked with delectable horror.
"Not real ones… but they might as well be." The dusty tendril of his being still hovered close to my ear, brushing lightly against my skin. "There’s something missing in Cashlings: some important spark has burnt out. Admiral Ramos told you they waste most of their lives with entertainment, bought from other species; and they spend the rest of their time on crusades, which are just another form of hollow amusement. Crusades don’t really mean anything to them — it’s just that their ancestors organized crusades, so the current generation does too. Do you think those prophets genuinely have anything to say about life?"
"No… but how does that make them dangerous?"
Nimbus did not answer right away. Finally he said, "Think about people on your planet, Oar — the ones with Tired Brains. Suppose that instead of lying dormant in towers, they actually moved around. Suppose they had parties, they traveled to other cities, they pretended to practice spiritual devotions… but their brains were still Tired. It was all just sleepwalking. They never built or manufactured anything, they never did anything new, they never dreamed of change; they simply lived in automated habitats filled with machines that did the bothersome work of keeping everyone alive. Wouldn’t that be a form of hell?"
I did not answer immediately. The conditions Nimbus described were perilously close to the reality of my world not just the state of my ancestors, but my own state through much of my life: creating nothing, and living by the grace of machines. "It would be most suffocating to the soul," I said at last. "But I do not see how it could be dangerous to other persons."
"It’s dangerous," Nimbus whispered, "it’s terrifyingly dangerous. Because after seeing the Cashlings, everyone else wants to be that way too."
The Resentment Of Vassals
"Everyone would wish to be Cashlings?" I whispered. "How can that be? They are awful."
"That is nonsense!"
"Yes, it is. But nevertheless, it’s happening. Believe me, I know — belonging to a vassal race teaches you a lot about your masters."
"But you work for Uclod, not Cashlings."
His mist fluttered. "Do you know how old I am?"
"No."
"Over two hundred Terran years. I’ve worked for all the local races."
I stared at him. "You are two hundred years old? That is quite most astonishing."
"Why?" the cloud man asked. "You and I are Shaddill technology; you’re virtually immortal, so why shouldn’t I be? In fact, I should be more immortal than you — the Shaddill created your race 4,500 years ago, while my race is less than a thousand. If the Shaddill continued to make scientific advances all that time, my design is 3,500 years more sophisticated than yours."
"Oh foo!" I exclaimed in outrage. Then I remembered we were supposed to be whispering and glanced around guiltily to see if anyone else had heard me. The other people in the transport bay showed no signs of noticing — the room was large, and we were quite some distance removed. Besides, everyone was still listening intently to Festina speak of Alexander York… though mostly they were listening to the Cashlings ask irrelevant questions about the whole business. Festina could only utter a few words at a time before Bell and Rye interrupted with more pointless quibbles.
I turned back to Nimbus and whispered sharply, "You are not more advanced than I!"
"Maybe not," he agreed. "I’m only a vassal race."
"Do not pretend to be pitiable. I do not see anyone persecuting you."
"Apart from the fact that I’m owned? That I’m a slave? That I’m sent to impregnate females I’ve never met before, I stay long enough to deliver the baby and get a bit attached to it, then off I go to some new master fifty lightyears away, never to see my mates or children again? You don’t call that persecution?"
I stared at him… or perhaps I was staring at the infant Starbiter clutched tight in his belly. Perhaps it was not coincidence that he carried the child as a pregnant woman does — not in his hands but in the center of his being, at his body’s core. "Very well," I whispered, "it is persecution. Your species is callously mistreated… though I shall not call you a vassal race, for I do not think of you that way."
"Everyone else does," he said, "and that’s how I know about Cashlings. Not to mention it’s how I know that all other sentient races are hell-bent on becoming Cashlings."
"Explain," I said.
And he did.
Coveting Folly
Though the majority of Zarett ships were owned by Divians, a number had been sold to alien races as well. More precisely, Divian breeders sold female Zaretts to non-Divians; they then leased male Zaretts (at high cost) to the aliens whenever paternalish services were required.
Therefore, as Nimbus said, he had spent his life drifting from one stud position to another, only staying long enough to mate with a Zarett female, help with the birth, and attend the first months of motherhood. Such a forced impermanence saddened him deeply; but it had also given him a unique chance to observe alien species at their most unguarded. Most of the time, the aliens did not know they were being watched — male Zaretts were microscopic eyes and ears hiding in a starship’s walls, watching their "masters" at work and play.
Very much play. Very little work. Especially in alien species who had been Scientific for a long long time.
Nimbus spoke of diverse alien races — Earthlings and Divians and Cashlings and several other species whose names did not stick in my mind — but they all had two qualities in common. First, they had been "uplifted" by the Shaddill: approached in their native star systems, given new homes elsewhere in the galaxy, and presented with sophisticated Science Gifts as a welcome to the League of Peoples. Second, ever since their uplift, these species had all grown more decadent, temperamental, and culturally sterile… particularly those uplifted for the longest period.
As a simple example, one could compare Cashlings with humans. Cashlings had been uplifted four thousand years ago; with humans, it was only four hundred. You therefore might expect the Cashlings to be more sophisticated in the ways of technology, having had so much longer to develop… but in fact, the Cashlings were not superior at all. Partly, this was because Cashling civilization had lost all interest in Scientific Research. In addition, whatever advanced knowledge they did once possess they had speedily bartered to Homo sapiens in exchange for VR adventures, situation comedy broadcasts, and glossy picture books.
The Cashlings had sold their technology to other alien races as well — which meant every species now possessed the know-how to build self-repairing cities that could satisfy the physical requirements of inhabitants without those inhabitants needing to work. ( Much like our cities on Melaquin, I thought.) And gradually, such places were being constructed by other species, humans and Divians and all.
Most of these other species declaimed loudly they were not imitating the despised Cashlings but simply exploiting Cashling technology… yet little by little, these races declined into lifestyles indistinguishable from the Cashling mode. Idle entertainment. The pursuit of faddish excuses for profundity. A deadened inner emptiness, reinforced by a self-righteous conviction there was no more worthwhile way to live — not that they felt satisfied with their own way of life, but they held an unquestioned certainty that no one possessed anything better.
So the diverse races of the galaxy were drifting toward the feckless ways of the Cashlings. Was this not the case with the human navy? Filled with venal admirals like Alexander York and puffed-up captains like Prope, not to mention foolish but inept saboteurs like Zuni. As for Divians, what could one say about the villainous marriage brokers who threatened to kill Lajoolie’s family if she did not perfectly satisfy Uclod? Wicked, arrogant, and self-centered.
Of course, Lajoolie herself was not so bad. Neither was Uclod… nor Festina… nor perhaps Sergeant Aarhus and various other persons I had met…
When I voiced this objection, Nimbus said it merely demonstrated that Earthlings and Divians had notprogressed so far into decadence as other species. Their races had only been uplifted for a few centuries; though decline was definitely creeping in, it had not yet infected everyone. Given a few more generations, however, Earthlings and Divians were headed for the same ghastly foolishness as Cashlings.
And apparently, Cashlings were very foolish indeed. Nimbus told me of numerous Cashling misdeeds he had observed over the years while riding in female Zaretts: Cashlings neglecting to pack sufficient hydrocarbons for long voyages… never bothering to calculate an optimal flight path, but simply aiming toward the apparent position of one’s destination… forgetting the difference between internal and external gravity, and consequently landing their spaceships upside-down…
I giggled at that, but Nimbus said it was Not Funny, Oar, It Was Tragic. At one time, the Cashlings had been a great people — intelligent, sensitive, and thoughtful. They had created some of the greatest visual art in the galaxy; they had cared passionately about color and form and meaning. But that was long ago and those artworks were gone: sold off to pay for foolish games and amusements from other species. Soon there would be nothing left… and no one could tell what the Cashlings would do with themselves when they could no longer squander their ancient heritage to pay for short-term diversions.
"Perhaps," I suggested, "they will rouse themselves from fruitless indulgence and embark upon lives of industry."
Nimbus’s mist swirled a moment. "No, Oar. They’re no longer capable." He paused. "A lot of non-Cashling planets have Cashling communities: outreach crusades travel all over the galaxy, leaving bored drop-outs on every planet they pass. If someone doesn’t take care of those Cashlings, they simply languish and die; they’re too accustomed to having everything done by machines. That includes machi
nes to rear their children — if a baby comes along, a Cashling mother has no idea how to raise an infant and no desire to learn. As a result, there’ve been lots of Cashling children raised by foster parents from different races… and those kids are just as useless as other Cashlings, no matter what their adoptive families do. Petulant. Disdainful. Negligible attention span. Unable to function, unwilling to be taught." Nimbus made a sighing sound. "Even children brought up with no knowledge of Cashling ways still grow up to be Cashlings. Every last one of them. Nature completely defeating nurture."
"But why is that odd?" I asked. "Rabbit babies grow up to be rabbits. Wolf babies grow up to be wolves. All creatures have instincts, and instincts cannot be erased."
"But Cashling instincts have been erased," Nimbus whispered intensely. "That’s the point, Oar, that’s the whole point. Cashlings haven’t always been useless. Before they were uplifted, they had a thriving ambitious culture. If nothing else, they certainly possessed the instinct to raise their own children. Now they don’t. None of them. Too flighty and easily bored. The only ones with the tiniest bit of initiative are the prophets, and you can see what they’re like."
His misty hand wafted dismissively in the direction of Lord Rye and Lady Bell. "It’s not surprising that affluence leads some people to indolence, but there should be others who buck the trend. Cunning schemers who want everybody else under their thumb, or strong-willed crusaders who fight to change the world. Cashling history has had plenty of striking individuals, both good and bad… but not in the past few millennia. No conquerors, no heroes, no devils, no saints." He paused. "The only way to explain such a universal absence is some crucial degeneration in the Cashling genome: a dominant mutation that’s made them all peevish and ineffectual."
"In other words," I said, "some dire calamity has afflicted them with Tired Brains."
"Exactly. And the same thing is happening to other species. Fasskisters, for example the greatest mastersof nanotech in our sector, but these days they hardly work at all. Oh, they still take jobs if they find the assignment amusing (and if the price is right); but they haven’t initiated anything themselves for quite some time. They don’t dream up projects on their own. It’s as if they’re incapable of imagining what they might do: they need an outside commission to kick them into activity."