by Larry Niven
Water spurted from the hose as Lawri carried it into the carm. The Grad couldn’t see what she was doing in there. He pedaled.
In Klance’s presence the Grad was Lawri’s equal. Otherwise Lawri treated him as a copsik, a spy, or both. He was clean, fed, and clothed. Of the rest of Quinn Tribe he had not even rumors. He and Lawri and the Scientist explored the cassettes together for old knowledge, and that was fascinating enough. But he was learning nothing that would rescue Quinn Tribe.
It was night. Both Voy and the sun were hidden behind the in tuft. In the peculiar light that remained, two faint streamers of blue light fanned out from the tuft. If he stared at them they went away. He could catch them by looking near them. He could almost imagine human shapes pouring as smoke from a squeeze-gourd. To starboard, the Blue Ghost. To port, even fainter, the Ghost Child.
The Scientist (the Scientist) had told him that they were discharges of peculiar energies from the poles of Voy itself. The Scientist had seen them when he was younger, but the Grad had never been able to see them, not even from the midpoint of Dalton-Quinn Tree.
He was sweating. He watched the elevator climb the tree to its housing. A Navy man and two copsiks emerged. None were jungle giants; he had never seen a first-generation copsik at the Citadel, barring himself. They entered the Scientist’s laboratory complex and presently left carrying the dishes from brunch.
Lawri called from the carm. “The tank’s full.”
The Grad moved with a briskness he didn’t feel, unfastening the belt, jerking the hose free of the pond. There were lineholds, wooden hoops, set in the bark to crisscross the citadel region. The Grad used them to make his way toward the carm, calling ahead of him, “Can I help?”
“Just coil the hose,” Lawri answered.
She hadn’t yet let him into the carm during this operation. The hose must lead, somehow, into a water tank in the carm. They filled it repeatedly, and a couple of days later they would fill it again.
The Grad coiled the hose as he moved toward the carm. He heard cursing from within. Then Lawri called, “I can’t move this damn fitting.”
The Grad joined her at the doors. “Show me.” That easy?
She showed him. The hose attached to a thing on the back wall, with a collar. “It has to be turned. That way.” She rotated her hands.
He set his feet, grasped the metal thing, put his back into it. The collar lurched. Again. He turned it until it was loose in his hands, and kept turning. The hose came loose. A mouthful of water spilled out. Lawri nodded and turned away.
“Scientist’s Apprentice? Where does the water go?”
“It’s taken apart,” she said. “The skin of the carm picks up sunlight and pumps the energy into the water. The water comes apart. Oxygen goes in one tank and hydrogen goes in the other. When they come together in the motors, the energy comes back and you get a flame.”
He was trying to imagine water coming apart, when Lawri asked, “Why did you want to know?”
“I was a Scientist. Why did you tell me?”
She sent herself skimming across the seats and settled herself at the controls. The Grad moored the coiled hose to fixtures in the cargo area.
The tank must be behind the wall. The carm had been nearly out of fuel…which came in two “flavors”? There must be fuel by now; the artificial pond was visibly shrunken.
Lawri tapped the blue button as he came up behind her. The display she’d been studying disappeared before he could see it. The Grad had half forgotten his question when she turned to him and said, “The Scientist quizzes me like that. Since I was ten. If I can’t answer I get some dirty job. But I don’t like having my buttons pushed, Jeffer, and that information is classified!”
“Scientist’s Apprentice, who is it that calls you Lawri?”
“Not you, copsik.”
“I know that.”
“The Scientist. My parents.”
“I don’t know anything about marriage customs here.”
“Copsiks don’t get married.”
“You’re not a copsik. Would your husband call you Lawri?”
The airlock thumped, and Lawri turned in some relief. “Klance?”
“Yes. Put that display on again, will you, Lawri?”
She looked at the Grad, then back at Klance.
“Now,” said the Scientist. Lawri obeyed. She’d made her point: she’d show scientific secrets to a copsik, but only under protest. Dominance games again. If she really cared, she would have removed the hose herself.
The blue lights and numbers had to do with what moved the carm, as green governed the carm’s sensing instruments and yellow moved the doors and white read the cassettes…and more. He was sure that they all did more than he knew. And red? He’d never seen red.
Every time he saw this display, certain numbers were larger. Now they read O2: 1,664. H2: 3,181. Klance was nodding in approval. “Ready to go anytime. Still, I think we’ll feed in the rest of the reservoir. Jeffer, come here.” He cut the blue display and activated the yellow. “This number tells you if there’s a storm coming, if you watch it.”
“What is it?”
“It’s the external air pressure.”
“Can’t you see a storm coming?”
“Coming, yes. Forming, no. If the pressure goes up or down fast, over a day or so, there’s a storm forming. Lets you impress hell out of the citizens. This is classified, of course.”
The Grad asked, “Where does the tree go from here?”
“Out of this rain. Then on to Brighton Tree; they haven’t seen us in a while. Grad, you’ll get a good chance to look the bud colonies over and pick and choose among them.”
“For what, Klance?”
“For your children, of course.”
The Grad laughed. “Klance, how am I going to have children if I spend my life at the Citadel?”
“Don’t you know about the Holidays?”
“I never heard of them.”
“Well, every year’s-end, when Voy crosses in front of the sun, the copsiks all get together at the treemouth. It’s holiday for six days while the copsiks mate and gossip and play games. Even the food comes from the out tuft. The Holidays start in thirty-five days.”
“No exceptions? Not even for a Scientist’s Apprentice?”
“Don’t worry, you’ll go,” Klance chuckled.
Lawri had turned away, showing her bowed back, the wealth of blond hair floating around her. He wondered then: How would Lawri have children? The Scientist didn’t seem to be her lover; the Grad knew that he imported copsik women from the in tuft. If she never left the Citadel—How would Lawri ever find a man?
Me?
A copsik could have children, but Lawri could not. It couldn’t be helped. He dared not think of Lawri as other than an enemy.
There was flesh against her as she woke. It happened often. Minya shifted position and refrained from wrapping her arms around the citizen who slept beside her. She might hurt him.
Her motion wakened him. He turned carefully—his arm was bound with cloth against his torso—and said, “Good morning.”
“Good morning. How’s your arm?” She searched her memory for his name.
“You did a good job on it, but it’ll heal.”
“I wondered why you came looking for me, given that I broke it.”
He scowled. “You stuck in my head. While Lawri was setting the bone I kept seeing your face, two ce’meters away with your teeth bared like you were going for my throat next…yeah. So I’m here.” The scowl relaxed. “Under, eh, different circumstances.”
“Better now?”
“Yes.”
His name surfaced. “Karal. I don’t remember a Lawri.”
“Lawri’s not a copsik. She’s the Scientist’s Apprentice—one of his apprentices, now—and she treats Navy men if we get hurt.”
One of his apprentices? Minya gambled. “I hear the new one is a copsik.”
“Yes. I saw him from a distance, and he’s not a
jungle giant. One of yours?”
“Maybe.” She stood, donned her poncho. “Will we meet again?”
He hesitated—“Maybe”—and added, “The Holidays are eight sleeps away.”
She let her smile show through. Gavving! “How long do they last?”
“Six days. And all work stops.”
“Well, I have to get to work now.”
Karal disappeared into the foliage while Minya strolled into the Commons. She missed Dalton-Quinn Tuft. She’d grown almost used to the obtrusive differences: the huge Commons, the omnipresent supervisors, her own servility. But little things bothered her. She missed cupvines, and copter plants. Nothing grew here but the foliage and the carefully cultivated earthlife, beans and melons and corn and tobacco, as thoroughly regimented as herself.
A dozen copsiks were up and stirring. Minya looked for Jinny and spotted her at the treemouth, just her head showing above the foliage as she fed the tree.
The schedules were loose. If you arrived late, you would work late. Beyond that, the supervisors didn’t care much…but Minya cared! She would do nothing badly. She would be an exemplary copsik, until the time came to be something else.
She tried to remember nuances of Karal’s speech. A citizen’s accent was odd, and she had been practicing it.
It had been strange for Minya. Her instincts were at war: a conditioned reflex that resisted sexual assault as blasphemy incarnate, versus the will to live.
Survival won. She would do nothing badly!
Jinny stood up, set her poncho in order, then sprinted west.
Minya screamed. She was too far to do anything but shout and point as she ran. A pair of supervisors, much closer, saw what was happening and ran too.
Jinny plunged through a last screen of foliage, into the sky.
Minya kept running. The supervisors (Haryet and Dloris, hard-faced jungle giants of indeterminate age) had reached the edge. Dloris swung a weighted line round her head, twice and out. Haryet waited her turn, then swung her own line while Dloris pulled. The line resisted as she pulled it in, then gave abruptly. Dloris reeled back, off balance.
Minya reached the edge in time to see the stone at the end of Haryet’s line spin round Jinny. Dloris threw her line while Jinny was still fighting Haryet’s. Jinny thrashed, then went limp.
Haryet pulled her in.
Jinny huddled on her side, face buried in her arms and knees. By now they were surrounded by copsiks. While Dloris gestured them away, Haryet rolled Jinny on her back, groped for hen chin, and pulled her face out of the protection of her arms. Jinny’s eyes stayed clenched like fists.
Minya said, “Madam Supervisor, a moment of your attention.”
Dloris looked around, surprised at the snap in Minya’s voice. “Later,” she said.
Jinny began to sob. The sobs shook her like Dalton-Quinn Tree had shaken the day it came apart. Haryet watched for a time, impassively. Then she spread a second poncho oven the girl and sat down to watch her.
Dloris turned to Minya. “What is it?”
“If Jinny tries this again and succeeds, would it reflect badly on you?”
“It might. Well?”
“Jinny’s twin sister is with the women who carry guests. Jinny has to see her.”
“That’s forbidden,” the jungle giantess said wearily.
When citizens talked like that, Minya had learned to ignore them. “These girls are twins. They’ve been together all their lives. They should be given some hours to talk.”
“I told you, it’s forbidden.”
“That would be your problem.”
Dloris glared in exasperation. “Go join the garbage detail. No, wait. First talk to this Jinny, if she’ll talk.”
“Yes, Supervisor. And I’d like to be checked for pregnancy, at your convenience.”
“Later.”
Minya bent to speak directly into Jinny’s ear. “Jinny, it’s Minya. I’ve talked to Dloris. She’ll try to get you together with Jayan.”
Jinny was clenched like a knot.
“Jinny. The Grad made it. He’s at the Citadel, where the Scientist lives.”
Nothing.
“Just hang on, will you? Hang on. Something will happen. Talk to Jayan. See if she’s learned anything.” Treefodder, there must be something she could say…“Find out where the pregnant women are kept. See if the Grad even comes down to examine them. He might. Tell him we’re hanging on. Waiting.”
Jinny didn’t move. Hen voice was muffled. “All right, I’m listening. But I can’t stand it. I can’t.”
“You’re tougher than you think.”
“If another man picks me, I’ll kill him.”
Some of them like women who fight, Minya thought. She said instead, “Wait. Wait till we can kill them all.”
After a long time, Jinny uncurled and stood up.
Chapter Sixteen
RUMBLINGS OF MUTINY
Gavving woke to a touch on his shoulder. He looked about him without moving.
There were three tiers of hammocks, and Gavving’s was in the top layer. The daylit doorway made a black silhouette of a supervisor. He seemed to have fallen asleep standing up: easy enough in London Tree’s gentle tide. In the dimness of the barracks, Alfin clung to Gavving’s hammock-post. He spoke in a whisper that wanted to shout in jubilation.
“They’ve put me to work at the treemouth!”
“I thought only women did that,” Gavving said without moving at all. Jorg snored directly below him—a “gentled” man, pudgy and sad, and too stupid to spy on anyone. But the hammocks were close-packed.
“I saw the farm when they took us for showers. There’s a lot they’re doing wrong. I talked to a supervisor about it. He let me talk to the woman who runs the farm. Kor’s her name, and she listens. I’m a consultant.”
“Good.”
“Give me a couple of hundred days and I might get you in on it too. I want to show what I can do first.”
“Did you get a chance to speak to Minya? Or Jinny?”
“Don’t even think it. They’d go berserk if we tried to talk to the women.”
To be a treemouth tender again…seeing Minya, but not allowed to speak to her. Meanwhile, maybe Alfin could carry messages, if he could be talked into taking the risk. Gavving put it out of his mind. “I learned something today. The tree does move, and it’s the carm, the flying box, that moves it. They’ve settled other trees—”
“What does that do for us?”
“I don’t know yet.”
Alfin moved away to his hammock.
Patience came hard to Gavving. In the beginning he had thought of nothing but escape. At night he could drive himself mad with worry over Minya…or he could sleep, and work, and wait, and learn.
The supervisors wouldn’t answer questions. What did he know, what had he learned? The women farmed the treemouth and cooked; pregnant women lived elsewhere. Men tended machinery and worked with wood, here in the upper reaches of the tuft. The copsiks talked of rescue, but never of revolt.
They wouldn’t revolt now anyway, with the Holidays eight sleeps away. Afterward, maybe; but wouldn’t the Navy know that from experience? They’d be ready. The supervisors were never without their truncheons, sticks of hardwood half a meter long. Horse said the women supervisors carried them too. During an insurrection the Navy might be given those instead of swords…or not.
What else? Bicycle works wore out. Damaging them—damaging anything made of starstuff—would hurt London Tree, but not soon. Here was where the elevators could be sabotaged; but the Navy could still put down a revolt by using the carm.
The carm did everything. It lived at the tree’s midpoint, where the Scientist kept his laboratory. Was the Grad there? Was he planning something? He’d seemed determined to escape, even before they reached London Tree.
Was any of that worth anything? If we were together! We could plan something—
He had learned that he might spend the rest of his life moving an elevat
or or pumping water up the trunk. He had not had an allergy attack since his capture. It was not a bad life, and he was dangerously close to becoming used to it. In eight sleeps he would be allowed to see his own wife.
Carther States was setting fires halfway around the biggest flower in the universe.
Clave flapped his blanket at the coals. His arms were plunged elbow-deep in the foliage to anchor him. His toes clutched the edge of the blanket. He undulated his legs and torso to move the blanket in waves, exerting himself just enough to keep the coals red.
Eighty meters away, a huge silver petal gradually shifted position, turning to catch the sun at a sharper angle.
A fire would die in its own smoke, without a breeze, and breezes were rare in the jungle. The day was calm and bright. Clave took it as a chance to exercise his legs.
There was a knot as big as a boy’s fist where the break had been on his thighbone. His fingers could feel the hard lump beneath the muscles; his body felt it when he moved. Merril had told him it couldn’t be seen. Would she lie to spare him? He was disinclined to ask anyone else.
He was disfigured. But the bone was healing; it hurt less every day. The scar was an impressive pink ridge. He exercised, and waited for war.
There had been tens of days of sleep merging into pain. He’d seen spindly, impossibly tall near-human forms flitting about him at all angles, green shapes fading like ghosts into a dark green background, quiet voices blurred in the eternal whisper of the foliage. He had thought he was still dreaming.
But Merril was real. Homely, legless Merril was entirely familiar, entirely real, and mad as hell. The copsik runners bad taken everyone. “Everyone but us. They left us. I’ll make them sorry for that!”
He had taken little notice in the pain of a healing bone and the sharper ache of his failure. A hunt leader who had lost his team, a Chairman who had lost his tribe. Quinn Tribe was dead. He told himself that depression always followed a serious wound. He stayed where he was, deep in the dark interior of the jungle, for fear that fluff might grow in the wound; and he slept. He slept a great deal. He didn’t have the will to do more.
Merril tried to talk to him. Things weren’t that bad. The Grad had impressed the Carthers. Merril and Clave were welcome in the tribune…though as copsiks.