Bowl of Heaven

by Gregory Benford; Larry Niven

  “You can’t judge intelligence from the size of skulls,” Beth said, “and anyway, dino skulls are plenty large. Look, they had grappler claws, a start toward hands. Later on, some dinosaurs had feathers—that’s where birds came from. There’s plenty we don’t know about that era.”

  Fred nodded and then said quietly, “There was one clue. When I saw that great holo of how they built this Bowl, I looked at the star in the distance. It looked a lot like the sun.”

  “That’s it?” Lau Pin snorted dismissively.

  Another shrug. “Started me thinking.”

  “They were really smart, built this—and got wiped out by a rock even we could deflect away centuries ago?” Mayra said. “Come on.”

  Fred shrugged yet again. “No answer. Maybe they got caught in a cultural phase where they stopped watching the skies. Look, it’s an idea, not a complete theory.”

  As Mayra argued with Fred, Beth watched her. The deep furrows on Mayra’s brow had gone away and the worry lines at the eyes, too. She seemed better about the death of her husband, and had even laughed a bit. But Beth was sure that Abduss was never far from her mind. Nor was Cliff from hers, of course. She would never forget the squashed Abduss she had seen, still breathing for a short while in milky spurts, frothy saliva dripping like cream down to his ears while his cracked skull leaked brown blood into his eyes.

  Beth shook her head to sweep away the image. She left them to their discussion and sat down near the cave entrance to savor the scent of the rain. As a little girl, she had loved that smell—freshness enveloping her, fragrances boiling into the air. They weren’t on Earth, but it felt the same. “This Bowl has a lot of similarities to Earth, yes? Maybe the really strange stuff, like those walking plants, are from other worlds.”

  Fred nodded eagerly. “Or tens of millions of years of directed evolution.”

  “Point is,” Beth said, “even if Fred’s right, how do we use the theory? How can it help us?”

  Lau Pin stretched, drew in a clean lungful of moist air. “Sleep on it, I say. Fred, you get your ideas how? Dreaming?”

  “No, but I have them when I wake up. I go to sleep thinking about things, problems—and when I wake up, there’s an idea there. Maybe wrong, but … it’s like getting a note from another part of myself.”

  Beth got up and patted Fred on the shoulder. “I suspect that’s why you made SunSeeker crew, too. Didn’t you figure out the high-voltage capacitors in the ramscoop?”

  He smiled. “Yeah. That was fun. That was a neat puzzle.”

  “Sleep again, after you take the first watch. Maybe the part of you that never sleeps will come up with more ideas.”

  Beth unfolded her cushion from her backpack and inflated it with long, deep breaths. A part of her eyed Fred’s lean stance framed by the cave’s mouth. Wait a bit, get it on with him? You’re horny, alone—do something. But she brushed the impulse away. Don’t complicate a team that’s barely getting by.

  By the time she was ready to sleep, the rest were distributed back through the small cave, grateful for some shade and the storm’s muting of the constant sunlight. She squinted through the clouds and could barely see the star’s disk.

  As she dropped off to sleep, she thought of Cliff again. He had always been better at fieldwork than she was, and she hoped maybe he understood this weird place better. Would she ever find him in this huge world-machine? “G’night, Cliffy. Wherever you are.”

  She hugged her blow-up pillow and smelled the rain and thought of places secure and warm and far away.

  FORTY-SEVEN

  Memor had always enjoyed the serene voyaging these living craft afforded. She looked down on the slow passage of rugged terrain and breathed in a luxurious sweet aroma. The mucus of this great beast had been engineered to carry a delicate fragrance unlike anything else. Its scent was a luxury and settled the mind, though chaos raged all about them. She allowed herself another lingering taste, then turned with an appropriately severe expression.

  “This is truly absurd,” Memor said. “We have dozens of airfish aloft and much airplane coverage. Yet the prey keeps ducking belowground, eluding us.”

  The Captain of this armed airfish gestured with indifference. “We will turn them up. They exited the Longline transport at the station below. They can surely not go far— Wait, see those Sils?”

  The reed-thin male peered at a large wall display. Small life-forms filled narrow canyons of tan rock. More of the Adopted species, one Memor had not seen before, were coming into the crowds, arriving apparently by foot. Good—an agricultural culture, with low technologies and simple ways.

  The Captain drawled thoughtfully, “They cluster in several canyons. No dancing, no parades or ceremony. This is not their usual communal gathering.”

  “You know well these…?”

  “Sils, we term them. Always an unruly lot. Not the first time, my dear Astronomer, that I have taken to air to discipline these.”

  “The problem persists?”

  “Yes, has worsened steadily. The Sils are among the worst of the Adopted. They are not much evolved beyond carnivores, so I suppose we should not be surprised. Herbivores—why did we not bring more of those aboard?” The Captain blinked, taken aback by his own outburst.

  “Because herbivores are seldom intelligent,” Memor said dryly. “Good eating, though—we do have some of those.”

  “Of course, of course.” The Captain turned and barked out quick orders to his staff officers. They were taking more rattling fire. The great beast that carried them protested in long grumbling notes that rolled through the walls that ran with juice.

  Memor watched the living opalescent walls run with anxiety dewdrops, shimmering moist jewels hanging and spattering with an acid odor. Skyfish expressed their deep selves through chemistry, an unreliable, or at least largely unreadable, medium. They were perhaps the most successful of the Adopted. Taken from the upper atmosphere of a gas giant world long ago, they found the deep atmosphere of the Bowl a similar paradise to cruise and mate and turn water into their life fluid, hydrogen. Somehow the great ones of the early Bowl had managed to make these living skyships merge into the blossoming Bowl ecosphere. To cruise the skies in them was a voyage into history.

  She turned when the Captain, now quite distressed, was done. “Can we disperse this crowd? They hamper our finding these primates.”

  The Captain gave an efficient flutter of feather-arcs: agreement. “I can use standard suffering methods.”

  “Do so.”

  The Captain gave orders and the great belly of the skyfish began its laborious turn. Memor circled the observation deck, scattering small crew before her, to see how the Sils were moving. Streams of them came from all directions. Such crowds! Many walked, some ran with a dogged pace, others rode animals. They looked up at the skyfish. Some stopped and shook themselves, their rage evident. At what? Their target was the Longline station.

  “Captain! When might the primates arrive here?”

  “They could get here soon, Astronomer. It is possible. But we do not expect them to follow a simple route, staying on the same line. That would be too obvious.” This last sentence provoked an involuntary submission-flutter of amber and brown as the Captain saw the implications.

  “They may realize we expect evasion.”

  “Our strategy command thinks that unlikely—”

  “Humor me.”

  “These Sil have no way of knowing—”

  “There are always betrayers, Captain. Information crosses patchwork boundaries, though we try to stop it.”

  “I wonder, Astronomer, why your esteemed presence came here. Surely the primate invaders would not take a simple route—”

  “Do not presume to estimate the rationality of aliens. Nor their clever nature.”

  “Surely you do not expect them—”

  “These Sils gather for a reason.”

  “But how could—? Of course, these Sils have given us trouble since my grandmother’s time. The
y see this as another device to—”

  “You are wasting time.”

  The Captain hurried off to alter his commands. The skyfish eased lower as it wallowed across the air, toward the stony ridges that marked the Longline here.

  Memor took some moments to review on her private mind-feed the background of these Adopted, the Sil. The Bowl had passed near their star as the Sil were still in hunter-gatherer stages. The Bird Folk found Sil promising, and brought many aboard. Those early Sil were long since left behind genetically—crafty they had been, yes, but not that smart. Something close to the far older Bowl primates, but with ambition, tool-making and better social skills, developed through group hunting. As usual, their first tools had been weapons. This always led to a spirited species, which could be positive—but not, alas, for the Sils. They made their periodic rebellions, and were periodically reinstructed, often genetically.

  These Sils evolved first in trees—often a source of later troubles, for it gave them dexterous use of several limbs. Thus the Bird Folk bred quite deliberately for higher intelligence and tool use, by increasing artificial selection, testing the results, and directing their mating to enhance the effects. The Sil were domesticated and made smarter, suiting them better for the technological jobs needed to tend the Bowl. Troubles came when these wily ones rebelled, or worse, tried to expand their territory. The tragic solution was to be avoided, of course, but even that didn’t always work.

  “Crews! Begin firing!” the Captain called.

  Memor braced herself. This was the inevitable problem with using living beings to fly in the Bowl’s deep atmosphere. Of course, they could not use chemical fuels for every aircraft, as that would tax the farming regions beyond their endurance. Electrodynamic flight was preferred for long stays aloft, but was too delicate for the long skirmishes that regional patrol officers had to carry out. Skyfish, though, could bear up under the typically archaic weaponry Adopted species could bring to bear. Further, its immense vault of hydrogen made it ferocious in close air support.

  As Memor watched, the crew used their flame guns on scattered Sil groups on the ridgeline. These were apparently spotters, for they were armed with simple chemical explosive weapons. As the skyfish slewed slowly to the left, it brought its flame spouts to bear. Gouts of rich golden flame raked the ridge. They were so close, Memor could hear angry shouts from the burning ridge, often followed by shrieks and screams as their last agony came to them. Not a delicious sound, but reassuring, yes.

  Then the pain projectors came into play. Memor watched as the Captain adroitly directed the assaults, driving the Sil. The running, struggling Sil looked like herd animals in a panic. Then the green laser pulses destroyed them in densely packed groups. It slashed down, annihilating in fire and ferment. The Sil broke into fleeing remnants.

  But the skyfish was taking hits as well. The simple Sil had fixed artillery set up with surprisingly mischievous warheads that blew shredding blasts into the underbody. Memor felt the floor vibrate as the great beast reacted, flinching from the wounds. A deep bass note rang and the wall membranes fluttered. In answer the gun crews poured on more pain projector power. Soundless, this was the standard weapon to terrify opponents.

  Yet the artillery fire did not abate, even under maximum power. “The Sil surely cannot withstand—” Memor broke off as she saw on the viewer the gun crews. Primates!

  The Late Invaders had come. “Captain, use your lasers.”

  The male displayed a corona of dismay. “Their fire has disabled our forward batteries, Astronomer. I apologize for—”

  The skyfish writhed as shrapnel struck it. Long rolling waves warped the moist walls. Equipment smashed down from their perches. Crew ran by, babbling of emergencies. Memor ignored this and said, “Your sting does not take with these primates. They have different neurons. You must use the gas-fed lasers.”

  “We will get them up and running. A few moments—”

  A volley from below slammed into the great beast. Memor carefully descended, feet seeking a balance as the floor shifted—down a great curving stair and through a polished plate glass dilating door into the skyfish bridge. Chaos.

  The Captain turned and bowed. “We have taken many hits, Astronomer. Perhaps we relied on the agony projectors too much—”

  “Perhaps?” Memor scarcely thought it necessary to point out that the skyfish was floundering, spewing fluids from multiple wounds, losing altitude, veering erratically. “Perhaps?”

  “I propose we withdraw—”

  “If you can.”

  “We can mend and rearm at higher altitude—”

  “If you can reach it.”

  Skyfish had all the advantages of living technologies, but they had their own life cycles as well. The marriage of life with material was a great ancient success that made the Bowl biosphere work, but of course with drawbacks. Life-forms needed rest and could self-repair, and even with help could reproduce—and all that took time. In battle, at times knowing the organism’s limits meant having the wisdom to withdraw.

  “This beast is badly damaged. It’s frightened—feel it?” The floor and walls were vast lapidary membranes that now shook with a neurological spasm. Smoldering fumes rose amid the clanging discord.

  “We relied too much perhaps on the agony projectors. In future—”

  “You have no future. We are so close to these primates, yet they prevail.”

  “I can—”

  “Get me to my pod.”

  “I believe we have the situation in hand, or soon will,” the Captain persisted. “My crews can quickly bring the laser—”

  “If the hydrogen vaults are breached, we shall have no further disputes. I will have my pod now.”

  Memor loved the moist, fragrant membranes of skyfish, but prudence demanded that she not risk herself while this great being floundered and perhaps even failed. She swiftly followed the running escorts, down a long ramp and to the side farthest away from the rattling battle. Here her pod waited, with crew looking anxious. “Depart,” she said, “with speed.”

  As they dropped away from the great belly of the beast, Memor wondered what this reversal might mean. There had been regional revolts before, of course. These Sil fit the age-old pattern—an Adopted species suffers some cultural or even genetic shift, and becomes difficult to manage. Standard strategy was to contain the conflict, using reliable nearby territories. Such struggles set up larger scale rivalries, of course, and with adroit handling, these could lead to calm. Once the regional Profounds played factions off against each other, stability emerged.

  That would have to be done here—unless the aliens upset the usual forces. These Sil were canny creatures, a fairly recent addition to the Adopted. A mere twelve-triple-cubed Annuals had passed since their genetic alteration had pacified them. Perhaps it was time for a more fundamental solution—pruning.

  But the primates had now shown that they were too destabilizing. Their ship, which might hold technologies of some use, might as well be destroyed. Those at large would have to be exterminated. It was a pity, for their minds were a fount of oddities, and study might reveal some of the features of the Folk in far antiquity—even before the opening of the Undermind.

  Well, perhaps Memor could conduct some research with them, before the executions. That would be a just reward for her, after all the annoying troubles they had brought.

  FORTY-EIGHT

  Sitting on a riverbank beside lounging aliens, Cliff recalled his father showing him how to cast for fish.

  The rhythm, first—how to cast the line with his elbow doing the real work and his wrist firm while the left hand payed out the line. A quick rainbow trout had leaped for it in a silver flash. He had felt it tug back and forth as it fought. When he reeled it in, the gasping body was a sacred, beautiful thing. He had thrown it back, on impulse, and his dad had laughed, comprehending the wonder of it.

  No such goal here. He landed a big, floppy thing that watched him with huge round yellow eyes when he
dragged its bulk up onto the shoreline. Oddly, once out of the water it did not fight. Maybe it expected to be tossed back in? If aliens did catch-and-release, maybe so.

  He fidgeted the hook out—the fish mouths were bony and complex here—and turned with the heavy body in his arms. The Sil danced their heads around and made a high, murmuring noise. Slowly it dawned on him that this was their way of applauding.

  One Sil came forward, took the fish, and did an astonishing thing. It cast the fish up and with a flashing knife blade caught the skin, tossed the fish up using the leverage, and spooled the skin off. It was a miraculous trick, skinning the fish—and then the Sil sectioned the fish, too, in slashing cuts as it turned in air. One of the Sil offered Cliff a hand-sized slice of sashimi.

  Cliff took a bite out of courtesy. It was near tasteless, something like tai.

  These creatures were quicker than the eye could see.

  Their lands were different, too: lush greenery, few rocky landscapes, odd trees and big-leafed plants rich in fruit. Plenty of scampering small game, too, which the Sil must relish hunting.

  He sat and thought about the Sil for a while and then of Beth. He wondered where she was, what she had learned. He recalled the soft brush of her hair on his chest when she hovered over him, sighing in low, sliding notes. He longed to see her, share the eerie wonder of this place with her. There might be trouble over Irma, but … but what?

  He had deliberately not thought about the problem. Irma had been a refuge from the increasing tensions that came from roving in hostile territory, yes.… But was there more to it? He didn’t know.

  Face problems as they come, he realized, had become his working rule. Irma sat down lazily beside him. “If you leave out these meaningful silences, I won’t fall asleep.”

  Cliff shrugged. “No meaning at all. I’m just feeling good.”