Stranger Suns

by George Zebrowski

  “That may not mean anything. There hasn't been much of a gravitational variation since we left Earth. The only time it dropped noticeably was when I went through frame one back there.”

  “How much of a drop was it?” Juan asked.

  “It reminded me of my Lunar visit years ago.”

  Juan looked at his friend. “It's not much to go on.”

  “Quite right, but consider. It appears that the ships were used as frame terminals, initially at least. They could be left anywhere they went. Perhaps that's why they're so roomy. They were intended to be moved into place, to hold supplies and equipment, as well as provide living quarters. More than one might have been left in our solar system.”

  Juan nodded. “So we may be home, or at least somewhere in our solar system, and the first frame may open on the Moon.”

  “And one of the others may open inside the Sun, or in various places within our sunspace, or in nearby solar systems. We know that at least two ships are linked—the one we left and this one. That's the most important clue. Shaky conjecture, but it makes some sense.”

  “We'll soon know,” Lena said as they started up the straight passage.

  “Exactly the same,” Malachi said as they turned right.

  They went up the winding passage, following their torch beams. “I wonder why the overheads are off,” Lena said.

  “If we're not on Earth, or a world with a breathable atmosphere,” Malachi said, “then the outer lock won't open.”

  “Unless something's gone wrong,” Juan replied.

  “It might not open at all,” Lena said, “wherever we are.”

  “The ship could be buried very deeply,” Malachi added, “if past experience is any indication.”

  They came to the drop tube. “It doesn't seem operational,” Juan said, shining his light down into it.

  Malachi said, “If we're not home, we may have to go back through the frame just to eat.”

  Lena turned her head suddenly. “Listen.”

  Juan strained to hear, then looked back and saw brightness near the curve of the passage behind them. A luminous thing seemed to be following them.

  It made the turn, and they saw the overhead lights coming on, square by square, racing their reflections in the shining black floor.

  Malachi took a deep breath as the overheads rushed past them and around the next turn. “And ventilation, too!”

  Juan said, “The ship might be getting ready to leave.”

  “Just our luck!” Lena shouted as they hurried up the passage.

  “It's possible,” Malachi added. “Even likely.”

  Juan glanced at Lena as they jogged ahead. She returned a strained smile, and he wondered what ordinary days with her would be like.

  The inner lock glowed as they approached. They went through and it closed behind them. Juan stepped forward. The circle dissolved to reveal a wall of dirt.

  “We're buried,” Lena said as he stepped back and the lock closed.

  They dropped their packs. Malachi snapped open his spade and stepped toward the lock. It dissolved and he stabbed at the dirt. “It's soft!” he cried with relief. Juan got his own spade, came up beside him, and they began to dig.

  “I'll take over when one of you gets tired,” Lena said, sitting down on her pack.

  They were digging their way out of a starship somewhere, Juan thought as he looked at the growing pile of dirt on the floor. Magnus would have been vastly amused.

  Lena got up and bent over the pile of dirt. “Look at this,” she said.

  Juan glanced at her hand and continued digging. “What is it?”

  “Reminds me of aVeado bone from a small Brazilian deer.”

  Juan stopped digging. “Are you sure?”

  She examined the bone more carefully, then knelt by the pile and sifted through the dirt. “Here are a few more. It's an extinct species, but I'm not enough of a paleobiologist to be sure.”

  Juan resumed digging. “We may be home!”

  “More likely it's just something that only looks familiar.” She got up. “Give me that spatula.”

  He put it in her hands and retreated to his pack. “We may be down very deep.”

  “How deep can we be?” Lena asked.

  “Hundreds of meters,” Juan replied, “up or straight ahead. No way to tell.”

  “Wonderful,” she said with a grunt, attacking the wall of dirt.

  “It may take days,” Malachi added.

  Juan paused, breathing heavily. “No choice. We must find out where we are. Slant upward at forty-five degrees. Digging straight up is harder. We can crawl up more easily at an angle.”

  “It may be a longer dig,” she replied, pausing to catch her breath.

  Juan got up and reclaimed his spade. They dug in silence for a while. Two meters in, he began to angle upward.

  “Ah, despair!” Malachi exclaimed. “It makes one so hungry.”

  * * *

  They sat on their packs around one of the tablelike structures in the alien cafeteria, eating duplicated fish and vegetables with rice. Juan was quiet, content to listen.

  “I suspect,” Malachi said, “that these doorways are a safety feature. Each chamber along the ship's passage is sealed until the protean moment when it is entered.”

  “But one failed,” Lena replied.

  Malachi shrugged. “Time and chance were generous, providing all that was necessary for a freak quantum event to occur.” He paused to swallow. “The process,” he continued, “that runs the duplicator, recycles the air, wastes, and water, governs the fluid process of the doorways, perhaps even the frames, might have needed adjusting.”

  “I wonder,” Lena said, “if the mazelike structure of the ship and the web is a clue to the minds of the builders?”

  “Maybe they got lost in it,” Juan replied.

  Malachi looked at him approvingly. “Could be, granting complexities we haven't considered.”

  Lena stood up. “Sleep or back to digging?”

  “I feel refreshed,” Malachi said, looking at Juan. “I'm game.”

  “I won't sleep soundly,” Lena said, “until we know where we are.”

  * * *

  Juan crouched in the tunnel and continued to dig. Loose stones and dirt cascaded past him. Six meters in, it was no longer possible to just shovel the dirt out behind them. Each digger filled a sleeping bag cover with dirt, and the others pulled it back on a line.

  “Anything?” Lena called to him.

  Juan stabbed with his shovel and turned his face away. “Nothing!” He dropped his spade, turned off his torch, and crawled backward. Lena gave him a cup of water as he emerged by the pile of dirt. “It could continue for thousands of meters, for all we know,” he said, “but it smells damp, which might indicate that we're near the surface.” He sat down on the pile.

  She emptied the bag and crawled up into the tunnel. Juan watched her feet disappear as he finished his water.

  “Damn,” Lena's muffled voice said.

  “Are you okay?” Juan shouted.

  “Just twisted my ankle,” she called back, “but not badly.”

  “Come down. Mal will take over for you.”

  “I'll manage!”

  * * *

  “We just have to keep digging,” Malachi said at the start of his shift. Juan and Lena sat on the pile of dirt, exhausted.

  “It seems so hopeless,” she said, rubbing her ankle.

  “How is it?” Juan asked.

  “Better.”

  The damp smell filled the lock chamber. “We're ten meters in,” he said, trying to sound hopeful.

  Malachi smiled. “Well, back to it.”

  “I'll take this shift,” Juan said. “I won't be able to sleep anyway.”

  He got to his feet and crawled up the dark tunnel. At the end, he turned on the torch and picked up the spade. The damp smell was pungent in his nostrils as he began to dig. He was sweating and breathing heavily after only a minute. He stopped, struck the spade i
nto the dirt, and rested. The universe had closed in around him, forcing him to rebreathe his own air. Blood rushed to his head. After a few minutes, he wanted to sleep, but his legs ached in their rigid position.

  “Juan!” Malachi shouted.

  He opened his eyes. “Okay!”

  He struck the stony earth, loosening large clumps. Might just as well be trying to dig through the sky, he thought, jabbing with the spade.

  He tried to work calmly. There was no rush. They could eat and rest as long as they wanted. The ship would not take off with the lock open. It might if the opening were cleared. He wanted the ship to stay, but feared what that might do to the world. Good might come from the alien technology, if it could be studied. It seemed more likely that it would be used rather than studied, because its inner workings were too well concealed. The promise of a way to anywhere, of numberless worlds to be explored and plundered, would be too much for a problem-ridden humankind. Power would accrue to those who would control access to the web. Titus would not turn away from such power. Knowledge, understanding, humane applications—these were things for true believers, not for those who fancied themselves people of the world, who told themselves that they lived and exercised power according to harsh facts.

  It seemed that the only way to remain thoughtful and free of illusion was to live outside the cadres of influence and authority. He had always balanced his doubts about power with the need to get ahead professionally; now his convictions might be tested. The Earth he knew lived on the edge of disaster. Perhaps it just wasn't possible to mold human beings through social systems and laws. The example of extraordinary individuals was not enough to push back the dark. Something better was needed—a more cooperative and intelligent species, one that would create for itself a condition nearer the angels, on some reasonable shore. . .

  But humanity still huddled at the bottom of its time, where the great theologies selected individuals for paradise on the basis of moral attainments while the godless ruled niches of power and wealth.

  Juan struck more deeply as he thought. What are we taking home with us? What will a practical knowledge of the alien web do to us? Suddenly his spade shot through into an open space. He breathed in cool, damp air.

  “Mal!” He struggled to widen the opening. Chunks of dirt fell past him. He put down his spade, grabbed the torch, and scrambled upward on his knees, rising up into a black space.

  “Coming up!” Malachi shouted.

  Juan cast his beam into a small chamber, maybe ten meters wide, with a low dirt ceiling.

  “What's there?” Malachi called as he crawled up.

  “Looks like a covered sink hole. I think I can touch the roof if I stand up. Grab my spade as you come up.”

  Malachi appeared, spades in one hand, torch in the other. “Doesn't look promising,” he said, looking around. “This kind of water-shaped chamber can be deep below the surface.”

  “We're breathing good air,” Juan said, taking his spade and standing up. The ceiling was only a few inches above his head. He tapped it gently.

  “Careful,” Malachi said, “you don't want to bring it down on us.”

  “Where's Lena?” Juan asked.

  “Resting, but pretty upset about injuring herself.”

  “I'm going to push through slowly,” Juan said, handing him his light and positioning his spade.

  “Hello!” Lena called from below.

  “Bloody hell,” Malachi said as a small stone hit him in the head.

  Juan pushed up. The spade went in easily.

  “Can I come up?” Lena shouted.

  “No!” Juan called back as a large chunk of dirt fell at his feet.

  “It's an opening,” Malachi said, pointing his beam up into it. “Slight draft. We're into somewhere.”

  Juan widened the hole and dropped his spade. “Boost me up.”

  Malachi put his hands together. Juan stepped up and grabbed at the rim of the opening. “Got it.” He lifted himself up. “Seems like outdoors.” He climbed out on both knees and stood up, peering around in the gloom as his eyes adjusted. Mists rolled in around him. The air was hot and humid.

  “Where are we?” Malachi shouted.

  “Seems tropical. Overcast.” Juan felt more than saw the forest around him. Black branches moved in the hot breeze. The air was heavy in his lungs. Warm rain fell suddenly, tasting acrid. The sky flashed. He dropped to his knees and reached down into the hole to help Malachi.

  16. THE WAY TO ANYWHERE

  “Halfway across the universe,” Juan said, looking up at the sickly white overcast, “to connect with the ass-end of nowhere.” Chills crept up his back as he labored to breathe the hot, damp air.

  Malachi coughed. “At least it's stopped raining.”

  “We can't move in these mists.”

  Malachi said, “I feel a cooler breeze.”

  Juan looked up again. The clouds were thinning overhead. A bright patch appeared, and the Moon rode out, full and familiar, peeked and stained, shield for lovers, puller of tides, the unfinished port from which humankind had eyed the solar system and longed for the stars. It seemed pitiable now, to dream of taking a vessel to Alpha Centauri in a mere twenty years, round trip.

  “We're home,” Malachi said. “I didn't quite believe it.”

  Juan turned and knelt by the opening. “Lena! A full moon, and it's ours!” A snake slid past him in the growth, glistening in the moonlight, oblivious to his presence. He sat back and laughed; but in a moment he was silent and shaking, thinking of what he wanted for himself and Lena, from his work, fearful of what was to come, wishing that Magnus were here.

  “Coming!” Lena shouted.

  The breaking clouds fled past Luna like hurrying souls.

  * * *

  At dawn, they came out and saw that the ship was entombed in a hill surrounded by jungle. The sun was a ball of white-hot iron rising over the thicket of trees, vines, and brush, warming wetness back into the sky.

  “Smashing heat,” Malachi said.

  “Glad we dressed light,” Lena replied.

  They dropped their packs and climbed to the top of the hill. Juan took out his binoculars and scanned in a circle. “There seem to be patches of red desert to the east.” Lena and Malachi took out their glasses and scanned.

  “One thing's sure,” Lena said. “No one knows we're here. Without radio or map, we could die trekking through all that.”

  “It's the only way,” Juan said. “We can't just sit in the ship and hope to be found. Besides, I'm not sure I want anyone to find this ship just yet. I'm for covering this exit. It'll grow over quickly. Do you two feel the same way?”

  They nodded. Lena said, “Magnus would have wanted it.”

  “I don't think the ship will take off,” Juan continued, “with two spades lying across the lock, but we can't be sure.”

  “We're somewhere in the Amazon,” Malachi said. “I've seen red patches like that from orbit, where the forest won't ever come back. That means we may be near a highway, either north or south of us. It would be reasonable to make a search, with the ship as a base.”

  “Can we stop anyone from finding this place?” Juan asked.

  Malachi smiled. “You'd like to hide it for a wiser time.”

  “When does either of you think that will be?” Lena asked.

  Malachi shrugged. “Maybe the jolt will do our kind good.”

  Juan nodded. “We'll have a lot of explaining to do if we march out of here. They'll search the area and find the ship. It might even be transmitting tachyons right now.”

  Lena said, “Titus isn't stupid. He knows how we left, and he'll assume a ship brought us back, even if they didn't detect its presence.”

  “We haven't much choice,” Juan answered as he took out his spade and started to cover the hole. “We can at least delay them.”

  “Maybe it won't be so bad,” Malachi said. “Everyone will know about it. They can't hide what happened in Antarctica.”

  “It'll be up
to us,” Lena added, “to make sure everyone knows. Keeping secrets is dangerous.”

  “We'll have to blab,” Malachi said, “even if it does get the big-shot brigade stirred up. I must say that I rather liked the idea of being the proud custodian of a big secret, at least for a short time.”

  Lena turned her head. “Listen!” She pointed away from the sun. “A whooshing sound. Don't you hear? It's louder.”

  Juan heard a faint rushing sound. “Just barely.” He continued covering the hole.

  “Let me,” Malachi said, taking the spade from him.

  Juan sat down, feeling winded. “God, the air is bad out here. We've been spoiled by the ship.”

  Malachi finished with the hole and put the spade away. They shouldered their packs and went down the hillside.

  “Go slow,” Malachi said. “We'll be bathing in sweat soon enough.”

  The jungle confronted them at the bottom of the hill—a wall of greenery rising twenty meters into the air.

  “We'll cut through,” Juan said, taking out his spade. Lena and Malachi did the same. He led the way forward.

  The sun rose higher, playing hide-and-seek with them through the trees. Juan hacked forward, grateful for his boots and coarse clothing. Malachi moved up and worked next to him relentlessly.

  “You've done this before,” Juan said between breaths.

  “Yes, master, I'm very valuable on safari.”

  “We won't make a hundred yards in an hour,” Lena said behind them. “I'm soaked through to the skin.”

  “These packs aren't much help,” Juan added, “but we can't get rid of them.”

  “The sound is louder,” Lena said as they paused.

  Juan listened. It was a hum, almost a rumble, behind the forest sounds.

  “I know what that is,” Malachi said. “Heard it before.”

  “If we don't get somewhere by noon,” Juan said, “we'll have to go back to the ship.”

  “Sooner than that,” Lena replied. “Tropic sun is dangerous.”

  Juan swung at the foliage, willing himself forward. Damp odors of decay filled his lungs, mingling with the smell of flowers and animals.

  “Take it easy,” Lena gasped, “you'll have a heat stroke.”