The Year’s Best Science Fiction: Fifth Annual Collection

by Gardner Dozois

  “Enough of this,” Augustine murmurs, clutching his head in his gnarled hands. “Please, Adeodatus, no more today.”

  “Forgive me, Father. I’ve spoken in such detail only because I wanted you to see that your theory of time coincides with Sung’s. So does your belief in the linearity of history. You reject the Greek notion of cycles; so do Sung and his disciples, who believe the universe will die of cold, a plethora of icy, black lactastrons wobbling out into the darkness forever.”

  “That isn’t what I believe!” Augustine rages. “We’ll have our end not in ice, but in judgment and transformation!”

  “You speak of the soul, Father, but I of the palpable world all about us. And Sung has found too little attractive force among the lactastrons to halt the universal expansion and to draw all matter back into a lump that may again erupt, to begin this cosmic vanity anew. His position coincides with yours—a ‘No!’ to the periodic rebirth of worlds. In that, you’re kindred thinkers.”

  “We’re brothers only in our shared humanity!” Augustine says. “What religion does he have?”

  Adeodatus thinks. “I’m not sure. His work, perhaps.”

  “I’ve listened to you for as long as I can, Master Iatanbaal. Harangue me no more. Have mercy upon me and go.”

  The astronomer—his son—reluctantly obeys, and Augustine notes with wary surprise that darkness has fallen and that he himself is chill-ridden as well as feverish. Genseric’s soldiers rattle their weaponry outside the city gates, and both the Roman Empire and the bishop’s careworn body seem destined for the charnel heap.…

  5

  An uproar in the corridor. Possidius is arguing with somebody who speaks Latin with a peculiar accent. Augustine, his intellect a scatter of crimson coals, sits up to see a tall black man pushing into his bedchamber past the flustered Possidius. The black man wears only a soiled tunic and sandals. Over his shoulder, a large woven bag as filthy as his tunic.

  “You can’t do this! The bishop is gravely ill!”

  “I had a dream,” the black man keeps saying, dancing with the frantic Possidius. “My dream told me to come to Augustine.”

  Augustine gathers the coals of his mind into a single glowing pile and looks at the Ethiop. This business of the dream touches him: He has never been able to dismiss the requests of those who have dreamed that he could help them. Indeed, Monica, his mother, envisioned his own salvation in a dream.

  “Let him stay, Possidius.”

  The black man bows his head respectfully and says, “My name, Excellency, is Khoinata. Thank you.”

  “Where’s my son?” Augustine asks Possidius.

  “In the hostel, Excellency. He has assured me that he won’t intrude on you again without your direct summons.”

  “A policy that I urge you, too, to adopt, Possidius.”

  As soon as Possidius, visibly wounded, has left, Augustine asks the Ethiop what distance he has traveled and why he thinks that the bishop of Hippo can help him. Like Adeodatus, Khoinata has sneaked through Vandal lines to enter the city, and he has come all the way from the farthest Kush, a great African kingdom, for the privilege of this interview. He believes that what he has brought with him will prove to the imperious Romans that the Kushites are a people with an admirable history and a civilization deserving of the prose of a Tacitus or a Suetonius.

  “What do you have?” Augustine asks him.

  Instantly, Khoinata gets down on all fours, opens his bag, and begins assembling with impressive dexterity and speed the skeleton of a creature that seems—to Augustine’s untutored eye—a troubling conflation of human being and ape.

  “My brothers and I found these bones far south of Meroe. They belong to an early kind of man, a kind almost certainly ancestral to you and me. Notice: the curve of these foot bones—the way they fit with these other bones from the lower legs—that shows that the creature walked erect. And the skull—look here, Excellency—its skull is larger than those of apes and yet not quite so large as an adult Roman’s. One of our wisest chieftains, Khoboshama, shaped a theory to explain such strangeness. He calls it the ‘Unfolding of Animal Types,’ and I believe it should greatly interest teachers of natural history from Carthage to Milan.”

  Augustine merely stares at Khoinata.

  Khoinata says, “We know these bones are old—very, very old—because Khoboshama counted the rock layers in the declivity where we found them. In addition, he…”

  Augustine spreads out the coals of his mind. He cannot keep them burning under Khoinata’s discourse. He both sees and does not see the skeleton that his guest has arranged—as if from dry, brown coals—on the floor of his bedchamber. The creature has been dead for almost two million years—yes, that’s the figure that the man cites—but it lives in Khoinata’s imagination, and Augustine has no idea how to drive it from thence.

  “Excellency, are you listening?”

  “No,” the bishop replies.

  “But, Excellency, only you of all Romanized westerners are wise enough to grasp the far-ranging implications of…”

  The old man feels a foreign excrescence on his arm. He glances down and finds that Adeodatus has strapped his Cathayan time-gem to his wrist.

  Heedless of Khoinata, he depresses the stem on the side of its obsidian jewel, and these characters manifest on the black face of the tiny engine: XII:I.

  The hour is one minute past midnight.

  Something old is ending. Something new is beginning.

  KIM STANLEY ROBINSON

  Mother Goddess of the World

  Kim Stanley Robinson sold his first story in 1976, and quickly established himself as one of the most respected and critically acclaimed writers of his generation. He is a frequent contributor to such markets as Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine, The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, Universe, and Omni. Robinson’s books include the acclaimed novel The Wild Shore, Icehenge, and The Memory of Whiteness, and the critical book The Novels of Philip K. Dick. His most recent books are The Planet on the Table, a collection, and a new novel, The Gold Coast. His World Fantasy Award—winning story “Black Air” was in our in our First Annual Collection; his story “The Lucky Strike” was in our Second Annual Collection; “Green Mars” was in our Third Annual Collection; and “Down and Out in the Year 2000” was in our Fourth Annual Collection. Robinson and his wife, Lisa, are back in the United States after several years in Switzerland.

  Robinson is known for his use of exotic locales, having given us stories set on Mars, on a ship of the Spanish Armada, in a sinking future Venice, and on the molten surface of Mercury. Here he takes us deep into the Himalayas, and up Chomolunga, Mother Goddess of the World, the tallest mountain on Earth (you probably know it better as Mt. Everest), for a delightful screwball comedy featuring an oddly assorted cast of characters on a risky, improbable, and decidedly strange quest.

  MOTHER GODDESS OF THE WORLD

  Kim Stanley Robinson

  1

  My life started to get weird again the night I ran into Freds Fredericks, near Chimoa, in the gorge of the Dudh Kosi. I was guiding a trek at the time, and was very happy to see Freds. He was traveling with another climber, a Tibetan by the name of Kunga Norbu, who appeared to speak little English except for “Good morning,” which he said to me as Fred introduced us, even though it was just after sunset. My trekking group was settled into their tents for the night, so Freds and Kunga and I headed for the cluster of teahouses tucked into the forest by the trail. We looked in them; two had been cleaned up for trekkers, and the third was a teahouse in the old style, frequented only by porters. We ducked into that one.

  It was a single low room; we had to stoop not only under the beams that held up the slate roof, but also under the smoke layer. Old style country buildings in Nepal do not have chimneys, and the smoke from their wood stoves just goes up to the roof and collects there in a very thick layer, which lowers until it begins to seep out under the eaves. Why the Nepalis don’t use chimneys, which I
would have thought a fairly basic invention, is a question no one can answer; it is yet another Great Mystery of Nepal.

  Five wooden tables were occupied by Rawang and Sherpa porters, sprawled on the benches. At one end of the room the stove was crackling away. Flames from the stove and a hissing Coleman lantern provided the light. We said Namaste to all the staring Nepalis, and ducked under the smoke to sit at the table nearest the stove, which was empty.

  We let Kunga Norbu take care of the ordering, as he had more Nepali than Freds or me. When he was done the Rawang stove keepers giggled and went to the stove, and came back with three huge cups of Tibetan tea.

  I complained to Freds about this in no uncertain terms. “Damn it, I thought he was ordering chang!”

  Tibetan tea, you see, is not your ordinary Lipton’s. To make it they start with a black liquid that is not made from tea leaves at all but from some kind of root, and it is so bitter you could use it for suturing. They pour a lot of salt into this brew, and stir it up, and then they dose it liberally with rancid yak butter, which melts and floats to the top.

  Actually it tastes worse than it sounds. I have developed a strategy for dealing with the stuff whenever I am offered a cup; I look out the nearest window, and water the plants with it. As long as I don’t do it too fast and get poured a second cup, I’m fine. But here I couldn’t do that, because twenty-odd pairs of laughing eyes were staring at us.

  Kunga Norbu was hunched over the table, slurping from his cup and going “ooh,” and “ahh,” and saying complimentary things to the stove keepers. They nodded and looked closely at Freds and me, big grins on their faces.

  Freds grabbed his cup and took a big gulp of the tea. He smacked his lips like a wine taster. “Right on,” he said, and drained the cup down. He held it up to our host. “More?” he said, pointing into the cup.

  The porters howled. Our host refilled Freds’s cup and he slurped it down again, smacking his lips after every swallow. I held my nose to get down a sip, and they thought that was funny too.

  So we were in tight with the teahouse crowd, and when I asked for chang they brought over a whole bucket of it. We poured it into the little chipped teahouse glasses and went to work on it.

  “So what are you and Kunga Norbu up to?” I asked Freds.

  “Well,” he said, and a funny expression crossed his face. “That’s kind of a long story, actually.”

  “So tell it to me.”

  He looked uncertain. “It’s too long to tell tonight.”

  “What’s this? A story too long for Freds Fredericks to tell? Impossible, man, why I once heard you summarize the Bible to Laure, and it only took you a minute.”

  Freds shook his head. “It’s longer than that.”

  “I see.” I let it go, and the three of us kept on drinking the chang, which is a white beer made from rice or barley. We drank a lot of it, which is a dangerous proposition on several counts, but we didn’t care. As we drank we kept slumping lower over the table to try and get under the smoke layer, and besides we just naturally felt like slumping at that point. Eventually we were laid out like mud in a puddle.

  Freds kept conferring with Kunga Norbu in Tibetan, and I got curious. “Freds, you hardly speak a word of Nepali, how is it you know so much Tibetan?”

  “I spent a couple years in Tibet, a long time ago. I was studying in one of the Buddhist lamaseries there.”

  “You studied in a Buddhist lamasery in Tibet?”

  “Yeah sure! Can’t you tell?”

  “Well…” I waved a hand. “I guess that might explain it.”

  “That was where I met Kunga Norbu, in fact. He was my teacher.”

  “I thought he was a climbing buddy.”

  “Oh he is! He’s a climbing lama. Actually there’s quite a number of them. See when the Chinese invaded Tibet they closed down all the lamaseries, destroyed most of them in fact. The monks had to go to work, and the lamas either slipped over to Nepal, or moved up into mountain caves. Then later the Chinese wanted to start climbing mountains as propaganda efforts, to show the rightness of the thoughts of Chairman Mao. The altitude in the Himalayas was a little bit much for them, though, so they mostly used Tibetans, and called them Chinese. And the Tibetans with the most actual mountain experience turned out to be Buddhist lamas, who had spent a lot of time in really high, isolated retreats. Eight of the nine so-called Chinese to reach the top of Everest in 1975 were actually Tibetans.”

  “Was Kunga Norbu one of them?”

  “No. Although he wishes he was, let me tell you. But he did go pretty high on the North Ridge in the Chinese expedition of 1980. He’s a really strong climber. And a great guru too, a really holy guy.”

  Kunga Norbu looked across the table at me, aware that we were talking about him. He was short and skinny, very tough looking, with long black hair. Like a lot of Tibetans, he looked almost exactly like a Navaho or Apache Indian. When he looked at me I got a funny feeling; it was as if he was staring right through me to infinity. Or somewhere equally distant. No doubt lamas cultivate that look.

  “So what are you two doing up here?” I asked, a bit uncomfortable.

  “We’re going to join my Brit buddies, and climb Lingtren. Should be great. And then Kunga and I might try a little something on our own.”

  We found we had finished off the bucket of chang, and we ordered another. More of that and we became even lower than mud in a puddle.

  Suddenly Kunga Norbu spoke to Freds, gesturing at me. “Really?” Freds said, and they talked some more. Finally Freds turned to me. “Well, this is a pretty big honor, George. Kunga wants me to tell you who he really is.”

  “Very nice of him,” I said. I found that with my chin on the table I had to move my whole head to speak.

  Freds lowered his voice, which seemed to me unnecessary as we were the only two people in the room who spoke English. “Do you know what a tulku is, George?”

  “I think so,” I said. “Some of the Buddhist lamas up here are supposed to be reincarnated from earlier lamas, and they’re called tulkus, right? The abbot at Tengboche is supposed to be one.”

  Freds nodded. “That’s right.” He patted Kunga Norbu on the shoulder. “Well, Kunga here is also a tulku.”

  “I see.” I considered the etiquette of such a situation, but couldn’t really figure it, so finally I just scraped my chin off the table and stuck my hand across it. Kunga Norbu took it and shook, with a brief, modest smile.

  “I’m serious,” Freds said.

  “Hey!” I said. “Did I say you weren’t serious?”

  “No. But you don’t believe it, do you.”

  “I believe that you believe it, Freds.”

  “He really is a tulku! I mean I’ve seen proof of it, I really have. His ku kongma, which means his first incarnation, was as Naropa, a very important Tibetan lama born in 1555. The monastery at Kum-Bum is located on the site of his birth.”

  I nodded, at a loss for words. Finally I filled up our little cups, and we toasted Kunga Norbu’s age. He could definitely put down the chang like he had had lifetimes of practice. “So,” I said, calculating. “He’s about four hundred and thirty-one.”

  “That’s right. And he’s had a hard time of it, I’ll tell you. The Chinese tore down Kum-Bum as soon as they took over, and unless the monastery there is functioning again, Naropa can never escape being a disciple. See, even though he is a major tulku—”

  “A major tulku,” I repeated, liking the sound of it.

  “Yeah, even though he’s a major tulku, he’s still always been the disciple of an even bigger one, named Tilopa. Tilopa Lama is about as important as they come—only the Dalai Lama tops him—and Tilopa is one hard, hard guru.”

  I noticed that the mention of Tilopa’s name made Kunga Norbu scowl, and refill his glass.

  “Tilopa is so tough that the only disciple who has ever stuck with him has been Kunga here. Tilopa—when you want to become his student and you go ask him, he beats you with a stick. He’ll d
o that for a couple of years to make sure you really want him as a teacher. And then he really puts you through the wringer. Apparently he uses the methods of the Ts’an sect in China, which are tough. To teach you the Short Path to Enlightenment he pounds you in the head with his shoe.”

  “Now that you mention it, he does look a little like a guy who has been pounded in the head with a shoe.”

  “How can he help it? He’s been a disciple of Tilopa’s for four hundred years, and it’s always the same thing. So he asked Tilopa when he would be a guru in his own right, and Tilopa said it couldn’t happen until the monastery built on Kunga’s birth site was rebuilt. And he said that that would never happen until Kunga managed to accomplish—well, a certain task. I can’t tell you exactly what the task is yet, but believe me it’s tough. And Kunga used to be my guru, see, so he’s come to ask me for some help. So that’s what I’m here to do.”

  “I thought you said you were going to climb Lingtren with your British friends?”

  “That too.”

  I wasn’t sure if it was the chang or the smoke, but I was getting a little confused. “Well, whatever. It sounds like a real adventure.”

  “You’re not kidding.”

  Freds spoke in Tibetan to Kunga Norbu, explaining what he had said to me, I assumed. Finally Kunga replied, at length.

  Freds said to me, “Kunga says you can help him too.”

  “I think I’ll pass,” I said. “I’ve got my trekking group and all, you know.”

  “Oh I know, I know. Besides, it’s going to be tough. But Kunga likes you—he says you have the spirit of Milarespa.”