Dragon's Egg

by Robert L. Forward

  As the time grew near, the High Priest went to fetch God’s-Chosen, who had isolated himself in the old temple. As Bright’s-First approached the old temple area, he could hear God’s-Chosen in a whispered prayer to Bright, and even he was stirred by the genuineness of the supplication.

  “Bright. Give me the strength to do as you will have me do.”

  The prayer stopped, for God’s-Chosen had felt the tread of the High Priest through the crust. As Bright’s-First came nearer, God’s-Chosen appeared at the entrance.

  “Let us go and receive the Blessing of Bright,” he said, leading the way to the Holy Temple.

  Together the High Priest and God’s-Chosen moved through the throngs gathered in front of the western orifice. They were followed by a large group of astrologers, all experienced in speaking to crowds. Slowly the procession made its way through the packed inner courtyard and up the slopes of the Inner Eye mound.

  At the top, God’s-Chosen and the High Priest took up a position at the center of the mound while the other astrologers formed a circle around them. God’s-Chosen looked out at the multitude, whose every eye seemed to be upon him. He would have liked to have talked to them all directly, but there was no way that even his far-carrying, high-pitched voice could reach them all. Fortunately, most of the throng had been to one of the previous services where he had called down the Blessing of Bright, so they knew the ritual.

  God’s-Chosen scanned the Eyes. It had been many turns since he had last seen the beam from the Inner Eye, and he was now unsure exactly when to expect the Blessing to come.

  God’s-Chosen began the service as they had planned it. He would chant the prayers, which would carry out and down the mound to the nearest ranks of cheela. The chant would then be repeated by the High Priest and the rest of the astrologers, the combined treading of the chorus carrying through the crust even to those at the farthest walls. The prayers would then be echoed by the rumbling treads of the multitude.

  “Bright the glorious!

  “We believe!

  “Bring your Blessing!”

  God’s-Chosen paused, but nothing happened. He went on.

  “Bring your Blessing!

  “Down upon us!”

  He paused again, waiting in vain for the Blessing to come down upon them all. In desperation he continued.

  “We are waiting.

  “In your Temple!

  “Bring Your Blessing!”

  For the first time in many greats of turns, God’s-Chosen felt his faith falter. There was a subdued murmur from the crowd. There was nothing hostile, just bewilderment, for God’s-Chosen had never failed before.

  God’s-Chosen gazed upward at the Eyes, longing for the sight of the Blessing. None came.

  Without further word, God’s-Chosen moved his pale body through the ring of astrologers, down the mound and out into the multitude, heading for the eastern orifice.

  Some of the crowd whispered as he passed, others reached out to touch his hot pale body with a slender tendril. The High Priest, still up on the mound, tried to salvage things by proceeding with the regular worship chants, but no one paid him heed—not even the chorus.

  As God’s-Chosen left the Temple, the multitude of worshipers broke up into bewildered groups. Many had gone without food for a full turn, and they now went out to find something to eat in the overcrowded city.

  By the next turn, food had run short and the crowds became nasty. Some recalled the original clan name of God’s-Chosen, and from then on, whenever he was mentioned, it was by his old name of Pink-Eyes.

  The High Priest went to discuss the previous turn’s events with Hungry-Swift, the Leader of the Combined Clans. Hungry-Swift was completely demoralized by the experience.

  “I am sorry that you too were taken in by that charlatan,” Bright’s-First said.

  “But I saw! I saw the Blessing coming down!” protested Hungry-Swift.

  “Yes—you may have seen the Blessing of Bright, but this Pink-Eyes person was using the Blessing of Bright to his own advantage,” the High Priest replied. “He said that he gave the Word of Bright, and that he was God’s-Chosen. But was he? No! Bright chose this way to say that he was a false prophet, for Bright withheld his Blessing before all the multitude.”

  “You seem to be right,” Hungry-Swift agreed.

  “I am right,” the High Priest said. “I have served Bright longer than this pink-eyed hatchling. You must do something about this fraudulent impostor.”

  Hungry-Swift was too dejected to do anything. Bright’s-First took advantage of his hesitancy and gave a command to a squad of troopers nearby.

  “Bring Pink-Eyes to the Temple!” he commanded.

  The troopers hesitated, looking at Hungry-Swift, who remained silent. Finally the troopers moved off to carry out the High Priest’s command. They found Pink-Eyes in the wilderness to the east of Bright’s Heaven. He had been going back toward the Eyes, constantly looking upward for the missing beams of light.

  The troopers had no problem with Pink-Eyes, and they treated him gently. Most of them had experienced the Blessing of Bright and were still in awe of the personality in the tiny pale body.

  “You are to come with us,” the squad leader stated. Without a word, Pink-Eyes reversed his direction of travel and went back along the pathway, with the troopers surrounding him.

  As they slowly made their way back west, paced by the small tread of Pink-Eyes, the crowds gathered again. As they passed, most of them stared, their treads silent. Other groups, hungry and angry, muttered into the crust, and a few rolled sharp fragments of crust into the pathway in front of Pink-Eyes. He did not swerve but moved steadily onward, often leaving a sharp fragment wet with his warm white juices after his tread had passed over it. The squad leader saw what was happening, and put two troopers on either side to keep the pathway clear.

  As they passed through the outskirts of Bright’s Heaven and headed for the Temple, the crowds following them grew. As they entered the eastern orifice of the Temple, Pink-Eyes saw that the inner courtyard was partially full.

  The troopers led Pink-Eyes up the inner mound where the High Priest and the Leader of the Combined Clans waited. Bright’s-First led the interrogation.

  “Are you God’s-Chosen?” the High Priest asked.

  “If you believe it, then I am,” was the reply.

  “Well, I don’t believe it,” the High Priest said angrily. “Admit you are a fraud!”

  Pink-Eyes made no reply.

  Bright’s-First turned his eyes to Hungry-Swift and said firmly, “I say we should turn him into meat!”

  Hungry-Swift hesitated. “He did bring us the Blessing,” he said.

  “Maybe,” countered the High Priest. “But where is it now? He has caused us to lose it.”

  As the two leaders talked, Pink-Eyes had been gazing alternately at Bright and the Eyes for guidance. Suddenly he saw a beam from the Inner Eye!

  “I can see it again!” he called out.

  “What?” the startled Hungry-Swift asked. The High Priest was worried. Could it be that this creature had arranged all this in order to bring down Bright’s curse upon him, to destroy him, and take over as High Priest?

  “I can see the Blessing of Bright,” Pink-Eyes said, but then in despair he saw that the beam was no longer coming toward them, but instead was pointing toward the north.

  Hungry-Swift looked up at the Inner Eye, searching in vain for the faint flicker that he had longed to see these many turns. “I don’t see anything,” he said.

  “I am afraid that you cannot,” Pink-Eyes said. “The beam is now going off to the north.”

  “The north!” the High Priest exclaimed in relief. “That is the territory of the barbarians! By your own admission you have caused Bright to avert his Blessing from us and give it to the barbarians.”

  There were angry murmurs from the crowd at the base of the mound.

  “Away with him!” the High Priest shouted, and Hungry-Swift and his troopers s
tood by helplessly while an angry crowd flowed up the mound and pushed and rolled the helpless pale body down the slope.

  Sharp prickers were pulled from weapons pouches; they prodded at Pink-Eyes’ edges, forcing him out the eastern orifice of the Temple. A storage bin at a nearby needle trooper compound was raided and two dozen long dragon tooth spears were brought and laid out on the ground. Pink-Eyes was then forced onto the row of spear shafts. The ends of the shafts were raised by burly warriors. As Pink-Eyes felt his tread leave the crust, he went into a hysterical panic. The small pale body was easily carried to a nearby field.

  The crust in the field had recently been plowed and seeded, but it would be a long time before the petal plants would grow. Now, however, a more vicious crop was springing up, as warrior after warrior planted a slicer or pricker in the crumbled crust, point upwards.

  Pink-Eyes’ tread trembled in pain as his body was lowered down over the points. He tried to support his body on the narrow shafts of the spears, while lifting the rest of his tread away from the tormenting pricks. Then the spear shafts were pulled out from underneath his trembling tread. His tortured body fell helplessly onto the crust, the slicers and prickers glinting up through his topside, wet points glowing white with his juices.

  In agony, Pink-Eyes attempted to lift his pale body off the agonizing shards of dragon crystal, but with each heave he only sliced his body further. He gave up trying, and slowly spread out as his juices flowed into the crust.

  “O Bright,” his tortured tread cried in muffled agony, “Bring down your Blessing—even on these—for they want you too much.”

  It was half a turn before the butchering crew was called. There was not much meat on that tiny carcass, and the meat had the same sickly paleness that the skin had. One of the butcher crew sucked at a hunk of meat. “It does not even taste right,” she said. “I wouldn’t eat this stuff.”

  “You are right,” another said after taking a small taste. So by common consent, the body was left in the field to dry on the glowing crust, the shrinking skin pricked through with sharp shards of dragon crystal abandoned by their former owners.

  TIME: 06:49:32 GMT MONDAY 20 JUNE 2050

  Seiko Kauffmann Takahashi looked up as her shift relief drifted in from his breakfast—early as usual. Abdul, still sipping a squeezer full of sweet mint tea, pulled himself to the vacant communications console. With a few practiced flips of his left hand, he soon had a copy of Seiko’s screen on his console.

  “Anything exciting?” he said as his unbuckled body floated slowly up out of the console seat. He was surprised at the reply—for nothing ever excited Seiko.

  “Yes,” she replied firmly, reaching out to finger a panel. A picture from the star image telescope flashed on both their screens. She did not say another word-she did not have to.

  TIME: 06:50:12 GMT MONDAY 20 JUNE 2050

  Pierre Carnot Niven, having finished his ten-hour shift and a leisurely dinner, was relaxing. He sat buckled into a seat in front of a console down in the library, his finger flicking over the screen.

  “Fatter!”

  “More!”

  “Fine!”

  His finger traced another line. “Now—the other arm-same as the first!

  “Good!”

  He stretched back and surveyed his handiwork on the screen with pride. The image of the child on the screen now looked the way it should, although the baby-fat pudginess made it an unlikely candidate for what he would make it do next. However, that image was just what he had been striving for. The audience for his scan-book needed to identify—even if they couldn’t copy. He leaned over to the screen and touched the right hand of the image.

  “Put a ball in this hand!” A ball was instantly there, with the fingers of the hand opened to grasp it.

  “Now comes the difficult part,” he thought. “We’ll see how good the body action subroutine is.”

  He spoke again. “Throw ball from here—along hereto here. Use Earth gravity!” While he spoke, his finger scribed a curve leading from the hand along a high arc down into the background area of the picture.

  He watched as the body in the image leaned back in a slightly jerky movement and launched the ball into the air. The ball rose and then fell back to the ground-stopping abruptly without a bounce. The computer handled the perspective very nicely; the ball grew smaller and smaller as it sailed into the distance.

  “Good—repeat with Lunar gravity!”

  The scene was repeated with the words LUNAR GRAVITY in the upper corner of the screen. The ball now rose much more slowly, with a significantly flatter trajectory.

  Pierre spoke again, “Repeat both!”

  The two scenes repeated their actions. First EARTH GRAVITY, then LUNAR GRAVITY. Pierre watched, checking them carefully. They would look much better after they were fleshed out with the publisher’s curved surface software routine. He then generated another one using Mars gravity. There weren’t many of his readers on Mars yet, but he suspected there would be by the time he returned to earth.

  Pierre leaned toward the screen. “Earth gravity picture—rotate 45 degrees to right!

  “Display action!”

  He watched as the action repeated, this time as seen from the side. The ball rose in a nice parabolic trajectory. He smiled and thought, “The kids have had their fun imagining that their bodies are strong enough to throw a ball fifty meters. Now they will have to get to work and learn some science, which—after all—is why they are scanning the book.” He spoke aloud:

  “Shrink ball by two!

  “Shrink child by five!

  “Put in graph axes—vertical here!” His hand reached out and scribed a line from the top of the screen down to the miniature figure now tossing a baseball as big as its head.

  Pierre was halfway through getting the coordinate axes numbered and the parabolic equation placed in the picture where it would be out of the way of the trajectory, when he was interrupted by a message that flashed on the upper part of the screen.

  LINK FROM BRIDGE CONSOLE

  Pierre looked up. “Accept link!” he said.

  HI PIERRE,

  COULD YOU COME UP TO THE MAIN DECK?

  THERE IS SOMETHING HAPPENING ON DRAGON’S EGG.

  WE WANT YOU TO CONFIRM OUR SUSPICIONS.

  # # # # CESAR

  “Sure Doc,” Pierre said. “Be right there.

  “Break link!”

  “Store under Trajectory Graph!

  “Detach job!”

  He unbuckled from the console chair and pushed himself quickly up the passageway leading to the main deck as the computer obediently flashed confirmation after confirmation toward his disappearing feet.

  LINK BROKEN

  SAVED TRAJECTORY GRAPH: EARTH GRAVITY

  DETACH JOB 3; PIERRE. ACCT: GOLDEN SCIENCE PRESS

  TIME 06:52:30 20 JUNE 2050. USED 0:01:26 IN 1:36:33

  Pierre swung onto the bridge and over to the group looking at some fresh printouts. As he floated over he could see that they were pictures from the high resolution star image telescope.

  Cesar spoke up as he approached. “Sorry to drag you up on your break, Pierre, but these printouts are really bewildering. Since you are our resident expert on neutron star crustal activity, we figured you could make a better evaluation than we could.”

  Seiko handed him a sheet. “I took these off the star image telescope this shift. This one was taken at 0645 hours. Notice the pattern here near the west limb.”

  Pierre looked briefly at the printout. The chaotic hash of the west limb region was almost familiar by now. But there was something new there, a short arc-like pattern. Seiko was right. As of yesterday there had been no such structure at that place on Dragon’s Egg. “It looks like wrinkle ridges that you could get on any crusted object with a liquid core. In fact, there are many similarities between those patterns and the ones near the Caloric pole of Mercury. But wait … the directions in the pattern are all wrong. From what I know about the behavior of neu
tron star crustal material under the influence of high magnetic fields, the ridges should all be aligned along the magnetic field lines.”

  “So far, we have all come to the same conclusion,” Seiko said. “This pattern is not a wrinkle ridge from a collapse of the surface. Besides, we have been monitoring the spin speed of the star, and if there had been a slump of that magnitude in the past day, it would have shown up as a glitch in the rotation period, and there has been none.”

  “Now,” Abdul said, “show him the kicker.”

  Seiko pulled out another sheet from beneath the first.

  “This was taken at 0648 hours, just before Dr. Wong finished a laser scan of that region.”

  She passed it over without further comment.

  Pierre saw an elongated oval shape, with ten oval dots around it and one in the middle. The dots on the outside were connected to the large oval with short exponentially tapered horns. There were slight traces of two more dots that would complete the symmetric pattern.

  “The direction of the oval looks generally east-west,” he said.

  “It is,” Seiko stated, with the calm assurance of someone who had taken the trouble to check. “The semimajor axis is within less than a milliradian of magnetic east, so the pattern is dominated by magnetic effects and not rotational effects. But the lines that make up the oval are not straight magnetic east-west as are all the other cliffs and wrinkle ridges in that area.”

  “It looks like something that is stretched,” Pierre said, holding the printout up to his eye. “In fact, from this angle it looks exactly like a Sheriff’s star in an old western movie, complete with a bullet hole in the center. However, it isn’t complete, there are only ten points.”

  He looked up and the others watched his expression change from initial surprise to suspicion.

  “You’re kidding me,” he said.

  “No,” Cesar said. “We are deadly serious. I knew you would have a tough time accepting this without better proof, so I had Seiko fix up the star image telescope with the filters for direct viewing.”