by David Brin
All of that lies behind us. Come. Look ahead, toward our destiny.
Though nothing tangible existed on this plane — not matter, or memes, or even directionality — Lark nevertheless got a sense of “forward” … the way they were headed. According to the Transcendents, it was a large cluster of galaxies, lying almost half a billion parsecs away from Galaxy Two. A place where enigmatic signals had been emanating for a long time, hinting at sapient activity. Perhaps another great civilization to contact. To share with. To say hello.
Its sole manifestation — to Lark’s subjective gaze — was a swirl of faintly glowing curves and spirals. Vague hints that another domain existed where hyperdrive and transfer points and all the conveniences of spacefaring might be found in abundance.
We’ll live to see that, Ling pondered. And much else. Are you glad we came?
Unlike the dolphins, no transcendent had ever asked Lark about his wishes. Yet, he felt pretty good.
Yeah, I’m glad.
I’ll miss some people. And Jijo. But who could turn down an opportunity like this?
In fact, some already had. Gillian Baskin, striving to remain where her duty lay. And Sara, whose love he would carry always. In sending a dozen dolphin volunteers, Baskin had included other gifts to accompany Polkjhy’s voyage — Streaker’s archives, the genetic samples accumulated during a long exploration mission.
Plus another item.
Lark glanced at the most unique member of the Mother Consortium, encapsulated in a golden cocoon of toporgic frozen time. An archaic cadaver, possibly a billion years old, that had traveled with Streaker’s luckless crew ever since their fateful visit to a place called the Shallow Cluster.
Herbie was its name.
The mummy’s enigmatic smile seemed all-knowing. All-confident.
“Isn’t this your most precious relic?” Lark had asked during those frenetic moments leading up to the supernova explosion, as the Streaker samples were stowed and Polkjhy’s protective shell closed around it.
“Herb and I have been through a lot together,” Gillian answered. “But I figure it’s more important that he ride with you folks. He may tell some distant civilization more about us than a whole Library full of records.”
The Earthling woman had looked tired, yet unbowed, as if she felt certain that her trials would soon end.
“Besides, even if Streaker somehow survives what’s about to come, I figure old Herbie’s not irreplaceable.
“I know where we can get lots more, just like him.”
That cryptic remark clung to Lark as he and his mate let their senses roam, watching a soft luminance sweep by — the loose threads and stitching that always lay hidden, behind the backdrop of life’s great tragicomedy. For some reason, it seemed to imply a story still unfolding. One in which he kept playing a part, despite an end to all links of cause or communication.
Someone could be felt sliding alongside the two floating humans. A dolphin — long, sleek, and scarred from many travails — jostled their bodies slightly with backwash from its fins, slipping a strong mental presence near theirs, sharing their view of the austere scenery beyond Polkjhy’s glimmering hull.
Soon, their new companion sang a lilting commentary.
Even when you have left
Old Ones, Transcendents,
and gods far behind,
Who can truly say they are
beyond Heaven’s Reach?
• • •
Ling sighed appreciatively and Lark nodded. He turned to congratulate the cetacean for summing up matters so beautifully.
Only then he blinked, for his eyes were staring at an empty patch in Mother’s rich, organic stew.
He could have sworn that a big gray shape had drifted right next to him, just moments before — glossy, warm, and close enough to touch! A dolphin he had not met, among the newcomers.
But no one was there.
It would be many years before he heard that voice again.
Afterword
I feel it’s a bad practice for a writer to get stuck in a particular “universe,” writing about the same characters or situations over and over again. To keep from getting stale, I try never to write two “universe” books in a row. But clearly, the Uplift Storm Trilogy (Brightness Reef, Infinity’s Shore, and Heaven’s Reach) is an exception. I never deliberately set out to “go the trilogy route,” but this work took off, gaining complexity and texture as I went. Life can be that way. If you drop one stone into a pond, the pattern of ripples may seem clear. But start tossing in more than a few at a time, and the patterns take off in ways you never imagined. A realistic story is much the same. Implications and ramifications spread in all directions.
Many people have asked questions about my Uplift series. This is certainly not the first time an author speculated about the possibility of genetically altering non-sapient animals. Examples include The Island of Dr. Moreau, Planet of the Apes, and the Instrumentality series of Cordwainer Smith. I grew up admiring these works, and many spin-offs. But I also noticed that nearly all these tales assume that human “masters” will always do the maximally stupid/evil thing. In other words, if we meddle with animals to raise their intelligence, it will be in order to enslave and abuse them.
Don’t get me wrong! Those morality tales helped tweak our collective conscience toward empathy and tolerance. Yet, ironically, I feel it is now unlikely our civilization would behave in a deliberately vile way toward newly sapient creatures, because the morality tales did their job!
The Uplift series tries to take things to the next level. Suppose we genetically enhance chimps, dolphins, and others, with the best of motives, offering them voices and citizenship in our diverse culture. Won’t there still be problems? Interesting ones worth a story or two? In fact, I expect we’ll travel that road someday. Loneliness ensures that someone will attempt Uplift, sooner or later. And once an ape talks, who will dare say “put him back the way he was”?
It’s about time to start thinking about the dilemmas we’ll face, even if we’re wise.
As Glory Season let me explore a range of relationships that might emerge from self-cloning, the Uplift Universe gives me a chance to experiment with all sorts of notions about starfaring civilization. And since it is unapologetic space opera, those notions can be stacked together and piled high! For instance, since we’re positing Faster Than Light Travel (FTLT) I went ahead and threw in dozens of ways to cheat Einstein. The more the merrier!
One problem in many science fictional universes is the assumption that things just happen to be ripe for adventure when we hit the space lanes. (For instance, the villains, while dangerous, are always just barely beatable, with some help from the plucky hero.) In fact, the normal state of any part of the universe, at any given moment, is equilibrium. Things are as they have been for a very long time. An equilibrium of law perhaps, or one of death. We may be the First Race, as I discuss in my story “Crystal Spheres.” Or we could be very late arrivals, as depicted in the Uplift books. But we’re very unlikely to meet aliens as equals.
Another theme of this series is environmentalism. What we’re doing to Earth makes me worry there may have already been “brushfire” ecological holocausts across the galaxy, set off by previous starfaring races who heedlessly used up life-bearing planets as their “Galactic Empire” burned out during its brief reign of a few ten thousand years. (Note how often science fiction tales ring with the shout, “Let’s go fill the galaxy!” If this already happened a few times, it might help explain the apparent emptiness out there, for the galaxy seems, at this moment, to have few, if any, other voices.)
A galaxy might “burn out” all too easily, unless something regulates how colonists treat their planets, forcing them to think about the long run, beyond short-term self-interest. The Uplift Universe shows one way this might occur. For all the nasty traits displayed by some of my Galactics — their past-fixation and prim fanaticism, for instance — they do give high priority to preserving planets
, habitats, and potential sapient life. The result is a noisy, vibrant, bickering universe. One filled with more life than there might have been otherwise.
For the record, I don’t think we live in a place like the wild, extravagant Uplift Universe. But it’s a fun realm to play in, between more serious stuff.
Pile on those marvels!
Hang on. There’s more to come.
Acknowledgments
I want to thank my insightful and outspoken prereaders, who scanned portions of this work in manuscript form — especially Stefan Jones, Steinn Sigurdsson, Ruben Krasnopolsky, Damien Sullivan, and Erich R. Schneider. Also helpful were Kevin Lenagh, Xavier Fan, Ray Reynolds, Ed Allen, Larry Fredrickson, Martyn Fogg, Doug McElwain, Joseph Trela, David and Joy Crisp, Carlo Gioja, Brad De Long, Lesley Mathieson, Sarah Milkovich, Gerrit Kirkwood, Anne Kelly, Anita Gould, Duncan Odom, Jim Panetta, Nancy Hayes, Robert Bolender, Kathleen Holland, Marcus Sarofim, Michael Tice, Pat Mannion, Greg Smith, Matthew Johnson, Kevin Conod, Paul Rothemund, Richard Mason, Will Smit, Grant Swenson, Roian Egnor, Jason M. Robertson, Micah Altman, Robert Hurt, Manoj Kasichainula, Andy Ashcroft, Scott Martin, and Jeffrey Slostad. Professors Joseph Miller and Gregory Benford made useful observations. Robert Qualkinbush collated the glossaries. The novel profited from insights and assistance from my agent, Ralph Vicinanza, along with Pat LoBrutto and Tom Dupree of Bantam Books.
Emerson’s last song comes from the finale of Giuseppe Verdi’s opera Falstaff.
Some of the spectacles contained herein did not start in my own twisted imagination. The Fractal World, that tremendous structure made of huge fluffy spikes, presenting far more surface area (for windows) than any Dyson sphere, was described by Dr. David Criswell in a farseeing paper that can be found in Interstellar Migration and the Human Experience, edited by Ben Finney and Erik Jones (University of California Press).
As usual, this tale would have been a far poorer thing without the wise and very human input of my wife, Dr. Cheryl Brigham.
And now … a lagniappe!
I did it once before, following the afterword to Earth. A little denouement — a story-after-the-story — for those of you who hung around all the way through my final remarks. It visits one of our characters a year or so after the Great Rupture, and attempts to tie off just a few (of many) loose ends.
Enjoy.
Civilization
[Denouement]
THE SEAS OF HURMUPHTA ARE SALTIER THAN Jijo’s.
The winds don’t blow steady, but in strangely rhythmic bursts, making it awkward and dangerous to sail a close tack.
That is, till you figure out the proper cadence. After that, you get a feel for the rolling tempo, sensing each gusty surge and tapering wane. With a light hand on the tiller, you can really crowd the breeze, filling the mains till you’ve heeled over with spars brushing the wave-tops!
The first time I did that with Dor-hinuf aboard, she hollered as if Death itself had come up from the deep, to personally roar a Chant of Claiming. By the time we got back to the new dock, soaked from head to toe, she was trembling so hard I figured I must have really gone too far.
Boy was I wrong! The moment we stepped through the door of our little seaside khuta, she grabbed me and we made love for three miduras straight! My spines hurt for several days after.
(Soon I realized, civilized hoons seldom experience the stimulated drives that come from exhilaration! Back on Jijo, that was part of daily life, and served to balance a hoon’s instinctive caution. But our starfaring relatives have such sedate lives, except for once-a-year estrus, they hardly ever think of sex! Fortunately, Dor-hinuf has taken to this new approach, the way an urs takes to lava.)
Alas, we seem to have less time for romantic trips together. Business is picking up, as word keeps spreading across the high plateau — where hoonish settlements huddled for a thousand years, confined to prim, orderly city streets, far from any sight of surf or tide. After all that time, I guess there’s a lot of pent-up frustration. Or maybe it has something to do with the way the Five Galaxies have been shaken up lately. Anyway, lots of people — especially the younger generation — seem willing to consider something new for a change. Something our Guthatsa patrons never taught us.
Groups arrive daily, flying down to our lodge on the deserted coast, emerging from hovercars to stare at the glistening lagoon, nervous to approach so much water, clearly mindful of rote lessons they learned when young — that oceans are dangerous.
Of course, any hoonish accountant also knows that risk can be justified, if benefits outweigh the potential cost.
It takes just one trip across the breezy bay to convince most of them.
Some things are worth a little jeopardy.
My father-in-law handles the business details. Twaphu-anuph resigned his position with the Migration Institute to run our little resort, meeting investors, arranging environmental permits, and leasing as much prime coastal land as possible, before other hoons catch on to its real value. He still considers the whole thing kind of crazy, and won’t step onto a sailboat himself. But each time the old fellow goes over the accounts I can hear him umbling happily.
His favorite song nowadays? “What shall we do with a drunken sailor”!
I guess it bothers me a little that neither the haunting images of Melville, nor the Jijoan sea poetry of Phwhoon-dau, have as much effect on Twaphu-anuph as a few bawdy Earthling ditties. The rafters resound when he gets to the crude part about shaving the drunkard’s belly with a rusty razor.
Who can figure?
I’m so busy these days — giving sailing lessons and reinventing nearly everything from scratch — that I have no time for literary pursuits. This journal of mine lies unopened for many jaduras at a stretch. I guess my childhood ambitions to be a famous writer will have to wait. Perhaps for another life.
In fact, I found a better way to change my fellow hoons. To bring them a little happiness. To change their reputation as pinched, dour bookkeepers. And perhaps help make them better neighbors.
Back on Jijo, all the other races liked hoons! I hope to see that come true here, as well. Among the star-lanes of civilization.
Anyway, the literary renaissance is already in good hands. Or rather, good eyestalks.
Huck gave in to half of the role assigned to her.
“Ill have babies,” she announced. “If you guys arrange for hoonish nannies to help raise ’em. After all, I was raised by hoons, and look how I came out!”
I would have answered this with a jibe in the old days. But without Pincer and Ur-ronn around, it just isn’t the same. Anyway, I’m a married man now. Soon to be a father. It’s time I learned some tact.
Huck may be resigned to staying pregnant, since she’s the only one who can bring a g’Kek race back to life in the Four Galaxies. But she absolutely refused the other half of the original plan — to live in secrecy and seclusion, hiding from the ancient enemies of her kind.
“Let ’em come!” she shouts, spinning her wheel rims and waving her eyes, as if ready to take on the whole Jophur Empire, and the others who helped extinguish her folk, all at the same time. I don’t know. Maybe it’s her growing sense of prominence, or the freedom of movement she feels racing along the smooth sidewalks of Hurmuphta City, or the students who attend her salons to study Terran and Jijoan literature. But she hardly ever comes down to the Cove anymore, and when she does, I just wind up listening to her go on for miduras at a stretch, saying little in response.
Maybe she’s right. Perhaps I am turning into just another dull old hoon.
Or else the problem is that g’Keks seldom compromise — least of all Huck. She doesn’t understand you’ve got to meet life halfway. For every change you manage to impose on the universe, you can expect to be transformed in return.
I brought gifts from Jijo to my spacefaring cousins — adventure and childhood. They, in turn, taught me what serenity can be found in home, hearth, and low, melodic rituals inherited from a misty past, before our race ever
trod the road of Uplift or cared about distant stars.
Those stars are farther than they used to be. Ever since the Five Galaxies abruptly became four, half the transfer points and interspatial paths went unstable, and may remain so for the rest of our lifespans. Untold numbers of ships were lost, trade patterns disrupted, and worlds forced to rely on their own resources.
I guess this means it’ll be a while before we get a letter from Ur-ronn. I’m sure she’s having the time of her life, somewhere out there, consorting with engineers of all races, up to her long neck in pragmatic problems to solve.
Though urs aren’t a sentimental people, I do hope she remembers us from time to time.
All I can say about poor Pincer is that I miss him terribly.
Sometimes you just have to let go.
Death has always been the one great, hopelessly impassable gulf. Now there is another. When Galaxy Four finally ripped loose, it seems every sapient being felt it happen, at some deep, organic level. Even on a planet’s surface, it staggered many folks. For days, people walked around kind of numb.
Scientists think the recoil effects must’ve been far worse in Galaxy Four itself, but we’ll never know for sure, because now that entire giant wheel of stars lies beyond reach, forevermore. And with it, Jijo. My parents. Home.
There are consolations. It feels nice to imagine dolphins, swimming with abandon through the silky waters off Wuphon, playing tag with my father’s dross ship, then coming near shore each evening to discuss poetry by Loocen’s opal light.
Of course the Commons of Six Races can now tear up the Sacred Scrolls and stop hiding their faces from the sky. For the laws of the Civilization of Five Galaxies don’t apply to them any longer. Perhaps Jijo’s people have already dealt with the Jophur invaders. Or maybe they face even worse crises. Either way, the burden of guilt we inherited from our criminal ancestors can be shrugged off at last. The folk of the Slope aren’t trespassers — or sooners — anymore.