The Starry Rift

by James Tiptree Jr

  The recorded voice of Navigator Torrane is starting. As he proceeds through the part she has heard, the deputy starts to frown. After Torrane gives the blue sun’s specs there’s a pause.

  “Sounds nervous,” Fred observes.

  Exec nods.

  Pauna reproaches herself sharply. She’d missed that. Now she hears it, too, the breathing, the tone. And Torrane had started improperly, with an abbreviation—and the jammed-in cassette. Curse her overexcitedness. But—is there trouble? Has anything gone wrong? Oh, please, no!

  Torrane gives the course change and then goes on. “By the way, there seems to be a lot more transmission activity than we expected. There may be something pretty big over there.”

  Exec’s eyebrows go up, then meet in a frown. She’s listening intently, but her gaze seems to be fixed on some vistas beyond the voder.

  “I wonder how much briefing those kids got,” she says quietly to Fred as Torrane pauses. He looks at her thoughtfully and nods.

  But the next words drive all this from Pauna’s mind. Torrane takes another audible breath, then blurts out, “Something weird is happening to us, I think—but I don’t know how to say it!”

  At that same moment—insofar as simultaneity can be affirmed over such vast distances—far away on the other side of the Rift, which is here called the River Darkness, another but non-Human message is being heard. This message, too, has come automatically to its destination, the planet Zieltan, headquarters of the Harmony. But it has not come so long a way or over so much time. It identifies its origin as a group of colonies at the far northeast end of the River Darkness. These colonies are not of the dominant Ziello race, but of another, the Comenor, who are also in the Harmony.

  It is being listened to by an assembly of the Advisers of Zieltan, who are clustered around a great table in the brilliant afternoon sunlight, their large single eyes intent upon the strange-looking mechanism, which shows the scars of its perilous journey.

  “Help!” cries the recorded Comeno voice. “Help in the name of the Oversoul!”

  It is the ultimate appeal; the Advisers raise their distinguished heads, tensely attending to the alien accents.

  “Help us or we die—and others, many others, after us. We have been attacked by an unknown alien race, who descend upon our colonies and capture, murder, and enslave us by torturing our children. Every world they touch on is captured or extinguished. It has taken us years and lives to contrive to send this message. When you receive it we may be gone, too. The attackers are infiltrating around the east end of the River, from the south. They are repugnant in aspect, and call themselves the Zhumans or Zhumanor.

  “In the name of the Harmony, send help to wipe out these monsters, even if we die with them. Death is better than life under their rule. They will not stop with us.”

  As the message runs out, the Chief Adviser comes painfully to his aged feet.

  “We must convene a full Council at once, and our young Administrator must attend.” He brushes the gray exudate of grief from his eye. “This is terrible. Terrible... Never did I think I would say such a thing, but I thank the Oversoul that we did not destroy all the dread weapons of the Last War.”

  Around the table, indrawn breaths of realization as the full import of his words strikes home.

  Back in the Executive office at Human FedBase 900, the three Humans look with sudden sharpness at the cassette from which Torrane had just uttered his strange words.

  “Weird,” he repeats. “I’ve got to tell you. Maybe if I just say it like it happened... The others are all back in cold-sleep now, there’s no hurry. But I wish I knew who’s listening to this. If the Exec is still Myr Rabeson, I know how he feels about Sensitives and hallucinations. Believe me, I’d give anything not to send this. But I have to.”

  Exec smiles very faintly. Her name is Myr Jonne.

  Torrane takes another loud breath.

  “Well, I was awakened according to plan, when the computer decided we should change course, and I proceeded to put out a beacon and take scope holos. But first I checked everything, according to regs. All instruments were green, go. But when I checked the crew, well, that’s when the first strange thing happened, when I looked at Kathy, uh, Lieutenant Ekaterina Ku. Her vital signs were fine.

  “But I, well, it was like somebody was thinking for me, I said to myself, like whispering, ‘Her spots are too pale.’

  “Spots. I was looking at her through the front vision plate, and of course she doesn’t have spots any more than I have. She has a lot of freckles, sure. But I was looking for big blotches like dark brownish, about three-four centimeters’ diameter. Especially she should have one on the bridge of her nose. Then I thought, I’m crazy, I’m still asleep—what gives me the idea Kathy should have spots? And yet it meant something, too.

  “So I went on checking out the others—and they all looked a little queer to me. Their colors were wrong—mostly too pale. And when I saw Captain Asch’s neck it looked completely wrong to me. Please, I’m not crazy. Or if I am, it’s not only me, you’ll see in a minim. Anyway, when I saw his neck—Oh, I can’t say it.”

  Comes the sound of Torrane swallowing.

  “Funny, water tastes bad... Damn. I have to. All right—I thought he should have like extra little arms. Little arms where his neck joins his shoulders, on the collarbone. And he was too short there.

  “Wait, please—I can tell what you must be thinking. Only please wait.

  “Well, I choked those thoughts down—there were others, about Dinger and Shara, see. Different things wrong. About faces and eyes, yes, eyes most. But all of them were green on their vital signs. I was pretty scared about myself, I wondered should I wake Captain Asch and tell him I was unfit for duty.

  “Because thinking these things wasn’t all. I was clumsy. I mean, out of cold-sleep you expect a little slow reflex, but this was—is—different. I keep reaching for things with hands that aren’t there, and finding I’m too short or small to fit where I expect—and the worst is, this is hard to say... I keep trying to brace myself... like with a tail. A tail, I mean, like an animal. A picture came in my mind sort of, I saw it once, an animal called a Roo, or a Kangroo, with a big thick tail like a third leg. That’s what I felt I should look like. Be like.

  “Meanwhile I was doing my work in spite of the clumsiness. I put out the beacon and examined the area the computer had headed us for, and found a high-density region of GO suns. A lot of signal activity was coming from there. Too garbled to get anything, of course, but I did catch voice sounds not too different from Human.

  “I was feeling a little more normal then, except sometimes when I went to use the stylus I tried to pick it up with a hand that wasn’t there. I mean a little hand and arm like I’d imagined on Asch. And just when I was coming to where I had to decide about myself, a shower of small rocks hit us, plus one large one that holed the cargo bay. And the alarms went off and everybody was waking up.”

  He pauses again; the listeners hear him gag. Realune, Exec’s aide, has come in quietly with a sheaf of papers; Exec nods for her to stay.

  “ ’Scuse me. Well, we did the routine and it was nothing, just a teeny hole by the aft scope. I want to make a note here, somebody please record. There ought to be reinforcement there. If a rock bounces off the rear scope housing just right, it can hit a single weld. That’s what happened to us. But we had the sealant right there and made permanent repairs in seven minim. And I reset course, because the jet of the leak had moved us a hair off.

  “But what I want to say, why it took us seven minim, was because everybody else was clumsy, too. During sleep we all wear as much as we can tolerate, in case we wake up in vac alarm, so there was only like pulling up and closing in to do. But people had trouble. Captain Asch and Shara were cursing their suits, and Dinger said, ‘Some joker had one too many bright ideas; where do I stow my tail?’ But he like broke off as he said it. And Kathy said, ‘You, too?’ while we were all rushing and scrambling to check the
leak. And I saw a couple people hopping; if we hadn’t been zero gee we’d have broken our necks. Kathy seemed to be the worst off; I saw her standing with her hands at her sides, wiggling her shoulders, as if her helmet ought to be coming down by itself, saying, ‘Oh, oh, oh.’ But what with the alarms and the leak and the confusion, I was about in panic myself. I figured I might be hearing and seeing things as well as feeling them.

  “Then after we fixed the leak and everyone was checking their assigned areas as per regs, I got Asch aside and told him I’d been feeling and seeing funny things and maybe the cold-sleep was affecting my mind. He didn’t say anything for the longest while, just kept looking at me like I was, well, slipping in and out of focus. Then he suddenly turned to the whole crew and asked, ‘Have any of you noticed any unusual subjective phenomena?’

  “There was kind of a gasp, like people had been holding their breaths, and Dinger said, ‘Oh, man! Have I. Yes!’ And then it came out all at once, they’d all been feeling just like I had, that they had missing hands, and a tail, and everybody looked and felt wrong. And Kathy said, ‘I am the spotted one! I shall do the Ritual if we make it!’ And she was crying and laughing together. I tell you, it’s weird—like something had got at our minds. Shara even said, ‘Shall we turn back? Abort?’ ”

  Torrane is breathing hard with the effort of telling the strange tale. They hear him drink again.

  “Even water tastes terrible,” he complains. “Usually after cold-sleep you can’t get enough... Well.

  “So then Asch, who hasn’t been saying much, speaks up in his official voice, slowly. ‘All right. So we’re all experiencing the same type of illusory sensations, as if we had different bodies. I have heard of one another such phenomenon, though I can’t at the moment recall any more than that, I do recall that it wore off after the region had been passed through. It may be that this is normal for this particular region of space as well. And although it slows us down a little, it doesn’t prevent us carrying out our duties. That’s the crucial point. And somebody’s got to explore this area sooner or later. We’re here. I propose going on. But I realize some of you may be more affected than I, so we can take a vote. Lieutenant Dinganar?’

  “Well, Dinger voted yes, and so did the others, but when it came to me I told him I had reservations. ‘I don’t know exactly, but it’s like there was some danger to Kathy—Lieutenant Ku.’ I should say here, Kathy is our Sensitive. My specs show I’m part Sensitive, but it’s not reliable.

  “Captain Asch thought this over and then asked me if I felt strongly enough to force an abort. You know a vote like that has to be unanimous. That was the toughest decision I ever had to make. And Kathy kept saying, ‘Oh, no, Torry, not for me,’ and grinning so I lost my feeling of fear. So 1 just said, ‘Abstain,’ which wouldn’t abort, and it was decided. They all got back in their chests.

  “I didn’t want to strain matters by asking Asch if I should send all this, but he knows I have to report the course change and leak. Maybe he guesses I’ll put the rest in.

  “I guess that’s all. Except just now I took a look in Kathy’s sleep-chest and for a minute I could have sworn she has this big spot, over her nose. And like this voice whispering in my ear, ‘She’s the one who’ll have to do the pool ritual if we land green.’ And I felt terribly afraid—and yet at the same time happy, like it was great for her. But it can’t be. I wish, I wish we’d turned back... Oh, lords, let me not be crazy... I don’t feel crazy, but they say the worst ones never know it. But Asch did say...”

  He chokes off, then comes back stolidly.

  “I’ll send this now, after I take a roll of holos of the whole starfield from Beacon Alpha for Charts. Another will follow when we’re halfway to target. Lieutenant Torrane of Rift-Runner One signing off.”

  In the Executive office there is silence for a minim; then Exec clears her throat and turns to Pauna and Realune.

  “You two can probably guess what I’m going to say. We simply have no evidence on which to judge the seriousness of Lieutenant Torrane’s report. And it’ll be years before we do. I want you to remain entirely silent on the so-called subjective phenomena he or they experienced—spots, tails, rituals, little arms, clumsiness, and all. During the years before Rift-Runner’s return, a loose word could get magnified into the rumor that you grow tails if you go too far into the Rift. Maybe you do, but not at the distances we use. Pauna, I want you to prepare an extract for me to post, about the beacon and the blue sun and the leak, and so on, but use the voder up here in my antechamber and do not let that cassette out of your sight. Realune will help. Rea, I can count on you.

  “Now run along and leave the worrying to those who will come after us. Chances are everything’s green by now, and they’ll come home with the story of the century to tell. Rea, I won’t need you again today.”

  She smiles her great smile and the two junior officers depart.

  Exec and her deputy sit in reflective silence for a few moments. Then she sighs and says broodingly, “An hour ago we were effectively alone in the Galaxy, Fred. Now... we’re going to meet the neighbors, like it or not. I don’t know... I’m wondering if Asch was wise to ball on in. If only we could message them.”

  “You’re thinking of Torrane’s remark about the volume of transmissions on the other side? Implying that there might be another organization there, not just single worlds?”

  “Yes... that, and the, ah, subjective phenomena. Fred, I’ve met Torrane, once briefly, to be sure, but my impression was, a solid type. If they’re all getting this business, the only explanation I can think of is that there’s a race over there psychically powerful enough to throw some kind of mental beam or field. Of course I’ll take this up with theorists more qualified than I, but I don’t see how you can get away from the idea of some kind of influence. Frankly it has me a little spooked.”

  “It would be good to know what Asch was referring to,” Fred says, “when he said he’d heard of one other such phenomenon. I’ll inquire around.”

  “Ah, good thought. That might help us a lot.” She smiles, then sobers.

  Watching her face, Fred comments, “You’re wondering... what would happen if they react with hostility? Or, if they came to us?”

  She nods grimly. “Fred... I find myself wondering an appalling thought: How much of that war matériel we dumped out west is still viable? I can scarcely believe I’d ever ask that.”

  In a rare gesture of personal sympathy, the deputy pats one of her strong hands. He knew what that thought must cost someone who had lived through the last stages of the war.

  “After all, we have time. You could initiate a confidential consideration of this at the Exec’s Council, with Central participation.”

  She makes a wry face. “I feel like Torrane. How would they take my story of tails and little arms?”

  “People like Exec Starheim and Exec Cabrisco have enough imagination to grasp the problem,” he tells her reassuringly. “And I can put in an advance word through the deputies’ grapevine.” He smiles.

  “Thanks, Fred.” She brushes imaginary dust off her desk, straightens her shoulders. “You’ve just given a superb demonstration of the stabilizing powers of the professional deputy... I’ve always thought I was very lucky in getting you.”

  “I, too, have enjoyed our years together,” he replies gravely, and they prepare to leave.

  Many light-years away, on far Zieltan, it is early morning. Kanaklee, chief of Message Section, is opening his office for the day. The night staff is gone; there will be a few quiet moments while other offices open, before they develop traffic. The incoming day crew is taking over. Kanaklee lingers in the ground-floor rooms, savoring the clean bright day.

  Outside the windows the covered way is filled with government people on their way to work. Most are Ziellor; there’re a few aliens, probably workers at Archives/History, or one of their embassy chancelleries.

  Suddenly Kanaklee sees his little friend Zillanoy, of the Alien Affairs Se
ction. She’s hopping along at a good clip, looking as usual pleasurably excited about something. Kanaklee taps on the vitrines.

  To his surprise, she turns and hops straight for the doors, evidently intending to visit him. He pushes wide a flange of the big double doors.

  “Oh, Kanak, the most exciting!” she bursts out.

  “It’s always the most exciting, little one. What is it this time?”

  “Oh, I’m forgetting my manners. How are you? And how is Leiloy? And your parents?”

  Leiloy is his bride and intended coparent. He assures Zillanoy that everyone is well. “But what is your news?”

  “Well! You know those warships they sent out east to save those poor Comeno people? Of course you do.”

  “We had a message in last night,” he tells her soberly, “saying they’ve found a devastated planet on the very borders of the Harmony, Zilla. This trouble is bigger than we thought.”

  She, too, sobers briefly. “That makes my plan even more promising, Kanak. You see, Navy has to send a supply fleet to service and fuel the fighters. And Headquarters has been allotted six places on the main ship. And I’ve applied for one of them! I’m sure I’ll get it. Oh, Kanak, isn’t that tremendous?” He is taken aback. “Great suns, Zilla—whatever/or?”

  “To learn the Zhuman language! At least, learn as much as I can before we send them all to rejoin the Oversoul. Don’t you think that’s a noble idea? No one else will know it, I’ll be our expert on that alien tongue and culture!”

  “Sounds like a nasty thing to be an expert in. And besides, hopefully they’ll soon be extinct. Our Navy won’t care to keep those types separated from the Oversoul very long,” he says wryly.

  “But there must be more Zhumanor someplace. We’ll meet them again, and then they’ll need me. And I’m young enough to wait.”

  “And you’ll be younger than ever to me, after this trip. How many years will you be asleep?”

  “Only about seven, overall. I’ll be able to pick up and go on easily.”