So at the afternoon meeting, it didn’t surprise me that the Herkle twins—probably at Mr. Costello’s coaching—stood up and suggested we needed some rules and regulations for our settlement as well as for our business. “Just so we’ll all know where we stand. So there won’t be any misunderstandings later on.”
Mr. Costello smiled and said, “Having rules is a good thing, yes. These boys are very smart, they are.”
And because no one wanted to argue with Mr. Costello, the vote was unanimous. A committee was set up to determine appropriate guidelines for establishing property limits—and for personal boundaries, too. That was a week’s worth of wrangling, sometimes heated, because there were a lot of people here now, not everybody knew everybody, and different folks kept imagining various ways to get their toes stepped on.
We kept out of most of it. Mostly because Grampa didn’t like crowds. Neither did any of the rest of us, but Grampa was worst. He kept to his cabin a lot—enough that we were starting to worry about him. But he showed up for dinner and he was okay during Circle, so as much as we worried, we knew he was staying close and connected.
I was feeling a lot better, too. At midnight meal, I went to each member of the family and just hugged them close. There was nothing that needed to be said, the hug said it all. And they hugged me back and kissed me and told me they were proud of me, and that was the end of it. Grampa was funniest, though. He whispered in my ear, “Next time I rejuve, I’m gonna want you to wear that blue dress for me.” And I whispered back, “I promise I will.” He didn’t flirt with me often, but when he did, it was his way of saying, “You’re good with me.”
Meanwhile, after laying out the feed, five hundred kilos a night now—and more wood than we felt comfortable shredding—we focused ourselves on gathering as much horg-dung as we could. We had six bots working the downslope and we kept them out there all day and all night, only pulling them back when the horgs were around. We chilled the dung balls as fast as the bots collected them and were close to filling the first trailer. Lazz was already talking about driving it back home to empty it into the main cellar.
The Maetlins had their warehouse lit up all the time now, and one afternoon they invited everyone to walk through the installations to see how the carcasses would be hung and fed into the disassembly line, where all the separate machines would skin, cut, separate, slice, grade, and process the horg meat. They were ready to go, anytime. They just needed a horg-sized tunnel from the feeding pen into the first machine, the killing machine.
And finally, on the last day, a few more trucks arrived—looky-loos and wannabes, curiosity-seekers and even a few tourists—all of whom had heard the gossip about Mr. Costello’s marvelous horg-catching operation. They’d all come out to see this idjit get himself good and killed. Tilda Jacklin was running a pool.
Afternoon meeting got a little heated, tho. Finn and Charlie and me always attended. Trina usually stayed home with Grampa. Lazz and Marlie kept busy, monitoring the dung-bots.
This day tho, the Maetlins started talking about offal rights. You cut up a carcass, the intestines—or whatever the horgs use as intestines—spill out. The upper part of the tract is mostly full of undigested food, but the lower part is packed with dung that hasn’t been dropped. And a lot of that dung is fertilized seedpods.
By rights, that dung belonged to us, and Charlie stood up to voice our claim. The Maetlins argued otherwise. Their contract gave them rights to all parts of the creature that were not immediately saleable, and that included the undropped dung. We knew they were being paid on a per-carcass basis, plus a percentage of Mr. Costello’s sale price, a very fair deal. They were also getting the ingredients for bone meal and various fertilizers, which was their bonus. So Charlie argued that if they took the dung, they were taking part of our bonus. The Maetlins argued back that if the dung wasn’t dropped, it was still part of the animal and covered by their contract. Obviously, they knew the value of fertilized seedpods.
We already had enough to corner the market—enough to crash the market if we wanted to—but that wasn’t information anyone else knew and we intended to keep it that way. But if the Maetlins got fertilized seedpods from the undropped dung, they’d have enough to be a serious competitor. They could drive the prize down if they wanted to. And they might want to, just because they could. It wouldn’t be the first time they’d savaged another family. If they saw an advantage for themselves, they took it. That was their reputation and it was well earned. There were some abandoned farms to testify to that.
So we argued, first Charlie, then Finn. I kept my mouth shut and made notes. It got pretty ferocious there for a bit and I was afraid a fight might break out. We had a hospital truck. The Hellisons managed that. And surveillance, too. But the kind of injuries the Maetlins were capable of inflicting—I put my hand on Finn’s forearm and he sat back down.
Harm Maetlin noticed it, and I knew he was about to ask who wore the balls in our family—but Arle Maetlin stepped in front of him. The Maetlins might be feisty but they’re not stupid. A fight was the last thing they needed right now.
In fact—just the possibility of a fight sidetracked that meeting, Mr. Costello stood up and said it worried him terribly that we had gotten to such a sad position. Perhaps we needed to consider what kinds of mechanisms should be put in place?
Well, that’s how we got a police force. And a judge. And a mechanism to enforce the application of our new settlement’s rules and guidelines. It all happened so fast, it would have been head-spinning. Except Mr. Costello just happened to have the boilerplate. Because a good businessman is always prepared. And Mr. Costello was a very good businessman. He didn’t say so, he didn’t have to, but he’d been planning this from the beginning.
And that’s how the settlement got named, too. Costello. Of course. In honor of the man who made it happen.
Mr. Costello accepted the position of mayor. And judge. Of course. And as his first ruling, he cut Solomon’s baby in half. We got the offal. The Maetlins got the responsibility of running the police force. They would be paid appropriately for their efforts. The rest of us would be charged a pro-rata user fee for the provision of police salaries, as well as the billables of the judge and mayor, who—because Mr. Costello was so thoughtful and generous—would only be compensated for hours actually served.
That night, while the horgs were feeding, Jerrid and Mikla rolled the last huge section of fence around and slammed it shut with a satisfying clank, penning in a hundred and twenty-three grunting, grumbling mountains of ugly meat. The horgs were so busy scraping the glitter-pods off the deck, they never even noticed.
Almost immediately, the Maetlins started spraying liquid nitrogen into the air above the pen, forming huge clouds of cold steam. A cross-spray of water created flurries of snow, which fell onto the backs of the uneasy creatures like a quiet blizzard. And just as quickly, the horgs started huddling together, their instinctive response to winter.
The monitors showed us that their metabolic processes were slowing, slowing, turning the animals into huge docile lumps. Using nothing more than a bucket of warm glitter-pods, a single man could lead a near-slumbering horg to the receiving gate, through a short tunnel, through the airlocks, and finally into the killing room of the processing plant. Harm Maetlin had the honor of leading the first. The other beasts would follow, one at a time. When the line was fully up to speed, they’d be able to process—kill and butcher—thirty-six horgs a day.
From the hill above, cheers and applause. Mr. Costello had captured a herd. Mr. Costello was going to pack and ship several hundred tons of horg meat. Mr. Costello was going to make us all rich. Mr. Costello, hooray.
Mr. Costello!
I could still hear the clank of that last piece of fence slamming shut. That’s when the uncomfortable little itch at the back of my neck became a lot more than an uncomfortable little itch.
We watched for a bit, then walked silently back to our trucks. Nobody said much. We ate in sil
ence. Cold sandwiches. We’d just seen the future of Haven. It wasn’t pretty.
The videos of what we’d accomplished at Costello Township were already circulating across the public webs. Within hours, new partnerships, new alliances, new collectives of all kinds would be announced—all with the intention of cashing in. The giant herds would be slaughtered, sacrificed to the greed of little men. They’d be annihilated within a generation and the ecology of Haven would collapse.
It’s okay to take one or two. It’s not okay to take a thousand or ten thousand. It’s not okay to wipe out an apex predator. I stayed up late, running simulations. Without enough mates, the horgs would self-fertilize. Without any parents to feed on them, the mini-horg swarms would run out of control. They’d decimate the countryside, eating everything they could, leaving deserts behind, and wiping out every species that depended on the devastated land. The only good news? They’d wipe out most of the human population, too.
The next morning, we had an emergency meeting with Mr. Costello. Just me and Finn, Charlie and Grampa. We told him about our fears.
Mr. Costello looked sad. Very sad. “Yes, of course. Of course,” he said. “You’re very smart to share your concerns with me. This is why I’m so glad we’re business partners. You’re all so intelligent and insightful. So please let me put your minds at ease.” He motioned to Mikla, who arrived with two fresh pitchers of lemonade, his signal that this was going to be a long but pleasant meeting.
“From the beginning, I realized that if our techniques worked, they could be copied. So I incorporated a holding company, patented the mechanics of the entire operation, and transferred the patent to the corporation. That corporation will sell licenses, materiel, and equipment to any other prospective horg-trapping collective. They will only be allowed to take a limited number of horgs in any given year. Their license requires them to sell their catch only to licensed shippers, and the corporation takes a percentage from both packagers and shippers. So there will be a limit on the number of beasts killed and the amount of meat shipped. That will also keep the prices high. The enforcement protocols are all in place. For the protection of the species … as well as for the protection of the market, nobody will be able to ship a ton of horg-meat off this planet without buying a license from me. Well, from my corporation.”
Finn leaned back in his chair. He looked to Grampa. Grampa looked to Charlie. Charlie shook his head.
Mr. Costello sensed our unease. Hell, even a rock would have noticed. “You still look unhappy. Did I do something wrong? How can I make it up to you? You’ve been paid, haven’t you? You even got bonuses. Was it not enough?”
“No, you’ve been fair,” Grampa said. “You kept your word.”
Mr. Costello relaxed in his chair.
“But—” Grampa continued. “To be honest, we kinda expected you to get killed. We was even bettin’ on how it would happen. You weren’t the first idjit to come down here with a brilliant idea. You probably won’t be the last. So we never expected you to get this far. But your money was good and what the hell—we went along for the ride.”
“So what’s the problem?”
“Nothing. Everything.”
I raised my hand politely to interrupt. Grampa nodded to me.
I said, “You’ve changed the world. And I’m not sure—we’re not sure it’s going to be for the better.”
Mr. Costello looked honestly confused. “Oh my. Oh dear. Yes. You must think I’m planning to leave and take all my profits with me. Oh, no. No, no, no. We’re going to lay tracks and build a railroad from Costello Town to Settlement so we can ship horg-meat all year long. Restless Meadow is perfectly situated to draw horgs off the main migratory track. This will be a permanent base for expansion. We’ll have a hospital, a school, a year-round marketplace. Eventually, we’ll extend the railroad across the continent and establish Costello Towns on every major migratory track. That’s where the other collectives will be allowed to build. Liftcore has already agreed to drop a second beanstalk, and we’ve got sites picked out for three and four as well. And you’ll be senior partners. You’ll be among the richest people on Haven. No, please don’t thank me—I’m happy to do it. Haven will no longer be a backwater world. Soon it will live up to its name. Millions of people will want to settle here.”
Well, you can’t argue with good news. And I suppose all that good news should have made us happy, but it didn’t. Finn and Grampa headed back to the truck, their footsteps quiet on the new sidewalks the Hellisons had installed.
Charlie shook his head and walked on down to Jacklins’ Outpost to see what new goods Tilda had driven in from Temp.
Me? I stood alone, shaking. Trying to figure out what to do next.
Was I the only one who could see it?
Bait and walls. First you put out bait. Something juicy. Then you put up a wall. You put out more bait, you put up another wall. Do it enough, you have a cage. Costello did it to the horgs, he did it to us. Glitter pods. Money. Something juicy. No difference at all. Bait and walls. Money and banks, then courts and police. We all get captured.
Mr. Costello saw me on the sidewalk and invited me to join him for a stroll. Some of the horgs were warming up, getting a little agitated. He wanted my opinion on whether or not they needed to be cooled again.
I didn’t know, but what the hell. I followed him.
Yes, the remaining horgs were waking up. Yes, they were getting agitated. I didn’t need the monitors to tell me that. They were hungry and annoyed. They’d definitely need to be fed and cooled. Already a few were pushing themselves against the fences, testing their imprisonment.
We climbed up onto the catwalk that overlooked this side of the pen. “Aren’t they beautiful?” Mr. Costello said. His smile was broad and beneficent. In the afternoon light, he glowed like a saint.
I had to admit—if you looked at them the right way, horgs could be beautiful.
“Someday…” he mused. “Someday, there will be a city here.” He turned to me with a serious expression. “Tell me something. Do you think they might put up a statue of me?”
That’s when I kicked him into the pen with the horgs.
No one saw. And apparently someone had conveniently turned off the cameras without leaving any prints.
It was time for me to move on, anyway.
Finn caught up with me at Settlement and pulled me out of line for the bus to Beanstalk. “Like hell you will,” he said, and wrapped me in his arms.
I didn’t argue. He was wearing the blue dress.
AUTHOR’S AFTERWORD
First, let me acknowledge and thank the Theodore Sturgeon Literary Trust for permission to continue the adventures of one of Theodore Sturgeon’s most memorable characters. I hope I have done him justice. If you haven’t read the story that inspired this, “Mr. Costello, Hero,” you should seek it out now. It is a classic. It will stick to the roof of your mind like mental peanut butter.
Now, let me acknowledge the gifts that Ted Sturgeon represented to the community of science fiction authors—and to me as both a writer and a friend.
One night, when a group of us were gathered at a local restaurant, I asked him about style. He generously showed me one of the most marvelous mechanisms for creating voice and style in a story. He called it metric prose, and it’s a tool I continue to use today.
There’s not enough room to share the details here, but the short version—Ted showed me how it’s possible to write with a poetic meter that carries from one sentence to the next to create a specific mood. When you change the meter, it changes the emotional tone of the prose, as if you’re moving from silk onto sandpaper (his metaphor). Google Sturgeon’s interviews or read James Gunn’s writings on Sturgeon for more information.
But the most important lesson I learned from Ted wasn’t about writing as much as it was about how to be a human being. I can’t sum that up easily, either—the best I can say is that in its expression, you find yourself living at the center of your soul, unafraid
and joyous, discovering over and over that the very best stories one can write are about what happens in the space between two human beings.
Innumerable Glimmering Lights
RICH LARSON
Here’s another story by Rich Larson, whose “Jonas and the Fox” also appears in this anthology. In this one, he takes us to a strange alien world where a “space race” of sorts is taking place—except instead of racing to launch rockets into space, they’re racing to tunnel through the miles of ice between their undersea home and the open sky one beleaguered visionary believes must exist far above.…
At the roof of the world, the Drill churned and churned. Four Warm Currents watched with eyes and mouth, overlaying the engine’s silhouette with quicksilver sketches of sonar. Long, twisting shards of ice bloomed from the metal bit to float back along the carved tunnel. Workers with skin glowing acid yellow, hazard visibility, jetted out to meet the debris and clear it safely to the sides. Others monitored the mesh of machinery that turned the bit, smoothing contact points, spinning cogs. The whole thing was beautiful, efficient, and made Four Warm Currents secrete anticipation in a flavored cloud.
A sudden needle of sonar, pitched high enough to sting, but not so high that it couldn’t be passed off as accidental. Four Warm Currents knew it was Nine Brittle Spines before even tasting the name in the water.
“Does it move faster with you staring at it?” Nine Brittle Spines signed, tentacles languid with humor-not-humor.
“No faster, no slower,” Four Warm Currents replied, forcing two tentacles into a curled smile. “The Drill is as inexorable as our dedication to its task.”
“Dedication is admirable, as said the ocean’s vast cold to one volcano’s spewing heat.” Nine Brittle Spines’s pebbly skin illustrated, flashing red for a brief instant before regaining a dark cobalt hue.
The Year's Best Science Fiction--Thirty-Fourth Annual Collection Page 44