Asimov's SF, December 2009

by Dell Magazine Authors

  So I populated the forests and waters of Majipoor: with sea-dragons like great plesiosaurs, with balloon-shaped submarine monsters, with glassy-fronded ferns that emitted piercing discordant sounds, and—one of my favorites—trees whose trunks begin to atrophy with age and whose limbs inflate, until eventually their trunks are mere guy-ropes that break at maturity, setting the limbs adrift like balloons to drift off and start new colonies elsewhere. All these things have models in real natural history, but I think I did a pretty fair job of extending and transforming those models to produce the distinctive flora and fauna of Majipoor.

  The terrain, too—forests and jungles, mountains, rivers, a formidable desert, the mighty thrust of Castle Mount—came alive because I was working from life, depicting with appropriate variations things I had seen myself, altering colors, shapes, forms, greatly expanding the scale of everything, making it all more magical (though the originals are magical enough!) to yield the strange and extraordinarily rich landscape of my invented world. The cities were magnified versions of cities I had visited in Europe or Asia; the ruins of the prehistoric Shapeshifter capital were inspired by Roman ruins I had clambered through in North Africa; the geology was Earth-plus geology, everything writ large.

  The grand scale of everything was the most important point. It would not have been enough simply to tell the old story of the disinherited prince yet again. It would not have been enough just to set a pack of wanderers loose on a gaudy hodgepodge of a planet. It would not have been enough to flange together a governmental system for that planet out of bits of Roman history and medieval archetypes. It would not have been enough merely to make up a bunch of funny animals and peculiar plants. I had to create, out of available parts, something plausible, something internally consistent, and something that was entirely new, which by virtue of its size, its splendor, and the richness of detail with which I envisioned everything, would provide my readers with an experience they could not have had before and would never forget.

  For that I needed six months of planning and research, six intense months of day-by-day writing, and some additional months of revision. But the result was successful, a big, popular book that won me an audience far larger than I had ever had before.

  What I learned from the Majipoor experience is:

  —Make it big. Scope counts, if you want a multi-book concept. (I wasn't looking for one, but very quickly realized that I had one anyway.)

  —Make it ancient. Plenty of history is useful in the novel of scope, and in order to invent plenty of history, you need to know plenty yourself.

  —See it and feel it from within: birds and bugs and plants, critters large and small, the cuisine, the landscape, the smell of the air, the taste of the water, the color of the sky. Make it real for yourself and it will be real for your readers. Call on all the physics, chemistry, and biology at your command, and make sure that no inherently contradictory scientific aspects get yoked together because you think your plot requires them. ("What the hell, it's only science fiction” is not a sufficient justification for having a planet's population of carnivorous animals outnumber the herbivores or the atmosphere of one occupied by humans to have the nice bracing tingle of sulfur trioxide.) Get to know textures, detail, color, shape, above all the purpose of each component part of the entire invention. Nothing should be there just because it amuses you to toss it in. Everything should fit into a logical ecological structure. If your invented world is a place you know extremely well, but nevertheless would like to return to again and again, your readers will feel the same way about it.

  Copyright © 2009 Robert Silverberg

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  * * *

  Short Story: A LOVELY LITTLE CHRISTMAS FIRE

  by Jeff Carlson

  Since his first story for Asimov's—"Gunfight at the Sugarloaf Pet Food & Taxidermy” (January 2007)—Jeff Carlson has gone on to become an internationally bestselling author and a finalist for the Philip K. Dick Award with his Plague Year trilogy. The third book in this series, Plague Zone, will be out in December from Ace. Free excerpts from Jeff's work, as well as videos, contests, and more, can be found on his web site at www.jverse.com. His new tale for us brings police officer Julie Beauchain, whose dangerously hot holiday season leads her to...

  Someone was smart enough to call her. Even with the Army and DHS on scene, the governor had tapped her personally. Miss Beauchain? he said on the phone. The job couldn't have been any dirtier, but that kind of compliment was better than cash, neck rubs, or beaches, so Julie grinned as she turned into the moist stink of the bugs.

  “Watch the ceiling!” she yelled.

  “I'm more worried about the floor,” Highsong said.

  Julie waved her TI gun as she hit the stairs, glancing back at him through the office space. “The ceiling is hot—”

  Highsong wasn't moving. “We're three stories up,” he said. “If the floor lets go, you won't be so excited about making our bonus.”

  He wouldn't have stopped her any faster if he'd smacked the wide part of her jeans. Julie froze, then turned on the fourth step, exasperated—in part because he was twenty feet away. A dozen low cubicles separated them. Highsong could be as stubborn as a rock, but the truth was they made a fine pair. Julie was aware that they both looked out of place in this well-organized call center, dragging guns and packs into the maze of desks. He was six and a half feet of Irish/Cheyenne, a mix almost as exotic as her own African/Arabic/French ancestry, and lean and firm in comparison to her curves.

  “It's not about the money,” she said.

  “Isn't it?”

  “It's about doing well.”

  “Then why is your radio off ?”

  “We don't need help.”

  “Always the superhero.”

  Watching him, Julie shifted beneath thirty pounds of sensors and other gear. She never felt the weight when she was running—only when they stopped to rest in the late July heat—and the mischief in her heart grew as she took in Highsong's posture. Spine straight. Arms folded. His protectiveness made her happy, so she flirted with him by stamping her feet up and down two stairs in a spontaneous little salsa dance. Maybe she put more hip into it than necessary. Ba boom bang bang. Her thoughts were like a drum. I love you.

  “Seems safe,” she said, lilting the words.

  “If you fall through—”

  “You wish.”

  Highsong's mouth twisted as he fought with a smile and won. His scowl deepened. Then he started toward her through the cubicles. “Just be careful,” he said.

  Julie laughed. “They haven't made a bug yet that's got more brains than—Aaah!”

  The stairwell exploded overhead. Julie fell. In the first seconds, the avalanche was only noise, a stampede of footsteps and crashing boxes, but then she was overwhelmed by hundreds of small, shiny objects and cardboard and a leaping man. He was Caucasian. Brown hair. Brown beard. He wore a backpack even larger than her own.

  “Run!” he screamed.

  Julie tumbled into an unladylike heap on the floor, her elbows and knees spread to catch herself. Instead, the man squashed her flat when he put his shoe on her pack. Everywhere, the small trinkets clattered down the stairs—silver balls and red balls and gold stars—and Highsong shouted behind her. He might have tried to intercept the man. Julie heard someone bang against a desk, another shout, and a sharper crash.

  She yelled, “What the—”

  Then she got a face full of bugs. The stairwell was buried in winged termites. They were slick, yellow, damp, stinking. Julie shrieked and clawed both hands across her mouth.

  “Yuck!”

  Blinded by the swarm, she tried to get up. Someone grabbed her shoulder. Highsong. No one else would have waded into the bugs for her—but he was still supporting her when he slipped, yanking her sideways. Julie bounced off the wall. Highsong hit the floor. She landed on him.

  Fortunately, the termites were dispersing. Julie spat in disgust and looked around, not
unhappy with her position on Highsong's chest. There were bugs in his hair and bugs on the floor and Julie giggled to shake off the lasting sensation of creepy little feet against her skin. But it was too hot to stay together. The office building was stifling in the summer sun, so she patted his arm affectionately and began to roll aside.

  Highsong grabbed her waist. “Wait. You okay?”

  “Hey!” Julie said, not fighting too hard.

  His free hand went to the absurd junk on the floor, distracting her as he lifted a clump of trinkets—a glittering blue-and-white ball, a plastic snowman, and a red-nosed toy reindeer. Julie wrinkled her eyebrows in confusion. Highsong smiled. “Merry Christmas,” he said. Then he kissed her.

  * * * *

  What had the other man been doing in the building? This part of town was supposed to be clear, but some hold-outs had stayed to fight the bugs themselves. There were also looters, thrill-seekers, and other assorted fruitcakes. The man was probably stealing as much as he could carry. He was about the twentieth unauthorized person they'd seen today.

  Julie rubbed a bruised elbow as she and Highsong worked to kill the termites. It was messy. The bugs were in the walls and file cabinets and a translucent squirming mass of yellow bodies burst from an easy chair in one office. The air was hazy with winged termites and dust. They had a hard time finding the nest. Julie used her thermal imaging gun to locate the worst pockets in the walls as Highsong created some breathing room with his glue sprayer. They laid down bait and pheromone beacons.

  As it turned out, there were already three queen colonies. Heterotermes aureus machovsky moved fast—too fast for an eleven syllable name. Julie called ‘em machos for short, like nachos, even though their creator's surname was pronounced ma CHOV ski. Lance Machovsky. His babies were smaller than most termite species but acted as though they bled methamphetamine.

  The bugs had ravaged most of the building's top floor, which seemed to be dedicated to management offices and storage for discontinued items. In back, endless boxes had slumped to the floor, chewed apart by the machos, leaving flecks of bright wrapping paper and cardboard and what appeared to be eighty-six billion Christmas ornaments and other holiday goodies like pint-size Marys and Santa Clauses. Julie crunched through the debris with an alarming sense of guilt.

  “Is this going to put us on the nice list or the naughty?” she called back to Highsong, wincing at each krnnch and pop of snowflakes, elves, and holly beneath her boots.

  “You know which list you're on,” he said.

  * * * *

  They were dumber than pigs to mix work and romance, of course. Julie's grandpa would have said Never poop where you eat, with stronger language, but Julie Beauchain and William Highsong had been partners in the Department of Fish, Wildlife & Parks before they were lovers. Neither of them wanted to quit the job. Putting in for a transfer would have created another problem, most likely moving one of them too far across Montana to see each other regularly. So they had rules.

  Rule Number One: Keep your clothes on during your shift.

  “Stop it!” Julie said, laughing as she skipped away from Highsong outside the office building. But he caught her easily. The sidewalk was empty. The road was empty. Julie let Highsong take her prisoner again and they nuzzled right there beside an abandoned car for anyone to see, no matter how filthy they were with grime and sweat.

  “I'm glad you're all right,” he said.

  “Next building,” she said.

  “That guy could've broken your neck.”

  “And you let him go.”

  “That's right.” Highsong touched the sensitive skin behind her ear and Julie shivered.

  “This is business, not pleasure,” she said, even as she ruined her own attempt at severity with a wink. She loved to encourage his playful side—was that the Irish in him or the plains-riding Cheyenne?—and she felt especially glad for it now. The silence was worse than the bugs.

  Missoula, Montana, was hardly a major metropolis with a population of sixty thousand, but it seemed larger in the preternatural quiet. As far as she could see, the downtown blocks were lifeless, resonating only with the sound of distant helicopters. She smelled smoke and gasoline.

  “Let's move,” she said. “We're behind schedule.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  That earned him a whack and another approving kiss. The truth was that Julie wore the pants in their relationship. At least she liked to think so. Highsong was hardly a cliche TV Tonto, yet he seemed content to follow her lead, in part because her head was just louder than his. Most of their gadgets were Julie's inventions. Their notoriety was also due to her tech skills. Two days ago, every public servant in Montana had been called into duty at all levels—city, state, and federal—but few Fish, Wildlife & Parks rangers like themselves were actually in combat.

  Missoula had been under DHS quarantine for thirty-plus hours as the 4th Infantry and units of the National Guard tried to control the infested areas. Martial law was in force across most of Big Sky Country and neighboring Idaho.

  “Scanning,” Julie said as she tried the glass doors of the next building. The ground floor was retail, a coffee shop and a women's clothing store. Both were locked. Very few people had obeyed the requests by DHS to leave their businesses and homes unsecured. No problem. Highsong took his prybar to the coffee shop door and they were in.

  Julie was already fairly sure the place was clean. Even sitting still, machos ran hotter than normal termites—and these bugs never sat still. Her TI gun had only penetrated through the windows into the front room, but if there were machos anywhere in the coffee shop, she would have picked up movement or trails outside where the bugs were squeezing through the slightest gaps around the windows, doors, or vents. That was how they'd tagged the office building next door. H. aureus machovsky was voracious. Even with more than enough dry wood or paper to sustain a colony, the machos always sent scouts to expand their foraging area.

  Julie and Highsong swept the back rooms of the coffee shop, then moved to the clothing store. Minutes later, they broke into the first of eight apartments on the floors above. It was hot work. Their grid consisted of two full city blocks, which they were expected to clear before sundown, so the pace was relentless. Sweep each room. Leave bait if suspicious. Chart their maps. Keep moving.

  “You can't buy a work-out like this,” Julie gasped at the top of three flights of stairs. She hoped Highsong would smile and say You don't need the exercise, babe.

  The big lunk just nodded and said, “No kidding.”

  Julie laughed. He gave her a quizzical look—yet as much as she liked to argue, there wasn't time. She would bring it up again in the shower, though, he could be sure of that.

  “You're some date, Highsong,” she said.

  “What are you talking about?”

  I love you, she thought, but she was careful with those words, hoarding them to herself. It was better to joke. That was how their relationship had begun, light and easy, and for the most part Julie was okay if it stayed that way. Except she was crazy for him. Who was she protecting?

  “Scanning,” she said as she approached the next building.

  Inside, they refilled their canteens in a men's room sink and snacked on the sodium-laced Buffalo Wing chips and bland cheese sticks they found in a break room, scavenging like the machos. Unfortunately, their packs were nearly empty of beacons and bait. Soon they'd be forced to hoof it back to their FW&P jeep, which they'd left down the block.

  They emerged into the late afternoon sun with less than two-thirds of their quota done. Julie's disappointment made her mad, which seemed to heighten her senses. She felt on stage in the empty city. Maybe that was why she noticed the change in the air. There were voices around the corner of the nearest intersection.

  “You hear that?” she asked. “Either we've got more civvies who should've evacuated or there's another bug team poaching our grid, and I don't want ‘em making any kills that are ours. Let's get in their face.”


  “We could use the help.”

  “Whose side are you on?”

  “Let's just call it in,” Highsong said, but Julie marched away from him. They could have driven, but their jeep was in the opposite direction, and Julie wanted to surprise the other group if possible.

  She was still two buildings from the corner when the voices turned to screams. “Look out!” a man yelled as Julie broke into a run, the TI gun swinging in one hand. Her pack jostled against her shoulders. Highsong passed her and she doubled her effort, cursing under her breath. What she wouldn't give for legs that long.

  He beat her to the intersection. Then they froze. The five men and women in the street were unauthorized persons, that much was clear. No uniforms. No gear. They'd also dropped a lot of money when they panicked, breaking away from the doors of a check cashing operation. Machos rushed from another entrance to the building as if the two-story structure had opened its mouth and breathed. The fog was an evil yellow. Great tendrils of bugs swept over the paper bills on the street and absorbed the screaming people.

  Three of them made it to their pick-up truck, beating madly at their hair and faces. They left a duffel bag and their friends behind in the swarm.

  “Jimmy!” a women shrieked from the pick-up.

  “Freeze!” Julie yelled. They ignored her. The engine roared and the full-size Dodge Ram lurched toward Julie and Highsong through the bugs, trying to intercept one man. The other guy had charged in the opposite direction.

  Neither Julie nor Highsong had any real weapons, so Julie faked it. Her thermal-imaging gun looked like a Martian death ray with its stubby barrel and a side-mounted display as round as a dinner plate. Julie pointed it at them, shoving it forward in a classic gunman's stance. Someone inside the pick-up shouted. The vehicle jerked.

  Highsong blasted them with his glue sprayer, hosing down the windshield and the open passenger door and the schmoe they were trying to rescue. The schmoe fell down, coated in a sticky gray mess full of hundreds of bugs. At the same time, the pick-up swerved again—its driver blind—then submarined magnificently into the streetfront of a laundromat, sending glass through the sky. Alarms went off. The neon TOPWASH sign slipped and then detonated against the truckbed.