by David Brin
For all I know, Alvin may die blurting in order to avoid exile, he may have no I idea who we are.
Or perhaps he really Has surmised the truth. yuter all, dolphins are mentioned in ' many of the earth books he's read. Even . wearing a mlly armored, six-legged walker unit, a tins outline can be recognised it you look in tne right way. Once tne idea occurred to him, Alvins fertile imagination would cover the rest.
As a precaution, we could Intern the kids much larther south, or in a subsea I habitat. That might keep them sale and silent. , Isnt suggested as much, before I ordered the ; lUKaM to turn around and bring them back.
I admit I'm biased. I miss ,Win and his pals. 11 only the fractious races of the Five Galaxtes could have a camaraderie like theirs. ' ,Anyway, they are grown-up enough to choose their own late.
Wfc,Vb had a report trom Makanees nurse. On her way by sled to check on a sick member of Kaas team, Repoe spotted two more piles of Junked spacecratt, smaller than this one, but suitable should we have to move Streaker soon. Hannes dispatched crews to start preparatory work.
,xgain, we must rely on the same core group of about liity skilled crewten. I he reliable ones, whose concentration remains untlagged atter three stresslul years. Those who arent frightened by superstitious rumors of sea monsters lurking amid the dead Buyur machines.
AJ for our pursuers--weve seen no more gravitic signatures or Hying cratt, east of the mountains. That may be good news, but the respite makes me nervous. Iwo small spacecraft cant be the whole story. Sensors detect some great brute of a ship, about (ive hundred klicks northwest. Is this vast cruiser related to the two vessels that (ell near here?
They must surely realise that this region is of interest. It seems creepy they haven t followed up. .As it they are confident they have all the time in the world.
1 ~L, NISS Machine managed to exchange Just a few more words with that so-called noor beast that our little drone encountered ashore. But the creature keeps us on tenterhooks, treating the little scout robot like its private toy, or a prey animal to be teased with bites and scratches. )4t it also carries it about in its mouth, careful not to get tangled in the hber cable, letting us have briet, tantalising views of the crashed sky boats.
We had assumed that noor were simply devolved versions of tytlal . . . of little interest except as curiosities. But if some retain the power of speech, what else might they be capable or? .At first I thought the Niss AAachine would be the one
oest qualthed to handle this contusing encounter. .Alter all, the noor is its cousin, in a manner of speaking.
But family connections can Involve sibling rivalry, even contempt. Maybe the lymbrlmt machine is simply the wrong spokesman.
One more reason I'm eager to bring ,Win back.
AMID all this, I had time to do a bit more research on Herbie.
I wish there were some way to guess the isotopic input profiles, before he died, but chemical raeemi?atlon analyses of samples taken from the ancient mummy appear to show considerably less temporal span than was indicated by cosmic-ray track llistories of the hull lorn boarded, in the Shallow (cluster.
In other words, Heroic seems younger than the vessel lorn round him on.
I hat could mean a number of things.
AAlght Herb simply be the corpse of some previous grave robber, who slinked aboard Just a few million years ago, Instead of one to two billion'
Or could the discrepancy be an enect of those strange Holds we (ound in the Shallow (cluster, surrounding that Heet of ghostly starcraft, rendering them nearly invisible, perhaps the outer hulls of those huge, silent ships experienced time dinerently than their contents.
It makes me wonder about poor Lieutenant ,achapa-Jean, who was killed by those same fields, and whose body had to be lett behind. AAight some future expedition someday recover the well-preserved corpse of a dolphin and go rushing around the universe thinking they have the recovered relic of a progenitor'
yVllstaking the youngest sapient race for the oldest. What a Joke that would be.
A Joke on them, and a Joke on us.
llerbie never changes. Yet I swear I sometimes catch him grinning.
OUR stolen Galactic Library unit gets queer and opaque at times. It I werent in disguise, the big cube probably woutdnt tell me anything at all. L,ven decked out as a Thennanin admiral, I itnd the lilbrary evasive when shown those symbols that lorn copied aboard the derelict ship.
One glyph looks like the emblem worn by every Library unit in known space--a great spiral wheel. Only instead or hve swirling arms rotating around a common center, this one has nine:
And eight concentric ovals overlie the stylized galactic helix, making it resemble a bulls-eye target.
I never saw anything like it before. when I press for answers, our purloined archive says the symbol ... is very old . . . and that its use is ... memetically discouraged.
Whatever that means.
At risk of humanising a machine, the unit seems to get grumpy, as it it dislikes being contused. Ive seen this before. lerragens researchers rind that certain subject areas make libraries touchy, as ii they hate having to work hard by digging in older riles. . . . Or maylie thats an excuse to avoid admitting there are things they dont know.
It reminds me of discussions lorn and I used to have with Jake l-)emwa, when wed all sit up late trying to make sense of the universe.
Jake had a theory-that Galactic history, which purports to go back more than a billion years, is actually only accurate to about one hundred and titty million.
With each eon you go lurther back than that, he said, what were told has an ever-increasing Havor of a carerutly concocted (able.
Oh, there's evidence that oxygen-breathing stanarers have been around ten times as long. Jurely some of the ancient events
recorded in oiiicial annals must be authentic. But much has also been painted over.
It s a chilling notion. The great Institutes are supposed to be dedicated to truth and continuity, tlow, then, can valid tniormatlon be memetically discouraged:
Yes, this seems a rather abstract obsession, at a time when Streaker--and now Jijo--races dire and immediate threats. Yet I can t help thinking it all comes together here at the bottom of a planetary graveyard, where tectonic plates melt history Into ore.
We are caught in the slowly grinding gears of a machine more vast than we imagined.
Marines
ftT TIMES HANNES SUESSI ACUTELY MISSED HIS nyoung friend Emerson, whose uncanny skills helped 11 make Streaker purr like a compact leopard, prowling the trails of space.
Of course Hannes admired the able fins of his engineroom gang-amiable, hardworking crew mates without a hint of regression in the bunch. But dolphins tend to visualize objects as sonic shapes, and often set their calibra, tions intuitively, based on the way motor vibrations sounded. A helpful technique, but not always reliable.
Emerson D'Anite, on the other hand-
Hannes never knew anyone with a better gut understanding of quantum probability shunts. Not the arcane hyperdimensional theory, but the practical nuts and bolts of wresting movement from contortions of wrinkled spacetime. Emerson was also fluent in Tursiops Trinary . . . better than Hannes at conveying complex ideas in neodolphins' own hybrid language. A useful knack on this tub.
Alas, just one human now remained belowdecks, to help tend abused motors long past due for overhaul.
That is-if one could even call Hannes Suessi human anymore.
Am I more than I was? Or less?
He now had "eyes" all over the engine room-remote pickups linked directly to his ceramic-encased brain. Using portable drones, Hannes could supervise Karkaett and Chuchki far across the wide chamber ... or even small crews working on alien vessels elsewhere in the great underwater scrap yard. In this way he could offer advice and comfort when they grew nervous, or when their bodies screamed with cetacean claustrophobia.
Unfortunately, cyborg abilities did nothing to prevent loneliness.
You sh
ould never have left me here alone, Hannes chided Emerson's absent spirit. You were an engineer, not a secret agent or star pilot! You had no business traipsing off, doing heroic deeds.
There were specialists for such tasks. Streaker had been assigned several "heroes" when she first set out-individuals with the right training and personalities, equipping them to face dangerous challenges and improvise their way through any situation.
Unfortunately, those qualified ones were gone-Captain Creideiki, Tom Orley, Lieutenant Hikahi, and even the young midshipman Toshio-all used up in that costly escape from Kithrup.
I guess someone had to fill in after that, Hannes conceded.
In fact, Emerson pulled off one daring coup on Oakka, the green world, when the Obeyer Alliance sprang a trap while Gillian tried to negotiate a peaceful surrender to officials of the Navigation Institute.
Not even the suspicious Niss Machine reckoned that neutral Galactic bureaucrats might betray their oaths and violate Streaker's truce pennant. It wasn't supposed to be possible. If not for Emerson's daring trek across Oakka's jungle, taking out a Jophur field-emitter station, Streaker would have fallen into the clutches of a single fanatic clan-the one thing the Terragens Council said must not occur, at any cost.
But you let one success go to your head, eh? What were you thinking? That you were another Tom Orley?
A few months later you pulled that crazy stunt, veering a jury-rigged Thennanin fighter through the Fractal System, firing recklessly to "cover" our escape. What did that accomplish, except getting yourself killed?
He recalled the view from Streaker's bridge, looking across the inner cavity of a vast, frosty structure the size of a solar system, built of condensed primal matter. A jagged, frothy structure with a pale star in its heart. Emerson's fighter swerved amid the spiky reaches of that enormous artifact, spraying bright but useless rays while claws of hydrogen ice converged around it.
Foolish heroism. The Old Ones could have stopped Streaker just as easily as they stopped you, if they really wanted to.
They meant to let us get away.
He winced, recalling how Emerson's brave, futile "diversion" ended in a burst of painful light, a flicker against the immense, luminous fractal dome. Then Streaker fled down a tunnel between dimensions, thread-gliding all the way to forbidden Galaxy Four. Once there, her twisty path skirted the trade winds of a hydrogen-breathing civilization, then plunged past a sooty supergiant whose eruption might at last cover the Earthship's trail.
Others came toJijo in secret before us, letting Izmunuti erase their tracks.
It should have worked for us, too. '
But Hannes knew what was different, this time.
Those others didn't already have a huge price on their heads. You could buy half a spiral arm with the bounty that's been offered for Streaker, by several rich, terrified patron lines.
Hannes sighed. The recent depth-charge attack had been imprecise, so the hunters only suspected a general area of sea bottom. But the chase was on again. And Hannes had work to do.
At least I have an excuse to avoid another damned meeting of the ship's council. It's a farce, anyway, since we always wind up doing whatever Gillian decides. We'd be crazy not to.
Karkaett signaled that the motivator array was aligned. Hannes used a cyborg arm to adjust calibration dials on the master control, trying to imitate Emerson's deft touch. The biomechanical extensions that replaced his hands were marvelous gifts, extending both ability and life span- though he still missed the tactile pleasure of fingertips.
The Old Ones were generous . . . then they robbed us and drove us out. They gave life and took it. They might have betrayed us for the reward ... or else sheltered us in their measureless world. Yet they did neither.
Their agenda ran deeper than mere humans could fathom. Perhaps everything that happened afterward was part of some enigmatic plan.
Sometimes I think humanity would've been better off just staying in bed.
Tsh't
SHE TOLD GILLIAN BASKIN WHAT SHE THOUGHT OF the decision.
"I still do not agree with bringing those young sooners back here."
The blond woman looked back at Tsh't with tired eyes. Soft lines at the corners had not been there when Streaker started this voyage. It was easy to age during a mission like this.
"Exile did seem best, for their own good. But they may be more useful here."
"Yesss . . . assuming they're telling the truth about hoons and Jophur sitting around with humans and urs, reading paper books and quoting Mark Twain!"
Gillian nodded. "Farfetched, I know. But-"
"Think of the coincidence! No sooner does our scout sub find an old urrish cache than these so-called kids and their toy bathysphere drop in."
"They would have died, if the Hikahi didn't snatch them up," pointed out the ship's physician, Makanee.
"Perhaps. But consider, not long after they arrived here, we sensed gravitic motors headed straight for this rift canyon. Then someone started bombing the abyssss! Was that a fluke? Or did spies lead them here?"
"Calling bombs down on their own heads?" The dolphin surgeon blew a raspberry. "A simpler explanation is that one of our explorer robots got caught, and was traced to this general area."
In fact, Tsh't knew the four sooner children hadn't brought Galactics to the Rift. They had nothing to do with it. She was herself responsible.
Back when Streaker was preparing to flee the Fractal System, heading off on another of Gillian's brilliant, desperate ploys, Tsh't had impulsively sent a secret message. A plea for help from the one source she felt sure of, revealing the ship's destination and arranging a rendezvous at Jijo.
Gillian will thank me later, she had thought at the time. When our Rothen lords come to take care of us.
Only now, images from shore made clear how badly things went wrong.
Two small sky ships, crashed in a swamp . . . the larger revealing fierce, implacable Jophur.
Tsh't wondered how her well-meant plan could go so badly. Did the Rothen allow themselves to be followed? Or was my message intercepted?
Worry and guilt gnawed her gut.
Another voice entered the discussion. Mellifluous. Emanating from a spiral of rotating lines that glowed at one end of the conference table.
"So Alvin's bluff played no role in your decision, Dr. Baskin?"
"Is he bluffing? These kids grew up reading Melville and Bickerton. Maybe he recognized dolphin shapes under those bulky ,exo-suits. Or we may have let hints slip, during conversation."
"Only the Niss spoke to them directly," Tsh't pointed out, thrusting her jaw toward the whirling hologram.
It replied with unusual contrition.
"Going over recordings, I concede having used terms such as kilometer and hour . . . out of shipboard habit. Alvin and his friends might have correlated this with their extensive knowledge ofAnglic, since Galactics would not use wolfling measurements."
"You mean a Tymbrimi computer ccan make mistakesss?" Tsh't asked, tauntingly.
The spinning motif emitted a low humm they all now recognized as the philosophical umbling sound of a reflective hoon.
"Flexible beings exhibit an ability to learn new ways," the Niss explained. "My creators donated me to serve aboard this ship for that reason. It is why the Tymbrimi befriended you Earthling rapscallions, in the first place."
The remark was relatively gentle teasing, compared with the machine's normal, biting wit.
"Anyway," Gillian continued, "it wasn't Alvin's bluff that swayed me."
"Then what-t?" Makanee asked.
The Niss hologram whirled with flashing speckles, and answered for Gillian.
"It is the small matter of the tytlal . . . the noor beast who speaks. It has proved uncooperative and uninformative, despite our urgent need to understand its presence here.
"Dr. Baskin and I now agree.
"We need the children for that reason. Alvin, above all.
"To help persuade it to talk
to us."
Sooners
Emerson
HE BLAMES HIMSELF. HIS MIND HAD BEEN ON FARaway places and times. Distracted, he was slow reacting when Sara fell.
Till that moment, Emerson was making progress in the struggle to put his past in order, one piece at a time. No easy task with part of his brain missing-the part that once offered words to lubricate any thought or need.
Hard-planted inhibitions fight his effort to remember, punishing every attempt with savagery that makes him grunt and sweat. But the peculiar panoramas help for a while. Ricocheting colors and half-liquid landscapes jar some of the niches where chained memories lie.