by Arthur C.
At the four corners of this outer rectangle were massive cylindrical structures. Richard and the other technological personnel in the colony were convinced that the impenetrable corner cylinders contained the fluids and pumping mechanisms whereby the environmental conditions inside the habitats were maintained.
The new outer region, which had no ceiling except for the opposite side of Rama itself, covered most of the Northern Hemicylinder of the spacecraft. A large metal hut, shaped like an igloo, was the only building in the Central Plain between the two habitats. This hut was the control center for New Eden and was located approximately two kilometers south of the colony wall.
When they exited from New Eden, Richard and the three Einsteins were headed for the control center, where they had been working together for almost two weeks in an attempt to break into the master control logic governing the weather inside New Eden. Despite Kenji Watanabe's objection, the Senate had earlier appropriated funds for an "all-out effort" by the colony's "best engineers" to alter the alien weather algorithm. They had promulgated this legislation after hearing testimony from a group of Japanese scientists, who had suggested that stable weather conditions could indeed be maintained inside New Eden, even with the higher levels of carbon dioxide and smoke in the atmosphere.
It was an appealing conclusion for the politicians. If, perhaps, neither barring wood-burning nor deploying a reconstituted GED network were truly required, and it was only necessary to adjust a few parameters in the alien algorithm that had, after all, been initially designed with some assumptions that were no longer valid, well, then…
Richard hated that kind of thinking. Avoid the issue as long as possible, he called it. Nevertheless, both because of Nicole's pleas and the total failure of the other colony engineers to understand any facet of the weather control process, Richard had agreed to tackle the task. He had insisted, however, that he work essentially alone, with only the Einsteins helping him.
On the day that Richard planned to make his last attempt to decode the New Eden weather algorithm, he and his biots stopped first near a site one kilometer away from the colony exit. Under the large lights Richard could see a group of architects and engineers working at a very long table.
"The canal will not be difficult to build—the soil is very soft."
"But what about sewage? Should we dig cesspools, or haul the waste material back to New Eden for processing?"
"The power requirements for this settlement will be substantial. Not only the lighting, because of the ambient darkness, but also all the appliances. In addition, we're far enough away from New Eden that we must account for nontrivial losses on the lines… Our best superconducting materials are too critical for this usage."
Richard felt a mixture of disgust and anger as he listened to the conversations. The architects and engineers were conducting a feasibility study for an external village that could house the RV-41 carriers. The project, whose name was Avalon, was the result of a delicate political compromise between Governor Watanabe and his opposition. Kenji had permitted the study to be funded to show that he was "open-minded" on the issue of how to deal with the RV-41 problem.
Richard and the three Einsteins continued down the path in a southerly direction. Just north of the control center they caught up with a group of humans and biots headed toward the second habitat probe site with some impressive equipment.
"Hi, Richard," said Marilyn Blackstone, the fellow Brit whom Richard had recommended to head the probe effort. Marilyn was from Taunton, in Somerset. She had received her engineering degree from Cambridge in 2232 and was extremely competent.
"How's the work coming?" Richard asked.
"If you have a minute, come take a look," Marilyn suggested.
Richard left the three Einsteins at the control center and accompanied Marilyn and her team across the Central Plain to the second habitat. As he was walking, he remembered his conversation with Kenji Watanabe and Dmitri Ulanov in the governor's office one afternoon before the probe project was officially approved.
"I want it understood," Richard had said, "that I am categorically against any and all efforts to intrude upon the sanctity of that other habitat. Nicole and I are virtually positive that it harbors another kind of life. There is no argument for penetration that is compelling."
"Suppose it's empty," Dmitri had replied. "Suppose the habitat has been placed there for us, assuming we are clever enough to figure out how to use it."
"Dmitri," Richard had almost shouted, "have you listened to anything that Nicole and I have been telling you all these months? You are still clinging to an absurd homocentric notion about our place in the universe. Because we are the dominant species on the planet Earth, you assume we are superior beings. We are not. There must be hundreds—"
"Richard," Kenji had interrupted him in a soft voice, "we know your opinion on this subject. But the colonists of New Eden do not agree with you. They have never seen the Eagle, the octospiders, or any of the other wonderful creatures that you talk about. They want to know if we have room to expand…"
Kenji was already afraid then, Richard was thinking as he and the exploration team neared the second habitat. He's still terrified that Macmillan will beat Ulanov in the election and turn the colony over to Nakamura.
Two Einstein biots began working as soon as the team arrived at the probe site. They carefully installed the compact laser drill in the spot where a hole in the wall had already been created. Within five minutes the drill was slowly expanding the hole in the metal.
"How far have you penetrated?" Richard asked.
"Only about thirty-five centimeters so far," Marilyn replied. "We're taking it very slowly. If the wall has the same thickness as ours, it will be another three or four weeks before we are all the way through… Incidentally, the spectrographic analysis of the wall parts indicates it's the same material as our wall."
"And once you've penetrated into the interior?"
Marilyn laughed. "Don't worry, Richard. We're following all the procedures you recommended. We will have a minimum of two weeks of passive observation before we continue to the next phase. We'll give them a chance to respond—if they are indeed inside."
The skepticism in her voice was obvious. "Not you too, Marilyn," Richard said. "What's the matter with everybody? Do you think Nicole and the children and I just made up all those stories?"
"Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence," she replied.
Richard shook his head. He started to argue with Marilyn, but he realized he had more important things to do. After a few minutes of polite engineering conversation, he walked back toward the control center where his Einsteins were waiting.
The great thing about working with the Einstein biots was that Richard could try many ideas at once. Whenever he had a particular approach in mind, he could outline it to one of the biots and have complete confidence that it would be implemented properly. The Einsteins never suggested a new method themselves; however, they were perfect memory devices and often reminded Richard when one of his ideas was similar to an earlier technique that had failed.
All the other colony engineers attempting to modify the weather algorithm had tried first to understand the inner workings of the alien supercomputer that was located in the middle of the control center. That had been their fundamental mistake. Richard, knowing a priori that the supercomputer's internal operation would be indistinguishable from magic to him, concentrated on isolating and identifying the output signals that emanated from the huge processor. After all, he reasoned, the basic structure of the process must be straightforward. Some set of measurements defines the conditions inside New Eden at any given time. The alien algorithms must use this measurement data to compute commands that are somehow passed to the huge cylindrical structures, where the actual physical activity takes place that leads to modifications in the atmosphere inside the habitat.
It did not take Richard long to draw a functional block diagram of the process. Because there
were no direct electrical contacts between the control center and the cylindrical structures, it was obvious that there was some kind of electromagnetic communication between the two entities. But what kind? When Richard scanned the spectrum to see at what wavelengths the communication was taking place, he found many potential signals.
Analyzing and interpreting those signals was a little like looking for a needle in a haystack. With the Einstein biots helping him, Richard eventually determined that the most frequent transmissions were in the microwave bandwidth. For a week he and the Einsteins catalogued the microwave exchanges, reviewing the weather conditions in New Eden both before and after, and trying to zero in on the specific parameter set modulating the strength of the response on the cylinder side of the interface. During that week Richard also tested and validated a portable microwave transmitter that he and the biots had constructed together. His goal was to create a command signal that would look as if it had come from the control center.
His first serious attempt on the final day was a complete failure. Guessing that the accuracy of the timing of his transmission might be the problem, he and the Einsteins next developed a sequencing control routine that would enable them to issue a signal with femtosecond precision, so that the cylinders would receive the command within an extremely tiny time slice.
An instant after Richard had sent what he thought was a new set of parameters to the cylinders, a loud alarm sounded in the control center. Within seconds a wraithlike image of the Eagle appeared in the air above Richard and the biots.
"Human beings," the holographic Eagle said, "be very careful. Great care and knowledge were used to design the delicate balance of your habitat. Do not change these critical algorithms unless there is a genuine emergency."
Even though he was shocked, Richard acted immediately, ordering the Einsteins to record what they were seeing. The Eagle repeated his warning a second time and then vanished, but the entire scene was stored in the videorecording subsystems of the biots.
3
Are you going to be depressed forever?" Nicole asked, looking across the breakfast table at her husband. "Besides, thus far nothing terrible has happened. The weather has been fine."
"I think it's better than before, Uncle Richard," Patrick offered. "You're a hero at the university—even if some of the kids do think you're part alien."
Richard managed a smile. "The government is not following my recommendations," he said quietly, "and is paying no heed whatsoever to the Eagle's warning. There are even some people in the engineering office who are saying I created the hologram of the Eagle myself. Can you imagine that?"
"Kenji believes what you told him, darling."
"Then why is he letting those weather people continually increase the strength of the commanded response? They can't possibly predict the long-term effects."
"What is it you're worried about, Father?" Ellie asked a moment later.
"Managing such a large volume of gas is a very complicated process, Ellie, and I have great respect for the ETs who designed the New Eden infrastructure in the first place. They were the ones who insisted the carbon dioxide and particulate concentrations must be maintained below specified levels. They must have known something."
Patrick and Ellie finished their breakfasts and excused themselves. Several minutes later, after the children had left the house, Nicole walked around the table and put her hands on Richard's shoulders. "Do you remember the night we discussed Albert Einstein with Patrick and Ellie?"
Richard looked at Nicole with a furrowed brow.
"Later on that night, when we were in bed, I commented that Einstein's discovery of the relationship between matter and energy was 'horrible,' because it led to the existence of nuclear weapons… Do you remember your response?"
Richard shook his head.
"You told me that Einstein was a scientist, whose life work was searching for knowledge and truth. 'There is no knowledge that is horrible,' you said. 'Only what other human beings do with that knowledge can be called horrible.'"
Richard smiled. "Are you trying to absolve me of responsibility on this weather issue?"
"Maybe," Nicole replied. She reached down and kissed him on the lips. "I know that you are one of the smartest, most creative human beings who ever lived and I don't like to see you carrying all the burdens of the colony on your shoulders."
Richard kissed her back with considerable vigor. "Do you think we can finish before Benjy wakes up?" he whispered. "He doesn't have school today and he stayed up very late last night."
"Maybe," Nicole answered with a coquettish grin. "We can at least try. My first case is not until ten o'clock."
Eponine's senior class at Central High School, called simply "Art and Literature," encompassed many aspects of the culture that the colonists had at least temporarily left behind. In her basic curriculum, Eponine covered a multicultural, eclectic set of sources, encouraging the students to pursue independent study in any specific areas they found stimulating. Although she always used lesson plans and a syllabus in her teaching, Eponine was the kind of instructor who tailored each of her classes to the interests of the students.
Eponine herself thought Les Miserables by Victor Hugo was the greatest novel ever written, and the nineteenth century impressionist painter Pierre-Auguste Renoir, from her home city of Limoges, the finest painter who had ever lived. She included the works of both of her countrymen in the class, but carefully structured the rest of the source material to give fair representation to other nations and cultures.
Since the Kawabata biots helped her each year with the class play, it was natural to use the real Kawabata's novels A Thousand Cranes and Snow Country as examples of. Japanese literature. The three weeks on poetry ranged from Frost to Rilke to Omar Khayyám. However, the principal poetic focus was Benita Garcia, not only because of the presence of the Garcia biots all over New Eden, but also because Benita's poetry and life were both fascinating to young people.
There were only eleven students in Eponine's senior class the year she was required to wear the red armband for having tested positive for RV-41 antibodies. The results of her test had presented the school administration with a difficult dilemma. Although the superintendent had courageously resisted the efforts of a strident group of parents, mostly from Hakone, who had demanded that Eponine be "dismissed" from the high school, he and his staff had nevertheless bowed somewhat to the hysteria in the colony by making Eponine's senior course optional. As a result her class was much smaller than it had been in the previous two years.
Ellie Wakefield was Eponine's favorite student. Despite the great gaps in the young woman's knowledge due to her years asleep on the trip back to the solar system from the Node, her natural intelligence and hunger for learning made her a joy in the classroom. Eponine often asked Ellie to perform special tasks. On the morning that the class began its study of Benita Garcia, which was, incidentally, the same morning that Richard Wakefield had discussed with his daughter his worries about the weather control activities in the colony, Ellie had been asked to memorize one of the poems from Benita Garcia's first book, Dreams of a Mexican Girl, written when the Mexican woman was still a teenager. Before Ellie's recitation, however, Eponine tried to fire the imaginations of the young people with a short lecture on Benita's life.
"The real Benita Garcia was one of the most amazing women who ever lived," Eponine said, nodding at the expressionless Garcia biot in the corner who helped her with all the routine chores of teaching. "Poet, cosmonaut, political leader, mystic—her life was both a reflection of the history of her time and an inspiration for everyone.
"Her father was a large landowner in the Mexican state of Yucatan, far from the artistic and political heart of the nation. Benita was an only child, the daughter of a Mayan mother and a much older father. She spent most of her childhood alone on the family plantation that touched the marvelous Puuc Mayan ruins at Uxmal. As a small girl Benita often played among the pyramids and buildings of that tho
usand-year-old ceremonial center.
"She was a gifted student from the beginning, but it was her imagination and élan that truly separated her from the others in her class. Benita wrote her first poem when she was nine, and by the age of fifteen, at which time she was in a Catholic boarding school in the Yucatecan capital of Mérida, two of her poems had been published in the prestigious Diario de Mexico.
"After finishing secondary school, Benita surprised her teachers and her family by announcing that she wanted to be a cosmonaut, In 2129 she was the first Mexican woman ever admitted to the Space Academy in Colorado. When she graduated four years later, the deep cutbacks in space had already begun. Following the crash of 2134 the world plunged into the depression known as the Great Chaos and virtually all space exploration was stopped. Benita was laid off by the ISA in 2137 and thought that her space career was over.
"In 2144 one of the last interplanetary transport cruisers, the James Martin, limped home from Mars to Earth carrying mostly women and children from the Martian colonies. The spacecraft was barely able to make it into Earth orbit and it appeared as if all the passengers would die. Benita Garcia and three of her friends from the cosmonaut corps jerryrigged a rescue vehicle and managed to save twenty-four of the voyagers in the most spectacular space mission of all times…"
Ellie's mind floated free from Eponine's narrative and imagined how exhilarating it must have been on Benita's rescue mission. Benita had flown her space vehicle manually, without a lifeline to mission operations on the Earth, and risked her life to save others. Could there be any greater commitment to one's fellow members of the species?
As she thought about Benita Garcia's selflessness, an image of her mother came into Ellie's mind. A montage of pictures of Nicole rapidly followed. First, Ellie saw her mother in her judge's robes speaking articulately before the Senate. Next Nicole was rubbing Ellie's father's neck in the study late at night, patiently teaching Benjy to read day after day, riding off beside Patrick on a bicycle for a game of tennis in the park, or telling Linc what to prepare for dinner. In the last image Nicole was sitting on Ellie's bed late at night, answering questions about life and love. My mother is my hero, Ellie suddenly realized. She is as unselfish as Benita Garcia.