Rifters 1 - Starfish

by Peter Watts

  * * *

  It sounded like some kid fresh out of grad school. It acted like one, too. It wanted him to drop his pants and bend over.

  "Stuff it," Scanlon said at first, his public persona firmly in place.

  "Exactly my intention," said the machine, wiggling a pencil-shaped probe on the end of one arm. "Come on, Dr. Scanlon. You know it's for your own good."

  In fact he didn't know any such thing. He'd been wondering lately if the indignities he suffered in here might be due entirely to some repressed asshole's misdirected sadism. Just a few months ago it would have driven him crazy. But Yves Scanlon was finally starting to see his place in the universe, and was discovering that he could afford to be tolerant. Other people's pettiness didn't bother him nearly as much as it used to. He was above it.

  He did, however, stop to pull the curtain across the window before undoing his belt. Rowan could show up at any time.

  "Don't move," said the poltergeist. "This won't hurt. Some people even enjoy it."

  Scanlon did not. The realization came as a bit of a relief.

  "I don't see the hurry," he complained. "Nothing goes in or out of me without you people turning a valve somewhere to let it past. Why not just take what I send down the toilet?"

  "We do that, too," the machine said, coring. "Since you got here, in fact. But you never know. Some stuff degrades pretty quickly when it leaves a body."

  "If it degrades that fast then why am I still in quarantine?"

  "Hey, I didn't say it was harmless. Just said it might have turned into something else. Or maybe it is harmless. Maybe you just pissed off someone upstairs."

  Scanlon winced. "The people upstairs like me just fine. What are you looking for, anyway?"

  "Pyranosal RNA."

  "I'm, I'm not sure I remember what that is."

  "No reason you should. It's been out of fashion for three and a half billion years."

  "No shit."

  "Don't you wish." The probe withdrew. "It was all the rage in primordial times, until—"

  "Excuse me," said Patricia Rowan's voice.

  Scanlon glanced automatically over to the workstation. She wasn't there. The voice was coming from behind the curtain.

  "Ah. Company. I've got what I came for, anyway." The arm swung around and neatly inserted the soiled probe into a dumbwaiter. By the time Scanlon had his pants back up the teleop had folded into neutral.

  "See you tomorrow," said the poltergeist, and fled. The teleop's lights went out.

  She was here.

  Right in the next room.

  Vindication was at hand.

  Scanlon took a breath and pulled back the curtain.

  * * *

  Patricia Rowan stood in shadow on the other side. Her eyes glittered with faint mercury: almost vampire eyes, but diluted. Translucent, not opaque.

  Her contacts, of course. Scanlon had tried a similar pair once. They linked into a weak RF signal from your watch, scrolled images across your field of view at a virtual range of forty centimeters. Patricia Rowan saw Scanlon and smiled. Whatever else she saw through those magical lenses, he could only guess.

  "Dr. Scanlon," she said. "It's good to see you again."

  He smiled back. "I'm glad you came by. We have a lot to talk about—"

  Rowan nodded, opened her mouth.

  "—and although your döpplegangers are perfectly adequate for normal conversation, they tend to lose a lot of the nuances—"

  Closed it again.

  "—especially given the kind of information you seem to be interested in."

  Rowan hesitated a moment. "Yes. Of course. We, um, we need your insights, Dr. Scanlon." Yes. Good. Of course. "Your report on Beebe was quite, well, interesting, but things have changed somewhat since you filed it."

  He nodded thoughtfully. "In what way?"

  "Lubin's gone, for one thing."

  "Gone?"

  "Disappeared. Dead, perhaps, although apparently there's no signal from his deadman. Or possibly just— regressed, like Fischer."

  "I see. And have you learned whether anyone at the other stations has gone over?" It was one of the predictions he'd made in his report.

  Her eyes, rippling silver, seemed to stare at a point just beside his left shoulder. "We can't really say. Certainly we've had some losses, but rifters tend not to be very forthcoming with details. As we expected, of course."

  "Yes, of course." Scanlon tried on a contemplative look. "So Lubin's gone. Not surprising. He was definitely closest to the edge. In fact, if I remember I predicted—"

  "Probably just as well," Rowan murmured.

  "Excuse me?"

  She shook her head, as if clearing it of some distraction. "Nothing. Sorry."

  "Ah." Scanlon nodded again. No need to harp on Lubin if Rowan didn't want to. He'd made lots of other predictions. "There's also the matter of the Ganzfeld effect I noted. The remaining crew—"

  "Yes, we've spoken with a couple of— other experts about that."

  "And?"

  "They don't think the rift environment is, sufficiently impoverished is the way they put it. Not sufficiently impoverished to function as a Ganzfeld."

  "I see," Scanlon felt part of his old self bristling. He smiled, ignoring it. "How do they explain my observations?"

  "Actually—" Rowan coughed. "They're not completely convinced you did observe anything significant. Apparently there was some evidence that your report was dictated under conditions of— well, personal stress."

  Scanlon carefully froze his smile into place. "Well. Everyone's entitled to their opinion."

  Rowan said nothing.

  "Although the fact that the rift is a stressful environment shouldn't come as news to any real expert," Scanlon continued. "That was the whole point of the program, after all."

  Rowan nodded. "I don't disbelieve you, Doctor. I'm not really qualified to judge one way or the other."

  True, he didn't say.

  "And in any event," Rowan added, "You were there. They weren't."

  Scanlon relaxed. Of course she'd put his opinion ahead of those other experts, whoever they were. He was the one she'd chosen to go down there, after all.

  "It's not really important," she said now, dismissing the subject. "Our immediate concern is the quarantine."

  Mine as well as theirs. But of course he didn't let that on. It wouldn't be— professional— to seem too concerned about his own welfare right now. Besides, they were treating him fine in here. At least he knew what was going on.

  "—yet," Rowan finished.

  Scanlon blinked. "What? Excuse me?"

  "I said, for obvious reasons we've decided not to recall the crew from Beebe just yet."

  "I see. Well, you're in luck. They don't want to leave."

  Rowan stepped closer to the membrane. Her eyes faded in the light. "You're sure of this."

  "Yes. The rift is their home, Ms. Rowan, in a way a layperson probably couldn't understand. They're more alive down there than they ever were on shore." He shrugged. "Besides, even if they wanted to leave, what could they do? They're hardly going to swim all the way back to the mainland."

  "They might, actually."

  "What?"

  "It's possible," Rowan admitted. "Theoretically. And we— we caught one of them, leaving."

  "What?"

  "Up in the euphotic zone. We had a sub stationed up there, just to— keep an eye on things. One of the rifters— Cracker, or—" a glowing thread wriggled across each eye— "Caraco, that's it. Judy Caraco. She was heading straight for the surface. They figured she was making a break for it."

  Scanlon shook his head. "Caraco does laps, Ms. Rowan. It was in my report."

  "I know. Perhaps your report should have been more widely distributed. Although, her laps never took her that close to the surface before. I can see why they—" Rowan shook her head. "At any rate, they took her. A mistake, perhaps." A faint smile. "Those happen, sometimes."

  "I see," Scanlon said.

&nb
sp; "So now we're in something of a situation," Rowan went on. "Maybe the Beebe crew thinks that Caraco was just another accidental casualty. Or maybe they're getting suspicious. So do we let it lie, hope things blow over? Will they make a break if they think we're covering something up? Will some go and some stay? Are they a group, or a collection of individuals?"

  She fell silent.

  "A lot of questions," Scanlon said after a while.

  "Okay, then. Here's just one. Would they obey a direct order to stay on the rift?"

  "They might stay on the rift," Scanlon said. "But not because you ordered them to."

  "We were thinking, maybe Lenie Clarke," Rowan said. "According to your report she's more or less the leader. And Lubin's— Lubin was— the wild card. Now he's out of the picture, perhaps Clarke could keep the others in line. If we can reach Clarke."

  Scanlon shook his head. "Clarke's not any sort of leader, not in the conventional sense. She adopts her own behaviors independently, and the others just— follow her lead. It's not the usual authority-based system as you'd understand it."

  "But if they follow her lead, as you say..."

  "I suppose," Scanlon said slowly, "she's the most likely to obey an order to stay on site, no matter how hellish the situation. She's hooked on abusive relationships, after all." He stopped.

  "You could always try telling them the truth," he suggested.

  She nodded. "It's a possibility, certainly. And how do you think they'd react?"

  Scanlon said nothing.

  "Would they trust us?" Rowan asked.

  Scanlon smiled. "Do they have any reason to?"

  "Perhaps not." Rowan sighed. "But no matter what we tell, them, the issue's the same. What will they do when they learn they're stuck down there?"

  "Probably nothing. That's where they want to be."

  Rowan glanced at him curiously. "I'm surprised you'd say that, Doctor."

  "Why?"

  "There's no place I'd rather be than my own apartment. But the moment anyone put me under house arrest I'd want very much to leave it, and I'm not even slightly dysfunctional."

  Scanlon let the last part slide. "That's a point," he admitted.

  "A very basic one," she said. "I'm surprised someone with your background would miss it."

  "I didn't miss it. I just think other factors outweigh it." On the outside, Scanlon smiled. "As you say, you're not at all dysfunctional."

  "No. Not yet, anyway." Rowan's eyes clouded with a sudden flurry of data. She stared into space for a moment or two, assessing. "Excuse me. Bit of trouble on another front." She focused again on Scanlon. "Do you ever fell guilty, Yves?"

  He laughed, cut himself off. "Guilty? Why?"

  "About the project. About— what we did to them."

  "They're happier down there. Believe me. I know."

  "Do you."

  "Better than anyone, Ms. Rowan. You know that. That's why you came to me today."

  She didn't speak.

  "Besides," Scanlon said, "Nobody drafted them. It was their own free choice."

  "Yes," Rowan agreed softly. "Was."

  And extended her arm through the window.

  The isolation membrane coated her hand like liquid glass. It fit the contours of her fingers without a wrinkle, painted palm and wrist and forearm in a transparent sheath, pulled away just short of her elbow and stretched back to the windowpane.

  "Thanks for your time, Yves," Rowan said.

  After a moment Scanlon shook the proffered hand. It felt like a condom, slightly lubricated. "You're welcome," he said. Rowan retracted her arm, turned away. The membrane smoothed behind her like a soap bubble.

  "But—" Scanlon said.

  She turned back. "Yes?"

  "Was that all you wanted?" he said.

  "For now."

  "Ms. Rowan, if I may. There's a lot about the people down there you don't know. A lot. I'm the only one who can give it to you."

  "I appreciate that, Y—"

  "The whole geothermal program hinges on them. I'm sure you see that."

  She stepped back towards the membrane. "I do, Dr. Scanlon. Believe me. But I have a number of priorities right now. And in the meantime, I know where to find you." Once more she turned away.

  Scanlon tried very hard to keep his voice level: "Ms. Rowan—"

  Something changed in her then, a subtle hardening of posture that would have gone unnoticed by most people. Scanlon saw it as she turned back to face him. A tiny pit opened in his stomach.

  He tried to think of what to say.

  "Yes, Dr. Scanlon," she said, her voice a bit too level.

  "I know you're busy, Ms. Rowan, but— how much longer do I have to stay in here?"

  She softened fractionally. "Yves, we still don't know. In a way it's just another quarantine, but it's taking longer to get a handle on this one. It's from the bottom of the ocean, after all."

  "What is it, exactly?"

  "I'm not a biologist." She glanced at the floor for a moment, then met his eyes again. "But I can tell you this much: you don't have to worry about keeling over dead. Even if you have this thing. It doesn't really attack people."

  "Then why—"

  "Apparently there are some— agricultural concerns. They're more afraid of the effect it might have on certain plants."

  He considered that. It made him feel a little better.

  "I really have to go now." Rowan seemed to consider something for a moment, then added, "And no more döpplegangers. I promise. That was rude of me."

  Turncoat

  She'd told the truth about the döppelgangers. She'd lied about everything else.

  After four days Scanlon left a message in Rowan's cache. Two days later he left another. In the meantime he waited for the spirit which had thrust its finger up its ass to come back and tell him more about primordial biochemistry. It never did. By now even the other ghosts weren't visiting very often, and they barely said a word when they did.

  Rowan didn't return Scanlon's calls. Patience melted into uncertainty. Uncertainty simmered into conviction. Conviction began to gently boil.

  Locked up in here for three fucking weeks and all she gives me is a ten-minute courtesy call. Ten lousy minutes of my-experts-say-you're-wrong and it's-such-a-basic-point-I-can't-believe-you-missed-it and then she just walks away. She just fucking smiles and walks away.

  "Know what I should have done," he growled at the teleop. It was the middle of the day but he didn't care any more. Nobody was listening, they'd deserted him in here. They'd probably forgotten all about him. "What I should have done is rip a hole in that fucking membrane when she was here. Let a little of whatever's in here out to mix with the air in her lungs. Bet that'd inspire her to look for some answers!"

  He knew it was fantasy. The membrane was almost infinitely flexible, and just as tough. Even if he succeeded in cutting it, it would repair itself before any mere gas molecules could jump through. Still, it was satisfying to think about.

  Not satisfying enough. Scanlon picked up a chair and hurled it at the window. The membrane caught it like a form-fitting glove, enfolded it, let it fall almost to the floor on the other side. Then, slowly, the window tightened down to two dimensions. The chair toppled back into Scanlon's cell, completely undamaged.

  And to think she'd had the fucking temerity to lecture him with that inane little homily about house arrest! As though she'd caught him in some sort of lie, when he'd suggested the vampires might stay put. As though she thought he was covering for them.

  Sure, he knew more about vampires than anyone. That didn't mean he was one. That didn't mean—

  We could have treated you better, Lubin had said, there at the last. We. As though he'd been speaking for all of them. As though, finally, they were accepting him. As though—

  But vampires were damaged goods, always had been. That was the whole point. How could Yves Scanlon qualify for membership in a club like that?

  He knew one thing, though. He'd rather be a vampire
than one of these assholes up here. That was obvious now. Now that the pretenses were dropping away and they didn't even bother talking to him any more. They exploited him and then they shunned him, they used him just like they used the vampires. He'd always known that deep down, of course. But he'd tried to deny it, kept it stifled under years of accommodation and good intentions and misguided efforts to fit in.

  These people were the enemy. They'd always been the enemy.

  And they had him by the balls.

  He spun around and slammed his fist into the examination table. It didn't even hurt. He continued until it did. Panting, knuckles raw and stinging, he looked around for something else to smash.

  The teleop woke up enough to hiss and spark when the chair bounced off its central trunk. One of the arms wiggled spastically for a moment. A faint smell of burnt insulation. Then nothing. Only slightly dented, the teleop slept on above a litter of broken paradigms.

  "Tip for the day," Scanlon snarled at it. "Never trust a dryback."

  * * *

  Head Cheese

  Theme and Variation

  A tremor shivers through bedrock. The emerald grid fractures into a jagged spiderweb. Strands of laser light bounce haphazardly into the abyss.

  From somewhere within the carousel, a subtle discontent. Intensified cogitation. The displaced beams waver, begin realigning themselves.

  Lenie Clarke has seen and felt all of this before. This time she watches the prisms on the seabed, rotating and adjusting themselves like tiny radio-telescopes. One by one the disturbed beams lie back down, parallel, perpendicular, planar. Within seconds the grid is completely restored.

  Emotionless satisfaction. Cold alien thoughts nearby, reverting.

  And further away, something else coming closer. Thin and hungry, like a faint reedy howl in Clarke's mind...

  "Ah, shit," Brander buzzes, diving for the bottom.

  It streaks down from the darkness overhead, mindlessly singleminded, big as Clarke and Brander put together. Its eyes reflect the glow from the seabed. It slams into the top of the carousel, mouth open, bounces away with half its teeth broken.

  It has no thoughts, but Lenie Clarke can feel its emotions. They don't change. Injury never seems to faze these monsters. Its next attack targets one of the lasers. It skids around the roof of the carousel and comes up from underneath, swallowing one of the beams. It rams the emitter, and thrashes.