Richard Russo

by Ship of Fools

  “What?”

  “Evil.”

  He gave me that faint smile again. “Like unwashed flesh and bodily wastes.”

  With that, he started back along the corridor, and I followed.

  37

  “WE cannot continue in this way,” the bishop declared, his gaze slowly sweeping the long table and the twenty-four other people who sat around it. Instead of an Executive Council meeting, the bishop had requested a session of the full Planning Committee. It was a gamble. The rules were different, the dynamics uncertain—no one could count on committee member votes. Although the Executive Council could override any vote or action taken by the Planning Committee as a whole (the Executive Council formed a third of the Planning Committee, but acted independently as well), they would need seven votes out of eight to do so.

  I was sitting with Maria Vegas and Dr. G. in chairs set back from the table. We were there primarily to answer questions, but it was also understood that we could participate in any aspect of the discussion, as long as we did not abuse that privilege. The eight Executive Council members sat together at one end of the table, Nikos at the head. Then there was a gap the size of an empty seat on each side, and the other members of the Planning Committee occupied the remainder of the table.

  “The exploration of the alien starship must end now,” the bishop continued. “Before there are further casualties.”

  No one objected to his argument, but no one spoke out to support it, either. Caution all around. When it became clear that even the bishop was not going to take it any further unless pushed, I spoke up.

  “The bishop says we cannot continue this way. I would agree with that much. But I would also argue that we can’t abandon the alien ship. There are two reasons. First, there is the possibility of other human survivors like the old woman. I find it incredible to believe that on that entire ship, with large sections habitable for human beings, there was only one person aboard. If there are others on board that ship right now, and we abandon them, we are responsible for their deaths.”

  Again there was no response, as if everyone was content to let me and the bishop argue the issue between us—possibly they were afraid of the responsibility for any decisions. But I could feel the tension gradually increasing throughout the room as people sensed the building confrontation.

  “Before I respond to your point,” the bishop said, “what is the second reason?”

  “The alien starship is far too important to be left behind. There has never been anything like it. It’s the greatest discovery the Argonos has ever made, and possibly the greatest discovery anyone has ever made in human history. Its potential value is unlimited. We have no way of knowing what we might find.”

  The bishop sighed heavily. “Not everyone would agree with your characterization of ‘greatness.’ But that aside, we do know what we have found. Evil. Death. And one tortured soul. There is nothing to suggest we will ever find anything more than that.” He shrugged. “And that is my response to both of your points.”

  “There is plenty to suggest we will find more than that,” I said. “The alien starship is so large, it holds months, if not years, of exploration. That’s daunting, perhaps, but it’s also exhilarating. Leave it all behind? If we abandon it now, the odds are—if you will excuse the expression—astronomical against its ever being found again.”

  The bishop smiled slyly, without looking directly at me. “Oh, it will be found again. It wants to be found.”

  “What do you mean by that?” asked Costino.

  But the bishop only shook his head and would not reply. I knew what he meant, but I wasn’t going to explain it either.

  Silence hung in the room. I waited, hoping someone else would venture into the discussion—preferably taking my side, of course. If the debate remained between the bishop and me, I knew I would lose.

  I could sense Maria and Dr. G. shifting in their seats beside me, but neither spoke up. Just as well, I thought. I needed support from outside sources. But I needed something.

  The bishop was leaning back in his chair with a sense of satisfaction, and I had just decided I couldn’t wait any longer, when Alexandra Malfi, the chair of the Planning Committee, spoke.

  “We should carefully consider what Bartolomeo has said. For both of his reasons, but primarily the possibility of other survivors. He is right about one thing. If there are any, and we abandon that ship, we are abandoning them. If they die, we are responsible.”

  “But if we leave, we would never know either way,” Costino said.

  “Does that make it okay? That we wouldn’t know if we’d left anyone to die?”

  “That’s not what I meant,” Costino said defensively.

  “Then what did you mean?”

  “I was just pointing out that there is no way for us to know. We could spend the rest of our lives searching for survivors that don’t exist. When do we stop?”

  Toller spoke up. “We certainly don’t stop right after finding one survivor. That makes no sense at all.”

  “Perhaps it’s like Schro¨dinger’s Cat,” the bishop said with an amused expression. “As long as we don’t look for them, as long as we don’t explore any more of the alien ship, then there’s no one really there. Or if they are there, they are neither dead nor alive. Finding them could be the worst thing for them.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?” asked a man named Wexler. “What’s Schro¨dinger’s Cat?”

  Cardenas answered, shaking her head. “The bishop misunderstands it, either deliberately or through ignorance. I won’t speculate on which.” The bishop’s expression hardened. “It’s an ancient, theoretical paradox suggested by quantum theory,” she added. “First, it’s theoretical, as I said, and probably has no actual application in the physical world. Second, it’s completely irrelevant to the discussion. It has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not there are any more people on that ship, and nothing to do with whether they are alive or dead.”

  I was afraid someone was going to ask her to explain it, anyway, but thankfully no one did. The bishop leaned forward as if to say something, then thought better of it. He settled back in his chair, eyelids lowered, his expression not at all softened.

  “Let’s get back to it.” This was said by Renata Tyler, a dark-haired woman blind in one eye from a wild bird attack in one of the nature rooms when she was a child. “While I have sympathy with Bartolomeo and others concerning the possibility of survivors, there are some important considerations. Even if we assume there are other survivors, and I suspect that’s actually unlikely, how much are we willing to pay to search for them? Look at the cost so far.” She looked down at her hand screen. “Six dead, and another ten or twelve with severe psychological problems. All to save one woman who has lost her mind and may never recover. At that rate, we’ll have half the population of the Argonos dead or deranged in another year, and we’ll have rescued a few dozen traumatized men and women who will need to be cared for the rest of their lives.”

  A few people laughed, but most realized Renata was essentially serious. I could feel Maria getting angry beside me, could sense her trying to keep her anger under control. She stood and spoke, her voice tight but steady.

  “We also might find a section with a hundred survivors tomorrow, if we go back in. We have to take that into consideration as well.”

  The dynamics in the room shifted, and several people started talking at once. Suddenly everyone wanted in.

  I sat silently in my chair for the next hour as the discussion and arguments swirled back and forth and all around. For a long time it didn’t seem that any one point of view was dominant, but during the last part of that hour I began to sense a subtle coalescing of opinion—most people wanted to stay and continue searching for more survivors; but the majority of those who wanted to stay also felt the risks and dangers were too great, and the possible benefits did not outweigh the probable costs.

  I had to get back into the discussion before it was too
late. I’d been hoping it wouldn’t come to this, but I’d known it probably would. I stood and waited for the talking to subside as the committee members turned to look at me.

  “I have a proposal to make,” I finally said. There must have been something in my voice because I could sense a palpable intensifying of their attention.

  As I stood there preparing to speak, I wondered at how much had changed in the last year. Before, these same people would have been listening to me, but only to gauge what Nikos was thinking and planning, to assess the political currents and to aid their own ambitions. Now, I felt certain that many of them were listening to me with a genuine interest in what I had to say. It was different for me, too. My proposal was coming from me, from what I believed, and not simply to achieve some subtle (or even unsubtle) manipulation of people and actions.

  “A full-scale, comprehensive exploration of the alien starship is beyond our capabilities,” I began. “We do not have the time, or the human and physical resources necessary to do it properly. But I will reiterate what I passionately believe—that the alien starship is too important to abandon. I’ve already explained why, and more than once.”

  I paused, looking around the room. “There is also the question of more survivors. But that, too, is problematic. Even if we could agree that it was worthwhile to spend more time searching, it is clear that we can’t agree on how to decide when we have done enough.”

  “We have already done enough,” the bishop interjected.

  “So you’ve said,” I replied. “But there is no universal agreement about that.”

  “Give us your damn proposal,” Costino demanded.

  “All right,” I said. “We leave, but we take the alien ship with us.”

  That set them off. For five minutes the meeting room was a demented, disorganized chorus of voices. Finally Nikos stood, and held up his hands until the babble faded.

  “There will be plenty of time for . . . discussion,” he said. “Later. For now, let’s hear from Bartolomeo, let him explain what it is he’s suggesting.”

  I nodded my thanks. “Just what I said. We take the alien ship with us.” I paused for a moment, organizing my thoughts. “I don’t know how, but I’m fairly certain it can be done. We would ask the experts—Cardenas and her crew, I’d say. Tether it to us with cables, maybe. The details aren’t important at the moment—”

  “The details are always important,” someone interrupted.

  “They will be important, but not right now. For the moment, let’s assume it can be done. The question becomes, To what purpose?”

  “As I said, we don’t have the resources for a thoroughgoing exploration of the alien starship. But it needs to be done. It must done, or too much will be lost. What we do, then, is take it with us so someone else, someone who does have the time and resources, can do it properly.” I paused again, looking around at everyone. “We need to rediscover civilization.”

  I was surprised by the restraint, by the rapt attention. There was some squirming, and I could sense the struggle within a few people to refrain from throwing questions at me.

  I sensed Nikos’s excitement and anticipation. Cardenas was nodding to herself, both waiting for me to continue and, I knew, trying to work out the logistics of taking the alien ship with us. And Bishop Soldano steamed silently, his half-closed eyes radiating something close to hatred.

  “There are worlds out there,” I said, gesturing expansively with my right hand, “worlds we haven’t seen in centuries, if ever. Worlds with millions, billions of people, huge thriving cities of advanced civilization, powered by wonders of technology, and with the resources to explore the alien starship in a way we never can. All we need to do is find one of those worlds.”

  “Yes,” the bishop said, nodding and smiling. “That should be an easy task.”

  Someone snickered, but choked it off quickly. No one was really sure where this was going to end.

  “No,” I said, “it won’t be easy. But there must be a way. There must be records somewhere in this ship. The Argonos must have visited worlds or systems like that in the past. If nothing else, it had to have been built in orbit around one those worlds, if not Earth itself.”

  Before the bishop could interrupt, I turned to him and held up a hand. “I know what Bishop Soldano claims—that the Argonos has always existed. Presumably created outside of time in some way and disconnected from Earth.” I shook my head. “But none of us really believes that. I’m fairly certain the bishop himself doesn’t believe it.”

  The bishop surged up from his chair. “You!” he roared. “I have had enough from you! Now you presume to tell me, tell all of us, what I believe. I will not have it!”

  I’d gone too far. His arms trembled, his hands gripped the edge of the table; his skin was flushed and sweating. I had to do something.

  I bowed my head once, then said, “I apologize, Bishop. I was out of line—” I hesitated, not sure what else to say. Saying too much could be just as bad as saying too little. “I apologize.” I left it at that.

  He remained standing a long time, glaring at me. Neither of us had good options. He could walk out of the meeting, but that would be dangerous for him; he needed to know what occurred, he needed to see and hear it; he needed to be there to try to influence the outcome. As for me, I could do no more than I had. And I still had to complete my presentation. I wasn’t backing down now, and I couldn’t afford to appear as if I had any hesitations. The bishop would leap on any sign of weakness.

  The silence and the tension stretched out until at last the bishop breathed deeply once and nodded. “All right, Bartolomeo.” He slowly lowered himself back into his chair. “I will accept your apology. But that doesn’t mean I accept your absurd notions, your ridiculous proposal.”

  Okay, I thought. Standoff. I turned to Toller. “August. You’re the ship historian. You know our records. What do they tell us about what I’m looking for?”

  The old man slowly shook his head. “They are incomplete. Or rather, they are complete only for the last two hundred seventy-three years. That is when they began. We have nothing before that.”

  “Two hundred seventy-three years?” I repeated. “That’s all?”

  Toller nodded.

  “Why? The Argonos has been around much longer than that. It’s understood. According to the bishop, it’s been around forever.”

  “Something happened,” Toller said.

  “What?”

  Toller shrugged. “A plague that went through the Argonos. Most of you have heard about it. In itself it should not have caused such . . . devastation. But people got scared, and many went mad. That time came be to be called the Repudiation.”

  I’d heard the name, a few stories, but I’d never been sure it was more than a myth. No one seemed to care much about it; it had occurred so long ago. I’d imagined mobs of diseased people tearing through the corridors of the Argonos, burning everything they could find, destroying machinery, defacing walls, screaming at everyone they saw.

  “Before it had run its course, the plague killed almost a third of the population of the Argonos. The Church was blamed by some. God by others. The ship, captain, and crew by still others. The Church managed to protect itself, but several factions of scared and maddened people took over the Argonos for a short time. Only a few weeks, but long enough to disable much of the ship’s infrastructure, and purge the ship’s logs and navigational records. When the crew regained control of the Argonos, most functions were restored, but the logs and other records were never recovered.”

  He leaned on his cane and adjusted his position. “Before that, there was no official ship History. The only official records were the ship’s logs.” He sighed heavily, shaking his head. “But they were all destroyed. Which is why the History was begun, to provide an alternate record should anything like that occur again.”

  Someone spoke up, asking the question I was about to ask myself. “Couldn’t the ship History be destroyed as easily as the ship�
��s logs?”

  Toller smiled. “There are too many copies made, distributed and hidden throughout the ship, in various formats. Even I don’t know how many, or who has them. Some would always survive.”

  “But there is nothing in these that can help us,” I said.

  Toller shook his head. “That’s not quite true. There is an Appendix to the History, recorded summaries of what the early historians remembered or had been told about the decades and centuries that preceded the beginning of the official History. It makes for fascinating reading, particularly the discussions of the Repudiation and the years leading up to it, but by its nature the Appendix is fragmentary, anecdotal, sketchy in parts. There are, however, several references to just what you want, Bartolomeo. Star systems with populated worlds, interplanetary transportation, political and social networks. But when we encountered those systems, those worlds, we never stayed long. We were looking for isolated outposts, colonial settlements, lost missions. More importantly, there is no navigational data in the Appendix. There are planetary and system names, but no locational coordinates. The historians are not navigators. Only the ship’s logs would have the information needed to locate any of those worlds.”

  I closed my eyes, thinking. “And the ship’s logs were all destroyed?” I asked. I opened my eyes and turned to Cardenas for confirmation. She nodded.

  “Toller is correct. They were all destroyed.”

  “But we still have the star charts, right?” I wasn’t giving up. “We don’t navigate blindly, the charts still exist with all the coordinates.”

  “But no names,” Cardenas said. “All named references were deleted except Earth’s. We’ve gone back to Earth, many years ago, and there was nothing there. We have names without coordinates, and coordinates without names.” She paused and sighed. “The Repudiators did a very thorough job. Navigators have worked with Toller and previous historians, trying to match the names and references in the History to what we have in charts . . .” She shook her head. “We’ve never been able to do it.”