The Children Star (14 page)

“Is there is a better credit risk in the whole Fold than Proteus Unlimited? Let your own servos calculate.”

“Would I have come, had they not? Let's get to the point,
Shon
sib. What will you do with Spirilla once you've got it?”

Nibur shrugged. “My firm is maturing. It's time to diversify.”

Verid gave him a sharp look. They both knew well enough what he intended.

“Diversify?” echoed Iras. “Mining and farming?”

“Farming, yes. You must admit,” said Nibur, “that we need better ways to settle Iota Pavonis Three.” He always preferred the planet's original designation instead of its common name, sentimental in its reference to its living creatures. After all, life never occupied more than the outermost scum of a world. Better to name a planet for its major features and its greatest resources—say, Planet Lanthanide. “Yes, better ways to colonize. The latest news from that deadly planet makes it clear.”

Iras shuddered delicately. “A tragedy.”

“But isn't the real tragedy that honest immigrants cannot live there?”

“There are settlements. Lifeshaped settlements,” added Iras, with a look at Verid, the great advocate of lifeshaping human settlers.

“You can't call them real settlements,” Nibur pointed out. “Not until the settlers start giving birth.” No colonist had yet borne a child live on Prokaryon; the chemistry of development was too delicate. Even those lifeshaped from birth had to travel off-world to carry an infant to term. There was no such thing as a native Prokaryan.

“Not yet,” agreed Iras, “though in a generation or two—”

“They'll get it right someday—at what cost? Do you know how much it costs now to lifeshape every one of them, even the babies? And then to manage their pregnancies later? No more than a handful of L'liites will ever settle there.”

“It's true,” said Verid suddenly. “That is what science is for. Our scientists work day and night to solve these problems.”

Privately Nibur did not care much about L'liites. They would be better off today, had the creeping pruned their numbers several centuries before, for fewer people would be left, with less irreparable damage to their biosphere. But Iras had a soft spot for L'liites, along with guilt at having made her fortune on their loans. Nibur lowered his voice. “What harm is there in cleansing just a part of Pavonis Three—a continent, let us say.”

Iras paused, not looking at Verid. “A lot of L'liites could live there. The native species would have three other continents, plus the ocean.”

“The native flora of Pavonis Three are remarkably uniform,” Nibur pointed out. “The Spirilla continent, for example, supports only a thousand major species, all found elsewhere on Iota Pavonis Three. The few exceptions will be transplanted.”

“The weather, too, is remarkably uniform,” added Iras. “Our tests show that the ocean will buffer the other continents, which will not experience severe effects.”

“Hundreds of millions of settlers could lease farmland,” said Nibur. “Mining productivity could rise tenfold or a hundredfold.”

“In fact, the value of all of our holdings anywhere on the planet will shoot straight up.”

“Iras,” said Verid quietly.

Iras tossed her head and took a deep breath. “You know, I can't leave your creation without exploring a bit down the ‘shore.' If you'll excuse me,
Shon
sib . . .” She swirled her train around in a wide arc through the waters and strolled outward, leaning over to inspect a shell or a bit of seaweed.

Nibur took a step toward Verid, the black light shimmering down his talar. Verid watched him, her shoulders slightly hunched, her eyes wide, thoughtful. “Transplanted,” she repeated.

“We'll hire all the best ecoengineers.” She must know she lacked the votes, he told himself, or she would not have designed to come. She must know she could not stop him—and her own lovesharer would finance it. The triumph was too sweet.

Still, never underestimate the Owl. If a way could be found to stall him, she would find it. What would be her move?

“The weather is uniform,” mused Verid, as if to herself. “The planet is indeed well managed.”

With a shrug Nibur picked up a stick of driftwood and tossed it to Banga. “The Honorable Secretary herself signed the declaration that Pavonis lacks intelligent native life.”

“ ‘Intelligent life.' You mean, fast-talking bipeds with ten fingers.”

What was she getting at, he wondered. Could she really try to resurrect all those “alien intelligence” rumors? “Ten fingers would help,” he said ironically. “At least they could make sign language.”

“There once was a great creature that dwelt in the deep, its ten fingers each longer than ten men stretched on end. Where lies that creature now?”

“Surely the Secretary will not call me to task for a dead creature on a world long gone? Every world has its share of extinctions. Even your blessed Sharers caused mass extinctions.”

“It is said, no life exists outside
The Web.”

“No life escapes death, either.” Nibur looked down at the foot of her talar. “Watch out there.”

A jellyfish with its poison tendrils had washed onto her hem. She shook it off, forgetting the illusion.

Nibur gave a low chuckle. “So much for nature's creatures. Look”—he spread his arms—“I enjoy nature as much as anyone. But what difference does it make to us whether a dead creature exists or not, on a world many light-years away?”

“You play with your toys,” she said with anger.

“Honorable Secretary, excuse me,” he said, bowing again. “We are considering a proposal to settle millions of starving L'liites on a free world. Humans with vital needs—and souls, remember. We Elysians needn't worry to keep body and soul together. How dare we put the needs of some mythical creature above our own humankind?”

Verid moved closer to him, until her small round face was staring up into his own, uncomfortably near. “You don't care about humankind. You only want to own that planet. You will buy and kill, until you've got it.”

Nibur's mind raced. How could she know of his secret agreements? Of course not; but she would guess. Elysians knew each other only too well, after centuries spent outwitting each other.

“What will you do with it?” she demanded. “What will you do once you've got it?”

“Now, now. Trade secrets, remember.” He paused. What could it matter; she knew what he wanted. “My creations
require materials. The history of man is the ascent of machines; the rise of ever-greater devices to serve our desire.”

“The history of man is the contest between the enslavers and those who set free.”

“Precisely. And I set men free—free from the limits of their flesh.”

“By enslaving ‘the other.' So what if their flesh is nanoplast?”

“By applying our intellect to inanimate objects.”

Verid shrugged. “Different words.”

Nibur paused. “Did it ever occur to you, that with the capabilities
we
provide them, our devices could become
our
masters? If machines are human, then we humans are finished, because the machine has no physical limits.”

“Life is more than physical limits. There is . . . humanity.”

“I offer humanity the choice: Let machines be machines. If machines are our tools, nothing more, then humans are unlimited.”

“A choice, you say? And what gives
you
the right to that choice?”

Nibur lost patience. “Why ask me? Why not ask the universe what gives it the right to throw an asteroid at a living world every hundred million years? The last one that hit Pavonis killed all but the microbes,” he said with contempt. “Why shouldn't humans use a world as we choose? Are we not worth more than an asteroid?”

“Are we not?” Above her head the gulls circled with their cries, and the sea breeze keened. Then abruptly she turned and left, disappearing through the black doorway, her train shrinking down to nothing.

A
s promised, Khral met them in the morning at the brainless old lightcraft. Rod carried Gaea into the craft, while Khral carried one of the travel bags, with 'jum holding her hand. He winced to see the battered console; somehow it looked even worse, with another adult to see it. As the hatch closed behind them, he hoped the craft would not treat his guest too badly.

Above the holostage, the hull of Station receded into darkness.

“This is the only place I could talk,” Khral said suddenly. “Station told us to shut up, lest reporters hear. And Station hears everything.” She shuddered. “Rod, those microzoöids grew, all right—slowly, but they're growing, even ‘triplicating' now and then. And yes, they flash prime numbers.”

“So Sarai was right.”

“Yes.”

“But that's great, isn't it? Now you can grow the ones from the singing-trees, and decode them somehow.”

“Rod—these micros are different. They're a different species altogether from the ones in the singing-trees. You see, now?
Where do they come from?”

He frowned, puzzled. Then he remembered. “They grow . . . in tumbleround tissue.”

“Now you see why our fieldwork will change.”

For a moment his skin crawled. Then he relaxed. “So be it. Tumblerounds are no strangers to us; I'd still be glad to help out. But why not let the reporters hear?”

“Station says all hell would break loose. Half the reporters would condemn us for trying to influence the vote in the Secretariat—to quash the ‘partial terraforming,' so that Iras can't make the deal with Nibur. The other half would descend on Prokaryon—and the tumblerounds are unpredictable, not studied for years like the singing-trees.”

Politics again. Rod shook his head. “You can't hide the truth.”

“I know, but . . .” Khral bit her lip. “We were so sure about the singing-trees. Now, who will believe us about tumblerounds? We need better data.”

The craft was coming in faster than usual, Rod thought, and the scream of the plasma sounded uneven. On the holostage, he saw with alarm that they were headed ominously near the end of the brokenhearts, where the field met the forest.

As they approached the ground, the floor swayed up and down beneath their feet. Gaea laughed at first, then started to shriek as the craft swayed harder. With one final jolt the craft landed, at a crazy angle up against a singing-tree.

No one was hurt, but the door half faced the tree. It
took all Rod's strength to force it open; then he had to jump down to the ground outside. Khral handed each of the children down, first screaming Gaea, then stoical 'jum. Then at last Rod helped Khral jump down. “I'm so sorry,” he said. “I don't think that craft will make it back up again.”

“No problem; Quark will fetch me up.” She glanced frankly at the craft, then at him. “Take care of those children, Brother Rod.”

So this was the Children Star, thought 'jum. Brother Rod was still her god of death and life; but like most gods, he did not keep all his promises. He had promised no more sickness; yet day after day she had been sick to her stomach from all the strange potions of the machines in this prison-palace, where unheard-of riches combined with unending tortures. She still dreamt at night of her mother, whole and well, come to fetch her home again. But lately the dreams had dulled, and sometimes she could not remember what her mother looked like.

The only family 'jum had left was the family of numbers. The prison-palace offered numbers and patterns of numbers beyond imagining. Lately 'jum had learned something called a transform that could turn the patterns inside out. On the lightcraft, while Brother Rod was preoccupied, 'jum had tried to talk to the holostage. “Show me the transform of four dots in a square,” she had demanded. This lightcraft did not answer, however; it was as stupid as most people. So 'jum crossed her eyes and thought out the transform for herself. It would have concentric circles of light, tiled with little squares.

When the door opened at last, 'jum fell out into another world. This world had a fresh, fragrant smell to it, almost
like the old days when her mother had a kitchen to bake in. Something wet trickled down her cheek; she wiped it off hastily and dug her fists deep into her pockets.

The bright light made her squint at first. But then, the loopleaves and whirling birds and distant forests, all came alive—
alive
, not just shapes of light on a holostage. Real earth, full of things to catch your feet. Brother Rod was running ahead to pick up little Gaea, who already had fallen over herself. With his back turned, 'jum's pockets soon filled with pebbles.

In the distance two great beasts came lumbering up a trail, their ears sticking out straight as street signs. They looked like llamas, with ridiculously outsized hooves. An older girl called Haemum stepped down from one of them, crying out to Brother Rod. Like Mother Artemis, Haemum spoke 'jum's language with an odd accent, but 'jum could understand most of it. Some great creature was looking in at a window, Haemum said.