The Depths of Time (19 page)

But the worst of it was this: A man like Fribart would dare imagine such things only after he started to believe, subconsciously at least, that there was no hope outside of desperation and magic.

If even men like Fribart were starting to think that way, then, it seemed to Parrige, things could not hold together very much longer.

“
It
’
s quite a terrible stink, isn
’
t it?
”
the biotechnician asked, his voice apologetic. He stood on the moldering pier and looked down at the greasy green water of Lake Virtue, a body of water that wasn
’
t remotely near living up to its name.

The slope of the shore was very gentle at this end, and the pier wasn
’
t long enough to get out toward really deep water. The pier
’
s boardwalk was all of a meter above the lake surface, and probably the water below it was no more than a meter and a half deep. But no one would wish to get closer to that water than necessary.

“
No worse than I expected,
”
Neshobe Kalzant replied. She turned to Parrige, a step or two behind her on the pier.
“
Though you
’
ll agree that
’
s not saying the smell is pleasant.
”

“
That much is certain,
”
Parrige replied. Dead fish, decaying vegetation, a rotten-egg stench—far from the most enjoyable of bouquets. He certainly felt no desire to experience it any longer than he had to.

“
It was worse a month ago, if you can imagine that,
”
said the biotech. Parrige concentrated for a moment on the pro forma introductions at the brief ceremony when their ajrcar had landed. Milos Vandar. That was the fellow
’
s name. He was an amiable-looking sort of chap, tall and thin, long-faced, with an impressive hook nose that could have looked sinister if the man
’
s expression had not been so open and friendly. He had nondescript brown eyes, and brown hair that had obviously been ferociously combed down into place for their arrival. By now, twenty minutes later, it was already wandering out of control, back to what was obviously its customary state: drifting into Vandar
’
s eyes and starting to stick up around his ears.

“
Mind you,
”
Vandar went on,
“
it doesn
’
t
look
any better than it did back then. Not at this shore. Not yet. But it
does
smell better here—or at least less bad. We
’
re definitely registering improvement.
”

Improvement.
There was a word Parrige had heard but rarely in recent times—and it was the word they had come in search of. He stepped forward a trifle and looked at the greasy water a bit more closely.

“
So you
’
re turning it around,
”
Neshobe suggested.

Vandar shrugged, then squatted at the end of the pier, staring out at the greasy green scum on the water.
“
I suppose you could put it that way. Lake Virtue is so far down there
’
s not much place to go but up. If there
is
any way to go down from here, I don
’
t want to know about it. But yes, we
’
ve got some nice clear positive upticks. Oxygen levels, water clarity, populations of desirable species. We
’
re getting there.
”

“
That
’
s what we
’
re here to hear,
”
Neshobe said.

Or, more accurately, that’s what we’re here to be seen hearing,
Parrige thought, glancing toward the infostream service techs on the shore. The point of the exercise was to have Neshobe Kalzant shown in connection with an ecological recovery project. It almost didn
’
t matter
which
project. At least it wasn
’
t an act. Madam Kalzant was genuinely, even urgently, interested in the recovery program. He watched as she knelt at the very edge of the pier, staring intently at the green sludge below as the biotech explained something or other.

With Neshobe
’
s back turned, Parrige half-instinctively took advantage of the moment to move back from the edge of the pier, and a bit closer to the shore. He had never much cared for open water, particularly water this foul. Fribart, who, it would seem, believed even less in the lake
’
s virtues, waited on land, standing on the path leading to the dock, the news-service reporters standing behind him.

The wind shifted for a moment, blowing a particularly pungent gust of rancid lake air right into the knot of reporters. It was almost worth the inconvenience of the trip to see Fri bait
’
s expression at that moment.

But there were other matters to deal with. He turned back toward Neshobe and Vandar at the end of the pier.
“
So what went wrong?
”
Parrige asked, moving a cautious step or two back toward the pier
’
s end.

“
Classic socks-in-the-soup infestation,
”
Vandar said.

“
I beg your pardon?
”
Parrige asked.

“
Sorry,
”
said Vandar.
“
That
’
s our slang term for it. Introduction of an uncontrolled organism. Someone drops their dirty socks with who-knows-what bacteria on them into the soup, the environment, and the bacteria start in growing. The introduced organism doesn
’
t have any natural enemies or internal kill switches, so it
’
s hard to repress, never mind eliminate.
”

Neshobe nodded thoughtfully, but Parrige was not much better off for having received that explanation.
“
I
’
m sorry,
”
he said,
“
but I don
’
t know what a kill switch is.
”

“
You should,
”
Neshobe said.
“
There
’
s only one species of life-form allowed on this planet without one, and you
’
re it.
”

“
I beg your pardon?
”
Parrige said, more confused than ever, and now even a trifle alarmed.
“
Should I have one?
”

“
It
’
s not you personally who doesn
’
t have one,
”
Vandar said, smiling.
“
It
’
s all of us. Humans. We
’
re the only species legally allowed on-planet without having at least one, and generally two or three, genetically engineered kill switches inserted into our DNA.
”

“
Every other authorized species on-planet has some sort of booby trap built in,
”
Neshobe explained.
“
Something that will respond to a certain stimulus by inducing death. Some way we can kill some or all of a species in a given area without having to kill anything else. Usually a very specific artificial toxin, but it can be anything from tuned hypersonics to a particular frequency of coherent light. Whatever the switch is, if it turns out we
’
ve made a mistake, and the species isn
’
t right for whatever niche it
’
s in, we can undo the mistake.
”

“
But there
’
s always something that gets in that isn
’
t supposed to,
”
Vandar went on, obviously quite unmindful that he was interrupting the planetary leader.
“
A bacterium that comes in on some spacecraft that doesn
’
t get a proper decontamination, some vermin or another that hides out in a food shipment, some damn fool pet someone smuggles in. Something. And one of those somethings is the species of algae that
’
s infested this lake. There
’
s nothing in this lake that
’
s willing to eat it.

“
But the real problem is that by now it
’
s embedded itself in the local ecosystem. It
’
s too well established. There
’
s no longer any way to eradicate it without killing everything else in the lake and the surrounding countryside. And even if we did that, it
’
s probably hitchhiked on a bird or two by now, or else traveled via windborne transmission, or even had itself carried up in convected water that
’
s already rained down somewhere else. Which means either it already has or it probably will spread from here to other lakes and rivers and so on. We have to assume that, from here on in, it
’
s part of the planet
’
s ecology, and we have to figure out ways to live with it.
”

“
What have you brought in to control it?
”
Neshobe asked.

“
Nothing too fancy. We sent samples of the algae and the water and so on up to Greenhouse, and they managed to locate several organisms they had on file that
’
d happily eat the algae in question. Two looked like reasonable fits into the local ecosystem, with minor modifications. Greenhouse modified the candidate organisms, ran mathematical simulations and real-life trials, and confirmed the fix would work. The modified rotifers and microshrimp will eat the algae and won
’
t overbreed themselves. Greenhouse bred up a stock of the new species and shipped them to us. We
’
ve started introduction at the south end of Virtue, and everything seems to be going well.

We
’
ll let the first
introduction run another week or so, and then perform wholesale introductions into the entire lake and connected waterbeds. And, of course, we have the needed mods of the microshrimp and the rotifers on file if we get another outbreak.
”

“
Excellent,
”
Neshobe said.
“
First-class work all the way.
”
She stood up, turned her back on the lake, and headed back toward Fribart and the newspeople. The whole point of the operation was to have them see her here, to have them report back to the people at large that Neshobe Kalzant was there on the scene, learning all about the latest and most advanced techniques for rebuilding the Solacian climate. It would tell her people that she was doing something positive—and that something positive was being done. A good morale booster, and a good way to improve her image, which had gotten a bit roughed up in recent days.

Certainly such staged events were far from new in the world of politics, but they had never been seen before on Solace. Before Neshobe Kalzant, politics and government hadn
’
t been particularly public.

But now the public was paying attention. Neshobe understood the importance of playing to the public, of putting her story before them. Thus today
’
s visit to a malodorous lake. Parrige had set the whole thing up himself— and had done so, needless to say, over Fribart
’
s vehement objections, on any number of grounds. It was his first venture into political theater, and, modest though the effort might have been, it had gone well. He was pleased with the result, and was already thinking ahead to what might be done next.

But there was another part of him that was less than satisfied. He stepped to one side to let Neshobe pass, and then fell into step with Vandar as the scientist followed her toward the press. Parrige put a hand on Vandar
’
s arm, holding him back just a trifle, slowing him down.
“
It all sounds very good,
”
he said.
“
But this
is
just one medium-sized lake with one relatively simple, even routine problem.
”

“
What of it?
”
Vandar asked, his voice
”
as cheerful and open as his face.

“
Well, I have two questions, actually. It took a fairly large effort, and extensive resources, for you to be able to solve this problem. Does it always take that much time and effort to compensate for an algae infestation?
”

“
Sometimes,
”
Vandar said carefully.
“
Sometimes it
’
s a lot easier. But, on balance, I
’
d have to admit that this was a comparatively simple fix. There have been lots of others we
’
ve put more time in on.
”

“
And there could easily be more and bigger problems in future. One only a bit more complex than this one could absorb all of your people
’
s time and attention for an extended period. Even overwhelm you completely. Or you could just be caught by the fact that a planet is a big place. You could easily miss a crisis as big as this one, or even bigger.
”

“
Right again,
”
Vandar said.
“
We
have
missed crises worse than this. Plenty of times. We
’
re only now getting good at detecting them early on.
”
They had come to the end of the pier, and paused there.
“
What
’
s your other problem?
”