Year's Best Scifi 5 Part 33

Ari had a.s.signed three groups of exploration machines to a hunt for camp sites. The teams concentrated on depressions that looked as if they had once been rivers and probed for evidence such as stone tools and places where a large number of animal fossils had been concentrated in a small area.

They found two animal deposits within their first three tendays and Ari quickly pointed out that the animals had clearly been disa.s.sembled.

"These aren't just tar pits or places where a catastrophe killed several animals accidentally," Ari argued. "Note how the remains of the different species are all jumbled up. If they had been killed by a rockslide from the surrounding heights-to name just one alternate possibility-the remains of each animal would have tended to stay together. The pattern we're looking at here is the pattern we'd expect to see in a waste pit."

Miniruta tossed her head. "If they were butchered," she said in VA13, "then somebody had to use tools to cut them up. Show us a flint tool, Ari. Show us some evidence of fire."

Machines burrowed and probed in the areas around the "waste pits." Sc.r.a.ping attachments removed the dirt and rock one thin layer at a time. Raking attachments sieved the dust and rubble. Search programs a.n.a.lyzed the images transmitted by the onsite cameras and highlighted anything that met the criteria Ari had stored in the databanks. And they did, in fact, find slivers of flint that could have been knives or spearheads.

Ari had two of the flints laid out on a tray, with a camera poised an arm's length above the objects, and displayed them on one of the wall screens in his apartment. Morgan stared at the tray in silence and let himself surrender to all the eerie, haunting emotions it aroused, even with Ari babbling beside him.

"On Earth," Miniruta pointed out, "we already knew the planet had produced intelligent life. We could a.s.sume specimens like that had been made by intelligent beings because we already knew the intelligent beings existed. But what do we have here, Ari? Can we really believe these objects were shaped by intelligent beings when we still haven't seen anything that resembles hands? So far, you haven'teven located an organism that had arms."

There were other possibilities, of course. Ari had studied most of the ideas about possible alien life forms that humans had come up with in the last few centuries and installed them in the databanks housed in his electronic enhancers. He could produce several plausible examples of grasping organs composed of soft tissue that would only fossilize under rare, limited conditions. The tool makers could have possessed tentacles. They could have used some odd development of their lips.

Miniruta tipped back her head and raised her eyebrows when she heard Ari mention tentacles. The high pitched lilt of her VA13 communicated-once again-the condescension that permeated her att.i.tude toward Ari.

"The cephalopods all lived in the sea, Ari. Our arms evolved from load-bearing legs. I admit we're discussing creatures who evolved in a lower gravity field. But they weren't operating in zero gravity."

"I've thought about that," Ari said. "Isn't it possible some tentacled sea-creatures could have adapted an amphibious lifestyle on the edge of the sea and eventually produced descendants who subst.i.tuted legs for some of their tentacles? On our own planet, after all, some of the land dwellers who lived on the edge of the Earth's oceans eventually produced descendants whose legs had been transformed into fins. With all due respect to your current belief system, Miniruta-our discussions would be significantly more succinct if you weren't trying to discuss serious issues without the benefit of a few well-chosen enhancements. You might see some of the possibilities I'm seeing before I have to describe them to you."

As an adherent of the fourth EruLabi protocol, Miniruta only rejected permanent enhancements that increased her intellectual and physical powers. Temporary enhancements that increased pleasure were another matter. Miniruta could still use a small selection of the s.e.xually enhancing drugs developed in the twenty-first century, in addition to the wines, teas, and inhalants that had fostered pre-pharmaceutical social relations. She and Morgan had already shared several long, elaborately ch.o.r.eographed s.e.xual interludes. They had bathed. They had banqueted. They had reclined on carefully proportioned couches, naked bodies touching, while musicians from a dozen eras had materialized in Miniruta's simulators. The EruLabi s.e.xual rituals had cast a steady, sensuous glow over the entire six decades Morgan had spent with Savela Insdotter. He had resumed their routines as if he had been slipping on clothes that were a.s.sociated with some of the best moments of his life.

They were nearing the end of a particularly satisfactory interlude when Miniruta switched on her information system and discovered she had received a please-view-first message from Ari. "I've been looking over some of the latest finds from one of your random-survey teams," Ari said. "Your idea paid off. They've handed us a fossil that looks like it left traces of soft-bodied tissue in the rocks in front of it-imprints that look like they could have been made by the local equivalent of tentacles. Your team found it in the middle of a depression in that flat area on the top of the main southern plateau-a depression that's so shallow I hadn't even noticed it on the maps."

Miniruta had decided that half her exploration machines would make random searches. Ari and Morgan were both working with intellectual frameworks based on the history of Earth, Miniruta had argued. Morgan was looking at the kinds of sites that had produced fossils on Earth. Ari was looking for traces of hunter-gatherers. "A random process," she had p.r.o.nounced, "should be studied by random probing."

Now her own philosophical bias had apparently given Ari what he had been looking for. Ari would never have ordered one of his machines into the winding, almost invisible depression Miniruta's machine had followed. But that dip in the landscape had once been a river. And the river had widened its path and eroded the ground above a fossil that had formed in the sediment by the bank.

It was a cracked, fragmented sh.e.l.l about a third the length of a human being. Only one side of it had been preserved. But you could still see that it was essentially a tube with a large opening at one end, a smaller opening at the other, and no indications it had openings for legs. In the rock in front of the large opening, Morgan could just make out the outlines of impressions that could have been produced by a group of ropy, soft-bodied extensions.Ari highlighted three spots on the rim of the large opening. "Notice how the opening has indentations on the rim, where the extensions leave it. They aren't very big, but they obviously give the extensions a little more room. I've ordered a search of the databank to see how many other sh.e.l.ls have indentations like that. If there was one creature like this on the planet, there should have been other species built along the same pattern. I'm also taking another look at all the sh.e.l.ls like this we've uncovered in the past. My first pa.s.s through the databank indicates we've found several of them near the places where we found the burial pits."

For Ari, the find proved that it was time to let the solar system know the full truth. He posted a picture of the fossil on the information system an hour after he had notified Morgan and Miniruta. "We now have evidence that creatures with fully developed grasping organs existed on this planet," Ari argued. "The evidence may not be conclusive, but it can't be dismissed either. The people of the solar system have a right to draw their own conclusions. Let them see the evidence we've collected. Let the minority who are resisting stagnation and decline derive hope from the knowledge more evidence may follow."

It had only been eight tendays since Ari had agreed to the compromise Morgan had worked out. Yet he was already demanding that they cancel the agreement.

To Miniruta, the idea was absurd. Ari was suggesting that the forests of Athene had harbored tentacled creatures who had hung from trees and occupied the ecological niches monkeys had appropriated on Earth. And he was jumping from that improbability to the idea that some of these hypothetical creatures had developed weapons and become hunter-gatherers.

"I am not saying anything is true," Ari insisted. "I am merely noting that we now have pits full of butchered animals, tools that could have butchered them, and a type of organism that could have manipulated the tools."

Ari had even developed a scenario that equipped his fantasy creatures with the ability to move along the ground at a pace suitable for hunters. Suppose, he argued, they had begun their advance to intelligence by learning to control some type of riding animal?

To Ari, his proposal was a logical variation on the process that had shaped human intelligence. On Earth, tree dwellers had developed hands that could grasp limbs and brains that could judge distances and trajectories. Then they had adapted the upright posture and used their hands to create stone tools.

Tool use had created a way of life that put a premium on intelligence, the individuals with the best brains had tended to be the survivors, and a creature who could build stars.h.i.+ps had taken its place in the universe.

"On Athene," Ari argued, "the drive toward intelligence may have followed a different course. The tree dwellers couldn't develop upright walking so they began by controlling animals. They became mounted hunters-creatures who could rove like ground animals and manipulate the same simple tools our own ancestors chipped from the rocks. The evolutionary process may take many twists. It may be b.l.o.o.d.y and cruel. But in the end, it gives us planets populated by creatures who are intelligent and conscious. The arrow points in only one direction."

Thirty years from now-perhaps even ten years from now-Morgan's feelings about Miniruta would just be a memory. Morgan knew that. There would come a moment when he would wonder how he could have believed all his pleasure in life depended on the goodwill of another human being. But right now he just knew he wanted to create a crowded memory. Right now he felt as if he had spent the last few decades in a state of half-dead numbness.

He had started playing with his political a.n.a.lysis programs as soon as he had realized Ari was initiating a new round of agitated debate. The situation had looked dangerous to him and the picture that had emerged on his screens had confirmed his intuitive judgment. About 25 percent of the people on the s.h.i.+p believed a report on the new find should be transmitted to the solar system. Almost 30 percent registered strong opposition. The rest of the population seemed to be equally divided betweennot-convinced-we-should and not-convinced-we-shouldn't.

If Ari's first appeals had attracted a solid 40 or 45 percent, Morgan would have given him some extra support and helped him win a quick, overwhelming victory. Instead, the Island of Adventure community had stumbled into one of those situations in which a divisive debate could go on indefinitely.

Morgan was savoring teas with Miniruta when he suggested the one option that looked as if it might defuse the situation.

"I've decided to a.s.sign all my exploration teams to the search for evidence that supports Ari's theories," Morgan said. "I think it would be a wise move if you did the same thing-for awhile anyway.

We're not going to get any peace on this s.h.i.+p until we come up with solid evidence Ari's right. Or make it clear we probably never will."

They had both been speaking Plais-a graceful EruLabi invention that had been designed for the lighter types of social events. Morgan had switched to Jor when he started discussing his proposal and Miniruta transferred to Jor with him.

"You want to divert equipment from all the other research we're doing?" Miniruta said. "As far as I'm concerned, Ari has all the resources he needs. We're producing the first survey of an alien ecosystem.

Why should we interrupt that merely because one member of our expedition has become obsessed with a fantasy?"

The vehemence in her voice caught Morgan off guard. He had thought he was offering her a modest, reasonable proposal. He had run the idea through his political simulation programs and the results had indicated most of the people on the s.h.i.+p would approve a transmission to the solar system if Ari managed to locate more evidence. A minority would never feel happy with the decision-but at least a decision would have been made.

"It shouldn't divert us for more than a few tendays," Morgan said. "We can intensify Ari's hunt for campsites. We can look for a.s.sociations between possible mounts and possible riders. We can ignore the low lying areas for the time being and concentrate on the regions that probably stayed above sea level when Athene had seas. If we do all that and don't come up with something decisive in a few tendays-I think we can a.s.sume we'll get a clear consensus that we shouldn't overrule our current agreement and transmit a message before the next discussion period."

"And what if we find the kind of evidence he's looking for? Do you think Madame Dawne will just nod agreeably? And let us do something that could destroy her?"

"If there's evidence out there to be found-sooner or later we're going to find it. She's going to have to accept that eventually."

Miniruta reached across the tea table and touched his hand. She slipped into Plais just long enough to preface her response with a word that meant something like "pleasure-friend."

"Donilar-even if the evidence is there, will it really do us any good if we find it? Why should we jeopardize our whole way of life just so Ari can give a dying minority group information that will only prolong its agonies?"

Morgan knew he shouldn't have felt as if he had just been ambushed. He had been watching Miniruta for over a century. Everything she had done had proved that the profiling program had been correct when it had decided her personality structure was dominated by a deep need for affiliation. When she had been a.s.sociated with Ari's group, she had maximized her use of enhancements. When she had switched to the other side, she had become a model of EruLabi virtue.

But he was in love. He had surrendered-willingly, for his own reasons-to one of the oldest delusions the human species had invented. And because he was in love, he had let himself ignore something that should have been obvious. Miniruta's dispute with Ari wasn't an argument about the nature of the universe. It was an argument about what human beings should believe about the nature of the universe.

The teas were followed by music. The music was followed by a long, dream-like concentration on the shape and texture of Miniruta's body. And afterward Morgan returned to his apartment and watched his programs churn out scenarios that included a new factor: a woman who believed Ari's world-viewwas a disease that should be eradicated from human society.

Morgan's programs couldn't tell him what Miniruta was going to do. No program could predict all the tactical choices a human brain could choose. But the programs could suggest possibilities. And they could estimate the intensity of Miniruta's responses.

He spotted what she was doing hours after she started doing it. Her "randomly searching" machines occupied one of the prime sites on Ari's list and started sc.r.a.ping and digging just a few hours before Ari's own machines were scheduled to work on it.

Ari called Morgan as soon as he finished his first attempt to "reason" with Miniruta. He still thought Miniruta's program had made a random choice. He still believed she was just being obstinate when she refused to let his machines excavate the site.

"She's got some kind of silly idea she has to stick to her ideal of pure randomness," Ari said. "She's trying to tell me she wouldn't be operating randomly if she let her team go somewhere else."

Morgan agreed to act as a go-between and Miniruta gave him the response he had expected. It was just a random event, she insisted. Why should Ari object? Now he could send his machines to one of the other sites on his list.

"It's one of the big possibilities on his current list," Morgan said. "He thinks he should explore it himself."

"Doesn't he think my machines are competent? Is he afraid they'll spend too much time indulging in sensual pleasures?"

"Ari thinks this is a totally accidental occurrence, Miniruta."

She smiled. "And what does my little donilar think?"

Morgan straightened up and gave her his best imitation of an authority figure. It was the first time she had said something that made him feel she was playing with him.

"I think it would be best if he went on thinking that," he said.

Miniruta's eyes widened. Her right hand fluttered in front of her face, as if she was warding off a blow. "Is that a threat, donilar? After all we have enjoyed together?"

Three daycycles later, Miniruta's machines took over two more sites. Morgan's surveillance program advised him as soon as it happened and he immediately called Ari and found himself confronted with a prime display of outrage.

"She's deliberately interfering," Ari shouted. "This can't be random. She is deliberately trying to destroy the last hope of the only people in the solar system who still have faith in the future. Even you should be able to see that, Morgan-in spite of your chemical reactions to certain types of female bodies."

It was the kind of situation Morgan normally delegated to one of his political operatives. This time there was no way he could slip away gracefully and let someone else handle it. His studies had taught him what the best responses were. He had even managed to apply them on one or two previous occasions.

He let the tirade go on as long as Ari wanted to maintain it. He carefully avoided saying anything that might indicate he was agreeing or disagreeing.

Unfortunately, he was faced with something no one on the s.h.i.+p could have handled. Miniruta had given Ari an opening he had obviously been looking for.

"I agreed to wait until we had a consensus," Ari ranted. "I'm trying to be cooperative. But I think it's time someone reminded your overzealous paramour that there's no practical, physical reason I can't transmit a message to the solar system any time I want to."

Ari's elongated head could make him look slightly comical when he became overexcited. This time it was a visual reminder of the commitment behind his outbursts.

"If you really want to get this situation calmed down, Morgan-I suggest you remind her I still have more supporters than she has. They can all look at what she's been doing at the first site. They can all see her machines are carefully avoiding all the best locations and deliberately moving at the slowest pace they can maintain without stalling. You can tell her she has two choices. She can get her machines out of allthree sites, or she can put them under my control. And after she's done that-I'll send her a list of all the other sites I expect her to stay away from."

Miniruta was standing in the doorway of her ritual chamber. Behind her, Morgan could glimpse the glow of the bra.s.s sculpture that dominated the far end. Miniruta had just finished one of the EruLabi rituals that punctuated her daily schedule. She was still wearing the thin, belted robe she wore during most of the rituals.

Only the night before, in this very room, they had huddled together in the most primitive fas.h.i.+on. They had stretched out on the sleeping platform just a few steps to Morgan's left and he had spent the entire night with his arms wrapped around her body while they slept.

"I've discussed the situation with Ari," Morgan said in Tych. "He has indicated he feels your actions have given him the right to transmit a message without authorization. He believes his supporters will approve such an action."

"And he sent you here to relay something that is essentially another threat."

"It is my belief that was his intention."

"You should tell him he'll be making a serious error. You should tell him it's obvious he thinks no one will resist him."

"I believe it would be accurate to say he believes no one will offer him any high level resistance."

"Then you should tell him his a.s.sumptions need to be revised. Madame Dawne has already armed herself. I obviously can't tell you more than that. But I can tell you she will fight if Ari tries to take control of the communications module. She is already emotionally committed to fighting."

Miniruta smiled. "Is that an informative response? Will that give Ari some evidence he should modify his a.s.sumptions?"

Morgan returned to his apartment and had his fabrication unit manufacture two sets of unarmed probes. The probes were large, c.u.mbersome devices, about the size of a standard water goblet, but he wasn't interested in secrecy. He deployed both sets by hand, from a maintenance hatch, and monitored them on his notescreen while they tractored across the surface area that surrounded the communications module.

His notescreen accepted a call from Miniruta two minutes after the probes had made their fourth find.

"Please do not interfere, Morgan. Madame Dawne has no quarrel with you."

"I've detected four weapons so far. None of them look to me like items Madame Dawne would have deployed on her own."

"Don't underestimate her, Morgan. She believes Ari is threatening her ability to survive."

"I thought Madame Dawne was a dangerous person when we were coping with the course-change controversy. But that was over ten decades ago. She's only been seen twice in the last eight years. The last time her responses were so stereotyped half the people she talked to thought they were dealing with a simulation. I don't know how much personality she has left at this point-but I don't think she could surround the communications module with a defense like this una.s.sisted."

"Ari is threatening the fabric of our community. We made an agreement as a community-a consensus that took every individual's needs into account. Madame Dawne is defending the community against a personality who thinks he can impose his own decisions on it."

Morgan fed the information from his probes into a wargame template and let the program run for over thirteen minutes. It went through four thousand simulations altogether-two thousand games in which Madame Dawne was willing to risk the total annihilation of the s.h.i.+p's community, followed by two thousand possibilities in which she limited herself to ambushes and low-level delaying tactics. Seventy percent of the time, Madame Dawne could keep Ari away from the communications module for periods that ranged from twenty-one daycycles to two hundred daycycles. She couldn't win, but she could force Ari into a sustained struggle.

And that was all she needed to do, according to Morgan's political estimates. Miniruta would gainsome extra support if Ari broke the agreement unilaterally. But neither one of them would have a commanding majority when the fighting began. They would start out with a sixty-forty split in Ari's favor and a drawn out battle would have the worst possible effect: it would intensify feelings and move the split closer to fifty-fifty.

Morgan thought he could understand why people like Ari and Miniruta adapted belief systems. But why did they feel they had to annihilate other belief systems? His profiling programs could provide him with precise numerical descriptions of the emotions that drove the people he modeled. No program could make him feel the emotions himself.

Still, for all his relentless obsession with the Doctrine of the Cosmic Enterprise, Ari was always willing to listen when Morgan showed him the charts and graphs he had generated with his programs. Ari was interested in anything that involved intellectual effort.

"I think we can a.s.sume Miniruta isn't going to budge," Morgan reported. "But I have a suggestion you may want to consider."

"I'd be astonished if you didn't," Ari said.

"I think you should send your own machines to the sites she's occupying and have them attempt to carry out your plans. My profiling program indicates there's a high probability she'll attempt to interfere with you. As you can see by the numbers on chart three, the public reaction will probably place you in a much stronger political position if she does."

Ari turned his attention to the chart displayed on the bottom half of his screen and spent a full third of a minute studying it-a time span that indicated he was checking the logic that connected the figures.

"The numbers are convincing," Ari said in Tych. "But I would appreciate it if you would tell me what your ultimate objective is."