T. K. F. Weisskopf - Cosmic Tales II-Adventures in Far Futures

COSMIC TALES II

ADVENTURES IN FAR FUTURES

Edited by

T.K.F. Weisskopf

This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are

fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.

A Baen Books Original

Baen Publishing Enterprises

P.O. Box 1403

Riverdale, NY 10471

www.baen.com

ISBN: 0-7434-9887-9

Cover art by Bob Eggleton

First printing, February 2005

Distributed by Simon & Schuster

1230 Avenue of the Americas

New York, NY 10020

Production by Windhaven Press, Auburn, NH

Printed in the United States of America

Dedication:

For the next generation,

Katie, Max, Peyton & Jackson

Hannah & Owen

And, of course, for that great explorer

Grandma Vera

BAEN BOOKS edited by T.K.F. WEISSKOPF

Tomorrow Sucks (with Greg Cox)

Tomorrow Bites (with Greg Cox)

Cosmic Tales: Adventures in Sol System

Cosmic Tales: Adventures in Far Futures

INTRODUCTION:

Why do we need tales about

"Strange adventures on other worlds,

the universe of the future"?

T.K.F. Weisskopf

* * *

A voice, as bad as Conscience, rang interminable changes

In one everlasting Whisper day and night repeated—so:

"Something hidden. Go and find it.

Go and look behind the Ranges—

Something lost behind the Ranges.

Lost and waiting for you. Go!"

—from "The Explorer" by Rudyard Kipling

* * *

In the previous volume of Cosmic Tales, Adventures in Sol System, I tried to show why we need

stories about the near future: to inspire us to get our butts off this planet. In this volume, I share with you

stories about what happens when we escape the Sun's pull and explore the galaxy, fulfilling our destiny.

These are stories of those possible futures where destiny becomes reality.

Humans need tales of adventure and exploration. We want to see what's beyond the next hill. We

have an urge to "seek out new life and new civilizations," if I may borrow from the introduction to Star

Trek. I think it's one of sf's jobs to encourage that urge, to expand our minds to include the possibilities

of the strange and weird. Early in the history of the novel, all that was necessary to distance the reader

and put him into a strange different culture was to set a novel in Spain, or Transylvania. Back when sf

was getting its start in the early part of the twentieth century the world was already beginning to shrink. It

was soon no longer possible to find strange new civilizations in darkest Africa or encounter hidden

treasures and pagan princesses in the deepest jungles of South America, let alone the edges of Europe.

We'd been everywhere. And it's only gotten worse with the onset of global positioning systems, jet

airliners, communications satellites, cell phones, and long-life batteries that can power a laptop anywhere.

There is very little an adventurer can discover, though much that can be revealed to a dedicated tourist.

This book is for adventurers.

It's possible to find adventure in the past, but even the Dark Ages aren't so dark anymore now that

legions of dedicated Ph.D. seekers have analyzed every remaining fragment of literature and every

surviving civil and legal record. The past has been largely drained of its romance. Who is going to write

another Scaramouche, now that it has been done? Life will always be a mystery, and there are many

stories left to tell about Earth and its future. But for thrilling adventure stories, full of wonder and new

experiences, we have to look further out. We have to explore and colonize new planets.

The expansion into near space will be work, hard work. But in the far future, we, and the authors of

the tales included here, can have fun. We hope you will, too.

* * *

If you'd like to see more Cosmic Tales or to comment on this volume or its predecessor, Cosmic

Tales: Adventures in Sol System, write to me care of Baen Books, P.O. Box 1403, Riverdale, NY

10471. Or you can write directly to me at toni@baen.com.

THE TREE OF DREAMS

If this is the Garden of Eden—where are the snakes? What happens when the

business of planet-conquering just doesn't go according to the book. . . . James P.

Hogan's most recent longer works include Mission to Minerva, a new novel in the

"Giants" series coming out later in 2005, and Kicking the Sacred Cow, a

nonfiction review of science's most treasured orthodoxies and the challenges to

them, released July 2004.

James P. Hogan

The far-space exploration vessel Hayward Kermes, operated by the Kermes-Oates Restructuring

consortium on license from the Sol Federation to promote cultural advancement among the outer regions,

blipped back into 3-space two months ship's time after leaving the fitting-out station above Ganymede. It

entered the Horus system, and four days later took up a parking orbit over the star's second planet,

Lydia.

As stated in the preliminary report beamed back by the reconnaissance ship Oryx three years

previously, Lydia was a warm, Earthlike world with two moons, slightly smaller than Earth but with a

surface closer to three-quarters water rather than five-sixths. It had five major continents, spread across

greater extremes of tropical, desert, temperate, mountain, and polar climates. Pictures obtained from

orbit and lower-altitude probes confirmed Lydian habitats ranging from village communities to

moderate-sized towns that exhibited colorful and picturesque architecture rendered in wood, brick,

adobe, or stone, according to the locality, with spectacular central buildings in some areas, suggestive of

religious or imperialistic societies. Technology did not appear to have progressed beyond primitive or

early agricultural in any area. Of the Oryx itself, there was no sign. Its preliminary assessment was the last

to be heard from it.

* * *

Lydian skies could be spectacular, mixing a palette that ventured from the palest of streaky greens

unveiling the sun at daybreak, to full-bodied violets, lilacs, and lavenders that turned the western clouds

into towering castles of light in the evening. One of the biologists with the Kermes had put forward a

theory attributing the displays to photodissociation in the upper atmosphere of exotic molecules produced

by the planet's lush and varied flora, which made even the tropics of Earth seem unassuming in

comparison. The biologist had been challenged by the mission's head physicist and head climatologist,

both of whom claimed the subject as belonging rightfully to their domain, and a motion was already being

filed back on Earth for the issue to be brought before a scientific arbitration court.

Chelm was seldom drawn into such things. As an archeologist, his field was more self-contained and

defined, and territorial disputes with other disciplines tended to be rare. Colleagues warned him that

invisibility equated to obscurity, and having a low political profile was tantamount to committing career

suicide. Wilbur Teel, his section head, would come poking around, looking for possible areas of overlap

that could be used to pick a fight with the linguists or paleo-sociologists, maybe, and hinting that Chelm

could help his future promotion prospects by taking a more aggressive stance himself. Chelm sometimes

wondered if perhaps he was too accepting and passive. But the thought of a future supposedly

broadened by getting involved in the perennial rivalries and infighting that went on among the upper

administrative echelons back on Earth simply didn't excite him. He wasn't, he supposed, if he was honest

with himself, really that competitively disposed by nature—not that he would have admitted it to the ship's

psycho-counselor. The fact of the matter was that he liked his work and its challenges, especially when it

took him out in the field and among the natives. Times like right now, for instance . . .

He sat on the end of one of the log pilings supporting the boat dock that formed the lower level of

Ag-Vonsar's house, watching the old man scrape an upturned wherrylike craft that had been hauled up

for cleaning and repair. The house was built on stilts like the rest of the settlement at the bottom end of

the lake, with storage space immediately overhead, the general living area above, and sleeping rooms

above that again. The houses were all interconnected by stairways and bridges to form what was

essentially a village over the water. The workmanship was rich, ornate, and precise, bringing to mind a

combination of ancient Mesoamerican pattern work and colorful Chinese intricacy. Besides making

boats, Ag-Vonsar also constructed sluice gates for the system of water channels and locks that irrigated

the surrounding area and allowed the level to be controlled during the season when the river feeding the

lake was in flood. The dry dock and shop that he maintained for this heavier work were part of a

boatyard built along the shore.

What had first attracted Chelm's interest to this place was a long, low, square-formed block

protruding from a hillside and into the water to provide a breakwater and jetty bounding the upper end of

the yard. He had assumed it was cut natural rock, until closer examination showed it to consist of an

artificial material similar to concrete. Some Lydian structures, such as temples, aqueducts, and bridges in

cities and other locations that Terran exploration teams had visited did, it was true, use forms of concrete.

But the type was invariably reminiscent of the kind the Romans had developed: tough, virtually immune to

demolition in some instances, deriving strength from the filiform binding of carefully blended minerals. The

block at the upper end of the lakeside yard, however, was of coarser composition, reinforced internally

by metal ties in the style of Terran patterns that had come into use millennia later—as if the arrival of

heavier industry had rendered the earlier reliance on finer-grain chemistry superfluous. Could it be that an

advanced culture had existed at one time on Lydia, and then vanished practically without trace? If so,

what kind of calamity could have overtaken it?

This was the kind of once-in-a-lifetime occurrence that sent an archaeologist's blood racing with

excitement, and—unless Chelm was truly missing something—relegated such alternatives as chairing a

peer review committee in some academy or university, or becoming a familiar face on the academic

social and cocktail-party circuit, to the depths of irrelevancy and tedium.

And then had followed the seismic images showing broken outlines of even more massive and

extended structures deeper down. The mission's steering group had higher priorities than archeological

searches, however, and the possibility of even a pilot excavation was on hold indefinitely at that stage.

Chelm had made overtures to see what the chances of recruiting native labor might be. The Lydians

seemed amiable and willing enough in principle—but he had to be careful of the ship's sociologists and

psychologists, who considered any activity of that nature to be part of their turf.

"They suggest structures like levees," Chelm said. "As if this might have been part of the river before

the lake formed. They look like bits of levees."

"Levees?" Ag-Vonsar repeated, without looking up. The exchange took place via the transvox

channel in Chelm's wristpad, but the process had become so familiar that he barely registered it. He was

making an effort to learn the local Lydian tongue, but the number of languages identified already, each

with endless dialects, made it a daunting business. The transvox was trained primarily in the speech of a

region about the size of Europe's Iberian province, centered on a city called Issen, fifty miles or so from

the lake settlement. Landers from the Hayward Kermes had established a Terran surface base just

outside Issen.

"Artificial embankments built along the sides of rivers," Chelm said. "To stop them flooding over

low-lying land."

Ag-Vonsar peered at the strip of the boat's underside that he had cleaned, running a finger along a

seam that was showing signs of opening up. He had a surprisingly muscular and well-contoured body for

what Chelm judged from his grizzled, crinkly hair, craggy features, and veined hands to be by Terran

standards sixty or even seventy-plus years of age. As with most Lydians, his skin had the hue and tone of

polished walnut. He wore a loose, red, knee-length tunic with a pouched leather tool belt, and laced

boots of a soft material that looked like suede or felt. The doctrine that had once been taught of species

developing uniquely, as never-to-be repeated accumulations of accidents, had long been discredited and

forgotten. Genetic codes seemed to be universal—the reasons why were still not understood, and hotly

debated—expressing themselves similarly in similar environments, and the missions probing ever farther

from Earth were no longer astounded to find Earth-like life on Earth-like planets.

"Why would you stop the water that brings life to the crops?" Ag-Vonsar asked finally. "Tame the

waters, yes—like the wild horse. But you would kill the horse. Then it can no longer work for you."

"The floods caused a lot of damage to the towns," Chelm pointed out.

"Then they built their towns in the wrong places. The floods deliver the silt that revives the fields. And

the darvy fish that hatch in the early spring when the floods come eat the eggs of the shiver-fever fly. So

it seems that your levees would bring sickness as well."

There really wasn't any arguing with that. Chelm smiled and looked away at the hills tumbling down

to the upper reaches of the lake in forested folds and rocky outcrops decked with necklaces of waterfalls

and streams. A group of egani—ponderous, buffalo-like creatures with shaggy hair the color of an Irish

setter—had come down to drink on the far side. The Lydians seemed to have it all figured out. The water

here seemed corrosive to metals, eating away the reinforcement bars in the concrete slab to leave little

more than stains and residues in the surrounding matrix. Ag-Vonsar used no metal fastenings in his boats,

Chelm had noticed, the parts being joined by precise-fitting wooden dowels and pins. The same seemed

to be true of the houses and other constructions forming the settlement. Ag-Vonsar said that the woods

used for the houses were of a mix selected to repel the local varieties of bug pests.

The opening bars of Eine Kleine Nachtmusik sounded tinnily from the unit on Chelm's wrist. He

turned it toward himself and pressed the Answer stud on the band. The inch-square screen showed the

face of Praget, calling from the folda-cabin set up as the local field camp on a rise below the end of the

lake, where the flyer was parked.

"We're about ready to head back," Praget said.

Chelm looked at the old man. "The flyer is leaving. I need to get back."

"Moishina will take you," Ag-Vonsar said, and then louder, directing his voice upward at the house,

"Moishina. Our guest is leaving. Will you take him back to the shore?"

"Yes, of course."

"Okay, I'll be right over," Chelm said to the face on his wristpad. Moishina was Ag-Vonsar's

granddaughter. Chelm had left her unpacking and sorting the items he had brought back from some

digging farther up along the lake. The family let him use a bench in the lower part of the house. He

preferred working there on his own, away from the stifling filtered and conditioned air of the cabin. It was

supposed to be "safer" than prolonged exposure to the raw unknowns of the Lydian environment—but

the ones who seemed to be sick all the time were those who stayed cooped up in the base. In any case,

some kind of soil microorganism had developed a partiality for the plastic that the folda-cabin was made

from and eaten through the floor, with the result that the place was overrun by insects.

"Do you know when you will be back?" Ag-Vonsar asked Chelm.

"Well, there are some routine chores I have to take care of back at the base. Not tomorrow, but

probably the day after."

"I may not be here. I am due to journey into Issen on business shortly, but the day has not been fixed

yet. If I have gone, your work space will still be available, naturally."

"You're sure it's not an imposition?"

"You are always welcome among our family, Stanislow Chelm from Earth."

Chelm thought for a moment. "You know, we could take you there right now if it would help. There's

plenty of room in the flyer."

Ag-Vonsar smiled thinly. "I thank you, but I will not be alone. And we prefer our own ways of

traveling."

"If you want to contact me while you're in Issen, just have someone enter my name into the Terran

comnet. It will find me."

"What is this 'comnet'?"

"Just ask any Terran."

"I will remember. . . . Moishina! Are you taking a bath up there? Stanislow's people are waiting."

"Coming. I was just cutting some flowers for Quyzo." Moishina appeared at the top of the stairs as

she spoke. Chelm guessed her to be in her twenties. She had the brown, sharply angular features that

were typical of Lydians in these parts, and straight, black hair that fell halfway down to the waistband of

the short saronglike garment that she was wearing. The stairs were steep and narrow but she descended

them nimbly, facing toward them like a ladder, one hand sliding on the guide rail, the other holding a

bunch of brightly colored blooms with the stems wrapped in leaves.

As she reached the bottom, the voice of Moishina's nephew Boro called from above, saying

something that Chelm's transvox channel didn't catch. "Then tell him to hurry up!" Moishina called back.

Boro called out again, shouting this time. A figure that had been approaching across the connecting

bridge from one of the other houses—another boy, maybe about ten—broke into a run. A woman's

voice came from somewhere, telling them in tones that would have been unmistakable anywhere, in any

language, on any planet, to be quiet. Boro came scampering down as Moishina moved toward a boat

moored at some steps leading down from the dock. "A couple of extra passengers," she explained to

Chelm, intoning it in a way that seemed to ask if that was okay with him.

"Sure." Chelm shrugged. It was their boat, after all. He followed her, stepping down inside and sitting

himself on the center cross-board facing aft. Moishina gave him the flowers to hold while she took up the

oar and remained standing in the stern. Boro's friend arrived, climbing aboard behind Boro after expertly

untying the mooring line behind him, and the two boys squeezed past Chelm to crouch in the bow.

Ag-Vonsar raised a hand in farewell as Moishina pushed the boat away from the dock. She propelled

the craft deftly with a rhythmic sculling motion, evoking lithe, supple movements of her body. Chelm had

to make a conscious effort to stop himself staring. The boys chattered behind him, trailing their hands in

the water. One of them almost caught a fish, and then lost it.

"Quyzo. Is that one of the spirits?" Chelm asked, as Moishina turned the prow shoreward. The

Lydians had a spirit for just about everything. Mountain passes, waterfalls, dells in the forest, each one

had a shrine to the dedicated being who safeguarded travelers entering its domain, dispensed good

fortune or bad, or danced capriciously over the world in the form of the elements. Ag-Vonsar had told

Chelm about the Fessym—mountain sprites who teased the land into crying tears of laughter, producing

the springs that made the river that fed the lake. Chelm had asked him out of curiosity if he really believed

magical spirits existed.

"It doesn't matter," Ag-Vonsar had replied. "People should live their lives as if they do, anyway."

"Quyzo lives in the lake," Moishina confirmed. "But he watches over the whole valley. So the village

is his family."

"Is he a happy spirit, do you think?" Chelm asked.

"Oh yes, very much. He catches stars to make the water sing and sparkle. You can see them in the

lake at night."

They tied up at a wooden jetty below the jumble of slipways and painted roofs that constituted the

yard. Boro and his friend disappeared along the shore in the opposite direction; Moishina walked with

Chelm up the rock steps that led toward the rise where the Terran field camp was situated. They came to

Quyzo's shrine on the way. It did indeed convey the impression of him as a cheerful little fellow, perhaps

somewhat inclined toward the mischievous: a finely worked, abstract sculpture of variously tinted stones,

set in a rocky niche above a running pool and gazing out at its lake abode over a low stone parapet

smothered in flowers. Lydian artists never tried to depict the actual likenesses of their spirits.

Some figures were sitting on the rocks beside the terrace in front of the shrine. It was only when

Chelm and Moishina had approached to within a few yards that Chelm realized from the empty

expressions on several of the faces, and the simple, guileless smiles on others, that the group was partly

made up of jujerees, probably being taken on an outing. The nearest English translation was

"child-people." They were harmless and incapable of malice, having reverted to a condition of infantile

trust and dependency, greeting each new experience with the awe and delight of eyes beholding the

world for the first time. The Lydians didn't seem to know what caused the affliction, but the Kermes'

Principal Medical Officer guessed it to be a genetic condition. There were moments, such as when the

petty jealousies and rivalries of life at the base got to him, or some particularly inane and exasperating

edict came through from Earth, when Chelm came close to envying them.

Moishina unwrapped the flowers she had brought and placed them in one of the vases along the

parapet, picking out the previous withered occupants and dropping them in a receptacle to one side,

provided for the purpose. She fell silent for what Chelm assumed was a quick prayer or moment of

reflection, and then turned toward one of the women minding the jujerees, who had come over. "Forgive

me if I intrude," the woman said.

Moishina smiled. "Not at all."

"I just wanted to say welcome to the Terran. I have seen them at their work up above, but never

T. K. F. Weisskopf - Cosmic Tales II-Adventures in Far Futures

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