Bear, Greg - Anvil of Stars

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Anvil of Stars

Greg Bear

Praise For Greg Bear and Anvil of Stars

"Whether he's tinkering with human genetic material or prying apart planets, Bear goes at the

task with intelligence and a powerful imagination."

—Locus

"The sequel to his splendid The Forge of God . … displays all of Bear's superior literary

gifts."

—Chicago Sun-Times

"Compelling… A major work of the imagination… Transcends the science-fiction genre,

making [Bear] a writer for anyone concerned with the human condition."

—Seattle Times/Post-Intelligencer

"A moving and insightful portrait of an emerging society aboard the starship… a substantial,

inventive, and satisfying coming-of-age novel."

—Locus

more…

"This is powerful, well-thought-out science fiction, with believable characters and fascinating

science. Anvil ponders in new ways some of literature's oldest themes of justice, conscience and

even love… Anvil of Stars is only the most recent proof of the permanent niche [Bear] has carved

for himself in the field."

—Flint Journal

"Succeeds because of Bear's ability to create characters the reader can care about… a top-

notch space war novel."

—Kansas City Star

"[A] riveting tale of interplanetary revenge."

—The Bookwatch

"An incredible adventure. It's a sequel, but easily stands on its own. It's thought-provoking

and maintains an extremely high interest level throughout. What a frantic pace!"

—Rave Reviews

"This is a powerful work that is going to make you sit and think for a while, and hopefully

disturb you just a little. A powerful hard SF novel from one of the top writers in the field."

—Amazing Stories

"Provocative and entertaining… an action-packed and often thrilling plot… Bear draws on the

full range of his gifts here, seamlessly pulling together action and characterization to create a

gripping story."

—Publishers Weekly

"A satisfying sequel to a terrific novel."

—Eastsideweek, Seattle

"If, like me, you relish a neutronium-dense blend of Edmond Hamilton and Freeman Dyson,

A. E. Van Vogt and Richard Feynmann, you'll risk super-deceleration under volumetric stasis to

lay your hands on the latest Bear."

—Washington Post Book World

"Anvil of Stars shows him at the top of his form and poses a number of fascinating questions

about the true nature of vengeance and what seeking it can do to the human heart. Don't miss it!"

—West Coast Review of Books

"Bear writes with a heady brilliance that communicates a sense of immediacy and credibility."

—Library Journal

Also by Greg Bear

Queen of Angels

Eternity

Tangents

The Wind from a Burning Woman

Strength of Stones

Eon

Blood Music

The Forge of God

Psychlone

The Infinity Concerto

The Serpent Mage

Heads

WARNER BOOKS

A Time Warner Company

For Dan Garrett, cousin and friend

If you purchase this book without a cover you should be aware that this book may have been stolen

property and reported as "unsold and destroyed" to the publisher. In such case neither the author nor the

publisher has received any payment for this "stripped book."

WARNER BOOKS EDITION

Questar® is a registered trademark of Warner Books, Inc.

Cover design by Donald Puckey Cover illustration by Bob Eggleton

Warner Books, Inc.

1271 Avenue of the Americas

New York. NY 10020

A Time Warner Company

Printed in the United States of America

Originally published in hardcover by Warner Books. First Printed in Paperback: February, 1993

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

CONTENTS

Prolog

PART ONE

PART TWO

PART THREE

Perspectives

PROLOG

AT THE END OF THE FORGE OF GOD, the Earth is dead, murdered by self-replicating

spacefaring machines. A few thousand humans have been saved by other robots, machines sent

by the Benefactors to defend primitive worlds and civilizations from the depredations of planet-

killing probes. The Benefactor machines have succeeded in wiping out these probes within the

solar system, but not before Earth's total destruction.

Kept aboard a huge Central Ark while Mars is made ready for their habitation, the humans

are informed of the Law, a galactic code that governs the behavior of civilizations. The Law

demands that civilizations which make self-replicating killer machines be punished—with

extinction. Humans must carry out this punishment, with the help of the Benefactors. Younger

occupants of the Central Ark volunteer, and their journey begins.

This is how the balance is kept.

PART ONE

MARTY SITS IN THE FRONT SEAT OF HIS FATHER'S BUICK, RIDING along a

freeway in Oregon at midsummer twilight. The highway is thick with cars and rain glazes the

road. Gray-blue sky, tail-lights brilliant red, streamers of reflection in wet dark blue roadways,

road reflectors gold, big trucks with running lights and turn signals flashing, windshield wipers

streaking all into dazzles and sparks, raindrops reflecting microcosms.

He feels the smooth fur and warmth of his dog, Gauge, pressed between the front seats, paw

and jaw resting on Marty's curled knee. "Father," he asks, "is space empty? "

Arthur does not reply. There are no more highways, no more Earth. His father is off the Ark

and on Mars by now, far centuries away.

Martin Gordon stirred and tried to wake up. He floated in his net, opened his eyes and

unclenched his fists. A single salty tear, sucked into his mouth from the still, cool air, caught in

his throat and he coughed, thrashing to complete awareness. In the large, high-ceilinged cabin,

beads and snakes of yellow and white light curled along the walls like lanes of cars.

He rolled over in the suddenly strange place. A woman floated in the net beside him, hair dark

brown almost black, face pixy with fresh sleep, upturned eyes opening, wide lips always half-

smiling. "Are you all right?" she asked.

"I think so," he said. "Dreaming." Martin had been dreaming a great deal lately, much more

since joining with Theresa. He had been dreaming of Earth; dreams both pleasant and disturbing,

four or five each sleep.

"Of what?"

"Earth. My father."

Eight years after Earth's death, the children had left the Central Ark, in orbit around the Sun,

and begun their journey on the Ship of the Law.

Two years after the children's departure, measuring by the Ark's reference frame, the survivors

of Earth who stayed behind had entered suspended animation, the long sleep.

Two years for the Central Ark had occupied only a year for the children as the Ship of the

Law accelerated to relativistic speed. Now, cruising at more than ninety-nine percent of the speed

of light, time advanced even more slowly, relative to the outside universe; six and a half days for

every year. Years were an archaic measure anyway, counted against the revolution of a world that

no longer existed.

If still alive, Martin's mother and father and all the remaining survivors on the Ark had settled

on Mars by now, after almost three centuries of long sleep.

For Martin and the children, only five years had passed.

Theresa drew closer to him in the single net, curled her arms around him, made a warm sound

in the back of her throat. "Always the thread," she murmured. She slept again, could fall asleep so

easily.

Martin looked at her, still disoriented. Dissonance between that past inconceivably far away in

all dimensions, and this woman with her chest moving in and out, eyes flickering in dreamstate.

The thread, umbilicus of all the children, cut only in death.

"Dark, please," he said, and the ribbon lights dimmed. He turned away from Theresa, coughed

again, seeing behind closed eyes bright red tail-lights and mystic blue highways.

If the drivers had known how beautiful that traffic jam was, how lovely that rain, and how few

twilight evenings remained.

The Ship of the Law was made of Earth, smelted and assembled from the fragments of Earth's

corpse, a world in itself, cruising massively close to the speed of light, hundreds of years from the

dust and rubble of home.

Christened Dawn Treader by the children at the outset of their voyage, the ship resembled a

snake that had swallowed three eggs, five hundred meters from nose to tail. Each egg, called a

homeball, was one hundred meters in diameter. Between the homeballs, hung around the

connecting necks like fruit in baskets, storage tanks held the ship's reserves of volatiles:

hydrogen, lithium, helium, nitrogen, oxygen, carbon. Food and fuel.

The first two homeballs belonged to the children, vast spaces divided into a variety of

chambers flexible in design and even in size.

Dawn Treader reminded Martin of a large plastic habitat his mother had pieced together in

their house in Oregon; two hamsters in a maze of yellow plastic pipes, clear boxes lined with

wood shavings, a feeding box and sleeping box and exercise wheel, even what his father had

called a "remote excursion module," a plastic ball in which a single hamster could roll outside the

habitat, across the floors, carpet, into corners.

The eighty-two children had even more room in proportion to their numbers. There was

sufficient space for every Wendy or Lost Boy to have dozens of quarters in the homeballs. Most

chose one primary residence, and used two or three others as occasion suited.

The third egg, farthest aft, held training centers and weapons stores. The spaces between the

homeballs, the necks, were filled with huge conduits and pipes. The second neck was cramped by

protrusions that Martin had long since decided must be part of the ship's engine. How the engine

worked, or its location on the ship, had not been explained.

There were a lot of mysteries. Huge but light, most of the Dawn Treader's bulk consisted of

what the robot moms called fake matter. Fake matter had the properties of size and resistance to

pressure, but no mass. Dawn Treader massed little more than twenty-five hundred tons unfueled.

The children trained with weapons whose inner workings they knew next to nothing about.

What they did not specifically need to know, they were not told.

The necks—dubbed wormspaces because of the twisty pipes—were ideal for gymnastics and

games, and thirty Lost Boys and Wendys, two cats, and three parrots even now skirmished, using

wads of wet clothing as missiles. Sheets of water crawled along the outer wall beneath a

transparent field. Shadows lay deep and black everywhere in the wormspaces, offering even more

places to hide.

Martin watched his fellows. They might have been part of a street gang in a city robbed of up

and down. He breathed in their beauty and harmony, focused on a select few: Hans Eagle of the

Raptors, a year older than Martin—oldest on the ship—pug-nosed, broad-shouldered, short-

legged, with powerful arms, blond hair cut close and bristly, skin glistening pale; Paola Bird-

song, small and graceful, flowing black hair tied up in a waggling long braid; Stephanie Wing

Feather, with gentle, intelligent gray eyes, hair wrapped in a compact bun; Rosa Sequoia, large,

red-haired, with her characteristic look of puzzled concentration.

The children screamed, hissed, yelled instructions to fellow team-mates, tossed wads of wet

clothes, kicked back and forth among the pipes, all but Rosa, who kept apart.

They had been weightless for over four years now. Ladder fields allowed them to get around

where it was inconvenient to echo—bounce from the walls and surfaces—or fly, or climb on

physical objects. Whenever possible, the children tried to avoid using them. That was part of the

game.

Cats bounded between the children, or hid in the shadows. Birds squawked and pretended to

be upset; but birds and cats always followed the children, scrambling along ladder fields or

gliding free in the air.

Martin puckered his lips and whistled shrilly. Play broke off in a clatter of shouts and jeers

and the children gathered, grumpy at being interrupted. The air between the pipes filled with

ribbons and sheets of faint light, ladder fields intersecting, like curling thin paper floating in

water.

The children formed a ball around Martin. Most were only half-dressed. Four retrieved the

wet, wadded clothes.

"Time for pre-watch drill," he said. "The rest can carry on."

Martin had been elected Pan six months before. Pan was in charge of all strategic functions,

the most important now being drill planning and crew training. Five previous Pans had

commanded the children, beginning with Stephanie Wing Feather.

Rex Live Oak, Stephanie Wing Feather, Nguyen Mountain Lily, Jeanette Snap Dragon, Carl

Phoenix, Giacomo Sicilia, David Aurora, Michael Vineyard, Hu East Wind, Kirsten Two Bites,

Jacob Dead Sea, Attila Carpathia, Terry Loblolly, Alexis Baikal, Drusilla Norway, Thorkild Lax,

Leo Parsifal, Nancy Flying Crow, Yueh Yellow River. These made up the Pan's drill group

today; each day, he drilled with a different group. There were five groups. Once a year, the

groups reshuffled. Some members with well-honed skills moved from group to group depending

on the drills.

The children's skins, yellow and white, brown and black, shone with sweat. Slender and

stocky, tall and short, manner not obeisant, not insolent, within the observed forms, they were

family and team, forged by five long years into something his mother and father would not have

recognized as a useful society, but it worked… So far.

The twenty rotated and bounced in mid-air, sliding into damp overalls, Wendys in blue, Lost

Boys in red. Dressed, they followed Martin aft through the second neck, toward the third

homeball. Behind them, Hans Eagle urged the others to continue the game.

Most of the children wore painted designs, chiefly on their faces and bare arms and legs,

patterned after things found on Earth. The designs revealed ship family associations, also

reflected in their names: Cats, Places, Birds, Gifts, Plants, Foods, twenty-one families in all.

Some chose not to associate, or freelanced, as Hans did, though originally he had belonged to the

Birds.

A Pan was required to be more circumspect than other children. Martin came by it naturally;

he wore no designs, and had never worn paint, though he belonged in a semi-formal way to the

Trees family. Behind him, bulky, strong Rex Live Oak followed with an oak leaf on each cheek;

Stephanie Wing Feather carried parrot feathers in her hair; and so on, back through the ranks,

climbing through the dim, close spaces of the second neck, dipping hands and toes into ladder

fields. They used ladders in the neck to keep discipline before drill. The bunched-up colors of

twenty ladders—personally selected shades of red, green, blue and yellow—made a dim rainbow

down the neck's clear center aisle, smearing like paint poured down a gutter.

Each child carried a wand, a cylinder of steel and glass about nine inches long and two inches

wide, with no buttons or visible moving parts. The wands served as monitors and communicators

and gave them access to the ship's mind, the libraries, and to the moms. Nobody knew where the

ship's mind or the libraries resided—nobody knew where the moms went when they were not

among the children, or even how many moms there actually were.

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AnvilofStarsGregBearPraiseForGregBearandAnvilofStars"Whetherhe'stinkeringwithhumangeneticmaterialorpryingapartplanets,Beargoesatthetaskwithintelligenceandapowerfulimagination."—Locus"ThesequeltohissplendidTheForgeofGod.…displaysallofBear'ssuperiorliterarygifts."—ChicagoSun-Times"Compelling…Amajorwor...

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