Swallow the Sky: A Space Opera (21 page)

The Technical Alliance, one hundred and sixty souls, has broken with the other survivors. We have fled
the Eridani system with the human race’s one existing starship, the Yongding, thus marooning our companions on New Earth. We find this act deeply
troubling but we have no choice.

We go to seek a distant
world where we can grow and flourish in peace. Certainly not this planet, we do
not have the time to seed new life and besides, it is much too close to Eridani.
We fear that if we again encounter the other survivors they will attempt to
finish what they have begun and extinguish the flame of progress forever. We
must go somewhere where we will never be found.

I apologize for the
fact that these storage units are empty, but I trust you can do without: if you
have the resources to build an interstellar vessel then you must be
curiosity-seekers, not men and women such as ourselves in desperate need of
supplies and material.

Perhaps in the far
future our descendents will meet again. Until that day, I wish you well.

June 7, 2148

“Oh my God” said Aiyana
“it was the Techs!”

Carson sighed. “Now it’s
obvious. They wanted to found a new colony but they were stealing an empty starship. Sakyamuni was one of the dissidents – and he knew exactly where all the supply dumps were
located. Like Samuelson says, they were desperate for material, they had to
stop here to pick up everything.”

He grinned at Aiyana. “I
bet they also cleared out the stuff in cometary orbit. Just as well we didn’t
weeks thrashing around deep space searching for it. But this…”

His voice trailed off as
he stared at the glass tablet.

“There is nothing like
this, is there?”

“When they fled New Earth
the Techs just vanished. No-one has ever found the slightest trace of what
happened to them.”

“Until now”

Carson gestured at the
tablet “do you realize that in a few years time there will be lines a hundred
meters long at the Archives Museum to see this?”

“Why’s it made of glass?”

“It’s incredibly stable. We’ve
seen what time can do to a recording media.”

“I thought it was a
super-viscous liquid, eventually it just flowed away.”

Carson shook his head. “That’s
a myth. Samuelson was a scientist, he knew what he was doing.”

“Well, Juro was not
expecting this.”

“I guess not” Carson said as he re-closed the case “but he never did let me listen to the third cassette
– all I got was an edited transcript. Who knows what was really on it? Who
knows what he’s really after?”

Early the following
morning they made one final trip to the clearing to image the last six storage
modules. After reading Samuelson’s message none of them expected to find
anything but all agreed they had to try.

“How are you doing flying
blind?” Carson asked the buggy. The machine’s sensors were still attached to
the improvised imaging system.

“No problem, I’m
following Tallis’s radio beacon.”

They traveled on for a
few minutes.

“Radio beacon!” Carson shouted.

They found it perched on
the rocks above the clearing, a battered grey cylinder wedged between two
boulders. The outer casing was deeply corroded from eight thousand years of
exposure but astonishingly the inner workings appeared to be intact.

“They must have built it
to take a beating” said Aiyana. “What are those square things?”

“They’re called solar
panels. They generate electricity from daylight. It probably kept transmitting
for decades.”

“Wow! The one thing they
left behind. Why would they take the location beacon? It was the supplies they
were after.”

They stowed the ancient
transmitter to the buggy and went through the chore of checking the last
modules. To nobody’s surprise they were all empty. They agreed to take two –
the one that had held Samuelson’s message and an unopened container to keep the
preservationists happy.

By late afternoon they
had packed away the camp and were heading to the ship. Mirama c shrank visibly as the acceleration ramped up.

“It’s good to be able to
see again” said the buggy “it makes me wonder how Tallis functions.”

“We speculate same about humans and
machines that have no sense of smell”

“I can smell” Aiyana
objected.

“And we can distinguish [untranslatable] light
and dark but you do not call that seeing.”

Carson was studying a
facsimile of the glass tablet.

“Hey buggy, do you have
an image of Samuelson?”

The face of a man in late
middle age floated in front of them, his dark brown eyes glittering with
intelligence.

“He could almost be Cissokho’s
brother” Aiyana said.

“Yeah” said Carson “they
were both of African origin, but it’s believed that Samuelson was born and
raised in the North American Federation. Cissokho grew up in Botswana, though she spent most of her adult life in Greater China.”

“I thought she was born
in Africa.”

“Africa was a continental
landmass, not a political and cultural entity. The Book says that at one time
there were over two hundred
countries
on Old Earth, though there were
fewer by the time the Yongding was built.”

“Two hundred separate
cultures on one planet! How did they all manage to get along?”

“They didn’t. Armed
conflicts – they called them
wars
– were going on all the time.”

“Poor creatures”

“There were simply too
many of them, thirteen billion at the end. They could all communicate
instantaneously and travel anywhere on the planet in less than an hour. It must
have been easy to get into a fight.”

“Imagine a conflict
between cultures nowadays” Carson laughed “It would take weeks just to trade
insults!”

“Is that why the Techs
left New Earth, to avoid another
war
?”

Carson gazed at the stern
face floating in the cabin.

“Maybe – we always thinks
of the Techs stealing the Yongding as a crime, but perhaps Samuelson was right,
it was the only peaceful way out. Where does that leave the last eight thousand
years of history? Where does that leave us?”

The next day they met in
the ship’s main cabin. Carson had repacked the priceless glass tablet and
secured it in the safe that he used for his most treasured objects.

“So what should we do
now? Tallis, Aiyana, ship – any suggestions?”

“I follow your scent”

“Me too” said the ship.

“What about you honey?”

“Oh come on” said Aiyana
“this is your party. I just came along for the ride. What do you think we
should do?”

“Well, we have one of the
most unique historical artifacts ever discovered, plus some great pieces of Old
Earth technology. The only responsible thing to do is to head straight to New
Earth and hand them all over to the Archives Council.”

“Hey ship” Aiyana yelled “is your Carson to Aiyana auto-translator working today? Would you care to
interpret that last comment?”

The cabin echoed with
fake mechanical noises.

“Message reads:
let’s
get the hell out of here and find the next supply dump
”

“Exactly what I thought,
you’d better start plotting a course.”

“Already locked and
loaded” said the ship as Aiyana tousled Carson’s hair.

Ancient voices whispered in Carson’s ear as he
drifted, eyes closed, through the darkened cabin. He was listening to the
debates of the Covenant Convention recorded by Teng, ironically on the very
same tapes that they had stolen from the archives. Ever since the revelation
ten days ago that they were following the path of the stolen Yongding he had
been scrambling to learn as much as he could about the Techs.

He was driven by more
than curiosity. The key question was whether all the storage dumps had been
emptied by the fleeing dissidents. Sakyamuni hinted that it had taken several
voyages to distribute all the material. Perhaps the supplies left at each
system represented the Yongding’s maximum cargo capacity. Not much was known
about the ancient starship –just the one famous image of the vessel that
appeared in every history of New Earth – but that was all. Perhaps the renegade
colonists had filled their holds at Mirama and left the other dumps intact. Carson
shivered with pleasure at the thought.

The Convention was coming
to its climax – the arguments before the adoption of the Covenant. The
traditional portrait of the Techs was that of a group of selfish rebels, but as
he listened to the tapes a different picture was emerging. Samuelson had
genuinely tried to find a compromise; in many ways it was Cissokho who was the
hardliner. Suppose they had reached consensus, how different would the world
have been? It was one of the great ‘
what if
’ questions of history.

Carson sighed and turned
off the recording. They were two days from the Falk system, the next unlikely
candidate for colonization chosen by the astronomers of Old Earth.

“At least the ship’s library says that this one has a complete ecosystem” he told Aiyana. Prior to Sakyamuni’s
account neither of them had heard of the obscure world.

“Falk is an M class star
– a red dwarf – so it will be a narrow habitable zone.”

“Won’t the planets be in
tidal lock, one side always facing the sun?”

“It’s bigger than most of
its kind – about a third of a standard solar mass – so Falk a won’t be too
close, and it has a giant moon just like Old Earth. I guess that must help
maintain rotation.”

“Oh hell” he said
“there’s so little information. Let’s divide the workload, you research the
planet and I’ll keep on investigating the Techs.”

But even with the ship’s vast resources Aiyana had not been able to find much more. The system was sparsely
inhabited, although it was not part of the Commonwealth or any other alliance. As
a consequence trade was virtually non-existent. Apparently, the people of Falk
had turned their back on the outside world.

“This isn’t going to be
easy” Carson said, “I would have preferred another empty planet.”

“It will do you good, you
need to meet more people.”

She was right of course. Where
was Aiyana? He had lost track of time listening to the recordings. Carson
flexed his legs against sixth millennium gene editor and pushed his way across
the cabin towards the conservatory. Predictably, she was lying in her favorite
spot at the heart of the garden. Was she asleep? He pushed his way through the
dense vegetation. She remained motionless as he emerged into the clearing.
Aiyana’s body was as still as death, her naked skin crawling with Tallis’s
workers.
Oh God no!
The scream died in his mind as she opened her eyes
and smiled.

Shaking, Carson slumped onto the turf.

“There you are! Why are
you looking like that?”

“It’s just that I
thought… Oh, forget it. What the hell are you two doing?”

“Tallis was telling me
that she had never come into physical contact with a human being, so I thought I
should give her the opportunity.”

“It is [untranslatable]. So huge, so like a
giant grub! Carson, are you the same?”

“Come on” said Aiyana
“let her check you out as well.”

Muttering under his
breath, Carson stripped off his flight suit and lay down beside her. He forced
himself to stay still as a swarm of tiny feet moved across his skin.

“[Untranslatable]. This part is different!”

They both lay giggling as
the examination continued.

Later on, when they were
dressed and back in the main cabin, Aiyana explained Tallis’s perception of
their roles.

“She thinks you must be a
drone – you know, the male Ants whose only purpose is to service the queen. But
she suspects you are defective, otherwise why don’t I get fertilized with all
the mating?”

“She’s got me nailed”
said Carson, then added “seriously, have you ever thought about having a
child?”

“I suppose every woman
has at some point in her life, but not yet. I want to be at least a hundred
years old before making such a commitment. How about you?”

“Oh God no! Anyhow, I’d
have to change sex first which is a tremendous hassle.”

“I think you’d make a
great woman.”

“I gather that’s a
compliment.”

“You bet it is” she said
butting her body into his. “Maybe I’ll change sex at the same time. Imagine that!”

“The mind boggles.”

They spun laughing across
the cabin.

“Well there it is” said
the ship.

A silvery globe hovered
in the cabin like a gigantic steel bearing.

“Nice imaging” said Carson.

“Thank Tallis – she built
me an optical interferometer. I deployed it with the periscope.”

The ship had arrived at the inner edge of Falk’s Kuiper Belt twelve hours earlier. As soon as
spin-down re-established contact with the universe the first order of business
was to find out more about the reclusive planet.

Aiyana peered closer, the
bluish light giving a metallic appearance to her skin.

“I can’t see any land –
surely it’s not an ocean world.”

“No” said the ship “let me enhance the image.”

Thin diagonal strips of
green appeared, as if a monstrous claw had shredded the continents.

“That’s one of the
strangest landmass formations I’ve seen” said Carson “any idea why it’s shaped
that way?”

“Erosion perhaps – being
that close to the star must induce powerful tides. We should know more soon; I
think I’m receiving a welcome package.”

“You’re not sure?”

“It’s encrypted, nothing
too sophisticated” there was a pause “Okay – ready when you are.”

They gathered round a
display.

To their surprise the
welcome package was not published by the planet’s government but by the
Commonwealth Consulate. He apologized for the encryption and explained that it
“was in the best interests of discretion.”

“In other words, he’s
going to say something rude” said Carson.

It transpired that the
people of Falk were fundamentalists in a way that would have dismayed Cissokho
and the framers of the Covenant. They did not believe in the slow technological
progress pursued by the rest of the galaxy – they favored in
no
technological progress. In fact they had deliberately regressed and the
Covenant had assumed the status of a religion. They had little to offer the
larger world and distrusted outsiders as harbingers of modernity.

“Visitors, however, will
be received with courtesy provided local sensitivities are observed.”

“Whoa!” said Carson, studying the addendum on the planet’s economy “they appear to have an industrial
base similar to Old Earth in the middle of the twentieth century.”

“Wasn’t it incredibly
polluting?”

“You bet – the main power
source comes from burning carbonaceous minerals – but there are only five
million inhabitants so I guess the ecosystem can take the stress.”

“Well it is beautiful.” Aiyana
was inspecting the packet’s images which showed snow-capped mountains and wide
valleys covered with deep green foliage.

“The plant life has to
absorb every scrap of energy it can from that red sunlight. Any terrestrial
vegetation would need re-engineering.”

But Carson was more
interested in the technology. “From an antique collector’s point of view I bet
there’s some damn interesting stuff down there. I wonder what I can trade.”

“But what about finding
the supply dump?”

“Yeah, this is not going
to be easy. If we start flying around in the buggy the locals will go berserk.”

“Surely my fleet will pass unnoticed.”

“Maybe Tallis, but
you’ll have to teach us how to operate it. I’m sorry but you’ll be staying home
– you’d scare the life out of them. And we’d better make some new clothes. This
is not, I repeat not, somewhere you’ll be running around naked Aiyana.”

“What excuse are we going
to make for our visit?” Aiyana asked as the buggy hurtled sunward.

“Have you forgotten
darling, I’m a mailman.”

“There’s mail for this
place!”

“Yup, not much – most of
it’s probably all for the consulate – but it gives us a legitimate reason to be
here. Plus I’ll spin a story about hunting for antiques, that’ll be a good
excuse for traveling around.”

“Where are we landing?”
Aiyana asked as she wriggled in her new clothes.

A small copy of the
silvery globe materialized in the buggy’s cabin. One straggling strip of land
in the center of the northern hemisphere shone red.

“The welcome package indicates that this is the most developed landmass” said the buggy “All visiting craft
are instructed to land at the
airport
at its southern tip.”

“I’ve been thinking about
geography” said Aiyana. “I reckon Sakyamuni chose that promontory on Mirama
because it was such an obvious landmark. It was a precaution against the radio
beacon failing.”

“So you’re saying search
for something similar here?”

“I guess, but where…” Her
voice trailed off as she turned to the glowing image.

Two hours later they were
hovering over the
airport
.

“It seems kind of empty”
said Aiyana. “It’s really nothing but a big field.”

As instructed, they set
down at the southern perimeter.

“I don’t know what the
locals would make of you” Carson told the buggy once they had unloaded their
baggage. “Best to stay out of sight – hang around in low orbit until I call”

“okay” said the little
spacecraft “stay out of trouble.” It shot up into the violet sky.

They were in the middle
of a flat expanse of grass so dark green it appeared almost black. On three
sides the windswept land finally gave way to the ocean while to the north they
could see a stubby tower surrounded by low buildings.

“This is about as
exciting as Mirama” said Carson.

“Wait until Mr. Lizard
turns up.”

“Here he comes now”

A uniformed man had
emerged from the nearest building and was hurrying towards them.

“Honor to the Covenant
and good morning to you!” the stranger cried as he came within hailing
distance. He sported a neat mustache and had the overworked, slightly perplexed
manner that seemed to be the universal attribute of all civil servants.