Futures Near and Far (30 page)

Neil rubbed his temples, trying to massage out the headache
that had sprouted halfway through the flight. He had rarely suffered headaches
before the Thwaa had altered him. “Not really,” he admitted, “but it’s nothing
you should be concerned about.”

Dimitri scratched the five o’clock shadow on his chin,
saying nothing. In the old days, either in
Athens or while they were both aides to
Governor Brendt, prior to ark launch, Dimitri would have never have let
Neil off so easily. He loved to diagnose, be the remedy a doctor’s visit, a
night of drinking, or one of his wife’s home-cooked meals.

What I have can’t be
cured by talking,
Neil thought.

He peered out the window at the oncoming twilight. A
lavender veil was climbing up from the eastern horizon. Below, the only lights
were those of Landfall — a few fireflies in a shadowed wilderness. “We’re
bypassing the capital.”

“Yes. I’m to drop you off at the residence. The pilot and I
will take the body on to the morgue. I’ll have my own meeting with Brendt in
the morning.”

“Oh, yes, the new house. He’s moved in, then?”

“Three days ago,” Dimitri said. “I believe you’ll be the
first guest other than family.”

A few minutes later, Neil was left at a clearing in the
woods — if the term “woods” could be applied to Bjornssen’s barkless, oddly
colored analogs of trees — several kilometers from the capital.

Neil paused on the landing pad, gathering himself. In years
past, the governor had been his boss, perhaps even his mentor. Now Neil was the
one person on Bjornssen who reported to a higher level of authority. The role
change placed him in apparel that hung as if cut four sizes too large.

A lone individual emerged from the shadows. Not the expected
household servant.

“Neil. Welcome to my home,” Governor Brendt called, louder
than necessary.

“Hello, sir,” Neil said.

“Let me show you my new sanctuary,” Brendt offered, only the
weakness of his smile betraying his discomfiture. In other respects, he
fulfilled the role of proud new homeowner completely. As they set off up a
trail he paused to display a favorite feature: Repellers hidden in the foliage
generated fields that warded off various species of small insectoids, common
pests in this humid region of the continent.

The footpath was the only route to the site. The villa was
constructed along the same lines as the nearby city, which is to say it blended
into the native terrain as much as possible, with a minimum of pavement. The
buildings were low and sprawling, hugging the contour of a small hill, roofs
tucked below the level of the forest canopy so as not to mar the line of the
horizon, the patio and courtyard shaded by century-old vegetation. Turn off the
molecular stabilizers and the structures would return to the soil within a few
generations.

They stopped on the patio deck. Inside two women sat on a
matching pair of sofas, chatting, awash in the warm glow of the living room,
apparently unaware of the two men standing outside in the twilight. Neil
recognized the governor’s wife, Nadya, a sable-haired, long-necked beauty, and
Brendt’s sister, Olivia, not so lovely but a better
conversationalist. The scene was charmingly domestic. Inviting.

Brendt had seldom favored Neil so thoroughly when he was a
mere employee. As Thwaa consul, he seldom did less.

Brendt opened the patio door and ushered Neil within. Nadya
sprang up and greeted him with a hug and a kiss.

“Neil! How good to see you!”

“An excellent estate you’ve designed,” Neil told her.

“Thank you.” She glowed. “Sit down. Have some wine. You
remember Olivia?”

“Of course.”

The evening was as soothing as the governor’s intimate
gatherings often were. First, Neil was given a tour of the rooms. Next, the four
shared a first-rate meal served by the governor’s unobtrusive domestic staff.
Finally, they relaxed for hours sampling vintages from Brendt’s cellar. Neil’s
new favorite proved to be a Napa Valley late harvest Riesling. He was sorry to
hear they were consuming the last bottle in the Gamma Leporis A system. No
matter how perfectly the longterm stasis/storage equipment aboard the ark had
functioned, there had been only so much capacity aboard for amenities. In
another few years the only wines anyone would be drinking would be those made
on-planet.

The pleasantries may not have been entirely targeted at Neil
himself, but he indulged in them nonetheless. God knew he spent enough evenings
living the life of a pariah these days.

All too soon, Nadya and Olivia excused themselves to let
governor and consul see to their business of the evening. The residual flavor
of the Riesling soured in Neil’s mouth.

“I’ve reviewed a summary of the situation at the
archaeological dig,” Brendt said when the euphony of the women’s voices had
faded into the depths of the villa. “What in particular do you need to ask me
about?”

Neil looked down, but felt Brendt regarding him steadily. He
knew what the governor was really asking: Why the Thwaa had taken an interest?
The murder was one incident out of thousands. They rarely scrutinized
occurrences so closely as to send Neil on-site, to filter the news to them via
their own peculiar information-gathering methods.

The presence inside his mind gained coherence. Without
words, as always, he received the directive, and knew what he was expected to
say. It would not answer the governor’s unspoken question, but it would address
the one he had actually asked.

“They just want to know what you would do if they hadn’t
sent me to observe the case.”

Brendt frowned. “What will I do? Christ, Neil. What can I
tell you? It’s a mess.”

Neil nodded. “I’m just relaying the message. I can’t say for
sure, but I think it’s all right if all you do is speculate. As long as you do
so sincerely, of course.”

Brendt bristled at the implied slur, but perhaps he read in
Neil’s open gaze that it was meant as helpful advice, not as character
assassination. He settled back on the sofa.

“It was only a matter of time until we had a homicide,” he
began. “My hope was that it would be something cleaner. A headline that the
majority could read and forget about the next day. After all, we have enough to
keep us busy just building this colony. I’ll do what I can to steer things in
that direction, try to make it seem routine — not that I like to think of
murder as routine. But I have to admit I’m worried.
The racial component may keep the whole business alive. The Aussie
faction will argue for some sort of leniency. The Indonesians will be outraged
at anything less than the death penalty.”

“No matter what you do, you’ll antagonize somebody,” Neil
conceded. He spoke for himself; the Thwaa voice in his head had gone silent,
leaving him once more as nothing but their listening post. “It’s a lose-lose.”

“Yes. God damn it.”

“So . . . what will you do?” Neil repeated.

“Stretch things out. Gather every last scrap of evidence.
Hear all the appeals. In the end, I’ll have to execute him, but I have to be
sure anyone who might be on his side has had their chance to argue that he’s
not guilty. We don’t have much of a backlog in our court system” — he tried to
chuckle — “but I estimate the whole process will take half a decade. In the
meantime, our society will simply have to cope with the turmoil, I guess.”

Neil saw that it was gnawing Brendt from the pancreas
outward to be placed in a position of impotence. The least that Neil could do
was cut short the conversation, spare him further embarrassment. A burst of
communication told him the Thwaa had learned whatever it was they needed from
the night’s conversation.

“That’s it?” Brendt queried, as soon as Neil had spoken.

“Apparently so,” Neil said.

The deep brow wrinkles remained on the governor’s face. His
mouth tightened.

Neil had feared the man would not relax. And why should he?
Why should any human on the planet?

The Thwaa might not have put the issue aside. One of these
times, the matters Neil investigated would cause the aliens to alter policy.
The Thwaa rarely stirred, but when they did, their actions could go to
extremes. As the Eridanin had learned.

“I’ve set aside a room for you across the patio,” Brendt
said. “May we all have a good night.”

“Thank you. I’ll give my regards to Nadya in the morning,
then.”

“Pleasant dreams, Neil.” The governor glanced away and
pretended to sip his wine.

o0o

Sleep was the wisest use of the remainder of the night,
but Neil was far too keyed up. He made a fire in the room hearth. A real fire,
using cordwood salvaged from the scrap of forest removed in order to erect the
dwelling. The hearth was rigged to display artificial fire, with or without
heat, but could be made to function in the literal way, with filters in the
chimney that eliminated air pollution. It would rarely be used so, for per the
charter, no living trees on Bjornssen would be cut down solely to provide
recreational flame. Making the luxury available was Brendt’s indirect way of
letting the Thwaa see how well he treated their representative.

Neil did not hesitate to strike the match. He had not asked
for the job, but as long as he had it, he would accept the perquisites.

He pulled his palm computer out and attempted to sedate
himself with the mundane task of organizing recent email into folders. Scanning
the list, he noticed a folder he’d had few entries for lately, only two, sent
twenty-seven lightyears ago to coincide with the arrival of the ark at
Bjornssen. The folder was labelled FAMILY.

Thoughts of his niece, Whitney, now his only living relative
— older than he now due to his sojourn in hibernation — brought a tender smile
to his face. After tucking away her latest letters — gossipy text messages
about all that had happened to the clan in the past one hundred fifty years — he
was drawn to dip into the archive and open up the special farewell she’d made
for him, so long ago.

A picture filled the small screen. Thanks to Whitney’s
artistic skill and her computer, the scene appeared to be taken from life, but
in fact, she had composed the elements. It showed Neil standing in a vegetable
garden, a toddler at his side. He and the boy, a tow-headed lad looking much as
Neil had at that age, were examining the intricacies of a web a spider had made
during the night. A spider of Earth, just as
most of the plants in the garden were Terran. The locale was Bjornssen,
however, as Whitney imagined it to be, with some sort of fanleafed trees by the
house in the background. The aqua cast to the sky was uncannily close to the
actual hue of a Bjornssen morning.

The spider was sterile, Whitney’s voice recording explained,
its reproductive abilities removed so as not to disrupt the planet’s natural
checks and balances. Like the food, the arachnid was meant to contribute to the
transition from immigrant to native lifestyle. A little bit of the old country,
to make an Earth fellow feel at home. Sunlight glinted off the droplets
suspended on the web. The child was enraptured. The expression on the face of
“Neil” was one of rich contentment, yet full of delight at investigating new
things.

“
Bon voyage
, Uncle
o’ mine,” the message concluded. “I’ll be expecting a picture of the real thing
some time before I die.”

Neil let the audio track play a second time while he pored
over the visual. The moisture in the corners of his eyes evaporated. He closed
the file with a curt vocal command. The image had steered him unwillingly to
recall the Eridanin gallery Dimitri had showed him, and suddenly he was back in
the moment, thinking of his job, and how he didn’t want it.

His memory turned inevitably to the first time he had met
Thwaa in person. He had done so as part of the greeting committee giving the
aliens a tour of the newly completed ark that they, in their conditional
benevolence, had allowed humanity to construct. At one point, by his guests’
insistence, he found himself the lone escort of a Thwaa noble as they examined
some of the passenger quarters.

Neil had seen pictures of Thwaa for the better part of
seventy years, but it ill prepared him to navigate in confined spaces with one.
He tried to drown his apprehension in his script, but the monologue on the
finer points of coldsleep tanks did not distract him from the alien’s
proximity. Its appendages floated about, evoking irrational fears of burns like
jellyfish should it touch his skin. A brain with strings attached is how one
early journalist characterized them. A monster tick with veins extending two
meters beyond its body is what he would have said. It was safe to say that
their race was a thousand generations removed from a gravity environment.
Perhaps that was what made them the proper arbiters of who could, and could
not, claim the habitable territory at the bottom of gravity wells.

Neil couldn’t tell if his companion was bored by his
presentation or simply preferred not to comment. He doubted the alien could
have had much real interest in chambers meant for beings who required spin or
acceleration to maintain health. It certainly would never be able to visit
again once the ship became operational.

Only when they had reached the end of the fifth identical
level in the hibernation section did it break silence. The little speaker attached
to its knobby “head” startled Neil by announcing in a perfectly synthesized and
mellifluous, if androgynous, voice, “You will travel on this vessel?”

“As a matter of fact, yes.”

“Safe journey. It is a mighty undertaking.”

Its tone conveyed nothing impolite, but Neil reasoned that
sarcasm would not be part of the translation protocols. “Don’t patronize me,”
he said. The Thwaa had travelled between
galaxies
,
for Christ’s sake.

“I was simply wishing you well, and stating the truth. It is
a mighty undertaking to shape a world, and do it well. The attempt is to be
commended.”