The Winds of Altair (19 page)

Jeff's heart sank. "Not again. Not after everything that's happened."

Amanda nodded gravely. "Bishop Foy's orders. We either whip this planet into shape or die trying."

Jeff looked back at the empty contact couch. "It's the animals down there who will die."

Laura whispered, "What can we do?"

"Nothing," said Amanda.

"That's what you think," Jeff snapped.

CHAPTER 25

The Tabernacle was filled for the evening service. Even the scientists and social technicians were there, at Bishop Foy's express command.

After the opening prayers, the hymns of praise, and the special prayers for strength and guidance, the Bishop—in his full regalia of green and gold—paced slowly, wearily to the lectern to begin his sermon.

With an intensity that even Jeff could see, from his pew halfway toward the doors, Bishop Foy's bony, blue-veined hands gripped the lectern. It had been made of wood taken from the original Church of Nirvan, in St. Thomas. The Bishop seemed to gain strength from touching it.

"Tomorrow," he began, in a voice that Jeff could barely hear from his pew, "we return to the work that God has given us, a task that will determine the fate of millions of souls spread over the dark distances between here and Earth, and uncounted billions of souls of the yet-unborn."

He took in a long, weary breath. His body straightened, his voice grew stronger. "Tomorrow, after fourteen days of mourning, we renew our faith and our commitment and take up once again the task to which we have dedicated our lives. Tomorrow, we pay homage to our dead in the way
they
would have wanted us to: by returning to the work for which they sacrificed their lives."

Jeff knew it was an old orator's trick: start out softly and increase the volume as you drive your points home. And it always worked; it never failed to stir an audience. He probably has the amplifiers set on a feedback loop, Jeff thought, so that the louder his voice, the more wattage they pour into the speakers.

The Bishop became eloquent, powerfully stirring up the images of duty and faith that would strike at the students' souls. He spoke of God's infinite wisdom, and of Nirvan's promise of eternal paradise for those who obeyed God's will.

But how does he know God's will? Jeff asked himself silently. How do I know that he isn't confusing his own desires with the wisdom of the Almighty?

"Let each of us renew our vows," the Bishop commanded, in a voice that rang with certainty and power, "to devote every gram of strength and purpose in us toward the goal that these fourteen martyrs gave their lives for: To redeem that planet of Satan below us and transform it into a new Eden! To find the salvation of our souls in preparing a living home world for the colonists that are on their way! To work, and work, and work still more—no matter what the setbacks, no matter the pain or danger, no matter the obstacles in our path."

Raising his eyes toward the brilliantly glowing Globe of Nirvan that hovered over the packed pews of the congregation, the Bishop raised his hands in benediction and murmured, "Let us pray."

Some four hundred students bowed their heads obediently. Many of the scientists and social techs did also. Jeff lowered his chin a few centimeters, but looked sidelong across the crowded pews. His moment was almost here.

"Amen," said the Bishop, the signal for everyone to sit up straight again. Then the ritual dismissal: "Let all voices be as one in the praise of the Lord as we return to God's work."

His palms suddenly slick with sweat, Jeff rose to his feet, feeling his heart fluttering in his chest.

"Reverend Bishop, may I speak my praise?"

It was a ritual phrasing, inserted into the liturgy when the founders of the Church of Nirvan realized that many potential converts expected the right to speak during the worship services, if the Spirit so moved them.

Foy looked startled. He peered at Jeff in a squinting way that made Jeff wonder if the Bishop recognized him at this distance.

"Every member of the Faithful is free to praise the Lord," Bishop Foy answered, unable to hide the impatient scowl on his face.

"Reverend Bishop," said Jeff, forcing himself to speak loudly enough to be heard throughout the circular chamber, "you ask us to dedicate ourselves anew to the task before us. But, sir . . ."

Jeff hesitated. Can I go through with it? Will the others support me?

He swallowed hard, then went on, "Sir, I find that I cannot in good conscience continue to participate in the destruction of the world we call Altair VI."

A sigh went through the Tabernacle, a sort of collective moan that escaped unbidden from more than five hundred throats. Jeff saw Carbo whip around from his seat in a front-row pew. Amanda, sitting beside him, swung her gaze from Jeff to the Bishop.

Foy stared at Jeff. "May I remind you that you swore before God to transform Altair VI. Do you take your vows so lightly?"

Jeff had expected his legs to turn to putty once the Bishop levelled his guns at him. Instead, he answered firmly:

"I do not take my vows lightly, Reverend Bishop. But my conscience will not allow me to participate in killing all the living creatures of an entire world."

The students stirred and buzzed like a single entity awakening from a chrysalis.

Foy glared, knowing that to control them all, he had to control this one outspoken rebel.

"You stand in danger of excommunication," the Bishop warned.

"Nirvan teaches that the individual conscience is the final authority," Jeff countered. "I ask all those whose consciences are troubled to stand with me, and refuse to continue the genocidal work we have been put to doing."

The Tabernacle went absolutely still. Jeff could hear his heart thudding in his eardrums. Foy stood frozen at the lectern, leaning on it as if he would collapse without its support.

Then, from her assigned pew, Laura McGrath got to her feet. Across the main aisle, Petrocelli's best friend rose. Then another student, and another. Jeff turned to see a half-dozen more standing behind him, and when he faced forward again, Carbo, Amanda, and two others among the scientists were on their feet.

So few, he realized. A dozen students. Four scientists. Not very many. But enough. Enough to stop things where they stand.

Foy thundered, "You fools! Don't you understand that you cannot return to Earth! You students will
never
be brought back to Earth! You will either transform this planet or die here aboard the Village!"

None of the students sat down. Two more got to their feet.

"As your spiritual leader and the head of this project I
command
you to sit down," Foy said. He lowered his voice and added, "If you sit down now and return to Nirvan's path of obedience, we will forget all about this incident."

Jeff called out, "Reverend Bishop, you are asking us to put authority above conscience, to obey rather than Believe."

"I am
ordering
you to remember your vows to God and this Church, and to be faithful to them."

"Those vows said nothing about annihilating millions of God's creatures," Jeff replied. "A vow taken in ignorance is meaningless."

The Bishop's mouth opened, then clicked shut. He glared out at the congregation. shot a special frown at Carbo and the other standing scientists, then snapped, "The service is ended. Go in peace."

With that, he turned abruptly from the lectern and strode to the gothic-arched door at the far side of the altar, radiating frustration and anger.

Jeff stood there, his knees rubbery, cold sweat trickling down his flanks. How much easier to be a wolfcat, he thought in a distant part of his mind, and deal in the simplicities of life and death.

The students stood in their pews for a stunned few moments after the Bishop had fled from the altar. Then hundreds of dazed, hushed conversations burst out.

Laura pushed her way through the milling crowd toward Jeff's side. "You did it," she said glowingly. "You actually stood up to him. I'm so proud of you!"

But the other students kept their distance from Jeff. Even those who had stood with him made their way numbly to the Tabernacle's exits and toward their dormitory rooms.

"I wonder what he's going to do now," Jeff said to Laura, voicing the fear they all felt.

"What can he do, excommunicate us? We could get that reversed as soon as we get a message back home."

"
If
he allows us to send a message back to Earth," Jeff said.

"He couldn't refuse! We have rights . . . "

"If we're excommunicated, what rights do we have?"

Laura looked shocked. "This is a fine time to think of that, Jeff."

"I thought of it this afternoon."

"And you still . . . ?"

He nodded. "I still went ahead and opposed him. I had to. I meant every word that I said, no matter what Bishop Foy does to us."

Laura began to reply, then realized there was nothing she could say. She stood beside Jeff as the students filed out of the Tabernacle until there was no one left in the huge circular chamber except the two of them, standing alone beneath the dully glowering Globe of Nirvan.

Stretched out on the soft warm buoyancy of the waterbed, Frank Carbo and Amanda Kolwezi were also worrying about Bishop Foy's next move.

"Jeff shouldn't have done it," Amanda said, staring through the darkness to the star-filled viewport in the ceiling.

"He had to.
Somebody
had to. He's the only one with the guts to do it."

"But not like that," she said. "Not in front of the whole Village. He's forced Foy to retaliate."

Carbo gave an exasperated grunt. "You've seen how Foy has responded to persuasion and argument. What else could be done except to face him head-on?"

"I don't know," Amanda answered. "But what Jeff did is bad strategy. It's forcing Foy into a corner, giving him no alternative except to lash back as strongly as he can."

Carbo smiled in the darkness. "You talk like an expert in political strategy."

"I am," Amanda said.

"Really?"

"Do you think a princess of a Congo tribe can live to adulthood—even in London—without learning something of politics?"

He chuckled softly. "No, I suppose not. I am impressed. You are a woman of many, many talents."

She turned toward him and crabbed two handfuls of his hair. "Which of my many, many talents do you like the most?"

"Your mind, of course," Carbo said. "I love you for your mind."

"Oh?"

"Because it directs such a luscious, beautiful, well-coordinated body."

She laughed and then kissed him.

He held her close to him, feeling the cool softness of her body against his bare skin.

"If a man marries a princess," he asked, "does that make him a prince?"

"No. That makes him a princess' consort."

"Consort. H'mph."

"Would that damage your Italian male ego?" Amanda teased. "Would that weaken your
machismo
, or soften your, eh . . . pride?"

"I don't think so. I guess we'll have to get married to find out."

"A psychobiological experiment?"

"I want to marry you, Amanda," he said, suddenly quite grave. "Will you marry me, my love?"

He felt her breath quicken. "Frank—are you serious?"

"I have never been more serious about anything in my life."

"Marriage," Amanda murmured. "That . . . that's a major step, isn't it?"

"Yes."

"We seem very happy together without it."

"I agree. But there is more involved than merely our physical passion—delightful though it may be."

"Maybe?"

"Be serious, darling. This project is going to end in a disaster, one way or the other. We could be stranded here, or we could be shipped back to Earth."

"I don't want to return to Earth."

"As my wife," he went on, ignoring her statement, "you would share my personal wealth, which is rather considerable. No matter what happens to me, you would be assured of enough money to return to Earth and live quite comfortably for the rest of your years."

"I will not return to Earth!" Amanda sat up on the bed, sending waves undulating through it.

"But why not?"

"I left Earth behind me," Amanda said, almost fiercely. "I will never go back. Never!"

He sighed. "You're painting yourself into a corner."

"I don't care. I will not return to Earth, to the tribal wars and suicidal politics of that old world. Earth is where all my family is buried. I will not go back there."

"But if you stay here . . ."

She looked up at the stars. "I know. If we stay here we must transform the planet or eventually die."

"There must be some other way, some better alternative."

Amanda said nothing. For long moments Carbo could not speak, either.

Finally, "But will you marry me?"

She turned and looked down at him. "Even if we stay here?"

"Yes. I love you. I want you to marry me."

Amanda touched his cheek with her outstretched hand. "You foolish, wonderful man."

"Will you?"

"Of course I will."

They kissed, long and lingering. Then Amanda broke into a giggle. "But do you think Bishop Foy will perform the ceremony for us?"

Carbo laughed too. Soon enough, though, they grew silent as they lay side by side, gazing up at the stars. Carbo quoted softly:

"Ah, love, let us be true

To one another! for the world, which seems

To lie before us like a land of dreams,

So various, so beautiful, so new,

Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,

Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain . . ."

CHAPTER 26

When Carbo awoke the next morning, he felt emotionally exhausted, heavy-spirited. Slowly he turned on the undulating waterbed, to find that Amanda was no longer there beside him.

He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, then pulled himself up to a sitting position as the bed rocked gently beneath him. Then he heard her voice singing, and he let himself breathe again.

"Good morning," Amanda said as she came into the bedroom. She was fully dressed in a loose orange and brown caftan over a pair of dark form-fitting slacks.

"You're damned cheerful." he grumbled.

"Why not? There's no work to do. I got up early and checked with . . ."

The phone buzzed. Carbo leaned across the bed and clicked it on, holding the bedclothes up to his chest with his other hand.

Bishop Foy's face appeared in the tiny screen, white and drawn, his eyes bloodshot with sleeplessness.

The Bishop grimaced with distaste as he saw that Carbo was still in bed. Amanda stayed at the bedroom doorway, out of the phone's line of sight.

"You haven't tried to get into the contact laboratory this morning, I see," said the Bishop.

"I . . . uh, I overslept." Carbo suddenly felt as if he were being confronted by his Jesuit disciplinarian again.

"Well, get down there as fast as you can and see if you can talk some sense into Holman and the rest of those rebels. If you can't, there's going to be real trouble. I promise you that!
Real
trouble!"

The screen went blank.

Carbo blinked his gummy eyes and turned to Amanda.

"I was just about to tell you," she said, a strange smile on her lips. "Jeff and the other students have taken over the contact lab. They won't let anyone else in."

"Jesus, Mary and Joseph," Carbo gasped.

Jeff fought down the temptation for the twentieth time. Sitting in the flimsy wheeled chair in front of the control console, he could see the couch—
his
couch—where he could be in contact with Crown within minutes.

But we've all agreed there will be no more contact work, he told himself. Not even to see how Crown is getting along. Nobody touches any of this equipment. No matter what the Bishop says or does, we stay here and keep them from using this equipment and killing Windsong.

Still, he itched to be linked up to the equipment, to make contact with Crown, to be a wolfcat leading a whole clan down on the surface of that world.

He shook his head, as if to clear it of such temptation. I've done a lot better for Crown than I have for myself, he told himself ruefully.

"Jeff." Laura's voice broke him out of his thoughts.

He swivelled the creaking chair to face her. "Dr. Carbo's here. He'd like to speak with you."

"Good." Jeff got to his feet and went with Laura to the reception area where the offices and the main exit to the outer corridor were.

Amanda was with Carbo, looking more beautiful than ever. The scientist himself seemed disheveled, as if he had dressed very quickly. His jawline was dark, stubbly.

"It's all right," Jeff said to the four students who were standing guard at the corridor door. "They can come in."

Jeff led Carbo and Amanda to Carbo's own office, an unkempt cubbyhole at the end of the row of offices. Carbo's eyes took in everything: the students lounging at the reception desk, the others posted at the entrance to the lab area.

"You've really taken over the place," he said as Jeff opened the office door.

"We haven't harmed anything," Jeff said. "We just want to make certain that no one uses the equipment."

Carbo gestured Amanda into the office, then stepped in himself. Jeff and Laura followed. The office was cramped and littered with cassettes of data tapes, book spools, recording tablets.

"May I?" Carbo asked, pointing to the padded chair behind the desk.

"It's your office," Jeff said.

He went around the desk and sat down. Amanda took the chair beside the desk. Laura and Jeff squeezed together on the half-sized couch facing it.

"I didn't know if you'd let me in," Carbo said.

"You stood with us last night, didn't you?"

"Yes, but I'm not sure that I agree with this move—taking over my lab."

"I thought about it all night," Jeff said. "It's the only way we can prevent Bishop Foy from forcing the work to continue."

"And it's the only way we can make him listen to us," Laura added.

Amanda said, "You're going to force him to do something drastic."

"That can't be helped," Jeff said. "He can try to starve us out, prevent other students from bringing food to us."

"Or he can use police powers to muscle you out," Carbo said.

"He'd have to have the Elders agree to the use of physical force," Jeff said.

"Since when have the Elders said no to him?"

Jeff admitted, "You're right. But he'd have to recruit the police from among the students. I don't think they'd attack us. And even if they did, we'd destroy this equipment before they were able to overcome us."

Carbo threw his hands up. "
Jesu,
what talk! Destroy the equipment."

Leaning forward, placing his hands on his knees and staring straight into Carbo's eyes, Jeff said, "We are determined to prevent the annihilation of the living creatures of Windsong—Altair VI."

"But there's got to be a better way than blowing up the lab," Carbo argued.

"I wish I knew one."

Glancing up at the ceiling and the curving wall of the office, Amanda said slowly, "You know, if I were Foy, I wouldn't try to use force against you students. I would just evacuate the rest of this dome, leave you here sitting in the lab, and then turn off your air."

For a moment no one spoke; the only sound in the room was the electrical hum of the air blowers.

"Once we realized he'd done that," Jeff said at last, "we would still have time to wreck the equipment."

"Not if he just opened all the vents in this dome," Amanda said, "and let the whole dome decompress. You'd all be dead inside of a few minutes."

Laura shuddered. "He wouldn't do that."

"Maybe," Amanda said.

"Whether he would or not is unimportant," Carbo said impatiently.

"Unimportant?"

"Maybe to you," Jeff said.

Carbo waggled his hand at them. "Listen, my friends. I am here. I will stay here with you. I made that decision last night in the Tabernacle. We are in this together, to the very end."

Jeff felt his breath catch in his chest. "Do you mean that?"

"Of course. We live or die together, and in the long run, whether we live or die is not important."

Amanda made a sour face at him.

"No, hear me out. What
is
important is that world down below us, and those colonists on their way here. We must find some way to save them both. So far, the way we have been going, we can only save one at the expense of the other. How can we save them both?"

Jeff shook his head. "I've been trying to figure that one out for months now."

"Either we destroy Altair VI and turn it into a habitable planet for the colonists," Amanda said, "or we leave the planet alone and let the colonists die in their ship."

"But they can live in that ship for a long time," Laura pointed out. "For years, can't they?"

"Yes," Carbo agreed. "But not indefinitely. The ship's supplies are limited. Its recycling equipment won't last forever."

"We're in the same boat," Jeff muttered.

"This is no time for a pun," said Amanda, grinning. Jeff shot her a puzzled frown.

"But I don't understand," Laura said, "why we can't live in the Village indefinitely. Can't we convert some of the domes into farms and grow our own food? I mean, the colonists must be bringing seed stocks and frozen livestock embryos, aren't they?"

Jeff turned in the couch to look at her. "You might as well talk about building an O'Neill colony."

"Well, why not?" Laura asked brightly.

"Because," Carbo explained, "O'Neill colonies are incredibly expensive to build. Only the very richest corporations on Earth can afford them. And once they're built, only the richest people on Earth—or the corporations' employees—are allowed to live in them."

But Laura would not be deterred. "You say we need an alternative to lay before Bishop Foy. You say we need a solution that will save both Altair VI and the colonists. So why not build an O'Neill colony here in space? It could be big enough to be a habitat for a million people or more, and it could be built to be just like Earth inside: Earth-type air, gravity, temperatures, everything!"

"It would cost hundreds of billions," Carbo insisted. "It would take years to build it."

"But it would take years to transform Altair VI, wouldn't it?"

"And it wouldn't cost hundreds of billions," Jeff said slowly, "because we don't use money here."

Carbo grumbled, "You know what I meant . . ."

"Yes," Jeff said. "You mean that we can't afford to build an O'Neill colony. But why not? What makes you think we're so poor?"

"We . . ." Carbo stopped abruptly, and stroked his chin as if lost in thought over this new idea.

Jeff said, with growing enthusiasm, "We have energy, a constant flood of energy here in orbit from Altair itself. We have raw materials from Altair's asteroid belt—the same raw materials we used to build the oxygen plants. We have a core of trained, dedicated workers right here in the Village."

"We would need thousands more workers," Carbo said.

"They're on their way," Jeff countered. "The colonists."

"But those people aren't engineers or managers. They're the poor scum of a dozen Asian cities, scooped up off the streets."

Amanda reached out and put a hand gently on Carbo's arm. "Frank,
you
were poor scum scooped off the streets, once."

His jaw dropped open. With a visible effort, he regained control of himself.

"Yes, that's right," he said softly. "But it took almost twenty years of discipline and education to turn me into a scientist."

"And you invented a device that telescopes that twenty years into—what, twenty months? Twenty weeks?"

"The neuro probe?"

Amanda nodded. "It could be the greatest educational tool in human history, Frank. If it's used properly."

"The colonists are already implanted with them," Jeff said.

"We could use them to train those people," Laura added. "Educate them. Turn them into . . ."

"No," Carbo snapped. "I won't use the probes to force people into shapes they don't wish to be."

"But what makes you think they want to be poor and ignorant?" Amanda demanded. "They'd jump at the chance to learn, to change their lives."

"Not all of them would."

"Then to hell with those who refuse!" Jeff snapped. "They're the
real
dregs and they'll be nothing but trouble no matter what we or anybody else does for them."

"But most of them will work with us," Amanda insisted. "Most of them will join us and help us to build."

"An O'Neill colony," Laura echoed.

"More than one," Jeff said. "Five of them, twenty, a hundred. Who needs to destroy an existing world when we can build brand-new ones, exactly fit for human habitation?"

For the first time, Carbo smiled. "You're crazy, all of you."

"Yes, of course," Jeff agreed. "But it will work. We can make it work."

Carbo looked at each of their faces in turn: Amanda, Laura, and Jeff. Then he reached across his desk and flicked on the phone. "Bishop Foy, please. Tell him it's urgent . . . and it's good news."