Starmind. Part 7

She hugged him closer and nuzzled his ear. "You watch: in another year or two, she'll be shaping. I'll go snooping through her files, and a monster will appear and bite me on the a.s.s."

"And it'll serve you right," he said, nuzzling back. "Snooping. Despicable. You haven't been snooping in my part.i.tion, have you?"

She snorted. "As if I could outhack you. Why, is there anything interesting in there?"

He smiled. "Never accuse your husband of having a boring diary. Salieri!"

"Yes, Maestro?"

"Run file 'Home.'"

"Yes, sir."

"Take a look out the window, love." He pulled his head back slightly so he could watch her reaction. He was really proud of this idea, and had high hopes for it. He had set himself the question:my wife is suffering, and it's my fault. What can a person of my special talents do about that? This was the answer he had come up with after three days of thought. Because it was just a rough first draft, the visual image took a few seconds to coalesce and firm up, pixel by pixel. But somehow he got the idea she guessed what it was nearly at once, the moment she heard the soundscape. She stiffened in his arms.

Outside the window were Cape Cod Bay and Provincetown. The view from Rhea's upstairs turret writing-room window, back home. Bay to the left, stone dike sticking its tongue out at the horizon; P-Town in the center, the Heritage Museum's spire rising above the jumble of rooftops; and off to the right, the Pilgrim Monument. It was early evening there; a crescent moon was just rising over the water.

"That's not a simulation," he said quickly. "It's live, and real-time. Well, three-second switching delay."

Somewhere a dog yapped. "See? That's the Codhina's rotten little Peke."

Something told him to shut up now. He studied her face. It was as though a gifted actress had been asked to do the audition of her lifetime in fifteen seconds. Every expression of which her features were capable pa.s.sed across it in rapid succession. The only sounds were distant waves, winter winds, a few gulls, a pa.s.sing car with a bad gyro and, over all, the sound of Rhea's deep breathing.

And when she finally settled on a reaction-silent, bitter tears-he only got to see it for a second before she left the suite at high speed.

Nice work.He breathed deeply himself for a minute. Then he jaunted to the window and gazed hard at Provincetown for a measureless time. Finally he shut down the display. "Salieri, let me speak to Rhea." "She is not accepting calls, sir."

"Where is she?"

"Privacy seal, sir."

He nodded. He knew a couple of ways around that . . . but he decided he had already done enough stupid things for one day. If Rhea had wanted him to find her, she wouldn't have taken the trouble to invoke privacy seal.

He was too tired to deal with this much misery, and could not diminish or share it, so he took his work to bed with him, and fell asleep on the back of a cloud, winds whistling past his ears.

9.

The Ring Saturn.

The Stardancer was unplugged from the Starmind, thinking with only her own brain. The vast System-wide flow of telepathic information from the millions of Stardancers who made up the Starmind pa.s.sed through her, but she did not pay any conscious attention to it, and sent nothing back out into the matrix.

A year ago, something she still did not fully understand had told her that she needed to be still and meditate. She had been engaged in the form of meditation that worked best for her-dancing-continuously ever since. This sort of unplugging was not unusual; at any given time, as many as several thousand Stardancers might be out of rapport, dropping in or out of the matrix as suited them, and as they could be spared from ongoing tasks. Having accepted the alien gift of Symbiosis, they were all untroubled by the need to eat, drink or sleep, and were impervious to fatigue. Furthermore they were effectively immortal, or at leastvery long-lived, which tended to produce a meditative state of mind.

To an observer unfamiliar with Symbiosis, she might have seemed to resemble a human being in an old-fas.h.i.+oned, bulky red pressure suit-without air tanks or thrusters or transparent hood. But she was not human, anymore, and the red covering was literally a part of her; the organic Symbiote with which she had merged forty-four years earlier. Designed by the enigmatic alien Fireflies to be the perfect complement to the human metabolism, Symbiote protected against cold and vacuum, turned waste products into fuel, could be spun out at will into an effective solar sail . . . and conferred telepathy with all others in Symbiosis. It also required sunlight, of course, like all living things. She was now, orbiting Saturn, almost as far as she could get from Sol without artificial life-support in the form of a photon source. But she did not feel cold . . . any more than she had felt hot when, decades earlier, she had traveled to the other extreme end of her range, the orbit of Mercury.

She had selected an orbit high enough above Saturn's mighty Ring to free her from concerns about navigational safety in that endless river of rock. Her visual field was perhaps the most beautiful the Solar System had to offer, so beautiful that she had almost ceased to see it. And even her harshest critic-herself-could not have said that her presence there detracted from the view, for she had been a gifted dancer even before she had entered Symbiosis. A tape of the past year's dancing would have fetched a high price on Earth. But this was hers and hers alone. As her body flung itself energetically through the near-vacuum, her mind was utterly still; she had long since reached that much-sought state in which one is not even thinking about not thinking. She was pure awareness, fully present yet leaving no trace.

Since she had once been a human being, there was a very primitive part of her mind which was never still for long, and in that part something like daydreaming took place from time to time. Sometimes it reached out across the immensity that engulfed her and touched the similar places in the minds of her most beloved ones, as if to rea.s.sure itself that they still existed and that all was well with them. As it went down the list, brus.h.i.+ng against each mind, her dance unconsciously changed so as to express them and her relations.h.i.+p with them. Thus an occasionally recurring series of motifs ran through the dance: a sort of kinetic giggle that was her youngest child Gemma, followed by the syncopated, slightly off-rhythm movements that represented Olney Dvorak, the Stardancer she had conceived Gemma with . . . and so on, down to her eldest, forty-three-year-old Las.h.i.+, and his human father- -it was at that point that her back spasmed and she screamed.

Any telepathic scream is strident and shocking enough; when it comes from one who has been in deep meditation for a year, every Stardancer in the Solar System flinches. And comes running to see what is wrong and what must be done about it. At once, the Starmind enfolded her like a womb, probing gently to learn the nature of her hurt.

But even she did not know.

The only clue was the word she had screamed: the name of her first co-parent.I just touched him, she told the others,and suddenly I knew something was wrong. Everything is wrong.

He was in the hookup, of course, and as baffled as she was. He reported that as far as he knew, nothing specific was wrong. He was in a region of great potential danger, but he had been there for half a century now. He was presently engaged in a delicate and complex task, with elements of almost inconceivable danger in it, but as far as he could tell it was shaping correctly.

Since there was absolutely no explanation for her terror, she could not shake it off. Unreasonable fears are the hardest to conquer. She wanted to scan and a.n.a.lyze every second of his memories of the last several weeks at least, looking for clues to the danger, but since he was not a full-fledged Stardancer she could not probe as deeply as she wanted. Their son Las.h.i.+ joined her, and they probed together.

The results were still ambiguous.

So Las.h.i.+ turned his attention to his mother.When did you first become aware that something was wrong? When I screamed.

But how longbeforethat could something have gone wrong? When was the last time you had monitored Father?

She thought about it.Yesterday, I think. And everything was fine then.

And we know what has changed in the last twenty-four hours. So we know where the danger lies.

Las.h.i.+'s father said,But why are they any more dangerous to me today than they were yesterday?

I don't care,she wanted to say.Can't you get out of there? But she could not ask that, because she already knew the answer.

I don't know,she said instead.But dammit, you be careful!

You know I will, Rain,he replied.

PART F0UR.

10.

The s.h.i.+mizu Hotel 7 January 2064.

By the time Jay and his brother had finished a room-service dinner and separated for the night, it was 21:45.Jay tried to call Eva, but her phone was not even accepting messages. He and Rand had accomplished so much work that he decided to celebrate. He jaunted to Jake's, in the Deluxe Tier, one of the livelier of the s.h.i.+mizu's twenty-one taverns-and one of only three in which off-duty employees were welcome. There he found some friends, and settled down to matching orbits with them.

He liked Jake's; he had become a semiregular there since Ethan left him for an earthworm. The management frowned on spilled blood or broken bones, but was tolerant of merriment short of that point.

It was a great place to hear extravagant lies. One red-faced old man, for instance, a wildcat asteroid miner named w.a.n.g Bin who had come to the s.h.i.+mizu to drink up a lucky strike, insisted on telling the whole room about a "white Stardancer" he claimed to have seen on his last trip out. "d.a.m.n near ran into him, no beacon or anything, spotted him by eyeball. Just like any other Stardancer, but white as a slug.

Didn't even have the manners to acknowledge my hail." And a groundhog dancer from Terra who hadjoined Jay's table told them all a whopper about a broken ankle that had healed itself just in time for a curtain.

The dancer was attractive, close enough to his age and well built-but as Jay thought about making an approach, he realized he still wasn't ready. The memory of Ethan was still too clear. A few abortive experiments had reconfirmed for him that casual s.e.x is best with oneself-certainly simpler.

A sense of duty made Jay leave sooner than he wanted to. As soon as he got back to his room, he tried Eva again. Considering the late hour, he did not expect to reach her; he hoped to leave a message requesting an appointment for a chat tomorrow. But the face that appeared onscreen was not Jeeves.

Instead he saw a bald and beardless man who had done nothing to disguise the fact that he was well over ninety years old, dressed in black loose-fitting tunic and trousers.

"Hi, Reb," Jay said after a moment of surprise. "I heard you were coming over. How are things in Top Step?"

Reb Hawkins bent forward in the Buddhistga.s.s...o...b..w, then smiled warmly. "h.e.l.lo, Jay. It's good to see you again. Things are well in Top Step, I'm happy to say. How is it with you these days?"

It had been a long day; Jay was too tired for tact. "To be honest, Reb, I'm consumed with curiosity. Is Eva still up?"

"She's gone to bed, but she told me to expect your call. Why don't you come over for a cup? We haven't talked in a while. Or are you too tired? I know you've been working hard on the new piece."

Jay was torn. His brain hurt. But he did want to know why his old friend had decided not to die after all, and it was not the sort of question that could be dealt with over the phone. "I'm on my way."

Hawkins-ros.h.i.+ was something of a legend in s.p.a.ce. He was a Zen Buddhist monk, and the oldest continuous resident of Top Step, the Earth-orbiting asteroid where human beings came to enter Symbiosis. For over forty years, until his retirement, he had helped hundreds of thousands of postulants make that profound transition, fromh.o.m.o sapiens toh.o.m.o caelestis, with minimal psychological and spiritual trauma. A cronkite had once referred to him as the Modest Midwife to the Starmind. During those four decades, he had also made regular visits to most of the other human habitations in High Earth Orbit, including the s.h.i.+mizu, dispensing spiritual sustenance and friends.h.i.+p to Buddhists and nonBuddhists alike. He and Eva were old and close friends, had known each other since they'd been groundhogs. Jay had met Reb through her.

Almost the moment Eva's door had dilated behind Jay, he was glad he had come. He had forgotten how soothing Reb's presence could be. It was not merely his obvious years; Jay was pretty sure Reb had had the same effect on people when he was a teenager. He simply had an almost tangible aura around him, projected a zone of serenity, of clarity, of acceptance. There is a quality dancers call "presence," and Jay was very good at achieving it onstage. Therefore he knew how amazing it was for Reb to have it all the time, every day. Presumably Hawkins-ros.h.i.+ had an automatic pilot, like everybody else . . . but he never seemed to use it. He would surely have long since been abbot of his own monastery somewhere down on Earth by now, if he had not found a career more important to him in s.p.a.ce; helping human beings become something more.

"How long are you here for?" Jay asked him. "Can that big rock get along without you?"

Reb smiled. "Top Step can get along just fine without me. I'm retired, remember? It's Meiya's headachethese days. I'll be here for a week, or until Eva throws me out, whichever comes first. I can use the vacation."

"I'm glad. I'd like to have a long talk with you sometime."

Reb nodded. "But not tonight. You're exhausted. You don't want any tea, do you? I'll make this as quick as I can. You want to know why Eva has changed her mind."

Jay nodded gratefully. "She told you she'd confided in me, then."

Reb nodded. "We talked for a long time. About suffering, and what it is for. About friends.h.i.+p, and what that is for. About what she has done since she came here to s.p.a.ce, and what she might do yet. About samsara. In the end I was able to persuade her that to end one's life when one is not in mortal pain or fear is a kind of arrogance."

Jay stared. He had said much the same thing to Eva, in one form or another, at least a dozen times in the last month. "But Evais arrogant," he blurted out.

Reb said nothing.

It came to Jay that perhaps Reb was just better than he was at teaching people about arrogance. Come to think of it, he was doing it now. . . .

"Well," Jay said lamely, "that's great, then. I'm glad you managed to get through to her. But I still don't see how you-"

"How do youfeel about Eva's new decision?" Reb interrupted quietly. "If you don't mind my asking."

One of the problems with talking with holy men was their uncanny habit of putting a finger-gently, nonthreateningly-right on your sore spots. Another was the difficulty of successfully bulls.h.i.+tting them.

"Ambivalent," he admitted.

Reb nodded. "I can see why. What a mix of emotions you must have felt, when she asked you to dance at her dying."

Jay nodded vigorous agreement. "Oh G.o.d, yes! Sad, of course, but also proud to have been asked, and annoyed at the extra workload, and creatively stimulated, and . . . and Reb, I'm almost as confused right now. I'm glad we're not going to lose her. But I've just gone through a month of trauma and grief reconciling myself to the idea that we were . . . and I've wasted hours of work on a piece that now may never get performed, at a time when I was already up to my a.s.s in alligators . . . and-"

"And?"

"-and if you want to know the truth, a part of me resents the h.e.l.l out ofyou, for accomplis.h.i.+ng in one conversation what I've failed to do in a month of trying. I mean, I know this is your line of work-but she and I have been friends a long time. Part of me wants to kick you-and then go wake her up and punch her in the nose."

Reb grinned. "You're welcome to kick me. But if you feel you must wake Eva, make sure your insurance is paid up first. Whatever Eva's brain may be thinking at any given moment, her body's survival instincts are strong . . . and I happen to know she fights dirty." "Yeah, I know." Jay had once seen a foolish person behave rudely to Eva. He lived.

"Think of it this way. A man tries to split a tough piece of wood with an ax. He strikes again and again, day after day, with no result. Then another man comes along and takes a tentative swing. The wood splits with a loud crack. Did the first man play no part?"

"Well . . . sure, he did. But he's going to feel frustrated as h.e.l.l."

"So you didn't just want Eva not to die; you wanted the credit for changing her mind. Be content with partial credit, all right?"

Jay laughed ruefully. "You're right. I'm being silly."

"Also known as the human condition. You're tired and high. Go to bed, and in the morning you'll be a much more admirable human being. I'll be impressed, I promise."

Jay laughed out loud. Reb could always jolly him out of a sulk. "You're right. Uh . . . look, tomorrow's going to be hectic. Could you ask Eva if she can set aside time for a visit with me the day after tomorrow?"

"I'll tell Jeeves."

"Thanks. And could you and I have a talk the day after that?"

"Whenever you like. I'm going to be busy myself tomorrow, but the rest of the week is pretty much open. Diaghilev and Rild can work out a time."

"Good. I'll see you then."

"And I'll see you tomorrow night at the performance," Reb said.

"Oh, right. I should have known you'd be on the comp list."

They exchanged bows, and Jay left. On the way home his thoughts were so scattered that he let Diaghilev navigate for him. Eva's sudden flip-flop just seemed so weird, so . . . arbitrary. Rhea would have said that it didn't ring true artistically.Eva spends sixteen years making up her mind, withstands a month of argument from me . . . and then Reb shows up and tells her suicide isn't nice, and she folds? There had to be more to it than that. What else had Reb said to her? All Jay could think of to do was to ask her at his first opportunity.

As he jaunted along, he remembered some of Reb's closing words. "Diaghilev and Rild can work out a time." Jay was struck by that now. Reb met thousands of people a year, juggled trillions of details . . .

and had remembered the name of Jay's AI without checking. He himself had forgotten that Reb called his own AI "Rild"-and had never gotten around to following up his original mental note to find out what that name signified. Whereas he was willing to bet that Reb knew not only who Sergei Diaghilev had been, but exactly what he symbolized for Jay. Perhaps here was a clue as to why Reb had succeeded with Eva where he had failed. Reb retained every detail of what people told him, and followed them up, thought them through. "Sergei," he said suddenly, "who did Reb Hawkins name his AI for?"

"I don't know, Jay. Shall I find out?" "Please."

"Waiting . . . The only match I find on file is a character in a twentieth-century novel called LORD OF LIGHT, by Roger Zelazny. Rild was student of the Buddha, a former a.s.sa.s.sin who came to surpa.s.s his master in enlightenment."

The answer was interesting-but what caught Jay's attention was its first word. It had taken Diaghilev a startlingly long time-nearly two whole seconds-to tap into the vast memory cores of the Net. It was late at night; most guests and staff were asleep. Someone must be using a h.e.l.l of a lot of bandwidth and processing power for something.