And what would I have then?
On the Ride Down
Walton gave directions to the city entrance, then headed back to his weather station. I couldn't help feeling I'd disappointed him: I was too clenched to respond to his calm cheerfulness. Still, I was not so numb that I didn't feel a stir of excitement as we left the lark and the river behind. We followed a short trail through pine forest, then came to an open area of rock and gravel, just as Walton described.
A concealed doorway lurked behind a rock outcrop. PRESS PALM HERE was scratched onto the stone. I pressed, and the door opened.
An elevator lay beyond the door. Someone had painted UP and DOWN beside two buttons embedded in the wall. I pressed DOWN.
The elevator began to descend.
"We're here," I said to Oar.
"And there are many fucking Explorers here?"
"I promise they'll treat you kindly."
"They will not whisper about me? They will not look at me as if I am stupid?"
"Walton didn't, did he? And if any of the others do, I'll punch them in the nose."
I smiled, but Oar didn't smile back. It occurred to me I'd barely paid attention to her since we boarded the plane. I had spoken more to the plane than to Oar.
Moving to her, I took her arm and patted her hand. "It'll be all right… really."
"I am scared," she said in a small voice. "I feel strange in my stomach."
"Don't be afraid. Whatever happened between you and Jelca—"
She interrupted. "Will he want to give me his juices again?"
Ouch. "Do you want him to do that?" I asked.
"I am not such a one as needs Explorer juices!" she snapped. "I just do not want him to think I am stupid."
"No one thinks you're—"
"They left without telling me! All of them: Laminir Jelca, Ullis Naar, and my sister Eel. I woke one morning and they were gone. They took Eel with them, but not me."
I studied her for a moment. "You're angry at Eel?"
"She was my sister. She was my sister but she went with the fucking Explorers and left me alone."
"Oar…" I wrapped my arms around her. "You aren't alone now. You're with me. We're friends."
She hugged me, crying, her head on my shoulder. That was how we were standing when the elevator opened… and damned if I didn't try to pull away, for fear Jelca might see us like that.
Oar's grip was too strong for me to escape. Anyway, there was no one waiting on the other side of the door.
Reflections on the City
Beyond the door lay a city.
A city.
Oar's home had been a village; Tobit's a town. Here, in a cavern hollowed out of a mountain, there was space for thousands of buildings, perhaps millions of people.
All glass. All sterile. All empty and sad.
Listen. When you think of a glass city, do you imagine a crystal wonderland, bright-lit and glittering? Or perhaps something more mysterious, a glass labyrinth dreaming in permanent twilight? Then you don't understand the ponderous monotony of it all. No color. No life. No grass, no trees, no gardens. No friendly lizards basking in the plazas, or pigeons strutting across the squares. No smells of the marketplace. No playgrounds. No butterflies.
Nothing but a vast glass graveyard.
I don't know what the League intended on Melaquin. To build a refuge? A zoo? How had those humans of four thousand years ago reacted when they saw this new home? They had food, they had water, they had medicine and artificial skin; they even had obedient AIs to help and teach them. With all those comforts, it would be hard to walk away… but it would also be hard to live here, eternally colorless and odorless.
Or perhaps I was wrong. Perhaps those ancient people filled these streets with music… held dances, played jokes, painted murals on every glass surface. They were finally free from fear and want; their beautiful glass children would never starve down to skeletons, or cough themselves bloody from TB. Those first people might have lived joyously and died in comfortable peace, convinced this was truly a paradise.
That was four thousand years ago: the early ages of what humans call civilization. If those first generations painted these walls, the paint had long since flaked away. If they sang and danced, the tunes were forgotten. Human roots ran shallow on this planet; when the people of flesh died, their works crumbled, leaving only immortal glass.
Glass buildings. Glass children. Children who seemed to make no artworks, no songs, no sloppy messy life.
Was the problem physical… some lack in their glands, something the League left out when making these new versions of humanity? Or was the problem social? When the fear of death was gone, when offspring were rare, did you lose the incentive to achieve something beyond yourself?
I still don't know. Whatever went wrong on Melaquin happened in every settlement on the planet — an astounding thing in itself — and it happened so long ago that no evidence remained of the loss.
All I saw was glass. A glass city.
Oar no doubt thought it beautiful. She too was glass.
Signs
The elevator was set into the outermost wall of the city: a wall of rough-hewn stone, striated with geological layers slanted twenty degrees to the horizontal. I have never liked caves — I can feel the weight of all that rock pressing down on my head — but the cavern was so huge, my misgivings were small. Besides, there were veins of pink quartz, green feldspar, and other tinted minerals deposited through the stone, providing welcome variations in the bleak color scheme.
Another variation was a sign painted in loose black letters on the nearest building:
GREETINGS, SENTIENT BEINGS
WE'RE IN THE CENTRAL SQUARE
WE'LL SHOW THEM WHAT EXPENDABLE MEANS!
"What does that say?" Oar asked.
"It says hello," I told her. "And that we've come to the right place."
"It is a very big place," Oar said, staring out on the forest of towers, domes, and blockhouses.
"Be brave." I gave her a squeeze, telling myself not to feel awkward about touching her "Walton said we should walk to the center now."
It was a long walk; it was a big city. I wondered how many ancient humans had been brought here… certainly not enough to fill the place. After living in grass huts or wattle-and-daub, the people must have been intimidated to have so much space at their disposal. Then again, they were used to living outdoors; maybe with a roof over their heads, they actually felt confined.
Our route led straight down a broad boulevard, its surface smooth white cement. A few buildings had words painted on their walls: KEEP GOING… NO U-TURN… BE PREPARED TO MERGE… the indulgent signs people write to amuse themselves in empty cities. SIGNAL YOUR TURNS… DEER CROSSING… ALL CARS MUST BE RUNNING ELECTRIC…
I didn't translate them for Oar. Some jokes aren't worth explaining.
Dirt
The closer we got to the center, the more dirt I saw. First it was just thin dust on nearby buildings; then bits of grit accumulated at the edge of the boulevard; then spills of grease or electrolyte darkening the pavement.
"This is a filthy place," Oar said with self-satisfaction. "My home would never become so dirty."
"Do you clean your home?" I asked.
"No." Her voice was offended. "Machines attend to such matters."
"This city has the same kind of machines. Otherwise the place would be buried in grime. The Explorers must have kicked up more mess than the systems could handle; either that or my friends have commandeered the cleaning machines for other things." Most likely for spare parts, I thought. Someone like Jelca wouldn't hesitate to sacrifice a janitor-bot in his drive to restore a spaceship.