“We know that we are fatally susceptible. We cannot alter our own genome, at least not for the living, but we have learned much from you. By the time the spore cloud reaches World, we will have developed a vaccine. This would not have been possible without your full cooperation and your bodily samples. We—”
“If this is true,” Penny Hodgson shouted, “why didn’t they tell us?”
“—did not tell you the complete truth because we believe that had you known Earth was in no critical danger, you would not have allocated so many resources, so much scientific talent, or such urgency into the work on the Embassy. We are all human, but your evolutionary history and present culture are very different from ours. You do not build identity on family. You permit much of Earth’s population to suffer from lack of food, water, and medical care. We didn’t think you would help us as much as we needed unless we withheld from you certain truths. If we were mistaken in our assessment, please forgive us.”
They weren’t mistaken, Marianne thought.
“We are grateful for your help,” Smith said, “even if obtained fraudulently. We leave you a gift in return. This recording contains what you call the ‘engineering specs’ for a star drive. We have already given you the equations describing the principles. Now you may build a ship. In generations to come, both branches of humanity will profit from more open and truthful exchanges. We will become true brothers.
“Until then, ten Terrans accompany us home. They have chosen to do this, for their own reasons. All were told that they would not die if they remained on Earth, but chose to come anyway. They will become World, creating further friendship with our clan brothers on Terra.
“Again—thank you.”
Pandemonium erupted on the barge: talking, arguing, shouting. The sun was above the horizon now. Three Coast Guard ships barreled across the harbor toward the barge. As Marianne clutched her yellow blanket closer against the morning breeze, something vibrated in the pocket of her jeans.
She pulled it out: a flat metal square with Noah’s face on it. As soon as her gaze fell on his, the face began to speak. “I’m going with them, Mom. I want you to know that I am completely happy. This is where I belong. I’ve mated with Llaa^moh¡—Dr. Jones—and she is pregnant. Your grandchild will be born among the stars. I love you.”
Noah’s face faded from the small square.
Rage filled her, red sparks burning. Her son, and she would never see him again! Her grandchild, and she would never see him or her at all. She was being robbed, being deprived of what was hers by right, the aliens should never have come—
She stopped. Realization slammed into her, and she gripped the rail of the barge so tightly that her nails pierced the wood.
The aliens had made a mistake. A huge, colossal, monumental mistake.
Her rage, however irrational, was going to be echoed and amplified across the entire planet. The Denebs had understood that Terrans would work really hard only if their own survival was at stake. But they did not understand the rest of it. The Deneb presence on Earth had caused riots, diversion of resources, deaths, panic, fear. The “mild illness” of the 20 percent like Robbie, happening all at once starting today, was enough to upset every economy on the planet. The aliens had swept like a storm through the world, and as in the aftermath of a superstorm, everything in the landscape had shifted. In addition, the Denebs had carried off ten humans, which could be seen as brainwashing them in order to procure prospective lab rats for future experimentation.
Brothers, yes—but Castor and Pollux, whose bond reached across the stars, or Cain and Abel?
Humans did not forgive easily, and they resented being bought off, even with a star drive. Smith should have left a different gift, one that would not let Terrans come to World, that peaceful and rich planet so unaccustomed to revenge or war.
But on the other hand—she could be wrong. Look how often she’d been wrong already: about Elizabeth, about Ryan, about Smith. Maybe, when the Terran disruptions were over and starships actually built, humanity would become so entranced with the Deneb gift that we would indeed go to World in friendship. Maybe the prospect of going to the stars would even soften American isolationism and draw countries together to share the necessary resources. It could happen. The cooperative genes that had shaped Smith and Jones were also found in the Terran genome.
But—it would happen only if those who wanted it worked hard to convince the rest. Worked, in fact, as hard at urging friendship as they had at ensuring survival. Was that possible? Could it be done?
Why are you here?
To make contact with World. A peace mission.
She gazed up at the multicolored dawn sky, but the ship was already out of sight. Only its after-image remained in her sight.
“Harrison,” Marianne said, and felt her own words steady her, “we have a lot of work to do.”
PART TWO
Man is always prey to his truths. Once he has admitted them, he cannot free himself from them.
CHAPTER 12
S plus 2.6 years
Marianne stood in a small storage room somewhere in the DeBartolo Performing Arts Center at the University of Notre Dame, waiting to go on stage and staring at eight mice.
They were, of course, dead. These eight, however, looked unnervingly lifelike, superb examples of the taxidermist’s art. Why were they here, meeting her gaze with their shiny lifeless eyes from behind the glass of a tiered display case? Had they been moved to this unlikely venue from another building, to sit among cardboard cartons and discouraged-looking mops, because someone could no longer bear to be reminded of what had been lost?
Sissy Tate, Marianne’s assistant, stuck her head into the room. “Ten minutes, Marianne. Are those mice? Wow, it’s stuffy in here.”
“No windows. What about the—”
“They should have put you in the green room! Or at least a dressing room!” Sissy shook her frizzy cherry-red curls, which leaped around her head as if electrified. Two weeks ago the curls had been the same rich brown as her skin. Today’s sweater, purple covered with tiny mirrors, glittered.
Marianne said, “There’s a concert setting up in the big hall. No space.”
“That’s not the reason and we both know it. But at least you don’t have to worry about the storm—this one is going to miss South Bend. No problem.” Sissy’s head disappeared, and Marianne went back to contemplating mice.
Eight representatives of what had been the world’s most common herbivore, now existing nowhere in the world except for a few sealed labs.
Mus musculus and Mus domesticus, their pointed snouts and scaly tails familiar to anyone who ever baited a mousetrap or worked in a laboratory.
A deer mouse and a white-footed mouse, almost twins, looking like refugees from a Disney cartoon.
On the second glass shelf, the shaggy, short-tailed meadow vole and its cousin, the woodland vole.
A bog lemming, its lips drawn back to show the grooves on its upper incisors.
And finally, a jumping mouse, looking lopsided with its huge hind feet and short forelimbs.
“Hey,” Marianne said to the jumping mouse, of which no specimens had been saved. “Sorry you’re extinct.”
“You talking to a mouse?” a deep voice said behind her.