Gridlock and Other Stories Part 15

For the blinking blue symbol with the tiny "E" inside it was still there. Now that her conscious mind was in control again, she realized that it could not have been otherwise. After all, if the Doomsday Device had been set off, she would have had considerably more indication of that fact than the lack of the Earth symbol on the monitoring screen. Its absence had been the result of a minor malfunction brought about by her blow to the screen. The repair circuits were already working on it. There had never been any need for concern.

Yet, it was her sudden concern that surprised her. She really did care! What happened to this muddy ball of squabbling savagesdid matter to her. She felt an exhilarating feeling of relief. After all these empty years, she had a reminder that there was purpose to her life. Humanity was down, but not out.

They would rise again. True, not in her lifetime. Perhaps in Amber's.

The stars were still out there, waiting. They would not have to wait forever.

Fria did not know how long she stayed down below after her revelation, but when she finally pushed back the trap door and climbed into her own bedroom, she was surprised to see daylight softly shining in the window. For the first time in a long time she felt refreshed, as if she had finally achieved a long needed sleep. She pulled the blanket part.i.tion aside and stood quietly. She was pleased to see Amber had returned and was apparently no worse for having spent the night in the storm. The girl was sitting in the middle of the main room with her back to Fria, holding something in her arms.

Fria hesitated, unsure of how to approach the girl. Finally, she walked forward and sank to her knees.

Amber had been crying. Her face was puffy and red. She looked up from the wet ball of fur that she cradled in her arms and began to sob again.

"When I came back this morning, I found Pounce lying all stiff in the doorway ... I'm so sorry."

Fria gently took the cat from the girl's arms and placed it lovingly on the floor.

"It's all right. Don't cry. Please don't cry."

Amber sniffed back her tears and stared up at Fria with uncertainty and fear in her eyes. After a moment of hesitation, Fria reached out and took Amber's small hand in her own. She smiled rea.s.suringly. Amber leaned forward and rested her head against Fria's shoulder. She felt the child's hand squeeze her own and she gently stroked the girl's soft curls. A smile played across her lips. Maybeher prayers had been finally answered.

Maybe, after all these years, she had a child of her own.

Author's note forWho Will Guard the Guardians ?:

You may have noticed a strong feminine flavor toWho Will Guard the Guardians ? that is missing from my other work. That is because I did not write it. My wife, Catherine, did. I polished it and we jointly published it in the 14 October 1982 issue of a.n.a.log Science Fiction.

One of the things that drives new authors to take up writing is meeting the old writers.

For some reason, people have an inflated opinion of the craft of writing. It is as though they expect a writer to be somehow better than everyone else. Therefore, when they finally meet a real live writer for the first time, the most common reaction is one of ... disappointment.

That is because writers are almost exclusively introverts - you have to be an introvert if you are going to spend hundreds of hours alone working at your craft.

(If you would like a boring experience, try attending a party attended solely of writers.

Mostly people sit around and stare at one another, not knowing what to talk about. So we talk shop. Every writers' party should have at least a few non-writer extroverts to liven up the mix.) Having finally met a writer, people generally are not particularly impressed. That leads them to the inevitable thought, "If he can do it, anyone can!" New writers, then, are born out of disdain as much as any other emotion. The interesting thing about this phenomenon is that people are right. Just about anyone can become a successful writer. All they need is perseverance and the desire to write.

My wife caught the writing bug in the early 1980's. She had been proof reading my stuff for years and obviously had decided that if I could do it, so could she. Who Will Guard the Guardians ? was her first attempt. One of the problems with writing is that while you can clearly see the story in your head, it takes practice to get it down on paper. The rule is that you have to write a million words before you write the first one that sells.

This rule does not necessarily hold if you live with a professional writer and can make his life miserable if he doesn't help you polish your story. Therefore, after Catherine finished her story, I read it over and grudgingly admitted that it was, indeed, a good idea. I then went over it and polished it where I thought it was a little rough. We agreed on the changes, stuck it in an envelope (along with a self addressed, stamped return envelope) and sent it off to Stan Schmidt. And, wonder of wonders, he bought it.

Catherine was now one for one in the writing game! Those of you who have pursued careers in writing will recognize that to be an amazing statistic. Most of us have to collect a hundred rejection letters before we get our first acceptance. Not knowing this, my wife embarked on her second story. I polished it up, as before, and we sent it in to the magazines. This time, they rejected it, and Catherine was p.i.s.sed!

Which only goes to show, no matter how successful a person is in this life, they are never really satisfied. Which, if you think about it, is the theme of the story you just read. Our never-ending quest for becoming better than we are is probably what makes us all human! Itis our most endearing quality.

LIFE PROBE.

If an alien s.p.a.cecraft searching for intelligent life in the universe encountered Earth, would it think that it had found any?

I wake...

...in quick stages...

... of jumbled impressions...

... and stray memories.

The attack of integration vertigo lasts a dozen nanoseconds while my brain a.s.sembles itself back into a functioning whole. Finally, the fuzziness is gone and I am once more awake and aware.

I "look" around.

As expected, I am in deep interstellar s.p.a.ce. The stars are cold, hard points of radiance etched against the fathomless black of the cosmos. My chronometer informs me that I have been in flight for more than ten thousand years. It has been a long journey. Jurul warned me that it might.

The thought of Jurul brings a sudden flood of long dormant memories to my main processing units. Jurul was my mentor and the Maker whose personality I carry imprinted on my circuits. It is his influence that allows me to look upon the stars and see beauty, or listen to the monotonous thrum of the pulsars and hear music.

And it was Jurul's voice that bade me goodbye just before launch: "How are you doing, Nine-three-five?"

"A little nervous, Jurul."

"Not to worry. I have yet to see a life probe that was calm at this point in the countdown."

"Truly?"

"Yes. Remember what you're supposed to do?"

"How could I forget? I'm a computer."

"Humor us. Repeat your mission objectives."

I accessed the record containing my mission objectives and output it verbatim: "I am to seek out and observe intelligent lifeforms among the stars. If possible I will learn all I am able of their scientific knowledge, obtain their help in my overhaul and refit, and then return home to report.""And if you should happen to discover a civilization that has developed a means of traveling faster than light?"

"Not much chance of that."

Jurul chuckled."How did a computer energized so recently get to be so cynical? Answer the question, Nine-three-five."

"In the event that I observe a civilization with an FTL drive, I will ensure that it is safe to do so before directing them here to the home world to bargain for the secret of faster than light travel."

"Very good. How long to boost?"

"Coming up on eight-to-the-second-power seconds."

"Luck, Nine-three-five."

"Luck to you as well, Jurul."

I remained in communication with the Makers for nearly a full year following launch, but that was the last time Jurul's voice ever rode the laser beam. Shortly after reaching cruising velocity, even that tenuous link with home was broken-- and with it, all hope of ever speaking to Jurul again.

For when I return to point of launch (if I return), Jurul will be ancient dust and it will fall to one of his descendants to take my report.

To report I must first return home and that is proving no easy task. I accepted the same gamble every life probe takes when it boosts into the unknown. It is a gamble five of six eventually lose. It is beginning to look as though I may become another grim statistic.

A life probe is the ultimate of the Makers' many creations. Powered by the complete conversion of matter into energy, we climb to nearly one-eighth light speed in less than a single year. But in so doing, we leave ourselves nearly crippled. For after attaining cruising velocity, we find ourselves with barely sufficient fuel reserves to slow our headlong rush at journey's end.

Thus, necessity has doomed me to spend most of my life in transit. I plod slowly outbound toward the galactic rim, with the eternity between stars my greatest danger. What intelligent being, organic or machine, could maintain its sanity on such a journey? My memory banks would overflow with data long before the first waypoint sun if nothing were done to protect me.

It is for this reason that the Makers createdCARETAKER and the Long Sleep.

CARETAKERis my alter ego. His brain is my brain. Only the arrangement of our basic circuitry is different. CARETAKER is an ent.i.ty with no real sentience, a mere computer that comes awake after I give the command to switch all circuit modules to temporary data storage. It is his function to watch the sky, ever vigilant for that one stray bit of energy that betrays its creators as intelligent beings.

When he finds one, he signals me awake. He has done so four times now.

That first time I was less than two hundred years out, barely within my area of search. Excitement welled in me like a nova sun asCARETAKER signaled me awake. I scanned the star in question, noting unmistakable signs of an advanced civilization. However, a quick check of the star's position showed it to be outside my ability to maneuver. To attempt rendezvous would have drained my fuel stocks without halting my rush through the void.That was my first great disappointment.

The next two contacts were no better. One was with a race on its way back to savagery, no longer able to repair the few machines that still operated. The other was sketchy and far outside my range.

I returned to the Long Sleep each time with a feeling of increasing disappointment resonating through my circuitry.

Now it is time to turn my attention to Contact Number Four.

I call up the signal from whereCARETAKER has stored it in memory. It is weak, splotchy, and very nearly unreadable. I study the parameters of the contact with growing excitement: Amplitude modulated electromagnetic radiation ... midcommunications band ... a raster pattern of parallel lines ... high and low intensities that form a two dimensional array when arranged in proper sequence...

Clearly,CARETAKER has intercepted someone's televid signal.

Simultaneously with contact confirmation, I set two subroutines in motion within my logic units. One has the purpose of determining if rendezvous with the signal source is physically possible. The other is concerned with a far more difficult question.

A yellow star leaps toward me as I focus my telescope on the source of the signal. With mounting tension, I begin the delicate operation of plotting the position of the star. I am in luck.

A first approximation shows the yellow sun to be almost directly on my course. A few more hours of careful measurement confirms it. I will pa.s.s within a thousand stellar diameters of the star at closest approach-- almost a glancing blow on the scale of the galaxy.

Now comes the difficult part. Before I can commit myself and my precious fuel to a rendezvous attempt, I will have to decide whether the creatures that originated the televid signals are civilized. To a life probe, such things are defined by very narrow parameters.

A civilized species is one that possesses a knowledge of matter-antimatter reactions, a working grasp of the principles of ma.s.s conversion, and a large enough industrial base to support the ma.s.sive reconstruction efforts I will require if I am to return home. A sizable s.p.a.ce fleet able to ferry a large work force into orbit is also helpful, but not absolutely necessary. Within my memory banks, I carry complete plans for literally hundreds of different s.p.a.cecraft designs. I can teach a technologically literate race what they must know if need be, but it will significantly slow the process of returning home. All depends on the character of the beings I choose for my helpers.

I turn my detectors to high gain and focus my attention on the yellow sun. There is much to learn.

The star is closer now. Closer and brighter. I have detected two of the system's planets-- gas giants to judge by the interference lobes they cast on the star's diffraction pattern. As the image of the yellow sun has grown in intensity, so too the intensity of the intercepted televid signals.

It is a hopeful sign.

My data banks now contain hundreds of hours of televid signals and I avidly collect more. I wait patiently for the knowledge stored within me to build to critical ma.s.s, the point at which I can begin tolearn the language of those from whom the signals originate.

My study has taken far longer than expected. The creatures do not appear to possess a single language.

Rather, their signals arrive coded in dozens of different linguistic variations. The wide diversity suggests a planet of many competing cultures. That part of me dedicated to the collection of pure knowledge is ecstatic. The opportunity is unparalleled. Never before has a life probe chanced upon such an infant culture.

However, the rest of me is worried.

For interesting or not, the creatures do not yet possess any of the attributes of civilization. My only hope is that they can be taught the skills they will need to a.s.sist in my overhaul. But can they learn? Do they have the intelligence, the ability, and the desire to absorb a thousand years of technological advancement overnight?

It is a question for which I have no answer.

I settle down to collect more data and eventually I speak several of their languages. Very quickly afterwards, however, I learn that the signals mean little more to me than they did before. That is hardly surprising. I know nothing of the cultural referents the creatures take for granted when they speak to one another. I know not the backdrop against which they live their everyday lives. In many ways, the gulf between us is as great as that between stars.

I ponder the problem for a few million nanoseconds and decide to approach it in a less direct manner. I begin preparations to split my brain in two in order to establish an independent intelligence that will help me understand the strange creatures on which I eavesdrop.

The mechanics of such a division are relatively simple. I split off one of my logic modules and isolate it from the rest of my circuitry. The vertigo a.s.sociated with the split is a dozen times worse than any I have ever experienced in waking. As the new intelligence forms, I find myself growing more stupid by the instant. At the same time, my thoughts develop a disturbing echo.

As Jurul drilled into me so very long ago, forming a secondary mind is a dangerous step. It affects my coordination, my speed of thought, even that tenuous quality that is self-awareness. If my mind loses too much of its internal synchronization, I will become anotherCARETAKER , although I will not realize it should it happen. To cleave one's mind in two is dangerous for any thinking ent.i.ty. The detrimental effects are so great that it is a move normally reserved for dire emergencies.

My current situation is desperate enough to be cla.s.sified as such.

My dilemma is clear. If I choose to decelerate as I close on the yellow sun and the inhabitants prove intractable, I will end my quest with dry tanks, trapped in orbit about a planet of savages, with no hope of ever returning to my point of launch. To stop is a risk, but possibly less so than going on.

My life span is long, but far from infinite. A constant rain of interstellar dust scours my leading edges as I hurtle through s.p.a.ce. Even the minor quant.i.ty of matter found in deep s.p.a.ce will eventually erode my shields to uselessness. Should I continue my journey, my shields will be gone before another ten thousand years have pa.s.sed. When that happens, cosmic radiation will slowly wreak havoc on my circuits. Once I lose my shielding, a slow, creeping insanity will be my future, and eventually, death.

How am I to choose my fate? How can I get inside the minds of creatures with which I have nothing in common, not even the mutual bond of being fellow organic beings? I cannot.That job will fall to the secondary mind I have created.

At the instant of birth, my stepchild is little more than a grouping of circuits from which I have wiped all knowledge. Nothing remains except a few billion memory modules waiting to take on a new form. And a new form they shall have. With luck, they will become a reflection of the essence of a human being ... a h.o.m.o sapiens ... a man.

When this new creature takes shape, thisSurrogatehuman being , I will explore its mind. If what I find is positive for my purposes, I will use the last of my precious fuel to stop at the human world. Once there, I will negotiate with the strange bipeds of that world to obtain their a.s.sistance. For my part, I will give them access to all the scientific knowledge with which the Makers filled my memory modules. For their part, they will provide me with willing hands and whatever materiel my reconditioning requires.

The yellow star has grown large enough to show a disk at maximum magnification as I move ever closer to my decision point-- where I must decide to decelerate for rendezvous or not. I am troubled, perhaps more so than at any other time in my quest. Every hour brings new data to feedSURROGATE . With each additional byte, I find myself with greater doubts about the wisdom of ending my long journey among the creatures known as men.

Very quickly after I first encountered the televid signals I learned the humans' name for their planet and their convention for numbering the years. The planet is'Urth' or'Earth' in the predominant language of the signals, other things in other tongues. The humans number to the base ten, making it natural for them to divide their history into decades. Seeing that it is the proper tool for my study, I quickly adopted the system and rearranged my data to conform. I feedSURROGATE in decade-sized packets, always stopping to observe the effect of each feeding before going on to the next.

I begin with the one-hundred-ninety-fifth decade, the span in which I first encountered the signals in s.p.a.ce. I enter the data and testSURROGATE 's att.i.tudes on subjects scientific and technological. I care little for the creatures' mating rituals, their problems in raising their offspring, or the catalog of injustices that makes up the bulk of my data. It is their interest in the stars and the atom that will decide their usefulness to me. I probeSURROGATE for his knowledge of such things.