GODS OF RIVERWORLD

They drank, and he said, "Another toast. To all those who hold dual citizenship, that of Earth and that of Riverworld."

He put the glass down.

"We all seem to be well situated and happy, and I pray that we will be so until the Gardenworlders arrive. And perhaps after that. When that time comes, though, we will, whether or not we like it, return to the restored Earth or go into oblivion. I hope, and I believe, that we here will be qualified to go to Earth where we should enjoy life until the Earth's core cools and we must move on to a young planet. That should be quite a few million years in the future, however, and who knows what will happen in that inconceivably long time?"

He stopped, sipped wine, put the goblet down, and stared around at them.

"As I understand it, Earth's core will be tapped for the use of e-m converters. But this power will be used only to raise those who die there, and with the type of people on Earth then, there should not be much need for resurrection power. There will be no grails or converters to furnish food. Food will be grown on the soil. Earth, if events work out as the Ethicals plan, will be a nice quiet place. Peace and harmony will reign, though I have doubts that the lion will lie down with the lamb. Not if it's hungry. Lions do not and never will find grass nourishing.

"And, of course, even those who have Gone On will not be perfect. No human being, with perhaps a few exceptions, and these might be unendurable models for the rest of us, is perfect or will be."

Many of his audience were looking at him as if they wondered what he was preparing to spring on them.

"Some of you, I'm sure, anticipate life on Earth with great pleasure. You know you'll always have intellectual adventures because the opportunities for study and for artistic creation will be equal to what the tower provides. And you're happy with the idea that life will be serene, well-ordered, and secure. You luxuriate in that prospect."

He stopped, and he frowned.

"However, there is an alternative to the Earth I've described. I have investigated the spaceships in the hangar, and I have discovered that they do not require highly trained crews to navigate and operate them. They are complex in themselves, but an intelligent child of twelve, after some study, may get into one and have the ship carry him to whatever destination he wishes. Provided, of course, that the ship has enough fuel."

Frigate smiled up at him and held up a thumb and a finger to form an O.

"What if we reject the return to the near-Utopian Earth?" Burton said. "What if we prefer another kind of life or are not sure that, even if we would love Earth as I've depicted here, we will be chosen to be among her citizens?

"Nothing can stop us from boarding a spaceship, all those in the hangar if we wish, choosing one of the virgin planets catalogued in the ship's navigation system, and then going there.

"What would we do there, our motley group of near-immortals of many races, nations, languages, and times? We wouldn't have the rich, easy life we have here, or the more restricted but still easy life on the Earth-to-be. Though we can carry with us the science and technology of the Ethicals in records, we could use very little of it for centuries. It would take a long time before our population increased to the point where we would have enough hands to do all the dirty and hard labor needed to get the raw materials for processing.

"These planets have been seeded with wathan generators and catchers just as was done on ancient Earth. We can have children because they will be born with ivathans and will be self-conscious and free-willed. But—" he looked around him again "—if any of us or our children die, we will be dead for a long time. Perhaps forever. Should the Ethicals be able to track us down, we who went on the ship from the tower will be judged then and there, at once. We may have passed and so be allowed to live. Or we may not. In any event, if we should die early, we will have to stay dead for a long time, because the Ethicals may not get to our planet for many thousands of years. And if, during that time, our descendants do build resurrection machinery, how do we know they'll decide to raise us? We can't foresee the political or religious or economic situation of that time. Our descendants may think it best we not be raised.

"That is by no means the worst thing that can happen. In the begi

"Different languages and different races. Just as an old Earth. But it will have variety.

"And, try though we will to bring up our children with love, in time, as generation succeeds generation, or perhaps in a very short time, we will have the same kind of people that we had on old Earth.

"Ladies and gentlemen, after we have labored long and mightily, survived many hardships and dangers, and perhaps established a just and equitable society for all, we will nevertheless see the inevitable degeneration of our society. As on Earth, there will be multitudes of the strong and the weak, the rich and the poor, the pushers and the pushed, the brave and the cowardly, the dull and the bright, the open and the shut, the givers and the takers, the compassionate and the indifferent or cruel, the sensitive and the callous, the tender-and the brutal, the victimizers and the victims, the sane, the half-sane, and the mad.

"There will be hate but love, despair but joy, defeat but triumph, misery but happiness, hopelessness but hope."

He looked briefly at them, seeing all their faces as one. They knew the spirit if not the exact form of what he was going to say.

"But... we will have immense variety, the richness and the full spectrum that a secure life ca

"And we will have adventure.

"We will be rejecting the promised Heaven of Earth. But we will be taking some of Heaven with us, and, I'm sure, more than a bit of Hell. Can Heaven exist in a vacuum? Without Hell, how do you know that you are in Heaven?

"I ask you, my friends, and even those who are perhaps not very fond of me, which shall it be? The new Earth? Or the unknown?"

His audience was silent. Then Frigate called out, "Is all this rhetorical? Where are you going, Dick?"

"You know where," Burton said.

He waved his hand to indicate the stars.

"Who's going with me?"