The Ringworld Engineers

Gisk had been a condominium, or something similar, at the Fall of the Cities. It was a cube with an air well down the center, and it was half empty. Judging by the smell of the place, Gisk had been restricting its use of water overmuch. Louis was learning the look of water-condensation machinery. He made his repairs quickly, and they worked. The Gisks paid at once. They fell at Laliskareerlyar’s feet to express their thanks … ignoring her tool-wielding servant. Oh, well.

Fortaralisplyar was delighted. He packed a double-handful of metal coins into Louis’s vest and explained the tricky etiquette of bribery. The face-saving language would strain his translator to the limits. “When in doubt, don’t,” Fortaralisplyar told him. “I will come with you to Orlry Building tomorrow. Let me do the bargaining.”

Orlry Building was on the port side of the city. Louis and Fortaralisplyar took their time, sightseeing, walking the highest ramps to get a better view. Fortaralisplyar was proud of his city. “A bit of civilization remained even after the Fall,” he said. He pointed out Rylo, a building that had been an emperor’s castle. It was beautiful but scarred. The emperor had tried to claim the city for his own at about the time Orlry Building arrived. A fluted column shaped like a Greek pillar, supporting nothing but itself, was Chank, which had been a shopping center. Without the supplies aboard Chank—from markets, restaurants, clothing and bedding stores, even toy shops—for trading with the Machine People, the city would have died early. From the basement of Chank the air road spiraled down to Sky Hill.

Orlry Building was a disc forty feet thick and ten times that wide, built along the lines of a pie. The massive tower at one edge, elaborated with gun emplacements and railed platforms and a derrick, reminded Louis of the bridge of a great ship—a battleship. The walkway to Orlry was broad, but there was only one walkway and one entrance. Along the upper rim were hundreds of small projections. Louis guessed that they were cameras or other sensors, and that they no longer worked. Windows had been chopped into Orlry’s sides after the building was raised. The glass in them fitted poorly.

Fortaralisplyar was dressed in yellow and scarlet robes of what appeared to be vegetable fiber: coarse by Louis’s standards, but grand from a distance. Louis followed him into Orlry, into a large reception area. There was light, but it flickered: scores of alcohol lamps burning near the ceiling.

Eleven City Builder types of both sexes waited for them. They were dressed almost identically, in loose pants with tight cuffs and brightly colored capes. The edges of the capes were cut elaborately and without symmetry. Badges of rank? The white-haired man who came smiling to greet them wore the most elaborately cut cape and a shoulder gun.

He spoke to Fortaralisplyar. “I had to see him for myself, this being who can give us water from machinery five thousand falans dead.”

The handgun in his worn plastic shoulder holster was small, with clean, efficient lines; but even a gun couldn’t make Filistranorlry look warlike. His small features showed happy curiosity as he examined Louis Wu. “He seems unusual enough, but … well. You have paid. We shall see.” He gestured to the soldiers.

They searched Fortaralisplyar, then Louis. They found his flashlight, tested it, gave it back. They puzzled over his translator until Louis said, “That speaks for me.”

Filistranorlry jumped. “So it does! Will you sell that?” He was speaking to Fortaralisplyar, who answered, “It is not mine.”

Louis said, “I would be mute without it.” Orlry’s master seemed to accept this.

The water condenser was a dip in the center of Orlry’s broad roof. The access tubes below were too small for Louis. Even if he took off his armor he wouldn’t fit, and he didn’t intend to do that. “What do you use for repairmen? Mice?”

“Hanging People,” Filistranorlry said. “We must rent their services. Chilb Building was to have sent them by now. Do you see any other problems?”

“Yes.” By now the machinery was familiar enough; Louis had repaired three buildings and failed at a fourth. He could see what ought to be a pair of contacts. He looked for the dust below them, and it wasn’t there. “Were there earlier attempts at repair?”

“I assume so. How would we know, after five thousand falans?”

“We’ll wait for the repairmen. I hope they can follow orders.” Tanj! Somebody long dead had neatened things up by blowing the telltale dust tracks away. But Louis was sure he could get his arms in there …

Filistranorlry asked, “Would you care to see our museum? You’ve bought that right.”

Louis had never been a weapons buff. He recognized some of the principles, if not the forms, behind the killing tools in the glass cases and behind the glass walls. Most of them used projectiles or explosions or both. Some would throw strings of tiny bullets that exploded like small firecrackers in enemy flesh. The few lasers were massive and cumbersome. Once they must have been mounted on tractors or floating platforms, but those had been scavenged for use elsewhere.

A City Builder arrived with half a dozen workmen. The Hanging People stood as high as Louis’s floating ribs. Their heads seemed too large for their bodies; their toes were long and dexterous, and their fingers nearly brushed the floor. “This is probably a waste of time,” one said.

“Do it right and you’ll be paid anyway,” Louis told him. The little man sneered.

They wore armless gowns covered in pockets, the pockets heavy with tools. When the soldiers wanted to search them, they stripped off the gowns and let the soldiers search those. Perhaps they didn’t like to be touched.

So small. Louis whispered to Fortaralisplyar, “Does your species do rishathra with those?”

The City Builder chuckled. “Yes, but carefully.”

The Hanging People clustered around Louis Wu’s shoulders, peering, as he reached into the access tube. He wore the insulated gloves he’d borrowed from Mar Korssil. “These are what the contacts look like. Fasten the cloth strip thus … and thus. You should find six pairs of contacts. There may be a worm track of dust below.”

After they had disappeared around the curve of the access tube, he told the masters of Orlry and Lyar, “We’ll never know it if they make a mistake. I wish we could inspect their work.” But he did not mention his other fear.

The Hanging People presently emerged. They all trooped up onto the roof: workers, soldiers, masters, and Louis Wu. There they watched as mist formed and condensed and water ran toward the center of the dip.

And six Hanging People now knew how to repair water condensers with strips of black cloth.

“I want to buy that black cloth,” Filistranorlry said.

The Hanging People and their City Builder master were already disappearing down the stairwell. Filistranorlry and ten soldiers blocked Louis and Fortaralisplyar from that escape route.

“I don’t intend to sell,” Louis said.

The silver-haired soldier said, “I hope to keep you here until I can persuade you to sell. If pressed, I will insist that you sell the talking box too.”

Louis had half expected this. “Fortaralisplyar, would Orlry Building keep you here by force?”

Lyar’s master looked Orlry’s master in the eye as he said, “No, Louis. The complications would be unpleasant. The lesser buildings would join to free me. The Ten would become the Nine rather than face a boycott on guests.”

Filistranorlry laughed. “The lesser buildings would grow thirsty …” and his smile vanished as Fortaralisplyar’s grew. Lyar Building now had water to give away.

“You could not hold me. Guests would be pushed from the ramps. The dramas in Chkar and the facilities in Panth would be closed to you—”