The Smoke Ring

Section Four

THE DARK AND THE LIGHT

Chapter Nineteen

The Dark

from the Citizens Tree cassettes, year 54 SM:

WE’VE HAD SERIOUS ARGUMENTS ABOUT WHY KENDY CUT CONTACT. MAYBE SOMETHING JUST BURNED OUT SOME CIRCUITS. MASS DOES CONSTANTLY RAIN OUT OF ORBIT ONTO VOY — MAKE THAT LEVOY’S STAR, MY APOLOGIES TO SHARON. A BIG INFALL WOULD CAUSE BIG MAGNETIC STORMS, MAYBE BIG ENOUGH TO BURN OUT DISCIPLINE’S COMPUTER, AND THE THICK SMOKE RING ATMOSPHERE WOULD STILL SHIELD US. I HATE TO THINK SO. I LIKED KENDY.

THAT SOUNDS CRAZY. A COMPUTER PROGRAM… I CAN’T HELP IT. KENDY HAD LESS IMAGINATION THAN THE TURKEYS. I TRIED TELLING HIM A JOKE, ONCE AND NEVERMORE. BUT I ADMIRE DEDICATION, AND KENDY HAD AS MUCH DEDICATION AS A MAN CAN STAND. I’M GOING TO LEAVE THIS IN.

BOOCE HAD BOUGHT A SMALL PUMP. RATHER WAS working it to fill Logbearer’s fuel tank. A Navy ship was doing much the same on the other side of the pond. Water had to be shared, this close to the Market. Greetings had been exchanged, and now the two crews were ignoring each other.

Carlot said, “Raym’s been ru

“No problem,” Booce said. “How did he lose his rocket?”

“I didn’t want to ask. He’s far gone on fringe spores, Dad. We want him, but I don’t want him in charge of anything.”

“Fine. Rather, stop, it’s full.”

Rather began packing up the pump and hose. “That was quick,” he said, remembering how long it took to fill the CARM.

“A pretty good pump for something that’s all hardwood. Let’s get going. Carlot, you drop me and Clave at the Market and then go on to the house. Clave, you get the rest of the seeds. I want to buy us some clothes. You’re all still wearing tree-dweller pajamas.”

“You’ll bring Raym?”

“I’ll send him to the house. If he’s too fringey to find it, I don’t want him aboard any ship of mine.”

Rather had not found the chance to confide in anyone but Debby and Carlot. Maybe that was good. Booce seemed to take it for granted that he would stay where the Navy could find him. Rather’s plans were quite different.

Would Carlot help him? He wasn’t sure. The way she was acting—

The Market swarmed like a hive. When the rocket came near, a dozen citizens separated from the pattern and flew to look. Booce delayed his exit for dramatic reasons. When he emerged he was surrounded. He stayed to talk, and Carlot joined him. Clave grew bored and flapped off toward the Vivarium at the far rim. Booce took an order for a thousand square meters of wooden planks…and the sun crossed half the sky and was behind the Dark before Logbearer moved on.

Serjent House continued to drift. It was now radially out from the Market. The Dark eclipsed the sun; Voy shone from the side. Half violet, half black, the cluster of cubes made an eerie sight.

“We’ll have to tell Clave,” Debby said. “First chance we get.”

Carlot said, “I’m still not sure about this.”

Rather said, “Booce was right, wasn’t he? I want to look undependable. So—”

“They’ll think you had Dad’s permission!”

“The Navy doesn’t own me. Booce doesn’t own me. Even you don’t own me, Carlot, and if you’re holding me as a copsik I want to know it so I can think about escaping!”

“No, I don’t own you.” The ship was turning, decelerating. Carlot was very busy tending the rocket, too busy to look him in the face. Her voice was almost inaudible. “But it was a fool stunt, ru

“You’re going to marry Raff Belmy.”

“I said probably. Skip it. It was a fool stunt. So tell me this. Does Clave own you? Your Chairman?”

“…Maybe.”

“So ask him whether you’re going.”

“I want to talk to Jeffer too. And one other.”

“You keep hinting—”

“You’ll see for yourself. You too, Debby. I am treefeeding tired of keeping secrets.”

A random comet had impacted Levoy’s Star. It had reached the surface as a stream of gas moving at thousands of miles per second. The neutron star had rung like a bell. There were two hot spots on the rapidly spi

But Kendy spared instruments for the CARM.

He ran the record as it came in. Jeffer had been idle: not much there. The house had been empty most of the time. Ah, here was something—

The motley collection of metal and plant tissue the savages called Logbearer bumped the wall nozzle-first. Rather, Debby, and Carlot emerged. They tethered the steam rocket to the door, close enough to block the sky.

Rather said, “Jeffer. Come in, Jeffer.”

Jeffer had been reviewing records from the cassettes. He set up the link. “I’m here. Hello, Debby, Carlot, Rather.”

“I’m in trouble,” Rather said.

“Tell me.”

“Petty Wheeler interviewed me for the Navy.”

“How did it go?”

The depth of Smoke Ring atmosphere was blocking most of the radiation and X-rays, and Kendy’s instruments too. He could still watch events on the star itself via neudar. A plasma cloud hovered over the impact site, several centimeters high and spreading at terrific speed along lines of magnetic force—

Rather said, “Scientist, I did everything right except only two things. I did what Booce told me. I slept in the silver suit with the humidity turned low, and got there sniffling and crying. Debby came with me, and I really did need supervision. I could hardly see where I was flying. I asked for Sectry Murphy: all seeds and no brain, stet? But Booce didn’t tell me not to show off my muscles, so I did.”

“You’re strong but sickly.”

“And I’m a dwarf. If enough dwarves get into the Navy, a certain Captain-Guardian Mickl gets to act like an officer. I’m quoting Sectry. Mickl was there to watch the interview.”

“Two mistakes. Did you suggest marriage to Bosun Murphy?”

Laughter, chopped off. “We got high on fringe tea. Then we dived into a puff jungle and—” Quick sidewise glance at Carlot, whose face was like stone. “Jeffer, none of us ever thought she might take me up on it. Now she thinks I’m joining the Navy and making plans to marry her. Maybe she can hold me to it!”

“This is not to your taste?”

“Sectry…I don’t know. I don’t want to join the treefeeding Navy and I don’t know how to tell her that!”

“Okay, I’m thinking…Rather, they already know you’re allergic. Let them train you. Carlot said they don’t give you much sleep in training. Stay awake even when you don’t have to. Get sick a lot. They’ll give up.”

“I thought of something better.”

“Listen—”

“No, you listen. I went ru

Jeffer’s medical readings showed his shock. Kendy stopped paying attention to the impact on Levoy’s Star.

Paydirt!

“Rather? You told them?”

“I’m letting you tell them. You and Kendy.”

“Kendy isn’t in range yet. When he gets the record—”

Carlot said, “Kendy the Checker?”

“The same,” Jeffer said. “Kendy made contact with us fourteen years ago…fifteen now. I made a mistake with the CARM. Kendy told us how to get home. We didn’t hear from him again till…well, it was just before you showed up, Carlot. He wanted this expedition.”