Fire Time

TEN

As she ended the old song, Jill Conway kept fingers flying on her guitar and began to whistle. Trills, glides, notes, chords, now shivery shrill, now bell-deep, flew out beneath the stars, entered ears and danced along nerves till the whole body seemed to tone with them. Those were rollicking ghosts they raised, nevertheless ghosts.

Meanwhile her gaze wandered aloft. On this warm night she had rolled back the porch roof of her cottage. She and Yuri Dejerine sat under the sky only. Primavera had no need for street illumination; a tall hedge around the yard screened off windows of neighbors, who weren’t close anyway; there was nothing except a glowglobe on a table where stood the cognac he had brought to follow the dinner she cooked. Above shadowy sweet-smelling masses of trees, the stars marched in brilliant armies on either bank of the galactic river. Caelestia hastened tumbling and glittering between them. But her eyes sought past Ea, toward the Wings. In that constellation lay Earth, which had begotten the words and music she offered her guest—had begotten her entire race, though scarcely an atom from it could be in her…

Wings, passed over her mind. Is it part of a different idea for Yuri? We’ve naturally come to use the star-pictures of Beronnen; but across a thousand light-years, he can recognize a few of man’s, however strangely changed, he told me. Which are they?

Light-years. Light… It glimmered on grass, glinted where it caught insignia on the man’s dress uniform or, she knew, the silver in her headband; maybe her unbound hair shone a little for him. She finished the music.

“Nom d’un nom!” Dejerine exclaimed. He struck hands together. “I have never heard anything like! Where is it from?”

“America, I believe.” Jill lowered the guitar to the floor, leaned back in her chair with one long leg crossed over the other, and lifted her glass for a sip. This Earthside brandy was heady stuff. She warned herself to go slow. Well, not too slow. Moderation in all things, including moderation.

She had made that remark to Ian Sparling, and he had said, “My dear, your idea of moderation would’ve strained Alexander the Great,” then at once retreated into impersonalities. Is Ian really in love with me? I wish I could be sure, to help me know what to do. whatever that would be. She continued, smiling a bit:

“Odd, that you should have to come this far to hear a song off your native planet. But maybe it’s forgotten there. I daresay we preserve many quaint archaisms. Shall we charge admission?”

Dejerine shook his sleek head. “No, no, Jill,” he said. They had gotten on first-name terms in the course of the meal, which he praised with a knowledgeability that proved he was sincere. She had been pleased, being rather proud of her skill. “I meant your incredible… coda? It fitted so well, yet it cannot be of human origin. Can it?”

“Yes and no,” she replied. “I spent a couple of seasons doing field work in the Thunder-head Mountains. The locals there communicate across distances by whistling, and they’ve developed a music based on it. I learned and adapted what I could. That wasn’t much, Ishtarians are better than us at producing and hearing sounds. Their music, tike their dance, is nearly always incredibly sophisticated by our lights.”

“What you can do is remarkable.”

“Yeah, I’ve made it a minor art of my own. You should hear some numbers.” Jill grinned. “Downright obscene.”

Dejerine chuckled and bent toward her. She hoped he hadn’t misunderstood her jape as a suggestion. To change the subject, and because the sudden fancy amused her, she said, “Apropos peculiar cultural creations, that expression you used. ‘Nom d’un nom,’ wasn’t it? If you’ll forgive my pronunciation. Am I right that it means ‘name of a name’?”

He nodded, relaxed, picked his cigar out of the ashtray on the table, and puffed.

I reckon he got the hint. she thought. Maybe not consciously. He’s sensitive.

“A French phrase,” he said. “I have never grasped the logic of it.”

“Oh, but I do. What is the name of a name? For instance, my name is Jill. But the name of my name—” She cocked her head and laid a fingertip to chin. “Yes, I believe my name is named Susan. And yours… m-m… Fred? Why, we may have founded a whole new science!”

They laughed together. Then a silence fell, wherein they heard a nightringer sing.

“What a lovely evening,” she murmured at last. “Enjoy it. We won’t get a hell of a lot more like this in our lifetimes.”

“Lovely in every way,” he said, “though chiefly because of you.” She gave him a quick glance, but he stayed where he was and his tone came earnest rather than glib. Therefore, her look stayed with him. “I am truly grateful for your invitation, your all-around kindness. It has been, it is hard work getting settled here. And then nearly everyone is chilly toward us, if not outright hostile.”

“That seems wrong to me. You’re wearing the same uniform as my brother. This war wasn’t of your making, and you’re doing your duty the most humane way you can.”

“You know I support the war. Not for conquest or glory—ad i chawrti, no!—but as the lesser of two evils. If we keep the balance of power today, we should not have to fight on a far larger scale in ten or twenty years.”

“You’ve told me before. I—Yuri, I like you as a person, but you’re too bright not to realize I’m also trying to influence you, get your help for the help of Ishtar. You talk about sacrifices for the greater good. Well, what value have millions of thinking lives? A whole set of societies, arts, philosophies, all we could learn and make of ourselves, from a race which quite possibly balances out as ahead of us in evolution.”

His free hand made a fist on the arm of his chair. “I sympathize with the fact that you have friends here who will suffer if your programs are curtailed,” he said. “But as for the more abstract issues—Jill, excuse me, but I ask you to ask yourself: How much scientific advance is your brother’s life worth?”

“That isn’t the point!” she flared. “Your wretched base—”

She broke off and he stepped quickly into the gap. “The base is a detail, important here but still a detail. If it were cancelled, you would become able to do certain things. Nevertheless, the war would go on engaging resources and shipping you need for most of your projects. Engaging them for the sake of humans who can hurt just as badly as Ishtarians.”

“Well, I don’t know.” She stared past him, into darkness. “Are we obliged to bail out the Eleutherians? Would we need that ‘balance of power’ you say is our real reason, if we hadn’t first encouraged and then underwritten their land grab?” She shook her head. “I don’t know. I only know, here we’re letting a chance—purely from a selfish, practical viewpoint we’re throwing away a chance at knowledge that could make as big a difference to us as, oh, molecular biology.”

From the comer of her eye she saw him frown; but she felt he was as relieved as she at this way to steer clear of a partisan fight. “M-m-m, I’m not sure,” he said. “I’ll take your word for it that the Ishtarians have done unique things, sociologically. Yet how relevant can their experiences ever be to us?”

“No telling till we’ve tried. But I’m talking about straight biology. Look, what do you imagine it was like to live in a world where people got cancer? Or any of those foul things we tossed out after we understood our cell chemistry? Our chemistry. Since, we’ve begun getting in-depth knowledge—barely begun—knowledge of extraterrestrial life. I’ll bet it brings on a, an Einsteininian revolution in Terrestrial biology, too. And one of the most enlightening cases is right here on Ishtar. Maybe solitary in the universe.”

“You… your research needn’t be affected by the war, Jill.”

“I doubt if mine matters—natural history, and in the most Earth-similar parts of the planet. No, I mean T-life. And to study T-life, we have got to get safe, steady, large-scale access to Valennen. Now the Gathering is in danger of losing Valennen. My honorary uncle Larreka’s been in charge there; he’s come down to plead for help in keeping a foothold—” She turned her gaze full upon him. “How do you like that. Captain Dejerine? A possible rebuilding of all our ideas about how life can work—possible immortality for man, or you name it—in the hands of one battered old legionary mudfoot!”

“I don’t quite follow you,” he said softly. “I will be happy to hear you explain.”

Surprise jolted her. In their encounters hitherto, he had shown he’d done his homework. His questions were well informed and he needed answers less elaborate than she had given him at first. Why this sudden ignorance?

A put-on, to make me enthusiastic and jolly again? she wondered. And if so, for what purpose, plain goodheartedness or—?—He must know women the way he knows orbits. Or, anyhow, better’n any other man I’ve ever met does. For sure better’n I know men. Not that that’s saying a valwas of a lot.

In the warm and fragrant star-dusk he sat at ease, glass in his experienced right hand, cigar in the left, cordial but with a hint of the mysterious; and, holy Darwin, was he handsome! Her heart knocked.

No, I am not falling in love, I am not, I insist I am not. Though scientific objectivity compels me to note that it wouldn’t be hard to do. Have an affair, at least. Which might or might not lead to, well, permanency… No. A hairy-brained notion. What kind of Navy wife would I make, or Primaveran settler he? An affair: her few men flickered before her. Not the boyfriends earlier; they and she were merely part of a group who styled themselves the Cartesian Divers, were considered wild in their staid community but really only dashed around at high speeds, did breakneck things in the outback, drank and smooched less than they sang rowdy songs, and rowdy songs less than ballads which filled them dripful of what today she called Weltschmalz; looking back, she saw that the boy Divers had been a tad scared of her, and maybe she of them… Probably they’d prepared her to cannonball herself at Kimura Senzo when she was seventeen, Earthside eighteen. And for the two years he was here on his research grant, it had been a wholly beautiful, terrible, heavenly, hellish, shameless, furtive, merry, sorrowful, tender, angry, rainbow-colored thing they stole by divine right; and it wouldn’t have been what it was if he weren’t the kind who, after she made him surrender, kept warning that in the end he would go home to his wife because he’d have deprived their little girl of her daddy too long as it was—and then did… She got over it in a couple of years. The three romps since were exactly that, fun, friendship, appeasement of the body for a while, though not for very long because Primavera was staid and she didn’t want several people she liked to find out and be antagonized.

Ian—Well, I’ve never been sure, and besides, poor Rhoda—

Jillian Eva Con-way, she said in Larreka’s voice, get your tail down! This man is the enemy, remember? A nice fellow, probably, but the object of the game is for you to seduce his mind.

An irresistible image intruded, of one brain sexily rippling its cortex at another. She giggled, “Pardon?” asked Dejerine.

“Nothing,” she answered in haste. “A stray thought. Unlicensed.”

He gave her a quizzical regard. “If you would rather not talk science, I don’t mind discussing my personal magnificence. However, I really would like to know what you mean about the, the T-life.”

“Oh. Yes.” She relaxed (sort of) and took a sip of cognac. It slid ardently over tongue and palate. “Short for ‘Tammuz-descended life.’ As distinguished from what we call ‘ortho-Ishtarian,’ the life that originated here. You must know—I know you do, but I’ll repeat to make sure we’re using the same terms—Anu has a planet which is, or was, terrestroid, and about a billion years ago had evolved a sentient species. When their sun started ballooning, we think they tried to plant a colony on Ishtar.”

Dejerine raised his brows. “You think? My sources took that for granted.”

“It’s a theory,” Jill shrugged. “After a billion years, what physical evidence is left? I must lend you some stuff on what the archeologists have done on Tammuz. Fascinating reading, if occasionally grim.” She refreshed herself again. “In our style of thinking, it is reasonable to suppose the Tammuzians developed an interplanetary transport capability and tried to colonize Ishtar. Not all of them, that’d doubtless have been impossible, and Lord knows what epics of endurance the mother world saw while its sun slowly roasted it to death. We presume they hoped to save a few, who’d give the race a fresh start.”

“Let me see if I have the facts correctly.” Dejerine said. “Because Ishtar had already developed an incompatible biochemistry, they sterilized a large island and seeded it with their kind of life. The effort proved too great, or perhaps the survival margin was too small. At any rate, the colonists died out, and the plants and animals they had introduced. Microscopic forms did come through, did establish an ecology and in time evolved new multicellular species. Do I have it right?”

“You have the most popular theory right,” Jill replied. “It’s certainly colored our notions here on Ishtar. Countless bad poetry, songs, science fiction plays for our amateur theater… But it’s a theory, I say. Maybe Tammuzian spores were borne here by meteoroids. Maybe the sophonts rocketed spores here on purpose, for some weird reason. Maybe simple exploring expeditions of theirs happened to leave bits of life which survived. After all, a Tammuzian bug wouldn’t be edible to the local microfauna. Or maybe the sophonts did start their colony, and then discovered how to use Mach’s Principle —we did long before we’d’ve been able to mount that kind of interplanetary effort—and their whole race went whooping off into the galaxy. Maybe they’re still around, away out yonder, a billion years ahead of us.” The lightness departed from her. She raised her face to the stars, where they glinted in their secret hordes, and whispered, “Now do you see? Even the archeologists aren’t necessarily turning over dry bones.”

She thought from his voice that the spaceman felt a tinge of the same frosty awe. “A big idea. Too big for us.”

She regained a matter-of-fact tone: “Plenty of theories, yes. The data they try to account for are fewer. First, on this planet Ishtar with its otherwise pretty terrestroid biochemistry, there occurs T-life: also built out of proteins in water solution, et cetera, but too alien to have developed here, since it is in the minority. Uses dextro amino acids, levo sugars, where we and the ortho-Ishtarians are the exact opposite—to name only a couple of the differences, and say nothing about those we haven’t yet identified.

“Second, the planet Tammuz is dead, but fossil traces and such-like clues show it did once carry T-life.

“Third, on Ishtar T-life is fairly well confined to Valennen. The northern three quarters, at that. It does spill into the rest of the continent and nearby islands, but there it has to be sympatric—share the range with ortho-life, which dominates. This suggests northern Valennen was the original site, a big island that later collided with another to form the land mass we know. Before, it was isolated, giving T-life a sanctuary to evolve in. Hence the notion that long ago, would-be colonists sterilized and re-seeded it. But we haven’t any solid proof. That’s unknown territory.”

She took a further drink, feeling the glow in her stomach—and, yes, in her heart, at his look of shared excitement.

“Unknown, after a hundred years of man on Ishtar?” he wondered. Before she could explain: “I see. Orbital surveys, cursory overflights, landings almost at random, samples, specimens, yes. But nothing more. You have had too much else to do.”

Jill nodded. “Right. Nobody’s lacked for projects in the ortho sections. Nor will they for decades to come.

“But we have been accumulating a little knowledge, in the interzone of South Valennen. We’ve started learning something about T-life. And, if the Gathering can be saved, we’ve got the support base for a really massive attack on the riddles further north.”

In unwonted earnestness, she continued: “Don’t you see, this makes Ishtar directly valuable to Earth? Sure, I know about planets that carry analogues of T-life. But they have nothing else! Nothing we can eat, for openers; no chance for a base to practice agriculture, in a not-too-different surrounding ecology; no strong civilization of highly intelligent beings eager to help. Everywhere else, everybody who wants to study our biochemical mirror image in action, has to do it at the end of a long, thin, expensive supply line. Here it’s a matter of an aerial hop.

“And then there’s that absolutely unique interzone.”

“Interzone,” Dejerine said. “I take it you mean where the ranges of ortho- and T-life overlap?”

“What else?” Jill answered. “In a way, it covers the whole planet. The theroids incorporate a few T-microbes into their symbioses, and that alone is worth learning more about. But only in the South Valennen area do you get interaction between metazoans, or higher plants, or oddball things that we don’t yet know quite which what are.”

Dejerine blinked, then laughed. “You win.”

She grinned back. “Two distinct ecologies, neither able to exploit the other. At least not till the ortho-sophonts came along. The phoenix tree is valued for more than being hardwood. Once out of the interzone, that lumber doesn’t rot nohow. There’ve been attempts to raise it nearer home, but none succeeded. Likewise for a few more T-species, plus ortho-species and minerals—plenty reason for the Gathering to want to be present in Valennen.

“But otherwise, well, very limited interaction. Plants crowd rival plants out of soil and sunlight, and so restrict the scope of animals. Possibly lia is the main barrier to T-life spreading further than it has. Animals… no mutual nourishment, so as a rule the two kinds simply don’t bother each other.”

He startled her by obviously quoting: “What, never?”

“Hardly ever,” she warbled back, maybe startling him in turn.

“Actually,” she added, “what interaction does go on is co-operative, as far as we know—though we know itchingly little.” She combed fingers through a strand of hair. “Um-m-m… let me give you an example. I’ll change the names to those of Earth types, to help you keep ’em straight; and bear in mind, the real critters are small.” In a high-pitched singsong:

“See the ferocious tiger. See the fat, juicy antelope. Is the tiger going to jump on the antelope? No, the tiger is not going to jump on the antelope. The tiger does not think the antelope is fit to eat. But see the tiger watch the antelope. The tiger knows the antelope has very fine eyes and a very fine nose. See the antelope peer. See the antelope sniff. See the antelope gallop off. See the tiger follow. The antelope locates a herd of deer. The tiger can eat deer. The tiger does eat a deer. The antelope is a fink. See the leopard. Leopards like antelope steak. See the tiger chase away the leopard. The tiger is a goon. Children, this is called co-operation.”

Jill tossed off the rest of her brandy. Dejerine moved to pour her a refill. “After all that lecturing,” she said, “I suppose I should fetch me a beer… Aw, a shame, on top of this gorgeous stuff. Go ahead, thanks.”

“You certainly make your subject come alive,” he said, the faintest accent on the first word.

“Well, your turn. Tell me about places you’ve been.”

“If you will give me more songs later.”

“Let’s find songs we both know. Meanwhile, please do reminisce.” Jill looked again skyward. Caelestia had dropped out of view and the stars shone forth still keener. Wistfulness tugged at her. “So much wonder. Damn it, I haven’t got time to die.”

“Why have you never visited Earth?”

“Oh… I dunno. Seems as if everything interesting there—wait, yes, I realize they have natural extravagances left like the Grand Canyon, but Ishtar has them too—mainly, everything is man-made; and our data banks hold millions of pictures, recordings, what-not.”

“The best hologram isn’t the real thing, Jill. It isn’t the totality of, oh, the cathedral at Chartres… which besides beauty includes the fact that countless pilgrims for hundreds of years walked and knelt and slept on the selfsame stones under your feet.… And you can have fun on Earth, you know. A lively person like you—”

A chime sounded from the open door. Jill rose, “Phone,” she said. “ ’Scuse,” Who’d call at this hour? “Maybe an officer of Yuri’s, in need of him?”

The fluoropanel she switched on was harsh after the majestic dimness outside. The room leaped at her, comfortably shabby, slightly untidy, its plainness defiled by scarlet drapes on which she had painted gold swirls and by a fireburst feather-plant cloak from Great Iren. Other souvenirs included native tools and weapons hung on the walls among pictures, landscapes and portraits, she had done herself with camera or pencil. Printouts were shelved and piled around, both flimsies for recycling and permanents which she had liked sufficiently well to pay for.

The phone chimed anew. “ ‘Bong’ right back at you,” she grumbled, sat down before it, and tapped the accept plate.

Ian Sparling’s head sprang into the screen. He was haggard, the lines trenched in his long face, eyes burning blue-green out of hollowness. The gray-shot black hair was totally unkempt and no beardex could have touched his skin for two or three days.

Jill’s pulse stumbled and began to run. “Hi,” she said mechanically. “You look like outworn applesauce. What’s wrong?”

“I thought you should know.” His voice came hoarse. “Being as close to Larreka as you are.”

She caught the table edge and hung on.

“Oh, he’s safe,” Sparling told her, “But—Well. I’m calling from Sehala. We’ve been here arguing, pleading, trying to bargain, this past eight-day. No go. The assembly has voted to abandon Valennen. We couldn’t convince them the danger there is as bad as Larreka claims.” He hesitated. “Well, hell, I had to take his word for that myself. I don’t know from experience. And… not only did the Tamburu commandant declare we—the Gathering could absorb the loss and survive elsewhere, the Kalain’s boss did, too. Sent a courier clear from the Dalag to say his ground and naval forces are in control but could use whatever help they might get which is now tied up in less vital areas. Larreka doesn’t believe any legion will agree to join his Zera. The cause looks too lost.”

Rage leaped in Jill. “Those idiots! Couldn’t they investigate for themselves?”

“Not easy to do, especially when they’ve such growing demands on their attention right at home. I suppose I can try to talk a few key people into letting us fly them there for a look-around. If we can get a vehicle.” Sparling sounded dubious. “What gets you involved is Larreka. He’s taking this pretty hard. You could… encourage him, console him, whatever you gauge is best. He thinks the world of you.” His weary eyes dwelt on her image as if to add Larreka was not alone.

Tears stung. Jill must swallow before she could ask, “What’s he plan to do?”

“Head straight back. He’s already left. You can catch him at the Yakulen Ranch, though. He’ll stop off there to collect travel gear and say good-by.”

“I c-can fly him.”

“If our dear naval governor will release an aircraft of the right size. Ask him. It’d sure help. Larreka’s not simply got to take charge—he says the new vice commandant is overcautious—but he’s got to persuade his troops to stand fast.”

Jill nodded. A legion elected a chief by a rank-weighted three-fourths vote of its officers, and could depose him by the same. “Ian,” she half begged, “is it necessary? Does he really have to stay on? Won’t he be spending himself, his males, for nothing?”

“He says that’s the chance he must take. He’ll keep a capability of evacuating survivors, should worst come to worst. But he hopes to do more than harass the barbarians. He hopes he can draw them into fights that’ll show their real strength, their real intentions, before it’s too late; and this’ll get him his reinforcements. Sounds forlorn to me, but—” Sparling sighed. “Well, now you know, and I’d better report to God.”

“You called me first?” she blurted. “Thank you, thank you.”

He smiled the wry smile she had always liked. “You deserved it,” he said. “I’ll be home in two or three days, after tying up some loose ends here. Come see us. Meanwhile, daryesh tauli, Jill.” It meant both “fare you well” and “fare in love.” He was silent for an instant. “Good night.” The screen blanked.

She sat briefly in an equal blindness. Dear, awkward Ian. Did he suspect how she admired him, he who had roved over half the planet readying to do battle with the red giant? Or how fond of him she had grown, his patience and decency, the good company he was when a dark mood had not taken him? Sometimes she daydreamed about how things could have been, were she born twenty years earlier on Earth.

She blinked hard, wiped her eyes with the back of a hand, blinked again. Damn! Why am I woolgathering on a sheepless planet? I’ve got a job to do. Except I don’t know how.

Surging to her feet, she went back outside. Light from the doorway caught Dejerine sharp athwart a night where she could not at once see stars. He rose, concern upon his features. “Bad news, Jill?”

She nodded. Her fists were clenched at her sides. He came to take them in his hands and raise them. His gaze captured hers. “Can I help in any way?” he asked.

Hope sprang. “You bet you can!” Abruptly controlled, she related the situation in a few unemotional words.

The mobile face before her congealed. He let her go and stared past her. “A pity, I suppose,” he said, toneless. “That is, naturally I regret your distress. As to the wisdom of the military decision, I am not qualified to judge. You realize my orders are clear. Apart from self-defense, my command is forbidden to intervene in native affairs.”

“You can appeal. Explain—”

He had never before interrupted her. “It would be futile. Therefore it would be undutiful, wasting the time of my superiors.”

“Well… okay. Let’s talk about that later. Right now, Larreka needs quick transportation. I hear you’ve classed flyers big enough to hold an Ishtarian as, uh, Federation resources.”

“Yes,” he said, half defiantly. “You have few. We couldn’t bring many more. To construct the ground installations in a short time will take every available freight carrier.”

“You can let me borrow one for a couple of days, can’t you?” she inquired around a tightening in her throat. “Full-scale work hasn’t started.”

“I was afraid you would request that.” He shook his head. “No. Believe me, I wish I could. But if nothing else, the risk from storms—how bad do equinoctial gales get during a periastron? Nobody was here last time to study the meteorology. It must be unpredictable.”

Jill stamped her foot. “Damn you, I don’t need protection against myself!” She gulped. “Sorry. My turn to be sorry. Somebody else can pilot if you insist.”

His eyes shifted back to hers, and the least sardonicism touched his lips. Huh? Does he think I think he’s worried about losing delightful me?

He turned grave, even gentle. “I cannot authorize it for anyone,” he said. “The aircraft would be put at hazard for a purpose irrelevant to my mission. Worse, this would be a kind of intervention, however minor. Given such a precedent, where can I draw the line against further demands? No, there is no way I could justify myself to my superiors.”

Rage and grief whirled upward. “So you’re afraid of a reprimand!” Jill yelled. “A check mark in your file! A delay in your next promotion! Get out!”

Astounded, he stuttered, “Mais… please, I don’t… I didn’t mean—”

“Get out, you gonococcus! Or do I have to throw you out—like this?” She snatched the bottle and hurled it to the porch. It didn’t break, but the contents ran forth as if from a wound.

His mouth compressed, his nostrils dilated. He gave her a bow. “My apologies. Miss Conway. Thank you for your hospitality. Good evening.”

He walked off with metronomic strides and was lost in the dark.

Was I foolish? Jill hopped to and fro. Should I have—? But I couldn’t! I couldn’t! She sat down by the spilled cognac and wept.