The Ascension Factor

"I will check back to see how you're doing. Go ahead with your piece on the OMC. Leon, good job. You know what to do."

Then he was gone as quickly as he came.

"What is it you're supposed to do, Leon?" she asked.

He didn't answer, and he didn't smile. He was lean and dark, like Brood, and she thought he might even be a relative.

Leon handed himself to one of the editing consoles and sat with his back to her. He was still for a moment, then he said, "We're putting a story together on Crista Galli. And one on Ben Ozette."

Beatriz felt herself go cold.

"And what's the lead?"

Her voice stuck in her throat, barely a whisper.

"Crista Galli safely in the hands of Vashon Security Force."

"And Be... what about him?"

Leon was silent for a few more blinks. He typed something into his console and it came up on her own:

"Holovision reporter killed in hylighter blast."

She tried to still the trembling in her hands and her lips.

"It's a lie," she said. "Like the rest, it's a lie. Isn't it? Isn't it?"

Without turning, without apparently moving a muscle, Leon spoke so quietly she barely heard.

"I don't know."

***

The gods do not limit men. Men limit men.
- T. Robbins, A Literary Encyclopedia of the Atomic Age

"Dr. Dwarf," Spud called from behind the Gridmaster, "you were right. There's another kelp frequency inside that sector - look here."

Dwarf MacIntosh glanced up from underneath one of the consoles that fed the Gridmaster. Though a big man, MacIntosh had always been adept at getting at problems in small places. In fact, he preferred crawling through runnels of cables and switches to attending any of the so-called "recreational" events aboard the Orbiter.

He backed his way out of the shielding ducts and towered over Spud's shoulder to see what he had found.

"This signal came through when we released the kelp in sector eight," he said. "It's taken me a while to fix and amplify."

"I see the rest of the kelp is doing well," MacIntosh said. He reviewed the readouts flanking the kelp display. "It released at least twenty captured cargo trains, if our data here are correct."

Spud nodded. "They are. The kelp's just floating free. Most of the vessels are on the surface, though, and the afternoon squall in that area's due right about now. There are no kelpways, no way of guiding them through. Unless we get a grid in there pretty soon, they'll just get fouled in all that slop."

"This is a very small focus," MacIntosh murmured.

His stare at the screen seemed intense enough to propel him right into the middle of the kelp itself. He pulled himself up to height and tapped a thin lip with his forefinger.

"Without tapping into that other signal, we won't be able to enforce a grid. I'm sure of it. What's the history?"

Spud spun the graphic yarn on Mack's screen.

"It moves," Spud said.

"Yeah." MacIntosh nodded. "Runs the kelpways like a pro. And it's something the kelp would gnaw a limb off for, don't forget that."

"So what do you think? Merman transplants being routed?"

"Signals too strong," MacIntosh said. "A stand doesn't register with us unless it's achieved some kind of integrity, whether Flattery cuts it back or not. This is like having a whole stand of kelp in a spot no bigger than you o... ."

"And it can move."

"And it can move."

Mack stroked his chin in thought.

"It can persuade the kelp to resist our strongest signals, even with the threat of being pruned back to stumps. The dataflow tells us that the signal's been getting stronger by the hour. Flattery's been frantic about this in spite of riots at his hatchway. What does all this tell us?"

Spud frowned at the screen in imitation of Mack and tried stroking his chin, too, for answers.

"There's somebody running the kelpways, acting like a stand of kelp?"

MacIntosh whooped, grabbed Spud by the shoulders and gave him a shake. They both spun high against the upper bulkhead. The startled assistant's eyes opened nearly as wide as his mouth.

"That's it!" MacIntosh laughed. "What we've got disrupting the kelp grid in sector eight is a person pretending to be a stand of kelp!"

He dropped his grip on Spud and stuck his head back into the electronic and neuroelectronic guts of the Gridmaster.

"But who?" Spud asked.

"If you can't guess, you're better off not knowing right now."

MacIntosh's resonant voice was barely audible over the clicks and whirrs of the Gridmaster as it held the other stands of domestic kelp in functional stasis.

"More than anything right now we need a communications expert." He backed out of the crawl space and added, with a sparkle in both eyes, "That would be Beatriz Tatoosh. Notify her that we require her services, if you would."

Spud smiled a wide smile.

"'Services,'" he said, "that's one way of -"

MacIntosh cut him off.

"Stow it," Mack ordered, smiling his own wide smile. "Just get her in here, pronto."

***

Men are moved by two principal things - by love and by fear. Consequently, they are commanded as well by someone who wins their affection as by someone who arouses their fear. Indeed, in most instances the one who arouses their fear gains more of a following and is more readily obeyed than the one who wins their affection.
- Machiavelli, The Discourses

The fuel warning buzzer sounded its piercing screech above his console, and Spider Nevi cursed under his breath. They were very close now, very close, but he didn't dare take chances on making contact with dry fuel tanks.

"We're going to have to set down in that muck," he said. "Make sure both screens and filters are intact. I don't want kelp clogging our inlets."

They'd seen several cargo train survivors on the surface, working to clear their intakes. They all moved in the slow-motion, dreamlike manner of those who are under the influence of one of the kelp's toxins. Surface travel on Pandora's seas was dangerous enough with the kelpways intact. Like great veins, the kelpways helped clear the waters of the storm-damaged fragments of fronds and other troublesome debris.

Zentz grunted an acknowledgment, then paled.

"But - but I'll have to go out there after we set down," he said. "That kelp is - it's crazy. With only two of u..."

"With only two of us, one of us has to go out there. It's your fault we're out here at all, so you get the duty."

The look on Zentz's face was the one that Nevi wanted to see: fear. Not fear of the kelp, or fear of the sea, but fear of Spider Nevi. The expression of fear represented power to him, a raw power that even Flattery didn't wield among the people. Flattery maintained the politician's mask, and such a mask implied hope to anyone who witnessed it. Nevi projected no mask, no hope.

"If I go out there to clear those intakes, you will leave me."

Nevi released upon Zentz one of his rare smiles.

"It pleases me that you have due respect for my - abilities," he said. "But I promised you a very special part in this drama, and your time has not come yet. I would not sacrifice you here for nothing. You know one thing about me if you know nothing else: I kill for something, not for nothing. I value human life, Mr. Zentz, this you must realize. I value it for what I can get out of it, what I can spend it on. The word 'value' implies 'commodity,' don't you think? The pleasure of killing ranks very low, in my book, as a good reason. Much as I might like to kill you just to get rid of a certain annoyance, I'm sure someone, somewhere would make it worth my while to wait for the right price, the right trade, the right favor. Understand?"

Zentz stared straight out the cabin plaz. He was pale, appeared slightly more bloated than usual, and his pasty fingers crawled nervously over each other's backs.

"Do you know why I kill?" Zentz asked him.

Nevi finished the final attitude adjustment and settled onto the slightly choppy sea in a spot that he judged to be relatively clear of the kelp debris. As they descended, he saw that there was no clear spot. The struggle in this stand of kelp must have been tremendous.

"Yes, I know why you kill," Nevi said. "Like any of the lower animals, you kill to eat. It is your job, and you see no farther than that. You kill by orders, to someone else's plan, because to not kill means you yourself die. That is a difference between the two of us. I think of myself as a sculptor, a societal sculptor. The populace is my stone, and I shape it chip by chip into a form that suits me. The stone keeps growing, and my task is a relentless one. But I have time."

In a flurry at his keyboard Nevi set the foil up for seawater intake and hydrogen conversion. The intakes clogged within blinks. Even with Zentz out there to clear them, this would take longer than Nevi felt they could afford. He checked the fuel gauge.

Fifteen minutes, he thought, maybe twenty at the outside. Shit!

"Forget the intakes," Nevi said. "There's a wild stand just northwest of here. We'll set up there to take on fuel, then I'll see what I can learn from the Director," he said. "Don't worry. Leaving you to the kelp would be a waste, and I'm not a wasteful man."

The convolutions of Zentz's brow unwrinkled somewhat. He lifted his sullen bulk out of his couch and donned a dive suit.

"Just in case," Zentz said, "I'm ready. I've heard about wild kelp. People disappear out here, and the kelp doesn't have a reason."

Nevi throttled up and lifted them off. Much as Zentz disgusted him, Nevi intended to keep him alive until the time came when it simply wasn't handy to do that anymore.

The run to the blue sector took only ten minutes, and all the time they were heading into the afternoon squall. A black wall pushed across the sea toward them, though when they set down in the blue kelp's lagoon they were haloed in the magnificent afternoon sun.

Nevi deployed the intakes, but a warning light on his console told him they were still clogged. He tried retracting and redeploying them, but they stayed clogged.

"Better get out there after all," Nevi said. "And step on it. That squall's moving in pretty fast."

Zentz grumbled something, but trudged aft without complaining. Nevi noted from the console display that Zentz left the aft hatch open. He chuckled to himself.

He thinks he'll sink me if I submerge, and blow out the flight controls if I take off.

Nevi knew ways around both of those situations, the simplest being to go aft and close the hatch. He was tempted to do that now, just to give Zentz a thrill, but decided against it. They'd be refueled in fifteen or twenty minutes and with luck would lift off ahead of the storm.

Nevi set out a call for Flattery on their private frequency, and received an immediate reply.

"Mr. Nevi," Flattery said, "time is wasting. Do you have them yet?"

Nevi was surprised at the clarity of the reception. Indeed, the clarity of reception was unlike any that he'd experienced over the years. The activity of Pandora's two suns interfered constantly with transmissions, and lately sabotage of transmitters by the vermin made things even worse. The kelp itself often garbled radio communication, but this time it seemed to embellish it.

"No," he said, "we don't have them. We're refueling before the final push. I thought we were to make the most of this, get as many of the rebels as possible."

"Forget it," Flattery said. "I want Crista Galli now. She's not to talk with anyone before she sees me, understand?"

"Right," Nevi said, "I -"

"Tonight's news is carrying notice of Ben Ozette's death. He's not to be seen, but I want him for my own. Do what you want with that LaPush bastard."

"Do you need support back there?"

"No," Flattery said. He sounded distracted. "No, I've taken care of it. We've called some security back from the Island docking sites and from demon patrols. These bastard... there are so many of them. They've looted the public market and its warehouse is dry. We must've shot three hundred of them, but they kept on coming. I've given orders to blow up any warehouses that are in danger of being looted. When they see their precious food blasted all over the landscape, they'll think twice about this kind of thing. You stick to your job, I'll handle things here. Don't call me again unless you have them."

Nevi was left listening to static and to the whine of the pumps processing out their hydrogen. He reached to break the connection, but hesitated. There was a pattern to the static, something he hadn't noticed before. It seemed as if there was a music in the background, and voices from several conversations that he couldn't quite pick out. Over and over, faint in the distance, he could hear the rhythmic repetition of Flattery's voice saying, "Mr. Nevi, Mr. Nevi, Mr. Nev..."

He closed the circuit and stared out over the sea toward the black curtain of storm. The surface chop had increased and a wind had come up that was blowing the foil out of the center of the lagoon and closer to the inner edge of blue kelp. He glanced at the fuel readout and was relieved that they were nearly full. What worried him was the distinct repetition of his name that continued, chantlike, even though he'd shut off the radio.

The fuel light indicated full, so he shut down the pumps and sounded a warning klaxon to Zentz before he retracted the intakes. He felt them thump into the bay, but still there was no sign of Zentz.

This was clear water, Nevi thought. He should've been back aboard after clearing the intakes once.

He sounded the klaxon again, twice, but heard nothing. The aft hatch light remained on. Nevi secured the console and started back toward the aft hatch. The chant got louder, more distinct, and behind it a babble of voices rose on the air. The hair on his arms rose, too, and Nevi armed his lasgun before leaving the cabin.

He felt a metallic taste on his tongue, a taste he'd heard others describe as fear. He spat once on the deck, but the insidious taste remained.

***

Consciousness manifests itself indubitably in man and therefore, glimpsed in this one flash of light, it reveals itself as having a cosmic extension and consequently as being aureoled by limitless prolongations in space and time.
- Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Hymn of the Universe

The Immensity smelled trouble on the waters, a great disturbance from one of the coastal stands. It had been a struggle, the debris told that tale. Currents had changed suddenly, bringing the strange scents of fear and, just as suddenly, bliss. So far, the currents hadn't changed back.

The little whiff of death that the Immensity caught on the current was human, not kelp.

Perhaps the pruner has become pruned, it thought.

It stretched its outermost fronds coastward, but still could not contact the neighboring stand. Only fragments of messages drifted in on bits of torn fronds. These were shards, frames, pieces of recordings - not the Oneness that the Immensity sought, not this "talk" that humans enjoyed and withheld from others.

Then came the humans. They set into the Immensity from above, like hylighters reversing their lives, and with them they brought splinters of dreams from the stand next door.

Yes, Her Holiness was among the kelp again at last. Her presence suddenly freed the neighboring stand of prisoner kelp, a stand that had lost her to Flattery's butchery five cycles back.

Who are these others, now, come to my stand?

Few humans fished outside their gridwork. The few organic islands left to risk a float on Pandora's seas likewise stayed to the more merciful currents of the grid. The Immensity had spared fishermen, scouts, humans fleeing humans, and it had spared entire island-cities more than once. The human in charge of humans had not shown the Immensity equal compassion.

Though humans often called them "willy-nillys," the islands floated now in predictable patterns. Current Control, the enslaver of the kelp, ensured this. But the volcanics of the past twenty-five cycles had conjured storms the like of which the Immensity had never seen in its own time, and these storms brought islands into its reach. It thought of the organic islands as Immensities of Humans, and adjusted its own greatness to let them pass.

These humans came in their flying creature, dropping pieces of kelp into the Immensity's lagoon. The Immensity unraveled a long vine from the wall of the lagoon and sniffed the human. The scents talked of fear and death, and to have the whole story the Immensity would have to read this human's tissues bit by bit.

It waited until the human finished discharging the pieces of kelp, so that the Immensity would know as much of its neighbor as it could. It knew now, by scent and touch, that this was Oddie Zentz human. As it gripped Oddie Zentz human at the waist and pulled him into the walls of the lacuna, it knew that this human had killed many humans, as many as a storm and perhaps more.

The Immensity had spent most of its awakened time trying to communicate with other kelp, to merge with other, smaller stands. More kelp was better, it thought. Closer was better. It failed to understand creatures that killed their own kind. These were, indeed, diseased individuals. If they were merciless to their own, they would certainly show no mercy to others. The Immensity concluded that it should respond in kind.

***

We Islanders understand current and flow. We understand that conditions and times change. To change, then, is normal.
- Ward Keel, The Notebooks

Beatriz knew that it would not be in the captain's best interest to kill Mack, especially if there were links with other forces groundside. But she had also quit trying to guess what could be in Captain Brood's best interest. From what she could gather, Captain Brood was a man trying to capitalize on a bad decision, making more bad decisions to cover his tracks. He wouldn't last long at this rate, and he was the type who just might take everyone, and everything, with him.

She concentrated on the map she'd called up on the large studio display screen. It was a map of Pandora, rotatable, and at the touch of a key it highlighted populated areas, agriculture, fishing and mining. She could tell at a glance where the factories lay, both topside and undersea, and where the wretched communities lived that served them, for serve them they did.

Only today, with the murders of her crew and Ben's warnings ringing in her memory, did she realize how the people of Pandora, including herself, had become one with their chains. They were enslaved by hunger, and by the manipulation of hunger, which was a particular skill of the Director. He concentrated on food, transportation and propaganda. Before her, on Holovision's giant screen, she saw the geography of hunger spread out for her at a touch.

The largest single factory complex above or below the sea was Kalaloch, feeding the bottomless maw of Flattery's Project Voidship. It showed up on her display as a small, black bull's-eye in the center of amoebalike ripples of blue and yellow. Those ripples represented the settlement - the blue was Kalaloch proper, where all paths led to the ferry terminal or to The Line. People inside the blue lived in barrackslike tenements or in remnants of Islander bubbly stuck to the shore.

The yellow, a weak stain of sorts widening out from the blue, represented the local refugee population. Starving, unsheltered, too weak for heavy work, they were also too weak to rebel. The Director's staff rode among them daily, picking the lucky few who would be trucked to town to wash down the stone pavements, sort rock from dung in the Director's gardens, or pick through refuse for reusable materials. For this each was given a space in The Line and a few crumbs at one of a hundred food dispensaries that Flattery operated in the area. Even private markets were offshoots of the dispensaries - true black market vendors disappeared with chilling regularity."

The sphere of Kalaloch included the bay and its launch base, the factory strip, the village, Flattery's Preserve and the huddle of misshapen humanity that squeezed inside the perimeter for protection from Pandora's demons.

Outside this sphere Beatriz noted the similarities of other settlements along the coastline. These smaller dots also were ringed by the huddle of the poor, even agricultural settlements, fishing villages, the traditional sources of food. Security squads shot looters of fields, proprietors of illegal windowboxes and rooftop gardens. They shot the occasional fisherman bold enough to set an unlicensed line. All of this Ben had told her. She had seen evidence herself, and had chosen to disbelieve. Beatriz earned her food coupons fairly, ate well, felt guilty enough about the hunger around her to believe what Flattery had fed her about production meaning jobs and jobs feeding people.

For almost two years her assignments had covered jobs, the people who worked them and the people who gave them out. It had been a long time since she'd walked the muddy streets of hunger.

There aren't any new jobs lately, she thought, but there sure are a lot fewer people.

Now she was above it all, trapped and converted, with nothing to offer and everything to fear.

***

Thou shalt give life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.
- Christian Book of the Dead

Boggs had been hungry all his twenty years, but today his hunger was different and he knew it. He woke up without pain in his bones from the ground underneath, and when he scratched his head a handful of hair came with it. This, he knew, was not hunger but the end of hunger. He looked around him at the still, wizened forms of his family huddled together under their rock ledge. Today he would get them food or die trying, because he knew he would do the dying anyway.

Boggs was born with the split lip, gaping nose slit and stump feet characteristic of his father's family. His six brothers shared these defects but only two still lived. His father, too, was dead. Like Boggs, they had known the enemy hunger from birth. His malformed mouth had made nursing a futile noise, so most of the sucking that he did as a newborn slobbered down his chin. His mother tried to salvage what she could with her fingers, slopping it back into the cleft of his mouth. He'd watched her do this countless times with his younger brothers.

A week ago he'd watched her try to nurse the starving ten-year-old when there wasn't even a bug to catch. She had been dry for two years, and his brother died clutching a handful of fallen orange hair. Boggs looked again at the fistful of orange hair in his hand, then weakly cast it away.

"I will take the line, Mother," he said, in the lilting Islander way. "I will bring us back a fine muree."

"You will not go." Her voice was dry, hoarse, and filled the tiny space they'd dug out under the ledge. "You are not licensed to fish. They will kill you, they will take the line."

His father had begged the local security detachment for a license. Everyone knew that many temporaries were issued every day, and that some could even pay with a share of the catch. But the Director issued a fixed number each day. "Conservation," he called it. "Otherwise the people will outfish the resource and no one will eat."

"Conservation," Boggs snorted to himself. He eyed the fish line wrapped around his mother's ankle. There were two bright hooks attached. There had been a fiber sack for bait but they'd eaten the sack weeks ago. There was just the ten meters of synthetic line, and the two metal hooks tucked inside the wrap.