Death's End

Nine time grains after the first three communications, another record appeared: The Star-Pluckers plucked their star again to send out another broadcast… a set of coordinates! The main core was certain that it was a set of coordinates. Singer looked for the star indicated by the coordinates and saw that it had also been cleansed, about thirty-five time grains ago.

Singer thought that perhaps he had been wrong. The Star-Pluckers must have possessed the hiding gene. They obviously had the cleansing gene, so it was impossible that they didn’t also possess the hiding gene. But like most coordinate broadcasters, they didn’t have the ability to cleanse on their own.

Interesting. Very interesting.

Why did whoever cleansed the dead three-star world not also cleanse the world of the Star-Pluckers? Many possibilities. Perhaps they hadn’t noticed these three communications—primitive membrane messages often didn’t get much attention. But given the millions upon millions of worlds out there, someone would have noticed—Singer was just one who did. Even without Singer, some other low-entropy entity would have noticed them; it was just a matter of time. Or perhaps they had noticed them, but decided that a low-entropy group that didn’t possess the hiding gene wasn’t much of a threat, and cleansing them was more trouble than it was worth.

But that would be a mistake, a terrible mistake! Broadly speaking, if low-entropy entities like these Star-Pluckers really didn’t have the hiding gene, then they would not be afraid of exposing their own presence, and they would expand and attack without fear.

At least until they got killed.

However, as applied to this particular case, the situation was more complicated. The first three communications were followed nine time grains later by the coordinate broadcast. Then, sixty time grains after that, there was another long-membrane coordinate broadcast from somewhere else, pointing at the dead three-star world. The chain of events painted an uneasy picture, a picture that indicated danger. The cleansing against the dead three-star world had happened twelve time grains ago, so the Star-Pluckers must have realized that their own position had been revealed. Their only choice was to shroud themselves in slow fog so that they would appear perfectly safe and no one would bother them.

But they hadn’t. Maybe they didn’t have the ability? But more than sufficient time had passed from the time they could pluck their star to send out a primitive membrane message for them to possess this ability.

Perhaps they didn’t want to shroud themselves.

If that was so, that made the Star-Pluckers very dangerous; far more dangerous than the dead world.

Hide yourself well; cleanse well.

Singer gazed at the world of the Star-Pluckers. It was an ordinary star that had at least a billion more time grains of life left. It possessed eight planets: four giant liquid planets and four solid ones. Singer’s experience told him that the low-entropy entities who had sent out the primitive membrane broadcast lived on one of the solid planets.

Singer activated the process for the big eye—he rarely did this; he was exceeding his authority.

“What are you doing?” asked the seed’s Elder. “The big eye is busy.”

“I’d like to take a closer look at one of the low-entropy worlds.”

“Your job doesn’t require close-up examinations.”

“I’m just curious.”

“The big eye has to observe more important targets. There’s no time for your curiosity. Go back to doing your job.”

Singer didn’t persist in his request. The cleansing agent had the lowest position on the seed. Everyone thought of him contemptuously, thought of his work as easy and trivial. But they forgot that coordinates that had been broadcast often indicated far more danger than the vast majority who kept themselves well hidden.

The only thing left was cleansing. Singer took a mass dot out of the magazine again, then realized that he couldn’t use a mass dot to cleanse the Star-Pluckers. Their planetary system had a different structure than the dead world’s system: it possessed blind corners. Using a mass dot might leave something behind, thereby wasting effort. He needed to use a dual-vector foil. However, Singer didn’t have the authority to retrieve a dual-vector foil out of the magazine; he had to ask the Elder for approval.

“I need a dual-vector foil for cleansing.”

“Permission granted,” said the Elder.

The dual-vector foil drifted in front of Singer. It was sealed in its package, crystal clear. Although it was an ordinary object, Singer liked it a lot. He didn’t like the expensive tools too much; they were too violent. He liked the unyielding tenderness displayed by the dual-vector foil, a kind of aesthetic that could turn death into a song.

Yet Singer felt a bit uneasy. “Why did you give it to me without so much as asking a question?”

“It’s not like this is very costly.”

“But if we make too much use of this—”

“It’s being used everywhere in the cosmos.”