Infinity's Shore

The swirling patterns seemed confused. “You would prefer sea monsters?”

“Forget it,” Huck said. “You wouldn’t understand.”

The patterns bent and swayed.

“I am afraid you may be right about that. Your small band of comrades has us terribly perplexed. So much that a few of us posed a sly scenario — that you were planted in our midst to sow confusion.”

“How do you mean?”

“Your values, beliefs, and evident mutual affection contribute to undermining assumptions we regarded as immutably anchored in the nature of reality.

“Mind you, this confusion is not wholly unpleasant. As a thinking entity, one of my prime motives might be called a lust for surprise. And those I work with are hardly less bemused by the unforeseen marvel of your fellowship.”

“Glad you find us entertaining,” Huck commented, as dryly sarcastic as the voice had been. “So you guys came here to hide, like our ancestors?”

“There are parallels. But our plan was never to stay. Only to make repairs, gather stores, and wait in concealment for a favorable window at the nearest transfer point.”

“So Uriel and the sages may be wrong about the ship that came to the Glade? Being a gang of gene raiders — that could just be a cover story. Are you the real cause of our troubles?”

“Trouble is synonymous with being a metabolizing entity. Or else why have you young adventurers sought it so avidly?

“But your complaint has merit. We thought we had eluded all pursuit. The ship that landed in the mountains may be coincidental, or attracted by a confluence of unlucky factors. In any event, had we known of your existence, we would have sought shelter somewhere off-planet instead, perhaps in a dead city on one of your moons, though such places are less convenient for effecting repairs.”

That part I had trouble believing. I’m just an ignorant savage, but from the classic scientific romances I grew up reading, I could picture working in some lunar ghost town like my nicknamesake, waking mighty engines that had slept for ages. What kind of starfaring beings would find darkness and salt water more “convenient” than clean vacuum?

We lapsed into moody silence, unable to stay outraged at folks who accept responsibility so readily. Anyway, weren’t they fellow refugees from Galactic persecution?

Or from justice, came another, worried thought.

“Can you tell us why everyone’s so mad at you?” I asked.

The spinning figure turned into a narrow, whirling funnel whose small end seemed diminished and very far away.

“Like you, we delved and probed into unvisited places, imagining ourselves bold explorers.…” the voice explained in tones of boundless sadness. “Until we had the misfortune to find the very thing we sought. Unexpected wonders beyond our dreams.

“Breaking no law, we planned only to share what we had found. But those pursuing us abandoned all pretense of legality. Like giants striving over possession of a gnat, they war lustily, battling each other for a chance to capture us! Alas, whoever wins our treasure will surely use it against multitudes.”

Again, we stared. Pincer unleashed awed whispers from all vents at once.

“Tr-tr-treasure-ure-ure …?”

Huck wheeled close to the spinning pattern. “Can you prove what you just said?”

“Not at this time. Not without putting your people in more danger than they already are.”

I recall wondering — what could be more dangerous than the genocide Uriel had spoken of, as one likely outcome of contact with gene raiders?

“Nevertheless,” the voice continued, “it may prove possible to improve our level of mutual confidence. Or even help each other in significant ways.”

Sara

SUPPOSE THE WORLD’S TWO MOST CAREFUL OBSERVERS witnessed the same event. They would never agree precisely on what had happened. Nor could they go back and check. Events may be recorded, but the past can’t be replayed.

And the future is even more nebulous — a territory we make up stories about, mapping strategies that never go as planned.

Sara’s beloved equations, derived from pre-contact works of ancient Earth, depicted time as a dimension, akin to the several axes of space. Galactic experts ridiculed this notion, calling the relativistic models of Einstein and others “naive.” Yet Sara knew the expressions contained truth. They had to. They were too beautiful not to be part of universal design.

That contradiction drew her from mathematics to questions of language — how speech constrains the mind, so that some ideas come easily, while others can’t even be expressed. Earthling tongues — Anglic, Rossic, and Nihanic — seemed especially prone to paradoxes, tautologies, and “proofs” that sound convincing but run counter to the real world.