Starplex

Jag was losing his balance again. He finally gave up, and dropped back to his four hind legs, making him look like a chubby centaur. “Talk about an ego blow,” he said. “This one is the biggest of them all. Early on, each of the Commonwealth races had thought its homeworld was the center of the universe. But, of course, they weren’t. Then we reasoned that dark matter must exist—and, in a way, that was even more humbling. It meant that not only were we not the center of the universe, we’re not even made out of what most of the universe is made from! We are like the scum on a pond’s surface daring to think that we are more important than all the vast bulk of water that makes up the pond.

“And now this!” His fur was dancing. “Remember what Cat’s Eye said when you asked it how long ago dark-matter life had first arisen? ‘Since the beginning of all the stars combined,’ he said. ‘Since the beginning of the universe.’ ” Keith nodded.

“He said they had to exist that far back—had to!” Jag’s fur was rippling. “I thought it was just a philosophical position, but he’s right, of course—life had to exist from the beginning of this universe, or as near to the beginning as physically possible.”

Keith stared at Jag. “I don’t understand.”

“What arrogant fools we are!” said Jag. “Don’t you see? To this day, despite all the humbling lessons the universe has already taught us, we still try to retain a central role in creation. We devise theories of cosmology that say the universe was destined to give rise to us, that it had to evolve life like us. Humans call it the anthropic principle, my people called it the aj-Waldahudigralt principle, but it’s all the same thing: the desperate, deep-rooted need to believe that we are significant, that we’re important.

“We talk in quantum physics about Schredinger’s cat or Teg’s kestoor—the idea that everything is just potentialities, just wavefronts, unresolved, until one of us all-important qualified observers lumbers by, has a peek, and, by the process of looking, causes the wavefront to collapse. We actually allowed ourselves to believe that that is how the universe worked—even though we know full well that the universe is many billions of years old, and not one of our races is more than a million.

“Yes,” barked Jag, “quantum physics demands qualified observers. Yes, intelligence is necessary to determine which possibility becomes reality. But in our arrogance we thought that the universe could work for fifteen billion years without us, and yet that it somehow was geared to give rise to us. Such hubris! The intelligent observers are not us—tiny beings, isolated on a handful of worlds in all the vastness of space. The intelligent observers are the dark-matter creatures. They have been spinning galaxies into spirals for billions upon billions of years. It is their intellect, their observations, their sentience that drives the universe, that gives quantum potentialities concrete reality. We are nothing—nothing!—but a recent, localized phenomenon—a spot of mold on a universe that doesn’t need us, or care that we exist. Cat’s Eye was absolutely right when he said we were insignificant. This is their universe—the darmats’ universe. They made it, and they made us, too!”

Chapter XXV

Keith sat in his office on deck fourteen, looking over the latest news from Tau Ceti. Reports were sketchy, but on Rehbollo, forces loyal to Queen Trath had put down the insurrection against her, and twenty-seven conspirators had been summarily executed in the traditional method of being drowned in boiling mud.

Keith set down the datapad. The report strained credulity—it was the first he’d heard of any political unrest on Rehbollo. Still, maybe it was true—although more likely it was just a government desperately trying to distance itself from a disastrous initiative.

A chime sounded, and PHANTOM’s voice said, “Jag Kandaro em-Pelsh is here.”

Keith exhaled. “Let him in.”

Jag entered and found a polychair. His left eyes were on Keith, but the right pair were scanning the room in the instinctive fight-or-flight pattern. “I suppose at this juncture,” he said, “I must fill out some of those forms you humans are so fond of.”

“What forms?” said Keith.

“Forms for resigning my position aboard Starplex, of course. I can no longer serve here.”

Keith rose to his feet, and permitted himself a stretch.

It had to begin somewhere—maturity, the stage after the midlife crisis, peace. It had to begin somewhere.

“Children play with toy soldiers,” said Keith, looking now at Jag. “Child races play with real ones. Maybe it’s time all of us grew up a bit.”

The Waldahud was quiet for a long moment. “Maybe.”

“We all have loyalties hardwired into our genes,” said Keith. “I won’t push for your resignation.”