Last Shadow (9781250252135) Read online

  Quara: And what are you doing to falsify your interpretations of the data you’ve been getting from Descoladora?

  Ela: We haven’t yet found any hypotheses that are not already contradicted by some or all of the data. We’re trying to think of new hypotheses that do fit. Then we’ll start experimenting.

  Quara: Meanwhile, you’re terrifying the local population by instantaneously popping from here to there in the night sky.

  Ela: If they did devise the descolada and send it out into space, they deserve a little terror from meeting up with a superior civilization.

  Quara: Humans are not a superior civilization. You’re dazzling them with a single trick, which is not done by a human.

  Ela: Well, she’s a human now.

  Quara: Debatable.

  Ela: Says who?

  Quara: I know, your verdict isn’t in on me yet.

  Ela: Oh, we know you’re human. We just don’t have enough evidence to determine whether you know it or not.

  Quara: Let me know when you decide.

  Ela: We’re in the midst of the experiments now. So it will be you who decides, my dear.

 

  Quara: How do you hope it will turn out?

  Ela: I would love to have you back in the circle of my love, and to find that I am in the circle of yours.

  Quara: Don’t you already know how much I love you?

  Ela: Sometimes I hope, and sometimes I fear, that I do already know.

  —Quara and Ela Ribeira, transcript of text messages

  Notes for Plikt: “The Ribeira Family Saves the World”

  Peter clung to the arm of the Formic tighter than he meant to; he had not been prepared for how frightened he was of walking in the dark, on a path that kept going up and down, and turning this way and that. He had no idea if there was a steep drop-off on one side or the other—or both—and they might have been surrounded by a thousand Formics geared up for war or none at all.

  Peter didn’t try to speak to the Formic he clung to. He knew that he would really be confessing his fear to the Hive Queen, and even if she already guessed it or even knew it somehow, he did not want anyone to hear his voice tremble or go too high or some other giveaway. Better to stay silent, like the others.

  Until at last Thulium’s small voice said, softly but audibly: “Here we are.”

  The Formic stopped, and gently but firmly peeled Peter’s hand from its upper arm. Then it stepped forward—Peter couldn’t see, but he felt its passage.

  “Light,” said their Formic guide. Peter assumed it was the same one that had carried Thulium. Its speech was perfectly clear now, though it was also obvious that its vocal apparatus was not a larynx or even the syrinx of birds. Was it related to the chirping legs of crickets? Yet somehow its mouth could create articulate consonants and shape intelligible vowels.

  After a few moments, a very dim light began to allow Peter to make out some aspects of his surroundings. The floor around him was fairly level, but it was not empty. Instead, thousands of low hollow pillars shaped like interlocking hexagons surrounded him, and many small creatures were scampering across the tops, stopping now and then to put something into or pull something out of one of the hollow hexes. The creatures were certainly not ordinary Formics, but they might be Formics with a special purpose, given a different shape to allow them to move lightly over what had to be the nursery for the Queen’s eggs to hatch, pass through their larval stage, and then cocoon themselves to emerge as Formics—of whatever type the Queen had determined they needed to be.

  “Yes, Brother,” said the talking Formic. “You understand what my messengers do. They feed and protect and care for the babies. But they also carry my instructions to the babies about what they need to grow up to be.”

  Peter knew she was talking to him. “I’m sure you already know what we came here to ask you.”

  “I do,” said the Formic. “But do you?”

  Peter knew this was a trick question designed to make him feel stupid and lost. So he skipped the stage where he gave a stupid answer, and simply felt stupid and lost anyway.

  “This one, whose voice I am using, she is the result of many years of trying to develop a child who could speak to humans, and understand human speech. The good-enough vocal apparatus I perfected a long time ago, as you measure time. But the brainwork required for this one to understand and produce human speech, that took far longer.”

  “So she speaks to us using intelligence of her own?” asked Thulium.

  “If I created her speeches for her, it would use up far too much of my—what does Jane call it?—my bandwidth. So I inform her of what I wish her to accomplish, and she shapes the language to that purpose. Has she done well?”

  It was odd to hear the talking Formic speaking of itself in the third person. Especially as the Hive Queen was having the Talker explain that even though she spoke as if she were the Queen, she was explicitly not merely transmitting the Queen’s own words. Apparently the Queen had no words of her own.

  “You’re wrong, Boy Who Calls Himself Peter,” said the Talker. “The Queen has all the words. She has been communing with humans for three thousand years. She fought to learn to understand human language back when the survival of all her sisters depended on such understanding.”

  So this time Talker was speaking as herself, referring to the Queen in the third person.

  “By my count, there are six people present,” said Talker. “The Queen, myself, and four humans. Why is one person thought of as the third person?”

  “It’s grammar,” said Jane. “It doesn’t make sense to the humans, either, but somehow they communicate.”

  Jane’s words apparently gave Wang-Mu permission to speak. “O Queen, does my connection with Peter have enough strength to allow him to carry me Outside and Inside without danger to my survival?”

  “It has enough strength,” said Talker. “But he must also will it to be so. Can he concentrate on you with enough purity and endurance that he won’t get distracted and forget you?”

  Peter wanted to cry out, No, I would never! But then he remembered that an hour ago he had toyed with the idea of doing his interplanetary journeying without Wang-Mu, leaving her behind, as if she were not a part of everything he did, as if she did not matter in the accomplishment of his purposes.

  “And what are your purposes, Boy Who Calls Himself Peter?” asked Talker. “I think it would be good for you to decide and then explain it to us.”

  Peter felt as if he had been called on the carpet before a demanding teacher who insisted that he take an oral examination in front of everybody who mattered.

  When was I ever in a classroom? When did I have a teacher? When was I given a test? Why do I recognize how this feels?

  “We are all waiting,” said Talker. “What are your purposes? Why will you flit from one world to another?”

  “Wang-Mu and I have found some value,” said Peter, “in the speculations Quara Ribeira has written.”

  “You all see how he answers a question about his intentions with reference to a person who is not present,” said Talker.

  “I was creating a context,” said Peter. “Quara believes that the researchers studying Descoladora are trapped in their own assumptions. Wang-Mu believes, with reasoning and evidence of her own, that the inhabitants of Descoladora did not create the descolada virus and did not send it out into the galaxy. Wang-Mu believes that the planet Descoladora faced its own descolada epidemic, and that far from being our enemy, its inhabitants are a valuable source of information about what the virus did to them, and how they coped with it.”

  Thulium quietly said, “Me, too.”

  Talker spoke over her. “Still you speak of Quara, who is not here, and Wang-Mu, who is. Nowhere can I detect your answer to the question that was asked.”

  “My intention,” said Peter, “is for me and Wang-Mu to travel to the surface of Descoladora. At first we would merely observe. We would return to Lusitania often to
be quarantined and examined, in case we pick up some previously unknown virus. If it looks possible for us to communicate with the inhabitants, then on a later visit we will do so. That’s my plan, and since everything is contingent on how each step plays out, it can’t be much firmer than that.”

  “I ask your companions,” said Talker. “How does this plan seem to you?”

  Wang-Mu said, “Since it’s the plan Peter and I worked out together, making it our plan—”

  “I’m sorry,” said Peter. “She asked me about my intentions and already rebuked me once for speaking on your behalf.”

  “Let’s not have a spat right here,” said Wang-Mu.

  Peter thought: If you didn’t want to quarrel, then why did you claim ownership of the plan, as if I had denied you any part in it?

  But there was no point in embarrassing himself or her in front of the others. So he contained his resentment and held his tongue.

  “Well chosen,” said Talker. “Well chosen, Brother.”

  Peter knew what was meant when the Hive Queen called him Brother. She knew she was talking to Ender’s aiúa. And so she recognized him as her companion on many voyages, through many centuries. But he did not remember her that way.

  Wang-Mu resumed what she had been saying, as if the interruption had not occurred, “My presence here affirms that I agree with and want to participate in this plan.”

  “Not knowing what you’ll find on the surface of Descoladora?” asked Jane.

  “Until someone ventures there,” said Wang-Mu, “we’ll never know much more than we know now. And we must know more, for the sake of the whole human species.”

  Talker resumed control of the interview. “Who designated you for this perilous mission?”

  Peter chuckled. “Neither Wang-Mu nor I has genetic expertise to contribute to scientific investigations. Wang-Mu learns more quickly than I, so she has a hope of being of some help. But we both wanted to do something that has value, and since this is a dangerous job, we can’t afford to risk wasting the life of any of the geneticists involved with the project. If everything went wrong, and Wang-Mu and I died without being able to escape back to the Lusitanian quarantine, the loss to the project would not be crippling.”

  Talker shook her head. “You do not know what will or will not cripple something, or what form the crippling might take. You do not know what has value greater than the value of other things. All your decisions are in ignorance of the outcome.”

  “Decisions always are,” said Wang-Mu. “But still we decide and act boldly, for if we don’t, nothing can be accomplished.”

  “Where did you read that?” asked Thulium.

  Wang-Mu did not answer.

  “You’re habitually scornful, you know,” said Jane. “Even when you are not superior to other people in any way.”

  “I know that,” said Thulium. “I’m so scornful that I’m going to point out the deep stupidity of this whole plan.”

  “We’re holding our breath to hear,” said Peter.

  “Whoever and whatever the inhabitants of Descoladora turn out to be, whatever the biota of the planet turns out to be, for you to go without a geneticist along will make your observations nearly worthless. You don’t know what to look for. You don’t know what it will imply about the inhabitants.”

  “You’re not coming with us,” said Peter.

  “I’m the most expendable of the geneticists,” said Thulium. “I can go to the surface of Descoladora with an open mind and open eyes—eyes that are trained to see ecological relationships. And a skill set that can include, with the right instruments—highly portable ones, I must add—the ability to look at genomes and evaluate them and transmit information to the Box about what I learn. If you don’t take me, take some geneticist, because the geneticist you don’t take will be the most important loss your expedition could possibly suffer.”

  The light in the space was so dim that when Peter looked down to see what Wang-Mu thought of Thulium’s declaration, he couldn’t begin to read the expression on her face.

  The light in the room increased slightly, until Peter could see Wang-Mu as she slowly nodded to him.

  “How do you light this space?” asked Thulium, as if she hadn’t been part of the discussion up till now.

  “Skylights,” said Talker. “I have tunnels with mirrors leading to spots on the surface. My children cover and uncover the mirrors to allow less and more light to come to this chamber.”

  Nobody told Thulium to stick to the subject. Peter realized that the Queen and Jane were treating her with the same respect they showed to Peter and Wang-Mu.

  “Brother,” said Talker. “Your bond with Wang-Mu is strong enough for you to take her anywhere, as long as you vow that when you do so, you will never forget that she is with you.”

  “I make that vow gladly and willingly,” said Peter. “I want her with me. I need her with me.”

  “Make sure you act upon that statement,” said Jane dryly, “until it’s completely true.”

  Peter felt a flash of resentment toward Jane.

  “But now we have a greater problem,” said Talker. “Thulium spoke the truth. Your expedition is crippled if you don’t have a geneticist with you. She is a superb geneticist, and she should go with you. Furthermore, she should take her cousin Sprout with her, so they can examine what they find and converse about it at a level that no one else in the expedition can begin to understand.”

  Two leguminids, thought Peter.

  “You don’t know them,” said Talker. “You don’t love them.”

  “He doesn’t even like me,” said Thulium.

  “Yes he does,” said Jane. “He admires your chutzpah and he envies your intelligence and learning. He enjoys your company, especially when you intend him not to enjoy it.”

  Peter wanted to shout at her, Maybe that’s how Ender would have felt, but I am not Ender!

  And then something deep inside him said, Yes you are, so keep your mouth shut.

  Beside him, Wang-Mu stifled a short laugh. As if she had heard or guessed at Peter’s internal conversation.

  “You will not be ready to embark on this expedition,” said Talker, “until you come back and show me that you have philotically entwined with Thulium and Sprout to a great enough degree that you can transport them along with yourself and Wang-Mu, with complete safety, from world to world.”

  “Why?” asked Peter. “I mean, why come back here? I understand the reason for making sure I can carry them safely. But you’ll know without our coming through this tunnel. You’ll know and Talker can come and tell us.”

  “I don’t send my children where they might terrify the Lusitanians who aren’t already used to our appearance,” said Talker. “Least of all one so valuable as this one who speaks.”

  “And you shouldn’t underestimate the power of ritual,” said Jane. “When you think you’re ready, you’ll come here and you’ll walk into the darkness and this time you won’t cling to a Formic’s arm. You’ll follow Thulium because you’ll know her and trust her—enough to risk your life on her observations and decisions. Because, on the planet’s surface, she, not you, will be making the most important decisions.”

  Peter felt the sting of that, the stab of it, the dull ache of it.

  “Aw, Peter,” said Jane, her voice dripping with pity. “Are you only just discovering that what you liked best about this plan of yours was that you would be in charge?”

  “I thought it would be only me and Wang-Mu,” said Peter.

  “And you trusted that her deferent attitude would guarantee that your will would prevail in all things?” asked Jane.

  “Yes,” said Peter. “I thought I would be in charge.”

  “And why does that matter to you?” asked Talker. It was a surprise that she weighed in on something so personal.

  Peter spoke to Talker, knowing that it was really the Hive Queen he was addressing. “Do you ever relinquish your authority?” he asked.

  “No,” said
Talker. “But here is a difference between you and me. I actually have authority. And if I ceased to exercise it, all my children would soon die, as was proven when Mazer Rackham killed the Sister that we sent to colonize Earth. You humans found no living soldiers or workers after that. Once Ender Wiggin had killed all the remaining Sisters, no human found a living Formic anywhere. No one depends on your authority to that degree, Boy Who Calls Himself Peter.”

  The truth of this statement was brutal. The bitter disappointment in Peter’s soul brought tears to his eyes and rage to his heart.

  This is what the original Peter Wiggin felt when Ender was taken to Battle School and he was not. This was the rage that made him Ender’s enemy. Now I know what it felt like. Feels like.

  But I am not Peter. Not the original one. Ender never needed to have authority. He never reached for it, unless it had already been granted to him. He always lived and worked within circumstances that he could not change, while changing and improving all the circumstances that he could.

  And he realized that he was basing this thought on what was written in The Hegemon, as the Speaker for the Dead explained why Peter was able to unite the nations of the world under a single government, one that protected the rights of groups and, above all, of individuals. Hegemon Peter Wiggin had learned to understand what other people needed and find ways to accommodate them, so that they never felt enslaved and oppressed under his leadership. They always felt like valued friends and allies, because the Hegemon made sure they were friends and allies, and he valued them.

  I do not need to govern this expedition. I just need to transport it to and fro. And then to look out for the others and protect them as well as I can, while everybody does the work they’re suited for.

  As he articulated this thought in his mind, Peter felt a strange emotion pass over him. The sense of having accomplished something. Of having understood something that had always been just out of reach.

  “Now you are leader of the expedition,” said Talker. “And now you are ready to start learning to love Thulium and Sprout, and for them to come to value you.”

  “Well done,” said Jane.