Antagonist - Childe Cycle 11 (39 page)

"I
do
thank
her,"
Toni
said.
"She
was
an
important
person
in
my life.
But
it's
more
than
that;
my
non-Dorsai
ancestors
could
never have
been
enslaved,
either."

"I
believe
that,"
he
said.
"And
I
know
there
are
Friendlies
like that,
too."
He
shrugged.
"Whatever
it
takes
to
produce
that
completely
free,
responsible,
strong
individual,
our
societies
don't
seem to
have
it—not
enough
of
it.
That's
why
I
think
the
race
needs
to
go back
to
Old
Earth
and
retrench—look
into
itself
until
it
finds
the way
to
be
mature
adults."

"Is
that
what
you
believe
the
historical
forces
want?"

"I
don't
think
the
forces
have
any
wants
at
all,"
he
said.
"They're just
there?

"Like
gravity,
you
said."

"We
never
were
completely
independent
entities,
any
of
us,"
he said.
"We
never
will
be.
We're
like
fish:
we
swim
in
an
ocean
of forces—even
matter
is
really
a
function
of
forces—and
we
have
no prospect
of
ever
being
in
a
position
to
order
the
ocean
itself.
But that
doesn't
lessen
us;
in
fact,
we
need the
forces—it's
like
the
ocean: if
it
weren't
there,
we
could
never
swim
at
all.

"Hello?"
he
asked,
after
a
long
moment
of
silence.

"I
haven't
gone
to
sleep,"
she
said.
"I
was
thinking
about
a
cosmology
class
I
took
once,
long
ago."

"What
about
it?"

"Well,
I
remember
we
explored
speculations
people
have
had over
the
centuries,
as
to
what
makes
up
what
we
call
the
'fabric
of space.'
I
had
trouble
with
the
idea,
I
remember,
because
I'd
always understood
space
to
be—well,
empty.
Nothingness!
And
yet
using the
term
'fabric'
seemed
to
me
to
imply
there
was—is—something out
there
with
a
texture
..
.
something
that
can
be
touched.
Or
at least
sensed,
in
some
way."

"The
physicists,"
Bleys
said,
"have
largely
accepted
that
even though
we
lack
the
senses
necessary
even
to
perceive
that
'fabric,' as
you
called
it,
there
must
be
something
like
it,
to
hold
everything together.
My
thought
is
there's
something
like
that
going
on
with history
...
or
maybe
with
time."

"Are
you
saying
you
have
some
sort
of
perception
of
these
historical
forces?"

"Not
at
all,"
he
said.
"All
I
have
is
a
construction—a
sort
of
fictional
picture
in
my
mind,
that
sometimes
I
can
use
to
help
me
envision
what's
going
on
in
the
Universe."

"Would
you
tell
me
about
it?
Do
you
mind?"

"I
don't
mind,"
he
said.
"But
I've
never
tried
to
describe
it
to anyone
before;
so
bear
with
me
if
this
seems
a
little
vague."

He
paused
for
a
moment.

"You
mentioned
the
'fabric
of
space,'"
he
said.
"Now
try
to imagine
a
kind
of
fabric
that
flows
through
time." "A
fabric
of
time?"

"I
don't
necessarily
mean
it
in
the
sense
of
something
that
holds time
together,"
he
said.
"What
I'm
thinking
of
is
more
like
a
ribbon, or
even
a
tapestry—a
tapestry
made
up
of
threads
that
each
represents
the
life
of
a
human
being,
as
that
life
moves
through
time,
so that
the
entire
tapestry
runs
from
the
beginning
of
the
race
on
into the
future,
indicating
the
direction
the
whole
race
is
moving."

"So
this
tapestry
is,
in
a
way,
telling
you
a
story—the
story
of
the human
race?"

"Yes,"
he
said.
"That's
why
tapestry
may
be
a
better
word
than
ribbon,
even
though
the
length
of
the
thing
is
more
ribbon
-
like.
I
sometimes
imagine
the
threads
are
all
of
different
colors,
and
I
can
pick out
my
own
and
those
of
some
other
people.
I
imagine
that
the
great moments
of
the
race
are
represented
when
threads
of
similar
color begin
to
run
together—which
means
some
great
idea
has
arisen
and begun
to
influence
more
and
more
people."

"Do
some
people's
threads—their
lives—have
more
weight
in determining
the
direction
of
the
tapestry
than
do
others'?"
Toni asked.

"People,
no,"
he
said.
"It's
the
ideas
they
hold
that
gives
the weight.
Or
maybe
weight
is
the
wrong
word;
maybe
color
or
direction
would
be
better."

"I
think
I
get
the
idea,"
she
said.

"I
know
these
threads
aren't
real,"
he
said.
"It's
just
a
picture,
a symbol
in
my
mind,
that
puts
my
own
position
and
plans
into
a
form I
can
think
about
more
easily.
I've
found
that
meditating
on
the
image
sometimes
seems
to
lead
me
to
answers
for
some
problems
.
.
. perhaps
it's
a
channel
into
my
subconscious
mind,
that
uses
my
own creative
abilities
to
analyze
situations
on
a
level
below
my
conscious mind,
when
that
consciousness
is
having
trouble.

"Sometimes
I
feel
I
can
see
the
direction
the
threads
are
going, into
the
future.
I'm
sure
they're
not
real,
but
just
projections
from
my mind's
calculations—or
guesses.
But
sometimes
seeing
them
gives me
ideas
for
things
to
do,
as
if
I
were
looking
at
a
map."

"And
where
do
the
historical
forces
come
into
this?"
she
asked.

"They
don't,
really,
in
any
physical
sense,"
he
said.
"But
the forces
are
made
up
of
the
energies
of
the
life-threads,
and
the
ideas that
motivate
them.
When
a
large
number
of
people
want
a
particular
future
for
the
race—even
if
they
never
think
of
what
they
want as
influencing
the
race's
future—their
threads
run
together.
Together
they
have
a
kind
of—let's
use
weight
for
this—weight
that bends
the
tapestry
of
the
entire
race's
future
in
their
particular direction.
If
other
people
have
different
ideas,
their
weight
tends to
lead
the
tapestry
in
a
different
direction
...
so
that
the
tapestry of
the
future
is
being
tugged
in,
at
a
minimum,
two
different
directions."

"So
maybe
war
isn't
a
good
word
for
the
reconciliation
of
these historical
forces,"
she
said.

"Perhaps
not,
as
applied
to
the
forces
themselves,"
he
said. "When
water
is
released
from
a
dam
and
flows
down
to
a
lower-lying
body
of
water,
it's
not
a
war—it's
only
a
righting
of
things that
have
been
out
of
balance
...
a
simple
search
for
a
state
of equilibrium."

"This
feels
very
right
to
me,"
Toni
said.
"It
fits
with
the
importance
of
balance
in
the
martial
arts,
for
one
thing.
And
I
recall,
too, that
some
of
the
masters
suggested
that
the
true
martial
artist should
be
like
water—be
infinitely
flexible,
able
to
adapt
and
flow without
effort."