The World at the End of Time (54 page)

“No!” Viktor yelled, shocked. “That’s
salt
water! That’ll kill them.”

“Oh, sure,” Jeren said remorsefully. “All right, then there’s a creek that goes down by the landing strip, how about that?”

But by then Viktor had an idea. “Why pump it uphill?” he asked. “There’s all that water that’s being pumped out of the power plant area. I saw it running down by the trail. We could get the gillies to dig a ditch, divert it to here. Or, even better in the long run, we could start a new farm, wherever the water comes down.”

He stopped, because they were all grinning at him. Balit’s face was shining with particular pride. “I told you Viktor would know,” the boy informed the others. “Now what do we do about this fertilizer stuff, Viktor?”

Viktor thought for a moment. “I suppose if we sent some soil samples back to Nergal somebody could test them and tell us what to do,” he said slowly. “Then, I remember we seeded earthworms. I don’t imagine any of those survived the ice, but there might be some left in the freezers. We could look. If there aren’t any there, maybe Nrina or somebody could make some for us. You have to have something like earthworms to get a good crop, because they lighten the soil and help things grow.”

He stopped, because Balit was looking doubtful. “What is it?” he asked.

“Well, there’s one thing I don’t understand about that, Viktor,” Balit said diffidently. “In school we learned about growing things, and nobody ever said anything about earthworms.”

Viktor frowned, trying to remember what the farms in the habitats had been like. “Maybe they prepare the soil a different way on the habitats,” he hazarded. “Probably they do—I’m sure the crops on the habitats don’t grow in plain dirt. It’s bound to be something artificial—really special—probably with all the minerals and so on that the plants need measured out exactly. But here we’re talking about trying to restore vegetation to a whole planet, Balit. The earthworms would do it all for us, you see. And—yes, now that I think of it, you might need other kinds of bugs, too. Bees, for instance. Some kinds of plants have to have bees, to carry the pollen around so the seeds will develop.”

He stopped, startled by the expressions of relief on every face.

“I told you,” Balit repeated happily.

And Jeren said with pride, “I knew things would be all right as soon as I saw you get off the ship, Viktor.”

By the time Pelly’s ship took off again for the return flight to Nergal, Viktor had come to terms with his worst defeat . . . almost.

It wasn’t easy to do that. The destruction of the data files meant the end of a lot of hopes for him, but the thought of bringing Newmanhome back to life provided a different kind of hope. Almost as good. Not quite.

But everyone around him seemed almost cocky with expectations for the future, even Pelly. In the last moments before takeoff, Pelly took time out from shouting at the gillies as they finished loading the lander to clasp Viktor’s shoulder awkwardly and say, “I’m sorry about your files, Viktor. Listen, if there’s anything I can do—”

“Thanks anyway,” Viktor said.

Pelly paused to study him thoughtfully. “You know,” he said, “sometimes when things are at their rottenest something nice happens. Maybe something that you don’t even expect. You could turn out to have a pretty happy life here, Viktor, with a little luck.”

“I know that,” Viktor said, summoning up a smile. It wasn’t a smile of amusement or pleasure, but the kind of graveside smile a widow gives to the friends offering condolence. “Jeren’s been telling me the same thing. You’re both right, of course.”

But it didn’t feel as though they were right, and he was glad enough when Pelly had to break off his efforts at consolation to give orders to the gillies. And then, very quickly, Markety finished the last of his weepy farewells to his wife, who was going back to Nergal for a visit; and the last of the capsules containing corpsicles for Nrina’s lab were stowed, and the gillies were herded away out of range of the rocket’s exhaust, and Pelly waved a final good-bye from the port . . . and then the port was closed. Everyone retreated to safety, Jeren carrying Balit and anxiously urging Viktor on with them. The lander motors spilled out a little wisp of flame, then roared. The ship picked up speed as the noise became deafening—rolled away—began to lift—and was suddenly only a dot in the sky, disappearing over Great Ocean. Everyone was watching. No one spoke. Viktor caught a glimpse of Balit, staring wistfully at the vapor trails the lander had left behind, and behind him Markety, looking very tired and staring sadly after the disappearing ship that was carrying his wife away.

Then the ship was out of sight. The last fading thunder of its engines died away, and the silence of lonely, empty Newmanhome came in around them.

It was Manett who broke it. “Well,” he said, his tone angry as he challenged them all, “now we can get back to digging those irrigation ditches.”

Two weeks later the ditches were dug and a trickle of muddy water seeped into the soil of the farm plot whenever somebody, usually Jeren, lifted the flat panel that served as a gate. It hadn’t rained, but the plants were already looking a little healthier. Korelto and half a dozen others were spending their days in the cryonics chambers, looking for the earthworms and bees that Viktor had prescribed, or for anything else that might be useful to their task—without much luck so far, but still hoping.

Viktor did not go with them for that. Viktor did not like being in the place where he had lain as a corpsicle for all those centuries; it was too much like visiting his own grave.

In any case, there were plenty of other things to keep Viktor busy, and some of them were even pleasant. One morning he sought Balit out and offered him a treat. “Markety’s got an inflatable boat, and there’s something I want to look at. How would you like to go out on the bay?”

Naturally the boy had only one answer to that. “Oh, Viktor,” he sighed when they were afloat. “I didn’t know people could go floating out onto all that
water
—without even getting
wet!
No one I know has ever done such a thing!” And he dabbled his bare feet into the water, squealing in pleasure at the unexpected cold.

Viktor pulled them a few hundred yards away from shore and then rested on his oars, looking about. Balit had his camera out again, taking pictures in sheer joy of everything he could find. But when Viktor looked at the same things—the barren hills, the empty skyline—it all seemed bare and hopeless. The idea of a living Newmanhome seemed like a mirage. Apart from the handful of revived corpsicles, no one seemed to care. Even Markety. If these were the most enterprising people alive, Viktor thought sourly—and people like Markety and Pelly had to be that, since they were the only ones who bothered to come here—then the human race was in bad trouble . . .

But the sun was warm, and the water gentle. The only breeze was mild and on-shore; there were no waves to speak of, and no risk of being blown out to sea. “What was it you wanted to see, Viktor?” Balit inquired.

“Look down into the water,” Viktor ordered. “See if you can find anything that doesn’t look natural.” And then, as the boy leaned precariously over the side, Viktor pulled him back, laughing. “Don’t fall in. You don’t know how to swim yet.”

“But there are some funny-looking things down there, Viktor. Are they what you mean?”

Viktor leaned over to look. It took a moment to be sure of what he was looking at, for they were nearly buried in mud, but then he nodded in satisfaction. “I thought they’d be there. They’re Von Neumanns.”

“What are Von Neumanns, Viktor?”

“Do you know the things that bring metals in from the asteroids? The things your grandparents use to manufacture things with? Those are Von Neumanns, too. These are the same kind of thing, only these don’t travel in space—they feed on metals in hot springs under the sea. And it looks like they went right on doing it for a long time! There are thousands of them here, Balit.” And he tried to explain how the Von Neumann nautiloids had gone out for untold centuries, even under the ice when Newmanhome was frozen, eating and reproducing, and then returning as their chemical sniffers sorted out the flavors of Homeport, as salmon did on Earth, and their tiny brains told them to return for harvesting.

“But there wasn’t anyone here to harvest them,” Viktor said

“So they’re no good anymore?” the boy asked.

“Not at all! I’m glad to see they’re really there. They could be pretty valuable, if we had any way to use them. Pure metals, already refined, all sorts of raw materials . . .” He grinned wryly. “If we had factories we could do a lot of manufacturing. If we had food to feed the people to run the factories. If we had the people to grow the food to feed the people. If—”

He broke off as he realized Balit was holding the camera on him. “Come on, Balit, what are you going to do with all these pictures? Why don’t you turn that thing off?”

“No, it’s really interesting, Viktor,” the boy protested. “What do you mean, if you had people?”

Viktor resigned himself. “All right, let’s start from the beginning. The whole planet’s bare, right? Which means there’s no ground cover to hold the soil in place. So it’s been washing down into the sea for a couple of centuries now, which means that if it isn’t stopped fairly soon Newmanhome will
stay
dead.” He paused for a moment, trying to remember the bright, promising early days of the first colony on Newmanhome. “So what has to be done, as soon as possible, is get some kind of vegetation going, all over the world. That means planting seeds—a whole planet’s worth of seeds, Balit; millions of tons of them. I suppose they’d have to be sown from airplanes—if we had airplanes. If we had the seeds to sow. Then—are you sure you want to hear all this?”

“Please, Viktor!” the boy begged.

Viktor shrugged. “But we need people to do the work. Not only to sow the seeds planetwide, but to grow food to feed everybody doing it. And to build the planes, maybe; and before that to build the factories to build the planes. Balit,” he said earnestly, “I’ve been through this before, and it’s
hard.
When the first Earth ships landed here they had a few thousand people, and all kinds of machinery designed for every purpose you can imagine—and still everybody was working night and day for years. How many people are on Newmanhome now?”

“Sixteen,” the boy said promptly. “I mean, sixteen from the habitats, plus forty-two like you, and all the gillies.”

“Sixteen,” Viktor said, nodding. “Plus forty-two like me. Of course there are a few thousand more—like me—in the freezers, but we can’t do much about it. Manett says they tried to revive some on their own, but most of them died. Freezer burn, over all that time, the only chance is to take them back to the habitats where somebody like Nrina has all the equipment and can do the job right. No,” he said, staring emptily at the brown hills, “I don’t see how it’s possible. We just don’t have the resources to stay alive here, much less try to figure out—”

He stopped himself, then grinned at the boy. “I was all set to go on about Nebo and what happened to the universe again, wasn’t I? And you’ve already heard enough about that.”

“Never enough, Viktor,” Balit said seriously, but he turned off his camera. Then he said, “There are plenty of people on the habitats, you know.”

“Sure there are. They stay there, too. They don’t come to crude places like this.”

“I’m here, Viktor.”

Apologetic, Viktor reached out to stroke the boy’s shoulder. “I know you are, Balit. I appreciate it. But—let’s be serious, Balit. How many people are willing to leave the habitats and come here? And the ones who do come, how long can they stay? You can’t tell me you’re
comfortable
here.”

“It’s not so bad, Viktor,” the boy said, trying to sound as though he meant it. They were silent for a moment, then Viktor pointed down through the water.

“See those lumps down there? Not the Von Neumanns, the square-edged ones? I think those were the docks of Homeport. Of course, they’re buried in mud now, but I’m pretty sure that’s what they were.”

“Wouldn’t the docks be at the water’s edge, Viktor?”

“They were. But that was before the ice pushed the land down; that happens, sometimes.” Viktor looked around. “I’d bet,” he said, “that we’re floating right now just about over where Homeport was!”

He stopped paddling and gazed at the water, trying to reconstruct the plan of the old town. It could have been so. This could have been the waterfront—that patch back there where his home had been—up higher, near where the present shoreline lay, perhaps the old site of the schoolhouse where he had first met brash, red-headed, teen-aged Theresa McGann . . .

“Is something the matter, Viktor?” Balit asked anxiously.

Viktor blinked. After a moment he managed a grin. “It’s all right,” he said. “I was just remembering.”

Balit nodded, studying Viktor’s face. Then he said hesitantly, “Viktor? Has—ah—has Nrina called you?”

Viktor looked at the boy. “It wasn’t Nrina I was thinking about,” he said.

“I know,” the boy said. “I just wondered.” And then he said, “When we give Markety’s boat back to him, do you think we should ask him to show us the Nebo things?”

“Oh, my God,” Viktor said, shaking his head in astonishment. Because, incredible as it was, with all the other things that had been going on since he arrived back on Newmanhome, he had almost forgotten “the Nebo things.”