Robert Sawyer - Fossil Hunter

And, at last, intelligent life appeared, nearly simultaneously, on both worlds.

The dominant land life on the Crucible eventually came to call itself Humanity and to call their world Earth. In a place that came to be known as Canada, human geologists found the Burgess shale, fine-grained fossil-rich stones dating right from what they called the Cambrian explosion, a vast diversification of life, with dozens of new, fundamentally different body plans appearing virtually simultaneously.

Almost all of these body plans died out quickly on the Crucible, although I transplanted specimens of them to many worlds. One of those, the five-eyed, long-trunked Opabinia, was the ancestor of the Jijaki, those long-gone cousins the humans would never know.

For their part, on the moon I’d moved them to, the intelligent beings descended from Earth’s dinosaurs—in particular, from a dwarf tyrannosaur called Nanotyrannus—named themselves Quintaglios, “the People of Land.”

I thought I had succeeded. I thought I had allowed both sentient forms to flourish. But it eventually became horribly apparent that there was another factor I had failed to consider.

This universe differs from the one I evolved in. Here chaos reigns: sensitivity to initial conditions drives all systems. I thought I had done well, picking the third moon of a gas-giant world. But there were thirteen other moons, moons whose orbits and masses I could measure only approximately. I hadn’t been able to reliably plot orbits more than a few thousand years into the future. Nor could I accurately gauge the minuscule but not irrelevant pulls of the other planets in that system.

The tugs of all these masses produce a chaotic dance to which even the dancers can’t predict the outcome. The orbits of the moons changed over time, and eventually the third become the first, growing closer, and closer still, and at last, too close, to the planet it orbited. The Quintaglio world—now the innermost moon—continued to be tidally locked, so its day matched the length of its orbit, but now its days, days that are numbered, lasted slightly less than half the length of those on the Crucible.

I can nudge a comet ever so slightly, can attract hydrogen gas if conditions are favorable, even spin corkscrews of dark matter, but I can’t move worlds.

The Quintaglios have a myth about a God who had lost her hands. Without my Jijaki, I have lost mine.

But I watch.

And I hope.

Dybo’s authority was no longer in doubt. He ruled now unchallenged the eight provinces and the Fifty Packs.

Spenress, the only other surviving child of Len-Lends, had given up her claim to eventual power in Chu’toolar, and, instead, had accepted a minor position in Capital City. The thirst for blood was slaked, and no one was calling for further sanctions against her.

In six of the outlying provinces, siblings of Len-Lends still ruled, but they were slowly agreeing with the will of the people: their eventual successors would be appointed on the basis of merit, not bloodline.

And in Edz’toolar, the only province in which one of Dybo’s generation had already been ruling, instead of just apprenticing, there was currently no one serving as governor, for no one had been groomed to replace Rodlox. That problem would have to be solved soon, and perhaps it could provide a model for the subsequent successions in the other provinces and—the thought still startled Dybo somewhat, although he was learning to accept it—here in the Capital itself.

Dybo could live with all that, but there was one more issue in the aftermath of Rodlox’s challenge that gnawed at him, keeping him from sleeping. He wished it were not his responsibility, but knew, though it saddened him to the very core of his being, that he must deal with it quickly.

He had come to Rockscape many times of late, seeking the sage counsel of his friend Afsan, and now, slimmed down, he no longer found the trek to the ancient stones uncomfortable. He hoped Afsan would have a solution for him once more. With six of his own siblings dead, plus hundreds of others killed in the mass dagamant , the last thing Dybo wanted to contemplate was more death.

He saw the blind one up ahead, straddling his rock, his muzzle tipped up, enjoying the warmth of the sun. As Dybo drew nearer, Afsan turned to face him. “Who’s there?” he called out.

“Dybo.”

Afsan nodded. “Welcome, my friend, and hahat dan .” Gork was nowhere to be seen. Off hunting, perhaps. Dybo was silent.

“The garrulous Dybo at a loss for words?” said Afsan, gentle teasing in his tone. “What troubles you?” Dybo’s voice was heavy. “The children.”

Afsan at once grew serious. “Yes,” he said softly.

“There are thousands of them,” said Dybo. He shook his head. “A census is not yet complete, but so far it seems that in at least two hundred and seventeen clutches, every hatchling got to live.”

“Seventeen hundred and thirty-six children, then,” said Afsan automatically. “Assuming no abnormally sized clutches.”

“Yes,” said Dybo. “Something has to be done soon. The overcrowding is far too dangerous. Every Pack is on the verge of another mass dagamant .”

Afsan pushed himself up off his rock. Startled, a blue and yellow snake slithered away from the base of the boulder. “I understand for the first time, I think, the burden borne by the bloodpriests,” he said.

“No other choice is possible, is it?” said Dybo. “Than to eliminate the excess children?” Afsan exhaled noisily.

“I am blind, but rarely do I feel helpless. And yet, in this instance, that’s precisely how I do feel. No, I can conceive of no other solution.”

There was a long silence as each of them digested his own thoughts.

“What is the status of the bloodpriests now?” said Afsan at last.

“They’ve been reinstated in just about every Pack, as far as we can tell, although word from the more distant provinces is still coming in. You were right, though, as usual: as the envoys return from here, having watched the spectacle in the arena, the news that no one, not even The Family, is exempt from the bloodpriests’ culling is making the reinstatement easy. And, frankly, it seems that just about everyone is irritated by all the youngsters underfoot. They’re calling out for population controls.”

Afsan nodded. “Have you appointed a new imperial bloodpriest yet?”

“To replace Maliden? No. His body lies at Prath, and the palace is still mourning his passing.”

“But is it not the imperial bloodpriest who leads the entire order?”

“Yes.”

“Then a replacement must be appointed soon,” said Afsan.

“Granted. But who? Maliden had no apprentice.”

“Toroca.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Kee-Toroca. My son. Make him the new imperial blood-priest—or, at least, assign him the task of determining which should live.”

“But he’s a geologist.”

“Yes.”

“Why him?”

“Toroca is special. He has no sense of territoriality.”

Dybo nodded. “I’ve noticed he has a tendency to stand too close to people.”

“It’s more than that. He doesn’t feel territoriality at all. He thinks it’s a secret, but, even blind, I am more observant than he knows.”

“No territoriality,” repeated Dybo. “Amazing.”

“You and he have much in common, really,” said Toroca. “I heard from Cadool about how you helped quell the frenzy in the streets.”

Dybo clicked his teeth. “I have my good days and my bad. I’m certainly not free of territoriality.”