Richard Russo: Ship of Fools

Nikos said nothing, just seemed to sink further into thought, or despair.

For one of the few times I could recall, I had no idea what the captain was thinking. Was he completely aware of what was going on, planning strategy and tactics to deal with the situation? Or was he somehow oblivious to the real dangers? Or, even worse, was he aware but incapable of responding to the threats? Was I seeing the beginning of his end?

Nikos did have strong tradition on his side, and the First Echelon would be extremely reluctant to break with that tradition, if only because doing so might threaten their own security. Though technically an elected position, in practice the captaincy was inherited, and had resided within the Costa-Malvini clan for several generations. Also, though it might not be true any longer, Nikos had been a good captain for many years, as had his father and his great-uncle before him.

But the situation had deteriorated badly. Nikos was losing respect and authority, and tradition would not hold sway much longer. Nikos had no direct heir, his nephew was an idiot, and no one else within the clan displayed either the qualities or the desire to be captain, which meant the captaincy after Nikos would be open to outsiders for the first time in decades. The situation brought out ambition everywhere. Especially in the bishop.

“The bishop wants to be captain,” I finally said.

In response, Nikos chuckled.

“I know that, Bartolomeo. At first, I thought he merely wanted to remove me and replace me with a figurehead that he could control. But no, you’re right, he wants to be captain himself.” He nodded. “The bishop is a fool.”

That was the Captain Nikos Costa I had known all my life, and I felt a little better when I heard his words, his confidence.

“I’m preparing for him,” Nikos said, looking at me with a sly grin.

“How?” I asked.

But Nikos shook his head. “My plans aren’t completely ready yet, Bartolomeo. The bishop will not move until after the landfall, when he will attempt to either take credit for any successes, or place blame for any failures. By then, I will be ready. I will let you know what I have in mind; you will give me your advice, and we will be ready for him.”

I had worried about Nikos, but it was as if he needed to be faced with a real threat to stir him, to bring out his cunning and his political strengths. Now that I could see he was prepared, I felt confident again. I thought everything would be all right.

THEREwas a dwarf who lived in the lower levels of the ship, and I visited him often. His name was Pär. He was less than a meter in height—ninety-two centimeters, to be precise—yet he was strong and powerful. Although he was relatively well-proportioned, his head was slightly too large for his body; his face was heavily wrinkled, and he had always looked like an old man, even when he was young.

We distrusted one another, but this was tempered with mutual respect and admiration—he for my position of influence with the captain, and I for his intelligence and cunning.

I went to see Pär before the bishop’s sermon. Dirt and grime and stink all increased the farther you descended through the ship. Poor maintenance and different lifestyles. The downsiders actually cooked most of their meals in their own cabins, adding huge quantities of spices and other enhancers to give flavor and texture to the processed food product which provided the bulk of their diet, and you could smell it; the air circulation systems functioned inefficiently down there. In many ways, the lower levels felt more real.

Pär’s quarters consisted of two rooms filled with so much detritus I was always surprised it didn’t spill into the corridors whenever the door was opened. Stacks of shipping crates formed tables and counters which were covered by candles, music modules, hardcopy books and pamphlets, wood and stone carvings, drawing and painting supplies, strange bits of clothing and strings of beads, tiny glass figurines. The walls were almost completely concealed by pictures and drawings, photographs and framed strips of fabric. Some of this had been created by people aboard the ship, but much of it had been collected by earlier generations during landfalls on populated worlds.

Pär served coffee when I arrived—the best coffee anywhere on the ship, and the only time I drank it black. Pär and two other downsiders cultivated a clandestine coffee plantation in one of the ag chambers, kept most of the beans for themselves, and bartered the rest. Another reason I visited frequently. He settled into the cushions of his small bed, and I sat on a thickly padded chair that folded out from the wall.

A furry, elongated snout topped by two tiny black eyes poked out from the jumbled contents of one of the crates. It was Skate, one of a couple hundred stennets that now lived on the Argonos , making themselves pets of a sort, adopting people throughout the ship. Someone had brought two mated pairs aboard fourteen years ago, at our last landfall. They were long and thin, about half the size of cats, and were now more numerous.

Skate sniffed once, opened her mouth to reveal small but extremely sharp teeth—she seemed to be smiling at me—then pulled back and disappeared.

“She likes you,” Pär said. “Usually she won’t even make an appearance, but she always says hello when you come.”

“I feel honored.” I drank some coffee and sank back in the chair.

Pär sat up and looked intently at me. “There won’t be any survivors,” he said, referring to our new destination.

I nodded. He was right. No one had said it aloud in the Executive Council session, but we all knew.

“It doesn’t take brilliant analysis,” Pär went on. “A single, steady signal, no other electromagnetic emissions of any kind.” He shook his head, almost smiling. “There’s no one alive down there. Either they’ve all died, or there was never anyone there—maybe it’s some emitter left behind by a commercial exploration team that discovered nothing of value, or impossible conditions.” Then he shrugged as if the matter did not concern him much, but I knew him better than that. “What does Captain Nikos say?”

Pär was the only one who called him that. To everyone else he was either Nikos, Captain Costa, or simply “the captain.”

“Nothing much.” I was always reluctant to be too forthcoming with Pär. We traded information—the real key to our relationship—and I didn’t like to give away what might later turn out to be valuable. “He is unsure what effect our landfall will have on the ship’s dynamics.”

“He is in trouble no matter what we find.” Pär said this with a nasty, almost gloating smile. “Abandoned colony, dead colony, even a surviving outpost or a full-fledged settlement with towns or cities spread out around the planet—though that, of course, is the least likely possibility. All of those would be bad, some worse than others. What your captain should hope for is that we find a planet completely uninhabitable for humans.”

Pär was wrong about that. The captain’s position was so tenuous that he feared almost any change in the ship’s routine, even if it appeared aimless. The captain was wise to be afraid. But if something didn’t change soon, nothing would help him.

“If the planet is habitable, however,” Pär resumed, “any number of possibilities present themselves.”

“Like what?”

“Colonization. For instance.”

I just shook my head. Those in the upper levels, particularly in the First Echelon, had always resisted any moves in that direction, but I didn’t want to get into a discussion with him about it.

“Why not?” Pär asked.