Eric Brown - Starship Summer

We sat and thought about that for a while as we climbed from the central plain, leaving behind the neat, parcelled farmland and following the twisting road into the foothills. The vegetation changed too; gone were the rows of cash crops regimented by settlers, to be replaced by alien trees and shrubs, green but bearing strange multicoloured fruits and flowers. I saw many examples I had not seen before on my drive to and from MacIntyre, shocking silver blooms and dazzling red fruits: it was like travelling through some crazed artist’s impression of an alien world, and the Ring of Tharssos, scintillating through the heavens above us, only heightened the effect.

As we climbed it became cooler, but not uncomfortably so. We had set off just after midday and it was now three. We had another two hours to drive before we reached the Column.

The road switch-backed up through the mountains, becoming narrower as we progressed, and I hoped we wouldn’t meet a vehicle heading in the opposite direction. I slowed to a crawl, not bothering to look to my right at the precipitous drop that began half a metre from my shoulder.

At last we came to a cutting between two rearing peaks and passed into its shadow.

Seconds later we emerged again into sunlight and began to descend. Then we rounded a bend, and the sight that greeted us compelled me to brake suddenly and stare ahead, and up, in amazement.

I’ve heard that the first sight of great mountains has a similar effect on people: the first Westerners to behold Mount Everest were stopped in their tracks, rendered breathless by something so huge emerging from the earth before them.

I just gaped, open mouthed, as I took in the enormity of the Golden Column.

We were still ten kilometres from the Column, but it dominated everything about it, the plain on which it stood and the surrounding mountain ranges. It emerged en bloc from the flat, green plain, a vast rounded pillar that rose and rose and didn’t stop. Collectively we craned our necks, but still we were unable to make out where the Column terminated: its upper reaches were wreathed in cloud.

But, perhaps more striking even than its vast dimensions, was the glow that it emanated. It was a gold I had never imagined could exist, a bright, almost pulsating effulgence. It filled me with wonder and a strange, tearful emotion I could not place.

We were silent as we stared.

Finally Matt said, “Worth the trip?”

Hawk said, “You kidding? Look at the thing.”

“I’ve never seen anything so…” Maddie began.

“What makes it all the more amazing,” I said at last, “is the fact that we know who made it.”

A silence greeted my words as we all took this in.

I gathered myself and restarted the engine, and slowly we descended the mountain road towards the plain.

Still in the foothills, we looked down and saw, spread around from the base of the Column, what looked at this distance like a refugee transit camp. The area was crowded with thousands of people, their vehicles, tents and portable domes. At this elevation the roughly circular spread of pilgrims resembled a vast pie chart, each segment a different wedge of colour, great triangles of saffron and mauve, white and red, conforming to the uniforms of that section’s devotees.

I considered the explorers who had first discovered the Column, and how wonderful it must have been to view the marvel in its pristine state, unadulterated by the meretricious infection of human beliefs and prejudices. It struck me as arrogant that these people had claimed the Column in the name of their own belief systems, and the sight of the massed pilgrims sickened me.

Evidently Matt felt the same. “Why can’t we just leave things alone?” he said, almost under his breath. “Look at it, the sublime and the ridiculous.”

A great ring road had been constructed, to take arriving traffic to the section of their choice. We came to the road along with a jam of other vehicles and headed anti-clockwise around the Column. To our left we passed shanty towns of tents and domes, and pilgrims going about their various rites of obeisance.

Maddie read from a signboard posted at the side of the road. “This way to the Enlightenment of Krishna, four miles; the Church of the Ultimate, six miles; The One True Way, eight miles…”

“Isn’t there a place for agnostics?” Hawk wanted to know. “When I came a few years ago,” Matt said, “I found a government run area that allowed tourists and visiting scientists a close view. But back then it was never this busy.”

Maddie said, “Perhaps that’s it.” She pointed to a signpost: Chalcedony Research Centre welcomes visitors, two miles. “We could try it,” I said.

We passed a mass of saffron-robed neo-Buddhists and came to a relatively quiet area, cordoned off from its neighbours by a high chain link fence. A gate gave access, and beside it a uniformed woman sat at a kiosk, selling tickets.

At ten credits per head, it seemed a small price to pay to get closer to the Column.

We paid and drove on through, together with a dozen other vehicles.

I ignored the press of humanity to either side—distant to begin with but, with the gradual narrowing of the section, becoming closer all the time—and concentrated on the sight ahead. The pillar of light sprang from the earth and rose, perpendicular and solid, into the heavens, and it seemed odd that something so massive should be so silent.

At one point I stopped the car and listened.

“What?” Hawk said.

“Hear it? The silence?” We listened.

“Strange,” Matt said.

For all the trundling vehicles, the massed humanity, an odd quietude filled the air, as if the wall of the Column a mile ahead of us were sucking the polluting noise from the air and replacing it with soothing silence.

I started the engine and we continued. Perhaps five minutes later we were forced by the crowds to park up and walk the rest of the way.

The point of this section was taken up with buildings, on the top of which was an array of monitoring equipment, dishes and antennae and probes.

The closest we could get to the golden light was perhaps a hundred metres, but my disappointment was tempered by the sight of the Column. Its glow seemed to pull at you, draw you in, promise some ineffable fulfilment if only you could approach and become one with the light.

I looked up, and up; I craned my neck, and high above the Column seemed to curve, describe a great parabola, as it shot into the stratosphere.

I was standing beside the chain-link fence that separated this section from the next, and only after a few minutes did I notice that someone was watching us.

I turned. A young girl was staring at me through the diamond mesh of the fence, her fingers hooked around the wire. The way her mouth hung open suggested either disbelief or awe. She looked barely in her teens, fifteen at the oldest. Blonde curls and blue eyes brought an ache to my chest.

At last she said, “You know…”

I stared at her. The others joined me.

I said, in barely a whisper, “Know what?” Only then did I see the symbol, tattooed high on the girl’s left cheek: >=<, the connected minds sigil of an accredited telepath.

I felt suddenly uneasy in her scrutiny.

“You know the truth,” she said in a whisper.

Matt looked at me. “Best if we get out of here,” he said, “before the crowds find out.”

The girl raised a hand, as if to forestall our departure. She said, “Don’t fear. I won’t tell anyone. Your secret is safe with me.”

She wore a silver one-piece, and I noticed that the other devotees in her section were similarly garbed. “We are the Upholders of the Ultimate,” she said. “We can apprehend the truth. Come, follow me, if you would like to lay hands upon the Ultimate.” I hesitated and she smiled. “Your friends can come too.”