Joe Haldeman - Worlds Apart

The temperature never fell below freezing, but we followed prescribed caution and didn’t plant anything for three weeks. We got the baseball diamond all plowed and fertilized and brought the seedlings from the ship. It was a festive day. Everyone was assigned one part of the garden as his personal responsibility, though of course there were overall chores for the ones specializing in farming. (One girl said she didn’t think she could eat anything that came out of the dirt . Most of the others laughed at her, but a couple were obviously thinking about it for the first time.)

We had a remote terminal from the ship, and I began spending an hour every evening patching through to work on the start-up demographics. It was actually rather pleasant to return to familiar work, and of course I felt virtuous, keeping Daniel somewhat happy. I talked to him or John for a few minutes every day, before relinquishing the terminal for other people’s calls.

The terminal was just a standard communicator, without the feedback touchboard, so we couldn’t use it for elementary teaching (it would only accommodate one student at a time anyhow). But I taught Indira how to use it for data access, and she was captivated. She knew how to type, though she hadn’t done it in years, and soon was using New New’s library as effectively as anyone her age who’d grown up with it.

We started calling the place “the farm” and a noisy farm it was. The chickens kept up a constant dialog and the goats, still hobbling around with their legs in casts, complained to anyone who would listen. The Frommes caught a small deer and penned it. The children were charmed, but the goats waxed even more existential. Before long we had baby chicks, and the seedlings were starting to look like vegetables.

There was a general feeling of happiness, of relief. For some reason I couldn’t share it. Things were going too well.

Jeff and Tad had been on the Island for several months before the question came up. They were sitting with Storm, watching the sun go down over the weathered hulks of the vessels that lolled in the harbor.

“You know, I been feelin’ real useless,” Storm said. “Don’t know how long it’s been since somebody got the death.”

“Only one since we got here,” Jeff said. “How often do you expect it to come?”

“Three or four a year, anyhow. Last year we got ‘em almost every month.” He threw a shell at the water, trying to make it skip. “I’m gettin’ sure as hell tired of fish.”

“Some places don’t get it nearly as often.”

“Yeah,” Tad said. “I’ve heard there’s places up north that don’t get it at all.”

“Sure. Where are all the oldies, then?”

“Stayin’ up north, maybe. Where they don’t get it.”

“Shit.” He threw another shell, harder, and this time it did skip once. “Who’d want to go on that long? Feel like I’ve lived forever already.” There was a note of bra-vado in his voice.

“Come on,” Jeff said. “You wouldn’t mind a few more years.”

“Shet that up.” He brooded, looking out over the glaring water, mouth set. “Maybe I would and maybe I wouldn’t. Sometime I’m curious ‘bout you, ‘bout how it feels. You know a hell of a lot.”

“I was still in school when the bombs fell. I was thirty-one.”

“Boy howdy,” he said softly, and thought for a minute. “But you hurt all the time. You can’t hardly walk when you git up in the morning. That’s another thing you git for gettin’ old.”

“No, that’s the thing I was born with. I used to know really old people, like a hundred years old, who didn’t hurt at all.”

“I did too,” Tad said. “You’re not that young, Storm. Didn’t you have grandparents and all?”

“Naw. I mean I had ‘em, I guess, like anybody. But I was raised up in a home, you know, up Tampa. Said my mother was a whore, she got killed when I was still a baby. That’s what they said, anyhow.” He tried another shell. “Guess I saw old people, yeah, outside. On the street. Didn’t know any.”

“I think maybe it doesn’t have anything to do with Charlie,” Jeff said carefully. “I think the death might be just a disease, and maybe people aren’t getting it anymore.”

Surprisingly, Storm nodded. “I’ve thought about that myself. Be hell to pay.” He looked sharply at Tad and Jeff. “Don’t you tell nobody. But I figure it that way.”

“Yeah,” Tad said. “It’s what I’ve been thinking, too. I didn’t want to say anything.”

“People I been wait in’ to see get it,” Storm said savagely. “People I really want to cut into. And now what?”

“Have to learn to like fish,” Jeff said.

Storm made a retching sound. “Maybe not. General’s talkin’ about goin’ inland, hunting trip. Bring back some pedros to smoke.”

“All this talk about food,” Jeff said, getting up. “Think I’ll go get some soup.” Tad stood up too.

“You guys go on,” Storm said. “I have to get hungrier.”

They walked toward the kitchen through deepening twilight. Sticky perfume of magnolias and jasmine in the thick still air. “Maybe we should keep our traps shut,” Tad said.

“No, we did right. It’d look more suspicious if we avoid talking about it”

“What’ll we do when someone puts two and two together?”

“God, I don’t know. Just deny it.”

“I sure as hell don’t want to get eaten.”

“Ah…what’s the difference?” He laughed. “Tell you what, though. If they come after us, I’ve got some arsenic. They try to eat us afterwards, we’ll get revenge.”

Tad nodded soberly. “That’s a good idea.” He scuffed at a pebble and it skittered on ahead of them. “You know, I been thinkin’ about the boat again.”

“Speaking of suicide.” There were several sailboats around the island. They’d talked about trying to get to the English-speaking Bahamas, to the east. But neither of them had ever sailed.

“Well, hell. What if it came to that? Sail or be someone’s lunch?”

“Sail, I guess. Be some shark’s lunch.”

“All we have to do is get General mad at us. And he’s the craziest asshole I’ve ever met.”

“I wouldn’t worry about him. When I treated his herpes I told him he had to get shots twice a year. Or his dick’d fall off.”

“That keeps you safe, maybe. Hey, though.” He stopped suddenly and whispered. “Why don’t you give him a shot of something else? Why don’t you kill ‘im? He’s so old, nobody’d think anything.”

Jeff shook his head. “I don’t think I could do that.”

“You’ve killed plenty.”

“Yeah, but not mur der.”

“Hell, that wouldn’t be murder. He’s just a fuckin’ animal.”

“You think whoever took his place would be any better?”

“It could be you.” He shook Jeff’s arm. “Half the family thinks you’re some kind of god.”

Jeff started walking again. “The other half wants to see me on a cross. No thanks.”

The soup was a bland chowder of fish and bean curd. They took their bowls outside; the cafeteria’s air conditioning was set too high for Jeff’s joints.

“You don’t want to go back north because it’s too cold. Sure as hell ain’t goin’ any other direction without a boat We stay here, our luck’s gonna run out.”

“I don’t know,” Jeff said. “We may have plenty of time. And things could change.”

“Haven’t seen much change.” Tad went back inside to scrape himself some salt.

“You ever think about the Worlds?” Jeff said when he returned.

“Aw, they’re all dead. Saw it on the cube the day of the war.”