Greg Egan - The Clockwork Rocket

“Very much like that,” Yalda said. “What we’re going to be doing, eventually, is trying to predict both the colors of solids in ambient light and the spectrum of the light that we’d expect them to emit. And then the question will be: why are our predictions so wrong? Why does it actually take some kind of disruption for solids to start emitting any light at all?”

After the lesson, half the class moved to the food hall, unwilling to end the discussion. Yalda watched the young women among them swallowing their two tablets of holin with their loaves; each cube was smaller on its side than the old ones by just one part in six, which made the rather greater reduction in its volume almost invisible. But she’d taken her own dozen full-strength cubes in the privacy of her apartment, ashamed of the discrepancy even though it was unlikely that anyone would have noticed it.

Yalda listened to the students’ excited chatter and answered their questions with care. Who else could have taught them harmonic analysis of Nereo’s potential, if not her? Who else could have set them on the path to a future where everything the Peerless would need in order to survive its exile and return in triumph was finally understood?

Isidora. Sabino. Severa. Perhaps a dozen people in all. She was not indispensable.

Fatima lingered after the others in the group had gone. “Have you thought any more about Nino?” she asked Yalda.

“You know I’d be happy to free him,” Yalda replied. “But to do that, I need to be in a position of strength. I’m sure Nino understands that.”

Fatima was unmoved. “You rescued the crops and swatted away the orthogonal dust with the same hand! Everyone knows that they owe their lives to you. How much stronger do you think you’ll ever be?”

“This goldenrod problem—” Yalda protested.

“That’s hardly your fault.”

“Whether it is or it isn’t, people won’t be happy until it’s resolved.” Suddenly self-conscious, Yalda looked around the hall with her rear gaze, but no one was paying them any attention.

Fatima said, “There’ll always be something. If you just saw Nino, if you spoke with him—”

“Anyone else would have gotten rid of him by now,” Yalda declared irritably.

Fatima regarded her with disbelief, then lapsed into a reproachful silence.

Yalda said, “I didn’t mean that. I’m sorry. When things have improved, I’ll look at his situation again.”

“You were in prison once, weren’t you?” Fatima replied. It was a rhetorical question; she knew the answer. “Waiting for someone to set you free?”

“I won’t abandon him,” Yalda said. “I promise you that. Just let me find the right time.”

“Ten of the goldenrod cuttings are infected with blight,” Lavinio announced. “The other two appear to be healthy. But those two cuttings are all we have now; the plants in the four main gardens are lost.”

Yalda absorbed the news, and tried to think through the consequences calmly. They would not be able to harvest any petals from the cuttings until they’d grown larger, or they’d risk killing the plants. It could be as long as half a year before any more holin was being produced—and after that, it could take another year or two for the rate of supply to return to normal.

“What if you split each cutting—after a few stints—and grew the halves separately?” she suggested.

“That would just delay the time until they were strong enough to survive harvesting,” Lavinio explained. “The most important thing is keeping those two plants strong and uninfected.”

“I understand.”

“We’re lucky we haven’t lost the goldenrods completely,” Lavinio said bluntly. “If we’re not careful, it might yet end that way.”

When he’d left, Yalda clung to the ropes beside her desk, fighting a growing sense of helplessness. Word of how serious the problem had become would not take long to spread; if she failed to deal with it swiftly there’d be chaos.

Rationing the stored holin more severely wouldn’t help; there was no point eking it out so slowly that it began to lose its potency. The only way she could survive the wait until production started again was to commandeer enough of what remained to increase her dose as time went on, to compensate for the drug’s deterioration.

But then even when the holin was fresh again, there would not be enough to go around.

She could ask Sefora to draw up a plan to save the oldest women, leaving the others to take their chances. No one on the Peerless was a child, though; no one would be immune to the risk. The shortage would take its toll across the mountain—while the drugs that kept each old woman alive could protect half a dozen of their younger crew-mates.

Yalda struggled to clear her mind. How was she meant to weigh up the choices and reach the right decision? Eusebio had given her Frido to share the burdens of leadership, but she’d destroyed any chance of trust between them, any hope of getting honest advice from him.

She dragged herself along the ropes to the front of the office and pulled the doors closed. She let her body relax completely, then she felt herself begin to shiver and hum.

How close had she come to snatching a few more years for herself, by risking the futures of all the young women who still had their lives ahead of them? How close had she come to stealing the hard-won promise of Prospera, Ausilia and Fatima—Fatima who’d never shown her anything but loyalty, who’d had the love and courage to pluck her from the void?

What had she imagined her own role would be? To see the journey through to the end? To return to Zeugma to share the triumph with Eusebio, and join in the celebrations with all her lost friends? She’d made her choice: she’d been vain enough to believe that the Peerless needed her. But it needed her only to set its course; everything else belonged to the generations to follow.

Yalda composed herself. Once her body was still again she felt calm and lucid.

She’d played her part, and it was almost over. But now she knew what needed to be done.

Isidora’s co worked in the pharmacy, and he’d done the same job for eight years back home. Yalda met him to gauge his loyalties. While Sefora was in charge he would follow her instructions, but he accepted Yalda’s right to replace her. And he did not want his own co to lose control over her body.

Yalda picked a dozen young women to accompany her. They made their move a bell before the main shift began; none of the junior pharmacists put up any serious resistance, and by the time Sefora came on duty Yalda’s team had the holin store surrounded.

“Are you going to punish me for doing what you asked?” Sefora demanded angrily. She looked to her colleagues for support, but they wouldn’t meet her gaze; they were backing the new guard.

“I’m not punishing you at all,” Yalda replied. “You served the Peerless well, but now this job needs someone new. You can retire to a life of ease.”

“Really?” Sefora emitted a mirthless buzz. “Is that what you intend doing yourself?”

Yalda said, “You can hear about my plans at the meeting, along with everyone else.”

Yalda surveyed the faces of the assembled crew. “I wish we had holin for everyone in the mountain,” she said, “but that’s beyond our control now. So the time has come for the women like myself who would use the most of it to step aside, and leave what remains to those who have the most to lose.”

She listed the replacements for a dozen senior positions. A trace of discontent rippled through the crowd, but she could see expressions of acceptance, too. There was no painless way through the shortage, but any other scheme would have ended in insurrection.