David Brin - Earth

A group based in California offered a unique proposal. “Sheckleyans” they called themselves, and they agitated — tongue in cheek, Jen imagined — for the genetic engineering of new predators smart and agile enough to prey on human beings. These new hunters would cull the population in a “natural” manner, allowing the rest of the race to thrive in smaller numbers. Vampires were a favorite candidate predator — certainly canny and capable enough, if they could be made — but another Sheckleyan subsect held out for werewolves , a less snooty, less aristocratically conceited sort of monster. Either way, romance and adventure would return, and mankind, too, would at last be “regulated.” Jen sent the Sheckleyans an anonymous donation every year. After all, you never could tell.

These were just some of the suggestions, both serious and whimsical. But Jen realized the young man deserved more than stock answers. She put his letter on the high-priority heap — the pile of items she would go over carefully later, in the hours before bed.

One letter to go then. The last one had arrived on auto-accept, so the sender knew her private code. Jen scanned with rising irritation. Someone seemed to be advertising vacation homes on the Sea of Okhotsk!

That’s all I need.

But then she suddenly remembered. Vacation homes …

It was a mnemonic cue. “Sri Ramanujan,” she said aloud. “I think this message may be in cipher. Please see if we own a key to break it.”

The face of the young Hindustani appeared briefly.

“Yes, Jen Wolling. It uses a private code given you years ago by the Pacific Society of Hine-marama. I’ll have it translated in a minute.”

Ah , Jen thought. This had to be from the New Zealand priestess, Meriana Kapur. It was ages since she’d seen the Maori woman, whose cult took the Gaia concept rather literally. But then, so had Jen during one phase.

“Here it is, Professor.”

Ramanujan vanished again, leaving a totally transformed message in his place.

A totally innocuous message, as well. What she read now consisted of a rambling series of disconnected reminiscences… some the two women had experienced together, long ago, and some clearly made up. Jen noticed that none of the sentences were even highlighted. Her semantic-content program couldn’t find a single explicit statement to set in bold!

But then, gradually, she smiled. Of course. This isn’t senility, it’s diamond blade sharpness! There are ciphers within ciphers. Codes within codes .

Apparently, Auntie Kapur wanted to be sure only Jen understood this message. Certainly no busybody hacker’s automatic snooping program would sort meaning out of this, not without the shared context of two women who had lived a very long time.

Vagueness can be an art in itself.

Jen’s smile faded when it began dawning on her how seriously the Maori priestess took this. The precautions began to make sense as glimmerings of meaning penetrated.

“… I’m afraid Mama’s unexpected ulcer has only one possible cure. Repairing the hole requires drastic measures… but the regular doctors would only interfere if they knew. (We think they originally caused the problem.)…”

There were more passages like that. Hints and allusions. Was Meriana saying the world itself was in danger? A danger worse than the big power nuclear standoff of long ago?

A passing reference was missed until her third reading. Then Jen realized Kapur was referring to her grandson.

Alex? But what could he be involved in that could pose such a threat to…

Jen gasped. Oh, that bloody boy. This time he must really have done it !

Nobody with any sense kept confidential notes on a computer. So from a desk drawer she took out an expensive pad of real paper and a pencil. Carefully this time, Jen went through her friend’s letter line by line, jotting references and probable meanings. It wasn’t any form of code-breaking a machine could perform, more like the ancient Freudian art of analyzing free associations, a sleuthing through the subjective world of impressions and wild guesses. A very human sort of puzzle, thousands of years older than the discrete patternings of cybernetics.

Exactly what is it they want of me ? Jen wondered what she, an old woman, could do to help Auntie and Alex in a situation as dire as this. Finally, though, it became clear. Africa. Ndebele Canton… Meriana heard of my visit there. She thinks I can help get them in. Secretly .

Jen sat back, amazed. Secretly? These days ?

The idea was absurd.

She chewed her lip.

Well… it would be a challenge, at least.

By Pauling and Orgell… I’ll bet I can do it.

One thing for certain, Auntie’s letter demanded an immediate response. No waiting till Friday for this one.

And that lad in Kuwenezi — Nelson Grayson. It looked as if the young man with the pet baboons might be getting his answers in person after all.

□ Net Vol. A 8230-761, 04.01.38: 11:24:12 UT; User M12-44-6557-Bac990 STATISTICAL REQUEST [Level: generic/colloquial]

Earth Land Surface Area (In millions of square kilometers) 1988 | 2038

Total: 149 | 142

In desert, mountain, tundra: 101 | 111

In arable land: 40 | 29

In cultivated land: 13 | 11

In fish farms: 0.002 | 0.12

Census Counts (in billions of individuals) 1988 | 2038

Human beings: 5.2 | 10.6

Domestic cattle: 1.2 | 0.2

Domestic sheep: 1.0 | 0.5

Domestic hogs: 0.5 | 0.5

Domestic dogs and cats: 0.4 | 0.02

On a different continent, but only milliseconds away by light-cable, another woman also sailed the data sea. Only while Jen Wolling carefully navigated a dinghy, Daisy McClennon sailed a privateer’s sloop, in search of prey.

On her work wall, a science fiction space epic stepped frame by frame through a flashy battle sequence — her video processor inserting new special effects, making already grand starships even more magnificent. Matted stars and planets grew three dimensional, and explosions more titanic than ever. With such magic Daisy breathed new life into old classics, though for a diminishing, specialized audience.

Again, however, Daisy’s attention swerved from her cash crop of embellished movies to other scenes and truer obsessions. The news services told of recent raids by Bedouin rebels, attacking the International Petroleum Reservation. She checked the reports’ accuracy by other means and discovered that U.N. peacekeepers were understating the amount of oil spilled from pipelines severed by the nationalists, but not by enough to cause a scandal, unfortunately. Daisy had learned from hard experience never to cry “coverup!” unless the payoff was worthwhile.

Now here was a likely target. Blue symbols off Luzon showed one of the floating barge-towns of the Sea State, heading northward toward Japan. UNEPA was supposed to make sure the nation of refugees obeyed its rules. But sure enough, only two inspector boats showed in the vicinity. Nowhere near enough.

I wonder what Sea State is up to, she asked herself.

Keying an oceanographic database, Daisy noted that a large migration of spinner porpoises would intersect the path of the flotilla in a few weeks’ time. UNEPA had recently downgraded spinners from “threatened” to “watch” status, which meant those with proven need were allowed to harvest limited numbers. Sea State could always establish proven need.

“Gotcha!” Daisy said, and sent a coded alert to an activist group in Nagasaki. When that Sea State flotilla reached its destination, there’d be a party waiting to pounce on the slightest infraction.