Larry Niven - The Ringworld Engineers

Vala set the bowls down and knelt across from him. Her face was in shadow. From her viewpoint the translation could not have ended at a worse moment.

Louis said, “Then the Conservatives won an election, I take it.”

“Inevitable. A probe found attitude jets. We knew of the Ringworld’s instability, of course, but we hoped for some more sophisticated means of dealing with it. When the pictures were made public, the government fell. We have had no chance to return to the Ringworld until—”

“When? When did you spread the plague?”

“Eleven hundred and forty years ago by Earth time. The Conservatives ruled for six hundred years. Then the threat of the kzinti put Experimentalists back in power. When the time seemed opportune, I sent Nessus and his team to the Ringworld. If the structure had survived for eleven hundred years after the fall of the culture that kept it in repair, it would have been worth investigating. I could have sent a trade and rescue team. Unfortunately—”

Valavirgillin had the flashlight-laser in her lap, pointed at Louis Wu.

“—unfortunately the structure was damaged. You found meteor holes and landscape eroded down to the scrith. It now seems—”

“This is an emergency. This is an emergency.” Louis held his voice steady. How had she done that? He’d watched her kneel with a steaming bowl of stew in each hand. Could the thing have been taped to her back? Skip it. At least she hadn’t fired yet.

“I hear you,” said the Hindmost.

“Can you turn off the flashlight-lasers by remote control?”

“I can do better than that. I can explode it, killing him who holds it.”

“Can’t you just turn it off?”

“No.”

“Then give me back my translator function tanj quick. Testing—”

The box spoke Machine People speech. Vala answered immediately. “Whom or what were you talking to?”

“To the Hindmost, the being who brought me here. May I assume that I have not yet been attacked?”

She hesitated before answering. “Yes.”

“Then our agreements are still in force, and I’m still gathering data with intent to save the world. Do you have reason to doubt that?” The night was warm, but Louis felt very naked.

The dead eye of the flashlight-laser remained dead. Vala asked, “Did the Hindmost’s race cause the Fall of the Cities?”

“Yes.”

“Break off negotiation,” Vala ordered.

“He’s got most of our data-gathering instruments.”

Vala thought it through, and Louis remained still. Two pairs of eyes glowed close behind her in the dark. Louis wondered how much the ghouls heard with those goblin ears, and how much they understood.

“Use them, then. But I want to hear what he says,” said Vala. “I have not even heard his voice. He may be only your imagination.”

“Hindmost, you heard?”

“I did.” Louis’s earplugs were speaking Interworld, but the box at his throat spoke Valavirgillin’s own tongue. Well and good. “I heard your promise to the woman. If you can find a way to stabilize this structure, do so.”

“Sure, your people could use the room.”

“If you should stabilize the Ringworld with help from my equipment, I want credit. I may want to ask a reward.”

Valavirgillin snarled and choked off a reply. Louis said quickly, “You’ll get the credit you deserve.”

“It was my government, under my leadership, that tried to bring aid to the Ringworld eleven hundred years after the damage was done. You will vouch for that.”

“I will, with reservations.” Louis was speaking for Vala’s benefit. He told her, “By our agreements, you regard what you’re holding as my property.”

She flipped him the flashlight-laser. He set it aside, and felt himself sagging with relief, or fatigue, or hunger. No time . “Hindmost, tell us about the attitude jets.”

“Bussard ramjets mounted on brackets on the rim wall, regularly spaced, three million miles apart. We should find two hundred mountings on each rim wall. In operation each would collect the solar wind over a four- to five-thousand-mile radius, compress it electromagnetically until it undergoes fusion, and blast it back in rocket fashion, in braking mode.”

“We can see some of them firing. Vala says there are… twenty-one operating?” Vala nodded. “That’s 95 percent of them missing. Futz.”

“It seems likely. I have holos of forty mountings since we last spoke, and all were empty. Shall I compute the thrust delivered with all jets firing?”

“Good.”

“I expect there are not enough jets mounted to save the structure.”

“Yah.”

“Would the Ringworld engineers have installed an independently operating stabilizing system?”

Pak protectors didn’t think that way, did they? They tended to have too much confidence in their ability to improvise. “Not likely, but we’ll keep looking. Hindmost, I’m hungry and sleepy.”

“Is there more that must be said?”

“Keep a watch on the attitude jets. See what’s functional and get their thrust.”

“I will.”

“Try to contact the floating city. Tell—”

“Louis, I can send no message through the rim wall.”

Of course not, it was pure scrith. “Move the ship.”

“It would not be safe.”

“What about the probe?”

“The orbiting probe is too distant to send on random frequencies.” With vast reluctance the Hindmost added, “I can send messages via the remaining probe. I should send it over the rim wall in any case, to refuel.”

“Yah. First set it on the rim wall for a relay station. Try to reach the floating city.”

“Louis, I had trouble homing on your translator. I trace the lander nearly twenty-five degrees to antispinward of your position. Why?”

“Chmeee and I split our efforts. I’m headed for the floating city. He’s headed for the Great Ocean.” It should be safe to say that much.

“Chmeee doesn’t answer my broadcasts.”

“Kzinti make poor slaves. Hindmost, I’m tired. Call me in twelve hours.”

Louis took up his bowl and ate. Valavirgillin had used nothing in the way of spices. The boiled meat and roots didn’t excite his taste buds. He didn’t care. He licked the bowl clean and retained just enough sense to take an allergy pill. They crawled into the vehicle to sleep.

The padded bench was a poor substitute for sleeping plates, and it was jolting under him. Louis was stiff tired. He slept and was shaken awake, slept and was shaken awake…

But this time it was Valavirgillin shaking his shoulders. Her voice was silkily sarcastic. “Your servant dares to break your well-earned rest, Louis.”

“Uh. Okay. Why?”

“We have come a good distance, but here there are bandits of the Runner breed. One of us must ride as gunner.”

“Do Machine People eat after waking?”

She was disconcerted. “There is nothing to eat. I am sorry. We eat one meal, then sleep.”

Louis donned impact armor and vest. Together he and Vala manhandled a metal cover into place over the stove. Louis stood on it and found that his head and armpits rose through the smoke hole. He called down, “What do Runners look like?”

“Longer legs than mine, big chests, long fingers. They may carry guns stolen from us.”

The vehicle lurched into motion.

They were driving through mountainous country, through dry scrub vegetation, chaparral. The Arch was visible by daylight, if you remembered to look; otherwise it faded into the blue of the sky. In the haze of distance Louis could make out a city floating on air in fairy-tale fashion.

It all looked so real, he thought. Two or three years from now it might as well have been some madman’s daydream.