Larry Niven - The Ringworld Engineers

“Nobody knows. But, Louis, you speak as if you watched it happen!”

“You’ve lived with it all your life. You don’t see it the way I do.” He kept looking.

There was a bridge. From a low, windowless building at the top of a nearby hill, it rose in a graceful curve to touch the bottom of a huge fluted pillar. A poured stone road switchbacked uphill to the hilltop building.

“I take it the invited guests have to go through that place at the top, then up the floating bridge.”

“Of course.”

“What happens in there?”

“They are searched for forbidden objects. They are questioned. If the City Builders are choosy about whom they let up, why, so are we! Dissidents have sometimes tried to smuggle bombs up. Mercenaries hired by the City Builders once tried to send them parts to repair their magic water collectors.”

“What?”

Vala smiled. “Some still work. They collect water from the air. Not enough water. We pump water to the city from the river. If we argue over policy, they go thirsty, and we do without the information they gather, until a compromise is reached.”

“Information? What have they got, telescopes?”

“My father told me about it once. They have a room that shows what happens in the world, better than your goggles. After all, Louis, they have height and a view.”

“I should be asking your father all this. How—”

“That may not be a good idea. He is very… he does not see… ”

“I’m the wrong shape and color?”

“Yes, he would not believe you can make things like the things you own. He would take them.”

Tanj dammit. “What happens after they let the tourists through?”

“My father comes home with his left arm inscribed in a language only the City Builders know. The script gleams like silver wire. It does not wash off, but it fades in a falan or two.”

That sounded less like a tattoo than like printed circuitry. The City Builders might have more control over their guests than their guests knew. “Okay. What do the guests do up there?”

“They discuss policy. They make gifts: large quantities of food and some tools. The City Builders show them wonders and do rishathra with them.” Vala stood suddenly. “We should be moving.”

They had left the threat of bandits behind. Louis rode in front, beside Vala. Noise was as much a problem as the bumping; they had to raise their voices. Louis shouted, “Rishathra?”

“Not now, I’m driving.” Vala showed a wide expanse of teeth. “The City Builders are very good at rishathra. They can deal with almost any race. It helped them hold their ancient empire. We use rishathra for trading and for not having children until we want to mate and settle down, but the City Builders never give it up.”

“Do you know anyone who could get me invited up as a guest? Say, because of my machines.”

“Only my father. He wouldn’t.”

“Then I’ll have to fly up. Okay, what’s under the city? Can I just stroll underneath and float up?”

“Underneath is the shadow farm. You might pass for a farmer if you leave your tools behind. The farmers are of all races. It is a dirty job. The city sewer outlet is above, and sewage must be spread for the plants. The plants are all cave life, plants that grow in darkness.”

“But… Oh, sure, I see it now. The sun never moves, so it’s always dark under the city. Cave life, huh? Mushrooms?”

She was staring at him. “Louis, how can you expect the sun to move?”

“I forgot where I was.” He grimaced. “Sorry.”

“How can the sun move?”

“Well, of course it’s the planet that moves. Our worlds are spinning balls, right? If you live on one point, the sun seems to go up one side of the sky and down the other; then there’s night till it rises again. Why did you think the Ringworld engineers put up the shadow squares?”

The car began to weave. Vala was shaking, her face pale. Gently Louis asked, “Too much strangeness for you?”

“Not that.” She made an odd barking sound. Agonized laughter? “The shadow squares. Obvious to the stupidest of people. The shadow squares mock the day and night cycle for spherical worlds. Louis, I really hoped you were mad. Louis, what can we do?”

He had to give her some kind of answer. He said, “I thought of punching a hole under one of the Great Oceans, just before it reaches the point closest to the sun. Let several Earth-masses of water spew into space. The reaction would push the Ringworld back where it belongs. Hindmost, are you listening?”

The too-perfect contralto said, “It does not seem feasible.”

“Of course it’s not feasible. For one thing, how would we plug the hole afterward? For another, the Ringworld would wobble. A wobble that big would probably kill everything on the Ringworld, and lose the atmosphere too. But I’m trying. Vala, I’m trying.”

She made that odd barking sound and shook her head hard. “At least you do not think too small!”

“What would the Ringworld engineers have done? What if some enemy shot away most of the attitude jets? They wouldn’t have built the Ringworld without planning for something like this. I need to know more about them. Get me into the floating city, Vala!”

They began to pass other vehicles: large or small windowed boxes, each with a smaller box at the rear. The road widened and became smoother. Now the fueling stations were more frequent and were of sturdy, square Machine People architecture. There were more and more boxy vehicles, and Vala had to slow. Louis felt conspicuous.

The road topped a rise, and the city was beyond. Vala played tour director as they drove downhill through growing traffic.

River’s Return had first seen life as a string of docks along the spinward shore of the broad brown Serpent River. That core region now had the look of a slum. The city had jumped the river via several bridges, and expanded into a circle with a piece bitten out of it. That missing piece was the shadow of the City Builders’ floating city.

Moving boxes surrounded them now. The air was scented with alcohol. Vala slowed to a crawl. Louis hunched low. Other drivers had ample opportunity to peer in at the strangely built man from the stars.

But they didn’t. They saw neither Louis nor each other; they seemed to see only other vehicles. And Vala drove on, into the center of town.

Here the houses crowded each other. Three and four stories tall, the houses were narrow, with no space between them. They pushed out above the street, cutting into the daylight. In marked contrast, public buildings were all low and sprawling and massive, situated on ample grounds. They competed for ground, not for height: never for height, with the floating city hovering over all.

Vala pointed out the merchants’ school, a wide complex of prosperous stone buildings. A block later she pointed down a cross-street. “My home is that way, in pink poured stone. See?”

“Any point in going there?”

She shook her head. “I thought hard on this. No. My father would never believe you. He thinks that even the City Builders’ claims are mostly boastful lies. I thought so too, once, but from what you tell me of this… Halrloprillalar… ”

Louis laughed. “She was a liar. But her people did rule the Ringworld.”

They left River’s Return and continued to port. Vala drove several miles farther before crossing the last of the bridges. On the far, portward side of the great shadow, she left an almost invisible side road and parked.

They stepped out into too-bright sunlight. They worked almost in silence. Louis used the flying belt to lift a fair-sized boulder. Valavirgillin dug a pit where it had been. Into the pit went most of Louis’s share of the fine black cloth. The dirt went back into the pit, and Louis lowered the boulder on it.