Michael Flynn - On the Razor’s Edge

Patriotism meant love of a place, of the patria, and this of a place no larger than one could embrace as whole. But in the new world of the Commonwealth, men had gone from world to world, weakening ties, forging new fortunes, forming a new allegiance to a broader empire, while the stay-at-homes would have preserved their own particularities and celebrated their own festivals. And this would have been most true on the longest-settled worlds, and in particular on Terra herself. Was that why the Exiles, scattered to the Periphery, had so diligently re-created lost particularities?

He looked again at the worlds arrayed before him. Most of them with one seat—one vote? A few—more populous?—with two. The Old Home-Stars with three and Terra alone with five. Had that been in rough proportion to population? Or had the Home-Stars been loathe to dilute their power? He recalled also that Peacharoo had sounded slightly condescending: This dormitory is reserved for Terrans. Colonists from the Lesser Worlds are housed elsewhere.

So as Terra cooled and dried and its population grew sparser, Dao Chetty must have asked why Terra retained five votes when her now-more-populous colonies held but three.

The breeze outside the colonnade freshened and a ball of tumbleweed rolled through the amphitheater, caught on one of the seats, broke loose, and rolled out the other side.

Maybe Gidula was right, Donovan thought. Maybe at the end a desperate Terra had tried to use the Commonwealth to sustain itself, tithing the wealth of the colonies to replace what she could no longer produce, even while her own sons and daughters fled for more prosperous worlds. What had been the blackmail? You owe it to your Mother World? But one day a generation arose who knew no such debt of sentiment, who did not keep St. Patrick’s Day or Cinco de Mayo, Navratri or Lunar New Year, and for whom Terra was just another planet.

Donovan stood and made his way down the dais and when he left the Hall of Suns he did not look back.

Quite by instinct, he took a different route back to where he had left the hopper, but the geometry of the ruins forced him through the same intersection where he had earlier stopped for lunch. The sun was lower in the sky and the mysterious crackling had subsided a little, though he could still hear it distantly from across the entire city.

But Inner Child was constantly alert to alterations in his environment and the Brute was keen to all his senses, and between the two of them they brought the scarred man to a halt by the block upon which they had earlier sat.

«The crack is gone.»

The Brute remembered that the crack had made the block uncomfortable to sit on. Donovan went to his knees and the Sleuth studied the stone closely. He ran their fingers across it.

I can feel where it was. Like a scar.

“It’s been spackled,” said the Fudir.

«Someone is in the city with us!»

He turned suddenly and looked down the empty avenue behind him. The freshening evening wind stirred the grasses.

“Who?” scoffed Donovan. “A stealthy stonemason who creeps through the ruins patching up the cracks?”

The wind drove pebbles and grit before it, stinging Donovan’s cheek. They rolled across the surface of the foundation block like a miniature barchan. A grain found the slight groove where the crack had been and nestled within it.

There’s your answer. Windblown grit has simply filled in the crack. He reached out to dislodge the grain—to free it, as he thought—and found that it was fused with the stone. When he put pressure on it, he experienced a sudden wave of foreboding, as if the entire city would tumble itself upon him and bury him.

He pulled his hand away, stood, withdrew a pace from the wall.

Certain materials of the Commonwealth, called metamaterials, were said to be self-repairing. Like the self-sealing hulls and pressure suits we have.

“But,” said Donovan, “self-repairing stone? ”

It is not true stone,said the Pedant, but some sort of Commonwealth material.

Donovan looked out over the ruins. The Capital of All the Worlds has been rebuilding itself all these centuries, the Sleuth decided. Listen to that sound, that unending rustle.

The young man in the chlamys thought it sounded like the rustle of leaves on the ground of autumn, and thought how lonely the stones must have been over the ages.

“And after all this time,” the Fudir said, “this is as far as it’s gotten?”

After all this time, the Sleuth agreed. One pebble at a time. Starting from rubble. You remarked how well preserved the city is. Imagine what it looked like after the Dao Chettians had finished with it! Do you imagine for a moment that they left the Hall of Suns so nearly intact? No, the whole complex is rebuilding itself, but the Hall came first.

And when it is finished, said the Silky Voice, when it stands once more the Capital of All the Worlds, then will the Ulakaratcakan appear.

“No, Silky,” said Donovan buigh. “Then will the fleets of Dao Chetty appear, and flatten the place once more.”

“If they know this is happening,” said the Fudir. “Terra is a backwater now, and even the Terran natives avoid this place. How much might this place change in the span of a life? If the grandchildren see a city less ruined than their grandparents saw, would they realize it?”

The city will rebuild itself, said the young woman in the chiton, but there will be no one to come live in it.

For Pollyanna, of all of the Donovans, to say a thing like that filled them all with deep sorrow.

Imagine, said the young man, waiting for wind and chance to bring materials to it. Ah, the patience of a stone …

A shiver ran through Donovan. Once before, he had dealt with a stone of surpassing patience, and the stone had very nearly won. He stared into the gathering dusk, listened to the busy dust and grit. Had any of them changed their shape? Were they twisting stones? It was too dark to tell, nor did he linger to learn.

He hastened through the deserted streets, guided by the Brute’s instinct for directions, haunted by the rustling sounds of the restless ruins, until he came at last to the open field where he had landed with his hopper.

Naturally, Gidula was waiting for him—with five magpies and Khembold Darling.

“Time to come home, Gesh,” said the Old One.

The Silky Voice stilled the inchoate fear that had driven Donovan from the city, gathered it, and with a proper mix of enzymes put it aside. He drew a breath. “You always knew I would come here.”

Gidula shrugged, as if not to belabor the obvious. “You needed a vacation. I had people at each of the villages hereabouts to tell me when you arrived.”

“It doesn’t matter,” he said. “I was on my way back.”

Gidula nodded. “Ah. Then you have remembered? You hoped the trip would clear your mind.”

Inner Child grew suddenly cautious. “Some things have become clear, but other matters remain obscure. But I am this close to it. I can feel it.”

Gidula nodded as if he had expected such an answer. “I believe that when we return to the Forks, your last hesitations will vanish. Two,” he called, “run ahead of us in Gesh’s hopper and send the packet drones off to Dawshoo and the others. Tell them it is time to gather.” He turned with the other magpies to his own coaster, but Donovan called out.

“Two?”

The short woman in the black shenmat did not turn, as she needed but a portion of her attention for Donovan. “What?” that part of her replied.

“Don’t forget to turn the hopper in to the State rental consortium. I don’t want to pay late charges.”