Joan Vinge - World's End

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JOAN D. VINGE

phantom stone from the steps at the foot of the path behind me. I hear her humming inside my head, and push her voice out of my thoughts with a conscious effort. What are these people to you? I ask the Lake, waiting for an answer I know will not come.

A flash of silver rises from the depths of the river as sunlight spills over the canyon's rim. It strikes me like the clear white light of revelation. I watch the sunlight turn the canyon walls to flame and illumine the river's blue-green depths. I see the silvery light-catcher clearly at last. It lies meters and meters deep, by the dark green mouth where water flows out of the hidden heart of the world to feed this impossible river. Wreckage. I identify the pieces of twisted, broken metal for what they are, and my excitement rises. I move along the narrow stretch of shore, clamber up a pile of broken boulders for a better view.

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The metal is old, corroded, eaten away by time and the river. Once there must have been more of it ... a lot

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more. The river rolls and glitters and suddenly there is a lot more; I glimpse a crumpled form as large as--

The phantom is gone with another shimmer and twist of water, another blink of my eyes. I am not even sure that I saw it. ... I'm crazy, I see ghosts-- Stop it, goddamn you! Analyze! There is still wreckage in the water, but not all of it looks old. I force the wreckage of my thoughts to consider it again. There is a piece of hull . . . a piece of hull. Recognition is rewarded by a dizzying rush of bliss.

I shake my head, throwing off the distraction. A piece of hull. I have seen that unmistakable form somewhere, but it fits no ship I have ever seen in the spaceyards. And yet the metal looks new, now--a trick of light and water. There is something marring the perfectly preserved surface: symbols, lettering, words . . . but no language of any world I know. And yet, I know them. I strain forward; my

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sweating hands slide on the warm surface of the boulder.

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I can almost see it ... almost see it in my mind. Where have I seen this?

Suddenly the memory bursts open, and gives me my answer: I see the university, the recording--the image opening inside my head again just as it did so many years ago. . . . The language is ST'choull. The language has been dead for a thousand years. And the ship is a Class Four Estade freighter of the Old Empire.

I slide down from the rocks, deafened by the ululation inside me. I fight myself for a space of clear thought;

slowly it comes, and fills with more answers. A ship of the Old Empire crashed here. It must have happened during the Empire's fall, when refugees fled from world to world. Probably the survivors of the crash built the city up on the plateau. But then they abandoned it.

... It has lain forgotten for centuries, lost in this heart of desolation. I frown. Why would anyone do so much here, build an entire city, and then abandon it? What could make them . . . The Lake.

Was the Lake always here?

My body is wracked by ecstasy. I writhe against the stones as the Lake possesses and rewards me. Stop. . . stop it! Leave me alone! I plead. I claw my way back to reason;

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crouch strengthless at the foot of the boulders, gasping with helpless gratitude and frustration.

"Who cares?" I

shout at my demon. "Who cares about a dead city? Who cares why they left?" My frustration turns to killing despair, confusion; I feel my mind falling apart again. Gods, I really am insane. ...

I bury my face in my hands. It's no use.

"The clues were all there. They'd been there all along, of course," a voice says ironically; speaking in Sandhi, the language of my home. It is a very familiar voice.

I open my eyes. A ghost haloed in blue stands before me, with a face so familiar that for a moment I am

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dumbstruck by the sight of it. My father--as he must have looked before I was born. But then I realize that it is not my father ... it is me.

Me--and yet a stranger, years older. A trefoil shines

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like a star among the medals and honors that crust my uniform. Seeing them, I seem to know when and where

I was given each one, even though I've never seen them before. I sit watching as my other self goes on speaking, smoothly, with almost cynical ease--as I have never been able to speak before a crowd. He gazes at me but through me, toward his phantom audience: ". . . though at the time I didn't consider myself lucky to be in the position. . . ." He smiles, but his eyes are hiding secrets.

I--he lifts his hands. There are no scars on his wrists.

My heart constricts. He pauses, waiting for laughter. I

hear the laughter inside my head, and wonder what I

would see behind me if I turned to look. I do not turn to look. "I remember how I told myself at the start that someone would find the answer, if they'd only ask a sibyl the right questions. . . ."

He glances down, grimacing at some private memory, and his face--my face-- begins to fade.

"Wait! Wait!" I reach out, reach through him. "What questions?" My hand meets solid flesh, closes over an arm. I jerk back from the unexpected contact.

"BZ?" a hoarse voice murmurs in Sandhi. "BZ, is that you? Is it really you?" A familiar Kharemoughi face hangs before mine again--familiar, and yet profoundly

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changed.

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"HK--" I whisper incredulously. I touch the face, and my hand confirms his reality. "HK!" I scramble to my feet, and grab him by the shoulders. "Holy Hands of Edhu! Ye gods ... I never thought I'd find you alive."

He sags against me, his legs going out from under him, as if the shock is too much for him. I lower him to the ground and crouch down beside him. "You . . . you 186

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... what are you doing here?" he asks almost plaintively.

"I hardly knew you."

"I came searching for you." It is almost too painful to keep looking at him. His once fleshy face is gaunt and haggard. His body is filthy and covered with bruises, his clothes are in rags. There is a metal collar around his

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neck, an oozing sore on his leg. I wonder morbidly how

I must look to him.

"You came?" he asks again. "You came here to find us?" His voice rises. "You fool, you fool--you're the biggest fool of all!" Irritation prickles inside me. His eyes catch on the trefoil dangling at my chest; he grabs it.

"You told them you were a sibyl? Is that how you did it? When they find out, they'll kill you--"

He drops the trefoil, his hands trembling.

"No they won't," I say, as calmly as I can. I grip his shoulders. "I really am a sibyl, HK."

"You? A sibyl?" His eyes focus on me again. "You said you couldn't... you never ... How? When?

Why?"

"Song. Song infected me." I look down, feeling my face flush, as if he could read how it happened in my eyes. "When I came here."

"Song!" His eyes bore into my head. "Then you must be crazy, just like she is!" He pulls away from me.

"I saw you when I came down here, you looked crazy. You were talking to yourself--"

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To myself. For a moment I don't realize that he means talking to the air. Talking to myself. I saw myself... I saw my own future. And I will be--I am--perfectly sane. I begin to laugh, for the first time in months, or maybe years. "I'm sane!"