Lovelock Read online

  It took only a few moments, though, for the first relief at the largeness of the space inside the Ark to wear off, and then all we could see was the strangeness of it. There was no sky, though a bright “sun” shone above us. There was no horizon. Instead, far in the distance, the land curved upward before us and behind us, as if we were in a broad valley, except that the “mountains” on either side got steeper and steeper, and then sloped outward until they met in an arch overhead. If we looked up, shielding our eyes from the “sun” glowing in the middle, we could make out the fields and villages above us. We could imagine the people walking around up there. Impossibly, they did not fall toward us, screaming. When I vertiginously imagined them to be on the ground and us to be dangling in the air above them, it made no difference; the spin of the Ark held us tightly to its inner surface.

  The curving, along with the greenery, stretched before and behind us in a band no more than a couple of kilometers wide. To either side there was a vast greyish-blue wall, crisscrossed with inexplicable lines. Each wall made a huge wheel, with the giant skeletal legs of a tripod rising like spokes from the rim of each wheel, meeting in the middle to hold the track on which the “sun” peregrinated at the center of everything.

  It was like being inside a vast tuna-fish can. All the greenery and all the people were on the curving wall, while the bottom and the lid of the can were nothing but metal sheathed in plastic the color of a dismal winter sky.

  But that was only for now, while the Ark moved in orbit around the sun—the real sun, dear old Sol, whose happy little photons had given sight to every creature that ever opened its eyes on God’s green Earth. To keep us from having to live in perpetual freefall, the Ark was spun around and all the soil and people and buildings clung to the curved wall of the tuna can. That was orbital mode. It was the way we lived in orbit around Sol, and it was the way we would live again when at last we reached our new star system, as we waited for Carol Jeanne and her crews to prepare our new planet for human habitation.

  There would be two other phases to the journey—acceleration and deceleration. The voyage itself. And for those, everything would be different. There’d be no spin at all. Instead, the sense of “gravity” would come from acceleration, and all the soil and the villages and orchards would be moved from the curving wall to the flat circular floor. There we would live, bounding happily through life at about a fifth of a gee, until we reached the midpoint of the trip. Then, once again, everything would change, as the soil would be moved from the bottom to the lid of the tuna can, as deceleration put our “down” in the opposite direction.

  Those changeovers—from spin to acceleration, from acceleration to deceleration, and from deceleration to spin again—would be brutal. Tons of soil plunging from one surface to another in a vast avalanche, clouds of choking dust that wouldn’t settle for days. No one could live through it.

  Fortunately, we wouldn’t have to. For the curving wall of the Ark—the wall that seemed like the ground to us right now—was really a wheel-shaped building several stories thick. In huge chambers were stored the embryos of millions of animals, along with all the nutrients we would need to sustain human life during the voyage. In much smaller rooms, the humans had their offices, their computers, and the tiny rooms where they would huddle during the cataclysms of changeover.

  When the Ark was being designed, there had been some talk of the wastefulness of maintaining the huge open area with its greenery. Why not pack people into a ship designed more like a vast Ironsides? If they don’t like it, sedate them and let them sleep. The voyage was only a few years, anyway, right?

  But wiser heads prevailed. The goal of the voyage was not simply to get to another planet, it was to form a viable human colony there. The open farmland and villages had very practical purposes. In the fields, the people would learn the skills, the customs, the calendar of farming. And by living in villages instead of apartments, with country lanes instead of corridors leading from house to house, the people would form stable farming communities long before they reached the planet where those communities would have to work together to create a second human world.

  That was the theory, anyway—to use the voyage as one long rehearsal, to create the colony as a society before they had to make it a physical reality on what might turn out to be a hostile planet. After all, what good would it do to save money by building a cheaper Ark, only to have the colony fail because the people were all strangers to each other?

  That was why the Ark was subdivided into villages, their citizens grouped according to general categories of compatibility. By necessity and recent international custom, English was the common language of the Ark, but within the villages there were many languages; all would be preserved in the new world.

  Dividing communities by language made sense to me. But it was a typical human absurdity that, after language, the next most important set of divisions was religious. Muslims, Buddhists, Catholics, Jews, Hindus, Espiritistas: All had their own villages. Those groups with too few practitioners to maintain villages of their own—Baha’i, for instance, and Sikh, animist, atheist, Mormon, Mithraist, Druse, native American tribal religions, Jehovah’s Witnesses—were either thrown together in a couple of catch-all villages or were “adopted” as minorities within fairly compatible or tolerant villages of other faiths.

  The whole thing struck me as absurd. Why didn’t they simply limit the colony to rational human beings who were above the petty concerns of religion, and spare themselves all these meaningless dogmas and hostilities?

  The answer, of course, was that they couldn’t have found enough rational human beings on planet Earth to fill the Ark. A man might be a brilliant scientist, but he was still a Hindu, and there was no hope of him living peacefully with a Sikh; or he was a Jew, and the Muslims would allow him only second-class citizenship at best. A certain woman might be the greatest gaiologist in the world, and perfectly rational, but she had grown up Catholic, and so her Episcopalian mother-in-law would always look down on her and “her people.”

  Even most of the “rational” people—the ones who claimed not to have a religion—were just as chauvinistic about their irreligion, sneering at and ostracizing the believers just the way the believers treated nonmembers of their own groups. It’s a human universal. My tribe above all other tribes. That’s what religion is—another name for tribalism in a supposedly civilized world.

  What about me? I felt no tribal kinship with the other witnesses. Certainly not with Pink, but even as I became aware of other witnesses—Carol Jeanne was not the only colonist important enough to merit bringing her witness—I felt no particular kinship with them. Yes, we were all victims of an oppressive system, but that mattered far less to us than our deep bonding with our owners. Carol Jeanne was my tribe. It was from her that I drew my identity, it was around her that I built my hopes, it was in her that I had my life. What was another witness to me? I could look at them and pity them for their helpless devotion to an unworthy human. But my feelings for Carol Jeanne were different. She was not unworthy. She was deeply good, brilliant of mind and generous of heart, and she loved me. Our bond was stronger than blood, than religion, than language, than marriage. It was the bond of selfhood. I saw the world through her eyes, and she through mine. We—almost—were the same person.

  We were a village in ourselves, no matter that officially she was going to belong to an arbitrary clumping of effete Christians called Mayflower Village. She would be a Catholic among Congregationalists, I a low-order primate among Presbyterians; we belonged only to each other.

  That was what I thought of as I looked out onto the scenery of our new home, the flat farms and clotted villages of the Ark.

  The other people emerging from the elevator milled around, rubbernecking like country tourists on their first visit to the big city. Only instead of looking up at skyscrapers, they were looking up at overhead farms.

  Someone had tried to brighten up the arrival area with some nasty orange flo
wers. They were probably meant to look pretty. Instead they looked garish, and a little weary, too, as if the effort of trying to make this place pretty had worn them out.

  Mamie surveyed the terrain, holding a hand above her eyes to shield them from the sun orbiting on its track above us. Then she sighed. “Did I survive all these years only to end up in Kansas?”

  “Curves a little, for Kansas,” said Stef. It was as close as he ever came to contradicting her.

  “What are we supposed to do now?” asked Mamie.

  “I’m hungry,” said Lydia.

  “I’m thirsty,” said Emmy.

  “I’m hungry and thirsty,” said Lydia.

  “No, I’m hungry and thirsty,” said Emmy.

  “No, me,” said Lydia. “I said it first!”

  “No, me!” screeched Emmy.

  Did they really think that only one of them would be permitted to eat? Red’s genes must have been extraordinarily dominant.

  But the decision about what to do next was taken out of our hands. Bearing down on the herd of people and witnesses was a massive woman, big and busty. When she walked, the weight of her breasts pulled her posture out of alignment. She looked like the masthead on a ship, straining forward against the wind.

  She carried a placard in front of her, hand-lettered with the word Cocciolone. Unless there were some other Cocciolones on the transport, she was looking for us. Red raised his hand to get her attention. He might have called to her, but Mamie touched his arm and said, “Don’t be vulgar, Red,” and so he merely held up his hand, not even waving it.

  The woman with the sign finally noticed him. He beckoned—not a bit vulgarly—and she bore down on us like a steamship.

  “My Mayflower people! I knew I’d recognize you the minute I saw you,” she said as she approached.

  Of course, thought I. We look like a slice of Wonder bread on a platter of lentils and beans.

  “Are you our guide?” asked Mamie, moving forward to meet the woman with the sign.

  “Why, I suppose I am. Your guide, your nursemaid, and your first friend in the village, I hope.” She lowered the sign. “I’m your Mayor,” she said. “But don’t be intimidated, my dears. I wasn’t elected, and the title doesn’t mean a blessed thing. Penelope Frizzle’s the name. It’s pronounced the way I said it—PENNY-lope. Puh-NELL-o-pee sounds so—excretory. And you must be the Cocciolones.” She pronounced the name as if it rhymed with “bones.” She was obviously as cavalier with other people’s names as she was with her own.

  Then she saw me. “What a cute monkey! That must be one of your witnesses.”

  She reached out a hand. Constricted by gaudy rings, her fingers were as bloated as sausages. I was tired. I couldn’t stop my reflexes. I bit her.

  “Lovelock!” Carol Jeanne was furious. “Trab!”

  It was the painword. Immediately I felt that terrible scissor grip on my testicles. I fell from her shoulder and rolled into a ball on the ground, whimpering. As luck would have it, another family was called by their mayor as I writhed in the dirt. They stepped right over me as if I were a turd on the ground, compounding my shame.

  As she always did, Carol Jeanne relented the moment she saw my agony. Rescuing me from the stampede of human feet, she picked me up and stroked me, holding me close until my trembling stopped. I confess I enjoyed this enough that I made no effort to hasten my recovery.

  When I opened my eyes again, I was glad to see a small drop of blood on Penelope’s outstretched finger. Still, she obviously wasn’t hurt too badly. Even though she held her finger ostentatiously in the air for sympathy, everyone ignored her while Carol Jeanne comforted me.

  “The beast is obviously enjoying all this sympathy,” said Penelope. “It will probably bite me again, just to get all this attention.”

  I bared my teeth at her. Just a flash, you understand.

  “Now it’s threatening me!” cried Penelope.

  “Not at all,” said Carol Jeanne. “Monkeys bare their teeth to show fear. He’s afraid of you.”

  That’s what ordinary monkeys mean when they bare their teeth, and it’s my natural way of expressing fear, too—but I’m an enhanced capuchin, and so I’m clever enough to use that grimace for other reasons as well. I thought it was wise to let our mayor know that despite the punishment, and even without Carol Jeanne comforting me, I’ll bite anyone who tries to handle me like that. What do they think I am—a pet?

  “Well,” said Penelope, suddenly beaming with a brand-new just-for-us smile. “It’s all for the best. You can be sure I’ll never forget my first meeting with the Cocciolones!”

  “We’re the Todds,” Mamie said, tight-lipped. “Cocciolone is my daughter-in-law’s maiden name.”

  “Then you are the very ones I’m looking for. My! You’re such an attractive family.” If she was being ironic, you couldn’t tell from her voice. Nobody in our family was especially attractive at the moment.

  “It’s sweet of you to say so,” Mamie said, accepting it as a compliment instead of sarcasm.

  But now that Penelope knew which of our group was the Cocciolone, she hardly noticed that Mamie had spoken. Instead she planted the mountains of her bosom directly in front of Carol Jeanne. “So you’re Carol Jeanne Cocciolone. All those brains, and beautiful too. Just like those lovely children. They’re so pretty they must be yours.”

  They certainly weren’t my children, and since Mamie’s child-bearing years were centuries behind her, of course they belonged to Carol Jeanne. But Lydia and Emmy were lovely to look at; even I had to admit it. They looked just like Carol Jeanne in miniature, and Carol Jeanne was the fairest of all.

  Carol Jeanne ignored the compliments, though. “We’re all pretty tired and dirty right now,” she said. “It’s been a long trip.”

  “And you smell a little stale, too,” Penelope said. “Everybody does, when they first come out of the box. But we can’t do anything about that at the moment. We barely have time to get you to the funeral.”

  “Funeral? What funeral?” Stef’s Adam’s apple bobbed when he talked. His voice sounded dry.

  “Haven’t you heard? I thought everybody knew. The chief administrator’s wife died three days ago. Mayflower gets to host the funeral. It’s one of the blessings we get for having the chief administrator dwelling in our village.”

  “We didn’t know there was a funeral,” Carol Jeanne said, her voice low and respectful, “but we really didn’t know the lady who died. Can’t we go somewhere and rest until it’s over?”

  “You can’t be serious.” Penelope’s chest quivered when she talked. “It would be an affront to everyone in Mayflower Village. People will be here from all sixty villages, and Mayflower has to feed them all. Though I suppose you’re so important that people will overlook it if you don’t do your fair share.”

  “We want to do our fair share,” said Carol Jeanne. “But we just got here, and we’re—”

  “That’s why it’s such a wonderful opportunity for you, coming to the funeral. It’s the best way in the world to meet the community. You’ll be one of us before nightfall.”

  “That’s a great idea,” Red said.

  What kind of husband was he, to undermine Carol Jeanne’s effort to get them out of this? I hissed at him.

  “Lovelock, hush.” Carol Jeanne sounded annoyed. But I knew she was as irritated at Red as I was.

  Penelope ignored Carol Jeanne and me; apparently she only noticed the existence of people who agreed with her. “Of course it’s a great idea,” she said. She seized Red’s arm in the iron grip of intimacy. “I can see that you’re going to be a great success in Mayflower village, Mr. Cocciolone.”

  Mamie cut in, her voice as cold as liquid nitrogen. “I told you. Cocciolone is Carol Jeanne’s maiden name. She uses it professionally, but the rest of us are Todds.”

  “Oh,” Penelope said. “You did tell me that, didn’t you?” She gave Mamie her sweetest smile. Only her words revealed just how toxic that smile could be. “Did yo
u know, my dear,” she said to Mamie, “that when I first saw you folks I just assumed that you were Carol Jeanne Cocciolone. It just seemed to me that this sweet girl here was too young to be the world’s greatest gaiologist. While you were the only one who looked old enough to have worked with James Lovelock himself.”

  I hooted with laughter.

  Carol Jeanne silenced me with a touch. “I’m afraid I never had the privilege of knowing James Lovelock himself. I studied under his student, Ralph Twickenham.”

  Penelope brightened. “Oh. Our English village is named Twickenham. They’re very high-church. Is it the same Twickenham?”

  “Probably. Twicky is pretty famous.”

  “Carol Jeanne is pretty famous,” Red broke in. “The American Catholic village applied for the name Cocciolone, but Carol Jeanne said she wouldn’t come with the Ark unless they named their village something else.”

  “It’s all for the best,” Penelope said. “Assisi sounds so much nicer, doesn’t it? There’s that business about St. Francis feeding the birds, and Assisi is so much easier to say, don’t you think?”

  I hissed again. Penelope glanced at me and tucked her fingers safely behind her back.

  “Anyway,” she added, “the whole village has been waiting for you. They’ll be so excited when they see you at the funeral. Imagine our good fortune, to have the chief administrator and the chief gaiologist in the same village. What a lucky coincidence!”

  “My son Red is going to be quite a contributor to the voyage, too,” Mamie said, putting her hand on Red’s shoulder to indicate who he was. And then, to make sure the mayor understood how important he was, she made sure Penelope noticed his most important status symbol. “His witness isn’t half so much trouble as the monkey. See?” She pointed at Pink, who simply stood there, looking piglike.

  “A pig,” Penelope said, her voice flat and unenthusiastic. “How nice.” After the briefest glance at Pink, she turned to Carol Jeanne. “Tell me, Dr. Cocciolone,” she asked deferentially, “what do you think of the Ark?”