Marooned in Realtime

Odysseus oho spent half his life being blown from one side of that pond to the other. I wished we had taken maritime sports more seriously. Sailing to Catalina barely qualified us as novices; we didn't even make our own boat. The notion of hugging the coast didn't look good either. I remembered the pictures: our tsunami had smashed the whole southern coast. There were no beaches or harbors left on this side of the sea, just millions of tonnes of broken wood and mud. I would have to carry all my food even if I stayed close to the shore.

T So there I was, kind of discouraged and awfully wet. My schedule was in shambles. And that was a laugh. I have all the time in the world; that's the problem.

T There was a super-close lightning bolt. From the corner of my eye I saw something rushing me. As I turned, it dropped on my shoulder, grabbing for my neck. An instant later something else landed on my middle, and on my leg. I bet I screamed as loud as ever in my life; it was lost in the thunder.

T... They were fishermonkeys, Lelya. Three of them. They clung tight as leeches; one had its face buried in my middle. But they weren't biting. I sat rigid for a moment, ready to start smashing in all directions. The one on my leg had its eyes screwed shut. All three were shivering, and holding me so tight it hurt. I gradually relaxed, and set my hand on the fellow who had grabbed my middle. Through the seal-like fur, I could feel its shivering ease a little.

T They were like little children, running to Momma when the lightning got too bad. We sat in the lee of that root fan through the worst of the storm. They scarcely moved the whole time, their warm bodies stuck to my leg, belly, and shoulder.

T The storm gentled to an even rain, and the temperature climbed back into the thirties. The three didn't rush off. The-sat, looking at me solemnly. Now, even I don't believe that nature is full of cuddly creatures just waiting to love a human. I began to have some unhappy suspicions. I got up, climbed over the side of the trunk. The three followed, then ran a little way to one side, stopped, and chittered at me. I walked to them, and they ran off again, and stopped again. Already I was thinking of them as Hewey , Dewey and Lewey, (How did Disney spell those names?) Of course, fishermonkeys look nothing like ducks, either real or caricatured. But there was a cooperative madness about them that made the names inescapable.

T Our lurching game of tag went on for fifty meters. Then we came to a pile that had recently slipped: I could see where the trunks had turned, exposing unweathered wood. The three didn't try to climb these. They led me around them... to where a larger monkey was pinned between two trunks. It wasn't hard to guess what had happened. A good-sized stream flowed beneath the pile. Probably the four had been fishing there. When the storm came up, they hid in the wooden cave formed by the tree trunks. No doubt the wind and the added water in the stream had upset the woodpile.

T The three patted and pulled at their friend, but halfheartedly; the body wasn't warm. I could see that its chest was crushed. Perhaps this had been their mother. Or maybe it was the dominant male — Unca Donald even.

T It made me sadder than it should, Lelya. I knew our rescuing the Peacers was going to blow a hole in the ecosystem; I'd already done my rationalizing, cried my tears. But.. . I wondered how many fishermonkeys were left on the south shore. I bet they were scattered in small groups all through the dead jungle. And now this. The four of us sat for a time, consoling each other, I hope. t

T If sea travel was out, my options were a bit constrained. The jungle parallels the coast and extends inland to the two-thousand-meter level. It would take me a hundred years to get around the sea by hacking my way through that, with every stream at right angles to my line of travel. That left the jacaranda forests-back up where the air is cool, and the spiders spin their webs.

T Oh. I took the fishermonkeys with me. In fact, they refused to be left behind. I was now mother, or dominant male, or whatever. These three had all the mobility of penguins. During the days, they spent most of the time on the travois. When I stopped to rest, they'd be off-racing each other around, trying to tease me into the chase. Then Dewey would come to sit by me. He was the odd man out. Literally. Hewey was a girl and Lewey the other male. (It took a while to figure this out. The fishers' sexual equipment is better hidden than in the monkeys of our time.) It was all very platonic, but sometimes Dewey needed another friend.

T I can just see you, Lelya, shaking your head and muttering about sentimental weakness. But remember what I've said so many times: If we can survive and still be sentimental, life is a lot more fun. Besides, there were coldly calculated reasons for lugging my little friends back to the Jac forest. The fishers are not entirely sea creatures. The fact that they can fish from streams shows that. These three ate berries and roots. Plants haven't changed as much as animals over these fifty megayears, but some of the changes can be inconvenient. For instance, Dewey et al. wouldn't touch the water I got from a traveler's palm; on the way down, that stuff had made me sick. t

Here the diary had many pages of drawings, enhanced by Yelen's autons to show the dyes' original colors. These were not as skillfully drawn as those Wil had seen later in the diary when Marta had had years of practice-but they were better than anything he could do. She had brief notes by each picture: T Dewey wouldn't touch this when green, otherwise okay... t or T Looks like trillium; raises blisters like poison ivy. t

Wil looked carefully at the first few pages, then skipped ahead to where Marta entered the jacaranda forest.

T I was a bit frightened at first. The fishers picked up on it, edging moodily around on the travois and whimpering. Walking through the jac forest just seemed too easy. The air is wet and moist, yet not nearly so uncomfortable as in a rain forest. The mist I'd seen earlier is always present. The musky, choking smell is there, too, though you don't notice it after the first few minutes. The light coming through the canopy is shadowless and green. Floating down from the heights are occasional leaves and twigs. There are no animals; except at the edges of the forest, the spiders stick to the canopy. There are no trees but the jacs, and no vines. The ground cover is a moist carpet. In the top few centimeters you can see leaf fragments, perhaps little bits of spiders. Walking through it kicks up a murkier version of what hangs all through the air. A thousand meters into the forest, the only sounds you hear are those you make yourself. The place is beautiful, and heaven to hike through.