Existence

nation or consortium should doubt the sovereign independence of this archipelago of wealth.

Seasteading. Of course, Bin had heard of such places. Along the spectrum of human prosperity, these projects lay at the very opposite end from the shorestead that he had settled with Mei Ling in the garbage-strewn Huangpu. Here, and in a few dozen other locales, some of the world’s richest families had pooled funds to buy up small nations to call their own, escaping all obligation (especially taxes) owed to the continental states, with their teeming, populist masses. Yet, Bin could see a few traits shared in common by seastead and shorestead. Adaptation. Making the best of rising seas. Turning calamity into advantage.

Three technical experts-a graceful Filipina who never removed her wraparound immersion goggles; an islander, possibly a native Pulupauan, who kept fingering his interactive crucifix; and an elderly Chinese gentleman, who spoke in the soft tones of a scholar-watched Peng Xiang Bin and Nguyen Ky gingerly replace the worldstone in its handcrafted cradle, surrounded by instruments and sleek, ailectronic displays.

The ovoid had already started coming alive in response to Bin’s touch. As keeper of the worldstone, he alone could rouse the object to craft lustrous images-like a whole world or universe shining within an egglike capsule, less than half a meter long. Whatever the reason for his special knack, Bin was grateful for the honor, for the resulting employment, and for a chance to participate in matters far above his normal station of life. Though he missed Mei Ling and the baby.

The now familiar entity Courier of Caution lurked-or seemed to-just within the pitted, ovoid curves, amid those swirling clouds. Courier’s ribbon eye stared outward, resembling Anna Arroyo’s unblinking goggles, while the creature’s diamond-shaped, four-lipped mouth pursed in a perpetual expression of uneasiness or disapproval.

Bin carefully reattached a makeshift device at one end that compensated for some of the object’s surface damage, partly restoring a sonic connection. Of course, he had no idea how the mechanism-or anything else in the room-worked. But he kept trying to learn every procedure, if only so the others would consider him a colleague… and less an experimental subject.

From their wary expressions, it might take some time.

“Let us resume,” Dr. Nguyen said. “We were attempting to learn about the stone’s arrival on Earth. Here are the ideograms we want you to try next, please.” The small man laid a sheet of e-paper in front of Xiang Bin, bearing a series of characters. They looked complex and very old-even archaic.

Fortunately, Bin did not have to hold the ovoid in his hands anymore. Just standing nearby seemed to suffice. Bringing his right index finger close-and sticking out his tongue a little in concentration-he copied the first symbol by tracing it across the surface of the worldstone. Inky brushstrokes seemed to follow his touch-path. Actually, it came out rather pretty. Calligraphy… one of the great Chinese art forms. Who figured I would have a knack for it?

He managed the next figure more quickly. And a third one. Evidently, the ideograms were not in modern Chinese, but some older dialect and writing system-more pictographic and less formalized-from the warring states period that preceded the unification standards of great Chin, the first emperor. Fortunately, the implant in his eye went ahead and offered a translation, which he spoke aloud in modern Putonghua.

“Date of arrival on Earth?”

There were two projects going on at once. The first involved using ancient symbols to ask questions. But Dr. Nguyen also wanted to expose the entity to modern words. Ideally-if it truly was much smarter than an Earthly ai-it should learn the more recent version of Chinese, and other languages as well. Anyway, this would test the ovoid’s adaptability.

After a brief pause, Courier appeared to lift one arm, weirdly double-elbowed, and knocked Bin’s ideograms away with a flick of one three-fingered hand, causing them to shatter and dissolve. The simulated alien proceeded to draw a series of new figures that jostled and arrayed themselves against the worldstone’s inner face. Bin also sensed the bulbous right end of the stone emit faint vibrations. Sophisticated detectors fed these to a computer, whose vaice then uttered enhanced sounds that Bin didn’t understand.

Fortunately, Yang Shenxiu, the white-haired Chinese scholar, could. He tapped a uniscroll in front of him.

“Yes, yes! So that is how those words used to be pronounced. Wonderful.”

“And what do they mean, please?” demanded the Vietnamese mogul standing nearby.

“Oh, he… the being who resides within… says that he cannot track the passage of time, since he slept for so long. But he will offer something that should be just as good.”

Dr. Nguyen stepped closer. “And pray, what is that?”

The alien brought its forearms together and then apart again. The ever-present clouds seemed to converge, bringing darkness upon a patch of the worldstone, till deep black reigned across the center. Bin caught a pointlike glitter… and another… then two more… and another pair…

“Stars,” announced Anna Arroyo. “Six of them, arrayed in a rough hexagon… with a final one in the middle, slightly off center… I’m searching the online constellation catalogs… Damn. All present-day matches include some stars that are below seventh magnitude, so they’d have been invisible to people long ago. It’s unlikely…”

“Please do not curse or blaspheme,” said the islander, Paul Menelaua. “Let’s recall that the topic at hand is time. Dates. When. Stars shift.” Still fondling the animatronic cross that hung from a chain around his neck, he added. “Try going retrograde…”

The figure of Jesus seemed to squirm, a little, under his touch. Anna frowned at his terse rebuke, but she nodded. “I’m on it. Backsifting and doing a whole sky match-search in one hundred year intervals. This could take a while.”

Bin grunted. Held back a moment. Then blurted:

“Seven!”

The scholar and the rich man turned to him. Bin had to swallow to gather courage, managing a low croak. “I… think the number of stars may… make this simpler.”

“What do you mean, Peng Xiang Bin?” asked Dr. Nguyen.

“I mean… maybe… you should try the Seven Maidens. You know. The…” He groped for a name.

“Pleiades,” the scholar, Yang Shenxiu, finished for him, at about the same time as Bin’s aiware also supplied the name. “Yes, that would be a good guess.”

The Filipina woman interrupted. “Got you. Scanning time-drift of just that one cluster, back… back… Yes! It’s a good match. The Pleiades-Subaru constellation, just under five thousand years ago. Wow.”

“Well done.” Dr. Nguyen nodded. “I expected something like this. My young friend Xiang Bin, please tell us again about the box that formerly held the worldstone-what did the inscription say?’

Bin recited from memory.

“‘Unearthed in Harappa, 1926’…”

He then spoke the second half with an involuntary shiver.

“‘Demon-infested. Keep in the dark.’”

“Harappa, yes,” Nguyen nodded, ignoring the other part. “A center of the Indus Valley culture… poor third sister during the earliest days of urban civilization, after Mesopotamia and Egypt.” He glanced at the scholar Yang Shenxiu, who continued.

“Some think it was a stunted state-cramped, paranoid, and never fully literate. Others admired its level of primly regimented urban planning. We don’t really know what happened to the Indus civilization. Abandoned about 1700 B.C.E., they say. Possibly a great flood weakened both main cities, Harappa and Mohenjo-daro. By possible coincidence, several thousand li to the west, the great volcano at Thera may have-”

Dr. Nguyen shook his head, and the elegant braids swished. “But this makes no sense! Why would it be speaking to us in archaic Chinese, a dialect from more than a millennium later? Harappa was buried under sand by then!”

“Shall I try to ask, sir?” Bin took a step forward.

The small man waved a hand in front of his face. “No. I am following a script of questions, prioritized by colleagues and associates around the world. We’ll keep to these points, then fill in gaps later. Go to the next set of characters, Xiang Bin, if you would please.”

Bin felt gratified again by Dr. Nguyen’s unfailing politeness. The gentleman had been well brought up, for sure- skilled at how best to treat underlings. Perhaps I will get to work for him forever. Not a harsh fate to contemplate, so long as Mei Ling and the baby could join him soon.

He meant to prove his value to this man. So, bending over the stone, Bin carefully sketched four more of the