Ringworld's Children

Hanuman. Shed almost managed to ignore his mutant smell. 'I see your point. Not just scavengers like this one, but brachiators like you. Mutations and evolution are good, if only you can stop it now, always now, so that your own kind need not change.'

Hanuman didnt answer. She was only stating the obvious.

But Tunesmith spoke. 'Your kind, your original Pak, did not survive. Thats what mutations and evolution are for, Proserpina. Something almost of your shape has multiplied into the tens of trillions. You dont like some of us? When did you ever like all of your neighbors?'

He was standing atop a chair on a boom just above her head. He could have nailed her in an instant. Too clever, too quick.

Proserpina said, 'Bet. Even odds well be dead in nineteen falans, if I read these patterns right. Youve studied them longer. Hello, Tunesmith.'

Tunesmith leapt down. 'Hello, Proserpina, revered ancestor. Are your guests safe?'

'I see this as more urgent than their lives. You have been meddling with our basic design!'

'Yes, but not quickly enough. I need all the help I can get.'

'What design changes have you made? What changes do you contemplate?'

'What would be your approach to dealing with the Fringe War?'

'I might have tried… can you give me a way to make pictures?'

Tunesmith set his chair swinging near the elliptical wall. Now the starscape was gone, and the wall was deep blue. Tunesmith waved at the wall: white lines appeared.

Proserpina jumped to another chair. She waved shapes to life. Sun. Shadow squares. Ringworld. They were white lines and curves, and then they were photographically realistic views. Proserpinas arms moved like a concert masters. The sun took on detail: magnetic fields cradled the interior. The fields changed: squeezed. The suns south magnetic pole curdled, churned, then sprayed light.

'I might have tried this,' Proserpina said. 'When we built the Ringworld, we set a superconductor network within the foundation structure. We can manipulate magnetic fields.' The suns south pole jetted X-ray-colored flame. Slowly the sun moved north, leaving the Ringworld behind. Its gravity pulled, faint lines on the blue wall, and the Ringworld followed.

'We use the sun for thrust, up to a few meters per second squared by Interworld measurement. Beyond that—' Streamlines formed. The Ringworld moved on alone, the sun lost. 'Flux of interstellar matter through the Ringworld can be steered to the axis to undergo fusion. The jet from the sun gives more fuel. A fusion exhaust confined by magnetic fields replaces the sun, bathes the Ringworld in light, and serves as a ramjet too. The Ringworld survives. We can continue to accelerate.'

'Drawbacks?'

'Deceleration would be difficult but not impossible. Fields could be adjusted to thrust forward. Tides would shift.'

Tunesmith waited.

'When we stopped, there would be no sun.' Proserpina shrugged; the picture distorted. 'It doesnt matter. We cant even begin. The sun grows too hot if we try to accelerate it. The shadow-square ring can be pulled almost closed, for shielding, but if the shadow squares fell behind or were pulled ahead, landscape would be charred.

'Worst, its too slow,' Proserpina said. 'The suns gravitational pull isnt enough. I can manipulate the suns magnetic fields to pull harder on the Ringworld, and it still isnt enough. Alien intruders still follow. I cant think of a way to leave them behind.'

'Its the wrong principle,' Tunesmith said. 'You didnt know. You lack information. Did Louis Wu speak of Carlos Wus medical system? Or the spacecraft we stole from the Kzinti?'

'No.'

'Ill give you details when I need to. Meanwhile — those protectors vicious enough to hold the Repair Center have not always been diligent. Theyve allowed meteor impacts, eyestorms, erosion, and sometimes an exposed sea bottom. That fool bloodsucker left thousands of places where the Ringworlds foundation shows through. I need you and your allies and servants to find these places and shake a dust into them. I have been working with others of my own kind, with the Ringworld-wide network of Ghoul species; but I havent been able to reach enough of these breaches. We move too slowly.'

'What is this dust? What does it do?'

'You need only know—'

'I must judge for myself!'

'I dont want an equal partner, Proserpina! The dust spreads itself through scrith, but first the scrith must touch it. How can we put more of it in contact with the Ringworld floor?'

'My servants in the spill mountains,' Proserpina said, 'are useless on the flats. They suffocate. Theyll spread dust along the spill mountain edges, on the rim wall, if you can get the dust to them. Theyll travel by balloon from peak to peak.'

'Good. My own spill mountain protectors have been doing that. What else?'

'Water folk,' Proserpina said. 'Well use them. We need to reach the spill pipe system that circulates sea bottom sediment—'

'Hup.'

'Yes, flup. We use that word too. Flup accumulates in the bottoms of the seas. Without our tending, it would stay there. Topsoil all through the Ringworld would be lost under the seas in a few thousand years. Weve set in place a circulation system of spillpipes that runs under the scrith floor and up the outside of the rim wall, to fall over the edge. It becomes spill mountains. Ultimately it replenishes the earth. If your dust can be introduced into the seabottoms, can it spread into the scrith from there?'

'Yes.'

'How long will it take?'

'If we begin now, less than two falans.'

CHAPTER 19 Wakening

He ate, and he hid.

Louis crawled among the plants, working his way deep into the jungle. He lived on his belly, reaching out of the shadows to dig for the yellow roots. The hanging garden was too exposed. He couldnt do anything about that; he couldnt leave his food source. Every hominid species on Earth and the Ringworld must have kept at least this one trait: a breeder turning into a protector would hide lest other protectors find him.

Shadow and light: days flickered by.

Nothing seemed to be looking for him. He wondered about that. A loose protector ought to be a matter of concern. It suggested that the Ringworlds protectors had other concerns: they were all involved in the Fringe War problem, ignoring the usual lethal dominance games. It must be bad. He should be helping.

Changing body, restless mind. Why was he eating tree-of-life at an effective age of twenty or so? That had an obvious answer, but the implications were serious.

The doc had given him the symptoms, but hadnt really made him an adolescent. Why not?

Tunesmith had opened Carlos Wus experimental autodoc and spread it out like an autopsy patient, to solve all its puzzles. Hed kept Louis Wu in there much longer than Louis needed, to test his notions, and for another reason. The docs nanotechnology had rewritten Louis Wus genetics, possibly over and over, until he was ready to become a protector at any time Tunesmith chose.

If Tunesmith had studied nanotechnology in such detail, by now hed know that subject better than any mind in known space. What was he doing with it?

And that too was obvious, given the theft of Long Shot.

Louiss mind wandered away, fizzing with inspiration, seeking other puzzles.

Where was the Hindmost? Aboard Hot Needle of Inquiry. A ship built like a glass