We zipped up in the tanks and took off simultaneously.
We wound up spending a lot of time in the tanks, just to keep from looking at the same faces all day long in the crowded ship. The added periods of acceleration got us back to Stargate in ten months, subjective. Of course, it was 340 years (minus seven months) to the hypothetical objective observer.
There were hundreds of cruisers in orbit around Stargate. Bad news: with that kind of backlog we probably wouldn't get any furlough at all.
I supposed I was more likely to get a court-martial than a furlough, anyhow. Losing 88 percent of my company, many of them because they didn't have enough confidence in me to obey the direct earthquake order. And we were back where we'd started on Sade-138; no Taurans there, but no base either.
We got landing instructions and went straight down, no shuttle. There was another surprise waiting at the spaceport. Dozens of cruisers were standing around on the ground (they'd never done that before for fear that Stargate would be hit) – and two captured Tauran cruisers as well. We'd never managed to get one intact.
Seven centuries could have brought us a decisive advantage, of course. Maybe we were winning.
We went through an airlock under a 'returnees' sign. After the air cycled and we'd popped our suits, a beautiful young woman came in with a cartload of tunics and told us, in perfectly-accented English, to get dressed and go to the lecture hall at the end of the corridor to our left.
The tunic felt odd, light yet warm. It was the first thing I'd worn besides a fighting suit or bare skin in almost a year.
The lecture hall was about a hundred times too big for the twenty-two of us. The same woman was there and asked us to move down to the front. That was unsettling; I could have sworn she had gone down the corridor the other way – I knew she had; I'd been captivated by the sight of her clothed behind.
Hell, maybe they had matter transmitters. Or teleportation. Wanted to save herself a few steps.
We sat for a minute and a man, clothed in the same kind of unadorned tunic the woman and we were wearing, walked across the stage with a stack of thick notebooks under each arm.
The woman followed him on, also carrying notebooks.
I looked behind me and she was still standing in the aisle. To make things even more odd, the man was virtually a twin to both of them.
The man riffled through one of the notebooks and cleared his throat. 'These books are for your convenience,' he said, also with perfect accent, 'and you don't have to read them if you don't want to. You don't have to do anything you don't want to do, because … you're free men and women. The war is over.'
Disbelieving silence.
'As you will read in this book, the war ended 221 years ago. Accordingly, this is the year 220. Old style, of course, it is 3138 AD
'You are the last group of soldiers to return. When you leave here, I will leave as well. And destroy Stargate. It exists only as a rendezvous point for returnees and as a monument to human stupidity. And shame. As you will read. Destroying it will be a cleansing.'
He stopped speaking and the woman started without a pause. 'I am sorry for what you've been through and wish I could say that it was for good cause, but as you will read, it was not.
'Even the wealth you have accumulated, back salary and compound interest, is worthless, as I no longer use money or credit. Nor is there such a thing as an economy, in which to use these … things.'
'As you must have guessed by now,' the man took over, 'I am, we are, clones of a single individual. Some two hundred and fifty years ago, my name was Kahn. Now it is Man.
'I had a direct ancestor in your company, a Corporal Larry Kahn. It saddens me that he didn't come back.'
'I am over ten billion individuals but only one consciousness,' she said. 'After you read, I will try to clarify this. I know that it will be difficult to understand.
'No other humans are quickened, since I am the perfect pattern. Individuals who die are replaced.
'There are some planets, however, on which humans are born in the normal, mammalian way. If my society is too alien for you, you may go to one of these planets. If you wish to take part in procreation, I will not discourage it. Many veterans ask me to change their polarity to heterosexual so that they can more easily fit into these other societies. This I can do very easily.'
Don't worry about that, Man, just make out my ticket.
'You will be my guest here at Stargate for ten days, after which you will be taken wherever you want to go,' he said. 'Please read this book in the meantime. Feel free to ask any questions, or request any service.' They both stood and walked off the stage.
Charlie was sitting next to me. 'Incredible,' he said. 'They let … they encourage … men and women to do that again? Together?'
The female aisle-Man was sitting behind us, and she answered before I could frame a reasonably sympathetic, hypocritical reply. 'It isn't a judgment on your society,' she said, probably not seeing that he took it a little more personally than that. 'I only feel that it's necessary as a eugenic safety device. I have no evidence that there is anything wrong with cloning only one ideal individual, but if it turns out to have been a mistake, there will be a large genetic pool with which to start again.'
She patted him on the shoulder. 'Of course, you don't have to go to these breeder planets. You can stay on one of my planets. I make no distinction between heterosexual play and homosexual.'
She went up on the stage to give a long spiel about where we were going to stay and eat and so forth while we were on Stargate, 'Never been seduced by a computer before,' Charlie muttered.
The 1143-year-long war had been begun on false pretenses and only because the two races were unable to communicate.
Once they could talk, the first question was 'Why did you start this thing?' and the answer was 'Me?'
The Taurans hadn't known war for millennia, and toward the beginning of the twenty-first century it looked as though mankind was ready to outgrow the institution as well. But the old soldiers were still around, and many of them were in positions of power. They virtually ran the United Nations Exploratory and Colonization Group, that was taking advantage of the newly-discovered collapsar jump to explore interstellar space.
Many of the early ships met with accidents and disappeared. The ex-military men were suspicious. They armed the colonizing vessels, and the first time they met a Tauran ship, they blasted it.
They dusted off their medals and the rest was going to be history.
You couldn't blame it all on the military, though. The evidence they presented for the Taurans' having been responsible for the earlier casualties was laughably thin. The few people who pointed this out were ignored.
The fact was, Earth's economy needed a war, and this one was ideal. It gave a nice hole to throw buckets of money into, but would unify humanity rather than dividing it.
The Taurans relearned war, after a fashion. They never got really good at it, and would eventually have lost.
The Taurans, the book explained, couldn't communicate with humans because they had no concept of the individual; they had been natural clones for millions of years. Eventually, Earth's cruisers were manned by Man, Kahn-clones, and they were for the first time able to get through to each other.
The book stated this as a bald fact. I asked a Man to explain what it meant, what was special about clone-to-clone communication, and he said that I a priori couldn't understand it. There were no words for it, and my brain wouldn't be able to accommodate the concepts even if there were words.
All right. It sounded a little fishy, but I was willing to accept it. I'd accept that up was down if it meant the war was over.
Man was a pretty considerate entity. Just for us twenty-two, he went to the trouble of rejuvenating a little restaurant-tavern and staffing it at all hours (I never saw a Man eat or drink – guess they'd discovered a way around it). I was sitting in there one evening, drinking beer and reading their book, when Charlie came in and sat down n
ext to me.
Without preamble, he said, 'I'm going to give it a try.'
'Give what a try?'
'Women. Hetero.' He shuddered. 'No offense … it's not really very appealing.' He patted my hand, looking distracted. But the alternative … have you tried it?'
'Well … no, I haven't.' Female Man was a visual treat, but only in the same sense as a painting or a piece of sculpture. I just couldn't see them as human beings.
'Don't.' He didn't elaborate. 'Besides, they say – he says, she says, it says – that they can change me back just as easily. If I don't like it.'
'You'll like it, Charlie.'
'Sure that's what they say.' He ordered a stiff drink. 'Just seems unnatural. Anyway, since, uh, I'm going to make the switch, do you mind if … why don't we plan on going to the same planet?'
'Sure, Charlie, that'd be great.' I meant it. 'You know where you're going?'
'Hell, I don't care. Just away from here.'
'I wonder if Heaven's still as nice–'
'No.' Charlie jerked a thumb at the bartender. 'He lives there.'
'I don't know. I guess there's a list.'
A man came into the tavern, pushing a cart piled high with folders. 'Major Mandella? Captain Moore?'
'That's us,' Charlie said.
'These are your military records. I hope you find them of interest. They were transferred to paper when your strike force was the only one outstanding, because it would have been impractical to keep the normal data retrieval networks running to preserve so few data.'
They always anticipated your questions, even when you didn't have any.
My folder was easily five times as thick as Charlie's. Probably thicker than any other, since I seemed to be the only trooper who'd made it through the whole duration. Poor Marygay. 'Wonder what kind of report old Stott filed about me.' I flipped to the front of the folder.
Stapled to the front page was a small square of paper. All the other pages were pristine white, but this one was tan with age and crumbling around the edges.
The handwriting was familiar, too familiar even after so long. The date was over 250 years old.
I winced and was blinded by sudden tears. I'd had no reason to suspect that she might be alive. But I hadn't really known she was dead, not until I saw that date.
'William? What's–'
'Leave me be, Charlie. Just for a minute.' I wiped my eyes and closed the folder. I shouldn't even read the damned note. Going to a new life, I should leave the old ghosts behind.
But even a message from the grave was contact of a sort. I opened the folder again.
11 Oct 2878
William–
All this is in your personnel file. But knowing you, you might just chuck it. So I made sure you'd get this note.
Obviously, I lived. Maybe you will, too. Join me.
I know from the records that you're out at Sade-138 and won't be back for a couple of centuries. No problem.
I'm going to a planet they call Middle Finger, the fifth planet out from Mizar. It's two collapsar jumps, ten months subjective. Middle Finger is a kind of Coventry for heterosexuals. They call it a 'eugenic control baseline.'
No matter. It took all of my money, and all the money of five other old-timers, but we bought a cruiser from UNEF. And we're using it as a time machine.
So I'm on a relativistic shuttle, waiting for you. All it does is go out five light years and come back to Middle Finger, very fast. Every ten years I age about a month. So if you're on schedule and still alive, I'll only be twenty-eight when you get here. Hurry!
I never found anybody else and I don't want anybody else. I don't care whether you're ninety years old or thirty. If I can't be your lover, I'll be your nurse.
–Marygay.
'Say, bartender.'
'Yes, Major?'
'Do you know of a place called Middle Finger? Is it still there?'
'Of course it is. Where else would it be?' Reasonable question. 'A very nice place. Garden planet. Some people don't think it's exciting enough.'
'What's this all about?' Charlie said.
I handed the bartender my empty glass. 'I just found out where we're going.'
9
Epilogue
From The New Voice, Paxton, Middle Finger 24-6
14/2/3143
OLD-TIMER HAS FIRST BOY
Marygay Potter-Mandella (24 Post Road, Paxton) gave birth Friday last to a fine baby boy, 3.1 kilos.
Marygay lays claim to being the second 'oldest' resident of Middle Finger, having been born in 1977. She fought through most of the Forever War and then waited for her mate on the time shuttle, 261 years.
The baby, not yet named, was delivered at home with the help of a friend of the family, Dr Diana Alsever-Moore.
Forever Free
Men stop war to make gods
sometimes. Peace gods, who would make
Earth a haven. A place for men to
think and love and play. No war
to cloud their minds and hearts. Stop,
somehow, men from being men.
Gods make war to stop men
from becoming gods.
Without the beat of drums to stop
our ears, what heaven we could make
of Earth! The anchor that is war
left behind? Somehow free to
stop war? Gods make men to
be somewhat like them. So men
express their godliness in war.
To take life: this is what gods
do. Not the womanly urge to make
life. Nor the simple sense to stop.
War-men make gods. To stop
those gods from raging, we have to
find the heart and head to make
new gods, who don't take men
in human sacrifice. New gods,
who find disgust in war.
Gods stop, to make men war
for their amusement. We can stop
their fun. We can make new gods
in human guise. No need to
call to heaven. Just take plain men
and show to them the heaven they could make!
To stop God's wars! Men make
their own destiny. We don't need war
to prove to anyone that we are men.
But even that is not enough. To stop
war, we have to become more. To
stop war, we have to become gods.
To stop war, make men gods.
Book One
The Book of Genesis
One
Winter is a long time coming on this god-forsaken planet, and it stays too long, too, I watched a sudden gust blow a line of cold foam across the grey lake and thought about Earth, not for the first time that day. The two warm winters in San Diego when I was a boy. Even the bad winters in Nebraska. They were at least short.
Maybe, we were too quick to say no, when the magnanimous zombies offered to share Earth with us, after the war. We didn't really get rid of them, coming here.
Cold radiated from the windowpane. Marygay cleared her throat behind me. 'What is it?' she said.
'Looks like weather. I ought to check the trotlines.'
'Kids will be home in an hour.'
'Better I do it now, dry, than all of us stand out in the rain,' I said. 'Snow, whatever.'
'Probably snow.' She hesitated, and didn't offer to help. After twenty years she could tell when I didn't want company. I pulled on wool sweater and cap and left the rain slicker on its peg.
I stepped out into the damp hard wind. It didn't smell like snow coming. I asked my watch and it said 90 percent rain, but a cold front in the evening would bring freezing rain and snow. That would make for a fun meeting. We had to walk a couple of klicks, there and back. Otherwise the zombies could look through transportation records and see that all of us paranoids had converged on one house.
We had eight trotlines that stretched out ten meters from the end of the dock to posts I'd sunk in the chest-
deep water. Two more had been knocked down in a storm; I'd replace them come spring. Two years from now, in real years.
It was more like harvesting than fishing. The blackfish are so dumb they'll bite anything, and when they're hooked and thrash around, it attracts other blackfish: 'Wonder what's wrong with that guy – oh, look! Somebody's head on a nice shiny hook!'
When I got out on the dock I could see thunderheads building in the east, so I worked pretty fast. Each trotline's a pulley that supports a dozen hooked leaders dangling in the water, held to one-meter depth with plastic floaters. It looked like half the floaters were down, maybe fifty fish. I did a mental calculation and realized I'd probably just finish the last one when Bill got home from school. But the storm was definitely coming.
I took work gloves and apron off a hook by the sink and hauled the end of the first line up to the eye-level pulley wheel. I opened the built-in freezer – the stasis field inside reflected the angry sky like a pool of mercury – and wheeled in the first fish. Worked it off the hook, chopped off the head and tail with a cleaver, threw the fish into the freezer, and then re-baited the hook with its head. Then rolled in the next client.
Three of the fish were the useless mutant strain we've been getting for more than a year. They're streaked with pink and have a noxious hydrogen-sulfide taste. The blackfish won't take them for bait and I can't even use them for fertilizer; you might as well scatter your soil with salt.
Maybe an hour a day – half that, with the kids helping – and we supplied about a third of the fish for the village. I didn't eat much of it myself. We also bartered corn, beans, and asparagus, in their seasons.
Bill got off the bus while I was working on the last line. I waved him inside; no need for both of us to get all covered with fish guts and blood. Then lightning struck on the other side of the lake and I put the line back in anyhow. Hung up the stiff gloves and apron and turned off the stasis field for a second to check the catch level.