Greg Egan - The Clockwork Rocket

When Yalda was almost three years old, she was entrusted with the task of bearing her grandfather into the forest to convalesce.

Dario had been weak and listless for days, refusing to move from the flower bed where the family slept. Yalda had seen him this way before, but it had never lasted so long. Her father had sent word to the village, and when Doctor Livia came to the farm to examine Dario Yalda and two of her cousins, Claudia and Claudio, stayed close to watch the proceedings.

After squeezing and prodding the old man all over with more hands than most people used in a day, Doctor Livia announced her diagnosis. Youre suffering from a serious light deficiency. The crops here are virtually monochromatic; your body needs a broader spectrum of illumination.

Ever heard of sunlight? Dario replied caustically.

Sunlight is far too blue, Doctor Livia countered, too fast for the body to catch. And the light from the fields is all sluggish red. What youre lacking lies between those extremes; a man of your age needs umber and gamboge, saffron and goldenrod, jade and viridian.

We have all those hues right here! Have you ever seen such glorious specimens? Dario, whod taken to resting limbless, budded a lone finger from the middle of his chest to gesture at the garden around them. Yalda, whose job it was to tend the flower bed, warmed with pride, though the blossoms he was praising were closed for the day, their luminescent petals furled and dormant.

Those plants are merely decorative, Doctor Livia replied dismissively. You need a full range of natural light, at much greater intensity. You need to spend four or five nights in the forest.

When the doctor had left, Yaldas father, Vito, and her uncle, Giusto, talked the matter over with her grandfather.

It sounds like quackery to me, Dario declared, snuggling deeper into his indentation in the soil. Umber and gamboge! Ive survived for two dozen and seven years with sunlight, wheatlight and a few floral adornments. Theres nothing healthier than farm life.

Everyones body changes, Vito said cautiously. There must be a reason youre so tired.

Years of hard work? Dario suggested. Or dont you think Ive earned a rest?

Giusto said, Ive seen you shining yellow at night. If youre losing that hue, whats putting it back?

Yalda should have planted more goldenrod! Claudio blurted out accusingly. Giusto shushed him, but Claudia and Claudio exchanged knowing glances, as if they were the doctors now and theyd finally exposed the root of the problem. Yalda told herself that it was only an adults admonition that meant anything, but her older cousins smug delight in her supposed failure still stung.

Vito said, Ill go with you to the forest. If the doctors right, it will give you back your health. And if shes wrong, what harm can it do?

What harm? Dario was incredulous. I dont have the strength for a twelfth of that journey, and I doubt you could carry me even halfway. It would finish us both off!

Vitos tympanum became rigid with annoyance, but Yalda suspected that her grandfather was right. Her father was strong, but Dario had always been the heavier of the two and his illness hadnt changed that. Yalda had never even glimpsed the forest, but she knew it was farther than the village, farther than anywhere shed been. If there had been a chance of hitching a ride on a truck then someone would have raised the possibility, but the route must have been so rarely traveled as to make that an unlikely prospect.

In the awkward silence that followed, Giustos rear gaze fell on Yalda. For a moment she thought he was merely acknowledging her presence with a friendly glance, but then she understood why she was suddenly worthy of attention in the midst of this serious, adult debate.

I know who could carry you, Father! Giusto announced happily. There and back, with no trouble at all.

The next day, the whole family woke before dawn to help the three travelers prepare. By the soft red light of the fields around them, Lucia and Lucio, Yaldas brother and sister, darted back and forth from the store-holes, packing provisions for the journey into the generous pouches that their father had formed along his sides. Claudia and Claudio tended to Dario, helping him rise and eat breakfast then taking him by the shoulders and walking him around the clearing to prepare his body for the long ride.

Yaldas other cousins, Aurelia and Aurelio, acted as stand-ins for Yaldas passenger as Uncle Giusto coached her on her quadrupedal posture. Make your front legs a bit longer, he suggested. Your grandfather will need somewhere to rest his head, so it would be good if your back sloped higher. Yalda extruded more flesh into her two front limbs; for a moment her legs wobbled beneath her cousins weight, but she managed to stiffen them before she lost her balance. She waited until she felt the central shafts harden and the old joints ossify, then she cracked a new pair of knees higher up and re-organized the surrounding muscles. The last part was the most mysterious to her; all she was conscious of was a sense of pressure moving down her limbs and imposing order, as if her flesh were a bundle of reeds being passed through a comb to rid it of tangles. But her muscles werent merely straightening themselves out; they were making sense of their new surroundings and preparing for the new tasks that would be demanded of them.

Giusto said, Try a few steps now.

Yalda moved forward tentatively, then broke into a slow trot. Aurelia kicked her sides and shouted, Yah! Yah!

Stop it, or Ill throw you! Yalda warned her.

Aurelio joined her in rebuking his co. Yeah, stop it! Im the driver.

No youre not, Aurelia retorted. Im in front!

Then I should be in front. He grabbed Aurelia and tried to swap places with her. Yalda quashed her irritation at her squirming cousins and decided to treat it all as good practice; if she could keep her footing while these idiots sprouted arms just to wrestle with each other, she ought to be able to manage anything her ailing grandfather did.

Youre doing well, Yalda, Giusto called to her encouragingly.

For a giant lump, whispered Aurelia.

Dont be cruel! Aurelio said, pinching her on the neck.

Yalda said nothing. Perhaps she was graceless compared to Aurelia, two years her senioror even compared to her own brother and sisterbut she was stronger than anyone else in the family, and the only one who could carry Dario into the forest.

She trotted to the edge of the clearing, where the wheat-flowers were starting to close. She couldnt see the sun itself yet, but brightness was spreading across the eastern sky. Dawn brought so many changes at once that Yalda had had to watch the flowers furling several times before shed convinced herself that their petals really did grow dimmer, and werent just being outshone as they curled in on themselves for the day.

How do they know that they should stop making light? she wondered.

Aurelia buzzed with amusement. Because the suns coming up?

But how do they know that ? Yalda persisted. Plants dont have eyes, do they?

They probably feel the heat, Aurelio suggested.

Yalda didnt think the temperature had risen all that sharply. Yet the whole field had grown dim as they were speaking, the nights glorious red blossoms reduced to pale gray sacs hanging limply from their stalks.