Alastair Reynolds - Absolution Gap (Revelation Space)

The Universe begins to look more like a greatthought than like a great machine.

SIR JAMES JEANS

She stands alone at the jettys end, watching thesky. In the moonlight, the planked boarding of the jetty is ashimmering silver-blue ribbon reaching back to shore. The sea isink-black, lapping calmly against the jettys supports. Across thebay, out towards the western horizon, there are patches ofluminosity: smudges of twinkling pastel-green, as if a fleet ofgalleons has gone down with all lights ablaze.

She is clothed, if that is the word, in a whitecloud of mechanical butterflies. She urges them to draw closer,their wings meshing tight. They form themselves into a kind ofarmour. It is not that she is coldthe evening breeze is warm andfreighted with the faint, exotic tang of distant islandsbut thatshe feels vulnerable, sensing the scrutiny of something vaster andolder than she. Had she arrived a month earlier, when there werestill tens of thousands of people on this planet, she doubted thatthe sea would have paid her this much attention. But the islandsare all abandoned now, save for a handful of stubborn laggards, ornewly arrived latecomers like herself. She is something newhereor, rather, something that has been away for a great whileandher chemical signal is awakening the sea. The smudges of lightacross the bay have appeared since her descent. It is notcoincidence.

After all this time, the sea still remembersher.

We should go now, her protector calls, hisvoice reaching her from the black wedge of land where he waits,leaning impatiently on his stick. It isnt safe, now that theyvestopped shepherding the ring.

The ring, yes: she sees it now, bisecting the skylike an exaggerated, heavy-handed rendition of the Milky Way. Itspangles and glimmers: countless flinty chips of rubble catchingthe light from the closer sun. When she arrived, the planetaryauthorities were still maintaining it: every few minutes or so, shewould see the pink glint of a steering rocket as one of the dronesboosted the orbit of a piece of debris, keeping it from grazing theplanets atmosphere and falling into the sea. She understood thatthe locals made wishes on the glints. They were no moresuperstitious than any of the other planet dwellers she had met,but they understood the utter fragility of their worldthat withoutthe glints there was no future. It would have cost the authoritiesnothing to continue shepherding the ring: the self-repairing droneshad been performing the same mindless task for four hundred years,ever since the resettlement. Turning them off had been a purelysymbolic gesture, designed to encourage the evacuation.

Through the veil of the ring, she sees the other,more distant moon: the one that wasnt shattered. Almost no onehere had any idea what happened. She did. She had seen it with herown eyes, albeit from a distance.

If we stay her protector says.

She turns back, towards the land. I just need alittle time. Then we can go.

Im worried about someone stealing the ship. Imworried about the Nestbuilders.

She nods, understanding his fears, but stilldetermined to do the thing that has brought her here.

The ship will be fine. And the Nestbuildersarent anything to worry about.

They seem to be taking a particular interest inus.

She brushes an errant mechanical butterfly fromher brow. They always have. Theyre just nosy, thats all.

One hour, he says. Then Im leaving youhere.

You wouldnt.

Only one way to find out, isnt there?

She smiles, knowing he wont desert her. But hesright to be nervous: all the way in they had been pushing againstthe grain of evacuation. It was like swimming upstream, buffeted bythe outward flow of countless ships. By the time they reachedorbit, the transit stalks had already been blockaded: theauthorities werent allowing anyone to ride them down to thesurface. It had taken bribery and guile to secure passage on adescending car. Theyd had the compartment to themselves, but thewhole thingso her companion had saidhad smelt of fear and panic;human chemical signals etched into the very fabric of thefurniture. She was glad she didnt have his acuity with smells. Sheis frightened enough as it is: more than she wants him to know. Shehad been even more frightened when the Nestbuilders followed herinto the system. Their elaborate spiral-hulled shipfluted andchambered, vaguely translucentis one of the last vessels in orbit.Do they want something of her, or have they just come tospectate?

She looks out to sea again. It might be herimagination, but the glowing smudges appear to have increased innumber and size; less like a fleet of galleons below the water nowthan an entire sunken metropolis. And the smudges seem to becreeping towards the seaward end of the jetty. The ocean can tasteher: tiny organisms scurry between the air and the sea. They seepthrough skin, into blood, into brain.