516 ARTHUR C. CLARKE AND GENTRY LEE
called. His face was growing. Larger, ever larger, it was as big as a car, then as big as a house. His laughter was deafening. Omeh’s face was a huge balloon, rising high, ever higher into the dark night. He laughed once more and his balloon face exploded, showering Nicole with water. She was drenched. She was submerged, swimming underneath the water. When Nicole surfaced she was in the oasis pond in the Ivory Coast, where as a seven-year-old girl she had confronted the lioness during the Poro. The same lioness was prowling the perimeter of die pond. Nicole was a little girl again. She was very frightened.
/ want my mother, Nicole thought. Lay thee down I Now and rest I May thy slumber be blessed, she sang. Nicole started to walk out of the water. The lioness did not bother her. Nicole glanced at the animal once more and the face of the lioness had changed into the face of her mother. Nicole ran over to embrace her mother. Instead, Nicole became the lioness herself, prowling on the shore of the oasis pond in the middle of the African savanna.
There were now six swimmers altogether in the pond,, all children. As lioness Nicole continued to sing the Brahms Lullaby, one by one the children emerged from the water. Genevieve was first, men Simone, .Katie, Benjy, Patrick, and Ellie. Each of them walked past her, heading into the savanna. Nicole raced after them.
She was running on an infield in a packed stadium. Nicole was a human again, young and athletic. Her final jump was announced. As she headed for the top of the triple jump runway, a Japanese judge approached her. It was Toshio Nakamura. You are going to foul, he said with a scowl.
Nicole thought she was flying as she sped down the approach. She hit the board perfectly, soared into the air on her hop, executed a balanced skip, and powered far out into the pit with her jump. She knew it had been a good one. Nicole bounded over to where she had left her warm-ups. Her father and Henry both came over to give her a hug. Well done, they said in unison. Very well done. Joan of Arc brought the gold medal to the victory stand and hung it around Nicole’s neck. Eleanor of Aquitaine handed her a dozen roses. Kenji Watanabe and Judge
THE GARDEN OF RAMA
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Mishkin stood beside her and offered their congratulations. The announcer said that her jump was a new world record. The crowd was giving her a standing ovation. Nicole looked out at the sea of faces and noticed that there weren’t just humans in the crowd. Hie Eagle was there, in a special box, sitting beside an entire section of octo-spiders. Everyone was saluting her, even the avians and the spherical creatures with the gossamer tentacles and the dozen caped eels pressed against the window of a gigantic enclosed bowl. Nicole waved to them all.
Her arms changed to wings and she began to fly. Nicole was a hawk soaring high above the farming strip in New Eden. She looked down on the building where she had been imprisoned. Nicole turned west and found Max Puck-ett’s farm. Even though it was the middle of the night, Max was outside, working on what appeared to be an addition to one of his barns.
Nicole continued to fly west, heading toward the bright lights of Vegas. She descended when she reached the complex, flying behind the big nightclubs, one by one. Katie was sitting outside on some back steps, all by herself. She had her face buried in her hands and her body was shaking. Nicole tried to comfort her but the only sound was a hawk’s cry in the night. Katie looked up at the sky, puzzled.
Nicole flew over to Positano, near the habitat exit, and waited for the outside door to open. Startling the guard, hawk Nicole departed from New Eden. She reached Ava-lon in less man a minute. Robert, Ellie, little Nicole, and even an orderly were all in die lounge with Benjy in the ward. Nicole had no idea why they were all awake in the middle of the night. She cried to mem. Benjy came over to the window and gazed out into the darkness.
Nicole heard a voice calling her. It was faint, far to the south. She flew rapidly to the second habitat, entering through the gaping hole that the humans had cut into the exterior wall. After speeding through the annulus and finding a portal, she soared over the green region in the interior. She could no longer hear the voice. But Nicole could see her son Patrick camped with other soldiers near the base of the brown cylinder.
518 ARTHUR C. CLARKE AND GENTRY LEE
An avian with four cobalt rings met her in midair. He’s not here anymore, it said. Try New York. Nicole exited quickly from the second habitat and returned to the Central Plain. She heard the voice again. Up, up she went. Hawk Nicole could barely breathe.
She flew south over the perimeter wall enclosing the Northern Hemicylinder. The Cylindrical Sea was below her. The voice was now more distinct. It was Richard. Her hawk heart was pounding furiously.
He was standing on the shore, in front of the skyscrapers, waving at her. Come to me, Nicole, his voice said. She could see his eyes even in the dark. Nicole flew down and landed on Richard’s shoulder.
There was blackness around her. Nicole was back in her cell. Was that a bird she heard flying just outside her window? Her heart was still fluttering.
She walked across the small room. Thank you, Amadou, she said. Or Omeh. She smiled. Or God.
Nicole stretched out on her bed. A few seconds later she was asleep.
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