“Welcome,” another identical voice had interrupted Richard’s thought. Again the sound seemed to be coming from all directions. “We hope everything in your apartment is satisfactory. If it is not, please tell us. We cannot possibly respond to everything that all of you say at all times. Therefore, a simple communication regimen has been established. On your kitchen counter is a white button. We wiil assume that everything said by an individual after pushing the white button is directed at us. When you are finished with your communication, push the white button again. In that way—”
“I have one question first,” Katie had then interrupted. She had run into the kitchen to push the button. “Just who are you, anyway?”
A tiny delay of maybe one second had preceded the answer. “We are the collective intelligence that governs the Node. We are here to assist you, to make you more comfortable, and to supply you with the essentials for living. We will also, from time to time, ask you to perform certain tasks that will help us to understand you better. …”
Nicole could no longer see the shuttle she had been watching out the window. Actually, she had been so deeply immersed in her memory of their arrival at the Node that she had temporarily forgotten the newcomers. Now, as she returned to the present, in her mind’s eye she imagined an assemblage of strange creatures disembarking on a platform and being startled upon hearing a voice address them in their native language. The experience of wonder must be universal, she thought. Belonging to alt conscious chemicals.
Her eyes lifted from the near field and focused on the Administration Module in the distance. What goes on over
THE GARDEN OF RAMA
139
there? Nicole wondered. We hapless creatures move back and forth between Habitation and Engineering. All our activities appear to be logically orchestrated. But by whom? And for what? Why has someone brought all these beings to this artificial world?
Nicole had no answer to these infinite questions. As usual, they gave her a powerful sense of her own insignificance. Her immediate impulse was to go back inside and hug one of her children. She laughed at herself. Both pictures are true indications of our position in the cosmos, she thought. We are both desperately important to our children and absolutely nothing in the grand scheme of things. It takes enormous wisdom to see that there is no inconsistency in those two points of view.
THE GARDEN OF RAMA
141
3
;reakfast was a celebration. They ordered a feast from the exceptional cooks who prepared their food. The designers of their apartment had considerately provided them with a variety of ovens and a full refrigerator, in case they wanted to prepare their own meals from the raw materials. However, the alien (or robot) cooks were so good, and so quickly trained, that Nicole and her family almost never prepared the meals themselves—they just pushed the white button and ordered.
“I want pancakes this morning,” Katie announced in the kitchen.
“Me too, me too,” her sidekick Patrick added.
“What kind of pancakes?” the voice intoned. “We have four different types in our memory. There is buckwheat, buttermilk—”
“Buttermilk,” interrupted Katie. “Three altogether,” She glanced at her little brother. “Better make it four.”
“With butter and maple syrup,” Patrick shouted.
“Four pancakes with butter and maple syrup,” said the voice. “Will that be all?”
“One apple juice and one orange juice as well,” Katie said after a brief consultation with Patrick.
“Six minutes and eighteen seconds,” the voice said.
When the food was ready, the family gathered at the round table in the kitchen. The youngest children explained to Nicole what they had been doing during her absence. Patrick was especially proud of his new personal record in the fifty-meter dash over in the exercise room. Benjy laboriously counted to ten and everyone applauded. They had just finished breakfast and were cleaning the dishes off the table when the doorbell rang.
The adults looked at each other and Richard walked over to the control console, where he turned on the video monitor. The Eagle was standing outside their door.
“I hope it’s not another test,” said Patrick spontaneously.
“No … no, I doubt it,” Nicole replied, moving toward the entryway. “He’s probably here to give us the results of the last experiments.”
Nicole took a deep breath before she opened the door. No matter how many times she encountered the Eagle, her adrenaline level always increased in his presence. Why was that? Was it his awesome knowledge that frightened her? Or his power over them? Or just the bewildering fact of his existence?
The Eagle greeted her with what she had come to recognize as a smile. “May I come in?” he said pleasantly. “I would like to talk to you, your husband, and Mr. OToole.”
Nicole stared at him (or it, her mind instantly flashed), as she always did. He was tall, maybe two and a quarter meters, and- shaped like a human being from the neck down. His arms and torso, however, were covered with small, tightly woven charcoal gray feathers—except for the four fingers on each hand, which were creamy white and featherless, Below his waist, the surface of the Eagle’s body was flesh-colored, but it was obvious from the sheen of his outer layer that no attempt had been made to duplicate real human skin. There was no hair below his waist and neither visible joints nor genitalia. His feet had no toes. When the Eagle walked, wrinkles developed around
142 ARTHUR C. CLARKE AND GENTRY LEE
the knee area, but they disappeared when he was standing still.
The Eagle’s face was mesmerizing. His head had two large, powder blue eyes on either side of a protruding grayish beak. When he talked the beak opened and his perfect English came from some kind of electronic voice box at the back of the throat. The feathers on the top of his head were white and contrasted sharply with the dark gray of his face, neck, and back. The feathering on his face was quite sparse and scattered.
“May I come in?” the Eagle repeated politely when Nicole did not move for several seconds.
“Of course … of course,” she replied, moving away from the door. “I’m sorry … I just hadn’t seen you for so long.”
“Good morning, Mr. Wakefield, Mr. O’Toole. Hello, children,” the Eagle said as he strode into the living room.
Patrick and Benjy both backed away from him. Of all the children, only Katie and little Ellie did not seem to be afraid.
“Good morning,” Richard replied. “And what can we do for you today?” he inquired. The Eagle never made social calls. There was always some purpose for his visits.
“As I told your wife at the door,” the Eagle replied, “I need to talk to ail three of you adults. Can Simone take care of the other children while we chat for an hour or so?”
Nicole had already started herding the children back into the playroom when the Eagle stopped her. “That won’t be necessary,” he said. “They can use the whole apartment. The four of us are going to the conference room across the hall.”
Uh-oh, Nicole thought immediately. This is something big. We’ve never left the children alone in the apartment before.
She was suddenly very concerned about their safety. “Excuse me, Mr. Eagle,” she said. “Will the children be all right here? I mean, they’re not going to have any special visitors or anything like that. …”
“No, Mrs. Wakefield,” the Eagle responded matter-of-
THE GARDEN OF RAMA
143
factly. “I give you my word that nothing will interfere with your children.”
Out in the atrium, when the three humans started to put on their space suits, the Eagle stopped them. “That won’t be necessary,” he said. “Last night we reconfigured this portion of the sector. We have sealed off the hall just before the junction and transformed this whole area into an Earthlike habitat. You’ll be able to use the conference room without putting on any special clothing.”
The Eagle started talking as soon as’ they sat down in the large conference room across the hall. “Since our first encounter you have repeatedly asked me questions about what you are doing here and I have not given you direct answers. Now that your final set of sleep tests is completed—successfully, I might add—I have been empowered to inform you about the next phase of your mission.
“I have also been given permission to tell you something about myself. As all of you have suspected, I am not a living creature—at least not by your definition.” The Eagle laughed. “I was created by the intelligence that governs the Node to interface with you on sensitive issues. Our early observations of your behavior indicated a reluctance on your part to interact with the disembodied voices. It had already been decided to create me, or something similar, as an emissary to your family when you, Mr. Wakefield, nearly caused serious chaos in this sector by trying to make an unscheduled and unapproved visit to the Administration Module. My appearance at that time was designed to preclude further untoward behavior.
Page: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109