Rama 3 – The Garden of Rama by Clarke, Arthur C.

“What is it precisely that you want to know?”

“I’ve told you already,” Nicole replied, her frustration showing. “What the hell is really going on in this place? Who or what are you? Why do you want to observe us? And while you’re at it, how about a good explanation of why you need for us to leave a ‘reproductive pair’ here? I’ve never liked the idea of breaking up my family—I

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should have protested more forcefully at the beginning. If your technology is so wonderful that it can create something like this incredible Node, why can’t you simply take a human egg and some sperm—”

“Calm down, Mrs. Wakefield,” the Eagle said. “I’ve never seen you so agitated before. I had you classified as the most stable individual in your group.”

And most malleable too, I’ll bet, Nicole thought. She waited for her anger to subside. Somewhere in that bizarre brain is doubtless a quantitative assessment of the probability that I would meekly follow orders. . . . Well, I fooled you this time. . . .

“Look, Mr. Eagle,” Nicole said a few seconds later, “I’m not stupid. I know who is in control here. I just think we humans deserve to be treated with a little more respect. Our questions are quite legitimate.”

“And if we answer them to your satisfaction?”

“You’ve been watching me carefully for over a year,” Nicole said. She smiled. “Have I ever been completely unreasonable?”

“Where are we going?” Nicole asked.

“On a short tour,” the Eagle replied. “That may be the best way to deal with your uncertainties.”

The strange vehicle was small and spherical, just large enough for the Eagle and Nicole. The entire front hemisphere was transparent. Behind the window, on the side where the alien birdman was sitting, was a small control panel. During the flight the Eagle occasionally touched the panel, but most of the time the craft seemed to be operating on its own.

Within seconds after they were seated inside, the sphere zipped down a long corridor and through a large set of double doors into total blackness. Nicole gasped. She felt as if she were floating in space.

“Each of the three spherical modules of the Node,” the Eagle said, as Nicole struggled vainly to see anything at all, “has a hollow center. We have now entered a passageway that leads to the core of the Habitation Module.”

After almost a minute some distant lights appeared in front of their small craft. Soon thereafter the vehicle

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emerged from the black passageway and entered the immense hollow core. The sphere flipped and turned, disorienting Nicole as it headed toward the darkness, away from the many lights on what must have been the inside of the main body of the Habitation Module.

“We observe everything that occurs with all our guest species, both temporary and permanent,” the Eagle said. “As you have suspected, we have hundreds of monitoring devices inside your apartment. But all your walls are also one-way mirrors—from this core region we can watch your activities from a wider perspective.”

Nicole had grown accustomed to the wonders of the Node, but the new sights around her were still staggering. Dozens, maybe hundreds of tiny blinking lights moved about in the vast darkness of the core. They looked like a group of scattered fireflies on a dark summer night. Some of the lights were hovering near the walls; others were moving slowly across the void. Some were so far away that they seemed to be standing still.

“We have a major maintenance center here as well,” the Eagle said, pointing in front of them at a dense collection of lights in the distance. “Every element of the module can be reached very quickly from this core, in case there are engineering or any other kind of problems.”

“What’s going on over there?” Nicole asked, tapping on the window. About twenty kilometers to the right a group of vehicles were stationed just away from a large, illuminated portion of the Habitation Module.

“That’s a special observation session,” the Eagle replied, “using our most advanced remote sensing monitors. Those particular apartments house an unusual species, one that has characteristics never before recorded in this sector of the Galaxy. Many of its individuals are dying and we do not understand why. We are trying to figure out how to save them.”

” So everything doesn’ t always work the way you planned it?”

“No,” replied the Eagle. In the reflected light the creature seemed to be smiling. “That’s why we have so many contingency plans.”

“What would you have done if no humans had ever

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come to find out about Rama in the first place?” Nicole suddenly asked.

“We have alternate methods of accomplishing the same goals,” the Eagle answered vaguely.

The vehicle accelerated along its chordal path in the darkness. Soon a similar sphere, slightly larger than theirs, approached them from the left. “Would you like to meet a member of a species whose development level is approximately equal to yours?” the Eagle said. He touched the control panel and the interior of their craft was illuminated by soft lights.

Before Nicole could respond, the second vehicle was beside mem. It also had a transparent forward hemisphere. This second sphere was filled with a colorless liquid, and two creatures were swimming about. They looked like large eels wearing capes, and they moved in undulations through the liquid. Nicole estimated that the creatures were about three meters long and twenty centimeters thick. The black cape, which spread out like a wing during movement, was about a meter wide when fully extended.

“The one on your right, without the colored markings,” the Eagle said, “is an artificial intelligence system. It serves a role similar to mine, acting as a host for the aquatic species. The other being is a spacefarer from another world.”

Nicole stared at the alien. It had folded its cape tightly around its slightly greenish body and was sitting nearly motionless in the liquid. The creature had arranged itself in a horseshoe configuration with both ends of its body facing her. A burst of bubbles came from one of its two ends.

“It says, ‘Hello, and wow are you intriguing,’ ” the Eagle said.

“How do you know that?” Nicole replied, unable to take her eyes off the bizarre being. Its two ends, one bright red and the other gray, had now wrapped around each other. Both were pressed against the window of the craft.

“My colleague in the other vehicle is translating and then communicating to me. . . .Do you wish to respond?”

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Nicole’s mind was a blank. What do I say? she thought, her eyes focused on the unusual wrinkles and protuberances on the alien’s extremities. There were half a dozen separate features on each end, including a pair of white slits on the red “face.” None of me markings looked like anything that Nicole had ever seen on the Earth. She stared silently, remembering the many conversations that she and Richard and Michael had had about the questions they would ask if, and when, they were ever able to communicate directly with an intelligent extraterrestrial. But we never imagined a situation like this, Nicole thought.

More bubbles flooded the window opposite her. “Our home planet accreted five billion years ago,” the Eagle said, translating. “Our binary stars reached stability a billion years later. Our system has fourteen major planets, on two of which some kind of life evolved. Our oceanic planet has three intelligent species, but we are the only spacefarers. We began our space exploration slightly more man two thousand years ago.”

Nicole was now embarrassed by her silence. “Hello . . . hello,” she said haltingly. “It is a pleasure to meet you. . . . Our species has only been spacefarers for three hundred years. We are the only highly intelligent organism on a planet that is two thirds covered by water. Our heat and light come from a solitary, stable, yellow star. Our evolution began in the water, three or four billion years ago, but now we live on the land—”

Nicole stopped. The other creature, its two ends still entwined, had now brought the rest of its body over against the window so that the details of its physical structure could be seen more clearly. Nicole understood. She stood up next to the window and turned around slowly. Then she held her hands out, wiggling her fingers. More bubbles followed.

“Do you have an alternate manifestation?” the Eagle translated a few seconds later.

“I don’t understand,” Nicole replied. The Nodal host in the other sphere communicated her message using both body motions and bubbles.

“We have two manifestations,” the alien explained. “My offspring will have appendages, not unlike yours,

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