THE MEMORY OF SKY

A GREAT SHIP TRILOGY

ROBERT REED

To the memory of Bette Boellstorff

Copyright © 2014 by Robert Reed.

Cover art by Benoit Penaud.

Cover design by Sherin Nicole.

Ebook designed by Neil Clarke.

ISBN: 978-1-60701-429-4 (ebook)

ISBN: 978-1-60701-426-3 (trade paperback)

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BOOK ONE

DIAMOND

PROLOGUE

“Standing on two feet and calling yourself human does not make you so,” says the man. “True humans are a noble, glorious species—an eternal family that has always been mortal and flawed, but keenly beautiful in that multitude of hearts.”

Then he pauses for a moment, forcing the numbers and nothingness to listen to silence.

“Ages ago, humanity stood against miserable odds,” he says. “Yet we managed to defeat a host of enemies as well as our own worst natures. As a prize, we were given a rich corner of the Creation and one long deceptive peace. But war is an endless business. War always returns, and not every battle will be won. A new enemy arose, rising straight from the souls of humans: immortal monsters, perfect and astonishingly lovely. Those monsters only pretended to be human. Instead of violence, they used smart words and charm and musical, intoxicating voices that unleashed every kind of wild promise. Bullets and nuclear plumes were nothing compared to those endless corruptions, and worst of all, the false humans could make every promise come true.

“Immortality was the most bewitching lure. Traditions and scruples were helpless against one soothing voice offering endless life and perfect health. A young man might listen to the siren call and then drift away before breakfast, never to return. Old women would pack their bags at midday, shamelessly limping off to claim vibrant new bodies. Fathers and mothers picked up their little ones, entire families slinking off in the night, repudiating honorable life to claim ten thousand years of monstrous existence.

“Ageless bodies demand superior minds. There are kinds of knowledge and knowing that only dense, eternal machines can master, and the lost people shamelessly mated with those machines—another abomination in the endless, one-sided struggle.

“The colossal war was unleashed, and true humans were losing.

“But the shreds of humanity gathered, and with old-fashioned minds, they decided on a bold strategy. Creation was full of places. One or two little corners had to exist where an honorable species could find its well-earned peace. This was why people joined together, marching into long forgotten realms. Humanity passed through and around and over and beneath every obstacle. Accidents killed many. New attritions came with every temptation. But the solemn, clear-eyed survivors arrived in a place that seemed nothing but perfect, and the last best souls settled down to make their final home.

“Except the Creation was relentless, and after a long age of safety, the great sanctuary grew porous, imperfect.

“Good souls stood on honorable legs, discussing and debating their miserable options. For three generations, wise scholars offered every moral solution. None were accepted. Then the fourth generation fell into an ugly slow war, the species collapsing into tribes, the tribes murdering one another with the age-old relish.

“And that was when one small boy drowned.

“His name and circumstances would soon be forgotten. True humans have brief perishable memories, which is as it should be. But the bare facts are that he slipped beneath a volume of chilled water, his last breath lost in a panic of bubbles. Blood grew purple and cold inside that shell of flesh. His mind fell away into darkness. Then a parent or perhaps an uncle grabbed a handful of hair and dragged him to the surface and pushed fresh air into his lungs, and somehow that cold dead mind remembered to live and came back from the Afterlife.

“Smothering water came up with the phlegm.

“His first words were, ‘I heard a voice.’

“ ‘You heard my voice,’ his savior agreed. ‘I was shouting at you, you careless shit.’

“ ‘No, I heard a new voice . . . while I was dead and gone,’ the boy said. ‘The voice told me what has to be done to save my people.’

“True humans can be intense believers, shamelessly superstitious to the brink of foolish. Yet it had been ages since any of them were instinctive followers of gods or wise demons. Suspicious citizens had gathered in a circle, watching and listening. ‘So whose voice was it?’ one bystander asked. ‘Do you know who was talking?’

“The boy nodded weakly, but he said nothing.

“ ‘And what did this voice tell you?’ another person asked.

“The boy wasn’t known as being especially bright or well-spoken, but the voice must have said quite a lot because he spoke without interruption, laying out a new journey and a fresh destination that none in the audience, not even the oldest wisest scholar could have imagined.

“Nobody believed him.

“Obviously the drowning had made him crazy. But the body quickly recovered its health, and as boys did in that day, he trained as a warrior, preparing to defend his tribe and his personal honor. But he never forgot the voice or its very clear message. On the eve of his first adult battle, he stole away fifty children and left the enclave. No great journey is easy. That little band endured forgotten adventures, defeating and confounding a host of monsters, but in the end, as their reward, they were allowed inside a place too remote to be named.

“This would be their home, just as the voice promised.

“ ‘But who was talking to you?’ asked one little girl. ‘When you were dead in the cold, who told you about this hiding place?’

“For the first and only time, the boy named their benefactor.

“ ‘The Great Ship spoke to me,’ he said with a soft voice.

“It was an unexpected joke, and it seemed funny. Everyone else laughed while the boy smiled patiently, and then everyone joined together in a communal embrace, and ten generations later, nobody could remember that day or any day that came before.”

ONE

The boy was real and his room was real but nothing else was. Other rooms and spaces larger than any room stood somewhere beyond the walls, but he couldn’t believe in what refused to be seen. He was the one authentic person and the one true life. Even Mother and Father existed only when they stood beside him, their giant faces covered with silken white masks, gloved hands cradling his tiny misshapen body. They told him that he was a beautiful baby despite his appearance. They wanted him to relish a long pleasant life, despite frailties and the endless fever. Their words began as slow senseless noise, but there was no mistaking the devotion and fear woven through their voices. Learning to love those giants, the boy grieved when they left him and he wished they could be real even if he was alone, and one day his door was closed and locked and he let himself imagine his parents standing inside a second room just like his own—an inspiration, an epiphany, born from his growing love.