Fate of Worlds: Return From the Ringworld Read online

  Fate of Worlds: Return From the Ringworld

  Larry Niven

  Edward M. Lerner

  For decades, the spacefaring species of Known Space have battled over the largest artifact — and grandest prize — in the galaxy: the all-but-limitless resources and technology of the Ringworld. But without warning, the Ringworld has vanished, leaving behind three rival war fleets.

  Something must justify the blood and treasure that have been spent. If the fallen civilization of the Ringworld can no longer be despoiled of its secrets, the Puppeteers will be forced to surrender theirs. Everyone knows that the Puppeteers are cowards.

  But the crises converging upon the trillion Puppeteers of the Fleet of Worlds go far beyond even the onrushing armadas:

  Adventurer Louis Wu and the exiled Puppeteer known only as Hindmost, marooned together for more than a decade, escaped from the Ringworld before it disappeared. And throughout those years, as he studied Ringworld technology, Hindmost has plotted to reclaim his power ...

  Ol''t''ro, the Gw''oth ensemble mind — and the Fleet of Worlds'' unsuspected puppet master for a century — is deviously brilliant. And increasingly unbalanced ...

  Proteus, the artificial intelligence on which, in desperation, the Puppeteers rely to manage their defenses, is outgrowing its programming — and the supposed constraints on its initiative ...

  Sigmund Ausfaller, paranoid and disgraced hero of the lost human colony of New Terra, knows that something threatens his adopted home world — and that it must be stopped ...

  Achilles, the megalomaniac Puppeteer — twice banished, and twice rehabilitated — sees the Fleet of Worlds'' existential crisis as a new opportunity to reclaim supreme power. Whatever the risks ...

  One way or another, the fabled race of Puppeteers may have come to the end of their days.

  Larry Niven, Edward M. Lerner

  Fate of Worlds: Return From the Ringworld

  To big ideas. And to those who dare to dream them.

  DRAMATIS PERSONAE

  HUMANS

  Sigmund Ausfaller: retired Defense Minister; New Terra resident; Earth expatriate.

  Julia Byerley-Mancini: Captain in the New Terran Defense Forces; commander of starship Endurance; leader, expedition to “The Anomaly”; granddaughter of Sigmund Ausfaller.

  Alice Jordan: member, expedition to “The Anomaly”; New Terra resident; Sol system expatriate.

  Donald Norquist-Ng: Minister, New Terran Defense Forces.

  Denise Rodgers-Bjornstad: Governor (planetary executive), New Terra.

  Louis Wu: Earthborn adventurer; member of both Ringworld expeditions; newly escaped from the Ringworld.

  Tanya Wu: Earthborn junior naval officer aboard ARM vessel Koala.

  Wesley Wu: Earthborn naval officer commanding Koala, deployed to the Artifact Monitoring Mission.

  GW’OTH

  (FLEET OF WORLDS [NATURE PRESERVE FIVE] RESIDENTS UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED)

  Cd’o: A Gw’o unit from the Ol’t’ro ensemble mind; born on the colony world of Kl’mo.

  Er’o: Memory remnant within Ol’t’ro of a long-dead Gw’o unit; veteran of the Pak War.

  Ol’t’ro: the Gw’oth ensemble mind (a Gw’otesht-16) who secretly rules the Fleet of Worlds; also see artificial intelligence Proteus and Citizen/Puppeteer Chiron.

  Tf’o: the Gw’o leader in the joint Gw’oth/Citizen expedition lurking around the Ringworld.

  ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCES

  Hawking: AI managing tactical operations of Earth’s Task Force Delta within the Artifact Monitoring Mission.

  Jeeves: Any of the many AIs descended from the shipboard intelligence of the ramscoop Long Pass (from whose embryo banks New Terra was populated).

  Proteus: AI that manages the Hearth/Fleet of Worlds defensive grid; controlled by Ol’t’ro. As a minor function, it also animates the “Citizen” known as Chiron.

  Voice: AI long in exile with Hindmost on the Ringworld.

  CITIZENS/PUPPETEERS

  (HEARTH RESIDENTS UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED)

  Achilles:planetary hindmost[*] of Nature Preserve One; member of Experimentalist Party; former Hindmost[*]; former Minister of Science; former physicist.

  Baedeker:former Hindmost[*]; former Minister of Science; former engineer; member of Experimentalist Party; in off-world exile.

  Chiron:longtime Minister of Science and planetary hindmost[*] of Nature Preserve Five; secretly a network persona animated by Proteus; Ol’t’ro’s stealthy presence within the Citizen government.

  Hindmost:deposed Hindmost[*]; member of Experimentalist Party; hindmost[*] of the second Ringworld expedition; newly escaped from the Ringworld.

  Horatius:Hindmost[*] — as a pawn of Ol’t’ro — since soon after the first Ringworld expedition; head of the Conservative Party.

  Minerva: Citizen head in the joint Gw’oth/Citizen expedition lurking around the Ringworld. A deputy director of Clandestine Directorate.

  Nessus:onetime senior agent/scout of Clandestine Directorate; hindmost[*] of the first Ringworld expedition; in exile on New Terra.

  Nike: former head of Clandestine Directorate; former Hindmost; Experimentalist.

  Vesta: longtime deputy to Achilles; Experimentalist.

  KEY DATES

  2645

  Puppeteers and their worlds flee the galactic-core explosion

  2650–51

  Human slaves rebel; New Terra (was Nature Preserve Four) goes free

  2659

  Puppeteer effort to reclaim New Terra fails

  2675

  The Pak War

  2780–81

  The Gw’oth War

  2783

  Isolationist New Terran regime veers away from the Fleet of Worlds

  2850–52

  Ringworld discovered; first expedition to the Ringworld

  2878–93

  Second expedition to the Ringworld; explorers all stranded

  ?–2893

  War among many spacefaring species for control of the Ringworld

  (Dates follow Earth’s calendar and reflect Earth’s frame of reference. During much of this era, New Terra and the Fleet of Worlds traveled fast enough relative to Earth to experience significant relativistic time dilation.)

  PRELUDE

  Earth Date: 2893

  A beautiful world, alone, serene, races through the interstellar void. Warmed by necklaces of artificial suns orbiting from pole to pole, the world’s climate is everywhere and always temperate. Beneath the many suns, oceans sparkle and cloud tops gleam. Bountiful fields and lush forests span continents. Here and there cities stand, proud and prosperous.

  The human inhabitants call this paradise New Terra. Only in story do they remember the days when their home was known merely as Nature Preserve Four. When their home was but one farm world among many in the Fleet of Worlds. When alien masters ruled their lives. “Citizens,” the aliens called themselves and, moreover, “saviors.”

  But young and old on New Terra know the hard-won truth: that their former masters had attacked their ancestors’ ramscoop, not chanced upon a derelict starship. That from the wrecked ship’s embryo banks the aliens had bred a race of slaves.

  Independence had not come easily, but now New Terra sets its own course through space.

  And what of Old Terra? Earth? No one here could say where the ancestral world may lie.

  Not only artificial suns accompany New Terra on its seemingly endless trek through the darkness. Myriads of tiny spacecraft, sprinkled across many light-days, hold formation with the world. The early-warning array endlessly scans in all directions, endlessly probing with every k
nown method of long-range sensing.

  In the planetary defense center, staffed round the clock, people try to imagine against what, besides boredom, they stand guard. New Terra is light-years from the nearest star. Aboard their Fleet of Worlds, the ruthlessly cowardly Citizens — increasingly, and aptly, come to be known to all here as Puppeteers — have receded beyond the reach of every instrument except powerful optical telescopes.

  Suddenly every element in the planetary early-warning array clamors in unison. Every watch stander in the planetary defense center jolts to full alertness to stare at their consoles.

  To gape at the impossible.

  RIPPLE

  Earth Date: 2893

  1

  “There is an intruder, sir,” Jeeves announced, breaking the silence.

  Sigmund Ausfaller sighed. Age had not so much mellowed as exhausted him. The universe was out to get him, and so what? It had been — years? — since he had mustered the energy to care. Maybe it had been years since he had cared that he no longer cared.

  “Sir?”

  Shading his eyes with an upraised hand, Sigmund peered across the desert. The day’s final string of suns was low to the horizon. Here and there, scattered across barren landscape, cacti cast long shadows. A lone bird glided overhead. Beyond the limits of his stone patio, civilization had left no visible mark.

  A cluster of cacti reminded him of other columns. Long ago. Far away. Columns of a world-shattering machine. And they had shattered a world, although by the time it had happened he had been dead. That happened to him far too often. The getting dead part. Peril to entire worlds, too, but —

  “You should withdraw to safety, sir,” Jeeves prompted.

  Sigmund sighed again, this time at himself. Age made one’s mind wander. So did living by oneself. Not that, with Jeeves around, he was truly alone. To be old and alone —

  “Sir,” Jeeves insisted.

  Sigmund struggled out of his big mesh hammock to stand. “Describe the intruder.”

  “An antigrav flitter. It’s on approach from the east at just within the low-altitude speed limit.”

  “Visual sighting?”

  “Too distant at present. Radar, sir.”

  “How long until it arrives?”

  “Ten minutes, sir, if the craft maintains its current velocity.”

  Sigmund glanced at the dark circle inset in a corner of his patio. The circle was the bottom of a stepping disc. Apart from its active side being obstructed — and so rendered inert — the device was like millions across the world. Flip to light-colored side up and in one pace he could teleport at light speed to any disc of his choosing, almost anywhere on the planet.

  But were he to invert the disc, then others, if they had the authority to preempt his privacy settings, could teleport here.

  Sigmund valued his privacy, and his stepping disc stayed upside down.

  And to be honest, his disc was not exactly like the millions of others. The micro-fusion reactor on this disc would overload seconds after he stepped out, destroying all record of his destination.

  He really valued his privacy.

  “Sir?”

  Sigmund considered. “They’re not stealthed. They’re approaching from the east, easy to spot, not flying out of the setting suns. They want us to know they’re coming.” Sigmund gestured at his modest home, in which, on the oaken desk he had crafted by hand, his pocket comp sat powered down. “It’s not as though they can call ahead.”

  “Very good, sir,” Jeeves said in his gentleman’s gentleman tone of voice: acknowledgment and mild reproach together.

  Jeeves was more ancient even than Sigmund. The butler mannerisms that had once been a few lines of code — an affectation or a jape on someone’s part — had, over the centuries, permeated every facet of the AI’s persona. Kind of like paranoia in Sigmund’s brain.

  Friends don’t reprogram friends, even when they’re able.

  Sigmund dropped back with a grunt into his hammock. “Let’s find out what our visitor wants.”

  * * *

  THE FLITTER MORPHED from invisible to droning speck to, all of a sudden, here. Sigmund stood watching as the craft swooped in for a landing on the windswept sands. The canopy pivoted upward from its aft edge; a woman, dressed in the trim blue uniform of the New Terran Defense Forces, stepped out of the cockpit.

  “Good evening, Minister,” his granddaughter called.

  Minister. An official visit, as though her uniform would not have told Sigmund that.

  “It’s hot,” Sigmund said. “Join me in the shade, Captain.”

  “Thank you, sir.” Julia looked around before joining Sigmund under the awning that overhung half the patio. She was a tall, lithe, beautiful woman with pale blue eyes and shoulder-length ash-blond hair.

  “Sit, Captain. May I get you something to drink?”

  “No, thank you, sir.” His visitor stood, ill at ease, uniform cap clutched under an arm.

  Her nametag read BYERLEY-MANCINI. Sunslight reflecting off the nametag rendered a shimmering hologram, detailed beyond the capability of badge-sized photonics to mimic. So, too, did her rank insignia. On a world where everyone dressed in garments of programmable nanocloth, where on a whim the wearer could change the color, texture, and pattern of her clothing, the credentials of the planetary defense forces remained — special. And, in theory, difficult to counterfeit.

  In progeny and in uniforms, Sigmund’s legacy survived. And in a third respect: that New Terra remained free and whole. If others had had their way …

  “If I may, sir,” Julia prompted gently, as though channeling Jeeves.

  “Go ahead,” Sigmund said. “What brings you here?”

  “An astrophysical phenomenon, sir. An anomaly.”

  Sigmund twitched. Twice in his long life he had been marooned, alone, deep in space. Three times he had been murdered, each death grislier than the last. A glimpse of an astrophysical phenomenon had presaged his most recent death and, after resurrection, left him stranded in interstellar space.

  Turbulence in the ineffably tenuous interstellar medium. An uptick in concentrations of interstellar helium. Only by such subtleties had the Pak invasion armada, wave upon wave of ramscoop warships, given warning of its coming.

  The Pak were genocidal xenophobes, a pestilence upon every other form of life. As protectors, the neuter postadult life stage, Pak were freakishly brilliant, reflexively aggressive, utterly selfish in the defense of their bloodlines. Eating tree-of-life root transformed an adult, what protectors dismissively called a breeder, into a protector.

  Humanity, it turned out, descended from a Pak colony that had failed on Earth millions of years ago, because Earth lacked trace elements essential to tree-of-life. From the Pak perspective humans were, rather than distant cousins, mutants to be obliterated.

  Sigmund shivered, all too aware that the universe cared not a fig for his memories or his phobias.

  Julia was doing her best to hide her feelings, but beneath a stoic, professional veneer she was tense. Perhaps only someone who knew her well would notice.

  Sigmund said, “I’m no astrophysicist.” Open up, Julia. Tell me what’s troubling you.

  “Understood, sir.” Julia hesitated. “Is Jeeves with us?”

  “Indeed, sir,” the AI intoned.

  “This is a matter of world security, Minister,” Julia said.

  “Jeeves and I are both fossils. Our security clearances, like my title, are long lapsed.” Never mind that, as far as this world was concerned, Sigmund was the one who had invented security clearances. That he had built from nothing what had been known on his watch as the Ministry of Defense. Never mind that Julia would have no inkling what a fossil was. Life beyond the single-celled was too recently imported to New Terra to have left fossils. “Whatever this anomaly is, you’ve come to tell me about it. So, tell.”

  “Right.” Julia took a deep breath. “Something impossible has happened. You’re familiar with space-time ripples as ships en
ter and leave hyperspace?”

  Sigmund nodded.

  “Yesterday, the planetary defense array detected a … big ripple.”

  “How big?” Sigmund asked.

  “That’s the thing, sir. It can’t be that big.”

  And so your superiors sent you to see what alternate explanation my devious brain can conjure. “How big did the ripple look to be?” Sigmund persisted. “How many ships?”

  “The ripple was reported by every sensor in the array. Saturation strength.”

  The array that surrounded New Terra. An array — at least during Sigmund’s tenure in the Ministry — deployed in concentric spheres across vast distances. To saturate all the sensors at once would require an unbelievable number of ships, many emerging almost on top of New Terra.

  He tamped down resurgent memories of Pak war fleets. This was no time to get lost in the past.

  After detecting ships nearby, the first step in the alert protocol would have been a hyperwave radar sweep. He asked, “And radar showed what?”

  “Nothing,” Julia said. “That’s part of what’s odd.”

  Because no one had ever found a way to disguise the interaction between a hyperwave and normal matter. That didn’t mean no one ever would. “I imagine the Defense Forces dispatched ships. And found nothing?”

  “Right, sir.”

  Very puzzling. “Just the one ripple?” Sigmund asked.

  “Yes, sir. Whatever emerged from hyperspace didn’t drop back into it. That, or these ships came a great distance through normal space, shielded from our sensors, waiting until they were on top of us before jumping into hyperspace to speed away. Either would explain a single ripple.”

  “A huge fleet, after sneaking up on us and shrieking the news of its arrival, continues on its way? I don’t believe that, either.”

  “Nor do our analysts.” She hesitated. “They need you at the Ministry to figure it out.”