victories of centuries. And so such things, innocent as they might seem, were outlawed. Yet, their outlawry was probably not essential, for in a leveled world, where even the tallest, their backs aching, must bend down and pretend to be little, in a world in which elites, whether they existed or not, were illegal, a world which would by statute subvert, squander, and repudiate its occasional gifts won in the genetic lottery, its own pathfinders, its own commanders, its own aristocracy, as it might spring up here and there, like flowers and trees, the stars could not be achieved. How insignificant are the parameters of physics compared to the gravity of the mass. From that bulk what must be the accumulated force, the consolidated and directed power, that could achieve escape velocity? And so organisms such as Brenner and Rodriguez were, on the whole, little more than passengers, neglected and scorned, amongst the stars. Yet Brenner did not begrudge his fortunes. He would have come, really, even in spite of his being “assigned,” for he could have challenged the assignment, with anyone to the stars, even such as the captain, even such as Rodriguez. He was there, and this was enough for him. He would have been happy, could he have afforded it, to have purchased passage in steerage; he would, like many others, if he had received the opportunity, have been delighted to work his passage from system to system; he would have cheerfully kept cabins and polished brass; he would cheerfully have carved strange vegetables in the galleys; he would cheerfully have cleaned the cages of transported animals, even those of the blue-skinned Serian slave girls, bred for beauty and passion over generations, as loving as dogs, as incapable of rebellion as cattle and sheep; or even the slaves taken from his own planet, many of them, in their cages and chains, as lovely and as needful as the Serian sluts, women who had been homeless on a world shut against them and their deepest, loving nature. They would find worlds on which they were prized, worlds on which they brought high prices.
“I was saying,” said Brenner, returning to what had been on his mind before the visit of the captain, a visit a consequence perforce perhaps of etiquette, or perhaps even of his own innate politeness, as landfall, so to speak, at Abydos was to occur in a few divisions, ship time, or, to be more precise, a.s.t., adjusted ship time, her governing chronometer having been set, as was typically the case, and has been suggested, to commercial time, indexed to Commonworld, “that I have read your writings.”
“No, you haven’t,” said Rodriguez.
“I beg your pardon?” said Brenner. To be sure, he had probably not read everything which Rodriguez had written, but he had done his best to find what he could, shortly after learning the identity of his projected senior colleague. For the most part he had secured monographs in the library of his base university, to the faculty of which he was attached as an adjunct researcher, certain sections of which he had extracted for personal notes.
“What did you read?” asked Rodriguez.
“Congenital Heraldic Design: An Analysis of the Shells of Holarians,” said Brenner. “The Phratries of Chios, Ritual Meiosis: An Essay on Segmentation in Tunnel Societies, Avoidance Behaviors amongst the Milesian Amphibians, Asymmetrical Endogamy amongst Four-Spined Creodonts: A Study in Genetic Randomization, Aquatic Clans, Rites of Passage in Seven Societies, such things.”
“Rites of Passage?” asked Rodriguez, looking up.
“I found it in paper,” said Brenner.
“And you weren’t afraid to read it?”
“No,” said Brenner.
“Good,” said Rodriguez. “That was the first book I wrote which was banned.”
“I do not see why,” said Brenner. “It did little more than collect and record indisputable observations.”
Rodriguez laughed, a not pleasant laugh. Then he said, “My real writings are all in paper.”
“In books—with pages?” asked Brenner.
“That sort,” he said, moodily, “not the sort on spheres, not the sorts on cubes and plates. You can’t broadcast selective magnetic erasure signals, coded to the sphere, the plate, or cube, and destroy the manuscript, simultaneously, wherever it might exist, on an entire world.”
“‘Book burning’?” said Brenner.
“One match does for the entire pile,” said Rodriguez.
Brenner nodded.
“But with pages, with books with pages,” said Rodriguez, with a sort of grim satisfaction, apparently considering the labors set authorities, “you have to hunt down each one, each one, slowly, painfully, expensively. And how can you be sure you have them all, even if you have? There might be one in