Down in the Bottomlands

Plot

Radnal vez Krobir, a field biologist from the Homo neanderthalensis nation of Tartesh, works as a guide at Trench Park. During a tour, a military officer from the Kingdom of Morgaf is killed by another tourist. Radnal summons authorities, who discover a microprint in the deceased man's effects detailing a plot by the Krepalga, a Homo sapiens nation, to detonate a nuclear weapon near the Barrier Mountains. The explosion would rupture geologic faults, flooding the Bottomlands to create a new sea.

The conspirators sabotaged the tour party's transport, stranding them on the hot, dry abyssal plain. Radnal and others identify the killer, and a koprit bird—which steals shiny objects—unwittingly helps locate the bomb by taking the detonator wire, disguised as jewelry, to decorate its food-hoard bush. The bomb is defused. A task force of Tarteshan secret police, regular police, and army evacuates the party by giving each member a backpack tank of drinking water and marching them toward sea level, where a helicopter eventually flies them to safety.

Did You Know?

• The novella was first printed in January 1993 in the magazine Analog.
• It was reprinted in 1997 in The New Hugo Award Winners, Volume IV.
• A 2015 reprint appeared in a collection titled We Install and Other Stories.