The Legacy of Heorot
Encyclopedia
The Legacy of Heorot is a science fiction
novel written in 1987 by Larry Niven
, Jerry Pournelle
, and Steven Barnes
. Reproduction and fertility expert Dr Jack Cohen
acted as a consultant on the book, designing the novel life cycle of the alien antagonists, the grendels.
This is the first book in the Heorot series. It concerns the establishment of the first human colony on Avalon, fourth planet of Tau Ceti
.
on the starship Geographic (the expedition is funded by the National Geographic Society
). The colonists, all selected for their outstanding physical and mental attributes, make a terrible discovery: though the suspended animation
technology permitted them to survive the journey worked well enough, it had unforeseeable side effects due to the unprecedented duration of its use. Their intelligence and reasoning skill are damaged. Some are only mildly afflicted, while others have mental retardation
. One of them was once a renowned scientist, but now has the mind of a prepubescent child. Eight of the colonists could not be reanimated at all. The book opens with the colonists learning how to live without the sharp and nimble minds they all once had.
At first all seems well, as the colonists build a town on the island of Camelot and begin growing crops and stocking the nearby waters with terrestrial
species of fish to complement the samlon, a local aquatic species. The island seems like a paradise, and the colonists quickly become overconfident in their security, much to the frustration of the expedition security officer (and only former soldier), Cadmann Wayland.
But then unsettling events begin to happen: missing animals, fences torn down, etc. The colonists' impaired minds prevent them from properly analysing what is going on, and in a panic Cadmann is blamed, accused of deliberate sabotage to further his agenda. However, when a baby and its mother are killed while Cadmann and his only supporter are away on a hunt for the creature he believes is the cause, the colonists become increasingly irrational. When he returns alone (His companion having been killed during the hunt), badly wounded, and with a chunk of burnt tissue he claims is from the monster, he is drugged and restrained - completely helpless when the creature (named by the colonists as a "grendel" after the character in the poem
Beowulf
) attacks the camp in revenge.
Despite the colonists' advanced weapons (fully automatic machine-guns, slug shotguns, even flame-throwers) and larger numbers, ten people are killed just to drive the lone, gravely wounded creature away. This proves to all the colonists that there is a deadly and efficient predator native to the island. Cadmann, however, is now completely unwilling to assist the community that mocked, demonised, and finally left him helpless to be killed by the creature.
He leaves the colony to set up a homestead on a bluff further up the mountain that forms the basis of the island, hunting the island's only large animal life for food, and spending the rest of his time in wallowing in despair, hatred and moonshine liquor.
He is completely disillusioned with committees and short-sightedness, and when a woman joins him in the hopes of persuading him to return, he demands her fealty as long as she stays - every kind of fealty a man can possibly get from a woman. She stays, and after she conceives his child, he has an epiphany: the colonists may have brutalized and betrayed him, but their children are innocent, and deserve to be protected. Thus she is the reason he decides to return and lead the fight against the grendels.
He makes it clear that he is not interested in the day-to-day workings of the colony, only its defence. If the colonists want his assistance, they will have it only as long as they accept it - if they reject it even once he will leave and never return. The deal is made, and preparations for conflict begin.
The autopsy leads to terrifying revelations. They are crocodilia
n in appearance and behaviour, complete with jaws that can crush steel. Their bones are significantly stronger than those of humans, as they are not based on calcium. They have a sense of smell better than a dog
s. Studying its brain shows it is not fully sapient, but that it is not far off, and is at least as smart as a gorilla
. Its claws are not just weapons, but exert enough traction
for the creature to sprint up rocky cliffs. Though it is not a true amphibian - it cannot breathe water - it does possess an integral snorkel enabling it to move undetected beneath several feet of water. Its cardiovascular system and musculature give it strength and stamina far beyond that of humans, and that is without its primary evolutionary advantage: A super-oxygenated blood supplement.
A grendel can, on demand, release a chemical supercharger into its blood that does to it what Nitrous Oxide
does to internal combustion engine
s - enable short bursts of speed in excess of a hundred miles per hour. This is the primary trait makes the grendels so dangerous - and the key to their destruction. The supercharger, when used, generates large amounts of waste-heat that warm up their bodies so rapidly they effectively "cook themselves" and will die after using it if they do not immediately return to the water to cool off. With this knowledge added to Cadmann's tactics, combined with the colony's weapons and technology, the colonists are able to wipe out the grendel population within several months, making Cadmann a hero to the people who previously turned on him.
But the glory is short-lived. Despite the periodic updates from the colonists, Earth is abandoning the colonization program. There will be no new ships, no new colonies. Avalon is unique.
Then catastrophe. A disturbing discovery has been made - the grendels' primary food source. The grendels and the samlon are actually the same species. Their life cycle is similar to that of terrestrial frog
s - the herbivorous samlon are in fact the juvenile form of the carnivorous grendels. Like certain species of frogs, they change gender over the course of their lifetimes. The juvenile samlon are male. The adult grendels are female. Interaction is unnecessary as the grendels continually lay their unfertilized eggs in the water for the samlon to fertilize. And like many species of frogs, they are cannibalistic - if no other prey is present, they will eat their own young.
At some point in the recent past, most of the prey animals on the island were destroyed by an unknown cataclysmic event. (It is left to the reader to draw conclusions as to what actually happened. Over-predation by the grendels is subtly suggested). Among the few surviving species on the island were the samlon, and thus the grendels. Cannibalism became the rule instead of the exception. Only the fastest juvenile samlon survived predation by grendel females to become adult grendels themselves, and this drove the species to evolve at an immensely accelerated rate. This resulted in the incredible predatory abilities of the grendels.
When the colonists introduced terrestrial fish into the ecosystem, they provided the grendels with an additional food source. Where once there were only one or two grendels on the island at any given time due to their territorial behaviour pattern, dozens of samlon became grendels. This is why the attacks began in the first place.
The colonists have just exterminated the adult grendels. There is now no check at all on the samlon population. Within a very short period of time, they all become grendels. Instead of a few dozen grendels, there are now thousands. The fight between the colonists and the grendels is no longer a hunt - it is a war.
-like feeding frenzy
by spraying them with blood taken from dead grendels, especially if it is laced with traces of the "supercharger" chemical extracted from the organ that secretes it, as this chemical triggers an immediate "fight" instinct. Tracer bullet
s are also used to ignite the supercharger gland in their bodies. The colonists ultimately discover and utilize a new tactic - they harvest supercharger from dead grendels and spray it over the grendel horde with crop dusting equipment, driving hundreds of them into a frenzy and killing many of those remaining.
But as the grendels' numbers fall, their individual strength rises - every dead grendel is food for the rest. Eventually, all that remain are full-grown grendels, and the colonists make a planned retreat to Cadmann's Bluff, Cadmann's carefully designed mountain hideaway which has been well-stocked and defenses reinforced.
Unfortunately, a mistake is made - upon their arrival, a grendel is killed in the river next to Cadmann's Bluff, and its blood enters the river, drawing the rest up the stream toward them. However, this is realized immediately, and preparations are made. As the horde approaches, they are sprayed with more supercharger, sending them into a frenzy once more. When they begin climbing the Bluff, Cadmann sets off an avalanche using a deadfall, killing even more.
And then it is over. The grendels, though not as smart as humans, are smart enough to learn, given time and lots of experience. Their behavior changes, suggesting that they realize that the remaining colonists are not worth dying to reach, not when there are other grendels to kill. The humans have defeated the grendels. Camelot is theirs.
A year later, the grendels are being driven to extinction. Now that the grendel life cycle is known, the colonists continue the hunts, but this time the samlon are targeted as well. New tactics - supercharger spraying and recorded grendel challenges - make them almost a chore. The terrestrial fish are gone, and will not be reintroduced, forcing the grendels to drive their own species into extinction. Soon the grendel threat will be eradicated.
Now rebuilding can begin, and this time, they will not be caught unaware. The mainland is being carefully explored, and the colonists have high hopes. Communications with Earth were cut off by the Grendel Wars. Now that it is over, perhaps the story of their battle will inspire Earth's population to new adventures, to restart the colonization program. If suitably motivated, they might come to Avalon, a known inhabitable world. New colonists would be welcome, and new equipment would be invaluable. But they can survive without it.
The colonists came to make Avalon a new home for humanity, and have survived a great test. Now they understand that if they wish to survive, they cannot become complacent. Camelot is just one corner of a vast world. Who knows what lies in store?
The book also draws from some of Robert A. Heinlein
's work involving the adage "if you desire peace, prepare for war," in exploring the conflict between the civilian leadership of the colony who see no danger, and the military advisor who believes that danger always exists in the future. Cadmann is successively treated as crackpot, savior, scapegoat, and hero as the needs of the colony for his talents change.
Finally, the book explores the social dynamics of a situation where nobody can trust anybody else's judgement, not even their own. The eventual outcome of this is more fully detailed in the sequel, Beowulf's Children
.
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
novel written in 1987 by Larry Niven
Larry Niven
Laurence van Cott Niven / ˈlæri ˈnɪvən/ is an American science fiction author. His best-known work is Ringworld , which received Hugo, Locus, Ditmar, and Nebula awards. His work is primarily hard science fiction, using big science concepts and theoretical physics...
, Jerry Pournelle
Jerry Pournelle
Jerry Eugene Pournelle is an American science fiction writer, essayist and journalist who contributed for many years to the computer magazine Byte and has since 1998 been maintaining his own website/blog....
, and Steven Barnes
Steven Barnes
Steven Barnes is an African American science fiction writer, lecturer, creative consultant, and human performance technician....
. Reproduction and fertility expert Dr Jack Cohen
Jack Cohen (scientist)
Jack Cohen, FIBiol is a British reproductive biologist also known for his popular science books and involvement with science fiction.-Life:...
acted as a consultant on the book, designing the novel life cycle of the alien antagonists, the grendels.
This is the first book in the Heorot series. It concerns the establishment of the first human colony on Avalon, fourth planet of Tau Ceti
Tau Ceti
Tau Ceti is a star in the constellation Cetus that is spectrally similar to the Sun, although it has only about 78% of the Sun's mass. At a distance of just under 12 light-years from the Solar System, it is a relatively close star. Tau Ceti is metal-deficient and so is thought to be less likely to...
.
Plot setup
Two hundred colonists arrive on Avalon to found a new community, having made the 100-year journey from Earth in suspended animationSuspended animation
Suspended animation is the slowing of life processes by external means without termination. Breathing, heartbeat, and other involuntary functions may still occur, but they can only be detected by artificial means. Extreme cold can be used to precipitate the slowing of an individual's functions; use...
on the starship Geographic (the expedition is funded by the National Geographic Society
National Geographic Society
The National Geographic Society , headquartered in Washington, D.C. in the United States, is one of the largest non-profit scientific and educational institutions in the world. Its interests include geography, archaeology and natural science, the promotion of environmental and historical...
). The colonists, all selected for their outstanding physical and mental attributes, make a terrible discovery: though the suspended animation
Suspended animation
Suspended animation is the slowing of life processes by external means without termination. Breathing, heartbeat, and other involuntary functions may still occur, but they can only be detected by artificial means. Extreme cold can be used to precipitate the slowing of an individual's functions; use...
technology permitted them to survive the journey worked well enough, it had unforeseeable side effects due to the unprecedented duration of its use. Their intelligence and reasoning skill are damaged. Some are only mildly afflicted, while others have mental retardation
Mental retardation
Mental retardation is a generalized disorder appearing before adulthood, characterized by significantly impaired cognitive functioning and deficits in two or more adaptive behaviors...
. One of them was once a renowned scientist, but now has the mind of a prepubescent child. Eight of the colonists could not be reanimated at all. The book opens with the colonists learning how to live without the sharp and nimble minds they all once had.
At first all seems well, as the colonists build a town on the island of Camelot and begin growing crops and stocking the nearby waters with terrestrial
Terraforming
Terraforming of a planet, moon, or other body is the hypothetical process of deliberately modifying its atmosphere, temperature, surface topography or ecology to be similar to those of Earth, in order to make it habitable by terrestrial organisms.The term is sometimes used more generally as a...
species of fish to complement the samlon, a local aquatic species. The island seems like a paradise, and the colonists quickly become overconfident in their security, much to the frustration of the expedition security officer (and only former soldier), Cadmann Wayland.
But then unsettling events begin to happen: missing animals, fences torn down, etc. The colonists' impaired minds prevent them from properly analysing what is going on, and in a panic Cadmann is blamed, accused of deliberate sabotage to further his agenda. However, when a baby and its mother are killed while Cadmann and his only supporter are away on a hunt for the creature he believes is the cause, the colonists become increasingly irrational. When he returns alone (His companion having been killed during the hunt), badly wounded, and with a chunk of burnt tissue he claims is from the monster, he is drugged and restrained - completely helpless when the creature (named by the colonists as a "grendel" after the character in the poem
Grendel
Grendel is one of three antagonists, along with Grendel's mother and the dragon, in the Anglo-Saxon epic poem Beowulf . Grendel is usually depicted as a monster, though this is the subject of scholarly debate. In the poem, Grendel is feared by all but Beowulf.-Story:The poem Beowulf is contained in...
Beowulf
Beowulf
Beowulf , but modern scholars agree in naming it after the hero whose life is its subject." of an Old English heroic epic poem consisting of 3182 alliterative long lines, set in Scandinavia, commonly cited as one of the most important works of Anglo-Saxon literature.It survives in a single...
) attacks the camp in revenge.
Despite the colonists' advanced weapons (fully automatic machine-guns, slug shotguns, even flame-throwers) and larger numbers, ten people are killed just to drive the lone, gravely wounded creature away. This proves to all the colonists that there is a deadly and efficient predator native to the island. Cadmann, however, is now completely unwilling to assist the community that mocked, demonised, and finally left him helpless to be killed by the creature.
He leaves the colony to set up a homestead on a bluff further up the mountain that forms the basis of the island, hunting the island's only large animal life for food, and spending the rest of his time in wallowing in despair, hatred and moonshine liquor.
He is completely disillusioned with committees and short-sightedness, and when a woman joins him in the hopes of persuading him to return, he demands her fealty as long as she stays - every kind of fealty a man can possibly get from a woman. She stays, and after she conceives his child, he has an epiphany: the colonists may have brutalized and betrayed him, but their children are innocent, and deserve to be protected. Thus she is the reason he decides to return and lead the fight against the grendels.
He makes it clear that he is not interested in the day-to-day workings of the colony, only its defence. If the colonists want his assistance, they will have it only as long as they accept it - if they reject it even once he will leave and never return. The deal is made, and preparations for conflict begin.
Plot conflict
The colonists are confounded by the ecology of the island, as there does not seem to be a sufficient food source for the grendels to inhabit it. Nonetheless, weapons are built - poisons that can sterilize entire rivers, armor-piercing spear-guns with explosive tips. These, along with Cadmann's tactics, enable the colonists to kill their first grendel.The autopsy leads to terrifying revelations. They are crocodilia
Crocodilia
Crocodilia is an order of large reptiles that appeared about 84 million years ago in the late Cretaceous Period . They are the closest living relatives of birds, as the two groups are the only known survivors of the Archosauria...
n in appearance and behaviour, complete with jaws that can crush steel. Their bones are significantly stronger than those of humans, as they are not based on calcium. They have a sense of smell better than a dog
Dog
The domestic dog is a domesticated form of the gray wolf, a member of the Canidae family of the order Carnivora. The term is used for both feral and pet varieties. The dog may have been the first animal to be domesticated, and has been the most widely kept working, hunting, and companion animal in...
s. Studying its brain shows it is not fully sapient, but that it is not far off, and is at least as smart as a gorilla
Gorilla
Gorillas are the largest extant species of primates. They are ground-dwelling, predominantly herbivorous apes that inhabit the forests of central Africa. Gorillas are divided into two species and either four or five subspecies...
. Its claws are not just weapons, but exert enough traction
Traction
- Engineering :*Forces:** Traction , adhesive friction or force in the context of vehicle** Traction vector, in mechanics, the force per unit area on a surface, including normal and shear components...
for the creature to sprint up rocky cliffs. Though it is not a true amphibian - it cannot breathe water - it does possess an integral snorkel enabling it to move undetected beneath several feet of water. Its cardiovascular system and musculature give it strength and stamina far beyond that of humans, and that is without its primary evolutionary advantage: A super-oxygenated blood supplement.
A grendel can, on demand, release a chemical supercharger into its blood that does to it what Nitrous Oxide
Nitrous oxide
Nitrous oxide, commonly known as laughing gas or sweet air, is a chemical compound with the formula . It is an oxide of nitrogen. At room temperature, it is a colorless non-flammable gas, with a slightly sweet odor and taste. It is used in surgery and dentistry for its anesthetic and analgesic...
does to internal combustion engine
Internal combustion engine
The internal combustion engine is an engine in which the combustion of a fuel occurs with an oxidizer in a combustion chamber. In an internal combustion engine, the expansion of the high-temperature and high -pressure gases produced by combustion apply direct force to some component of the engine...
s - enable short bursts of speed in excess of a hundred miles per hour. This is the primary trait makes the grendels so dangerous - and the key to their destruction. The supercharger, when used, generates large amounts of waste-heat that warm up their bodies so rapidly they effectively "cook themselves" and will die after using it if they do not immediately return to the water to cool off. With this knowledge added to Cadmann's tactics, combined with the colony's weapons and technology, the colonists are able to wipe out the grendel population within several months, making Cadmann a hero to the people who previously turned on him.
But the glory is short-lived. Despite the periodic updates from the colonists, Earth is abandoning the colonization program. There will be no new ships, no new colonies. Avalon is unique.
Then catastrophe. A disturbing discovery has been made - the grendels' primary food source. The grendels and the samlon are actually the same species. Their life cycle is similar to that of terrestrial frog
Frog
Frogs are amphibians in the order Anura , formerly referred to as Salientia . Most frogs are characterized by a short body, webbed digits , protruding eyes and the absence of a tail...
s - the herbivorous samlon are in fact the juvenile form of the carnivorous grendels. Like certain species of frogs, they change gender over the course of their lifetimes. The juvenile samlon are male. The adult grendels are female. Interaction is unnecessary as the grendels continually lay their unfertilized eggs in the water for the samlon to fertilize. And like many species of frogs, they are cannibalistic - if no other prey is present, they will eat their own young.
At some point in the recent past, most of the prey animals on the island were destroyed by an unknown cataclysmic event. (It is left to the reader to draw conclusions as to what actually happened. Over-predation by the grendels is subtly suggested). Among the few surviving species on the island were the samlon, and thus the grendels. Cannibalism became the rule instead of the exception. Only the fastest juvenile samlon survived predation by grendel females to become adult grendels themselves, and this drove the species to evolve at an immensely accelerated rate. This resulted in the incredible predatory abilities of the grendels.
When the colonists introduced terrestrial fish into the ecosystem, they provided the grendels with an additional food source. Where once there were only one or two grendels on the island at any given time due to their territorial behaviour pattern, dozens of samlon became grendels. This is why the attacks began in the first place.
The colonists have just exterminated the adult grendels. There is now no check at all on the samlon population. Within a very short period of time, they all become grendels. Instead of a few dozen grendels, there are now thousands. The fight between the colonists and the grendels is no longer a hunt - it is a war.
Plot resolution
Cadmann again asserts control. The grendels cannot hunt away from water. This is why there are larger animals (about the size of rabbits) on the higher reaches of the mountain. The colony's pregnant women, children and essential specialists are evacuated to the Geographic. Combat is joined. At first, the colonists' technology and tactics serve them well. The laser-based welding tools and plasma-based drilling equipment are used as weapons. Whatever liquid hydrogen can be spared from the shuttles is used to fight the grendels as well. Cadmann observes mass grendel behaviour and discovers that packs of grendels can be sent into a sharkShark
Sharks are a type of fish with a full cartilaginous skeleton and a highly streamlined body. The earliest known sharks date from more than 420 million years ago....
-like feeding frenzy
Feeding frenzy
In ecology, a feeding frenzy is a situation where oversaturation of a supply of food leads to rapid feeding by predatory animals. For example, a large school of fish can cause nearby sharks to enter a feeding frenzy. This can cause the sharks to go wild, biting anything that moves, including each...
by spraying them with blood taken from dead grendels, especially if it is laced with traces of the "supercharger" chemical extracted from the organ that secretes it, as this chemical triggers an immediate "fight" instinct. Tracer bullet
Tracer ammunition
Tracer ammunition are bullets that are built with a small pyrotechnic charge in their base. Ignited by the burning powder, the phosphorus tail burns very brightly, making the projectile visible to the naked eye...
s are also used to ignite the supercharger gland in their bodies. The colonists ultimately discover and utilize a new tactic - they harvest supercharger from dead grendels and spray it over the grendel horde with crop dusting equipment, driving hundreds of them into a frenzy and killing many of those remaining.
But as the grendels' numbers fall, their individual strength rises - every dead grendel is food for the rest. Eventually, all that remain are full-grown grendels, and the colonists make a planned retreat to Cadmann's Bluff, Cadmann's carefully designed mountain hideaway which has been well-stocked and defenses reinforced.
Unfortunately, a mistake is made - upon their arrival, a grendel is killed in the river next to Cadmann's Bluff, and its blood enters the river, drawing the rest up the stream toward them. However, this is realized immediately, and preparations are made. As the horde approaches, they are sprayed with more supercharger, sending them into a frenzy once more. When they begin climbing the Bluff, Cadmann sets off an avalanche using a deadfall, killing even more.
And then it is over. The grendels, though not as smart as humans, are smart enough to learn, given time and lots of experience. Their behavior changes, suggesting that they realize that the remaining colonists are not worth dying to reach, not when there are other grendels to kill. The humans have defeated the grendels. Camelot is theirs.
A year later, the grendels are being driven to extinction. Now that the grendel life cycle is known, the colonists continue the hunts, but this time the samlon are targeted as well. New tactics - supercharger spraying and recorded grendel challenges - make them almost a chore. The terrestrial fish are gone, and will not be reintroduced, forcing the grendels to drive their own species into extinction. Soon the grendel threat will be eradicated.
Now rebuilding can begin, and this time, they will not be caught unaware. The mainland is being carefully explored, and the colonists have high hopes. Communications with Earth were cut off by the Grendel Wars. Now that it is over, perhaps the story of their battle will inspire Earth's population to new adventures, to restart the colonization program. If suitably motivated, they might come to Avalon, a known inhabitable world. New colonists would be welcome, and new equipment would be invaluable. But they can survive without it.
The colonists came to make Avalon a new home for humanity, and have survived a great test. Now they understand that if they wish to survive, they cannot become complacent. Camelot is just one corner of a vast world. Who knows what lies in store?
Themes
The story is largely concerned with the struggle for supremacy between humans and grendels, and more generally with the relationship between humans and our natural environment. The Avalon colonists inadvertently worsen their own predicament with their first attempts to rid the island of grendels, because they failed to fully understand the grendels' role in the local ecosystem. The book demonstrates that nature is a complex web of interdependent species, which human intervention can easily disrupt with unpredictable results. This is a theme also explored in Jurassic Park.The book also draws from some of Robert A. Heinlein
Robert A. Heinlein
Robert Anson Heinlein was an American science fiction writer. Often called the "dean of science fiction writers", he was one of the most influential and controversial authors of the genre. He set a standard for science and engineering plausibility and helped to raise the genre's standards of...
's work involving the adage "if you desire peace, prepare for war," in exploring the conflict between the civilian leadership of the colony who see no danger, and the military advisor who believes that danger always exists in the future. Cadmann is successively treated as crackpot, savior, scapegoat, and hero as the needs of the colony for his talents change.
Finally, the book explores the social dynamics of a situation where nobody can trust anybody else's judgement, not even their own. The eventual outcome of this is more fully detailed in the sequel, Beowulf's Children
Beowulf's Children
Beowulf's Children is a science fiction novel written by Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle and Steven Barnes. It is a sequel to The Legacy of Heorot. The book was published in the United Kingdom as The Dragons of Heorot in 1995...
.