by Sarah Lahey
Copyright © 2019, Sarah Lahey
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, digital scanning, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, please address She Writes Press.
Published 2019
Printed in the United States of America
ISBN: 978-1-63152-872-9
ISBN: 978-1-63152-873-6
Library of Congress Control Number: 2020901197
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
For Tracey and Andrew
In the late twentieth century, Marvin Minsky said, “We rarely recognize how wonderful it is that a person can traverse an entire lifetime without making a single really serious mistake—like putting a fork in one’s eye or using a window instead of a door.”
Prologue
AT THE AGE OF thirty, Quinn realized she belonged to a highly evolved but irrational species.
Humans are supposed to be the intelligent primate, the ones with cognitive thought processes that aid their reasoning and learning abilities, so they should be good at life—the everyday stuff should be easy for them. A day on Earth only has twenty-four hours; how hard can it be? A day on Titan lasts the equivalent of fifteen Earth days, plus twenty-two hours and forty-one minutes—now that is a long day.
Yet life is not easy for humans. Their species has a problem, a big problem: they are ruled by emotions and feelings rather than logic and rational thought. “Homo sapiens” means “wise man,” but in my experience, humans are not wise at all.
Some days, Quinn has no idea what she is doing. It is a miracle she gets out of bed, stands on two legs, and manages to get through her twenty-four-hour day. This morning, while she was washing her face, she leant too far over the basin, hit her forehead on the faucet, and bruised her eyebrow. Now it hurts to touch, but she keeps touching it, pressing it with her finger. I have told her to stop touching it, and she knows she should stop, but she does not.
Two years ago, Quinn’s life was organized: she had a job, she was single and childless, and she was a reasonably sane human. Then she made some questionable choices—illogical and irrational decisions that changed the course of her life, and mine.
When I first met her she was already pregnant, though she did not realize it yet.
It started a few years ago, back in 2049.
One
I’ve totally Fucked this up.
What was I thinking?
THE DAYS ARE LONG in the southern Indian Ocean. The Desolation Islands are close to the Antarctic Circle, and in the summer months the afternoons extend into never-ending twilight. This evening, just as the sun is beginning to set, the sky turns pink. Dusty pink, like the color of cultured meat or the algae blooms that plague the planet’s waterways—a ruddy hue that reminds Quinn of birthday party icing and plastic dolls from her childhood, so she names it Nostalgia Pink.
She goes to bed thinking how quickly time has passed; almost thirty years of her life already over, and tomorrow she’s getting married.
She wakes at midnight in an inky mauve darkness reminiscent of the not-quite-blue chrysanthemum flowers her mother received after she was born. It’s a feigned purple-blue, more lavender than blue, and the scientific feat of gene-edited pigments; as in the case of her mother’s chrysanthemums, it had yet to be refined and polished to produce a true blue, like the azure and sapphire hues now abundant in today’s floral sprays.
Bathed in the modified mauve of anthocyanin pigment, Quinn says, “Good lordt, I’ve totally fucked this up. What was I thinking?” and is gripped with an urgent need to jump off something very high. (Leaping from great heights is how she resolves most of the dilemmas in her life. Falling through space helps her to breathe, and it’s here, immersed in the undulating, flexible universe of space-time that the heaviness of existence slips away. This is the place where she thinks, where she plans, where she finds freedom: tumbling from a mountaintop towards Earth.)
Objects—rocks and rain, planetary bodies and people—all fall because space curves. Gravitational fields spread out across the universe, trapping us all in their warp and weft, and it’s the curvature of space-time that holds Quinn down, pinning her to the planet, binding her to her bed in the inky mauve glow of midnight.
If Quinn intends to jump, she needs to do it soon; Mount Ross is a five-hour hike and they’re leaving tomorrow, headed for Antarctica, so the passenger drones are stowed. But she lies motionless in her crib, immobilized by regret. “I’m so fucking stupid, I can’t believe how stupid I am,” she mumbles. And it’s true, this is probably the worst thing she’s ever done, and it’s entirely her fault—no one else to blame, just her. She created this mess and now she has eighteen hours to fix it, to find a way out.
Quinn Buyers has a PhD in electrodynamics. She’s been called a world leader in electromagnetics and nuclear forces. Few people on the planet understand how shape-shifting neutrinos merge into dark matter, or, how the graviton—the particle defining gravity— functions, but she does. Clearly she has a brain—a brain that works, a brain adept at math and science, a brain that loves physics. How then, she wonders, is it possible to be so competent in one part of her life and so mind-numbingly stupid in others? Years of study and academic achievements have failed her. Decades of learning about nuclear forces and shape-shifting neutrinos have failed her. Gravity has failed her.
“Fuck, what have I done? I don’t love him. I like him, sure—he’s good company, sometimes he’s funny—but I’m not in love with him. I was never in love with him.” In eighteen hours they’ll be exchanging vows five kilometers high in the sky, because they’re getting married inside a cumulus cloud, a big, white, fluffy cumulus cloud—another stupid idea that she agreed to.
Quinn was a bit preoccupied when Mori asked her to marry him. She was busy reviewing figures from the magnetometers that monitor the planet’s Auroal Zone, and there had been some unusual geomagnetic disturbances. Normally those are linked to sun spot cycles, but this activity was atypical and unsettling, so understandably she was distracted and his proposal took her completely by surprise. She looked up at him, standing there in the doorway of the Research Station, and replied, “Sure. Okay. Well, why not?” Then they smiled at each other, and she thought he looked a bit like a giant otter leaning against the doorframe. He’s long and slim, with small ears and not much of a neck, and he wears his climate pants too high. (None of the rest of the team wears climate suits in Kerguelen; he’s the only one. They are south of the equator, a long way south, but he feels the heat and the pants keep him cool.)
Yes, she thought, if he were an animal, he’d be an otter, and she went back to her confusing data. But he didn’t leave; he waited, unsure what to do next, so she said, “You organize it,” because that’s what he’s good at, organizing things. That’s why he wears three Bands, so he can schematize all the different parts of his life. And he has a lot going on: there’s the new business, Dining in the Clouds, and he’s head of New Developme
nt at eMpower, so he needs a Band for each of those. The third is for other things—personal things, important things, she’s not sure what, but he has a lot going on.
Now, a month later, lying in the darkness, she knows two things for sure. First, no one needs three Bands. You can manage perfectly well with just one. Secondly, “Sure. Okay. Well, why not?” is not an appropriate response to a marriage proposal. It’s not even close. The truth is, she believed compatibility could sustain their relationship. But it hasn’t, and he deserves so much more. He’s good, and kind, and patient, and he’s been so helpful, organizing the funding for her research. He’s the reason they’re here, deep in the Southern Indian Ocean, on Kerguelen, searching outer space, recording geomagnetic disturbances.
It’s now after midnight, and she needs to formulate a plan, a new plan. She needs to jump off something very high and she needs to do it very soon.
***
The trek up Mount Ross is peaceful, the morning clear and mild—a balmy 20 degrees. There’s a new moon and a few lingering stars to the west. Her ascent is perfectly timed, and as she reaches the summit the sun begins to rise, the scarlet orb slipping quickly into the morning sky. The sight leaves her slightly awestruck—the dawn of a perfect day. Poetic, but not very smart. After the five-hour climb, she’s weary, and there’s an irritating tickle at the back of her throat; she could be coming down with something.
After pulling on her wingsuit, she steps out onto a small plateau, almost the highest point on the island of Kerguelen, and moves to the edge of the precipice. She drops a small rock over the edge, then watches it fall. A time-formed habit. There’s fear, but she’s always scared—the edge, the height, the speed, the fall. The trick is to make it into something else. Change it from a clawing, negative thing to a thrilling, tingling sensation. This is the first step to freedom. Soon her fear dissolves like melting ice, replaced by anticipation.
She straps on her helmet and goggles, pops in earplugs, and turns the music up, loud. Closing her eyes, she tumbles backward, over the edge, free-falling, but not into emptiness—space is not empty.
Adjusting her angle, she tilts 90 degrees and follows the curve of the mountain. The route takes her through a deep ravine, around the side of Mount Ross, and over what remains of the Cook Glacier. Thirty years ago, the glacier covered 450 square kilometers. Today, some sections are still frozen, but the meltwater has forged a majestic, swift-flowing river that runs from the mountaintop to the ocean. Pooling arteries of icy liquid, like blue and white lace, seep into the scenery, and Quinn sees her reflection as she zips across the fjords. The remainder of the mountain landscape is sparse, rough with stumpy vegetation, thick shrubs and grasses, and a particularly unpleasant native cabbage.
She’s scouted this line many times; she’ll travel eight kilometers in three minutes, with a top speed of over two hundred kilometers an hour. Normally she jumps with heat pads strapped to her torso, feet, and hands, but today she forgot and the blood drains quickly from her fingers. Tingling numbness. It’s rare to feel so cold. Of course, it should be cooler, considering the altitude and the season, but cool weather abandoned the planet decades ago. Today there are no frosts, no ice-covered puddles, and no flurries of snow on cold winter nights. Outside the Polar Regions, snowflakes, snow-covered mountains, and clouds have vanished entirely. Life is one long, continuous, monotonous, never-ending summer. The heat is here and it’s here to stay, but the cold weather is greatly missed: chunky knits and hats with pompoms, mittens, and scarves; rugging up for long walks, feeling warm in the auto, and knowing it’s cold outside; feeling warm in an apartment Pod and knowing it’s freezing outside; lying late in bed on winter mornings and the sound of falling rain—yes, she misses this most of all. The pragmatists and Transhumans say complaining won’t help: “Nostalgic cold-weather yearnings are pointless, it’s warm, there’s nothing we can do, we tried to fix the planet, and we made it worse.” For two years, 2030 to 2032, the Earth’s atmosphere was systematically seeded with reflective particles—stratospheric aerosol injections, which create a cooling effect—and it worked; the planet began to cool. Then the regional jet streams changed course, shifted toward the poles, and the clouds began to disappear.
Transhumans don’t see the point of another attempt. They don’t see a future for Earth, and they want Coin allocated to the Leaving Project, not the remaining-behind-and-staying-fixed-to-the-spot project, because terraforming Titan is going to cost trillions. Quinn disagrees; sentimental cold-weather longings give her something to aspire to. The weather is just a science problem, and all problems have a solution. Earth Optimism is growing; it’s never too little or too late. All you need is a plan and some time alone, preferably falling through space.
As Quinn falls, she considers her marital options. Plan A: Have a go at it, get married, and see how it turns out. People who aren’t in love couple up all the time, and they make it work. She could make it work. Once they’re married, things might improve. She’ll wake up one morning and realize the way Mori pronounces it An-ta-tic, instead of Antarctic, or Sil-i-cone instead of silicon—Honestly, they’re two completely different materials—no longer bothers her. Instead of lovers, they’ll be colleagues working alongside one another, solving the mysteries of the universe, uncovering new scientific discoveries. It’ll be a marvelous time for humanity; he can be her assistant and together they’ll discover a new form of modified gravity. The people of Earth will be forever grateful. Or, they’ll drive each other crazy, one of them will have an affair, and then, they’ll conspire with their new partner to kill the other, and modified gravity will remain decades away. The people of Earth deserve more.
Plan B: Be less judgmental. She likes him, she likes him a lot, he’s very likable, and she’ll learn to love his likability. And he’s funny— that’s important. Humor is an essential element in any relationship. What was it he said the other day? Something about the weather, the climate, it was quite funny. Yes, she remembers, he said, “We still have four seasons: Warm, Hot, Hotter, Scorching.” Disaster averted; he’s funny and likable. Except for the “learn to love him” part—that’s not something anyone should be thinking on their wedding day. And he’s too old for her. And there is no sex—probably because he’s too old for her.
Plan C: Get the fuck out while I can. Pull up her big-girl climate pants and call the whole thing off. Sit him down and say, “You’re likable and funny, both important elements in any relationship, but I can’t marry you.” Problem solved. She’s not in love, she was never in love, and there will be no wedding inside a big, white, fluffy cloud today.
***
Her landing site is a grassy field close to the coast, elevated, north-facing, and partially protected from the southerly winds. On a good day, without wind, it’s the perfect place to land. But today the southerlies rush in brief but forceful bursts along the coastline.
Regardless, she deploys her chute, brakes hard, glides low over the field, and drops down, feet first, onto the soft, wild grass. A burst of crosswind surges, and the floundering chute vacillates. She hauls it into submission, securing and fastening the billowing silks. Then she peels off her wingsuit and lies down on the grass to rest.
She breathes. Problem solved: There will be no wedding in a cloud today.
A shadow passes overhead, blocking her light. It’s a bird, an unfamiliar species, perhaps a type of gull or dove. Its head and wings are a typical tawny brown, but its belly is orange and its neck streaked yellow and ochre. She’s not seen anything like it before; it’s a stunning creature, a triumph of beauty and natural selection. She lies still on the ground, the bird stays fixed to its spot, caught in the headwind, and both appear as two motionless bodies in the universe.
Quinn knows the bird’s speed has no fixed frame of reference and their static positions are relative to their perceptions of each other. She learnt that from her mother, Lise, and obviously Lise learnt that from Albert Einstein. Some parents teach their children how to cook, or h
ow to swim, or fish, or drive, but Lise taught Quinn that motion affects her perception of how time passes, and that this depends entirely on her perspective. Quinn knows the only thing that doesn’t change with perspective is the speed of light. The speed of light is fixed.
She rolls over. She should holo Mori and let him know her whereabouts. He loves her. She doesn’t know how that happened, one person in love and the other person not. Love should be an even equation. Two positives or two negatives, then you get an even result. That’s the way it should work. You can’t have one person in love and the other person not in love; it makes no sense, it’s not logical.
Quinn activates her Band. She only has the one, a highly conductive combination of lithium and graphene, wrapped around her wrist. It’s synced to her brain electrodes. Software in the Band translates her thoughts to either text or a holographic vision. It took a week for the device to create a file of her speech patterns when she first got it, but now it’s 86 percent correct, most of the time.
Consolidating her thoughts, she launches a message: Text Mori, tell him I woke early, went for a jump, be home soon.
“The speed of light is absolute?” the Band suggests.
What the fuck? No. She tries again, I’ll be home soon. An hour, I’ll be home in an hour.
“A hour with Mori feels like a week?”
Fuck. No. Don’t send that. Forget it.
Briefly she considers a dialogue message, then drops the idea; she’ll see him soon enough. Her mother will arrive on Kerguelen later this morning; she’s hired a private transporter for the event. Soon, they’ll gather together on the lawn with Mori for introductions. She has an hour. The grass underneath her is fresh and cool, the morning sun is warm, and she’s spent. It will be a long day. She closes her eyes.
Two
Her mother is