by Far Freedom
My mind stopped thinking even as poorly as it was. I don’t know if I tried to turn around and go back; I know I couldn’t. The battery in my wheelchair was frozen. I couldn’t touch the cold wheels of the chair. The grease in the bearings of the wheels was too frozen to allow movement. I shook uncontrollably. My nose streamed mucous which quickly froze to my numbed upper lip. My eyebrows were covered in frost from my breath. It hurt everywhere, except below my waist.
I knew for certain I had lost Sam - because I had lost my life. I didn’t want to die but I could see no other option. The pain subsided after a few more moments. This should have concerned me but I was very sleepy. I slept.
Section 001 Sammy’s Father
“Good morning, Zakiya,” Aylis greeted, putting her hand on her friend’s shoulder and nudging her to wake her. She left her hand there as Zakiya roused herself and finally reached up to hold Aylis’s hand.
Zakiya rubbed her eyes with her other hand and lifted her face to smile at Aylis. Their friendship was deeper than it had ever been, if that was possible. Even with the prospect that they would each regain what they had lost from Alex and Setek, Zakiya felt she and Aylis shared a history that could never be matched, a history that gave them a bond that could never be broken. “Did I ever tell you that I love you?”
“Perhaps not with words,” Aylis said, surprised to the point of tears, “but in every other way. I hope you know I love you, Zak. What brought this on? Why are you holding a vigil over our dying stranger? Why aren’t you home taking care of Alex?”
Zakiya got up from the chair in which she had spent half the night, hoping the stranger from far across the universe would wake and speak to her. She walked to the side of his bed and touched his forehead. His eyes remained closed. His hair was now trimmed and he seemed less gaunt, his eyes less sunken, but he wouldn’t wake up.
“Alex told me to come here,” Zakiya said. “He’s extremely perceptive. He knew I was worried about this person. I feel guilty leaving Alex alone. I can give Alex comfort. But no reassurance he deserves to be alive. I don’t have that assurance for myself.”
“Why are you this concerned about the stranger? I mean, I realize the implications he represents, being an alien who appears human, and all the other factors that seem to connect him to our own mysteries. But I think you have some further concern about him. What is it?”
“I think he’s Sammy’s father.”
Aylis was intrigued by this unexpected idea. She knew there were human similarities in the stranger’s genes. That was about the only part of it she could understand. She might be able to isolate that part well enough to try a match with Sammy’s DNA. Certainly there was a resemblance between the two, despite the mother’s influence on Sammy’s heredity. “I’ll try to compare them. I’ll do it right now! And then we’ll have breakfast.” She hurried away.
Zakiya stood up and paced around the hospital room, stretching. She missed talking to Sammy’s memory-AMI but she had decided it wasn’t good to keep it inside her for long periods of time. It was a recording machine which would add experiences and perhaps her own thoughts to Sammy’s memory. Someday they might try to put Sammy’s memories into a new body and she didn’t want to risk adding the wrong things to his personality. Direk and Setek were setting up a lab to study Sammy. It seemed to be a logic technology that wasn’t too far in advance of current science. That the tiny thread of nanoscopic machines was sentient might only be a form of mimicry. It was not really Sammy she experienced, just a very sophisticated approximation. How could the soul of a child reside in a little amorphous machine? Yet, how could Freddy not have a soul? The definition of a soul must still lie far from the reach of man’s intellect.
Zakiya was again alone with the stranger. Aylis had not expressed any objection to an idea that was, on the face of it, absurd, so perhaps she was at least sympathetic. Regardless of the outcome of Aylis’s analysis, Zakiya would call the stranger Sam. “Good morning, Sam,” she said to him in Twenglish, as she came to his bedside and took his hand. She immediately felt movement of his fingers and they curled around to hold onto her hand tighter and tighter.
He tried to sit up, as though he was in a rush, but he was weak and she had to help him. His eyes opened and he was hungry to see who she was. When he saw her he was disappointed, saddened. His hand released its grip and he tried to lie back down. She stopped him and made him stay up. She made him look at her again by holding his head between her hands and turning his face toward her.
“Please, talk to me. Do you understand me? Nod your head if that’s all you can do.”
“I speak English,” he said very slowly and in a raspy voice. He looked at her hard, her hands still holding his head to face her. “I remember you. You… ” He frowned in concentration. “You look like Karl’s daughter.”
“Who is Karl?”
“I don’t remember,” he answered after a long internal struggle.
He tried again to lie down. She wouldn’t let him. She glanced at the medical monitor to make sure he was not too stressed, then made him move his legs off the edge of the bed. She lowered the bed to make it easier for him to reach the floor with his feet. She urged him to stand and then take the few steps to reach the chair in which she had been sleeping. Nori arrived at that moment and helped her seat him on the chair.
“He’s speaking,” Zakiya said to Nori. “I forced him out of bed. I didn’t want him to go back to sleep.”
“He speaks Twenglish! I told Aylis he was human, not alien.”
“American,” the man said. “I was born in America.”
Zakiya knelt down beside him and quickly asked, “Who are you?”
He shook his head slowly. “I don’t know.”
“But you know you are American.”
“I remember saying that. I don’t know it’s a fact. Are you American?”
“America disappeared long before I was born. How are you feeling? We’re all concerned that you aren’t responding well.”
“Responding to what? Where am I? Is this a hospital?”
“You’re being treated for starvation and dehydration. You’re on a ship in space. You are in its hospital.”
“In space? This is a spaceship?”
“Would you like to see it?”
“He’s too weak,” Nori objected.
“I want to get him out of here.” Zakiya called Aylis by shiplink. “I’ve got him out of the bed and he seems to be alert but weak,” she explained to Aylis. “Too many questions, Aylis! Yes, we can do that. Nori is helping me. We’ll be there in a few minutes.” She turned to Nori. “Can you get us a wheelchair?”
“You mean one that actually has wheels?”
“No, it was the only Twenglish word I knew for the floater.”
Nori shiplinked to hospital stores and a few minutes later a floater presented itself in the doorway to the hospital room. Nori brought it in and helped Zakiya move the man into it.
“Do you mind if I call you Sam?” Zakiya noted the frown of concentration on his face. He was looking at the floating chair he sat in. He looked up at her with perhaps puzzlement in his frown. “Or just pick a name,” she amended, thinking her request had disturbed him. “We need to call you something.”
“Sam is OK,” he replied, relaxing his frown, perhaps even trying to smile. ” Some wheelchair! How fast can it go?”
Section 002 Facing the Music
The narration of Samuel Lee begins here.
I was no longer in the hospital but I knew I was still in a hospital room. I could feel Doctor Mnro’s presence (“Call me Aylis!”) in every wall and fixture. These people from the future had many sneaky ways of sucking data from my lively corpse. Every morning when I awoke I would notice subtle changes in my quarters, as if it was aware of my waking, as indeed it was.
This morning I felt good. That made me suspicious because I know Aylis can slip dope into my plumbing without my knowing it. I didn’t want to feel good. I didn’t deserve to feel good.
I tried to feel bad, grumpy, whatever. I don’t know what I felt. Not happy. Nuts! Something was missing.
The kitchen wanted to feed me and I sneered at it. I was losing weight again but I had no appetite. The wall wanted to show me pictures of pleasant Earth scenes and I ignored it. I was supposed to love Mother Earth but I didn’t. I stepped outside to take a run around the lake on an empty stomach. I couldn’t remember running as a preferred exercise and so I assumed I did it because of a perversity of character. It hurt. I liked the pain. The first thing I saw, before I could begin running, was a handwritten paper note stuck to my back door. “Good morning, Sam,” it said in neat English script. “Could I do some archeology on the 20th century today? Phuti.”
The 20th century. What am I going to tell him about the 20th century? It sucked. “Archeology hurts my head,” I replied aloud to the piece of paper, “and the 20th century sucked, Phuti. Fortunately for you, I like to suffer.”
“Thank you, Sam,” the paper replied in writing.
I took my run around the lake. I had to pass by the golden dumbbell. I didn’t know it was there. I had stopped seeing it. It made me hurt inside.
People said hello to me along the jogging trail. They called me Sam. I was beginning not to like the name. It was making my brain itch every time I heard it. It had become significant in some threatening way.
The future. I was in the future. How long was I gone from Earth? All I knew was that Einstein was still alive when I was born. How could I exist in this here-and-now? I could as easily have died centuries ago. I should have. I didn’t want to be in the future, not without… Without what? Stop! Don’t think it! Crap! Just the merest hint of where the terror lay set me to trembling. Any minute now Aylis would be dragging me away to her laboratory. There were too many inconsistencies and the questions they raised. My broken mind had just enough function to want to examine some of these oddities, even while another part of it screamed to cease and desist.
I pulled into home port and saw that tall Greek guy smooching his gorgeous East African wife on their patio next door. Just the medicine to keep Aylis off my back. I don’t know why, but little things like that meant a lot to me. The mere presence of people seemed magical to me, as though their existence had regressed to the status of myth and now they were proved real. I had been away somewhere and I just returned. Where I was then and where I was now were both complete mysteries to me. The only memories I had were fragments of a life in the 20th century. That was impossible. That I even existed seemed impossible - and very unwelcome.
Zakiya waved. I waved back. I tried to keep jogging, wanting to use the last of my strength to make it inside my apartment to collapse on my sofa, but the woman kept looking at me, slowing me down. I loved her. Why did she make me love her?
“Come have breakfast with us, Sam,” Alex invited. The big guy made me uneasy. There was an intensity hidden behind his calm blue eyes. But the way he looked at Zakiya and the epic story of their relationship kept me hoping to become his friend. Perhaps I wanted too much to be his friend, and I was afraid of beginning something I didn’t deserve, something that would end too soon. It was already too much that Zakiya made herself my friend. There was an emptiness in me that disqualified me from having normal relationships and the responsibilities they required. I shook my head negatively as I tried to keep my leaden feet moving. “Every morning I ask, every morning you decline,” Alex called to me. “Have I offended you?”
“Come eat with us?” Zakiya asked, continuing to stare at me with her big brown eyes. Where had I seen those eyes before? Why did they comfort me? Why did they scare me? I couldn’t refuse Zakiya. The only time I felt good was in her presence. She watched with concern as I wavered into a sloppy landing at the patio table. I sat down hard. Alex started to rise, as though he wanted to catch me from falling. I righted myself. I was winded. I ached. I hated to admit it but I felt weak - too weak. I needed to eat better. I wished I had an appetite. To what purpose? Toward what future? Stop! Don’t think!
I sat in a partial stupor feeling naked to their inspection. Why I worried about what they thought of me was another mystery. I wasn’t worth it. This was before I understood who Alex and Zakiya were. I mean, I did feel they were important people. You could just look at them and know they had something special. But they treated me like I was the same as them, whatever they were. I didn’t trust it. I didn’t examine it too closely. I didn’t examine anything too closely. Very dangerous.
Zakiya was an archaeologist, like Phuti, and I expected her to slip in a few questions about ancient Earth, back when I was a kid in… Where was I a kid in? I was American, Korean American. My parents ran a convenience store in a big city. I could never see the stars clearly in the city. How did I wind up in a science fiction movie? How could any of this be real? It would break my heart if Zakiya was not real.
“A penny for your thoughts,” Zakiya inquired. How did she speak such perfect American English? Where would I spend a penny?
A wisp of what could be memory seeped out of a corner of my mind. “Korean. My parents were Korean. They had a little store in… in… some city. I remember running the cash register, late at night, a teenager. Getting robbed by this kid who was younger than me. He had a twenty-two caliber revolver, shaking so badly he could never have hit me. I gave him the money. He wanted cigarettes. He was too young to smoke. It was bad for his health. I hated selling cigarettes! Does anybody smoke cigarettes these days?”
“Not on this ship,” Zakiya replied. “Did you give him the cigarettes?”
“Sure. As many cartons as he could carry.”
She spoke softly, yet her voice was so rich in quality. “Yes, people still smoke tobacco. We probably have your 20th-century movies to blame for the persistence of the nasty habit.”
“You have all those old movies.” I blinked at an image ejected by my besieged mind, of a little dog being threatened by an ugly green witch.
“Newspapers, music, books. Why do you and Phuti need my faulty memories of that awful century?”
“There’s nothing like a living fossil to verify what we guess was the truth of the past,” Alex replied for his wife. To be frank, Alex looked the part of archaeologist more than Zakiya. He had a scholarly face. His physique was not scholarly at all but would be an asset for a serious dig-it-up antiquities hunter.
“You’re convinced I’m a fossil? I could be faking it. I may have watched the same movies and read the same books you watched and read. You learned to speak old American English. I could have learned it the same way.”
“You’re joking, right?” I wished I was. Alex didn’t smile.
” You’re the real McCoy.” Zakiya didn’t smile either.
“We’re sure. What are you doing today?”
“Phuti wants to grill me again. I really like the guy, or else I would beg off. Maybe, if I’m with Phuti, then Aylis won’t get me. I wish she would hurry up and… She gets cranky very fast, and I always find the wrong thing to say or do to set her off.” Aylis was another person to whom I responded strongly and, unlike Zakiya, she always posed a threat to me.
“Did I ever tell you that Aylis is my best friend?” Zakiya asked.
“I don’t have a chance!” I tried to be humorous. Why did they have no smiles for me today? Did I look that bad? “I seem to talk too much, especially when I have nothing correct to say.”
Zakiya looked at me - as she always did - with an expression of controlled concern, as if she needed to carefully meter that concern, lest it overflow and damage me. If I had enough brain function to analyze this, I would be frightened at how much she seemed to care about me. I got the message then that some bad news might be in the queue. I got that message all the time, of course. There were things I knew that I didn’t want to know that I knew, but I knew I would have to remember those things sooner or later. Painful things. They said that, when I arrived among them, I had blood on my hands. It had to be bad. It scared the crap out of me!
I
got up, almost knocking my chair over, and tried to make my getaway on rubber legs. Alex grabbed me by the shoulders before I could fall down. He was massively strong and I thought I would not bother to struggle. I wasn’t even sure I could walk the few feet back to the apartment they let me use. Alex would only let me sit, so I sat, only to glance at Zakiya and see anxiety in her eyes. Why was my feeble brain processing such details so well? What did they mean? Strike that! I didn’t want to know. “Are you going to hurt me today?” What a thing to say! They hurt me every day, never knowing it. I hurt myself. I needed to die. I was not supposed to exist. I was not supposed to be the one to suffer. There was this other guy who got lost, and he was the one to blame, the one to punish. I was an innocent bystander, caught holding the bag of spiders. I seemed to exist solely to be terrorized by something worse than death. I started crying then. I wanted to run away and I couldn’t even stay on my feet. Talk about asking for it! I dried up quickly and made a show of nonchalance that was pitiable.
“It’s going to be painful for both of us today,” Zakiya said gently. “I don’t look forward to it but time pushes us to do what must be done.”