The Transhumanist Wager

by Zoltan Istvan

  Chapter 7

  In Singapore, while Contender was drying in the boatyard for maintenance, Jethro Knights received a phone call at the marina office. It was Francisco Dante, who had recently been promoted to senior editor at International Geographic.

  “Jethro, what's going on?”

  “Boat's out of the water. I’m doing some bottom work in Singapore.”

  “How’s Contender holding up?”

  “Fine. Just some routine maintenance and painting needed.”

  Jethro wondered what Francisco wanted. His voice sounded edgy, and this was an unscheduled phone call.

  “Been following the news in Pakistan and Indian Kashmir?”

  “A bit,” Jethro answered cautiously.

  “Our correspondent on the ground there got killed forty-eight hours ago. Shot to damn pieces. We think the whole region is going to blow. Two Third World nuclear giants about to duke it out. An Asian crisis of historical proportions.”

  There was silence on the phone. Jethro knew what was coming next.

  “We need someone there,” Francisco said. “We needed someone there yesterday. To stay for at least six months—maybe a year.”

  “What about my boat?”

  “We can cover it all. Just lock her up and tell the boatyard to send us the bill.”

  The phone went silent again.

  “Jethro, this might be worse than the Congo—plus you'll be all alone. A grueling, full-blown war zone. Possible genocide, if the rumors are right. And you'll be expected to write frequently, sometimes daily, if things are hot. You’ll need to be right in the middle of the action.”

  “Okay, I understand.”

  "It's not a very safe, transhuman-like thing to do. But your writing skills are sure to be used. And the experience will help define your journey, perhaps even your manhood."

  The phone line went silent again.

  Jethro mumbled, "True, it's not a very safe thing to do."

  “So you'll do it?”

  Jethro stared longingly at his boat through the office's window, then said, “Yeah, I'll do it.”

  The next morning an express shipping package arrived; it contained an International Geographic company credit card, a new telephoto zoom lens for his camera, and a one-way business class ticket to Islamabad, Pakistan. Jethro locked up his boat and headed to the airport. Eight hours later, he stepped off the plane, picked up his lone backpack, and took a yellow taxi towards the Indian-Pakistan Line of Control, thirty miles away. When he saw smoke and military helicopters in the distance, he tapped the taxi driver on the shoulder, saying, “Right here. Stop right here.”

  The Pakistani looked at him, his face twisted with confusion. They were ten miles from anywhere. Outside was nothing but the base of the snowcapped Himalayas. Jethro paid the driver and jumped out, knowing better than to take a taxi into combat fighting. That was like driving around with the word “target” written on the side of the car.

  Jethro covered his blond hair with a knit cap and stood on the side of the road. He stuck out his right thumb when the occasional car drove past. An hour later, a civilian vehicle picked him up and took him towards the Line of Control. In the back seat, he discreetly retrieved his camera from his backpack and hid it in his jacket. His index finger tensely rested on the shutter release button.

  War always touches the essence of a person no matter how many times it’s witnessed. As a participant, it remains perpetually novel. The smoke, fires, and explosions never seem to stop or burn out. The sight of bodies torn to shreds, children orphaned, and buildings in ruins are penetrating and humbling—it's life, elevated and unmasked. The slumbering alligator in our brain awakes and tries to take over. Tragedy mixes with the summoning of a better life.

  Later that day, when the sun was disappearing, Jethro checked into The Himalayan Inn, the main journalist hotel in Muzaffarabad. There were heavily armed guards hiding behind sandbags at the front entrance. Jethro would begin his work again tomorrow at first light.

  A week later his first article started:

  Fourteen miles from Muzaffarabad, near the Line of Control in Pakistani Kashmir, a small bombed village is awash in activity—in tragedy. It's desperate and shocking. An old woman runs up to me, throwing her hands at my face. All ten of her fingers are pointing in unnatural directions—broken in different ways. She’s another torture victim. To my right, a man wanders the dirt roads, calling out his child's name. In another part of the village, younger women grieve, complaining of multiple gang rapes by soldiers. I try to interview the husbands—those who are still alive refuse, turn away, and cry. War is a frothing beast.

  As any war reporter knows, this type of work could never be called a job. It's a pledge to reveal humanity, a passion for unpredictable consequences, a spiral through the worst and best of civilization. Daily, Jethro interviewed and photographed participants of the war—from weeping villagers, to armed Jihadists, to teenaged government soldiers listening to rock music on their cell phones. Often, bullets buzzed by Jethro’s head or a bomb would explode nearby and send him scampering for cover or diving into a ditch. Transhumanism was always in his thoughts, the plethora of wounded and dead constantly reminding him of the need to overcome the fragility of biological life and the capriciousness of the human race.

  After four months of working near the Pakistan Line of Control, Jethro crossed over to Indian Kashmir to report on the conflict from that country. It was the same nightmare; only the people and soldiers were bound by a different flag and religion.

  Eventually, after another half year, the crisis died down. Journalists from all over the world, who once descended by the hundreds, now departed for the next global conflict hot spot. Third World nuclear war and 100 million dead never occurred. Government diplomacy and international finger-chiding reigned as the main news items to cover. The conflict continued—just as it had for sixty years—each side shelling the other from protected mountainside positions, doing little else except testing new artillery and showering terror on civilians ensnared in the crossfire. For now, however, the nuclear rhetoric and threats from politicians were gone.

  Francisco Dante called Jethro, telling him he could return to his sailing trip and continue with his travel articles. Jethro was glad to leave; Kashmir and its horrors would remain burned in his psyche for the rest of his life. War does that. But through the battle zones, he also saw things that would give him emotional immunity and protection for his whole life. There, travesty and the overcoming of it were daily lessons. He learned to appreciate and recognize functional power. Military might. Fearsome, unabated leadership. Clarity and confusion from the media. The magic of a camera and a single startling image. The power of a heartrending story or of a charismatic individual to help turn an entire nation for or against something.

  Before Jethro caught the flight back to his yacht, he had one more photo shoot to make. He needed pictures of the half-destroyed historical village of Kundara. He would stop there on his way to the airport the next day.

  ************

  Dr. Preston Langmore walked into Dean Graybury's office at Victoria University, eagerly greeting the man. “My old friend, what a pleasure to see you.”

  “It's great to see you too, Preston. It's been a long time,” said the dean, jumping up and extending his hand.

  “Yes, it has. Since that ‘waste-of-time town hall forum,’ as it's become known to us transhumanists.”

  Both men laughed, the kind of easy acquaintance that has been ongoing since their college years together in those exact same halls.

  “So how's the movement going?” asked the dean. “Not much news coming out it seems—and more pressure than ever from the NAH and Uncle Sam. I hear the World Transhumanist Institute's Future Living magazine stopped printing. Is that true? I'm going to miss it terribly.”

  “Damn, yes—it's been a tough few years. We can’t afford to publish it anymore. Advertising has fallen off a cliff. Donors are broke. In fact, no one seems to be able
to do anything anymore. No one has a dime of funding and the scrooge government won't give a penny. And if they do, you can't even mention the word ‘transhumanism’ connected to the research, let alone try to do something directly for it.”

  “Yeah, I know. They've made ‘transhumanism’ a very dirty word.”

  “And they've made it witchcraft science to have anything to do with it,” Langmore said obstinately. “Damn quasi-Christian-run government insists on making you want to die so you can meet Jesus and other celebrities in heaven. Sounds like a cheesy, B-rated Hollywood flick. People are crazy.”

  “Hopefully, there will be a breakthrough soon or something. My small group of friends here in academia sure hopes so.”

  “We're actually in the midst of trying new publicity and funding angles at the institute. It's more grassroots stuff, outside the usual realm of talking to scientists and entrepreneurs. In fact, I came here to try to locate a former student of yours about it. He was the young man who spoke up at the town hall forum. Do you remember him?”

  “Sure I do,” said the dean, smiling broadly, letting Langmore know by his reaction that he knew the student well. “His name is Jethro Knights.”

  “Excellent. So you do know him. Well, his senior thesis, Rise of the Transhuman Citizen, was posted a while back on a life extension blog. The essay has received heaps of attention in the transhuman underground and also on the Web, the grassroots side of the movement. Really, it’s mainly the youth that seem interested. But many thousands of people have read it now, and some of them have re-posted it all over the Internet. The Institute’s board and I want to see if we can get him to write more, possibly organize that grassroots energy. The thesis is quite aggressive and radical. But we need any traction we can get to make transhumanism more popular. We need to make headway somehow.”

  Langmore looked at his feet sheepishly, then continued. “We need new blood, new visionaries—perhaps even a new, bolder generation for the movement. It seems we old scientists and engineers are no match for the brazen politicians and Christian evangelists sweeping the public right now.”

  “Jethro is currently abroad for a few years,” said the dean.

  “Yes, it seems he's a journalist. But I couldn't get a hold of him through International Geographic. They wouldn't share any of his personal info. Legal policy, they said.”

  “He's sailing around the world and may not be very reachable. I haven't actually talked to him in two years, but a good friend of mine is his editor at International Geographic. I'll put you in direct touch with him and he'll make sure you and Jethro connect.”

  “That’s exactly what I was hoping for.”

  The dean shrugged. "I don't know if it'll be useful, though. Jethro is still young and brash. He's got much to learn about the overall movement. And he's definitely not a team player, if you know what I mean. In fact, he can be downright antisocial and unruly. But he clearly believes in transhumanism."

  "That's fine. We were all young once. And none of us are team players unless there's an opposing team that needs to be played against out of necessity. And, right now, that necessity has arrived."

  ************

  In the middle of a breezy Kashmir afternoon, a driver took Jethro Knights to Kundara. It was his last scheduled stop before boarding a flight later that night to his boat in Singapore. Jethro was anxious to sail again.

  Along the way, his driver described some of the main sites of the village: a bullet-ridden century-old mosque, a small functioning school, a hospital tent where children are born and soldiers are operated on by a Western doctor.

  “The doctor is a strange woman with powerful green eyes,” the driver said simply, unassumingly. He concentrated on the road, agilely swerving around numerous two-foot-deep bomb blast craters. “The local oracle says she is friendly with ghosts.”

  “Fine. Maybe we can do a quick interview,” Jethro replied, looking out the window to see if the light was good for photos.

  When they arrived, they parked in front of the village’s white hospital tent. The 1000-square-foot structure bore a huge, painted red X on its roof to protect it from air raids. Dr. Zoe Bach was inside, working in bloodstained scrubs and delivering a baby. It was her third one that week. But this was a good week, she thought. Each baby and mother had survived so far—better than last week. Much better.

  Above her, a rickety lamp tied to the ceiling of the tent swung gently back and forth. The wind outside was perpetually seeping in, moving the light and casting dancing shadows on the operating table. The Kashmiri nurses struggled to keep the tent as airtight and dust-free as possible for surgeries. The floor was dirt, but Zoe's few instruments were spotless, a condition she always insisted on. She called for the scalpel and severed the newborn’s umbilical cord in one swift, expert moment. With blood everywhere, she handed off the wailing infant to a nurse, who then began cleaning the healthy child.

  After taking some pictures of the bombed village and its school, Jethro Knights ducked his head into the hospital tent. The hanging lamp inside swayed wide; the sun's rays and wind following him in. Zoe noticed the strong draft and thought, What the hell? When she turned, however, Jethro's luminous blue eyes met hers, and she felt stunned to be looking at a light-skinned man only a few years younger than she. The tingling on the back of Zoe’s neck told her he was neither handsome nor ugly, but intensely compelling. She felt aroused, and unconsciously adjusted her legs. There was a spiritual and nebulous connection she felt as well, but it was too much for her to immediately fathom.

  Jethro answered her surprise with a masculine smile and a slight nod.

  An irritated nurse quickly pointed for Jethro to wait outside the tent, to give the patients privacy and to keep the wind out. Half an hour later, Zoe appeared, escorting the wheelchair-bound mother and her newborn out of the hospital tent to her waiting family. In Urdu, Zoe instructed the mother to come back the following morning for a checkup. A minute later Zoe returned and invited Jethro into the tent.

  “Greetings to a stranger. We don't get many this far along the Line of Control. S’il vous plait, Francais—or do you speak English?” she asked, pulling the surgeon's cap off her head and shaking her hair freely.

  “Je parle deux. Mon nom est Jethro Knights. It's a pleasure to meet you.”

  “Pleased to make your acquaintance too,” she said, delighted. “What brings you out here? Though the camera on your neck and the International Geographic hat give you away.”

  Jethro, grinning, shrugged his wide shoulders, and Zoe thought it strange that she noticed his strong, straight teeth.

  “I'm a journalist researching a story on refugees.”

  “Well, how can I be of service? I like your magazine.”

  “Do you have some free time for a short interview? Maybe a walk through the village?”

  “Sure, you have great timing. I'm finished here for the day unless something else comes in. I just have to help clean up. Give me ten minutes.”

  They walked all afternoon, both of them quickly forgetting the article he was working on. Instead, they swapped stories of their adventures in Kashmir and the other places they had traveled. They even touched on their personal commitments and beliefs toward transhumanism. Each thought it unnerving how much they shared in common, how many similar ideas they had, how many similar places they had visited, how many similar books they had read and planned to read. Even their unspoken thoughts and desires seemed to wrap themselves around each other.

  Chemistry, amongst the dust and destruction, mushroomed. Less than five minutes into their walk, Jethro Knights knew he wasn't leaving on a flight that evening.

  Chapter 8

  Two years after the Transhumanism Town Hall Forum, a giant photo of Reverend Belinas appeared on the front page of the USA Daily Tribune. In bold, black letters, the headline declared him “Man of the Year.” The picture was a classic of the preacher: his 6-foot-3-inch frame towering over a church pulpit, his right arm raised and pointing toward
s some distant horizon, cautioning yet guiding at the same moment.

  The newspaper’s caption underneath his photo ran:

  Reverend Belinas is a saint to his burgeoning international congregation and has all the makings of a great religious leader in a broken-down world. He considers the transhuman movement and their advocacy of human enhancement technology the greatest threat of our time. Can he stop it?

  That same day of the “Man of the Year” announcement, at a luncheon in southern Missouri with a group of welfare-supported single mothers who were marginalized by their communities and circumstances, Belinas preached that he was fighting for a self-declared spiritual purity that would spread across the land. He wanted it to be the kind that didn't marginalize anyone. In the bleak economic times facing America, especially in the Bible Belt of the continent, he found a willing group of listeners, most of whom were financially devastated and barely subsisting day to day. Thousands joined his movement every week. Millions more supported his evangelism and considered him with awe.

  Unlike other famous religious leaders, Belinas never asked the poor for donations. His disdain for money was legendary. He was essentially without possessions—and made sure everyone knew it. He encouraged others to not just believe in Jesus Christ, but to literally live like him too. Year after year, Belinas never splurged on fancy living, nor entertained women in inappropriate ways, nor even handled a single dollar bill. His followers, friends, and admirers provided for everything. His reputation was so commanding that a meal or a service hadn't been charged of him in years. His personality and sonorous voice, always in the didactic tone of a sermon, was compensation enough.

  Behind him, though, hidden from the public—and carefully monitored by carefully chosen people—was an enormous machine, worth hundreds of millions of dollars. It was supported by a wealthy few, feeding endless money into the machine for the right to belong to it. They were people for whom riches came too easily and freely: celebrities, royalty, and heirs. They bought Belinas' goodwill and paved the way for his ministry with their resources. In return, he promised them God's favor, both in this world and the next. He meant it, and they believed it.