“She shall know what it is to burn,” he said. “She shall know it for many lifetimes.”
Sparks blew across the floor before the Incarnation’s feet. There was a glow from the doorway, where some of the wickerwork had caught fire.
The machine was automatic in its function. Dr. O’Neill began to scream again, a rising series of shrieks. Her body began to rotate. The Incarnation smiled. “She shall make that music for many centuries. Perhaps one of my future incarnations shall put a stop to it.”
Jigme felt burning heat on the back of his neck. O’Neill’s screams ran up and down his spine. “Omniscient,” he said. “The pavilion is on fire. We should leave.”
“In a moment. I wish to say a few last words.”
Kunlegs came loping back, grinning, and hopped onto the platform. The Incarnation joined him and kissed him tenderly. “Kunlegs and I will stay in the pavilion,” he said. “We will both die tonight.”
“No!” Taisuke jumped to her feet. “We will not permit it! Your condition can be corrected.”
The Incarnation stared at her. “I thank you, loyal one. But my brain is poisoned, and even if the imbalance were corrected I would still be perceiving the Library through a chemical fog that would impair my ability. My next Incarnation will not have this handicap.”
“Omniscient!” Tears spilled from Taisuke’s eyes. “Don’t leave us!”
“You will continue as head of the government. My next Incarnation will be ready by the next New Year, and then you may retire to the secular life I know you wish to pursue in this lifetime.”
“No!” Taisuke ran forward, threw herself before the platform. “I beg you, Omniscient!”
Suddenly Jigme was on his feet. He lurched forward, threw himself down beside Taisuke. “Save yourself, Omniscient!” he said.
“I wish to say something concerning the Sang.” The Incarnation spoke calmly, as if he hadn’t heard. “There will be danger of war in the next year. You must all promise me that you won’t fight.”
“Omniscient.” This from Daddy Carbajal. “We must be ready to defend ourselves!”
“Are we an Enlightened race, or are we not?” The Incarnation’s voice was stern.
“You are Bodhisattva.” Grudgingly. “All know this.”
“We are Enlightened. The Buddha commands us not to take life. If these are not facts, our existence has no purpose, and our civilization is a mockery.” O’Neill’s screams provided eerie counterpoint to his voice. The Incarnation’s many arms pointed at the members of the Cabinet. “You may arm in order to deter attack. But if the Sang begin a war, you must promise me to surrender without condition.”
“Yes!” Taisuke, still facedown, wailed from her obeisance. “I promise, Omniscient.”
“The Diamond Mountain will be the greatest prize the Sang can hope for. And the Library is the Buddha. When the time is right, the Library will incarnate itself as a Sang, and the Sang will be sent on their path to Enlightenment.”
“Save yourself, Omniscient!” Taisuke wailed. The roar of flames had drowned O’Neill’s screams. Jigme felt sparks falling on his shaven head.
“Your plan, sir!” Daddy Carbajal’s voice was desperate. “It might not work! The Sang may thwart the incarnation in some way!”
“Are we Enlightened?” The Incarnation’s voice was mild. “Or are we not? Is the Buddha’s truth eternal, or is it not? Do you not support the Doctrine?”
Daddy Carbajal threw himself down beside Jigme. “I believe, Omniscient! I will do as you ask!”
“Leave us, then. Kyetsang and I wish to be alone.”
Certainty seized Jigme. He could feel tears stinging his eyes. “Let me stay, Omniscient!” he cried. “Let me die with you!”
“Carry these people away,” said the Incarnation. Hands seized Jigme. He fought them off, weeping, but they were too powerful: he was carried from the burning pavilion. His last sight of the Incarnation was of the Gyalpo Rinpoche and Kunlegs embracing one another, silhouetted against flame, and then everything dissolved in fire and tears.
And in the morning nothing was left, nothing but ashes and the keening cries of the traitor O’Neill, whom the Bodhisattva in his wisdom had sent forever to Hell.
Jigme found !urq there, standing alone before O’Neill, staring at the figure caught in a webwork of life support and nerve stimulators. The sound of the traitor’s endless agony continued to issue from her torn throat.
“There will be no war,” Jigme said.
!urq looked at him. Her stance was uncertain.
“After all this,” Jigme said, “a war would be indecent. You understand?”
!urq just stared.
“You must not unleash this madness in us!” Jigme cried. Tears rolled down his face. “Never, Ambassador! Never!”
!urq’s antennae twitched. She looked at O’Neill again, rotating slowly in the huge wheel. “I will do what I can, Rinpoche,” she said.
!urq made her lone way down Burning Hill. Jigme stared at the traitor for a long time.
Then he sat in the full lotus. Ashes drifted around him, some clinging to his zen, as he sat before the image of the tormented doctor and recited his prayers.
BLOOD SISTERS
Greg Egan
Here’s a haunting glimpse of a crowded, high-tech future that has become perhaps a little too fond of that dispassionate Long View we hear so much about.…
Born in 1961, Greg Egan lives in Australia, and is certainly in the running for the title of Hottest New Writer of the Nineties to date. Although he’s been publishing for a year or two already, 1990 was the year when Egan suddenly seemed to be turning up everywhere with high-quality stories, and he continued the streak in 1991. He is a frequent contributor to Interzone and Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine, and has made sales as well to Pulphouse, Analog, Aurealis, and Eidolon. Several of his stories have appeared in various “Best of the Year” series, including this one; his story “The Caress” and his story “Learning To Be Me” were in our Eighth Annual Collection, and he was good enough to place another two stories in this year’s collection as well. He just sold his first novel, Quarantine, to Legend as part of a package deal that includes a second novel and a collection of his short fiction—a pretty high-powered deal for such a young writer. My guess is that you will be seeing a lot more of Egan as the decade progresses.
When we were nine years old, Paula decided we should prick our thumbs, and let our blood flow into each other’s veins.
I was scornful. “Why bother? Our blood’s already exactly the same. We’re already blood sisters.”
She was unfazed. “I know that. That’s not the point. It’s the ritual that counts.”
We did it in our bedroom, at midnight, by the light of a single candle. She sterilized the needle in the candle flame, then wiped it clean of soot with a tissue and saliva.
When we’d pressed the tiny, sticky wounds together, and recited some ridiculous oath from a third-rate children’s novel, Paula blew out the candle. While my eyes were still adjusting to the dark, she added a whispered coda of her own: “Now we’ll dream the same dreams, and share the same lovers, and die at the very same hour.”
I tried to say, indignantly, “That’s just not true!” but the darkness and the scent of the dead flame made the protest stick in my throat, and her words remained unchallenged.
* * *
As Dr Packard spoke, I folded the pathology report, into halves, into quarters, obsessively aligning the edges. It was far too thick for me to make a neat job of it; from the micrographs of the misshapen lymphocytes proliferating in my bone marrow, to the print-out of portions of the RNA sequence of the virus that had triggered the disease, thirty-two pages in all.
In contrast, the prescription, still sitting on the desk in front of me, seemed ludicrously flimsy and insubstantial. No match at all. The traditional—indecipherable—polysyllabic scrawl it bore was nothing but a decoration; the drug’s name was reliably encrypted in the barcode below. Th
ere was no question of receiving the wrong medication by mistake. The question was, would the right one help me?
“Is that clear? Ms Rees? Is there anything you don’t understand?”
I struggled to focus my thoughts, pressing hard on an intractable crease with my thumb. She’d explained the situation frankly, without resorting to jargon or euphemism, but I still had the feeling that I was missing something crucial. It seemed like every sentence she’d spoken had started one of two ways: “The virus…” or “The drug…”
“Is there anything I can do? Myself? To … improve the odds?”
She hesitated, but not for long. “No, not really. You’re in excellent health, otherwise. Stay that way.” She began to rise from her desk to dismiss me, and I began to panic.
“But, there must be something.” I gripped the arms of my chair, as if afraid of being dislodged by force. Maybe she’d misunderstood me, maybe I hadn’t made myself clear. “Should I … stop eating certain foods? Get more exercise? Get more sleep? I mean, there has to be something that will make a difference. And I’ll do it, whatever it is. Please, just tell me—” My voice almost cracked, and I looked away, embarrassed. Don’t ever start ranting like that again. Not ever.
“Ms Rees, I’m sorry. I know how you must be feeling. But the Monte Carlo diseases are all like this. In fact, you’re exceptionally lucky; the WHO computer found eighty thousand people, worldwide, infected with a similar strain. That’s not enough of a market to support any hard-core research, but enough to have persuaded the pharmaceutical companies to rummage through their databases for something that might do the trick. A lot of people are on their own, infected with viruses that are virtually unique. Imagine how much useful information the health profession can give them.” I finally looked up; the expression on her face was one of sympathy, tempered by impatience.
I declined the invitation to feel ashamed of my ingratitude. I’d made a fool of myself, but I still had a right to ask the question. “I understand all that. I just thought there might be something I could do. You say this drug might work, or it might not. If I could contribute, myself, to fighting this disease, I’d feel…”
What? More like a human being, and less like a test tube—a passive container in which the wonder drug and the wonder virus would fight it out between themselves.
“… better.”
She nodded. “I know, but trust me, nothing you can do would make the slightest difference. Just look after yourself as you normally would. Don’t catch pneumonia. Don’t gain or lose ten kilos. Don’t do anything out of the ordinary. Millions of people must have been exposed to this virus, but the reason you’re sick, and they’re not, is a purely genetic matter. The cure will be just the same. The biochemistry that determines whether or not the drug will work for you isn’t going to change if you start taking vitamin pills, or stop eating junk food—and I should warn you that going on one of those ‘miracle-cure’ diets will simply make you sick; the charlatans selling them ought to be in prison.”
I nodded fervent agreement to that, and felt myself flush with anger. Fraudulent cures had long been my bête noir—although now, for the first time, I could almost understand why other Monte Carlo victims paid good money for such things: crackpot diets, meditation schemes, aroma therapy, self-hypnosis tapes, you name it. The people who peddled that garbage were the worst kind of cynical parasites, and I’d always thought of their customers as being either congenitally gullible, or desperate to the point of abandoning their wits, but there was more to it than that. When your life is at stake, you want to fight for it—with every ounce of your strength, with every cent you can borrow, with every waking moment. Taking one capsule, three times a day, just isn’t hard enough—whereas the schemes of the most perceptive con-men were sufficiently arduous (or sufficiently expensive) to make the victims feel that they were engaged in the kind of struggle that the prospect of death requires.
This moment of shared anger cleared the air completely. We were on the same side, after all; I’d been acting like a child. I thanked Dr Packard for her time, picked up the prescription, and left.
On my way to the pharmacy, though, I found myself almost wishing that she’d lied to me—that she’d told me my chances would be vastly improved if I ran ten kilometers a day and ate raw seaweed with every meal—but then I angrily recoiled, thinking: Would I really want to be deceived “for my own good”? If it’s down to my DNA, it’s down to my DNA, and I ought to expect to be told that simple truth, however unpalatable I find it—and I ought to be grateful that the medical profession has abandoned its old patronizing, paternalistic ways.
* * *
I was twelve years old when the world learnt about the Monte Carlo project.
A team of biological warfare researchers (located just a stone’s throw from Las Vegas—alas, the one in New Mexico, not the one in Nevada) had decided that designing viruses was just too much hard work (especially when the Star Wars boys kept hogging the supercomputers). Why waste hundreds of PhD-years—why expend any intellectual effort whatsoever—when the time-honoured partnership of blind mutation and natural selection was all that was required?
Speeded up substantially, of course.
They’d developed a three-part system: a bacterium, a virus, and a line of modified human lymphocytes. A stable portion of the viral genome allowed it to reproduce in the bacterium, while rapid mutation of the rest of the virus was achieved by neatly corrupting the transcription error repair enzymes. The lymphocytes had been altered to vastly amplify the reproductive success of any mutant which managed to infect them, causing it to out-breed those which were limited to using the bacterium.
The theory was, they’d set up a few trillion copies of this system, like row after row of little biological poker machines, spinning away in their underground lab, and just wait to harvest the jackpots.
The theory also included the best containment facilities in the world, and five hundred and twenty people all sticking scrupulously to official procedure, day after day, month after month, without a moment of carelessness, laziness or forgetfulness. Apparently, nobody bothered to compute the probability of that.
The bacterium was supposed to be unable to survive outside artificially beneficent laboratory conditions, but a mutation of the virus came to its aid, filling in for the genes that had been snipped out to make it vulnerable.
They wasted too much time using ineffectual chemicals before steeling themselves to nuke the site. By then, the winds had already made any human action—short of melting half a dozen states, not an option in an election year—irrelevant.
The first rumours proclaimed that we’d all be dead within a week. I can clearly recall the mayhem, the looting, the suicides (second-hand on the TV screen; our own neighbourhood remained relatively tranquil—or numb). States of emergency were declared around the world. Planes were turned away from airports, ships (which had left their home ports months before the leak) were burnt in the docks. Harsh laws were rushed in everywhere, to protect public order and public health.
Paula and I got to stay home from school for a month. I offered to teach her programming; she wasn’t interested. She wanted to go swimming, but the beaches and pools were all closed. That was the summer that I finally managed to hack into a Pentagon computer—just an office supplies purchasing system, but Paula was suitably impressed (and neither of us had ever guessed that paperclips were that expensive).
We didn’t believe we were going to die—at least, not within a week—and we were right. When the hysteria died down, it soon became apparent that only the virus and the bacterium had escaped, and without the modified lymphocytes to fine-tune the selection process, the virus had mutated away from the strain which had caused the initial deaths.
However, the cosy symbiotic pair is now found all over the world, endlessly churning out new mutations. Only a tiny fraction of the strains produced are infectious in humans, and only a fraction of those are potentially fatal.
A mere
hundred or so a year.
* * *
On the train home, the sun seemed to be in my eyes no matter which way I turned—somehow, every surface in the carriage caught its reflection. The glare made a headache which had been steadily growing all afternoon almost unbearable, so I covered my eyes with my forearm and faced the floor. With my other hand, I clutched the brown paper bag that held the small glass vial of red-and-black capsules that would or wouldn’t save my life.
Cancer. Viral leukaemia. I pulled the creased pathology report from my pocket, and flipped through it one more time. The last page hadn’t magically changed into a happy ending—an oncovirology expert system’s declaration of a sure-fire cure. The last page was just the bill for all the tests. Twenty-seven thousand dollars.
At home, I sat and stared at my work station.
Two months before, when a routine quarterly examination (required by my health insurance company, ever eager to dump the unprofitable sick) had revealed the first signs of trouble, I’d sworn to myself that I’d keep on working, keep on living exactly as if nothing had changed. The idea of indulging in a credit spree, or a world trip, or some kind of self-destructive binge, held no attraction for me at all. Any such final fling would be an admission of defeat. I’d go on a fucking world trip to celebrate my cure, and not before.
I had plenty of contract work stacked up, and that pathology bill was already accruing interest. Yet for all that I needed the distraction—for all that I needed the money—I sat there for three whole hours, and did nothing but brood about my fate. Sharing it with eighty thousand strangers scattered about the world was no great comfort.
Then it finally struck me. Paula. If I was vulnerable for genetic reasons, then so was she.
For identical twins, in the end we hadn’t done too bad a job of pursuing separate lives. She had left home at sixteen, to tour central Africa, filming the wildlife, and—at considerably greater risk—the poachers. Then she’d gone to the Amazon, and become caught up in the land rights struggle there. After that, it was a bit of a blur; she’d always tried to keep me up to date with her exploits, but she moved too fast for my sluggish mental picture of her to follow.
The Year's Best SF 09 # 1991 Page 25