Scale Free

by Patrick Arnesen

  "Apparently I work for this Mr. Speer guy now? Who's that?"

  "Minister of Foreign Relations. He handles matters dealing with the outside world."

  "You know I've already got a job working on the polis's software systems. I'm actually pretty deep into some new software right now. It'll be pretty hard to pull away from that and then dive back into it later."

  "I know, I'm sorry Melanie. I need someone I already know and trust for this, and it could be really important."

  "Well, what is it then?"

  "Sit down" I said, gesturing at the second patio chair and reaching into my pocket for my desktop. "I'll show you."

  Chapter 13

  Melanie stared at the four photos.

  "And Gaudet thinks this lab is a big nuclear fusion experiment? It's a strange request isn't it, him wanting us to turn over the reactor’s blueprints? I mean if you found a lab doing illegal nuclear research, wouldn't you just arrest the people involved?"

  "I've been thinking about that. Gaudet must have his reasons for giving us this week's grace period."

  "I bet the reactor is this weird polygon thing inside the vacuum chamber. Those big circles that make up the surfaces of the sphere are probably superconducting magnets."

  "The only explanation I can think of is that he wants the nuclear reactor much more than he wants to press charges. If he were to seize VivraTerra's servers and arrest us all, it probably wouldn't get him the reactor. For one thing nobody knows who built it; it could be any one of the 200,000 people who live here, or it might not be an upload at all. Some organization could just be using VivraTerra as a front, and shutting down VivraTerra would just sever Gaudet's only link to them."

  Melanie looked up from the pictures. "And even if he did grab our servers, they wouldn't do him any good without our cooperation. We've been working on our own hard encryption for years now. I doubt even NASC could break it, and even if they could, they’d have to sift through exabytes of data.”

  “True. Then there’s the political fallout to consider. A lot of humans hate uploads, but many others who don’t. 200,000 uploads would have a lot of friends and business connections in the real world.”

  Melanie nodded. “If you offline a whole polis you’d have a big public backlash.”

  Melanie frowned. “Guadet said he especially wanted the reactor plans? What if it was more than just an experiment? What if it actually produced useful power?”

  Her eyes darted over the photos again. “Nobody’s ever managed to make an energy-positive fusion reactor before. After the failure of ITER in the 2020’s, there hasn’t been much research into fusion, people basically gave up.

  If someone could build one, it would change the world. We could get rid of coal and oil and actually do something about global warming. That kind of tech would be worth almost anything.”

  I nodded. “Especially now that global warming’s doing so much damage and even coal’s becoming expensive. Maybe we should assume that Gaudet believes he’s found a successful reactor prototype. If so, he’d be prepared to do almost anything and take big risks to get it.”

  “That makes him pretty dangerous.” Melanie said. “I’d take his threat to shut down the whole polis at face value. He’ll do it if we can’t give him a better option.”

  “Why would the blueprints be so important?” I asked. “Why does he need them if he has the reactor itself?”

  Melanie expanded the photo of the inside of the vacuum chamber and looked closer. “I’m not familiar with this design. It doesn’t look anything like the tokomaks the ITER experiment was working on. There’s no torus, and if those rings are magnets then all of their fields would get focused up right in the center of that dodecahedron. However this thing works, it would probably need very precise computer control to regulate the magnetic fields and inject the fuel at exactly the right time and in exactly the right amounts. Most of the magic wouldn’t be in the hardware itself but in the software, which Guadet probably doesn’t have. He also said that the reactor was partially trashed. I’ll bet the computers were wiped clean too.”

  “Makes sense, but we still need to figure out who built the thing. Do you see any components here that are rare or exotic, something we could trace?”

  Melanie stared at the photos. “I’d focus on those superconducting magnets. You don’t normally see many that big outside of a particle physics lab. They’d have to be custom built and there aren’t many companies out there that do that. I’ll see if I can get you a short list.”

  “Great.” I took another look at the photos. “Do you have any idea what all that equipment inside that big metal cage in the second photo is for?”

  “Well the cage is probably a Faraday cage. It creates an electromagnetic shield around whatever’s inside so no radio signals can get in or out. I have no idea what the rest of the equipment is for. Those huge rings with magnets all the way around them, they look a bit like particle accelerators; like much smaller versions of the ones at CERN on the border between Switzerland and France. They could be used to accelerate particles to very high energies.”

  “Does that have anything to do with nuclear fusion?” I asked.

  “Not directly. I mean you can use particle accelerators to fuse hydrogen or helium nuclei together, but you’d use up so much power doing it that you’d never get anywhere close to break-even power. Besides these rings don’t look like they’re connected to the reactor itself.”

  Chapter 14

  I heard footsteps from the kitchen.

  “Hi guys” said Emma as she came out onto the deck. Her blond hair was pulled back in a loose ponytail and she was wearing a dark green summer dress. “I don’t normally see you two here. Are you working on work-work?”

  “Hi Emma” Melanie replied, assuming a sarcastic grin “Your father couldn’t keep his little nightmare to himself. He got his boss to recruit me. It seems I work for your dad now.”

  “Not very smart Dad.”

  I smirked. “Couldn’t be helped. If Melanie wants to take revenge for this, then I guess I’ll just have to survive whatever she dishes out. Time for homework?”

  “Uh huh.”

  Melanie turned to me. “I’ll track down the superconductor supplier. Why don’t you stay here with Emma in the meantime. There isn’t really much else we can do right now anyway.”

  “Ok, thanks. Come on Emma, let’s get set up.”

  Melanie stood up, waved goodbye and vanished from sight.

  Emma sat down at the kitchen table in front of her still-open desktop and I pulled up a chair beside her. “So what did you cover in class today?”

  “Planets. Julia was telling us about planets and solar systems.”

  “And what’s for homework today?”

  “Well we know of about 1000 roughly earth-sized planets outside the solar system. I’m supposed to find which of them are most likely to have life like ours and write up a report on why.”

  “Do you have the list?”

  We got down to business. It was a good homework assignment, covering biology, chemistry and astronomy. We stared by researching all the known requirements for life and then started whittling down the list. After a few hours of hard work we had narrowed it down to 10.

  “This sucks.” Emma said. I don’t think we can do any better than the top ten.

  “I can’t think of anything else we could take into consideration.” I said, “These planets are all the right mass, around the right kind of star, the right distance from the star in nice solar systems where all the planets have stable, circular orbits. They’re not too close to any pulsars, recent supernovas or other sources of radiation. They’re not tidally locked to their suns, which means they have a day and a night, so it never gets too hot or too cold. That’s just about everything we can tell about them right now.”

  Emma shook her head. “For all we know half of them could have atmospheres of sulfur and carbon dioxide. They could be hell-worlds like Venus and we’d never know.” />
  “Well, I think we did pretty well. Your teacher should be pleased.”

  “I guess. I’ll write this up in a report after dinner. I’m getting hungry.”

  “What do you want to eat?”

  “I know we had it yesterday, but I’d like BBQ’d fish with pineapple again.”

  “Ok. Here or from the lagoon?” by which I was asking whether she wanted to conjure dinner out of thin air and eat it here, or if she wanted to play by Polynesia’s rules, where everything had to be gathered or made by hand.

  “From the lagoon!”

  “Ok. Let’s go.”

  Chapter 15

  I made a quick wardrobe change back to my Polynesian clothes and followed Emma to our usual jump point on the beach. It was late afternoon, cloudless with a light breeze. I jogged back to the village to fetch our spear guns and Emma readied her tri. My boat still lay in ruins further down the beach.

  “Ready Captain?” I asked as I returned with a spear gun in each hand.

  “Uh huh” Emma replied absentmindedly. Her eyes were focused on her invisible interface. “I’m just checking the dolphin cams... they’re hunting! We can join them. Quick get in!”

  We pushed the boat off the beach and forced it past the breakers. I lifted Emma in and she took the steering position at the tiller. Then I turned the boat around so it faced away from the beach and climbed in, taking my place ahead of Emma to handle the sails. “I’m going to dial up more wind or we’ll never get there in time.” Emma yelled.

  A second later the breeze picked up and rose relentlessly to nearly 20 knots. I stuck my feet under the safety straps and leaned out as far as I could, using my bodyweight to counterbalance the force of the wind on the sails to prevent it from flipping us over. Both the windward hull and the center hull rose out of the water and we flew on a single hull, the centerboard humming loudly as it sliced deep into the water at high speed. As the boat leaped over each wave Emma and I were drenched repeatedly with bucket-loads of warm salt water. I risked taking my eyes off the sails for a split second to catch a look of wild glee on Emma’s face.

  In just a few minutes we were nearly a kilometer offshore and approaching the large outer reef that ringed our island within the lagoon. Up ahead was a small patch where the sea appeared to be foaming. As we got closer I could make out hundreds of fish all trying to leap out of the water at the same time.

  When we were within 50 feet of the dolphin hunt, Emma turned the boat up into the wind and yelled for me to drop the sail. I freed the correct line and the mainsail collapsed onto the center hull. Emma sprang past me on the netting between the hulls, took the anchor from the anchor box at the foot of the mast and threw it overboard. Then she grabbed her spear gun and dove headfirst from the front of the boat. Just before she disappeared under the water I saw her legs melt together. Her feet merged, then flattened and expanded, turning into a large tail-flipper.

  A second later I dove deep into the water myself. A number of exceptions to the conventional laws of mundane physics come into play when you find yourself under water in the Polynesian sim. For one thing, the sim allows you to exchange your legs for a dolphin style flipper with powerful muscles. This lets you swim faster and more gracefully; the need to breathe switches off, you can dive to any depth without risking nitrogen bubbles in your blood and your eyes remain in perfect focus without the need for goggles.

  Once under water, I could see the dolphin hunt in progress. They were mounting a coordinated wrangling operation against their hapless school of fish. Up to ten dolphins at a time were diving twenty feet below the school to circle it. As they circled, they released a steady stream of air bubbles from their blowholes. The bubbles percolated up through the sparkling water to form a ring of air that the fish wouldn’t swim through. As we watched, the dolphins drew their noose tighter and tighter around the school. When one dolphin exhausted its air supply another would swim down to take its place. The rest of the school darted up the center of the ring from below, grabbing their prey and pinning the fish against the surface.

  We swam closer and two of the dolphins broke off hunting to greet us. Emma stroked the back of the nearest one when it drew close. She knew each one by its appearance and the way it moved.

  Emma swam through the ring of bubbles and drew back the bolt on her spring-loaded spear gun. She waited for a break in the stream of feeding dolphins and fired. On her third attempt she hooked a foot-long fish. She reeled it in and attached it to a line trailing from her waist, then prepared for another shot.

  It was at moments like these that I felt the greatest sense of peace. The water was cool against my skin and the rays from the sun turned the surface into a dazzling ceiling of ever-shattering diamonds. Emma’s long hair flowed out behind her as she drifted inside the curtain of bubbles. I swam to join her in the hunt.

  Chapter 16

  The decision to upload with Emma was the hardest one I have ever had to make.

  I had begun to seriously consider it four years earlier on the day I buried Nicola, my wife and Emma's mother. Emma, had been withdrawn and quiet during the ceremony. When Nicola’s mother stood up to speak to the congregation, she said that while her daughter's death was tragic, it was God's Will, and that accepting death and learning to continue without her, was part of being human. Grief welled up in me and for a moment my reserve broke down. My heart leapt into my throat and I surrendered to involuntary sobs. Little eight year old Emma took my hand and tried to comfort me. I wrapped my arms around her and hugged her tightly.

  That night back at home it was Emma’s turn. Nicola had been in the habit of putting Emma to sleep every night and so her absence was most poignant before bed. I cradled her in my arms, stroked her hair and comforted her as she sobbed. After a long time her cries softened to weeping and she fell into a restless sleep, only to wake again with fresh tears. During that long night I swore to myself that our lives would never again be torn apart by death.

  I sold our townhouse in Ottawa, liquidated my pension fund and took a two week vacation from work; then with Emma in hand I boarded a plane to Holland.

  Uploading was illegal in Canada and the US because it was treated as assisted suicide, but VivraTerra ran an upload clinic in Amsterdam. Ironically, while Holland’s largely secular population was just about tolerant of uploading, its corporate privacy laws were too weak to risk setting up a polis there. That’s why most polises ran upload clinics in Holland and a handful of other progressive nations, but placed their hardware in corporate-friendly North America or Asia.

  We landed at Schiphol and took the train into Amsterdam’s central station. From there it was a few minute’s walk to our hotel. With one hand for Emma and another for our rolling luggage, we slowly strolled down the pedestrian-only street. It was early morning and the sky was pink. I felt a light breeze on my cheeks, tainted by a slight odor from the canals. We found a small café and decided to stop in. I ordered some toast and juice for Emma, and a tostie and a 'biertje' for myself. The tostie turned out to be a grilled cheese sandwich with ham but it was the beer that I remember most; fresh, light and sweet, like nothing in Canada. Emma was delighted to discover that the Dutch served toast with chocolate sprinkles on top. I slowly drank my beer and it struck me that that this would be one of the last times I would sip real beer with human lips.

  For our last week as humans I had ordered a suite with a large bedroom and a separate sitting room. We checked in, closed the curtains against the day and went to sleep. Emma and I spent the next few days exploring Amsterdam and the surrounding countryside.

  Chapter 17

  On the morning of our appointment with VivraTerra I woke early at 6AM, 4 hours ahead of our appointment. Emma was still asleep. I quietly picked up my huds from the nightstand, fished out my video camera from our luggage and headed into the sitting room. I closed the bedroom door behind me. There was a bowl of fruit on the coffee table and I plucked a few grapes. After a slight delay, my huds managed to log m
e into my bank account and 60 seconds later I had finished transferring every last penny into VivraTerra’s holding account. Half the total amount would soon be redacted for the cost of uploading.

  Only then did I feel safe to call my Mother. I picked up the video cam and tossed it up in the air in front of me. Its translucent wasp wings unfolded instantly and it settled into a hover, focusing its lens on me. The image of my Mother’s head with her fridge and stove in the background appeared on my huds a moment later.

  “Hi Mom” I began. “Hello Jarrod” she replied, obviously distracted by a kitchen chore. “How’s your vacation going?”

  “It’s been fine. I took Emma on a boat ride and she really loved seeing the cows beside the canal. We also went to see the new dams – they’re incredible!”

  “They’d better be if the Dutch want to stay above that rising waterline. How’s the food over there?”

  “Emma’s in love with Dutch waffles and chocolate sprinkles and I’m in love with the beer. How have you been doing?”

  “Oh fine. I’ve been busy with my church groups and walking club. Let’s see, if I remember your itinerary you’ll be taking the train to Paris tomorrow right? I’m sure Emma will love that.”

  I froze up, overcome by anguish over what I was about to do to my poor mother, who had been nothing but wonderful to me my whole life.