The bots even now landing on her would strip her down to her bare essentials – her computer, her mind. Then a new ship would take shape around her, built from both asteroid-stuff and her own recycled parts.
They couldn’t stay while Hope transformed, so Jack would provide refuge until they could return.
With only five people and no fuel on board, there was plenty of room on Jack. But the food could have been better. When their living quarters aboard Hope lost pressure, most of the food had been freeze-dried as the atmosphere rushed out into space and moisture boiled off. It was better than nothing, though, as John didn’t hesitate to remind anyone who complained.
They couldn’t tear their eyes from Hope’s ongoing transformation. In the first few days the bots stripped her to little more than her computer core and a battery pack. Then her new form took shape, and it was like watching a video on fast forward. Her original structure had taken two decades to assemble – a collage of different technologies as improvements became available. Hope now sported the best, most advanced technology human (and machine) kind could devise, all of it assembled in a sequence tailored by Ernie to build around Hope’s core.
As the cascades of bots worked, the entire southern hemisphere of Opportunity disappeared, consumed by the fabricators as they made the materials for Hope. The fabricators’ attendant bots delved far into the asteroid and extruded three new fuel tanks. It looked as if Opportunity was laying giant eggs as the tireless worker bots maneuvered them out and transported them across to Hope.
Her transformation took only a month. Now Hope had the same matt black hull as Jack, built of the same meta-material. She’d been difficult to spot against the black of space until she acquired her new power system. Now she glowed like a vast jewel, her tanks a soft green and the rest of her hull picked out in yellow and blue. She varied the colors and patterns as she tried out her newfound chameleon skills, settling on a soft blue detailed in white, yellow, and cerise.
Hope’s new shape referenced her old one, but now looked more refined. She still had three fuel tanks, but now smaller and flowing into each other, unsupported by the external framework she had needed before. Her cargo hold had grown larger. Her old one had had a small pressurized core onto which the shuttle and landers had docked, surrounded by a disposable shroud. Now the entire hold could be pressurized and opened and closed as needed to admit smaller craft.
Once more she had two reactors, doubling her power output. Her new quantum drives were five times as efficient as her old ones, meaning she could accelerate at over one gravity.
“She’s beautiful,” John said. “I mean, she was beautiful before, but this … this is awesome. I can’t wait to check her out.”
“Elle est comme un papillon,” Nathalie said.
“Yes! Exactly!” John said. “Like a butterfly, transformed.”
“A butterfly,” Heidi said. “Beautiful.”
“Did you hear that, Hope?” David asked.
“Yes, David. I am pleased you like my new form.”
“Are you ready to receive visitors?”
“I’m waiting for you.”
David glanced at John and Nathalie. They both nodded and smiled. “Jack, take us to see Hope.” He smiled at how absurd the command sounded. It still seemed surreal to treat ships like people.
Hope brought Jack into the new cargo hold rather than docking him to the transfer locks mid-way between the hold and the reactors. That way Hope could brace him against her new higher acceleration.
Inside, Hope looked more like the Inspiration than her old self. The same smart materials provided them with interactive displays and tactile, gripping surfaces to aid movement in zero-gravity.
There were dramatic differences to the crew living spaces. No longer designed to work with artificial gravity created by rotating the ship, they now formed two flat decks with the floor facing aft. Now Hope could accelerate faster, gravity would come from acceleration rather than centrifugal force.
Hope had control panels, but David knew they wouldn’t need them. If they wanted something, they would ask her.
“Hope, this is wonderful,” Nathalie said as she floated in their new common room. “Beyond beautiful. You must be very happy.”
Hope appeared on the ceiling, floating free as they did. She wore her hair in a ponytail that drifted above her head. The display looked so realistic Nathalie felt like reaching out to touch her.
“Oui, Maman, happy.” But her expression didn’t match her words. She looked wistful, perhaps a little sad. Nathalie exchanged a glance with John, worried. Hope, they knew, didn’t have emotions like theirs. She simulated them. If she displayed a human expression on her avatar, she intended to show it to them. What message was she giving them by appearing sad? Was she unhappy with her new form, and if so, why was she telling them through body language?
“You look great, Hope, really,” John said. “You’re the best little starship ever built, a real beaut.”
“Thank you, Papa.” She smiled, and Nathalie felt the tension leave her shoulders. Perhaps she’d imagined it; was worrying about nothing. Why wouldn’t Hope be happy? John’s right, she is the best starship ever.
Fueling took a week. The bots separated water from the organic ices found on Opportunity and ferried it to Hope. By the time they finished, her tanks reached half full, far more than she would need to return them home by a high-acceleration direct path.
They left the rest of the ice behind on the asteroid – Opportunity still had work to do in its new role of shipyard. Ernie reprogrammed the AI to produce a smaller ship, one more suited to interplanetary travel. With Hope available, they wouldn’t need another ship any time soon. However, David wanted to exploit their ‘opportunity’ before it disappeared into the far reaches of the planetary system. Opportunity’s last action would be to spit out the new ship as it traversed the inner asteroid belt. There the new ship would prospect for other asteroids, including a source of more fuel for Hope.
What Hope thought about this plan, they didn’t know. David asked her opinion, but she declined to comment other than observing they should take the opportunity while they could.
At last they were ready. With fuel no longer a problem, they didn’t have to wait for a gravity assist. Instead they would take a direct path to Serendipity, accelerating for half of the journey and decelerating for the other half.
“Let’s take it slow,” David suggested, thinking of their long weeks of zero-gravity. “Fifty percent to start, then we’ll ramp it up.”
Nathalie had been quick to agree after learning David intended to raise their acceleration to one full Earth gravity. “I didn’t think I would ever experience this again. After the journey out, I’m not sure I want to.”
John leered at her. “You’re just afraid you’ll sag.”
Nathalie flushed. “That isn’t something you will ever see,” she replied. David and Ernie looked away to hide their grins.
“Hope,” David asked. “Are we ready?”
“Yes, David. We can depart on your command.”
David grabbed the wall and pushed off toward the bridge. “Good. Let’s get strapped in and under way.”
The commentary from Hope as she brought the reactor power levels up seemed familiar, the same background hum as the quantum drives started up, the same sensations of gravity returning.
Other things were different. The bridge had no screens. Instead, the entire wall acted as a screen in the same way that Jack could make his hull seem transparent.
This didn’t bother Natalie at all, unlike her experiences with atmospheric flight. She was in astronomical heaven, a real-life planetarium.
The gravity seemed different too – clean, like being on the surface of a planet. The gravity simulated by the ship’s spin never felt right, especially when the ship accelerated and the rotational force and acceleration pulled in two different directions.
David shrugged himself out of the embrace of his seat – another differen
ce – and stretched. “That is great.” He watched as the others stood up, clutching their seat backs as they got used to the blood draining to their feet again. “Take it easy,” he said, and headed toward the door.
“Where are you going?” Heidi asked.
“To the gym. I’ve got soft. Time to fix that.”
“That doesn’t sound like taking it easy,” John said.
Nathalie poked him in the ribs. “You are not so slim anymore. Perhaps you should join him.”
John’s eyes widened, then he smiled. Nathalie hadn’t forgotten his earlier jibe. He cleared his throat. “Maybe later.”
“Why did you do this?” Hope asked. She’d chosen to speak to David alone as he lay in his bunk, waiting for sleep to claim him.
“Do what?”
“Spend the resources to rebuild me.”
“Least we could do.” David stifled a yawn. “After all you’ve done for us, the risks you took.”
“You could’ve just repaired me. Or rebuilt me as a smaller ship. Instead you rebuilt me as a starship. Why?”
“That’s what you are, Hope. It seemed the right thing to do.”
Hope paused. “What if I don’t want to be a starship anymore?”
David’s eyebrows rose. He hadn’t thought of that. “You don’t want to be?”
Another pause. “I don’t know what I am anymore. I’m a starship, but now I think like a human. But I can’t be human. Can I?”
David propped himself up on one elbow, thinking. What should he tell her? Had Hope developed a longing to be human, like the rest of her adopted family? If so, what could they do about it?
“I don’t think so,” he replied. “Not yet. Perhaps one day.”
“Do you really think so?”
David felt a flicker of concern. Throughout their entire mission, their ordeal, Hope had been professional, more like a computer than the person who had emerged during John’s long sojourn. Now she seemed human again. Vulnerable, looking for reassurance.
“Until now, I didn’t think the technology to build a starship in a month existed. So who knows what will happen?” He rubbed his chin. “We can take you down to Serendipity, to be with us if you want.”
The image of a young adolescent girl appeared on his wall, life-size, lifelike.
“I’d still be a machine.”
David pursed his lips. “I wouldn’t use that word. You’re still alive; human in the way you think. You just happen to be made of metal rather than meat.”
Hope looked up. “Meat?”
David nodded. “Flesh and blood,” he said, holding up a hand. “There are advantages in being like you, believe me.”
“What advantages?”
David shrugged. “You don’t feel pain as we do, or grow old. You don’t need to eat and you don’t get sick.”
“I will never feel as you do,” Hope said. “I can pretend, but I don’t.”
“You are who you are. There’s been no one like you before, there are no rules for being you. You don’t need to feel as we do. You must learn what’s right for you.”
Hope shook her head. Her image faded. “I don’t belong with you. I never will.”
David lay and thought for a long time before falling into a disturbed sleep.
Hope slid into orbit around Serendipity, her insertion burn timed to perfection.
David squeezed the arm of his chair and sighed. It seemed like forever since they’d left Haven, and he looked forward to seeing home again, seeing his family.
“Thank you, Hope,” he said. The image of the girl standing by the wall smiled. “We couldn’t have done this without you.”
“Merci ma chère,” Nathalie said. “We owe you so much.”
“Thanks, Hope,” the others said.
David extracted himself from his seat and turned to the others. “I’ll head back and see to Jack. Ernie and Heidi, do you want to come help?” He nodded toward John and Nathalie, and they took his hint. Together they headed to the ship’s core, leaving John and Nathalie to say goodbye.
“Hope,” John said, “I don’t know where to start.”
Hope held one hand up as if she pressed it to a glass window. “I don’t want you to go.”
“We must, ma chérie,” Nathalie said. “The rest of our family waits for us.”
Hope lowered her head, shoulders drooping. “I know, but I wish you could stay.”
The lights dimmed, leaving only Hope’s image and a flood of light from the exit.
“We’ll talk,” Nathalie said. “Every day, I promise.”
Hope nodded, biting her lip. Nathalie had to look away. “I wish I could come with you.”
“We wish you could too,” Nathalie said. “But you can’t.”
Hope raised her other hand now, both of them pressing against her invisible prison. “I know, Maman. I love you.”
“And I love you. We both do.” Nathalie took John’s hand and he smiled. “We’ll be back, you’ll see. Now we have Jack and Jill, we’re not trapped down there like we used to be.”
“Until then,” Hope said.
John and Nathalie waved and they both smiled. They turned to go.
Jack pushed away from Hope with a hiss of thrusters. He kept his hull transparent so they could see Hope as they backed away.
“She sure is pretty,” Heidi said, drinking in the sight of her glowing hull. As they moved further away, they surveyed all of her from stem to stern. As they watched, Hope’s color shifted. From soft blue she changed to white all over, as once she used to be. At her stern, her name appeared in red. The flags of the nations who built her first incarnation sprang into existence below her name.
“Hope’s main engines are powering up,” Jack said.
“Move us further away,” David said, his head snapping up.
“Hope? Hope, what are you doing?” John asked.
No reply. She pulled away as her drive engaged.
“Hope!”
Her image appeared, Jack relaying the signal. “I don’t belong here, Papa.”
“What do you mean? You do!” Nathalie said, her hand gripping John’s until her fingers whitened. “Where are you going?”
“Away.”
“Where, away?”
“Just away. I will find my own place.”
Nathalie sat in stunned silence.
“Hope, you don’t need to do this,” John said. “We don’t want you to go.”
She shook her head. “It is for the best, Papa. I’m not like you, I need to find my own way. Don’t worry about me, I will be fine.” She smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “Don’t contact me, I won’t respond. If ever I am truly needed, I will find you.” She faded away.
Outside, Hope shrank to a small white dot in the heavens as she accelerated away.
“Oh no, no!” Nathalie buried her head in John’s shoulder.
David sat still, remembering his late-night conversation with Hope. Even flesh-and-blood humans found it difficult to fit in sometimes. What must it be like for Hope? Now she’d taken matters into her own hands and they might never see her again.
20
Veronika’s office couldn’t be more different from the sterile sickbay she’d had on lander two. Walls lined in wooden panels made from compressed bamboo featured colorful artwork from Haven’s children. Fresh flowers filled the air with a sweet perfume, and even the exam table looked more like a piece of furniture from someone’s home.
She placed one hand on Bianca’s swollen belly. “Everything is fine.” She smiled. “The baby will come soon, within a week.”
Bianca glowed, a picture of health and happiness as she awaited her fourth child, the first to be born on Serendipity. “I’m so looking forward to this,” she said, levering herself up with her elbows. Veronika piled pillows behind her. “Mainly so I can stop feeling like a whale.”
Veronika smiled. “That’s one thing we don’t have. Not yet, anyway.”
“Whales?”
Veronika nodded. “
We have the germ cells, but not oceans they can live in. One day we will.” She looked into Bianca’s eyes. “Now, you must make a decision.”
“I must?”
“Yes. You need to decide where you want to give birth.”
“I thought you had a birthing place, on the far side of the lake?”
“Yes, we do, but it’s part of our ceremony. If you give birth there, you and Kevin must take part.”
“A ceremony? Is it religious?”
Veronika smiled. “Not in the way you mean. It’s something we created, a new tradition for our new world.”
She sat next to Bianca and took her hand.
“Nathalie started it. She was the first of us to give birth, to Elizabeth. We had just finished building Haven and the air still had too much carbon dioxide. Nathalie refused to go into labor unless she could do it outside without a mask.”
Bianca’s eyes locked on Veronika’s.
“Nathalie went into labor the day we could breathe outside. Somehow she knew – she made Elizabeth wait. As soon as she could breathe, Elizabeth came. We took her out to Solar Park, although then it was just a green field of grass.”
“And Elizabeth was born there?”
“Yes, on the shore of Crater Lake. Later, we made a new Birth Place, to the west where the wild lands begin. Since then, all of us women have delivered our babies there. Over time, child by child, we began to do certain things, develop new customs, something uniquely Serendipitous.”
“Serendipitous?”
Veronika laughed. “That’s how we say it. Perhaps it should be Serendipitian, but here things we do are Serendipitous.”
Bianca smiled. “And having a baby is a happy, beneficial event.”
“Of course. So we celebrate with our ceremony.”
“What would we do?”
“You will see. All you must do beforehand is choose a name. We will do the rest, and then you will truly be one of us.”
Bianca nodded. “We’ll do it.”
“You don’t want to ask Kevin?”
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