by Neil Clarke
Two big buses were parked at the entrance to the village, the same two buses that had brought the Gods here a year ago. More than a hundred Gods would now be taken to the nearest space elevator and ride up in space capsules. The silver thread that could be seen in the distance was in reality hundreds of kilometers away.
Qiusheng’s whole family went to send off their God. No one said anything along the way. As they neared the village entrance, God stopped, leaned against his cane, and bowed to the family. “Please stop here. Thank you for taking care of me this year. Really, thank you. No matter where I will be in this universe, I will always remember your family.” Then he took off the large watch from his wrist and handed it to Bingbing. “A gift.”
“But . . . how will you communicate with the other Gods in the future?” Bingbing asked.
“We’ll all be on the spaceships. I have no more need for this,” God said, laughing.
“Gramps God,” Qiusheng’s father said, his face sorrowful, “your ships are all ancient. They won’t last much longer. Where can you go then?”
God stroked his beard and said calmly, “It doesn’t matter. Space is limitless. Dying anywhere is the same.”
Yulian suddenly began to cry. “Gramps God, I . . . I’m not a very nice person. I shouldn’t have made you the target of all my complaints, which I’d saved up my whole life. It’s just as Qiusheng said: I’ve behaved as if I don’t have a conscience . . .” She pushed a bamboo basket into God’s hands. “I boiled some eggs this morning. Please take them for your trip.”
God picked up the basket. “Thank you.” Then he took out an egg, peeled it, and began to eat, savoring the taste. Yellow flakes of egg yolk soon flaked his white beard. He continued to talk as he ate. “Actually, we came to Earth not only because we wanted to survive. Having already lived for two, three thousand years, what did we have to fear from death? We just wanted to be with you. We like and cherish your passion for life, your creativity, your imagination. These things have long disappeared from the God Civilization. We saw in you the childhood of our civilization. But we didn’t realize we’d bring you so much trouble. We’re really sorry.”
“Please stay, Gramps,” Bingbing said, crying. “I’ll be better in the future.”
God shook his head slowly. “We’re leaving not because of how you treated us. The fact that you took us in and allowed us to stay was enough. But one thing made us unable to stay any longer: in your eyes, the Gods are pathetic. You pity us. Oh, you pity us.”
God threw away the pieces of eggshell. He lifted his face, trailing a full head of white hair, and stared at the sky, as though through the blue he could see the bright sea of stars. “How can the God Civilization be pitied by man? You have no idea what a great civilization she was. You do not know what majestic epics she created, or how many imposing deeds she accomplished.
“It was 1857, during the Milky Way Era, when astronomers discovered a large number of stars was accelerating toward the center of the Milky Way. Once this flood of stars was consumed by the supermassive black hole found there, the resulting radiation would kill all life found in the galaxy.
“In response, our great ancestors built a nebula shield around the center of the galaxy with a diameter of ten thousand light-years so that life and civilization in the galaxy would continue. What a magnificent engineering project that was! It took us more than fourteen hundred years to complete . . .
“Immediately afterward, the Andromeda galaxy and the Large Magellanic Cloud united in an invasion of our galaxy. The interstellar fleet of the God Civilization leaped across hundreds of thousands of light-years and intercepted the invaders at the gravitational balance point between Andromeda and the Milky Way. When the battle entered into its climax, large numbers of ships from both sides mixed together, forming a spiraling nebula the size of the Solar System.
“During the final stages of the battle, the God Civilization made the bold decision to send all remaining warships and even the civilian fleet into the spiraling nebula. The great increase in mass caused gravity to exceed the centrifugal force, and this nebula, made of ships and people, collapsed under gravity and formed a star! Because the proportion of heavy elements in this star was so high, immediately after its birth, the star went supernova and illuminated the deep darkness between Andromeda and the Milky Way! Our ancestors thus destroyed the invaders with their courage and self-sacrifice, and left the Milky Way as a place where life could develop peacefully . . .
“Yes, now our civilization is old. But it is not our fault. No matter how hard one strives, a civilization must grow old one day. Everyone grows old, even you.
“We really do not need your pity.”
“Compared to you,” Qiusheng said, full of awe, “the human race is really nothing.”
“Don’t talk like that,” God said. “Earth’s civilization is still an infant. We hope you will grow up fast. We hope you will inherit and continue the glory of your creators.” God threw down his cane. He put his hands on the shoulders of Bingbing and Qiusheng. “I have some final words for you.”
“We may not understand everything you have to say,” Qiusheng said, “but please speak. We will listen.”
“First, you must get off this rock!” God spread out his arms toward space. His white robe danced in the autumn wind like a sail.
“Where will we go?” Qiusheng’s father asked in confusion.
“Begin by flying to the other planets in the solar system, then to other stars. Don’t ask why, but use all your energy toward the goal of flying away, the farther the better. In that process, you will spend a lot of money, and many people will die, but you must get away from here. Any civilization that stays on her birth world is committing suicide! You must go into the universe and find new worlds, new homes, and spread your descendants across the galaxy like drops of spring rain.”
“We’ll remember,” Qiusheng said and nodded, even though neither he nor his wife nor father nor son really understood God’s words.
“Good,” God sighed, satisfied. “Next I will tell you a secret, a great secret.” He stared at everyone in the family with his blue eyes. His stare was like a cold wind and caused everyone’s heart to shudder. “You have brothers.”
Qiusheng’s family looked at God, utterly confused. But Qiusheng finally figured out what God meant. “You’re saying that you created other Earths?”
God nodded slowly. “Yes, other Earths, other human civilizations. Other than you, there were three others. All are close to you, within two hundred light-years. You are Earth Number Four, the youngest.”
“Have you been to the other Earths?” Bingbing asked.
God nodded again. “Before we came to you, we went first to the other three Earths and asked them to take us in. Earth Number One was the best among the bunch. After they obtained our scientific materials, they simply chased us away.
“Earth Number Two, on the other hand, kept one million of us as hostages and forced us to give them spaceships as ransom. After we gave them one thousand ships, they realized that they could not operate the ships. They then forced the hostages to teach them how, but the hostages didn’t know how, either, since the ships were autonomous. So they killed all the hostages.
“Earth Number Three took three million of us as hostages and demanded that we ram Earth Number One and Earth Number Two with several spaceships each because they were in a prolonged state of war with the other two Earths. Of course, even a single hit from one of our antimatter-powered ships would destroy all life on a planet. We refused, and so they killed all the hostages.”
“Unfilial children!” Qiusheng’s father shouted in anger. “You should punish them!”
God shook his head. “We will never attack civilizations we created. You are the best of the four brothers. That’s why I’m telling you all this. Your three brothers are drawn to invasion. They do not know what love is or what morality is. Their capacity for cruelty and bloodlust are impossible for you to imagine.
�
��Indeed, in the beginning we created six Earths. The other two were in the same solar systems as Earth Number One and Earth Number Three, respectively. Both were destroyed by their brothers. The fact that the other three Earths haven’t yet destroyed one another is only due to the great distances separating their solar systems. By now, all three know of the existence of Earth Number Four and possess your precise coordinates. Thus, you must go and destroy them first before they destroy you.”
“This is too frightening!” Yulian said.
“For now, it’s not yet too frightening. Your three brothers are indeed more advanced than you, but they still cannot travel faster than one-tenth the speed of light, and cannot cruise more than thirty light-years from home. This is a race of life and death to see which one among you can achieve near-light-speed space travel first. It is the only way to break through the prison of time and space. Whoever can achieve this technology first will survive. Anyone slower will die a sure death. This is the struggle for survival in the universe. Children, you don’t have much time. Work hard!”
“Do the most learned and most powerful people in our world know these things?” Qiusheng’s father asked, trembling.
“Yes. But don’t rely on them. A civilization’s survival depends on the effort of every individual. Even the common people like you have a role to play.”
“You hear that, Bingbing?” Qiusheng said to his son. “You must study hard.”
“When you fly into the universe at close to the speed of light to resolve the threat of your brothers, you must perform another urgent task: find a few planets suitable for life and seed them with some simple, primitive life from here, like bacteria and algae. Let them evolve on their own.”
Qiusheng wanted to ask more questions, but God picked up his cane and began to walk. The family accompanied him toward the bus. The other Gods were already aboard.
“Oh, Qiusheng.” God stopped, remembering. “I took a few of your books with me. I hope you don’t mind.” He opened his bundle to show Qiusheng. “These are your high school textbooks on math, physics, chemistry.”
“No problem. Take them. But why do you want these?”
God tied up the bundle again. “To study. I’ll start with quadratic equations. In the long years ahead, I’ll need some way to occupy myself. Who knows? Maybe one day, I’ll try to repair our ships’ antimatter engines and allow us to fly close to the speed of light again!”
“Right,” Qiusheng said, excited. “That way, you’ll be able to skip across time again. You can find another planet, create another civilization to support you in your old age!”
God shook his head. “No, no, no. We’re no longer interested in being supported in our old age. If it’s time for us to die, we die. I want to study because I have a final wish.” He took out the small TV from his pocket. On the screen, his beloved from two thousand years ago was still slowly speaking the final word of that three-word sentence. “I want to see her again.”
“It’s a good wish, but it’s only a fantasy,” Qiusheng’s father said. “Think about it. She left two thousand years ago at the speed of light. Who knows where she is now? Even if you repair your ship, how will you ever catch her? You told us that nothing can go faster than light.”
God pointed at the sky with his cane. “In this universe, as long as you’re patient, you can make any wish come true. Even though the possibility is minuscule, it is not nonexistent. I told you once that the universe was born out of a great explosion. Now gravity has gradually slowed down its expansion. Eventually the expansion will stop and turn into contraction. If our spaceship can really fly again at close to the speed of light, then we will endlessly accelerate and endlessly approach the speed of light. This way, we will skip over endless time until we near the final moments of the universe.
“By then, the universe will have shrunk to a very small size, smaller even than Bingbing’s toy ball, as small as a point. Then everything in the entire universe will come together, and she and I will also be together.”
A tear fell from God’s eye and rolled onto his beard, glistening brightly in the morning sun. “The universe will then be the tomb at the end of The Butterfly Lovers. She and I will be the two butterflies emerging from the tomb . . .”
8.
A week later, the last spaceship left Earth. God left.
Xicen village resumed its quiet life.
On this evening, Qiusheng’s family sat in the yard, looking at a sky full of stars. It was deep autumn, and insects had stopped making noises in the fields. A light breeze stirred the fallen leaves at their feet. The air was slightly chilly.
“They’re flying so high. The wind must be so severe, so cold—” Yulian murmured to herself.
“There isn’t any wind up there,” Qiusheng said. “They’re in space, where there isn’t even air. But it is really cold. So cold that in the books they call it absolute zero. It’s so dark out there, with no end in sight. It’s a place that you can’t even dream of in your nightmares.”
Yulian began to cry again. But she tried to hide it with words. “Remember those last two things God told us? I understand the part about our three brothers. But then he told us that we had to spread bacteria onto other planets and so on. I still can’t make sense of that.”
“I figured it out,” Qiusheng’s father said. Under the brilliant, starry sky, his head, full of a lifetime of foolishness, finally opened up to insight. He looked up at the stars. He had lived with them above his head all his life, but only today did he discover what they really looked like. A feeling he had never had before suffused his blood, making him feel as if he had been touched by something greater. Even though it did not become a part of him, the feeling shook him to his core. He sighed at the sea of stars, and said,
“The human race needs to start thinking about who is going to support us in our old age.”
Rich Larson was born in Galmi, Niger, has studied in Rhode Island and worked in the south of Spain, and now lives in Ottawa, Canada. His work appears in numerous Year’s Best anthologies and has been translated into Chinese, Vietnamese, Polish, Czech, French, and Italian. He was the most prolific author of short science fiction in 2015, 2016, and possibly 2017 as well. His debut novel, Annex, comes out from Orbit Books in July 2018, and his debut collection, Tomorrow Factory, follows in October 2018 from Talos Press.
Water Scorpions
RICH LARSON
This is you,” Noel says to his new brother, holding up a writhing water scorpion by its tail. Spindly legs churn and its pincers clack, but the tail is stingerless. It is thin and stiff and hollow like a straw, so the water scorpion can breathe through it when it clings to the rusty iron bar around the inside of the pool.
Danny rocks forward on his haunches and watches through his cluster of gleaming black eyes. His body is all slippery spars and gray angles. Noel hopes he sees the resemblance to the creature dangling between his fingers.
“This is you,” Danny mimics, a warbling echo that doesn’t require movement from his needle-lined jaws, coming instead from the porous bulb underneath them.
Noel stands up from the pool’s blue-tiled lip, keeping the water scorpion pinched between thumb and finger. He doesn’t have to tell Danny to follow. Danny always follows, even when Noel stamps his feet and screams at him to go away.
He leads his brother along the concrete deck, slapping wet footprints. Danny’s feet clop instead of slapping, like when their mother wears high heels. Now she sits barefoot in a dilapidated beach chair, wearing the stretchy black one-piece that hides her scar. Her eyes are on a work screen full of lab notes, but she sets down her stylus and waves and smiles when Noel and Danny pass by.
Noel lowers the water scorpion into the pocket of his trunks to shield it from view, still gripping the tail. It squirms and rasps against the fabric.
Nobody else looks up from their loungers. Nobody stares at Danny here, not even the cooks anymore. The private pool on the edge of Faya-Largeau, only hours from the Saharan crash
site, was bought out by the UN specifically for its team of scientists, translators, engineers—all of them now used to seeing aliens.
Noel and Danny pass under a stucco arch, and the concrete becomes the courtyard’s chipped mosaic tile, hot on Noel’s feet. He does not know if it is hot on Danny’s feet; Danny never jerks away from scalding sand or half-buried thorns. Not even when Noel has him walk over a spread of prickly goatheads.
Pungent eucalyptus overtakes the smell of chlorine and greasy samosas. The silvery-gray trees line a long open-air entryway. Noel leads Danny all the way to the end, into the red dust of the parking lot where the pool sounds of splashing and satellite radio and voices are muted. Danny’s neck pops and swivels toward the family car where it gleams hot white in the sunlight.
“Look at this, Danny,” Noel says, lifting the water scorpion from his pocket. “Watch this.”
“Watch this,” comes the wavery echo. He crouches obediently as Noel drops the creature into the warm sand. It makes a skittering circle, claws waving, then tries to dart away. Noel meets it with a wave of sand kicked up by the blade of his hand. The water scorpion flails and shies off, scuttles in the other direction. Noel tosses another fistful of sand.
Danny keeps watching, stone still, as Noel pours scoop after scoop of sand onto the panicking scorpion, sucking the moisture from the cracks in its keratin, battering down on its carapace, until the creature turns sluggish and can only slowly kick its legs in place.
“That’s like you, if Mom didn’t bring you to the pool all the time,” Noel says softly. “You’d cook. You’d get all dried up and die, and after a while she’d forget you ever existed. Just like she forgot Maya.”
Danny looks up at him with all of his black beetle eyes. Danny never blinks. He never smiles and never cries. He doesn’t understand, not a single thing.