know you don’t, Otto,’
she thought softly. ‘I don’t want you to, either.’ Then she sighed. ‘Maybe we’re thinking about this the wrong way. Maybe you do only have a short time left. But you’ve always wanted to seeEuropa, haven’t you? One of your lifetime goals is about to be accomplished. There are people who live their entire lives without achieving anything. It isn’t the length of life – it’s what you make of it.’
I know, I wrote. I can live no one’s life but my own.
Dr Bija smiled, and that was the end of the session.
*
Right before I left I went to say goodbye to the simple ones. There were onlysix of them, and only half of them were intelligent enough to even understand I was leaving. It was always painful to visit the simple ones. Their blank faces and dull eyes did not inspire one with hope. But I managed to play a game of Go-Fish with Niney and Toseph (19 and 27) and Fifen (54) drew me a picture. Those three had an intellect about that of a four-year-old. None of the simple ones hadbeen intelligent enough to select their own names, but their numbers had mostly degenerated into something resembling nomenclature. All of them received a farewell mindscape from me, even Three, in her large crib, who frankly didn’t have much mental capacity beyond that of a newborn. I constructed a mental garden for them, something pretty with unicorns and flowers and fairies. They always lovedit when I thought up pretty things for them. Fifen cried when she learned I wasn’t going to be back for a long time. Toseph got angry and kicked me, but I’m used to that.
Quin and my sisters had been permitted to join me on my trip to the flight base on Luna, from which the moonliner to Europa would embark on its interplanetary journey. Luna was not as strictly regulated as the outer colonies,really only being a space-port off planet. Most earthly regulations were still in effect on Earth’s moon. The journey there didn’t require stasis, and only a moderate disinfection procedure, so many people travelled there on vacation, or to get a taste of colony life to see if they could endure it. Many people, they say, can’t. There are all kinds of reasons why. Health concerns, gravity, nutritionaldeficiencies, sunlight, asthma. Human beings aren’t really built to live anywhere but Earth.
I spent most of the time on Luna with a blinding headache. It had faded mostly on the morning of my ultimate departure, probably due to the huge number of drugs Dr Svarog had prescribed. I had waited, nervously, in the seated queue at the space-port, as first Xavier and then Rose had been bundled offto their final disinfection procedure. Then it was my turn. Tristan had a stranger snap a final photograph of all four of us. She and Penny had bid me a tearful farewell, and Quin carefully nodded at me, with a strange smile on his face. I stared at them, trying to memorize their faces, trembling.
I might never see them again.
Then I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and stepped into the firstdisinfection chamber. Now it was over an hour later, and apparently I was finally disinfected enough to pass muster.
‘Please lie on the couch for bacterial reintroduction,’ the disembodied voice said sweetly.
I lay down on the cold plastic table – calling it a couch was far too charitable – and allowed mechanical arms to brush me on various parts of my body. According to the literature, theywere reintroducing beneficial bacteria without which my body would be susceptible to dangerous infection. How anything that would infect me could have made it past the antiseptics and disinfectants and antibiotics and irradiation we all had to endure was beyond me, but apparently human beings – and close genetically modified cousins – could not easily function without
some
microscopic symbionts.They’d discovered this in the early days of colonization. We are not alone – we are each colonies of mites and microbes and bacteria, all
she thought softly. ‘I don’t want you to, either.’ Then she sighed. ‘Maybe we’re thinking about this the wrong way. Maybe you do only have a short time left. But you’ve always wanted to seeEuropa, haven’t you? One of your lifetime goals is about to be accomplished. There are people who live their entire lives without achieving anything. It isn’t the length of life – it’s what you make of it.’
I know, I wrote. I can live no one’s life but my own.
Dr Bija smiled, and that was the end of the session.
*
Right before I left I went to say goodbye to the simple ones. There were onlysix of them, and only half of them were intelligent enough to even understand I was leaving. It was always painful to visit the simple ones. Their blank faces and dull eyes did not inspire one with hope. But I managed to play a game of Go-Fish with Niney and Toseph (19 and 27) and Fifen (54) drew me a picture. Those three had an intellect about that of a four-year-old. None of the simple ones hadbeen intelligent enough to select their own names, but their numbers had mostly degenerated into something resembling nomenclature. All of them received a farewell mindscape from me, even Three, in her large crib, who frankly didn’t have much mental capacity beyond that of a newborn. I constructed a mental garden for them, something pretty with unicorns and flowers and fairies. They always lovedit when I thought up pretty things for them. Fifen cried when she learned I wasn’t going to be back for a long time. Toseph got angry and kicked me, but I’m used to that.
Quin and my sisters had been permitted to join me on my trip to the flight base on Luna, from which the moonliner to Europa would embark on its interplanetary journey. Luna was not as strictly regulated as the outer colonies,really only being a space-port off planet. Most earthly regulations were still in effect on Earth’s moon. The journey there didn’t require stasis, and only a moderate disinfection procedure, so many people travelled there on vacation, or to get a taste of colony life to see if they could endure it. Many people, they say, can’t. There are all kinds of reasons why. Health concerns, gravity, nutritionaldeficiencies, sunlight, asthma. Human beings aren’t really built to live anywhere but Earth.
I spent most of the time on Luna with a blinding headache. It had faded mostly on the morning of my ultimate departure, probably due to the huge number of drugs Dr Svarog had prescribed. I had waited, nervously, in the seated queue at the space-port, as first Xavier and then Rose had been bundled offto their final disinfection procedure. Then it was my turn. Tristan had a stranger snap a final photograph of all four of us. She and Penny had bid me a tearful farewell, and Quin carefully nodded at me, with a strange smile on his face. I stared at them, trying to memorize their faces, trembling.
I might never see them again.
Then I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and stepped into the firstdisinfection chamber. Now it was over an hour later, and apparently I was finally disinfected enough to pass muster.
‘Please lie on the couch for bacterial reintroduction,’ the disembodied voice said sweetly.
I lay down on the cold plastic table – calling it a couch was far too charitable – and allowed mechanical arms to brush me on various parts of my body. According to the literature, theywere reintroducing beneficial bacteria without which my body would be susceptible to dangerous infection. How anything that would infect me could have made it past the antiseptics and disinfectants and antibiotics and irradiation we all had to endure was beyond me, but apparently human beings – and close genetically modified cousins – could not easily function without
some
microscopic symbionts.They’d discovered this in the early days of colonization. We are not alone – we are each colonies of mites and microbes and bacteria, all
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