Far futures, p.41
Far Futures, page 41
He could go elsewhere, on to the stars in search of other solutions. The ship was completely self-sustaining, with ample power for many subjective lifetimes of travel.
But Drake hoped that one trip would be enough. It was one of his ambitions on his return to locate the cryocorpse of his friend Par Leon, and return a favor.
He was strangely, sublimely happy.
Drake’s original plan had been for a gravitational swing-by, a maneuver that would take the ship through a tight hyperbolic trajectory close to Canopus and then hurtle away again the way they had come.
But perhaps he had been enjoying creative solitude too much, or maybe he felt a simple curiosity to see what worlds might circle another sun. For whatever reason, he chose to decelerate during the last couple of weeks and put the ship into a bound orbit about four hundred million kilometers away from Canopus.
There were planets, as he had hoped, four gas giants each the size of Jupiter. Closer in he located a round dozen of smaller worlds. But he had ignored or forgotten the infernal power of Canopus itself. It was a fearsome sight, more than a thousand times as luminous as the Sun and spouting green flares of gas millions of kilometers long. The inner planets were mere blackened cinders, airless and waterless, charred by the furnace heat of the star. The outer gas giants were all atmosphere, except for a small compressed solid core where the pressure was many thousands of tons per square inch. He saw no chance of life there.
But he stayed and looked. In two days of fascinated observation, his eyes turned again and again to the fusion fire of the star itself. He wondered. Had any other human been here, when the ships were new? Had any intelligence been here, human or nonhuman? Or were his the first sentient eyes to dwell on the dark twisted striations—not sunspots, but sunscars—that gouged the boiling surface of Canopus?
At last Drake could stand it no longer. Like a lost soul flying from Hell-gate he turned and ran. He needed the infinite silence of space, and after that the comforting shelter of the solar system. If another trip out were necessary with Ana, he knew that it would have to be to a smaller and less turbulent star.
He settled back into the shipboard routine of daily composition. But now all harmony, mental and musical, had been banished. What he saw, over and over, was a vision of Hell. He was circling endlessly in tight orbit around Canopus. Flaming gas prominences, bright jets of green and white and blue, danced a witch’s sabbat in his mind. He could not eat, drink, or sleep. The urge to see Ana, to seek peace in her face, grew within him.
Finally he could stand it no longer. He went aft, and lifted the sealed cover.
She lay quietly in the tank, pale and peaceful as a Snow Goddess with pearly eyes and skin of milky crystal. He took one quick look, afraid to open the tank more than a crack in case it interfered with the cooling system, then rapidly sealed the lid again. The one moment was enough. He was able to control himself again and think of other things . . .
To ponder how fortunate he had been. He had never dreamed of light-speed ships and time dilation when he had made his plans so long ago. At best he had envisioned a chancy succession of freezings and thawings, farther and farther off in time, until at last Ana might safely be revived and cured. He had imagined the multiple uncertainty of waking, not sure where Ana might be, not even sure if she still lay within a cryowomb.
Instead of such an uncertain quest, he had Ana here with him. He could safeguard her himself and protect her from risks.
The journey home was if anything even more tranquil than the voyage out. He scanned all the ship’s communication channels, electromagnetic and neutrino, wondering what might await him back in the solar system, and found nothing but silence. Two centuries was a long time; enough for some totally new communication technology to have taken over. Two centuries was also—a frightening prospect—time enough for humanity to have in some way destroyed itself.
Finally the long journey was ending, in a steady deceleration past the Dry Tortugas, on to the outer borders of the Oort Cloud, into and through the Kuiper Belt. There was still no sign of human presence, not even the scouts who had performed the original outer-system survey. By the time they came to the barren outcroppings of Pluto the ship was crawling along at a mere ten-thousandth of its top speed, and Drake was becoming worried.
He headed for the inner planets. With no idea how Earth or the rest of the solar system had changed in two hundred years he could not guess at his welcome. Must he be slow and careful, or could he be rapid and confident?
That question was answered as the ship passed the Asteroid Belt, floating high above the ecliptic. A navigation and guidance beam locked on to them, overrode the ship’s internal controls, and steered it steadily in to a landing on the Moon.
The spaceport was new, massive silver columns set in a regular triangular array. Ships, if they were ships, formed dark, windowless tetrahe-dra at the center of each triangle. Spaceflight, if nothing else, had changed in two centuries.
A small wheeled guide met Drake at the ship’s lock. Its body was a one-foot sphere, with above it a thin upright cylinder topped by a whisk-broom of flexible metal fibers. The broom head dipped toward Drake in greeting, and the machine led him to an oval opening at the base of a silver column. Feeling ready for anything, Drake went through. Although there had been no sign of a lock, his suit monitor suddenly showed breathable air and a comfortable temperature outside it. He removed the suit as his wheeled guide instructed and followed it along a short corridor to another interior chamber.
One man was waiting there, a tall dignified figure with the distant eyes of a prophet. Drake had somehow expected more: a reception committee, or perhaps a show of weapons. But the man merely nodded and said at once in Universal, “Welcome again to Earth-space, Drake Merlin.”
Drake realized that he had been wrong. He was prepared for most things, but not to be recognized, and named.
Then he realized that he should not be surprised. The ship’s identity would have been revealed back in the Asteroid Belt during its first handshake with the navigation and guidance beam. The data banks would show the ship’s history, and record its disappearance from the solar system.
Drake wondered what else the files might say about the ship’s run from Pluto. “Since you know my name, perhaps you also know my history. If you do, then you realize that I am seeking your help.”
It seemed strange that he had been greeted in a familiar language.
Par Leon had been able to speak to him on his revivification, but only because of long preparation for Drake’s arrival and extensive studies of that historical period.
Had language become static, totally fixed over several centuries? Or was the robed figure in front of him simply giving a formal greeting, a single sentence that he had learned of Universal?
But the man was nodding, and speaking again. “My name is Trismon Sorel. I do know a little of your history as it has come down to us from long ago, although the early record is seriously incomplete. Also, one version holds that centuries ago you lost control of your ship and were carried off unwilling to the far depths of space. Another version suggests that your removal of a cryocorpse from the old Pluto wombs and the immediately subsequent departure of your ship are linked events—that your disappearance at close to light speed, however bewildering, was intentional. I await your elucidation. However, we should first proceed to another environment, where we will find conversation easier.”
There were small pauses in his speech, slight hesitations in places where it was not natural to break the pattern of words. As Drake was led out of the room and down a spiral flight of metallic stairs, he decided that Universal must be a learned language for Trismon Sorel, just as Old Anglic had been for Par Leon. But to learn so quickly, in just the couple of days since the return of the ship to the inner system—that was a staggering feat. In spite of Sorel’s normal appearance, his grasp of Universal suggested some huge advance in human mental powers.
Sorel entered a room furnished with a desk and comfortable-looking chairs and settled into one of them. He gestured to the little wheeled servant, and as it moved forward with refreshments he gazed at Drake with steady, knowing eyes.
“Speak, Drake Merlin. Tell your story.”
Drake nodded and sat down opposite Trismon Sorel. He felt a rising tension. In a few more minutes he would learn if his long quest was finally over.
“My departure from the solar system was intentional.” He had to swallow hard before he could speak clearly. “Intentional, and done for a good reason. But I cannot begin there. I must begin long ago, more than eight hundred years ago. At that time, the cryocorpse who now lies safe within the ship was my wife. Then we learned that she was suffering from an incurable disease . . .”
As Drake told his story he forced himself to relive scenes that he had suppressed over the centuries. If Ana was to be helped, Trismon Sorel had to know everything: Ana’s symptoms, her illness, the manner of her death and her freezing.
Sorel listened intently. He raised his hand when Drake spoke of the awful hours at the Second Chance cryonics facility.
“One moment. Do you say that the original medical records are now stored with the cryocorpse?”
“Everything is there. Inside the cryotank.”
“Then before we proceed further let me summon the necessary experts, in both medicine and old languages. I can say at once that we are able to cure all known diseases, of the present or of the past. However, we will need to examine the records and the cryocorpse itself.” He sat, eyes distant, for three or four seconds.
Two waves of emotion swept through Drake. He felt wild joy—Ana would be cured at last—and then an almost superstitious awe. Trismon Sorel’s advanced mental powers seemed to include telepathy. “You are speaking to them directly, by transmitting your thoughts?”
Sorel looked puzzled, and again there was a brief pause before he smiled. “Not in the way that you are perhaps thinking. I can do no more than you yourself will be able to accomplish in a few days’ time. You will share thoughts with others. You will have instant access to all information in the data banks. You will be able to calculate faster and better than the computer of the ship that brought you here. Look.”
He turned his head and raised the hair above his temple. A faint, thin scar was covered by the hairline.
“That marks where the implant sits. It is normally installed in early infancy. It is tiny, smaller and thinner than a fingernail, and it serves multiple purposes: as a body-function monitor, as slave computer, and as transmitter and receiver, so that commands, requests, data, and programs can be sent to or received from data banks or other individuals. I sent a request to bring medical experts to your ship via the Copernicus network. I am able to speak to you now in real time, although your language is new to me, because I am employing the language translation modules within the Tycho network.”
Some transfer of information was still person-to-person. Sorel read Drake’s misgivings from his facial expression. “Do not worry about this. First, in your case as in all cryowomb revivals, the implant will be totally optional. Before you make a decision you will have ample opportunity to observe its use in others. But I can assure you that if you do proceed, you will find it hard within a few months to believe that you were ever able to function without such a service. You will possess total recall; you will be a calculator beyond the most powerful computers of your time; and you will have immediate access to every data bank within the solar system— though naturally, access and transmission time to people and data banks n other planets is considerable. Do you have questions?”
“Only one. I want to know if Ana can be cured.”
“I will ask the medical team that question. They are already on board your ship, and they will be performing their assessment. Be patient for a little, while I talk to them.”
The grey eyes widened. Their expression again became remote and preoccupied. This time the wait stretched on, to become one minute and then two.
As the silence continued Drake felt a knife of tension twisting inside him. Something was going wrong. But what could possibly go wrong? He comforted himself with Trismon Sorel’s earlier assurance: this society was able to cure all known diseases, past or present.
Finally he could stand it no longer. “Are you talking to them? What do they say?”
Sorel’s eyes focused again on Drake. “I am talking now to the medical specialists. It is—complicated. Give me one moment more.”
The grey eyes were changing. They became gentler and closer. Trismon Sorel nodded, and he appeared to be choosing his next words with great care.
“They ask me to ask you questions. The woman in the cryotank, Anastasia. According to our records she had been constantly maintained in the Pluto cryowomb. Is that correct?”
Drake nodded.
“And when you found her, she was within a cryotank. You did not remove her, but you brought the whole cryotank with you on board the ship?”
“That’s right.” Drake’s mind was filled with foreboding. “I carried the tank to the ship, just as I found it. I did it very carefully. The gravity on Pluto is low, I had no trouble handling it.”
Trismon Sorel was frowning. “Then—did you open the tank for any reason, after your ship left Pluto?”
“Just once. For a few moments, after we left Canopus.” Drake saw again before him Ana’s peaceful face, her pearly eyes and milky skin. “I looked for only a second or two. I was careful to seal the cryotank afterwards . . .”
It was pointless to try to explain why he had done it, to say that he had been unable not to do it. Trismon Sorel was regarding him sorrowfully, across an eight-hundred-year gulf. His face was Tom Lambert’s, and also Par Leon’s. The eyes spoke the same sad message.
“Drake Merlin, a cryotank is not designed for sealing and resealing. Resealing calls for special equipment and special procedures. When a seal is broken, it is assumed that the person will at once be revivified. Do you understand what I am saying? With an imperfect seal, suitable conditions cannot be maintained within a cryotank.”
“Then Ana . . .”
“One moment more. I must consult the data banks.” Again the eyes became unblinking. When they focused again on Drake there was no doubt in them.
“I have checked all our references,” Trismon Sorel said gently. “As did the medical team. The problem that faced them was quite different from that of curing a disease. The damage caused to a body, and particularly to a body’s brain, when a cryotank is open and revivification is not performed . . . that is permanent. It cannot be repaired. There can be no revival. Now, or ever.
“I am sorry, Drake Merlin. Anastasia is dead. Forever dead.”
Forever dead. Ana is dead. Trismon Sorel’s words echoed those of Tom Lambert, so long ago. But this time there was the ring of complete certainty.
For each man kills the thing he loves. Drake knew that he, and not disease, had killed Ana. Like Orpheus, he had pursued his Eurydice through a double hell of cryodeath and Canopus. Like Orpheus he had looked at her; and by looking he had lost her.
With that thought the barriers came down inside his mind. For the first time he noticed a spicy fragrance in the air, felt a steady dry breeze blowing past him, and heard the faint concert pitch A-natural of vibrating metal far along the corridor. It was as though his senses were opening again after long centuries of hibernation.
Trismon Sorel was speaking again. “One possibility remains. Anastasia, the woman that you know, cannot be reanimated. However, many whole cells remain intact within her body. She could be cloned without difficulty, and growth and education begun anew. But it would be a new Anastasia. There is no hope of sufficient memory transfer from undamaged cells for any inkling of her former existence to pass to her new body. Your former relationship to her would be known to you, but it would be irrelevant to her. Should we proceed?”
The temptation was enormous. To see Ana once more standing before him, blooming and vibrant as he had once known her . . .
She had the right to a healthy new life in this new world, eight hundred years on. He could not deny her that.
“Proceed, if you please. Make a clone of Ana.”
She would live again. But it would not be the Ana that he knew and loved. It would be a quite different person.
Trismon Sorel had assured him that the Ana he had known was gone, gone forever. He spoke with the authority of eight hundred more years of science and technological progress.
But—
A tiny seed of doubt sprouted deep in Drake’s mind. But what would science say in another two hundred years? In a thousand, or ten thousand? Science had come so far. Surely no one, least of all a scientist, believed that it was now at an end and could go no farther.
Trismon Sorel was talking to him, trying to catch his attention. He forced himself to listen.
“Ana cannot be revived and cured,” Sorel was saying, “not in the way that you hoped when you took her body from the cryowombs. But we can help you.”
“Me?”
“Certainly. We can cure you. There is evidence that a cure was attempted more than two hundred years ago, but it clearly failed. We have superior techniques now that will end your obsession. With your consent, of course.”
“Do I have a choice?”
“You have an infinite number of choices. The right to self-determination—even self-destruction, if you wish it—is basic.” Trismon Sorel leaned forward. “Now I speak personally. I hope that you will agree to a cure, and enjoy your own new life. I have vast sympathy for you. I have searched the whole data bank as we have been speaking, and your suffering seems unique. No quest comparable to yours can be found.”
“I have not suffered.” Drake had made up his mind. “And I know what I want.”
“State it.”
“A cloned form for a new Ana, just as you offered.”
“It will be done. And for yourself?”
“I want to remain here just long enough to be sure that the cloning can proceed without problems. Then I wish to leave.”
