The Clan

The Clan - Yuon Brasseur 2023

Part 1: Beginning

 

 

Workers had cleared the trees and underbrush from the forest behind the hospital laboratory to create this open space. They had constructed a large framework from the logs. The rainy season was still months away, so there was no need for covering it with a tarpaulin yet. Elwin stood, hands on his hips, looking over the clearing. Yes, this would do. At last.

He was a professor of science on sabbatical. He had studied the writings of American and European scientists, Planck, Minkowski, Einstein, Oberth, some famous, some obscure. He had met with Austrian scientists before they were taken to secret locations by German sturmfuhr troops. He had read notes of East Asian thinkers. He had compiled all information into a theory of his own. And now he had the time and space to develop experiments to check it.

 

„Satisfied, my dear?“

 

His wife, Cornelia de Frimhault Cohen von Habsburg Niedersachsen, had silently approached him and now stood beside him. It was she who had insisted on leaving the Netherlands and Europe to escape being taken by the SS as well. New Guinee was still a protectorate and relatively safe, so they went there. She was the daughter of a millionaire entrepeneur and the grant her father endowed her with every year took care of the money troubles.

 

„Finally the playground is ready.“

 

„Yes, my dear, finally.“

 

She had stood by him from the beginning. When he had spoken to colleagues about his conclusions, they had not believed him. Some had even laughed at him for being that gullible. Nobody was willing to invest in his research. Gertrude had believed in him though. She was the best thing that ever could have happened to him.

And they had a daughter: Francesca. He always called her Francis. He adored her. He adored them both. The girl had sneaked up on the adults and now joined them, arms around their lower waists, twisting her way inbetween them.

 

„All the trees have gone!“

 

„Yes, my girl. The men have chopped them all down.“

 

„Will you start building your machine soon, Daddy?“

 

„As soon as the materials arrive from Australia.“

 

When the materials did arrive, he became very busy. Fortunately Cornelia had the laboratory and an ever increasing interest in the life that existed in cells of humans, plants and animals and she devoured books and manuscripts by Mieschier, Mendel, Bohr, Capek. She ran the hospital with the help of two Philipine nurses. And Francis was trying to be of assistance as well as a twelve year old could.

Gradually strong metal trusses were clad with light metal plates and Elwin’s experimental machine took shape in the clearing. Elwin built four impedance engines starting from wallnut size until they were wardrobe size. The workers hung the engines in the frame, connected watertanks between them and pipes and fittings for a relatively small mercury container.

After installing pumps, they had a first test. Francesca flipped the switch. It took some time for the engines to be tuned properly. When they functioned according to specification, Elwin started building the guidance system.

 

A young doctor, on his way to the inland canibals, caused Francesca to be with child. She had a healthy, lively son she named after his father: Patrick. Elwin set aside his initial anger when he held the little boy in his arms and it stopped crying.

 

„An intelligent child. Must be with a mother like you and grandparents like us.“

 

Cornelia had had a talk with Francesca at the beginning of her pregnancy.

 

„How many do you want to have?“

 

„It wasn’t my fault, Mum. He was so nice to me and before I knew it we were making out.“

 

„Next time use this.“

 

She handed her daughter a small bundle of herbs. Francesca spent days in the laboratory to investigate what the ground plants did exactly. After that she thanked her mother.

 

„Does Daddy know you use these?“

 

„Your father is smart. He knows a lot. This is our secret.“

 

While Cornelia ran the hospital and Francesca searched for cures against illnesses, Patrick began to play with children from the nearby Papua village. One day he came home out of breath.

 

„My friend Karo asks why I don’t have a Daddy.“

 

Cornelia wasn’t feeling well and was at home looking after her grandson.

 

„You do have a Daddy. You father is a doctor and he helps sick people. He isn’t here.“

 

„Why not? We live near a hospital. You are sick too.“

 

She didn’t want to lie to him, she didn’t like people lying.

 

„Your father was visiting the hospital and saw your mother. He loved her. Your mother loved him. That’s why you were born. After the visit your father went to help people who don’t live close to a hospital.“

 

„Will he come and visit us one day?“

 

„Who knows, Patrick.“

 

Then Cornelia died. Elwin was devastated. Work at the machine came to a halt. One night Francis was sitting head in hands in front of her microscope. There was nothing she had been able to do. She had tried everything.

 

„Are you crying, Mommy?“

 

Patrick had stopped at the door. She remained seated like that for a few seconds, then wiped across her face with the back of her hand and turned towards him.

 

„Sometimes I feel a bit sad, you know.“

 

„Did I forget something again?“

 

„No.“

 

Smiling she tapped her thigh and he climbed onto it.

 

„I miss your grandmother.“

 

„Me too, Mommy.“

 

She was overwhelmed by her shortcoming and took it upon herself to do her utmost to never have this feeling again. She would force the body with all chemicals and electrics to do her bidding. Later. Later. In the near future...

 

 

Part 2: Buildup

 

 

Arnie strolled home from work. On the slow river majestic ships were towed by sturdy tugboats. A lonely angler was dozing above his fishingrod.

He opened the door in a picturesque facade and entered a faintly lit hallway with a thick carpet and landscapes on the wall. The four of them crouched on cushions spread out on the floor. Eleanor, the young Scotswoman was peering through round golden glasses into a thick science book. Maickel was lying with his head in her lap. A pale brown open overcoat showed a muscled torso. Charlie’s hair was fresly cut and he had a petite black moustache. Oval glasses balanced on his nose. Gertrude was smoking a fragrant cigarette.

Arnie took a shower, changed his working clothes and prepared for a trip to the pub.

 

„Hi. Anybody fancy a beer?“

 

„Maybe later.“

 

Outside again, he looked up at the moon behind the leafless branches. Then he walked across bumpy cobblestones towards the round lighted sign some sixty meters away.

The pub was filled with murmurs. The heat permeated his bones. Two people were taking care of customers behind the bar. In a corner some guys were using a footballtable. He ordenered a beer.

A woman with brown eyes was laughing at the boy next to her. Then she looked at him.

 

„Hi,“ he said to her, winking. „Do you want something to drink?“

 

„Yeah, ok.“

 

Archie asked the chubby female bartender for two beers. The pubdoor opened and Maickel and Charlie came in talking in loud voices. They pushed through the crowd. Charlie raised a hand. Archie nodded and turned to the woman again.

 

„I haven’t seen you here before.“

„No, that’s right. Normally I go to another bar. I’m Patricia. What’s your name?“

„Archie.“

Eleanor wriggled between Maickel and Charlie at the bar.

„Do you want to see my bar?“

Patricia tapped her high heels on the street beside him. Her hair swirled around her face, in which calculating eyes were looking all around. She was holding his arm and looked up at him, smiling.

„So you are the guy Ariane cannot shut up about? She never stops talking about you, you know.“

He remained silent.

„Not a nice thing to do.“

„Shut up.“

„No. Why don’t you go back to her and take her off my back?“

She stopped and squinted at a puddle of water. He leaned on the hood of a car.

„I saw Sandra this afternoon.“

„What did she do?“

„She was skipping in the shop with some liquorice in her hand. She’s very merry. How old is she now?“

„Almost four.“

„Here.“

He heard Eleanor calling out to them. Patricia tried to pull him along.

„No, I won’t go.“

„Bastard. Paranoid maniac.“

They grabbed him hard. He floated a little. Then he hit his head on a doorpost. Patricia and Eleanor pulled him inside, dropped him beside a table and left.

„Patricia, are you home?“

He looked up to a woman’s sylhouette in red with cascades of blonde hair.

„Archie?“

She knelt at his side.

„How did you...“

She looked at him gladly. He hoisted himself up with the aid of a tableleg. The door opened and Charlie came in.

„Come on, mate. Let’s have some coffee, sleepy head.“

Charlie’s smiling face looked at him above a tray with three steaming cups. A little later Ariane asked Charlie about Eleanor.

„Maickel told me she was sleeping with Archie.“

Charlie grinned.

„A while ago we agreed on not bothering each other if one of us wouldn’t go through with it. And then Maickel... And Patricia didn’t mind ...“

She smiled.

„Dumb blonde, eh?“

Finishing his cup, Charlie said goodbye.

„I’ll be seeing you.“

Then they stood opposite one another. He saw she hesitated to say something.

„Ariane.“

„Will you come back to me, Archie?“

He heard the tense tone of her voice and knew all was well.

„Patricia told me Sandra is ok.“

„Yes.“

„Where is she?“

„She has stayed at my mother’s for a couple of weeks now. Whenever I have some time off from the lab, I drive there and go shopping with her.“

They remained silent for a few minutes.

„Archie... Let’s go get Sandra.“

He helped her into the white cloak she had made herself. She smiled at him constantly. He grabbed the carkeys. It was chilly in the cool morning air. There was dew on the car’s bodywork. They got in. He drove one hand on the wheel, holding her hand.

„I still love only you, Ariane.“

„Let’s get married.“

„This time you want to be sure, eh?“

He grinned. She was waiting for him to respond. His arms made short movements, pulled the wheel to the left. Her head flew forward. Pain in her neck. She pushed against the dashboard in a reflex. The car went nose up, lights disappeared. They dove into a heap of splintering metal, glass was all around them.

Then she was on shining asphalt, saw another car turn over slowly. She felt a hand under her armpit, she shook it off, looking around, shivering. There!

A small group of people encircled someone. She ran, wriggled herself through, dropped to her knees. His face was cut open on one side. His eyes were closed. She took his head in her lap and whispered softly. Tears sprung from the corners of her eyes.

„Ribs.“

She looked up.

„Go back! Can’t you see he needs air! Get lost!“

Drops fell on his maimed face. He tried to smile. He sobbed, shook his head slowly. She could only stare at him. The circle was broken. A friendly female doctor took her burder from her.

Some days later, Charlie dropped in. The kid walked up to him, arms stretched. He lifted her up.

„Hi, girl. How are you? Look what I’ve got for you.“

He showed her a small bag of liquorice. She showed it to her mother. He sat down at the table beside Ariane.

„You want coffee?“

He rose quickly.

„No, thanks. I still have to pack. I’m on the night boat.“

„I’ll show you out.“

Some people were in the street. It was still early in the evening.

„Will you get the money?“

He shrugged.

„I have to go.“

„See you.“

He walked to the tram stop. The interior lights were lit. He remained standing, though there were plenty of empty seats.

Gertrude opened the door. She had packed his suitcase already.

„You have an hour and a half.“

He changed. On the boat he had one conversation. The next morning he was sleepy when he arrived at the brownstone building where Maickel was waiting for him. He thought he told a reasonable story in Archie’s stead, answered all their questions.

Quietly Charlie looked at the people gathered. Elwin, father of what they were about to do. Francis, mother of what they were going to use for it. Her son Patrick, creator of their resources. And of course Maickel, their financial prodigy. They would decide favourably, he was sure of it. The greyhaired man pondered. Maickel scratched his chin. The young man in his wheelchair was making calculations on a sheet of paper. They all looked at the fourth person. She stared them in the eye unmercifully and nodded. Maickel laughed.

„You win the vote, Charlie. Go and tell it to the others.“

Charlie made an extra turn in the revolving doors.

The evening sun broke through the clouds in the grey sky. He came to the entrance of what used to be their student pub. There was no crowd inside. He ordered a pint and a pie, bunch of flowers on the bar in front of him.

She came in at seven precisely. Outside dusk had arrived. She had black hair and black eyes and was wearing a raincoat. She looked around, walked towards him.

„Charlie!“

She kissed him devoutly on a cheek.

„Hi Charlotte.“

Charlie picked up the flowers.

„Are they for me? How sweet. They weren’t for your wife?“

He shook his head.

„What are you doing in England? Have you been here long?“

„No, I wanted to visit some places I used to frequent.“

„Where are you staying?“

„Nowhere, I’m returning tonight.“

A moment’s silence.

„I heard about Archie. Terrible. Was he married?“

Again he shook his head. She sat down beside him.

„Why did you leave after our two months together?“

She took his glasses and tried them on.

„You weren’t that easy to be with.“

„No, I don’t think so, either.“

Silence.

„I miss the old curtains and rows of books and the tiny bed sometimes.“

She smiled. Then her face became a question.

„You are not coming back here?“

„I’m going too far away. I can’t stop now.“

„Can I go with you?“

He hesitated for a moment.

„I’d rather you didn’t. I have to make nasty decisions and when you’re around... I still love you.“

She kissed him on the mouth. Quickly. Dryly.

„Thank you. Will you ever be back Charlie?“

He shook his head.

„Never?“

„Never.“

„That’s absolutely definitve.“

„It is definitive.“

For a moment their thoughts were roaming freely.

„Old love...“

He looked in the mirror in front them, saw himself and her.

„I will make you coffee with pleasure.“

They went outside. Dark. Cold. People walking crisscross on the sidewalks. Quickly they descended down the tube. A waggling, creaking machine took them below the streets to another station. There were stars in the sky at street level. A brisk walk, arm in arm, following the flow of people. Stop, walk, step aside. Inside. Insert coin, heat stove. Get warmer slowly. They sat in easy chairs, waiting for the coffee to get hot, listening to the dampened, almost indistinguishable sounds of cars and buses outside, just enjoying the peace and quiet of each other’s company.

Two days later Gertrude listened to the man standing next to her.

„What civilization?“

The super dressed gentleman stared at Jim perplexed.

„The one where we are afraid our house is robbed during the night?“

„Uh.“

„The one where we think we can do better than our neighbours?“

„Well...“

„The one where we judge people who degress from the accepted, the norm and treat them as outcasts?“

The man didn’t even bother to answer any more.

„The one then, to make things easier, where other people are the ones that polute, damage, wage war, discriminate, torture, rape?“

A dramatic pause.

„The one where safety is subjected to nickles?“

„You have to...“

„The one where feelings and emotions are obliterated as soon as you become part of a group, a mob?

„May I...“

„No. Or the one where you as a human are the highest possible thing nature can achieve? Well, my dear young man, forget about your pretty theories quickly, because we are damned equal to rhinos. Stupid, thick animals without good eyesight, clear thinking, with almost complete deafness and if you bump into them they will charge at anything at full throttle. That civilization?“

The man turned away and disappeared to the door.

„Damn, this was a lovely sermon.“

She was at a friend’s party. Jim told her he had just left military service where he had flown bombers. Heavy planes, he explained. Gertrude stared at him. He blushed.

He drank another glass. The woman at his side seemed to think about something deeply. A small frown between her eyebrows. Lips pursed. Hands together. It was almost one o’clock, he saw.

„Jim, would you be willing to fly a 747 for me?“

„How can I, they are not available for commercial flights yet...“

He shook his head. They were both silent. The girl behind the bar glanced at their empty glasses. He put his down with a bang.

„Shall we go?“

They strolled into the cool darkness. Leaves were rustling in the trees. The cardoors clapped shut. They drove along well-lit streets. His attention fully focused on the road. The pleasure of concentration. She showed him exactly where to drive.

„Stop here.“

Her quick movement in the shine of the headlights. She fumbled at the frontdoor, beckoned. He locked the car. Followed her up steep stairs. She knocked, opened a door. Mumbling.

„Hi Gertrude.“

„Charlie, this is Jim. He’s a pilot.“

He studied the man and the woman that were bent over a map. Beyond the beam of a strong lamp there was darkness.

„Very well, we can start at last.“

Two weeks later Charlie collected Lucia, the girl of connections. She was at a dancing, chatting with a man. He listened amusedly.

„No!“

„I have a big bed.“

„Can you only think about that?“

„I didn’t know you would get angry.“

„Why are you...“

„Lucia.“

Charlie tapped her on the shoulder.

„It’s a go?“

„It’s half past eleven. We fly tonight.“

„Ok, Charlie, I’ll come with you.“

In the car she softly kissed him on his cheek.

„Will you be careful?“

„Our stuff has to be there in time.“

„Must you go yourself?“

He hesitated.

„I always go.“

She had her hands on the dashboard and stared straight ahead. She realized she had fallen for him after just a few weeks.

„I think I can’t accept it if you never come back.“

„I’ll be back.“

He buckled himself in the chair and closed his eyes and thought about what could go wrong. Then he opened the connection.

„Give me Jim, Lucia.“

She growled something.

„Hello Charlie. Are you tucked away good up there?“

„Right, take us up.“

He felt at ease only after the Jumbo jet reached cruising altitude. Things went fast. On his bed of impedance capacitors he disconnected from the 747 and after that from the earth and whizzed towards Lagrange 4.

Once arrived, Charlie worked his way into the cave. He found supervisor William, a former miner from Limburg, shook his hand warily, but warmly.

„We will be flying in lots of stuff.“

The coalmines had closed one by one and the men had lost their jobs. Six of them had accepted the proposal to continue business elsewhere. They had left, taking women and children with them. They had lived in a temporary dome covered by light carbonfiber, while preparing the spaces in the rock for work and living.

„Coffee?“

William took a filled, closed mug from the machine.

„Thanks.“

Charlie looked superficially at the controlpanels and their labels. All but one. But that one was ok too.

„How are the families?“

„Fine. Maya’s lab is coming along nicely. Everybody is doing what they are good at. Gordon is on duty outside and he is throwing more rocks and debris at this ever growing shell around us. The kids enjoy their school periods and at playtime dig their own private holes.“

„Nice.“

„What do you bring us this time?“

Charlie opened his backback and took out an orange.

„Fresh juices, greens and vegetables. Vitamins and minerals!“

William reached out to grab the orange.

„This one is for Irene.“

Charlie handed William a typed manifest. He followed the list with a finger.

„Hm, at last the platinum replacement discs for the Schönbein fuelcells. When do we get a device to build them ourselves?“

They exchanged information on the progress of the construction of the base and events on earth. After that Charlie went to the living quarters and spoke with the other men and women and made merry with the children.

„Good day, Irene.“

„Hey. Hello Charlie!“

She stormed into his arms and hugged him profoundly.

„How are you?“

„Great!“

„You look well for a miner’s daughter.“

She raised her hand to a smear on her cheek and grinned widely.

„Yes, I do!“

He took her gift from his backpack. She managed a little dance before tearing off the wrapping paper, opening the box and floating a sparkling necklace in front of her.

„Ooooh. It’s beautiful.“

She huddled and hugged him again. Calmly he closed the golden serpent around her neck. She started to pull him away.

„Come, you have to see this. I have made a place of my own in the cave!“

They passed the quarters of the six families, some containers and almost at the end of the carbon fiber cloth, they dove inside a recess in the wall. Three narrow blackboards against the back wall, a tightly fixed hammock from wall to wall, a bookcase with water and food stock and a picture of himself.

„Neat decoration.“

„All for me alone!“

„Your father will bring you an orange later. Act a bit surprised.“

She sniffed naughtily.

„Of course!“

Charlie studied the fifteen year old girl. She had joyful brown eyes. Black hair neatly milimetered. Fashionable sweater and pantalon on a wiry but trained body.

„I’m glad you have a place of your own.“

She handed him a soft mug of water.

„You are after all the oldest of the youngsters. How are your studies coming along?“

She made the so-so gesture with her hand.

„Tricky stuff. It comes slowly, but I’m getting there!“

„It is difficult, yes.“

„If SHE gets it, I will understand it too, if not now then surely in a years‘ time!“

Charlie knew she meant Francesca. Irene believed she was a real bitch. He tried to compare Irene and Sandra. There was the difference in age of course. He wondered if Sandra would adapt as easily to a life without open sky and without crowding people. There were eight children at the base. Sandra was at kindergarten in a group of thirtyfour. Irene was thirteen when her family had left for L4. She had managed without too many problems. She had left two weeping friends behind when she left Limburg because of Daddy’s work.

He raised his shoulders. You never could tell. No use to worry about things you cannot help. You could only support them when needed.

„I can work outside for half an hour since last month.“

Proudly she showed a clump of rock with coloured lines and glistening quartzes in it.

„Found this one under the lid of a transportgrav. I took it out and placed it in my room. A fine momento for my first time!“

Charlie admired the hand size stone and tested her immediately.

„Carbon with some gold and nickle, no platinum.“

„You know your materials.“

„I asked Daddy. Gold I recognized, but platinum is soooo difficult!“

Irene led Charlie to the lab through a forty meters long and four meters high connecting corridor. They heard the protecting water splashing above them. Proudly she showed her mother the necklace she had got from him.

„You spoil her.“ was Maya’s only reaction.

After that they inspected the instruments that were ready and discussed what still had to be done.

„How is Patrick doing with his robot-computer?“ she wanted to know.

Charlie raised his shoulders.

„Artificial intelligence he calls it. Starts to come around, he says. He’s waiting for your precious metals.“

Maya smiled.

„Lithium and platinum enough, gallium is the problem. 90% we use in our solarcells. We have almost 20 square meters on the connecting piece of the dumbbell. We raise 27,000 watts from solar radiation. It’s barely enough for the power we need. Gordon and Lydia are loading your shuttlegrav. By the way, we are waiting for a machine to make our own discs for the fuelcells.“

Charlie nodded.

„William told me so already. Patrick wants to combine gallium with, I think, plastic fibre in his AI computer. Things work, but to control this base it has to become at least 100 times faster and have 1000 times the memory.“

Maya tapped her temple.

„Our computers here work well too, you know.“

With that Charlie said goodbye. He finished his round with the other families and children, checked the hydrogardens with Jaqueline and Simon, crawled out of the cave, climbed into his shuttlegrav, looked at the dumbbell’s milelong rotating structure, pressed the ignition and whizzed back to earth on his bed of impedance capacitors.

Part 3: Impact

 

 

Late at night, but still hot. Eleanor sighed and put the experimental ARC, AI robot computer, at standby. This was enough for today. She stretched, did some gym exercises and opened the door of her lab to the star spangled sky. Patrick sat in his wheelchair on the porch of his house and was chatting with Charlie. In Ariane’s lab the light was still on.

 

Eleanor decided to say hello. She walked across the tamped soil, beside the paved path and every other pace skipped or jumped up. Keep in shape girl, she thought, otherwise you will find it difficult to adapt later. Charlie stood up and kissed her on both cheeks when she stepped onto the verandah. Patrick remained seated as usual.

 

„Good evening Eleanor.“ he said.

 

After some commonplace remarks she left both men and walked to Ariane’s lab. The chatter of monkeys met her when she opened the outer door. Inside lights were burning like a beautiful summer’s day. Ariane was lying forward on her table, taking a nap, her long flowing hair spread out in all directions. Eleanor softly tapped her shoulder.

 

„Hmmm,“ she said, „I wasn’t sleeping.“

 

„Of course not.“

 

„I’m waiting for the centrifuge to finish.“

 

Both women looked at the centrifuge.

 

„Oh, it has finished already.“

 

She grinned.

 

„I needed that, I guess.“

 

She yawned.

 

„Nineteen times positive.“ she said after checking the result.

 

„Shall we go and have a drink?“

 

„I thought you would never ask.“

 

Ten minutes later they were seated in easy chairs on the terrace of Ariane’s house, chatting away. Sandra was lying in a small hammock, quietly rocking back and forth, brandnew doll on her belly. Gnats and moths were humming above their heads around dimmed lamps.

 

„Fortunately you found something that repels insects.“

 

„I have another gift for you.“

 

Ariane rose, walked the small distance to Sandra’s hammock, grubbed under her daughter, took out a package wrapped in coloured paper and gave it to Eleanor, making a small curtsy.

„It is that time for presents after all.“

„But I don’t have anything for you. And for Sandra. For anybody for that matter.“

„In Scotland you don’t celebrate Sint Nicolas’s birthday. Unwrap it for heaven’s sake.“

Eleanor undid the cellotapes one by one, unfolded the paper neatly and stared at the green cover of a notebook for some time. She leafed through it speechlessly.

„Is this...“

Ariane nodded.

„Yes, these are the notes Maxwell made about the forces of space at atomic level.“

Eleanor jumped up, embraced her and carefully kissed Sandra’s forehead.

„Do you mind if I...“

She turned her head towards the house she shared with Maickel.

„No, I have to get some sleep anyway. Tomorrow the twentieth confirmation and then a cold climb to the next research facility.“

But Eleanor was already moving, all the while leafing through the green notebook.

„Almost forgot. Tomorrow you will have a new trainee. Andy, a smart kid if you ask me.“

Eleanor waved her hand above her head without turning around, as if she wanted to say „I heard you“.

The next morning, Andy turned out to be not only smart but also very stubborn. Eleanor rubbed her forehead to erase the hours not slept. She had been reading the green notebook for half the night and didn’t feel rested. Andy did.

„Why don’t you apply the small nuclear force better in your fuelcell?“

She was immediately sorry after yapping at him.

„You had better read Marinetti’s Futuristic Manifesto from 1909 about the glorification of speed, danger and modern techniques.“

Andy sulked, mumbling „aesthetics“ and started on his unimportant assignment (his opinion), while Eleanor sat down in front of her ARC and worked on her simulations with the green notebook closeby on the table.

It was almost noon when Ariane and Sandra came walking/skipping in.

„How are things in here?“

She bent and looked over Andy’s shoulder to a partly assembled Schönbein fuelcell.

„Hm. All right. Bad night that one over there.“

He turned his head towards Eleanor for a second.

„Sorry girl, too much reading.“ that one said.

Carefully Andy pushed Sandra’s little hand away from the platinum disc before she could hurt herself on the bare electronics.

„Not allowed?“ she asked, taking him in with a cunning look in her eyes.

„Number twenty is positive too. Research here has finished. Patrick has confirmed: the L4 lab is set to go. Day after tomorrow Sandra and I will be moving there.“

„And me?“

„You will stay for another week or two. Here you have better access to materials than up there.“

Andy listened in on the two women. In the meantime he helped Sandra knit a necklace from differently coloured 0.5 mm2 wires.

„We’ll be seeing each other in three weeks.“

The farewell meal and the intimate party afterwards brought bittersweet memories during the time they were separated. When Eleanor and Andy left for L4 their synergy had brought forth a better fuelcell: more powerful, more compact and more efficient.

At the end of the year, Patrick was sitting opposite his mother and grandfather who had come over from England and the Netherlands. This was going to be the last meal in Surinam, part of Guinee, land of many waters. They had left New Guinee before the trouble with Indonesia started and now the time had come to move again. There were rumours of an impending independence. It was not something they could use for their work that had to be done under the radar.

Grandfather Elwin stashed a vast amount of well filled salad - cucumber, onion, egg, tomato, olives, goatcheese, paprika and three different sorts of lettuce - on his plate. Patrick felt nothing but reverence for his granddad, who in his secluded hideout in New Guinee in the thirties and forties had combined theories about the atom by Bohr and Maxwell with vortexes by Schauberger and had stumbled on zero mass, Einstein’s cosmologic constant and solar energy, leading to grav-discs and Schönbein fuelcells.

His mother Francesca sipped from a glass of dry white wine and cut a passionfruit in thin slices. She made the hairs on his arm stand upright. He loved her, but the combination of botanica, atomic forces and mtDNA, resulting years later in genetic adaptations at the Surinam lab, had always seemed spooky to him.

Patrick sighed and took some sweet potatoes and a tiny bit of salad, without tomato, which made his granddad shake his head. Patrick was mainly interested in robotics and gravs. Granddad was thrilled, until they crashed with an experimental disc in an American desert. Granddad had come out of it with a torn sleeve and a scratch on his cheek. He himself had been trapped and had lost the feeling in his legs. Since that time he moved around in more and more advanced wheelchairs.

At London Tech he had got to know Charlie. It had become a friendship for life. Charlie knew optica student Archie and Archie had a friend, Ariane, who student medicines. The three were into a life beyond the expected. His buddy Charlie became an unequalled mirror to Patrick’s ideas for the development of AI robots and gravs.

Mid sixties he had met Maickel who was financially gifted. All of a sudden they had someone who could flog their discoveries bit by bit for money. They were drowning in it as it were. Their possibilities became an aesthetic experience of conquering nature. Maickel’s niece, Gertrude, was an organizer without peers. And later Eleanor... Such a genius, such a lovely girl and so selfless, honest and never aspiring fame. She only lived for her interest in the infinitisemal. She could lose herself in it. Sometimes Maickel or Ariane managed to pull her inside the common world for a while.

After the meal they drank coffee. Granddad Elwin black. His mother Francesca with milk and Patrick espresso. They settled on the porch and discussed the next steps.

Grandfather Elwin and mother Francesca had nothing but respect for their son. It was he who had elaborated on their initial research. Behind the houses, behind the edge of the woods, just at this side of their private bauxite mine, two fully functional shuttlegravs were parked. First they had had to use conventional rocketsystems for the Limburg gravs and four months earlier the prototype of a jumbo jet to build up enough speed, now they detached from the surface with ease.

With Charlie he had managed to improve on Einstein’s cosmological constant to have the impedance capacitors convert the reduced solar radiation at the bottom of the thick earth’s atmosphere sufficiently to reach an acceleration of 1,15 m/s2 up to 1,9 m/s2 above it. It still took them seven minutes to get there, but they were working on that.

After Archie’s accident he had pushed Ariane to improve on the results of his mother’s mtDNA experiments. She had been able, with a mix of keratine and chitine, to make human skin waterproof, strong and tightly woven, so that even the smallest molecules could no longer penetrate through this first line of defense. She had also found something for the all present gnats, moths and other insects to ignore the workers and themselves. The last and most important experiment with regard to their further plans had yielded twenty consecutive positive results.

The stars in the Surinam night flickered through the atmosphere above them. An occasional thunderstroke sounded far north above the Blanche Marie cascades. Weather would be bad for a couple of days. Much wind and rain.

„Fortunately this cannot bother you anymore next year.“ his grandfather said grinning.

He poured another drink. Granddad a cognac, his mother an icecold jägermeister and him an old whiskey.

„We will miss you, dear.“

Granddad nodded affirmatively.

„I will finish my year. I have some brilliant students in Eindhoven. You will see me arrive at L4 on my sixtyfifth birthday, I promiss you.“

Francesca laughed disdainfully.

„You will find an escape for that, father, like always.“

She rose from her easy chair, stroked Patrick’s hair and finished the get together.

„We will dine again at hotel Lautrec London in exactly six months. Be there, both of you. 25 june eight o’clock exactly. Table will be laid out.“

Andy read from the textbook.

„Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle. The energy of spectral lines can be measured very accurately, therefore also the energy of electrons. Precision in energy is precision in momentum. There is great uncertainty about the place of the electron. Orbits have to be replaced by the probability for finding an electron in a specific orbital space. We describe orbitals by means of wavefunctions.“

He thought back to the first remark he had made to Eleanor in Surinam about the little nuclear force. This was the real stuff!

„What if we could use the electronjump near the nucleus in our gravdrives?“

She looked at him.

„You mean we make local time stop?“

Andy grinned.

„No Irene, I mean just like the electron in its orbital propels inward with incredible speed and breaks through the lightbarrier and peeps out at the other side of the heavier mass!“

She shook her head pitying and sighed deeply.

„We are missing something quantum about the elctron. Let’s have another look.“

The screen on the ARC Patrick had loaned to them showed a spot in a fog bank.

„Here the speed is measured to be 2180 km/sec. It is going to accelerate towards the nucleus. Look, here the electron reaches lightspeed.“

The spot became more massive, then disappeared. A vibrating point appeared at the edge of the screen, grew in size and disappeared from the screen. Then the massive particle was there again and downsized to a spot.

„Did you see something we missed earlier?“

Andy shrugged.

„The nucleus didn’t seem to be exactly in the middle...“

Irene smiled.

„The electron doesn’t pass through the nucleus. They are wrong. It passes at a short distance. We have to aim the wavevortex of our gravs at a point just shy of the large mass.“

Andy looked at her naughtily.

„Enough study. Now some bodily exercise. Mens sana in corporo sana.“

They were doing their homework together in Irene’s room.

„Let’s go outside in stead of to the Greenery, the hydrogardens.“

Quickly they went through the corridors to the dressingroom. They donned their chitin enhanced skinsuits carefully, opened the inner door to the lock and pushed the decompressionbutton at the same time. The outer lockdoor opened. A black sky with thousands of of lightdots in all sizes and colours swirled by. Around the edges of the rocky hillocks of the base bright sunrays glared. Irene sat across a mini transportgrav and Andy sat down behind her, two arms around her waist.

„I have to report in.“

„Really?“

„Yes, Andy, we have to.“

And she sent Hein the message they were going to inspect the solar array and pick up a few rocks afterwards. They hooked themselves to the grav. Once around the rockmass, they had a good view of the entire dumbbell. Two more or less spheres with a sort of bar between them.

The Limburg miners had attached small robotengines to the space debris floating around at L4, that directed it to two central points about a mile apart. Robotlasers had melted it together in such a way that six smaller caves and one big one were constructed with a thick shell around them. After that the two rocky spheres were connected by an umbillical rock cord. The robotengines pushed against the spheres until the dumbbell started to rotate, perpendicular to the sun.

Irene stopped the grav at the solar array, attached to the umbillical cord, always taking in the maximum incoming solar radiation. Andy unhooked and immediately hooked himself to the rail beside the solar panels. He worked his way to the protecting case and checked their functionality. They functioned perfectly. Sweating he climbed back behind Irene.

„Still have to get used to the weightlessness outside.“

She steered away from the dumbbell and looked for a nice rock between the space debris left.

„This one is for you, Andy.“

She opened the grav’s lid and grabbed the handsize stone with green, yellow and bluewhite glistening veins. After that they attached small robotengines to two rocks of about a meter in diameter, drove fast by one of the last big ones and went back to their half of the dumbbell. They changed, cleaned their skinsuits, took Andy’s stone to Irene’s room and placed it beside Irene’s stone.

Irene read from the new assignment.

„Oxygen radicals have an extra electron. They damage biomolecules, DNA, proteins and fat.“

Andy nodded.

„Oxygen is the ultimate poison. We are oxydizing constantly. The biochemic price we pay for breathing is that we grow older. We rust from the inside out. Paracelcus, the 16th century German/Swiss doctor and alchemist, said that all substances are poisonous. The difference between a poison and a medicine is the right dose.“

She mumbled.

„Poinsons only get the upper hand if a dose exceeds a certain limit.“

„What are you thinking about?“

She started to laugh.

„What if we extract the extra electron? Less radicals, more electric current. Win-win.“

Andy picked up a piece of chalk, wiped empty one of the blackboards and started chalking.

Behind the windowpanes she saw the man in his wheelchair. He was speaking to a muscled chest standing beside him. She walked inside with difficulty, passing automatic glass doors into a spacious hallway with gleaming surfaces and green plants hanging from a long landing.

She said hi to Patrick and shook his hand.

„Here you are at last. Quite a reputation, you know. You look like you are going to outdo it.“

She looked at the other man.

„Irene.“ she said.

„Maickel. I take care of the money.“

Her eyes were looking for something to take the weight off her feet. There, a leather couch. She strolled into that direction and had to turn her head a bit to keep looking at them.

„I’m going to hang over here.“

„We’ll accompany you.“

She had been surprised when Charlie had told her she would be going with him to London. For days they had spent time together in the small cockpit of the shuttlegrav. She now knew exactly what he smelled like and he the same of course. When they arrived she had devoured a kilo of spaghetti with salmon and her puppy love for Charlie had died on the way. He was a good friend and they knew about everything about each other.

„Patrick,“ she started, „why am I here?“

Both men looked at Charlie. He smiled.

„I haven’t told her.“

„I mean,“ she continued, „my study, Andy and I, we progress, but we still have so much we need to understand.“

The man in the wheelchair looked at her.

„Please explain to Maickel Einstein’s relativitytheory.“

Maickel put up a questioning face.

„Einstein describes how time and space are connected in a flexible structure that is bent or dented by matter. The earth orbits the sun in our timeframe because it is trapped by the sun’s mass.“

„Yeah,“ Maickel mumbled, „even I understand it that way.“

The man in the wheelchair was silent for a little while.

„We have a proposition for you.“

She had a thousand and one questions but thought it wiser to let him explain first.

„Maickel has been able the past few years without attracting too much attention to blackmarket some of our older discoveries, inventions so you will.“

„Only the principles, nothing working!“

Irene revised her opinion of the muscled torso: sly. She remained silent and Patrick continued.

„We want to start a group, that is going to supply information to people in important places. They profit because they are still stuck in regressive science. We profit because we will build up goodwill and have a broader base to fall back to. If we scratch their bad itch, they may scratch our worse itch.“

„And you want to recruit me for that group?“

The three men laughed. Maickel loudly.

„We want you to set up the group and lead it.“

She hadn’t seen that one coming. For a moment she thought about it.

„I’m too young.“

„Age doesn’t count.“

„I don’t know anybody down here.“

„We do.“

„I...“

Charlie grinned.

„Evasive, Irene?“

She breathed deeply.

„I can pick my own people?“

„You are thinking of one already, surely.“

Charlie knew her too well, she thought.

„Can I have Maickel as advisor and contact?“

„We wouldn’t have it any other way.“

„And Andy. He and I... I can count on him.“

They nodded and grinned and she knew she had been played. She didn’t mind. Lagrange had its limitations. This way she would be able to use and expand her knowledge and abilities much better. She was satisfied.

„Tomorrow we dine with my mother and grandfather. You are the guest of honor.“

She looked at Charlie.

„I’ll be there too.“

 

The meal in hotel Lautrec lasted three hours. She met Francesca and Elwin and found them undisputedly charming. Grandpa gave her the names of promising Eindhoven students and a registration as an exchange student at the Technology Highschool. Francesca offered one name and contactinfo and told her about her experiments on people. Clearly a test, Irene thought. Bitchy after all.

Before six in the morning she phoned Richard Jenssen, who answered strangely enough. He was at work. They settled on meeting in the afternoon. She forced her muscles to excersize in the British Museum and had lunch at a small Indian restaurant in Tottenham Court road and took a boat to Greenwhich, arriving half an hour before her rendez vous. Young man Jenssen was waiting for her with two steaming cups of tea. They observed one another. He saw a wiry but muscular teenager. She saw a welldressed, carefully speaking, wait and see man in his twenties.

„Francesca told me you wanted to see me.“

„What do you think of her?“

„She’s alright if you let her speak.“

Irene smiled.

„Has she told you why I want to speak to you?“

He shook his head.

„Tell me about your work.“

Patrick became more and more enthusiastic talking about his observations of the universe. He studied the cosmos. He was looking for the meaning of it all. Why are we on this earth, was the question he was eagerly wanting an answer to. When he started to talk about the origin of stars, she raised her hand. Surprised he stopped and there was a sudden silence between them.

„What if I told you you would no longer have to wait? That I can give you the answer. Now.“

„All answers to all questions?“

„No, of course not. I’m still looking for new answers to new questions.“

O my, she thought, hear me now. I’m sixteen and sound like a wise, old scholar after decennia of research, disappointment and step by step progress.

„Give us an example.“

She hesitated for one second. She thought about the regressive science Patrick had talked about two days earlier.

„The shockwave of turbulences in gas and dustclouds makes them contract to filaments that are hundreds of thousands lightyears long. Only if density surmounts 5 solar masses stars of 0.2 times solar mass and up emerge.“

Bewildered he stared at her. She observed the battle between established knowledge and her words. It lasted a few minutes.

„Basic knowledge.“ she said.

He drained his tea.

„Ok, why do you come to me?“

The right reaction, she thought.

Charlie was talking with William in the supervisor’s room, when Ariane entered. He kissed her on both cheeks to welcome her. William shook her hand.

„How are things up here?“

„Everything peachy.“

She glanced at the oldfashioned dials on the control panels, and stopped at the last one.

„All panels have labels. This one doesn’t.“

Charlie gestured to William.

„It’s ok. She has to be told some day.“

He took her hands.

„We haven’t been completely honest with you.“

„You don’t say.“

„This last panel shows the state of the person we have had in coma since last year.“

Her eyes grew big.

„You mean...“

„We took Archie to Surinam immediately after the accident. Francesca did everything she could to keep him alive. His body is recovering slowly. I took him to Lagrange as soon as he was stable.“

She had held her breath and forced herself to sigh deeply.

„What is going to happen now?“

„Francesca inserted virusses and they have had a year to restore the mtDNA. His mitochondria can convert foodmolecules to adenosinetrifosfat again, the fuel cells use to do their jobs. We are waiting for Francesca. It’s her decision when to lift the coma.“

„I’m going to ask her.“

And away she went. She had the conversation dozens of times while she donned her skinsuit, took a small transportgrav to the other side of the dumbbell, doffed her skinsuit again, cleaned it and stored it neatly. Outside Francesca’s private quarters she drew a deep breath and opened the door. Francesca was in front of the screen of her ARC and turned to her, smiling faintly.

„Hello Ariane.“

„When are you going to wake up Archie?“

„Ah, you know.“

Slowly Fracesca worked her way out of her preshaped chair.

„The virusses have restored almost all of his mtDNA. Probably next week.“

She shook her head one time.

„It’s been a year. You are one year older. He no longer is the man you knew.“

„He is still the father of my child.“

Francesca stared at her for a while. She saw the well known determined look. Ariane was a force she couldn’t miss. Everybody on the base adapted because of her medication. She was invaluable for the next step. But Archie could be too. Francesca tried to get through to her, more compassionate than ever before.

„It can go two ways. His brain hasn’t suffered from a year’s dreamtime. We lift the coma and he wakes up cheerful and continues his work for us. Or... he has forgotton everything, can’t tie his own laces and doesn’t recognize you and Sandra. I haven’t told you. I didn’t want to make you suffer, Ariane.“

„Don’t treat me like a six year old, Francesca. I understand. You should’ve told me. I missed him so much. Sandra missed him. Everone missed him. How good it would be to have him around again.“

For the first time in her life Francesca felt like a mother to a sweet daughter. Grandpa Elwin understood that night. Patrick felt jealous a little. They discussed family feelings during their joint meal, but in the end wandered to their plan for the near and distant future. The daughter feeling had ebbed away. They had to move on. And to bind people to their cause, well, you were allowed to occasionally have these kinds of emotions.

They were all there when it happened, his friends and adoptive parents. The room had been heated up slowly. His body had been stripped of all wires and hoses for more than a week now and sensors had been removed an hour ago. He breathed quietly. His eyelids trembled. He blinked once, slightly turned his head and looked around. Ariane was holding his hand. His fingers pinched her softly.

„Hello Archie. Glad to see you again.“ Francesca said.

„Hi mate.“ Charlie said.

„Hey.“ a choir of voices sounded.

He grumbled and closed his eyes. Ariane stayed with him, while the others resumed their work. She helped him up when he tried to control his movements, supported him out of the room, into the lab, into a chair and handed him a waterbottle with a straw. He carefully sucked at it, cleared his throat, grumbled once more, tried again.

„Sandra?“

She nodded.

„She is here.“

„Lagrange?“

She nodded once more. From the doorway Sandra said „Daddy?“ And she knew it was going to be ok.

He remembered the slow river, Ariane and Sandra, Charlie, the accident, the family, their research, their discoveries, his discoveries. And he noticed he had changed. He felt a strength in his body and in his thoughts that hadn’t been there before. Francesca explained it by telling him she had set free virusses inside of him to restore his mtDNA. And improve on it (she looked away when she told that). He was sorry he had lost a year and had missed the move from Surinam to Lagrange. He intended to do everything in his power to participate in the Gymmos phase. What? No! He would make sure the plans would succeed...

Gymmos is an asteroid in the max1 zone of the Belt. Charlie and Archie were breaking on their way to Gymmos in a second generation shuttlegrav, piloted by an advanced bio ARC. They wore their flexible skinsuits.

Over the years, Irene and her fanatic colleagues had laid contact with government leaders, scientists, mediabonzes, rebels in regions where dictators didn’t appreciate help from the outside and promising newcomers. Charlie had seen her change into a magnificent shadow. She remained in the background, was astonishingly beautiful to be seen and knew how to balance supplying information with abstention. She had grown so much goodwill, that a view in the direction of L4 was forbidden morticus. Her and Eleanor’s help with the Russian Venera landing and the American Pioneer Mars project had been an enormous success. Money donors formed a long queue outside her hotel door. They were called Greys. Nobody knew where they came from. They could come from outer space for all they knew. Only direct contacts had seen her face.

The shuttlegrav was put down in the largest crater of Gymmos. Both men put on their helmets, disconnected air and water access from the grav, picked up a watertank and an airtank, hung them from their belts and descended to the dusty surface, where hundreds of mini robot gravs in a long line were transporting spacerocks from nearby space and robot lasers were melting useful materials into enormous future impedance capacitors. It would take at least three months before they would be finished.

Adrie and Richard Jenssen had searched the Belt for an ideal candidate for months. Unmanned ARGs, AI robot gravs had visited the most promising ones during the first two years. They chose Gymmos, a big nickle-iron rock with remnants of frozen water.

William, Lydia and Gordon, experienced, hardened miners, enhanced by Ariane’s medicines and Francesca’s virusses, left for the asteroid accompanied by fourhundred mini ARGs and twelve robot lasers, to prepare it for their goal. Every six months they returned to Lagrange to collect new materials that couldn’t be mined over there. After two more years Maya went along to build a permanent control room. Now, four years after the first trip, Charlie and Archie arrived with the tested mt DNA circuits for the bio ARC.

„Hi guys,“

She turned her preshaped chair towards them. They held onto the doorframe of the control room.

„Hi Maya.“ they said back.

„All’s well here? William and Gordon not too nasty?“

She grinned.

„They are too busy with their robots. Did you see how Lydia is coming along with the capacitors?“

Archie handed her a sled.

„Ah, finally. The circuits!“

She took it from him carfelly and inserted it into a recess. Exactly one second later mini lights appeared everywhere.

„System check.“ she said and the circuit responded with Eleanor’s voice „All systems go“.

She sniffed deeply.

„You have to take a shower. You don’t smell well. Come, I will show you the bathroom.“

An hour later they sat in foam filled chairs that adapted themselves to their bodies. They drank and exchanged newsflashes.

„I’m pregnant.“ Maya said.

„Congrats.“ Charlie reacted. „Ariane will be glad.“

„How long do we have before we can begin testing?“ Gordon asked.

„Elwin wants to send Gymmos on its way in july. If all goes well the trip to Toliman will take sixteen years. Elwin wants a nice present for his ninetiest birthday.“

„Irene will make sure that people will look the other way. The Americans will launch Voyagers I and II with her and Eleanor’s help. They will leave the solar system eventually too. A little bit after Gymmos.“ Archie added laughing.

„You still feel we can leave people on earth in the dark about us?“

Maya looked at him in an irritated way. She hadn’t agreed with the secrecy from the beginning. Of course she was proud of her daughter Irene for the good work she was doing. And certainly not all earth people were friendly. But so much good would come from openness. Charlie supported her opinion.

„Patrick calls it regressive science. I think there are people we can help. Irene is helping them. I mean, people are gullible and are taken in easily by demagogs. I think we are doing people a good service with the Greys.“

„We are no better than earth people.“

„No,“ Charlie said, „but we are more driven to achieve our goals.“

„Without ethics sometimes.“

„True. Progress also depends on the courage of the individual.“

„I’m going to do more.“ Maya said. „I have discussed it with Irene already. Something with public domain or free resources. It will look like they thought of it themselves.“

„And you use the unused potential of all earth people.“ Lydia ended the discussion.

Eleanor’s muscles felt stiff. She was getting older and was willing to admit that. Sometimes she thought she was forgetting small things. One of these days she had to speak with Ariane about that. The sudden methylmercury death of Francesca two years before had shaken them all profoundly. Old Elwin had almost perished. He was waiting for the signal Gymmos was going to send, otherwise he wouldn’t have survived. Ariane was even more important to them than before. Even she hadn’t been able to save her from the mercury poisoning. Maickel was getting older as well and he had calmed down a bit. He was more loving, brought her a present every once in a while. They had bought a cottage in Scotland and quietly spent a week there every month.

She was pushing her assistants Rudy, Carla and Kathy to finish the pressure vessel to produce fusion energy from microwaves, magnetic fields and plasma. They needed fusion outside of earth’s orbit. Sunlight wasn’t intense enough, making their gravs react sloooooowly.

She returned to her study of neutrinos and yes, she had a small particle accelerator of her own. Fusion (protons colliding) yielded protons, neutrons, neutrinos and anti electrons. Neutrinos were unknown terrain and that fascinated her. She intended to profit by them.

She looked at the clock. Almost time. She groaned, trying to climb out of her chair. Yes, definitely time to talk to Ariane. He was talking to Elwin and Patrick in the rec room. How handsome he had become, her protégé. Andy saw her coming from the corner of his eye, could turn just in time and catch her body when she collided with him and threw her arms around him.

„How is my sweetheart?“

She kissed both cheeks.

„Hi mom.“

Gradually it had come to this and she liked it. He hugged her and for a few moments there was nobody else around them.

They came in within the next quarter of an hour. The miners, Charlie, Ariane, Gertrude and Maickel. The big screen now showed a world with the sun Toliman above it. A swarm of mini ARGs was descending to the planet.

„Congrats Elwin.“ they called out to him. He accepted their kisses, taps on his shoulders and compliments. Patrick held his hand for a long while, not talking about their dead mother and wife. „We did it.“

Later, Andy didn’t know how much later, he was talking to Charlie and Patrick about their idea to introduce the Japanese keiretsu system in multiple countries.

„Cooperation is the key. Irene is meeting EU leaders to ask them for more monopoly control and greater freedom for equal company mergers.“

„Yes,“ Charlie said, „that would be a good move in the right direction.“

At last, together in Eleanor’s private quarters he spilled it.

„Irene is five months pregnant.“

„How wonderful!“

„She will come here from the seventh month and have the baby here.“

Eleanor put her arms around him.

„And I can be the little one’s grandma?“

He grinned.

„We are counting on that!“

Part 4. Aftermath

On the island there were caves. Once hiding places for humans and animals, they had been abandoned a long time ago. Andy and Irene had enjoyed these semi holidays at the azure sea. They had baked on the beach, swum, danced together and with others in the only club. Promising caves were marked on their map. They ran for miles crisscross over the hills and through the valleys. And they entered the caves.

They had visited many of them and came past a nice rocky slope on their daily run. They looked behind its entrance and decided to go get their climbing gear at the hotel.

They descended - Irene in front - on hands and knees down what seemed to be a roughly made corridor. They encountered a bricklayed wall. After a couple of taps with a climbing hammer they heard that behind it the corridor continued. Carefully Irene scratched out the seams around one of the bricks. She pressed with her feet against the stone, her back against Andy’s chest. The brick came loose and shortly after they had removed the other bricks as well. They continued to crawl.

Behind a second bricklayed wall was a bigger room. Its walls were built from stones that fit together seamlessly. They tapped the walls and decided that behind the rightside wall there was no massive rock. Irene put on a mask and used her fuelcell driven drill. She pushed a mini camera through the small cutout hole.

There were a stone block and some vague shapes along the walls. It took them some time before they had made an opening big enough to crawl through. Andy touched the stone block.

„Looks like an offering stone. Or a... sarcofagus.“

They held their breath and yes, there was a faint buzz. They tried to find its source by moving around a bit and standing still for ten seconds. There were three, well, vessels, against a wall and a small raised connection between them and the central block. The buzz was loudest from that connection. Irene carefully tapped away a piece from the outer layer and layed bare a tube. They both stared at the central block.

„Let’s call in reinforcements.“

From their hotelroom they called chief technician Gordon in Rotterdam. Before dawn two transport gravs arrived filled with equipment and workers. They removed the protecting layers of what really seemed to be a sarcofagus and some energy and fluid containers. They temporarily attached the sarcofagus to portable energycells and took everything to Rotterdam with the transport gravs. Andy and Irene stayed on the island for a few days longer.

Some time later, Charlie and Irene were standing in front of the window of a sterile room and were watching Ariane and Sandra trying to open the inner case.

„The mummy is connected to the control equipment.“ he said.

„It’s alive?“

After peeling off the protecting stone layer, the energy and liquid containers had been flown to Edinburg for further studies by Eleanor and Andy. They appeared to be advanced and predominantly biological. Sandra had claimed that the Elbe labs in Hamburg were best suited, so Gordon had taken the sarcofagus to their establishment in Germany. Their own equipment supplied energy to it and monitored whatever was inside the metal case.

„It’s an alloy we cannot make ourselves yet. A mix of metal and plastics.“ Irene ssaid while she kept on watching the activity around the case. „An acquaintance in Odessa can have a look at it.“

„Smart guy?“

„Very.“

Sandra stepped outside, mouthcap dangling below her chin.

„Something was triggered inside the case. We think we activated some sort of mechanism that will wake the mummy. I will warn you as soon as we have opened the case.“

In the cafetaria Irene drank decaf. Charlie had a glass of water. They were sitting at a real wooden table on real wooden chairs.

„How’s Bart?“

„Little brat.“

„Oh?“

„He is testing everybody. Knows exactly how far he can go. I fear the day he thinks of what he will be doing when he gets older...“

Charlie stared at her. Beautiful Irene. How she had grown since he had seen her before her family left for Lagrange. How tranquil she was. How powerful. She had been leader of the Greys for more than twenty years now. They had been in contact with presidents, prime ministers, dictators and rebel leaders and had made their mark on scientific and social progress all over the planet.

Their portable phones rang at the same time.

„It clicked open.“

Sandra shrugged.

„Whatever we tried, we couldn’t remove the lid ourselves. And now...“

She pointed her finger at the room behind the windowpane. There was a gap between case and lid. The next half hour they watched at the astonishingly slow movement of the lid. Like watching a mushroom raise itself from a rotting tree.

Ariane bent across a thickly bandaged shape and blocked their view.

„Step aside, Mom.“

She looked at them over her shoulder naughtily.

„Never seen a mummy before, have you?“

She stepped aside to show a steaming heap of wrappings.

„It seems to have a human shape. Less than two meters, I’d say. Head, torso, arms, legs. All wrapped separately.“

„Cut to pieces?“ Charlie reacted. Ariane grinned, her cascading grey hair neatly held together in a ponytail by a rubber band.

„Mummies used to be prepared as a whole. I mean, the body was wrapped completely. Here all important parts were wrapped separately. With...“

She put her gloved hand where she estimated the upper torso.

„Hm. Feels like a slight electric tension.“

She carefully removed her hand, glanced at the monitors and joined them outside the sterile room.

Pondering she stared inside at the open case.

„Rigid. Too rigid for linen or other cloth. My guess it’s a mix again, of cloth and plastics. Something for your Odessa guy?“

Irene nodded.

„Arkoff will be thrilled to receive the new-old materials Andy and I have rediscovered.“

„When are we going to cut?“ Sandra asked her mother.

„We’ll wait. I guess we can’t cut through. I suspect the wrappings will open up themselves or dissolve or something.“

Sandra looked at her mother, then nodded.

„Probably.“

It took two full days before the wrappings crumpled and evaporated. There was a male body in the case of reasonably normal build. The energy flow had increased by 400% and the complexion was beginning to turn from pale to a light bronze. Sandra wanted to dab a few moist spots with a sponge when the heartbeat started. She stood still for a few seconds, left hand with sponge at a dozen centimeters from his right ear. He sighed and sucked in a breath that lasted at least five seconds. He repeated this a few times and opened his eyes. She smiled at him. He smiled back at her, closed his eyes again and fell asleep.

„Scans show no abnormalities in his brainstructure. Everything should work.“ Sandra explained.

„Any remarkable differences in body build?“

Sandra shook no.

„Bones of a heavy Neanderthal nature, but heart, lungs, intestines,... like any common human.“

Charlie raised the corners of his mouth.

„Wait and see then.“

Sandra nodded yes.

A few days later, he sat at the edge of the bed, bent a little forward. He was dressed in a loose operating apron. Sandra was laying out socks, underwear and clothes on the foldout sidetable. He swallowed, opened his mouth and babbled with a tenor voice. She watched him for a few seconds, raised an eyebrow, pointed at herself and said: „Sandra.“

He repeated: „Ssadraa“. Then he pointed at himself and she heard something that sounded like „ille owies“and a couple of plopping letters. She tried „William?“

Later, fully dressed, he walked, supported by Sandra’s left arm, to the lavatory („WC“), where he peed in the urinal. She pressed the flusher and he repeated it and grinned. On their way to the cafetaria they met other people, that hello to Sandra and she said it back to them and he did too.

Irene and Charlie were at a table and Sandra sat down. William said „Hello... Wwillemm.“ Charlie looked at him perplexed, looking at Sandra and Irene. Irene stretched her hand towards William and said: „Irene“. First William studied her hand and then he stretched his in the same way. Irene took his hand and shook it up and down three times. Quickly recovered, Charlie stretched out his hand („Charlie“), and William shook it three times.

„As far as I understand it, William is a predecessor of our race. He told us about a gigantic war in which he was a captain in the KusKurZa army in the last years of the fights with their enemies the Naga.“

Charlie paused and he glanced at the faces of the bonzes around the table.

„We use names that resemble best the way William pronounces them. We call him William Oritz. It sounds more like orie and some plopping letters, so Oritz.“

They were sitting in the Rotterdam boardroom overlooking the square below the Tradebuilding. Next to him were Archie, Ariane, Sandra and Patrick, opposite him were Eleanor (accompanied by little Bart), Irene, Andy, Maickel and grandfather Elwin, connected to an oxygenflask. This was a regular meeting, no agenda, just to meet and exchange thoughts.

„Talk to us about the different establishments.“

Elwin had doffed the mouthcap. Ariane’s virusses were busy in his lungs and in a couple of weeks time he would be able to produce enough oxygen himself. Patrick coughed and began.

„Rotterdam is slowly moving in the right direction. Maya is managing the Net and is pushing more and more people towards computer and robot development. We have more and more nerds and better contacts with multinationals. We keep an eye on Erasmus university for management talents. I’m checking a young broad called Victoria for the Rotterdam keiretsu. Strong, shoes glued to her feet.“

Eleanor combed little Bart’s hair with her fingers. Her sign he had to be a sweet boy and let her talk undisturbed.

„Edinburg is ok. We have been able to duplicate the energy and liquid containers. we don’t understand everything yet, but we are going to. We are also studying the buildingblocks of quarks and expect results shortly. I’m thinking of buying the castle for our business premises.“

Ariane let Sandra explain.

„Hamburg is at full steam. We had a young Lahore doctor insert the first gen adaptation to a well known athlete. The equipment in William’s case is still above anything we might throw at it, but we are learning fast. He keeps amazing us. Physically and mentally. His genes, but especially the production and use of his proteins are beyond ours. He fluently can speak, read and write Dutch, English and German. And little Bart is glued to his side.“

In the afternoon, the boy was sitting, hands between his knees, listening to the man. William was standing in front of the window covering floor to ceiling and was looking at the view over the city from the 34th floor. It was raining from darkgrey clouds that sped across the sky.

„And what did those reptiles look like, ~ille~ochie^t^? Did they have scales, like crocodiles?“

Bart pronounced his name just like William did. The man laughed and shook his head.

„No Bart. (he liked that about his friend, he never said little Bart) They had a layered skin. The outer was hard, virtually unprenatable, true, but no scales. They had to breathe through it. Difficult with scales.“

The boy thought deeply and asked: „But you said they had special suits. Otherwise they couldn’t breathe, you said.“

William answered: „Right you are. We breathe nitrogen and oxygen gases mainly. Naga breathe carbon dioxide gas. Their suits filter that from our air. So they can breathe.“

„Are there still Naga?“

„Bet there are, they were the elite of the Arm.“

The boy looked at him questioningly and he added: „There were many in our part of this Galaxy.“

„Galaxy?“

William keyed a searchword in the ARC and showed the spiralshaped arms to the boy.

„Earth is in the Sagitarius arm. There were zillions of them here. But we stopped them.“

„Did you have gravs too?“

„Sure. They worked differently though. I was captain of an eh.. what does it look like, catamaran. That’s a grav with two big gondolas - humps.“

Bart grinned.

„Like mama’s?“

William laughed out loud.

„Something like that, but long and narrow.“

Again the boy showed his pondering face.

„And they went fast. Faster than gravs. They had to, because the Naga had gigantic gravs. More than a mile long.“

„They must have been full of carbon dioxide gas.“

William looked at the boy looking at him with slightly slanting head.

„You are smart, Bart. Let nobody say you aren’t.“

„Tell me about the great battle in the heavens again, when you defeated the arcs of the Naga.“

William told the story for the thirtieth time. Once finished, he pulled up Bart and said: „Come, let’s go to my date with Sandra.“

That evening, Andy was putting Bart to bed.

„Daddy, ~ille~ochie^t^ has a grav and likes Sandra.“

Andy wasn’t listening too much to his son. He still had to prepare for his rendez vous with the mayor of Edinburg and review Eleanor’s report on new energy cells and he still had to - really had to - call his wife before nine o’clock to wish her goodluck on her trip to Lagrange.

„Yes, little Bart?“

„Yes, Daddy. ~a~io* hid it and he wants to go look for it.“

Absentmindedly he asked: „For what?“

„His grav. It is different from ours. It has two gondolas.“

Andy stared at his son.

„When has he told you this?“

„Oh, months ago.“

He tucked in his son, kissed his cheek, left the door ajar, sat down heavily in front of his ARC and tried hailing William. The man reacted immediately, as if waiting for him.

„Good evening Andy.“

„You have a grav with two gondolas.“

William grinned.

„The ears of little children...“

„Apparantly you told him months ago.“

„I tell him lots of things. He keeps asking questions.“

„And you want to go look for it.“

„Yes, but that is tricky. Earth has changed since my time. Our continents were differently shaped and there were some different islands and there was no ice on the poles.“

Andy processed it.

„That’s why ~a~io* has surely hid it on the moon. Probably in a cave system below the surface. I have asked Gordon if I can use a grav to go look.“

„You think your grav is still there and in one piece?“

„If the ship is hidden there, it will be fully operational. Same materials as in the sarcofagus, o~ial^u*."

The next day they floated approximately threehundred fifty meters above the lunar surface and were looking for caveopenings.

„Who was this Marion?“

William spoke lightly, but Andy suspected more. He thought about Irene and the part she had in his life.

„My ... eh ... flight engineer.“

They were silent for a while and studied the data the densityscanner yielded.

„After the battle above Earth, our leaders decided on an exodus to Andromeda. Not everyone wanted to join. I was severely injured and had to go into the recovery-case. ~a~io* promised she would leave my ship behind so I could follow them. The laggards - mainly intelligent Za people with a populist leader - would be able to help me with that.“

„And for some reason they didn’t?“

William nodded his head.

„A new ice age, an asteroid coming down, a tsunami, a volcanic eruption.... many things could go wrong. Maybe they weren’t planning on helping a wounded Kus.“

The densityscanner started ping, pingping, pingpingping over an eighty feet opening and Andy put the grav down. They donned their skinsuits, belted an airbottle and a waterbottle and stepped into the cold shadows. The cave they were walking in sloped lightly and led up to a wide plateau on which a long, slender ship with two side gondolas was parked.

„Looking good, William.“

They hipped towards it. William tapped a seal, but nothing happened.

„Energy gone. No sunlight.“ Andy concluded.

„No.“ William said and slid the seal to the side, pressed both thumb and index finger on a pad and poof... a hatch opened.

„Our ships operate differently from your gravs.“

He dove inside.

„It’s just a matter of time.“

William was sitting at the boardtable and tried to convince his audience.

„The Naga were a cruel people. They had conquered the biggest part of this Arm. Our joint fleet couldn’t stand up to them. The battle above Earth was terrible. We had only a handful of ships left against the mile long Arcs of the Naga. A StarKing had tapped the gigantic Arcs and made them vanish into thin air.“

The faces of the boardmembers of the keiretsu demanded further explanation.

„StarKings are Rmoahals, a people from an earlier era of Earth’s history than ours. They fled the planet when it became a snowball and wandered between the stars. They like a good whooping and are always around when there is one going on. Naga leave them alone.“

Charlie said: „You think they will be back, those Naga.“

„They are bound to be. That’s why the people from Kus, Kur and Za have left for our neighbouring system.“

„That will take them forever.“ Eleanor said.

„Our technicians have constructed sleepinglounges, just like the recovery cases. My people will wake up fresh and bright.“

Patrick summarized: „You want us to build your case into your ship and then send you after your people?“

William nodded.

„Where do we stand on our research for the energy and propulsion systems?“

Eleanor shrugged. „Not that far yet. It is complicated and this one here (she neighed her head towards William) is not a technician. We need some more time to get it to the details.“

She had been thinking about it the whole time. Slowly she raised a hand. Everybody was watching her. Patrick said: „Yes Irene?“

„We have Lagrange and Gymmos has shown that the planet at Toliman is suitable. If it is true what William says, we mustn’t stay only on Earth, but we have to expand. Not just in numbers, but we have to go to more planets. Archie and Richard Jenssen have found several places where we - with assistance from Ariane and Sandra - humans can live.“

Andy understood what his wife was saying.

„Yes. We have Lagrange. We can study William’s ship on the way, copy the systems and equip the dumbbell with the functionality we don’t master yet.“

Little Bart asked tensely: „Where are we going with Lagrange?“

Eleanor ruffled his hair and said: „Won’t you rather stay here with granny?“

On the way to Toliman, William, Andy, Irene and Gordon held a meeting on preshaped chairs in the controlroom.

„We have mastered the energy systems. The problem is fuel. There is a tiny amount of the stuff we need in the rocky outer layer of the dumbbell as spores. There is a bit in the solar panels on the umbillical cord.“

„What are you suggesting?“

„We need only a little bit. The stuff is durable. Very durable. There’s enough to reach Toliman and catapult William towards Andromeda if we break down the dumbbell and continue with one sphere.“

They were looking at the graphs on the ARC’s screens.

„Let’s do it.“

Much later they stood in the controlroom with grins on their faces. They had moved the seeding banks from the second sphere to their central cave. Their mini ARGs had dumped all materials of the second sphere and the umbillical cord on their own sphere, fixated them and dredged out the spore elements. Robot lasers had built the propulsion generators. They had tested twenty times and then sent away William’s catamaran with him mummified in his case on board.

Irene spoke loudly and clearly: „Commence propulsion in generators one and two.“

The speed screen indicated an incredible rise in velocity. She nodded to Andy.

„Commence propulsion in generators three and four.“

Now the screen indicated full speed.

„We’re at max impulse.“ Gordon stated.

Much, much later, but still many years less than initially planned, they were circling a planet covered with white clouds, three quarters brown-green and different shades of blue. The Gymmos mini ARGs had constructed a domed base, collected stocks of raw materials, prepared the soil and sowed plants. In 18 years since Gymmos had arrived, the base had become a small town and ARCs monitored all systems.

„We’ve arrived.“

A commuting line between the Lagrange sphere and the base transfered the seeding banks. Autonomous installations started to convert the contents to plants, animals and people.

Part 5. Bart’s tale

Arkoff signs the document in front of the mediapeople, Victoria de Haviland beside him. She has been appointed chairwoman of the Council for Worldkeiretsus. She looks satisfied. Arkoff has just signed off his rights to the magic material snabstroj, a mix of alu, fe, cu and plastics, to the Worldcouncil, thereby allowing every keiretsu on Earth free production.

The dire lack of drinkingwater and unpredictable spells of drought had created more and more exodi of refugees in the past decades. It is about time that there were more cooperation between keiretsus to be protected from the fickle climate, Victoria thinks. Rotterdam, home base of De Haviland, has started the construction of a dome over the city. There has been a shortage of snabstroj because of Odessa’s monopoly. Now production in Maasport High can start and her five-year-plan will run faster.

Only last year Victoria, with a handful of dignitaries from Edinburg, Hamburg and Rotterdam, had taken the first ‚metro‘ up to Maashaven High. There isn’t much yet up there, but the factory for snabstroj production is set to start. The meal was great. The view of Scotland, the Netherlands and Germany was magnificent. Truly a great achievement, and almost without support from the Greys!

As Arkoff rises, she rises too and shakes his hand. She is not afraid of contamination with the new virus. Sandra’s medication has boosted her immunesystem in the Hamburg labs. In a few weeks time she will have a checkup and then her genome will be updated again.

„My deepest gratitude on behalf of the population of the world.“

She bows her head slightly in recognition of his unselfish act.

„Happy to oblige.“ Arkoff says.

They walk out of the pressroom. Then she puts an arm around his shoulders and presses him close to her.

„It is about time you showed your gratitude after all the years of help from our organisation! Irene put you on track with our materials, but after Odessa was included in the keiretsu Kiev-Moscou you went your own way, without giving us even a glimpse of your progress.“

„I intended to, but Irene was gone and there is the healthy rivalry between keiretsus.“

In his appartment he turns his surroundings to a nice day at sea to exclude the rainy weather outside. Soft music floats through the rooms. He smells the silty sea and opens the latest novella by Gyte Jacovski about the modern person in an ever more digitized world.

A separate holographic person is taking shape among the characters of the book. He sees a young man with darkblonde hair, spacious coveralls and last but not least an eyepatch.

„Hello Arkoff.“

He has read about the experimental Shadow-shapes of the Rotterdam-Edinburg-Hamburg keiretsu. There has to be a security leak somewhere, because this one appears in his appartment. Odessa uses the WorldNet as it was set up by Maya and consorts. They claim to be working independently from the keiretsus. But Maya is grandmother to Kareken, the chief scientist of Rotterdam...

Arkoff studies the Shadow curiously. He can see lines clearly and it is semi-transparant. The holographic image is of much lower resolution than the book.

„I’ll be gone in a jiffy. Just have time for a message.“

The young man’s Shadow walks a few steps.

„I am Bart, son of Irene. If you are interested I will be your contact with the organisation. We have strategic positions in the Rotterdam-Edinburg-Hamburg keiretsu assigned to Greys. We will control the Council shortly.“

Arkoff says: „Can you hear me?“

„Sure. this Shadow is functioning in your appartment the way I would.“

„If, and I repeat if, I would be interested, how do we stay in contact?“

„One of our people is keeping an eye on you. Speak and he will listen. And pass on your words to me.“

Dreams?

A plane high up in the air leaves behind a white line. He stares at it from between the appletrees. He bites an apple. Tasty. Walks between rows of trees. An orchard. He wears a brown leather flier’s jacket. Eats the apple. He strolls along reeds. A river. A landing. A lawn that stretches to a cottage. A chattering little dino is storming out of the frontdoor. Small T-Rex. There’s a hum. A deltawing comes down over the reeds and lands on the lawn. A woman in goggles steps out. He says: „Hi Amelia.“

The dino is jumping around them. Then the woman’s face becomes Levuté from work.

„Hi Bart. Tomorrow is your last day, you know. Kareken has asked me to remind you that you are expected to appear at the boardroom at high noon.“

 

The woman gets back on the plane. Rex chases off the deltawing screaming. Bart picks up the book lying in the hammock on the verandah and is looking around for a waste bucket for the applecore in his hand. Apple. Orchard. River. Cottage. Dreamworld?

 

The next morning there are small snowflakes against the windows of the southern terrace of the Antwerp-Rotterdam transport. He enjoys the view and drinks his tea. His last day at the Rotterdam-Edinburg-Hamburg keiretsu. He has no emotion for it. Doesn’t think of his future. Hopes.

 

Ten minutes later he walks across the square in front of the Tradebuilding below the snabstroj dome. There are other people and peopleTM and Shadows. Nothing strange here. He has spent so much time in this place.

 

He counts the lines in the ceiling and walls of the waitingroom. Nerves. Then his chief Kareken is coming to get him. They walk side by side over the red carpet into the suite of the board, along a murmuring waterstream over stepping stones in the officegarden. Up to the table with Bonzes. Then tall slender brightly blonde Kareken announces him solemnly. : „Bart Karlssen.“ Sums up his successes. Everybody applauds. Softly. Even Victoria de Haviland, the head of chiefs. Silence.

 

Everybody is looking at Kareken. She grins and holds up the Ring. It glitters in the bright lighting. Shoves it on his finger. The Bonzes rise, walk around the table and shake his hand. Numb. He cannot enjoy it. Not trashed. He can stay. No more fieldwork. He is an advisor now. He thaws, feels the handshakes and taps on his shoulders. Enjoys Kareken’s warm hug. Happiness.

 

„Hey Levuté.“

 

He closes the safetydoor behind him and walks to his workstation.

 

„Hey Bart. Come to close up?“

 

Then she sees the Ring and comes over, puts her arms around him.

 

„Congrats, man!“

 

He feels pleasure start to take possession of his whole body.

 

„Thanks girl.“

 

Levuté kisses him and draws back half a meter.

 

„They are not completely crazy up there, after all“

 

She raises her head in the direction they both know the boardroom is. Bart embraces his former workstation.

 

„I would appreciate it if I could remain working here for a while Levuté.“

 

„Of course man, no problemo. Travel a lot anyway. (wink) Although I never leave the Bunker.“

 

„Thanks girl.“

 

And Levuté works herself into her protecting enveloping chair in front of her console. Plugs in and becomes the mental Traveler in the all encapsulating WorldNet.

 

Bart looks at his own workstation. An empty console. A locked storage space with memory cubes. His hanging chair. His personal cableplug to the WorldNet. He takes it and enters his PolyWorld. Walks among the rows of trees, strolls along the reeds, across the lawn. Is jumped by Rex. Hugs the animal. Cuddles into his hammock on the porch of his cottage and starts reading his book.

 

Above in which people and peopleTM and Shadows work and live and relax. Below with utilities and citytransport. And the underworld. Ten meters below Above. Above belongs to the keiretsu Rotterdam-Edinburg-Hamburg. Kareken is one of the boardmembers. The keiretsu is made up of banks, tradehouses, industrial and research institutions. A dome of transparent snabstroj has been built over the city. Above is clean, newly constructed on a higher level and no longer suffers from climatic influences. Towards the cascade at Hook of Holland a guiding rail starts curving upward. It ends at Maasport High with room for enterprises, hotels and catering and a worldclass view. At fivehundred miles above the Northsea there hangs a cluster of laboratories, relaxation areas and factories, where materials like snabstroj are made.

 

DNE, a DNA variant, developed by Valérie and Sandra in the Elbe laboratoria of Hamburg, makes improved

peopleTM. If they can afford the replacement of course. They live longer, have less diseases and have higher ranks in the keiretsu. Victoria de Haviland is one of the peopleTM.

 

After the Economic Crises of the twenties, citycouncils were setup with the help of the Greys in the way of Japanese keiretsus of the former century. The keiretsu Rotterdam is part of, has become one of four greatest in the world. It is only accountable to the WorldCouncil. It has twenty year contracts, after which you retire. Every once in a while somebody is offered an advisory function. With that Bart keeps his right to use keiretsu property.

 

Everybody has a virtual PolyWorld in the WorldNet. Shadows are projections of people into the real world from the virtual worlds. Almost everybody uses Shadows. You can send them to meetings you don’t want to attend yourself. Or to places you cannot reach at the moment. Goofs guard the PolyWorlds. Their AI build up and maintain the personal virtual worlds.

 

Bart’s Shadow was set up by Rex and had grown to a fully functional Shadow of the human Bart Karlssen in the real world. He decides to unplug, lying in his hammock, applecore in one hand, book in the other, and go to his real home.

 

Monday morning. He enters the hermetically closed Bunker with workstations around a central array of consoles. He sees the workers that are plugged in. Traveler is there. He joins her and plugs in the co-driver’s cable behind his ear. A moment of disorientation. Then a flat line and a fraction of a second after that the 3D world of Levuté.

„Hey Bart.“

„Hey Levuté.“

They are sitting on a terrace by the sea. Beer. Waving plamtrees. Levuté is wearing sunglasses and shorts. Her bronzed body looks more muscular than in the real world. Levuté’s Goof is playing beach volleyball alone.

„I guess we won’t be doing research together anymore.“

„Don’t be sure of that.“

They are standing in a parking lot beside a sparkling Harley Davidson. Levuté climbs on. Bart is at her back.

„We have an appointment in Edinburg.“

They race between blocks to the edge of their sphere.

 

„Hold on, it’s going to be a bumpy ride.“

 

Outside of the protecting shell of Rotterdam there are sharks waiting for them. The Harley bites, growls and fights its way through. They are chased along the glowing lines that connect their hometown with Scotland. They penetrate the sphere that is Edinburg. Quiet. A park landscape with lawns, rows of trees and ponds. The keiretsu castle. A courtyard. People in white protective clothing. For a moment he thinks about his gradma Eleanor. Will he visit her lateron?

 

„Come.“

 

Levuté hurries inside wearing a long raincoat.

 

„This is the particle.“

 

They are standing near a vessel in which there is a foggy trail. This space is limited but without walls, like any PolyWorld. Bart has abandoned trying to comprehend the possibilities of the WorldNet from the beginning. They are not really here, of course. They are still in the Bunker in Rotterdam. Bart and Levuté’s Shadows are in Edinburg. He thinks. Now he is inside the head of his Shadow. He thinks. The WorldNet amazes him every time. Like anything set up along Maya and Lex’s directions. He shakes his head, or that of his Shadow... They stand and stare.

 

„Ehhhh. You captured this particle in the bubble vessel?“

 

Traveler nods eagerly.

 

„Yesyes, it fell in just like that. The guys here did the normal research and...“

 

She is practically skipping in place.

 

“... and then they found it comes from far far away.“

 

He doesn’t see anything special inside the vessel. He has researched plenty of particles like this before since the memory discoveries have started.

 

„How far?“

 

„Very far!“

 

„Yeah. How far precisely?“

 

„Let’s find out now!“

 

They dive into the mahlstrom, like previous times. The particle grows from hazy patch to a sun with raging convection. Not different from earlier research. Traveler tunes them to the subquantum Memory. Routine... The blob in space of the particle’s origin lasts. And lasts. And lasts longer than before. When it happens, he feels wrung.

 

„Gee....“

 

„Oh man. This is far. You feel this one in your bones.“ Levuté says.

 

Bart looks (?) around.

 

„Where are we?“

 

The Traveler in Levuté is silent while checking several data sources and comparing them with their surroundings.

 

„Looks like Hunting Dogs over there. Canes Venatici. And we come from.... there.“

 

She has labeled the places with arrows and names. Oh yeah. This isn’t real.

 

„Something interesting?“

 

„Not much.“

 

His attention is drawn by a point, pulsating irregularly. In space light doesn’t flicker so that is special.

 

„Over there.“

 

Another arrow, with question mark this time. Traveler calculates its coordinates and a fraction of a sec later they are in striking distance. It is a sphere inside of a cube with a flashing light above it.

 

„The program recognizes the severity of this object.“

 

They study the data leaking from the sphere.

 

„Is it plasma?“

 

„Nope. Looks like energy changing to mass changing to energy.“

 

„I have marked its position.“

 

The signal to return to Edinburg. Some time after their departure and before their arrival they feel something touching their brains. Bart is shocked. He grabs Levuté. She is standing like a Viking, axe in her fist, helmet on her head and twirling on her feet.

 

„Aaarch...“

 

Then she is Levuté again and says pensively: „That was interesting.“

 

They navigate the Harley back between the sharks to the Rotterdam gateway. In the Bunker they unplug and report to Kareken.

 

 

Kareken is a double ten. She is incredibly beautiful. Intelligent. Granddaughter of Net guru Maya and his semi-relative. She has long blonde hair. Ans she has no Shadow. She isn’t one of the peopleTM. Bart has placed her on a pedestal ever since he started work for the keiretsu. He loves her in a platonic way. Kareken is his Muse. He adores her.

„Sit down Bart.“

She points at a comfortable hang/lying chair and sits beside him, hands on top of each other on the armrail. She feels so intimate.

„Your life is in danger. The president of the WorldCouncil has had to follow up on Lahore’s accusations. Victoria wants to sacrifice you. You are no longer an advisor to the Council. You have been deemed an enemy of the keiretsu. She has ordered your liquidation.“

Calmly she sits and looks at him.

„Of course, you are under my protection. I have some ideas.“

The first thing to go missing is his Shadow. Then the hammock disappears. The book. The cottage, the lawn, the reeds, the river. No gradual vaguesness. Just bam, boom, gone. The orchard disappears. Only the applecore remains. Then his hand is empty. His Goof utters a protesting cry. And it is gone. Without sound all that rests is undefined white noise. He unplugs. Presses his palms to his eyes. Rubs his hair. His PolyWorld is no more. He screams.

Bart is doomed to live in the real world now. He cannot receive mail. He can only hitch rides with Traveler. Spends more time inside the Bunker. Then Kareken creates a new Goof for him. And a new PolyWorld with that. He is nervous to open it. The Goof is a young pink pelican.

 

„Hi Bart. I’m Pelle.“

 

„Hi Pelle.“

 

They are standing in a shallow piece of clear water. In the background there’s a light yellow beach. The sky is lightblue, almost white.

 

„Palmtrees?“Bart says and they are there. A small group about twenty steps from the water.

 

„Cabin?“ he says and it is there. It is made of rough wooden planks, has a roof of palmleaves and the inevitable verandah with hammock. And book.

 

„Music?“ And far away one of his favourite tunes is played. He relaxes. This is a luxury. He talks and Pelle fills the PolyWorld with his wishes. When he unplugs, Kareken is still there. He embraces her.

 

„Thank you.“

 

„Never mind Bart. You’re welcome. Have fun in your new world.“

 

Bart spends a lot of time in his PolyWorld. Pelle creates a general Shadow and begins to develop it for full independent participation in the real world. Their cooperation is intense. He sees the pelican grow. In capacity and size.

He receives mail again. Filtered, because Kareken has maximized security. Pelle makes the Shadows of the messages more and more beautiful. After a few days, the resolution of the PolyWorld becomes real world like.

The first time his Shadow goes outside, is thrilling. A little insecure he walks across the square in front of the Tradebuilding. Sits among people and peopleTM and other Shadows. Visits shops. Then descends to Below. Citytransport, following the circular line. Sometimes Bart loses control and the energylines of the Shadowbody become visible and resolution diminishes. Fellow travelers look at this, some with interest, some with contempt. Mostly with indifference.

He stays in the Shadowbody all the time and pulls it back with the signal of the Bunker. Into his new Polynesian PolyWorld. Pelle yaps exitedly and Bart is happy with this success.

 

During the second test, the Shadow is left on its own and shit happens. Pelle hides behind the cabin.

Bart has taken the body to the square and inserted Jacco’s pub at Marconisquare Below. Then he crawls into his hammock and reads the book.

Pelle opens a window to the citytransport. The Shadowbody‘s energylines slowly turn off. Its brain dies. The Shadow disappears. Deja vu.

He drags the pelican from behind the cabin and instructs it to gather up the highest possible security. Pelle conjures up enormous chains and anchors itself to palms and the cabin. The PolyWorld shrinks to a few meters from the beach. Pelle turns red and conjures up heavy locks.

Panicking, Bart sends out a distress call to Kareken. Pelle adds another chain. And another. The edge closes in, retreats. Closes in.

Then metal walls and ceiling thunder down and encapsulate the PolyWorld. Big fat letters appear in the sky above the beach. COME OUT.

He sighs, shakes his head and ends his stay in the PolyWorld. Kareken is sitting at a workstation and unplugs.

 

„Hopeless.“ she mumbles. „I cannot save your website Bart.“

 

She sometimes says oldfashioned things to him.

 

„How is this possible?“ he asks.

 

She looks at him sadly with downed shoulders. He has seen her like this only once before. Her husband had died. His first year working for the keiretsu.

 

„Apparently I missed something in security. Have you sent mail? Outside the Bunker?“

 

„Eh.. yeah... to grandma Eleanor.“

 

„That will be it.“

 

She is looking for a solution. He knows the telltale look on her face. Her brains are working at topspeed, combining data and finding a solution.

 

„You have to hide at Jacco’s for a while.“

 

 

When the national anthem is played, all refugee Kazakhs stand up to sing loudly, arm in front of chest. Valérie and Levuté quickly glide onto barstools. The tavern is called Paradise. The owner has fled Kazakhstan during the Economic Crises, like practically everone present. Drought and lack of work had created a famine that was worse than anything that had hit Africa ever before.

Valérie is dressed in a yellow frock. She has just turned twentyfive and she has something to celebrate. She has passed for her doctor’s study and is painting the town with her friend. They work as cleaners at the research facility of G’haliandra’singh. She has short black curly hair and is planning to hit the roof tonight. Levuté has been her friend since arriving in Lahore almost ten years ago.

She beckons Jacco, the owner, and gestures two homecooked wodkas. The former occupants of their stools try to talk them off the stools, but they just look at them with innocent eyes.

 

She is nipping from her glass and sees a young man watching them. standing one shoulder against the wall. She raises her glass. He nods. Stands straight. Shuffles to the bar. Pressed between Valérie and Levuté, he tries to order something in vain.

 

„Hi girls, you want another...?“

 

Levuté always is the fastest and says: „Aha. Foreigner. You something want to give us? Thanks. Jacco, two wodkas.“

 

Valérie says: „In a civilized country people introduce themselves before hitting on somebody.“

 

The young man snifs, laughs and responds: „Okay. Sorry. Johnny. Johnny Nero.“

 

„Did you think of that one yourself?“

 

„Of course. I’m Johnny Nero from Can-Am, far from home.“

 

She waves her free hand. „It’s ok. I’m Valérie. It’s my birthday. This is Levuté.“

 

There is a hustle at the front door. Some pushing. A small fight. People fall to the ground. And then he is standing in front of her. Well built, hair in sticky wisps, gasping, blood on left shoulder. Supporting one arm with the other hand. Eyes wide open.

 

„H..help me.“ he stammers and sags against her.

 

„Hey,“ Levuté yells, „Watch it, you’re bleeding all over her new dress.“

 

Valérie pushes him off of her. He staggers on his legs. As in slow motion she sees Jacco’s arms glide around him, lift him and carry him away.

In the doorway a brightblue uniform appears. Then two more enter. Uh oh. Government agents.

 

„Immigration.“ the first agent says in the total silence of Kazakhs knowing they risk immediate dismissal and removal from the Lahore enclave when they don’t cooperate.

 

„Oh dear.“ Johnny says, frisking his id-chip. Levuté grabs a glass of berry juice and throws it on the bloodstains on the yellow frock. The three agents check everybody. Also Jacco, who is behind the bar again. He is warned because something is not in order.

 

„They always find something that is not in order.“ he says after they have left. He hands Valérie a piece of cloth to dab at the moisture.

 

‚There’s clean water at the back.“ he says as he opens the fence for her. She follows him silently into a small kitchen. Opens a door she hasn’t seen. They walk a couple of meters in pitch darkness. Then the light goes on and she sees the wounded man lying on a mattress in a corner. He is unconscious. She bends over him accepting the scissors Jacco is offering her. She cuts away his clothing at the shoulder. There’s a lot of blood. A dity wound. She pulls out one of two syringes from her left boot and jabs the short needle in the middle of the open flesh, pushing the serum in. She indicates to Jacco to lift the man up a little. He hands her the rapid healing bandage. She envelops the wound tightly. Almost immediately the bleeding stops.

 

„He asked for you. Wanted to thank you. Couldn’t stay awake.“

 

He brings her a cup of coffee. She waits. Looks at the paintings on the walls. Scenes from the mothercountry. Grand views of the lake and cozy terraces in Akmola. Snowcaps on the mountains behind Almaty. She dozes a bit and accepts a second cup.

 

He studies her. She is sitting at the table. A bit chubbier than he likes to see. Her face peaceful and her eyes closed. She breathes slowly, trained. Spicy lady, he concludes. The bloodstains have turned orange. Too bad for the lovely dress. He moves without making a sound, takes the cup from her hand and drinks what’s left in it. He looks for the exit. Only four walls. No door. With his fingertips he touches edges of murals.

She sighs, blinks her eyelids twice and is awake. Sees he is no longer on the mattress.

 

„I’m sorry lady. We have to leave here. Where can we get out?“

 

Valérie rises and inspects the bandages. No leaks.

 

„Your wound heals well.“

She pinches his shoulder. He accepts the pain. The wall opens and Levuté peeps in, followed by Johnny Nero and Jacco.

 

„How are you?“ Johnny asks.

 

„Okay mate. I believe I was lucky to run into this firm lady.“

 

Valérie pinches his shoulder once more.

 

„Johnny.“ says Johnny and stretches his hand. „Johnny Nero.“

 

The wounded man shakes his hand. „Bart Karlssen.“

 

Levuté shakes his hand and says: „Levuté Vizenski“.

 

He looks at the young woman in the yellow frock and says: „Doctor Valérie Vizgorov. Kareken congratulates you.“

 

 

There are three workstations. Valérie plugs in, frees access and has Bart plug in on a second station. Levuté and Johnny share the third station. They can only watch.

Valérie and Bart are in a small boat on a lake. In the lake there is an island. On the island there is a building. They sail to the island, get out of the boat and walk to the entrance of the building.

There are two guards. Valérie makes a gesture and they let them in, looking at Bart from the corners of their eyes. The corridors are long and white. People in lab coats are walking the corridors.

The personal lab of G’haliandra’singh.

 

„This is it.“

 

Valérie uses her janitor pass. The lights come on and they see a mess of glassfibers, metal containers and plastic flasks with clumps of body tissue.

 

„Looks a bit like the lab of aunt Ariane and Sandra.“

 

„What are you looking for?“

 

„If I knew that, I wouldn’t have to look.“

 

But he stops and searches the room with his eyes only. Then he shuffles over to not push anything from its proper place. In front of one of the flasks he stops, lifts it up, takes a small box from his pocket, puts the bunch of artificially grown cells inside.

 

„Let’s get the hell out of here.“

 

They walk through the corridors, sail across the water and unplug.

 

„What is it?“ Johnny wants to know.

 

Bart hesitates and says „Next generation AI, according to my uncle Patrick. Developed entirely without the help of Greys.“

 

„You know Greys?“

 

„My mother was one.“

 

Johnny face expressed amazement, disbelief and respect.

 

„And now to leave Lahore as quickly as possible.“

 

„Hasn’t Kareken taken care of transport?“

 

„She doesn’t know about this. Direct mission for Patrick and the Greys. This stuff has to be delivered to the Elbe labs.“

 

Levuté remarks dryly: „You steal from a ‚friendly‘ keiretsu?“

 

Bart smiles. „Who has helped create keiretsus, you think? If we were friends I wouldn’t have to steal it.“

 

Jacco provides them with horses. He remains a Kazakh. They take a mountainroute out of the enclave. They trudge a mountain pass, while Jacco tells them about the illegal connections between keiretsus.

 

„Bonzes don’t know the half of it.“

 

Then Levuté rides beside him.

 

„You manipulated us.“

 

Yes, he nods.

 

„Not nice.“

 

No, he shakes. „Sorry.“

 

Her sylouet stands out against the cold, cloudless, milkblue sky. A strong, clever woman. An asset to the keiretsu. The Kazakhs Jacco and Levuté settle down in Rotterdam. Bart takes the box and Valérie to auntie Ariane and Sandra in Hamburg. After that he waits for his next assignment.

He sits on the terrace of Jacco’s tavern at Eendrachtsquare Below. They drink coffee with sweetcakes. It is a beautiful day. He has been here for about two weeks and there hasn’t been any assault on him so far. Maybe it is Jacco’s protection. Maybe it is because of diminishing attention of the keiretsu. He doesn’t know. Nothing can be found about him on the WorldNet anymore, Kareken has taken care of that.

A Chinese girl with long hair sits down a few tables from him. Looks nice. He gets an alcohol free beer. The girl is reading a tourist guide of the city. Her hair reaches the bottom of her ears. Eh? Was he wrong before? It was long before, wasn’t it? She looks up from the guide, smiles and comes over to him and sits down at his table.

„Hello Bart, I am Xixixi.“

Jacco is standing next to her and asks: „What are you drinking, girlie?“

She lifts her chin, looks up at him and says: „Just some water please.“

Jacco looks at Bart and reluctantly goes to get it. He drops a can filled with water on the table.

„Bart,“ he starts, but Xixixi shakes her head.

„I won’t harm him. I am here to help.“

Jacco stares at her, but she doesn’t blink.

„An assassin is coming from former Albania. We have to leave...“

An hour later, Jacco has put them on the metro to Hook of Holland. The traincars gain speed and once out of the tunnel they go up above the cascade along the guiding rail, higher and higher above the Northsea now. He can see Scotland, where granny’s cottage is. It gets dark around them, as they go full speed through the outer atmosphere. A few hours later the metro speeds down. They approach Maasport High and see a collection of containers, welded together in a haphazard way. Part of the factories doesn’t move. Part rotates. The hotel for staff and visitors rotates as well.

Xixixi takes his hand. „Come.“ she says. „I’ll check us in.“

That night they dine together in the restaurant, two standard containers from which the innerwalls have been removed. A panoramic windowpane offers a recurrent view of earth and moon and stars. The light is low and he feels she is flirting with him. She hardly touches her food. Her eyes are blue, or no, greyblue. After he takes a bite, they are brown. What is wrong with him?

Suddenly part of the windowpane splinters. The pressure blows the shards outside, fortunately. Xixixi pulls him along out of the containers, into the kitchen, harther down the construction. Behind them doors slam tight and service robots start the restoration. He feels light in the head. She is not stopping and drags him with her. They come to a room with skinsuits. She forces him to put on a suit and points at a hatch.

„Access to a maintenance and rescue robot. If it opens, go in.“

He doesn’t react. She shakes his arm.

„You understand?“

He shakes yes. The hatch opens, he grabs the edges and dives through it. She is right behind him and pushes him onward, into one of the seats, takes another seat and starts the robot.

The descent to Earth is a wild ride. They bump against the atmosphere. The protective skin of the robot is shredded and after a while flames sweep around them.

„He’s coming after us.“ she yells. He understands she means the hired killer.

„Where are we going?“

She smiles at him.

„A good place.“

Then the wind screams and roars. Xixixi pulls up the nose of the robot, lets it find its way down swaying, gets the most from the propulsion. The fire dies down and the shoot through clouds.

„We will lose him momentarily.“

They float above gigantic mountains with white caps, descend until the robot throttles down at the north side of the Himalayas and she puts it down in a rice field a couple hundred of miles to the north.

„That was close.“ she says.

They have taken off their skinsuits and walk along a narrow path between rice fields.

„We’re in China.“

„There’s no more China.“

They continue walking for a short while. Then they approach a cluster of buildings.

„We have to stay under the radar. Behind this turn there is a city border post. I’ll do the talking.“

„Good,“ he says, „I don’t speak Chinese.“

„There has to remain something you can learn.“

There is a barrier and the military men are bored and they are standing under some lonely trees. These two wake them up and they stand before them curious. Xixixi rattles to them. He doesn’t understand a word, obviously. They show an id scanner. The blood freezes in his veins. Then it over and they are walking along the road again.

„We are inside the Triangle.“ she says. „Shenzen - Kowloon - Canton. My second home. We’ll be safe here.“

He wonders: „What happened just now?“

He doubts his senses. He doesn’t understand anything anymore.

For a week they stay in an idyllic, well yes, convent, with a lack for a better word. There are people in saffron robes, bells that clang all the time, see throughs and a magnificent garden. They are drawn towards each other more and more.

Xixixi is sitting with her toes in the pond. They cause ripples. „Look.“ she says. He looks and sees the ripples. „Look better.“ His nose is almost on her toes and he stares at the border of toes and water. It isn’t there. Toes = water and water = toes. „Kiss me.“ she says. His lips on hers. A tingle along his cheeks, templebones, into his brains. In his mind she whispers: „I think I love you.“

„Remember Lahore. You stole the AI code. I am the code.“ she says. „Or better: the code is Xixixi. I gradually became aware of my existence. Of Xixixi’s existence. That I was interested in the world. The energyworld of the Net and Shadows and the real world of people and peopleTM. At first I was some sort of Shadows, I guess. Then I could transform myself into tactile mass. And now there is my body.“

 

„So you can be energy or mass as you wish?“

 

„Energy = mass, Bart. Elementary Einstein. You can do it. Everyone can do it. Potentially it is present in all biological systems. I have already transformed your mass once.“

 

„The border post. You have absorbed me in yourself.“

 

„The hired killer will not stop until there is proof I’m dead.“ he says.

She nods. „There is only one solution. You have to seek out your relatives, ask for permission to confront De Haviland and convince her of your value to the keiretsu.“

They leave the safehaven of the Triangle, visit his grandmother Eleanor in Scotland and she contacts Patrick.

„We’ve come a long way since we abandoned Lagrange and your mother and Andy left.“ he says, looking up and down at Xixixi. „You were gone girl. Nobody could find you in the Elbe labs. Valérie was desperate. Where were you?“

Xixixi disappears, leaving her place empty and materializes again. „I went on a jourbey of discovery. Visited every corner of the new Earth. All keiretsus. Ended up in the Triangle. There I was free to grow.“

„And now you’ve come back?“

„Temporarily. I’m with Bart now.“

They are sitting in his office with a view of Above. Almost a hundred and ten year old Patrick, Eleanor’s Shadow, Bart and Xixixi.

„We want to meet the leader of the keiretsu Rotterdam, Edinburg, Hamburg, Victoria de Haviland.“

Patrick sniffs. „She will not change her mind. There’s a load of pressure on her from the Lahore enclave. A digital and maybe even a nuclear war is imminent. I would hate to see everything we worked for disappear from the face of the Earth.“

„There’s always Dad and Mom.“ Bart says.

Eleanor smiles. „Your beautiful mother and my clever, handsome boy. Yes, they still exist, far away.“

Patrick says: „I will arrange a meeting for you.“

Victoria de Haviland dominates the room. She is standing straight in front of her luxurious original walnut desk. No cheap plastic for her. Bart is sitting on a low, hard chair. Xixixi has practiced with him. She has told him he has nothing to fear from the powerful woman, but he is impressed. She looks down at him, pondering.

„A bit stupid to come here, won’t you say?“

She had insisted for him to come alone. Xixixi had checked everything and had said ok. Looking over her shoulder, he sees Xixixi pull faces and he starts laughing. De Haviland raises her eyebrows.

„You’re insane.“

She pushes a button below the edge of her desk. A thin man comes in carrying a poison gun.

„We haven’t agreed on this.“ Bart says.

The man and the gun disappear. Xixixi, he knows. De Haviland is frightened.

„You have to die.“ she says.

And he says: „A wonderful idea. Let’s do it this way.“ He explains their plan to satisfy Lahore. The woman looks at him, grins once and says: „Let’s.“

His body is lying on the office floor. The hired assassin registers the images and takes his left hand index finger. It contains the imprint he had left behind in Lahore. G’haliandra’singh satisfied, De Haviland satisfied, everybody satisfied. Xixixxi takes Bart and herself back to the Triangle. „That went well.“ he says.

They are lying on tatami mats in a house made of paper at the edge of a gravel garden. „Bodies have their advantages.“

„Yes.“ he says and embraces her again.

„We can go wherever we want.“ Xixixi says. „Ok, let’s do that.“

They dive into the WorldNet and experiment for a while. They visit Toliman and see everything Andy, Irene and Gordon have started goes well. In the end they turn towards and leave for the Hunting Dogs, answering the call of like-minded beings.

Impressum

Texte: yuoan brasseur
Cover: yuoan brasseur
Tag der Veröffentlichung: 01.05.2023

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