He Without Sin (34 page)

Out of curiosity, I checked more mission histories,
this time not for details but for frequency of
visitation. It looks like our promise to return to this
planet may take a lot longer than we guessed
down below. It will be a minimum of five thousand
of this planet’s years before a return, and probably
much longer.

It’s time to wind down and begin to think of home. What will it be like? What has happened?

Carol and I have talked of the future. What’s next? Another mission? A different career? It would be a
dream to fulfill our fantasy of retiring someday to a
property with some space, some natural feature or
beauty, maybe a waterfront home. I am afraid we
were spoiled by the beautiful areas we were able to
visit and enjoy together on the lush, largely
uninhabited planet below. It doesn’t seem, no
matter how I figure it, that it will ever be possible
for that dream to come true.

Final note before we catch a wave: We have left
orbit; the double L system is engaged and working. I’ve already seen the doc and am groggy. It’s time to save my work and check out for the bulk of the
journey home.

Getting Up to Speed

I will never get used to that. I will say I was expecting the weird sensations and this time, while they are indescribable, I can at least now assume they are normal for this mode of travel. Be careful, set timer, relax.

I remember talking to my dad when I was very young. It was a quiet time and we were alone. We weren’t doing anything but sitting; he may have been reading, I’m not sure. But I was sitting beside him looking at his face the way young kids do. In an adult, this sort of staring or close inspection would be considered rude behavior, but as a child it was just ‘looking’ with no other motive than to see.

“Dad, you have a black spot. There. On your cheek.”

“Yes. I do.”

“Where did it come from?”

He looked at me and thought for a minute.

“I got it long ago, when I was just a little older than you,”

he said. “I used to work on a train, you know, like the ones downtown? But this was an old, old train and it needed fire to run.”

“Fire?”

“Yep. Fire to make it go. I used to shovel coal into the fire to make it burn hot.”

“Coal?”

“Coal is a black rock that burns. I will show you sometime.” He takes a moment to touch the black spot with his finger and says, “Anyway, one day, as I was shoveling coal into the firebox of the engine, a little red spark from the fire flew out and blew back and hit me right in the face. Right here. And since then, there’s been a little black spot.”

As kids do, I accepted this explanation without question. Near as I can recall that was the end of our talk, although I did think about what he said for quite some time. I still think about it. Since then the image I have of the spark as it flies off of the blazing fire, glowing and swirling through the air, inevitably making its erratic way to my dad’s cheek, has remained vivid.

As I matured, historical fact began to clash with the story. Coal-fired engines were a thing of the past—the distant past. How can this be? In the way that happens with children and parents, I both believed the story and doubted it at the same time, trying my best to reconcile the discrepancy.

As an adult, I have convinced myself that Dad was telling a story, an interesting and harmless entertainment for his son, perhaps invented off the cuff. I also choose to carry the image of a brave and strong engineer faithfully stoking a fire in the face of certain danger. And I always will.

It won’t be long now before we are back. I find myself thinking of family more and more. Carol and I will have our separate personal things to take care of and then sometime later will get together to discuss the future. I wonder if she’s game for another mission, or if this is it. I could go either way.

______

“Remember, we’ve been gone a long time. Things have changed. It’s going to be a shock,” David announces at one of our wrap-up meetings. “Many if not most of your family members have opted into the LP but let me tell you that life goes on. I know from personal experience that nothing is perfect.”

“LP? You mean LMP, longevity medical, yes?”

David nods. “It means long life but it doesn’t mean infinite life. You will see clear signs of aging in those you left behind, assuming…” David looks around, seemingly to make sure everyone is paying attention, then continues, “… assuming the best case scenario.”

Resuming, he adds, “I am required to tell you that you…me, all of us, will be attending mandatory debriefing. It’s then that you will be brought up to speed on the news of the world such as changes in government, laws, and the like. As stable as we have been over time, as a society, you simply have to believe me that there will be surprises.

Changes at the Academy—I presume you know that the staff there, unless they have a family member on a long term mission, are not part of program—are to be expected. And we may safely assume that there have been one or more disasters, natural or otherwise.”

David checks his genie and during this pause there arises a murmur amongst the crew, I guess about the expected changes David mentioned.

“David, what about Dylan?”

Dr. Gleshert doesn’t wait to be acknowledged, and answers right away, “I am keeping him under and he will transfer to a proper medical facility as soon as possible. There is no other news. He’s stable but I cannot make any other statement at this time.”

“Back to homecoming.” Quiet prevails again. “There is a second debriefing. This one will be private with your families or descendants, depending on your individual case. It’s during this portion you will learn their fate, good or bad. I am required, also, to tell you that things happen. Sometimes people choose to opt out of longevity before you return, for whatever reason—this happens more than you might think. Sometimes accidents happen to the healthiest people, due to bad luck. Look at what happened to Wesley. What I’m saying is, be prepared, as best you can, for this second debriefing. There is bound to be an emotional shock, hopefully pleasant, but possibly not. Jason, are we set?” David says, and looks for me at the table. I nod.

“Ok. We are now close enough to home and in communication range, so why aren’t we all overloaded with incoming calls and messages from home? It’s blocked. All communication for now is routed through the ship’s equipment and any incoming not critical to mission completion is blocked. And will be until debriefing. The reason is obvious, I think. The stack of incoming would literally overload each of our devices. Even if the device could handle it, we would each be overwhelmed catching up with messages from the years we have been gone. And by the way, you will be given suggestions on how to deal with this problem once we are back on the ground. On a personal note I can tell you this from experience: Do not start looking at the oldest messages first. If you think about it for a moment, you will understand why.”

______

One nice thing about having access to communications passwords is that I can get my messages if I want to. He is right, there must be literally millions. I’m not going to attempt to go through them all, but for the text and other typed messages I am using filters to sort, and then keywords to bulk delete the ones that I know I don’t want.

I have been long curious about my brother Tom and, strangely, filtering produces only a very few about him, and they are old. Real old. One is from that Jeff Sanders guy, copying Tom, and blasting Brachus for misleading him about trying to help with his career. He said that not only did he, Jeff, not hear from the people Brachus said he would set him up with, when Jeff talked to the people themselves, they said Brachus never contacted them at all.

Worse, he said that when he checked the receipts on the several messages he sent to Wes—this was back before we got out of communication range—they all showed they were read within an instant of each other. He knows, he says, at least from the Ming message-handling protocol, that this is a pretty good sign that they were never read: They were instead most likely group-deleted to the trash. At least, that’s how their system worked at Ming: It would send a receipt at opening
or
at deletion.

The most recent message from Tom is ominous. It is short and says, ‘J Am erasing last line. No limit now! Goodbye T’ and nothing else. I don’t see any other messages from him. I decline to search anymore and will wait for debriefing.

It’s hard to believe after all this time and all that’s
happened, but I am back on home planet ground as
I write this! Debrief is over—the first half of the
first part at least. There is no way to absorb all this. The world I knew is now chronicled in history
archives and while there is, as David said, a great
deal of continuity, the names have all changed,
even some of the language.

For the next part we have been given time to meet
and talk together as a group while having access to
media. This is and has been an enjoyable session; a
time where we can all share the surprises and
changes. One more day and we break up the
mission crew and meet privately for the second
part—the family reunions.

David said his goodbyes first. He was professional
about it. I have to wonder if he will consider this
mission his last. I don’t think his experimentation
results were what he was hoping for, but on the
other hand it would be a big commitment for him
to take on another mission.

Mark and Grigor are going to get together before
the families come. They have asked me to join
them. They say that others from the crew will be
there but I decline. I need to talk to Carol about
what she is going to do in the near future, once we
are cleared to leave. Other than that I am in the
mood to be alone.

So far we’ve had no update on Dylan. And I’ve
heard no fallout from his ‘accident’ or Brachus’ sad
end.

Home Again

Parents, if any, come in first.

I thought I was prepared for the unavoidable effects of aging, but even so I have to work to avoid displaying my shock at her appearance as she comes in. The lines on her face have multiplied and deepened. Her hair is all gray, almost white. It’s my mother all right—if I look at the eyes, there is no doubt—but numerous changes have ganged up as if to try to hide the rest of her from immediate recognition.

“Mom. How are you? Where’s Dad?”

“Oh Jay, it’s been so long! Look at you!” She looks first, holding me at arm’s length, then hugs. When did my mother get so short? Her voice is soft and small, not how I remember it at all! I notice too that her hug is weak, not like the smothering hugs from before. “They warned me you would be different. But how different! You have turned out well, Jay, and so handsome!”

We must’ve both heard the same warning speech. How you never notice changes in people when you see them often although they are changing little by little all the time. But after a long separation, the cumulative effect of the small changes can be startling. The eyes, the smell, these have remained the same.

“How are you?” she asks, holding me again at arm’s length and giving a little shake.

“I’m great. I’m good. It’s good to be home. Mom, how’s Dad? Where is he?”

“Jay…” she starts. But I can see without hearing any more that he’s not coming. “Jason. Your father is no longer with us.”

“Mom, why? What happened?”

“It’s too much to tell right now. We will wait and talk about it,” she says with determination. I see her eyes glisten, but no tears. “It was a long time ago. He did not want to continue the treatments.”

“Didn’t want…”

“He saw all his friends pass, oh, and not to mention Tom…” She put her hand to her mouth and stopped in mid-sentence as if she had not meant to say anything about Tom.

“Mom! Not Tom too?” I say, not really asking for a response. She hangs her head, but manages to nod.

“I… I just got a strange message from him,” I say. Mom looks up, not understanding. “I mean I just picked up an old message that he left a long time ago. I didn’t understand it. He said ‘goodbye’ in it.”

“A… a voice message?” she asks, with some difficulty.

“No, no, not voice.”

“Oh, Jay, I would have liked to hear his voice again.” She wipes her eyes. “But I am forgetting. There is someone else here for you to see.” She totters, rather unsteadily to my eyes, with short little steps to the door and signals for someone to enter.

I don’t get it at first. This big strapping young man looks familiar, but…

“Come on, don’t tell me…” this man says, in a voice and tone I do recognize from somewhere.

“Jared? Oh, you’ve got to be kidding! But how? How…how are you… I mean how did…”

“How how how… Ha! I am fine, how are you!” He says, laughing at my confusion.

As we shake hands and hug I start again, “How…”

“I can fill you in when we get home. You are staying with us, yes?” He gives me a questioning look but does not wait for my response. “I wish I could say there were more people here to greet you, but instead you are stuck with us.” I gather the few personal items that I have and begin to walk to the door with them. “You do remember I tried to join the Academy when you did?”

“Yes, but you were too young or…?”

“Ah, but I made it the next try. Man, I’ve got more missions under my belt than you! One was short and local, but the long one—Jay, look at me! They put me on the LMP!”