The Golden Space (14 page)

Nola shrugged. “It depends. People on the moon accept some danger, and so do those on Mars, but the ones on Asgard and the Floating Bridge of Heaven and the Egg think it’s more dangerous here. They have jokes about it. They talk of earthquakes and storms and floods and wonder why all of us don’t live in space, in controlled environments with plenty of shielding.”

“I had the fear,” Yasmin said, staring past Nola. “With me, it started earlier than with most. At first, I simply made sure that I always wore a lifesuit and never went to isolated places. But soon I didn’t travel at all.” She paused to sip some wine. “Oh, I still saw some friends and went to parties, but that meant there were always a few strangers around. I began to wonder about them. Perhaps one of them was a fanatic, just waiting for a moment to strike.”

Nola turned a bit. Hilde, who must have heard the story before, was staring at her, as if waiting to see how Nola would react.

“I was living in Jeddah then,” Yasmin went on. “Once in a while, a rumor would start about unchanged people who lived in the desert, who had resumed the life of the Bedu. The story was that these people believed that by accepting immortality, we had upset the pattern of Allah. Instead of accepting God’s judgment on our lives, we had created Paradise here. The Prophet said, ‘Do not weep for your dead.’ These people went further, so it was told; they rejoiced in death. It was rumored that they sent assassins who would conceal themselves in our cities, mingling with us, choosing the people they would dispatch to the Throne of God.”

Nola kept her face still. “Often, at a party,” Yasmin continued, “someone would tell a gruesome story of bloodied bodies and severed heads, of a man with a scimitar murdering unprotected people.” Nola choked and pushed her plate away. “This kind of thing always seemed to be happening far away, or in a city by the Gulf, and whenever anyone tried to check on it, the story would fade, vanishing like a tent in a sandstorm. There were no computer records of such things, no reports, but the rumors, after a while, would circulate once more.”

Yasmin smiled. “I now think that the stories were simply a way for some to deal with our long lives. We could accept our endless existence while still believing that our judgment would come eventually. The stories weren’t lies. Those who told them believed them because they filled a purpose. Do you understand?”

“I think so,” Nola replied, wishing that she did not.

“I believed them. I stopped going to the homes of my friends. I would speak to them only over the holo, and invited only those I knew well to my home. Then I began to worry. What if a friend were really a disguised assassin only waiting for the right moment? What if someone I knew had changed? Soon I was not seeing my friends. I grew afraid even to speak to them on the holo, as if they could step from the screen and crush me. It was as though some ancestral trait had been reawakened, as if I had become one of those veiled women whose worlds were bounded by the walls of their homes, but, unlike those women, I did not even have the consolations of gossip with friends, a family, or an occasional trip to the
souk
to buy a bauble.”

Nola lifted her wine slowly and sipped. Yasmin lowered her eyelids. “Perhaps I would still be in Jeddah if a friend had not left me a message. ‘Follow me,’ she said, ‘speak to Giancarlo Lawrence.’ I listened to Giancarlo over the holo, but it took all the courage I had to leave my home and come here. By then I was almost ready for death, just to be rid of the fear. It was such a paradox, wanting to die so the fear would leave me, while having that overwhelming fear of death itself. Giancarlo gave me back my life.” She stretched out her arms. “I went through the little death, and my fear was gone.”

Nola leaned forward. “The little death?”

“It’s only a name. You should talk to Giancarlo, Nola. I’m not good at explaining it, I’m afraid.”

Hilde began to speak of her vegetable garden, losing Nola’s attention. She knew all she had to know about this settlement. Giancarlo Lawrence was obviously some crank who had cooked up a theory and talked others into believing it. There were many such theorists; even Luna had a few, though their notions usually did not survive in that barren place and they often left for more fertile soil.

Lawrence was probably one of the harmless ones. Those who wanted a sense of community would sometimes cluster around a charismatic figure. There was lots of time to try on new ideas and see which ones fit. The fact of long life and the possibility of learning as much as one could did not seem to hold the emotional power of a closed system that seemed certain and final.

The world had wanted immortality, and that had been bestowed. What greater gift could there be? Now the biologists made only toys; she thought of Lise Trang’s android elf.

Nola gazed at the darkened window, thinking of Luna’s night and the unchanging rocky landscape of a dead world. She rarely thought of it as dead; it was eternal, a fitting home for people who were deathless. On Earth, nature’s cycle still continued; death still called.

II

The tower drew Nola. She stood at the fork in the road, then turned right. Maple trees lined the road. A breeze stirred the limbs and she felt droplets of water on her face and arms. The road was muddy; dirt clung to her boots.

She reached the tower’s shadow and looked up. At the top of the turret, under the roof, she saw openings, and she thought of archers. It was a watchtower, a place for sentries and guards.

She approached the heavy wooden door, leaned against it, then pushed it with her hands.

“It isn’t locked.”

Nola turned. A slim figure covered by a cape was coming around the side of the turret; a solemn face, framed by a blue hood, watched her. The stranger seemed very young; only a young person would seem so serious, since frivolity was a characteristic of the old.

“I wasn’t going to go inside,” Nola said.

“You can if you like.”

She stepped back. “Maybe I’d better not.”

“I haven’t been inside either.” The stranger’s voice was a high-pitched tenor. “I haven’t been here very long. My name’s Teno.”

“I’m Nola Reann.”

“We don’t see many people from space.”

She felt herself slouching, as if to minimize her height. “You can imagine why. Even with the wire web, it’s difficult. Your body feels heavy and fragile at the same time. The weather is disorienting. And walking around like this on the surface—well, I can never shake the feeling that it’s dangerous, that I’m unprotected.”

“I think I know what you mean,” Teno said. “I lived on Asgard for a while. When I came back to Earth, it seemed inside out, because I was used to looking up and seeing the clouds and, beyond them, the other side of the world. It took a while to get over that.”

Nola turned back toward the door, and when she looked around, Teno was gone. She saw a flash of blue among the trees. She backed away from the turret; the air seemed chillier in its shadow.

She went back down the road, retracing her steps until she stood before a square gray house faced with flat stones. A man in a robe of red silk sat on the patio sipping tea. He waved, motioning for her to join him. She went up to the patio, sat down in a wicker chair, and he handed her a cup.

“I am Jiro Ikiru,” he said.

“Nola Reann.”

He gazed at her sticklike arms. “I’d guess you’re from the moon. You’re too lean for Mars.”

She nodded.

“I thought I saw another hovercraft near Yasmin Hallal’s,” he went on, being courteously indirect.

“It’s mine.” Nola sipped her tea. “I just met her yesterday, but she asked me to be her guest.”

“Now that it’s summer, more people will return. Many don’t care to brave the rigors of winter. I’m sure you’ll enjoy meeting them.”

“I knew Mikhail Vilny before,” she said. “I met a woman named Hilde last night, and someone called Teno a few minutes ago, by the turret.”

Jiro was silent as he passed her a plate of tiny pastries. Then he leaned back in his chair. “Some people feel a little uncomfortable around Teno.”

“Why?”

“There was a project a few decades back. A biologist produced people who were physically stronger and presumably more rational than we. These beings don’t have certain hormonal reactions, don’t feel our emotions. They’re hermaphroditic as well. Teno is one of them.”

“Now I remember,” Nola said. “I went to the place where their parents were bringing them up. I had an argument with two people there. I told them that they were trying to change human nature before they fully understood what we were. We’re adaptable, we have minds, we have all the time we need to learn.”

“You thought the project was premature?”

“I thought it was wrong.” The emotional force of her objections surprised her once again. The creatures looked like human beings; that seemed the worst travesty of all.

“When Teno came here,” Jiro said, “it upset some people. Even Giancarlo was worried.” He paused. “You see, what we have here is based on faith—our lives are the result of certain convictions which are perhaps hard for anyone to accept who hasn’t spoken to Giancarlo or heard of the higher state. I don’t know if Teno can feel this faith or grasp it. But Giancarlo realized it’s not his place to decide these matters or to bar anyone from the truth. So Teno remains.”

Nola stirred restlessly. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Jiro smiled, obviously anxious to explain. “You really should talk to Giancarlo, but I can tell you a bit. The higher state is simply the life after this one. All of us here have seen it —we’ve stepped outside these bodies and experienced it.”

Nola stared at him. His light brown face glowed; he seemed convinced of what he had said. “And how have you seen this higher state?”

“By dying.” She started, and gripped the arms of her chair. “Oh, it’s not what you think. We’re monitored the whole time. We’re put under, suspended, and gradually our life functions are stopped. This lasts only a few moments, but in those moments, we see the next life; we are held by eternity. Then we’re revived. It takes only a few seconds or so—of our time here, of course—and I haven’t yet seen anyone who hasn’t come away changed.”

Nola watched him cautiously. “Forgive me for saying this, but it sounds mad, and dangerous as well.”

“It isn’t, believe me. We use the same equipment rescue teams use. Giancarlo knows medicine and was part of a rescue team. That was how he made his discovery. He spends some time teaching us rescue techniques.” Jiro peered at her with his small dark eyes. “It may seem strange to you. But look around. Has it harmed us? Have you met anyone who isn’t at peace?”

“I’ve met almost no one here,” she said drily. “And it isn’t that simple. There are people who get along; they aren’t all unhappy.”

“Of course. But many pursue enjoyment for its own sake. That can’t remain satisfying. Many only seek sensations, with no concern for others.”

“Are you that different?” she asked. “You’re here, hiding away from the world.”

“We’re preparing ourselves,” he replied. “We leave when we’re ready. Most of us will probably join rescue teams. We don’t plan to stay here forever. Nothing is forever in this world.” He smiled at his little joke.

Nola did not smile back. Metaphysical discussions made her uncomfortable and irritable. Assumptions were advanced which could neither be proven false nor demonstrated in the world, and those who had swallowed them wore looks of complacency and pitied those who failed to understand or agree. She thought of her own beliefs, her feeling that the biologists were wrong to tamper with the human form and mind. It isn’t the same, she told herself. Their experiments would fail and they would find out they had been wrong not to allow humankind to evolve in its own way. Tampering with biology could narrow the range of possibilities; granting immortality had not been tampering, only opening each life to more possibilities.

Nola’s chain of reasoning stopped there. Did she believe that in fact there was some purpose, some end toward which all life moved? Was there a metaphysical assumption buried somewhere in her thinking? She shook off the feeling. That was the trouble with this sort of pondering; it led one to doubt common sense.

“You seem unconvinced,” Jiro said softly. “But argument won’t convince you of what Giancarlo teaches, and it’s not the evidence by itself that matters. It won’t convince anyone trapped in doubt.”

“I don’t think of doubt as a trap. I think of it as a useful procedure.”

“I suppose it is, up to a point. We’ve all doubted. It’s necessary at first.”

Nola rose. “Thank you for the tea. I must go.”

Jiro stood up and bowed. “We must talk again.”

Nola had still not met Giancarlo Lawrence, but she had seen his house, a large log cabin down the left side of the forked road. At first she had been surprised by the simple structure, then annoyed; it seemed so blatant, this simple home for the simple man of faith.

She had thought of searching the computer for information on the man, or for his visual image. Her implant could have helped her in the search, but she did not rely on it as much here. Somehow, in this setting, during the long, unscheduled days, the device seemed intrusive, something that interfered with her senses instead of aiding them. She would try to approach this Giancarlo Lawrence without preconceptions and see him as he was.