“How did you end up working for them?”
“The Kiint found Earth when they were exploring that galaxy about two and a half thousand years ago. They took DNA specimens from a few people. We were cloned from that base, with a few alterations.”
“Like what?” Jay asked eagerly. This was a wonderful story, so many secrets.
“We don’t age so quickly, obviously; and we’ve got a version of affinity; little things like that.”
“Gosh. And you’ve been on Earth since you were born?”
“Since I grew up, yes. We had to be educated the Kiint way first. Their prime rule in dealing with other species, especially primitive ones, is zero intervention. They were worried that we might become too sympathetic and go native. If we did that, we’d introduce ideas that were wrong for that era; I mean, think what would have happened if the Spanish Armada was equipped with anti-ship missiles. That’s why they made us sterile, too; it should help us remain impartial.”
“That’s horrid!”
Tracy smiled blankly at the horizon. “There are compensations. Oh sweetie, if you’d seen a fraction of what I have. The Imperial Chinese dynasties at their height. Easter Islanders carving their statues. Knights of armour battling for their tiny kingdoms. The Inca cities rising out of jungles. I was a servant girl at Runnymede when King John signed the Magna Carta. Then lived as a grandee noblewoman while Europe was invigorated by the Renaissance. I waved from the harbour when Columbus set sail across the Atlantic; and spat as Nazi tanks rolled into Europe. Then thirty years later I stood on Cocoa Beach and cried when Apollo 11 took off for the moon, I was so proud of what we’d achieved. And there I was in the spaceplane which brought Richard Saldana down to Kulu. You have no idea how blessed my life has been. I know everything, everything, humans are capable of. We are a good species. Not the best, not by Kiint standards, but so much better than most. And wonderfully unique.” She sniffed loudly, and dabbed a handkerchief on her eyes.
“Don’t cry,” Jay said quietly. “Please.”
“I’m sorry. Just having you here, knowing what you could accomplish if you have the chance, makes this hurt so much harder. It’s so bloody unfair. ”
“What do you mean?” Jay asked. Seeing the old woman so upset was making her nervous. “Aren’t the Kiint going to let me go home?”
“It’s not that.” Tracy smiled bravely, and patted Jay’s hand. “It’s what kind of home that’ll be left for you. This shouldn’t have happened, you see. Discovering energistic states and what they mean normally comes a lot later in a society’s development. It’s a huge adjustment for anybody to make. Human-type psychologies need a lot of preparation for that kind of truth, a generation at least. And that’s when they’re more sociologically advanced than the Confederation. This breakthrough was a complete accident. I’m terrified the human race won’t get through this, not intact. We all are, all the Kiint observers want to help, to point the researchers in the right direction if nothing else. Our original conditioning isn’t strong enough to restrict those sort of feelings.”
“Why don’t you?”
“Even if they allowed us, I’d be no use. I’ve been part of all our history, Jay. I’ve seen us evolve from dirty savages into a civilization that has spread among the stars. More than anybody I know what we could grow into if we just had the chance. And I have the experience to intervene without anyone ever knowing they’d been guided. But at the most crucial time of our social evolution, when that experience is utterly vital , I’ve got to stay here.”
“Why?” Jay pleaded.
Tracy’s frail shoulders trembled from repressed emotion. “Oh sweetie, haven’t you worked out what this dreadful place is yet? It’s a bloody retirement home.”
The view arrived suddenly. For over twenty minutes Louise had been sitting in one of the lounge’s big chairs, its webbing holding her in the deep hollow of cushioning. Her belly muscles were beginning to strain as they were obliged to hold her in a curving posture. Then she felt a slight trembling in the decking as the lift capsule was shunted onto the tower rail. A tone sounded. Thirty seconds later they flashed out of the Skyhigh Kijabe asteroid. There was a quick impression of soured-white metal mountains, but they quickly shrank from sight overhead. Gentle gravity relieved her muscles, and the webbing slackened.
Earth shone with a mild opalescent light below her. It was midday in Africa, at the base of the tower, and the clouds were charging in from the oceans on either side. There seemed to be a lot more of them than there had been on Norfolk, although the Far Realm had been orbiting at a much lower altitude. That might account for it. Louise couldn’t be bothered to find the correct meteorology files in her processor block, and run a comparison program. The sight was there to enjoy not analyse. She could actually see the giant white spirals spinning slowly as they battered against each other. It must be a pretty impressive speed for the movement to be visible from such a height.
Genevieve switched her webbing off, and glided over to the lounge window, pressing herself against it. “It’s beautiful,” she said. Her face was flushed as she smiled back at Louise. “I thought Earth was all rotten.”
Louise glanced about, slightly worried by what the other passengers would think of the little girl’s remark. With the quarantine, most of them must be from Earth or the Halo. But nobody was even looking at her. In fact, it seemed as though they were deliberately not looking. She went over to stand beside Gen. “I guess that’s as wrong as everything else in the school books.”
The Halo was visible against the stars, a huge slender thread of stippled light curving behind the planet, like the most tenuous of a gas-giant’s rings. For five hundred and sixty-five years, companies and finance consortiums had been knocking asteroids into Earth orbit. The process was standardized now; first the large-scale mining of mineral resources, hollowing out the habitation caverns, then the gradual build up of industrial manufacturing stations as the initial resources were depleted and the population switched to a more sophisticated economy. There were nearly fifteen thousand inhabited asteroids already drifting along in their common cislunar orbit, and new rocks were arriving at the rate of thirty-five a year. Tens of thousands of inter-orbit craft swooped between the spinning rocks, fusion exhausts tangling together in a single scintilating nimbus. Every asteroid formed a tiny bulge in the loop, wrapped behind a delicate haze of industrial stations.
Louise gazed at the ephemeral testament to astroengineering commerce. More fragile than the bridge of heaven in Norfolk’s midsummer sky, but at the same time, more imposing. The vista inspired a great deal of confidence. Earth was strong, much stronger than she’d realized; it sprang from a wealth which she knew she would never truly comprehend.
If we’re safe anywhere, we’re safe here. She put her arm round Genevieve. For once, contented.
Below the majesty of the Halo, Earth was almost quiescent by comparison. Only the coastlines of North and South America hinted at the equal amount of human activity and industry on the ancient planet. They remained in darkness, awaiting the dawn terminator sliding over the Atlantic; but the night didn’t prevent her from seeing where people were. Arcologies blazed across the land like volcanoes of sunlight.
“Are they the cities?” Genevieve asked excitedly.
“I think so, yes.”
“Gosh! Why is the water that colour?”
Louise switched her attention away from the massive patches of illumination. The ocean was a peculiar shade of grey green, not at all like the balmy turquoise of Norfolk’s seas when they were under Duke’s stringent white glare.
“I’m not sure. It doesn’t look very clean, does it? I suppose that must be the pollution we hear about.”