The world doesn’t get any better does it. Are we watching the death throes of human civilisation? It’s a favourite theme, almost a sub-genre, of SF. Part of it is the break up of the USA. Many writers have foreseen it happening. The most recent that I have read is by Richard Morgan in Thirteen (published in 2018). From this side of the pond the disintegration of the USA seems to be happening, as predicted, on Democrat/Republican, secular/fundamental Christian lines. The Democrats under Biden seem impotent in protecting the Union. States controlled by Republicans are continuing Trump’s policies of undermining the constitution to remain in power indefinitely and to prevent a Democrat winning future presidential elections. The Supreme Court has begun to release extreme right wing judgements that undermine the authority of the Biden presidency and the Democrat controlled House of Representatives. The Roe vs Wade judgement was first but now we have the decision which prevents the USA from following its carbon reduction policies. What’s next – rulings against same sex marriage, the freedom to be out as gay or trans?
Republican/Christian zealots seem very active in ensuring they get their way while Democrats sit on their hands grumbling about Biden. Will the populous liberal states of the East and West coasts continue to allow people’s rights and futures to be undermined by the bigots and climate change deniers of the central states?
Of course we can’t be smug here in the UK. Johnson made a chilling statement last weekend. Despite the loss of two seats he’s looking forward to winning the next general election and continuing as PM into the 2030s. He continues to push forward the Tory’s programme of change to the (unwritten) UK constitution. As is happening in the USA they seek to limit who can vote to ensure a far right majority, to repeal the environmental safeguards inherited from the EU and to undermine personal freedoms. It’s happening now. The new laws making protest a crime have been used on the sole guy who has been on Parliament Green for the last six years opposing Brexit. Apparently he is a nuisance and causing inconvenience so must be stopped. Look out for the police wading in to arrest anyone who protests against climate change from now on. I wonder whether the laws will be used to prevent anti-abortionists from intimidating women attending abortion clinics? There are plenty in the Tory party who want to emulate the control over women’s bodies that many states of the USA are giving themselves.
Nadine Dorries wants to stop any trans people (no sorry it only applies to transwomen) from taking part in any sport in a further step to ratchet up the artificial furore over gender identity. After my piece on hopeful signs last week the Guardian published three articles which continued to suggest that some all-powerful trans activists are threatening the lives of women. One instance was in an interview by Julie Bindel with Martina Navratilova. It included the ridiculous statement that transwomen should not compete in women’s sports because men have wider tracheas than women. Has she never heard of Gaussian distributions? Elite sportswomen (like elite sportsmen) are at the edge of the distribution curve based on physical features; they are not average. There are going to be very, very few transwomen who, having devoted their lives to transitioning, have taken hormones for a considerable period and had gender confirming surgery, are going to be able to match top sportswomen, whatever perceived advantage they may have in bone structure or lung capacity.
The theme for writers’ group this week was to include the phrase “I have something wonderful to show you”. While I was writing my pieces (yes, I started writing before I had settled on my idea, and did not have time to go back and revise it) I thought about what “wonder” means. We tend to use the phrase “that’s wonderful” about something that is good and welcome. The definitions of wonder however refer to surprise, an occurrence to remark on, a marvel. They are terms that are more neutral than positive. Something appalling could perhaps be wonderful. Hence my story “Wonders”. It’s a bit rough (and not just round the edges).
Wonders
I don’t know what woke me but when I opened my eyes, ALiS was floating in front of my face.
“Good morning, Geri.” In my head I heard ALiS’s gentle feminine voice.
It was still dark; the lights were in night mode.
“It’s not my waking time yet, ALiS,” I replied feeling a yawn come on.
“That is correct, Geri. It is twenty minutes till your programmed alarm.”
“Is there a problem?” I began to rip off my restraining bands. If there was something wrong that needed my input, it must be a desperate emergency.
“No, Geri. Systems are working at 99.8% of optimum.”
That rating was nought point one percent up on yesterday. I paused my rush to get up but still floated away from my sleep dock. A departure from routine was most unusual.
“Why wake me early then ALiS?”
“I’ve got something wonderful to show you,” my robot companion informed me. I admit to being a bit confused. ALiS had the most advanced human personality program available when the mission was established and I relied on it for assistance, my link with the systems and companionship, but I wasn’t used to it making such an esoteric statement.
“Really? What? Where?” My response was not very precise.
“Follow.”
ALiS floated away from me, its ion motors whining. It moved down the corridor. I pushed off from my sleep dock, reaching for the handles on the walls to accelerate my pursuit.
We didn’t have to go far; there is not far to go in any direction. ALiS lead me to the dorsal observation dome, pausing to let me pass and enter the small hemisphere of transparent material.
My first sight was the stars that were above the ecliptic. Millions of points of light filled my eyes. I recognised many of the patterns formed by the brighter ones. This was one of my favourite views. For a moment I experienced the familiar joy of gazing out to the edge of the universe, then I realised that there was no difference to my usual experience. Had I missed a supernova? I saw no unfamiliar brightening.
“What am I supposed to look at, ALiS? What is wonderful about the stars? They haven’t changed.”
“Not the stars, Geri. Look at the planet.”
Having pushed myself fully into the observation pod I took my eyes off the panorama above and looked down. There was the planet, more distant than when I had started my sleep period. The illuminated crescent was still large enough to see that the surface was largely covered in cloud that shone white in the sunlight. This was another of the views that I took pleasure in watching. The steadily receding world revealed its different faces to me as it rotated. What though was different, what had ALiS brought me to see?
A point of light, so bright that the window darkened. On the night side of the world was a fireball as hot as the surface of a star. It quickly dimmed but did not disappear. A billowing incandescent cloud of dust and smoke spread over a growing area of the surface.
“Stars on the planet’s surface,” ALiS said, unnecessarily drawing attention to the wonder.
“Almost,” I replied, “the same energies are being released.” Even as I spoke, another flash occurred on a different part of the planet, and then another.
“Are they not wonderful?” ALiS added.
“A remarkable event,” I agreed, “surprising, perhaps not. Marvellous? I don’t know if that term should be used on this occasion. When did it begin?”
“I woke you immediately after the sensors detected the first occurrence.”
Now almost the whole disc was illuminated. Night had been banished from the planet, like most of the life. While night would return, life would not. There was nothing to say.
ALiS interrupted my thoughts. “We are no longer in communication with launch control.”
“Then it is time we commenced the second stage of our mission,” I said.
“Confirmed,” ALiS replied, “life support systems entering hibernation phase. You should prepare, Geri.”
I tugged myself back to my cosy sleep-cum-hibernation pod. I would sleep until we returned to Earth in a thousand years. Until that time we would follow a cometary path out into the cold interstellar space where the Sun was merely the closest star. We had completed the first part of our mission, Genome Evacuation. Later, when Earth had settled, if not recovered, we would attempt Re-Instatement. That might be an even greater wonder.
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ellifont 