Lovelock Read online

  Two hundred years ago Britain was still trying to wipe out the African slave trade, Spain had just lost her American colonies, and Russia and the Ottoman Empire were still maneuvering for control of the Black Sea. Ships were still made of wood, steam was the hot new technology, and no one in the world had yet heard the triumphant sound of a toilet flushing. What would Earth be like two hundred years from now?

  Maybe they would have found a way to give speech to people like me. Maybe, in the name of progress, the world would be filled with mentally-enhanced capuchins, baboons, possums, pigs, and dogs, all eagerly and obediently doing everything their creators demanded of them. All the work of the world being done by brilliant little beasts; all the information creatively stored in our oversized genetically-engineered brains.

  Two more centuries, and humanity would finally have got what they coveted all along: slavery without shame. No, they were enhancing the lives of their little beasty servants.

  But I’m getting ahead of myself. My thoughts didn’t go that far at the time. I was naive; my real education was still before me. All I noticed as we boarded the Grissom-bound shuttle was the way the other people looked at us. Rich tourists and serious travelers alike, they sized us up immediately: a family with two small children, a couple of old people, and a monkey. None were particularly happy to see us. I knew what they were thinking: The children will cry, the old people will jabber and whine, and the monkey will probably pee on somebody.

  How right they were.

  We started out well enough. Lydia was sitting with Red—to my relief. The child was so odious to me that I even preferred sitting next to Emmy and watching the inevitable diaper changes. Human feces, especially baby ones mashed into a diaper, are so repulsive. There’s nothing you can do with them, they stick to everything they touch, and they stink. Besides, at three years, the child should have been toilet-trained long before. I suspect her “accidents” were only attention-getting devices, oft repeated because they were so successful. But despite the attendant odors, at least Emmy had her pleasant moments; Lydia was a spoiled, petulant creature whose every breath was more offensive than a thousand of Emmy’s diapers.

  With Red and Lydia sharing one another’s company, Mamie and Stef were left to sit by themselves. Pink was nowhere to be seen—she had been sedated through her little piggy snout and placed in the cargo hold, which was where she belonged. Red had tried to trot her up the gangplank like a regular passenger, but the shuttle crew banished her to the hold like a pet. I knew Red resented the fact that Carol Jeanne got to keep her witness and he didn’t. But then, Red was no Carol Jeanne. And Pink was no me.

  Carol Jeanne and I had flown on suborbitals—subbos—a dozen times before, and I had the routine down pat. There was always a little bit of fuss at the gate, as they examined her letter from the ISA authorizing her to bring her witness inside the cabin; they were always impressed that somebody (never us) was paying full fare for my seat. Then I’d coast into the cruiser on Carol Jeanne’s shoulder, hop down when we got to our seat, and put myself in place on my seat. The attendant would bustle up, inspect my harness, and then attach it to the human-size lap-belt. They always made sure that the fasteners were all where I couldn’t reach them—as if it wouldn’t be enough just to tell me to keep them fastened.

  This time was no different, except that instead of it being only me and Carol Jeanne on the two-seat row, Emmy’s presence forced us to sit on the three-seat side. Emmy had the aisle seat and Carol Jeanne was between us. There was no window on the wall next to me—there was so much white heat on reentry that giving the passengers a view would cause panic on every flight.

  My harness held me tight enough against the seat that I couldn’t reach the in-flight magazine. Carol Jeanne remembered, though, and handed it to me. An attendant noticed it.

  “He’s acting just as if he were reading,” he said, delighted at my antics.

  “He is reading,” Carol Jeanne said.

  “But he turns the pages so fast.”

  “He reads about two thousand words a minute,” she answered.

  I looked up at him and grinned. Humans always think my smile is cute, until they see how sharp my teeth are. He went away.

  Takeoff was takeoff. It felt like we traveled three kilometers on the ground before we finally shambled up into the air. And then, once we were aloft, the pilot laid us on our backs and climbed straight up—or so it felt. I could see across the aisle where Mamie and Stef were both gripping the armrests—they’d never flown on a subbo and the harsher movements were unnerving them a little. I knew something they didn’t know—that the initial climb was nothing.

  When we reached twenty thousand meters, the pilot came on the loudspeaker and warned us to face front and not to attempt any movements during the boost. I usually follow instructions to the letter, if only to win Carol Jeanne the tiny reward of having the flight crew tell her at the end of the flight that I was such a good little flier. This time, though, I couldn’t help a moment of disobedience—I had to lean forward and steal a glance at Mamie and Stef. Sure enough, her eyes were pressed shut and tears were squeezing out of the corners. Mamie Foxe Todd was having a new experience, and she didn’t like it a bit.

  “Sit back, Lovelock,” muttered Carol Jeanne.

  She had been checking on me. It was nice to be reminded that she was looking out for me almost as carefully as I always looked out for her. And she was right, too. Leaning forward and turning my head to the side hadn’t been a good move. It gave me a queasy little ache at the back of my head. The genetic enhancements that enlarged my head enough to hold my expanded brain and the digital interface weren’t fully matched with enough extra strength in the cushioning and support mechanisms of my neck and skull. I get headaches fairly easily, and with the stress of the climb out of the atmosphere, moving and turning like that had given me an instant nausea headache. And because we were boosting clear up to orbit, the stress went on and on. Smart move, Lovelock, I thought. A little bit of gloating at Mamie’s fear, and now you get to feel icky for the rest of the day until you sleep it off. My arms were so immobilized that I could barely hold the magazine, so there was no way of freeing my hands enough for me to pinch the pain away with acupressure.

  In the seat behind us I could hear Lydia complaining about not being able to play during the boost. For once Red was actually being firm with her—he did firmness about once a year—so with luck she’d hold still and we wouldn’t have to put up with Lydia sick, which was even more annoying than Lydia healthy.

  Finally the boost let up, and we went from sharp acceleration to free-fall in an instant.

  I could hear the panicked whimpering from across the aisle. I didn’t even have to look.

  “It’s just low-gee, Mamie,” said Carol Jeanne. “You get used to it in a few moments.”

  “We’re falling!” Mamie insisted.

  “That’s how it feels,” said Carol Jeanne.

  “We’ll be just fine, dear,” said Stef. “People do this all the time.”

  “This is just awful,” said Mamie. “They ought to do something about this. People like us shouldn’t have to put up with this.”

  If only I had a voice, if only I could make words, I would have answered. These are laws of physics, Mamie, and even the bodies of people with genteel upbringing react to the sudden absence of gravity. The only way to spare you the discomfort would be total anesthesia, and most travelers prefer to arrive at their destination awake. But for you, Mamie, total anesthesia is more of an aesthetic statement than a medical procedure, and we’ll be glad to provide it whenever you request.

  Wordless, I could only save up my comments for the next time Carol Jeanne and I were alone together. She’d shush me, of course, but not until she laughed. Carol Jeanne found Mamie almost as funny as I did. She did not understand how deep my feelings about Mamie really were. So I never mentioned to her how much I looked forward to Mamie’s funeral. Carol Jeanne was too kind-hearted to feel genuine mali
ce toward anyone, no matter how they deserved it. I’ve never had that deficiency. Malice is one thing that even wild stupid capuchins do fairly well, and I was the enhanced model.

  I didn’t wish Mamie dead, actually. I just wished her gone. But since there was no chance of her ever letting her dear boy out of her sight for more than a few hours at a time as long as she had a breath in her body, death seemed the only way we’d ever be rid of her.

  Mamie was absolutely transparent—to me, at least. She pretended to be so well-bred that she hardly noticed Carol Jeanne’s international renown—fame was just another burden that people of “our” class have to bear. Yet she clung to every scrap of reflected glory that she could get hold of, all the while resenting the fact that it was her Catholic-born daughter-in-law and not her dear little white-bread boy who earned all the attention. So she was always sniping at Carol Jeanne, even though everything that Mamie valued in life came because Red had married so well.

  In the seat behind us, Lydia was talking again. “Is this free-fall? Can I fly now?”

  “Not till we get to the Ark,” said Red.

  “And probably not even then,” said Carol Jeanne. She was unfastening her seat belt and getting up.

  “Mommy’s getting up!” cried Lydia. “Why can’t I?”

  “Because Mommy’s been in low gee often enough that she knows how to move around without smashing her head on the ceiling or putting her elbows into other people’s faces,” said Carol Jeanne. She was standing in the aisle now, holding on to the handgrips, her feet hooked under the edge of the seat. “I thought I saw Dr. Tuli in the gate area,” she explained to Red. “If it’s really him, he’ll be on his way back to Mars and I’d like to talk to him.”

  “You haven’t seen him in years,” said Red. “It’s not as if you’ll have a chance to get the friendship going again now.”

  Red was right, actually. Since we were leaving the solar system and never coming back in anybody’s lifetime, why bother performing friendship maintenance with people who were staying behind? It was as pointless as visiting people with terminal illnesses. But human beings do that, too.

  So Carol Jeanne went forward, hand over hand on the seat grips, as smoothly as the attendants, her legs trailing behind her gracefully.

  “Mommy’s flying!” cried Lydia in delight. “Emmy, can you see that?”

  Emmy, of course, was not interested in whether or not Mommy was flying. She only noticed that Mommy was gone, and so of course she began to cry. This was perfectly understandable. After all, Emmy was not yet a sentient being. She could hardly be expected to understand that Carol Jeanne would soon return.

  “Emmy’s crying,” said Lydia.

  There was no one within three rows who was not keenly aware of this, of course. But then, Lydia’s own hold on sentience was none too firm.

  “I know she’s crying,” said Red. “But her mother will be back soon.”

  I knew Red. He had no intention of doing anything to quell Emmy’s noise. He thought it was perfectly all right. If he let the crying go on, Carol Jeanne would hear and come back and deal with it. Even though he was better equipped for motherhood than Carol Jeanne, he was perfectly willing to let the kids jerk her around when it made things go his way. I had seen this pattern a thousand times. A ringing phone, a doorbell, the stove timer going off, a crying child—if Carol Jeanne was anywhere near, Red would simply pretend that he didn’t know anything was happening until she dropped what she was doing and came to handle it. Then, when the situation was well in hand, he would say, “Oh, I can do that.” To which Carol Jeanne would always respond, “Don’t worry, dear, I’ve got it taken care of.” It was a marriage made in heaven. Carol Jeanne never even realized she was being had. After all, Red did all these things whenever she was away, which was more often than not. But her absence made her feel guilty, and I think in a way she really was glad to have a chance to do those little jobs that made her feel as though she were as connected to her family as a traditional stay-at-home mother.

  So the crying continued. But apparently Carol Jeanne was far enough away—or so engrossed in conversation—that she couldn’t hear it. Other passengers were looking around now, glaring at Red for doing nothing to quiet Emmy down. Red, of course, was reading and paid no attention.

  Mamie noticed, however. As she had said so many times, she detested being made a public spectacle. Actually, of course, she loved being a public spectacle. It was negative attention that she hated. At the moment, it was her dear boy who was getting all the loathing glances; therefore she had to do something to turn away all that disfavor.

  “What are you doing?” asked Stef.

  “Unfastening my seat belt,” said Mamie.

  “You aren’t experienced in low gee,” he said. “You shouldn’t be getting up.”

  “I have to take care of my precious little unhappy girl.”

  At that moment her seatbelt came loose and she tried to stand up. The force of her movement immediately launched her straight toward the ceiling at high speed. She screeched and managed to get her hands up fast enough that she didn’t knock herself unconscious on impact. Instead she rebounded into the aisle, clutching desperately at the handgrips on the aisle seats. She caught one, but had no idea of anchoring herself by hooking her feet under the seats. So the angular momentum spun her around the handgrip. If she had planned any of this it would have been a brilliant stunt, and even as an idiotic accident I had to admire the fact that despite her age, her reflexes were still pretty quick and she was strong enough not to lose her hold on the handgrip despite all the twisting and wrenching.

  By the time the attendant got there to rescue her, she had managed to get herself into Carol Jeanne’s seat, and she dismissed the man rather coldly. “As you can see, I’m simply here to comfort my precious little granddaughter.” As far as Mamie was concerned, her athletic adventure of a moment before had never happened. No doubt her memory was already edited to show her moving with perfect grace at all times. Even when her muscles were sore tomorrow from the wrenching, I knew Mamie wouldn’t connect the stiffness with her acrobatics, because the acrobatics never happened.

  As for comforting Emmy, however, that was not to be. Emmy wasn’t fully human yet, but she could certainly tell the difference between Mommy and not-Mommy, and Mamie was definitely in the not-Mommy category. The crying continued without slackening.

  “You dear child, there must be something I can do with you,” she said. There was now an edge to her voice. Patience was wearing thin. After all this trouble to get across the aisle, it would hardly do if she were shown to be ineffectual as a grandmother. So she cast about for anything that might distract the child and put a stop to the crying. After giving up on the in-flight magazine, Emmy’s teething ring, and the vomit bag, Mamie cast her gaze in another direction.

  “Emmy, dear, would you like to play with Mommy’s monkey? I’ll even let you feed him. Now, where did Carol Jeanne put that bag of treats?”

  I’m a witness. I’m supposed to observe. And when Mamie—who had never willingly touched me before in her life—decided that I might be useful in solving her little dilemma, my first thought was to bite her hand if it came anywhere near me. Since interfering with a legally registered witness was a serious crime, no one ever sued or even struck back when I bit them for trying to touch me. Still, this wasn’t a stranger, this was Carol Jeanne’s mother-in-law, and if I bit her we’d probably never hear the end of it. So I hesitated.

  As she fumbled around with the straps and buckles behind me—she wasn’t very good at figuring out how things fastened or came apart—I began to think of several reasons why Mamie’s idea was actually a very good one. Emmy always responded well to me, and I enjoyed playing with her. Even though her style of play was to try every possible way to kill me with her bare hands, she had about as much dexterity as an oyster and so I could always get away. I knew that within moments, Emmy would be laughing with delight. That would allow Carol Jeanne to continue her c
onversation without interference, and she would appreciate it. If it also happened to make Mamie feel just a little bit more tolerant toward me, so much the better.

  That’s what I was thinking at the time. What never crossed my mind was the fact that I was no more experienced in freefall than Mamie. After all, I had been kept harnessed in my seat on every subbo flight I’d taken. But why should I have expected to have any problems? All my experience told me that if something required balance and dexterity, I could do it a hundred times more easily than any human. Freefall was just another physical challenge, and of course I would handle it easily and naturally, making humans seem clumsy by comparison.

  And maybe it would have been that way, if it had all depended on dexterity. Certainly I have that, and my enhancements have, if anything, made me even quicker and sharper. What I hadn’t reckoned on was how freefall would make me feel. Primates have invested a lot of evolution in learning how to swing through trees. Only a handful of species—humans and baboons, mostly—got back down out of the trees and learned to hoof it like cattle. We tree-swingers are the ones who developed binocular vision—the front-pointing eyes that define the primate face. They gave us the ability to judge exactly how far to leap to reach the next branch, and when and how to grasp it with our agile fingers and nubby little opposable thumbs. It’s the perfect setup for amazing acrobatics.

  The trouble is that all of it depends on a very keen sense of gravity: exactly how much we weigh, how far we’ll go on a leap, and how far downward we’ll drift in midair. Humans and baboons don’t need to be so aware of where down is. Their biggest challenge is standing up without falling over. We tree-swingers absolutely depend on our sense of down-ness or we’d die on the first jump.

  In freefall, no direction is down, yet every movement feels like falling.