The Journey of Rick Heiden - Chapters 9 and 10
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This novel contains 50 CHAPTERS, and every post will have 2 chapters each.
CHAPTER NINE
Later that night, afterward, as David held me, I asked him what he did during my orientation. He lay behind me, his mouth level with my ear, he whispered that he had visited several people, but I noticed one omission conspicuous by its absence: his parents.
"Hadn't you visited your parents?"
"Not yet," he said, and something hadn't felt right.
I turned to face him. "Oh? What's wrong?"
"Must you do that?"
"Do what?"
"Read me! It makes me feel vulnerable. Don't get me wrong; what you do astonishes me, but sometimes it's like you see through people."
"It's not magic, David. You haven't seen your parents in 10 years, and you didn't see them on the first day back. Naturally, I'll think something's wrong."
"Okay," he said, "I was afraid."
"Of what? I thought you said your parents were amazing people?"
"They are amazing --in their own way. It's just that I failed, and I know what my father will say to me."
I hugged him. "If he can't see how wonderful you are, he doesn't deserve you."
He wrapped his arms around me. "As biased as that sentiment is, it's still nice to hear, so thank you."
At three in the morning, Aiden awakened us for an early breakfast. We had several dozen dishes containing various culinary selections in the middle of our table, half of which were alien. And while I ate more than typical for me, Aiden was so ravenous he lost all his table manners. After stuffing himself, he grew sleepy, and we helped him return to his bed.
We missed the sunrise as it occurred on a different side of the building, but the view from our window, with the sun reflecting on the forest, made it look like Earth at a distance, but every step I took told me I was elsewhere. The weight on my legs grew intolerable. My woeful lack of athleticism had caught up with me at last. I never weighed more than one hundred and sixty-five pounds, too much of which was body fat. The heaviness of my then two hundred twenty pounds caused extreme discomfort for my leg muscles.
"How did people ages ago cope with this excess weight?" I asked.
"They were probably stronger people back then," David said, reading a book. "They weren't a bunch of lazy buggers like many modern humans. Don't worry, the Foundational Enhancement will recognize the gravity strain you're under, and you'll do better in no time."
"Well, this feels like a rigorous athletic training program, so it should hurry. All I foresee myself doing for a while is morning exercise, meandering around in pain, stuffing myself with food six times a day, and taking naps." Ever the attentive mate, David knew when I needed a hug.
A bit after dawn at 6:10, they brought our clothes back to us, but none of us thought that wearing a suit there made any sense, so we left them in the bags with our robes for us to carry home.
Not long afterward, they gave us our physical examinations. They declared me healthy despite my muscular deficiencies. It hadn't shocked me too much. Although, I would have loved for the clinician to have deemed me fighting-fit, but that more described David. Still, I never lived tied to a chair for a third of the day, and I ate well. On the other hand, Aiden, the research scientist, not only lived his life tied to a chair but consumed copious amounts of the unhealthiest, dare I call it 'food' I had ever seen. Based on his musculature, they declared him twenty-five pounds overweight. So, his results hadn't surprised me either, but he never expected it. Aiden had an IQ too intimidating to admit, yet he hadn't seen the detriment of his culinary lifestyle. It baffled me.
Afterward, they had brought us one at a time into the examination room next door with a different clinician. Aiden and I had become apprehensive, so we let David go first.
Aiden amazed me; he never complained about anything. Apart from his irrational fear of Amare, which appeared cured, it seemed that he could cope with everything that went on around him or happened to him. I admit that it made me envious.
"You've never said, so I'm wondering if it's just me. Have you any gravity-induced pain?" I asked Aiden.
"Yes," he said, "I thought the long hot shower would help to relax me, but I had trouble sleeping last night."
"Why haven't you said anything?"
"Why would I? It won't make it go away. So," --Aiden gestured toward the examination room door-- "will you 'be bold' this morning and go for it?"
"What will you do?" I asked.
"It's my body and my life. I've decided to get exactly what I want, and not care what anyone thinks about it."
It took about 30 minutes, and David exited the room with a smile on his face, particularly pleased about something, which made me suspicious. Aiden insisted I go next.
The female clinician, Yoncara, and I got along well. She treated me like I had known her for jears. With the list in hand, I had questions, so she and I discussed them. And the more we discussed them the stranger it felt. My only comparison might be that it felt like we had taken on the task of redecorating a house. Except, rather than choosing between siding and brick, hardwood and carpet, or fabrics in solids, stripes, or chintz, I played the focus in a Jiyu edition of `Supreme Makeover', and I held a menu of highly customizable options. The whole process fascinated me, and I will say that I enjoyed myself.
I asked her how the memory boost worked. She told me that it programmed the nanos to build a unique structure called a quantum memory lattice tucked away inside your skull. Once it integrated itself with your biological brain, it caused nearly perfect memory recall. She assured me that I wouldn't feel it and that it had no side effects, but I didn't feel ready to mess with my brain in that manner, so I declined that one.
I read down the list checking off all the necessities telling her what I wanted, "I doubt I'll be a party to anyone's pregnancy, so I don't need my fertility controlled. I need the Forever Young. It wouldn't do for someone to mistake me as David's doting decrepit grandfather. Why does the seminal support enhancement have a star?"
"It's a popular one and highly recommended," she said, "especially if you enlarge your penis, which David said that he hoped you would ask me about."
"Just how common is an enlargement, really?"
"Over 90 percent of men have it done to one degree or another. David told me about your fear, so may I give you some advice?"
"Sure."
"You grew up on Earth in a conflicted culture where, on one hand, you're encouraged to go for what you personally want, and on the other, someone will come along and chastise you for wanting it in the first place. You grew up in America so, you know what I mean. Think about this, who are you hurting by having a man for a mate?"
"Nobody."
"Exactly, and this is no different. I have seen this too often with newcomers. You're afraid to have what you want because, according to the taboos, mores, and conditioning of your upbringing, you're not supposed to want it. Those are control devices. Over time, they conditioned you to allow those devices to make your choices for you to keep you in line, and when you consider going against it, it creates anxiety and a fear of the repercussions. But who are you hurting by enlarging your penis if that's what you want?"
"Nobody"
"Exactly. This is Jiyu, when it comes to your personal choices that wouldn't harm anyone, no one here cares what you do, and they won't judge you for it. So, whatever you decide, never let external opinions or conditioning from your past make your decisions for you. Those are decisions you'll regret.
"I don't know your current size, but I've been a clinician with this job for 538 jears. Humans are very sexual beings, and they alter their genitals for various reasons. Sometimes it's because nature can be quite cruel, but for the most part, it's just because they want to, and they need no other reason. People want what they want, and I've made anatomical alterations that you couldn't imagine, but the choice is yours."
I sat and thought about it. I would never have described David as ordinary, and that presented a problem for me because, in contrast, I had proclaimed myself an introvert who reveled in the quiet calmness of his home to read the latest paperback novel by the fireplace, and even to me, that reeked of the conventional. It seemed enough for me before. But that day, faced with the opportunities like those on the list in my hand, with its options ranging from the fantastical to the mundane, it had importuned for a rejection of a life lived in self-appraised mediocrity.
So, the time had arrived, and I deliberated over it, for as long as seemed prudent, given the circumstances. I knew what I really faced. I had more occurring at that moment than a simple choice over whether to have a penis that wet dreams were made of. Of all my choices that day, that particular choice was representative, a true test of my mettle. Would I begin facing the fear I felt in making my choices both then and in the future, or would I continue to play it safe, and be little more than a mediocrity in David's considerable shadow?
I took a deep breath and I recalled what David said to me once, "Be Bold and Own it."
"Okay," I said. "Let's go for it."
"That's the spirit. What can I do for you? I can set it for whatever number of centimeters you wish to add or in multiples to a tenth of a decimal point like X1.6 or X2, whatever you want."
"Well, if I'm being bold and owning it, my penetrating David is unlikely to ever happen; I'm not really into that. So, I have no need to concern myself over whether he can take me."
"That leaves your options wide open."
"Be bold," I said to myself. "Okay, question. How will this affect my flaccid size?"
"The nanos calculate the optimal size that will give you the strongest erection, but it always seems to be proportional to the erect size increase."
"Okay, be bold, be bold. Ahh...add 1.25 centimeters to the circumference--that's about half an inch. But if I'm going to do this, let's be bold as hell and double the length. You only live once, right?"
"Well," she said, "with the Forever Young enhancement, it's likely to be a very long 'once'. Anything other enhancements?"
"No, I think you have everything."
"You can always add something later. Now I should give you the standard statement I give everyone. `Among all our available enhancements, a few ongoing ones we can stop like the libido enhancement, but some finalized enhancements might require a reversal. Currently, the only ones we can reverse are fertility control and a nano-tattoo; the rest we cannot reverse. For example, if I enhanced your height, we cannot undo that. It's one thing to make someone taller, but quite impossible to make them shorter. For many enhancements, once you get them, you can't change your mind. Do you understand?'"
"Be Bold. Be Bold," I said to myself. "Yes, I understand."
"Good, just give me a moment to finish this, and I'll program your nanos," she said. "I must tell you that for the libido enhancement to work properly, you must eat well, rest, and drink plenty of fluids.
"Good to know. So, how long will these take to start working?"
"Well, some enhancements work faster than others," she said, "The libido enhancement is your fastest. That will only take a few hours, but based on your choices, Forever Young will take the longest. How old are you now?"
"I'm thirty Earth years."
"Hmm, thirty. Could you stand up, please, while I do this?"
"Will this hurt?" I asked.
She placed an elegantly shaped device on my torso just below my heart. "One last chance to change your mind."
"Be bold. Be bold," I said to myself. "Do it."
"I'm done."
"That's it?" I took a deep breath trying to relax. "What's done is done, I suppose. Okay, so thirty."
"Thirty Earth? That's a five-year reduction. I wish I could tell you it had the equivalent of so many days per birth year, but it doesn't work like that. For you, at five years, I would say a good estimate is a quarter of a jear. David, on the other hand, I didn't have to estimate. He's at the maximum age. You see, if attaining youth is the goal, it doesn't work well the older you get, so we use forty as a cut-off age, but anyone forty takes a whole jear."
"So, a hundred days, for me. That's not so bad."
"The seminal support enhancement takes no more than a day. The communication link takes about a day, and then you will have Iris available to you. To do that, place your finger on this spot behind your ear and hold it. When you hear a tone, the link to Iris has activated. Tap the spot twice, say Iris, and she'll respond. Now for the others. Several of those depend on you."
"Okay, how's that?"
"Your arm hair, chest hair, and leg hair will fill in and thicken over a few weeks, all the rest of your body hair will begin to fall out in a few hours. It depends on how much you have before it's complete, but no matter how much you have that should finish in no more than a day after it starts."
"How much will fall out?" I asked.
"Everything you didn't want from the neck down. Between that and the Foundational Enhancement, most of your skin should look like a clean slate. Now, for the genital enhancement."
"Okay," I said with trepidation.
She smiled. "It works like the body hair, it all depends on you, but it should finish in no more than five days, including your uncircumcision," she said.
"Only five days?"
"Yep. The nanos induce skin and tissue growth with incredible ease. If you had asked for something outrageous that would take longer. One last thing, since you got your foundation from David, you've never had this, but you'll need it. Your body will go through a lot of change in the next few days; so, I will give you some nano-suspension." She handed me roughly an eight-ounce glass, twice the size of the one Aiden had the day before. It also looked like prune juice but had the taste and texture of a tepid vanilla milkshake.
When I left the examination room, I'm sure that I had the same look on my face that David did earlier. I would call it the I-know-something-you-don't-know look.
Aiden went next, and I wished him luck.
David hugged me. "How did it go?"
"I was bold, and I will own it." I kissed him and told him how much I loved him.
"I'm proud of you," he said. "So, how bold were you?"
"Way, way, way outside-my-comfort-zone bold with a capital B."
"Good! I look forward to it."
"Well, let me tell you," I said, "it will be difficult to miss."
"I was pretty bold myself; I hope you don't mind."
"After my recent insanely bold move, I have no room to complain."
It took Aiden only twenty minutes. He either didn't want much, or he knew in detail what he wanted. He had a funny look on his face when he reemerged.
"So, how did it go?" David asked him.
"Good," he said. "Yoncara gave me another dose of that stuff. You're right, the vanilla is better."
"So," I said, "have you also made a decision that might, in all probability, prove irretrievably foolish by equinizing yourself?"
He laughed. "Well, I don't know about equinize," Aiden said, "but I made a few plumbing improvements that are sure to please. I want to thank you again for bringing me. We haven't even seen the city yet, and I'm already stunned."
Just before second meal, David received a visitor: his adoptive mother. As a woman younger in appearance than David, she could have been his younger sister.
It had reached the point that I realized physical ages were irrelevant. I saw many people whose apparent age looked quite young. However, I still saw people who had not taken the anti-aging treatment, as there were people both middle-aged and older, yet they seemed in good health and doing well. Everyone had the personal freedom to choose. Some people wanted to live for as long as possible, while others wanted to live a more natural existence by growing old and dying. For them, the thought of living thousands of jears was unappealing, and everyone accepted the personal choices of everyone else.
David's mother's face had that attractiveness that often comes with youth. She had ash brown hair and wore a beautiful wrap-around dress of what looked like blue silk. It was stunning, and she looked beautiful in it. As she approached him, I thought they would embrace --it seemed reasonable for them to, but that never happened. She stopped about ten feet away.
In a calm, disappointed tone, she asked him, "Why have you not visited us? We waited when we heard you had returned, thinking you would want to see us."
"I'm sorry, Mother," he said. "I know how quickly news travels, but I had an uncertainty of what sort of reception I would receive."
"Do you think us that harsh?" she asked.
"Failure is failure, Mother."
"Fifty jears have passed, is your father not allowed to change?"
"We both know why he is as he is," said David. "Has he an incentive to behave otherwise?"
She glanced at her feet. "You've changed."
"In many ways, I had yet to mature when I left. I know who I am now, and I'm mated." David gestured to me. "Mother, please meet Rick. Rick, this is my adoptive mother, Siona."
I merely bowed with my head as politely as I could when she glanced in my direction, but I thought it best to say nothing. She nodded in return, acknowledging my presence. I felt I had received as close to an expression of acceptance as I would get at that moment.
"You will always be welcome," she said to David, "and despite your expectations, I believe your father had changed in your absence. I urge you to rethink your assumptions." She paused, looking at him, and switched the topic. "It's good to see you. You look...well."
David made a slight shift of his weight. He seemed uncomfortable, and I hadn't understood why.
"You haven't changed at all, Mother," said David, "and you're still the peacemaker. I will consider what you have said."
She turned to me. "I am pleased to meet you. I can tell you are a kind man of thoughtfulness and intelligence. David chose well. You are also welcome in our home."
And with that, they said their goodbyes, and she left. They had no hugs, no expressions of love. The overall formality of it felt strange.
"She had some kind things to say about me," I said, "but I only saw her for a few minutes, and I hadn't even said anything. How does she know that's how I am?"
"Welcome to the world of everyone who has ever stood in your presence," said David.
"What's that supposed to mean?" I asked.
David smiled and laughed. "It's funny. You must have difficulty recognizing that part of yourself when you gaze into a mirror." He pulled me to him.
"I don't understand what you're saying," I said. I did, though, and David knew that, but I hadn't wanted to admit it.
"I know," he said, hugging me, "and that's one of your many charms."
When it came to mealtimes, we had a radical change in diet. Aiden said nothing, but it must have put a strain on him. His typical food choices on Earth were those dipped and doused in enormous amounts of fat. Still, he ate without complaint. Jiyu had vegan food because the planet had no animals. However, due to the variety of foodstuffs, both indigenous and alien to the planet, they had enough macro and micronutrients to remain healthy without meats. Jiyu had several native species of plants unusual in that they contained a complete complement of amino acids in the same quantities as meat. I suspected they were not entirely plant. Once I learned of this, I made sure to eat more of that to increase my protein intake, as they were quite delicious.
"Why couldn't you bring over some animal species, at least some endangered ones?" Aiden asked David during our meal.
"Scholars speculated that perhaps the original Japanese settlers who came to this planet saw that it had no animals and decided it shouldn't have any, so they never brought them," said David. "It's a good thing they hadn't, talk about contamination. Today we could manage it safely in the short term, but we've concluded that removing them from their natural habitat when they cannot consent to come would be cruel and environmentally dangerous for them in the long term."
"I don't understand something," I said. "If the portal is in London, what made Jiyu originally a Japanese settlement?"
"We don't know. That information goes back to the beginning. We have some ancient Japanese texts, but they hadn't kept records well then, and much of what we have is incomplete generational hearsay written down much later. All of that's in the chronology at the Archive."
"I would love to read those one day," I said.
"It's available for everyone. I'm willing to show you."
We sat at the table at the end of second meal, just before we left the facility altogether when Amare came to see us. For someone shot a day prior, he looked good. I noticed that his clothing looked the same but lacked the bullet hole through the tunic and shirt. It seemed that Katheryn hadn't exaggerated about Amare's jacket mending itself.
When he came into the room, my awe caused me to stand up from my chair, which David and Aiden copied. I almost burst into tears at seeing him up and walking. He stood just inside the doorway; his hands clasped behind his back. I pushed my chair back, and David and I made the customary long bow. Aiden, who hadn't reacted as he once did with uncontrollable screaming, had watched and imitated us. Amare smiled and bowed in return as best he could. He then walked straight to Aiden, took his hands, and did the one thing I never thought would happen. Amare said, "Thank you for what you did" in English.
It left us astonished, but none more than Aiden, whom it struck dumb.
"I didn't think you spoke English," I said.
He turned to me and approached the empty seat at our table. Once he sat down, we did likewise. "For ages," he said, "I have stubbornly refused to speak any language except Japanese because I felt it might put the final nail in the coffin of my heritage. Early on, Jiyu was a Japanese settlement. Over time, many different people of diverse cultures came, and it seemed to wash out the original Japanese culture, and this concerned my ancestors. I am sad to say that they passed that concern through the generations to me. Over time, I have watched Jiyu blossom into a culture of its own because it could never have maintained any single culture to any degree, nor should it. We have taken the best parts of the cultures to which our circumstance has exposed us and kept only those things that have truly served us. We are our own culture, unique and beautiful, and for too long, I have set myself apart from it for reasons that were never my own. I want to thank you, Mr. Heiden, for honoring me in the ways of my ancestors during my stay in the cell. I had not been honored so in centuries. Once you had gone, and after some thought, I realized that I could honor my people in my way. I should not have made something as important as communication a complication. This morning I asked Dmitry to share with me his English, and now I can communicate with you in that language as competently as he."
"You can do that?" I asked. "It certainly makes all the effort I put into learning ten languages a complete waste of time."
"Not everyone can do it; only members of the Trust receive the special enhancements that allow the Sharing. Currently, the Trust represents a third of the population. And Mr. Heiden, please do not feel you have wasted your time learning those languages. In learning them, you have acquired knowledge even more important, that most humans on Earth never learn, self-worth through mastery and discipline. And believe me, you are all the better for it. But now you are here, and we have much for you to learn. I believe you will discover that Jiyu needs you. Jiyu needs all of you, which brings me to the other reason I came to you this morning."
His countenance became grave, and his body language grew somber. "We have a problem," Amare said. "We, and by that, I mean everyone on this planet, need the three of you to find a solution. Only you can do it. No one else knows the social and political complexity of the problem, as well as the current geography, as thoroughly as the three of you."
David, with downcast eyes, spoke one word: "Cadmar."
"Indeed, Cadmar," Amare said. "We came home so that we might escape the difficulty we were experiencing. I had no idea what I would face when I went to retrieve Cadmar and David. We must take this opportunity to plan and return to get what we can acquire of Cadmar if anything, but more importantly, and for as odd as it may seem, his ring. It is bad enough they have Cadmar's body, from which they could devastate their planet, but they have his ring, and that could allow them to devastate ours."
The three of us were wide-eyed. "How could Cadmar's ring be so important?" David asked.
"This secret about the portal I would call our second line of defense," said Amare. "It's arguably our weakest because it has one critical vulnerability." He removed his ring that looked identical to Cadmar's and held it at our eye level. "The ring's diamond contains the quantum chip that calls to the portal once it enters the portal's localized field. If they should discover how it works, they will come, and we cannot stop them."
"I had no idea that's how it worked," David said to Amare. "If I had only known. When I brought Rick to the facility on Saturday, I held that ring in my hand."
"Mr. Levitt, please, do not entertain notions of self-recrimination," said Amare. "They serve no one. No one is to blame for the current circumstance surrounding Cadmar. It stains no one's honor."
"How long do we have?" asked Aiden, who found his voice at last.
"Because of the time dilation, it gives us breathing space, but precious little," said Amare. "The longer you wait to return, the more time you give them to act. I recommend you leave in no more than six days."
"How long is that on Earth?" Aiden asked.
Amare turned to him. "The five to one ratio calculates best in jears. Six days on Jiyu, give or take a few hours, is perhaps only a day on Earth, but I suggest that six days is the latest you leave. Mr. Park, Mr. Levitt, Mr. Heiden, I have great confidence in the three of you." With that, we stood when he stood, a series of bows ensued, and he left.
CHAPTER TEN
Amare's visit left us disturbed. If we settled into a new life on Jiyu without going back, and they came through one day, we may not have a life worth living. Despite our reluctance, we had to return.
"I have something to tell you," David said. "I realized it at the time, but so much was happening; it slipped my mind. When I fired upon Katheryn, I only stunned her."
"Oh, no."
"Katheryn is alive?" Aiden asked. "She will tell them where to find the portal."
"I'm sorry," David said, "we had no time, and once I stunned her, I couldn't have done anything else anyway."
"It's unfortunate," I said, "but if we hadn't acted quickly, Amare could have died, so let's keep that in mind."
"It's a significant complication," David said. "We will have to give it some thought."
"About the portal," said Aiden, "how could they get through? Is this building not fortified?"
"The problem is bigger than it seems," said David. "This building isn't a fortress, and the containment area stops contamination, nothing more.
"The Earth has some resourceful, unscrupulous people who may know where to find the portal. Unscrupulous people will do whatever they must to get what they want, like Katheryn. The Americans probably have Cadmar. To them, he represents a resource of technology beyond their dreams. They will want the source. And while the portal can only carry a few dozen people at a time, people aren't the only thing they could send through. Let your imagination run wild for a moment."
"Oh my," I said.
"Exactly," David said.
"Is there no technological solution?" Aiden asked. "This place is advanced. Don't you have force fields to surround it or something?"
"I hate to tell you this, Aiden," said David, "because I know you love technology. After ages of study and experimentation, we've seen no evidence that force field technology of that kind is even possible, so for the moment, we don't have that option."
"Well, that's a complete disappointment."
"I take it no one knows who built the portals," I said.
"No, it's of unknown alien construction," said David. "We've studied the portal for millennia. We know things about it, but we still don't know what makes it tick. Scholars say that it resists giving up its secrets."
"I figured aliens existed," said Aiden. "It's nice to have confirmation, though. Couldn't you turn the portal off?"
"It has no off switch," said David. "To turn it off, we would probably have to destroy it."
"Why don't we destroy it then?" I asked.
"We can't do that," said David. "The portal represents a line to our past and a connection to our larger family. We know the Earth has crude, undisciplined people, and many malevolent ones, but they aren't all that way. They're our family; we care about them. They never made their circumstance; they inherited it. And knowing that, we can't abandon them. Besides, we have Jiyuvian volunteers all over the Earth doing what they can to make things better, like Pearce in the United States. We can't abandon them either. So, we shouldn't destroy the portal."
"That's a refreshingly enlightened attitude," Aiden said, adjusting his glasses.
"Jiyuvian...really?" I asked, skeptical of the appellation.
David smiled. "I just made that up. No one calls themselves that."
"I like it," said Aiden.
"I think it's terrible," I said, "the name of this planet doesn't lend itself to morphological derivation."
David gave me a blank stare. "You know I know nothing about languages, so what does that mean?"
"It means you can't make new words with it," I said. "It's just a Japanese word that doesn't even sound like the name of a planet."
David looked shocked. "It's Japanese?"
"You didn't know that? I'm sorry, I thought you knew," I said in mild perplexity. "Jiyu is Japanese for freedom."
David mused. "That's the first time I've heard that."
"That's fascinating," said Aiden.
"I thought so too," I said. "It does intimate a harrowing tale --one lost to time, no doubt."
"Okay, let's focus on the business at hand," said David. "We need to make a plan to track down Cadmar and the ring. We don't have much time."
"You tracked me down when they abducted me," I said, "why couldn't we do that? Surely, some of the technology inside him is trackable."
"Interesting," David said. "That's an excellent idea."
"I've seen the scans," said Aiden. "Cadmar's body has loads of technology inside it. Does any of it work when he's dead that we could use?"
"I don't know," he said, "but I know where someone does."
We gathered our things and left level two containment. Magnar and a woman we hadn't met entered the building. She had mixed parentage also, which I realized occurred often. It reminded me of what David said that humans had constructed the concept of race to divide people. Race had no meaning on Jiyu. I once asked David if the people there knew their ancestry. He said that few people knew, and they hadn't cared to know because it hadn't mattered.
The woman with Magnar presented a striking image. She had short wavy hair the color of honey which lay flat upon her head, tan skin, and eyes so darkly brown they appeared black. She wore a Trust uniform like Magnar's, in chartreuse with a black shirt, and naturally, her black pants had no codpiece. They both carried a silvery-handled sword on their back.
"David!" Magnar said with exuberance. "Tamika wishes to meet you. Please, meet my brother's mate; she has something to say."
I could almost feel David stiffen inside at those words, but with bravery, he would weather what he expected to come. She stood before him. They were the same height, and just as David thought she would strike him, or rake him over the proverbial coals, she embraced him instead.
"We know that you will soon return for Cadmar," she said. "I wanted to let you know how much I appreciate that, but Magnar and I have talked it over. For as much as we want to have Cadmar back, he's gone, and nothing will change that. It would ask too much to bring his body home."
"Nevertheless."
"I know," Tamika said, "you must try. We want you to know that, for ourselves, we release you of the obligation. We don't want to lose anyone else."
David turned to Aiden and me. "Tamika, meet Rick, my mate, and this fellow is our good friend Aiden."
I noted that Aiden's expression changed upon having heard David refer to him as a good friend. For the second time, I had the impression that Aiden had no friends, but I hadn't known for sure, and I wouldn't have wanted to embarrass him by asking.
Magnar and Tamika joined us for our first look at the city. We stepped outside, and the sun felt warm to my skin. We crossed the expansive hardscape to an elaborate railing, which served to mark the overlook. Peering over the edge of the dizzying precipice, I saw the city on the gently sloping base far below that stretched to the left and the right of our position, curving like two arms embracing part of an enormous sea. It seemed that a straight line from the temple to the seaside would reach eight kilometers (five miles). In the distance, we could see many large-scale buildings, some had massive colonnades of white stone, and green space scattered about with walking paths. An elevated rail car passed through the center, taking passengers around the city's curvature from one end to the other. I also noticed distinct neighborhoods, and some of the roadways in between.
David pointed to a building in the distance to the left. "See there, Rick," he said, "the rounded building next to that tall one. That's Kagura Hall, one of our theaters. We have a magnificent orchestra and an opera company. And Aiden, see that massive series of buildings just below us to the left? That's Bragi College, the oldest of our two colleges. That's our first stop. When we have time, they can catch you up on all the things that interest you."
"Where's your home?" I asked him.
"You mean our home," he said. "It's to the right. You can't see it from here, but see the tall building shaped like a diamond? You'll find our building right across the street."
"Where do men meet women here?" Aiden asked with squinted eyes as he gazed upon the city.
"Seriously?" I asked him. "Is that the first question you have?"
"Asks the man who already has a mate," Aiden said.
"I showed him the college," David said to me. "What else would he ask? A man must have his list of priorities, right, Aiden?"
Magnar spoke up, slapping his hand on Aiden's shoulder. "And a suitable priority it is!" Magnar exclaimed in his husky voice. "We unattached men must stick together, Aiden. To meet women here, we have diners filled with unmated people who enjoy stimulating conversation. We have a beach that stretches the full length of the city with women of exceptional beauty as well as intelligence, strength, and bravery. And we have places to dance where we revel in the freedom that is at the heart of Jiyu." Magnar brought his mouth close to Aiden's ear. "You'll find the people here passionate. They love many things a young man, such as yourself, will find captivating."
I could almost see the excitement in Aiden's eyes. "Why are we just standing here?"
Tamika smiled and shook her head at Magnar's vivid description. "I must go," she said. "I have one or two matters to attend to before going home. It's a pleasure to meet the three of you. We should share a meal soon. Magnar." She nodded her head at him before returning to the temple.
I liked Tamika; she was intriguing. Magnar seemed less so, but likable.
"Tamika is very quiet," David said as we watched her return to the temple.
"Not when you get to know her," said Magnar. "For now, she mourns her loss. You will find that she is intelligent and witty, but don't let her fool you. She's bested me every time in swordplay. Of all the women of my acquaintance, I respect her more than any other. Cadmar did well."
I noted the swords on Magnar and Tamika's back. "Does everyone carry a sword?"
"Not everyone," Magnar said, turning toward me, "only members of the Trust. We protect Jiyu, and we have the honor of such a responsibility."
David said to Magnar, "You're welcome to come with us when we return to Earth to retrieve your brother."
Magnar paused a moment and glanced at his shoes. "Thank you for that. My heart says go, but my head knows more is not always helpful. I would only hinder your success."
I looked around the hardscape. I saw no paths and no roads. "How do we get down? Please don't tell me we're walking."
"The old path I used to mountain bike is over there," said David, "but it's steep and still overgrown with disuse. We use the lift now, the little building at the edge there."
As flowering vines from the surrounding garden covered it, I barely noticed the glass, cylindrical lift. It provided an incredible view as we descended into the city below.
"Can we swim in the sea?" Aiden asked.
"Yes, of course," said David. "You will find people at the beach most of the time."
"Do any dangers exist here that we should know about," I said, "like any poisonous plants or minerals, for example?"
"None that I'm aware of, we may find some in other parts of the planet. We've not explored it as thoroughly as we should. Before I left, a team had built a new robotic satellite to scan the planet more closely, but it's been fifty jears, so, for all I know, it could be space debris by now."
"We lost it ten jears after we put it in place," Magnar said, "another orbiting body strike."
"Does that happen a lot?" asked Aiden.
"Two my knowledge, it's happened a dozen times," said Magnar, "and they burn up on reentry. This planet has a lot of smaller orbiting bodies made up of meteors and fragments caught in our gravitational well."
"I've noticed the culture here relies on robotics," I said.
"Yes," Magnar said, "and so that you know, we accept robots as people due to the artificial intelligence utilized in their design. We behave towards them as we would anyone else. It serves no good purpose to treat them like slaves. Once you meet one, you'll know why."
When we exited the lift, a metallic bodied, open-topped transport vehicle waited a few yards away on the cobblestone street. It appeared to have neither a front nor back end. It had two bench seats, each facing one another, with no steering wheel or instrumentation, and sat on a strange-looking sphere at each end of the vehicle.
"Speaking of meeting one...," David said.
"Hello, David," said a voice from the vehicle, "it pleases me to see you. Did you find Earth exciting?" As it spoke, lines of light in short windows surrounding the seating area oscillated with the sound.
"Hello, Venn. Yes, Earth was exciting. How are you? I know you still had some testing to do when I left, have they upgraded you since then?"
"I am performing optimally, thank you," said Venn, "and I upgrade frequently. Hello Magnar, I heard about Cadmar. My condolences for your loss."
"Thank you, Venn," Magnar said.
"It's odd to see you sitting here," said David. "Have you waited for us?"
"Yes, not long ago, Amare requested that I wait for you. He felt walking might prove too much for our new arrivals. I assume these are they, as I do not recognize your other two companions. They match no one in the database."
Amare was a true gentleman. I needed to thank him. The thought of a trek through the streets worried me because I had more pain than I was letting on.
After the introductions, David told us he met the newly installed Venn before he left, and although he was charming, the test phase meant Venn had no duties at the time.
"So, Venn, do you control this one vehicle or all of them?" David asked.
"In your absence, I have expanded in many ways," said Venn, "I have fully integrated into several main systems. I control all transportation, including the delivery of food and other necessities, removal of organic refuse and recycling, and I oversee the use and maintenance of the Forge."
"My goodness, all that and the Forge too?" David asked. "I see you've made a valued and trusted person here. I'm so pleased for you. Have you reached the Coping limit yet, or have they done away with that scale?"
"They still use Alexander Coping's scale, but it either needs recalibration, or it doesn't apply to me. I'm currently at 159.7 percent on the Coping scale, and I'm using only 33 percent of my current capacity."
"What's the Forge?" I asked.
"The machine called the Forge creates many of the things we need," Magnar said. "It can make almost anything from a button to a starship, in pieces of course. It even created the transport vehicle you see before you."
"Shall I take you home?" The doors opened before us like two barn doors leaving an expansive entry for easy access.
"We need to visit Bragi College first," said David, "and if you would, please take our things to the penthouse. We don't have the time."
"I will take care of that," Venn said.
"Sadly," said Magnar, "for now, we must part. I should prepare for this afternoon's session at the Arena."
"Goodbye, Magnar," Aiden said, "perhaps you can show me the hot spots soon."
"I look forward to that," said Magnar.
The firm seats in the transport aggravated the soreness of my glute muscles, but it beat walking on my aching legs. I felt like a bundle of pain, but I tried not to complain about every arduous step. I wanted the experience to toughen me up. At that moment, I envied Aiden.
Many people walked about on the pathways, and bicycles were a favorite mode of transportation. We passed many massive buildings that contained apartments, and specialty shops filled the ground floor of most buildings. According to David, artisans of all kinds would create useful personal items, things for you or your home, and provide services there. Custom clothiers of all kinds had immense popularity as fabrics were plentiful, and people always needed clothing. I knew we would need clothing ourselves soon; we couldn't go about in the same clothes forever.
One City had buildings in an eclectic mixture, but the districts we saw kept the style consistent for the sake of aesthetics. They built many of the structures with figural statuary. Some had ornate metal or woodwork of graceful curving lines and whimsical details. I saw One City as more than a city; they had created a work of art.
"Everything seems so clean," I said.
"It's what happens when you have a community made up of relatively disciplined people and don't create anything that will require permanent disposal," said David.
"The buildings look new," said Aiden. "How old are they?"
"They're quite old and built to last. We have a large quarry about thirty kilometers southeast of here that provides much of the structure. With metallic alloys and some technological help, stone lasts centuries with little decay. We also use many exotic kinds of wood from the rainforest, but we typically use it for furnishings, since we have less of it. On Jiyu, we don't cut down the trees, we wait until storms have knocked them over, but we also have tree farms.
"Robots build all our buildings. They do a far better job than any human. We create plans for them at one of the colleges. The Master Builder then receives the schematics whose army of robots build the structures."
They had designed the sprawling collection of ornate buildings of Bragi College in the Art Nouveau style. The team of architects' designs combined beauty and functionality throughout. The 80-year-old current campus replaced the outdated one they couldn't retrofit to keep up with the demands of technology. The newer one had more than enough flexibility to carry Jiyu's educational needs into the future for centuries to come.
The Information Director routed us to the appropriate team. The director, Nadia, a pleasant lady who seemed well suited for her job, sent us on a five-minute walk to the fourth floor of building 9 to Team E. The building had no lift, and I trudged up the stairs with difficulty, but I managed.
Having found Team E's lab at the end of the hall, we entered a more extensive and brighter room than the lab at Facility3, and I had never seen so much fantastical equipment. The twenty people there looked on in anticipation over a transparent vat the size of a large stockpot. The inside held a clear bag containing what appeared to be a full-term baby.
"Hello, may I help you?" a woman asked. Our singular concentration on the vat held our attention, and we didn't notice anyone had walked toward us.
"Oh, I'm sorry. It's just that looks fascinating." I pointed to the vat.
Curiously, her face held no discernible expression causing what she felt or thought to remain a complete mystery. Her braided dirty-blonde hair hung thickly down her back, complimenting her sand-colored skin, but most surprising of all, her eyes were like purple amethyst that almost glittered in the light. I could tell that Aiden was having trouble turning away from her to deal with the business for which we had come.
By this point, everyone in the lab was staring in our direction. "Yes, my name is Rick, this is my mate David, and this is our good friend Aiden, who one day could become a colleague of yours if I'm not mistaken."
"Aiden?" His name, called by a new voice, drew his attention. "Would you be the Aiden who saved Amare?" asked one of the men in the room.
"Yes, I am," he said, and that's when they did everything but roll out the red carpet.
"Will you go back for Cadmar?" asked someone else.
While their conversation went on, I whispered to David, "You said that three million people live here. Did everyone know Cadmar?"
David whispered back, "I know I hadn't known him well, and I hadn't met Tamika until today, but it's my understanding that many people liked him. However, when you've gone through the portal and not come back, the word gets out. I suspect he's the Amelia Earhart of Jiyu right now."
Finally, Aiden got to the reason we had come.
"I don't think so," said someone in the group at the front with many of them shaking their heads.
"Unfortunately, that's not possible," said a woman with an American accent toward the back. "I'm Laurel, the team leader." She moved forward in the group. "The enhancements neither emit a signal nor react in response to one, except an active link to Iris, which isn't possible after death."
We didn't want to hear that, but we thanked them for their time. As we turned to go, Laurel walked us to the staircase. Aiden kept staring at the woman with the amethyst eyes, and she stared at him in curiosity as we rounded the corner of the doorway to leave.
"I'm sorry that we couldn't help with tracing Cadmar," said Laurel, then she held us up for a moment. "I do have an idea, though. I'm part of a group with an obsession with the portal. We call ourselves Portalphiles, and we know everything known about the portal. Trust members receive the portal's secrets, but we have our ways to know. The diamond in Cadmar's ring has the quantum chip in it, and the portal's field will read it. If we could rig a device that could reproduce an identical field with longer range, then you could use it to find the ring, and if you find the ring, you may find Cadmar."
David made a glance at me. "Can you do that?" he asked Laurel. "How long would it take to build? We must leave in six days."
"If we used the forge, we wouldn't have difficulty with the device, and shouldn't take more than four or five days of intensive work, but we would need to know the nature of the signal--which my friends and I do not know--and its frequency. However, the biggest problem is that the Trust keeps the information we need more secret than the secret about the rings. Those few who know it, guard it closely. Someone could use the information to find the portal when it's out of phase, and regardless of which planet you're on, they wouldn't want to take that chance. I can hardly blame them."
"The ability to find the portal when it's out of phase would be dangerous for us if they didn't already know its location," said David. "Unfortunately, keeping that secret is moot now."
"If they know the portal's location," Laurel said, "I'm among many people who believe we can move it, so it's not necessarily a lost cause."
"Really?" The three of us asked.
"I think so, yes. While we know quite a lot about the portal, what we know is undoubtedly far less than what we don't."
David put his arm around Laurel. "I think, my dear Laurel, you are our new best friend."
"Laurel," Aiden said, adjusting his glasses, "who is that woman with the unusual eyes in the lab?"
"That's Greta," she said. "She's pretty fantastic, isn't she?"
"She looks-"
"Not human," Laurel said. "She's not, but she's close, and in some ways, she's more human than some humans are."
"What is she?" I asked.
"She's a genetically engineered, biological gynoid; the female counterpart to an android."
"Does she know that's what she is?" I asked.
"Yes, we've kept nothing from her," said Laurel. "She understands that, regardless of how she got here, her existence is no different than any of ours. We are all the lucky ones."
Laurel had to finish what she was doing in the lab but planned to meet us out front in half an hour. We stepped into the quad and waited on a bench in the shade of a tree. The light wind cooled us, and I felt grateful for the opportunity to sit for a few minutes. We watched as dozens of people went about the grounds on their way to one thing or another.
"It's a lovely place," Aiden said, looking around. "I would enjoy coming here."
"Who do you guys think has the information we need?" I asked them.
"I think we have only two reasonable choices," David said, "Amare and Dmitry, the two eldest members of the Trust." David tapped twice behind his ear. "Iris? I need to speak to Amare, please."
Although neither Aiden nor I could hear the voice, we could listen to David's side of the conversation. Amare invited us to his home at 12 o'clock to speak to him in person.
It had been several years since I'd gone to a school, but Bragi was different. The campus rested upon two and a half square kilometers of land with a sprawling mass of buildings and green space. I saw little bits of evidence everywhere that the college had no concern over monetary matters. It had academics as its primary focus, especially the sciences, but what is life without the humanities? So, Bragi had those well represented. The two colleges, Bragi and Leren, had produced the community's greatest minds and artists for centuries. For myself, as a lover of a multitude of art forms, the theatricals, opera, and symphony excited me. But I wanted most to immerse myself in the ancient manuscripts David mentioned.
As a woman of short stature, with auburn shoulder-length hair, I could tell that Laurel had genetically altered her skin tone. Although naturally red-headed, her skin could produce melanin like everyone else. No doubt, it stemmed from a desire to live life more comfortably beneath Jiyu's sun. As promised, half an hour later, Laurel met us in front of building nine.
On the way to Amare's home, bringing Laurel with us, Venn gave us some important news, a storm front would come through and would arrive in two days.
"Most of us live pretty busy lives," David said, "and we don't have many festival days, except New Year's Day, Founder's Day, and the three-day celebration at the beginning of summer. And while we have regular rainfall, it doesn't storm often, but when it does, we use them as nature's way of telling us to take the day off. It's customary to stay home, enjoy the storm from safety, and spend time with our families."
"That's a great idea," Aiden said. "Who thought of that?"
"No one did," said Laurel. "It evolved from a natural inclination to stay indoors during the storms. We have few things so urgent that it cannot wait till the next day. We care about our community, and we want everyone to remain safe. That's why it became something we culturally encouraged. You'll see why. The storm won't affect the timeline, though. We will finish the device on time."
"What part of the Americas were you from?" I asked as her muddled accent reminded me.
"I lived in Kentucky for a long while," said Laurel, "but in the end, I lived in San Diego. As I attended college there, I acquired enormous amounts of school loan debt, to add to the medical debt from a surgery I had in Kentucky. Between the two, I would have paid on those debts for the rest of my life. I came here about 60 jears ago when we had Caster as our envoy to the United States. I gratefully gave all that up. I'm all Jiyu now. I wouldn't go back at gunpoint."
"I wouldn't blame you," I said.
"So," she said to me, glancing at David, "what's it like to have Jiyu's Ambassador to Earth as a mate?" She smiled a crooked smile.
I looked at David. "You were Ambassador to Earth?"
"I've never thought of myself in such lofty terms," he said, "but essentially yes, and I still am, until I'm relieved of my position."
"Really? Do you have diplomatic immunity and everything?" I asked.
"Oh no, Rick, such a thing would entail far too much," David said. "That's an agreement between nations dealing with legalities. We would never involve ourselves in such things, even if they did know about us. Mine is a coordinator position, being so close to the portal, whoever has the London post acts as a hub."
"Fascinating," I said, then looked at Laurel. "It's strange, Laurel, strange, indeed. Thank you for letting me know, it's more than this lug has told me."
David laughed, placing his arm around me. "Trust me; the designation is virtually meaningless."
"It may not stay that way," said Aiden. "They do know about Jiyu now."
"Well...we'll see," David said.