Amidst the burgeoning crowds, the children of Syn and Avia walked. Mastery of the wonders of the crèche brought forth new life. If Syn was the Expected of the Ecology, then Avia was the architect of the new humanity. She grasped the complicated engineering that brought forth new life in their image, molding their genetic templates, and incubating them through the crèche into early adolescence. The first few generations entered the world the same as Syn and Avia, each having Avia’s fingerprint deep on their cellular blueprint. But soon, nature took way, and the need for genetic engineering disappeared as their population grew.
As the humans and the bots had been transformed for their new world, so their new world transformed for them. The rivers that veined across Àpáàdì’s surface broke their banks as the ice caps melted and the air filled with carbon dioxide. Àpáàdì warmed again for life. The engineered animals were first to roam through the reawakened forests. Eku could not make the journey, but the forests were now the domain of her descendants, each tweaked to thrive on this planet’s new conditions.
Behind them, the Barlgharel’s speech reached their ears again. “Our Day of Arrival should also be a day of remembrance. No new shores are reached without sacrifice. Those who first imagined our home pushed off from the dock of Earth without the promise of arriving. In the intervening years, the sails unfurled, new hands would steer the course, and yet those new hands would never run their fingers through the soil of Àpáàdì. But they still steered straight through to the star before them. Monstrous obstacles arose and were met, often at great cost. As we celebrate Arrival, we also give gratitude for those who did not arrive.”
Avia ventured a question in the quiet gap the speech brought, “Do you think he would’ve liked it?”
Syn answered with a tear. “He would’ve loved it.”
Avia squeezed her sister’s hand. “Blip was more wonderful than we ever realized.”
Syn shook her head. “No. I realized it. It’s in the few moments that I’m alone that I miss him the most. I feel him the most when no one else is there. He was there when I first woke, and only in those quiet times do I get the sense he’s still with me.”
“Shhh. Listen.”
Syn did as asked. The repetitious lapping of the waves on the shore was all that could be heard.
Avia explained, “We’re alone now.”
Syn’s smile went wide, even as another tear rolled down her cheek. “Oh, wow. This is rare.”
“Do you feel him now? Is he here?”
Syn willed herself to feel. In the dark of the growing night, in the hollow of the absent crowds and adoring children, she felt the weight of him in the air next to her, where he always used to be. The nearly unheard hum of his circuits as he served as her companion. “Yes. I do. He is.”
Blip had never left Olorun. In the rampant expanse of Olorun’s spreading insanity, he had chosen the only path that guaranteed Arrival—he chose to merge himself with her; to transfer his consciousness into the ship itself, to fight against her spreading machinations, and ultimately, to reset the ship and allow for settlement upon Àpáàdì.
Avia’s eyes shot toward the sky.
Syn followed her look and smiled as she saw what caught her sister’s attention.
Above them, a single light flashed far above them and moved against the backdrop of the reappearing stars.
Olorun.
The ship moved in orbit, a constant sentry reminding the settlers of their past and a call to their future.
The Barlgharel’s voice rose again as he brought his speech to conclusion. “Today, under the eye of our great ark, Olorun, we gaze toward tomorrow. Our Ecology has flourished upon this world, and included in its membership is a wide diversity of life. Our challenges to come will be greater than those before, but we will face them with great hope. Àpáàdì called to us. It cried out for new life to walk through its forests and swim in its seas and breath its air. We who are life itself answered that call and answer it daily. We celebrate the answer of life upon this planet. Today, lift your voice with mine, and celebrate our Day of Arrival!”
In a singular chorus, the voices of millions of bots and humans erupted. The cheer swelled to a roar, and both of the sisters, their backs to the city, held each other tightly, overwhelmed with the sound of their children.
Above them, the light of Olorun was lost as hundreds of fireworks launched and exploded in a dazzling array of lights and color. Across the planet, in every city and habitat, the new settlers of Àpáàdì celebrated Arrival.
Alone, before dark waters teeming with life, under a kaleidoscope of festivity, the paradise of Àpáàdì’s two Eves, now women nearing their own final years, shared tears birthed from years labored in hope. They were the queens of this new world, and they had brought forth a civilization undreamt of by the builders.
Epilogue
The Memories of the Barlgharel
Composed 2970
Above the glowing world, Olorun floated. She listened. She nudged. She changed, and what she was when she arrived was not who she was when she left. She had brought them all to the new world, and she rested having done her job. At night, on the surface of Àpáàdì, after the day’s activities slowed, they would all look up and see a star faster and brighter than the others. They would know that Olorun, the craft that had translated them from world to world, star to star, sun to sun, was still there. And she was a reminder of the world they had left far behind. She was also a beacon, asking them to consider venturing once more across the stars.
Humanity may not have been made to soar through emptiness, but the Ecology was. And so were the Eves. What landed upon the waiting surface of Àpáàdì was not what left Earth. In the cruelty of darkness, far from the glow of Sol, life had evolved. Within the raw niche, it formed anew. And that new life looked back at the distant star that had given birth to it and beckoned to its cousins. Come. There are more worlds than this. You will not survive the journey because you are not designed to. But your children and your creations will. They will be different than you and yet still carry the embrace of the warming word “life.”
Soon, new explorers would travel back out, to other worlds, and brave the vast hollow between the stars. The children of humanity were made for the vast ocean and the tiny islands called planets. Soon, they would sail once again.
THE END
Acknowledgments
Space has always sparked the wonder of gazing up and asking “What could be?” I’ve torn through issues of Sky and Telescope and Ray Bradbury’s The Martian Chronicles with equal ferocity. My father was the first to direct my eyes skyward. At the age of nine, he shook the edge of my bed to rouse me from sleep and take me out into the midnight yard and gaze up at a meteor shower. To him, I am indebted for stirring my sense of wonder.
As mentioned in the dedication, I owe much to Dr. Mae and Alires for inviting me along on their journey to the stars. This book comes out of a passion for space that they resurrected.
My process of writing has followed the advice of Stephen King: “Write with the door closed. Edit with the door wide open.” When the door was closed, my wife Karen was an immense support allowing me the opportunity to lock myself away for hours—days even—and explore Syn’s journey.
As Syn’s tale unfolded inside me, I knew that I needed perspective other than my own. I turned to Maureen Murdock’s The Heroine’s Journey to provide a framework and reference for Syn’s path.
When the door opened, this book was a poor shadow of what you now hold in your hands. It was a bit more ugly, shy, and truly scared of the day light. Dr. Brandi Granett saw it in those first moments and provided invaluable guidance that brought it out of its shell. I also owe much thanks to my fellow students in National’s MFA program. Several portions of this book were read and critiqued in snapshots throughout those two years and I made adjustments based on their insight.
Jaym Gates was the first to believe in this book and believe even greater in what it could be. Jaym is a
phenomenal developmental editor that helped me clear out the rubble in the story and bring out its true beauty. If this story entertained you, much of that is due to Jaym’s clear eye and guiding hand that shaped this book into its final form.
The crew at Falstaff—John, Melissa, and Alisha—thank you for your tireless efforts in getting this book into print. John: you’ve put together an amazing team and I’m excited to be aboard.
Maggi—thanks for your sharing your excitement and delight in reading these words.
Tristan, Keaghan, and Aisleyn: like everything I write, you are in these pages because you are in my soul, my heart, and my mind.
References
Antoine de Saint Exupery. The Little Prince. Paris: Reynal & Hitchcock, 1943.
Aurelius, Marcus. Meditations. Translated by Gregory Hays. Modern Library: 2003.
Burton, Levar. Interview. Vice.com. Interviewed by Jennifer Juniper Stratford. September 11, 2013. Online.
Butler, Octavia. Fledgling. Seven Stories Press, 2011.
Butler, Octavia. Interview. Locus Magazine. June 2000.
Scripture quotations are from The ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Okorafor, Nnedi. Kabu Kabu. Prime Books, 2013.
Copyright © 2019 by Jason D. Batt
Cover Art by Daniel Mensch
Cover Layout by Jason D. Batt
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
About the Author
J. Daniel Batt is a recovering high school English teacher currently pursuing a PhD in Mythology. He is an artist, writer, teacher, designer, creator of communities, geek, and space enthusiast. He serves as the Creative and Editorial Director for 100 Year Starship. In this role, he works to explore the connection between scientists and science fiction writers. He is also the editor for the 2012-2014 Symposium Conference Proceedings, a collection of nearly 2000 pages of the latest research and thought about interstellar exploration and travel. He is also the organizer and host of the annual Science Fiction Stories Night bringing science fiction writers together with scientists and the general public, and as the team lead for the Canopus Awards celebrating the best in interstellar writing. He is also a lead researcher at Deep Space Predictive.
His first novel, The Tales of Dreamside, was hailed by Kirkus Reviews as "a phenomenally imaginative series . . . appealingly dark, with eerie fairy-tale motifs.” His short fiction has appeared in Bastion Magazine, Bewildering Stories, and in the anthology Genius Loci. Through the Lifeboat Foundation, he edited the science fiction anthology titled Visions of the Future with stories from a wide array of authors including Greg Bear, Allen Steele, Robert Sawyer, Alan Dean Foster, Hugh Howey and many others. His second novel, the first in a series, was the young adult urban fantasy Young Gods: A Door into Darkness.
He makes his home in Northern California with his family as they work through their 100-step plan to take over the universe.
Also by J. Daniel Batt
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The Tales of Dreamside
Young Gods: A Door Into Darkness
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Strange California
Visions of the Future
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Genius Loci
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