by Rosa Montero
As he was speaking, the man was approaching them. And now he was standing next to the cylinder and contemplating Chi’s body with surprisingly watchful eyes under the sleepy eyelids. It’s a look that hides his tenacity, thought Bruna.
“If no one explains that there are adulterated mems out there that are driving reps mad, then it just looks as if we technos are dangerous murderers. It’s clumsy, but it works.”
The words had come out of Husky’s mouth of their own accord, as if someone else had dictated them to her. But as soon as she said them she realized that they were true, that Myriam Chi was right—there was a conspiracy—and that maybe this devious, granite-like inspector was also part of the plot. The RRM leader had said so already: you can’t trust the police.
“And why does it work? Well, because deep down, all you humans are afraid of us...You despise us and, at the same time, you fear us. You too, Inspector? Do I scare you? Do I disgust you?”
“Husky, you do say some silly things,” muttered Gándara, clearly displeased.
Ah, thought Bruna, you too. The old medical examiner was aligning himself with the recent arrival, a fellow human. Birds of a feather always ended up sticking together. But no, that wasn’t it, the rep thought again, making an effort to be rational; it was hardly surprising that her words would make Gándara feel uncomfortable, because she rarely let loose with such fiery speeches. It was as if she felt obliged to speak for Myriam Chi—as if she had to say what Myriam would have said.
“The only thing that frightens me is stupidity,” said Lizard.
“How many rep inspectors are there in the Judicial Police Force?”
The man gave a weary sigh.
“Answer! How many technohuman inspectors are there?” repeated Bruna, almost shouting.
Lizard looked at her with an easygoing calmness.
“None,” he replied.
Husky was stunned. She wasn’t expecting that reply. To tell the truth, before that moment, it would never have occurred to her to ask such a question. Something hurt inside her head. A thought that was burning like an emotion. A rational recognition of marginalization. She noted the mindless defense mechanism of anger taking hold inside her. She did an about-face and, without any farewell, left the room. She could just hear Paul’s thick voice behind her.
“Remember, tomorrow at 13:00 in the Judiciary.”
Bruna charged down the dark corridors, crossed the lobby without greeting the guards and left the institute as if she were running away. But her flight lost its momentum as soon as she abandoned the building. She stopped a few yards from the entrance, in the middle of the night and on an empty street, not knowing what to do or where to go. She was too upset to go home; too angry to go to one of her usual hang-outs, such as Oli’s bar, and put up with the banal chitchat of some acquaintance; too full of death to remain on her own. Four years, three months, and twenty-one days.
The cold air was a relief to her burning cheeks. She was standing on the sidewalk, feet slightly apart, feeling all the weight of her body, her neck sweaty, her arms relaxed, her stomach smooth and taut, her legs agile. Flesh alert, eager. A body raging with life. An acute unease began to take shape inside her, like a storm cloud in a late summer sky. Suddenly she remembered something and started to rummage through all her pockets. Finally, wrapped up in a crumpled piece of paper inside a box of painkillers in her backpack, she found what she was looking for—a candy. An oxytocin cocktail. The tiny pill must have been lying forgotten in its hiding place for months, and it was a bit sticky. Bruna gave the pill a superficial clean, rubbing it between two fingers, and then she placed it under her tongue to speed up the impact of the drug. And for a few minutes, she focused on breathing and waiting. On relishing the cold night air. On emptying her mind and becoming all body.
There was a car parked in front of the entrance to the Forensic Anatomy Institute. It wasn’t a regulation police vehicle, but the gray license plates indicated that it was an official car. Without doubt the car belonged to Inspector Paul Lizard—the Reptile, the Caiman, that barely trustworthy hulk. Bruna inhaled deeply. Her skin was burning, but from within now. In a few moments, the rep would do something about that. About all that energy and fire. Shortly, Bruna would begin to cruise the city; she would surf the night in search of sex—of a carnal explosion capable of defeating death. The only possible eternity was between her legs. Like most humans and technohumans, Bruna was more or less bisexual; only a few individuals were exclusively heterosexual or homosexual. But on the whole, she preferred men, and in any case, tonight she wanted a man. Maybe someone as big as the reptile Lizard, a gigantic human whom she’d have begging for her android vagina. Bruna let loose a brief laugh. Her heart was beating faster, her body seemed to be boiling; the air was charged with pheromones. The rapture of the night. She was a star on the verge of bursting, a pulsating quasar. She walked a few steps, relishing her vigor and her agility, her hunger and her health. Relishing a ferocious happiness. She put her hand under her short metallic skirt and, leaning against the parked car, she took off her panties. Tonight she wanted to roam the city without any underwear. It wasn’t the first time she had done so, and it wouldn’t be the last. What pleasure to feel herself completely open, rid of hindrances, available. Before she headed off, she left her panties on the windscreen of the policeman’s car. The world buzzed around her and the beat of life throbbed in her veins, her heart and, in particular, at the center of her naked flower, right down there.
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Floating Worlds
Keywords: History of Science, Labaric Cult, aristopopulism, Plagues, Robot Wars, bilateral agreements, Second Cold War.
#63-025
Entry being edited
The Floating Worlds in existence at present are the Democratic State of Cosmos and the Kingdom of Labari. These two gigantic artificial structures maintain fixed orbits with respect to Earth, and are authentic worlds with complete autonomy. Although, for strategic reasons, Cosmos and Labari both adhere to a cryptic policy of data concealment, it is assumed that there are between five and six hundred million inhabitants on each of the Floating Worlds. They are all humans, as neither world allows technos or aliens to live there, a fact which converts these Worlds into zones that are undoubtedly more secure for our species.
The first references to the eventual need for the construction of an artificial world in the stratosphere to provide accommodation for at least a portion of humanity in the event of a catastrophe surfaced in the so-called Atomic Era—the decades in the mid-twentieth century that followed the explosion of the first nuclear fission bombs among civilian populations (Hiroshima and Nagasaki). But the idea of building alternative worlds in space became a social necessity and a real possibility during the twenty-first century, following the havoc wreaked by global warming, which raised the level of the oceans by six feet and inundated some 18 percent of the Earth’s surface and, even more critically, following the high loss of life, despair, and insecurity caused by the Plagues, the Rep War, and the Robot Wars.
The Kingdom of Labari is named after the founder of the Church of the One Creed, the Argentinian Heriberto Labari (2001–2071). A podiatrist by profession, Labari was born on September 11, 2001, the day of the well-known attack on the World Trade Center in New York, a coincidence he would subsequently use as evidence of his predestination. When he turned thirty, Labari pronounced that he had received a divi
ne message. He gave up his work, founded the Church of the One Creed, and dedicated himself to preaching about the Labaric Cult, which, according to him, was the original and primordial religion brought to Earth by extraterrestrials in remote times and subsequently perverted and broken up through ignorance and greed into the planet’s various beliefs. The cult offered a syncretic mix of the bestknown religions, especially Christianity and Islam, together with ingredients from role-play and fantasy, with overtones reminiscent of a medieval, hierarchical, sexist, subservient, and highly ritualistic world. In order to disseminate his teachings, Heriberto Labari wrote some twenty science fiction novels that quickly became very popular. “My fantastic tales are the Christian parables of the twenty-first century,” he once declared. It must be remembered that the founding of the Church of the One Creed coincided with the terrible years of the Plagues, one of the most violent and tragic periods in the history of humanity, and Labari’s message seemed to offer security and the possibility of salvation. When the prophet died in 2071, killed by a fanatical Shi’ite assassin, there were already hundreds of millions of Ones throughout Earth. Some of them, ranging from Arab sheiks from the Persian Gulf region to important Western entrepreneurs, were incredibly wealthy.
A few years before his death, Labari had begun to speak about the construction of a stratospheric world, not only in order to flee from an ever more convulsed Earth, but also to create a perfect society based on the rigid parameters of the Labaric Cult. His posthumous novel, The Kingdom of the Pure, specified in great detail what such a place would be like. Labari is shaped like a thick ring or, rather, an enormous pneumatic tire. By all accounts, it was generated by semiartificial bacteria capable of reproducing themselves in space at dizzying speed and forming a light, semiorganic, porous, and practically indestructible material that does not lose its shape. The details of this highly innovative technology remain a secret. It is striking that a society that is officially antitechnology has been capable of a scientific discovery of this caliber, even if the processes employed are either natural or seem to imitate nature in some way. The Kingdom’s inhabitants live inside the walls of the outer ring; and, in the interior, an immense reservoir of water and hydrogenreleasing algae supplies the Kingdom’s energy needs.
While Labari is the result of a new religion, Cosmos is the product of an ideology. Although perhaps both end up being the same. When the Moon Pact, which ended the Rep War, was signed in 2062, there was only one state that did not sign it: Russia. At that time, the old Russian empire was going through the worst moment in its history. It was a bankrupt nation, devastated by gangs and drastically reduced in size thanks to successive wars and bitter conflicts with its neighbors, who had been shrinking its borders. Since the Russians were so poor and backward that they did not even have technohuman production plants, the fact that they had not signed the Moon Pact did not alter in any way the effectiveness of the agreement. But the refusal to sign made Amaia Elescanova—who had just been elected president of that nation in ruins—famous overnight.
Elescanova (2013–2104) was the founder and leader of the Regeneration (or PeГeHepauИЯ) Party. She argued that all the evils of the world were the result of the abandonment of utopias and of surrender to the abuses of capitalism. While she maintained that both Marxism and the Soviet model were obsolete, she nevertheless demanded the creation of a common revolutionary front to end the world’s inequalities. In her essay Responsible Minorities and Contented Masses, the cornerstone of her ideology, Elescanova proposed a society governed by the wisest and the fittest, along the lines of Plato’s republic but strengthened by scientific advances : “The same zygote could even be employed to boost the best qualities of the new ruling class, by employing eugenic techniques (...) Science and Social Conscience United to Create the Supermen and Superwomen of the Future (capital letters in the original text).”
Regenerationism, or aristopopulism as it rapidly came to be called, spread like wildfire throughout the world, especially after the mid-2070s, when various nations began to impose a charge for clean air, and citizens with fewer resources were forced to emigrate en masse to the more polluted zones. But it was not just the financially weak sectors that adopted Elescanova’s doctrine. Powerful parties from various countries and differing ideologies—from the extreme left to the extreme right—joined forces with the Russian leader in 2077 to form the International Aristopopular Movement (IAM), an antibourgeois, antireligion, and anticapitalist organization although, paradoxically, one that had considerable capital at its disposal.
A movement such as this naturally aspires to world domination, but perhaps Earth did not appear to the IAM to have much of a future. Whether it was for this reason or the news that the Labarians were going to build a floating kingdom, what is certain is that the IAM’s first decision was to build its own extraterrestrial platform. In fact, a fierce competition of sorts arose between the Ones and the Aristopopulists to see who could finish their project first, as if the remarkable achievement of an artificial world might serve as an advertising ploy for their respective, if opposing, life visions. Despite starting the race later, the IAM won; the Democratic State of Cosmos was inaugurated in 2087, while the first subjects of the Kingdom of Labari did not arrive until 2088.
Although the plans and details are also unknown in this instance, there is no question that Cosmos is a dazzling construction. A multitude of pyramids made out of carbon nanofibers are linked to one another to form a megapyramid. The result is a sort of tubular net, a framework from which the buildings or living modules are hung, interconnected by “streets” that run through the interiors of the tubes.
The construction of these artificial worlds was observed on Earth with growing distrust and apprehension. However, any effective opposition to the creation of these floating nations was prevented by the fact that the two projects were being driven by multinational social movements and, more importantly, by the chaos and loss of life provoked by the Robot Wars. And when they were finally inaugurated, millions of desperate residents of Earth attempted to gain admission to either of the worlds in order to escape the tremendous desolation caused by the wars. Cosmos and Labari did not participate in the Global Agreements of Cassiopeia, because they refused to grant technohumans and aliens the same rights as humans. Nevertheless, both the Ones and the Aristopopulists subsequently signed bilateral agreements with the United States of the Earth, although relations have never been easy. This coexistence, full of suspicion, secrets and tension, has been dubbed the Second Cold War by analysts. That said, given that the two worlds continue to be mortal enemies and have no diplomatic relations whatsoever, the USE has on occasion found itself obliged to carry out the role of unofficial intermediary.
Finally, some sources speak of the existence of a third Floating World, a much smaller structure, possibly even self-propelled——more a megaspaceship than an orbital platform——inhabited by a democratic, tolerant, and free society that enjoys a reasonably just and happy life. This community would have begun its clandestine existence during the turbulent years of the Robot Wars, and since then would have managed to hide itself in space. It is known as Avalon, but everything points to its existence being an urban myth.
CHAPTER TEN
The first thing Bruna was conscious of, as always, was the stabbing throb in her temples. The hangover drilling through her head like a fiery screw.
Next, she sensed a reddish light through the membrane of her eyelids—eyelids that were still too heavy to feel like opening. But the light suggested that it was very bright. Maybe it was daytime.
Whiplashes of pain shot across her forehead. Thinking was torture.
Bruna nevertheless forced herself to think. And to remember. A black hole seemed to have swallowed up her most recent past, but on the other side of that enormous void the rep began to recover broken images of the previous night, landscapes glimpsed through the fog. Noisy venues full of people. Packed dance floors. Before that, the Forensic Anatomy Institute
. Chi’s corpse. The street, the moon. And Bruna putting a candy under her tongue. Again, she glimpsed a confusion of venues. A faceless character inviting her to have a drink. The public screens chattering against a black sky. A group of musicians playing. A hand making its way up her back. She shivered, and that forced her to become aware of the rest of her body apart from her ever-present, pounding head. She was facedown on what seemed to be a bed, arms bent on either side of her body, her face resting on her left cheek.
Bruna breathed slowly so as not to arouse the monstrous headache further. She had no recollection of how the night had ended, and she had absolutely no idea where she might be. She loathed waking up in a strange house. She hated greeting a new day in a neighborhood she didn’t know, and having to check location coordinates on her mobile in order to find out where she was. She felt the sheet with her right hand, but it was impossible to determine by touch alone if it was her own bed. She had no alternative but to open her eyes. Four years, three months, and twenty days.
She raised her eyelids very slowly, afraid to look. Sure enough, there was a lot of light; a merciless daylight that beat down on her retinas. It took her a few seconds to overcome the dazzle, then she recognized the small fake-leather armchair half-covered by the messy pile of her clothes—the metallic skirt, the thermal jacket. And the T-shirt tossed on the familiar synthetic wood floor. She was in her own apartment. That was a start.
The good news encouraged her and, supporting herself on her hands, she managed to raise her trunk. As she was doing so, she noticed out of the corner of her eye that beside her the bedspread was bulging over what appeared to be another person. She wasn’t alone. Not everything was going to be so simple, of course.
Being totally nude wasn’t the best way to introduce herself to a stranger, so she grabbed the jacket from the nearby armchair and clumsily put it on, still sitting on the bed. Then she took a deep breath, summoned all her energy and stood up. Standing next to the bed, her temples throbbing, she looked at her visitor, who, judging by the lump, was very big. A bulky body lying on its side with its back to her, completely covered by the sheet. Well, not entirely. Up top some hair was visible—coarse—and the nape of a neck, a green neck.
