Amygdala

by Harper J. Cole

  “Of course, this might be the last day. Ms. Rivers has set out her overarching philosophy very clearly and succinctly. Truthfully, I can’t sum up mine that quickly, as I believe in judging each scenario on its merits, but I can tell you this: what we do out here will have repercussions. I’m not talking about the Matans. I’m talking about me and you.

  “I’m sure you’re all familiar with epic stories – the kind where the heroine achieves her objectives and the tale ends. She doesn’t have to deal with any psychological ramifications springing from her choices or experiences. Her existence ends with the last page.

  “Ours won’t. We’ll live on for years after we return home, and once the euphoria’s passed, once the media fanfare’s died down, we’ll have to live with our decisions out here. There’s no escaping the questions we ask ourselves during the long nights or the slow days. Did I do wrong? Did I do harm?

  “I want you to be able to say ‘I did right’, and to know in your hearts that you did. I want you to leave behind a heroic legacy, because that’s what each of you deserves.

  “In the end, wherever you lay yourselves down to rest, I want your sleep to be peaceful.”

  She smiled, feeling a hint of that peace herself. There was no need to run through her arguments against the specific plan of buying weaponry, because there wasn’t a woman sitting before her who couldn’t grasp the pros and cons for herself easily enough. Trying to reach them on an emotional level had been the only way.

  “I’ve said all I can. What happens next is up to you…”

  * * *

  Miriam Hunter sat alone in her quarters half an hour later.

  She’d won. Her speech had won over enough hearts to keep her in command. The final tally was eleven to four in her favour, with a single abstention.

  Rivers, to her credit, had taken the defeat well, even flashing a rare smile.

  “Congratulations, Captain. It seems that your way is the best, after all. I’ll understand if you no longer want me as your science chief, but whether I am or not, I’ll do everything in my power to make this a happy, unified crew.”

  Hunter had never had any intention of demoting her. Even if she’d wished to, a show of vindictiveness would have been a sour note to end a successful afternoon on. She’d thanked the professor for her grace in defeat, accepted the kind words of a few other crew members, then excused herself, explaining that she wanted to resume her studies of the Matan monetary system.

  It wasn’t until she was safely back in her quarters, with two sturdy doors standing between herself and the rest of the crew, that the tears had come.

  She felt drained now. How long had it been since she’d last cried? Her blurry gaze found the framed picture of her daughter that rested on her bedside cupboard. Yes, that would be it. The time she lost Amelia at Disneyland. Hunter remembered it well, how quickly her mild concern had escalated into full blown panic. Ten long minutes carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders. Then a flash of golden hair by the puppet stand. Sheer relief. Amelia, who’d had no idea she had been missed, had been nonplussed by her mother’s tears.

  For all the grief she’d had with her only child later in life, for all the joy of those early years, that had been the emotional peak, that blessed snuffing out of fear.

  Guess I’ve been kidding myself a little bit. Thought I was only concerned about staying in charge because that was best for the crew, but it was more personal than that.

  I was afraid of losing my ship. My baby.

  Captain Hunter shook her head, bemused by the depth of her own emotion. Then she wiped away the traces of her tears and stepped back out into the meeting room, where her computer was waiting.

  Enough sentimentality. She had work to do.

  X

  History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it.

  – Winston Churchill

  Who would have thought a little wind and a few billion grains of sand could produce something so mesmerising?

  One of the sandstorms after which the city of Habadimo was named had come to visit them a couple of hours ago and seemed to be in no hurry to leave. The Ramiran weather service had predicted it well in advance, fortunately – in that field, their technology was substantially ahead of the best humanity had to offer – and every building in the city was in lockdown mode, all doors and windows automatically sealed.

  As anyone caught outside would be at serious risk, the Ramirans had a subterranean network leading from building to building – a series of tunnels, narrow and crudely built, but quite secure. At Haji’s advice, Hunter had used these to reach the leisure centre. Here she could watch the storm.

  She stood on a circular platform within a transparent sphere, raised some fifty feet above the centre’s roof. Her hands rested on a simple metal bar, which ran around the perimeter. The only entrance was a shaft leading downwards from the exact centre of the platform. On Earth this would have meant a difficult climb by ladder, but with Matan anti-gravity one could simply walk up it. This was the first time the captain had seen that technology on Ramira – she had the impression that its use in architecture was considered needlessly flashy here.

  The sphere surrounding her was made of a material so clear as to be virtually invisible, and so smooth that almost none of the swirling sand stuck to it. By looking carefully Hunter could see a few spots where minor imperfections had allowed errant grains to accumulate, but they did little to dispel the illusion that she was standing unprotected in the middle of the storm.

  Shortly after the Bona Dea’s journey had begun, she’d taken a look at the ephemeral universe using Gypsy’s quantum goggles; what she’d seen that day had been somewhat similar to this. However, the bubbling soup of ephemeral particles had moved in a way that appeared random and chaotic, to Hunter’s eyes at least. By contrast, there was an underlying rationality to the sandstorm, a series of patterns that lent it a certain beauty. Lime coloured sand rushed by in streams and eddies, a shifting, tangled maze.

  Negotiations had been suspended; it was considered bad luck to conduct trade during a storm. Haji had looked a touch embarrassed when he’d explained the superstition to her, but she hadn’t minded the break. The Grand Merchant drove a hard bargain, and the difficulties inherent in trading with a foreign culture had made these a mentally draining few days.

  That said, she’d been enjoying the challenge. The Ramirans took an informal approach to their business that was quite refreshing. Each session had taken place in Haji’s house, with normal family life going on unabated around them. On one occasion the Grand Merchant, whose own children were fully grown, had been babysitting for his next-door neighbours. Two girls and a boy, all under ten, had spent the morning charging from room to room; the youngest eventually fell asleep under the negotiating table. Another time Kala had come storming in from her office and excoriated her husband for setting overly generous prices for crude oil exports, inconsistent with her own internal trade structure. The two Ramirans argued back and forth with such vehemence that Hunter had feared they might actually come to blows, but Haji had abruptly accepted his error and apologised. Kala then smiled affectionately and left without another word.

  The bargaining itself was going fairly well. A fair chunk of the credit for that had to go to Ernő Rubik; one of his cubes had been amongst the oddments that Annie had donated to the cause, and it had proven a smash. The toy’s design plus exclusive manufacturing rights had covered a fair chunk of the cost of the two fragments.

  As Hunter had suspected, though, there would be no deal if she didn’t hand over the blueprints for the Kohler-Schmid Drive. She couldn’t blame Haji for standing firm on that point, of course. He was giving her fragments of a unique and potentially very important artefact. Something equally special must be expected in return.

  While the captain still had doubts about the potential ramifications of introducing this new technology into Matan society, she felt able to rationalise the action. For one thing, if the Ramirans master
ed the technology with unexpected speed it might still provide them with another route home. Annie had been at pains to stress that this was highly unlikely, but miracles happened. Also, the captain trusted the Ramiran people to use the technology wisely.

  As to the warring colonies of Monosade and Anasade, she had introduced a clause stating that those worlds would not be given KSD technology until they had lived in unbroken peace for four generations.

  Time to take a break from thinking about trade, she decided. This was a good spot for meditation: only the faintest pattering could be heard as the storm washed over the transparency, and the swirls of sand were dense enough to hide the other observation globes she knew were dotted about above the leisure centre. She let her mind go quiet, seeing without observing, hearing without listening …

  Just as she was slipping into a truly voiceless state, she got company.

  “Howdy-hi skipper! Willya look at this?”

  Hunter turned with a smile, slipping smoothly back into her normal mental state. “Good afternoon, Annie. The storm’s quite a sight, yes. Care to enjoy it with me for a while?” She tapped the bar next to her.

  “Thanks.” Annie took a place beside her captain, leaning forward on her elbows. “Wasn’t disturbing you, was I?”

  “Not really. I was just meditating.”

  “Wow, literally? I’d not have had you pegged as the spiritual type.”

  “It’s not really a spiritual act, for me at least. I view my brain, and all the processes that happen in it, as tangible and physical. Voiceless meditation, if done correctly, produces scientifically proven benefits.”

  “Voiceless, hmm? Don’t think I know that one.”

  “It’s nothing revolutionary, just a combination of Buddhist techniques and principles from the mindfulness school. The central goal is to switch off your inner voice – that background chatter we all have running through our heads – and contemplate your environment and your own life wordlessly. I find it brings a lot of clarity, as well as being the most relaxing thing outside of a nice warm bath.’ She glanced across at the younger woman. ‘I could probably find some time to teach you the technique, if you’re interested.”

  Predictably, Annie grimaced. “Urgh, not for me I think. Silencing my outer voice is hard enough. When I see stuff like this I just gotta say something.” She indicated the raging storm. “Don’t know if the weather gets this crazed back in the deserts on Earth. What a sight! Mind you, it’s not half as mind-shredding as walking straight up a vertical shaft to get here. Never gonna get used to that.”

  “Oh, I think you’re quite adaptable. It’s old grandmas like me who have the most trouble.”

  “You’ve got grandkids?”

  Hunter blinked. “Good question. I was using a figure of speech, but I probably do have at least one by now. My daughter got married just before we left. I believe children were the plan…”

  “That’s something pretty awesome to be coming back to.”

  “Yes. What about you? Any plans for kids when you get back?”

  “God, I don’t know. Wouldn’t have thought so; don’t think I’m very maternal. Yeah, I certainly wouldn’t want one if it’s just me. I’d have to find the right woman first. Can’t say I’m in a hurry to do that, either. I’m still young, though not quite as young as I thought I was.” She smiled ruefully. “Just realised today that I forgot my own birthday.”

  “Ah. Well, it’s easy to lose track of the conventional date when you’re hopping from planet to planet like we are. I’m not sure myself when we’re up to by the ship’s calendar. April 6th, maybe?”

  “Close. Early hours of the 7th right now. I’ve been twenty-six for five days, and I never noticed.”

  Hunter smiled. “So, you just missed out on having April 1st as a birthday?”

  The technician looked pained. “By five lousy minutes. I’ve never quite forgiven my mother for not pushing a little harder.”

  “I hope that’s a joke.”

  “Yeah. Would have fitted me perfectly though, don’t ya think?”

  “For what it’s worth, you’ll always be an April Fool to me.”

  “Aw, thanks Cappy. Say, you know who’s got a really kick-ass birthday on our crew? Evi! Born on the 21st of the 12th, 2112. Double palindrome. Lucky bitch. Ah … person! Lucky person, I meant.”

  The captain considered Annie in silence for a moment, then turned back to the storm. “You’re probably expecting me to launch into a diatribe on the word ‘bitch’: it’s historical use as a tool to denigrate assertive women, the inappropriateness of its casual use, and so on,” she said. “Perhaps a few weeks ago, I would have done. But what would have been the point? You’re young. You care about today, not yesterday or tomorrow. It’s a shame for you I won that election, otherwise you’d have been free of my idealistic pontificating.”

  “Hey, I voted for you!”

  Surprised, Hunter scanned the younger woman’s face, and saw no deception.

  “You did? I must admit, I’d talked myself into believing that you must have been one of the four who went for Rivers. You and I have had our differences.”

  “Ah, that’s all in the past. Honestly, I’m sorry I signed Rivers’ stupid petition in the first place. She just made it sound reasonable and fair and all that.”

  “Perhaps it was. I’ll not be holding grudges, anyway.”

  “Thanks. And, Captain, I’m cool with your pontificating these days. I can see it means a lot to you.”

  Hunter laughed bitterly. “But not so much to anyone else. A shared passion for women’s betterment was supposed to be the bond that unified us, but I had to back away from that concept to beat Rivers. ‘Lecture mode,’ my daughter used to call it, when I appealed to history. She always hated it.”

  “You don’t talk about her much. Was she mad that you left?”

  Hunter’s first instinct was to push the matter aside, as she had done for years, but Annie’s frank honesty was contagious. “No. We fell out long before that. Things started going wrong once she hit her teens and got progressively worse from there. I wasn’t invited to her wedding, and things were pretty frosty when I visited her to say goodbye before we set off. I don’t suppose she’d be heartbroken if I never came back.”

  “Hey, I’m sure that’s not true. My mom always argues with her sisters, but family’s family. Betcha she misses you already.”

  “You don’t know my daughter. She hangs onto resentment like a life preserver. But I shouldn’t blame her, when I was the one who caused it.”

  “Teenagers can be a nightmare. Looking back, I was a whiny little drama queen for three or four years. I was that way cozza me, not my parents.”

  Hunter shook her head decisively. “I appreciate what you’re saying, but I mishandled her. I thought she’d be another me, but she was always rebellious, like her father.

  “Back when I was a girl, I loved hearing about my legacy. It inspired me; it still does. It’s why we’re here. Whenever I felt like settling for what I had, I only had to remember the accomplishments of my forebears to shatter my complacency. Irene Hunter shrugged off death threats to push through her internet harassment laws; Ada Hunter put a rape response kit in every home on the planet; the impact of Harriet Hunter’s sex worker reforms can be measured in the human lives it’s saved. But how would Miriam Hunter be remembered? As a billionaire businesswoman? Not good enough. I needed something outstanding, something to keep our matrilineal tradition going. The Bona Dea was my solution. I didn’t just want it – I had to have it.

  “Amelia was different. She didn’t idolise me as I did my mother; she didn’t want to know about the past. But I couldn’t accept that the Hunter feminist line might be ending, especially when I realised how bright she was – every test the same, A plus, A plus, A plus – so I started trying to push her in that direction. Of course, the harder, I pushed, the harder she resisted. The harder she resisted, the harder I pushed. I wound up driving her away from me completely, and into the a
rms of Darwin’s Arrow.”

  “Who’re they?”

  “Radical regressive movement. Evolutionary extremists. They believe men and women are at their happiest when playing the roles set for them in the dark ages, and that the social changes feminism has achieved are actually strides in the wrong direction.”

  “I’m guessing you don’t like them much,” suggested Annie.

  “Good guess. Two degrees from Harvard and Amelia winds up a housewife darning her husband’s socks. All to spite me.”

  “Maybe she’s happy that way?”

  “Maybe,” Hunter conceded, “but I know in my heart I didn’t handle her the right way. Then I talk to Rivers and wonder whether I’ve really learned anything about inspiring people.”

  The two of them watched the sandstorm in silence for a while. Hunter tried to lose herself in the spectacle, but her heart wasn’t in it any more. The power of blood ties. However far I go, whatever wonders I see, the wounds Amelia gave me still bite. A serpent’s tooth, indeed…

  At length, Annie spoke again, weighing her words with uncharacteristic care. “Y’know, captain, I’ve been thinking lately. I’ve always been told, ‘Just be yourself,’ and I figured that was pretty easy advice to follow. Last few months, though, I’ve come to see there’s a difference between being yourself and acting yourself that I never saw before. One of them’s natural; the other ain’t.

  “I mean, I know I’m extro and wacky and fun-loving and irreverent – I like all those things about me, I don’t wanna change them. But when I find myself thinking, “I need to do four stupid things today to prove I’m still me,” well … that’s when I wind up getting thrown in the cell. And blaming everyone but myself. Sometimes things are better if you don’t force it. What you said to us at the debate? That wasn’t forced, and, yeah, it inspired us.”

  Hunter smiled, broadly and with warmth. “It seems like we’re learning the same lesson, you and I.”