The Lowest Heaven

by Alastair Reynolds

  Ted’s clone passed the open door of the lounge, pushing the vacuum ahead of him. Ted froze. He stood by the corner of the corridor, hovering half out of sight. Just about the last thing he needed was a conversation with his clone. He needed to clear his head, not muddy it further.

  He watched his clone for a moment, crossing this way and that past the open door. The clone was almost smiling. He seemed… Ted thought the best word for it was ‘content’ and, for a moment, he was reassured. Maybe this was the right thing after all, for his copy as well as himself.

  In a few days, once Ted had left the solar system for good, that clone would head inwards, back towards the Sun, back to where he was needed. The property of FentiCorp, sure, but he had a guaranteed job for life. And, thanks to the behavioural conditioning that was part of the force-grow process, his clone would be happy. He’d have a fraction of a life, but it would be enough. For him.

  Ted slipped back round the corner, out of sight. He leant against the metal wall and sighed. Maybe Marco had been right all along. Maybe they didn’t need their liferights, because maybe their life was just a piece of shit. FentiCorp was welcome to it. About the only good thing they had was each other – and they got to keep that, along with a ticket to a new life out there, beyond the edge of the solar system. So what if they leave behind a couple of familiar-looking shells. Who gives a shit?

  That’s the past.

  What they get in return is the future. All their screw-ups put behind them. A fresh start. A blank slate.

  In the end, Ted stayed up all night, watching old movies in the entertainment suite. His eyes were dry and sore when he finally realised what time it was. He rushed to the restaurant to find Marco, breakfast done, finishing off his coffee.

  Ted sat down next to him.

  “I’m sorry about last night,” he said. “I was just feeling a bit shitty. I shouldn’t have been so weird with you.”

  Marco arched a sniffy eyebrow as he drained his cup. “Good morning to you, too.”

  Ted grabbed Marco’s free hand and squeezed it. He lifted it to his lips and kissed it. Marco smiled, despite himself.

  “So how do you want to spend the day?”

  “One thing,” Marco said, “before all that.”

  “Anything.”

  “Just answer me honestly. You want to go back, don’t you?”

  Ted glanced out of the gallery window and instantly regretted it. He knew how it would look to Marco, how it would seem like he was casting one last, longing gaze at home, and so he knew he wouldn’t believe his answer when it came. But it was the truth: “No. I don’t. I promise you.” He squeezed Marco’s hand again. “I was just feeling a bit funny about… about what we’re leaving behind.”

  “What we’re leaving behind? What are we leaving? Your dad, who hates me? My fucking family, in and out of fucking court every five minutes? Or maybe your glittering career in civil engineering. You make sewers, Ted. People literally shit on your job.”

  “Marco, seriously…” Ted kept his voice level and smooth. He’d dealt with a thousand of Marco’s bad moods and snapping back was going to get them precisely nowhere. “I don’t want to go back. I am happy to put all that behind us. But…”

  No! Idiot! Not “but”. Anything but “but”.

  Marco’s jaw clenched. Ted saw it all in his eyes, what he thought Ted was thinking: But I have doubts. But I have regrets. But I’m lying. That’s not what he was about to say. He had to finish his sentence now, he couldn’t leave it hanging, though he knew how weak it would sound to Marco, how hollowly it would ring against the assumptions he had already made. “But I was letting it all get on top of me. I was just feeling down about it. Come on, be reasonable – I’m allowed to be a bit sad, aren’t I?”

  Big mistake. Don’t flip it back.

  Marco tutted and turned away from him.

  Ted was about to say something when he heard footsteps. Last night’s arrival, joining them for breakfast. He glanced towards the door to see a woman, middle aged, in a sharp grey skirt suit. Needlessly formal, Ted thought. He tightened the belt on his robe, suddenly self-conscious.

  “That could be the last other human face we see,” he whispered, nodding towards the woman.

  “See?” Marco hissed. “You don’t want to go.”

  “What? How do you get that?”

  As the woman picked some bacon out of one of the heated trays, she glanced in their direction. She smiled thinly, and Ted tried to smile back, but everyone in the room knew there was an argument going on and nobody wanted to get any more involved than they already were.

  “I don’t care if I never see another living soul,” said Marco. “But you’re obviously going to miss it. You don’t want to go.”

  “I do. Jesus, Marco. I want to go.”

  “I thought this is what you wanted.” (It is! Didn’t I just say that?) “A new start, away from all that bullshit behind us.”

  “Yes, I do. Bu… However, it’s not been that easy to just throw it all away. I mean, I’m ready now, but –”

  “But what?”

  Bollocks.

  “But what, Ted? You didn’t want to throw it all away? Fine. I believe you. But you were fucking happy enough to sell it when it came down to it.”

  “You make it sound like it was easy. You think this whole fucking thing is easy. This is my life you’re talking about.”

  “Wrong. It was your life.” Marco stood. “Kiss it goodbye, Ted. It’s gone.”

  He marched towards the door without looking back. His retreating footsteps were swallowed by the silence.

  He heard the woman clear her throat.

  Now. Right about now, Neptune, would be a good time to start roaring.

  He glanced over at the woman. She had taken a seat nearer the gallery window, and he thought to himself: I have never seen someone more fascinated by the view from a window.

  Ted spent a few more hours in the entertainment suite. Most of that time he passed by lying on one of the ridiculously squishy sofas – the last time you’ll see upholstery like this – trying to nap. But he couldn’t ever quite get to sleep, Marco’s angry words still ringing around his head.

  Ted had not, it would probably be fair to say, handled the situation well.

  They had to leave the next morning. Their permit window was narrow, and if they missed it, that was it, the deal with FentiCorp was over and they would have to limp home – at their own expense. And then, they’d have to live with limited access to the inner planets only. Marco would hate that even more.

  He swung his legs round and sat up. If he knew Marco – although this morning might suggest that he didn’t – he’d be in the spa. On the running machine, probably. Or maybe in the sauna. One way or another, he’d be sweating out his bad mood.

  How long will we spend aboard our ship? We might die in there. Just me and him, living out the rest of our lives, winding each other up. How’s he going to sweat out his moods in there? We’ll have to build a sauna. It can’t be that difficult. There must be a way. We won’t last five minutes without one. I’ll figure out how to make one. I have to.

  Knotting the belt on his robe, he crossed the lobby, following the tinkling music spilling from the spa’s smoked-glass doors. The rugs felt warm under his bare feet and he caught himself thinking, This is no way to spend your last day in sight of the Sun. In a dressing gown.

  He decided he’d get dressed – after he apologised to Marco.

  Ted found him stepping out of the showers, towelling his hair. His eyes were scrunched up tight, so he didn’t spot him at first. Ted cleared his throat, and said Marco’s name out loud.

  Marco opened his eyes and froze, his long fringe held in a bunch of towel.

  Ted stepped forward. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I messed up. I was too caught up in my thoughts, and I said some stupid things.”

  Marco said nothing. He barely moved a muscle. Water pooled around his feet.

  “I’m just nervous,” Ted a
dded with a shrug. “You know, who knows what’s out there? I was just freaking out a bit, I didn’t know what I was thinking. But look…”

  Ted moved closer.

  Marco lowered the towel, holding it loosely at his waist.

  Ted put his hand on Marco’s arm – the same one holding the towel. Marco stared at it like he’d never seen it before. Then his eyes met Ted’s. Ted smiled and moved closer still.

  “Everything we’re leaving behind,” Ted said, “all that shit – it’s right that we’re putting it behind us. But that doesn’t make what’s in front of us any less scary.”

  Now Marco smiled too – that soft smile that puffed his cheeks up like pillows. Ted took hold of Marco’s fingers and gently insinuated them into his grip; Marco dropped the towel and held Ted’s hand.

  “I’m sorry,” Ted said. “Make it better?”

  Marco’s smiled broadened. He tipped his head to meet Ted’s. They kissed.

  “A blank slate, yeah? That’s what we need, isn’t it? A blank slate. A fresh start. A chance to build a new life. Just for us. You and me, Marco. That’s all I want.”

  Afterwards, Ted showered, but when he came out, there was no sign of Marco at all. He wasn’t in the room either – his stuff was gone, too. A red light was blinking on the console by the bed.

  “Trident?” said Ted to his room, waiting for the answering bing of the hotel’s computer system. “Has Marco checked out?”

  A soft voice replied: “Yes. Mr. Campbell is currently in the departures suite. He told me to say he would wait for you there.”

  Keen. Very Marco.

  Everyone who wanted to leave the solar system had to do so via the Trident, and everyone who stayed at the Trident was required to spend their final night in the departures suite. This room was effectively quarantined from the rest of the hotel, and in the final hours before departure, guests were given one last medical exam and had to fill out a few more bits of FentiCorp paperwork. Once you went in, that was it.

  No way back.

  Ted took a deep breath.

  He dumped the robe on the floor, threw on a T-shirt and jeans, then crammed the rest of his clothes into his bag. Marco had already taken the toiletries from the bathroom, so Ted was at the reception console in the lobby within just a few minutes.

  As he was checking out, he saw his clone carrying a tray of clean glasses towards the bar. The clone smiled awkwardly and quickened his pace, but Ted said, “Hey, wait, just a minute.”

  Ted quickly signed off on the check-out process, ignoring the polite voice thanking him and giving him directions to the departures suite as he turned to face his double. “We’re off now, so… You know. Bye.”

  “Goodbye. I hope you had a pleasant stay.”

  “No you don’t. I don’t think you really care one way or another.”

  The clone didn’t reply to that.

  “Look,” said Ted, “I’ve got a question.”

  “I am happy to help.”

  “Just… Do you guys – you know, the clones – do you have relationships?”

  “That aspect of the human experience is coded out during the conception process.”

  “Coded out? Jesus. Ow. I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be,” said the clone. Ted couldn’t read his smile. “It’s not like I’m going to miss something I never had. And remember – your memories aren’t my memories. My memories only started a few months ago.” The clone shrugged. “I’m a blank slate.”

  Ted chuckled. “Then we have one thing in common.”

  “Marco?”

  Ted stepped into the living area in the departure suite. The door clicked shut behind him, then he heard the puckering of something hydraulic which he tried to ignore. (No way back.)

  Three closed metal doors studded the wall opposite, a dome-shaped light on the wall above each. Two lights were inactive, and the third was red. The doors seemed out of place in the otherwise plush room. A sheepskin rug covered most of the floor and a plump sofa sat facing a video image of a roaring fire. In an alcove to one side there was a high double bed, richly made-up with colourful linens. The lighting was soft, and the air was dry and warm. Ted thought he could smell cinnamon.

  If there was going to be a “last hotel room you ever stayed in”, it might as well be this one.

  “Marco? Are you there?”

  He dumped his bag on the floor, then noticed another blinking red light on a console next to the sofa.

  “Trident?”

  “Marco is currently undergoing his final physical examination, in medical room one. Room Two is free. Would you like to take your examination now?”

  Ted shrugged and said yes. One of the other lights in the wall opposite turned green and the door beneath it hissed open. Ted stepped inside.

  After three boring hours lying under an MRI scanner and a further hour at a console tidying up the last of the liferights contracts, Ted was exhausted. Rubbing his eyes, he stepped out of the examination room to find the fire switched off and the lighting dimmed. Marco was sleeping soundly in the bed.

  Feeling more ready for sleep than he had been in months, Ted joined him. The satin sheets sighed underneath him, and he barely had time to sigh with them before sleep took hold.

  He is in blue, naked. A wind tears by, licking at his skin. Mist curls around him, thickening and thinning in curves and waves. Ice shifts beneath his feet, floating on an invisible ocean of black. Sometimes he sees stars above. Sometimes, he sees nothing but blue. Biting blue. Teeth nibbling at his fingertips. He looks down and the skin hangs loose like a tattered flag sucked away by the wind. He sees his face – his mouth a silent circle, his eyes empty shadows. Skin torn by the wind. The roaring wind. The roar. His features dissolving as, fragment by fragment, they are carried away into the blue. The wind picks up and he is pieces now, carried on the current, through the mist, into an icy nothing where he sees the shattered atoms blown away, out of the cold, back towards the light, back towards –

  “Ted!”

  He mumbled, smacked his lips, rolled over. Where was he?

  “Jesus, Ted. Just shut the fuck up and let me sleep.”

  The bed rocked as Marco turned his back. Beautiful Marco. Brilliant Marco. The light to lead him on. His light. Ted stroked Marco’s shoulder. His skin was warm and smooth under his palm.

  Marco shrugged him away and hunkered down under the sheets.

  “Just fuck off, Ted.”

  And then Ted slept a deep, black sleep, with no blue.

  The Trident was behind them. They sat now in the twin pilots’ chairs on the flight deck of their ship. The ship they’d sold everything to buy. Every last penny on a ship, the permits, the stay at the Trident, and FentiCorp’s assisted departure service. Every last penny and then some.

  The ship’s engines had been spinning up since before they boarded, and now they were starting to whine. Marco flicked a switch on the console and the acoustic dampeners kicked in, deadening the noise. Finally, Ted could hear himself think.

  Clipboard in hand, he swiped at the computer screen and ran through a few final checks. He threw Marco a smile and got little more than a sneer in return. Marco liked his sleep, sure, but he wasn’t usually this pissed off if it was interrupted.

  Everything checked out. The ship was good to go. He transmitted his ready message to the Trident.

  “This is it, then.”

  Marco said nothing. He just stared out of the viewscreen into the darkness ahead of them.

  Ted wondered…

  “You don’t still think I’m having second thoughts, do you?”

  Silence.

  “You know that I’m not, though. Right? I want to see what’s waiting out there for us. A new life, just for us. Like I said, yeah?”

  “What?” Marco still wouldn’t look at him, but Ted supposed a one-word response could be considered progress.

  “You know. A blank slate.”

  “What are you talking about?” Now, Marco did turn to look at T
ed – and the confusion on his face was clear. “Last thing I know it’s all ‘Oh, I feel a bit weird’ or ‘I feel a bit sad’. Now it’s all supposed to be some great adventure? Will you make your fucking mind up?”

  “What?”

  “Blank slate? What the fuck are you talking about?”

  “Yesterday,” Ted said. “In the spa.”

  “What? The spa?”

  “Yesterday, you were in the spa. We talked and I –”

  “I don’t know what the fuck you’re on about now.”

  “Marco. In the spa, you and me. We talked, and then…”

  There was a cold weight in Ted’s stomach, the pull of realisation trying to suck him under the ground. There was a dull clank and the flight deck shook as the docking clamps released the ship. As the ship’s artificial gravity clicked into place, taking over from the Trident’s, Ted’s stomach lurched again. The engines fired and the ship started to drift away from the hotel, into the blackness beyond human space.

  “You and me,” Ted said. “You’ve got to remember. Please, you have to. We fucked.”

  “What?” Mark’s eyes were little scratches of confusion. “We what?”

  “We fucking fucked.”

  “No we didn’t – what the fuck are you even… Oh, fuck.”

  “Marco, I’m sorry. Shit. I’m sorry.”

  “You prick!”

  “I had no idea!”

  “No idea? You prick!”

  The console trilled an alarm, and the communicator flared into life. Ted recognised some of the music from the hotel bar, which played for a second before the Trident’s computer voice kicked in.

  Marco released the clip holding his safety harness in place. He glared at Ted, his jaw tense, then he stood and stomped into the back of the ship. As he went, he spat over his shoulder, “Fuck you, Ted.”

  Ted let his head fall forward, his chin rubbing against the straps of his harness, as the Trident’s recorded message played: