The Year's Best Science Fiction: Twenty-Fourth Annual Collection

by Gardner Dozois

  “If you do that,” she forced the word out, “I will never be able to return.”

  “No. You won’t.” Yastrenko tried to touch her cheeks, but she batted his hand away. To her surprise, she saw tears form at the corner of his eyes. “Jenna, I don’t want to lose you again. I want the old you to come back.”

  “I don’t believe,” Jenna said, void of any emotion, “she exists anymore.”

  * * * *

  She was alone.

  Among the family she had never sensed this absence of contact. Even when separated, the currents carried their trace. Distance became irrelevant, every thought uttered a part of the common whole. Not until she had been severed from the endless thread that was the River did she truly understand what she had lost. Even her senses seemed diminished, the richness of existence depleted in this dry, sterile world. Slowly, fighting the vertigo, Jenna removed the straps around herself.

  The room was mercifully empty. Jenna drifted weightless toward what at first appeared to be a portal into an adjoining chamber. Instead, she was disappointed to discover it only a reflection. She touched the mirror and frowned.

  “Who are you?” Her fingers traced the outline of her face. Among the Theid, appearance meant little. One simply was. Here, everyone not only claimed to be different, but seemed to revel in it. Suddenly, she felt a tearing need to see the stars. Jenna pulled the sliding door aside and floated into the corridor beyond.

  Padded walls formed tunnels, branching corridors that cut stark angles seemingly at random. A slight pull told Jenna which way out was, the ship’s spin providing a mild gravity. Without current to carry her, Jenna dragged herself along the handrails as she wandered outward.

  Her chest began to ache, her breathing irregular and quick as she increased her pace. Once, she passed several humans but said nothing, ignoring their startled expressions as she hurried past. Ahead, yet another corridor waited. Jenna reached the junction but couldn’t decide which path to take. Her temples pounded, and exhausted, she closed her eyes.

  “Why have you abandoned me? “ She whispered, but knew there would be no reply. Already, the old dreams faded, the River’s constant, swirling touch little more than the memory of a memory. Other memories intruded, odd glimpses of another life, a life she had carefully buried. Her hands shook violently as she curled into a tight ball, arms wrapped around her knees. The shaking in her limbs worsened, and she bit down on her lip, hoping the pain might hold back the flood of memories.

  “No, no, no…” Jenna fought to stem the flood but couldn’t. Her old life blossomed around her, disjointed flashes, bits and pieces of who she was before the surgeons had done their work. She sobbed, hard, wracking convulsions that tore the breath from her lungs. “No! Please, no!”

  Darkness stole over her. Disoriented, she vomited. Sour bile burned her nose and throat as the contents of her stomach gushed out. From nowhere, hands closed around her shoulders. She tried to break free but no longer had the strength. From far off, as if she listened from the bottom of an empty shaft, she heard voices.

  “Get her prepped for surgery,” the voices said. “Those implants are coming out now.”

  * * * *

  Emptiness claimed her, a wash of dull pain that refused to leave. Jenna tried to move, but her head and shoulders were bound by hard points that dug uncomfortably into her flesh.

  “Don’t try to sit up.” The voice was masculine and thickly accented. Jenna forced her eyes open. The light was dim, the temperature in the room cool and dry. A man stood over her, concern plain in his deep-set eyes. Despite the pain, Jenna smiled.

  “Hello, Val.”

  “Hello, Jen.” The man’s bearded face split in a pleasant, relieved grin. She hadn’t noticed how thick his accent was, or how wonderful his homely features could seem. He held a water bottle to her lips and let her take a short sip from the rigid straw. “Don’t struggle, okay? They have you in full restraints until the anesthesia wears off.”

  “So I gathered.” She closed her eyes and let her face go slack. It helped with the throbbing pain in her temples. “The implants are gone?”

  “Yes.”

  “All of them?”

  “The surgeons are confident they removed all the alien tissue. If you can trust a machine.”

  Jenna chuckled at the remark. For a scientist, Valeri Yastrenko was almost pathologically suspicious of robotic medicine. In so many ways he was an old-fashioned man, Earth-bound and proud of it. Part of his charm. Part of the reason she had fallen in love with him.

  “I am so glad to have you back.” His hand slipped into hers, his fingers so thick they forced hers apart. “How do you feel?”

  “Drained,” she said. “Empty. You can’t imagine what it’s like to be connected to them.” She hesitated. Despite the worsening pain, but she had to know the answer to the question plaguing her. “Was I able to break their math?”

  A long silence filled the room, broken only by the soft, liquid sound of the machinery tending her. She opened her eyes and focused on Yastrenko’s face. “What happened?”

  “Can we talk about this later?”

  “No. Now.”

  “Jenna,” Yastrenko sighed. “You stopped transmitting months ago. If you discovered how to translate their mathematics, you never bothered to tell us.”

  He bent down and kissed her forehead, the scent of his beard so like an old dog she had loved as a child. More memories rolled over her, a cascade effect as if the human side of her personality was punishing her for having been suppressed. She tried desperately to think about her time with the aliens, but nothing remained, as if a wall had been erected. A warm, sticky sensation crept through her limbs, no doubt a sedative released in response to her rising frustration. Unable to stay awake, she let herself be carried once more into watery dreams.

  When she woke again, the restraints were gone, nothing holding her but blankets and a sleep net. Nearby, someone snored. Jenna risked turning her head. In the corner of the small room, Yastrenko floated like an overgrown infant wrapped in a blanket. She smiled at the thought, but quickly her mood dissolved, her last thoughts swarming out of the drug-induced haze. Her time among the Theid triss had been wasted. She felt as if she existed in two planes simultaneously, entangled particles which could never exist in the same place simultaneously. With a cold certainty, she knew she was losing her memories of the River.

  She wondered if the strange, drifting creatures would remember her.

  * * * *

  New routines filled Jenna’s hours, the day broken into periods of therapy and rest. She went through the motions without enthusiasm. No matter how hard she pretended otherwise, the lost months preyed on her and more and more, she found herself drawn to the tiny observation lounge on the underside of the ship.

  She still needed to see the stars.

  The air in the narrow chamber was cool, the long window rimmed with creeping tendrils of frost, spent breath and escaped moisture transmuted into ethereal, ever-shifting patterns. Jenna’s fingers traced the crystalline etchings with a fingernail. Something in the juxtaposition of ice against the unblinking stars called to her, as if the key she sought lay in front of her waiting only to be noticed. Her reflection in the thick glass mocked her, as if a second Jenna Ree floated on the other side of the window.

  “Lights, off,” she said softly. The room dimmed until nothing remained but a soft blue line marking the exit. Now the stars seemed brilliant, bright gems spilled on an oily pool. From this vantage, far beyond Pluto’s orbit, the sun was simply one of billions. It had taken fifteen years from the moment the Theid triss ship had first popped into existence on the edge of the solar system, its beacon a mournful, unchanging wail, for humanity to mount this expedition. Jenna’s life had been consumed by the enigmatic message, swallowed up in the attempt to establish contact. So much had passed during the decade and a half. Her courtship with Valeri. The partial decoding of the Theid triss language. The decision to build this ship and the long, f
our years’ climb to reach the enormous alien vessel. Jenna craned her neck until she could see what lay beneath their own hull. A vague, cylindrical shadow blocked the Southern Cross, the water filled starship more than six kilometers in length. Compared to it, their own ship was like a barnacle on a whale’s flank.

  “Why did you bring us out here?” she whispered.

  A faint, octagonal glow, one of the thousands of windows that dotted the alien craft, caught her eye. For a moment, she thought she saw something drift past, the elongated skull and sleek tendrils a vague phantom through the viewport. The Theid triss were so different. How could she even contemplate understanding them? Jenna leaned her forehead against the cold glass, desperate to see more, but the shape had moved on, ever in motion.

  Motion.

  Stars swirling. Frost crystals on glass, melting and reforming, nothing constant. Jenna felt herself tilting and pressed her arm against the ceiling to quell the vertigo as the avalanche of information struck, the wall breeched. It was so simple. Overwhelmed, she pushed away from the dark window and hurried back into the bright corridors. Her mind buzzed with the new understanding, so much raw information she feared it might slip away if she didn’t tell someone. She found Yastrenko outside the infirmary and let herself crash into his arms.

  “Val,” she said triumphantly. “I’ve found the key.”

  “The key?” He frowned, then, nodded, a brief smile creasing the lines around his eyes. “That is good, Jenna. Very good.”

  “You don’t seem very excited.” Jenna pushed away, deflated by his lack of response. “Don’t you get it? I’ve finally found a way to reconcile our mathematic system with theirs. I’ve broken the code.”

  “Good.” He kissed her, but his heart didn’t seem in it. “I’m glad.”

  “What the hell is wrong with you? I thought you’d be thrilled? Don’t you see, now we can finally get to work understanding their technology.”

  “Yes…” Yastrenko opened his mouth to say more, but fell silent. Gently, his big hands firm on her shoulders, he pushed her to arms’ length until he could look her directly in the eyes. “Jenna, the Theid triss sent a communication a little over two hours ago. They want us to uncouple and move out to a safe distance. They intend to depart within the next three days.”

  “No.” Jenna stared at him, unbelieving. “You can’t let them leave. Not now. For God’s sake, Val, we have to do something.”

  “I know.” His voice fell until she thought he might burst into tears. “That’s why Emily is having an olfactor node implanted.”

  “Markser?” Jenna’s stomach twisted at the thought of the pale, humorless psychologist taking her place as liaison to the River. “You can’t be serious? If anyone should go below, it should be me.”

  Yastrenko stared at her, his eyes unblinking. For one horrible moment, Jenna had the impression that he wished it was her and not Markser about to undergo the dangerous surgery. She recoiled, all too aware that something else lurked in his eyes, a glimpse of betrayal. Guilt. Shame. An acknowledgment. Jenna stared at him, too stunned to speak as what was left of her once-stable universe crashed with fractallike speed into nothingness. She felt a fool for not having seen it earlier. While she was lost in the strange world of the Theid triss, her husband had fallen in love with another woman.

  * * * *

  Gravity increased, an off-tangent drag that piled loose objects against the rear corner of her tiny cabin as the Theid triss ship gradually boosted its spin rate. Chilled, Jenna wrapped a blanket around her shoulders as she sat at her work station, numbed by the day’s events. She desperately wanted to blink and find the affair had been an illusion, another byproduct of her immersion. She had known Emily Markser for years but had never thought of her as a rival. The woman seemed sterile, practically sexless, a pale caricature of cold, Ivy League detachment. How could someone as primal and vibrant as Valeri Yastrenko be attracted to her? Jenna pulled the blanket tighter. What had she done to drive her husband away?

  “Stop it,” she whispered, scolding herself. “I will not take the blame for this.” She welcomed the anger. Nearby, something cracked, like the sound of wood breaking. Jenna stared down at her hand, surprised to see the thin plastic stylus wound between her fingers snapped cleanly in half.

  She let the broken pieces fall with lazy ease toward the back corner of the room and stared at the scratch pad flickering quietly on her desk. Lines of hand-scratched symbols and equations glowed on the little screen, some familiar, some crude approximations of Theid taste-scent-touch charts. She hadn’t even realized she was doodling until she recognized her own sweeping, almost sloppy handwriting. Though she still had no proofs, Jenna knew the long chains of numbers would balance. She sighed. “Maybe the bastard should have cheated on me months ago. Then we could have all gone home.”

  Behind her, someone coughed. Jenna turned slowly and saw Yastrenko waiting outside in the corridor, his hand on the doorsill.

  “I just came to gather up my things,” he said.

  She nodded, but said nothing. Yastrenko slipped past her, found a duffle bag and quickly began stuffing clothing and personal items inside it. Jenna sat at her desk and watched him. Yastrenko pulled a final pair of socks from his locker then drew the string tight around the mesh bag.

  “Jenna, I’m sorry,” he began, but she cut him off.

  “Don’t. I don’t want your apologies or your damned excuses. Maybe someday, but not right now.”

  He looked away, unable to meet her eyes. Duffle bag in hand, Yastrenko turned to leave, but stopped as he noticed the numbers on her scratchpad. “These are your theorems?”

  Jenna nodded.

  “It almost looks like you are describing harmonic vibrations.”

  “I am.” Despite her anger, she couldn’t shut out the sense of discovery. “Like everything about the Theid, nothing is absolute. It’s no wonder we couldn’t understand what they were trying to tell us. We wanted hard numbers. They don’t even understand the concept. As a matter of fact, they only have two numbers in their lexicon.”

  “But, that is impossible.” Yastrenko frowned. Jenna pulled the pad around, secretly enjoying his confusion as she traced the jumbled string of glyphs.

  “To our way of thinking, yes. But not to theirs. To them, the entire universe is an unending string. For the Theid triss, there are only two numbers, one and not-one. Add one and one together and you don’t get two. You get a greater one.”

  “A greater one?” He sounded doubtful, but leaned closer and studied the equations. “And that lets them manipulate space-time?”

  “Apparently.” Jenna shrugged. “I’m not a physicist.”

  Yastrenko stood, eyes locked on the pad and shook his head in wonder. “It’s going to take years for us to reconcile this.” He straightened, and suddenly the excitement in his eyes faded, replaced by guilt. “Jenna, I do love you.”

  “Strange way you have of showing it.”

  He gathered up his duffle and started once more into the corridor, but turned before he left the cramped chamber.

  “I meant to tell you. The flight crew would like you to be in the cockpit when Emily goes below.” His voice cracked around her name. “They need you to monitor her transmissions.”

  “I’ll be there,” she said, her tone flat. She waited until he was gone, then lay down on her bed and cried herself to sleep.

  * * * *

  The cockpit reminded Jenna more of the trading floor of a stock brokerage than the control room of a spacecraft. She sat at the small workstation one of the environmental engineers had escorted her to and tried to remain as unobtrusive as possible. To keep busy, she ran a third diagnostic check of the equipment linking Markser to the ship. Fast numbers scrolled across the screen, followed by “All systems are operating properly.” Satisfied, she leaned back in the padded chair and waited. Across the circular chamber a young man with a thick red beard raised his voice.

  “Captain, the Theid triss just sent a message.�
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  Jenna winced at his horrible mispronunciation. A slender woman with short gray hair hurried across the room and joined him.

  “What did they say?” Paula Spolar, the First Shift Pilot asked. Everyone in the control room listened intently as the bearded man read the translation.

  “Caution given. Uncouple soon. We choose to leave in next day-cycle.”

  Jenna frowned. As much as she hated drawing attention to herself, she pulled her way towards the commo desk. “Did they use the Imperative or the Pending tense?” she asked.

  “I’m not sure.” The man stammered helplessly. “How do you tell the difference?”

  “Sorry. I forget most people haven’t spent six months living with the Theid triss.” Jenna smiled to put him at ease. “Could I have the audio?”

  “Sure.” The technician leaned back to let Jenna see his work screen. A series of multi-hued spikes danced on the monitor as a low, mournful series of notes washed around them. Jenna shut her eyes and listened. A faint trill at the end of the final stem-verb told her what she needed to know. Even without an olfactor, the message was plain.