“Reason for what?”
“The reason they didn’t influence your thoughts as well. That you can actually see the situation as it is!”
I nodded. “Possible. Probable, even.”
“So, is that the reason the Zlathars pushed Humans to the very bottom of Uni society: that Humans can resist their mind control? Or is there something else?”
I turned my gaze away from him and shook my head slowly. “I… I don’t know. I don’t think that’s the only reason. My feeling is that… Zlathars are afraid of Humans.”
“Afraid? But why would such an advanced Descendant species be afraid of low castes like Humans? What can Humans do that is a threat to them?”
“And that is the question, isn’t it?” I looked at him and nodded.
I realized I was slipping into my Senthien mode again. I did that whenever I analyzed. I smiled within.
There is something special about Humans that Zlathars fear. What is it?
I closed my eyes and sat very still, barely breathing.
I knew it was there, somewhere, I just needed to reach it.
J was waiting, not making any sound.
Nothing came, however. I exhaled and opened my eyes. “I can’t see it.”
I looked at J and gave him a weak smile. “I will see it though. I can feel it’s really close. Close to my mind.”
He smiled a gentle smile and kissed my forehead. “I don’t doubt it.”
It was late afternoon when we crossed the rope slide. The river was more turbulent and much higher than it had been on our outward journey, only a few IPs beneath our feet as we slid across. Peter said that a few years ago, the river had overflowed to such an extent that it flooded the village. After that, they raised the village and built it up in the trees.
We had only one day to go before we reached the village, and I realized I was afraid. One part of my anxiety was this little bubble of a small group of people with whom I’d learned to open up, to let go, to become Human completely. I was not sure if I would be able to remain Human in a large group as easily. And second, the Vision that I kept pushing away—and that kept coming back—scared me so much that I was now afraid to see it. Something was obviously there, something that at first I didn’t want to know, and now I was too afraid to face.
All of this kept me silent over dinner, and J kept looking at me with worried eyes. After the meal was done, J and I stayed sitting by the fire while everyone else went to set up their tents.
“Hey! You okay?”
“Yes,” I said and forced a smile.
“Soon home.”
“Yes.” But now I couldn’t even force a smile.
J hugged me with one arm. “Hey, don’t worry about it. One step at a time, all right?”
He understood me a lot more than I thought.
“So, tell me something.”
“Yes?”
“How come your dad managed to hide his relationship with your mom?”
“He took a sabbatical.”
“Okay?” said J slowly, with a clear question in his voice for me to continue.
“Senthiens, as you know, give predictions of things that might come to be. For that they need access to a vast amount of data. They either collect that via the Uni computer interface or port to different worlds to interact with other Descendant species.”
“And this is how your dad met your mom, right, when he went to Zema4?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“So, what about the sabbatical he took?”
“Senthiens are constantly gathering and analyzing information, and it’s actually hard to stop. Frequently experiencing intense Visions is exhausting, so periodically Senthiens are allowed to take a sabbatical. That was the first sabbatical my father had asked for, and it was approved.”
“Why was this sabbatical so important?”
“Because this was the time when my mother and father were together. And a Senthien sabbatical means privacy.”
“What does that mean exactly?”
“On a sabbatical, Senthiens have six years with no obligation to gather any information that could induce Visions. And that also means no access to the Uni computer interface or holo communication.”
“Hmm—so by taking the sabbatical, he made sure no one knew what was happening to him, and whoever was with him, at the time.”
“That’s right.”
“But weren’t there other people on this planet? Someone else who could, I don’t know, inform the Zlathars about the two—well, three of you?”
“Sabbaticals are really supposed to be a solitary period with limited interaction with other citizens. All the residences on sabbatical worlds are quite isolated to ensure this privacy. So I didn’t meet anyone else during those six years.”
“What about food and all the other things your family needed?”
“All of that was automated.”
J wrinkled his eyebrows, thinking, the dying fire coloring his face. “But how about transportation?”
“You don’t need to go anywhere once you are on the sabbatical world.”
“No, I mean, how did your mom and dad get there, to this sabbatical world?”
“Porting, of course.”
“Exactly—so how come no one noticed when they ported there?”
“They ported separately. Some Humans were needed on that planet for certain physical work, so a few hundred Zema4 Humans ported there and back every few years. She joined one of those groups.”
“How did she manage to do that? Wasn’t there proper control of the portation?”
“She swapped places with another woman.”
“Oh. Was she already pregnant then?”
“Yes.”
“How was that possible?”
“What do you mean? Why wouldn’t it be possible?”
“Well, the love-making… what we did,” he said, smiling, “is how babies are made, normally. And you said your folks—your parents—did it like that, right? No tubes and stuff.”
“Yes.” I smiled, remembering the experience we’d shared.
“So, they would have needed space, time, and privacy. How was that possible before they got to the sabbatical world?”
“They had that on Zema4.”
“Didn’t your father need a reason to teleport there so often?”
“He didn’t have to port there. He was stationed on Zema4 for several years to do ongoing surveillance.”
“What about the privacy? How could he meet your mom without anyone noticing?”
“By being undercover,” I said and smiled, remembering my newly learned word.
“He disguised himself?”
“Yes. And it wasn’t so difficult. The clothes that Zema4 Humans wear don’t reveal much. It was easy for him to hide who he really was.”
“Ha, interesting…. All right, and you were born on this sabbatical world, then?”
“Yes.”
“And that was… a real birth?”
“I do not understand.”
“Like, a vaginal birth? A normal Human birth?”
I wrinkled my eyebrows. “I cannot tell you. I don’t remember.”
“No, you wouldn’t. No one does. I just thought you might have asked.”
I shook my head. “No. It never… really crossed my mind.”
“Well, I would assume that was the case. Even if there were automated medical treatments available there, they wouldn’t be set up for normal Human birth, would they?”
“I would assume so too.”
After a few passes, J asked, “Tell me again, how do Uni babies come into the world? How are Descendants born?”
“I don’t know much about the process. The majority of that information is available only to the Anas.”
“The medic Descendants?”
“Yes. They control the Office of Progeny. They keep track of how many Descendants stop their rejuvenation processes and how many new individuals are needed.”
“So when D
escendants decide to stop their rejuvenation processes, they die?”
“They continue aging from that moment on.”
“How many years do they still live?”
“I know of some individuals who lived more than two hundred years after their last rejuvenation.”
“Two hundred years? That’s a lot. People don’t normally live that long.”
“That is correct, but in Uni, there are no diseases. And all our cells have been reprogrammed during previous rejuvenation treatments to remain at a very young stage.”
“So… if you never get another rejuvenation treatment, you would live another two hundred years?”
“Yes, that’s what I would expect.”
“Huh.” He looked sideways, thinking about it. “That’s… different. You’d outlive everyone here, even… uh, never mind!”
I tilted my head to one side. “Outlive who?”
“Never mind, I’m just rambling, pay no attention. So, let’s go back again. These Uni babies—we don’t know how they are born, right?”
“No, this information is not available as public knowledge.”
“All right. So, they are born, somehow, and then what?”
I frowned. “Then they continue living.” I wasn’t sure what was he getting at.
“No, I mean, who takes care of the babies? I certainly hope that’s not automated!”
“Ah, I see. No, it’s not automated. Most new individuals—”
“Babies?”
“—yes, babies, are raised in dedicated centers, called EruLocs, with caretakers until they reach the age of their first rejuvenation. They are raised and educated based on the Descendant species they belong to.”
“And they never meet their biological parents?”
“No. Only in rare cases is there a need for a personal meeting between the germ cell donor and the new individual.”
“I find that sad, don’t you?”
“That’s the Descendant way. They don’t know anything else.”
“But you were not raised like that, right?”
I had to smile at the look on his face when he said that. “No. For the first six years, I was raised by my mother and father.”
“And after that?”
“After his sabbatical was finished, my father needed to return to Senthia, and… they both decided that I would go with him.”
“What about your mom?”
“My mother joined a group returning to Zema4. I never saw her again.”
There was a moment of silence.
“That must have been very difficult for you.”
“My recollection is that it was difficult for the next several years after. But that was a long time ago, and I only have a few memories of that family time.”
“I am sorry.”
“It is all right. I do have many optic nerve cam recordings of her as well.”
J nodded and lowered his gaze. “Still, it must be difficult to grow up without a mom. But you had your dad with you. How did he manage to smuggle you back to Senthia?”
“I…”
He frowned. “What?”
“I took the place of an official Office of Progeny individual that originated from my father’s germ cell.”
“You took her place?”
I looked at the ground. I didn’t want to look at him. “Yes.”
“And where did that girl end up?” he continued.
“She didn’t.”
“Oh, I see…”
“I don’t want to talk about it anymore.” I stood up to leave, but J quickly caught me by my elbow.
“Hey, it’s okay. This wasn’t your decision. There is nothing you need to feel guilty about.”
I looked down.
He put his hands on my shoulders and stroked them as he spoke. “It wasn’t your fault. And… I understand your father’s decision if that was the only way to protect you. A parent will do anything, and I mean anything, to save his own child.”
Which is exactly what my father said when he first told me about it.
I swallowed. “Even preventing another one from being?”
J took a moment before responding. “Yes. Even that.”
My father had told me about this after my first rejuvenation. And I turned away from him and left. I ported from one world to another without any contact with him for a very long time. In the end, I realized he was the only person who knew me for who I really was. And I made peace with his mistake.
But right now, looking at J, I wondered if it was a mistake at all. If he even had a choice. If I had… a child… of my own, in the same situation, would I act differently?
“Hey!” J snapped me out of my deep thoughts. “Let’s change the topic. All of this makes me gloomy.”
I smiled. “Yes, you’re right. What would you like to talk about?”
“Well, I was wondering: you told me before that when you have your rejuvenation thingy going on—”
“You mean the treatment?”
“No, I mean, you said it was called… uh, Interactive Coupling or something. The eleven-second one.”
“Yes. What about it?”
“How come women do not get pregnant, then? Or to rephrase it, how do women get pregnant?”
“Descendants don’t get pregnant.”
“Why? Aren’t you—I mean, Descendant women—able to carry a baby?”
“I do not know the details, but from the information I have, I can tell you that the embryos are fully developed extracorporeally.”
“But… do you—ah, Descendant woman—have female internal organs, like uterus and ovaries?”
I quickly searched through my nanoprobes. “Yes. The organs are there. But their function has been lost.”
“Oh,” he said, an indecipherable expression on his face.
“This information is important for you. Why?”
“Ah,” he said and waved his hand, “old habits die hard.” Then he smiled a crooked smile and looked at me.
“What?” I asked.
“Your tent or mine?”
I blinked. “I do not understand.”
He leaned in and kissed me on my nose. “You’re so sweet, you know that? Where do you want to sleep tonight? I am ready to set up one tent for us, not two.”
I understood and smiled. “All right. My tent, then.”
“Rise and shine, everyone!” We heard Peter shouting outside.
“What?” Frank moaned from his tent.
“The sun’s not out yet!” Now Rick was complaining.
“It is,” said Peter, “a little bit.”
I smiled at that, my eyes still closed.
“If we hit the road now,” Peter continued, “we’ll be home by late afternoon.”
I heard J shifting his position next to me. I opened my eyes and turned to look at him. He was already looking at me.
“Good morning, sunshine!”
Sunshine… Sweet. “Good morning. How did you sleep?”
“Perfect. I wish we could lie here longer.”
“Me too, but I think it’s time to go.”
I placed my hands on the ground to push myself to the tent door, but J moved his hands to my arms to stop me. He looked at me for a long moment without words, and then he moved his gaze to my lips.
Whenever he did that, it raised my heartbeat in an instant because I knew exactly what he was going to do next. It had nothing to do with my Senthien Visionaire capabilities, but everything to do with that fine and instinctive premonition Humans seem to have.
He propped himself up on his elbow and then bent forward to kiss me. We stayed like that, his lips on mine as if glued together by some invisible microgravitational force. Then we both smiled, our lips still touching, each of us knowing what was on the other one’s mind.
I looked at him again and said, “We should go. I wouldn’t want them to peek in here because we’re delaying the start.”
“Yeah, yeah… you’re right.”
Then he looked at the
floor for a moment and then back at me.
“We still have time to try the Uni speed, you know.” He smiled a mischievous grin and winked at me.
I shook my head, but smiled as I said, “I prefer the Earth speed.”
After a midmorning break, we continued our trek. Although we now walked in the shade of a dense forest, it was still extremely warm. J and I walked hand in hand a few IPs behind the rest, hearing a lot of good-spirited talking and laughing ahead.
“What are you thinking about?” J asked, seeing me watching the group ahead.
“I’m still wondering about the cryo-preservation,” I said and then looked at him. “How can a person living in a truly life-rich world, with no two trees the same, with no path symmetrical, with magnificent animals all around, believe there is no other choice for them but to stop living for the next hundred years? What could be so bad? Apart from the medical cases…”
What I really wanted to know was: Why had he chosen this path?
I wanted to know, but I was scared to find out. J looked at me and smiled, but did not answer.
“J, why did you freeze?” I finally asked.
He looked down and sighed. Then he raised his gaze to look at our path and said, “I was among the people who hoped there would be a medical miracle in a hundred years.”
I stopped, a sharp stab in my solar plexus. “Why?” I looked at him.
“It doesn’t matter anymore.” He smiled sadly, squeezed my hand once, and continued walking.
“I don’t understand. Do you need some kind of a cure?”
“No, no!” He shook his head. “I’m fine.”
“But?”
He sighed and his face saddened even more.
He took a deep breath, held it in for a few seconds, and then began. “Monica… Monica and I wanted to have children, but we couldn’t. Everything we tried had failed, so we decided to jump forward time. We hoped that in a hundred years there would be some medical miracle that would enable us to have children. So that’s what we did.”
I remembered our talk the previous evening, and how he wanted to know more about pregnancies in Uni worlds. I now realized he wasn’t interested in the pregnancy of Descendant women. He wanted to know about me.
And I… I lowered my gaze. “I am… sorry,” I said, answering his unspoken thought.
“Hey!” He looked at me, then hugged me with one arm and squeezed me closer to him. “That’s past. It’s time for a new beginning.”
The Senthien (Descendants of Earth Book 1) Page 23
