by Dani Kollin
The spell was broken by his daughter rushing into the study in her pajamas. Though she was dressed for bed, her energy level was so high, she was practically vibrating in place, as only a seven-year-old could. It had been two centuries since this man had seen seven, but watching his first child grow up was reminding him of it again.
“Abba, you promised that if I loaded the recycler and fed the new gascat, you would read me a story before bed.”
“Just because Vapor is our new pet doesn’t mean he doesn’t have a name.”
“I know, Abba, but I miss Mr. Swirls.”
“So do I, pumpkin, so do I, but we have a new gascat and he needs not only our static to feed on, but our love and companionship as well.”
“But, Abba, he’s all prickly when he surrounds you!”
“Of course he is, sweetness. He’s young and very nervous. Why, he’s barely a decade old. But if we give him the love and caring he needs, he will become tingly and warm in no time.”
“You mean he will be just like Mr. Swirls?”
“No one will ever be just like Mr. Swirls,” said the man, feeling the sadness that came from the loss of a pet he had had for as long as he could remember. “Nor would it be right if he was, pumpkin, but he will be himself, and you will see that that is good also.”
“Do you promise?”
“By the hope of the Holy Justin’s return.” Then he smiled and she burst into a giggle. “Now, go to bed.”
“You promised to read to me.”
“Did I?”
“Abba!”
“I guess I did,” he said as he picked her up and carried her to her room. “What should I read?”
“Could you read me a story from the Astral Bible?”
“Let me guess, you want me to read about the Holy Justin?”
“No.”
“Hmm, how about the revered martyr, Omad?”
“Abba,” said the girl with a rise in pitch that only little girls seemed capable of.
The man relented and did not mention the ten other names he was planning to extend this game with. “Why don’t I tell you a story of the Blessed One?”
“J.D., J.D.!” exclaimed the girl, who started squirming with excitement.
When he got his daughter to her room, he put her on her bed, disturbing Vapor. The gascat, who must have been sleeping, changed colors quickly and swirled to the corner of the room. The man went to the girl’s desk and put his hand on the only book on it, but then paused and looked at his daughter knowingly. She sighed and got under the covers. Then and only then did he take the book, a children’s version of the Astral Bible filled with simplified stories in modern language with lots of colorful pictures, to her bedside and sit on the chair she insisted he use.
“Now, which story of the Blessed One do you want? The Blessed One Leads the Children of the Stars on the Stellar Exodus, or the Blessed One Leads the Warriors of the Faithful through the River of Rocks!”
“An earlier one, Abba.”
“How about the Blessed One Is Called to Battle by Allah?”
“That one, Abba! That one!” she said with glee.
And so he read her the story telling of the ambush by the fleet of soul stealers who tried to thwart the will of God before the Blessed One knew her destiny, but the forces of evil not only failed to thwart God’s will but actually fulfilled it, by calling forth the Blessed One, who not only escaped, but then saved the Holy City, for the first of many times. When he was done reading, he saw that his daughter was not ready for sleep, but she was not bouncing up and down under the covers as she often did. Instead she appeared to be deep in thought. He waited patiently for her to say something.
“Abba, are these stories real?”
“What do you mean, pumpkin?”
“Did they really happen the way the Bible says?”
“I believe they did.”
“But how can you know? I mean really know?”
“Well, we have computer records that go all the way back to that time, but—”
“Lee Nughn says that we can’t trust any of the old records.”
“Your classmate is correct. We can’t trust any of the old computer records.”
“Why not?”
The man sighed. This was the price of having a curious and intelligent child. But the father quickly put that thought aside and was grateful to have such a problem. “You see, pumpkin, the thing is that we have all the records from the millennia since the Astral Exodus, but over the centuries, it has become harder and harder to know what was actually from the past and what some people made to look like it was from the past.” The man thought for minute. “Do you know how we make new plates and utensils every time we eat and throw the dirty ones back into the recycler to break it down?”
“Duh, Abba, everyone knows that.”
“Of course they do, pumpkin. Now, how would you tell the difference between a plate made today and one I told you was made a thousand years ago?”
“Well, one would be older, wouldn’t it?”
“Yes, indeed it would, but if they both look, feel, and weigh the same, how could you tell?” He saw that his daughter was stuck on that one. “That is the problem we have with the old records. We have so many from hundreds of systems, and most have been changed for reasons we can’t understand, and they say so many different things that we can’t tell truth from lies anymore.”
“Why didn’t they just write things down like we do when we want to make sure it’s real?”
“No one realized how important it was to keep things written down until many centuries had passed. But they looked for the oldest thing that was written down that many humans had from all the systems of the galaxy.”
“What was it, Abba?” The man held up the Astral Bible in his hands. His daughter’s eyes grew wide. “Really?”
“Really,” he answered. “In all the systems inhabited by the Children of the Stars, this is the earliest common denominator. Written in the lifetime of the Blessed One in the beginning of the Exodus and granted unto all the Children who went their many different ways.”
“Abba, why don’t we go back to the place before Exodus. Where it all happened. They must have all sorts of things to prove it’s true.”
The man smiled and got up. Without a word, he left his daughter’s room and in a few moments returned. She was surprised to see him carrying the family’s Astral Bible—something she’d been told she wasn’t ready for.
“You’re a little young to read all this yet. The Fall of Neela is heartbreaking and the attack of the demons is something your imagination can do without, but can I read you one passage that might help answer your question?”
His daughter nodded so vigorously, overjoyed in being given even secondhand access to this most adult of all books, that he was afraid she might hurt her neck. He opened the Bible to nearly the end and began to read, though the passage was so well known, he may have been able to recite it from memory.
“And thus did the All-Powerful speak to his Blessed One and command her to tell the Children of the Stars, ‘All the stars around you are yours. For you and your children and your children’s children, yea unto the last generation do I give my creation in its entirety. Every sun, planet, moon, and rock is yours to use and shepherd as you see fit, all save one. All the stars of my creation are yours save the one that bore you. To this star and this star alone are you barred. You, nor your descedants shall return to this one star until—’” The man paused.
“Until what, Abba?” his daughter practically screamed.
The man smiled, remembering how his own father would do similar things to him. “‘Until the return of the Holy Justin.’”
“Will he be here soon, Abba?” The man saw his daughter would prefer for the Holy Justin to be back by her birthday at the latest.
“As I am not Jesus, Muhammad, Moses, J.D., or any of the others Allah has seen fit to communicate with, I can only say he will come in God’s time. Now I think you must go to
bed.”
“But, Abba, you didn’t answer my question. How do you know it really happened? The Holy Justin, the war for the soul of humanity, the Blessed One, the battles—how do you really know?”
The man leaned over and kissed his daughter on the forehead. “Because, my most precious Kayliana, I have faith.”
Tor Books by Dani Kollin and Eytan Kollin
The Unincorporated Man
The Unincorporated War
The Unincorporated Woman
The Unincorporated Future
About the Authors
Dani Kollin lives in Los Angeles, California, and Eytan Kollin lives in Pasadena, California. Their first novel, The Unincorporated Man, won the Prometheus Award.
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the authors’ imaginations or are used fictitiously.
THE UNINCORPORATED FUTURE
Copyright © 2012 by Dani Kollin and Eytan Kollin
All rights reserved.
A Tor Book
Published by Tom Doherty Associates, LLC
175 Fifth Avenue
New York, NY 10010
www.tor-forge.com
Tor® is a registered trademark of Tom Doherty Associates, LLC.
ISBN 978-0-7653-2881-6 (hardcover)
ISBN 9781429948357 (e-book)
First Edition: August 2012
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Dedication
Acknowledgments
1. Unbridgeable Divisions
2. The Battle of Ceres
3. An Eye for an Eye
4. And a Plague Shall Fall on Both Their Houses
5. Coup
6. Dissension
7. Endgame
8. Hairsbreath
9. Exodus
Epilogue
Tor Books by Dani Kollin and Eytan Kollin
About the Authors
Copyright
