I stopped talking and gazed at Jonathan’s face. It was getting too dark to make out his expression.
“You’ve been very quiet,” I said. “You think I’m crazy?”
A few seconds later, he said, “I know of your husband. I know of your company, SouthPacificNet. I’ve worked for the company on several occasions, as a freelance software engineer.”
“You’ve met him? Besides here, I mean.”
“I don’t know anyone who has met him. He’s considered to be rather eccentric, kind of a recluse.”
I actually tried to laugh at this, but the fire in my hip cut it off. “Now you understand why. A lot of doctors would like to get their hands on him. He avoids them and just about everyone else.”
Jonathan seemed to consider this as the quad bikes got closer. Finally, he said, “I’ve never heard of his Kembalimo project. I’d love to help with that. At the risk of sounding boastful, I’m a rather accomplished software engineer. Perhaps I could be useful.”
“Are you serious? After hearing my story?”
He didn’t answer. His face was only an oval of blackness.
“Okay, Jonathan. If I live through this night, I’ll convince him to talk to you.”
“You’re going to live,” he said.
The headlights of two quad bikes illuminated the trail. Peter hopped off the back of one before they came to a stop, and he was immediately at my side, gushing over me and thanking Jonathan.
The ride down the trail was a nightmare of pain, despite the morphine they’d given me. I was strapped to a backboard stretcher attached to one of the quad bikes, but the trail was rough, and progress was slow. Two hours later, I was finally in an ambulance and on my way to Cairns Private Hospital.
∞
The surgery went well. As well as can be expected considering they had to remove the head and neck of my femur and install a metal replacement. Women don’t die from hip surgery. The real risks come after the surgery, and six days later I developed a complication known as deep venous thrombosis, or DVT. DVT is what almost caused me to leave Peter for good.
DVT is a blood clot that forms in a deep vein. This is caused by inactivity, which had not been a problem until it was forced upon me by the installation of a titanium femur. DVT is not typically dangerous, but my clot took it upon itself to move into one of my lungs, causing a pulmonary embolism. That’s when things got serious.
Later, Peter suggested we give the blood clot the name Gunner. It seemed fitting, as the clot was capable of dispensing a devastating blow. My life had been saved by yet another surgery, to remove Gunner. But not before the little bastard had caused the death of a hefty portion of my right lung.
My prospects of ever seeing the view from Lumley Hill again dropped to nearly zero. I was told I’d be lucky to climb a flight of stairs.
During my six-week hospital residency, Peter lived in my room. He read novels to me and never tired of providing excruciatingly detailed reports of the happenings at SouthPacificNet. At the end of the first week, Jonathan paid us a visit. Not only had I forgotten I’d promised Jonathan I would convince Peter to talk to him about helping with Kembalimo, I had also neglected to warn Peter about how much I had revealed to Jonathan that night he had sat with me on the Blue Arrow track. Soon after he entered my hospital room, Jonathan awkwardly revealed what he knew. Surprisingly, Peter took it in stride, perhaps because he was interested in Jonathan’s expertise. Or perhaps because Jonathan seemed to actually believe Peter’s story. The two of them started talking about the Kembalimo project, and suddenly I found myself mercifully free of Peter’s relentless doting attentions. I actually took a nap.
Jonathan returned the next week, and again the week after that. He insisted he had come to check on my recovery progress, but within minutes he and Peter would huddle up together and start talking shop. I suggested they might want to meet at Peter’s office, but Peter refused to leave my hospital room. By this time there was an unspoken understanding that Jonathan would be employed by, and working closely with, Peter. Jonathan had an intense interest in the challenges presented by the Kembalimo project. During their discussions at the hospital they developed a basic framework for a web-based language “game” that would allow each user to quickly develop a custom symbolic language based on his or her personal alphanumeric thought processes. As an incentive for completing the game, users could then communicate with any other Kembalimo user in the world, regardless of their native language. With the resources Peter commanded at the time, it would not take long to move from a rough concept to a functioning system.
It was an exciting development, and for the first time my enthusiasm for the Kembalimo project nearly matched Peter’s. Perhaps this was because Jonathan’s participation seemed to invigorate Peter and distract him from his concerns over my health. Perhaps I was truly beginning to see the importance of the project. Or perhaps I just needed some breathing room. Regardless, I thought his rekindled fervor was wonderful. But as Peter said, my brush with death had me looking at the world through rose-colored lenses. He was becoming rather fond of puns, especially when he was happy.
Yonks Day – Year 42 – 2019
I had never wanted to be in the spotlight. That had become Peter’s role, and even after years of being a recluse, he was good at it. And so, on our forty-second Yonks Day, there were no reporters at Mount Whitfield Park. Peter even brought four members of his security team—all of them female at my request—to gently persuade hikers and runners to leave their smartphones and cameras in their cars. Today was an event for me, not for the public.
Don’t ever let anyone tell you physical therapy is easy. It’s not. It is hard. It is grunt-and-strain-and-spit-and-cry-and-consider-the-ways-you-could-kill-your-personal-trainer hard. Like old age, it’s not for sissies.
And I did it for years. My eightieth birthday came and went, and my trainer and doctors told me I should stop. I told them all to go to hell. We hired a new trainer. I fired her, and we hired yet another.
But they were right. I was not capable of climbing the Blue Arrow to Lumley Hill.
And so Peter stepped in. At that time, SouthPacificNet employed a hundred engineers, with another three hundred contracted for specific jobs at any given time. Kembalimo had become a global phenomenon, but ironically it generated no revenue because Peter insisted on offering it for free. But the company’s other products ranged from inventory-tracking software to satellite phones and were quite lucrative. Peter pulled a handful of engineers from current duties, paired them up with some of the world’s leading prosthetics engineers, and tasked them with designing a robotic exoskeleton customized to assist my body from my hips to my feet. It was a marvel of electromechanical implementation. Even more impressive was its use of neural control signals and extraction of intent. It understood my intent at a time when it seemed many of the real people in my life didn’t.
After another five months of grueling, painful therapy and training with the exoskeleton, I could competently climb multiple flights of stairs. I vowed to use the monstrous device on our forty-second Yonks Day and then never set eyes on it again.
Fortunately, the trail was dry and rain was not forecasted. The exoskeleton was actually fairly sleek, and if it weren’t for the heat I could have pulled loose jogging pants on over it. But still, as I extracted myself from our van, I felt like a cyborg. A handful of hikers stopped what they were doing and came closer to observe. Peter’s security gals simply asked them to abstain from taking photos or video. I blocked them out and forced my mind to command my will. My exoskeleton responded, and I walked to the trailhead.
“Good luck, ma’am!”
The voice had come from my left, and I turned and smiled at a much younger woman who had kind eyes.
I hadn’t seen the trail in six years. It now seemed more menacing, dotted with protruding rocks and roots. It was a gauntlet of hazards. I took a few steps and then hesitated. Buzzing, clacking cicadas. A heady
aroma of damp soil and dry eucalyptus. Leaves whispering in the wind. Noisy pitta birds calling, ‘walk-to-work.’ And Peter right behind me, laden with a pack containing prawn salad and fritters.
Servomotors whirred, pneumatic lift rods contracted, metal and muscle worked as one for the next four hours, until finally I stood at the top of Lumley Hill.
∞
My world changed seven months later on a cool, windy night in July at 1:14 AM. That’s when a call came in on Peter’s smartphone. It was his corporate office. He answered the call and after a few seconds abruptly sat up in bed. He then got up and left the bedroom.
I was nearly asleep again when he came back. He sat on the edge of the bed and turned on his lamp. A tear streaked one of his cheeks.
“It’s been found, Rose—the Lamotelokhai.”
I sat up, which was a painful process. “What?”
“Americans. On a plane that crashed in the bush. Survivors found the hidden village.”
I turned on the light on my side of the bed and blinked a few times.
He let out a laugh, nothing more than a huff. “A boy called me. Only fourteen! And then I talked to his teacher. The boy is a Kembalimo user.” His tears were flowing freely now.
“And he could communicate with it?”
He nodded. “Because of Kembalimo—our Kembalimo—he could talk to it. And the tribesmen allowed the Americans to take it with them. They took it to the United States, Rose! The boy knew our company had created Kembalimo, so he tracked me down. He mentioned the word ‘Lamotelokhai’ to one of our people, which prompted her to call me immediately.” Peter spoke like he was trying to convince himself it had really happened.
I put my hand on his. “I don’t even know what to say.”
He wiped his cheeks. “The boy was able to talk to it because of Kembalimo.” He then shook his head. “All those years.”
I was happy for Peter, but a wave of uncertainty washed over me. I had no idea what this really meant. “I’m sorry I ever doubted you,” I said.
He smiled. “There were times I started to doubt it myself.”
“So, what’s next?”
He shook his head. “Hard to say. They asked for my help. It seems they are in some kind of trouble. They’re trying to avoid American government officials because they fear it might be used in ways that are harmful.”
“Do you think it’s dangerous?”
“In the wrong hands, maybe. I know it’s like nothing the world has seen before. They want to arrange a live media event to inform everyone about it. They need my help to do that.” He looked at me intently. “I’m going to help.”
I held his gaze. “This is starting to scare me.”
He got up and paced. “If the entire world knows it exists, no government can hide it away and do God-knows-what with it. There’s logic to that, right?”
“Do you want me to answer that, or—”
“It’s something that should belong to the entire human species.”
“It was found in Indonesian Papua. Doesn’t it belong to Indo—”
“That doesn’t matter. It didn’t originate there.”
I watched him pace for a moment. “You still believe that?”
“It’s true! It’s always been true. Forty-four years ago, the Lamotelokhai put a dream into my head. Somehow. I don’t know how. I saw the planet it came from, where it was created. And in this last week I’ve had two more dreams. After forty-four years! They were vivid dreams, Rose, more than just dreams. So I’ve suspected something important might be happening.”
I felt my chest starting to tighten. “In the last week? And you didn’t tell me?”
I think he finally sensed my growing alarm. He sat on the bed again. “I didn’t tell you because you’ve never taken the extraterrestrial idea seriously. And I don’t blame you for that.” He put a hand on his chest. “But I’ve seen it.”
“When were you going to tell me?”
“Now! I’m telling you now. Because of what’s happening. And I’m glad it’s happening. Because now you don’t have to…” He trailed off awkwardly.
“Now I don’t have to die?”
He looked me directly in the eye. “Yes.”
“You still want this thing to fix me, don’t you?”
“I’m trying to save you, Rose!”
I sighed loudly. “People grow old and die. That’s the way it is.”
“Perhaps that’s about to change.”
I grunted and shifted painfully in the bed. I wanted to jump up and shake him by the shoulders and demand that he understand what it was I had always needed from him. But my body was no longer capable of doing that.
“Why?” I asked. “Why don’t you want me to die?”
He furrowed his brows. “What?”
“Is it for you? Or is it for me?”
He shook his head, bewildered.
I took a deep breath. It seemed as if the last fifty years were spiraling down into this one moment. “I need to know this. I need an honest answer. But listen to me first. I’ve always loved you. But I’ve had time to realize certain things.”
Peter brought one knee up onto the bed, settling in to listen. The gesture didn’t reduce my agitation.
I went on. “I know you’ve lived through every year I have. But your body hasn’t changed. Your mind hasn’t started to fail, as mine has. I get it—you are superior to me.” He started to protest, but I held up a finger to stop him. “You love me. You tell me so every day. You dote on me, make sure I’m comfortable. If there’s something I need or want, you have someone design and make it for me. You’ve given me a life most women could only dream of. But I think, fundamentally, I’m different from you. I’m here for me. I want what you give to me. Not just financial security, but everything else. I’m here because you kiss me every morning. You remember my birthday and Yonks Day, and you make them memorable. You have made me part of your Kembalimo project, even though I’ve been more of a hindrance, believing you might be quite mad. I’m here because I’m happy when I’m with you. My passion for you is so primal it frightens me. You see, Peter, I’m here for me.”
He gripped my hand. “Rose—”
“I’m not finished. Peter, I’m an observer of people, did you know that about me?”
Wisely, he didn’t respond to this.
“I’ve observed countless people, especially couples. I know what makes people feel secure or insecure in their relationships. I can see it in their expressions and hear it in their words. You know what I’ve observed? People feel more secure when their partner has less money than they do, or when their partner is less attractive. Nine times out of ten, if you see a man with a more attractive woman, it’s because he has some other quality that makes him feel secure. Perhaps he’s a sports star or celebrity.” I nodded toward Peter. “Perhaps he’s a CEO of a company.”
He couldn’t stay quiet any longer. “You don’t think women do the same thing?”
“Of course they do. I’m just saying it happens more often with men, because our society favors wealth in men. But my point is that the scale is usually balanced. A man with wealth feels secure with a woman who does not have as much wealth. And that woman happens to be more attractive than the man, in turn making her feel secure. But look at me, Peter. What do I have to offer you that could make me feel secure?”
He shook his head like he was disappointed in me. “You think I would leave you or cheat on you?”
“No! You wouldn’t, because you’re a devoted husband who wants his wife to be happy. But are you devoted to me because of a burning, life-sustaining need within you? Perhaps that was true at one time, but is it true now?”
Peter gazed at me without expression.
“I know where this is going,” I said. “You’ll help those Americans. And then you’ll try to figure out a way to take that object created on some far-away planet you saw in your dreams—that Lamotelokhai—and have it do s
omething to me. Because you want to fix me. But I don’t want to be fixed, my love. Not now. When you first encountered it, you were forty-one. As a result, your body remained in that state. But I’m not forty-one, I’m eighty-three. Perhaps the Lamotelokhai could put a hold on my aging. But that wouldn’t make me the woman I once was. You will never think of me the way you once did.”
He started to speak, but I cut him off.
“I’ve had a wonderful life with you, Peter. But now it is time I did something for you, rather than for myself. I’m ready to let go.”
Yonks Day – Year 51 – 2028
It is commonly said that time passes more quickly as you grow older, and I used to think so. But the last nine years have changed my thinking on this. So much has happened that I now partition my life into two parts: the years before Peter got that phone call, and the years after. I think many other people of this world would agree.
I was up before sunrise and did my stretches. Relatively little pain from my hip. Good, considering the busy day I had planned. I entered the kitchen and heated some porridge the old-fashioned way. I pulled milk and fruit from the fridge. Then I realized there was no butter. That would not do. I slammed the fridge shut.
“Romulus! Where are you?”
A moment later I heard soft thumping approaching from the back rooms of the house. Romulus skidded to a stop on the tile floor. A tree kangaroo, or at least he was made to look like one. I have no idea what he is really made of. He eats and bleeds, but he isn’t a real animal. Most people call them roobots, and everyone has one now. It would be foolish not to.
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