The Sunspacers Trilogy

by George Zebrowski

  The phone rang as I came into the room.

  “Joe?” Linda’s voice asked as I opened the line. There was no picture.

  “Hello, I’m here.”

  “May I talk to you?”

  “Just turn on the screen.”

  “I mean personally.”

  She had quarreled with Jake, and I was to be the backup again. “Joe?”

  “You mean tonight?”

  “I’d like to explain.”

  “I really can’t…”

  She broke the connection. I thought of calling her back, but decided against it. She was using me for something, it seemed, yet I felt she liked me also.

  I went to the bathroom and washed my face with cold water. I stood there looking at my face in the mirror, wondering how I could figure Linda out if I couldn’t understand myself very well.

  The phone was ringing when I got back to the room.

  I sat down and waited for it to stop, but it kept ringing. Finally I opened the line. “Oh, hi,” I said, surprised by Rosalie’s smiling face.

  “Maybe we could get together this weekend?” she asked. I nodded.

  “Are you going home for the break?”

  “I don’t know,” I managed to say. “My folks are having problems, and they’re moving.”

  “You’re welcome at my house.”

  “That’s very nice of you, but I can’t promise.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing much.”

  “Where’s your roommate?”

  I shrugged. “Working on his future somewhere.”

  “And you’re not?”

  I smiled. “How’d you guess?”

  She was looking at me critically, but with concern. “See you this weekend.” Her face faded away.

  |Go to Table of Contents |

  10

  Problems

  I did my work in a kind of trance that week. The good thing about this was I didn’t notice the difficulty of the material, learning as a matter of habit, caring less each day, taking no pleasure in it. Morey was having fun, even when the work was very hard. I envied him.

  Morey studied away from the room, so I saw him only when he was asleep or going somewhere. He didn’t want to argue with me anymore, it seemed; his studies were more important. He was right—I did my work out of pride, because I refused to give up.

  I passed Kik ten Eyck in the student center one afternoon. He gave me a puzzled look and kept walking. I saw Jake and Linda from a distance a few days after she called. Kik, of course, probably thought I wasn’t good enough for his sister, since I was from Earth, but I didn’t take it personally; he would have thought the same of anyone from Earth. We were all childish, overprotected types. Kik, being a tough, mature Sunspacer, preferred Jake, who was more like himself, the brother Linda loved. It probably disturbed Kik that Linda had showed signs of being attracted to me. Still, it seemed I was missing something somewhere.

  I spent a lot of time on the hillside, gazing up at the rooftops on the other side of the world. The fresh air, the soft sunlight on my face, the flowers in the grass, the impossible river rising from the lake, made my doubts seem a bad dream …

  Something crouched in the grass near me. A Scottish terrier’s beady eyes were staring at me intently.

  “Electromagnetic!” the animal squeaked, repeating some physics learned from its owner. “Explain … vectors, hah, hah, hah!” It laughed mockingly.

  “Go on!” I shouted.

  “Good-bye!” the dog cried and rushed off into the tall grass, leaving me a bit disturbed.

  I lay back and wondered about the terms ahead, escaping into a future where I would be full of learning and under my own command. I pushed forward through time, watching the Earth-Moon system racing around the Sun, speeding the cosmic clock ahead into distant ages, my back pressed against the grass in this light-filled hollow.

  You can have anything you want in your mind, but the trick is to make dreams happen outside your head, so they become as real as the habitat around me. Still, wishes have to start deep inside you to be any good.

  Rosalie found me out there, late one afternoon, when I should have been in class. She sat down next to me and took my hand.

  “I don’t want the distraction of getting interested in someone, not while I’m in school.”

  I sat up. “So why did you come out here?”

  “I was worried about you. You haven’t been to classes much, and that began to distract me also.”

  “It’s okay, I’ll have the grades.”

  She gave me an exasperated look, and I knew what she wanted to say.Typical Earth boy .No ambition . Kik was the kind of guy for her, I thought.

  “I just don’t feel the dedication for physics when it comes to work. The idea appeals to me in my head, but I don’t feel it.”

  “Maybe you’re just lazy.”

  I laughed. “If only that’s all it was. Look—it’s the wrong thing. Might as well admit it early.”

  “Maybe you need some time to think, Joe.”

  “Who knows? I’m not that unhappy about it.” But when I looked at her I realized that there wasn’t much in me for her to like. I hadn’t done anything, and it seemed unlikely that I would.

  Rosalie and I started going out on Fridays, rationing our time together so it wouldn’t interfere with school. She seemed a much warmer and more sensitive person than Linda, but probably just as strong. She was determined to get what she wanted—an education before a career, in contrast to those students who thought of the university as the bottom rung of a scientific career.

  I wasn’t sure what Rosalie expected from me. She had a way of searching my face with her eyes for clues about my feelings. I was a little afraid she would discover a person neither of us would like.

  The term ended on October 10. Morey and I got A’s in our courses. He was very smug about it. Not bad for a couple of earthies.

  “Good going, Joe,” he said, but with a hint of doubt.

  “Just a first term.” Ro had pushed me a bit, but I still wasn’t a true believer. Her encouragement had helped, and I felt a little guilty. True believers sat around to all hours, plotting how to seize the holy grail of physics. It all depended on which problems they selected to solve; pick wrong and you were finished. So how could I do anything? I had no beastie in sight; I only got grades.

  The campus became a ghost town. The Earth kids went home for two weeks; the locals stayed in their towns. I was alone in the dorm, except for some wandering maintenance people and Carlos Ramirez in 107. I tried to talk to him, but he was hard at work for the next term and didn’t want to waste time. He was an orphan, studying physics on a small income from an insurance trust. He had no one on Earth except the bank. His grim determination made me feel worse about myself.

  Rosalie came and stayed with me for a few days. We slept late and went swimming in the lake before noon. Ramirez always gave us a few dour looks when we came back.

  “I don’t think we’re setting a good example, Ro said one day.

  “Don’t worry, he’s tough. So how are your parents?” I asked as I changed my clothes.

  “There’s only Dad and me. He’s fine.”

  “Oh.”

  She saw my hesitation. “My mother isn’t dead or anything, Joe, as some people assume. Dad had me alone.”

  “But you have genes from two parents, don’t you?” I asked, relieved that it was nothing sad.

  “Sure, but the female were made up to order.” She laughed. “There’s no Mom hiding somewhere for me to wonder about. I know you’re more used to it on Earth, but it’s getting quite common out here in the habitats. After all, we pioneered the biofacilities decades ago.” She smiled. “I’m healthier than chance combinations, since at least half my characteristics are handpicked. By Dad, of course.

  I knew about it, but she was the first I’d met. “Were you born from a host mother?”

  “No. Quality-controlled womb. What do you think?” She stepped o
ut of her damp suit.

  I put my arms around her. “You make me very happy,” I said.

  Ramirez pounded on the wall a few times before we went to lunch.

  The Mercury talks resumed on October 17. Ro and I were hoping that there wouldn’t be another quake before the negotiations were concluded. I didn’t really like the idea of negotiating about such things; what was right was right. Negotiations seemed just a way for Earth to see what it could get away with doing.

  I came out of the bathroom one morning and saw a familiar shape walking away from me down the hall.

  “Bernie!”

  He turned around and smiled. “Joe. How about seeing a bit of the engineering level?” His memory was perfect.

  “Sure, when?” Ro was at the bookstore, and I had nothing better to do. The break from school had put me in a good mood.

  “We can go right through the dorm,” Bernie piped, “along the water system.”

  He led me down the stairs into the basement, where he opened a large hatch in the utility area. I followed him down a spiral staircase. We came out into a tunnel. Guide lights went on overhead.

  We got into the open track car, and it whispered off down the passage. The overhead guide light snaked ahead of us, darkening behind us.

  “We’re running along the water and drain pipes,” Bernie said. He took a deep breath, then another.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing. But sooner or later I’ll have to have a new heart grown for me. Doc says I need a general cell scrub and ‘juvenation. Getting old.”

  “Nobody’s really old before a hundred nowadays.”

  “That’s what they teach, but you’d be surprised how many people die in their eighties.”

  “Do you feel old?”

  “Sometimes.”

  There wasn’t much I could say to that. I liked him, and felt that he liked me. He’d remembered our meeting on the hill, and was eager to show me around.

  “You can’t see much down here in one day,” he said.

  “That’s okay.” I looked back into the dark tunnel. “Where are you from, Bernie, originally?”

  “Earth. Had a son and daughter there, lost a second wife, and spent twenty years in prison. Learned enough to make myself useful when they sent me out to help build this place.”

  “What were you in for?” I asked, wondering if he had killed his wife.

  “Computer bank theft. They never found the money.”

  “What did you need it for?”

  “Things were worse in those days. I had a common law wife who ran away and left me with two kids. I set the kids up for life, but the money couldn’t be traced back to me. No one knew who they were or where. I had no time to raise them. I set it all up, so that when they caught me my kids would have enough. The money disappeared the day I transferred it. No one cares any more.”

  “You don’t mind telling me?”

  “It’s in my files now. I like you well enough.” He looked up. “We’re under the lake now.”

  “The sphere gets its water from the lake, I take it.”

  “Right. It’s used to irrigate the land, since we don’t get much rain weather. Land inside one of these can get very dry. The system releases water directly into the ground at thousands of points, then it drains through the ground back into the lake. Those switches have to be checked routinely and replaced when the computer says so. I can let you off at the student center on the way back, if you like.”

  “That’s okay.”

  “If you’re ever free, come and work for me. I’d be glad to teach you what I know.”

  “Are you serious about that?”

  “It’s the second time I’ve asked. Remember?”

  “Don’t you think I’ll stay in school?”

  He gave me a sly grin. “I can spot the moody ones. Seen them come and go. Make good apprentices. It doesn’t matter about school. You can work a term and go back.”

  “Oh.” I was surprised at how sure he was about me.

  “You know where to find me,” he said as the car slowed to a stop near a dark exit. “Give me a minute here. All I have to do is plug in an automatic switching unit. There are spares right here on the shelf. Then I’ll shoot back with you to the student center.”

  I wanted to see more. “Next time,” Bernie said, sensing my disappointment. It bothered me a little to think that anyone could figure me out, especially since I was having trouble doing it myself. Were people pretty simple when they were young, growing more complicated as they grew older?

  Morey came back on the twenty-third. “You’re a day early,” I said almost accusingly.

  “Got to get a good start. What did you do?”

  “Walked around a lot. Kept to myself.”

  “See Rosalie Allport?”

  “Once or twice,” I said reluctantly.

  “I’m glad to be back,” he said, sounding like his old self. “Mom kept asking if I still got the whoopsies in space. She kept saying the word. They dragged me around to their friends. At home I was the kid with the whoopsies, but in front of their pals I was the wonder brain from space. A few of their pals dislike Sunspacers. Never noticed it before. They see them as misfits who can’t hack it on Earth. There’s a lot of hate about the Sunspacers siding with the miners. You wouldn’t have liked it. I had to come back early.”

  He was glad to see me. And I was happy to see him, I realized. Maybe we could get along after all.

  “Did you get sick this time?” I asked, needling him.

  “Funny about that, I didn’t.”

  The second term began. We had the same teachers for the second halves of the first term’s courses. I worked very hard, trying to keep to my resolve.

  There was a knock on my door one afternoon in the first week.

  “Come in!” I shouted.

  The door slid open as I turned around, and I saw Linda. “Will your roommate be back soon?” she asked, stepping inside. The door slid shut behind her.

  “I don’t know.”

  “What are you reading?” she asked, smiling nervously.

  “War and Peace,” I said, puzzled. “Leo Tolstoy.”

  “I’ve read it. It’s long.”

  “I know.”

  She looked at me uncertainly. “Joe, I want to explain why I disappeared that evening.”

  “You don’t have to.”

  “I want to,” she insisted.

  “I understand about you and Jake.”

  “It’s not just that. When news came that my parents had been killed in the shuttle accident, it was a call from someone who sounded like your father. I thought you were going to hear something bad. I know it’s stupid, but I can’t listen when I know kids and parents are going to argue. It all got mixed together that night. I’m sorry. It’s been four years,” she continued, “but it seems like yesterday. Kik and I have only each other.”

  “You must have loved them a lot,” I said, standing up.

  She came up to me and kissed me. “Joe,” she whispered. “I wanted you that night. But that’s all it was.”

  I stared at her. She smiled and put her arms around me, and we kissed again. Her lips softened, and a flush came into her cheeks. “It’s unfair,” she whispered, pressing against me.

  “What is?” I managed to ask.

  “You’re too yummy,” she mumbled. We stumbled and fell on the bed. I tried to keep from laughing, not wanting to spoil her mood. No one had ever called me yummy. I felt like a dessert.

  The door buzzed, but we ignored it. Then it slid open and I heard Rosalie say, “I thought I’d surprise—”

  She stopped short and moved backward, triggering the door before it could close. I tried to say something, but she turned and walked out. The door took forever to close.

  “I’m sorry,” Linda said after a moment. I moved away from her and sat on the edge of the bed.

  “I’m sorry,” she repeated, moving to sit next to me.

  I took a deep breath. “It’s
okay.”

  She touched my arm.

  “Go make up with Jake,” I said resentfully.

  “Don’t be angry. It just happened, not because of Jake. I kept thinking about you …”

  “Please go.”

  She kissed my cheek and stood up. All I wanted to do was find Ro and change the hurt look on her face.

  The phone rang. I waited for the door to close after Linda, then I rushed to the desk, hoping that it was Rosalie calling from the lounge.

  I opened the line. Dad’s face stared at me.

  “Hello, Joe,” he said after a moment.

  “Oh, hi.”

  “What’s wrong?” he asked after the delay.

  I shook my head. “Just expecting another call.” One, two, three.

  “I won’t keep you. Just wanted to tell you that I’ve got a new place here in New York and I’m back at work, so your coming home for Christmas won’t be any problem.”

  “What about Mom?” One, two, three.

  “It’s over, I’m afraid,” he said heavily, “but she’ll be here to clear up some business, so the three of us will be together.”

  “I don’t know. Let me call in a day or two.”

  “What’s to decide?”

  “I’ts just that I have to see about a few things.” I waited.

  “Sounds like you don’t want to come.”

  “Well, I didn’t expect to!”

  His expression caught up with my words. “What’s wrong?” he asked softly, looking hurt.

  “Nothing. Look, I’ll call. There’s plenty of time.” One, two, three.

  “I’ll have to know, son.”

  “Yeah, I’ll call.”

  He faded.

  I called Rosalie. Her face appeared and disappeared. I touched in her number again.

  “Ro, please!”

  She stared. I had only a moment to get through to her.

  “What is it?” she asked coldly.

  “It’s all a mistake!”

  I explained nervously; it all sounded like a lie.

  “I just don’t know,” she said finally.

  “It was just a stupid accident, Ro!” I should have told her that I loved her, but suddenly I was uncertain. Here was my chance to be alone again, to think only of myself and what I would do with my life. Besides, what kind of person was she to doubt me so easily? Maybe I didn’t know her at all.