The Highest Frontier (66 page)

Glynnis clasped her hands on the table. “We’ve dropped parachute teams into every agency—and at Homeworld, getting them to talk is
mano a mano
. But this much we know. Ultra mutates like a virus; we knew that ten years ago. Ever since, we’ve plotted their rise of complexity in evolving new forms—forms that parallel successful life on Earth. Already some grow off submerged Florida; we’ve had chemical problems there. Others store salt and creep over land. Salt is pretty fundamental, but at some point even that requirement may be lost.”

“How far will it go?” asked Helen. “Since Earth has birds, will ultra make birds?”

“They won’t be birds. But if flight works on Earth, it’s a matter of time before ultra evolves something that can fly.”

Ultra mosquitoes, thought Dylan gloomily.

“Primates?” ventured Quade. Around the table, hands tensed and eyes narrowed.

“You mean, creatures that swing down from the trees to solve a Phaistos disk?” Glynnis shrugged. “If you do the math … maybe in another ten years. It’s a successful niche.”

That’s debatable, thought Dylan. “
Perdón,
you said ten years. So how did we get our alien student already?”

“Not alien,” corrected Glynnis. “We have no aliens here. ‘Undocumented.’”

“But—” He caught Nora’s eye. Luis, Orin, Zari, everyone looked at one another around the table. It wasn’t often they found all their human selves in one room, breathing each other’s air. “There are no aliens,” he said slowly, “because they are here to stay.”

“Claro.”

“So where did this ‘undocumented’ come from?”

“The back-room dworks at Homeworld,” said Glynnis. “The guys we don’t let out in daylight. They didn’t want to wait for ultra to get a brain one day and catch us unawares.”

“So they made their own?”

Glynnis nodded. “They sped up the quasispecies even more, with directed evolution. The idea was to make intelligent ultra, set it loose somewhere, and see what it could do. And how to combat it.”

Orin exclaimed, “They sent it here! But that’s—”

“They wrote off Frontera as a loss anyhow, by the next decade. Sorry,” she whispered. “Your hab is antiquated, you know. But we’ll try to bring it up to code.”

“But that Mary,” said Nora. “She wasn’t exactly a combatant.”

“Of course not. Evolution is never exact.” Glynnis reflected, “We think the dworks tried to model her after their boss.” The toywall displayed Mary Dyer, next to the Creep. They did have about the same nose and eyes, and the way their hands moved was uncannily the same.

Nora’s eyes narrowed. “Are there others?” Dylan could see her revising the student questionnaire.

“We’re still digging on that. But for now,” Glynnis pointed out, “your ultraphyte has reverted to single cells. The cells augment your solar power. Ultraphyte photochemistry could boost our solarrays, enough to convince Congress to build them. We’ll fund a major research center here.”

“Not here,” exclaimed Dylan. “We can’t have ultra crawling all over the hab.”

“Hold on,” grunted Orin. “Don’t forget the indirect costs.” The gravy that came with federal grants.

Glynnis turned to Quade. “To keep the ultra out in the shell, your ecoengineer has a good plan about ants. It works for some environments, especially in South America.”

61

By January, the hab was drying out, and the peepers were coming back. The deer were a nuisance again, crashing through the windows of FEMA modulars. Quade appeared in the window with one of his bulletins. His gloved hand held some tiny black creatures that stood on six spindly black legs, waving their antennae and mandibles. “
Eciton burchelli
has an unfair rep,” he assured the community. “Swarming in columns, they mostly consume invertebrates. They will fill an important niche in our hab.” Army ants would clear ultra from the surface soil, without harming the power-enhancing “contaminant” out in the phototrophic shell.

Most important, students were repopulating their newly printed residences and filling their toyboxes with homework assignments and party invites.

“Jenny!” Dylan waved to her out on Buckeye Trail. “I’ll miss you this semester.”

She turned with a smile. “I’ll miss Teddy.” The first-semester course was done.

“The new memorial in Battery Park—it’s magnificent.”

Jenny took a confident step toward him; the presidential step, all the Ramos clan were taught to walk like that. “I wanted you to know,” she said. “I’ve got beyond needing Jordi.” She added reflectively, “I do wish I could have seen him again, just once. Just to say good-bye.” Jordi’s body was never found. “But we’re all like Jordi now. Living in our moment, until the time to come.”

An admirable number of fellow students agreed; enough had returned to reopen that semester. Others had transferred out, not surprising, all things considered. But more surprising, a decent number had transferred in, seeking that frontier air. The transfers, plus a hefty FEMA grant, would just about tide the college over.

“We’re just one short.” His travel budget pared steeply, Luis reported in from Peoria. “Just one more admit to make our quota.” The admissions director added thoughtfully, “I don’t suppose you might persuade those ultras in the shell to … um.…” Seeing Dylan’s look, he hurriedly added, “Never mind.”

Meanwhile, the hab engineering had at last got the attention it needed. The substratum would get a permanent fix, no more pumps. President-elect Carrillo promised full protection from Kessler debris, and funded ultra studies at Reagan Hall. And alumni donors had recovered their nerve; the Campaign for Frontera was back in swing.

Gil’s window blinked insistently. “Dillie, what am I to do? All these lawyers,” he whined. “They want to wreck Toynet!” Like pushing over his tower of alphabet blocks.

Dylan sighed. “
Ahora,
Gil, I’m sure you can manage. Why, we all love Toynet.” Aside from the growing Babynet fanatics, who Dylan did his best to contain.

“But why?” Gil rubbed his eyes. “How could anyone think I’d want to harm my very own space college?”

“Nobody thinks that,” said Dylan carefully. “But Toynet got used by some … unscrupulous users.”

“
Claro.
We’ll get to the bottom of this.”

Dylan hoped Gil was right, that the culprits buried in Homeworld would get found; and that finding them out would not mean worse trouble. “Gil, you might consider revisioning your image. More philanthropy, perhaps.”

“Another college?”

“Something grander. Say, a global program to wipe out viruses.”

“
¡Oye!
That does sound like fun.”

A new project—Dylan thought wistfully how long since he’d had a chance of his own. Teddy was grand, but surely Dylan’s career had room enough to pen the story of yet another great American leader? Rosa Schwartz, for instance. Rosa had banned carbon output, launched the first solarrays, reformed housing, and founded the Frontera spacehab. Tax revolt had swept her out, but she was the only president of the twenty-first century who’d done as much as Teddy the century before. It was time someone set the record straight. If only he had the time.

Resignedly Dylan checked his schedule. To his surprise, the next two weeks appeared totally blank. Impossible; what had become of his ten meetings a day? Nora’s latest student disasters, Orin’s investment coups, and the faculty’s requests for scholarship leave?

“Fran?” His new student assistant Fran Pezarkar looked up, cheerful and well-mentaled, well-recovered from the previous semester’s ordeal. “Fran,
por favor.
What’s become of my schedule? Some glitch in Toynet?”

Fran’s eyes defocused as she reviewed her box. “It looks right to me. What’s missing?”

“Missing? Look there—a whole two weeks of my schedule, empty. Where are my appointments?”

Fran shrugged. “I guess everyone on Senior Staff thinks they can do without you just now.”

With a grim frown, Dylan blinked for Orin.

“Orin’s down on Wall Street,” the toyroom assured him. “Enhancing liquidity in our investment portfolio.” A likely story.

Nora—she couldn’t possibly be out. The dean of students appeared in her window. “May I help you?” she asked, in the tone one would address a wayward student.

Dylan gritted his teeth. “What on Earth has happened to my schedule?”

She gave him a very blank look. “Don’t know. What has happened?”

“Won’t you need me for anything, the next two weeks? Nothing you ‘thought I need to know’?”

“I guess not.” She added in a stage whisper, “Ask Clare.”

Dylan marched straight down to the chapel office. Leaning his arms on the desk, next to the palimpsest, he faced Clare. “What’s going on?”

Clare nodded across to the puzzle.

Fuming, Dylan went to the window seat and shoved a piece somewhere into the puzzle, a new one just starting to grow. “Clare, what is it? What ghost have you put in my schedule?”

“Two weeks’ vacation. The price for my silence about the ‘undocumented.’”

For a moment Dylan stared. “Why didn’t you just tell me?”

“I just did.” A new window appeared, a beach with palm trees and a faded wooden sign.

“Lila’s Beach?” Dylan sighed. “Clare, are you sure? What about those cameras?”

“True, but I keep my promises.” Clare gave a half smile, the way he used to when he pulled Dylan out of an all-nighter on his Teddy honors paper.

The college president and the college chaplain, taking time out from disaster recovery at the Toynet trillionaire’s private beach, with glimpses guaranteed to show up. That would do wonders for town-gown.

*   *   *

In the second semester, Jenny’s Cuba course finally reached the point where the rebel island took in thousands of refugees from flooded Miami. Cuba’s postvirtualist culture fascinated her; she looked forward to her trip down the Mariel space lift for her summer internship at the Havana Institute for Revolutionary Botany. Her Roosevelt course was done, and she finally got an art course. Life with Abaynesh, as always, went on. One day, as Jenny completed her Life exam, a new window opened. There stood Jordi, grinning like a twelve-year-old. “Hey, Jenny, it’s me! How’s your ultra in the cellar?”

Jenny glared. “Who are you?” What a tasteless prank. She blinked for a trace.

“I’m your brother. Come hear my speech—just for a minute, in the toyroom.”

Despite herself, Jenny was curious. Besides, the trace might work better in the toyroom. She’d get Anouk to hack it.

The toyroom opened upon an ocean rolling onto a long, white beach before a dense forest. A coconut lay half buried, near a faded wooden sign,
LILA’S BEACH.
There stood Jordi, in his suspenders and shirt with the sleeves rolled up, performing an old speech he used to practice in middle school. “I do not believe that any of us would exchange places with any other people or any other generation. The energy, the faith, the devotion which we bring to this endeavor will light our country and all who serve it—and the glow from that fire can truly light the world.”

Jordi turned to her, with a nod. “I’ve been watching, you know. Father Clare says I always will. You’ve done a mighty fine job for a frog. You earned an A-double-plus average, won the big one for Coach, and saved the breath of goodness knows how many fools, human and animal. On top of winning the prez. Not bad for a Somers Seldon.”

Jenny said nothing.

“It’s not been easy, has it. As Teddy used to say, ‘one becomes fearless by sheer dint of practicing fearlessness.’”

She smiled despite herself. Jordi never quoted Teddy, but she knew who did.

“In fact,” Jordi told her, “I couldn’t have done better myself. So I think I’ll leave Earth in your hands for now. You know, it’s hard to believe, but there’s another universe next door, even more foolish than this one. They really need my help. So that’s where I’m headed. Okay?”

“Okay.”

“Thanks for being the best sister ever.” He stepped over and kissed her on the forehead. “Good-bye, Jenny.”

“Good-bye, Jordi.”

Jordi turned, and took a step up as if climbing an invisible stair. Then he faded into the sky.

Jenny watched for a long while, as the waves rolled onto the shore. Then she left the toyroom, walking slowly back to the modular. Scanning her box for messages, she froze.

“WISDOM WE ARE HERE.”

Here? Frantically, her eyes scanned the four dull carboxyplast walls. Or did “HERE” just mean here in the hab?

The greenhouse box. She tore off the lid.

One of the plants was not a plant. A good approximation, but the fleshy fake leaves would need UV. And half buried in the stem was the diad. No tie-dyed shift, no more controls, no snake-like form escaping the DIRGs. Just an undocumented
compañera
. Who knows what ultra would come up with next?

“OK, MARY. YOU CAN WATCH TOO.”

NOTE

When you find an elephant atop a pole, you know it didn’t get there without help. I would like to thank several individuals who read part or all of the manuscript at different stages in the past ten years: Jeanne Griggs, Dave Switzer, Whitney Bratton, Sandra Lindow, Mike Levy, Ben Schumacher, Athena Andreadis, Clara Roman-Odio, Judy Kerman, and Lauren Brantley. I am also grateful for the comments of my editors, David Hartwell and Stacy Hague-Hill. While the book’s faults are my own, much of what is good arose from conversations with these people.

Joan Slonczewski, September 11, 2010

http://biology.kenyon.edu/slonc/slonc.htm

BY JOAN SLONCZEWSKI FROM TOM DOHERTY ASSOCIATES

The Children Star

Brain Plague

A Door into Ocean

The Highest Frontier

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

THE HIGHEST FRONTIER

Copyright © 2011 by Joan Slonczewski

All rights reserved.

Edited by David G. Hartwell

A Tor
®
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