The Whisper of Stars (3 page)

He burned his notes as planned, the words turning to ash and drifting on the wind, and then left their house and all those years behind him. It was time to say good-bye to his body, his identity and to Canada.

It was time to be reborn.

Chapter 5

It was Friday 6 December. Jennifer Logan sat in the window of the Shipwright’s Arms pub and stared blankly outside.

‘Tell me again it’s not my fault,’ she asked Jim McArthur as he arrived with their drinks.

‘It’s not your fault,’ he replied, nudging a glass towards her. ‘You should drink up and move on.’

Operation Penthouse had consumed their week. Debriefs, press conferences and plenty of finger-pointing. Yet somehow, within the department, it wasn’t considered a complete disaster. Chief Superintendent Paul Richards had seemed unusually calm about the whole thing. The operation hadn’t delivered the source of the body swap, but Duality Division still had a chance to secure a prosecution. Negative press for backstreet replication was always good, and the Harvey case would be in the news for weeks: an innocent man murdered – smeared across half a mile of train track – and a ‘swapper’ in custody. It was a good opportunity to highlight the dangers and feed the fear of splintering. Bronze Team had done a sterling job; Richards had said so in front of the whole department. Praise from him was rare, but Jen didn’t feel even the slightest shred of satisfaction.

McArthur pulled at his tie and sighed. He was solid, some would say stocky, befitting a man of his age. He kept in shape, dressed well and had allowed his hair to vacate residence, a decision that Jen thought suited him. They sat for a while, processing the week in shared silence. The traditional pub, a short walk from the Duality offices in London Place, was filling with after-work revelers and the smell of ale and history was comforting.

‘Are we still making a difference, Mac? I mean, really?’ she asked, her eyes searching his for answers.

‘It doesn’t always feel like it.’ After a long pause, he asked, ‘Jen, do you know how old this place is?’

She glanced around. ‘Older than you?’

He smiled, picked up a beer mat and rotated it in his stubby fingers. ‘Established 1884.’

Jen smirked, her trance broken. ‘No wonder you like it here; you fit right in.’

McArthur ignored her and continued to spin the beermat. ‘This place is over two hundred years old and still going strong.’ He leant forward. ‘People all want the same thing, Jen. They want to keep going, they want to cheat death.’

Jen made no effort to hide her sarcasm. ‘So it’s our job to make sure they die. According to the rules, of course.’

Mac didn’t take his eyes off her, his stare remaining fixed below a solid frown. It forced her to look down at the table again, huffing.

‘Making cloning and replication illegal was the right move.’ The humour was gone from his voice. ‘If people carried on sidestepping the system and living too long…’ He paused. ‘Well, we’d still be in that mess.’

The
mess
he referred to was an understatement. The 2066 Superflu had killed nearly a billion people. Then came the riots, the blackouts and of course accelerated warming, millions of refugees seeking asylum in the safe zones. The suffering had been horrendous. It was a mess alright, the biggest of them all. It meant the elusive dream of immortality had been just that.

Jen rubbed the back of her neck and sighed. The last legal replication – an older mind transferred into a younger clone – was over twenty years ago. Hard to imagine now, she mused.

McArthur continued. ‘If people want this life – the security that the UN safe zones bring – then they have to hibernate. That’s the deal and it’s a good one.’ He paused a beat, his tone softening, eyes meeting hers. ‘You know it.’

She did, deep down. The Hibernation programme offered longevity, security, and prosperity. It wasn’t quite the immortality of science fiction novels, but it was more than fair, especially when you considered the options. If mankind
didn’t
hibernate, there wouldn’t be a habitable planet in which to spend eternity. Accelerated warming had reached tipping point and drastic measures had been needed.

Jim McArthur was always right,
Jen thought, but she’d noticed his eyes had lost some of their sparkle recently. Decades of MI6 crap taking its toll, maybe. She could understand that. The world had changed a lot during his lifetime, and Jim McArthur had seen more than his share of suffering.

‘We do make a difference, Jen,’ he said, staring into his pint as if the answers lay there. ‘You just can’t always see it.’

Small cogs in a big machine,
Jen thought.

It triggered the unwelcome image of Marcus Aldridge, his terrified expression as he disappeared under that speeding train. He was the small cog, smashed under a big machine. She winced at the clarity of the memory and thought of Victoria Harvey, probably rocking back and forth in a padded cell somewhere. She wasn’t the first and wouldn’t be the last.

Splintering was becoming too common for Jen’s liking. It was one of the risks of an unregulated procedure, the mind transfer equivalent of a dirty needle. Fragmented memories of the previous owner’s life – as embedded and real as their own – made the new host unbalanced and dangerous, or in this case murderous.

‘I spoke to Callaghan on Wednesday,’ she said, thinking how quickly Operation Penthouse had spiraled out of control. ‘We had
fifteen
splinters last month.’

McArthur shook his head but didn’t seem worried. Bigger problems, she guessed, more important things to worry about. They both took a drink and McArthur changed the subject.

‘Did you hear the news this morning?’ he asked. ‘They’re ahead of schedule.’

The controversial draft system had been tested and deemed successful, and that morning the rumours that had been circulating homes, bars and workplaces for weeks were confirmed. With 9 billion people living in the safe zones and a global population approaching 12 billion, the UN had released their new, more aggressive Hibernation targets. During the next two years, 80 percent of people within the zones would be in the Hibernation programme.

The message was clear: Plan your alignment with friends and family. Choose your cycle – alpha or beta year – and claim a slot before the system chose one for you.

Jen hiked her eyebrows and lowered her voice. ‘Like it or not, people need to get used to the idea. Hibernation is happening, and if they want to choose their year, they should do it – and soon.’

A group of men laughed loudly in unison. Logan checked the time and looked around the bar. She didn’t want to socialise with anyone else from work.

‘You going to be okay?’ McArthur asked.

‘I’ll be fine,’ Jen replied, finishing her drink. ‘Say hi to Cole and the other guys.’

She stood, pulling on her coat. ‘See you Monday. Oh, and give my love to Sally and the kids. Remember to do that.’

As they hugged, Jen whispered in his ear, ‘Only a week to go, old man.’

His expression suggested he’d almost forgotten – retirement – something Jen never thought would happen. Although he didn’t like to admit it, Mac was tired. They both knew the nanobots cleansing his blood and repairing his ageing cells could only do so much.

‘I’m not
actually
retiring for another two months,’ he reminded her, and then said without any hint of importance, ‘Top brass are coming, apparently. Some posh meal or something.’

Jen smiled warmly and left. That
something
was a surprise party. A big one.

From his window seat, Jim McArthur watched her cross the street and disappear into a mass of people. He was going to miss the job, but most of all he would miss her. He had made a promise to watch over her.

He’d been on this earth for one hundred and nineteen years.

I guess for some people it’s never enough.

He drained his glass and ordered another pint.

Chapter 6

The Friday evening sky dressed London in soaked purple linen. Jen looked up, shrugged and decided to walk home. It would take her thirty minutes and the fresh night air, rain or no rain, would help her forget what had been an awful week.

As she crossed London Bridge, she paused to watch a large airship cruise above St Paul’s Cathedral, its blinking red lights cutting through the gloom. She looked up at the moon and found herself thanking it, as many did these days. It had pulled the tides forever, and now it might just turn the tide on the energy crisis, too. There were mining colonies up there now working triple shifts, pulling water and energy out of the ancient rock.

In the distance, the nearly complete Thames solar receiver stood majestic, rising up out of the water. Once operational, it would supply nearly half of central London’s power needs. It was incredible to think that a combination of technologies could end up giving the planet free energy, a fact that seemed all the more impressive as she watched the city glow into life, preparing itself for another power-hungry weekend. Jen continued on, deciding she would have a quiet night, a glass of wine and some mind-numbing entertainment.

Simon, her roommate, had other ideas.

Their apartment was on the third floor of a newly constructed smart building on Ropemaker Street. Her rent was heavily subsidised by the Government, a perk of her position at Duality. Simon had been an obvious choice for a roommate. He was clean, tidy and worked long hours as a healthcare assistant. That suited her. Only once had he made a move on her. He’d been drunk and suggested it would be ‘Fun!’ and might do them both some good. Logan had been careful not to hurt his feelings but made sure he wouldn’t suggest it again.

She made her way through the main entrance and up the stairs, and as she approached the door, she heard music. She opened it to see Simon and three friends in the kitchen, downing shots, dance music blasting from multiple speakers. The smell of warm food hit her immediately: pastry and spices, fresh herbs and cumin. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d eaten.

‘Officer Logan!’ Simon raised both hands in surrender, then grabbed a tall bottle and poured a generous measure into a shot glass.

Jen knew the friends. They were good people. They’d had some crazy nights out together, but she wasn’t in the mood this time. She walked over to them, planning to exchange pleasantries and make her excuses. Simon pushed a drink into her hand.

‘Your face?’ he said with mock concern, his infectious smile catching her.

‘Yeah, tough day.’

‘Rules are rules, Jen.’

They had made a pact. If either of them had a Friday that was beyond crap, then they had to go out. No questions. Drink, hit the town and blast the hell out of work. It was stupid and immature, but Simon had a contagious kind of optimism. She needed that sometimes.

His smile had become impossibly wide. ‘We are going to party!’ he screamed and resumed dancing.

‘Can I at least eat something?’ Jen pleaded.

‘You’ve got half an hour.’

She swore, knocked back a vodka shot and decided that actually, this might be just what she needed.

* * *

A few hours later, Jen was lost in herself, dancing alone, music pounding through her. From an open-air veranda she looked down onto a cobbled street packed with people. The Dome Nightclub, so named because of its huge clear glass ceiling, was crammed full. Projected colours and imagery flashed over its neon-blue floor as a sea of bodies swayed like tribal warriors, laser projection changing their appearances like flames licking a sea of ice.

In that brief, exquisite moment, Jen’s day ceased to exist, the stress gone. Most of the club members were augmented, linking and planning the rest of their evenings, the power of speech dwarfed by the ability to think together and share thoughts and feelings. Jen preferred to dance alone. It was a form of release for her, a kind of meditation. Later, the clubbers’ mind chatter would become flirtatious invites revealing desires and dreams, but for now the mood was exuberant anticipation.

Jen had turned off her social linking – she didn’t want to meet someone random tonight – but accepted the club’s audiovisual feed. She wanted to experience it alone. To her, that was the point. Which was why she was so frustrated by the man blatantly staring at her. Jen knew her dancing wasn’t overly sexual or erotic, and she wasn’t advertising or broadcasting herself as available. She ignored him and allowed her thoughts to wander.
Thomas.
She hadn’t seen him in a while. She sent him a message and waited, the music traveling through her. Minutes later she received a reply.

It read:
< So good to hear from you. How about my place at 1? >

She felt the unexpected, welcome rush of sexual anticipation. She continued to dance, trying to ignore the man still staring at her. She moved away as he approached, but he followed, smiling, eyes all over her. He closed in, seemingly unaware of the invisible boundary, the line between them. Jen stopped dancing, folded her arms and stared at him, the hypnotic trance broken.

‘I’m leaving,’ she shouted.

‘I’ll come with you.’

The man was drunk. As he placed his hand on her shoulder, he soon found himself on the floor facing the opposite direction, his arm twisted. He cried out, almost loud enough to be heard over the music. Jen released the wrist lock and walked away. The man sat there for a while, staring into space, rubbing his arm, shaking his head.

A large bouncer approached as she neared the door. ‘You okay, miss?’ he asked, his voice almost as deep as the sub-bass shaking the floor. ‘That man bother you?’

‘Thank you, I’m fine,’ she replied with a wry smile. ‘Nothing I can’t handle.’

The exit, a large circular tunnel, was reminiscent of a steel igloo. She stepped out into the cool evening air, called a taxi and disappeared into the night.

Fifteen minutes later Jen was in Thomas’s apartment. They shared a few drinks and kissed, warm, lingering kisses that lit her up inside. Thomas had shown her how sex should feel. It wasn’t an exaggeration to say he had unlocked its elusive mystery for her. Now they were naked, making love, entwined as one.