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There are no cities there that look like a bunch of needles poking into the sky. Everything and everyone are closer to nature there, at least if you get to the right place.
So why did they come here? What called them to this distant land?
They came for warmth and sustenance. They came because they are used to coming. Because they didn’t know how to change, didn’t know how to seize new territory like humans. They came to the only place they knew.
On the shore of a beautiful lake they found their shelter, as they had always found it. The place was still there. Worse was the food.
That’s why the two of them went on their way. That’s why they came here: to the city, to the man.
That’s why she died.
Randomness: life is a chain of accidents.
Regularity: people trying to help in small things do not notice how they hurt in big things.
They cried when they found her. Dead. They cried. But do tears change anything?
Their fault.
Their fault!
Why does this world put up with what they do to it?!
The same song cuts through the crowd’s clamor again.
…tausend Sonnen brennen nur für dich…
Spring
Erlöse dich***
He’ll have to go, even if it’s without her.
Make their usual way for both of them. To worship the flourishing of that land as bequeathed by their nature.
It’s time. It’s time.
He opens towards the wind, clinging to its flow.
The fall… and the rise.
He makes a sharp turn and crosses the river and heads north, away from the city, into the night that engulfs its silhouette.
***
«Will he jump or not? Do you think he will?» the guy tosses the empty cup into the trash. «It should come out beautifully, I think.»
«I guess. They’re rare around here. I mean, in the city. Usually they stick to the park, the lakes. They say it’s good luck to see one. Have you heard of it?»
He nods.
«Yes. It’s full of these symbols: posters, magnets, stamps,» he points the camera phone again at the green and red lights illuminated on the pavilion, the silhouette standing almost motionless on this man-made cliff. «They are weird, really: the proportions, the colors.»
«But beautiful,» objected his buddy. «White always looks great.»
«It’s a pity he’s alone. I think they usually travel in pairs. I’d love to see them dance! Oh! Look, look! He jumped!»
Above their heads, spreading its snowy wings, the Siberian Crane plummets from the roof and, with a long cooing sound that resonates throughout the neighborhood, flies north to catch up with the spring coming to its homeland.
* Here is an approximate translation. With great gratitude and respect:
* Rammstein, Spring
The crowd begins to rage,
They want his insides.
And they shout.
Jump
** Rammstein, Spring
The man begins to cry
He asks: «What did I do?»
I just wanted to look at the view
And the evening sky.
And they shout.
Jump
*** Rammstein, Spring
…a thousand suns burn only for you…
Jump
Spare yourself
Down
Two pairs of eyes watched through the narrow pupil of the porthole as the thin cable unfolded in the darkness, stretching more and more, almost indistinguishable against the ghostly blue glow of Earth’s atmosphere. The graphite-gray strand emerging from the A-11 airlock had already gained full length, and the platform attached from below must have already reached the South American stratospheric port, flying a dozen kilometers above the planet’s surface. So, it would be no more than an hour or two before we descended.
«Has the guy changed his mind? Still want to risk it?» an elderly trembling voice cut through the quiet hum of the thirty-third compartment’s walkway zone.
«No. You can’t talk him out of it once he’s made up his mind,» the respondent said, not hiding a bit of regret. «You know… that’s why he’s here, if you think about it.»
«Yeah… What if… what if he makes it? After all, they do work on those costumes, Ars.»
His friend shrugged his shoulders. His cheekbone face, riddled with a mesh of wrinkles – the evidence of a tumultuous life – twisted into a grimace of doubt.
«Well, so far, none of them have been successful with that option. And anyway… Tell me, Charlie, how many people have gone back down? In your memory? Not just like that, almost directly, but through other experiments? How many have won their freedom?»
The old man scratched his bald head, sighed, and hunched over more than usual.
«Two…»
«Yeah! And how many people have tried? Two dozen? Three? Five? I’ve lost count.»
«Actually, this guy seems to be on his game.»
«Yep… But I don’t understand why he’s so eager to go back. What’s pulling him there? I mean, he’s struggled with this new system himself.»
«And he’s got it, isn’t he?» Ars grinned wryly, «no one chip here. Consider it the freedom he wanted.»
«Freedom?!» his interlocutor rounded his eyes, smiled, and laughed, clucking. «Freedom… oh, I can’t… Here on the „Daisy“? Hey! Freedom!»
Continuing to cheer, Charlie took a dozen steps to the right, bumped into a silvery wall, turned around, shuffling in an attempt to imitate running, and moved back. Another thirty steps and another obstacle in the way. The laughter broke off. The old man slammed his palm on the metal surface:
«Here it is, our freedom. Thirty meters across, and that’s it. Is this cage better than that one?»
***
The Experimental Correctional Station, or, to put it simply, the orbital prison, has been circling the Earth for almost half a century.
The inmates affectionately and ironically called it «Daisy» because of its resemblance to a multi-petal flower. The visual resemblance, however, was the end of the story.
The multilayered disk with its petal compartments was spinning nonstop around the control module sphere, which also served as an intake and distribution point for new arrivals. However, the West Space Elevator’s delivery pods came no more than once a week, or even less frequently, so the central sector was not under much strain. The fully automated system coped with its task perfectly.
The most dangerous criminals on the planet were kept here: maniacs, terrorists, and also political opponents who were not successful but posed a threat. «The risk of undermining social foundations, the welfare of the population,» as they called it, those who managed to exile their enemies who created obstacles on their way to power here. Or perhaps the prisoners here were indeed monsters?
They kept three of them per unit and never all of them were seated at the same time. Old-timers and newcomers were regularly swapped places: one by one they were transferred to other cells or to newly-joined cells. Occasionally, prisoners were given the opportunity to communicate not only with their cellmates, but also with other residents of the prison through the internal communication system, but few became buddies or even friends in such an environment. The majority suffered from loneliness.
And the owners of the station turned it to their advantage.
Maintaining a prison in orbit was not cheap, even with stably operating space elevators and available energy. Therefore, the ECS became a base for experiments: they were always well paid, especially the extreme ones. And where to find test subjects for this, if not among criminals? A longstanding practice, in general.
And if you turn everything into a show… A show, with stakes on the outcome of each experience. A show with stakes on someone else’s life. Will the subject survive chemical blood modification? Will the subject remain sane after exposure to infrasound? Will the bones withstand the wave blows? Will a person be able to descend into the atmosphere without a capsule, only in a spacesuit?
The ECS program has long rivaled the profitability of the best casinos on Earth: the chances of winning are so slim – prisoners almost always go to waste – but the sweeter the desired prize.
Only in recent years, it has become increasingly difficult to understand the true meaning of the station’s existence: the isolation of scoundrels from society plus scientific achievements or, all the same, the spectacle.
Well, anyway, he’s already made up his mind. He can be a lab rat, a clown, a buffoon for a while, if the final result is what they promise. If he wins.
Christophe heard bursts of laughter behind the thin bulkhead of his room: the old buddies managed to have fun even here in the cage.
At first, when he just arrived here, the other people, the other inhabitants of this enclosed piece of space, seemed a boon. You might say they helped him get used to it. But now the cellmates only got in the way. For three days now – since the announcement of his participation in the descent experiment – they had dissuaded him as best they could. They assured him that it was a lost cause, that no one could manage it, that there was too much unpredictability in the case.
By the devil, he’ll manage to get through the suit and make it all the way down. He’ll go all the way and come back down. And then… then we’ll see.
Yes, everyone on Earth considers him a monster, perhaps even his former comrades-in-arms, his friends. But he would explain it to them, prove it to them. He was right, no matter what. It was worth it.
It was worth it!
***
In the experimental sector A, work was in full swing.
Preparing for the descent. The experience was to be the seventy-third, unless a participant dropped out at the last minute. This was the year that about half of the applicants withdrew from the experiment before launch. Fear, and justifiably so.
Flying down from the station to the stratospheric port, without pods or anything like that, just in a spacesuit – it was scary for her too. Of course, there was a rope, but it was rather for the cameras – so that the participant of the experience did not fly out of sight. And this thin string is not too reliable: even thick webs of space-lift systems sometimes break, but here is only a triple tape of the twentieth order.
Eight to ten hours total, if the wearable engines work properly. Eight to ten hours of uncertainty and stress for the participant. All for the purpose of testing a new suit. Or was it for the show?
A successful descent will give the prisoner his freedom, so one can understand his motives. But why return someone so dangerous to Earth? Take this one, the current one…
A middle-aged woman in a thick, light-colored jumpsuit was scrutinizing the file on the holoscreen.
«Christophe Jes. Thirty-two years old. White.
Born in Spain. Parents unknown.
Boarding School…
School…
Technical University… Included among the most promising graduates.
«Cyclone» Corporation, Development Department
Dismissal. Participation in protests against the new intrachip.
Video: «The installation of the sixth generation of Cyclone subdural chip is to enslave you! Your habitual assistant will become your controller, your overseer, your judge and executioner! Don’t switch to upgraded programs! Refuse to modify for your children! Our designs are stolen and corrected.
The possibility of total external control is real, and you may even suffer physically: reactions to stimulation are not well studied. There are victims in experimental groups who are hidden from you.
Get rid of the chip…»
First detentions. Litigation with «Cyclone» Corporation and the International Modification Agency.
Involvement in the explosion at the «Cyclone» plant in Monterey. Destruction of three million intrachips. Casualties: thirty killed (five terrorists), fifteen wounded. Damage…»
Yeah, and this guy could end up on the outside, back downstairs! How can you give such a guy a chance? So many people have suffered, died, and he calls them «accidental, but justified victims»! Does trying to save millions – supposedly save millions – justify the death of even one person? «The factory workers were involved…they knew who they were working for…the costs…It’s hard to conduct such an operation without getting dirty.» Jes’s words came up again and again in her brain, making her wrinkle in pain.
Is it possible to return such madman?
But it’s not up to her to decide. The corporation expects a super-successful edition of the show: the culprit has managed to become recognizable in the farthest corners of the Earth. The stakes almost broke the record of the biomodeling experience before last (ugh, creepy critter came out then).
The woman turned off the projection, turned around. Through the half-glass door of the A-11 airlock she could clearly see the manipulators being operated by her assistants. Metal arms, hoses and visors were completing the final assembly of the descent suit, checking seams, joints, fuel cells, and oxygen cylinders.
In ten minutes, the prisoner will be brought in. In twenty, he will enter outer space and slowly fly toward his desired freedom.
But it’s not up to her, is it?
***
