Geoff Ryman - The Child Garden

The universe had been made by inflation, gravity pulling energy out of nothing. The Consensus was mining the vacuum as well. It was plucking it gently, to release floods of heat. The Consensus would soon be making energy by making tiny, pocket universes.

‘You comfy, love?’ Root asked, giving Rolfa a drink of water.

Chao Li Song had other things in store to say. ‘For so long now, we have known the universe was not material. Everything calls up its opposites and achieves a new synthesis. Hegel told us, Marx told us. The time has come now. We had Dialectical Materialism. Now we must have Dialectical Immaterialism. Idea precedes reality.’

He had to flee for his life. The viruses did not tell Milena this. Her mother had, in the name of her father who had died. Because of Chao Li Song, socialism forged an alliance with resurgent religion. Because of him, socialism won. It required only a few compromises, with prudery and common sense. Milena lived in a theological state.

Charlie, the English called him. Charlie Song.

‘Sing a song of Charlie, take you for a ride,’ Root the Terminal was singing, wobbling backwards like a jelly towards Milena. ‘Sing a song of Charlie, down the Charlie Slide.’

We rose out of Africa, thought Milena. We rose out of a drought and survived, not with a bigger jaw, but with a smaller jaw because we had the beginnings of speech. We survived because we worked together. We are designed to survive changes in climate by working in concert. Like music.

Root gripped her hand and shook it. ‘You stay here with me, love, or we get two readings all mixed up, and that’s very weird. You never seen this. You never seen this, you in for a real treat, I can tell you that.’ She chuckled. She was like a balloon full of chuckles.

We survive, thought Milena, because after everything else, we are good. We survive to the extent that we are good.

The thing that was the room chuckled with them. It chuckled and space chuckled, the space containing Rolfa. There was a wave through it, and her.

Rolfa’s head was flung back like a cannonball, and it split into a grin. ‘Yeee-haaa!’ she cried. She roared with laughter. ‘Whooo-eeee!’

‘That’s it, that’s it!’ shouted Root and she jumped up and down with her vast bulk. ‘Oh, yeah. Ride it love, ride it!’

I had heard, thought Milena. I had heard it was wonderful, and I never believed.

Every synapse is engaged at once, every neural pathway, every cell in the brain works together, all at once for the first and only time. Like a national grid, all lit up. Each person a nation, a universe.

The Consensus pulled energy up out of nothing, from quantum vacuum, and it could roar back in time by travelling faster than light. It had been known for a century and a half that gravity in the form of inflation had helped spark the beginning. But how was there a viewpoint, a reference, for gravity to work in before space and time? The answer was that gravity had been imported back to the beginning, thought in the form of gravity.

Humankind, working as the Consensus, was going to make the universe. So loved the world that we made God in our own image.

‘Oh!’ cried Rolfa, in fondness for everything. ‘Oh!’ and her voice broke into a whine of loss and regret and she looked at Milena, smiling and sad.

‘That’s it,’ said Root. ‘Darling, you just been Read.’ She walked to Rolfa, leaned over her, inspected her, stroked her head. ‘So what did you see, love?’ she asked, speaking gently.

‘All kinds of things,’ said Rolfa, faintly.

Root laughed and nodded. ‘Yes, yes, everything comes back.’

‘I saw my mother,’ said Rolfa. ‘She was picking water lilies in a pond; she had her dress, her big orange dress lifted up out of the water, and she was laughing in case she fell.’ She sat up and took hold of Root’s arm. ‘The pond was behind an old white farmhouse. We were staying there. On Prince Edward Island. I was five years old. I got in a fight with my sister. She said she was going to grow bigger than me because she drank tea. And big people drink tea.’

‘I tell you, it’s the same for everyone. I see people, they leave her dancing.’

‘But it doesn’t just come back,’ said Rolfa. ‘It goes forward as well.’

‘Hmmm?’ said Root, turning, as if someone had spoken to her. Someone had. ‘Back to business,’ she murmured, and cupped a hand around an ear, and listened, rapt. Milena was given an uncomfortable chance to think.

Root began to smile. ‘Well you’re quite a character, aren’t you? You’re all over the place. I’ve never seen anyone like you before.’ She chuckled and shook her head. ‘You like your drink, I can tell you that.’

Milena felt a familiar chill. ‘Change as little as you can,’ she said, in a whisper.

‘We do, love. We don’t go mucking around.’

‘She’s a genius. That’s why this is being done.’

‘Is she now?’ Root was amused. ‘Well I wouldn’t be knowing about that.’ She bent down. ‘You feel up to moving now, Rolfa? We’ve got to make space now for someone else.’

Gently, Rolfa nodded. Root helped her to her feet.

‘In and out like a giant lung,’ murmured Rolfa.

Milena took the other arm. She felt Rolfa lean on her, exhausted. They walked through the concertina, down a white corridor to a little room with old chairs. As she was leaving, Root gave Milena a wry grin, and waved her to follow into the corridor, to talk.

‘Your friend, you know, she shakes with both hands.’ Root’s eyebrows were raised, her cheeks were bursting with amusement, her tiny hand on its fat wrist was placed delicately over her breast.

What was the woman talking about? Milena began to have an uncomfortable creeping feeling. ‘I think she’s left-handed, actually.’

‘Now don’t let on you don’t know!’ insisted Root. ‘We see it all here, nothing bothers us.’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘Your friend. She wants to botty-bump with other ladies.’ Root covered her face and hooted with laughter. ‘Oh, the shapes humankind gets in. We see them all! But a little rough justice and it all works out.’

Milena went still and cold. ‘She likes other women.’

‘Oh, loves them, love. Loves you.’

‘Can we stop this?’ Milena asked. Her voice was a croak.

Root shook her head sadly. ‘It’s the law,’ she said. Her vast buttocks made her white skirt rustle as she walked away.

Milena turned and walked into the room. She saw Rolfa sitting, smiling, looking through the whole world to somewhere else.

‘Rolfa,’ Milena said. ‘I love you. I want to sleep with you — I mean — I want to have sex with you.’

Rolfa began to grin. She covered her eyes. ‘This is a fine time to tell me.’

‘I tried before, but I couldn’t.’

Rolfa began to laugh.

‘It’s not funny!’ Milena did an anguished little dance.

‘It’s ficken hilarious! It’s the funniest thing I ever heard.’ Rolfa took Milena’s hand, and shook her head. ‘Why didn’t you say anything?’

‘I don’t know. I was afraid. Why didn’t you say anything?’

‘Because you’re a human being, and I thought you’d be cured! You told me. You said. I had all those viruses when I was ten years old!’

Oh merciful heaven. Something so simple. Milena whispered. ‘But I was never Read. They gave me viruses to educate me. But I was never Read. I was never cured.’ And I never talked about not being Read, because I was afraid of being found out. I never said anything because I was afraid. But they knew all along.

I had Rolfa. I had Rolfa all along. And now they’re going to destroy her.

Rolfa was laughing. ‘All those nights! Should I touch her, shouldn’t I touch her, no I mustn’t, they cure these people.’ She looked down at Milena’s hand and played with its fingers. ‘Who needs viruses, when you’ve got fear?’ She looked up at Milena, still smiling. ‘We’ll have some time,’ she promised. ‘However long, we’ll have it.’