Robert Sawyer - Humans

Bedros, an old male from Evsoy, frowned at Adikor. “So what are you proposing, Scholar Huld? That we shove a stick partway through the portal to keep it open?”

Ponter, standing next to Adikor, turned slightly so that Bedros, at least, would not see his smirk.

Adikor wasn’t as fortunate: he was caught in Bedros’s gaze, and couldn’t look away without seeming disrespectful. “Um, no,” he said. “We have something more, ah, versatile in mind. Dern Kord, an engineer of our acquaintance, has proposed that we insert a Derkers tube through the portal.”

This was Ponter’s cue to unfold the Derkers tube. He got his fingers inside the narrow mouth and pulled. The tube, a latticework of metal, expanded with a ratcheting sound until its diameter was greater than Ponter’s height. “These tubes are used to reinforce mining tunnels in emergencies,” said Ponter. “Once expanded, they resist being collapsed. Indeed, the only way to get one to return to its original size is by using a defastener to undo the locks at each intersection of the crisscrossing metal segments.”

To his credit, Bedros got the idea at once. “And you think one of these will keep the portal open indefinitely, so that people could just walk down it, like a tunnel between the two universes?”

“Exactly,” said Ponter.

“What about disease?” asked Jurat, a local female of generation 141. She was seated on the opposite side of the room from Bedros, so Ponter and Adikor had to turn to face her. “I understand you fell ill when you were in the other world.”

Ponter nodded. “Yes. I met a Gliksin physicist there who…” He paused as one of the High Grays snickered. Ponter had gotten used to the notion, but he understood why it sounded funny; he might as well have referred to “a caveman philosopher.” “Anyway,” continued Ponter, “she proposed that the time lines split-well, she said forty thousand years ago; that’s half a million months. Since then, the Gliksins have lived in crowded conditions, and have bred many animals in large numbers for food. Numerous diseases have likely evolved there to which we have no immunity. And it may be that some diseases have evolved here to which they’re not immune, although our lower population density makes that less likely, I’m told. In any event, we will need to provide a decontamination system, and everyone who travels in either direction between the worlds will have to be treated by it.”

“But wait,” said Jindo, another male, who came from the land south of here on the opposite side of the unoccupied equatorial belt. Fortunately, he was sitting right beside Jurat, so Ponter and Adikor didn’t have to turn around again. “This tunnel between worlds has to be located at the bottom of the Debral nickel mine, a thousand armspans beneath the surface, is that right?”

“Yes,” said Ponter. “You see, it’s our quantum computer that makes accessing the other universe possible, and for it to work at all, it has to be shielded from solar radiation. The huge amount of rock overhead provides that shielding.”

Bedros nodded, and Adikor turned to face him. “So it’s not as though people could travel in great numbers between the two worlds.”

“Meaning,” said Jurat, picking up Bedros’s point, “that we don’t have to worry about an invasion.” Adikor turned to face her, but Ponter continued to look at Bedros. “Not only will individuals have to come through this narrow tunnel, but they will have to make it all the way up to the surface before they can get out into our world.”

Ponter nodded. “Exactly. You’ve reached the marrow.”

“I appreciate your enthusiasm for your work,” said Pandaro, the president of the Council, a Galasoyan 140 female, who, to this point, had been silent. She was sitting halfway between Bedros and Jurat, so Ponter turned left and Adikor turned right until they were both facing her. “But let me see if I understand you correctly. There is no way the Gliksins can open a portal to this world, right?”

“That’s right, President,” said Ponter. “Although I certainly didn’t learn everything about their computing technology, they are a long way away from building a quantum computer anything like the one Adikor and I created.”

“How far away are they?” asked Pandaro. “How many months?”

Ponter looked at Adikor briefly; Adikor, after all, was the hardware expert. But Adikor conveyed with an expression that Ponter should go ahead and answer. “At least three hundred, I’d say, and possibly many more.”

Pandaro spread her arms, as if the answer were obvious. “Well, then, there is no rush to deal with this matter. We can take the time to study the issue, and-”

“ No!” exclaimed Ponter. Every eye in the chamber fell on him.

“I beg your pardon?” said the president, her tone cool.

“I mean,” said Ponter, “it’s just that-that we don’t know how reproducible this phenomenon is over the long term. Any number of conditions might change, and-”

“I understand your desire to continue your work, Scholar Boddit,” said the president, “but there is the question of disease transfer, of contamination, and-”

“We already have the technology to shield against that,” said Ponter.

“In theory,” said another Councilor, also a female. “But in practice, the Kajak technique has never been used in such a way. We can’t be sure-”

“You are so timid,” snapped Ponter. Adikor was looking at him with shock, but Ponter ignored his partner.“ They would not be so frightened. They’ve climbed their world’s highest mountains! They’ve gone far beneath the oceans! They’ve orbited the Earth! They’ve gone to the moon! It wasn’t the cowardice of old men and women that-”

“ Scholar Boddit!” The president’s tone thundered through the Council chamber.

Ponter stopped himself. “I–I’m sorry, President. I didn’t mean-”

“I think it’s abundantly clear what you meant,” said Pandaro. “But our role is to be cautious. We have the welfare of the entire world on our shoulders.”

“I know,” said Ponter, trying to keep his voice calm. “I know, but there’s so much at stake here! We can’t wait for endless months. We have to act now. You have to act now.”

Ponter felt Adikor’s hand land gently on his upper arm. “Ponter…” he said softly.

But Ponter twisted free. “We haven’t gone to the moon. We’ll probably never go to the moon-and that means we’ll never go to Mars, or the stars. This parallel Earth is the only other world our people will ever have access to. We can’t let the opportunity slip away!”

It might be apocryphal, but Mary Vaughan had heard the story so often she suspected it was probably true. They said that when Toronto decided to build a second university in the 1960s, the plans for the campus had been bought from an extant university in the southern U.S. It had seemed like an expedient thing to do, but no one had taken into account the climatic differences.

That used to create problems, at least in winter. The campus had originally had lots of spaces between buildings, but those had been filled in over the years with new construction. Now the campus was cluttered: crowded with glass and steel, with brick and concrete.

Still, there were things about the campus that appealed to Mary. Most notable was the name of the business school, which she was now passing: “The Schulich School of Business”-and, yes, Schulich was pronounced “shoe lick.”

It was still a week before classes would begin, and the campus was mostly deserted. Although it was broad daylight, Mary still found herself feeling apprehensive as she walked along, going around corners, passing walls, squeezing through passageways.

This was where it had happened, after all. This was where she’d been raped.