Ким Робинсон - The Ministry for the Future

The sound spheres in this part of the city overlapped, but as long as that didn’t confuse the players, or even if it did, the listeners took it as part of the experience. Down near the lake it got more and more crowded, it was the place to be, and here they could always hear at least three tunes at once, often more. Cacophony, she shouted to Art.

Polyphony! he shouted back, grinning.

Mary nodded, smiling back at him.

Midnight was approaching. Ash Wednesday would soon be here, with its discipline and fasting. It was time to let loose. Fat Tuesday. Even more than New Year’s Eve, it was time to let loose: winter’s end was in sight, and though it wasn’t spring, it was the promise of spring. Spring would come. That knowledge was always the real festival night.

They reached the lake. The Zurichsee, her summer schwimmbad. Mary recalled the big conference in Kongresshall just down the shore, the clot of trends, the Gordian knot of the world; but then she thought, No, not tonight. She had spent her entire life tugging on that Gordian knot, and at most had only loosened a snag, the big knot remaining intact despite a lifetime of ceaseless work. She shuddered in the cold at the thought of that, grabbed Art’s arm, guided him to the little lakeside park with the statue of Ganymede and the eagle.

Have you seen this before? she asked him.

The statue? Sure. But who was Ganymede, I never really knew. And what’s with the bird?

She said, It’s kind of mysterious really. It’s said to be Ganymede and Zeus, Zeus in the form of an eagle. So, but look at him. What is he saying to that eagle, do you think? What does it mean? I mean—what does it mean?

Art regarded it. Naked bronze man, arms outstretched, neatly balanced, one arm back and high, the other forward and low—as if offering something to the bird, as in falconry. But the eagle was almost waist high to him.

That’s a really big bird, Art said. And there’s something wrong with its wings.

A phoenix, Mary said as it occurred to her. Maybe it’s a phoenix.

The man is offering it his life, Art guessed.

Mary stared at it. I don’t know, she confessed. I can’t get it.

It’s some kind of offering, Art insisted. It’s a gesture of offering. He’s us, right? So he’s us, offering the world back to the animals!

Maybe so.

He was definitely saying something. That we could become something magnificent, or at least interesting. That we began as we still are now, child geniuses. That there is no other home for us than here. That we will cope no matter how stupid things get. That all couples are odd couples. That the only catastrophe that can’t be undone is extinction. That we can make a good place. That people can take their fate in their hands. That there is no such thing as fate.

Her lake extended blackly to the low hills in the distance, the VorderAlps, the forward alps. Black sky above, spangled with stars. Orion, the winter god, looking like a starry version of the Ganymede before them.

It has to mean something, Mary said.

Does it? Art asked.

I think it does.

That’s Jupiter there to the west, Art said, pointing to the brightest star. So if your big bird is Zeus, that’s where he comes from, right?

Maybe so, Mary said.

She tried to put that together with the burbling roar of the crowd, the overlapping music, the lake and the sky; it was too big. She tried to take it in anyway, feeling the world balloon inside her, oceans of clouds in her chest, this town, these people, this friend, the Alps—the future—all too much. She clutched his arm hard. We will keep going, she said to him in her head—to everyone she knew or had ever known, all those people so tangled inside her, living or dead, we will keep going, she reassured them all, but mostly herself, if she could; we will keep going, we will keep going, because there is no such thing as fate. Because we never really come to the end.

My thanks for very generous help from:

Tom Athanasiou, Jürgen Atzgendorfer, Eric Berlow, Terry Bisson, Michael Blumlein (in memory), Dick Bryan, Federica Carugati, Amy Chan, Delton Chen, Joshua Clover, Oisín Fagan, Banning Garrett, Laurie Glover, Dan Gluesenkamp, Hilary Gordon, Casey Handmer, Fritz Heidorn, Jurg Hoigné (in memory), Tim Holman, Joe Holtz, Arlene Hopkins, Drew Keeling, Kimon Keramidas, Jonathan Lethem, Margaret Levi, Robert Markley, Tobias Menely, Ashwin Jacob Mathew, Chris McKay, Colin Milburn, Miguel Nogués, Lisa Nowell, Oskar Pfenninger (in memory), Kavita Philip, Armando Quintero, Carter Scholz, Mark Schwartz, Anasuya Sengupta, Slawek Tulaczyk, José Luis de Vicente, and K. Y. Wong

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Names: Robinson, Kim Stanley, author.