‘If America doesn’t want to play with them and continues to block my ideas, then yes – as you can see, I’ve invited some very illustrious guests. Zheng is right, but not in the way he thinks. I’ve had it up to here with the sponsorship failing to make headway! Competition is invigorating for business. Sure, it would be a bit shabby to run from the Americans to the Chinese now – they’re all the same idiots everywhere when it comes down to it – but offering the lift to all nations, now that’s got a ring to it.’
‘And you said as much to Zheng?’
‘Yes, and he thought he’d misheard. He certainly never wanted to unleash that kind of change in perspective, but he was overestimating his contribution. I’d had the idea for a long time already. He just made me more determined to do it.’
Bowie fell silent for a while.
‘Well, I’m sure you know you’re playing with fire,’ he said.
‘With the sun’s fire,’ said Julian serenely. ‘With reactor fire. I’m used to fire.’
‘Do your American friends know about your plans?’
‘They may have an idea, to a certain extent. It’s no secret whom I go trotting off to the Moon with.’
‘You sure know how to make enemies.’
‘I’ll travel with whomever I like. It’s my elevator, my space station, my hotel up there. They’re far from happy about it of course, but I don’t care. They should make me better offers and stop their control games.’ Julian suckled noisily at his bottle and licked his lips with his tongue. ‘Delicious, isn’t it? On the Moon we’ll have wine with an alcohol substitute. Totally insane! 1.8 per cent, but it tastes like really hard stuff. Are you sure you want to miss out on that?’
‘You don’t give up, do you?’ Bowie laughed again.
‘Never.’ Julian grinned.
‘But you’re too late. Don’t get me wrong: I love life, and it’s definitely too short, I agree with all that. Three hundred years would be wonderful, especially in times like these! But it’s just that I—’
‘—ended up being turned from an alien into an earthling after all,’ finished Julian with a smile.
‘I was never anything else.’
‘You were the man who fell to earth.’
‘No. I was just someone who tried to get to grips with his difficulties around people by disguising himself, using the line “I’m sorry if the communication between us isn’t working, I’m from Mars”.’ Bowie ran his fingers through his hair. ‘You know, my whole life I gleefully absorbed anything that ignited the world, anything that electrified it; I collected fashions and sensitivities like other people collect art or postage stamps. Call it eclecticism, but it may have been my greatest talent. I was never really an innovator, more of a champion of the present, an architect who brought that feeling of being alive and trends together in such a way that it looked like something new. Looking back, I’d say it was my way of communicating: Hey, people, I understand what moves you, look at me and listen up, I’ve made a song out of it! Or something along those lines. But for a long time I couldn’t talk to anyone about it. I simply didn’t know how to do it, how a simple conversation worked. I was afraid of getting into relationships, incapable of listening to others. For someone like that, the stage, or let’s say the world of the arts, is the perfect platform, it’s ideally suited to giving monologues. You reach everyone, but no one reaches you. You’re the messiah! A puppet of course, an idol, but for that very reason you can’t let anyone get close, because then it might get out that you’re actually just shy and insecure. And so, with time, you really do become an alien. You don’t need to put a costume on to be one, but of course it helps. If you feel as uneasy around people as I did back then, then you just make outer space out to be your home, look for answers from a higher being, or act as though you’re one yourself.’
Julian tapped his bottle, let it drift away from him for a moment then grasped it again.
‘You sound so terribly grown up,’ he said.
‘I am terribly grown up,’ laughed Bowie, bursting with happiness. ‘And it’s wonderful! Believe me, this whole spiritual paperchase to find out the connection between humanity and the universe, why we were born and where we go when we die, what gives us and our actions meaning, if there even is a meaning – I mean, I love science fiction, Julian, and I love what you’ve created! But all this space stuff was always just a metaphor for me. It was only ever about the spiritual search. The Churches’ maps were always a little too vaguely drawn for me, full of one-way streets and dead ends. I didn’t want anyone else to dictate how and where I was supposed to look. You can ritualise God, or you can interpret him. The latter doesn’t go down pre-set paths; it demands that you slip away from them. I did that, and I kept on creating new spacesuits for myself in order to explore this empty, endless cosmos, hoping to meet myself, as Starman, Ziggy Stardust, Aladdin Sane, Major Tom. And then, one day, you marry a wonderful woman and move to New York, and suddenly you realise: Out there, there’s nothing, but on the Earth there’s everything. You meet people, you talk, communicate, and what seemed difficult before now just happens, with wonderful ease. Your inflated fears shrink to become bog-standard worries; the early flirt with death, the pathos of ‘Rock ’n’ Roll Suicide’ reveals itself to be nothing more than the spectacularly unoriginal mood of a clueless and inexperienced young boy; you no longer wake up with the fear of going crazy; you no longer think obsessively about the misery of human existence, but about your children’s future. And you ask yourself what the devil you were looking for in space! Do you see? I’ve landed. I’ve never enjoyed living on Earth so much, amongst other people. And if my health allows I can enjoy it for a few more years. It’s bad enough that it will only be another ten or twelve, and not three hundred, so I’m looking forward to every moment. So, give me one good reason why I should fly to the Moon now, now that I’ve finally found my home and settled in down there.’
Julian thought it over. He could think of a thousand reasons why he wanted to fly to the Moon, but suddenly not a single one that would have any relevance for the old man opposite him. And yet Bowie looked anything but old, more as though he had just been reborn. His eyes looked as thirsty for knowledge as ever. It wasn’t the look of an extraterrestrial observer, though, but that of an earth-dweller.
That’s the difference between us, he thought. I was always extremely earthly. Always on the frontier, the great communicator, untouched by fear or self-doubt. And then he wondered what it would be like if one day he reached the conclusion that this space opera, of which he was the director and protagonist, had only served to bring him closer to Earth, and whether he would like this realisation or not.
Or was he just an egocentric alien after all, one who didn’t even get what was going on with his own children. How had Tim put it?
You don’t have a clue what’s going on around you!
Julian pulled a face. Then he laughed too, but without any real pleasure, raised his glass and toasted Bowie.
‘Cheers, old friend,’ he said.
A little later, Amber opened her eyes and saw that the Earth had disappeared. Fear shot through her. She had slept straight through the previous night and it had still been there in the morning, half of it in any case. But now she couldn’t see even the slightest glimpse of it.
Of course she couldn’t. Night had fallen over the Pacific half and the lights of civilisation weren’t visible from the height of geostationary orbit. There was no cause for alarm.