‘Sleep’s the best thing, right now,’ insisted Prevezer. ‘In my considerable experience of these situations.’ He rolled up Dallas’s sleeve and pushed the needle in.
Simou shook his head, hardly convinced.
‘Then let’s just hope he doesn’t dream. After what he’s been through, who knows what he might dream about?’
‘At least they’re not dead,’ insisted Prevezer. ‘Dead’s the worst dream of all.’
IX
Reality changed forever in 1905, ‘the year of miracles.’ This was the year in which Albert Einstein published his Special Theory of Relativity. From then on it could be seen that time and space were geometrically equivalent in one four-dimensional whole, alongside gravity and matter. All points in space were also points in time, and all moments in time were also points in space. And space-time could be regarded as one giant block of ice in which the whole of physical reality is frozen once and for all. Just as every place in this block universe can be contained, so the same can be said of the past, the present, and the future. Of course, for this to be true, the future must already exist, just like the past and the present.
This hardly seems to make sense, and in fact, the only way space-time can properly be understood is from the point of view of quantum physics. We exist in multiple versions and in multiple universes. This is easier to comprehend with the help of your very own virtual reality generator — your memory and your imagination.
One version of you exists in the past, and this is easy enough to recall. It is your first day at school, and doubtless you can remember a great deal of vivid detail that enhances the reality of this version of you. It is easy enough to believe that somehow this version of you still exists in the past and that, for one eternal moment, it will always be your first day at school.
The next version of you is the version that exists in the present. This is you remembering your first day at school but also imagining yet another version of yourself, a future version in some notable situation — your last day at work perhaps. This is harder to do and depends on the dexterity of your imagination. However, in a curious way, the future version of yourself can seem just as real as the past version — perhaps even more so — for there is nothing that cannot be achieved in the virtual realities of our imaginations. Nothing that is physically impossible.
One day in the future (perhaps a very great distance in the future), and given enough computer power, it will be possible to render the entire universe in virtual reality. Where better for human beings to evolve, to achieve immortality, and to be raised from the dead? But until that day comes when nothing is intractable — in other words, until heaven itself exists — evolution must find another, less spectacular way forward. And find a way it will. Already human genes are reaching out, to the Moon and beyond. The only threshold that remains to be crossed in human evolutionary progress is the physical limit imposed by space travel. The journey, however, may be about to begin.
4
I
‘That’s a pity,’ said Dallas, surveying what remained of the geodesic dome worn by Rameses Gates. ‘We can’t do a simulation of the containment room in the reactor without two of these units.’
‘You mean you want to?’ asked Gates. ‘After what happened in there?’
Neither man had spoken about what had happened to them in the simulation when Rimmer had forced Prevezer to corrupt one silicon model with another, but neither was likely to forget it.
‘What happened was unfortunate,’ said Dallas. ‘But hardly likely to happen again, now that Rimmer is dead. And I’d still like to have an accurate idea of how many centigrays we’re likely to absorb in the time it takes for us to penetrate the containment room wall.’
‘There’s no way we’ll find another geodesic on the Moon,’ said Prevezer. ‘I already asked around. There’s no demand for Simworlds up here. I mean, people aren’t much interested in Simworlds when reality’s as good as this.’
‘Good of you to admit it,’ said Simou.
‘It would take at least four or five days to have another unit sent on the next astroliner from Earth,’ said Prevezer, ignoring him.
Gates shook his head. ‘Lenina can’t wait that long.’
‘Neither can we,’ said Dallas. ‘There’s our window of lunar daylight to consider. If we wait that long, we’ll be trying to land the Mariner in darkness. And it’s going to be hard enough in daylight without Lenina. How is she? I mean, I don’t suppose there’s any way she’ll be fit?’
‘The fact is, she could die at any time,’ said Gates, rubbing a big hand through his shock of white hair. ‘Back on Earth, she’d probably be dead already. It’s only the pressurized atmosphere that’s giving her hemoglobin the oxygen it needs for her to stay alive.’
Dallas nodded. ‘That’s settled then. We go tomorrow. July twentieth. What with all the activity for the Moon landing centennial, it’ll be easier getting Lenina out of the hotel. We have until then to make some calculations regarding somatic radiation effects. Prev? Any ideas?’
‘I could run a two-dimensional model on the computer,’ he suggested. ‘Kind of a predictive microworld using the data that’s already in the memory. It won’t give us anything like the verisimilitude of detail or realism of prescriptive process that characterizes the three-D, but it should give us a range of probable figures.’
‘Then do it,’ said Dallas. ‘Right away.’
‘Just how are we going to get Lenina out of the hotel?’ asked Ronica. ‘Quite apart from her being unconscious, she looks like she stepped out of a plague pit.’
‘She’ll have to wear a space suit,’ said Simou.
‘Well, of course,’ said Cavor. ‘Lots of people in the hotel lobby are wearing space suits. But most of them can walk.’
‘Have you looked in the hotel bar?’ asked Simou. ‘It’s full of drunks celebrating the centennial. And tomorrow there’ll be even more. Gates and I can carry her between us. Who’s going to notice three more drunks in space suits?’
‘What about Rimmer?’ asked Ronica. ‘What are we going to do with the body? We can hardly carry him out of here as well.’
‘We’ll leave him here,’ said Dallas. ‘It’s not like we’re actually checking out. Officially we’re supposed to be coming back here after our flight down to Descartes. By the time they figure we’re not, we’ll be long gone, hiding out on the dark side.’
‘We can stash him in the closet and switch on the Do Not Disturb,’ said Cavor. ‘That way the maid won’t bother to clean the room.’
‘Then that’s agreed,’ said Dallas. ‘Is that everything?’
‘I sure hope so,’ muttered Gates.
Dallas gave him a curious sort of glance, and then looked awkward. ‘In which case there’s one more thing I have to tell you all. Although this concerns you most of all, Cav.’
‘This sounds like what I’ve been waiting to hear.’
‘And you, Rameses.’
‘Someone get me a painkiller,’ groaned Gates.
‘There’s no easy way to put this, so I’ll just give it to you straight. After you’ve landed the Mariner, it’ll be just me and Cav who enter the main facility.’
‘Me?’ Cavor’s eyes widened with surprise.
‘Come again?’ demanded Gates.
‘You’re not coming inside the bank.’