I was named for a play on science words, which if you knew my father, would
make perfect sense. I’m not certain what he would have done if the woman he
impregnated had any other surname, but I wouldn’t have put it past him to just
make one up for me. Abigail Genifer Siskin. Abiogenesis is the process by
which nonliving matter evolves into living matter. At some point in Earth’s
history, nothing was alive. There were rocks, and gases, and lots of other
elements, including carbon, but there were no organisms. Then later on, there
was life. How long did that take, how did it happen, and why? These are
questions scientists have still not answered, but we’re all pretty confident
about the idea of abiogenesis, because any competing theory would be
paradoxical. Life had to start somewhere—even if it happened a million light
years away, a billion years ago—and my father says I’m the embodiment of that.
I’m nobody, though. I mean, I’m not nobody, but don’t expect some crazy story
about how I came into being. Tamerlane Pryce didn’t create me by shooting a
bolt of lightning into a stone. He conceived me with my mother the old
fashioned way, so him calling me Abiogenesis is really just about his
compulsion to make everything about science, whether it’s relevant or not. And
again, he didn’t give me her surname to be progressive, hip, or woke. He did
it for the nickname, because—and I say this with all the love he deserves—he a
basic bitch.
I hate my father, which is why I locked him in his tank, and I haven’t let him
out for months. He’s the stellar neighborhood’s foremost expert in
consciousness transference. The good people of Thālith al Naʽāmāt Bida asked
him to come here so he could use his expertise to build up their recreational
ventures. Well, he’s done that, and we don’t need him anymore. People come
here to temporarily load their minds into artificial animal bodies, and
explore those animals’ natural habitat without interfering with them. They use
his technology on Earth now too, which is presently the only planet we know of
with such diversity of life. Anyway, this obviously isn’t the only application
of it. There are many ways in this day and age to be immortal, but one of the
ways he uses to avoid death is to transfer his mind into a backup body
whenever anything goes wrong with the one he was in before. What he didn’t
consider is the fact that he can’t kill himself and trigger a transfer if he’s
unconscious and trapped in a clone tank, waiting for his rebellious daughter
to decide to let him out. I won’t do it, though. He’s not a good person, and
he’s been around for centuries, and if I killed him, I would be doing the
galaxy a huge favor. The only reason I haven’t is because I don’t know how. I
don’t know how to prevent him from transfering, or from just having an
outdated backup somewhere else. I don’t tell people that, of course. They all
think I’m keeping him alive because killing is wrong, or whatever.
I’ve moved on from him, and I’ll only go back to worrying about it once I
discover a weakness to mind transference. It’s pretty difficult, because
there’s always a chance he’s set aside a contingency I never knew about. If I
were him, I would send a darkbursting automated ship to the Andromeda galaxy
in case a cataclysmic failure took out all my other clones.
Right now I’m with my new family. Thor Thompson is another immortal human, who
Pryce used as his test subject for a new substrate that would have turned my
father into even more of a threat. There’s also Trinity Turner, who literally
created this world. Nearly everything here was toxic to humans when she set
foot on it, so she spent decades altering the native organisms on a molecular
level, without changing anything else about them. Good thing she’s from the
future, or her dream would have been impossible. Our friend, Ellie Underhill
also has a time power; one which Thor and I are presently learning more about.
“You’re bringing everyone who has ever lived in the history of Earth, and the
stellar neighborhood, back to life?”
“Yeah,” Trinity confirms. “I know, it’s—”
“I don’t think it’s crazy,” I assure her. “I’m just...what are ya gonna do
with them?”
Trinity and Ellie give each other a look, which they’ve been doing a lot
lately, since they keep a lot of secrets from me. “We’re going to put their
consciousnesses in a simulation,” Ellie answers.
“Why?” Thor questions.
“We don’t think they would do well in base reality,” Ellie continues. “I mean,
well, some people would. You take anyone from, maybe the 22nd century, and you
can get them up to speed. Hell, it might even be okay if we tried to integrate
someone who regularly used a personal computer while they were alive, because
at least they can fathom the concept. Anyone earlier than that, though, is
going to freak out.”
“So, will you convince them they’re in heaven, or are you going to simulate
the world they were living in at the time, and make them just think they
survived death?” Thor knows what kind of questions to ask.
“A little bit of both,” Trinity says. “They’ll know they died. We’re not going
to try to convince them that nothing happened. They’ll eventually wonder why
nothing else has killed them, or why other people aren’t getting hurt, and all
that. We’re not sure where to go from there, though. Can we tell them this is
the afterlife when it’s not true?”
“Well...” I start to say. “It will be true. If this is universal, it’s no less
of an afterlife than a so-called real one. Perhaps this is all destined to
happen, and every theory about the afterlife is partially true, because you’re
building it for them.”
“Hmm.”
At that, we stop talking for a good period of time. We all sit down, and stay
in the room together, but we think on the matter in our own heads. I don’t
know exactly what they’re thinking about, but I know what I’ve come up with,
so I speak first, hoping it’s something reasonable. “When are you planning to
start this? Will we bring back our primate ancestors? What is a human?”
“We’ve chosen five thousand years BCE,” Ellie replies.
“That’s as far back as my camera will go,” Trinity adds. She carries a magical
camera with her that lets her travel to the past, and even the future. Someone
else apparently invented the camera for her, and it automatically took
pictures from all throughout history.
“We don’t have enough data from before that. So when we say we’ll bring back
everyone, that’s a bit of an exaggeration.”
“Either way,” Thor jumps in, “how are you going to explain that? I don’t know
much about the brain, but this neural implant you came up with, you’re going
to give it to everyone in the past? Won’t people notice they have one, but
their ancestors didn’t?”
“Those are the logistical issues we’re still working on,” Ellie says with a
nod. “Neurolemmocytes already exist, but there’s no difference between the
ones found in the central nervous system, and the ones in the peripheral
system. What we would have to do is replace the ones in the brain with ours.”
“Won’t people eventually figure out there’s something strange about them?” I
presume.
“They’ll probably give them another name, because they will see a
distinction,” Ellie explains, “but they will function just as the real ones
do. They’ll just also have this mind transferring characteristic they would
never think to test for.”
“And do our primate ancestors have them?” I press.
“They do,” Trinity answers. “Evolution invented them a really long time ago.
Even invertebrates have them.”
“This sounds incredibly complicated,” I tell them apologetically. “And when I
say complicated, I think I mean impossible.”
“That’s why you got me.” Oh no. It’s my father. He’s somehow broken free.
Trinity and Ellie have known him longer than me, so they’re not exactly
pleased he’s awake, but they’ve developed coping mechanisms. I’m pissed
because my plan didn’t work, and Thor’s the worst off, because he doesn’t
fully understand what this guy’s deal is. All he knows is that they’re never
gonna be buddies.
“Oh, don’t look so surprised and upset,” he says to me. “I always have another
plan, and I don’t blame you for trying to sweep me under the rug.”
“What was your plan? How did you get out?” I ask.
He chuckles. “I obviously can’t trust you with that information. Just know
that there’s nothing you could do to get rid of me.” He sizes Thor’s new body
up. “I built this new substrate to make myself stronger, but I don’t need it
to be a survivor. I accomplished that a long time ago.” He claps his hands
together abruptly. “That’s not what we’re talkin’ about, though, are we?
You’re trying to save the human past. You’re gonna need me to do this.
Trinity’s got the connections, Ellie’s got the power, Abby’s got the ideas,
and I got the brains.” He looks back over to Thor. “Oh, and I guess you’re
still here too.”
Ellie and Trinity have another one of their infamous psychic conversations.
I’m starting to think that’s not just a metaphor about their facial
expressions. They may have actually formed some kind of psychic bond that
either can or can’t be intercepted.
“Don’t do this,” I say to them, shaking my head.
Trinity sighs. “There’s a reason I brought him to this planet in the first
place. To be honest, waking him up was probably inevitable. I don’t like it
any more than you do, Abigail.”
“I doubt that,” I contend, standing up defiantly. “He’s my dad, and that can
never be undone. You, on the other hand, chose to associate yourself with him,
and I won’t be a part of it.”
“Wait,” Thor says calmly. “He was right when he said we need you too. These
three are clearly strong and capable individuals, but they don’t have your
creativity.”
“We just met,” I argue.
He smiles at me. “I’ve grown pretty good at knowing when I encounter someone
who’s the polar opposite of me. Before he interrupted us, you were saying you
had an idea. I would like to hear it.”
“His interruption wasn’t a single moment,” I say. “It’s still happening.”
Thor nods understandingly. Then he stands up coolly, and punches my father in
the throat so hard, it collapses his windpipe, and kills him pretty much
instantly. I think there’s something seriously wrong with me, because I’ve
never been more attracted to anyone in my whole life.
Ellie rolls her eyes, and starts swiping on her device. “He was listening to
our conversation before he walked into the room. He must have hacked into our
security system, and I don’t feel like correcting that right now. So if we
want to continue our conversation, Trinity can transport us somewhere he can
never go. I honestly don’t know where this photo was taken, but the person who
took it claims there’s nowhere safer, and I trust him with my life. He said I
would know when I needed it. Maybe this isn’t it, maybe it is.”
Trinity takes a look at the photo. “You say you trust him? This could be
anywhere, anywhen. Who are these people?”
“You trust him too,” Ellie says. “I don’t know who the people in the photo
are.”
“All right. I could do with a break from this place,” Trinity decides. “I
wanna hear your ideas too, Abigail.”
We crowd around Ellie’s device, which is displaying a jungle. My eyes burn, as
they do when Trinity is traveling to a different time and place through one of
her pictures. In a second, it’s over, and we’re standing in that jungle.
“Whoa,” I hear behind us.
We all turn around to find a small group of people. There’s only one person I
recognize, though. I saw a clone of his body in a tank for decades of my life.
Mateo Matic.
“Ah,” he says. “This is unexpected. We were told there would not be a
transition window today.”
“Where are we?” I ask.
“This...” he begins, building suspense, “is The Parallel.”
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