Proof of Concept by Gwyneth Jones

Author:Gwyneth Jones
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Tom Doherty Associates

4

Kir’s second breakup with Bill didn’t last much longer than the first. For a day and a half Kir’s friends pretended they’d noticed nothing, while Bill’s friends cast sympathetic glances over the barbed wire. Then Bill came and sat one chair away from Kir at breakfast, and Kir, who happened to be alone at the end of a table, didn’t move from her place.

“Seems like we have differences,” remarked Bill, staring grimly ahead of him.

“Seems like it,” agreed Kir, focused on her food.

“Look. Suppose we say no more, and carry on as we were? And after this, if we want to meet again, I convince you, or you convince me?”

Kir said nothing. She was thinking that she couldn’t possibly tell him the experiment’s computer was behaving strangely, and this put them in bad faith again, straightaway. But it couldn’t be helped. His rotten ideas about Margrethe would have to make them even.

“Give me the silent treatment.” Bill sighed heavily. “Maybe I deserve it. You’re right about the Dead Zones and the MegaCorps. I could’ve been different. I’ve got a mind, I could’ve used it. I’ve caught a glimpse of . . . of another world, down here. It’s shaken me up: I’m sorry.”

“We all caught a glimpse. I can’t say you’re right about Margrethe, but it’s a deal. We carry on as we were, until after this.”

Paper flowers wouldn’t have been appropriate—this was an adult, uncertain peacemaking—but the quarrel was over. Kir looked up, Bill turned to face her: they smiled sadly, accepting what they had. “You know what?” said Bill. “I sincerely, truly wish after this would never come.”

* * *

Kir went searching for Dan Orsted. She needed a perspective on the Great Popularizer—possibly in revenge for what Bill had said about Margrethe. She tracked him down to a meeting of the “10ppm Club” in the mall; he was giving them a master class. 10ppm, her watch told her, stood for “10 parts per million atmospheric carbon dioxide,” the lower limit for photosynthesis, and the most extreme absolute limit for a habitable exoplanet. Kir hadn’t used any of the LDM facilities, except playtime. She slipped into the strolling mall feeling like a spy in enemy territory. An air-tag popped up: “10ppm Club Meeting. All Insanely Dedicated Survivalists Welcome!” and she followed it, glancing uneasily at the eye-hurting dioramas that lined the winding walls. The group clustered around Dan, on floor cushions, looked to be the entire crew complement: she couldn’t see any officers. She sat down quietly. She’d never been so close to Dan Orsted before. At the canteen parties he’d always been surrounded by his own people. Like Margrethe, and unlike Neh and Vati, he showed no sign of his great age. His light skin was tanned like leather but still looked supple. His eyes were bright, his hair a vigorous white brush. He looked as if he could run a mile, or knock one of his muscular starship troopers down with ease. There was no tech, just Dan, talking; and the lecture wasn’t about how to exploit a world that barely supports microbes.

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