them, but Kern had got the Brin launched – all those years ago –
against mounting opposition. By now the whole idea had become a
kind of scapegoat for the divisions of the human race. Bickering
primates, the lot of them. Progress is what matters. Fulfilling the
potential of humanity, and of all other life. She had always been one
of the fiercest opponents of the growing conservative backlash most
keenly exemplified by the Non Ultra Natura terrorists. If they had
their way, we’d all end up back in the caves. Back in the trees. The
whole point of civilization is that we exceed the limits of nature, you
tedious little primitives.
‘We stand on others’ shoulders, of course.’ The proper line, that of
accepted scientific humility, was, ‘on the shoulders of giants’, but she
had not got where she was by bowing the knee to past generations.
Midgets, lots and lots of midgets, she thought, and then – she could
barely keep back the appalling giggle – on the shoulders of
monkeys.
At a thought from her, one wallscreen and their Mind’s Eye HUDs
displayed the schematics of Brin 2 for them all. She wanted to direct
their attention and lead them along with her towards the proper
appreciation of her – sorry, their – triumph. There: the needle of the
central core encircled by the ring of life and science that was their
torus-shaped world. At one end of the core was the unlovely bulge of
the Sentry Pod, soon to be cast adrift to become the universe’s
loneliest and longest research post. The opposite end of the needle
sported the Barrel and the Flask. Contents: monkeys and the future,
respectively.
‘Particularly I have to thank the engineering teams under Doctors
Fallarn and Medi for their tireless work in reformatting –’ and she
almost now said ‘Kern’s World’ without meaning to – ‘our subject
planet to provide a safe and nurturing environment for our great
project.’ Fallarn and Medi were well on their way back to Earth, of
course, their fifteen-year work completed, their thirty-year return
journey begun. It was all stage-setting, though, to make way for Kern
and her dream. We are – I am – what all this work is for.
A journey of twenty light years home. Whilst thirty years drag by
on Earth, only twenty will pass for Fallarn and Medi in their cold
