So I've begun a side project, which will become my main focus once I finished editing Resonance. The new book is called We Cannot Be Content and stems from some of the history in Embassy and Resonance (in fact, they mention it a lot in Resonance).
I wrote the first chapter a couple weeks ago, and have been adding to and tweaking it since, so here's the final version I've come up with for now.
--------------------
ONE
BENEDICT – 2305, Earth
He didn’t like giving interviews. He preferred to write his own
questions and answer them without the pressure of a live interviewer and
audience. Posting an insightful video on Wander Enterprises’ site would do, or
even a FAQ section. Both alternatives were more appealing than his current
situation, staring at himself on the small monitor hanging below the camera
that was focused on him and Johna Radizzo for their one-on-one interview.
The man working the camera raised
his hand and counted down from five—
“And we’re live.”
“Welcome back to Today in the Plaza,” Johna immediately
said, turning her hips more toward the camera to open her stance. Then her
voice relaxed. “Twenty years ago, we received a positive signal from the crews
of the Almanac and the Endurance that they had landed safely on
two exoplanets, each between six and eight light years from Earth. Scientists
across the solar system lauded the mission as the greatest of humanity’s
achievements since the Mars and Europa missions. Humankind had not only
inhabited the solar system—it had inhabited the stars.
“Now I’m here with Dr. Benedict
Drake, the current CEO of Wander Enterprises, the company responsible for those
missions. We’re so glad you could join us, Dr. Drake.”
Benedict cleared his throat.
“Thank you.”
“Dr. Drake,” Johna went on,
shifting her posture toward him, “you are about to embark on your own tour of
the exoplanets I just mentioned. You leave in two days. The question everyone
wants to know is: are you scared?”
He averted his eyes and attempted
to laugh. “I think everyone gets scared in some way, you know, before they go
on a trip of any kind. There’s always something…nagging in the back of your head.”
“Like whether or not you
remembered to turn off the oven,” Johna joked.
That got a real laugh out of him.
He loosened up a bit, felt some of his nerves diffuse.
“Of which I’m guilty,” he
responded, even though it was a lie. He wasn’t forgetful, especially not in
clumsy ways. Besides, he didn’t have
an oven. He couldn’t even remember the last time he’d made his own supper, because
he hadn’t in years. Either way, Benedict figured that was a good time to drop a
joke. Rose told him to appear more likeable, more relatable than he tended to act. Today more than ever, Benedict
needed to be liked. It was a crucial part of the plan.
“Dr. Drake, you’re thirty-three
years old. You’re one of the richest people alive, you own the company some of
the world’s top minds say have brought about the greatest age in space
exploration humankind has ever seen—and now you decide to leave Earth for seventy-five
years. You say you aren’t afraid of this intergalactic trip—”
Interstellar, Benedict thought, though he didn’t correct her.
“—but what does the future hold
for Wander Enterprises while you’re gone?”
Benedict bit his lip and tried to
force another grin, as if the answer was a simple one. The truth was, the
future of Wander wasn’t what Benedict considered secure. Honestly, it hung in the balance, and was dependent on two
factors: the trip he was about to embark on, and the hope that Rose could carry
out Phase 3 in his absence. They needed public support. His fortune meant
nothing if the world didn’t see the value of keeping Wander Enterprises around
for at least the next five generations, and Benedict knew it would be difficult
to inspire the world as it was today.
“I have my assets in place,” he
said. “If… If I die during this trip… I’m confident Wander Enterprises will
continue to thrive.”
But not the program he was trying
to implement. Benedict knew if he met some ill fate, all his work would be for
naught. Less than fifty people knew about the Gateway Program, and in two days’
time, all but a few of them were boarding the same space cruiser—the Meridian—and embarking on a trip through
the stars.
“Out of curiosity: do you think
you will make it back?”
He tried to be funny again. “I
guess that depends on if I like these exoplanets.”
Johna laughed as if there was
nothing to worry about. Of course, she’d never been to space, never flown out
to Mars, or Venus, or Europa, or Titan, or any of the other settlements the
Global Space Initiative had erected. In fact, the GSI was the only
reason humans went beyond Mars. History proved how fickle the inspiration that
drove human endeavor truly was. One great leap would be made, and people would
rally around the world’s space programs proclaiming the next space age had
arrived. But before long, the excitement would die, the people would forget
their fragile love of the cosmos, and the world would go on, content to remain
as it was.
More than anything, Benedict sought to end
that contentment once and for all, but it would take more than a leap—it would
take a blind lunge into the unknown.
“Yours would be the first crew to make it
there and back again.”
“This is true.”
“Do you think there will be a day when we won’t
need to come back to Earth? We’ve heard of plans from both Wander Enterprises
and the GSI to relocate several of Earth’s species to these exoplanets. Do you
think we’ll ever need to relocate humans in the same way?”
“If we have a cruiser big enough.”
They laughed together, except only Johna’s
was real. Benedict faked it again, and his ended several seconds before hers,
at which point he leaned forward and put his palms together.
“No, no. In all seriousness, I think that one
day, yes, we’ll have to give Earth up. Some people speculate we should’ve left
when we colonized Mars—however impractical the idea—and let nature reclaim
Earth. We’re only borrowing it, after all.”
“Borrowing it?”
In the corner of his eye, Benedict saw the
screen zoom in on his face, saw the caption scrolling under his chin: ‘Richest Man Alive is Leaving Earth.’ He ignored the tagline. They made him
out to be some sort of celebrity, as if all his work was an overnight success,
as if managing Wander Enterprises was something any kid who loved the stars
could do. They overlooked the years of solitude, the painstaking work of
developing faster hyper drives and crafting new cruiser designs—and it still
wasn’t enough for him. Benedict was never satisfied with his work, no matter
how revolutionary it was.
And that’s what drove him to organize the
Gateway Program.
“There’s, what…somewhere around nine billion
people alive today? Only a few thousand live elsewhere in our solar system, all
of them scientists.”
Johna deliberately shrugged and faced the
camera to show off her white teeth. “You’re the man with the degree, Dr.
Drake,” she said with a laugh.
This time, he couldn’t even work up a smile.
Anger was creeping up inside of him, boiling in his chest. He both loved
humanity for its achievement, and hated it for its contentment, the plateau it
reached, with only a few more small steps ever few decades. He wanted to shout
at the camera. Yell at the millions of people watching his interview before
their daily commutes. Stop what you’re
doing and listen to me! he screamed inside his head. Have you lost your sense of wonder? Look up! We need to be out there!
That’s where the challenge lies.
But he didn’t say it. His lips never moved.
His eyes never so much as flickered at the camera.
“Dr. Drake, you were saying?”
“Yes.” He shook his head and looked up at
Johna. “I don’t think we can call ourselves a spacefaring civilization when one
hundred percent of the general population still lives on Earth. That’s
like…claiming I traveled the world, when in reality I just drove down to my
local Thai restaurant. Only a few humans have had a taste of the spacefaring
life—why aren’t we all trying to set
foot on other worlds?”
Johna looked back at the camera and raised
her eyebrows in an expression of confusion mixed with curiosity.
“I’m sure there are many people wondering the
same thing, Dr. Drake. We all share your dreams.”
If everyone
shared my dreams, we wouldn’t be having this interview.
“Finally, we’ve all heard about MACE’s most
recent rallies.”
Benedict’s muscles went rigid with hatred the
moment she said the name, but Johna either didn’t notice or didn’t care. She
was too busy looking down at her cue and waving her hands in the air.
“The organization has made a name for itself
these last few decades, with open protests against the GSI and Wander
Enterprises, causing public support of space programs to drastically decline to
a historical low of thirty-eight percent—according to the latest polls. Can you
tell us how you’ve gone about handling that situation?”
He began to speak, but stuttered. He hated
MACE and all it stood for. The Movement Against Cosmic Exploration spanned
centuries, but didn’t gain any traction until scientific settlements began
popping up around the solar system. MACE sought to sway public interest away
from space exploration, publishing magazines and books and airing television
shows devoted to mocking astronomical discoveries and condemning space programs
as worthless, flashy demonstrations to keep the people distracted from the
goings-on down on Earth.
Yes, on Earth. Where half the major cities on
the American seaboards were partially flooded and desert regions had expanded
to the temperate zones and droughts had ruined the dryer regions. Where living
in areas prone to hurricanes and tornados and wildfires was a death sentence,
and natural fresh water was a memory no living person had. Where more than
three hundred species of animals and plants and insects went extinct every
single day.
Earth.
“We’re aware of the…opposition MACE presents,” Benedict finally answered, doing his
best to keep his voice steady. He couldn’t let them hear the truth in it. “The reality
of the situation is that we’re moving forward with our projects. My supervisors
and I agree that MACE hasn’t…how can I put this?…fully come to terms with Earth’s current state.”
“How do you mean?”
Benedict wanted to gawk at her. Was this an
interview question, or was she really asking him why he thought Earth wasn’t
suitable for sustaining human life much longer?
“Political and foreign affairs aside…
Consider our resources. More than half of all our mining is done on asteroids
we’ve slung into orbit. Rocket fuels, construction material for cities,
computer chips, cars, the hyperloops—most of these materials aren’t accessible
here on Earth in quantities that were available in the past.”
“So you think MACE disagrees?”
He took a deep breath, hoping to calm his
nerves.
It didn’t work.
“They don’t disagree. Not…not necessarily.
They just don’t think we have any right to move beyond Earth. That the human race—the only intelligent civilization
we’ve ever known—deserves to die when Earth dies.” He paused and looked at the
feet of the cameraman. “That notion is… That…”
He shook his head. He knew what he wanted to
say, but he couldn’t say it on a live stream. Not yet. It was too early. Too
risky. Rose had warned him not to let his anger show if Johna brought up MACE.
Now he saw why. Because MACE could use it. Would
use it. Even now, they were watching, and they would know they had dug into
him. If Benedict slipped too far, they could use his own words against the
campaign Wander Enterprises would launch in the coming months, the campaign
that would stretch three-quarters of a century until Benedict and the crew of
the Meridian returned from their tour
of the two exoplanets.
Johna shot him a glance. He barely caught it
before she looked back to the camera, but it looked skeptical, unimpressed, as
if she found his answer underwhelming, even crazy.
“It was certainly a pleasure speaking with
you, Dr. Drake,” she went on, hardly missing a beat. “We all wish you the best
of luck on your trip. We’ll see you when you get back in…well, seventy-five
years.”
Benedict took a deep breath and grinned for
the camera. One last joke to fix the mood.
“I’m sure you won’t have aged a day.”
Johna laughed, then introduced the next
segment of the newscast before Benedict was allowed to leave. The cast director
thanked him for giving the interview and ushered him to the exit so the crew
could prepare. Benedict knew the way out from there, and soon found himself in
NBC Studios’ lobby.
Outside was the rally.
People leered at him. They shouted, spat
insults, cursed at him. They hoisted signs—DOWN WITH SPACE!—DRAKE
THE MISTAKE—BECAUSE
KILLING EARTH WASN’T ENOUGH! Someone had
started a chant, and it was spreading. Part of the crowd shouted, “Earth to Drake!” and another part
shouted, “Come in, Drake!” And then
they’d all laugh.
Though the sentries were holding back the
crowd, Benedict refused to look up. In the corners of his eyes, he saw they all
had the small, symbolic canister of mace dangling from their belt loops, their
wrists, their backpacks. Seeing those fueled his anger even more. He wanted to
shut his ears, close his eyes. Then they could laugh, but he wouldn’t hear, and
their efforts to enrage him would be childish at best. When they’d had their
fun, they’d stop.
But he could
hear them, and they knew it, so they were relentless.
The rally filled all of Rockefeller Plaza,
even spilled into the Avenue of the Americas, though the ranks grew thin there.
The throng of the crowd was the worst, but out here, Benedict saw signs
supporting him and Wander Enterprises—though they were few.
“Dr. Drake.”
He looked up at the voice: a man and son
stood at the corner of the block. The boy, who might’ve been nine or ten years
old, gave Benedict a young, giddy smile and two thumbs up.
After he had passed, Benedict regretted not
having smiled back at him.
