Into the New Millennium: Trailblazing Tales From Analog Science Fiction and Fact, 2000 - 2010 by Penny Publications Read Free Book Online Page B

Kuiper Belt through which I passed.
    It really was amazing to see so much debris in an area of space that most humans still thought of as empty, even up to and through the twenty-second century. Only the Outbound had had the forethought to see this region for what it truly was: a refuge from the catastrophes that were sure to strike the planets of the solar system—be they comets or asteroids, intense solar flares, or as had actually happened, the competitive stupidity of humanity itself.
    Out in the Kuiper Belt, there was room enough to get lost. Like a hermit penetrating deep into the wild, seeking resources enough to survive and distance enough to avoid the madness of other people.
    I found two more buoys, each with a similar message to the first.
    My antimatter fuel passed the point of no return, making it totally impossible to go back to the Jovian region of space. But I paid little attention. I was Outbound now, and there would never be any going back.
    Another decade's worth of time elapsed in surreal ease, and at the end of that, another micrometeoroid shower hit. But I'd secured the vital systems before putting myself into the computer, and the effort paid off. Nothing important was damaged, though the hydroponics and other life support systems would never operate again—too many micro-holes.
    I wondered why my messages, which I had been casting ahead of me like rocks across a pond, garnered no response.
    Maybe that was just the nature of being Outbound—never reveal yourself until it's absolutely necessary.
    At the twenty-ninth year since leaving Jupiter, I should have felt excited and nervous with anticipation.
    I felt only lingering ghosts.
    I never saw the other ship.
    One moment I was alone in space. The next moment a fifty-meter-wide wedge was matching course and speed—which was no small feat.
    I politely lobbed radio hellos at the wedge, anticipating a reply. But all the wedge did was spit out a dozen, tinier wedges, each of which fell on the observatory like fleas on the ass of a fresh dog, and suddenly I was struck by the notion that I'd been baited into a colossal trap.
    Each of the small wedges touched down and disgorged a series of spider-like drones that began scrambling into the observatory's interior, cutting through metal and rock as easily as a hot knife through butter.
    My hello calls became pressed, and then frantic. The spiders blindly ignored my efforts and sped towards the hole where I'd stashed the memory arrays. My cameras and other senses followed them, and I'd have screamed if I'd still felt the kind of visceral panic necessary.
    I remember one last camera view, overlooking the arrays. I watched a spider that climbed on top of my databanks, hungrily rubbing together its claw-tipped forelegs, then I sensed my mind fissioning into separate parts—which seemed like the worst kind of insanity imaginable—then merciful blackness.
     
    Reactivation was bothersome, because they wouldn't let me see, hear, or sense anything. Not at first. All I got was the impression that someone needed me to be patient, so I waited, tasting the quality of my thoughts and finding them . . . truncated. Limited. The absolute speed and precision of the observatory's databanks was missing. It felt like . . . It felt like?
    When I finally opened my eyes—?!—I was greeted by several different faces, all of which appeared concerned. I sat up and looked at the Outbounders, each of whom was dressed in what I took for medical gowns, though the room in which they'd placed me was remarkably warm and free from anything even approaching a scalpel or other menacingly surgical object.
    "I'm Doctor Hastel. How do you feel?"
    That was one of the women, who looked about forty.
    "I'm not sure yet," I said. "How did you . . . put me back?"
    "It's a long explanation," said one of the men, an Asian fellow in his thirties who identified himself as Surgeon Chow. "Here, I'll make it simple for you."
    He never moved, but there was a