Nature Futures 2 by Colin Sullivan Read Free Book Online Page A

on. Of course, they don’t have much time. That made the fifth this month, from several different centuries.
    Time was like a river, yes. Go with the flow, it’s easy. Fight against the current and space-time strips you of everything you’re carrying back — pictures, cancer stick, memories. He would show up not recalling a thing. Just like the thousands of others I have turned into a nifty little sideline.
    The past never seemed to catch on. Still, they stimulated interest in those centuries where time jaunters kept hammering against the laws of physics, like demented moths around a light bulb.
    I hefted the clothes and wallet. These were in decent condition, grade 0.8 at least. They should fetch a pretty price. Good; I needed to eat soon. Time paid off, after all. A sucker born every minute, and so many, many moments in the rich past.
    Gregory Benford is a professor of physics at the University of California, Irvine, and a novelist. His best-known novel is Timescape .

Eating with Integrity
    David Berreby
    So, how was the big dinner party?
    A complete disaster! Geoff and I haven’t spoken since …
    Not since Friday ?
    That’s right. You know, sometimes we joke about divorce when we’re arguing, but this time … it doesn’t feel safe to kid about that. It’s just so silent and grim. I think he thinks I’ve ruined his career.
    Look, I’m sure you did your best. It was a lot of pressure. All three of his new colleagues, plus the Big Boss. I’m sure you did everything right.
    I thought I had. I checked everyone for allergies. Religious covenants. Lipid and corticosterone metabolism. Medications, immunizations …
    Well, you can’t be too careful.
    And I social-vetted the menu: everyone checked off everything. And there was nothing to offend anyone. Tempeh-salmon, made by our own ’bot, right here. All ingredients grown sterile, no contact with organic matter or pollutants …
    You don’t have to tell me. I know how careful we have to be. How careful you are. No one’s been sick from your place in years, and how many of us can say that?
    Thanks. I appreciate that, especially after what’s happened. God, I don’t even want to tell. It’s just so mortifying.
    I think you’d better, though.
    Sigh . Well, then, from the top. The table is set and the containers are all sealed and ready to be opened, the dining tents are over the chairs …
    You used the good ones?
    Of course! Pressurized, sterilized, totally safe, near-transparent. The ones we got for our tenth anniversary. So there I am, all ready and Geoff is wandering around resterilizing forks because everything’s perfect and he has nothing to do and then bing! In walks our first guest, who is also the Big Boss, and he’s carrying several things that look like food boxes and I think, uh-oh. Then I think, well, of course, those must be gifts, maybe a floral hologram or something, because it can’t be what I’m afraid it is. It just can’t be !
    Well, how could you expect that ?
    You know how this thing is spreading. But I didn’t update before the dinner, so I managed to miss the day when Mr Big Boss became one of them .
    We had three people at work do the same thing last week. It’s like some damn cult!
    â€œI hope it’s not a problem,” he says, with that hick accent, “but I’ve decided to Eat With Integrity .” I mean, I about died. And the worst of it is, he’s the first guest . Everyone else is going to think we approve of this kind of thing.
    He’s also Geoff’s boss. You didn’t have much choice.
    I know, but I was just so … appalled. And disgusted. And I had no idea what to do, because we don’t have the equipment.
    You mean it wasn’t cooked ?
    Oh, no, of course it wasn’t cooked. Mr Big isn’t just a new-minted Integretist, he’s a hard-core Integretist. The meat has