James Patrick Kelly - The Propogation of Light in a Vaccuum, e-books, e-książki, ksiązki, , .-y
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The Propagation of Light in a Vacuuma short story by James Patrick KellyIntroduction"The Propagation of Light in a Vacuum" is probably my favorite James PatrickKelly story that no one knows about. I was quite thrilled to sell it to BobSilverberg and Karen Haber back in 1990 for the revival of the Universe seriesof original anthologies, edited by Terry Carr. Unfortunately, Universecollapsed.The story is a stylistic experiment: magic realism hitching a ride on a hardscience starship. I freely admit to committing a circular plot, playing withpunctuation and jumping off the page to throttle the reader. Also, this is theonly story of mine to include a recipe.Disappointed that "The Propagation of Light in a Vacuum" did not immediatelyfind its audience, I took to reading it in public. It proved an interestingpiece to perform; audiences seemed to like it. In 1996, I rewrote it as a oneact play; it has received several staged readings and will get its first fullproduction in May of 1998.The Propagation of Light in a VacuumWomen have served all these centuries as looking-glasses possessing themagic and delicious power of reflecting the figure of man at twice itsnatural size.Virginia Woolf, A Room of One's OwnMaybe you think I'm different, but I've got the same problems everyone has. Justbecause I'm on a starship traveling at the speed of light doesn't mean myfeelings can't be hurt. I still get hungry. Bored. I lust like any other man.When a bell rings, I jump. I don't much like uncertainty and I have to clip mytoenails every so often. I want my life to have a purpose.(You're nattering, dear. This is about us, so go ahead and tell them.)Ah.Yes.My imaginary wife and I are much happier these days, thank you. We've comethrough some tough times and we're still together. So far. But we still have away to go. Exactly how long, I'm not sure. When you attempt to exceed 299,792.46kilometers per second, here and there are only probabilities. Relative to you, Iam no place. I do not exist.I used to think that she was a hallucination, my sweet imaginary wife. Proofthat I'd gone mad. Not any more. If I ask her whether she exists, she justlaughs. I like this about her. We often laugh together. She keeps changingthough; I'm afraid she aspires to reality. I had a real wife once but it wasn'tthe same.(You're an artist. She didn't understand you.)I don't want to paint too rosy a picture. Like any couple, we have our ups anddowns. Then again, down and up are relative terms which vary with the inertialframe of the observer. Einstein warned that c is the ultimate limit withinspacetime. Exceed it and you pass out of the universe of logic. Causality loopsaround you like a boa; the math is beyond me. Of course, logic and causality arehardwired into our brains. It makes for some awkward moments.I was a hero when I began this grand voyage of discovery. Like Columbus. In histime, the world was flat. People believed that if you sailed too far in any onedirection, you would fall off the planet. My imaginary wife informs me that wehave sailed off the edge of reality. Perhaps that explains our predicament.(Predicament? Opportunity. Nobody has ever had a chance to invent themselveslike this.)The problem was that the theoretical framework supporting faster-than-lighttravel stopped at c. No one really knew what was beyond the absolute. Oh, therewas extensive testing before any humans were put at risk. The robots, unburdenedby imagination, functioned exactly as expected. The design team accelerated anentire menagerie: spiders and rats and pigs and chimps. They all came back; theones that weren't immediately dissected lived long and uneventful lives. So Isuppose there's hope.(What he hasn't told you yet is that it wasn't just him. He's embarrassed, butit's not his fault. There were fifty-one people on this ship. Crew andcolonists. His real wife was one of them. Her name was Varina.)I remember once Varina made a joke about it. She said that science ended at c.The other side was fiction. It's not so funny anymore.I don't know what happened to the others. All I can say is that when the shipwarped, I blacked out. I have my theories. Perhaps there was a malfunction. Icould be dead and this is hell. Maybe the others had reasons for stranding mehere -- maybe they had no choice. When I woke up there was no one else but herand she's imaginary.I have no idea how to save myself, or, indeed, if I even need saving. My graspof the technology that surrounds me is uncertain at best. Do any of youunderstand the dynamics of a particle with a mass of 1019 GeV? You see, most ofus were specialists. Aside from the crew, there were programmers, biologists,engineers, doctors, geologists, builders. Only the least important jobs went topeople with multiple skills. I'm down on the organization chart as NutritionStylist, but I'm also in a box labeled Mission Artist. Corporations pledgedmoney, schoolchildren sold candles and the arts lobby worked very hard to createa place for me on the roster. Of course, it didn't hurt my cause to be marriedto a civil engineer. My speciality has always been dabbling. I've spent a lot oftime in front of image processors. It says on my resume that I throw pots but Ihaven't spun a wheel for years and who knows if there'll be clay where I'mgoing. I write my own songs for the voice synthesizer and can even pluck a fewchords on the guitar. I do some folk dancing and tell stories and can jugglefour balls at once. And now I style food. After I got into the starship programthey sent me on a world tour of cooking schools. Budapest, Delhi, Paris -- moredabbling. You know, I used to hate to cook; now dinner is all that matters.What's the point to doing art when you have no audience?(You've uploaded some beautiful vids. Your stills were hanging in galleries.)They were on late at night on back channels. All right, I'm better than some,but not as good as others. A journeyman. Yes, that sums up my condition nicely.My condition. Should I describe a typical day? But then the notion of day isanother fiction. The laws of science do not distinguish between past and future.Here the arrow of time spins at random, as in a child's game. I'm never surewhen I fall asleep whether I'm going to wake up tomorrow or yesterday.Fortunately, the days are very similar. For purposes of sanity, I try to keepthem that way. Artists make patterns; we impose order even where there is none.Maybe that's why I'm still here and the others are gone.Today, then. She snuggles next to me as I wake up. Her warm breasts nudge myback. Her breath tickles my neck. I roll over and we kiss. Her hair is the colorof newly?fired terra cotta. When she opens her eyes, they're green. She has wideshoulders and I can see unexpected muscle beneath her pale skin. She can appearto be any woman I can imagine. Today she is large. Magnificent. There's a kindof music to her voice. When she talks, I hear bells. She's not perfect, though:the skin under her jaw is loose, there's a mole on her temple. Clever touches.Another time she may be petite. She could have big hips. Long fingers. I thinkthe reason she keeps changing is that, like so many women, she has a poor bodyimage. She's far too critical of her appearance. But no matter how she looks shecan't help but become herself.We make love. That shouldn't surprise you. Sex mostly happens between the ears,not between the thighs. Sometimes I lose myself and skip ahead in time to findI'm caressing a different body. But today she remains the same; it's what weboth want. I take pleasure from the way her lips part, the bloom on her cheeks.At the end a moan catches for a moment in her throat, and then she draws breathagain.(And you?)I can't help but love her. That's the biggest problem with our marriage. I loveher even though she wants to separate from me -- don't deny it! Go her own way.I hold her until the blood stops pounding; she plays with the hair on my chest.Finally I kiss her and get up. I'm hungry. There's french toast and orangejuice. As always. Just once I'd like to serve her breakfast in bed but shedoesn't eat. The high price of being imaginary. She watches, though.Afterwards we visit the fx lounge. She chooses Trunk Bay on St. John: bone whiteCaribbean beach, palms tilting toward water the color of the sky. This is partof our imaginary past. Our honeymoon, I suppose. She keeps the temperature setat 29? Celsius. Invisible fans waft a breeze laden with her own homemade brew ofcoconut oil, female pheromones and brine. She's convinced that the way to aman's heart is through his nose. The floor looks just like sand except itdoesn't sift between the toes, more's the pity. We spread blankets and soak upUV in the nude. Sometimes I wish she'd program the surround to show other peopleon the beach, but we're alone. Always alone.(Other women kept staring at you. You were so handsome and everyone knew you'dbe famous someday. I didn't like the way you looked back. I wanted you to seeme. Only me.)I never stay in the fx lounge very long. I want to relax but I can't. I hearthings, even over the ocean soundtrack. The hull creaks under the stress ofwhatever is outside. If I rest my head on the floor, I can feel the vibration ofthe ship in my molars. My imaginary wife tries to make conversation, divert mewith her memories of what might have been. But somewhere on board a thermostatclicks...
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