The Mammoth Book of SF Stories by Women (54 page)

She says it like she’ll actually make it back here, like we haven’t done all this work for a shot at 100 seeds before the other, smarter thieves close in.

Still, 100 plants isn’t bad. A hundred and one – she’ll take hers with her.

“All right,” I say.

After a while she says, “You
know, I’ve never been inside the Vault.”

I sit down beside her. Our shoulders are touching.

“It’s a long hallway,” I say, “and then some seeds.”

We sit awake long after the fire goes out, watching shadows gathering inside shadows, waiting for morning.

(Inevitably, eventually, you start to care.)

IMMERSION

Aliette de Bodard

In the morning, you’re no longer quite sure who you are.

You stand in front of the mirror – it shifts and trembles, reflecting only what you want to see – eyes that feel too wide, skin that feels too pale, an odd, distant smell wafting from the compartment’s ambient system that is neither incense nor garlic, but something else, something elusive that you once knew.

You’re dressed, already – not on your skin, but outside, where it matters, your avatar sporting blue and black and gold, the stylish clothes of a well-traveled, well-connected woman. For a moment, as you turn away from the mirror, the glass shimmers out of focus; and another woman in a dull silk gown stares back at you: smaller, squatter and in every way diminished – a stranger, a distant memory
that has ceased to have any meaning.

Quy was on the docks, watching the spaceships arrive. She could, of course, have been anywhere on Longevity Station, and requested the feed from the network to be patched to her router – and watched, superimposed on her field of vision, the slow dance of ships slipping into their pod cradles like births watched in reverse. But there was something about standing
on the spaceport’s concourse – a feeling of closeness that she just couldn’t replicate by standing in Golden Carp Gardens or Azure Dragon Temple. Because here – here, separated by only a few measures of sheet metal from the cradle pods, she could feel herself teetering on the edge of the vacuum, submerged in cold and breathing in neither air nor oxygen. She could almost imagine herself rootless,
finally returned to the source of everything.

Most ships those days were Galactic – you’d have thought
Longevity’s ex-masters would have been unhappy about the station’s independence, but now that the war was over Longevity was a tidy source of profit. The ships came, and disgorged a steady stream of tourists – their eyes too round and straight, their jaws too square; their faces an unhealthy
shade of pink, like undercooked meat left too long in the sun. They walked with the easy confidence of people with immersers: pausing to admire the suggested highlights for a second or so before moving on to the transport station, where they haggled in schoolbook Rong for a ride to their recommended hotels – a sickeningly familiar ballet Quy had been seeing most of her life, a unison of foreigners
descending on the station like a plague of centipedes or leeches.

Still, Quy watched them. They reminded her of her own time on Prime, her heady schooldays filled with raucous bars and wild weekends, and last-minute revisions for exams, a carefree time she’d never have again in her life. She both longed for those days back, and hated herself for her weakness. Her education on Prime, which should
have been her path into the higher strata of the station’s society, had brought her nothing but a sense of disconnection from her family; a growing solitude, and a dissatisfaction, an aimlessness she couldn’t put in words.

She might not have moved all day – had a sign not blinked, superimposed by her router on the edge of her field of vision. A message from Second Uncle.

“Child.” His face was
pale and worn, his eyes underlined by dark circles, as if he hadn’t slept. He probably hadn’t – the last Quy had seen of him, he had been closeted with Quy’s sister Tam, trying to organize a delivery for a wedding – 500 winter melons, and six barrels of Prosper’s Station best fish sauce. “Come back to the restaurant.”

“I’m on my day of rest,” Quy said; it came out as more peevish and childish
than she’d intended.

Second Uncle’s face twisted, in what might have been a smile, though he had very little sense of humor. The scar he’d got in the Independence War shone white against the grainy background – twisting back and forth, as if it still pained him. “I know, but I need you. We have an important customer.”

“Galactic,” Quy said. That was the only reason he’d be calling her, and not
one of her brothers or cousins. Because the family
somehow thought that her studies on Prime gave her insight into the Galactics’ way of thought – something useful, if not the success they’d hoped for.

“Yes. An important man, head of a local trading company.” Second Uncle did not move on her field of vision. Quy could
see
the ships moving through his face, slowly aligning themselves in front
of their pods, the hole in front of them opening like an orchid flower. And she knew everything there was to know about Grandmother’s restaurant; she was Tam’s sister, after all; and she’d seen the accounts, the slow decline of their clientele as their more genteel clients moved to better areas of the station; the influx of tourists on a budget, with little time for expensive dishes prepared with
the best ingredients.

“Fine,” she said. “I’ll come.”

At breakfast, you stare at the food spread out on the table: bread and jam and some colored liquid – you come up blank for a moment, before your immerser kicks in, reminding you that it’s coffee, served strong and black, just as you always take it.

Yes. Coffee.

You raise the cup to your lips – your immerser gently prompts you, reminding
you of where to grasp, how to lift, how to be in every possible way graceful and elegant, always an effortless model.

“It’s a bit strong,” your husband says, apologetically. He watches you from the other end of the table, an expression you can’t interpret on his face – and isn’t this odd, because shouldn’t you know all there is to know about expressions – shouldn’t the immerser have everything
about Galactic culture recorded into its database; shouldn’t it prompt you? But it’s strangely silent, and this scares you, more than anything. Immersers never fail.

“Shall we go?” your husband says – and, for a moment, you come up blank on his name, before you remember – Galen, it’s Galen, named after some physician on Old Earth. He’s tall, with dark hair and pale skin – his immerser avatar
isn’t much different from his real self; Galactic avatars seldom are. It’s people like you who have to work the hardest to adjust, because so much about you draws attention to itself – the stretched eyes that crinkle in the shape of moths, the darker skin, the smaller, squatter shape more
reminiscent of jackfruits than swaying fronds. But no matter: you can be made perfect; you can put on the
immerser and become someone else, someone pale-skinned and tall and beautiful.

Though, really, it’s been such a long time since you took off the immerser, isn’t it? It’s just a thought – a suspended moment that is soon erased by the immerser’s flow of information, the little arrows drawing your attention to the bread and the kitchen, and the polished metal of the table – giving you context about
everything, opening up the universe like a lotus flower.

“Yes,” you say. “Let’s go.” Your tongue trips over the word – there’s a structure you should have used, a pronoun you should have said instead of the lapidary Galactic sentence. But nothing will come, and you feel like a field of sugar canes after the harvest – burnt out, all cutting edges with no sweetness left inside.

Of course, Second
Uncle insisted on Quy getting her immerser for the interview – just in case, he said, soothingly and diplomatically as always. Trouble was, it wasn’t where Quy had last left it. After putting out a message to the rest of the family, the best information Quy got was from Cousin Khanh, who thought he’d seen Tam sweep through the living quarters, gathering every piece of Galactic tech she could get
her hands on. Third Aunt, who caught Khanh’s message on the family’s communication channel, tutted disapprovingly. “Tam. Always with her mind lost in the mountains, that girl. Dreams have never husked rice.”

Quy said nothing. Her own dreams had shriveled and died after she came back from Prime and failed Longevity’s mandarin exams; but it was good to have Tam around – to have someone who saw
beyond the restaurant, beyond the narrow circle of family interests. Besides, if she didn’t stick with her sister, who would?

Tam wasn’t in the communal areas on the upper floors; Quy threw a glance towards the lift to Grandmother’s closeted rooms, but she was doubtful Tam would have gathered Galactic tech just so she could pay her respects to Grandmother. Instead, she went straight to the lower
floor, the one she and Tam shared with the children of their generation.

It was right next to the kitchen, and the smells of garlic and fish sauce seemed to be everywhere – of course, the youngest generation always got the lower floor, the one with all the smells and the
noises of a legion of waitresses bringing food over to the dining room.

Tam was there, sitting in the little compartment that
served as the floor’s communal area. She’d spread out the tech on the floor – two immersers (Tam and Quy were possibly the only family members who cared so little about immersers they left them lying around), a remote entertainment set that was busy broadcasting some stories of children running on terraformed planets, and something Quy couldn’t quite identify, because Tam had taken it apart into
small components: it lay on the table like a gutted fish, all metals and optical parts.

But, at some point, Tam had obviously got bored with the entire process, because she was currently finishing her breakfast, slurping noodles from her soup bowl. She must have got it from the kitchen’s leftovers, because Quy knew the smell, could taste the spiciness of the broth on her tongue – Mother’s cooking,
enough to make her stomach growl although she’d had rolled rice cakes for breakfast.

“You’re at it again,” Quy said with a sigh. “Could you not take my immerser for your experiments, please?”

Tam didn’t even look surprised. “You don’t seem very keen on using it, big sis.”

“That I don’t use it doesn’t mean it’s yours,” Quy said, though that wasn’t a real reason. She didn’t mind Tam borrowing
her stuff, and actually would have been glad never to put on an immerser again – she hated the feeling they gave her, the vague sensation of the system rooting around in her brain to find the best body cues to give her. But there were times when she was expected to wear an immerser: whenever dealing with customers, whether she was waiting at tables or in preparation meetings for large occasions.

Tam, of course, didn’t wait at tables – she’d made herself so good at logistics and anything to do with the station’s system that she spent most of her time in front of a screen, or connected to the station’s network.

“Lil’ sis?” Quy said.

Tam set her chopsticks by the side of the bowl, and made an expansive gesture with her hands. “Fine. Have it back. I can always use mine.”

Quy stared at
the things spread on the table, and asked the inevitable question. “How’s progress?”

Tam’s work was network connections and network maintenance within the restaurant; her hobby was tech. Galactic tech. She took things apart to see what made them tick; and rebuilt them. Her foray into entertainment units had helped the restaurant set up ambient sounds – old-fashioned Rong music for Galactic customers,
recitation of the newest poems for locals.

But immersers had her stumped: the things had nasty safeguards to them. You could open them in half, to replace the battery; but you went no further. Tam’s previous attempt had almost lost her the use of her hands.

By Tam’s face, she didn’t feel ready to try again. “It’s got to be the same logic.”

“As what?” Quy couldn’t help asking. She picked up
her own immerser from the table, briefly checking that it did indeed bear her serial number.

Tam gestured to the splayed components on the table. “Artificial Literature Writer. Little gadget that composes light-entertainment novels.”

“That’s not the same—’’ Quy checked herself, and waited for Tam to explain.

“Takes existing cultural norms, and puts them into a cohesive, satisfying narrative.
Like people forging their own path and fighting aliens for possession of a planet, that sort of stuff that barely speaks to us on Longevity. I mean, we’ve never even seen a planet.” Tam exhaled, sharply – her eyes half on the dismembered Artificial Literature Writer, half on some overlay of her vision. “Just like immersers take a given culture and parcel it out to you in a form you can relate to:
language, gestures, customs, the whole package. They’ve got to have the same architecture.”

“I’m still not sure what you want to do with it.” Quy put on her immerser, adjusting the thin metal mesh around her head until it fitted. She winced as the interface synced with her brain. She moved her hands, adjusting some settings lower than the factory ones – darn thing always reset itself to factory,
which she suspected was no accident. A shimmering lattice surrounded her: her avatar, slowly taking shape around her. She could still see the room – the
lattice was only faintly opaque – but ancestors, how she hated the feeling of not quite being there. “How do I look?”

“Horrible. Your avatar looks like it’s died or something.”

“Ha ha ha,” Quy said. Her avatar was paler than her, and taller:
it made her look beautiful, most customers agreed. In those moments, Quy was glad she had an avatar, so they wouldn’t see the anger on her face. “You haven’t answered my question.”

Tam’s eyes glinted. “Just think of the things we couldn’t do. This is the best piece of tech Galactics have ever brought us.”

Which wasn’t much, but Quy didn’t need to say it aloud. Tam knew exactly how Quy felt about
Galactics and their hollow promises.

“It’s their weapon, too.” Tam pushed at the entertainment unit. “Just like their books and their holos and their live games. It’s fine for them – they put the immersers on tourist settings, they get just what they need to navigate a foreign environment from whatever idiot’s written the Rong script for that thing. But we – we worship them. We wear the immersers
on Galactic all the time. We make ourselves like them, because they push, and because we’re naive enough to give in.”