Divergence

“Not now,” shushed Craig, and Edward watched in confusion as his only friend on board ship stood up and stared intently at the walls.

“Stranger, what are you doing?” called Joanne.

“The last part of our bargain. I’ve activated the Self-Replicating Mechanisms of your ship.”

“But we’re still on it! We could be killed.”

“You’ll be perfectly safe. I suggest you go to your rooms. I will move you through the ship as fission proceeds.”

“Craig…” said Edward.

“Go to your room, Edward,” ordered Craig. “Go to your room.”

“But…”

But Craig wasn’t listening. He was shouting at Donny, who wasn’t listening either; he was too busy bundling up his children and pushing them towards the door. The floor shuddered and Edward looked down. Miss Rose hurried past, something half hidden in her hand.

“She’s got my knife!” yelled Armstrong. “She’s taken my bloody knife.”

“Get out of my way,” muttered Donny, hurrying past with his children.

“Joanne, don’t you think we should go to our rooms now?” Saskia stood up and took the arm of the person nearest to her.

“Come on, Edward,” Saskia said sweetly, and she guided him out into the corridor that led to the bedrooms. The garish walls there were already peeling apart like a snake shedding its skin. There was a cracking noise that seemed to travel the length of the ship, as indigo glass shook itself free of iron sheets.

“What’s happening?” asked Edward again, in a tinkling cloud of sparkling violet shards. Michel came hurrying up behind them.

“I think you should take Edward to his room,” said Saskia, passing him over. Edward watched as she hurried away. Beneath their feet, the wooden tiles of the parquet floor had risen up and were walking away all in one direction, like leaves being carried by ants. A tumbling river of glass blocks started to flow in the other direction.

Dancing over the shifting floor, Michel pushed Edward into his bedroom. The door slammed shut and Edward looked around to see that his collection of holopictures above the bed was migrating to one corner as the wooden frames of the doors and windows peeled themselves away from the walls and began to descend into the floor.

“What’s happening?” asked Edward again, but there was no reply. He was all alone.

edward 2: 2252

Just like the Eva Rye, the Stranger was itself a Von Neumann Machine—a self-replicating machine. It was aware of the mechanism within its body which, when triggered, would begin the reproductive process. The Stranger lived with the constant possibility of triggering that mechanism: the reasons why it did not do so at any given time were as fascinating as the reasons that would cause it to do so. In activating the Eva Rye’s Self-Replicating Mechanisms, the Stranger had imposed itself upon that object in a most fundamental way. The reproductive procedure followed by the Eva Rye was one of fission. A seam had developed along the back of the teardrop-shaped vessel, giving it the appearance of a deformed peach. Metal and plastic was flowing into the seam and then dividing itself, tearing in tissue layers, half going this way, half going that. A double bulge was slowly inflating into space and already two Eva Ryes could be seen taking shape, each half the mass of the original. The procedure was satisfying to observe, pleasing in its elegance and engineering. The reproductive program was well thought out: the Stranger measured both of the ships to be of almost exactly equal mass. There was a music to the separation, too, the singing of materials in harmony with themselves as they rent apart, and underneath it all the deep bass throb of the engine warping space into the gradient down which the ship slid. Even that warping was separating into two distinct bubbles of space.

And then, a question appeared in the Stranger’s vision. The fission process paused for a moment, the two nascent bulges wavering, anchored by an indissoluble mass within the ship. The stranger looked closer and saw the two cargo holds, and in them the goods carried by the ship. Apples and colored pebbles, crystal and china, bales of paper. And the two huge wooden venumbs that occupied the large hold; pacing back and forth with prehistoric fortitude. The Stranger consulted the results of the Fair Exchange and noted the division of the goods between the two ships.

Just for a moment, it could have sworn that the venumbs were gazing in its direction as it did so.