The Long Earth

‘Fine so far.’ In fact it was better than fine. As always when Joshua left the Datum behind, the oppressive sense of enclosure he invariably experienced there dissipated quickly: a pressure he’d not really been aware of when he was growing up, not until it wasn’t there any more. The pressure of a world too full of other minds, he suspected, other human consciousnesses. It seemed to be a fine sensitivity; even on remote stepwise worlds he always registered it if somebody else showed up, anywhere near by, even a small party. But he’d discussed this strange quasi-telepathic facility, or disability, with nobody — bar Sister Agnes — not even Officer Jansson, and he didn’t choose to talk it over with Lobsang now. Still, the sensation of freedom, of release, was there. That, and his peculiar awareness of the Silence, as of a mind far away, dimly sensed, like the toll of a huge and ancient bell in a far-off mountain range… Or rather he did sense this when Lobsang wasn’t talking, as he was now.

‘We will follow the line of latitude west, roughly. We can manage thirty miles an hour easily. A nice leisurely pace; we are out here to explore. That should bring us over the footprint of the continental US in a few weeks…’

Lobsang’s face was not quite real, Joshua thought, like a slightly off CGI simulation. But here in this fantastic vessel, in this realization of Lobsang’s astonishing dreams, Joshua was oddly warming to him.

‘You know, Lobsang, I caught up with your story when I went back to the Home, after my interview at transEarth. People were saying that the smartest thing that any supercomputer could do the moment it was switched on would be to make certain that it couldn’t be switched off again. And that the story about the reincarnated Tibetan was a front, precisely so you couldn’t be switched off. We all talked about that, and Sister Agnes said, well, if a computer has a desire not to be switched off then it has to have a sense of self, and that means a soul. I know the Pope decreed otherwise later on, but I back Sister Agnes against the Vatican any time.’

Lobsang thought that over. ‘I look forward to meeting Sister Agnes someday. I hear what you are saying. Thank you, Joshua.’

Joshua hesitated. ‘While you’re thanking me, maybe you could answer a question. Is this you, Lobsang? Or are you back on the Datum, in some store at MIT? Is that a meaningful question?’

‘Oh, certainly it is meaningful. Joshua, back on the Datum I am distributed across many memory stores and processor banks. That’s partly for security, and partly for efficiency and effectiveness of data retrieval and processing. If I wished I could consider my self to be distributed among a number of centres, of foci of consciousness.

‘But I am human, I am Lobsang. I remember how it was to look out of a cave of bone, from a single apparent locus of consciousness. And that is how I have maintained it. There is only one me, Joshua, only one Lobsang, though I have backup memory stores scattered over several worlds. And that “me” is with you on this journey. I am fully dedicated to the mission. And by the way, when I inhabit the ambulant unit, that too, for the duration, is “me”, though there remains enough of “me” outside that shell to enable the airship to fly. If I were to fail or were lost then a backup copy on Datum Earth would be initiated, and synched with whatever you were able to retrieve of my memory stores on the ship. But that would be another Lobsang; he would remember me, but he would not be me… I hope that’s clear.’

Joshua thought that over. ‘I’m glad I’m just a standard-issue human.’

‘Well, more or less, in your case,’ Lobsang said dryly. ‘Incidentally, now that we’re under way, be sure that my report on the congressional expedition slaughter is already with the authorities. And, to be on the safe side, with such newspapers as I find trustworthy. Including the Fortean Times, a boon to all researchers of the Long Earth phenomenon. You can access back issues on the screen in your stateroom… It’s done. A deal’s a deal.’

‘Thank you, Lobsang.’

‘So here we are — on our way! By the way, don’t be alarmed if the coffee percolator talks to you; it’s a beta- test AI from one of our associates. Oh, and do you have a thing about cats?’

‘They make me sneeze.’

‘Shi-mi won’t.’

‘Shi-mi?’

‘Another first for transEarth. You’ve seen the size of this gondola; it is lousy with hard-to-get-to spaces, and vermin may be a problem for us. It wouldn’t be hard for them to scramble up our anchor cables when we land. The last thing we want is a rat nibbling on a wire. So, meet Shi-mi. Come, kitty kitty…’

A cat walked on to the deck. It was supple, silent, almost convincing. But there was an LED spark in each green eye.

‘I can tell you that she—’

‘She, Lobsang?’

‘She can, on demand, make a pleasant purring noise designed to be optimally soothing to the human ear. She can track mice via infra red, and has excellent hearing. She will stun her prey with a low current, swallow it into a designated stomach with a small food and water dispenser, and then will carefully transfer the catch to a small holding vivarium, where the mouse can live happily until it can be relocated somewhere safe.’

‘That’s going to a lot of trouble for a mouse.’

‘That is the Buddhist way. This prototype is clean and hygienic, will not harm her prey and, in general, will do most of the things you would expect of a domestic cat, except for shitting in your stereo headphones — a common complaint I’m told. Oh, in the default setting she will sleep on your bed.’

‘A robot cat, on a robot ship?’

‘There are advantages. She has a gel brain, just like my own ambulant, and is a whole lot smarter than the average cat. And synthetic hair. No sneezes, I promise—’

Suddenly the stepping stopped, and Joshua felt an odd lurch, like being thrown forward. The deck was flooded with light. Joshua glanced through the windows. They were evidently in a world that happened to be sunny. Sunny, but cloaked in ice.

‘Why have we stopped?’

‘Look down. There are binoculars in the lockers.’

A tiny multicoloured dot in the whiteness resolved into a Day Glo orange domed tent, and a couple of people moving stiffly around, made Doughboy-sexless by the thick Arctic gear they wore. A portable drilling rig had been set up on the ice, and a Stars and Stripes hung limply on a pole.

‘Scientists?’

‘A university party, from Rhode Island. Studying the biota, taking ice cores and such. I’m recording all traces of human presence I find, naturally. I was expecting these gentlemen, though they have travelled a few worlds further than the nominal target they logged.’

‘But you found them even so.’

‘My view is godlike, Joshua.’

Joshua, peering down, wasn’t sure if the college guys had even noticed the airship, a whale suddenly hovering in the air above them. ‘Are we going down?’

‘That would serve no purpose. Though we could talk to them without landing. We carry a range of communications gear, from medium- and short-wave radios that ought to let us transmit to and receive from anywhere on an individual world, to — well, simpler means. A heliograph, Navy issue. Even a loudspeaker.’

‘A loudspeaker! Lobsang, booming from above like Yahweh.’

‘The equipment is merely practical, Joshua. Not every action carries symbolic freight.’

‘Every human action does. And you are human, aren’t you, Lobsang?’

Lobsang resumed the stepping without warning, another gentle lurch. The science camp winked into non- existence, and more worlds strobed past.

After his first night on the airship Joshua awoke feeling full of diamonds. The ship stepped steadily, the sound of its various mechanisms like the purring of a cat. In fact, he found the purring was the cat, curled up on his legs; when he stirred she elegantly rose, stretched, and loped away.

Prompted by the rumbling of his stomach, Joshua investigated the galley.

These days a decent meal out in the stepwise worlds was pretty easy to obtain, for him; the pioneering steppers kind of liked to see him around, they knew his name and reputation, and treated him as if he were a lucky