Tomorrow and Tomorrow

But having gone so far, I will continue. Your goal, for fourteen million years, has been to restore Ana to the form that you knew — not merely her body, but her whole personality.”

“And I’ve been told, over and over, that it’s quite impossible. Are you telling me that it isn’t?”

“It is impossible, today and for the known future. The question is, will it always be impossible? What I can tell you is this: whether Ana’s restoration is feasible or infeasible, in principle, in the very long-term future, does not depend on your actions or on my actions. It depends on the overall nature of the universe itself. And it is because our perceptions of that future have been changing that I am willing to discuss it with you now.”

“You’ve lost me. Totally.”

“As I was afraid I might. It is not easy to explain in a way that you will understand, or to know where to start so as to maximize the probability of your comprehension. But let us begin with a question: Do you know the difference between an open universe and a closed universe?”

“I know what the terms used to mean, at the time that I was frozen.”

“The notions have not changed, except possibly in minor details. The more distant galaxies recede from us, and more distant galaxies recede faster.”

“Even in my time, most people knew that.”

“Then the definitions with which you are familiar still apply. In an open universe, the galaxies go on receding from each other, forever. In a dosed universe, they one day reverse their motion and begin to approach each other. In a closed universe, the end point for that approach is a collapse to a point of infinite density, pressure, and temperature. Is that clear?”

“Clear, and totally irrelevant. I’m interested in restoring Ana, not in discussing cosmology.”

“That is understood. But the two are not unrelated.

Permit me to proceed. Whether or not the universe is open or closed depends on only one thing: the overall density of matter within it. If that density is too low, the universe must be open. If the matter density is high enough, past a critical value, the universe must be closed. What I say next may seem very difficult to you, and the minds of my

composite are not sure that you can ever understand it fully; but the possibility of restoring Ana — your original Ana — depends on whether the universe is open or closed. Hence it depends on the density of matter, or more strictly speaking on the mass-energy density of the universe.”

“You are quite right, I don’t understand you. But if I did, so what? Either the universe is open, or it is closed.” Drake could not conceal his impatience. He realized that he did not fit well into the world of Ariel and Milton. He was too focused, too direct, too impetuous and emotional, a living fossil atavism in a gentler and easier society. He did not know what the changed physical form of humanity looked like, but his guess was that nails and teeth had long gone. He alone possessed residual claws and fangs.

“We must be patient.” Ariel himself showed neither anger nor impatience. “If your original training had perhaps been in mathematics and physics, rather than in music, this would be simpler. But we will work with what we have.” There was no implied criticism, as Ariel continued, “Certain other things become possible in a closed universe. Such a universe possesses, as I said, a single, final end point: an eschaton. At that eschaton, that ultimate stage of confluence of all things, the universe contracts to a singularity. Everything converges, everything meets. This was known to scientists and philosophers at the time of your own birth, who sometimes referred to it as the Omega Point.

“And now we come to the most significant point. Just before the eschaton is reached, all that has ever been known, all information past or present, becomes accessible. Every item of information about people who died a thousand years ago — or fourteen million years ago — becomes available. At the eschaton, every personality who ever existed could in principle be re-created, in perfect detail.”

“Including Ana! I understand, I understand exactly.”

But Drake was filled with rage, not exhilaration. “If this was known millions of years ago, why the devil was it never once mentioned to me?”

“Because it seemed totally irrelevant. The potential for such future action exists only if the universe is closed. In your time, the observations of mass-energy density provided too low a value, by a factor of ten to twenty. That indicated an open universe. Later, scientists decided on theoretical grounds that the universe ought to sit exactly on the boundary between an open and a closed universe. They sought experimental evidence for the missing matter, and they slowly found it. There was still uncertainty; however, they thought that the universe would expand forever, but more and more slowly. In such a case the Omega Point would never exist.

“But that has at last changed. For reasons that we still do not understand, recent measurements reveal a mass-energy density higher than the critical value. That points to a closed universe. The eschaton will exist. One day, many billions of years hence, it must be reached.”

“And Ana can then return to me. When? When will it happen?”

“If it is ever possible, it will be in the far, far future. Our estimate is that the eschaton will be reached fifty billion years from now. That is a time so long that it makes the interval from your first moment of cryosleep to the present day seem less than the blink of an eye. The universe itself is only fifteen billion years old. I recommend that you do not let this conversation affect your subsequent actions. But your own wishes are important. I would like to know what you want.”

“You’re crazy!” Drake glared at Ariel in disbelief. “You know what I want. Why do you think I was frozen in the first place? I want to be with Ana. I’ll wait forever if I have to. I don’t care how long I have to stay in electronic storage.”

“We feared such a response. We deem it irrational. However, we sense your resolution and the force of your will. There is still one more thing.”

“There always is. Another problem?”

“Not at all. A recommendation. You will, I feel sure, want to understand as completely as possible the concept of a closed universe, and its implications for the Omega Point. That would become vastly easier were you to become part of a composite mind. You would have access to all that any knew, science and mathematics and language and philosophy.”

It sounded tempting. Surely, the more that he knew relevant to Ana’s ultimate resurrection, the better. But Drake had learned to be wary. Might there also be negatives, so well hidden that the composite represented by Ariel and Milton was not aware of them?

Drake could sense one, a subtlety that was hard to define precisely. There was a softness to this age, a kindness and a

willingness to bend and compromise. That sounded like real progress for the human species (if that name still applied). But as part of a composite, Drake would surely find his own anachronistic claws and fangs vanishing, dissolved by the pacifism and gentle altruism of the group mind.

A change for the better? Not necessarily. What was good for today might prove fatal tomorrow. Might there be a new future when polish and diplomacy were useless, where what was needed to restore Ana was raw resolve and crude energy?

Merging into a group was a risk too big to take.

“I don’t want to become part of a composite,”

Drake said at last. Ariel had been waiting patiently. “I am willing to be downloaded into the database. But I don’t want to be awake in electronic storage. Let me sleep until I can do some thing.”

“That can be done. There are, however, other and more pleasant options. It would be very easy to create for you a derived reality, one in which you and Ana are continuously together. Before the general use of the composites, many people lived their whole lives in such an environment.”

“How could I be with Ana? She does not exist.”

“We would provide a simulation. But, I guarantee, a highly plausible one.”

“No.” Drake did not tell of the zombie image that came into his head: Ana’s dead body, somehow reanimated but possessed of no genuine life, took hold of him in clammy hands and pressed cold lips to his. “No, Ariel. That would be the worst thing I can imagine. Let me lie dormant. Activate me only if there is significant new information about the Omega Point relevant to Ana’s restoration.”