Swan looks at Zasha those fuckers are treating them like qubes

Well? Zasha says What do you call them? Qubanoids? Qubans?

Qubans is good I say they’re like Pauline remember it was a qube that drove the A-Tay-Ha right into that pebble mob killed itself for us did its duty I mean I like the inspector as much as anyone which is quite a lot despite all but I feel no need to agree on every issue this is just crazy

Jean just thinks we need to hit the reset button a little

You never get to do that! life doesn’t work that way I’m going to take this one with me

Swan

Don’t you try to stop me! standing quickly fist pulled back to strike

Zasha both hands up Stop stop I don’t disagree for once just maybe you might have it right that’s why I called you up till now I was helping to track these things down so when I heard this one got away I went out and hauled it back in it was easy they’re credulous but then I called you I called you

That’s my Z we’ll leave at dawn

Zasha shaking head You and your strays here you are doing it again fuck every time you come out here

Hey you’re the one who asked me here you wanted my help you wanted me to do this

Yeah yeah gowan wicha getoutahere

The breaking of the day addedth to my degree if any ask me how artist who drew me so must tell

Hope is a bird the birds quieter at break of day sleepier cheerful at what the light portends a breeze throws waves through the parlor of the dawn

Follow Swan to a car off to a dock where a public ferry awaits all the faces dense with life eyes looking inward to other times past or future or watching the day like you

Across the broad river in spate water surface closely scalloped by the wind creased by wakes bubbly cross chop the round bow of the ferry skidding on the tide crashes gulps the broken water slides ahead Manhattan left to right before them a cliff made by people sunrise has not yet topped it long shadows over the river slowly grumble into the slip a giant vise that grips the ferry and rocks it still

Out with the people onto a platform out between tall buildings canals below long thin boats 52 boats visible 423 people in morning shadow busy day already

What do you think? Swan asks Can you pass? Will you be all right?

41 boats visible 364 people we are the birds that stay

I’ll be all right

Good off with you then

the human kisses you on the mouth click of eyeteeth jolts you both suddenly awake to the reality of the other look in the eye maple irises left eye marked with a bottom arc of blue Do good go

WAHRAM

People hunger for time both ways. Certain things we want to come faster: the terraforming of a new world we have come to love, the arrival of universal justice in human affairs, a good project. Other things we want to go slower: our own lives, the lives of those we love. Either way it’s a hunger for time—more time to do things, to experience things.

Getting married at age 113 is the triumph of experience over hope. So many lives have already been lived. One’s hopes long since have been reduced to a focus on the things of the day. Experience has taught all it is going to teach; more experience will be a reiteration.

But never quitereiteration. Life is always at most a pseudoiterative. Each day has its particulars. Performing the same actions day after day, in a ritual to ward off time, to hold the moment, does not remove these particulars, but rather burnishes them. The animals, our horizontal brothers and sisters, remind us; each day lived is a kind of adventure, a success. Nothing ever repeats. Each breath is a new suck at the atmosphere, a gasp for life. A hope for experience. Feel that and go on.

Fitz Wahram sat in the meeting room of the Titan Planetary Relations council, thinking these thoughts. When it was his turn, he made his case to his colleagues.

“One would hope that after all this time the Terran nation-states would have learned from experience and made their reconciliations with each other, such that their various ties with the off-planet settlements were consistent and coherent, and all the confusion and discord that their current actions create been dispensed with. But no. They have not managed that. It may take them decades more, or even centuries. No one can say how Earth will go. Meanwhile, we have to restore some kind of relationship with our old patron Mars. The work around Saturn began as a Martian nitrogen hunt, as you know, and that was a big part of settling the Saturn system in the first place. So the complete break from Mars, while necessary in its time, does not have to stay permanent, nor should it. We’re strong enough now that we can deal with Mars without being overwhelmed by them. Indeed, to engage them would be a sign of strength for us. So I propose that we go there and arrange to renew nitrogen exports from Titan to them, almost at the levels that existed before, but in a new arrangement that we control, in essence a fair trade. It would benefit both planets. The Titanic atmosphere still holds about twice as much nitrogen as we want it to have in the preferred state. That suggests a specific transfer quantity that we can set the conditions for. In return we can provide our part of a triangular trade: nitrogen from Titan to Mars, reconstruction and development assistance from Mars to Mercury, and heavy metals and rare earths from Mercury to Saturn. Also their help in assuring the Vulcan light imports.”

Questions and such from his interlocutors. Discussion. Then Wahram again:

“The reinforcement of ties in all three directions would be helpful in the effort to band together in the face of Earth’s recidivist imperialism, and their internal conflicts and rivalries, which threaten to spill outward and overrun all of us. We might even help to heal some of these old problems. It would be a way of following up on the reanimation, which has produced such remarkable effects already.”

“Like what?” He was challenged.

“The Arctic League has become one of the most progressive and cooperative political organizations on Earth. The middle of North America is being repopulated as a buffalo grasslands to tremendous acclaim. The Amazonian rain forest is being expanded back into its full historical basin, now tended as parkland, somewhat as it was in the pre-Columbian period. Southeast Asia, South Asia have achieved population balance and the biggest rewilding of all, which has helped their forests, water, and climate situation. These are all measurably improved situations since the reanimation occurred.”

“There hasn’t been anywhere near enough time to make those conclusions. The animal invasion is often described as a horrid botch that created a host of nightmare problems.”

“Wrongly so.”

They wrangled about the situation on Earth for a while. Finally the senior advisor from the Saturn Administrative Group reminded them that the issue on the table was the creation of a three-way trade with Mars and Mercury. Wahram pointed out that Mars had been considerably influenced and one might say infected by the qube humanoids that had infiltrated their system and only recently been ferreted out and sent into exile; the Martians were so pleased to be rid of them that they were revoking Jean Genette’s exile status and welcoming the now-celebrated inspector back home to be thanked for good service. Presumably the new dispensation there on Mars would include a more cooperative spirit. Many council members nodded at this good news, and they got down to details of quantities of nitrogen transport, schedules, and compensation. The ultimate millibar pressure of the Titanic atmosphere was debated.

Wahram waited until most of the people in the room were feeling impatient about the matter, then called for a return to the question at hand. The principle of the proposal was approved by consensus and they closed the meeting.