Each day, she quickened a little inside her chrysalis.

Awareness grew. She felt the process reaching its consummation; felt her new self struggling against confinement.

In a matter of days she would burst free.

Rosa felt the Greater World, too, all the new complexity of it since so many souls had gone over.

But she was not the only one left on the Earth. There had been other transformations.

Many, in fact, on every continent: New creatures half-human or ex-human or subtly post-human.

Like the man, Rosa thought as she rose toward dim consciousness… the boy… the old man who had become a boy…

…who was aware of her, too…

…who, in fact, was very close…

Clamoring for her attention through the medium of the Greater World…

Rosa, he said…

… while she struggled up from a winter’s hibernation… Rosa, we’re very close…

I hear you, boy, she thought. But I’m sleepy. What is it you want? Rosa, the boy said. We’re very close. Rosa, hurry. Rosa, finish what you have to finish, because we’re close now, and you might be in danger.

Chapter 29

I Know What You Are

The caravan pulled into an empty truckstop on I-80.

Home, a mountainous three-quarters disc above the southeastern prairie, turned a deep royal blue as the sun dropped below the horizon. A faint last light played about its apex and gave the high frost a reddish glow.

We shouldn’t linger here, William thought. Home was nearly finished, and soon—within a very few days—it would cast loose from the Earth. No doubt it would be a spectacular sight, but also a dangerous one to any unreconstructed humans in the area. The creation of Home had opened a deep wound in the mantle of the planet. When Home rose toward orbit, the wound would bleed magma; the bedrock would tremble and quake.

William knew all this through the agency of the Greater World, but he didn’t speak of it.

It wasn’t clear whether he should.

He walked a distance from Miriam’s camper, across the still-hot tarmac of the parking lot to an abandoned Honda, and sat on the dusty hood. He wore a sky-blue T-shirt, too big, and a pair of jeans unravelling at the knees, and when he closed his eyes he felt the gentle touch of the cooling air on his young skin.

Debate was raging through the Greater World. As the human polis expanded to completion, it had begun to take over certain tasks from the Travellers—chiefly, the management of the Earth. It was an onerous burden.

The Travellers had approached the Earth like a benevolent but clumsy giant. For all their wisdom, they hadn’t foreseen a ratio of resistance as high as one in ten thousand. They had underestimated the stubbornness of humanity, William thought, no doubt an easy mistake to make. Their own transition from a biological/planetary species to a virtual/interstellar epistemos had been self-generated and nearly unanimous.

But the question remained: How should the human collectivity, the Greater World, relate to this stubborn minority?

Leave them, one faction asserted. They’ve chosen their independence and we ought to respect it Let them find their own destiny. The destiny of the polis was among the stars; the Earth could fend for itself.

It’s inhumane to abandon them, other voices argued. They’re free to choose for themselves, but what about their children? If the human birthright is among the stars, how can we condemn another generation to death?

No resolution had emerged.

William’s problem was a miniature of the larger debate. He knew what Colonel Tyler was; he understood the threat Colonel Tyler posed… but should he intervene?

For the sake of his last sojourn on Earth he had elected to become a child again. He had put a great many memories behind him, stored them temporarily elsewhere, because he wanted this unmediated experience—not just to feel like a twelve-year-old but to be one. And so the Presidency had vanished into the misty past; the Greater World became a presence vaguely perceived.

Now this crisis had forced him out of his ekstasis and troubled him with doubt.

He supposed it wasn’t coincidence that had led him back to Colonel Tyler. Some unperceived connection had been forged as long ago as that day in Washington when he sat in the park with Colonel Tyler’s pistol at his throat. The boy had pedaled aimlessly across America; the man inside had maneuvered him into meeting this sad expedition. It wasn’t clear what events might unfold, but he felt a role for himself in their unfolding.

And a scant half mile down the road was the Connor farmhouse, another dilemma. {Rosa, he broadcast silently. Rosa, hurry!)

He heard Miriam come up behind him. Her footsteps dragged on the gritty parking lot. She’s tired, William thought. Miriam had demonstrated an enormous strength for her age—she insisted on driving her own camper. William recognized and appreciated her resilience. But she tired easily and was often short of breath.

She stood beside him, looking at Home where it dominated the horizon.

“In its own way,” Miriam said, “it’s beautiful.”

It was. Like a vast canyon wall at sunset, Home was every shade of blue, from the palest pastel at its summit to the indigo shadows at its base. A few tenuous clouds had formed along its western slope.

“You look sad,” Miriam said.

“I was thinking,” William told her.

“About what?”

He shrugged. “Things.”

There was a distant clatter of broken glass, the sound of Colonel Tyler breaking into the truckstop restaurant.

“William,” Miriam said. Her voice was solemn. “I wasn’t sure whether I ought to mention this. But perhaps the time has come. William, you don’t have to lie to me anymore. It’s not necessary to pretend. You see, I know what you are.” She regarded him loftily. “You’re one of them”

Miriam had doubted him from the beginning.

Why not? Doubt had been her constant companion for months. Since Contact, all her certainties had melted away.

Miriam had said a resounding No/ to the offer of immortality, but she had seen certain things that long-ago August night—had glimpsed certain immensities that shook her to the roots.

She went back to the Red Letter Bible her father had given her and read it from Genesis 1:1 to Revelation 22:21. The Bible had always been a cornerstone for Miriam. Not because it explained everything, as the TV evangelists alleged. The opposite. She trusted the Bible because it was mysterious. Like life, it was dense and contradictory and resisted interpretation. Rightly so, Miriam thought. How authentic could a book of wisdom be if you understood it at a glance? Wisdom didn’t work like that. Wisdom was a mountain; you climbed it, short of breath, dizzy, unsure of yourself even as you approached the summit.

But after Contact—

Here is a solemn blasphemy, Miriam thought, but after Contact the Holy Bible had seemed almost provincial.

All that earthly preoccupation with slaves and kings, shepherds and patriarchs.

For one unforgettable moment last August, Miriam had beheld in her mind’s eye the universe itself—indescribably ancient, large beyond comprehension, and as full of worlds as the sea was full of water.

Where was God in that immensity?

Perhaps everywhere, Miriam thought. Perhaps nowhere. It was a question the Travellers had refrained from answering. Increasingly, Miriam doubted her own access to the answer.

No, she told them. I don’t want your immortality. She would be immortal at the Throne of God. It was enough.

But the world had never looked the same since.