Solaris Rising 2

Solaris Rising 2 by Ian Whates Page A

Book: Solaris Rising 2 by Ian Whates Read Free Book Online
Authors: Ian Whates
Tags: Science-Fiction
Ads: Link
Carpenters? Cops? People with some experience of life. Tough, physical people who know what pain and hard work is. It wasn’t accountants or – or – or shut-ins who colonised the American West, was it? It was pioneers, outdoorsmen, cattle ranchers, rugged frontier folk. This is a disaster in the making. This has EPIC FAIL written all over it. As if we haven’t screwed up badly enough already, we’ve got to go for the double.
     
     
    T HE LIMO CRUISED towards Heathrow. It felt, weirdly, like going on holiday. Me, Claire, Martin and his sister Jenny, all in one car, heading for the airport. Incongruously normal. A trip to Spain, maybe, or Greece. Except there was no sense of urgency or expectation, no fear that we might arrive late and miss the plane.
    The roads were more or less empty. People didn’t travel much these days. Didn’t go anywhere. Would rather stay at home. In the first few months after the Incident, everyone went everywhere. Governments poured money into subsidising aviation fuel, airlines dropped their seat prices to rock bottom, and we all become globetrotters and jetsetters. Crossing those must-see destinations off our bucket lists. The Taj Mahal. Ayers Rock. The Great Wall. The Pyramids. But then, in time, the novelty wore off. That weird sense of exhilaration died. Dull mundanity set in again. We turned into hermits, favouring the familiar over the strange, the known over the unknown, friends over foreigners, people over places.
    Conversation in the limo was stilted. Claire kept trying not to cry. She had vowed not to make a scene, for Martin’s sake. Outpourings of sadness or affection made him uncomfortable. He would actively squirm.
    Finally, to combat the awkward silence, Jenny switched on the in-car TV. A news channel came up. There it was, a satellite shot of the Incident site. Facts and figures scrolled along the bottom. Width of site: now standing at 798.7 miles in diameter. Expansion rate: constant at a mile a day. Estimated number of ecophages: almost uncountable – a sextillion and rising.
    A jet black stain on the ocean, like an immense ink blot. Widening. Encroaching. Spreading outwards and downwards ravenously, insatiably. A tumour on the planet, metastasising like mad.
    The story switched to the trial of the eco-terrorist group responsible. For weeks the hearings had dragged on, bogged down in legal technicalities and fine print. The International Court was deliberating whether to prosecute the ten men and women for crimes against humanity, genocide, mass murder, or simply for industrial sabotage and destruction of property. Since nobody had died yet as a direct consequence of the Incident, it was all a bit moot. Besides, what punishment was there that could possibly fit the crime? Meanwhile, outside the Peace Palace in the Hague, thousands of protestors were baying for the culprits’ heads. Placards read HANG THEM ALL and JUSTICE FOR HUMANITY.
    Martin appeared oblivious. He sat with his head canted against the window, gazing out. Perhaps he was counting lampposts. Or establishing the limo’s speed from the rate at which the road markings flickered by. Or logging the number of windows in every house we passed so as to be able to produce an average at the end of the journey. Any of those.
     
     
    T HAT LAST CONTRIBUTOR , what bullshit. Who better to go than some of the brightest among us? We don’t need jocks up there, we need brainiacs. What they don’t have in terms of survival skills, they’ll pick up from Pandora ’s tutorial programmes. They’ll arrive at the other end ready and capable to colonise their new home. Plus – and this is true because I read it in the New Scientist – people with autistic tendencies are ideal for space flight, especially one that’s going to last a decade and a half. They cope better with boredom. They can amuse themselves for long periods. They’re less likely to suffer claustrophobia or mental breakdown. Think of it this way. They’re

Similar Books

The Shadow Society

Marie Rutkoski

The Sisterhood

Helen Bryan

Cover Me

Joanna Wayne Rita Herron and Mallory Kane

Windows 10 Revealed

Kinnary Jangla

At Risk

Judith E. French

A Timeless Romance Anthology: Spring Vacation Collection

Annette Lyon, Sarah M. Eden, Heather B. Moore, Josi S. Kilpack, Heather Justesen, Aubrey Mace

Numbered Account

Christopher Reich