A Visitor to the Future - 135 - The Abnormals
From what Sarkona had told me, there were a lot of space-based structures in the Sol system. Habitats were plentiful and popular, with thousands orbiting Earth alone. It was fair to say that my experience of space-based structures was extremely limited, as all that I'd seen was The Promise of Sol, the space elevator connecting Earth to the stars, the Boiling Point, and some images of Eru Ilúvatar around Mars from my time browsing the Infranet. There was a sort of unity to them all though, common features which repeated throughout most designs. Things like gravity rings, docking ports - even colour patterns were similar as hyperdense alloys were often left an unpainted dark grey color.
The Abnormals seemed determined to deliberately take those expectations and smash them into very small pieces, like a literal hammer-blow to the psyche.
Where the Abnormals lived defied all conventions - twisted every part of the middling engineering knowledge that I'd been working on with Regolith. I blinked repeatedly, as if the sight through the window would vanish if I paid too much attention to it. It was like looking at something someone had painted here in a particularly wild and inspired night of surreal artistry. It gave the impression of a tangled ball of roots - sleek dark-green curves spiraled in on themselves, creating a mess of passageways that bundled around a silvery metallic core before emerging at another point and tapering off into wisps of nothing at the station's extremities. Though the construction was stationary, there was a sense of movement to the lines - like they could unfold at any moment and embrace you. I moved my head slightly to appreciate how it seemed to absorb the light on the sunward side, picking up a slight carapace-like radiant sheen. It was eerily beautiful.
All four of us in the room were captivated by it, and our amazement had only grown with our closeness to it.
"This is quite the work of art!" exclaimed Tungsten, "I could quite easily see something like this in a gallery - though not at this scale, obviously."
"It'd be wasted in a gallery," said Anode, wrapping an arm around Tungsten's shoulders and pointing at the tapered points, "Look at those radiators! Completely integrated into the superstructure. I wonder how efficient they are. I'd love to take it apart."
I tried to pick out what Anode was pointing at, seeing nothing but plain hull myself - Anode was probably pointing out infrared light, only visible to her expanded senses.
"We should probably ask before we start doing that, dear," said Tungsten, patting her arm.
"I'd settle for seeing their heat management analytics then," concluded Anode.
"It isn't spinning," I said, "And I'm not seeing any gravity rings. Does that mean there's no spin gravity onboard at all?"
"Yes," said Sarkona, whose eager face was closest to the window, "The Abnormals are well-known for their no-gravity designs - they've outdone themselves though, I have to say their design this cycle is particularly refreshing!"
There had been quite a bit of chatter among the crew as neared the station over the last few days. Only Sarkona was really familiar with the work and lives of the Abnormals, and from the depth of their knowledge I'd gotten the impression that my friend really admired them. Sarkona's rising level of excitement over the past two hours had only confirmed that suspicion.
The glacially slow pace of our ship decreased further as the reaction control thrusters of the ship executed the final steps to delicately match speed and rotation with the station, the movements so graceful that the crew didn't even need to be seated or restrained. With Gatecrash and Regolith at the helm, I had no worries about being buffeted around, though I did wonder how we were supposed to dock, given that the structure was so sleek that there was no visible entrance to the docking bay.
The entire group boarded the skiff together, the CIs in the group filling the short transit time with speculation about how the artistic design had been achieved - what manufacturing techniques had produced the unique properties of the alloys? How long had this installation been here? Regolith, as always, cautioned against unsubstantiated guesses. I switched to the external view and watched as we approached what looked to be a solid and curved section of the station. I think at the start of this trip I might have been alarmed, but Gatecrash had more than proven their piloting abilities during the trip - I figured they knew what they were doing. Sure enough, a seam appeared in the solid surface, a panel sliding away to accommodate entry into a small docking bay.
We floated out of the skiff and into round, dark tunnel which had a raised hexagonal pattern to its surface, the surface shaded a dark blue colour. I'd been expecting the interior to mirror the curves of the outside, but that wasn't the case here. It was probably another problem of scale, the lack of a frame of reference really made things difficult. The temperature inside was slightly warmer than the default temperature within the Boiling Point, a difference which reminded me that at some point during the journey here I had stopped noticing the temperature at all. Another ever-present automation of spacefaring life that I was taking for granted.
The first sign that our host was here was a low hum, barely audible and quite pleasant to the ear, followed by a lingering aura of light which gently emmanated from the raised hexagons.
"Welcome to you all," a feminine and serene voice said from behind me. I instinctively spun, placing one hand on the wall to turn around, but there was no-one there, "And I'm so glad to have you with us in person, Sarkona. I have enjoyed receiving your letters."
"I'm super happy to be here!" replied Sarkona, then taking the time to introduce each of us to the empty air. I had no idea who my friend was looking at.
"I am also pleased to have the rest of you with us," said the voice warmly, "My name is Formerly, and I am one of the Abnormals. I am told that you each have your own areas of expertise, and, as a result, I have arranged for my friends to be available to share their knowledge. I will escort each of you to areas you will find of interest. Please, follow my lights."
The group quickly agreed to split up - Anode eagerly flew through the large tunnels in pursuit of her heat management analytics, with Tungsten in hot pursuit, and Gatecrash and Regolith went to inspect the core of the station. Sarkona and I went with Formerly for a wider tour - my friend was eager to see everything and I had questions of my own.
"Formerly, where actually are you?" I asked, trying to track the source of the voice, "I'm not trying to be impolite, I just don't see where you are."
I could almost hear a smile in Formerly's response. "I'm over here," she said, an oval section of the wall brightening further, "But feel no obligation to talk or look in any particular direction, because strictly speaking there isn't one."
I raised my eyebrows in Sarkona's direction, who smiled. "I figured it'd be better to let Formerly explain," they said.
"Which I will do," said Formerly, voice and accompanying hum now only audible in one direction, "It is quite novel to encounter anyone visiting here who has not heard of us or me. Please, follow my voice." We pushed off the wall to start down the tunnel in that direction. The surface of the hexagons was almost rubber-like, providing a high amount of friction to push off of.
"I was born Anessa Heiger," explained Formerly, "I adopted the name Formerly when I began my work as an Infranet activist, prior to my affiliation with the Abnormals. My younger self thought the name very clever."
"So you choose not to take physical form at all?" I asked.
"Not in the traditional sense. The way I have my interface set up, you can see the impact of my actions even if you can't see my physical body. I do have a brain, organs, skeleton - just like you. I just choose to keep them out of the way - use the sensors and abilities of my environment to live instead. To be accurate, it is over there," said Formerly, the wall section lighting up again, "Close to the center of the habitat."
"I've heard of teleforms, but not no-forms," I said, "Do you mind if I ask why? What appeals about it to you?"
"We're very rare, a subset of a subset," explained Formerly, "For me, it is how I am used to living. My experience in early life was quite unique - I'm native to Titan, where I was born in low-gravity conditions with a series of debilitating genetic defects. For a significant portion of my early life, I was confined to primitive life support machines. Neural link technology set me free, allowing me to move beyond the confines of my own body, which led to my involvement in the field of genetic research."
"Are you ever tempted to try out a body or two?" Sarkona asked.
"Yes, I've tried many physical forms but I always go back to this," said Formerly, a soft pulse of light suddenly filling the corridor by way of emphasis, "Many people don't take to it well, but it is how I feel at my most natural - I find a single form or perspective very constraining. One of our members puts it into words better than I - I not merely survive but thrive without the typical human experience to distract me. My working theory is that my early life prepared me for this in a way that isn't easily replicable."
We reached an airlock, moving through it into a grey-tinted tunnel, and then immediately after into a green one. There was a moderate air current which blew through this corridor. I was reminded of the wind festival on Earth, and closing my eyes for a second I was there again, flying once more.
"Please stay stationary for a moment," Formerly said, "Tomas is coming through."
Two of the panels next to us raised up to shield us from the wind as it briefly intensified, as a shape barreled around the bend - a large mass of wing-like appendages with a vaguely human core was all I could pick up as it zoomed by. It was a little like a bat flying overhead. The panels lowered again and the wind diminished in the wake of the creature, who must have been Tomas.
"Tomas loves the sensation of wind-assisted flight," explained Formerly, "I must always be mindful of his movement through our tunnels. My apologies if you were shocked."
Sarkona's face was delighted, suggesting exactly the opposite, "Were those wings? With a human-like core, that must have been very difficult to pull off! People aren't typically very aerodynamic."
The walls pulsed briefly as Formerly responded, "Specifically designed for this environment - the fans are also tailor-made for that purpose. I believe Tomas has a few Proxy bodies for guest use if you'd like to ask him about it later."
Sarkona beamed in a way that suggested they'd be doing exactly that.
"As these tunnels have been adjusted for Tomas I would suggest increasing speed. Otherwise it might take some time to reach our destination - our station is quite large. You should be able to run along the walls like this." Various hexagons lit up along the wall to show a suggested path. Sarkona immediately followed the suggestion, taking off with the confidence of someone who had spent a lot of time in zero-gravity. I thumbed the safety bands around my wrists before doing my best to follow.
"Your timing is very good," continued Formerly as we continued at pace, "We were looking to move in another year or two. We've spent enough time here."
"Happy to have caught you!" said Sarkona, leaping off one wall to another, "I've been meaning to visit for years. I hope you don't mind me saying, but the work of the Abnormals inspired me to take up biodev."
"I'm extremely pleased to hear that. I hope you've found the field engaging," responded Formerly.
"Very!" said Sarkona, "Would you mind explaining for Nat what the Abnormals do?"
I smiled, Sarkona had mentioned the basics but I was eager to hear from Formerly herself.
"Officially, the Abnormals are the Collective for Advanced Genetic Research. Not long after we founded a protest movement started calling us the Abnormals, intending it as an insult. We liked it so much we started using it ourselves, and it stuck. More people know us by that name than our official one. Our work, combined with that of many others, sparked the period that historians call the Bio-dev Breakthrough roughly four hundred years ago. Our group is most well-known for normalizing the use of extreme bio-development, whether for medical necessity, personal preference or simply enjoyment. Today we continue to campaign for Bio-dev accessibility for all, and act as a research collective to further enhance our understanding of the evolution of biological bodies and how they can be molded to meet our needs."
"You're missing quite a lot out there," added Sarkona, "Your personal involvement in the distribution of Bio-dev technologies, your liberation of years of corporate genetic research... Nat, did you know Formerly was one of the early Consortium's most respected hackers?"
"That was a very long time ago, and those skills have gone unused for almost the same amount of time. Besides, if I listed everything I'd done for the last four hundred years, we'd never finish the tour," joked Formerly, "And I'd rather sing the praises of my friends than my own. Here we are."
The tunnel opened up into a large, spherical room decorated with vibrant patterns, easily the size of a football pitch, inside of which there was a translucent sphere. It took me a moment to realize from its slightly rippling surface that it was water. I could see various shapes floating around the inside.
"This is where Takesh resides," Formerly explained, "But he is sleeping. I did try to schedule around this, but his statistics show he needs at least another hour. We won't disturb him in there, so we'll move on for now. We'll visit the labs."
We kicked off the spherical wall using hand-holds and toward another tunnel. I was transfixed by the surface of the watery sphere and had to resist the temptation to try and stretch out my hand to touch it. I didn't know what would happen to a person making contact with water while floating in zero-gravity, but it was probably messy.
I was almost to the illuminated hatchway we were aiming for when a shape emerged from within it. An overlarge head of grey-brown hair poked out and began to sport a devilish grin in our direction, before pulling its body into the space - to reveal a clothed, non-human torso with two sets of shoulders, one behind the other, each sporting an arm for a total of four.
"Do my eyes deceive me?" the figure yelled jovially, voice booming like the giant that he was, "Would that be a grown-up Sarkona Grant?"
We touched down next to the figure, his stature even more impressive up close. He was easily twice my size. I'll admit that his smiling teeth drew my gaze - every tooth after the front four narrowed to large point. It gave his mouth a shark-like quality. I'll admit his form unsettled me at first, but I tried to control the reaction. He seemed friendly enough.
"I'm sorry," said Sarkona, "I don't think I know you."
"Ohhoho, but I know you, dear child! We've met before, though you were but a child at the time. It must have been - why, nearly a hundred years! My dear, I'm Makeyha Drasquis! I used to work with your grandmother and grandfather on the Centauri Project!"
Sarkona blinked, "You'll have to forgive me for not remembering!"
"How could I not? You must have been no older than six!" the man boomed, "I was surprised to hear that a Grant would be visiting us today. Tell me, how are your grandparents? I've lost touch with them these days!"
"Well, to my knowledge! They moved to Ceres about two decades ago."
"Ah! What a thrill! I long since suggested a visit to your grandfather, what a joy to see he took my advice. Your visit has been a fine reminder for me to reach out to my old friends. Please tell them to expect a line from me. Oh, how rude of me - who is your friend?"
"This is Nat McEwan," Sarkona introduced me.
"Uh... hi," I said.
Makeyha looked at me intently and I noticed just how piercing his grey-blue eyes were. I felt like the sum of my being was being judged, for some reason.
"Formerly, you sly girl!" said Makeyha, slapping his leg with gusto, "You and your secrets! Such a thrill! I am so very happy to meet you, Nat. Formerly, I see now why you were so keen to keep our visitor's identities to yourself." Makeyha put a finger to his lips conspiratorially, "My lips are now sealed until you finish your tour - but what a thrill, oh, what a thrill! I shall leave you to it." The titan of a man suddenly pushed off the wall and flew past us, jovially waving as he did so.
The wall pulsed nearby, "My apologies, Nat," said Formerly, "Makeyha was not scheduled to be here - I had hoped to more gently introduce you to our group."
"Uh, I'm not sure there's anything to apologize for," I said, "But that was quite a reaction - does Makeyha respond that way to everyone he meets?"
"No," said Formerly, "It is that to us, Nat, you are something of a celebrity."
"Me?" I reacted, shocked.
"Yes, you see, many of the Abnormals got our start within cryocontainment-related fields. And you hold the records for being not only the first person to experience successful cryocontainment, but also for being one of the longest successfully recovered cryocontained. Many of my colleagues have visited you on Eru Ilúvatar within the past few hundred years. To have you here with us is so rewarding for us - it makes much of what my colleagues and I have been doing for the past few hundred years seem worth it."
"Wow." I said. I couldn't think of anything else.
"Are you okay, Nat?" Sarkona asked, concern writ on their features.
"Oh, fine, thanks," I replied, "Just a little surprised. I really didn't expect anything like this."
"I was planning to brief you on this before meeting any of the others", said Formerly, "But Makeyha has, in his typical fashion, blundered into my finely-crafted plans. Though that element of chaos does make him a great member of our group."
"Are there any other groups in Sol who might react similarly to me?" I asked.
"I'd be very surprised if they did," said Formerly, "There are a combination of factors which make you significant to our group particularly. You too, Sarkona - though I recognize familial ties are hardly something you have control of."
"Ah, Andreas Grant," said my friend, "As the creator of cryocontainment, I can see why."
"Speaking of, one or two of our members were fortunate enough to work with Andreas himself. I'm sure they'd be willing to share those experiences with you."
Sarkona grinned, "Well, now I'm even more glad to have made the trip."
Formerly's tone seemed relieved to hear we both weren't put off by the experience. "For now, if you wouldn't mind some subtle downplay and collusion, let's leave out the surnames - and we'll make the reveal to the others later?"
"Sounds good to me," I said. I wasn't used to being a celebrity.