Chapter 6

15 YAL

“You are homo liberas. You will never grow sick, never wither or fade.”

Standing on the cliff face, skin gleaming in the mist of the waterfall that thundered over the lip of dark brown rock at our feet, the words of our mother had the cadence of a rite. It was the morning of our fourteenth birthday.

We had arrived at the falls after walking most of the night, reaching the top just as the lightline began to glow into dawn. The higher elevation of the upper summerland plains dropped precipitously here, falling into a striated red and orange canyon biome visible below us through churning mist, the river twisting blue and serpentine between walls of engineered rock beyond under a thin veil of cloud. Clinging to the edge of the plains system above the waterfall, a conclave of small forested islands forked the river into multiple twines that anastomosed into the thundering falls beneath us. Mother had led us to a rock outcrop that jutted from the island closest to the fall’s curling edge, leaving us hanging in the air above the roaring torrent of water, naked bodies cool in the morning breeze.

“You are in control of your flesh; your body does not control you.”

I wasn’t entirely sure of that. My erections still rose unbidden at any moment; little more than a glimpse of my mother or sister could bring on sudden, unstoppable urges, sending me scurrying behind a tree or into a quiet dell until I relieved the tension.

“You control yourself through thought, with specific visualisations,” she continued, standing behind us. “Now think of your lungs. Imagine them as two pink spheres.”

Following Mother’s instructions I visualised the two large sacs in my chest, their fractal surfaces designed to absorb Gaia’s air, replicated in Longshot, and took a breath.

“Feel them inflating. See the spheres growing. Exhale completely. Good, again. Hold it this time. Keep thinking of the spheres, round and full.”

Looking at me, Zuri puffed out her cheeks dramatically, her eyes wide. I struggled to contain my laughter.

“Now. Dive to the bottom of the cataract. Stay underwater for as long as you can.”

Almost losing my breath again, I looked back at our mother. The waterfall tumbled into a foaming blue-green pool twenty meters below us.

Zuri was already running on the warm, slick rock towards the edge. Jumping antispinwards, she took advantage of the habitat’s Coriolis effect to gain some extra height and distance, floating upwards into the mist before bending her torso forward and tucking her head against her tight calves. A moment later her legs flicked straight, and she arrowed down into the pool, entering the water with barely a splash.

Show-off. Already submerged, she couldn’t hear me.

Steeling my courage, I took the simpler route of jumping with my arms folded across my chest like a pharaoh, body angled forward to compensate for spin. In the two seconds it took me to travel the length of the falls, the station turned fractionally underneath me, and I entered the water straight, surrounded by an explosion of silver bubbles.

The impact sank me quickly to the bottom of the pool. The roar of the waterfall was muted underwater, brought down to a constant low rumble of white noise. I looked around for Zuri, spotting her hidden under a ridge five meters beneath the surface, her dark body rippled with wave-shadow in the light from above.

As I swam to her, Zuri lifted her hands to show me the smooth rocks she held as ballast. A quick search found two more, allowing us to stand in front of each other.

The current’s strength forced us to lean heavily into the flow to keep our feet on the smooth stone of the riverbed. Above us the world wavered, our mother and the rock outcrop she watched from darkened into blue shadow.

Suddenly I felt Zuri’s lips press against mine, and almost lost my breath for a third time. Her kiss was long and warm, held in the rushing water.

Leaning back against the rock of the riverbank Zuri somehow managed to smirk in the torrent. Turning on her heel, my sister started to move carefully with the current, walking with the flow. I had little choice other than to follow.

Walking became easier as the river broadened and calmed, the water around us growing warmer as it flowed into the canyon system. Starved of oxygen, our bodies switched to using fructose as a source of energy. We moved slowly, entranced by the richness and density of life clinging to the rocks.

Disturbed by the white dome of an automated underwater dredger cruising along the riverbed, a giant freshwater stingray roused itself from the muddy bottom in a cloud of silt, flapping away from us. A school of silvery spotted knifefish darted in and out of swaying reeds. Eels slithered from crevices deep in the rocks. We even glimpsed a sturgeon, bigger and longer than either of us, cruising majestically through the water before flicking its tail and disappearing.

We made it almost a kilometer down the river before our lungs started to burn, forcing us to return to the surface. We ran back along the canyon, naked bodies drying in the heat, all the way to the base of the falls. Mother, still waiting at the top, was furious.

I was never sure if the night-march to the falls was intended to tire us out for the rest of the day. If that was our mother’s plan, it failed abysmally.

It was dusk. We were sitting on the blanket together, me behind Zuri, our mother opposite us.

“We are endlings,” Mother said quietly. “As far as we know, we’re the last of our species. Our bodies are amortal, not eternal. If we do nothing other than live and land on Gaia, our kind will be probably be extinct in a thousand years, through accident or event. Perhaps sooner: none of us is immune from fate.” She paused. “But it doesn’t have to be that way.”

“If we want to survive as a species, to create viable colonies, we need people,” she continued. “At least a few hundred at the halfway point to our destination, to serve as crew; a thousand or more if we want to thrive.” Her eyes moved to Zuri. “That means you will need to make babies. Not right now, necessarily. But soon. I will too.”

“Babies,” Zuri said quietly. The thought overwhelmed me, smothering out all others. Zuri and I would be parents. I’d long been aware of the need, but suddenly the idea became real, vital, immediate.

I looked up, further comprehending what she had just said. I do too. I would be making children. With my mother.

I couldn’t help my reaction. Already erect, my cock jerked behind Zuri’s hip, becoming even harder. I groaned softly at the sensation, hugging my sister. I could smell her arousal, a sweet spiced musk.

Feeling me grow at her back, Zuri smiled. “Yes.”

Her eyes serious, Mother looked at her. “Yes, what?”

“Yes, I want babies.” My sister reached back, hands stroking my thighs. “Right now.”

“You’re sure? It’s not an easy thing.”

“You did it,” Zuri said reasonably. “And you were completely alone.”

“I did. It will be easier for you,” Mother allowed, and thought for a moment. “We should alternate, to make it easier. You’ll go first. I’ll follow in a few years, after your child is grown.”

I swallowed, a thick wad of saliva audibly clicking in my throat.

“You’ll need to move an egg from an ovary. Concentrate here.” Mother touched Zuri’s abdomen low on her right side. “Think of squeezing a red ball through a tight white tube.”

My head held over her shoulder, I saw a line furrow between Zuri’s eyebrows as she closed her eyes, breathing slowly.

“You’ll feel a mild ache when it pushes into the fallopian tube.”

“Yes...” Zuri hissed after a minute. Her eyes opened, and she smiled. “Yes! I feel it!”

“Good.” Mother rose quietly, her eyes on us. “I ... I’ll leave you to yourselves.” Without another word she turned and walked down the riverbank until she was barely in sight, a black profile against the glimmering night-dark water.

Zuri turned in my arms to look at me. We stared at each other wordlessly for a long moment.

In an instant, years of restrained desire boiled to the surface. Zuri launched herself against me, wrapping her arms tight around my neck. Tumbling together, we fell back onto the rug, ravenous for each other.