Winter Nights Are Long When Summer Days Are Gone

[Tachyon 0]

“Winter Nights Are Long When Summer Days Are Gone”

Dave Grey

--------------------------------------------

 

The sand was hot beneath his feet, but that did not stop him from walking slowly, enjoying the feel of its warmth radiating up toward him. As he neared the water, the sand got damper, and it squelched into the space between his toes. The sun reflected harshly off the ocean, but the water itself was cool and refreshing.

 

Then there was a splash, and suddenly Dave was soaking wet even though he was only waist-deep.

 

“Got you!” ten-year-old Harriet screamed, then waded away, giggling. Dave followed after her; it was hard to make any progress against the waves, and once they were out into deeper water, Harriet was the better swimmer and would have the advantage.

 

Taking a deep breath, Dave dived beneath the surface and swam forward. He felt the plants and rocks along the bottom tickle his chest. He caught up with Harriet, who was still waded, and clamped a hand onto her leg, which prompted a scream of surprise. Emerging from the water, Dave gasped for breath and said, “Tag!” before running away again.

 

*****

 

“... a synaptic dysfunction caused by damage to the cerebellum, or in some cases, the hippocampus. It could have been much more severe,” Tratos said. “We’re talking catatonic vegetable here. But right now, she can talk . . . somewhat.”

 

“All this technology,” Grey swept his hand across the room,” all this medicine, and you can’t cure her!”

 

*****

 

The J.S. Bach Neurology Hospital—what sort of name was that for a neurology hospital anyway?—was the first place to which Grey went after Challenger arrived at Earth; he did not even bother stopping at his parent's place. He rushed past the snooty receptionist up to room 42, where patient 0097-XL-8233-GH was lying in a coma. The time he spent waiting for the elevator (and, later, running up the stairs when the elevator took too long to arrive) felt like an unbearable eternity before he finally stopped in front of the door to room 42 and took a deep breath.

 

“You can do this, Dave,” he said, then he entered the room. And there she was. The room was just as he had left it some months ago—then the abrupt realisation that it had in fact been more than an entire year gripped his heart and twisted it. Reaching out to touch Harriet's still form, he noticed how slim she had become while her body tried to fight the illness. “I should never have left you,” he whispered.

 

His heart twisted further when a familiar voice replied to him. “You would never have been happy here on Earth,” said Harriet's voice.

 

Dave literally jumped half a metre into the air. “Who—who said that?”

 

“I did,” Harriet replied. “Shut up, Dave, and listen to me.”

 

“But-but-how—” Dave looked down at his sister, but her eyes were still closed, her lips were not moving, and her breathing was sedate. Had he just been hallucinating?

 

“You're not hallucinating, Dave. Before Dr. Tratos induced a coma, I asked him to let me record this message to you. If you're hearing this, then I . . . I must be beyond saving.” Harriet paused here, and Dave could tell even through the recording that she was trying to phrase her words as perfectly as possible. “Don't blame yourself. You've done all you can, so don't drown yourself in guilt. If I can't say it to you face-to-face, Dave, I want you to hear it one last time: I love you, and you were the best brother a sister could ever ask for.”

 

Dave didn't notice the tears that had welled up in his eyes until they were halfway down his cheek. He bit his lip, and underneath his breath, he asked, “Am I—”

 

Harriet's recording interrupted him, “Yes, Dave, you are so predictable that I can record my side of the conversation in advance.” Then the computer beeped, and she was gone. Just like that.

 

*****

 

There's always hope, isn't there?

 

Grey’s eyes flew open again, this time to be confronted with the bright artificial light of the launch bay, only to realize that he had been dreaming the entire memory. There was no beach, no football, no Harriet. He was alone....

 

*****

 

Dave desperately tried to keep himself busy during the trip home. The excitement that had briefly dispelled his grief and guilt had itself dissipated some days ago, leaving him an empty shell again. He sat alone in the science lab, meditating more than working, listening to the beeps and bloops of the computer equipment, pondering why the universe seemed so innocuous on the surface while it was a seething sinkhole of suffering.

 

And with the slow force, the kind that one uses to push a boulder up a mountain, Dave shrugged. If he could not change it, what use was it being so depressed all the time? He might as well accept it and move on with life.

 

To his left was a PADD that he had been studying for the past four hours. It contained the details of the experimental procedure that Dr. Tratos and Jas had developed. The procedure that was illegal. The procedure that could save Harriet's life. Most of the terminology was over Dave's head, but he understood the basic concepts, and he knew that it was risky.

 

It was gene therapy. Not just any type of gene therapy though; it was modelled after the eugenics research that had first been done in the early 1990s—a period in Earth's history that no one liked to revisit. The procedure would involve treating the recessive gene that made one vulnerable to tovanengitis and deactivating it. Due to the Eugenics Wars and events thereafter, unfortunately, genetics had not advanced as far as it ought to have, and the technology required for the procedure was available. So they would have to improvise.

 

But Jas had warned him that the procedure was risky. “There's a chance that it'll go wrong, that instead of isolating the mutations that make her vulnerable, it'll cause a cascade reaction across her nervous system.”

 

“You mean it could kill her?!” Dave did not welcome the news. But he knew that they had no choice . . . she would die if he did nothing at all. At least with the procedure, she had a chance.

 

Not only does God throw the dice into the corner where you can't see them; His dice are crooked.

 

*****

 

I have always been quite indecisive. Even now, as you watch me babble on about choices and voices, you notice I have not made any judgement on the issue of the glass. It is not my nature, I think, to be decisive, although I consider it a character flaw. I’ve always found it difficult to make decisions, even little ones, and continuously delegate the duty to someone else.

 

“... somehow I don't think there are 'proper channels' for what I have to do.”

 

*****

 

Foamy waves lapped sanguinely along the sandy beach, their gentle motions making it seem as if the ocean beyond were breathing deeply. Dave’s bare toes lay just inside the range of the waves’ influence and received regular splashes of refreshing water. He lay on his back on the beach, eyes closed, oblivious to the world around him.

 

A football hit him. It landed squarely in his right eye, causing the world to shatter in an explosive pain as Dave instinctively reached up to touch the wound. His eyes flew open and then he winced, struggling to do too many things at once. After a few moments he had managed to sit up and ascertain the football had not caused any serious damage, so he turned in the direction from which the projectile had originated.

 

“Wake up, Dave,” his sister Harriet teased him. She ran past him to retrieve the football and gripped it menacingly. Dave reluctantly climbed to his feet. This time when she threw it, he was ready, and he caught it neatly in both hands before whipping it back at her just as hard. And so the game went.

 

After the sun had gone down and both of them had tired of the game, they joined the adults who were talking up near the cottage. Irene was in vigorous conversation with Trudy Masterson, the family friend who owned the cottage along with her husband Leonard. Mark was engaged in a crossword puzzle. Without looking up, he absently asked, “What's an eight-letter word for 'a neutron star with a magnetic personality'?”

 

“Magnetar, Dad,” Dave responded, equally offhand, as he dried himself off with a towel.

 

Mark mouthed each letter as he wrote it in and then said, “Thanks.” Only when he looked up did he notice that it was his ten-year-old who had replied. “I think it was a mistake to take Trudy's science crossword. I don't suppose you know what 'a solid material that deforms by viscous flow', five letters, would be?”

 

Dave's eyes widened and he shook his head. His sister, though, thought about it and then asked, “Does 'rheid' fit?”

 

“It does indeed,” Mark said after he pencilled it in. “Looks like we have two resident geniuses on our hands.”

 

*****

 

Harriet lay on the bed, her body covered in a thin linen blanket. Bones showed through jaundiced skin and her hair lacked lustre. She lay perfectly still, the picture of a corpse, and could be mistaken for bed were it not for the almost imperceptible rise and fall of the linen blanket.

 

Jas frowned at Tratos and his cheese burger then signed and walked forward to shake his hand. “You haven't changed a bit.”

 

*****

 

The operating room was silent save for the beeps of the monitor next to Harriet. There were four life signs in the room, but only three of them were aware of what was happening. Tratos, Jas, and Dave looked at each other.

 

They were in the second hour of the procedure. Dave was not actually performing surgery, but his skills meant he could help monitor Harriet's condition using . . . the device. Jas and Tratos, meanwhile, skilfully manipulated the genetic sequencer.

 

This was part one of the surgery. By resequencing Harriet's DNA, they hoped to eliminate the gene that caused her to be susceptible to the tovanengitis condition. Part two would involve neurosurgery to remove and regenerate deteroriated portions of Harriet's brain.

 

It was ironic. This part of the procedure was relatively painless and simple—yet it was far more unethical than the painful and complex second part of the surgery to follow. In this world, there was nothing wrong with cutting into a person's brain. But changing the order of a few amino acids? Apparently, that was a no-no.

 

*****

 

Harriet's voice had become his conscience; it had become his constant companion.... She was trapped. Too sick to get better, too well to slip from this world and into the next. She had no more options; she had no more hope.

 

“Of course it will work, Ms Rawel,” said Tratos, reclining back in his chair. “Just trust me. I'm a doctor!”

*****

 

“Whoa, look at that!”

 

Harriet turned to look in the direction that Dave indicated. Her expression blossomed into one of joy as she saw the massive whale send a spout of water into the air. She laughed, such a sweet, innocent, care-free laugh.

 

They were seventeen, and they had seen whales many times before, but every new sighting was a joy, particularly because most species of whales were so rare. “What sort of species is it?” Harriet asked, not having time to get a good glimpse of it before it dove back under the water.

 

“Maybe it's a humpback,” Dave suggested.

 

Harriet hit him playfully on the chest. “Those have been extinct for the better part of a century, silly. Nah, it's not that large. Mom would know. Where is she?”

 

“Seasick,” Dave said. Harriet nodded understandingly in response; although Irene Grey was a marine biologist, she was also prone to seasickness—but no one else in the household dared mention the irony of her profession, lest they expect an earful in return.

 

Another whale surfaced. Harriet sighed and said, “I should go see if we've got any ginger pills left. Dad always forgets to pack some.” Without another word she went below, leaving Dave to stare out onto the ocean alone. He spent a lot of time on or near the ocean. But the ocean was, as any sailor knew, inextricably linked to the stars.

 

On starry nights he could crane his neck upward and navigate by the pinpricks of light originating from hundreds of light-years away. Maybe it was the allure of those boggling distances—combined with the hallucinatory effects of the salty ocean spray—that got him interested in astronomy, and later, astrophysics.

 

Harriet came back after about ten minutes. She said, “Found the pills; she should be okay. Dad is getting dinner.” She frowned when her brother did not reply. “Dave? Dave ... helloooo?”

 

Smiling, Dave turned to look at her and shook his head. “I'm fine, Harriet. I'm just fine.”

 

“Seriously, Dave. Don't make me have to start worrying about you. You'll be the death of me, I just know it.”

 

*****

 

“She has less than a year. And if we try this procedure and it fails, it may be less than that.”

 

The doubt had begun to percolate in an insidious fashion, pooling in the deepest recesses of his harangued mind, but he still maintained this sliver of hope that things could be resolved without drastic measures.

 

*****

 

Jas twitched but remained silent; she knew from past experience that in moments like this, she should let the family of the unfortunate be at peace. A though struck her, and she wondered: Did Grey consider her family? Her mind pressed on despite the events unfolding in front of her.

 

I have never before been confronted with a crisis of this magnitude....

 

*****

 

Tratos stared at his desk, willing the tumultuous storm in his stomach to settle. It wasn't his fault, really. It would never be his fault. He was just following orders from powerful people in powerful places. It wasn't his doing, it was theirs. He was just an instrument.

 

Right?

 

His stomach did not agree, and nothing he did could soothe it. Robin had suggested ginger pills, but those only worked for seasickness with him. Even his precious cheeseburgers were little consolation. Now here he was, only hours before the most controversial and difficult procedure of his life, and he had butterflies like a first-year med student!

 

Of course, he had never undergone first-year, let alone second or third year....

 

No matter. Dr. Tratos stood up, cheeseburger in one hand and hand scanner in the other. Only a metre of air and a thin wall separated him from his destiny. Tonight, he would make his footnote upon history. Either way, he would emerge from that room having done something that no doctor before him had dared to do. Either way, he would have earned his place in the small print of medical historians' annals.

 

Either way, this would all end. Tonight.

 

*****

 

“Dave. Dave, I know you can hear me. You know you can hear me. So pay attention. You're running out of time, Dave. Even with the coma the clock is still ticking. How much longer? A year? Two, at the most. You can't put off the decision forever. And then it will be too late.”

 

“I wanted to see living patients again ... what happened to Marks ... hurt.”

 

*****

 

“What the hell is going on?!” Grey yelled. Alarms were going off everywhere. There was not a single green light on the monitor. And Jas was frozen, a scalpel hovering a centimetre away from Harriet's brain.

 

Tratos stood next to Dave, attempting to calm the scientist down. “Dude, chill,” he said with uncharacteristic calm. “You aren't helping things.”

 

“Yeah, well neither are you! She's dying. DO SOMETHING.”

 

That was when the monitor flatlined. That was when the universe paused for a single, small, significant moment, and Jas and Grey's eyes locked.

 

Tratos left Grey's side, immediately kicking the monitor with his foot whilst seizing the defibrillator from the crash cart and applying it to Harriet's chest. It was no good though—her heart was not the problem. It was her brain, and no matter how far science had advanced in the 22nd century, the brain still remained the greatest unknown.

 

Tratos' shoulders slumped as the monitor continued its incessant tone. He turned to look at Grey, and he shook his head. “I'm sorry. We . . . we did our be—”

 

But Grey was flipping out. “What do you mean, 'you're sorry'?! You're just going to give up now? Stop? How could you do that? She's not dead! You can save her, bring her back. Fix her.” Dave repeated again, with the plaintive voice of a petulant five-year-old child, “Do something!”

 

“There's nothing we can do, Dave,” said Tratos.

 

“Dave . . .” said Jas.

 

Dave could not hear her, or Tratos for that matter. He could only look at his sister lying on the operating table, hooked up to the machines. That was Harriet—or what was left of her. Just an empty husk, long gone. They had been foolish to try and act now, after all this time. He had been too late.

 

What an idiot.

 

*****

 

Grey's reservoir was quickly running dry. And just when he thought he would drown in the desert, someone tossed him a life preserver, and his mixed metaphor existence disappeared.

 

The dog looked at Grey calmly with sombre brown eyes for several moments. Then it nudged the pitcher of water with its nose, pushing it far enough that it knocked it over onto the floor. The water pitcher shattered into fragments, its contents sloshing onto the carpet.

 

*****

 

Ours is a universe of struggle. Darkness that lurks around every corner, waiting to seize us unawares. Yet ours is a universe of infinite possibility.

 

Each star out there, each thought, is a buoyant aspect of this possibility, an expression of the fundamental equation of space and time. Aristotle knew it but could not label it. Newton grasped at it blindly in the darkness but failed to find purchase. Einstein glimpsed it once, maybe twice, and was humbled by it simplicity.

 

Dave Grey had looked into the heart of Omega, and into the blazing centre of a supernova. He had seen more than any human could claim right to see. But he would give it all up if it meant having Harriet back. She had been his sister—his twin sister—and without her, Dave felt like he had lost a limb. Why, Dave asked himself, why do any of this—at all—when she was not there to experience it?

 

Dave lay on his bunk with his eyes closed, staring at the inside of his eyelids, and wondered what words were written there.