GENE GETS TO SHANGHAI

2380 CE

Stumpy little Wen Xi grabbed Gene‘s hand and shook it up and down with vigor. “It is good that you are here again, Dr. Hackshaw. We are happy to see you.” Wen Xi‘s three fellow greeters followed suit, but with more reserve. They all smiled, but gently, not with the common over-enthusiasm that came with hosting a stranger. Gene was a friend.

“I am very happy to see you,” Gene replied to them all, in his halting Sinese. He scanned the Shanghai port’s entry area. They stood near the middle of a huge circular space covered by a ribbed, arching paraboloidal ceiling; the afternoon sun shone yellow through the city smog and the overhead windows of the arch, stabbing down through wreaths of dust and smoke to the flat sprawl of concrete inlaid with a gigantic map of China. Wen Xi, Li Xiao, Yasunari Maeda and Tatsuo Minamata had all come to greet him. They were the first team, and his main allies here in the core of the greatest spacefaring culture anyone had ever built. The only trouble was that he didn’t know how much he could tell them.

“What is your news?” asked Li Xiao. She had aged since Gene had last seen her; too much extra work, he guessed. A woman in space work always got too much to do. Li Xiao‘s neck thrust forward as if her head was getting too heavy; her jumpsuit hung loose on her thin frame. She still wasn’t eating enough, Gene guessed.

“I’ll tell you when we can sit down. I’m really tired.”

Maeda and Minamata took Gene‘s bags from him and they all got aboard the outbound conveyor. It snaked across the floor map of Asia to let them off under an arched doorway where guards waited.

The last time he had been here, Gene had wondered how the Sinese would ever clean up their air and water enough to survive. Somehow the Sinese mix of Japan’s technology and China’s organizational focus had driven their energy and desalinization projects together, and they had laid a self-powered distillation pipeline network all the way from the Yellow Sea to the great inland cities and farm expanses. Monster concentric conduits, sheathed in solar-power collectors, stilted their way along above the roadways, workers and robots hauling away the minerals left from distillation, and fresh, clean water flowing freely where it was so badly needed. Still, the bitter air made Gene‘s eyes water and his throat rough. Coal still heated far too many homes here, and the acid moisture turned all paint colors dull and dead, even the strong oranges and reds in the airport decor.

“Where’s Park Hee?” Gene asked. No one spoke; the sounds of walking feet, turning wheels and scattered passing conversation filled several heartbeats. From distributed speakers, a calm Sinese voice announced an upside launch, headed for Station Four up at geosync.

“He couldn’t come,” said Tatsuo Minamata. “They’ve got him working upside, on the power project. He must stay until the engine test works.”

“Was this his reward for success?” Gene asked. Park Hee was a genius with propulsion systems, and the one who had solved some of the most difficult problems the Sinese engineers had faced. Now he was effectively chained up in orbit, doing what nobody else could. Too bad for the meeting, and Gene‘s little surprise. Knowing Park Hee and his mouth, the stay in orbit was probably a punishment for a few intemperate words here and there.

“Yah,” said Wen Xi. “He’s just too good. Bad luck for good work. You hungry?”