Inhuman(10)

“I can’t believe it,” Old-timer said in barely more than a whisper. He shook his head, the awe still not abating. “I remember you talking about how you wished you could…but I can’t believe you’re actually doing it.”

“Amazing, isn’t it? Years ago, when I told you that Europa would be a perfect moon for Venus, I thought it would be something we might be able to do in a distant future, but—”

“You didn’t know you’d turn yourself into a god,” Old-timer observed, an impressed expression on his face.

“Ha! There’s that ‘god’ word again. Old-timer, I’m far from it,” James answered. “Listen, get beside me, I have to make sure you’re inside the bubble.”

“Bubble?”

“I’ll explain it to you on the way to Venus. Once I explain it to you, the mystery will fade, and you’ll be far less impressed, I promise.”

Old-timer adjusted his position in space so that he was next to James and facing the same direction, a direction that pointed them toward Venus. “All right, it’s been a while since we’ve made a bet. The challenge is on. I dare you to try make this unimpressive to me.”

“A lot less impressive,” James corrected with a slight laugh. “Not entirely unimpressive.” He motioned with his right arm and faced his palm to the planet.

Old-timer watched as something seemed to happen to the stars in the background, their positions shifting noticeably as though their distant lights were refracting in water. Their positions continued to shift and Old-timer turned around, facing forward again when his mouth dropped in astonishment. The sun was noticeably growing in size in front of him, though it was flickering on and off as though it were on an old filmstrip. “What the—is that…gravitational lensing?” He turned to James. “Are you bending space-time?” he asked.

“I’m using the mass effect for propulsion,” James confirmed.

Old-timer was silent in his astonishment as his neck craned, following the outline of the lensing that was even larger in space than Europa.

James smiled. “Let’s admit it,” he replied, “it’s still pretty damn impressive.”





7



“Okay,” Old-timer said, “so explain to me how you’re not a god.”

“Gladly,” James replied. “Have I ever explained to you how I was able to calculate as accurately as a computer in my mind, even when I was a child?”

“No,” Old-timer replied. “I always assumed it was because you were the world’s foremost genius.” He shrugged. “I guess I took it for granted and didn’t think about it any further.”

“Genius is relative,” James answered. “What is genius? We could debate a definition forever, just like we debate a definition for consciousness. What I can tell you for sure, though—what we learned from the brain scans I gave to the governing council—is that I have a unique and very fortunate form of synesthesia.”

“Synesthesia?” Old-timer reacted, his eyes narrowing slightly as his memory collected a definition. “Isn’t that when people’s senses get confused? When they see music for example in the form of colors?”

“That’s right,” James replied. “In my case, however, I can see numbers as colors and shapes.”

“Seriously?” Old-timer asked, surprised to learn this new information about a person he considered to be one of his closest friends.

“Yep. Here, look behind you,” James said as he and Old-timer shifted their positions so that they were partially facing the surface of Europa behind them. “One of the reasons I love this moon so much is because I can see a beauty in the topography that other people can’t see. It took me a while to figure out that other people couldn’t see it, mind you; I thought everyone saw the world the way I did when I was a kid, but then, when I asked them…” he shook his head as he remembered the silliness of the moment, “…they thought I was nuts.”

“What did you ask?”

“I was looking at a tree during a break at school, examining the bark, and asked one of my classmates, a little girl, if she thought the number sevens were as beautiful as I did.”

“Uh…what?”

“Yeah, that’s how she reacted too,” James replied. “That’s when I realized that the hallucinatory world I saw overlaid on top of what you and everyone else sees was something that I alone saw. You see,” he continued as he pointed at a cluster of lines and circles on the surface of the moon, “those lineae and lenticulae down there, when you see them, you see a series of random shapes, whereas I see math.”