Launch: Chapter 28

  One hour later…

  

  “Markus… people are like ants.”

  “I know.” he answered.

  “What?” Livonia asked in a bit of a fog.  “No, I mean… I mean the behaviour, the whole… the whole nature of the individual’s existence as an integrated component of the larger… whole.  It’s just one cog, with a singular function amongst a teeming mass of other single purpose biological cogs.  To talk about an ant… it’s more appropriate to refer to the colony as the individual organism instead of to the individual… cogs which constitute the larger complex.   Same deal with pack animals like… like wolves.

   “Sure if you want to study individual ants or wolves you certainly can, but… you can’t learn enough that way if you want to understand its nature in any sort of… comprehensive way.  For that you need to recognize that it is a component within a larger organism.   Just like individual organs serve as components within your body’s more complex whole system, they must be understood as such, in order to understand them.”  She had a soft but distinct European accent which was a cross between Romanian (where she was born), and Parisian (where she had studied).  It was buried though, underneath the rasping gravel of a lifetime of cigarette smoking.

  “Humanity is a… is a force of nature, which acts in ways which cannot be attributed to, nor controlled by, any one individual.  Humanity’s largest impacts on the environment are… are necessarily communal enterprises by virtue of their scale and scope, much like an ant hill.”  She banged on the table to emphasize the point.  “That’s why all any of us are ever truly seeking out of life is to find a place where we feel like we belong, to feel the security of being an integrated component of a community.”

    Markus had always enjoyed the amusingly surly expression of her philosophy which was always so well punctuated by the lit cigarette she perpetually   held between her fingers as she lectured, something which was not possible in most public spaces due to health regulations.  As she considered what to say next, she appeared transfixed by the lit tip of her cigarette.  It was almost as if the artfully curling smoke rising off of her cigarette was a prop which inspired her, a muse from which she was drawing inspiration as well as smoke.

  “Our community is critically relevant because we are an inseparable part of it Markus,” Lavinia continued.   “We can’t ever escape that intrinsic connection child,” she said, “and those who make plans without accounting for that fact inevitably suffer defeat and disappointment.  We must always be mindful of what ripples into our community our actions will have…”

  “But doesn’t that mean that we have unavoidable obligations to our kind, to our community and everything?” Markus asked  “Whether particular or… absolute, doesn’t that mean definite duties to our group?”

  “Absolutely it does child, but not in the way you seem to think.”  She made the claim as she butted out her cigarette and popped the nearly depleted lollipop back in her mouth.  “The question is, between the groups you belong to, to which do you have a higher obligation?”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Of course not.   If you did I wouldn’t have to explain it to you.  Look.   In the before time… in our prehistory, there was only ever one group; the tribe.  There was your tribe, and there was everything else in the world.  Our extended family of between a hundred and two hundred and fifty people, was our group and we belonged to no other.  Other tribes and families were automatically, necessarily… obviously ‘other;’ obviously ‘out group.’  Do you see where I’m going?”

  “I think so…” Markus offered.

  “Humans evolved in that context.   We evolved to feel terminally loyal to the group we belong to, but we have since developed a way of life that has us belonging to multiple groups simultaneously, each with their own particular obligations and demands.  Sometimes those obligations and demands come into conflict… too often they come into miserable and pointless conflict, but sometimes that conflict is absolutely instrumental to human flourishing.”

  “I have a conflict… between my obligations to my blood family, and my… well, my intellectual family for lack of a better way to put it.”

  “Yes child, that’s it!  Your family and the New Horizon mission are both calling to you, but you can only pick one.  You know where your obligations lie, but what your higher obligation is… well that is something you must choose.”

  “Can I get you anything?”   Their server came by to ask.

  “No… but Markus and I are going up to the roof for a bit.  Sorry Hugh, but I need him alone for a few minutes.”

  “Certainly ma’am.  Good timing too,” he replied, “it’s nearly sunset.”

  

  It was true.  After climbing the short flight of stairs they emerged onto the rooftop section of the Cheshire Cat Lounge.  It was a beautiful rooftop garden, with lush vegetation and comfortable seating all the way around the outside of the roof.  There was probably a dozen or so people sparsely spread out across the roof, and it was more private than downstairs which was a little busier.  It was early July, and being just past the summer solstice, the sun was just settling to the horizon around nine o’clock in the evening.  The contrast between the dark and somewhat claustrophobic interior lounge, and this bright and colourful open space was off-putting at first, but Markus quickly adjusted to it.

  The two sat down on a couch facing the north shore mountains in the distance above Vancouver harbour.   They were quiet for a few moments as they watched the sun slowly dip down over the horizon to their left.   Finally, Lavinia broke the silence.  

  “It takes all kinds to make a community child… even rebels.  It is the role of most people to simply serve their community as is, wittingly or not.   It’s most people’s jobs to keep the equations of society balanced… and that is generally a good thing.  But sometimes a civilization, or a community… or a society, needs rebellion.  Sometimes they need dissenters, and people who refuse to just go along with the prescribed flow of their lives.  They serve a productive and necessary role in the dynamics of humanity, it is their job to unbalance the equation, and force everyone else to rebalance the system in a more honest, just, and productive way.”

  Lavinia paused to light a fresh cigarette and let what she had said linger in the air.  Markus suspected that coming here, to this rooftop, at this point in all of time and space was no accident.  He suddenly became acutely aware that if he were to go on the mission, tomorrow evening would hold his very last sunset… the last sunset of his whole life. He suspected that Lavinia brought him here specifically for this reason.   He believed that she wanted to force him to viscerally understand in a space beyond words what he was really leaving behind, while using words to explain why he needed to go anyway.  It was her way; she had an affinity for the added perspective which could be gleaned from multi-modality.

  “Markus, if no one ever critiqued their own culture, then how could any culture ever learn, or change, or grow?  If conventions were never challenged, then how could our institutions ever mature?   It is easy for humans to see forest fires and only see their immediate destruction.  It is hard for us to appreciate the longer cycles of forests in which fires are a natural and necessary part of their renewal process.

  “If no one ever thought they could do better, or never thought that they could build something better than what already existed, then there could be no progress of science, or of technology, or of art or philosophy, none of this could ever have occurred without both inspiration and dissention Markus.  A single flame can be used to both create and destroy.  Fire can be used to harden the steel we use to build and farm a better civilization, or used to then burn that entire civilization to the ground.  Power itself is both creative and destructive.  It depends on who wields it, and in what direction they unleash it.

  “Dissent, rebellion, an exploring spirit… these are all essential elements of who we are as human beings, but no less essential than those who embody these things are those who would hold you back.  You serve your community by critiquing it child, that is your purpose; choosing to abandon it is the most profound critique you could possibly make.  Do not be surprised by those who would rebuke your evaluation and try to force you to stay; if only to silence that critique.  Resistance and resilience are the seats of your power Markus; never shy away from them.  Maintain allegiance to your authentic self,” she accentuated the syllables with firm pokes to his chest with her bony index finger, “and never forget that you hold the power of change, child.  Life, the universe… everything in it, is forever in a state of change.

  “Don’t ever forget that…” she said.  She drew off of her cigarette again as the last sliver of the sun’s photosphere dipped below the horizon.

  

  Not long after, the two returned to the interior of the Cheshire Cat Lounge to meet up with Hugh again, who was sitting at the end of the bar talking to the security guard on duty.  They spent a couple more hours there that night and had dinner before taking a roadpod home to Hugh’s when they were ready to leave.  Although it was never said, there was the clear understanding between all three that this was the last time they would have the chance to spend time together in person.  They enthusiastically discussed their favorite finer points of philosophy, as well as speaking at length about what was known about Haven, the planet the New Horizon was ultimately destined for.  They discussed their hopes and dreams for the mission, for themselves, for humanity, and about what they thought the first secular generational starship meant for humanity.

  They speculated over the fate of the Earth after they were gone, the Earth from which it was believed that both Markus and his mother were soon to be departing, and all too soon Lavinia herself as well.  Eventually of course, and on a long enough timeline, even Hugh, Brakus, and Amber’s time would come as well.  Sooner or later they would all depart life on Earth, one way or another.  They wondered not just about what would happen to Earth, but also about what fate might await its people, what fates they might deserve, and which they might not.

  Friends and colleagues, brothers and mother in all but blood, they shared their minds with each other late into their last night together.