By Andy Hamilton
“We
should have left a note,” she says, watching him struggle with the oversized
steering wheel.
“Will
you stop with the note already!”
“It’s
just, I’m just saying…”
“I
know, but you’ve been ‘just saying’ every five minutes since we left.”
She
folds her arms tightly and peers through the windscreen.
"Listen,”
he says. “We’ve practiced for this, haven’t we?”
“Yes
but…”
“We’re
ready. You said it yourself. We can’t learn anymore from practicing, we need to
start doing. You said that yourself.”
“I
know, but this is different; this is dangerous. If we’d just left a note, then
if something goes wrong, someone might…”
“What
could go wrong?” he interrupts. “We both know what we’re doing. Right?”
“Yes
but…”
“Okay
then. Lets go.”
“Look!”
he says, pointing at a grey spec through the windscreen. “There it is.”
“There?
Really, are you sure?”
“Look
around, this is exactly what the map described.”
“It
doesn’t look like much,” she says.
He
exhales deeply, allowing his cheeks to puff out. “It doesn’t look like much…
yet.”
“Yes,”
she says. “Of course, ‘yet’. Which one is ours?”
“Ours?
Let me double check.” He rumbles through a stack of crumpled papers on the
dashboard. “Here we go. Ours is number three.”
“Number
three,” she says, pressing her index finger against the windscreen. “One. Two.
That’s it. That’s our spot.”
“Are
you ready?” he says, taking her gently by the hand.
“I’m
ready. If we pull this off, we’ll get A’s for sure.”
“Okay.
You first.”
“Me,”
she says, holding her hand to her chest. “Why don’t you go first?”
“You
have to go first. HELLO! You’re the planetary expert. I can’t do my thing until
you’ve done yours.”
“Oh
yes, I suppose you’re right.” She takes a small laptop computer from her bag
and begins to type. “I decided to take a little bit from all the models I’ve
coded before and combine them into one brilliant supermodel.”
“Okay,”
he says, peering over her shoulder.
“My
inspiration was motion. Not only will our planet orbit its sun, it will also
spin and sort-of bob on its own axis.”
“Nice.”
“I
know! But that’s just the start. The landmasses and seas will move as well…”
“Tectonics?”
“Exactly,
and it will also have an orbiting moon with its own gravitational pull, just to
liven things up even more.”
“And
weather?”
“The
same idea, a bit of everything. There will be cold places, hot places, calm
places, stormy places, all sorts of places. And the weather will change too.
Different times of day, different weather; different times of the year,
different weather.”
“That’s
insane!”
“I
know. But I think it’ll work.”
“Your
turn,” she says, handing him the laptop.
“Me?
Well, mine isn’t nearly as elegant a code as…”
“Quit
stalling. I showed you mine.”
“Okay,”
he says. “Okay. I decided to write a quite basic evolution programme…”
“Evolution!
You must be kidding me.”
“What?”
“It’s
a rip. Your evolution programme is just going to copy and paste the code from
my model. Your lifeforming is going to rip-off my terraforming.”
“Hang
on,” he says. “You didn’t let me finish. I started with an evolution programme,
but I tweaked it.”
“Really.”
“Yes
really, I changed a lot actually. This code will be 100 per cent original me.
Totally in my image.”
“And
how do you figure that?”
“Because
of the controls.”
“The
controls?”
“Ya,
I coded in a load of controls to make sure that everything evolves in its own
random way.”
“Oh
ya, like what?”
“Well
I engineered love.”
“Love!
Great, that’s going to get us an A.”
“Not
just love, I coded hate too; and jealousy, anger, lust, compassion, grief. I’ve
coded all sorts – stuff that’s never been done before. Spirituality, religion.”
“But
that’s mad. Anything could happen? The whole thing could crumble into chaos.”
“Don’t
worry,” he says, as he taps his forehead softly. “I also wrote a code for the
sun. So no matter what evolves – after about five billion year – it all goes
kablammo!”
“Oh
God,” she says, as the oceans begin to fill with water. “We should have left a
note.”
