Oh, the logistics of the rocket. Computerize the billion and one decisions. Ten thousand nursing bottles filled with super-homogenized gunk for space children. Fresh air produced by glass-enclosed botanical gardens. Sweat recycled into sweet water by machines.
Ring all the bells and klaxons. Flash the lights and prepare the thunders. Men and women run.
Quell and I stood by the gantry, staring up at the giant ship. It had been a week since our strange encounter with Elijah, seven days filled with intense activity as the Cetus 7 crew, of which we were now members, prepared the ship for voyage.
“Quell,” I said, “at no time in the last week, in all the rush and work, upon or around the ship, have we seen—blind or otherwise—the prophesied captain of our ship.”
Quell shut his yes and cocked his strange head.
“Him,” he whispered.
“What?” I urged. “What?”
Quell murmured, “He is near.” And he turned and pointed up at the gantry. Its elevator was slowly rising and within the cage we saw a lone, dark figure.
“There is our captain,” said Quell.
The spaceman’s chapel. I had come to say a prayer before liftoff the next morning. Quell accompanied me, although I knew not to what god he prayed, if any. The muted light soothed our eyes after the blinding glare of the launching pad. Within the quiet and sacred space we stared up at the curved panoramic ceiling and there we saw, floating, the translucent shapes of men and women long lost in space. Soft murmurs emanated from them, a multitudinous whispering.
“And those? Why?” said Quell.
I watched the floating shapes and said, “Memorials, images, and voices of those who have died and are buried forever in space. Here, in the high air of the cathedral, at dawn and at dusk, their souls are projected, their voices broadcast, in remembrance.”
Quell and I stood and listened and watched.
One lost voice recited, “David Smith, lost near Mars, July 2050.”
Another, higher, softer, said, “Elizabeth Ball, adrift beyond Jupiter, 2087.”
And a third, sonorous, again and again, “Robert Hinkston, killed by meteor swarm, 2063, buried in space.”
Another whisper: “Buried.”
A further sound: “Lost.”
And all the whispers at once, repeating: “In space, in space, in space.”
I took Quell’s arm and turned him toward the front of the chapel. “There,” I said, pointing. “In the pulpit, at any moment, we will see a man who died nearly a hundred years ago, but so remarkable a man was he that they computerized his soul, tracked his voice, made circuitries of his merest breath.”
At that, the lights rose to illuminate a figure that was rising behind the pulpit.
“Father Ellery Colworth,” I murmured.
“A robot?” said Quell, quietly.
“Yes,” I said, “but more. Before us is the gentle essence of the man.”
The lights dimmed somewhat as the incredible three-dimensional duplicate of Father Ellery Colworth began to speak.
“Is God dead?” he said. “An old question now. But once, hearing it, I laughed and replied: Not dead, but simply sleeping until you chattering bores shut up!”
There was a soft sound of laughter all around Quell and me, which faded as Father Colworth continued.
“A better answer is yet another question: Are you dead? Does the blood move in your hand, does that hand move to touch metal, does that metal move to touch Space? Do wild thoughts of travel and migration stir your soul? They do. Thus you live. Therefore God lives.
You are the thin skin of life upon an unsensing Earth, you are that growing edge of God which manifests itself in hunger for Space.
So much of God lies vibrantly asleep. The very stuffs of worlds and galaxies, they know not themselves.
But here, God stirs in his sleep. You are the stirring. He wakes, you are that wakening. God reaches for the stars. You are His hand. Creation manifest, you go in search. He goes to find, you go to find. Everything you touch along the way, therefore, will be holy. On far worlds you will meet your own flesh, terrifying and strange, but still your own. Treat it well. Beneath the shape, you share the Godhead.
“You Jonahs traveling in the belly of a new-made metal whale, you swimmers in the far seas of deep space, blaspheme not against yourselves or the frightening twins of yourselves you find among the stars, but ask to understand the miracles which are Space, Time, and Life in the high attics and lost birthing-places of Eternity.
Woe to you if you do not find all life most holy, and coming to lay yourself down cannot say, O Father God, you waken me. I waken Thee. Immortal, together we then walk upon the waters of deep space in the new morn which names itself: Forever.”
The congregation—above and below—softly repeated the word, “Forever, forever.”
There was a swell of soft music from somewhere in the heavens as Father Ellery Colworth finished, his figure went dark, and his silhouette was seen descending silently behind the podium.
In the long silence that came upon us I wept.
I lay awake that night in my berth aboard the Cetus 7.
Quell was already asleep. Rain patterns, simulated to aid slumber, fell on our faces and behind us on the wall.
The voice of a clock repeated, very softly, “Tick tock, two o’clock … tick tock, two o’clock.”
At last I spoke.
“Quell, awake?”
And his mind spoke to me silently from across the room.
“Part of my mind, yes, the rest sleeps. I dream of the old man who warned us.”
“Elijah? Did you believe him, that our captain is blind?”
“Yes. That much is common knowledge.”
“And that he is mad?”
“That we must discover for ourselves.”
“But by that time, mightn’t it be too late, Quell?”
The soothing rain patterns continued to fall on my cheeks and the walls. There was a faint rumble of thunder from beyond.
“Quell? What, is all of you asleep now? Good companion, lie there. Your body the strange color of a world I will never see. Cold blood but warm heart; your mouth silent but your mind, even in sleep, breathing friendship.”
Quell’s voice, within my head, murmured drowsily, “Ishmael.”
“Quell, thank God for you in the days ahead.”
From all around me Quell’s voice repeated, “Ishmael … Ishmael.”