BUBBLENEST ... Chapter 3 of a Science Fiction Novel [ other chapters via the tags writing fiction scifi science eggie ]

BUBBLENEST

CHAPTER THREE
SEASHORE

Piers chose a serpentine path through the park on his way to the beach. When he was alone and had no need to hurry, he invariably did this. On this occasion it not only gave his digestive system a bit more time to cope with breakfast, but he delighted in the park almost as much as in his patio garden. Obviously the park was more mature and he hadn’t had the luxury of choosing its plants himself, but there were other significant differences beyond the obvious ones. On his roof-garden the plants were ’modded to cope with the changed atmospheric conditions, but not to the same extent as those in the park, after all at the first signs of a storm or even of an emergency storm warning his storm shutters (which also shielded his windows of course) automatically activated to give the protection necessary to weather the really bad flash storms or major common storms, including the common-enough mega hailstorms and tornado blitzes. The various trees all had thickened ultra-hard bark, and the trunks and branches had whiplike adaptation that allowed them to yield to the storms rather than attempt to resist them. Other adaptations allowed any plants smaller than the trees to recover quickly after the inevitable damage. This was partly achieved by enhanced metabolisms and generous reserves stored in subterranean parts of the plants, such as giant rhizomes and multiple dormant bulblike shoots from which new stems and flowers could shoot up within mere days of the storm’s passing.

Some of the trees were huge and that was quite an achievment, since the oldest was planted barely forty years ago. The shades of green and the variety of foliage types were joy enough, but to that was added as fine and varied a pallet of colour as one could wish for. Piers would be ever grateful to his parents, not only for a superb loft, but for their choice of its prime situation. But for all that, he would gladly have lived in a far worse accommodation and location, if he could have had them still alive and well.

Well into the park, Piers heard the faint sound of music, which was common enough, thankfully. However, it sounded as though it might be interesting – not at all strident nor clicheed, and with a subtle alternation or blending of voice and strings together with what might have been some sort of sampler or syntho. He changed his direction to give himself a chance of making a fuller assessment, and to satisfy his curiosity as to its source.

Before long, the small group of musicians and their friends or audience came into view. They were as good from near by as the distant sounds had hinted, but Piers stopped to listen for only a few moments. A gorgeous Asian girl, or maybe she just had a pseudo-Asian genemod, caught his eye and they exchanged glances. He noticed that she had only slight epicanthic folds. She also had the tiny plain silvery disk of the pro-transhumanists in her right earlobe. Since body-piercing as a fashion statement was a fad of the turn of the century now held in universal contempt, it could only be the transhumanist sigil. Of course there was no significant progress along the transhuman path, but it would no doubt come soon enough, with integrated computing becoming an implanted part of the brain being one of the first goals. However, no matter how great the undeniable benefits would be, the whole area was fraught with difficulty. This was largely due to the bioethicists' insistence that any such radical modification, be it genemod or nano, must become virtually genetic, in that if parents opted for it, it would be passed on to their progeny biologically, or maybe auto-nano-biologically might be something more like the correct term. As far as Piers was concerned, he had no strong feelings either way; he’d just wait and see what progress offered.

Whilst he was certainly interested in both the music and the girl, he didn’t want to delay his swim any further, so he took his leave without exchanging a word with anyone since there had been no break in the music, and to have spoken while there was a performance would have been unforgiveable. He decided that he’d come back this way after his swim in case these new people were still there, but if not, no great loss and he would keep an eye out for their possible return.

Only a hundred and fifty metres beyond the shoreward limit of the park lay the beach. As the pale yellowy white of the beach came into view, he noted the sea was calm and there was the usual scattering of singles, duos and small groups either relaxing or playing on the beach or in the water. He knew they were lucky to have a beach at all, as since the Warming had brought such a pronounced rise in the sea level most of the world’s beaches had been drowned or washed away. The luck of this area was that the currents had just been right to deposit an almost traditional golden beach. However, although he sometimes liked to use the stretch of beach as part of his frequent jogs, he didn’t favour lying on sand or entering the sea from a beach. Better he thought, if you were lucky enough to have smooth rounded rocks, as there were further along the shore. These were better to dive in from, and to relax on too, without having the bother of dry sand sticking to your wet body.

So, deciding his breakfast had had plenty of time to settle, he jogged along the shoreline, then swung slightly inland for a while when he came to the cliffs. They started as a jumble of rocks at the end of the beach, but rose quickly to as much as maybe seventeen metres in places, and were mostly almost sheer, with fairly deep water below them. He continued his run, hardly even slowing for the rise in the ground. His course soon wound back to the water’s edge where the cliffs were about thirteen metres. The low rounded rocks of the stretch of water he was aiming for was no more than half a kilometre further, and anyway he always enjoyed running close to the ocean with a slight breeze to the seaward side of his body.

To his surprise he heard what sounded like laughing and muted cheering from not far ahead. Full of curiosity he increased his pace, and then slowed as he approached a group that looked as though they were taking it in turns to dive from the cliff. That was never such a good idea, but when he drew abreast of them he saw that they had chosen the spot where the cliff was maybe ten metres above the waves, but to his dismay where there was an infamous pair of large barnacle-encrusted rocks in the fairly deep water below. The place had a number of dramatic names such the Devil’s Bollocks or the Gateway to Hell, and took its toll of usually rather immature victims misguidedly out to prove themselves, or to establish some sort of reputation. As far as Piers was concerned they were all fools, or at the very least foolhardy. He would just run on by, and would have avoided them altogether if he’d had the option of moving further inland, but the path didn’t give that choice on this stretch.

He was startled when one of the group of ten or so called out to him. Slowing he looked towards them again; it was Axel, a friend from his college days whom he hadn’t seen for a year or two. Being too close to just wave and carry on, he felt obliged to jog over to greet his old companion and exchange a few personal trivia before taking his leave as soon as he politely could. He would have thought his friend had better judgement than to get involved in this sort of escapade, but he noticed that three of the group were women, so perhaps Axel had been dragged along to what his current girl considered a social occasion.

Actually the crowd appeared good humoured and seemed pleasant enough well-balanced people, so he found himself lingering a while. They were obviously adrenaline junkies for whom the modern world provided few opportunities for voluntary excitement now that sports like organised motorbike racing and jet-tobogganing had been banned. That was mostly because the powers that be begrudged the unacceptable medical expenses involved in the too frequent catastrophic accidents.

He watched several of the men, including Axel, dive without incident, and then one of the women took her turn performing a risky acrobatic dive that ended with a perfect entry almost exactly between what seemed like a very narrow gap between the rocks, although in fact they were almost two metres apart. Inevitably it was suggested that he too dive. He politely suggested that he wasn’t much of a diver and that it would be better if he declined. Axel, being new to the group, didn’t want this display of reticence to reflect badly on his own standing and urged Piers further, saying that it would be okay to just jump rather than actually dive. Several of the rest joined in in good natured encouragement. The peer pressure was just too much, he’d have to dive in and then politely make his departure as soon as he gracefully could.

The dive he executed was plain but faultless, and he got a small cheer and his shoulders clapped when he clambered up to the clifftop once more. However, although he had performed well enough not to disgrace himself or his friend, he had felt almost like a suicide as the twin rocks rushed towards him.

He watched another of the men, an unusually tall fellow, dive but make a disasterous entry mostly on his back, but thankfully he was well clear of both rocks. His dive got a chorus of pained exclamations, mostly of sympathy, and then the next diver was standing on the edge ready for his turn. His dive included a perfect sommersault, but almost ended in disaster as his left shoulder actually scraped one of the boulders as he entered the now bloodied water. There was a stunned silence among the spectators, but Piers noticed that one of the men was unable to suppress an expression of eager gloating. Not matter how skilled at camouflaging their natures, psychopaths inevitably gave themselves away in such circumstances. Piers felt sickened, not so much my the diver’s injuries which although bleeding copiously proved to be essentially superficial and caused by the rock’s razory coating of crustaceans rather than by the rock itself, but by the presence of the psycho. The spirits of the group had been dampened, with the exception of those of the psycho who no doubt was disappointed that the mishap hadn’t ended much worse. The diving stopped although one of the divers wanted to continue, no doubt out of bravado, but the rest of the group prevailed against him to save it for another day.

Piers bade Axel farewell and made his escape as soon a he could. As he resumed his trotting along the cliff top, he reflected that maybe the mooted legislation the authorities had been seriously considering might not be such a bad idea after all. They didn’t like the citizens taking part in this sort of activity, but it was impractical to ban something when the ban was virtually unenforceable. However, what they were proposing was that free medical care be withheld from those that were injured in voluntary dangerous sports or pastimes. That was a virtual death sentence for anyone whose injuries were serious, critical, or even those who needed resuscitation.

Still feeling gloomy, he reached his favourite stretch with its platform of low rounded rocks against which gentle waves were lapping under a perfect blue sky, with the sun tinging the water with brilliant sparkles. He sat for a while to recover himself and watch the few other bathers who had found their way to this more isolated spot.