Lights2

Tell Me What We've Learned


	After the President made the announcement, informing the public that the literal End of The World was coming in just about two and a half years, there was the expected run of chaos. For a few weeks, the world was in disarray. Millions committed suicide or attempted to; riots broke out and stores were looted; nearly 90% of college and university students dropped out, realizing that their advanced education would never be useful to them; anyone who had enough money saved up to afford a two-year retirement left their jobs to spend the last of their time with their spouses and cubs; churches saw an unprecedented influx of believers; and the stock market, of course, crashed down two-thousand points in a day. Every camping store sold out of cold-weather gear within hours, even those with long or insulated fur taking no chances.

	But then, everything seemed to settle down. The world's economies stabilized, and those who still had a job quietly went back to work, got their paychecks, and paid their bills and taxes. When Christmas rolled around, everyone still got together, gave presents, and ate too much food — just the hugs lasted a bit longer. Furry society, it could be said, was rational; there was no point ending civilization before its time. There was no point making a mess if nothing could be accomplished by it. Many, of course, just went on with the rote of their lives simply from having nothing else to do.

	Still, however, there remained questions. A year to the day after the initial announcement, the President appeared on television to give a progress report on the 'time capsules', and also to answer some difficult questions.

	"Of course, Mr. President, the foremost question on everyone's minds right now is: why can't we use the underground shelter to also house some of the USA's citizens so that they might survive?" asked the interviewer, a rail-thin and attractive young weasel.

	"First of all, I want everyone to know that time, as is true for all of us, is against me. The time needed to complete the storage facility for the data and the DNA is close to the amount of time we have left. It will take at least another sixteen months, during which the climate will already have begun radical changes. Our scientists estimate we would need another full year to prepare it to receive furs. Things like providing enough food and water and air and energy to house living, breathing beings is no easy task.

	"It took NASA a decade just to develop a spacesuit that would allow stepping paw on the moon for a half-hour. Creating an infinitely self-sustaining shelter for thousands of individuals is much more difficult, and frankly past our level of expertise. Only a few experiments on this sort of thing have been done, such as in Biosphere 2 a number of decades ago. The amount of resources needed in there for only a few individuals was gargantuan; the facility was the size of large warehouse. Even so, they barely survived a few years; at one point they began to hallucinate from lack of oxygen because the concrete structure was still curing, and was absorbing their air. Even the astronauts on space stations need shipments of fresh supplies every few months. A shelter to last for eternity all on its own is unthinkable."

	"Of course, it has also been mentioned that there would never be enough room or resources to save everyone. Isn't that right?"

	"Yes. The fact is: there are simply too many of us. During a briefing, before we begun construction of the DNA storage, I had an extensive discussion with our best minds on — should we use our time to build something that could house furs, instead — how many could we safely put in there? The answer was: about one thousand. So, my problem becomes simple: whom do I save? Put more clearly: whom do I allow to die?"

	"But surely saving some would be better than saving none?" she pressed.

	"Ma'am, there are over 475 million furs as citizens of the United States, and I am sworn to protect them all. According to the last census, there are in the order 'carnivora' sixteen families, one-hundred twenty-seven genii, and two-hundred eighty individual species living in this world today. Each of these species is genetically distinct and, except for a few exceptions such as the varying breeds of 'canis lupus' of which I am a member, incapable of interbreeding. Assuming a need for fifty individuals to sustain a healthy breeding population, we only have room for twenty species, or about seven percent of them. So who is to say which species should be saved? Bengal tigers or asiatic tigers? Red foxes or grey foxes or fennec foxes? What about ursids? What about procyonids? Is there room for any of them? Let me remind the public that any species not on this very short list will go extinct! Supposing I become comfortable with making this decision, how should I choose which individuals of those species? A national lottery? A famous scientist once said: 'God does not play dice,' and to the public, I say this: 'Neither shall I.'

	"The other option is to pick only those considered exceptional or important, such as scientists and celebrities, leaders and builders of civilization, specimens of good physical and mental fitness. Now, if this idea shakes you to your very core, fills you with a dread and an anger larger than you have ever felt, that is good. It means that you are of good character. I will be clear on this, ma'am: I am not a Nazi. I completely refuse to weigh the value of one life over any other simply because they were born with the intelligence to write a doctoral thesis, or the body to win an Olympic medal, or with a fine voice or acting potential or pretty fur, or because they gained the connections necessary to achieve a high political office. I will not play God; I will not play Death; I will not play Fate. The lives of everyone on this world is in the paws of a much Higher Authority than myself, and I will not presume to take that duty from Him."

	"Alright then. Now, someone here has asked, supposing people could — just hypothetically — be allowed to survive underground, what kind of life would they have?"

	"In a word: brutal. Cramped conditions, extreme difficulty getting rid of waste, a constant lack of food and good water, nutrition only sufficient enough for basic survival, stagnant and stinking air, no sense of direction or of time. It would be like a prison with no windows, no toilets, and only protein cakes and foul water for the rest of your life. Lack of sunshine and ability to naturally monitor the passage of time would disturb biological clocks, alter hormonal balance, wreak havoc on emotions and psychological state. It would be almost impossible to maintain educational facilities, so after a few generations there won't be any doctors left, nor teachers, nor engineers to maintain the equipment.

	"Different species would likely band together with their own kind and fight for the limited resources, becoming feral, fighting to the death with tooth and claw. Disease would spread. Any who were not killed would go insane. In a few hundred years, they wouldn't even have a written or spoken language left, just grunts and growls. It would only be a matter of time before someone too foolish or too unstable shuts down the air supply, or breaks the water filters, or opens an airlock to the frozen, airless surface.

	"This is not the kind of life I wish on anyone."

	"Thank you, Mr. President."

	And that was the end of that. Realizing the paralyzing moral weight of their decision, no other world leaders chose to dig a hole in the ground and then seal some of their citizens in there in a futile attempt to survive, either. Furkind needed the sun and the rain and the air to live; without it, there was simply no real way to go on. Fighting it would just be foolish.

																	* * *

	Ten years earlier, a raccoon and a fox stood bent over a clear, sealed chamber the size of a jar, inside which rested a nearly-microscopic embryo, suspended in solution. This chamber was nestled delicately among a tangle of wires, tubes, pipes, and varying computer equipment attached to it, most of it labeled with pen scribbles or sticky notes. They each had an arm over the other's shoulders, their clothes rumpled, and both of them were still panting and enjoying the afterglow of orgasm. A bit of semen was dripping down the backs of the fox's legs, and his pants bulged out from his persistent half-erection. To celebrate the completion of the experiment, they had excitedly mated in the lab's adjoining office, and then quickly gotten redressed to look at it again.

	This seemed highly appropriate after sex; it was, after all, sort of their child.

	"And I didn't even have to go through nine months of pregnancy," Jake quipped as they stared at the little thing.

	Alex looked up from a computer monitor, "Male pregnancy might be next on our list. With you, anything is possible."

	"Well, all that is left now is to get more funding. Our kid's on ice until we can secure a method to safely grow him." He put his paw on Alex's shoulder. "I'll go to the board. I know it's not what we SAID my thesis was based upon, but this is so revolutionary that they'll pay attention. Even if we don't get their approval right away, word will spread."

	Alex grinned. "You're gonna change the world with this."

	Jake shook his head, saying: "We are. Our son will. Together."

	"Together."

	And they kissed, kissed more, and then stumbled back into the other room for another round of sex.



	Jacob was tersely and immediately informed by the secretary that he was wanted in the dean's office, before he really got anywhere. The fox's smile grew. A private audience with him before seeing the board? Excellent. Having such a powerful ally when going to speak about funding would raise his chances of success.

	He entered the office, closed the door, and sat down in front of the desk. Dean Carl Stanton was an older Bengal Tiger, with a wide and pleasant face and an understanding look in his eyes most of the time. But right now, his visage was a tight poker-face, his eyes dark and suspicious. Jacob sat down, his mood beginning to shift. Somewhere from inside him, something was telling the young fox that he'd made a big mistake.

	The dean held up his paw before Jacob could say a word, and then looked down at his watch. About twenty seconds of silence ticked by. There was a dull 'thunk' from the walls, and all the lights in the office went dark. The electronics on the dean's desk: the computer and intercom, clicked off. Last of all, the bright red dot of light on the security camera in the corner flickered and then went dead. The windowless room was in pitch blackness.

	A harsh light erupted from one corner of the dean's desk. The tiger had switched on what looked like a camping lantern, with white LEDs inside of it. The single light source cast his face into menacing shadow, like he were about to start telling ghost stories, and Jake was suddenly frightened.

	"It seems we've had a power failure in the administration wing," said the Dean. "Nothing to worry about. I'm sure it will be fixed shortly. But in the meantime: NOTHING leaves this room."

	Jake started: "Sir, I—"

	"Quiet!" said the dean, holding up his paw again.

	He began to thumb through the stack of papers on his desk. Several minutes passed, and Jacob was squirming nervously by the end of it.
	"Mister Tarrish. Your thesis was titled: 'Genetic Markers of the P-Arm of Chromosome Twenty-Two, When Linked to Hybrid Abnormalities of Artificial Coyote-Dogs', correct?"

	"Yes, sir."

	"As I recall, I was very excited to see the results of your research. By coincidence, a close friend of mine is a coyote who was inadvised to have a child with her canine husband, due to risk of developing Ewing Sarcoma."

	"I..."

	"But that is not what you were really doing. You didn't think we'd find out? Lying to the board is only the least of your crimes, however." He put down the papers and looked over the desk, baring his teeth. "Even a first-year genetics student is aware that even theoretical research into Level-Three or greater Lineage Drift is an international crime."

	"But genus 'Urocyon' is a basal canine so we calculated the Lineage Drift to be only two-point-eight-f—"

	"Silence!" the dean thundered, slamming his paw onto the desk. "Do not quibble semantics of taxonomy with ME!" A cup full of pens fell over and rolled off the desk, thumping quietly onto the carpet.

	Jake's ears folded down, his eyes squinting, his paws trembling. His bushy tail, stuck out of the back of the chair, pulled underneath it and between his legs.

	"Misappropriation of grant money, lying to the board, tampering with computer records, utilization of university computers and laboratory equipment in the commission of an international crime. You even used an unapproved and unofficial gene sequencing program, that I'll bet we could trace back to the five times the servers crashed two months ago. I reviewed some of the code after we pulled it from the RAM; I recognized her style. It was Elle, that frizzle-haired ferret you eat lunch with every Wednesday. You can't hide anything from me, Mister Tarrish. A baby lizard does not walk onto this campus that I don't know about it!"

	Jake looked at his feet and said nothing, his whiskers drooping in defeat.

	"You're a very dangerous fox, Mister Tarrish. You're smart enough to make your thoughts into reality but not smart enough to have learned how to restrain them. If there had been just one error in your programming, the child could have been born with fatal genetic defects. This is what the public would call 'a crime against nature'. Now, with just this bit of paperwork, I have more than enough information to put you in prison, and by all rights and reason I SHOULD do so.

	"But I won't do that. This is just too big for such a simple solution."

	Jacob was on the verge of tears, but now looked up with a surge or renewed hope. One look into the tiger's cold eyes dashed it, however.

	The dean said: "Something of this magnitude, a crime of this magnitude, goes beyond just you. There would be a federal investigation, and the fallout would ensure that your partner the professor, Elle, the lab techs, the computer security, the board, probably even the janitors, (and myself of course), would join you in prison. They'd claim that just a stupid man like you couldn't have pulled this off alone. And they would be right. It was our collective ignorance — and my own personal feelings — that made us turn our heads, that gave you the benefit of the doubt, that pulled the wool over our eyes.

	"This is larger than you, larger than one man, Mister Tarrish," he said with an angry point of his finger. "I will not sacrifice the future of this university that I have worked to preserve and made to thrive for thirty years. The feds would shut it down and let it crumble into a stack of ivy-covered bricks and nothing more. This school is my child, and I will not allow you to kill it. I will, however, kill YOURS. That embryo is going straight to the biological waste bin. After that, Mister Tarrish, THIS is what you are going to do, understand?"

	Jake nodded weakly.

	The dean continued, steepling his paws on his desk, casting a bizarre pyramid-shadow onto the wall from the lantern-light: "You are going to start failing exams, Mister Tarrish. You are going to perform poorly in the lab and make frequent mathematical errors. You are going to change your thesis and submit a new one that is badly researched and incompetently written. In three or four months, you will be submitted to review and then expelled from this university, and you will not challenge the ruling.

	"You're a reasonably smart man. Perhaps you will find success as a salesman or by managing a small business. After the next few months, however, you won't be trusted with anything more complex than a kindergarten science fair. Your life in academia is over, Mister Tarrish. No university will take you, no research firm will hire you. You will no longer be allowed to threaten this world with your cavalier experiments. Do I make myself clear?"

	"Y-yes, sir..."

	"When that happens, all these papers will go away," he said, dropping them into an open drawer and slamming it shut for emphasis. "All the data the university has collected on your 'thesis' will go away. This chapter in your life will come to an end, and nobody will need go to prison for it. If you don't start down the path I have directed for you, however... I will be forced to take further action against the ones closest to you. I hope it will not come to that."

	The dean leaned back, and knocked on the wall behind him. After a few seconds, the power came back on, the lights above them lighting up and humming pleasantly.

	"That is all," said the tiger. "Leave."

	Jake stood up on weak legs, walked to the door, and put his paw on the knob. He stopped. His drooping tail started to twitch restlessly.

	"Oh, j— ... just one thing," he said meekly. He turned his head around, and although his face was still a mask of fear and submission, his eyes were burning with a rage hotter than the sun.

	The dean felt every strand of his fur stick up and his body shook like a leaf in a hurricane; he couldn't breathe, couldn't think.

	"Do what you will to me," said Jacob, "but if you touch Alex, I will find you and rip your fucking throat out." He turned back, walked out, and closed the door behind him. The latch clicked.

	The dean collapsed deep into his chair, staring up at the ceiling, panting with the latent fear. In concept, the idea was absurd. He was the larger and stronger animal, but that was only back in the jungle, back when both of them still walked on four legs. In this civilized world, he was old and fat, and his fangs had grown dull from a diet of too many sweets and not enough red meat. His strength were his words and his position, not physical might. If the little fox had lunged for him at that moment, his sharp teeth would have plunged into the tiger's soft neck like a tomato, before he could lift a finger.

	And his body instinctively knew it, knew it had been at the mercy of a superior predator. The trembling had stopped, but his nose was now filled with the sharp reek of his own urine, rising from his dress slacks and the growing puddle on the floor.

	He closed his eyes and calmed his breathing, said a few phrases of yogic meditation to calm his mind, and then sat back up. It didn't matter. Jacob Tarrish was, indeed, very dangerous. But soon, he would no longer be the problem of this school, or any others for that matter. His "partner", the raccoon microbiology professor, might have been a collaborator in this whole mess, but he was of no further concern. He wouldn't create any more messes on his own, and would likely leave the university of his own volition once his partner was expelled. That would be the end of that.

	Mister Tarrish would never work in the sciences for the rest of his life. Of that, the dean was completely assured.

																* * *

	Jacob fidgeted in his desk chair, stretching his back and letting out a groan. The light inside the bedroom had grown dim since the sun set, only the light from his three computer monitors keeping away the darkness. Alex lay naked on the messy bed behind him, sleeping peacefully; his ringed tail twitched a bit from an unknown dream. He usually slept after topping during sex, even though he'd done it very slowly and gently this time. Waking up long before Alex did — with a few new ideas stewing in his mind — Jake felt compelled to get a little work done before turning in for the night. He got up without so much as putting on underwear, and got to work.

	Absentmindedly, he sang to himself:
	"At night, when all the world's asleep,
	The questions run so deep
	For such a simple man.

	"Won't you please,
	Please tell me what we've learned.
	I know it sounds absurd,
	But please tell me who I am..."

	His fingers tapped impatiently at the keyboard, and then stopped. He reached down, stopped again. It was probably no use. The idea was there but he had no real plan for how to make it work; he wasn't the best programmer.

	The apartment's heater was already running with a noisy hum, even though it was scarcely past ten in the middle of what was supposed to be summer. About sixteen months had passed since the doomsday announcement, and already the world was getting noticeably colder. Time was running out, running out. Less than a year now remained before the probes would be launched with cold, dead computers inside them instead of the beating heart of a living thing, before the giant library hosted by a robot secretary would be sealed for probably eternity.

	"Our son...," Jake whispered to his sleeping mate.

	He knew of only one furry in the world who had a chance to get him what he wanted, what they needed, but he was reluctant to call her. She was gifted, brilliant even, and could easily make the program, but his last collaboration had ended in a monumental scare for them both. Although the dean had not conspired to get Elle expelled like he had done for Jake, he had made things difficult for her. Life hadn't been easy for Elle since then, and Jacob knew that his actions had probably destroyed a bright future for her.

	Still... it couldn't hurt to ask. After all, she'd been so exuberant to help the last time. He smiled as he remembered asking her about a program to govern the gene sequencing for their little Coonfox project, long before he had any form or "life" at all. She had returned to him in a week, and he'd expected an admission of failure or a progress report.

	But Elle had instead handed him a harddrive with a rough version of the entire completed program.

	"How? How?!" he had asked.

	"I've never been so excited about a project before," she had said. "I haven't slept all week! I even got approval to use the campus supercomputer array next month to check it!"

	Her bleary and glazed eyes, disheveled clothing, and powerful smell of ferret-musk gave Jake all the confirmation he needed that she'd done nothing but work in a manic craze for that week. For the life of him, he could not understand how she had managed to safely drive to his dorm while in such condition. As part of his thanks, Jake insisted she sleep while he reviewed her work, and she crashed on his bed for the next fifteen hours.

	Elle hadn't been naked then, of course, but the similarities between that night and the one he was spending right now with his mate sleeping on his bed while he worked, made his heart feel warm. Part of him knew that she had always had a crush on him, had always felt a good-natured jealousy toward Alex for stealing away the fox's affection. Elle was probably asexual, probably uninterested in a physical relationship, but her love was deep. He imagined that she longed for the day he would call, and would relish the sound of his voice, no matter the circumstances. There just never seemed to be a good enough reason to contact her, however, before now.

	Jake walked into the kitchen without bothering to get any clothes on, switched on the light, and got himself a cold drink while he scrolled through the list of contacts on his phone. He had only recently gotten it, so she wouldn't recognize the number.

	She picked up immediately, speaking: "Elle Reeves, here."

	"Hi," he said. "It's Jacob... err, Jacob Tarr—"

	"Jake!" she cried out. "I haven't heard from you in a coon's age! How have you been?"

	"Oh, I've been alright."

	"Wow! I was just thinking about you while I compiled this code, and..."

	They spent a while catching up on trivial matters, exchanging gossip, and of course talking about Alex. Then, because secrecy was about to go out the window anyway, he told her about their involvement with the President's plan and the "time capsules" being launched.

	"They went with the computer databases," Jake said, "so I figured you would approve."

	"My loyalties aren't that clear-cut, you know that," she said warmly.

	"Well, anyway..." Jake said, scratching his cheek nervously with one claw. "I was wondering if you remembered the system I was attempting to develop for Semantic Memory programming into that... embryo I made with Alex."

	"For the Xael Project," she said.

	Jake's ears flushed brightly as he remembered the silly and uninspired name he and his mate had chosen for their son. "Yeah, that one."

	"It's been over a decade, Jake," she said.

	"Oh, I understand! We'll have to get together and review the details before you can start."

	"No, sorry, you don't understand," she said. "As soon as you told me the details of the project, I got excited. More excited than I was over the program to just govern his gene sequencing. Several lifetimes of memory, of any subject, programmed directly into a developing baby's mind? Yet another revolutionary idea from inside the skull of Jacob Tarrish. You got it all started, put together the whole framework. All I had to do was string together some code."

	"Wait, you mean—?"

	"It's already finished, Jake. All those years ago, I already finished it just in case you would ever need it. Or... you know... just to prove I could do it!"

	"I can't believe it. Elle, you're incredible. Are you free on Saturday?"

	"You know I am. It's always been just computers or you in my life, and since you've been gone, well... It'll be nice to have lunch with you again, though I hope you don't mind if we pick somewhere besides the university cafeteria."

	They both laughed, solidified the plans, and said their goodbyes.

	As he hung up, Jake felt a pair of soft paws encircle his waist. Alex's muzzle leaned on his shoulder, and his warm crotch pushed into his bare butt.

	"Our son is going to live, Alex."

	"I heard," the raccoon said. "You forget my ears are better than yours; I could hear the entire conversation." He kissed the back of Jake's neck. "But enough about that. The bed is getting cold without you."

	"You're insatiable," Jake said. "We have lots of work to do. Tons of data to compile before we're ready to shove Xael into The Matrix to learn everything about the world. Tons of work to do about completing the engineering of the bio-mechanical interface. Tons of work to—"

	"You talk too much," Alex said, turning his mate around and kissing him.

	Jake pulled away with a boyish giggle. "And you play too much. Do you know how much time we have left?"

	"Enough to mate about a thousand more times if we do it thrice a day until the lights go down."

	"We'll start with Xael tomorrow, then."

	They kissed again, and walked back to the bedroom paw-in-paw.