Free Tales of Old Earth by Michael Swanwick

“Listen,” he said at last. “You remember that day in the Peabody?”
    â€œYou know I do.”
    â€œI stood there in front of that mural wishing with all my heart—all your heart—that I could see a real, living dinosaur. But even then, even as an eight-year-old, I knew it wasn’t going to happen. That some things could never be.”
    I said nothing.
    â€œGod hands you a miracle,” he said, “you don’t throw it back in his face.”
    Then he left.
    I remained.
    It was my call. Two possible futures lay side-by-side on my desk, and I could select either one. The universe is inherently unstable in every instant. If paradoxes weren’t possible, nobody would waste their energy preventing them. The Old Man was trusting me to weigh all relevant factors, make the right decision, and live with the consequences.
    It was the cruelest thing he had ever done to me.
    Thinking of cruelty reminded me of the Old Man’s eyes. Eyes so deep you could drown in them. Eyes so dark you couldn’t tell how many corpses already lay submerged within them. After all these years working with him, I still couldn’t tell if those were the eyes of a saint or of the most evil man in the world.
    There were two memos in front of me. I reached for one, hesitated, withdrew my hand. Suddenly the choice didn’t seem so easy.
    The night was preternaturally still. It was as if all the world were holding its breath, waiting for me to make my decision.
    I reached out for the memos.
    I chose one.

4
    Ancient Engines
    â€œPlanning to live forever, Tiktok?”
    The words cut through the bar’s chatter and gab and silenced them. The silence reached out to touch infinity and then, “I believe you’re talking to me?” a mech said.
    The drunk laughed. “Ain’t nobody else here sticking needles in his face, is there?”
    The old man saw it all. He lightly touched the hand of the young woman sitting with him and said, “Watch.”
    Carefully the mech set down his syringe alongside a bottle of liquid collagen on a square of velvet cloth. He disconnected himself from the recharger, laying the jack beside the syringe. When he looked up again, his face was still and hard. He looked like a young lion.
    The drunk grinned sneeringly.
    The bar was located just around the corner from the local stepping stage. It was a quiet retreat from the aggravations of the street, all brass and mirrors and wood paneling, as cozy and snug as the inside of a walnut. Light shifted lazily about the room, creating a varying emphasis like clouds drifting overhead on a summer day, but far dimmer. The bar, the bottles behind the bar, and the shelves beneath the bottles behind the bar were all aggressively real. If there was anything virtual, it was set up high or far back, where it couldn’t be touched. There was not a smart surface in the place.
    â€œIf that was a challenge,” the mech said, “I’d be more than happy to meet you outside.”
    â€œOh, noooooo,” the drunk said, his expression putting the lie to his words. “I just saw you shooting up that goop into your face, oh so dainty, like an old lady pumping herself full of antioxidants. So I figured …” He weaved and put a hand down on a table to steady himself. “.. figured you was hoping to live forever.”
    The girl looked questioningly at the old man. He held a finger to his lips.
    â€œWell, you’re right. You’re—what? Fifty years old? Just beginning to grow old and decay. Pretty soon your teeth will rot and fall out and your hair will melt away and your face will fold up in a million wrinkles. Your hearing and your eyesight will go and you won’t be able to remember the last time you got it up. You’ll be lucky if you don’t need diapers before the end. But me—” he drew a dram of fluid into his syringe and tapped the barrel to draw the bubbles to the