Past Magic

Past Magic

By Ian R. MacLeod

The clinic where they remade Steph from thawed scrapings of her skin lay up on the hill overlooking Douglas and the big yachts in the harbour. Claire took me along when it was time for Steph’s deep therapy. There were many places like this on the island, making special things for those parts of the world that had managed to stay apart from all the bad that had happened. New plants, new animals, new people. Little brains like the one inside the vox. Tanned pinstripe people wafted by on the grey carpets. I was disappointed. I only saw one white coat the whole time I was there.

They took Steph away, then they showed me her through thick glass, stretched out in white like a shroud with little wires trailing from her head. The doctor standing beside me put his arm around my shoulder and led me to his office. He sat me down across from his desk. Just an informal chat, he said, giving me an island smile.

His office window had a fine view across Douglas. I noticed that all the big yachts were in. A storm was predicted, not that there was any certain way to tell the weather. The thought made me remember my dream, being on the boat with Steph. She opened her mouth. And everything flooded back and back to when they finally hauled us out of the water, the chopper, flattening the tops of the waves, the rope digging into her white skin, the way a stripe of weed had stuck across her face.

The doctor tapped a pencil. “We all feel,” he said, “that your input is vital if Steph is to recover her full identity. We’ve done a lot with deep therapy. She can walk, talk, even swim. And we’ve done our best to give her memories.

“Can you invent memories?”

There was darkness on the horizon. Flags flew. Fences rattled. The sea shivered ripples.

Past Magic. Photo by ElenaB.

“We all invent memories,” he said. “Didn’t you write fiction? You should know that memories and the past are quite different propositions.”

“What do you want me to do?”

“Just be around, Tony. She’ll soon get to like you.”

“This little girl looks like someone who used to be my daughter. And you are asking me to behave like a friend of the family.”

(Excerpt from The Year’s Best Science Fiction, eighth annual collection, edited by Gardner Dozois, 2008)