The Light of Other Days. Stephen Baxter

darker, bald with a fringe of wiry black hair around his head; his eyes were intense blue over that prominent family nose, and he grinned easily, showing teeth stained by nicotine. He looked energetic, younger than his late sixties. ‘Ms Manzoni, I'm a great admirer of your work. And may I say you look terrific.’

      ‘Which is why I'm here, no doubt.’

      He laughed, pleased. ‘Well, that too. But I did want to be sure there was one intelligent person in among the air-head politicos and pretty-pretties who crowd out these events. Somebody who would be able to record this moment of history.’

      ‘I'm flattered.’

      ‘No, you're not,’ Hiram said bluntly. ‘You're being ironic. You've heard the buzz about what I'm going to say tonight. You probably even generated some of it yourself. You think I'm a megalomaniac nutcase –’

      ‘I don't think I'd say that. What I see is a man with a new gadget. Hiram, do you really believe a gadget can change the world?’

      ‘But gadgets do, you know! Once it was the wheel, agriculture, iron-making – inventions that took thousands of years to spread around the planet. But now it takes a generation or less. Think about the car, the television. When I was a kid computers were giant walkin wardrobes served by a priesthood with punch cards. Now we all spend half our lives plugged into SoftScreens. And my gadget is going to top them all…Well. You'll have to decide for yourself.’ He studied Kate. ‘Enjoy tonight. If this young waster hasn't invited you already, come to dinner, and we'll show you more, as much as you want to see. I mean it. Talk to one of the drones. Now, do excuse me…’ Hiram squeezed her shoulders briefly, then began to make his way through the crowd, smiling and waving and glad-handing as he went.

      Kate took a deep breath. ‘I feel as if a bomb just went off.’

      Bobby laughed. ‘He does have that effect. By the way –’

      ‘What?’

      ‘I was going to ask you anyhow before the old fool jumped in. Come have dinner. And maybe we can have a little fun, get to know each other better…’

      As his patter continued, she tuned him out and focused on what she knew about Hiram Patterson and OurWorld.

      Hiram Patterson – born Hirdamani Patel – had dragged himself out of impoverished origins in the fen country of eastern England, a land which had now disappeared beneath the encroaching North Sea. He had made his first fortune by using Japanese cloning technologies to manufacture ingredients for traditional medicines once made from the bodies of tigers – whiskers, paws, claws, even bones – and exporting them to Chinese communities around the world. That had gained him notoriety: brickbats for using advanced technology to serve such primitive needs, praise for reducing the pressure on the remaining populations of tigers in India, China, Russia, and Indonesia. (Not that there were any tigers left now anyhow.)

      After that Hiram had diversified. He had developed the world's first successful SoftScreen, a flexible image system based on polymer pixels capable of emitting multicoloured light. With the success of the SoftScreen Hiram began to grow seriously rich. Soon his corporation, OurWorld, had become a powerhouse in advanced technologies, broadcasting, news, sport and entertainment.

      But Britain was declining. As part of unified Europe – deprived of tools of macroeconomic policy like control of exchange and interest rates, and yet unsheltered by the imperfectly integrated greater economy – the British government was unable to arrest a sharp economic collapse. At last, in 2010, social unrest and climate collapse forced Britain out of the European Union, and the United Kingdom fell apart, Scotland going its own separate way. Through all this Hiram had struggled to maintain OurWorld's fortunes.

      Then, in 2019, England, with Wales, ceded Northern Ireland to Eire, packed off the Royals to Australia – where they were still welcome – and had become the fifty-second state of the United States of America. With the benefit of labour mobility, inter-regional financial transfers and other protective features of the truly unified American economy, England thrived.

      But it had to thrive without Hiram.

      As a US citizen Hiram had quickly taken the opportunity to relocate to the outskirts of Seattle, Washington, and had delighted in establishing a new corporate headquarters here, at what used to be the Microsoft campus. Hiram liked to boast that he would become the Bill Gates of the twenty-first century. And indeed his corporate and personal power had, in the richer soil of the American economy, grown exponentially.

      Still, Kate knew, he was only one of a number of powerful players in a crowded and competitive market. She was here tonight because – so went the buzz, and as he had just hinted – Hiram was to reveal something new, something that would change all that.

      Bobby Patterson, by contrast, had grown up enveloped by Hiram's power.

      Educated at Eton, Cambridge and Harvard, he had taken various positions within his father's companies, and enjoyed the spectacular life of an international playboy and the world's most eligible bachelor. As far as Kate knew he had never once demonstrated any spark of initiative of his own, nor any desire to escape his father's embrace – better yet, to supplant him.

      Kate gazed at his perfect face. This is a bird who is happy with his gilded cage, she thought. A spoilt rich kid.

      But she felt herself flush under his gaze, and despised her biology.

      She hadn't spoken for some seconds; Bobby was still waiting for her to respond to his dinner invitation.

      ‘I'll think about it, Bobby.’

      He seemed puzzled – as if he'd never received such a hesitant response before. ‘Is there a problem? If you want I can –’

      ‘Ladies and gentlemen.’

      Every head turned; Kate was relieved.

      Hiram had mounted a stage at one end of the cafeteria. Behind him, a giant SoftScreen showed a blown-up image of his head and shoulders. He was smiling over them all, like some beneficent god, and drones drifted around his head bearing jewel-like images of the multiple OurWorld channels. ‘May I say, first of all, thank you all for coming to witness this moment of history, and for your patience. Now the show is about to begin.’

      The dandy-like virtual in the lime green soldier-suit materialized on the stage beside Hiram, his granny glasses glinting in the lights. He was joined by three others, in pink, blue and scarlet, each carrying a musical instrument – an oboe, a trumpet, a piccolo. There was scattered applause. The four took an easy bow, and stepped lightly to an area at the back of the stage where a drum kit and three electric guitars were waiting for them.

      Hiram said easily, ‘This imagery is being broadcast to us, here in Seattle, from a station near Brisbane, Australia – bounced off various comsats, with a time delay of a few seconds. I don't mind telling you these boys have made a mountain of money in the last couple of years – their new song Let Me Love You was number one around the world for four weeks over Christmas – and all the profit from that went to charity.’

      ‘New song,’ Kate murmured cynically.

      Bobby leaned closer. ‘You don't like the V-Fabs?’

      ‘Oh, come on,’ she said. ‘The originals broke up sixty-five years ago. Two of them died before I was born. Their guitars and drums are so clunky and old-fashioned compared to the new airware bands, where the music emerges from the performers’ dance…And anyhow all these new songs are just expert-system extrapolated garbage.’

      ‘All part of our – what do you call it in your polemics? – our cultural decay,’ he said gently.

      ‘Hell, yes,’ she said, but before his easy grace she felt a little embarrassed by her sourness.

      Hiram was still talking. ‘…not just a stunt. I was born in 1967, during the Summer of Love. Of course some say the Sixties were a cultural revolution that led nowhere. Perhaps that's true – directly. But it, and its music of love and hope, played a great part in shaping me, and others of my generation.’