When Life Hands You Uranus : 1 / 9

By Iolanthe Portmanteaux

Two days before Christmas, in the year 6056, Barfield Owens exhausted his last appeal. At the age of 30, he’d already spent a decade in prison. Now, barring a miracle, he’d spend the rest of his life behind bars.

You’d think that in an age where sensors, detectors, and cameras are everywhere, and when forensic science is so refined that it can detect and distinguish microparticles and infinitesimal traces, that miscarriages of justice would be a thing of the past. Common sense would tell you that a normal, inoffensive, utterly innocent man could never be mistaken for a serial killer. Such a misunderstanding not only would never happen, it would be impossible to arrive at an arrest, let alone a trial and conviction, if a person were truly innocent.

And yet, in a universe of infinite possibilities, it would have to happen to someone. The someone to whom it happened was a man named Barfield Owens.

Barfield was no serial killer. Barfield wasn’t a killer at all. Barfield was a kind, good, law-abiding man who loved his fellow citizens and tried to make a positive contribution to society. Unfortunately, due to a series of terrible coincidences, he was mistaken for the appalling Mojan-Pardee Killer. Admittedly, all of the "facts" were circumstantial: there wasn’t a single shred of direct, physical evidence. There were witnesses who saw something and someone, but their testimonies were of doubtful value.

And yet, in spite of the absence of any solid, unimpeachable proof, a compelling case was built. The prosecution and the press often pointed out that the murders attributed to the Mojan-Pardee Killer abruptly ceased when Barfield was arrested.

When Barfield was taken into custody, the real killer was wise enough to lay low, and contemplated a change to his modus operandi. During his brief pause, he happened to be killed in an automobile accident, and no one ever discovered his secret life of crime. Another horrible coincidence that went to Barfield’s harm.

Barfield’s conviction was followed by a sentence of life without parole, and he was locked in a high security federal prison, where his only visitor (aside from journalists) was his lawyer, Jeff Tommelekis. Jeff tried — without success — to launch one appeal after another, and when he wasn’t making judicial attempts to free Barfield, he was lobbying the governor, other high officials, celebrities, and anyone else who might bring pressure to bear in his effort to free Barfield.

None of his efforts got off the ground. Certainly there were people who understood that Barfield had been undeservedly crushed beneath the wheel of justice, but no one dared say so out loud, in public, on the record. His alleged crimes were so heinous and so widely detailed by the media, that his name or image was enough to provoke anger, disgust, and deep, visceral hatred.

“I’m sorry, Barfield,” his lawyer told him in a sorrowful tone. “These past ten years, I’ve done everything I could. I’ve wracked my brain. I’ve asked everyone I know for help and advice. I’ve followed up every single possibility, no matter how remote—”

“I know.” Barfield cut him off. “Don’t beat yourself up, Jeff. I’ve made my peace with it. I’ve been wrongly accused, but after ten years of trying, there’s nothing left to do but accept my fate. I’ve seen this day coming, and now it’s here. I’ll spend the rest of my life behind bars.” Barfield gave a crooked smile as he shrugged. “I’ll find some useful way to spend my time. It’s not so bad in here, after all. You know the old saying, Even Hell has its sweet spot.” Barfield’s words and intentions were brave, but they were belied by his voice, his posture, and his trembling hands..

“I’ve never heard that particular saying,” his lawyer replied. Then he hesitated, drummed his fingers on the table, and cleared his throat. “Listen, Barfield, there’s something you need to hear. Just a week ago, I was approached by some people… people from the Nostalgia Project, and um… eh… there *is* one last possibility. There could be a way out of here for you, if you want to take it. The federal governor — and this is all very low-key, so keep it to yourself — the governor is willing to commute your sentence, under, um, under a certain condition. Personally, I think it’s pretty extreme, and I doubt that you’ll take him up on it, but I feel honor-bound as your attorney to mention it.”

“Commute my sentence?” Barfield repeated. “How? Why? What’s the condition? What’s the catch?”

“The catch is, you’d be stuck on Uranus. Permanently. You’d have to live and work there forever. You’d never be able to leave. It would essentially amount to exile. Frankly, it’s being offered because there are people in government and in the judicial system who realize that you’ve been unjustly imprisoned, but don’t dare admit it publicly. They’ve embraced this solution because they don’t see any legal way to set you free.”

Barfield countered, “A legal way? I’ll tell you a legal way: The governor could straight-out pardon me. Or he could commute my sentence without any conditions.”

“The public outcry would be overwhelming. You should know that. I’m sorry, Barfield, but you are the most hated man on this planet. Maybe even in the whole universe. I’ve kept this from you, but from the beginning, there’s been a lot of talk on social media about the death penalty.”

“The death penalty!” Barfield exclaimed. “What’s wrong with people today? That’s-- that’s insane! The death penalty? What is this? The middle ages?”

“Don’t worry,” his lawyer assured him. “It’s just talk. It’ll never happen. But as far as I can see you have only two possibilities: you can head for Uranus, or stay here in prison.”

“Uranus!” Barfield exclaimed. He scratched his head for a moment. “That name sounds vaguely familiar, but I can’t put my finger on it. Where on earth is it? Is it a penal colony?”

His lawyer grinned. Every schoolchild knew how to find Uranus. “No, Barfield, it’s not a penal colony. It’s a mining colony that was set up by the Nostalgia Project. You’ve heard of them, haven’t you? Uranus is one of the outer planets in the original solar system, back where Earth is located.”

Barfield’s face went white. He felt faint. “The original solar system? Are you kidding? Are you crazy? My God! That whole system must be a cold, frozen hell! Didn’t their Sun burn out long, long ago?”

“No,” his lawyer laughed. “The Sun? That old light bulb will be warm and bright for billions of years to come. Listen, Barfield, I need to go, but I’ll have someone from the Nostalgia Project call on you tomorrow. Just so you have all the facts.”

“Fine,” Barfield acquiesced. “I’ll listen, but I have to tell you that Uranus doesn’t sound very appealing.”

Midmorning on the next day, a slim young woman with eyeglasses arrived. Her name was Neeka Fimernikem. As you can well imagine, Barfield was quite curious about her eyewear. “Why don’t you get corrective lenses?” he asked. “I mean, get your lenses corrected?”

She smiled at him as though she’d been waiting for that exact question. “As it happens, there are many distinct advantages to wearing glasses,” she said. “It’s much easier to toggle the visual correction. See?” She took the glasses off and put them back on. “They also have cosmetic advantages. I think you’ll agree that they enhance the shape of my face, and bring out the colors of my irises.”

“Oh yes, I think so,” Barfield said, nodding. Neeka was one of the few women he’d seen in the past ten years, and he was ready to agree with anything she might say. As she spoke, he was fascinated by her smooth, unlined neck, by the movements of her soft, full lips, and by the curve of her plump, youthful cheeks.

“Also, since I represent the Nostalgia Project, it’s fitting that I wear such a throwback to simpler times. Now, let’s get down to business! Mr Owens, how much do you know about the Nostalgia Project?”

“Well,” he said, after searching the deep pool of his ignorance, “Well, I do know there is something about glasses.”

“Hmmm,” she commented. “I see. For the sake of convenience, would you mind if I proceed as if you’d never heard of the Nostalgia Project? It will improve the flow of my presentation if I don’t have to stop and consider what to leave in and what to leave out.”

Without waiting for his answer, she lit up a holomation model. Barfield recognized the image from his elementary school days. “That’s the original solar system!” he exclaimed. “And, uh, one of those planets in there is Earth.”

“That’s correct,” she agreed. “Earth is this one here. You can see that it’s very close to the Sun. Once upon a time, it was a very advantageous position. Unfortunately, we humans depleted the atmospheric protections, and Earth grew quite hot. Scientists love to speculate about whether it’s too hot to sustain human life. Some actually believe that there are humans still living on Earth, but of course no one has been able to prove it.”

“Can’t somebody just go there and take a look?” Barfield asked.

“There is a project to do exactly that: to return to Earth and — if possible — repopulate the planet. In case you haven’t already guessed, that effort is called the Nostalgia Project. However, we have one huge obstacle. Can you guess what it is?”

“Earth is far, far away,” he ventured.

“Yes, exactly. Earth is quite far. It would take so long for a ship to travel that distance, that by the time it got there, none of us would be alive to remember that the ship had ever left. However, we can get pretty close to Earth very quickly. Let me ask you, Mr. Owens, have you ever heard of teleportation?”

“Yes, it means you jump instantly from one place to another. Is that actually possible?”

“As of twenty years ago, yes, it is both possible and safe. It’s not a secret, but then again, it’s not widely known.”

“And so…” he said slowly, putting it together, “Why hasn’t someone teleported to Earth and seen what’s what? Or did they? Did someone go there and wasn’t able to come back?”

“No, no one has teleported to Earth. We can’t, as of yet. You see, if you want to teleport from point A to point B, you need to do some complicated calculations first. As it happens, if you start at point A, there is only one single, solitary point B in the entire universe available to you. You can’t go anywhere else but there. From point A there is only one point B. From point B there is only one point C, and so on. Surprisingly, if you keep going, you will eventually end up at point A again, if that’s where you want to go.”

“Why can’t you just go backward, from B to A?”

“I’m not a physicist or a mathematician, so I can’t answer that. However, fun fact: The mathematics that allows you to figure out your point B is an offshoot of what is called” (here she read from her notes) “pseudo-infinite tensor analysis. It was developed — guess when? — way back at the beginning of the twentieth century, which was a great time for speculative mathematics.”

Barfield wasn’t stupid by any means, but his brain was getting stretched and strained by all these new, complex, unaccustomed ideas. Earth? Teleportation? Whatsit whatsit tensor analysis? Why should there be only one point B? It made no earthly sense.

Neeka smiled at him. She appeared to be a flighty, bird-like girl, but she was clearly much smarter than Barfield. Conceptually speaking, Neeka was only wading in the shallows, but Barfield was already in well over his head. He gaped silently, and gestured mutely, as though he could rearrange with his hands the things that she’d said and turn them into something he could understand.

“Good God, my head is starting to hurt,” Barfield told her in a helpless tone. “Are you sure all this stuff you’re saying is real?” He sighed and shook his head.

“Why don’t we take a break for lunch?” she suggested.

Of course, he expected that the two of them would sit down together. He’d ask where she was from… she would play with her eyeglasses in a flirtatious manner… and (in his imagination at least) all sorts of lovely things would follow.

Instead, a guard escorted Barfield back to his prison cell, where he dined upon a prosaic and highly unromantic plate of meatloaf, mashed potatoes, and green beans, washed down with a cup of apple juice, served at room temperature.

As he masticated, he replayed in his mind all the things Neeka told him… point A and point B, the hot, inhospitable Earth… and suddenly realized there was one topic she hadn’t touched on at all.

After lunch, the guard led Barfield back to the little room where Neeka was waiting. Even before he sat down, Barfield asked his question:

“I thought you were going to tell me about Uranus. You haven’t touched Uranus -- as a topic -- yet.”

“I am going to talk about Uranus,” she said. “We’re going to talk about it now. Do you remember when I told you about point A and point B? Well, there is a viable point A not far from here, and guess where its point B happens to be?”

“Uranus?”

“Bingo. It’s the first and only viable teleport destination in the original solar system. As far as we know, of course. Although Uranus is one of the outer planets, and still very far from Earth, it gives us a toehold in that system. It brings us closer to Earth than anyone has ever been since the last ship left Earth.

“We’ve established a mining colony on Titania, which is Uranus’ largest moon. We’ve made it as large and lovely and comfortable as we could possibly manage. The miners are paid an extravagant wage, and while they’re out there, all their expenses are paid. Everything they earn is cash in the bank.”

“How often do they come home?” Barfield asked.

Neeka looked at him in silence for a beat. Then she said softly, “You would have to stay, you know. You could never come back. That’s the deal: in exchange for commuting your sentence, you would have to stay.” In a normal tone she added, “The miners are allowed to come home for an entire month twice a year. Surprisingly, they rarely exercise the option, which should tell you that they’re happy with Uranus. It tells us that Uranus is not as bad as you might think.”

Barfield was silent, weighed down by the enormity of his choice. Yesterday, he couldn’t have found Uranus with a map, and now he was being asked to live there forever. He could get out of prison, but only at the cost of his freedom.

Neeka saw how Barfield’s mood had fallen, so she added, “Keep in mind that you’ll have full access to all the goods and benefits the miners enjoy. You’ll receive the same extravagant pay they receive—”

“But I won’t be able to spend it!”

“Certainly you will! You can order anything you like. The teleport cycle runs once a week, so delivery of mail and other packages and goods only takes seven days.”

“How many people are out there?”

“I want you to know, but also to understand, and even -- if possible -- to feel that our goal on Uranus is to have a large, thriving community. The mining operation is extremely profitable, but in our calculations, that profit, and the mine itself, is secondary to our real goal, which is to build a thriving human settlement. The station is so highly automated that a staff of three could run it, in a pinch. So it isn’t workers that we need. We need people. We’re trying our best to build up the population not only for safety and social reasons, but also because we want to have a strong human presence in the original solar system. So far, though -- and we don’t understand why -- recruitment is surprisingly difficult. People haven’t caught the vision yet.”

“Yes, but how many people are out there?” he repeated.

“Right now there are two dozen men.”

A chill ran through Barfield. His brain keyed in on that last word: men. Oh, no, Barfield thought. His breath caught in his throat. Men? She can’t mean what I think she means! So he asked her: “Neeka, you said two dozen ‘men,’ not two dozen ‘people’ — how many women are out there?”

“Unfortunately, at the moment, there are none. We haven’t been able to attract any female recruits. Yet. We will, but we haven’t yet. And before you ask: no, there are no visitors allowed, of any gender, for any period of time.”

Barfield was stunned. Neeka was one of the few women he’d seen in nearly a decade. It was maddening to sit and interact so closely with such a lovely creature and know that soon she would leave, never to be seen again. So near and yet so far! Barfield felt a surge of despair. Could he bear living that way? Knowing that for the rest of his life he would never even SEE a woman again? Could he do it? Could he live without intimate contact? Could he live without even minimal, casual contact with the fairer sex?

“There are a couple of things for you to consider,” Neeka continued, as if reading his mind. “One is that here, in this prison, you quite definitely will never have any female companionship. Uranus, on the other hand, at least offers the possibility. We strongly and actively recruit women, especially young women, for a variety of posts on Uranus. We want to fill Uranus. We want to make Uranus bustling and lively. We want Uranus to be attractive to everyone. We offer special signing bonuses to women who pick Uranus, and perks that are denied to the men. It could happen for you on Uranus. It will never happen here.

“The other thing for you to consider is that if you go, we will give you a new identity, and we will alter your appearance. No one on Uranus will know that you were Barfield Owens. You’ll land on Uranus as a new person with a new identity and a second chance at life.”

She stood up and pushed a packet of documents toward him. “Everything I’ve told you is in writing here. There are also photographs of the colony and other quite detailed information. I suggest that you read it and think about it. Take your time. Don’t rush your decision—”

“I’ll go,” he said. “You had me at new identity. You should have led with that. You sold me. I’m ready now: I’ll go.”

She opened her mouth to warn against undue haste, but he spoke over her.

“I’m going,” he said. “I’ve decided. Uranus sounds pretty good to me right about now.”