凯达－基地组织 －‘基地’ – Al Qaeda – Al Qaida The organisation gets its name from the Arabic word for “the base”; The Chinese 基地 literally means “base”, there’s no Chinese equivalent for “the” so it’s left out.

巴基斯坦三军情报局 – Inter-services Intelligence – ISI The Pakistani intelligence agency.

伊斯兰堡－Islamabad

美巴关系 - The US/Pakistan relationship (etc). There is no one set phrase for this in English, but there is in Chinese. Confusingly, 巴 could also stand for Palestine, Brazil, Bahrain,

海葬 – burial at sea

扎瓦赫里 – Ayman al Zawahiri – Zawahiri Bin Laden’s second in command, and presumably the head of al Qaeda following his death.

海豹 – SEAL – Navy SEAL Notice SEAL is in capital letters.

My post on Japan has been taken up by Chinese Hacks. See it here.

More to come soon!

General Tao was not an economist.

He had told them that from the start.

He was absorbed in remembering this when outside in the courtyard there was a sudden volley of rifle fire.

Intruiging, no? Read the rest here.

Here’s a story that gave me the warm fuzzies.

It did not look like a classroom.  Thirty women, ranging in age from fifteen to sixty-five, sat cross-legged on the floor in a cramped room the size of a large rug.  Flies buzzed mercilessly in the 110-degree heat. The women did not look like students, with many staring at their pencils quizzically from behind full burqas, holding a writing utensil for the first time in their lives.  As with most rooms in rural villages, there were no tables or chairs.

I have to admit a little scepticism when it comes to our involvement in Afghanistan. I’m not sure that all the bombs, money and clandestine Navy SEAL operations will be that useful to the average guy on the street. But I can speak from personal experience how great and profound being able to read is, and I’m sure literacy among Pashto / Dari speakers in Afghanistan will be wonderful for the country’s future.

Read more: http://wordswithoutborders.org/dispatches/article/help-us-be-good-again-literacy-in-afghanistan/#ixzz1Mc7mlTiK

Deep Sea Fish by Chi hui (迟卉). Chapter 5 of 5. Translated by Max Roberts. Read Chapter 1 here, Chapter 2 here, Chapter 3 here, Chapter 4 here.

5 – Deep Sea Fish

The Ana Gorge had also been affected by the rising sea level. Yan Si arrived to find that they had been forced to turn off heating, and relocate life-support equipment to tunnels out of reach of the rising sea. People were crammed into any space they could fit into, which was every tunnel that could support life. Some were too scared to take off their pressure since even though it was perfectly safe. The horrors they had seen during the destruction of Rose city left them deeply shaken.

Yan Si offered to help with the distribution of supplies. He wasn’t as graceful as the Titanese, but a lifetime of Earth’s heavier gravity meant that he was stronger than any of them, and could work two shifts without feeling tired.

＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝

Soon they started running low on supplies but still the solar battering continued. And there was no way to get anything else. There wasn’t much carbon to go around to begin with, only enough for the Chen family and the occasional tourists. With so many people, the cycler couldn’t keep up, and many went hungry.

“We have to get through to the Saturn orbital station,” a young man said. “We need help!”

“We are hundreds of meters underground, so just how do you propose we do that?” An old technician answered.

The young man’s face went red. “We could head up through the tunnels, they lead straight to the top of Mount Wilkins,” another voice said.

Hopeful murmurs swept through the ground. But the technician shook his head.

“Mount Wilkins is Saturn side,” he chuckled bitterly. “The station is in orbit over the other side of Titan. We’d never get a message through with an entire moon in between them. And there’s no hope of repositioning the relay satellites, the controls were all destroyed in Rose City.”

Silence.

“I have an idea,” said a high voice. “All I’d need would be a radiation suit and a jet pack.”

Yan Si couldn’t believe his ears. He turned his eyes to the voice and met the gaze of Ishinali Chen.

＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝

There were climbing together. The tunnel to the summit of Mount Wilkins was almost vertical, so a spiral staircase had been cut into its walls.

But whoever had made them obviously hadn’t had humans in mind. Each ‘step’ was as tall as Yan Si. He grabbed the edge of each one, and straining with all his might, pulled himself up.

“Why don’t you just jump up? You’ll pull a muscle doing that.” Ishi asked as she helped him struggle up another ledge.

“I’m afraid I’ll fall off the side,” Yan Si said, looking down the centre of the twisting staircase at how far they had climbed. The ground looked to him like it was at least 200 metres away.

“Ha ha, you are such a deep sea fish.” She laughed loudly at him, and leapt up onto the next step.

“Excuse me?”

“A deep sea fish. All you Earth people are.”

She smiled again. “Look at gravity like an ocean. Deep space has no gravity, so it’s sea level. Earth’s gravity is so strong, so it’s like the seafloor. So people like you who live on earth are like those bottom feeding fish who always stick to the seafloor. Deep sea fish.”

“So that makes you, what, some kind of shallow water fish, does it?”

She laughed. “Of course.” She jumped up again, landing lightly on another step. “Professor, I’ve been reading about the ruins on Rhea, and the lunar surface. Those lifeforms went into space without developing any kind of technology for it, didn’t they?”

“Yes.” That was one of the main points of his work. He didn’t know why she was bringing it up now though.

“They are the real shallow water fish. They just jump, and reach the stars. And he we are, we’ve been trying to reach the stars for the last million years. To us, space rockets are the high technology, but to them they just means of reproduction.” She shrugged. “I figure, if they can do it, I can too. If we can reach Mount Wilkins, I think I might be able to get into orbit from there.”

Yan Si stopped. He knew that it just might be possible..

“Why didn’t you tell me before we left?”

“My mother was there, she would just cry and try to stop me. I couldn’t let her do that.” She smiled. “All it’s going to take is a little push. The jet pack will be enough. I’ll follow the seeds to Rhea. – Actually, I won’t even have to make it that far, just 100 km towards the dark side, and I’ll be able to contact the orbital station.”

“I’d rather you didn’t go alone.”

“We only have one radiation suit, professor.” She shrugged again. “I know what I’m doing, I’m not a child any more.”

Yan Si didn’t answer. They continued climbing.
=====

The closer they got to the summit, the more cracked and broken the steps became. Yan Si couldn’t be sure, but it seemed that a combination of the corrosive liquid methane that rained down occasionally, the rising temperature, and the fact that the steps were made of nothing more than ice, was causing them to break up. All he knew for sure was that just as they climbed high enough to see daylight poking through the top of the stairwell, the step Ishi was standing on gave way, and she fell over the side.

＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝

“Whoa…” Ishi’s voice, quiet but still terrified, came across the com unit as she disappeared.

“Ishi!” He reached out but she fell past before he could grab her.

The wind rushed through the opening at the top of the tunnel, making her fall faster. Yan Si saw her try to open the wings on her suit, but all this did was drive her into a wall as she fell. Finally he heard the heavy crunch of impact with the ground. Then all was still and dark.

He turned, and ran down the steps as fast as he could, shouting Ishi’s name.

“Professor…” Her thin voice. Yan Si held his breath and tried to run faster.

“Ishi, are you all right?”

“Professor, did you know…” He could hear her struggling to breathe. Internal bleeding? Had she broken her back? A rib? Yan Si tried to hail Ana Gorge over his comm unit, but couldn’t get through. The walls were too thick.

“Professor…” Her voice was getting smaller. “You know, I’m a deep sea fish too… We all are. We can only live at the bottom of the ocean, we need our pressurised domes… We can’t live in the shadows… We can’t survive there… If we stay in there too long, we… We die…”

“No, Ishi! We are in the shallows now, aren’t we? We’re there! We can do it! Ishi!”

“The stars are so beautiful, I would have loved to go there, to catch up to them, and tell them that we too can… Can…”

Her voice faded away and finally disappeared.

By the time Yan Si made it all the way down, Ishi had already stopped breathing. Her eyes were open, still staring at the tiny patch of sky visible at the top of the tunnel.

After a moment, Yan Si took the radiation suit and jet pack from her body, and started up the stairs again.

When he reached the top he opened the wings, and flicked on the jet pack. He soared like a bird up through Titan’s atmosphere. The stars winked at him, growing ever brighter. He couldn’t help but think of Ishi’s eyes.

＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝＝

Titan calling orbital station.

Titan calling orbital station.

Mayday, mayday, requesting urgent assistance for the survivors of Ana Gorge and Rose city. Repeat, this is an urgent request for assistance for the survivors of Ana Gorge and Rose city…

Epilogue

In 2090, astronomers agreed on the site for the first human colony outside the solar system. This was mostly thanks to Yan Si, and his work on decoding the Titanese language. The writing on the ancient monuments turned out to be maps and details of surveys of extra solar planets, and the astronomers had based their decisions on them. The program had been funded by the Chen family. And when the council gave Yan Si the privilege of naming the first exploratory probe, he decided to call it the “Deep Sea Fish”.

The name was inscribed not only on the chassis of the probe, but in Yan Si’s most well known work on interstellar archaeology.

Unfortunately, we are deep sea fish, tied down by gravity. We have our gravity quotas to try to escape it, to try to swim up painfully toward shallower water, but it costs us in resources and lives. Those life forms that went before us, leading the way for us humans, we envy them, seek them, research then…

But, as a girl said once, we should try to catch up with them.

She was a deep sea fish that wouldn’t stay on the ocean floor.

Read the original Chinese in the July 2010 edition of New Realms of Science Fiction. That was the end of Deep Sea Fish, the author and I hope you enjoyed it.

Deep Sea Fish by Chi hui (迟卉). Chapter 4 of 5. Translated by Max Roberts. Read Chapter 1 here, Chapter 2 here, Chapter 3 here.

4 – Evacuation

A year and three standard months later, Yan Si returned to Titan to finish his paper. The ventilation tunnels, and the Zhigang ruins were still there, but the magnificent forest of crystal had been turned into a landing pad. Ishi wasn’t to be found anywhere in the university.

Someone from the Chen family told him these days she spent most of her time up on the orbital station, researching those strange crystal “seeds” that orbited Titan and Rhea. She hadn’t been back in a long time.

Yan Si sighed and stuffed the piece of paper with her contact number into his pocket.

He said his thanks, goodbyes, and left the Chen tunnel.

Nowadays it was known as Rose City. 76,000 Titanese lived in its protective bubble throughout the year without any worries about pressure suits, storm season, freezing cold, air pressure, or having to dig airtight tunnels every 15 meters. They dressed however they liked, and strode freely about their domed city. Everyone smiled, confident and proud.

But the longer he stayed, the more clearly he remembered Ishi, her grave face and dark eyes.

One day he found he couldn’t take it any longer. He decided to have a look at a site in the South Gilded Sea. It was similar to the Zhigang ruins, but the subtle differences might prove a theory he had: that the ancient Titanese were as diverse as modern humans. He stopped absentmindedly organising his materials, and put in a requisition for a cutter and some diving equipment.

He set out across the sea. Saturn sparkled in the mist, lighting up Rose City’s enormous dome.The only sounds were the waves on the hull and the static over the com unit.

He took a slightly westerly bearing, heading for the observation station on New Chongming Island. He got quite a surprise when he arrived: the island had almost completely disappeared. The sea level had risen so far that all that was left was a tiny patch of icy land about 20 meters across, with the station perched on top like an abandoned fossil.

Yan Si landed on the flattest part of the island. He waded through the shallows, climbed up some steps, and reached the station. He gathered the equipment he needed and flipped open the logbook to make a note of it. Curious to see who else had been there, he turned back over the earlier pages.

The first half recorded the work done at the station, which Yan Si could see covered sites all over the South Gilded Sea. But in only six months, human activity had caused sea levels to rise so much that everyone had left. They left a few supplies in case they needed to come back, but this was just wishful thinking. The truth was that the workers on New Chongming Island had abandoned it and would probably never return.

Yan Si sighed and put down the logbook. He had been here with Ishi only a year ago, when the place was a hive of activity. Now there was only the lap of waves to keep him company.

It was a bad omen for the whole trip. The rising ocean levels meant that the ocean floor was further away from sea level so most of the lines he had brought weren’t long enough. He wasted hours before he was finally able to get to the ocean floor, and get to work. And when he finally finished his rubbings and brought them back to the surface, a sudden shower destroyed them all…
＝＝＝＝＝＝

After five days of exhausting work Yan Si raised anchor and headed back to the station. He was looking forward to some well earned rest in one of the station’s cosy underground quarters. But when he made his way to its co ordinates, it wasn’t there. Puzzled, he had a look at his map.

The sonar bleeped. With a start, Yan Si noticed a steel pole poking out of the water. The flagpole. The station’s flagpole. In a few days the sea had risen 10 meters, engulfing New Chongming Island completely.

He couldn’t believe it. It took him the longest time before it finally occurred to him to try and hail someone. He got through to Rose City on the intranet immediately. They said they knew about the rising sea level, and had a suspicion that it was caused by the terraforming. They had their hands full, but suggested he head to Nandao Island, and meet up with the family stationed there.

He heaved to, and headed south. It was only pure luck that he caught up with the last of the evacuees.

===

Yan Si saw the whole thing over intranet link. He looked on as the sea level rose, and at the almighty explosion when the liquid methane finally reached the heating elements. The dome cracked like an egg. Only a fraction of the people had had time to put on their pressure suits.

Yan Si looked on helplessly as they scrambled like ants from their burrows, before freezing to death, or asphyxiating. They collapsed one after the other, quickly freezing solid and turning pale white.

He couldn’t watch any more and turned to the vast sea. The horizon lilted in the distance with the boat’s rocking.

“Where are we going?” he asked one of the survivors.

“The Ana Gorge,” he replied. “Let’s hope we make it before storm season.”

A chill ran down Yan Si’s spine.

He had read somewhere that most underground living spaces had been closed, abandoned, or both, since work on Rose City had finished. The only people still living in the Ana Gorge with the Chen family. They had done up the tunnels, and were doing quite well running tours of the ruins. And now the Ana Gorge was now the only hope for tens of thousands of people who had nowhere to ride out storm season.

He looked at his watch. The first storm was due in three days.
Read the original Chinese in the July 2010 edition of New Realms of Science Fiction. Check back for Chapter 5.

Here are a few words that threw me in a spin when I first encountered them in Chinese.

遜尼派 / Sunni Islam- An Islamic sect. Explanation following the next entry…

Shiite Islam / Shia Islam/ Shi’ite Islam /什叶派 – An Islamic sect. Note that “Shiite” is two syllables. The two Islamic sects are mentioned a lot in the coverage of Bahrain. People who believe in the former are called “Sunnis”, the latter “Shiites”, “Shi’ites” or “Shias”. How do you remember which is which? I’ll leave that to you. Just remember that most Muslims are Sunni, with the exception of most of Iran, which is Shiite.

Misrata / 米苏拉塔 A city in Libya, and the scene of heavy fighting.

United Nations Human Rights Council / UNHCR / 联合国人权理事会 The UNHCR has been in the news recently; they had a meeting about Syria.

Damascus / 大马士革 The capital of Syria.

阿萨德 / Assad The surname of the Syrian president.

More coming soon!

Deep Sea Fish by Chi hui (迟卉). Chapter 3 of 5. Translated by Max Roberts. Read Chapter 1 here, Chapter 2 here.

3 – Daughter of Titan

Terraforming couldn’t go ahead as planned. By the time storm season had passed media coverage and pressure from the families made sure that instead of Zhigang, work started at Rose Plains. Visitors and settlers alike were delighted. But day by day Ishi’s mood got darker.

Yan Si tried to cheer her up. “You’ve won, Ishi. We’ll get enough time to excavate the ruins. No matter what.” But she just shook her head.

She spoke quietly. “No… It wasn’t just about that, it was about the whole thing… This whole terraforming nonsense…”

“But terraforming is a good thing, isn’t it? No more pressure suits, no more no more helmets, no more storm season, no more freezing cold…” He stopped when he saw how angry Ishi was getting.

Uncomfortable silence. Finally she spoke.

“How would you like to go on a little trip with me, professor?”

=================

---

They took one of the regular blimps that crossed the ocean. It swam through the reddish orange sky, the cabin a bulging egg sac underneath its belly. Ishi was back to her bubbly self, but Yan Si suspected she was hiding something.

Far away, poking out just above the horizon, Yan Si could make out a faint semicircle: Saturn. They were going to over to the dark side, that part of Titan that was always facing Saturn.

“So where we headed?” he asked.

“Rose Plains.” She answered, smiling. “I’m going to show you something, something special. Something not part of the terraforming project.”

=================

---

It was a long journey. After the blimp landed they rented a cutter and set off across the inland sea that stretched across the plains. – The Gilded Sea. It was raining when they arrived. Raining liquid methane.

Rose Plains had become an enormous construction site. A dome of scaffolding pierced the sky, stretching off into the distance, so big it looked like a rainbow. Robots were scampering over it, putting together supports. When it was finished, the interior would be filled with air – proper, Earth air – and the temperature would be a comfortable 22°C year round. The perfect greenhouse. After living inside long enough, the settlers might not even miss their homes on faraway earth.

Ishi tried to ignore it. She jumped ashore and walked along the water’s edge. It was deserted, and she was quite possibly the first person to ever set foot there. The waves were carrying icy debris onto the beach, leaving some, and taking some back out to sea with it. Over time the smaller fragments had accumulated and looked like light grey sand. It squeaked under their feet as they walked. Ishi, native to Titan, walked with such speed and grace that to Yan Si, breathlessly stumbling along behind her, she looked like she might fly away.

They walked around the bay then started heading inland. Then Ishi stopped and pointed. She needn’t have; Yan Si had already seen.

He was looking at a forest. A forest of crystal.

=================

---

The top of each structure came up to Yan Si’s waist. They were so delicate; such a structure on Earth would probably crumble in just a moment. But not on Titan. In its low gravity and thick atmosphere they formed into spectacular flowers, shoots, and trees. Row upon row of silver, sky blue, black, and light purple, each refracting the dazzling sky into a different colour.

Yan Si gasped. “Its…”

“Don’t worry,” Ishi said. She seemed to be less tense. Looking at her watch, she said. “We still have 20 minutes.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Until Rhea is at its closest point.” She chuckled. ”Saturn’s fifth moon. You’re in for quite a show.”

The minutes ticked over. Yan Si looked for Rhea in the sky, but with the thick atmosphere, Saturn so bright, and the glare coming off the scaffolding, he couldn’t see the tiny moon anywhere. But he knew something big must be happening soon because Ishi’s face brightened after being so dark for so long.

“I think it’s time, professor, I think we should find our seats.”

She climbed up onto one of the larger blocks of ice and gestured for Yan Si to follow. He tried to follow her example, and eventually got up. He lay face down and looked out over the forest.

It was completely quiet as he lay watching. Eventually he noticed the sound of the waves behind him, and after a while it occurred to him that they were getting louder. He turned and saw the sea was getting closer with each surge. The spot they had been standing on moments before was already submerged.

The tide.

Rhea’s gravity was affecting the tide, dragging the sea over the forest of crystals. A hiss came over his comm unit, and it took some time until he was finally able to pinpoint its source: the crystals.

Suddenly with a pop something shot out and streaked across the sky. It sounded to Yan Si like a firecracker, the kind he used to play with as a child. Ishi grabbed his hand and whispered: “Just stay down and watch!”

Eyes wide, mouth open. Amazement.

The cylindrical crystals were shuddering as the waves hit them. Something lodged in their base was being shot out, very strongly too, for they disappeared into the clouds without ever returning. They were firing as soon as the waves touched, like some sort of reverse waterfall.

Yan Si couldn’t tell how long it lasted but finally the waves retreated and all was calm. He tried to get up but his legs were numb so Ishi helped him down from their vantage point.

“What was that?” Yan Si asked.

She shrugged. “Hydrocarbons. Long chains of hydrogen and carbon, maybe with some helium. It’s -178°C here, so everything crystallises. At least that’s what those damn scientists said anyway.”

“It couldn’t be that simple.”

“Of course not.” Ishi turned, her eyes sparkling.

“We’ve done some tests on these things, some of the others and I. In this cold environment the hydrogen/carbon chains fold up into three-dimensional shapes. There’s some kind of information in their structure, and they replicate themselves by taking methane out of the air.

“But that’s not possible here, it’s not cold enough. So they collect here and form structures, from cylinders to spindly growths and seeds. The tide comes in when Rhea gets close enough,  and they have special parts which catalyse the ammonia and react to create hydrogen and nitrogen. They make so much that the pressure builds up and forces the seeds inside the cylinders to shoot out. Eventually they enter orbit around Titan.

“Most of the seeds float away but some enter Saturn’s orbit. Rhea has active volcanos spewing out sulphur and if it meets the seeds the two combine; if the temperature is low enough, they form new crystals. They continue in orbit around Saturn and eventually they fall to Titan’s surface again. The methane induces new chemical compounds, namely, everything you see before you right now. And all from a single seed.”

Ishi sighed quietly. “But they said… the scientists from Earth, I mean… they said these things don’t have DNA so they’re not really ‘living’… But professor, if they’re not ‘living’ creatures, then what are we? All for the sake of a little piece of earth here on Titan, this, all this… will….” She gestured to the forest. “It will all disappear.”

Yan Si tried to think of something to say.

“You did your best.”

“Yes, but not enough. It’s like… It’s like trying to block the river using an iceberg. No matter what you do they’ll never listen to you, they’ll always find a way around you… My parent’s generation are from Earth, there are always talking about Earth this, Earth that… But my generation doesn’t care about Earth. We are Titanese. We were born here, grew up here. If I ever went to Earth the gravity would break my bones and the air would suffocate me. We should be reaching out, into space, outwards, not downwards, not to Earth!” She stamped her foot childishly. “I hate Earth!”

Yan Si spoke warmly. “We’re all from Earth.”

“I know.” Ishi looked up, her black eyes little lumps of ice. “But I want to be Titanese.” She nodded at the crystal forest. ”I want to be Titanese like they are Titanese.”

Read the original Chinese in the July 2010 edition of New Realms of Science Fiction. Check back for Chapter 4 and Chapter 5.