“No way.”
“Took thirty years. Bodies were easier, came out of organ-growing stuff. But brains, getting the scans back into them, that was hard.” He tapped his head. “It’s impossible to say whether it worked. But I feel like me.”
She touched his arm, his stomach. “You do.” She touched her lips, ears, eyes, throat. “I do, too.” She swallowed. “I guess.”
She used him to pull herself into a sitting position. It didn’t feel like she’d been sleeping. It felt like nothing she’d felt before. Like being born again. Her skin tingled. It felt amazing.
“Gretyl?”
He frowned. “We’re working on her. Died five years ago. Left a scan. Hoping to have her in a year, two at most. We’re growing the body quick as we can.”
Her mouth was open. She closed it. “Stan? Jacob?”
“They stopped having bodies ten years ago.” He shrugged. “Kids. They’re waiting to talk to you. I think they want to talk you into giving up on the body, joining them. They’re offworld, most of the time. They entangle a lot, with each other and others. Gives me the fucking willies. That’s the next generation’s job, right? No matter how hard you try, the little fuckers always generation-gap you.”
She swung her feet over the edge, let them touch the floor. It was tile, maybe slate. Every seam crackled through her nervous system. It was a sensation between ticklish and being on orgasm’s edge. She clutched at his arm, vertigo and joy warring.
“I smell an onsen.”
“We built another B&B. It’s totally retro. Limpopo is waiting for us. Both of them, actually.”
Her mouth was open again. “Two of them?”
“It’s frowned upon. But no one gives either of them any shit about it. And only one of them talks to me.”
She stood, letting the sheet slip away from her, leaving her naked. She felt air on her skin. It was so intense she nearly sat again, but kept her grip on his arm.
“Enjoy it. You’d be amazed at how quickly you get over it. Normal is hard to resist. Everything becomes default, no matter how new.”
He led her down the hallway.
They passed other people, who smiled, said hello in a variety of accents. Some looked familiar, older versions of the people she’d known. Some looked like younger versions. She could have sworn one was Tam, but impossibly young. A teenager. Cousin? Daughter? Tam?
They paused at the heavy, salt-crusted onsen door, thick wood planks that transpired scented, warm air. He hugged her. She hugged him back.
“Welcome home,” he said.
acknowledgments
This book could never have been written without the influence of Rebecca Solnit’s A Paradise Built in Hell, David Graeber’s Debt: The First 5,000 Years, and Thomas Piketty’s Capital in the Twenty-First Century.
Thanks to Alice (of course!), Steven Brust, Scott Westerfeld, Barton Gellman, Patrick Ball, John Gilmore, Roz Doctorow, Noah Swartz, Biella Coleman, Mitch Altman, Quinn Norton, Jo Walton, Kim Stanley Robinson, Vladimir Verano and Third Place Books, Madeline and McNally Jackson Books, the ACLU’s Ben Wizner, Jeremy Bornstein, William Gibson, Edward Snowden, and Eleanor Saitta.
Thanks as always to my agent, Russell Galen, and my editor, Patrick Nielsen Hayden, who made this better by supporting me without ever letting me off the hook. Thank you to Tom Doherty for his contributions to science fiction, to publishing, and to literature—and for all the many gracious conversations he has afforded me over our long and fruitful association.
also by cory doctorow
The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Publishing Science Fiction
(with Karl Schroeder)
Essential Blogging
(with Rael Dornfest, J. Scott Johnson, Shelley Powers, Benjamin Trott, and Mena G. Trott)
Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom
A Place So Foreign and Eight More
Eastern Standard Tribe
Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town
Overclocked: Stories of the Future Present
Little Brother
Content: Selected Essays on Technology, Creativity, Copyright, and the Future of the Future
Makers
For the Win
With a Little Help
Context: Further Selected Essays on Productivity, Creativity, Parenting, and Politics in the 21st Century
The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow
The Rapture of the Nerds (with Charles Stross)
Pirate Cinema
Homeland
about the author
Cory Doctorow is a coeditor of Boing Boing and a regular contributor to the Guardian, Locus, and many other publications. His novels Little Brother and Homeland were New York Times bestsellers. He lives with his family in Los Angeles. You can sign up for email updates here.
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Contents
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Dedication
1. communist party
2. you all meet in a tavern
3. takeoff
4. home again, home again, jiggity jig
5. transitional phase
6. the next days of a better nation
7. prisoner’s dilemma
Epilogue: even better nation
acknowledgments
also by cory doctorow
about the author
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
WALKAWAY
Copyright © 2017 by Craphound LLC
All rights reserved.
Edited by Patrick Nielsen Hayden
Cover art by Will Staehle
A Tor Book
Published by Tom Doherty Associates
175 Fifth Avenue
New York, NY 10010
www.tor-forge.com
Tor® is a registered trademark of Macmillan Publishing Group, LLC.
The Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request
ISBN 978-0-7653-9276-3 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-0-7653-9417-0 (signed edition)
ISBN 978-0-7653-9278-7 (e-book)
e-ISBN 9780765392787
Our e-books may be purchased in bulk for promotional, educational, or business use. Please contact the Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department at 1-800-221-7945, extension 5442, or by e-mail at
[email protected] First Edition: April 2017
Cory Doctorow, Walkaway
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