The sixth millennium: An alien occupation of Earth has been thrown off. Now a ferocious new government called the Coalition is sweeping through the solar system, seeking out those who collaborated with the hated enemy. A handful of immortals, once collaborators, live on an ice moon called Port Sol, far from the sun. They govern a community of thousands of short-lived adherents. The Coalition's grasp will soon reach this remote place. The immortals must flee the solar system on vast starships - but they can take with them only a few of their followers. A young man called Rusel must choose between his lover, and his life; he chooses to flee. But Rusel faces a long journey, a journey that will last tens of millennia before the great ships reach their destination. Generations will live out their lives knowing nothing but the journey. Rusel agrees to accept an immortality of his own, to guide the ship and its evanescent crew across this desert of time. But as the years stretch to centuries and to millennia, the origins of the journey are lost in legend - and then the cruel scalpel of evolution begins to work on the crew. And Rusel lies on and on. This new story is set in Stephen Baxter's acclaimed future history The Xeelee Sequence, as were RIDING THE ROCK (PS Publishing 2002) and REALITY DUST (PS Publishing 2000), whose events precede this new story.
Description:
The sixth millennium: An alien occupation of Earth has been thrown off. Now a ferocious new government called the Coalition is sweeping through the solar system, seeking out those who collaborated with the hated enemy. A handful of immortals, once collaborators, live on an ice moon called Port Sol, far from the sun. They govern a community of thousands of short-lived adherents. The Coalition's grasp will soon reach this remote place. The immortals must flee the solar system on vast starships - but they can take with them only a few of their followers. A young man called Rusel must choose between his lover, and his life; he chooses to flee. But Rusel faces a long journey, a journey that will last tens of millennia before the great ships reach their destination. Generations will live out their lives knowing nothing but the journey. Rusel agrees to accept an immortality of his own, to guide the ship and its evanescent crew across this desert of time. But as the years stretch to centuries and to millennia, the origins of the journey are lost in legend - and then the cruel scalpel of evolution begins to work on the crew. And Rusel lies on and on. This new story is set in Stephen Baxter's acclaimed future history The Xeelee Sequence, as were RIDING THE ROCK (PS Publishing 2002) and REALITY DUST (PS Publishing 2000), whose events precede this new story.