Katilvik

Enchanting beams of the Far North kissed the smooth glass curves of skyscrapers. A city, built with the infrastructure of intention, formed an integrated society fast and strange, yet tranquil and simple.

Urduja felt the chill of the crisp nighttime air, the one breaking the silence, drifting through the spires and canyons of carbon. The air was fresh. The air smelled of balsamic and citrus. Wavy green-purple streaks danced from the heavens into an urban forest, its valley hillsides filled with young alpine, fruit, and nut trees meandering into abrupt peaks.

Green horizontal racks extended from the bases of glass and wood skyscrapers up each floor, housing fruits, vegetables, and grains in vertical farming. Vines clung up the edges as many as ten floors.

To inhale the fresh air, bask in nature only steps away, and combine with creators of shared dreams, that was the heart of Katilvik.

Why must this heart beat too late?

In a region once immersed in permafrost, the lone traveler hiked a pristine trail adjacent to a fresh creek in the middle of downtown.

Urduja extended her hand upward through the canopies into the stars. She saw glass printed from desert sand stretching outward in a kaleidoscope of dark colors. She touched the green phantoms of birds never to arrive. She saw banyan tree trunks of white crystal, the superstructures of twisted rope housing a thousand lives.

Urduja’s fierce aura both welcomed and intimidated others despite her short stature. She was passionately unpredictable: kind and vulnerable one moment, tough as nails the next. The weight of knowing more about life than she wished to share grounded her free-spirited ways.

Her hands gracefully glided through the bushes as she walked, feeling their dew. Upon a thought, her communication transferred to her intended vector; A voice message between minds.

“Are you going to make it? The lights are especially bright tonight.” She ‘spoke’ with urgency yet continued with intention.

She ‘heard’ a weathered voice with a faint Congolese accent. “Just a few more minutes, darling. I’m not as young as I used to be.”

Just over the ridge, an electric bicycle perched on a multi-use path made of hardened sand composite. The freedom to move (to explore!) was always at her fingertips.

A diverse group piloting various electric mobility devices crossed the road. They spoke not of possessions and trends, nor complaints about others, but shared ideas and support. Each had a spring in their step — a curiosity of motion — as if calming invisible waves penetrated them.

Most were displaced from somewhere.

Here was unlike her voyages in a world of scarcity far away.

There, overpopulated concrete cells separate from nature counted as habitable. There, the rat race was gasping its last breath. There, the stratification of society and ecology came at the price of everyone’s well-being. One’s mental maps constricted from open horizons into tunnel vision. Never here.

Urduja mounted her electric steed, briskly winding through canopied turns, roundabouts, and hills forged from old sinkholes. Some roads twisted leisurely like a giant city-sized board game, others more direct and utilitarian.

A man with short, white wisps of coiled hair patiently waited outside as she arrived. Damian had dark, smooth skin and the crinkles of years of smiles following times of anguish. Some expressions faintly molded like water eroding channels from stone. He was a man belonging to the Earth, old enough to remember a time when people believed Earth belonged to humankind, all in a relentless competition to carve in pieces and consume.

Urduja quickly flicked her kickstand and threw herself into his arms in a deep embrace.

“It’s been a long time, Dad.”

“Yes it has… I miss you dearly. Hard to meet with all the traveling, that’s for sure.” He pulled away, beckoning at the building. “Come now. You wanted to go to that special place you were talking about. We can catch up while we walk.”

He connected, then disconnected.

He longed to reach out.

What did she see in the shadows of his crinkling eyes? A tinge of pain?

The two held hands as the apartment sensed their presence, opening its doors and guiding them towards a giant elevator. Rather than heading upward, Damian thought of underground level 3, and his wish was his command.

The doors opened, revealing a mini road subway. Four compact tunnels were bored through the walls to their left and right in the plumbing of transportation. Other groups of people shuffled in and out the other elevators. Autonomous tear-shaped vehicles flowing with quiet precision exited the tubes, opening their sliding doors when new passengers approached. All sped in a blur through highways, networked like schools of fish, always close to colliding but never making contact. The passengers never batted an eye, occupied in their little worlds with assured safety.

Urduja shared a 3d map with Damian, and he understood instantly. “See Dad, it’s not too far. On the Northern edge, there’s a tower and park with a gorgeous view.” Within a minute, a car entered, parked, and opened its doors beside them.

“I saw your speech a few months ago. I’m proud of you,” Damian said as they both stepped into the car. The doors closed behind them.

“You do know what kind of mission this is, right?”

“Yes.”

“What do you think of it?”

“You know I’m naturally cautious, but if there is anyone that can handle that part of the world, it is you.”

His eyes shifted ever so slightly in a way only she could notice.

Suddenly, they were pinned back in their seats. The car accelerated like a rocketship, reaching 50, 90, then 120 through one of the tunnels, rapidly merging onto other tunnel-tube lanes. The AI wasted no time narrowly passing over, under, and above other vehicles, shuffling through them like an ace in a deck of cards. Then, already at 200 kilometers per hour, the car transitioned directly from acceleration to braking, its destination only a block away.

Perhaps she could nudge him to her side.

“Ironic, isn’t it? Terraforming Earth? That’s what the Reclamation is all about.”

He nodded quietly.

The car diverted from an offramp into another underground loading lot, turned toward a diagonal parking spot, and opened its doors. An audible chime signaled arrival.

Urduja and Damian advanced up the main elevator to the ground floor. The enchanting Northern Lights awaited them beyond hexagonal glass panes shielding a green open expanse with trees flanking its sides.

Upon a walk, Urduja extended towards a branch, grabbing a ripe mahogany fig. Finally, they both sat down on a wood bench.

“I hope Katilvik has treated you well. Would you like one?”

“No thanks, saving my appetite for dinner. The restaurant is right behind us, after all.”

He smiled coyly, unfolding his posture. “It gets a little cold in the winter, but I’m getting used to it. Not really that much different from Grande Prairie. It’s comfortable here. A lot of people want to know me, share what I’ve learned. We help each other with our goals. Oh, I didn’t tell you I won the fishing lottery recently.”

“Where’d you go?”

“Headed out past the farms to Nueltin Lake. Didn’t catch anything, but had some fun. I was going to go to Hudson Bay, but Nueltin seemed easier.”

The green lights from the heavens cascaded down the faces of two tiny specks living with comfortable pleasures accessible only to them, above the rest of the world.

“You wanted to see-em just in time, didn’t you? A little hard this time of year.” Damian lovingly extended his arm around her shoulder and pulled her in the silence and warmth of deep knowing.

“We always used to look up at them, up at the possibilities, the clear skies, the color. I was so tired of looking down at life. After everything that’s happened, the beauty is still here. I wouldn’t miss the chance to see them again with you.”

Urduja reminisced about sitting on tall, wild green grass wrapped around her still-scrawny legs, tall enough to barely peer down the gorge at the black liquid crystal of the nighttime river. Peace River, what a suitable name! Never before had she experienced a nighttime outside without sweating, now safely inside the eye of the planetary storm. Her father laid a red picnic carpet of worldly cuisines for numerous adopted siblings, running, playing, and bickering as usual. It was the last time he would beg her to eat to no avail. She stared at the green and purple call of the North, strong enough to heal, to slowly melt the edges of the ice encasing her heart, to slowly awaken her soul.

He could hold back no longer.

“How soon?”

“Next week.”

She volunteered where none tread, and he couldn't stop her. His child, however old, will face the unknown dangers, searching in the echoes of the lands of a billion cries. Was she the master of destiny or destiny the master of her? A bird is meant to be free. A bird is meant to find its way home. Where was her home?

He pulled away again, tightly clasping his slightly shaking hands, eyes meeting the ground.

“Why do you want to go, the real reason?”

A great weight lifted off her shoulders.

“After joining the peacekeeping core, I can sleep better now. I’d toss and turn, wrapping pillows around my ears, searching in vain to silence the noise. I could hear them… but it wasn’t them this time. It was me, yearning to reach out and touch them. Heal them. Millions are out there somewhere, buried, trapped! I can’t hold back any longer.”

Gently she gazed into his eyes. “You know this. It’s like you and I are living in a bubble, and I feel guilty. More should experience what it’s like to be here, right now.”

“How many are still in the Uninhabitable Zone?”

“It’s hard to say… Worldwide, probably ten million or more… Most able to leave have already left. Conflicting forces claim they’re the local government. They rarely let us in, though something about them is different now, and I don’t know why. Good news is we stopped the planet’s warming, so it shouldn’t get worse.”

Four degrees transformed the world.

Her father stared past the green light into the stars, detached as if observing his body from behind, tears streaming down his cheeks, reaching for something just too late.

“I could’ve done more.”

“What are you saying! You did the best you could! Raising all of us amidst all that shit.”

“That’s why I’m proud of you for going down there… You’re doing the right thing, but it still doesn’t make it any easier.”

He pointed almost straight up at the sky. “Can you see the North Star where you’ll be going?”

“No, I’ll be too close to the equator.”

“I see.”

Damian leaned toward her earnestly, grasping hands made of mourning dove wings. “I want you to remember. No matter where you are, you can circle the world a thousand times… Your home will still be here waiting. These lights will still be up here, shimmering at night, waiting for you.”

“I’ll be waiting for you.”