“In the long term, of course, I’m aiming to modify the stem cells which produce my sperm. My wife Carol has already begun a program of ova collection. And once we’ve translated the entire human genome, and replaced all twenty-three chromosomes in sperm and ova … everything we’ve done will be heritable. Any child of ours will use pure neo-DNA – and all the symbionts will pass from mother to child in the womb.

“We’ll translate the genomes of the symbionts as well – into a third genetic alphabet – to protect them from viruses, and to eliminate any risk of accidental gene exchange. They’ll be our crops and our herds, our birthright, our inalienable dominion, living in our blood forever.

“And our children will be a new species of life. More than a new species – a whole new kingdom.”

The soccer players in the park cheered; someone had scored a goal. I left it in.

Landers beamed suddenly, radiantly, as if he was contemplating this strange arcadia for the very first time.

“That’s what I’m creating. A new kingdom .”

#

I sat at the console eighteen hours a day, and forced myself to live as if the world had shrunk, not to the workroom itself, but to the times and places captured in the footage. Gina left me to it; she’d survived the editing of Gender Scrutiny Overload , so she already knew exactly what to expect.

She said blithely, “I’ll just pretend that you’re out of town. And that the lump in the bed is a large hot water bottle.”

My pharm programmed a small skin patch on my shoulder to release carefully timed and calibrated doses of melatonin, or a melatonin blocker – adding to, or subtracting from, the usual biochemical signal produced by my pineal gland, reshaping the normal sine wave of alertness into a plateau followed by a deep, deep trough. I woke every morning from five hours of enriched REM sleep, as wide-eyed and energetic as a hyperactive child, my head spinning with a thousand disintegrating dreams (most of them elaborate remixes of the previous day’s editing). I wouldn’t so much as yawn until eleven forty-five – but fifteen minutes later, I’d go out like a light. Melatonin was a natural circadian hormone, far safer and more precise in its effects than crude stimulants like caffeine or amphetamines. (I’d tried caffeine a few times; it made me believe I was focused and energetic, but it turned my judgment to shit. Widespread use of caffeine explained a lot about the twentieth century.) I knew that when I went off the melatonin, I’d suffer a short period of insomnia and daytime drowsiness – an overshoot of the brain’s attempts to counteract the imposed rhythm. But the side-effects of the alternatives were worse.