Zurich Meet Tomorrow by Alastair Reynolds - Book - Page 3
‘You don’t need luck, Amaka, you need only to be yourself.’
Mitsu nods encouragingly. ‘Hurry. The water-taxi will be here
in two minutes, forty seconds.’
‘It is no small thing, to have a new eye,’ Doctor Heurtier reminds
her. ‘Even for one as busy as the illustrious Amaka. How have
you been doing?’
‘Oh, very satisfactorily, Doctor.’
He shows her colour swatches, maddeningly similar shades
of blue. He wants to see how well her new left eye is at telling
them apart.
Amaka is in a rush to be going. She has squeezed in this
appointment on her way to the airport. Nonetheless she
acquits herself adequately.
‘Now we must talk about your right eye.’
He shows her how it is developing. The bioprinted organ
floats in a soupy matrix of support chemicals, several
centimetres of noodle-coloured optic nerve trailing behind
it. In 2050 it is easier to swap in a new eye than treat a preexisting condition like Amaka’s Retinitis Pigmentosa.
‘It’s revolting,’ she comments.
‘Beauty is in the eye of the beholder – quite literally in this
case. When can you find time?’
She shrugs her small, bony shoulders beneath her black
blouse. ‘A month, six weeks.’
‘You will need a month of post-operative recovery, and
then of course many more months of adjustment as the optic
nerve channels achieve stochastic reconnection.’
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