Tides of Change

copyright 2003 Sarah Jane Elliott and Trifolium Books Inc. Used with permission.

"Absolutely not!"

Zac glowered at his mother. "But all the kids are wearing it like this!"

"If all the kids decided to jump out an airlock, would you do it too?" She planted her hands firmly on his shoulders and pushed him toward his room. "I have a very important conference this evening, and I'm not going to spend it explaining why my son looks like a nickel-plated porcupine. You get back to your room and sonic that stuff out of your hair."

Zac stomped back to his room and stood in front of his mirror. His mother, he concluded, was crazy. The chrome spikes sticking out from his head looked farking cool -- but moms never understood these things. He sighed, picked up the styler, and set about pulling the alloy from his hair.

"Being the son of the Governor," he said quietly, "sucks."

She'd never been this bad back on Earth. Oh, she'd been a Mom, but she'd been kinda cool sometimes. And back then, he'd been able to get away from her every other weekend to go visit Dad. But then she'd gotten the job as Governor of Oceanus Colony on Altaris, and before Zac even knew what was happening, she'd packed up all their things and shuttled them off to this farking planet at the back end of the galaxy.

"The tides of change are turning." --his mom said stuff like that-- "Think about it, Zac. We'll be part of the mission to prove that a civilian colony can actually work. We'll be making history."

"History," Zac said, "sucks."

Back home, he'd never had to worry about looking good for the colony reporters. Back home, he'd had friends. But here, all anyone saw was the goody-goody squit he had to be for his mom. Back home, he'd never had to worry about things like whether or not Callie Williams would have laughed at him if he'd asked her to the Conjunction Dance.

He'd tried talking to his mom about it, but she didn't listen. She never listened. Not about school, not about friends. Not even about Lys.

He keyed up the display on his wrist-comp, and read over the five-year-old colony archive entry he had found.

OCEANOGRAPHER VANISHES WITH YOUNG DAUGHTER

ALTARIS -- Fatma Khatri, renowned oceanographer and founding member of Oceanus Colony, vanished yesterday during a routine survey of Connor's Reef. With Khatri was her daughter, Lysithea, age eight. Rescue crews continue to search the area.

Zac shut down the display and returned his attention to his hair. It had to be Lys. Lysithea. He wrinkled his nose. The stupid Jupiter names may have died out pretty fast, but they'd been really popular with parents in the year after the Zeus Station disaster. Sometimes he was thankful that his mother had a thing for classical authors.

"Isaac," his mother said, sticking her head in the door.

Sometimes he wasn't. "Don't call me that, Mom."

She ignored him, as usual. "I don't want you staying out any later than twenty-six."

"But the conjunction isn't 'till twenty-four and a half!"

"Which will give you plenty of time to get home after you see it."

Zac raked his hands through his hair as his mother left his room. On second thought, he was glad she never listened. She'd probably throw a fit if she ever found out about Lys.

He lowered his hands and ran his finger down the long barb embedded beneath the skin of his forearm. He remembered Lys's words after she had pulled him from the water, hurt and terrified, broken shards of coral still embedded in his hands and feet. She had glanced in disgust at the remains of his waverunner, and then placed her hand over the barb, splaying her fingers so that the webbing between them showed clearly.

"Is Her punishment and promise," Lys had said, in her hesitant, accented Commonwealth. "If She wants, if She needs, She change you as She changed me."

Zac looked at his reflection and smiled. That boy in the mirror, whom nobody liked, with the stupid brown hair that wouldn't stay out of his eyes now that it wasn't sticking up in spikes anymore, was the only colonist on Altaris who knew the secret of Connor's Reef.

Still grinning, Zac got up to change for the dance.

"Tides of Change" is my first professional sale. You have absolutely no idea how excited I am that it's finally in print (there was a lot of jumping involved).

It was a long and roundabout route to get here, but it began with Holly Lisle. Back in 2000, I joined Forward Motion, and encountered Beth Long, who had just won the Grand Prize in the 2000 Isaac Asimov Award for Undergraduate Excellence in Science Fiction and Fantasy Writing. After a long talk with her, I decided to enter. And won. "To Soothe the Savage Beast" got an Honourable Mention, and I flew down to Florida to meet the other winners and accept my award.

While there, I met Nick DiChario, a friend of Rick Wilber's (Rick is the award administrator). Nick is a friend of Rob Sawyer, and suggested to Rob that, since I live in the area, he should invite me to his next party. Which he did.

While there, I made two fortuitous meetings. The first: Russell Martin, head of programming for Ad Astra. The second: Julie E. Czerneda. We chatted briefly, and had a lovely conversation about writing and biology.

Fast forward to June. Julie was doing a signing at Bakka with Michelle West and Tanya Huff, so I decided to go. I was stunned when Julie remembered not only that I was a writer and had won the Asimov award, but also that I was a biologist.

Zoom forward again to Ad Astra 2002. Russell asked me to be a panellist, so I went. It was my first SF con, and I was a little overwhelmed. But who did I find there but Julie, who once again remembered me. Over the year or so that followed, I got to know her better, and she became more familiar with my writing and my science background. Familiar enough that when an opening for ODYSSEY came up, she asked me to submit a story.

I'd been nuts about the whole idea of Wonder Zone since I heard about it at Ad Astra, so I was thrilled at the chance to be part of it. ODYSSEY is an anthology of stories based on the grade 7 and 8 science curriculum, and I based "Tides of Change" on the water systems topic. The story practically flew onto the screen, and three days later I submitted it.

It was rejected. Let this stand as an example. Just because you make connections doesn't mean you'll sell a story. You still have to be able to write a damned good one.

However, Julie told me exactly why she couldn't use it, and told me that if I wanted to rewrite it, or write something new, I was welcome to try again. I did, and this time it was exactly what she needed.

I'd made my first professional sale.

I dedicated "Tides of Change" to two women who have had a huge impact on my life. The first is Nancy Clarke, who taught me Biology in Grade 11 and OAC. She was my favourite teacher in high school, and she brought such enthusiasm and fun to the subject that I was hooked right away. Round about the bonus fetal pig dissection three hours after school ended, I knew I'd be doing biology for the rest of my life. But she was also really excited about my writing. That was when I first started to suspect that maybe I didn't have to choose between the two.

The second is Deborah McLennan, who was my professor for a number of classes in University, among them Biodiversity and Behaviour. It was Debbie who clued me in to just how much I adored biology and biodiversity, because my favourite classes university were the ones she taught. But she also encouraged my writing. I was astounded when I got back my final essay from her section of my Behaviour seminar and she'd written "This is fabulous. You should be a writer."

There you have it. Two women, one at the start of my education, and one at the end of it, who brought home just how much fun I could have incorporating my two loves -- biology and writing. Which, after all, is the whole point of Tales From the Wonder Zone.

Looking at it that way, I coudn't dedicate the story to anybody else.