The Rise of Io (38 page)

If the home world was to receive word that there were Quasing stranded here, cut off from the rest of their kind, they would investigate. The Prophus and Genjix war would end. Tao could stop struggling after all these millions of years and finally return to the collective. He could once again bathe in the warmth of the Eternal Sea and become one with his people. It was what he had wanted ever since he had arrived.

The rescue would come at a price, though. Carryalls would soon follow, and with them, billions more of his kind. They would harvest all the resources, and then envelop the surface with the Eternal Sea so it would be suitable for Quasing life. In doing so, they would doom all other life on Earth.

T
oday is July 9th
.

I'm sitting in a hospital room. I haven't slept in nearly thirty-six hours. The only things I've eaten so far are two donuts and a small bowl of soup. I may have had a cracker or two, I don't remember. Everything is a haze. I am dead on my feet. The love of my life is in pain. It's hard to watch, and there's nothing I can do except be present and share in the suffering. I also think I threw out my back breathing heavily.

Today was a hard day, and it was amazing.

I have always believed that each of us has a calling. We were put on this Earth for a purpose. Mine is to write books. My novels are my life's work. They are my identity and my legacy for the future.

That changed today.

Today, July 9th, at 8:03PM CST, my son, Hunter Yusing Chu, was born, and it's the best day of my life. He has a kung fu grip and a set of cathedral-sized pipes. The first time I changed his diapers, he let me know who was boss by peeing on me. He is quite the marksman.

I have never felt the instantaneous need to protect and love and nurture anything in the world as much as I do right now, typing these acknowledgments while my son sleeps. He's not even a day old and I will happily never write another word and toil at the worst jobs if it means his happiness. Everything I have ever worked for, I now do it for Hunter.

I hope he is one of the first astronauts to go to Mars or he discovers the cure for cancer or he becomes the writer I aspire to be. I will do anything to give him the opportunity to find his own purpose in life. He can be whatever he wants to be as long as he is happy.

To my lovely wife, Paula, the love of my life, thank you for this gift and letting me share this journey with you. You are a wonderful mother. I'm just glad he has your brains and your looks. I hope he develops your kindness and generosity as well. And probably your killer sense of style and sharp wit. While we're at it, he'll be better served with your patience and temperament too. Let's just give him most of you, and my uncanny ability to keep running into things and not get hurt.

To Paula and Hunter, this book is for you.

W
esley Chu is
the bestselling author of both the Tao series, and
Time Salvager
and its sequel. He won the John W Campbell Award for Best New Writer and his debut,
The Lives of Tao
, won the Young Adult Library Services Association Alex Award. A consultant and corporate drone in his past life, Wesley is a kung fu master, a member of the Screen Actors Guild, and recently returned from climbing Mount Kilimanjaro. He lives in Chicago, USA, where he spends his many hours during the Great Lake winters writing and hanging out with his wife, Paula, young son, Hunter, and their Airedale terrier, Eva.

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NGRY ROBOT

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Io, let's go

A
n Angry Robot
paperback original 2016

Copyright © Wesley Chu 2016

W
esley Chu asserts
the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A
catalogue record
for this book is available from the British Library.

U
K ISBN 978
0 85766 581 2

US ISBN 978 0 85766 582 9

EBook ISBN 978 0 85766 583 6

S
et by Epub Services
.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.

T
his book is sold
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T
his novel is entirely
a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

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