Michael Swanwick's Periodic Table of Science Fiction

114

Uuq

Ununquadium

(289)

Island of Stability

Ununquadium has lasted for thirty seconds without breaking up, which is

very rare for an element this heavy. We're all terribly proud of it.

Let's hear a big round of applause for ununquadium. Everybody! That's

good.

The transfermian elements tend to be high-strung, everybody knows that.

They're thoroughbreds, hothouse flowers, pampered little bundles of

neuroses. You can look at them cross-eyed and they'll fall apart.

Not ununquadium. It had long been predicted that an atom with 114 protons

and 184 neutrons would be particularly stable, and, well, just look at

it! A little shaky, perhaps, a little damp on the forehead and jittery in

the eyes, but still with us. That's because ununquadium is the first

element in what's called an "island of stability," a region deep in the

periodic table where an element's half-life is appreciably longer than

those of its predecessors.

Why should this be? Well, evidence is mounting that it's a matter of

character. Ununquadium began well by admitting that it has a problem

holding things together. Then it sought help. It wasn't afraid of looking

foolish. It didn't worry that people might think the less of it. It saw

what needed to be done and did it.

But that's not all! I understand that ununquadium has an important

message for us. Something about God and the meaning of the universe, is

that right? Yes, I see that it is. It's urgent that we know this, you

say? I'm sure that it is. And in just a moment I'm going to ask you to

come up front and share it with us.

First, however, I have a few brief announcements. Will the owner of the

white Ford Taurus station wagon parked out front please move it? It's

blocking the driveway, and if it's not moved soon, it will be towed. Next

week's meeting has been postponed to the eighteenth, due to a scheduling

mixup. Please mark your calendars. Those of you who haven't yet paid your

annual dues should?

Oh. Dear me. Ununquadium seems to have split.

That's really a terrible pity, because I gather that what it had to say

really was important. In fact, if I may share this with you, ununquadium

confided to me just before I came up here that this might well be the

single most important message any of us ever received. And now, alas,

we'll never know what it was.

But let's not dwell on it. Life is too short.

The End