The Reality Assertion

by Paul Anlee

  The plan was to take a few days scouting an approach route to Alum’s local CPPU node, the one connected by the vulnerable QUEECH comm device. Darian said he was familiar with that node through Trillian’s biological memories; it was located on the top floor of a building that was once called Vesta One, the tallest in the habitat.

  The building had been demolished and rebuilt countless times in the millions of years since Vesta was nothing more than a simple asteroid habitat.

  The current manifestation was the heart of Alumit Administration. The top floor housed the offices of the Proctor of the Alumitum. It was a lofty office, both literally and figuratively. Proctor of the teaching college for the entire Church of Alum was the highest attainable rank for any human. Any normal human.

  One or more Shards of Alum met with the Proctor on a regular basis to ensure the teaching programs were correctly aligned with core doctrine.

  A Council of Shards loosely presided over the Alumita, and the Council took their instructions directly from Alum, Himself. Unlike the ancient religious councils of Earth/Origin, present day Alumita had no need for interpreters of God’s pronouncements. Anyone of suitable rank could simply ask Him to clarify His words.

  Because of the constant traffic of various holy representatives of the Living God, it was only fitting that the Alumit Administration be guarded by its own contingent of Angels.

  There’s no way we’ll be able to waltz in and be whisked up to the Proctor’s Office—Stralasi fretted. His consternation slipped out as an audible grunt.

  The young novice immediately in front of him turned at the sound. His eyes widened to see that two ordained Brothers had joined the small procession behind him.

  “Brothers,” the young man beamed, “are you joining us?”

  Darian hid his scowl behind a raised hand.

  Stralasi put on his most open smile and nodded.

  “Indeed, young man,” he replied. “We’ll be teaching Pragmatics 315 this semester. If you’re interested in specializing in Founding worlds, you should drop in for a lecture.”

  Hopefully, we’ll be done before I’m actually called on to teach—he thought.

  He realized that he’d just informed anyone within earshot about a course he had no intention in delivering. He had a sudden desire to retract his invitation.

  “But that would be a harsh life for one raised so close to Home World,” he said. “There are countless more suitable appointments for one like yourself, no doubt.”

  The novitiate perused the line of fifty other young men ahead of him. His brow furrowed a little.

  “Well, I hadn’t really thought about that. Competition for good posts will be tough.”

  His face lit up with hope. “Maybe I’ll drop in and see what it’s about.”

  “The course is intended for third-years. Maybe it would be better if you wait a semester or two,” Stralasi suggested.

  “Yes,” Darian growled. “Some might view a freshman in class as disruptive. We have the juniors and seniors to consider, Good Brother.”

  Stralasi tried to look appropriately remorseful, as one who’d overstepped his bounds.

  Caught in the crossfire of an uncomfortable exchange, the young novice lowered his eyes and turned back to the line ahead of him.

  “A little less enthusiasm for our fake job, Brother,” Darian reminded Stralasi.

  Suitably chagrined, the Good Brother shrugged.

  “Sorry,” he whispered. “Teaching at the Alumitum was always a dream of mine. I got caught up in the moment.”

  They moved forward a few steps.

  “If only we’d been able to shift to our target directly,” Stralasi suggested.

  “Impossible!” Darian said, a little too loudly.

  The same curious young novice turned around.

  Darian met his stare with an intensity that returned the naïve young student’s countenance full ahead with no desire to look back again, and lowered his voice to a secretive hush that slipped from the side of his mouth.

  “You know a direct shift to the Alumitum, not to mention right into the Vesta One tower, would be too easily detected. Unless, that is, you want to bring the full might of Alum upon us. Personally, I’d rather not confront him directly. No, without other diversions to count on, we’ll have to arrive with this group via normal starstep.”

  Stralasi grimaced.

  “You know, it’s ironic. For most of my life, Alum has had my implicit trust. But over this past year, I’ve gotten used to traveling with Darak. I’ve put my life in his hands more times than I can count, and he’s never let me down. It’s hard to go back to pretending I’m still the monk I once was. It’s hard to trust this system, now.”

  “I’m sure the system will work as designed,” Darian said. “There’ll be the usual scans for biological compatibility and such, not much else. That’s why we chose to start here on the Darbiness ringworld. It’s a Realm-Standard environment, like the Alumitum. The scans will be superficial and quick.”

  Stralasi fidgeted.

  “They won’t detect your lattice changes,” Darian assured him. “Nor your QUEECH connection to your Familiar.”

  Stralasi’s eyes shot to Darian’s face.

  Darian laughed. “Nor my recent nano-surgery, nor my...er…recently-enhanced intellectual status.”

  “Shhh! You can’t talk about that here! Good grief. I’d almost feel better about a straight-up confrontation,” Stralasi said. “At least that way I’d know my death would come quickly.”

  Darian gave Stralasi a comforting smile and squeezed his shoulder.

  “We have a few days to poke around before classes start. Let’s see if we can figure out a plan.”

  “I don’t think I’m built for this kind of covert activity.”

  “Even you can pretend to be a tourist for a few days.”

  “A tourist?” Stralasi snorted, “on Alumitum?”

  “Okay, a visiting scholar?”

  “I thought we’d agreed on the roles of professors.”

  “We did. That’ll be enough to get us into common areas like the Lecture complex or the Library. Maybe we can invent some kind of bureaucratic snag to justify a visit to the Alumit Administration.”

  “Not the Proctor’s Office!” Stralasi was horrified by the idea.

  “No, I don’t think so,” Darian answered. “That probably isn’t required. Anyway, Alum’s CPPU is one floor higher.”

  Another surprise.

  “The Proctor’s Office isn’t the top floor?”

  “No, too much casual traffic. Too high a chance that humans and maintenance Cybrids might bump into each other. Alum prefers a little more privacy. For His physical substrate if nothing else. Secrecy is excellent security. Having everyone believe there’s nothing above the Proctor’s Office but the machine room has its advantages.”

  “How will we gain access?”

  Darian frowned.

  “I don’t know that yet.”

  The line advanced a few more steps. The street opened into a plaza with a monk standing at a starstep prayer podium.

  Darian lowered his voice further.

  “Have faith, Brother,” he said to the monk. “We’ll figure out something.”

  * * *

  Stralasi and Darian materialized along with the rest of their cohort, at a small plaza in the far south end of the ancient Vesta One habitat tunnel.

  With under a hundred in their group, they’d been sent to one of the more remote starstep stations serving the Alumitum campus. From there, they had to walk an hour to get to their assigned quarters.

  The path wound pleasantly through a narrow park, beside a slow-moving longitudinal stream that led into the heart of the city. As they approached the midpoint of the habitat tunnel, the spires of educational and administration centers rose above the lower residential and commercial towers.

  The Alumitum Administration stood twice as tall as any of the other towers. It was a proud beacon that drew all eyes including
their own to the geographical heart of the habitat. Though the spiritual heart was located tens of thousands of light years away in Alum’s Hall in the Origin system, this was indisputably the educational heart of Alum’s Realm.

  The Vesta asteroid had been moved, ages ago, closer to the middle of the Milky Way galaxy, and nearer to the Home World system and its larger population centers. The population density had been conscientiously reduced over the ages, befitting a campus world. Each of the six habitat tunnels now comfortably housed a population of three million. Roughly a million of those were students following a blessed calling to serve the Alumit. The remainder was made up of instructors, administrators, and support staff who for the most part lived permanently on the Alumitum.

  Teaching the next generation of Brothers and administering a Church which spanned over a hundred million light years necessitated the largest bureaucracy in human history. And, every year, that Church bureaucracy grew a carefully-planned four percent larger—just like the Realm itself—ensuring new opportunities for its ambitious young novices.

  Also every year, Alum, the distributed Living God that governed all within the Realm, grew by the same amount.

  Though Stralasi had spent six years here studying, that was many years ago and it now felt oddly foreign to him. Whether it was because of the intervening years since his graduate work or because of the ominous threat posed by the God he once worshipped, the God he’d learned to represent in the lecture halls of this very city, the Good Brother couldn’t tell.

  The monk who led their group along the path beside the stream chatted in an incessant drone that matched the languid flow of the water.

  He recited mundane facts about the habitat tunnel and its population. He provided names for the towers in the distance. As they left the single-family residential area and walked into a region of low apartment buildings, he introduced the newcomers to the way everyday life worked in the Alumitum.

  “Your day begins with thirty minutes of prayers for Lauds at 6:00 am, Standard Time, followed by breakfast in your local cafeteria until 7:30. Morning classes start at 8:00 sharp and they run until the Midday prayers at noon. There will be a midmorning break after the first class for Terce prayers at 9:30, followed by thirty-minutes of private meditation and more classes. Lunch is from 1:00 pm and classes resume an hour later. Mid-afternoon prayers are at 3:30 and the final class follows until Vespers at 6:00 pm. Your evening meal is served until 7:30, followed by studies, until Compline at 9:30 pm, and back to studies and meditation until the Matins reading at midnight. Then, off to bed until we begin again the next morning.”

  To Darian’s amusement, Stralasi silently mouthed the recitation from the back of the line. When the Good Brother noticed his companion’s smirk, he gave Darian a brief glare and returned his attention to the lead monk’s tour.

  How many times have I heard this schedule over the years?—he wondered. Twice a year for four years, and again with every new Brother that had ever been assigned to one of his Founding Alumitas.

  Hundreds of times—he reckoned. Maybe thousands.

  The cadence was familiar, comforting. It felt like home.

  It reminded him of the life of certainty he’d led for hundreds of years before Darak showed up on Gargus 718.5 and lured him away to adventure.

  Though he now knew praying to Alum was like asking the wind for guidance and forgiveness, he found it hard to break old habits.

  “On Saturday,” the monk resumed, “you will contribute to upkeep of the college grounds from 8:00 am until dinner at 6:00 pm. Saturday evenings are reserved for individual studies, meditation, and prayer. On Sunday, following Church service at 9:00 am, the rest of the day is yours. Relax. Enjoy the amenities of the city—in moderation of course.”

  The caveat received the expected groans and chuckles.

  “The school week begins anew with Matins, Sunday at midnight.”

  The carefully-timed lecture ended as they approached the Housing Assignment Office.

  “Ah, here we are.”

  Groups that had arrived earlier were already dispersing.

  The monk climbed the first few stairs and motioned for his group to gather closer.

  “If you consult your tablets, you will see your class schedules and assigned residences. Maps of the freshman campus area will have been downloaded as well. Simply follow their guidance to your assigned building.”

  Around the corner of the building, Stralasi heard another group arriving and their guide launching into the exact same spiel.

  “If you have any questions or concerns, or if you’d prefer reassignment to a different residence or roommate,” their guide looked sternly at his charges, “I would urge you to consider the nature of your calling and pray on the matter until the next morning.”

  It was not uncommon for two initiates who were close friends to prefer to room together but requests for reassignment did not reflect the necessary forbearance required of the Alumit and were, without exception, frowned upon.

  The tour leader scanned the faces below for any sign of a problem.

  “Any questions?”

  Darian’s hand shot up.

  Of course—Stralasi groaned and edged away.

  The guide pointed at the outstretched hand clad in monk’s robes.

  “Yes, Brother...er?”

  “Darian,” Stralasi’s co-conspirator called out. “John Darian. Brother Stralasi and I don’t seem to have any assigned quarters.”

  The guide waved Darian forward. A few of the initiates wandered off, their fingers tracing out the routes to their assigned residences on their tablets. Some hung back, curious about the Brothers with no room, or waiting their turns to ask questions.

  The guide consulted his tablet.

  “I don’t see your names anywhere on my list,” he said. “I was only expecting novitiates today.”

  “Our orders came late last night,” Darian lied. “They were unexpected and gave us little time to prepare.”

  “Still, you could have informed me,” the guide said, clearly annoyed.

  “Our apologies, Brother,” Stralasi jumped in. “We didn’t know which starstep we’d be taking until minutes before our departure.”

  The man’s eyes flicked between the two troublesome Brothers.

  “Let me see your orders,” he said.

  Darak held out his tablet and swiped it to send a copy to the irritated monk. “Yes, of course. Right here, Brother...? How may I call you?”

  “Astram,” the man replied. He looked down at his own tablet, flipping through Darian’s and Stralasi’s counterfeit letter.

  “Everything appears to be in order.”

  He closed the letter, opened a connection to the Residential administration program, and poked around a bit.

  “Hmmm. That’s odd. Nothing here. I wonder who was originally assigned to the course.”

  He opened another tab and queried Registration.

  “Ah,” he said. “Here’s the problem. Your course isn’t in the schedule for this semester.”

  Stralasi stood silently, genuinely dumbfounded.

  What do I do now?—he wondered.

  Darian stepped in smoothly.

  “Yet our orders clearly tell us to report here, today.” He smiled innocently.

  Brother Astram stared skeptically at the two of them, not masking his annoyance at being presented with this irregularity.

  “Very well. I can put you up in the Residence Hotel over the weekend. I suggest you visit Alumitum Administration first thing on Monday morning and straighten this out.”

  He wrote a quick note to the Registrar’s Office for them, setting up an early morning appointment. Next, he booked them a room at the Vesta One Campus Inn.

  “Any other questions?” he huffed. Without waiting for a response, he brusquely departed for the Housing Assignment building.

  Stralasi noted Darian’s impish grin.

  “I thought our orders would appear legitimate.”

  Da
rian’s grin grew broader and more mischievous.

  “There are limits to what one can do from hundreds of light years away. The letter was sufficiently convincing to get us this far. We have a room for tonight and tomorrow. That will give us some time to shore up appearances and scout the neighborhood around the Alumitum Administration. On Monday, we’ll be inside the building. I’d say the day has been quite a success so far.”

  Stralasi consulted his tablet and pointed off to the right.

  “I believe our hotel is this way.”

  35

  “This feels criminal,” Stralasi whispered.

  “We need to keep up the appearance that we intend to be here for the full semester,” Darian replied. “You know that.”

  “An unholy waste of time, effort, and resources,” Stralasi persisted, as if he hadn’t heard. “Worse than criminal, it’s a sacrilege.”

  “It’s all part of the disguise, Brother,” Darian reminded him. “Justified by necessity and as righteous as anything else they do here in the Alumitum.”

  The pair had spent the better part of Saturday and Sunday traipsing around the city in search of food and clothing. Shopping, they agreed, was exhausting.

  When they couldn’t bear another minute, they took a break at a café a few blocks from the Administration tower and settled into a comfortable quiet between them. Only once they cradled steaming cups of strong brew did Darian open conversation along a more agreeable line.

  “Did you have a nice visit with Crissea?”

  “I’d rather have been there in person,” Stralasi mumbled.

  He didn’t mean to complain. He was grateful for his newfound ability to shift his attention to his Familiar self on distant Eso-La while his human self was shuttered away in the lackluster Vesta One Inn with Darian. But physical contact through the senses of his Familiar was not an entirely satisfying replacement for his own biological presence.

  “Naturally,” Darian answered. “But you are there in person. Just not in…human.”

  Stralasi was not amused.

  “Well, it feels inhuman,” he replied, picking up on Darian’s pun, “to be separated from myself this way. I kept finding myself wanting to reach out and touch her with a hand, only to brush against empty air. Or worse, one of my tentacles would slip out to stroke her hair. I didn’t realize that that just isn’t done. Did you know that Familiar manipulators are only for work or defense, not intimacy?”