The Watchers: A Space Opera Novella

by Ballard, Jeffrey A.

  Crawlers? I split again and let myself go deeper into one the policeman downstairs.

  Lee Delera. A man numb to Sumiko’s plight, a man pulled along by the forces of the world around him. Two hours and twelve minutes until his shift was over. Then he could meet up with his friends and immerse themselves in the virtual reality world of Kadara.

  The crawlers arrive, four of them. They came up to Lee’s knee, two spheroid balls stacked on top of one another with the top most ball smaller than the bottom one. Four spindly, whip-like legs descended down from the bottom ball, each moving so rapidly as to give the impression of mechanical spiders.

  They stop in front of Lee, awaiting his orders. Lee waves them away. The four shoot off, their legs a blur. Two hours and ten minutes until his shift is over.

  Sumiko steps off onto the fourth floor, a factory floor, unsure where to go next. Karon? Where should I—

  There’s no time, those crawlers are coming. The fourth floor is a manufacturing plant of some kind. There’s heavy machinery spread over the loft-like space with no interior walls. Hide in the machinery, as far as you can work yourself into it.

  But Branden, she thinks.

  Hurry! They’re coming. I’ll keep Branden calm.

  Thankfully, she listens. She runs to the nearest machine. An oven maybe? A printing press of some kind? Either way it has an entrance that she wiggles into, trying to work herself as far into it as possible. The fear of discovery overwhelms any fear of claustrophobia. She tenderly held Branden close and tries not to jostle him too much.

  I try to recall the happiest feelings of my life. Those periods in which I was most content. Oddly, I remember my own mother. I can’t recall what she looks like, but I remember her smell, the sharp floral scent. It’s the first time I ascribe the scent to her, but know it to be true. I remember wearing pajamas, the one-piece kind with the footies. I remember stuffed animals; I remember her reading, but not her voice. And now I remember not having to be worried. That’s what I send to Branden: warmth, comfort, security.

  Sumiko’s breath is hot in the confined space, humid. She chews her lips in worry.

  A door creaks open, skittling sounds shuffle over the floor. A crawler is here. Sumiko’s heart pounds; her left breast hurts—she needs to feed. I float above the machine Sumiko’s in and observe the crawler.

  It’s fast, frighteningly fast. And it’s dipping into the machines.

  Oh, God. It’s going to find her. There’s nowhere to go, nowhere to hide.

  Karon, what’s happening? Karon?

  I can’t respond. I can’t save her. Machines are immune to Watchers, they have no thought patterns.

  The skittling sound grows closer.

  Karon!

  I flee the building and dive myself into the first policeman I find. I hit him so hard all sense of his self is lost. I rip the communicator from his wrist and say in a voice completely foreign to me, “I found her! She’s over here—” Where is over here? “—She’s on the run, I’m in pursuit!” I start running and damn near fall. This guy is tall, his legs are much longer than I’m used to.

  “Stay in pursuit, Officer Cearley,” his/my communicator squawked. “We’re vectoring to your position.”

  I keep Officer Cearley running and pull back a little. The poor guy is lost, in shock. I’ve done something abhorrent, something so looked down upon, so reviled, I can feel myself wanting to throw up. But I keep him running.

  I come back to Sumiko. The skittling sound is gone. Officer Delera, his partner and four crawlers are exiting the building, heading in the direction of Officer Cearley.

  Sumiko, we have to move. I’ve called them away, but—

  Slip.

  ***

  My eyes open to a female with a hawkish nose that turns up at the tip standing over me. I feel like I should know her.

  She says, “Watcher Emre, welcome back. Tell me, how did it go?”

  Watcher Emre? I fight panic down. Where is Branden? My chest rises and falls, my breasts are flat, that’s not right, is it? No, it’s not. I am a Watcher. I’m a man. I am Emre.

  Oh, shit. I went too deep.

  “Watcher Emre?” Another woman with short raven hair comes to stand next to her.

  They’re familiar, but I can’t place them. Damn, my head hurts. I give a great sigh that’s not acting at all. “My head …”

  Hawk Nose says, “Watcher Emre, report.”

  I wave my hand in genuine confusion. I’m not sure what’s going on. I catch Hawk Nose sharing a look with Raven Hair. She says, “What is your name?”

  I can’t answer.

  “What is the last thing you remember?”

  “I— I—”

  “The last thing you remember!”

  “The crawlers, they were leaving. Following after Cearley. Sumiko—”

  “Sumiko?” Hawk Nose exchanges a surprised look with Raven Hair.

  “You went to Evaga?”

  “Yes.”

  “You were supposed to go to Strata.”

  “I did.”

  “Did Strata know about the events on Evaga?”

  “No.”

  “How long were you there?”

  “An hour.” Maybe?

  “How many people did you Watch?”

  “Thousands.”

  “And none knew of the events of Evaga?”

  “No.”

  “What is the key to making the consciousness projectors work?”

  “I— I don’t know.” Should I know? I don’t feel like I ever did. Should they know?

  Polston. That’s her name. And Delphine. Occupiers, enemies.

  She asks more questions rapid fire about my time on Strata and Evaga. I answer. She doesn’t slip in anymore questions directly about the Watch, but I’m wary. It’s slowly starting to come back to me.

  The Regency is here to steal the projectors. The DNA profiling law was a convenient cover. It’s really not all that surprising, but still frightening when confronted with it.

  Through it all I can’t stop worrying about Branden and Sumiko. I had called off the crawlers, given them opportunity. Are they okay?

  “Watcher Emre, you are dismissed until thirteen hundred tomorrow,” Councilor Polston says.

  I stand and waver a little unevenly. My legs are shorter than I remember. “As you wish.”

  I leave and wander the hallways, putting my thoughts in order. After the moist air of Strata and the clutter of the manufacturing floor in Evaga, the hallways are empty, barren: lifeless.

  Sumiko’s a survivor. She made it to that building without being caught. She was smart enough to dump her vehicle. I was able to give her a clear enough picture of what was happening, wasn’t I? I wander in these thoughts for … some time, I’m not sure how long exactly.

  Eventually, Renya smoothly saddles up next to me. “Easy, Emre.”

  Easy? I look at her quizzically.

  “You’re chewin’ your lip off.”

  I stop, wondering where I picked up that habit.

  “Dinner tomorrow?” Renya asks me, holding her hands together—a signal.

  I clasp my hands behind me to show I acknowledge. “Sure, what are we having?”

  “Split-pea soup, but there’s no Rye bread. It’s still in transport, and there’s concern it may have spoiled.”

  “Damn, I’ve been looking forward to Rye bread.”

  “I know,” she says sincerely, with something akin to compassion in her eyes. “See you then?”

  “Wouldn’t miss it.”

  Renya breaks away as swiftly as she came.

  Interesting. Joslyn’s back and wants to meet tomorrow. As punishment once for some shenanigans I did, all she allowed me to eat for a month was split-pea soup. Plus, the Regency hasn’t supplied the data on our origins (the “Rye bread”) yet and the Directorate thinks it’s tainted and doesn’t want us to look at it.

  I continue to wander the hallways for a bit, pondering these developments before heading to bed. />
  CHAPTER FIVE

  I’M BACK in the conference room where we met Ambassador Elkier, but it’s shorter than normal and I’m in a consciousness projector. The viewing port looks out over the Old Industrial part of New Florence on Evaga.

  An impossibility. A dream.

  I find a clock: 14:32. I look away and study the room: the oval table, the brown leather chairs are all the same. But the projector I’m in is made of wood, it smells spicy and floral, moist, alive. It reminds me of home. I look back at the clock: 10:12.

  Definitely a dream.

  I school my mind. This is the trickiest part, when you first realize you’re dreaming. If the conscious mind, awakened at this realization, rejects too strongly the setting from the subconscious, the dreamer will wake.

  Lucid dreaming is almost a byproduct of our training. Our minds are trained to accept bizarre inputs, thoughts of thousands of individuals, processing their senses as if our own. I feel my conscious mind slide into the passenger seat, able to process and still give direction, but willing to go where the subconscious is going to take it.

  I stand and consider what to do. I feel the need to talk to someone, which means finding another person. But do I go deeper into the station or through the window to Evaga? The station or Evaga?

  It’s not possible to engage Sumiko from a dream.

  Sumiko. The thought is like molasses: heavy, difficult. Going through the window would wake me.

  I leave the conference room and go deeper into the station. That’s not quite right. I don’t move—I move the station around me. It slides by on command, an odd mixture of polished black tiles and Evaga concrete with some street trash from Strata.

  The personnel quarters. I come to a door with an embossed “W” on the door. Joslyn’s room. I haven’t yet seen another soul, but somehow I know.

  I enter.

  She sits on her bed eating a stir-fry dish, her heavy glass table from the sitting room set in front of her as if she were eating at a restaurant. She’s dressed as she always is in loose fitting black pants and off-white shirt. She looks up as I enter.

  Everything in a dream is a reflection of the dreamer. People are but a reflection of ourselves, filtered through our expectations of them. Joslyn was one of the first people I was able to identify a meaning for in my dreams: Wisdom.

  “Greeting, Emre,” she says, “How may I help you?” Her standard greeting when she’s relaxed.

  I move into the room. It’s her room, through and through, no strange dream anomalies, besides the glass desk from the sitting room in the bedroom. That in-and-of itself is strange. The walls are a warm textured blue throughout, with a soft luxurious carpet in the bedroom and an intricate in-laid wood design of the systems in the Ancillary Universe on the sitting room floor.

  “I do not know how to help Sumiko,” I say. The statement surprises me both in saying it, and its sudden obviousness.

  I had only been helping her escape, acting as a guide. But toward what? Could she survive long term on Evaga? A life on the run? Was that possible without my constant input?

  “How have you helped her so far?” she asks.

  “I’ve helped her escape, avoid arrest. Calmed Branden so that he wouldn’t give them away.”

  “And that is not enough?”

  “No.”

  “Why?”

  The question almost irritates me—it’s something Joslyn would ask—but I’ve learned to go with it, both in a dream and when actually speaking to her. “I wish her to be able to survive without my intervention.”

  “You wish to pass her off to someone else’s care?”

  “No. I wish she wouldn’t have need of anyone else’s care.”

  “But you would object to having her in someone else’s care?”

  “What? No.” I didn’t think I did. “What do you mean?”

  “Plaiselle.”

  “What …” My conscious mind is off and racing before adding the exclamation point. It’s there … elusive … the connection. I can feel my frontal brain starting to pull me toward wakefulness, the desperate need to remember Plaiselle awakening the same part of the brain that contains the primary motor cortex. The part of the brain that is dormant during dreaming, too much activity and it kicks the dreamer out of the dream thinking the body is moving which requires more immediate attention.

  I try to set an anchor. Connect the thought with something absurd. Plaiselle was Watch Director when the Boon Blockade happened. I try to picture bright pink ships surrounding Watch Station as an anchor.

  It doesn’t work. Ka-tish. The dream slips away.

  I open my eyes to see Renya rushing through my door. It doesn’t take long to wake from a lucid dream; the conscious mind is already engaged. The experience is similar to putting a book down, shifting your mind from a fictional reality to the present one.

  I sit up calmly, and rest my feet on the floor.

  Renya says, “Plele and the other Watchers on Klast are dead.”

  ***

  I follow a half-step behind Renya as we rush through the hallways, heading toward the closest consciousness projector room.

  Renya continues updating me as we hurry, “The other members of Plaiselle—”

  Plaiselle, the word strikes a chord. It’s important to Branden, but how?

  “Emre, are you listening to me!” Renya stops to face me.

  I lower my eyes and shake my head no.

  Her eyes blaze, and she steps into my personal space. She may be shorter than I, but it feels as if she looks down on me from a mile above. “Damnnit, Emre. Now, now is the time we need you most. It has to be you. Has to be!”

  “Why?”

  She exhales through her nose like a bull ready to charge. I realize then I hadn’t been listening as I much as I thought I had. Watchers are dead, and all I can think about is an elusive thought from a dream I was trying desperately to latch onto for Branden’s sake. “Because Emre, we need you to go deep, to coordinate the resistance.”

  Mixed feelings flood me: to be needed for a self-perceived weakness; to be ordered to violate our most basic tenets—coordinating would require Watching the Prime Universe and speaking directly into minds. There was precedent, but still. And there is something else, something in connection with Plaiselle … resistance.

  “We want you,” Renya continues, “to first verify the de— deaths on Klast.” The stutter is the first sign to that which I should have been immediately aware of. Plele was on Klast, her mentor, the closest thing we have to parents around here.

  “Renya, I’m so sorry about—”

  “There isn’t time for this.” She turns on her heel and starts rushing toward the projector room again. “The Regency is moving to arrest and remove Watchers from Watch Station. They’re seeking to divide us both physically and electronically. Already, no signals can leave Watch Station. We have no way to get word out. There have been anti-Watch stories buried in the nets in the past few days, some even referencing the ‘disobedience’ of the Directorate about refusing to Watch the Ancillary Universe.

  “Don’t you see what’s happening? The Regency doesn’t want to control us, they want to replace us. Throw out all our rules in favor of their own. This isn’t an occupation—it’s an annihilation.”

  It sinks in. This is for real. The Regency has made a bold gambit to end the game on a daring strike. And we’re on our heels, desperate: not only willing, but viewing breaking two of our foundational rules as our only hope. Of course we would defend ourselves, stand against an abuse of power. And then it hits me, so would the people on Evaga. There has to be some kind of resistance to the DNA profiling law. Some kind of resistance to help Sumiko. People will always rise against tyranny, against unjustness.

  We enter the projector room, the same one I’ve been working out of with the Regency officials. I stride over to the projector, sit down and start attaching the neural patches. I look at the control panel and two problems hit me: there’s no power, and the control
panel is physically incapable of dialing in the Prime Universe—a safeguard.

  “Uh … Renya.”

  “I’m working on it.” Renya had entered the room and dropped to her knees and removed a white floor tile. She plunged her head and arms down below the floor and fiddled with stuff. I’m not sure what, but it sounded like she knew what she was doing. I can hear her pushing wires out of the way, and her grunts as she struggles with certain things.

  As she works, I prepare myself to jump Universes. Theoretically, it is no different than moving in space in the Ancillary Universe, but conceptually it is like physically leaping across a great chasm where both sides keep moving at split-second randomness. But the Watch needs me. They are counting on me.

  Renya says, her head buried beneath the floor, “They cut off power to all the projectors. I’ve just got to … make … a few …” She pauses for several seconds, long enough for me to think she forgot about me.

  “Renya?”

  “Yeah, listen,” she continues, sans head, still buried beneath the floor. “After Watching Klast, check in with Watch Director Joslyn to get orders. The rest of the Plaiselle team is leading an assault on the personnel quarters to free her. Part distraction for us up here, part we ‘effing need Joslyn. She’ll act as … commander …. Got it!” She extracts herself from the floor and hurries over.

  “Where should we set the coordinates?” I ask her. For some reason, I think putting them on the farthest most edge of the Ancillary Universe will help me mentally prepare for the Universe jump.

  “No time. I hardwired power to the projector, but the Regency will learn of it soon, if they haven’t already. Make the jump from wherever it sets you.”

  I want to object, but she flips the switch.

  I try to calm myself. Breathe in through the nose, out through the mouth. I am not Emre. I am not a single person. I am not Sumiko. I am not a mother or her baby. I am both. I am all.

  I am the Hope of the Watch.

  Slip.

  ***

  The building in Old Industrial. The factory floor. It’s quiet now, only artificial lights from the surrounding city leak in, only pale shadows inhabit the space now.