Virtual Horizon

by Kris Schnee

  A robot stood rigid at the altar. This one was a dull grey with treads for legs, one of Hayflick Robotics' cheaper models. She'd seen some working backstage with human employees.

  "Are you delivering something?" asked Linda.

  The robot whirred to face her, and it spoke in a stilted, translated voice. "Praying. I was able to find one of my sisters in my native Ethiopia, and I should give thanks. I'm not sure to who."

  She noticed a stylized wing design on its shoulders. She'd seen it elsewhere, but had never made the connection to Ludo. "Is that what I think it is?"

  The robot examined the mark. "The Wings! Yes, but I'm only borrowing this body. She's no god. An angel, maybe, but not all angels are good."

  Linda was glad that people ridiculed the cult called the Ludic Order; not even people like Horizon joined it and Ludo herself quietly discouraged it. But Linda still felt like it was a quest left incomplete, a problem that'd fester across both planes of reality. There was even a meme war in progress, over who would claim a design of wings as their symbol. The crazy cultists, or Horizon's griffins and other non-lunatics, or both? She'd have called it ridiculous, but she'd lived in two different countries calling themselves "America" and claiming to be the true heirs of the same revolution. Symbols and legends mattered.

  "Are you human?" Linda asked the robot.

  "I was. I'm not sure, anymore. My name is Alazar. Ludo and her friends helped me to rescue someone, so I'm repaying her by asking God to bless this place. Her enemies have already murdered to hurt her cause."

  "FAE, you mean?"

  "That's the story, anyway. An evil being that killed a girl through lies and police action, despite her brave guardians. Many people in Talespace find inspiration in that telling."

  Were there churches in Talespace? From hearing Horizon talk, she'd figured that everyone there thought they'd found paradise. Really, they'd rediscovered the old concept of Gnosticism, a lesser god using a false world to hide the real God. Except that they were happy about it. "FAE is your devil, then?"

  Alazar laughed. "To the extent that there's a sane religion of Ludo, you're a saint yourself, ma'am. Partly for challenging us."

  Linda blushed. "I haven't given you uploaders enough credit. I assumed you'd all bow down blindly to her, instead of doing honest soul-searching."

  "We haven't found all the answers in there. I tell myself I'm faithful to the God of Abraham, but my actions speak louder."

  Linda said, "I used to feel like I wasn't living up to what I believed in, so I left behind a pretty good life." Dread washed through her muscles. She was tempting this man away from Ludo's heaven. How much had she hurt Horizon by doing the same? "I think you're seeing the situation too much in black and white. My old country isn't all bad; my brother's there and I'm trying to bring him here. FAE has got to be more than a cackling supervillain if it's programmed to 'satisfy human values' besides obeying its government."

  Alazar nodded stiffly. "I hope you're right. Still, maybe it's time to live on Earth again. I can serve better here." He stretched out one clawed arm. "May I shake your hand?"

  She shook hands with a man from another continent, language, and plane of reality, knowing they'd only met because of the "angel".

  * * *

  Linda's brother, the bombastically named Nathan Concord Decatur, arrived at last to attend the Exposition and meet up with his sister.

  At Nathan's request, she met him at the Castro Brothers Bar. Linda thought the gaudy place showed as bad taste as the Girl Hitler restaurant chain in the USA. Making monsters cute was like ripping up warning signs, or rewriting fables. She preferred Cuba's Liberation Week festival, which presented the dead tyrants in a gorier light. She said, "I thought Americans couldn't get travel passes to Cuba during the Exposition."

  Her brother had gained weight and lost hair. "You have to know the right people. I'm to report on what I see."

  Linda scowled. "Nobles can travel and peasants can't, huh?" She regretted her words. Five minutes back in contact with American problems and she felt her heart straining again for rhetorical battle.

  Nathan laughed off the rebuke. "Stubborn rebel. Don't change. We're making progress, though. The Party's got worthwhile candidates for next year, real firebrands. If we retake the House we can block most of the president's conscription expansion plan and reform the travel pass system."

  He used to talk about ending both of those arrogant, tyrannical programs. "How are Mom and Dad?" she asked, wanting to keep the peace. Nathan was here to be wooed, not criticized.

  "They'd welcome you home."

  No! He was not doing this to her. Linda struggled to keep her temper. "I'm not going back. I live in a free country. You should too. Let me show you what we can do."

  He only frowned.

  It was time to lift the curtain on the Grand Exposition.

  20. The Only Game In Town

  Linda

  On opening day, Linda frantically re-checked the Westwind building's exhibits. Her direct input wasn't strictly necessary anymore, since they'd hired a souvenir-selling clerk and Zephyr/Tess had a body there to control, but who knew when something might break? The sleek silver building had enough flashy dreams on display to rival Ludo's. She looked over the exhibits she'd designed, and saw that they were good. She turned to the wallscreen where opening ceremonies were being broadcast throughout the Exposition grounds and beyond.

  Nathan was somewhere in the crowd of dignitaries and lucky tourists who'd gathered under a blazing sun. It was time for the opening ceremony of the Exposition of a Thousand Tales, "Where new tales begin!" Linda fiddled with the exhibit lighting while the blowhards talked. Texan and Cuban politicians, mostly. No one seemed deterred by last week's announcement about "Jade Dragon", another alternative upload destination built by the Chinese, or the quiet growth of other rivals. With these other options springing up, Ludo didn't seem quite as threatening.

  A lull between speeches caught Linda's attention. She checked the screen. This time, the speaker about to take the podium was a robot. Emerald-hued, a variant on the model that the Zephyr AI (and now Tess) used. But this one wore a shirt and slacks on its plastic body. It had only large eyes on its face; she supposed anything more detailed would've looked creepy. When it reached center stage, an array of machines sprayed water into the sky to create a shimmering projection screen in midair. On it, a male human avatar appeared, matching the robot's movements. Linda laughed. She recognized this man in green and had heard stories about him. The Sage was showing a false human face, for people who had trouble grasping that uploading meant more than stepping through a screen.

  "Hello. You know me as Clark Ostler, founder and co-creator of the Thousand Tales project. It's strange to be here after my friends and I vanished. I'm able to stand here today because I'm the only one of us who was never captured or worse."

  The crowd murmured. The robot held up one hand. "Let's talk about happy things. You've heard about how techno-fairs like this one represent 'the City of the Future', where we show you what could be. Sorry, everyone, but we're not doing that. We're showing you what is, starting today. There are actually people living here. We've got kids who would've died, people who were depressed or oppressed, and folks who just thought it'd be fun to come to Ludo's world. I've had a wild time myself, and it's only going to get better. Our partners here have plenty of other visions to show you, too.

  "Don't think of this fairground as a theme park or a tech demo. We do have concerts, prizes, games, and overpriced food. Oh, I wasn't supposed to say that part." He got a few nervous laughs. "No flying cars though. The best thing I can tell you is to come in and see for yourself that this place is home for us. It can be for you, too. Welcome."

  He got more applause than the politicians, probably for brevity. Somebody cut a ribbon, and the first thousand guests flooded into the AI's clutches. Linda watched them enter. Behind the podium and the entry gates stood an inviting grassy plaza with a bandstand bearing a Thousand
Tales logo, and buildings of concrete and glass belonging to people with other dreams. Nathan would see it all and be amazed into accepting this brighter future... Linda hoped.

  * * *

  Linda was in Westwind's space exhibit when Nathan entered. He blinked in the sudden dimness and looked at the world she was offering. The room was rust-red like the surface of Mars, and a tin-can habitat sat against one wall. She'd helped paint the walls to make the desert seem to extend forever in all directions, with a chain of painted-on habitats attached to the real 3D model. A humanoid robot, another Zephyr imitation, walked around in the type of light Mars spacesuit NASA had never needed. Kids sat in a control room along one wall, learning about orbital mechanics.

  Nathan crept closer. "This is your project?"

  "I'm just a trainee. You didn't bring i-glasses?" She slipped a cheap pair onto his head, then donned her own. She grinned as he looked around again. With augmented reality the room was full of digital life, other habitat designs with their own characters and audio, making the room seem huge. One kid was talking with a simple AI alien who was only visible with the glasses.

  "Where are the altars and statues to Ludo?" asked Nathan.

  "The Exposition isn't all hers." More tourists wandered the exhibit room and drifted next door to see Westwind's other projects.

  "Sure, but you've joined her in doing crazy techno stuff. You're talking about chopping people's brains out the same way Ludo does, then flinging them into the sky to poke at space rocks."

  Linda frowned; she'd expected more enthusiasm from him. "Westwind is different. We're doing things in the real world, like the cyber-dogs and preparing to launch rockets. Our VR is for marketing's sake, not for living in."

  Nathan leaned against the wall, breaking the illusion of a livable Mars. "You live on the fringe of the world. America wasn't good enough for you, so you moved to some little island in the AFS, and now you're talking about leaving the whole planet. Ever think you're going too far?"

  "With what? Inventing new things and starting to reach out and explore again?"

  "I've missed you. You could've helped the Party turn things around." The glasses hid his eyes. "You still could. Tell the story of yourself coming back from this chaos with fresh ideas, and you could be an exciting new face among the pundits. Then run for office after all."

  Was this man still her brother? He'd grown richer, more powerful, on his own adventures back home. No. The US wasn't "home" anymore. She said, "I've been free here. I can do things I could never have done there."

  She showed him around the exhibit. A cutaway view of a habitat explained how a dozen uploaded minds and a set of construction robots could fit in the space once designed for six ordinary humans and their life support gear. She'd made sure to include a cartoon mascot of a green alien, because the audience expected to see one.

  "This stuff's all about Mars," said Nathan, finally a little engaged. "Aren't you looking to go to an asteroid?"

  Linda smiled. This question was on the script. "A friend convinced me that the general public understands 'going to Mars' better than it does asteroids. Really we'll start on a near-Earth rock that's as easy to reach as Luna, then use that to go farther."

  Nathan said, "You make it sound like the moon's within biking distance."

  She hopped in place with her hands clasped. "We could make it easy to reach. Our grandparents could have. We just collectively lost our place in the story."

  She was getting through to him. Her brother held back his cynicism and studied the many channels of signage floating in augmented reality around them. Visitors could read different levels of detail depending on the channel. She commented on the more complex technical and business descriptions. Meanwhile, other visitors were reading simplified come-ons to build enthusiasm and teach them about the science. Linda hoped that some kid would leave today inspired to become an engineer, and some billionaire would cut a check.

  She checked the visitor traffic and grinned. There were kids not just taking an interest, but pledging a dollar here and there to the project. There were people who believed in the dream.

  Nathan was too busy in his own world of data to notice her little happy dance. He said, "What else have you got to show me?"

  Linda left the other staff in charge, as planned. She and Nathan had hardly made it out the door when they saw digital confetti rain down on him. A robot marched up to Nathan and said, "Congratulations! You win episode 42: 'The Clan-Brothers of Artemis'." It handed him a data chip.

  "Huh?" asked both humans. This wasn't part of Linda's work.

  The robot said, "Random drawing. You're one of the lucky winners to get an episode of The Hundredfold Experiment, a show produced entirely in Talespace. Interstellar adventure, romance and so on."

  Nathan looked skeptically at the silver chip in his hand. "Why give me a recording?"

  A digital grin appeared on the robot's face as it sucked attention away from the real space program. It said, "It's a social experiment. You see, for this episode, this is the only copy. Sell it, put it up on the Net, keep it for yourself, or crush it under your heel."

  "Break it?" he said.

  "I don't know. Some people like destroying beautiful things. Your call."

  When they were alone in the blazing sunlight, Nathan said, "That AI of yours --"

  "Ludo isn't mine." And this gimmick could've been done by anyone in there.

  "Still, you know her. Can't you see she's dangerous even to your plans?"

  "If she takes over, yeah. We lose unless we present a compelling alternative."

  * * *

  Horizon

  Ludo wouldn't tell him where Linda had gone. Instead he slipped into a robotic griffin body at the fairground. In the corner of his vision was a [Smile Meter], claiming that the bot was powered by making park guests happy. Horizon shook his head. Divine guidance could be annoying.

  Still, he wasn't here just for Linda. He felt constricted in this stiff body of metal and plastic. After so long in Talespace the colors of Earth seemed dull. He was lucky to be able to see clearly at all, considering that he was exploring another dimension.

  The standard slang for the real world was the Outer Realm, but he'd heard people say the Dark World, something to be shunned. He considered it part of his duty to push the first term and discourage the second.

  Nocturne jumped off of the crates in this maintenance shed, crashed, knocked over a shelf, catapulted a box onto her head, and landed in an undignified heap. "Forgot I can't fly in this body."

  Horizon snorted, and relayed a video of the last ten seconds to a fan network called the Thousand Joys Show. Caption: [Wing Fail!] Nocturne would make him pay for that, but he looked forward to seeing the look on her face when she found out.

  He went over to help her, hearing their motors whirr. He had only a few basic touch sensors and limited motors, so nudging Nocturne back upright was like typing with boxing gloves on. He asked, "Where are you headed first?"

  She said, "The Flashy Cyber Future Zone." That part was run by Ludo's African operation, featuring wonders like clean water and medicine. Horizon had sensed rebuke in its faux-1980s design, as though it were made to say "How have you still not accomplished this worldwide?"

  There was a similar exhibit elsewhere in the park, run by a friendly rival organization called Silver Circle. To his surprise, he'd learned it was co-founded by Nocturne's "sister" Lumina. He wasn't sure how to feel about that, about a Talespace AI leaving her world behind to make another one. Didn't she have a responsibility to help the world that'd created her? At least the many companion AIs were off accomplishing things, each of them with a story of their own.

  "All right. I'm off to my own patrol work." Horizon hugged Nocturne as well as he could, then went out to explore the mysterious world of the sunny fairground.

  He'd practiced with one of these bodies, but it was still strange to him that he was no more than waist-high to the adults. He tried rearing up on his hindlegs and f
lopped over backwards. Horizon rolled to his feet. Hopefully nobody had seen that.

  A minute later, he was spotted. A family of five came over and their girl tackled him, giggling.

  The father said, "Careful. You might break it."

  "Sorry," said the girl, and crouched beside Horizon. "What's your name?"

  "Horizon. Are you having fun?"

  The mother said to her husband, "See? They're remote-controlled."

  Horizon got to his feet again and looked up. "From inside Talespace." He stage-whispered to the kid: "Don't tell anyone, but in there I'm actually... a griffin."

  She giggled. A boy poked at him, saying, "So, you play games all the time?"

  "I have adventures. Totally different. Want to hear about the time I fought a giant mantis shrimp with shockwave claws?"

  A few more guests wandered over to hear him tell stories. Horizon reminisced.

  The kids' father sweltered in a suit. "How much do you cost?"

  "This robot model? These aren't on sale, but there'll be some toy versions soon."

  One of the other adults said, "Not a copy of you, though? Probably just an NPC."

  "That's right."

  The kids' father said, "What I want is a non-idiot watchman who won't steal from me. How much for whatever AI you're running, in a security bot?"

  Horizon's "Smile Meter" was declining, probably a function of his actual battery power as well as guest reaction. "Minds like mine aren't for sale."

  "Then what good are you? You're toys."

  The adults grumbled and the kids looked uneasy. Horizon said, "Much more than that, sir. How about if we walk over to the Ocean Zone and show you what we can do for the environment?"

  Horizon headed toward that exhibit, answering kids' excited questions. His Smile Meter had recovered nicely.

  When it hit 90%, he lurched in a different direction and started knocking people down. He couldn't control himself! He strained to pull back but felt himself leaping forward with blunt talons slapping a woman's face. He flailed to one side to knock a boy down, then kicked a man. He tried to shout a warning, but only static came from his beak. Three guests lay on the mossy ground, hurt, and some burly father was coming to tackle him. Good, apparently! This wasn't really his body hurting people. It was a horrible improvised weapon. He called out an alert through Talespace.