He couldn’t blink out of existence anymore. Not and expect to blink back in.
He held up his hands placatingly. “Yeah, I’m retired from arch-nemesis status until further notice.” He wasn’t sure if he’d be shown mercy. It sure as hell wouldn’t have been his first consideration.
This time he and the witch affixed their eyes on one another there was a different flash of awareness across their eyes. Their reptilian, fear-driven brains had taken over. The nanococktail Monica had released on the world in an effort to build on Synthia’s work had finally eroded their brains like it had all the others on the planet. Just took a little longer because their defenses were better. Even Noah, Jarod, Monica, and Ethan would have benefitted from the mind sync with Synthia, slowing the advances of the virus on their minds. But now, the strongest of them, namely Lazarus and Synthia, had succumbed to it. That’s why they only wanted to do one thing right now. The immediate danger gone, they just wanted to flee each other’s presence. That was the reptilian brain for you, all right. He could see the strategic mistake he was making just as the child could. But neither of them could do a damn thing about it.
So both parties turned and fled.
FIFTY-TWO
The group came out into the open like rats as soon as they saw the cat was gone. “Did he just actually run from us?” Noah said. “Yes!” He pumped his rifle at the subterranean hangar ceiling.
“He saw in my eyes what I saw in his,” Synthia said.
“And what was that?” Ethan asked.
“That we are no longer who we once were, just shadows of our former selves.”
“I don’t feel all that different,” Noah said.
“Actually, I feel pretty good,” Jarod chimed in. He dropped the last of the bands of grenades he’d been toting around.
“Yeah, me too. So what’s up?” Ethan was still trying to get his mind around what Synthia was referring to. The fear inside him told him he had to get his mind around it, even if he was feeling unusually thick.
“You feel good,” Synthia said, “because you’re like well-fed animals that have consumed your fill of adrenaline, which you feel more keenly now that the microbes in our body can feed off of pure energy even better than before. Soon the satiety will pass, and with it the sense of security that comes with the comfort food. The fears and dread will follow. The tremors of anxiety. The acting on impulse with little accompanying brain activity. For those of us more keyed to our reptilian brains. For those of us more in touch with our mammalian brains, we will withdraw into the shelter of the family unit. Pray that is the case for you and Monica, Ethan.”
“And for you and I,” Noah said.
“Don’t worry about me,” Jarod said. “The more cold-blooded I feel, the more likely I am to surrender to those urges to print a girlfriend for myself and catch up on ravaging her, make up for all those years gone to waste, without any of the intervening social constraints that the higher brain is wont to impose.”
“I’m afraid you won’t find it such a relief when the time comes,” Monica said. “Ethan and I have had plenty of opportunities to descend into more primitive ways of dealing with one another. You might say it’s the foundation of our relationship.”
“Yeah, she’s right,” Ethan said. “It’s not all that much fun. Though I didn’t exactly have a term for what we were doing at the time.”
“I don’t know if we’ll be together much longer,” Synthia said. “Once the more primitive urges kick in, we’ll be more at their mercy than ever. I’m afraid we’ll be less inclined to see one another as part of the same tribe. That said, I hope we will meet again, I hope we’ll find a way to crawl up to our former heights on our own. Not just for our sakes, but for the entire human race. If we can lick this thing, maybe we can pass the secret on to the rest of the world. Maybe this can be the beginning of a truly egalitarian era, and the post-apocalyptic world beyond this underground shelter is just the darkness before the dawn.”
“A nice enough sentiment,” Ethan thought. Which he had absolutely no faith in. Maybe he was already descending from that high ahead of the rest of them. He had more experience falling off his high horse than most, so it wouldn’t surprise him.
They took turns hugging one another, teary eyed. But soon enough the roller coast of emotions they were all on began descending. Folks were reaching for their weapons before heading out the door. Just the fact that they thought to take them with them, suggested it was a different world they were heading into—as different people.
Synthia proved to be right, as always. They didn’t leave together, but in smaller units. Synthia and Noah left first, then Jarod. Monica and Ethan pulled up the rear. Already all his mammalian-dominant brain could think of was where to find a safe place to procreate, to find food, and to shelter their young. Maybe sinking to a mammalian functioning level wasn’t such a bad thing. Techa knows, when his higher brain was in charge, those baser urges never seemed to get fed. It was time for the animal in him to come out. It made him sad though to think that might be the last joke he ever made. The higher brain, after all, was where all that self-detachment came from. What would he do from the warmth of whatever hovel they crawled into to have sex and pick fleas off one another if he couldn’t even laugh about it? That was who he was. The rest was just stuff he endured.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
So much research goes into even a highly speculative book of this kind. As much as you’d be tempted to believe it’s all imagination, it’s not. To this end I’m indebted to far too many souls to name. But the short list would have to include:
Those witting and unwitting souls who share their work so freely on the internet. In particular, those folks whose discoveries or reportage thereof weighed heavily in granting my prose that extra realism factor.
My primary Facebook newsfeed folks who keep their nose to the ground for all breaking technology news, especially those pertaining to the transhuman era. Gareth John, Marco Santini, Sergio Tarrero, René Milan, Louisa Baqués, chief among them, but there are literally hundreds of others.
And, of course, to the many transhumanist Facebook groups to which I belong, whose mind-trust is invaluable. Not just for the sharing of great intel, but for the willingness of all participants and experts in their fields to answer questions.
And last but not least, to my loyal beta readers, and to my writer’s circle. They help me to get outside of my own head and help to illuminate all my blind spots when it comes to editing and fact checking.
That said, all errors are entirely my own. As the buck stops with me.
AFTERWORD
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Convergence_ The Time Weavers Page 31