by LEMPEREUR
From that perspective he was beginning to miss his time in the connection. He missed it both psychologically and physically. He was glad to be back with Jacques, Clementine, Mario and the others again, but part of him had been left behind forever, just as part of Victor now lived in him. The virtual stimulation of his senses in the connection had brought on a massive rush of hormones and other chemical stimulants naturally secreted by the brain. There were also all those that could have passed through the neural probe from Victor’s brain to his, during convergence. In other words, during the connection, Charlie had been swimming in a sea of both pleasure-giving and anxiety-producing hormones, generated by the sensorial signals he received and the way he interpreted them. This had given him a particular impression of the virtual reality he was in; a completely different reality in which a whole part of his body – asleep and free of pain – had been replaced by a second body, a virtual one, which had given him at times an intense sensation of weightlessness and freedom. That sensation no longer existed today, and he sorely missed it.
After a few minutes, which seemed like hours to him, the vehicle pulled up in front of the research station. They had made the trip in silence, each aware that they were going to an interview that would be anything but casual. They got out of the car just as silently, then Mario, after identifying himself, motioned to them to go ahead of him into the small room adjacent to the large hall of the dome where Victor lay. They climbed the stairs laboriously and when they entered the small, harshly lit room at last, they found it empty. It was only a few minutes later that Giuseppe appeared, opening the door at the end of the room.
“Come with me,” he said.
He led them into the next room. The windows, which sloped in at the bottom, were on their transparent setting, showing Victor’s enormous body lying on its metal platform below them. Faced with this sight, Charlie felt deep sadness and pain, which he had trouble hiding, the emotion was so strong. A sort of nostalgia, mixed with pity washed over him. He wanted to protect Victor. He would even have taken him in his arms if he could but he knew that he had to hide his feelings at all costs if he was to be of any real help to him. He did not really understand where this sudden urge came from but he could not control it. It was as if they were united by some invisible, intangible bond. This being, which seemed so fundamentally close to him and to humans in general, symbolized solitude and powerlessness in the face of a tragedy whose final outcome they had surely not seen yet.
He discreetly brushed away the tears beginning to escape from his eyes and breathed deeply, trying to get a grip on himself before Giuseppe noticed anything. Fortunately, all eyes were on the giant’s body, but Jacques sent him a telepathic thought that was like a friend’s hand on his shoulder: “You know him so well now, don’t you? You must miss him.”
Charlie did not respond, but Jacques had just renewed the bond with his brother that would be their best asset in the future.
“It is truly a great mystery that we have here!” Giuseppe said suddenly, before turning to face the twins.
“It certainly is,” answered Charlie without hesitating.
“Although it’s certainly less of a mystery now, isn’t it Charlie?”
Giuseppe’s friendly tone seemed insincere. It was obvious to Charlie that he was trying to communicate to him an expectation of full/complete cooperation. Everything about his attitude had changed, even his facial expression, which had become even more closed. Jacques had warned him about this change he and Clementine had noticed. Charlie did not intend however to let excessive distrust color his judgment. Certainly, Giuseppe had not told them everything, but after all, why would he? He was first and foremost the head and coordinator of an ultra-confidential research program, which involved a certain number of responsibilities which he would have to be accountable for to his superiors.
Charlie knew he had to be cautious, while doing his utmost to maintain a positive relationship with Giuseppe. He did not think the ambient distrust that had crept in during his absence would be conducive to the sincere, constructive cooperation that he needed. In any case, one thing was sure; each of the two main players needed the other in order to reach his goal. After a moment’s hesitation, Charlie decided to answer him sincerely, all the while hoping to make him understand that he did not see himself as a mere pawn in the game of chess they had just begun.
“You can say that again! It has been a very rich and extremely intense journey for me. Actually, I want to thank you. If you hadn’t chosen me, there are things in this world I would never have had the opportunity to experience.”
“Don’t thank me, Charlie. You should be thanking Jacques and Francisco. They are the ones who trusted you and accompanied you all through an extremely risky process. I only followed Francisco’s advice which, incidentally, I have not regretted – in any case, not thus far. If necessary, the future will reveal whether this truly was the good and right choice.”
It seemed to Charlie that this false modesty served the unique purpose of keeping an appropriate distance in their relationship. Giuseppe was not one to succumb to flattery or manipulation by anyone, which he had just demonstrated and Charlie was going to have to take that into account during the rest of the interview.
“Now that you mention it, I’m surprised Francisco isn’t here. I haven’t seen him since I came out of the connection.”
“Well, since you mention it, I must tell you that he was particularly upset by the way in which you came out of the connection. He was not expecting it at all. As you know, we were expecting you to communicate via the neural probe that you were ready to come back. The other candidates did not have that possibility. We had to disconnect them without their consent, which caused significant damage, profoundly upsetting their psychological balance. Fortunately, today most of them have found a satisfactory balance again but none of them has been able to give us the slightest piece of useful information about Victor or the experiences they had. Francisco is very afraid that it will be the same for you, and for some unknown reason, that is particularly important to him. He feels responsible for any possible failure, and he told me this morning that he would prefer me to conduct this first interview without him. You know, Francisco can seem cold and unemotional, but when he becomes attached to someone he does not take it lightly. Maybe I shouldn’t tell you this, but I have rarely seen him so anxious.”
Jacques said rather tactlessly, “Isn’t it mainly the fact that things didn’t happen the way he was expecting that’s rattled him? Knowing what he’s like, I wouldn’t be surprised.”
Charlie quickly answered his brother, without waiting for Giuseppe’s reaction.
“No, Jacques, I don’t think so. He’ll definitely need some time to accept the fact that such a thing could happen without him understanding the real reasons for it. Apparently nothing from his predictions or the previous attempts led him to believe I was capable of suddenly freeing myself of the neural probe’s hold the way I did. Despite appearances, I’m sure maintaining our mental and physical well-being is very important to Francisco. He’s a young man with a very inflexible personality, but it’s precisely that inflexibility that means we can trust him. He does not experience events the same way we do. The emotions they arouse in him are not tempered. They are unmitigated. I’m sure they’re very intense, especially if he feels guilty about something that has happened to someone in his care. Personally, I don’t think such distrust toward Francisco is founded. I understand what Giuseppe means.”
“What’s come over you, Charlie? This guy is still trying to take us for a ride. Don’t tell me you haven’t noticed that he’s trying to bring us round by playing on our sentiments. There must be some other reason for his absence.”
Charlie would have liked to answer him in private but that was not possible. He hoped that Jacques would soon understand for himself and abstain from interfering in the conversation.
“I’m glad to see that you are not blinded by appearances, Charlie,” said G
iuseppe. “I know Francisco better than anybody and I can say that there is no reason for worry or doubt about his sincerity.”
“My brother is a bit edgy after the emotional roller-coaster he’s just been on. I’m sure he has as much time for Francisco as I do, don’t you Jacques?”
“Yes, of course I do,” he said, giving Charlie a veiled, accusing look.
“Well now, all this has not helped us find out how you managed to leave the connection of your own volition, Charlie. Perhaps you can offer us some explanation of the matter? Let’s go and sit at the table, if you will.”
Giuseppe walked over to the small door, which he opened to let them through, pointing to two chairs which had already been pulled out from the table. They sat facing one another, the twins on one side and Giuseppe on the other. This time there were no biscuits or tea; no smell or object or any decoration to brighten up the little room where the interview was to take place. This was going to be long.
31 THE INTERVIEW
“Well now, Charlie, I suggest we don’t lose any time on insignificant details. There will be time later to go over the order of events and everything you experienced during the connection. For now, what interests me is Victor, and Victor alone. I think you said you had met him in person. You even indicated that he was at the origin of the neural probe being temporarily disconnected. Francisco thought you were delirious, but I’m not so sure. In theory, such a meeting should not be possible, at least, not in such a direct way. We would never have imagined that your minds could communicate with each other. Francisco still cannot bring himself to accept the idea, so you can imagine that it is even more unthinkable for him that Victor was able to voluntarily disconnect the neural probe, although that is what you suggested. In any case, I would like to have your opinion on the matter. What do you have to say on the subject? Did you really have the impression you were talking directly to another conscious being? By conscious, I mean a being that was capable at some time or other of showing signs of autonomy and independent will – a being that was not simply an illusion or a memory manipulated by your own mind.”
Charlie hesitated for quite some time. He had thought he would be free to tell of his experiences in the connection in chronological order. He never would have expected Giuseppe to ask him such a direct question. By tackling this subject immediately, he was forcing Charlie to walk a tightrope from the outset. And there was no safety net made up of the many clues he would have gleaned from a conversation that had gradually led up to this point. Then Charlie heard his brother’s voice resounding in his head: “You know what? I think Giuseppe knows a lot more than he’s letting on. Not only has he spent hours studying the transcripts of our conversations through the neural probe, but I think he also has access to quite a lot of concrete information which he hasn’t told us about yet. If this cave really is a hibernation base, as you explained, it must contain a lot more tangible clues, maybe even documents which Giuseppe has access to. I think he mainly wants to find out just who he’s dealing with. He obviously wants to know Victor better and be sure that the N.H.I.’s do not represent a danger to humans. At least, that’s opinion and when I mentioned Mario, he didn’t contradict me. You know, Charlie, he’s bound to secrecy in some areas, but I’m getting to know him well, and I really think we can trust Mario. He will always do what he can to give us the information we need when the time comes. Other than that, I don’t know exactly what you went through in the connection but you seem to have developed a close bond with Victor. You are the only one who knows what you can or can’t say. In your own interest, and maybe Victor’s, too, be cautious when you answer, Charlie! That’s what I say, if you still want my advice.”
Charlie could not respond immediately, but he was keenly aware that by these words, Jacques was doing all he could to renew the close relationship they had always had before the connection had imposed a temporary separation on them. He thought for another minute then finally launched into the answer that Giuseppe had been patiently waiting for.
“That’s right. I saw Victor and I talked with him just as I’m talking with you now. I don’t know why, but he didn’t look the same.”
“What did he look like?”
“Well actually, he looked like an old man – I mean a human.”
“How do you explain such a distortion of reality?”
“I can’t really explain it, as least not for sure.”
“Tell me more.”
“I think it could have been a construct of my own mind to symbolize or personify the being I was communicating with.”
“Isn’t it rather more likely to have been an illusion, or a hallucination? What do you think, Charlie? I mean, do you think that would be plausible?”
“Entirely possible,” Charlie replied quite calmly and confidently.
Giuseppe observed him for a moment without saying anything. Charlie was obviously sure about the source of his vision of Victor but did not want to get into justifications which could lead the conversation in a direction he was not comfortable with. The elderly Italian decided to stay on topic anyway, becoming more insistent.
“Do you have any arguments in favor of this hypothesis?”
“The same ones as you, I guess! In something like a waking dream, it is possible that my desire to meet Victor was so strong that my brain constructed an image of him that corresponded to what I already knew about him. Right from my first entry into his memories I realized that he had been lying here for an eternity and not merely a few thousand years as I thought at first. That discrepancy struck me, because it seemed impossible that they could have survived for so long. So it was logical for my mind to personify him as elderly –”
“Yes, but an elderly human?” Giuseppe suddenly interjected.
“The N.H.I.’s have a similar appearance to ours in spite of their huge proportions. I don’t think I’m alone in noticing that detail. You know more than I do about their physiology and morphology from studying them in detail for decades before setting up the cerebral connection research program. I can’t believe that the similarity did not bother you.”
“What are you saying, Charlie? Do you mean by that that we could have common origins with the N.H.I.’s?”
“That’s a definite possibility!”
“What makes you say that? Do you have any information that can support that theory?”
When asking that question, Giuseppe expected anything but what Charlie was about to say. He gave him a challenging look before answering.
“What about you, Giuseppe? What information have you kept secret? Are you sure you aren’t hiding anything from us?”
Charlie’s tone was no longer quite so polite. The turn the conversation was taking had driven him to take the offensive. He would have preferred things to happen a lot more gradually, but he could not play innocent or meek with Giuseppe any longer without him noticing. He thought the time had come for him to take his stand as an indispensible part of the research program. Giuseppe and his men would now have to reckon with him and it was time they knew that.
“I’m not hiding anything from you, Charlie, but I may not have told you about everything we have found out since discovering this cave. Please don’t see in that some conspiracy against you, or the desire to hide some dishonorable details from you. The quantity of data and potentially crucial information that my team has been able to gather is such that it is impossible for me to give it all to you in a comprehensive way. Tell me rather what you are alluding to and I will try to answer you as frankly as possible. We have been working in a climate of mutual trust so far and I think it is in the best interest of both of us if we continue to do so, don’t you?”
The old man’s answer seemed reassuring on the surface, but on closer inspection, it sounded like a threat or at least a warning, which did not escape Charlie’s notice. Refusing to be intimidated, he continued in the same vein anyway.
“While exploring Victor’s memories I found a map which seemed to be a plan of the hiber
nation base as it was initially designed. When I looked at the map closely, I immediately recognized the architecture of the base where we are now, except for the new buildings and additions that you have made for human settlement and research of course. However, there was another wing at least as vast as the first one; a wing that I had never found, even in retrospect when I searched back through my own memories. And yet I had the impression I had been all over this base, many times, before entering the mind of the one you call Victor. I also had access, like everybody else, to the map pinned up in the entrance of every residential pavilion.
“All this could well be a mere error of interpretation on my part. After all, it wouldn’t be at all surprising if I had forgotten certain information. I wouldn’t have thought any more of it except that a question immediately occurred to me. How Victor possibly be the only survivor, and consequently the only representative of his kind, found on this hibernation base? According to what he told me, it was initially designed for at least 5,000 individuals. I think it would also be pertinent to mention again that your team was mistaken when they estimated Victor’ age at several thousand years. I can’t say right now exactly how old he is, but it would seem – as unbelievable as it sounds – that it could be millions of years. So you see, Giuseppe, my journey into Victor’s mind was not in vain. I have brought back a lot of information which could be crucially important to you and your team, and also for the rest of humanity. While this only concerned us – I mean Clementine, Jacques and myself, I had no particular reason to distrust you. We weren’t exactly given much choice in our involvement, it’s true, but we have always been well-treated. Personally, I appreciate not only the fact that you trusted me for this experiment but also that you gave me the opportunity to do something useful with my life; something likely to profit science and maybe even the progress of all humanity. I can never thank you enough for what you’ve allowed me to experience, believe me!