From what Junco could tell both of the major population centers on the Plateau had survived the landslide or whatever its called when a chunk of virtual floating rock gives in to virtual pseudo gravity. The fallen part was mainly forest and parkland. The residents were shaken up, however, and had decided on an impromptu evacuation – or at least some of them had. He could now see people pouring out of the Jupiter Moon by the hundreds and milling around on the street as if waiting to be told what to do.
The Jupiter Moon was an interesting bar that had interesting physics even by virtual reality standards. It existed on both the plateau and in the downtown region. It had one entrance in both places but two exits. One out door lead to downtown and one to the plateau. Probably best to think of it as a sort of instantaneous elevator. At least that is how Junco thought about it. Ani, its creator, would no doubt think of it in terms of numbers, squiggles, equations and programming code.
Teal spoke for the first time since Scoter had been blown away, seemingly by a random, idiot, nut-job. “We need to get a hold of Ani and fast.” She was emotionless, all business. Even after all of this time the military training just slid into place. Before Junco could reply Ani was in touch, using the private network that he had set up for them over thirty years ago. The message was short and to the point. “Jupiter Moon, back room now.”
Junco and Teal forced their way through the thousands of coders, support workers, and families who had made the plateau their home. They were still spilling out of the Jupiter Moon, albeit at a slower rate. Most of the refugees were quiet and lost in their own thoughts, some were in animated discussions with fellow residents, while a few were brawling even though they didn't look much like brawlers. Junco tried his best to avoid this last group and succeeded other than a badly aimed kick to the knee. The deliverer of the kick apologized profusely.
“Weirdest brawl I've ever seen.” Said Teal.
“Yup, me too.” Replied Junco.
They were just about to enter the bar when there was an explosion. Silence, then running, then panic everywhere. The ringing in his ears was getting louder and no other sound was penetrating. He caught sight of Teal and lunged forward and grabbed her arm. Judging by her pantomime gestures she had also lost her hearing. Teal pointed towards towards the Jupiter Moon's entrance and they headed towards it. Before entering Junco stopped and looked around. It was carnage, broken bodies littered the entire street. The red light from the red sun made everything even more grotesque than it already was. He saw the crying and the screaming but he still couldn't hear it.
Once they were in the bar Teal took the lead and attempted to push through the crowd. There was no way through, though, because the explosion had caused people to rush back into the bar. People were already passing out but they couldn't fall to the ground. Luckily those nearest the door had the sense to realize what was going on and poured back into the street. This allowed Teal to lead Junco back out of the bar where they could at least breathe.
Junco contacted Ani over the private net and brought him up to speed. The back room of the Jupiter Moon was not likely to be an option for some time to come. The relationship between Ani and Rubidium Beach was such that he could monitor any part of his creation at any time under normal conditions. Junco was pretty sure that what was happening did not qualify as normal conditions but it turned out that Ani was tuned in. He knew exactly what was happening outside the Jupiter Moon.
Junco and Teal went back to what they thought of as their bench, the one placed to overlook the liquid metal sea, and waited for Ani as instructed. They debated whether to help with the injured but the emergency services seemed to be coping well enough and they would probably just get in the way. After about twenty minutes Ani wandered over to the bench, his head bowed. Junco and Teal were facing inland, observing the chaotic scene outside the Jupiter Moon and throughout the nearby streets. He sat beside Junco and opened up the internal private network. Normal mouth to ear communication was useless as none of them could hear anything beyond their own internal ringing.
“Scoter's gone,” Junco said flatly.
Ani replied. “Maybe.”
“What do you mean maybe? He was atomized.”
Ani said simply. “Back ups – I made back ups of you all.”
Normally Teal would have been outraged but not this time. “You have a plan Ani?”
“Yes, we need to get to the body shop – that is where one of the backups is stored.”
Junco asked. “How many of these backups are there?”
“Eight for each of you.” Ani decided to give a fuller explanation. “I have eight digital copies of you two and Scoter. They get backed up once every day so if, say, something happens to you you may lose anything between twenty four hours and nothing on being rebuilt. The last automatic backup was six hours ago so if I can bring him back he will have no memory of anything after six hours before his death.”
Junco spoke. “You added an if there, you said 'if I can bring him back.' You haven't done this before have you?”
Ani answered honestly. “That is correct. At the moment the whole deal is very theoretical.”
Teal had a question of her own. “What about the body? There is nothing of the original left.”
“Doesn't matter. I have your entire Genomes along with maps of your physical bodies. It really isn't much more complicated than growing a new leg.” Ani answered, maybe a little less honestly this time.
“What about his real body – down on Level Minus One” Teal pressed.
Ani replied. “I've done a bit of tweaking involving the Minus One nanobots. They can now basically rebuild broken bodies on the fly. I have also programmed some of the nanobots to give audio and visual so I can see what is happening. You knew I could do that, though. Anyway, to cut a long story short, Scoter's body did fall apart on Minus One as it did here but the nanobots managed to round up his component atoms and basically stitch them all back together again. Scoter is alive on Level Minus One.”
“So his body is okay,” said Teal. “But what about his mind, his essence for want of a much better word?”
Ani thought for half a second. “This is the big 'if'. Do we get Scoter back or do we get something that looks like Scoter but with none of his memories, attitudes, quirks, or anything that makes him Scoter?”
“I guess we have nothing to lose,” said Junco. “What do we do next?”
“We go to the body shop, build us a new Scoter and then try to imprint the shell with the digitally stored personality,” replied Ani.
“What could possibly go wrong?” muttered Teal.
The spinning holo-neon sign read 'Bob's Superior Body Shop Inc.' and neither the sign nor the body shop itself had suffered significant damage in the blast. The body shop was, as the name suggested, a place where the injured were healed, charged and then sent on their way. It was necessary because injuries sustained on Rubidium Beach persisted into other Levels. This was not the norm. Usually injuries sustained on one Level disappeared as soon as the injured party changed Levels.
The place was jammed with the wounded from the blast. Luckily being the owner slash creator of a Level did carry certain privileges, one of which was permission to walk straight to the front of just about any queue.
Ani gave the body shop a verbal command to construct a new version of Scoter with maximum fidelity to the original. One of the metal box-like healers descended from its recess in the ceiling and covered one of the thirty or so white benches.
“The procedure will take approximately forty five minutes. It is recommended that someone, preferably a friend but failing that a relative, is here when he comes to. The patient will probably be very disoriented and highly stressed for a few minutes after the procedure is completed,” the body shop computer said soothingly. Junco noted that there was a correlation between how much a repair was likely to cost and how syrupy the computerized voice sounded. It didn't much matter in this case as Ani seemed to regard it as his duty to provide his
close friends with free healthcare.
The body shop was situated right next door to the Jupiter Moon. This was very convenient for the brawlers who liked to frequent the bar every so often. Junco and company decided that they may as well go back to the bar as wait in the body shop. The Jupiter Moon was more or less empty. There were only half a dozen or so refugees from either the plateau, the blast, or in the case of the really unlucky ones, both. Yellowlegs the barman poured them all a drink. Yellowlegs had managed the Jupiter Moon for over thirty years now and had never experienced a day like this. Ani instructed Yellowlegs to crank out a clone or two to run the bar and to follow the group into the back room.
The backroom was still decorated in Martian Outpost twenty-fifth century just as it had been for the last thirty years. Ani wanted to change it but Yellowlegs always vetoed the idea. Ani owned the bar, just as he owned everything on Rubidium Beach, and it was his main center of operations but Yellowlegs had a way of overriding Ani that the others admired. He seemed to use a perfect mix of charm, flattery and low level blackmail to get the job done.
Just as they were about to sit down, a series of massive explosions stopped them in their tracks. It wasn't so much the sound, as none of the group had recovered much of their hearing yet, but rather the vibrations. Two repro light sculptures and a two dee retro flat-work piece of art did not survive. Ani informed the group that what they were experiencing was the VR equivalent of earthquakes. The epicenter was about a mile away going out towards Neon Cove.
“I hope that didn't destroy Scoter's shack.” Said Teal. “He's having enough of a crap day already.”
“This one didn't go out that far – Neon Cove itself is currently undamaged.” Ani was monitoring events on his own internal display.
“What do you mean by 'This one' are there more on the way?” asked Teal.
Ani looked defeated. “Possibly, I don't know, probably. Yes it is likely. The underlying structure of that part of the Beach is looking very suspect at the moment.”
“What the hell is happening?” This time it was Yellowlegs asking the question.
Ani replied, “Something not good. Give me ten minutes and I'll report back. I want to be sure about what I'm telling you.”
With that Ani's eyes glazed over and the others knew that his mind was no longer in the room. He had gone off to the White Room, the place that he created where time ran at a approximately a thousandth of the speed that it did on the rest of Rubidium Beach. Of course it was a virtual space within a virtual space that was, to all intents and purposes, inside Ani's head, but that didn't hurt too much as long as you didn't think about it for too long. It worked Ani understood the underlying math and physics and that, at the end of the day, is all that mattered.
The others talked among themselves and brought each other up to speed. Yellowlegs had not left the bar since the first incident. He described seeing people rushing into the Jupiter Moon through the door marked 'Plateau' then either entering deeper into the Moon or going straight back out of the door marked Downtown and into the street. The explosion forced people back into the bar and that, said Yellowlegs, was when things got really hairy. Of course , Junco and Teal had been part of that crush and had witnessed the near mass panic that it had caused.
Yellowlegs was hooked into the private network so was aware of Scoter's execution and subsequent attempts to bring him back to life. He didn't know about the chunk of plateau that was now an island. Communications must have been down during that particular episode.
The rumbling that had died down suddenly became a lot more violent. This time around those in the room had to brace themselves against the bolted down table to avoid being thrown to the floor.
“That felt a whole lot closer,” said Teal. She appeared less fazed than the others. Junco knew for a fact that there was a part of her that really got a kick out of situations like this. She was definitely the groups' resident adrenaline junkie.
Ani returned. “I need a drink – a very large very alcoholic drink and hold off on the fruit.”
“That bad huh?” said Junco.
Ani replied, “That and some. The Mechanik are attacking us and I haven't a clue as to why. They are not taking any inbound communications as far as I can tell so I cannot even ask them anything.”
“Have you had any contact with them lately?” Junco asked.
Ani thought for a moment. “No, not for a decade at least. Ever since I left them I assumed that there was a truce in place. I still haven't forgiven them for wrecking Rubidium Beach with their civil war thirty years ago. The good guys may have won but good in the case of the Mechanik is a very relative term.”
“The Mechanik?” asked Yellowlegs. “Aren't they the ones who do running repairs on all the Levels?”
“That certainly used to be the case,” said Ani. “I have no idea at all of what they are about now. As you know I do my own maintenance so have no need of them.”
“Didn't you reach some sort of an agreement with them about that?” asked Junco.
“Yes,” said Ani. “basically they were to leave Rubidium Beach alone. Obviously that no longer holds.”
Yellowlegs asked “Any chance of a bit of background here? I was late to this party don't forget.”
Ani obliged. “The Levels are very rickety. They grew organically with no real blueprint. The original Mechanik spotted this and assigned themselves the task of maintaining the Levels out of view of the residents. The vast majority of the human race has never even heard of them. Bottom line is that they are expert programmers and coders who unquestionably started out as a force for good but who over time lost their way. They seemed to get back on the right track but recent events would seem to indicate that this no longer holds.”
Ani continued. “At the moment I don't even know whether we are fighting the entire organization, a large splinter group or a single pissed off individual. The only reason that I know the Mechanik are involved is by the coding behind the recent events. To be honest it is both beautiful and very distinctive. The traps that they have constructed to thwart my attempted repairs are beyond elegant.”
Junco decided that it was time to bring things out of the totally abstract. “Ani, enough, we get it, you admire their work. That is all well and good but we have to find a way to stop them causing a whole lot more damage. What we have just experienced was probably their opening salvo and little more.”
Teal spoke up. “One thing I don't get is how does Scoter factor into all of this?”
“I have absolutely no idea,” said Ani. “But I do know that we should have collected him ten minutes ago.”
“Oh crap.” Said Teal.
Yellowlegs sent a signal to one of his bar clones to prepare a tall blue drink with an octagonal piece of pink fruit and a cherry. He grabbed it on his way out of the door. The rest of the group was right behind him. The new Scoter was wandering in circles amongst the dried blood and rubble from the earlier explosion. He was also naked. Yellowdog ran up to him and inserted the drink into his outstretched right hand. Scoter mumbled something that sounded very much like thank you.
The group agreed to take him back into the body shop just in case there were any checks still required. As soon as they had walked in through the door scanner the computer spoke. “You were instructed to be here when the patient came around. You were not and therefore we are not liable for any extra therapy expenses incurred. Say yes to accept our waiver.
“Yes.” Said Ani.
The computerized voice continued. “Please put patient on table number three.”
Scoter seemed to understand. He knocked back his drink with a single swallow, handed the glass to Yellowlegs and lay down on table number three.
Some tools on a single-jointed arm descended from the ceiling. An intense, narrow beam of purple light was coming from one of them. The beam was drawn over Scoter's body then was pointed at various orifices and indents and then returned to its resting position. Scoter was instructed to turn over and t
he process was repeated.
“Scoter, are you in there?” asked Junco.
Teal added. “C'mon Scotes, time to stop playing.”
Scoter looked at Teal and there was a light of recognition. He spoke. “Cabbages.”
Ani smiled and said “I think that he is going to be okay.”
“Are you basing this theory on the fact that he can say 'cabbages'?” asked Teal.
Before Ani could answer Scoter smiled and said three words. “History, making history.”
“Now this is a very good sign,” said Teal.
Scoter looked Teal square in the eye and said. “Teal, we make love?”
Everyone in the room just cracked up. This was not the reserved, bordering on shy Scoter that they had all come to know yest it was still very much Scoter.
“Maybe later,” said Teal.
“Okay. I look forward to it,” Scoter responded.
“Procedure is now complete. You may leave,” said the computer.
The group did as instructed and returned to the Jupiter Moon.
3. THE CODERS, THE MECHANIK, AND SCOTER'S RECOVERY
The bar was empty apart from a group of a dozen or so coders who had pulled a couple of tables together and appeared to be in the middle of a fairly heated discussion. Ani walked over to their table and then beckoned the others to join him. They pulled up a third table to add to the existing two. “First things first. Can I get you anything to drink?”
The group gave their orders to one of the Yellowlegs clones and then one of the older members of the group spoke. “Hey Ani, how's things? What can we do for you?” The group's spokesman was a coder who went by the nickname 'Noddy'.
The Rubidium Beach Series - Episodes 1 Through 4: Cyberpunk/Dystopian Science Fiction Page 21