The Eden Paradox

by Barry Kirwan

  Louise remained poker-faced. "He says you have another lover, Antonia. You know how pliable men are after they’ve come. Does this lover want Micah in a coma?"

  Antonia’s mouth dropped open. Her eyes flicked for a moment towards Micah, shocked that he had told Louise, of all people… and slept with her! She stood up. "Stop this right now. You can’t just question me like this." She picked up her bag, "I’m leaving." But she didn’t.

  Louise smiled. "Actually, I can interrogate you anyway I like. Let’s see. I’m Chorazin. A key person in my investigation is in a coma for no good reason, and you were the only person with him at the time. In fact my boss would probably reprimand me for not putting you in a holding cell and having you deep-profiled. So, Antonia, you have to give me a reason. A piece of information that will keep me, and my boss, happy for the moment. What were you and Micah doing, what is your relationship with our sleepy friend there, and who exactly is your lover? And you have to give me these three bits of information straight away, or I will arrest you and you’ll spend the next three days in an uncomfortable cell. By the time your Ambassador father finds out, you’ll be a wreck, and believe me, the Chorazin have impunity."

  Antonia lowered herself back into her chair, clutching her bag, and stared at the floor. She didn’t doubt this woman – and she didn’t want to go to a cell – she’d be useless to anyone she cared about once inside one. She weighed everything up.

  "My lover is Katrina Beornwulf, the Ulysses astronaut. I believed Micah could find a way to contact her and the others. I wanted to help. Micah and I are colleagues, that’s all. Just before he went into the coma, he seemed to be on the verge of a breakthrough."

  Louise walked over to her, and knelt down before her lowered head and spoke close to her defeated face. "There, that wasn’t too hard, really, was it?" She walked back to the chair and pushed it against the wall. "Micah’s not a bad fuck actually. Inexperienced, but a quick study." She turned to see Antonia’s bewildered face. "Don’t leave town." She walked out.

  Antonia stared after her, then at Micah’s almost lifeless body. She raised a hand to her throat, closed her eyes, then leant forward onto her knees, and buried her face in her hands.

  ***

  Sister Esma continued the dispatch of orders on the vidcom using a secure line. The chess pieces are all in place. Endgame.

  "It has begun… We must move quickly... How fast can the remaining ships be found? Use discovery protocol beta, I believe an MIT scientist is working in the area, he would be a suitable candidate. It must be handled very carefully. Scripts will arrive within the hour for synchronized transmission across G-Net by Fundamentalist leaders. We have rehearsed for this moment for many, many years. The people must be persuaded the ships are gifts from their one true God, whichever one applies to the local population. The ships’ apparent simplicity will assist credibility of the message... The message will be a strong trigger – fear, anger and outrage at suppression of information will do the rest. The ships will only take at most a few percent of the population in the first volley, but that will be enough, and the political turmoil left behind, fuelled by tens of millions who will want to go but have to wait, and possibly die, will deliver us the power we have waited for… After? I will tell you in good time. Information is earned, revealed only when needed."

  The vidcom cleared.

  After, she thought. After the feeding on Eden, and the harvesting here, we – the Inner Circle alone – will be elevated, and will travel to the Grid. Those of us touched by these Gods, those of us who have borne their genetic gifts – the insights, strength, and above all the longevity, want nothing more.

  She leaned back in her chair, clasping her hands behind her skull. Galileo, my dear man, you should have listened to me. If you had, then you could have seen with your own eyes what your brilliance had only just managed to grasp – not just the non-Euclidean solar system, but the rest of the galaxy. And Amadeus – at least we will take your music with us, though you chose to remain so finitely mortal. She thought of the people she had known over the past six centuries. Most she despised – her perspective was so different that she no longer thought of herself as human, and found humans – earthlings as she had started to call them, hopelessly bound to this doomed planet – their pitiful, short lives and limited vision, their petty selfishness. Humanity left alone would never rise above itself. There had even been a time when she had questioned the Q’Roth-Alician pact, but the longer she trod the Earth the more she knew the inevitable choice was between culling most and upgrading a few, or culling all.

  There had of course been some exceptional men and women – a few. She and others had tried to turn them, most without success. Still – there were five hundred like her, a few even older, roaming the world. They controlled humanity, misguided it, kept it off-balance, bringing it to ripeness for the return of the Q’Roth. Soon – very soon – almost no time at all, this narcissistic civilization would be eradicated, and they, the five hundred who knew what was coming, plus another five thousand promising Alicians, would have their own ships and a passport to the Grid. A new existence and legitimacy as a sponsored Level Five species. The hierarchy they had heard about would know this new humanity for the first time and would respect it: our next stage of evolution.

  The vidcom buzzed, the code indicating her favorite protégé. "Report."

  "Micah is in a coma. Antonia doesn’t know anything. I’m on my way back to Chorazin HQ. I have a bunch of calls from Vince, which I’m about to take –"

  "Don’t. I have a mission for you."

  "My absence will already have been noticed. If I don’t turn up soon –"

  "I said I have a mission for you." Sister Esma waited. Anyone else would have apologized profusely for making her repeat herself, but Louise was special, and her silence was sufficient. "It has begun, Louise. I have instructions for you which must be passed face to face. Then you must return and kill Micah." This time the silence which followed was not acceptable. "Is there a problem, Louise?"

  "No. I’ll be there in ten minutes." The vidcom cleared.

  Sister Esma looked wistfully over to a wall where an unknown original by Leonardo hung, secret, beautiful. "And you, too, will come with us when we leave." The drawing showed two people, her and another, standing next to a large grey-black insect-like creature, upright, nearly twice as tall as its human companions. Such stark, uncompromising beauty.

  She switched on the vidcom again. After a few seconds a hooded face appeared; silent, tranquil, eyes unseen.

  "Start the beacon. Wake them."

  The hooded figure nodded, and then cut the transmission.

  It was an irony that she and her Alician flock were actually saving humanity: at least the Q’Roth had offered a lifeline, preserving a portion of mankind, allowing it to evolve to its next generation. Other races who stumbled upon Earth might prove less generous. But she had no sympathetic pretensions. The Q’Roth genetic alterations gave their human followers razor sharp clarity over what some would call ethics, and what later historians would call ecological necessity. Survival of the fittest, she had once argued with Darwin. At least he had finally understood, if only for the animal kingdom.

  She activated a mosaic of viewscreens showing major channels all over the world, and waited for the announcements. She could feel the tapestry of the maneuvers and manipulations of a millennium coming together. Finally, all the loose ends had been accounted for. It was not unlike a Da Vinci, she mused – a vivid painting that would flow inexorably from the brushes of the Q’Roth and Alician Protectorate, bright swathes of red on Earth’s dusty brown canvas. It was a painting she intended to see once, and then cast aside forever. Perhaps Mozart’s Requiem would be fitting music for the end of the world. She began to hum Dies Irae, recalling its first performance in Vienna.

  PART THREE

  BATTLE FOR EDEN

  Chapter 33

  Final Request

  Gabriel gained entry to the Vidsex parlor
. He quickly strapped in, inserted his own data crystal, logged on and accessed the net, and faced the redhead again. He spoke with urgency.

  "I will be dead within two hours. Sister Esma and her cohorts, maybe the Q’Roth themselves, are finally moving. Louise is the Chorazin double agent."

  The redhead morphed into an old man who nevertheless stood lightning rod straight. "It pains me to hear that you are departing this life. But I have also learned they are on the move, and so am I, too."

  His normally lake-like composure swirled with emotional riptides from the Alician drug. He found it difficult to focus on strategy; he would very shortly no longer be part of it. "I have a final request."

  "Speak and I will grant it."

  Gabriel swallowed. "I have discovered that my sister – Jennifer – is alive. You’ve no doubt seen the vids of the ship in the Pacific. She’s the Professor’s assistant. You may have noticed a family resemblance."

  There was a pause. "I will protect her. I was planning to go there next. Now, prepare yourself. Gabriel – whatsoever remains of us after, will meet again."

  Gabriel bowed to the figure. His Sentinel master bowed lower. He broke the connection, tore off the temple electrodes, and crushed the crystal underfoot.

  He had been preparing for death for the past seven years. Each evening he contemplated the void, to the point where his ego dissolved and all that was left was space, and the intangible sense of something else that remained: spirit, that which was there before he was born.

  He had always believed that nothing immortal could have a start – if it did there would be an end too, so whatever would be there after death must have been there before birth, and the ego, all the worries and joys, the personality, was just clothing used for the journey before the return to the nakedness of death. Every morning he had also meditated and acted as if this were his last day on earth.

  Despite the clarity such meditation had delivered him these past seven years, he couldn’t quiet his soul. There was something in the back of his mind that stirred restlessly.

  Finding out that his sister was still alive had unleashed a shockwave of inner turmoil and remorse, amplified by the emotion-enhancer Sister Esma had pumped into him. Futile thoughts arose of lost time, and a different life he could have had, with his sister, or even a family of his own. He had spent most of his adult life invisible to society – no one would weep for him, or even know he was gone. He tried to observe these feelings in a detached way. He dared not let them surface fully now, or else they would overwhelm him: he would crack, his resolve would splinter and he would be useless to himself, to Jenny, and his whole chosen way of life would be negated. He did not relish the idea of being cast into the wilderness at the moment of death – he’d seen it all too often.

  Taking a deep breath, he held it for a minute, breathed out slowly, then held his lungs still and empty. His mind cleared. Nothing mattered anymore except the mission. He picked up his bulky bag and headed for the exit. But the aching inside remained, even if subdued. As he moved toward the transit level, he realized there was one thing he could do to assuage this sudden longing, but it was a ridiculous idea – there was neither time nor opportunity.

  As he approached the Eden Mission service tunnel, his mind switched into killing mode, as he began to plan how to destroy the building completely, calculating how many guards and others it would take. For the first time in his vocation, he searched for the minimum kill ratio. Now that he was busy again, the inner voice silenced. The brief Mayfly fluttering of his ego had ended, accepting his fate, his choices. When he came to the first guard, the blade of his right hand whipped against the man’s carotid artery, spiking the guard’s blood pressure and knocking him unconscious, rather than crushing it and causing massive brain hemorrhage. He even protected the man’s head as he slumped to the ground. Gabriel felt as if a legion of the people he’d cleansed over the years stood behind him, watching, curious, but also anxious to meet him on the other side. He checked his wristcom. Sixty minutes left on this world, in this skin. He moved forward quickly.

  ***

  Sandy came in to pick up her things – she’d been given two week’s leave, on account of everything that had happened to her. She had a small list, but once she arrived, she screwed it up and threw it in the bin. She hadn’t come here for things – she’d come to say goodbye.

  Before discharging her, the Chorazin psych had warned her she was off-balance; the trauma of the last two days had raked over old scars, unleashing depression. Too right, and then some. The stiff but well-meaning psych had pulled her old files, and given her a fatherly lecture about not getting suicidal again, like the time she’d lost her brother Jake in a car crash on his twenty-first. She’d been driving.

  The shrink had shaken her hand and given her some pills to take. They currently inhabited New LA’s sewage system.

  Sandy felt unclean, like she had black, oily poison lining her gut; everyone she’d ever cared about died violently. She wanted to vomit it up out of her, but it clung to her insides like tar. It made her think of cutting herself again, but that had been a former life, and she didn’t want to restart that particular addiction. Anyway, she reminded herself, she wasn’t unique – everyone on the planet had lost loved ones violently in the War. She tried to mentally kick herself, to snap out of it. Easier said than done.

  She’d had it with the Eden Mission; Kane had been the only reason she’d stayed all these years. She had no idea where to go next, but had made up her mind: she’d leave town. Start over somewhere. Anywhere. Maybe Russia. She spoke Russian, and no one knew her there. But first, she had to say goodbye. She placed her hands on the door handles, took a breath, and entered the office.

  The conservative teak furniture was still pretty much where it had been. She went into Kane’s office, closed the doors behind her, and strode straight to his desk. She traced a finger over the inner edge. She steeled herself, and turned towards the bathroom, her prison for two days, and looked straight into the dark eyes of the man she’d shot at two days ago.

  "You!" She glanced from him to the inner door. He walked over to it and turned the key. She silently cursed Keiji’s desire for antique locking devices. Well, at least the assassin hadn’t shot her yet. She opted as usual for bravado.

  "Come to finish the job? I thought that bitch did you in?"

  He stared at her, looked her up and down, taking his time about it, she noticed. He was stripped to the waist, wearing only a pair of tight-fitting black trousers. She couldn’t help but notice the menagerie of scars on his upper body. She wondered what the lower half looked like, then mentally pinched herself; the psych had been right, but unbalanced didn’t quite cover it. Her dark impulses drove her forward.

  "Strong and silent type, eh?"

  He strode across to her. She smelt his sweat – it wasn’t distasteful. With a shock she realized he’d be about the same build and age her brother might be now, if…

  "I was trying to save you, Sandy. Louise is the killer."

  She gave out a sharp laugh. "You’re Alician, a Cleanser, remember, one of the bad guys."

  He returned to the bathroom, fiddling with some kind of device, a green glass cube the size of her daddy’s old footstool. She made out the word ‘Hextrite’ in red lettering on the side. She’d seen enough war-vids to know it was an ultra-powerful explosive, the type that produced a vertical compression shockwave, perfect for collapsing a building while leaving surrounding ones intact.

  "Christ, you don’t do anything by half measures, do you?"

  Still, he made no reply. She went to the door, but the key was missing.

  "So, you’re going to blow up the building? And take me with it? Or am I coming with you."

  "I’m not leaving."

  Shit. Despite her mounting fear, her mouth continued on autopilot, with no navigation. "Look. If you’re the good guy, let me go."

  He fished in his pocket briefly, and tossed her the key. She snatched it in mid air, and
looked at the door. Her mind said "Run, you idiot!" But she remained. He punched a code into a small keypad and then sat cross-legged on the floor.

  "There’s an implant in my head. In twenty minutes it will release a violent toxin into my brain and I will die, painfully."

  He locked eyes with hers. The effect on Sandy was like being struck by two jet-black lasers. The only men she’d ever been able to love had been completely convinced of what they were about – her father, her brother, Kane; no one else ever measured up. They’d all given her a reason to live. She studied him.

  "I haven’t made love to a woman for seven years. I have no children to leave behind. I never expected to have any. I’m not exactly a family man." He made an attempt to smile. She could tell he didn’t get much practice.

  "Is this an Alician chat-up line?"

  "I’m not an Alician; they’re my enemy." He balanced the backs of his hands on his knees in a meditative pose. "Their inner circle are genetically advanced."

  She wasn’t surprised; it fit, since they’d eluded capture for a decade, not one ever brought to justice. Genetics had been banned, but that never stopped anybody. She wondered why he was telling her this.

  "Three years ago I was infused with an experimental metagenic virus. It doesn’t affect me, but my children, if I had any, would be advanced, developing rapidly, becoming as strong as the Alicians."

  An explosion deep down in the building shook the room, sounding like a bomb had gone off underwater. The fire alarms shrieked. Sprinklers showered them with a fine mist of cool water. She realized he’d set off a smaller device to evacuate the building. He was an assassin, not a mass murderer. Her feet still didn’t budge.

  "Go," he said. "Take Kane’s emergency drop lift, it’s still there. It will get you fifty meters underground in ninety seconds. Then just head away from it in any direction."

  But she couldn’t. Stupid bitch, she thought to herself. They die violently, remember? But the irony made some kind of sense to her. This was the kind of pill she needed: serious psychological – and probably terminal – detox. As her decision firmed, all the self-loathing and depression fled like the people pouring out of the building six hundred meters below. Poison needed an anti-toxin; she needed a reason to live. She approached him.