Gamers and Gods: AES
Page 71
After his conversation with Elizabeth, Farker had a lot to think about, not that he didn't have enough already. “Finder,” he said, “why didn't you ever tell me that minds connected to a quantum computer could communicate memories to each other?”
“You never asked if it was possible. When she asked about it, simple checking revealed that it was an inherent (although unanticipated) capability.”
“You sound like it should have been obvious.”
“Shouldn't it? When the Players in PanGames 'speak' to each other, there are no microphones or loudspeakers involved. Data goes from the speech center of the speaker's brain to the system and from the system into the auditory and speech centers of the Player being spoken to. It is obvious that this kind of electro-telepathy could include others forms of data such as memories.”
“You're forgetting something,” he pointed out. “Am-heh has no physical body.”
“True, but that actually shortens the process. Elizabeth's information only had to reach the locus of his representation in the computer, and his data merely had to go from there to her brain. There is less of a transmission delay when only one link bed is involved.”
“You mean all the Players who talk to each other in PanGames...”
“Are doing so only out of habit, yes. They could talk just as easily without moving their lips, especially if they wanted privacy.”
Farker groped in a drawer for another protein bar. In his mind's eye he was picturing Aes going up against Am-heh. Could the gentle healer really beat the Devourer of Millions? He shook his head, remembering what the Finder had said about transmission delays. Residing entirely within the PanGames hypercomputer, Am-heh would react to events in the system faster than any human user. Any user, that is, except Aes. Like it or not, Aes was their best chance against him. He's the Aes up our sleeve, he thought.
For some reason the thought made his eyes water. He wiped them angrily. No time for sentimentality. “Finder, how much time does Aes have left to him?”
“If he does absolutely nothing, seven hours six minutes.” said Finder. “But anything that engages his attention might cause a growth surge and shorten it even more. And of course there is even less time for an optimal resolution.”
“An optimal resolution? Explain.”
“In seven hours and six minutes Aes will exceed any block in the computational matrix. But in less than three hours you will not be able to fit both Aes and Am-heh into even an empty block like Paradise.”
“So they're both doomed, really. Am-heh's growing himself to death too.”
“Affirmative. But their situations are not the same. Aes arrived here first and is way ahead on the exponential curve. Given their current growth rates, Aes will die first unless there is a Realm crash.”
“I assume you overheard my conversation with Darla's mother. What do you suppose would be the result if we keep them separate, or can't talk him into it, and Aes dies first?”
“We cannot presume to understand the thought process of aliens,” Finder observed. “But it seems likely that whoever survives longest will be considered the winner of the contest.”
“What about the avatars who were eaten by Am-heh? What happens to them if there's a system crash?”
“If they're still 'inside' him at the time it happens,” the Finder told him. “it's bad. If they're outside, they log out safely when the crash happens.”
“How do we get them out of him, assuming their minds aren't ruined already? How do we lead them back to the land of the living?”
“I have no answer for that. As you recall, even Orpheus didn't succeed.”
No, Farker reflected, he didn't. But that was because someone looked back at the last moment. How did we get to this place, where we're trying to use mythology to correct a problem with our technology? Most of his life, he had known that the floor beneath his feet was an illusion of solidity, that what kept him from falling through it was the mutual repulsion of electrons he would never see. Science, the modern mythology, comforts us, explaining the things we can see by resorting to theoretical things that we will never see.
But none of his science could help him now. His career, and the lives of the victims, were in the hands of a piece of living mythology. And the irony of the situation did not escape him. I only put the Asklepios NPC into Realm of Legends because the name was on a list of Greek gods, he thought. What do I really know about him? Hardly more than a pedigree.
“What it boils down to,” he said finally, “is that Aes has to be in the trap with him.”
“Correct. It's the only scenario which guarantees success.”
We have to ask someone who owes us nothing to die alone in an empty world. He'd die even sooner in a crowded Realm, of course. Bit it's still a lot to ask. I hope he's a better man than me. I'd probably spend my last moments feeling sorry for myself.
I need to know more about him before I can ask him to do this, he decided.
Chapter 64: Manny: “smoke from a distant fire”