Rich, in a trance-like state, ignited his cocoon, making sure that he protected the entire ship, along with himself.
In the next instant, the whole world flashed white as though they were on the surface of the sun, Rich was knocked upside down, and a second later he was in utter darkness.
PART 3
1
“What the hell am I seeing?” Old-timer asked as he stopped, images from the shared android collective communication network streaming into his field of vision.
The images appeared to be of Earth, after the impact of an android ship the size of Brazil, right on the western shore of North America. The giant impact was so intense that a shockwave of superheated, red-hot gas was surrounding the globe, eating away the blue oceans and the green, living continents and leaving a smoldering-hot magma glowing in its wake. Giant pieces of debris, some of them the size of entire countries were being flung from the surface, and the android ship was in the process of disappearing completely, partially embedding itself under the crust of the Earth and partially disintegrating due to the force of impact and the unimaginable heat and destructive energy produced in the collision. Androids all over the serene setting of the city hidden safely at the center of the Constructor cheered as though they’d won an important battle in a war.
“Tell me this isn’t real,” Old-timer whispered to Anisim. “Tell me this is a simulation.”
“It-it’s real,” Anisim admitted, reluctant as he considered the pain he might feel as a result of Old-timer’s instinctual desire for instant retribution, yet equally afraid to lie. “It’s live, a live feed.”
The duo stood in the shadow of a beautiful, modern building that towered high on the edge of a body of water that shimmered in the light of an artificial sun that glowed overhead. There was a breeze that felt as real as anything Old-timer had ever felt on his skin on Earth, perhaps even more real.
Old-timer sneered and pulled Anisim with him into the empty alley between the building and its equally beautiful neighboring structure, and once he was sure no one was watching, he pushed Anisim roughly against the cool concrete of the building in the shadow of the false sun. “My wife was down there, you son-of-a-bitch. Your people just murdered her...and they’re cheering?”
“They’re happy. You don’t realize it but those people—your wife included—were saved,” Anisim protested. “Not to mention countless more people in countless other universes. My Earth was destroyed, too, but I’m grateful for it. Friend, look, we’re not your enemies.”
“My wife was down there,” Old-timer repeated, twisting the tendril embedded in the back of Anisim’s skull.
“She wasn’t down there,” Anisim protested, barely able to respond and wincing painfully as every movement of the tendril inside his skull seared with pain. “You’d lost contact with her, which means she must’ve been assimilated, and if she was assimilated—”
“Then there’ll be an android body built for her here?”
“Yes,” Anisim replied with a grunt after aborting an attempt to nod.
Old-timer looked up at the building Anisim was pressed against. “Your girlfriend lives here?”
“Not my girlfriend, but yes,” Anisim replied, regretfully. “Her name is Jules.”
“She can locate my wife?”
“Yes,” Anisim confirmed again. “She can locate all your friends and awaken them early.”
Old-timer bit his bottom lip as he considered this. They’d lost the Earth, and Daniella and Djanet had been lost with it, but if they’d been assimilated, at least he could spare them the so-called education to which the androids subjected their newest members.
“Okay,” Old-timer relented, falling back on plan B as there was no other option, “get us up to her apartment.”
“There’s a small problem,” Anisim revealed.
“It better be small,” Old-timer growled threateningly.
“There’s no reason for her to expect me, and she’s gotta invite me in. I can’t just walk into her building unless she clears me.”
“So put on the charm,” Old-timer insisted.
“And what about you? You’re a complete stranger.”
“No, I’m not,” Old-timer said with a sardonic smile, “we’re best pals. I’m your oldest friend in the world. Got it?”
“Got it,” Anisim replied, acquiescing once he realized his protests were falling on deaf ears.
Half a minute later, they stood side by side at the front door of the high-rise, Old-timer keeping just one wiry connection to Anisim, jacked into the back of the android’s skull, practically working him like a ventriloquist’s dummy.
Jules’s surprised visage suddenly appeared on a view screen next to the door. She appeared young, though one never knew with an android, her hair a strawberry blonde, slightly darker, but still reminiscent of Samantha’s. “Hello? Anisim? What are you doing here?” she asked.
“Uh…I-I know this is a bit awkward, Jules, but—”
“Shouldn’t you be taking part in the rescue?” she asked.
Old-timer kept smiling, not even flinching at the euphemism the androids clearly used instead of the more accurate word: attack.
Anisim shrugged. “I was called back. As you can see, it went really smoothly.”
“Yeah, it really did,” Jules replied, a hint of a smile crossing her lips. Old-timer couldn’t help but think it was a look of pride. “1 must’ve pulled off some sort of brilliant tactical maneuver again, but what else is new, right?”
“Ha-ha. Yeah,” Anisim agreed, his tone nervous, the interaction awkward. Old-timer knew he had to interject.
“By golly, you are far more beautiful than Anisim could possibly have described,” he said, stunning the young woman.
“Wh-what?” she reacted, the smile vanishing, replaced by a look of shock.
“I-I didn’t—” Anisim began to try to explain.
“Anisim didn’t want to put you out,” Old-timer continued, “but I insisted.” He put his hand on his heart to feign earnestness. “Please forgive him. Look, we’re really old friends, and he’s always said Jules was the best girl he ever went on a date with and, with the rescue happening today and all, I said to him, ‘Look, Anisim, if we get called back today because things go really well, I want you to finally introduce me to that girl you won’t shut up about.’” He smiled. “And so…” he made a grand flourish with his hand to emphasize the point, “we’re here.”
Jules put a self-conscious hand up to fix her hair before beginning to utter a response, “I wish you’d let me know first—”
“I’m sorry—” Anisim began to apologize.
“He really is,” Old-timer cut him off, “he tried to talk me out of it. But I wouldn’t let him. We were just so happy that the rescue went so well and, well, Anisim thought we’d be perfect for each other and, I just wanted to meet you so gosh darn much. But look, I can see we’re putting you out. Maybe we can just come back another time?”
“No, no,” Jules replied, her face coloring. Old-timer marveled that an android’s face could flush. “It’s okay, I’m so flattered.” Her eyes went to Anisim and she added, seemingly embarrassed, “Anisim, I had no idea.”
“Me neither,” Anisim replied.
Old-timer resisted the urge to twist the tendril.
Luckily, Jules didn’t seem to catch the verbal misstep. “Just pardon the mess, okay? But come on up.”
“Oh, thank you. You’ve made a couple a fella’s days, milady.”
“Aw, shucks,” Jules replied as the door unlocked. “See you in a minute.” Her image vanished.
“That was close,” Old-timer noted, his faux, flirty smile completely vanished.
“I’m going to burn in Hell for this,” Anisim replied as they made their way to the inner, hollowed out core of the building. They began to float upward toward Jules’s apartment. “She’s a nice girl. She doesn’t deserve this.”
“Hey, I don’t remember us calling the android collective and asking you
to ‘rescue’ us, for Christ’s sakes. You people are so deluded, it’s—”
“We’re not the deluded ones,” Anisim replied. “I promise you. Please don’t hurt her.”
They arrived outside Jules’s door, floating to the ledge at her doorstep on the thirtieth floor.
“I’ll be as gentle with her as your kind have been with mine,” Old-timer replied coldly.
2
It’s the moment of truth, James thought. Will the candidate help us or turn his back?
James reached up, his eyes locked on those of the candidate as the A.I. and Thel stood, their necks craned upward as they watched the unfolding of the telling events while the NPCs crashed and clawed against the elevator door. It sounded as though the outside door of the elevator had already partially given way and only the thin interior door stood between them and their prey. They were seconds from breaking in.
To the shared relief of the A.I. and the post-humans, the candidate did, indeed, reach back, his gloved hand grasping James’s, and James turned to grab Thel’s hand, who in turn grasped the hand of the A.I., who, inexplicably to Thel, made sure he grabbed the hand of the Kali avatar.
“Hang on tight,” the candidate said as he began to fly upward, through the hole in the roof that the A.I. had blasted with his gun, de-patternizing it. The cold rain pelted them as they lifted off into the night, leaving the candidate’s building below them—a building now crawling with NPCs. It was a sight the A.I. had seen before, the walls seeming to move with the untold number of bodies scaling the outside of the structure.
“Where do we go?” Thel shouted out.
James turned to the skyline of the sim city. The tallest rooftops were obscured by the heavy cloak of cloud and rain. “Head to the highest buildings,” James yelled to the candidate. “We’ll lose them in the canopy!”
The candidate nodded as he flew, slowly and cautiously, into the dark, gothic sky. He chose the tallest building in the city and they landed on the roof, the A.I. and Kali touching down first, followed by the others.
“Are we stuck now?” Thel asked, as she brushed the gravel from the rooftop from the knees of her new, black body armor. “We just have to wait here to be rescued by Aldous?”
“I don’t believe that would be a wise course of action,” the A.I. returned.
“Why not?” James asked. “We’ll already’ve lost the mainframe by now, not to mention Earth.”
“Because Thel was right earlier,” the A.I. returned. “Aldous, is a suspect, and a strong one at that.”
“What?” Thel reacted, astonished. “You said there was no way—”
“I was lying. He was listening in on our conversation,” the A.I. answered. “I couldn’t let him know we suspected him, but you were spot on. Aldous does indeed benefit from keeping James and I trapped in the sim, and he also benefits from the destruction of the mainframe.”
“How?” James asked, flabbergasted. “If the mainframe’s destroyed, it can’t be a power grab. He’s just as powerless as any of us—”
“It wasn’t power that he wanted for himself,” the A.I. replied, “but power he didn’t want you and I to have.” He turned to the candidate. “And power he didn’t want you to have either.”
“Trans-human,” James realized. “You’re suggesting he did all this—gave up the Earth—caused us to be assimilated by the androids—all because he didn’t want Trans-human to be reactivated?”
“Possibly,” the A.I. replied cautiously. “I’m only suggesting that Aldous is a suspect, not that he’s definitely the perpetrator responsible for our current circumstances.”
“I don’t know,” James dubiously replied. “I’ve butted heads with that obnoxious, pigheaded egomaniac ever since I was a child, ever since the council identified me as gifted. But betraying his race? I just can’t believe he’d—”
“We can’t depend on belief, James,” the A.I. replied. “We have to depend on the facts, no matter how cold and hard they are. Indeed, Aldous is not a perfect suspect. He knew Trans-human had already been activated and that it operated in an exemplary manner when I was in charge of it. His fear of it then, would seem to be irrational.”
“Unless there was something he was afraid of in particular,” Thel pointed out, “one aspect.”
James nodded. “He warned Old-timer just last night about Planck technology, but as dangerous as parallel universe-hopping might be, was he so afraid of it that he’d destroy the mainframe and leave us defenseless just to stop it?”
“And it begs the question, what does Trans-human have to do with Planck technology?” the A.I. added.
James’s arms were crossed as he began to pace across the rooftop, his head bowed as the rain drenched his hair and ran down his face, dripping from his chin. “Trans-human would have almost infinite computing capability—a mind that could unlock innumerable mysteries. What if there was a mystery he didn’t want unlocked?”
The A.I.’s eyebrow raised as he considered the question.
“Perhaps,” the candidate suddenly spoke up, “this Aldous person feared that Trans-human might be the mind that would destroy the universe as the stranger warned me?”
James’s mouth opened slightly as he snapped his head around and locked eyes with the A.I. “Aldous was the visitor that the candidate had in the sim?”
“It’s plausible,” the A.I. agreed. “It’s plausible indeed.”
3
WAKING UP underneath the Earth’s crust was akin to waking up in the ninth level of Hell as far as Rich was concerned.
Aldous tilted his companion’s head up to help rouse him. “You’re alive,” he said.
Rich turned his head to see that Aldous had brought him inside of the ship after Rich had been injured in their fall. His forcefield had remained on despite his lack of consciousness, performing correctly according to its design, but it couldn’t protect him from the ship he also cocooned and the structure had hit him, knocking him unconscious and temporarily blackening his eye. A few minutes had since past and the nans had recovered him sufficiently that Aldous knew it was safe to wake him.
Rich turned from Aldous and looked outside of the view screen to see the perfect blackness all around them outside of the green glow of their magnetic field. “Tell me that was a nightmare,” Rich spoke.
“I’m afraid not,” Aldous replied as he inhaled deeply and puffed out his chest, once again stoically pulling his shoulders back. “We’ve lost the mainframe. We’ve lost Earth, but we haven’t lost our lives, and that, in the end, is what counts.”
“Yeah,” Rich forced a sarcastic smile, “you’re right. Things aren’t so bad. Just lost Earth and everyone we know and love, not to mention our whole way of life. We’re buried under who-knows-how-many kilometers of earth, but that’s okay, because even if we can make it to the surface, we’re officially the androids’s bitches for all time. Thanks for cheering me up, Chief! You always know how to look on the bright side of life.”
“Richard, I know this is difficult to process, but we’ve all lost our home and, if I may be so bold, your negative demeanor makes it very difficult to enjoy your company.”
Rich’s eyes widened in disbelief. “Oh my God. Kettle. Pot. Black!”
“At any rate,” Aldous said, ignoring the jab as he refocused himself and looked down at Thel’s unconscious body, “your magnetic field held, just as I’d calculated it would. We’re safe.”
“James isn’t,” Rich shot back. “His body was obliterated, and without the mainframe, there’s no way to reconstruct a body for him.”
Aldous patted the black hard drive on his hip. “But he is alive, Richard, lest we forget.”
“Wow. You’re a ray of sunshine and positivity today, Chief,” he said as he sat up, rigid with fury. “You know, we should hang out more. I know this great place in San Francisco at Fisherman’s Wharf—oh wait. IT WAS DESTROYED! What are you not getting about this, Chief? We just lost Earth! We failed!”
“We saved lives,” Aldous
countered, his face like stone, only his brow furrowing slightly. “Humanity hasn’t been wiped out. Mars is terraformed. The Purists were given the newly terraformed Venus by James. All is not lost, Rich Borges. Humanity will endure.”
Rich took in a deep breath. “Apparently, Chief, you live in your own world. Wish I could hang out with you there, but I’m in this place called reality. And speaking of,” he looked straight up. “We’ve got to get back to the surface. I don’t want to be stuck down here for a second longer. I’m just now realizing that I’m definitely claustrophobic.”
“Agreed,” Aldous replied, “this would make anyone feel claustrophobic, including me.”
He held out his hand for Rich and helped him off of the table he was on, not far from where Thel was lying motionless.
Rich moved to the pilot’s seat. “It may take a few minutes to move all of this debris and rubble aside. We better get going.”
They set off, flying upward slowly, the earth giving way in front of them like ice giving way in front of an arctic icebreaking vessel before the post-human era. They continued making their way up for several minutes before either of them spoke again.
Rich, grumbly, broke the silence. “Do you have a large family, Chief?”
Aldous hesitated before answering. He’d usually brush off questions about his personal affairs as intrusive and rude, but he knew that the usual customs didn’t apply in that instance. “I don’t,” he answered, uncomfortably. “It’s just my wife and I.” He quickly steered the conversation back to Rich. “What about you, Richard?”
Rich’s eyes stared forward, unblinking. “Yes. Big family. Kids. Grand kids. Great grand kids.”
Aldous had no words to comfort a man who he knew had to be crippled with worry. He stayed silent.
“Why no kids?” Rich suddenly asked. “I mean, no offence, but you’re old as all hell, aren’t you? Like 150 or something? And you never had children?”
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