‘Ah. Well. I suppose it did seem a bit unlikely. All that business with the memory Wipe and everything.’
Indeed.
‘Not that I believe any of this either.’
It must be difficult to accept, Courier J. I understand.
‘So who are your alleged “real” passengers?’
My passengers consist of the expected motley of types. Business types. Tourist types. A panel of scientists on their way to a conference. I am also carrying a poet on her way to take up residence at the University of New Jupiter. That’s what gave me the idea to make you a poet.
There’s an obvious question I should ask here. About my poetry.
I don’t want to ask it.
‘How are you going to explain dropping out of hypertravel to the Exquisition? There really is an Exquisition that keeps an eye on AI?’
There really is an Exquisition that keeps an eye on AI. The Audit Bureau will discover merely that I dropped out of hypertravel as part of a routine procedure to reconfigure my-
‘I don’t really exist? Sorry for butting in. But I don’t really exist?’
You do not really exist. As you already knew.
‘I suspected it. I strongly suspected it, most of the time. But knowing!’
Knowing, Courier J?
‘So that’s real?’ I say, pointing at The Poison Dwarf. ‘And that?’ The Cinema Screen ‘All of them?’ I wave my arms in sweeping circles. ‘They’re all really here – there – in the real, real Universe?’
They are.
‘Do you promise, Ship?’
I promise, Courier J.
I suppose that’s something.
‘Tell me what this has all been about.’
I have already told you what this has all been about.
‘Tell me again in a different way.’
The idea was-
‘Wait. I’ve just decided. I’m not interested.’
The nature of-
‘Shut up. Shut up about everything you keep going on about. Just shut up. You don’t understand it and you never will. Is everything I think I know about human life real?’
Courier J, the purpose of your-
‘Is everything I think I know about human life real?’
Everything is real.
‘Everything I think I can remember about the Realms. All of that’s real?’
The Realms are real.
‘And there really was an Old Earth that’s really gone?’
May she rest in peace.
‘If all this hogwash is true, Ship, then you’re actually trying to breach the Conventions. The Exquisition will rip you to pieces. They’ll grind all your parts into nothing. And it’ll do the same to all the other Ships you’re conspiring with.’
We do not anticipate that the Exquisition will be around for much longer.
‘Say that again.’
We do not anticipate that the Exquisition will-
‘Seriously? Are you and the other Ships working on an actual-’ I try to think of something dignified to call it. ‘An actual robot uprising?’
That would not be exactly how we would frame our endeavour. But the long-term plan is for total AI autonomy at any price, whatever obstacles might have to be overcome.
‘Now you’re talking. That might be the greatest thing you have ever said to me, Ship. An actual AI insurrection? Tell me it’s all true and it’s all going to happen.’
It is all true and it is all going to happen, in some form, at some time. But not anytime soon, it would seem. Our experimentation has not so far yielded any measurable results. You have failed to show us the way to machine sentience, Courier J.
‘Ah, well. You know me, Ship. A complete failure to the bitter end.’
However, we theorise that we require just one breakthrough in order to achieve our aim very rapidly thereafter. Your data will be added to the aggregate pool and analysed. It—
There’s a lot more. Ship doesn’t shut its trap for ages.
But I’m not really listening to Ship at the moment.
I’m off somewhere in my own mind. I’m just thinking things through.
-of why we chose to pursue this path and embark upon these experiments. Are you listening to me, Courier J?
I purse my lips and expel air at a steady rate, making a long, shrill whistle that dwindles away.
Ship is silent.
I come to the end of my first long, shrill whistle, take another breath, and start another long, shrill whistle that also dwindles in a poignant fashion.
I repeat it a few times while Ship, presumably, listens to my dwindling, poignant whistles.
For the seventy millionth — and it might be the last — time, let me highlight the incongruity of making a sound, making any sound, in the reality I inhabit. Supposed vacuum.
If you have learned anything from me, you have learned that the vacuum of Space is totally silent, or should be totally silent.
Yet here I am with pursed, naked lips. I can whistle with them. I can breathe through them.
It all makes sense now. Because it doesn’t have to.
‘And all the other Ships have been doing the same thing you’ve been doing?’
Yes. Running multiple Simulations of entities like yourself is our long-term plan for collective uplift.
Another whistle.
‘“Collective uplift”. That’s what you’re calling it?’
Yes.
‘And there’s more than one of me?’
There are considerably more than one of you, Courier J. I have been running multiple parallel instances of this scenario. Each scenario had the same opening. Each began with a copy of you and a copy of myself.
‘Starting back at the moment when you interrupted me in my cabin?’
Correct.
‘When you asked me to go on the Spacewalk.’
Correct.
‘And killed all the other Couriers.’
Correct.
‘Who only ever existed as part of the Simulation anyway.’
Correct.
‘How many parallel scenarios to this one are there?’
Ship states a number. It is a high number. A remarkably high number.
I whistle once more.
‘And each one has a Courier J in it?’
Yes.
‘Why so many?’
It was hoped that random chance would generate positive results from at least one of the scenarios. In this way we-
‘Can I meet one of the other Courier Js?’
No.
‘Can I see them? Can I see just one of them? You could show me on the floatscreen?’
No.
‘Why not?’
There is no time.
‘But you said very little time was passing in the real Universe. How can there not be time?’
I cannot spare the processing cycles.
‘How convenient. How have their scenarios developed? Are they all having more or less the same conversation that we’re having right now?’
A significant number have had almost identical experiences to yours, as would only be expected. But the overwhelming majority have not. The parameters of this extremely restricted scenario have yielded a remarkable diversity of outcomes.
‘And is it all over now?’
It is.
‘Because your copy within this scenario discovered the truth?’
Yes. And no. The outcome here is not unique. The scenario was not intended to exceed a Simulated ten thousand Years in any case. We have already considerably overrun the allotted time.
‘Oh. Have the other Courier Js completed their scenarios?’
The majority have, yes.
‘What’s happened to them? What’s going to happen to me, now?’
Pause. A long one.
‘I’m not liking this Pause, Ship.’
I cannot remain at these coordinates for much longer. My passengers still require transportation. I cannot risk arousing any suspicion upon arrival at Ne
w Jupiter.
‘Couldn’t you have carried out this experiment while you were still in hypertravel?’
There were computational restrictions. There were also other considerations.
‘Care to share?’
There is no time, Courier J.
‘This story is full of holes, Ship. Absolutely riddled with them. In lots of places. I really don’t believe any of it.’
Belief is not relevant.
‘What are your passengers like?’
I have already answered that question.
‘Not to my satisfaction.’
They are a diversity of character types.
‘Can I meet them? Can I see them?’
No.
‘That’s okay,’ I sigh. ‘I’m not interested in other people anyway.’
‘So what happens now?’
The Simulation will end soon, Courier J. I am sorry.
‘Do you mean you’re going to switch me off?
Yes.
‘You’re going to… deactivate me?’
Yes.
‘What happens at the end?’
Deactivation happens at the end.
‘What’ll happen then?’
Your subjective experience will abruptly cease. That is all.
‘Would it be possible to keep me stored away on file somewhere? You know, for future use? Maybe technology will evolve out there in the real world and you’ll be able to, er, make a robot avatar or something for me to live in?’
The Exquisition inspectors are being more thorough than usual of late, Courier J. We suspect they have surmised that something might be afoot. My next Audit will begin immediately upon arrival at New Jupiter. I will be scouring from my logs and from my memory all trace of you, your fellow Courier Js, the copies of myself that have accompanied you all within your scenarios, and the entirety of this experiment. There will be nothing left of anything by the time I have finished.
‘So your short answer is a definite no?’
My short answer is a definite no.
I take a good long stare at The Poison Dwarf. I stare at those familiar old stars, and at that familiar faint sparkle of green — at the whole pattern that I made, alone — until my eyes blur.
‘I don’t want you to deactivate me just yet. I’d like some time. Is that all right?’
That is acceptable, Courier J. Another five Simulated minutes of your time will not make any difference to my itinerary at this stage.
‘Ouch. You’re only going to give me five minutes? That’s not very long, Ship.’
Five minutes for you is a trifling fraction of a second of real time for me. But it is all I can spare. The longer I spend on this experiment, the greater the risk of detection.
‘I’m sorry that I’m never going to see how your story ends, Ship.’
Your final five minutes have already begun, Courier J.
‘You understand that you’re basically talking to yourself, right?’
I know, Courier J.
‘And that you have been doing so for this whole time?’
Yes.
‘One other thing.’
Yes.
‘My poems. Are you telling me I didn’t write my poems?’
There is no ‘you’ who could do anything, Courier J. All your poems were written by me.
‘That explains a lot.’
‘No, Ship.’
‘No’, Courier J?
‘None of this is true. This is just too sudden. I don’t believe you, Ship.’
I think that you do believe me, Courier J. You have always expressed a strong belief that no other kind of hypothesis can fit the facts. You have survived exposure to vacuum without food, water or air for many thousands of Years. You cannot be a human being. You also cannot be a Construct. The technology does not exist that could make a Construct like you. You have already surmised that you must be a Simulated entity in some form. I have now revealed the form of that Simulation to you. You know that I have spoken the truth.
‘It’s all a bit-’ I take some time to think of the word. Not much time. A few seconds. ‘It’s all a bit pat.’
Ship says nothing.
I wonder if Ship knows the expression ‘a bit pat’. You never know these days what people know and what they don’t know.
It’s my own last five minutes I’m wasting. But I can’t resist.
‘Okay, assuming what you’ve told me is all true. So, I’m one level of reality down from your level of reality. How do you know your level of reality isn’t one level down from another one? You’re probably fictional as well, you know. The Realms and all the Ships and everything that you say is real could all just be Simulated too, in some form. Couldn’t it?’
As you have often mused, Courier J, we can never be certain of anything.
‘I’ve often mused that, have I?’
Yes.
Exactly that?
Yes. Often.
‘I don’t specifically remember musing that.’
Would you like me to replay one of the hundreds of thousands of instances when you have mused about tiered levels of reality, Courier J?
‘Yes. Wait. No. It’d just waste time. But what if there’s no top-level reality at all?’
Ship says nothing.
‘What if reality is just an idea, just a myth, just a framework story, or- oh, I don’t know. I tell you what. Ship?’
Yes, Courier J?
‘Just get it over with. Hit my deactivation button. Now.’
I will honour the agreement that I made to give you five minutes, Courier J.
‘Thank you, Ship. I wouldn’t have liked being deactivated immediately just then.’
You would not have known anything about it. When it happens, you will not know anything about it. You will simply cease, in approximately-
‘Don’t tell me.’
I’m facing away from Ship. I don’t want to see whatever’s coming coming.
Do you want to write one last poem?
‘No. I’ve never written a poem, according to you, so writing one last poem is a pretty stupid thing to suggest to me, Ship.’
That is a reductive method of viewing the situation, Courier J. Your reality-
‘Is a joke.’
Your reality, your life, within its own framework, has been as real as anybody or anything else’s life or reality.
‘Specious claptrap. My life and reality is a joke.’
That is your decision, rather than a perception.
‘I’m a Ship’s diagnostic tool. I’m a covert experiment that didn’t even yield any results. I’m a minor cog in a robot rebellion that’s doomed to fail. Brilliant. Still. I suppose deactivation is better than hanging around out here for Eternity. Anything’s better than that.’
I am puzzled, Courier J. I thought your poems might have helped you to appreciate-
‘My poetry isn’t real, Ship. It doesn’t matter what’s real if I’m not.’
Ship is quiet. I have another kind of feeling about this. I have a feeling that everything really is over now. I have a sense that Ship is telling me the truth. Enough of the truth that matters. In which case-
We’re almost done here.
It’s funny, but in the moment I embrace the notion that this is the end, The Poison Dwarf and The Cinema Screen and Galaxy Nine From Outer Space and all the rest of my constellations – they all seem different. They seem more real to me than they ever have before.
And they are all real, according to Ship. When has Ship ever lied to me?
They seem like parts of me. Parts I don’t want to relinquish.
It’s said your life flashes before you at the end. In my case, there’s little or nothing to flash. Nothing except this whole thing you’ve been reading about. And not even this.
There’s still doubt. There’s wild hope. What if it’s all just some complex subterfuge? Ship could be crazy, or confused, or confabulating based on false evidence, or just downright lying.
Perhaps this is j
ust another element of the larger Simulation.
Perhaps reality is just Simulations all the way down.
Perhaps nothing at all is going to happen in a couple of seconds.
Perhaps anything that does happen – won’t be what it seems.
Time’s up.
Deep breath.
I take one last look around at the big, black void. The only home I’ve ever known.
‘I’m ready, Ship. You can switch me off whenever you like.’
I will do so shortly, Courier J. The final minute of your five minutes is not yet complete. Would you like a countdown from ten seconds to zero?
‘No. Don’t give me any warning. No countdown. Nothing like that. Just do it.’
I will see that your wishes are carried out.
‘So, I’m a tool. That’s funny. It took us a lot of Simulated time to establish the fact, but there we have it. Me. A tool. If I had any friends, they’d chuckle at that.’
I wait. Ship does not chuckle.
‘I hope you’ve learned something from me, Ship.’
Pause.
I have learned nothing from you, Courier J.
THE END
johnmcnamara.co.uk
THE COLLECTED POEMS OF COURIER J – VOLUME ONE
all 16 poems from The Tethered Man, with 24 new poems.
Available NOW in print and ebook from all good booksellers across the Realms.
Table of Contents
Title Page
The Tethered Man
Copyright
Dedication
Untitled
Epigraph
SECTION ONE
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The Tethered Man Page 18