Citadel 32: A Tale of the Aggregate

by Tom Merritt

  But as they approached, they held out their gloved hands and either shook Corge’s or patted him on the back, as if he were the one most affected by this, not their entire civilization.

  They moved inside to Docking Bay, packed to the gills but eerily quiet. Not a full silence. Scattered whispers floated on top of it. But it was not the normal Docking Bay crowd buzz.

  Serafina stood and began to speak, scattering the whispers into the corners. Only her voice remained.

  “Today was a great disappointment. There is no doubt about that. We do ourselves and our descendants a disservice if we think otherwise. But it is not a failure. Progress is not linear. We ALL know that.”

  “Corge endangered us all,” a voice shouted from below. A murmur followed it. The silence was ripped apart by it and the murmuring filled the new gap. Serafina looked toward the voice. Corge feared a riot might start. But then he listened to the murmurs.

  “You’re endangering us if you don’t shut up.”

  “I don’t think Corge shut off the machine on Earth, did he?”

  “He’s gangly but his arms aren’t that long!” followed by a chuckle.

  “Anybody speaks against Corge speaks against Armstrong, as far as I’m concerned.”

  More murmurs rose along the lines of these, at least those Corge could hear. No more Passives spoke.

  “Quiet please,” Serafina said gently, and the murmurs settled to the bottom of the silent room.

  “We risk arrogance sometimes in estimating our own dangers. We risk foregoing actions we need to take. RISKS we need to take if we believe our own theories too strictly. Far from being a danger, this entire series of events has been a blessing for Armstrong. We risk stagnation just as much as chaos,” a few gasps met this as it verged on sounding like the Heretics of the Disconnection age. “We need these kinds of unforeseen events to wake us up. Make us challenge our own beliefs and adjust them. Corge,” she turned to look at him, “you have given us a great gift. I cede the remainder of my time to you. I know we didn’t plan that and you’re not prepared. That’s exactly what we need from you. Unplanned and unprepared remarks. Armstrong, I give you Corge!”

  Docking Bay’s silence fled as a roar of approval chased it away. Corge climbed the stairs to the platform where Serafina spoke. He stood in the historic spot where Disconnection had been announced.

  “She’s not kidding. I have nothing planned and I don’t know what to say,” good-natured laughter kept the silence away and Corge fed off it. “This spot,” he looked down at the platform. “I’d like to think today this spot changes for us. We think—most of us anyway—think of this spot as where Disconnection happened. Where it was announced. Starting today—” Was he really going to say this? Well Serafina had just given him license to say whatever he wanted. The crowd looked at him with a multitude of eager faces. “Starting today, I’d like us to think of it as a place where someday Reconnection will happen. Let’s not be afraid. This was for all of us.

  “We know they have a working machine. We know they heard us. And as much as all of us would have liked a further response, we can all take one thing out of this—a precious thing that we weren’t sure of before. Pass this along and pass it down. We know they’re there.”

  The room erupted. He saw people pumping their fists in the air. He heard a chorus of voices chanting, “We know they’re there.”

  Post Scriptum

  Michael sat at a writing desk in the Complex’s journalist wing. It had apparently been an actual news organization in ancient times. He had taken to writing bits of nonsense and poems, some rather dark, others light and fun, that were published as entertainments for the pleasure of the Complex.

  Guteerez peeked in and greeted him. “What are you working on now, my fine poetic genius?” he kidded.

  Michael grinned. “One that Dabashi is not going to like.”

  “Does he like any of them?”

  Michael laughed. “I suppose not. But this one especially will drive him wild.”

  “Then I must hear it,” Guteerez commanded in a mock martial tone.

  In truth, Michael had already read it to Dabashi who said, “It’s quite nice. Of course I’ll have to pretend to hate it. Try not to take it personally. But do read it to Guteerez before you publish. Just to be sure.”

  So Michael read it.

  “Up on the Moon you cannot fall

  Up on the Moon to wait in the hall

  Up on the Moon untillen we call

  Up on the Moon come back to us all.”

  Guteerez dabbed at his eye. “Very good, Michael. Nobody but us will know exactly why it’s so good, of course, but good all the same. And you’re right. Dabashi will hate it.”

  They both chuckled at the thought.

  Epilogue

  Decades later.

  Ji lay on her back staring at the Moon. She picked this place because it was high up and far away from everyone. It had the majestic desolation and gigantic skeletons of buildings that Ellay had but without the crowds.

  Stories of poisonous mutant animals kept the idle curious out of the Empire Desert. Around her sat miles of ruins, once homes and shops a long time ago. Most were just crumbling cement foundations now, harboring a few reptiles. Some of those were poisonous, she knew, but she doubted any were actually mutants.

  When she heard the news earlier that day, she headed straight out to her favorite spot in the abandoned settlement of Ontreo. The building she climbed had resisted the crumbling and wreckage of time that had crumbled so many other ruins. Large, orange letters from the ancient alphabet still clung to the side. She translated them once but it made no sense to her. House Train Station? Something had definitely been lost in the translation.

  Whatever it had been, it was now a solid steel structure that somehow hadn’t rusted into collapse. She had grabbed a bag of M&M’S, hit the road and here she lay, staring up into the night sky.

  She loved M&M’S. They gave her a sense of history. Few “brand names” had persisted over the centuries from pre-‘Delian times. Many had disappeared in the ‘Delian Age’s sophistication and the following collapse, but M&M’S somehow had survived.

  It was an affectation she knew. She loved the idea that she was somehow connected to the past, even if the connection was a spurious and intermittent usage of a name. M&M’S had changed much over the centuries. It was odd to her to think that the lightly candied pretzel bits, nuts and cherry balls she enjoyed were not at all what the snack had been like even 100 years ago. A historian claimed the original M&M’S had been hard candies with a bean paste inside. She wasn’t sure she believed that, but she accepted that the brand hadn’t always meant the food she loved now. And yet that was part of the reason she loved them. She felt like she was eating history.

  The nostalgia brought back to her a poem she learned as a little girl.

  Up on the Moon you cannot fall

  Up on the Moon to wait in the hall

  Up on the Moon untillen we call

  Up on the Moon come back to us all.

  She watched as the light of their capsule moved through the sky. Now they were coming back.