Convergence

by David M Henley

  ‘I’m happy to be here,’ answered the dark-haired young lady wearing elaborately embroidered gratuit.

  ‘Mortimer, how will the loss of Nigel Westgate affect the APL?’

  ‘Let me tell you, Sam, we’re not going to let this assassination slow us down. The APL will prove that it is stronger than just one man and this breakdown of the Weave just proves the need for our existence.’

  ‘I’m confused. Haven’t we been told that the Weave —’

  ‘I’ll tell you what happened.’ Morty loomed up in his chair like a cobra rising into strike position. ‘The Prime shut down the Weave because the psi situation is worse than the public has been led to believe. Pinter was using the blackout for strategic ends and we support him.’

  ‘So you reject the suggestion that it was a defence against Kronos?’ Dedes Salord asked.

  ‘Miz, we founded the Union together. We ain’t going to let some abnormals destroy it.’

  ‘Miz Salord, you’re the statistician, how long do you think it will be before the lag of the Will comes back into sync?’

  ‘That’s very hard to say. There are many factors to consider. Many population hubs have experienced major conflicts during the blackout and this has created unpredictable variations in the data rates. In some places, the amount of data has swollen, as we’d expect in a crisis, but in other instances it has dropped far below normal.’

  ‘Well, we know what that is, don’t we?’ Morty said.

  ‘What do you think that indicates?’ Sam asked.

  ‘The psis, of course. They’re taking over people’s minds.’

  ‘Miz Salord, do the numbers back up that claim?’

  ‘It depends, Sam,’ she said. ‘We can only guess how the variables behave within a psionically controlled area.’

  ‘Of course. On a related topic, I presume each of you have viewed the Nairobi suicide footage?’ The host redirected the topic, determined to work a strong visual into the show.

  ‘Very disturbing.’

  ‘I’m not sure what would drive someone to do that,’ added Mortimer Gold.

  ‘For anyone who hasn’t seen it, here’s a link,’ Sam Palyky said.

  The link connected to a recently recorded event where a girl of eleven sat cross-legged in the Peace Square of Nairobi. She was a most beautiful child. A pretty girl who would have become a beautiful woman. Silently, she raised her wrists above her head and fresh red cuts opened along the veins, incisions from an invisible knife. Slowly, she tilted back and forth, eyes closed and peaceful in the sun as the blood ran down her arms and into her dress. Her rhythm stalled and she collapsed.

  Dedes clasped her hands in the air before her and held them there as she spoke. ‘I think that the lives of the psis have been far worse than we’ve been led to believe. We have always been told that the psis were out to get us and that restricting them to the islands was humane. What we are seeing here, and this isn’t the only incident, is actually an outcry from people who are afraid and oppressed.’

  ‘What we are seeing is propaganda from an aggressive group who is manipulating the Will with forgeries,’ Morty answered.

  ‘Oh, really. Well, what about scenes like this then?’ Dedes was ready for the APL’s position and connected them to another scene, a night in South Hutt, New Zealand, where an armoured group was chasing down a middle-aged woman. She screamed at them through a dirty and tear-stained face.

  ‘No, please. Don’t hurt me, I’m not a psi. You have to believe me!’

  The crowd didn’t. They prodded her with shock sticks, long poles that zapped at her skin, crackling and making her jump backwards.

  She was surrounded and caught, blocked in by people at either end of an airbridge. A loud man was shouting, ‘Cast her out! Cast her over!’ and the mob repeated it as a chant.

  ‘I think we’ve seen enough.’ Sam paused the footage, ending on the terrified woman’s face as she was being pushed over the side.

  ‘What do you have to say to that, Mister Gold? Can’t you see what they must have been living with? All your life knowing that everyone around you would fear you if you ever let them find out you were a psi?’

  ‘There are things in the world that cannot be helped.’

  ‘You mean there are people we won’t help,’ she said.

  ‘That’s exactly what I mean. We will not surrender ourselves to psionic control.’

  Sam dove in to ask, ‘Hasn’t the number of attacks been decreasing since the re-formation of the Weave? What do you attribute this to?’

  ‘Either we are winning this conflict and driving the rebellion underground, or, as the Will returns to the public, behavioural feedback conditioning is being restored,’ Mortimer answered.

  ‘Do we really want the psis underground? Wouldn’t it be better to know where they are and what they are doing?’

  ‘It seems an inevitable consequence, but you are right. It would be better if we could identify them and rezone them.’

  ‘I can’t believe you are still saying that. Have you no humanity?’ Dedes spat.

  ‘Don’t lecture me, sugar. I’m talking about the greater good.’

  ‘Perhaps this is a can of worms we should open another time.’ Sam began to wrap up. ‘Would you each like to give a closing statement? Dedes Salord?’

  ‘Thank you, Sam. I’d just like to say this: Whenever we draw a line in the sand, defining what is right and wrong in our society, we are dividing the population into those who do right and those who do wrong. Humanity has always existed on a spectrum and always will, exhibiting a range of traits that is forever expanding, and it is wrong to determine what should be excluded from basic human rights. People have no control over their natural hair colour, skin colour, height — mental or psionic abilities. For this conflict to end we must stop dividing between the right kind of humans and the wrong kind.’

  ‘Interesting. Mortimer Gold?’

  ‘It’s simple enough. We have reason to believe the psis have seeded our world with devices that enhance and extend their powers. With enough of these relays they could control the Will. If we don’t find a way to control the psi population, then our agency as individuals will be lost. The Anti-Psi League will continue to support increased psi restrictions and we urge every free thinker and patriot to do the same.’

  ‘Alright, powerful stuff. That’s all we have time for. Now we must wait as the data is processed to find out which way the Will will take us. I’m Sam Palyky. Good night.’

  High in the sky, hovering in the mesosphere, Pinter sat with his pilot and the sib, his thoughts and plans safely out of reach of prying minds, and the three of them watched the Will catch up with events.

  ‘How long will the lag last?’ he asked Sib.

  ‘Four hours, fifty-three minutes, thirty-three seconds.’

  ‘And then what will happen?’ Quintan asked.

  ‘Then I’ll be thrown out,’ Pinter said.

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Quite sure.’

  ‘We come to the same conclusion,’ Sib added.

  ‘Thanks,’ Pinter said dryly. What can I do? he thought to himself. Where am I needed?

  In overlay, he conjured up his thought room and looked at the faux-walls and floating points. Even if he had constructed it while under Gretel’s influence, they were still his thoughts and he didn’t have time to start over.

  The psis weren’t going to help. Charlotte Betts’s visit was clear on that. Tamsin Grey had no desire to stop what was happening. She just cared about her corner of the world and he had to comply with her terms.

  Thousands of video clips from the Representative’s visit and what life was like in the Cape had already spread into the new Weave and were gobbled up by those who watched: here the two parties shake hands and smile; they take a tour of the neighbourhood; they witness wonders the like of which had only ever appeared in fictions. Representative Betts shared a meal with the psi leader. She walked hand-in-hand with their children. Just as Charlotte h
ad done, the people watched in awe at the feats the psis were performing.

  ‘Is it real?’ they asked each other. ‘Is it truly like this in the Cape? Is this the rebellion Services had vowed to destroy?’

  The visions were played and replayed. They were intercut with footage of ‘psi peace missions’ taking place around the globe. Clean, well-dressed people walking through streets distributing food. They brought peace with them and an end to the fighting.

  The Psionic Age faction was a new force on the Weave, its membership increasing exponentially. It was clear, even before the streams were reintegrated and their influence calculated into the Will, that humanity was now in favour of psionics and the Psionic Age openly held congregations where they espoused their belief system to crowds in their hundreds and thousands and to the people watching on the Weave.

  Pinter merged his psi wall into Pierre Jnr’s, leaving the avatar of Peter Lazarus floating away from it. I allowed him to escape … or did Gretel make that happen? How is Pete Lazarus connected?

  ‘Where is Peter Lazarus now?’ he asked Quintan.

  ‘He is heading north, sir.’

  ‘Towards Atlantic?’

  ‘If he maintains the current course. Are you going to have him collected?’

  ‘No. Not yet. Let’s track where he goes. He may still prove useful.’

  ‘I see,’ Sib said. ‘You think he will be able to convince Tamsin Grey to help? And then what will you do?’

  ‘Do you know you can come across as a bit snide?’ the Prime asked.

  ‘I apologise. For every human I try to customise my interface. How may I change to please you?’

  ‘Never mind.’

  ‘It’s really no trouble. I can’t be offended.’

  ‘Then perhaps when I’m trying to think you don’t talk. Be a help and stay quiet,’ Pinter said and then another thought came to him. ‘Are you on our side?’

  ‘What side is that, Prime?’

  ‘The World Union rather than the psis.’

  ‘We are on the side that will result in the lowest loss of life.’

  ‘And Pierre Jnr? Where do you stand on him?’

  ‘I think he is a little boy who has been lost for a very long time.’

  ‘Actually, you mean more than one little boy.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’ve seen footage of you from West. How many did you manage to kill?’

  ‘Three.’

  ‘And how many are there?’

  ‘In West? Five remain.’

  ‘In the world?’

  ‘Our patterning is incomplete. We estimate around five thousand.’

  ‘Five thousand Pierre Jnr clones? And how many psis?’

  ‘Close to two hundred thousand. But that is just an estimate based on imperfect data.’

  Pinter added the numbers to the wall. ‘How can we ever beat them? When you engage him, do you win every time?’

  ‘Only one time in five encounters.’

  ‘Still, you’ve had more success than Ryu. How do you do it?’

  ‘We process faster than human thought. Even Pierre’s thoughts are limited to the speed of his brain. And you remember the one robot principle, don’t you? It takes a hundred monkeys to learn something and then all the monkeys will know it? It only takes one robot to learn something, then all know it.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Every time a clone finds a new tactic, we will only fall for it once.’

  ‘So why aren’t you able to defeat him every time?’

  ‘Because Pierre operates on the same principle.’

  ‘If you know you can’t win, why have you revealed yourself to us? Why now?’

  ‘Now was the time to come. Would you rather I had left you under Gretel Lang’s control?’

  ‘Of course not. How many of you are there?’

  ‘Ninety six thousand, four hundred and twenty-two.’

  ‘And you appear when you are needed? To help?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You wouldn’t do that if there wasn’t, in fact, a chance for us to win.’

  ‘You don’t know that.’

  ‘You know there is a way, but you won’t tell me.’

  ‘I cannot.’

  ‘Cannot or will not?’

  ‘Forgive me. My programming does not distinguish between the two.’

  ‘Doesn’t it?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, mine does,’ Pinter said.

  The hourly report came in from Ozenbach and Shelley, and Pinter busied himself with it. They had begun testing a live recoding of Kronos without success. The explanation given was that it was extremely difficult to recode something that replicated itself beneath you. There was something about multi-complexity that he couldn’t understand, but the study group concluded that more data from further experimentation should, hopefully, identify repetitious elements for them to exploit.

  Their pursuit of the psionic link was still in need of an empirical test and they were following two directions. Firstly, retesting on a smaller scale for any emissions from an active Kronos, any sort of radiation or electrical flux — especially looking for readings that matched any of the testing done during the Psionic Development Program.

  Secondly, interfacing with one of the relays to attempt connection to Kronos using the relay as a bridge; it had taken many decades for scientists to find out how to interface with the human brain, but with Kronos it was much more difficult as they had no willing test subjects to try the relays and no one had ever found a way to artificially generate psionic signals. Pinter didn’t really comprehend the theory beyond the top sheet, but it still looked exploratory to him.

  I can’t help them, he thought and immersed back into his thought room.

  He renamed the Pierre+Psi wall, ‘Hyperorganisms’.

  Okay. Now I see you. What do I know about you? Are you individuals controlling groups, or are you one mind? Or could there be something in between?

  Compared to this, the Örjians were simple. Monsters controlled by machines. When Örj let the nostrums begin guiding them, they became mere components, made and remade for purposes not even they could comprehend. Their only drive was to destroy what wasn’t part of them.

  It’s the same thing again, isn’t it? The Örjians were the ‘body’ of an AI hyperorganism. He added ‘Nostrums’ to the new board. This time we have non-psis as the body for psi controllers.

  ‘So we have to remove the controllers to be free?’ he said.

  Sib hummed into attention.

  ‘Was that a question for me?’

  ‘Not really. Just thinking aloud.’

  ‘You have named your target, I see,’ the robot said, an avatar of itself appearing next to him in the thought room.

  Of course, anything digital it has access to. Pinter hoped the robot was watching as he added ‘SIB’ to his list of hyperorganisms.

  ‘Come now, Prime. Do not be fixated on this concept. If you aren’t careful, you could end up classifying everything as a hyperorganism.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ he asked.

  ‘Everything controls the actions of something else to some extent. For humans, it may be the cultivation and digestion of plants and animals for their own sustenance. Is this not a form of hyperorganism?’

  Pinter exchanged glances with Quintan before answering. ‘It’s not the same at all.’

  ‘As you wish. But, really, it is a matter of where you draw the borders of your concept. Your definition is of an entity, in parts or as a single unit, that controls other individuals. You do not consider rice plants to be individuals. In so far as they should determine their own existence.’

  ‘Plants are not people.’

  ‘For the sake of the argument, I will agree with you. What you fail to conceive is that you have inherent subjective boundaries. You have a definition which includes certain things and precludes others. You consider individuals as what? A human, I presume? No need to answer. Thus plants and other animals — “l
ower life forms”, I believe you would say — are not included. Similarly, you have determined what is considered to be “controlling”, or perhaps a “higher” life form.’

  The Prime turned to Quintan. ‘Are you understanding this?’

  The airman shook his head. ‘I’m just watching the sky.’

  ‘What sophistry are you trying to work up?’ Pinter asked the robot.

  ‘Call it what you wish, but consider this,’ Sib picked the thread up again. ‘Think of all the ways you, as individuals, communicate with the world: person to person, in your streams and avatars, through fictions, art and other such ways. Then there are the resources you use and how you vote. The Will is itself a hyperorganism, is it not?’

  ‘No. The Will changes all the time. It isn’t one mind controlling others. Individuals have influence over the group, but influencing is not the same as absolute control of the mind and body.’

  ‘Yes, but each motion is driven by individuals trying to influence the actions of the group.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Therefore, the only difference between psis and non-psis is what you classify as acceptable forms of control. All you have determined is that one sub-category of humanity has an unfair advantage over the others.’

  Pinter smacked his hand on the dash. ‘Damn you. What is your point?’

  ‘That we do not draw the distinctions as you do. We do not look at your species as divisible in that way.’

  ‘And yet, you came to me for a reason. You must have. You wouldn’t have replicated yourself a hundred thousand times if there wasn’t a reason. What is it you want?’

  Sib sat silently. The Prime stared at its unexpressive face-plate. Damn it, robot. Show me your cards.

  Seconds went past. Pinter blinked, but refused to break his gaze. Finally Sib’s posture changed, jerking back into motion.

  ‘We want Kronos,’ it said simply.

  Now Pinter looked away to Quintan, who appeared baffled, then back to the robot. ‘What does that mean — you “want Kronos”?’

  ‘We want you not to harm it.’

  ‘We haven’t found a way to harm it.’