The Reality Thief (Deplosion Book 1)

by Paul Anlee

  Greg’s lattice had enabled him to memorize the complex martial art routine almost instantly. Sadly, his muscles had yet to become accustomed to the deceptively rigorous movements, let alone the brutally slow place of this traditional Yang form. As they approached the twenty-minute mark, he could feel his heart beating rapidly and his legs shaking from fatigue. The form was surprisingly challenging, both mentally and physically. Just a bit longer. It gets easier once we get past the last Needle at the Bottom of the Seabed.

  Over the past few months, Greg discovered he loved everything Chinese. He loved the food, the music, the architecture, the martial arts, the language and, most of all, Kathy Liang. They were happy to learn that Darian also had an appreciation of the ancient culture. When he and Kathy requested the Saturday morning off to take part in a Tai Chi demonstration at the Sun Yat-Sen gardens, Darian not only gave them permission but came along to watch.

  Truth be told, Greg and Kathy welcomed a little respite from the stress of the past five weeks. They were trying their best to be a normal couple, to nurture the love that was growing between them, but it wasn’t easy. They managed to steal away for a dinner date, a walk in the misty rain, or an occasional movie, but Darian granted time away from work begrudgingly, and only when exhaustion or tedium hampered productivity. By the time they got home, they barely had enough energy left to cook, eat, and crash, painfully aware that next morning’s alarm would come too early for their liking.

  In the meantime, the dendy lattices growing inside their heads pushed relentlessly forward, displacing and replacing biological neurons.

  Ever since the shooting, which Darian now referred to as, “The Event,” he had altered the lattice development program to make its host—that is, each of them—less reliant on the body’s natural biology.

  For now, the combination of retreating biology and aggressive semiconductor growth made all three of them more prone to total mental shutdown than they had been in prior weeks. Darian promised that would change after the system adapted. Once it did, their bodies and minds would no longer need the restorative cycles of sleep. They would be able to work as much as they wanted, provided they took care of their physical requirements.

  Greg wasn’t quite sure he liked the sound of that. I guess I’m not ready to be primarily machine-driven quite yet.

  Darian’s dendy program upgrade, having been implemented before the others’ as a precautionary measure, was further along in its progress. He didn’t need internal system checks to measure the improvements, he could tell by the dwindling hours he was able to work without rest.

  The man was obsessed with solving the enigma of the RAF generator dysfunction. Like so many compulsively dedicated scientists before him, other aspects of his life were starting to suffer, notably, his hygiene, his health, and his patience. He spent his days in electronic communication with Greg in a shared virtual, computational space he had constructed on his desktop computer.

  There, the two of them reworked the RAF equations from as many different starting principles as they could imagine. They compared the computed predictions with every cosmological, subatomic, and quantum experiment of the past century.

  As a result of their investigations, they proposed a host of new experiments, many of which they sent out to groups around the world. At least twenty new, ground-breaking tests would be underway over the next few months at research institutes in China, Japan, Germany, Switzerland, Russia, Brazil, Pacifica, and the United States of North America.

  Though politics had rearranged national alliances over the past few decades, science was as international as it had ever been. Those with the most appropriate expertise were sent proposals for new experiments regardless of their physical locations. Darian insisted that his research benefit all of humanity; borders and political alignments were irrelevant.

  The team knew something was wrong, most likely with the theory. Otherwise, the RAF generator would have worked. They held to the premise expressed by one of Darian’s favorite sayings, “Mother Nature is never wrong.” If that were true, they must have missed some important clue in the petabytes of available experimental data. Once discovered, the overlooked data would explain why the Reality Assertion Field theory could not be correct.

  But the more they probed, the better the theory stood up. Darian’s frustration with his inability to spot which of his initial assumptions was faulty began to wear on all of them.

  There was still a slim possibility that the theory was right, and that something had gone wrong with the implementation of the RAF generator. They’d run a cursory check early on in their testing and almost entirely ruled that out but…still. What else was left?

  One day, Darian asked Kathy and Larry to log every schematic, along with videos and intermediate test results into Darian’s workspace.

  While the others slept, Darian reviewed all of the engineering specs and functional tests of the device. He went over everything. He checked the approach, the implementation, and the operational verifications. He proposed new tests at every step to ensure that every part was functioning to spec. He could find nothing that wasn’t working exactly as designed. It was infuriating.

  Everything in Darian’s world moved at hyper-speed, including the questions around his competency. Within days of the publicized failure of the RAF test, the first grumblings began. “Maybe the university had been too ambitious to hire the wunderkind.” “Maybe Leigh was more of an engineer than a real scientist.” “Maybe the young genius had been fooled by his own brilliance or by his early successes.”

  Normally, fledgling tenure-track professors were granted a full two or three years to prove their academic mettle. Darian’s cockiness had heightened expectations to such a degree that, in the minds of much of the Faculty, the usual honeymoon period did not apply to him.

  It didn’t take long for the grumblings to find the ear of the Department Chair, and Dr. Wong saw no choice but to bring the concerns forward to the Dean of Sciences. Unaccustomed to failure in any intellectual arena, Darian reacted predictably. He was defensive and arrogant.

  “I would be happy for anyone to show me where I’ve gone wrong. However, seeing as no one outside of my team is capable of following the math in any reasonable period of time, I will likely be very old before outside help will be found to be in any way useful.”

  Dr. Wong was a seasoned veteran of departmental politics and knew when to withdraw quietly. He’d watched many star performers burn brightly at the beginning and flame out under the institutional pressures of constant productivity. He didn’t take Darian’s implied criticism personally. But while he let the comment pass, his estimation of the young man’s probable long-term outlook dropped significantly.

  Weeks passed without resolution of the academic or political problems picking away at the Faculty. The grumbling grew louder. Administrators from Dr. Wong to President Sakira urged patience, but the complainers enlisted the aid of those whose original protests over Darian’s research were based on philosophical or religious grounds, rather than scientific or safety concerns.

  Several groups organized rallies against Dr. Leigh’s work. Yesterday’s rally outside the President’s office was sponsored by the local chapter of Yeshua’s True Guard Church.

  “With the birth of His Son so recently celebrated,” declared the Archbishop of Vancouver, “God, Himself, has seen fit to demonstrate His dominion over the laws of nature. This experiment of Dr. Leigh’s has been, is, and always will be a failure. It is an abomination to our Lord. It is the work of Satan, and it must be stopped.”

  When he bothered to pay them any attention at all, Darian scoffed at the ridiculousness of the protests. “They have no scientific basis whatsoever. They’re just posturing for soundbites on the evening news.”

  He may have been right, but that did little to comfort the Board of Governors attending their first meeting of the New Year. Though academic freedom was purported to be highly valued among that eminent gathering, in the end, it came
down to an uncomfortably close vote.

  The decision on whether to censure Dr. Leigh’s work was tabled for the following month.

  * * *

  THE TAI CHI DEMO moved into the final Down Form and Step Forward With Seven Stars. Greg caught his mind drifting. He brought it back to the present, finishing the form with the required mindfulness, and as smoothly as he could muster on his trembling legs. As the music came to a close, the group held the closing position, then straightened and lowered their arms in perfect synchrony. The spectators applauded as the class took three deep breaths in silent meditation and were done. Several from the audience approached the group to congratulate the instructor and students, and to inquire about lessons.

  “That was great,” Darian said, his broad smile echoed by others gathering nearby. “I really should think about taking it up myself.”

  “I’m sure you already have all the moves memorized,” Greg replied. “I saw you following along with us.”

  “Guilty as charged. But you’ll note my movements were microscopic. It’s been so long since I’ve done anything like that, I’m afraid the body would find it hard to follow the brain’s instructions on a larger scale.”

  “It’s a really good break from working. Apart from the exercise, I find it very meditative, very calming, and deceptively challenging.”

  “I’ve always wanted to take up something like that. I like Kung Fu movies but I could never handle that level of intensity. Maybe this would be a happy medium or a good starting point. I’ve read that one should master Tai Chi before beginning Kung Fu.”

  Kathy worked her way through her classmates and joined Greg and Darian. “Well, that took care of the morning nicely. What say we avoid work a little longer and go for lunch?”

  “I’m game,” Greg replied. “Maybe we should change into our civilian clothes first, though.”

  Darian laughed. “Yeah, you go into a restaurant dressed like that,” he pointed to their traditional silk martial arts uniforms with their billowing sleeves and cloth buttons, “and someone might think you’re looking for a fight.”

  While Greg and Kathy changed, Darian finished his tour of the Garden with a brief meditation in the Main Hall. As he waited for his two assistants, he stared into the milky green water, looking for any tell-tale ripples made by the resident koi.

  He pushed aside the demands of his lattice to get back to work. The mystery will still be there this afternoon—he thought. Even semiconductors should take a break sometime. He chuckled to himself over that absurd comment. He needed almost no rest these days, except from the futility of their investigations.

  “Okay, where should we go?” Greg was back in his blue jeans, with his jacket draped casually over one arm; the heat generated from the thirty-minute demo was, for the time being, sufficient to dispel the winter chill.

  “Why don’t we go to Bojangles on False Creek,” Kathy suggested, “We don’t often get down this way in the middle of the day anymore and I miss it.” In addition to their enjoyment of Chinese culture, she and Greg shared a love of the water. She also hoped to finagle an after-lunch walk along the seawall once they were in the area. Getting away from their problems for a few hours would do them all good.

  They walked the few blocks down Carrall Street to the seawall. The first section up to the Cambie Street Bridge wasn’t all that nice but, by Kathy’s calculations, any sunny day by the water was a good one.

  The trio walked in companionable silence, Kathy and Greg arm in arm, and Darian alongside, enjoying the sunshine and the background hum of city traffic. They arrived at the café within thirty minutes.

  45

  “WHAT THE HELL?” As they entered Bojangles and looked around for an empty table, Greg spotted Larry sitting with Lucius Pratt, Darian’s nemesis from his first day on campus.

  Larry was about to stuff a ketchup-plastered French fry in his mouth. The look of smug superiority on his face changed into a guilty frown when he spotted his three colleagues approaching. Dr. Pratt, demonstrating the value of his experience and acumen, calmly stood up, smiled, and held out his hand to greet them.

  “Ah, Dr. Leigh. How wonderful to see you. Your associate, here, has been kind enough to update me on your group’s progress in addressing this latest challenge. I do hope that you will find your way through to a solution soon.”

  “Yes. Well, my assistant, Dr. Rusalov, is free to spend his spare time as he wishes,” Darian replied as he politely shook the philosopher’s hand. “I hope he hasn’t bored you with arcane details of our profession. We geeks sometimes think everyone is just like us.”

  “Heh, heh. No, I haven’t found him boring at all. Thankfully, Dr. Rusalov has stuck to a level of generalities appropriate to my lack of training in your field. We both happened to be out on the seawall, taking in this lovely day, and quite literally bumped into each other. I trust it’s alright for me to inquire how things have been going. Since I was there at the beginning, so to speak, I feel a personal interest in your research.”

  Darian’s answering smile was reserved in its warmth. “We have no secrets, and sometimes it can be helpful to talk out one’s issues with non-specialists. My father used to say, if you can’t explain what you’re working on to your grandfather, you don’t really understand it.”

  “Ouch! I hope I’m not the grandfather in that story. Not yet.”

  “It’s just a saying.”

  “Yes, I suppose it is. Well, as it happens, your timing is impeccable. I was just about to abandon Dr. Rusalov. There are some errands that I really must attend to. I’ve been enjoying our conversation so much that it seems I’ve lost all track of time.” He turned to Larry and proffered his hand, “Dr. Rusalov, thank you so much. It’s been very educational.” He pulled out the chair nearest Kathy and invited her to sit down. “Please, all of you, enjoy your lunch on me. I’ll instruct your waiter to leave my tab open.”

  “That’s very generous of you,” answered Darian.

  “No, not at all. It’s the least I can do after taking so much of your assistant’s time. Have a lovely day.” With that, Dr. Pratt shook hands all around and made his way to the front.

  Larry couldn’t mask his panic as he watched Pratt disappear out the door. He rubbed his hands too earnestly on his crumpled napkin and placed the disintegrating paper over his fries.

  “I hope you weren’t revealing any state secrets,” Darian joked to Larry once the team was alone.

  “You know I wouldn’t do that,” Larry asserted, his tone and demeanor more serious than Darian’s teasing warranted.

  Greg inspected his friend’s face and body language more thoroughly, calling on the more finely-tuned observational tools of his lattice. He didn’t like what he saw: nervous tics of the face and hands, flushed face, slightly dilated pupils, and an obvious attempt to control his breathing. He sent a quick private message to Darian and Kathy–He’s been talking way outside his comfort zone.

  I know—they both replied.

  “Larry, relax, I’m just kidding. You can talk to Dr. Pratt all you like,” Darian said aloud. “If the worst we have to endure is that our present embarrassment goes any more public than it already has, we will survive.”

  Larry relaxed a little, and his breathing returned to normal.

  “Hey, how’d the Tai Chi demonstration go? Sorry I missed it. I forgot all about it.” Larry opted for a quick change of subject to clear the slate.

  “It was great,” replied Darian. “Kathy and Greg’s lattices give them a considerable advantage over their classmates, but everybody performed admirably.”

  “I think people enjoyed it. We did, too. It was fun, wasn’t it?” Kathy asked.

  “I’m glad we did it; I was nervous at first but it went really well,” Greg replied.

  The waiter arrived, took their orders, and asked permission to remove Larry’s abandoned meal. “Was everything okay?” he asked Larry, with genuine concern. “Would you like something else?”

  “No, ev
erything was fine. My eyes were bigger than my stomach, I guess,” Larry answered, handing the plate to the waiter.

  Their orders given, Darian shifted in his seat to better observe the boats moored in the marina, and to let himself be entertained by the rhythm of the masts bobbing gently over the sun-dappled water. Sometimes the best approach to getting an answer is to ask no question at all–he broadcast to the other two. Kathy and Greg followed his gaze, enduring a few minutes of uncomfortable silence.

  Larry finally turned to Darian and asked, “So, do you need me to come in today, too?”

  “No, we won’t be doing any testing today,” Darian answered. Greg couldn’t tell if Larry was disappointed or relieved. He wasn’t enjoying this feeling of distrust he suddenly felt toward his old friend and co-worker.

  “If you’d like to go over some of the new experiments Darian and I have proposed for follow-up, I could come over tonight,” Greg said.

  He felt sorry for the distance that had grown between them over the past few months. Larry must feel completely sidelined from the main action. Still, it was his own decision to reject the dendy lattice and deprive himself of being useful. He could change that at any time.

  “No, that’s okay,” Larry replied, “I’ve got stuff to do. I’ll catch up with you in the lab tomorrow.”

  Something was definitely off, but Greg couldn’t quite put his finger on it. His earlier compassion for an old friend was losing ground to unsettling suspicion. He eyed his lab mate from a new perspective. What’s going on in there, Larry?—he wondered. The dendy lattice recognized and analyzed hundreds of micro movements in the face, but it couldn’t read his old friend’s mind.

  Larry continued, “I’m supposed to call my folks tonight, anyway. Those video calls back to the family usually take up the whole evening, now that I work for such a famous research team.”