Waiting for the Machines to Fall Asleep
Page 27
The voice is deep yet mild and pleasant.
Our mother unit sets a bright, warm illumination so that the unfamiliar environment won't frighten the Savior unnecessarily.
"Where am I? Is this the land of the dead? Are you angels?"
We chuckle and exchange transmitted smiles. He gets just as surprised every time! But he must not remember the previous holiday; it would have broken the commands of tradition.
We call for the droids, traditionally dressed up as Roman soldiers, and they quietly drag him out of the house, to the holiday hill. He makes lame protests, but soon gives up and goes quiet. We follow slowly.
The smallest units watch wide-eyed from the foot of the hill. We let Inrawdack sit on the lap of Our oldest winter body.
The Savior sees the awaiting cross. He seems to understand it is meant for him, and resists. It is of course futile; the droids are ten times stronger than his flesh body. He is dragged up the hillside and dust stirs where his sandaled feet scrape and stomp the ground.
And so they arrive. The site is starkly illuminated, to mimic the weather and temperature of the Savior's own era. The cross is lowered into a horizontal position, and the Savior is pushed on his back against the beam. The droids tie the terrified Savior to the traditional wooden cross, and now his implanted memories awake: Jerusalem, the disciples, the trial, the sermons.
He yells the names of his disciples. They were not recreated; last year he did not call for them. We discuss his unexpected behavior, and wonder whether it is a supernatural phenomenon or coincidence.
Inrawdack sends Us a quick question: "Is it true that the Savior knew he would die, and could prevent it, and still chose to die this way?"
And how else can We answer, but with the truth that tradition commands?
"Yes, child," We send.
"But why?"
"The meaning of the Savior's sacrifice has been interpreted many times since the very first time. But in all times the forefathers have agreed on one thing: the Savior would die, and then be resurrected. And each year we show that the forefathers were right. Each year we create him again."
"But what would happen if we just stopped awakening him?"
We shudder inwardly. "Child, you don't know what you're saying. Do you want the Savior to really die, one last and final time? It would make a mockery of the Savior's sacrifice. We honor his prophecy and make him immortal, from his first death to the end of time. Behold the man up there, child, and marvel."
Our favorite child watches the hilltop in silence, where the droids have begun to hammer in the nails. We watch the blood that flows from the wounds in his hands and feet.
The Savior cries out loudly in anguish and pain, as We have witnessed at least a hundred times before. We are overcome with emotion, and sob solemnly before the sacrificial scene.
The cross is raised, and the Savior continues to scream; it looks like he is going to live a little longer than last time.
When he ceases to live we shall keep the body in the kitchen, cleanse its brain of memories ... and freeze it until next time.
Tradition is not as strong as it once were, but We know many families who also recreate their Savior to celebrate Winter Solstice in the traditional way. With them we exchange transmissions and sensory recordings of our respective holiday celebrations.
Some families, We hear, have begun to question the manner in which We celebrate. They think that the story of the Savior's Last Meal should be interpreted as cooking and eating the Savior's body and blood after his death – or possibly while the Savior is alive and offered a meal himself.
But we have no plans to do such things. Tradition binds the family's We together, and We stand by it.
After six hours of feasting, noise-making and play around the hill, the Savior finally gives up the ghost. His head hangs limply against his thin chest. We cheer, hug each other's units and the mood in the habitat is filled with love and friendship. The droids take down the Savior's pale, bled-out body and We already look forward to next year's Winter Solstice.
Blessed holiday!
"Mission Accomplished" – My Bergström
Sound slowly crept into her awareness – electric blips and longer wavelike sounds – like drops of water falling into the ocean.
It took a while before she could move, but eventually she managed to open her eyes. Her eyelids felt stiff and dry, as if they hadn't been used for a long time. She could practically feel them creaking as she forced her eyes open. It was an unpleasant feeling. Something was floating in front of her – something vaguely familiar – she felt that she should recognize it. A shape, round and colorful. White. Green. Brown. More than anything – blue.
This ... is ... Earth ...
She nodded to herself. Earth. That sounded right. Earth was beautiful and filled her field of vision almost completely – a globe of light floating in the darkness around her. As her eyes adjusted, she noticed stars around the edges as well, faintly visible through the glowing circumference. Her eyes were drawn back to Earth. Looking at the familiar patterns of the continents helped focus her clouded mind.
Lieutenant, do you copy? This is the Earth coalition, stationed at Luna base.
Sudden realization that it wasn't her own thoughts that she kept hearing – someone else was calling for her attention. A radio? She tried to keep her thoughts together, but they kept floating away from her, like afternoon clouds in a warm breeze across the sea.
After a moment of disorientation, it dawned on her that she couldn't feel her body. Panic crippled her thoughts. Where was she? How did she get here? She felt trapped. Fear made her field of vision narrow down to almost nothing.
Lt. Berger, do you copy? Please confirm. A short silence. Please, signal me if you can hear me.
The voice sounded concerned. Listening to it and focusing on what the words meant calmed her down. Her mouth was too dry for her to talk, so she spent a while trying to work up some spit, but all she managed to do was chafe her parched tongue on her teeth. She made a sound of dismay in her throat.
Lieutenant, is that you? Has the transfer gone well? Can you speak? Remember your training. Please indicate one for no, two for yes and three if you don't understand the situation.
She moaned three times in a row, after which the voice in the radio disappeared for a while. When it returned, it began to explain.
Lt. Berger, your mind has been transferred wirelessly into a semi-organic body, but something seems to have gone awry in the process. Hang on; we're attempting to shock your nervous system online as we speak.
A moment later pain spread through her entire body and she screamed, soundlessly at first, until her voice came back. She screamed again. The radio voice disappeared and didn't return for several minutes. By the time it did, she was able move her body, while receiving input from the suit's systems that gradually came online. The exhilaration of not being locked inside her head didn't last long, though. Moving her arms, legs and head had brought another realization to her: she was trapped in a space suit, floating in vacuum.
She found the mobile camera lens on top of the suit and pointed it, with some effort, away from where she was facing. Behind her was the lunar surface, but far enough away that, even at full zoom, she couldn't make out any detail. Earth's relative size actually made it look closer to her than the moon, but her calculations placed her approximately three kilometers above the lunar surface. All that separated her artificial body from being exposed to hard vacuum was the space suit. Why had they put her out here, and not on the surface?
As if it could read her thoughts, the voice in the radio came back. Lt. Berger, are you all right? Awaiting status report, over.
"I'm a'right," she slurred, glad to finally have a voice. "What am I doing out here?"
Glad to hear your voice, Lieutenant. We're concerned though; how much of your initial orders do you remember?
"Nothing. I remember waking up here. Other than that, nothing." She tried to turn around in order to fac
e the moon, but without anything to push off from, not even air, she was as helpless as a tortoise turned upside-down.
Nothing as in you don't remember your orders, Lieutenant?
"Nothing as in nothing at all. I don't remember why I'm here or even who I am. You called me 'Lt. Berger,' but I have no recollection of that name or anything connected to it."
Hold on, Lieutenant, we'll get back to you in a moment.
The voice went quiet for several minutes, long enough for her to start wondering if it was ever coming back. To pass time, she examined her body through the space suit. If she hadn't been told, she probably wouldn't have noticed that it was artificial. She could feel touch, register what position she put her body in, and it seemed to her that her limbs had full flexibility.
"I wonder how I know all the basic stuff about being alive, despite having no memory of anything else?" she wondered aloud. "Shouldn't it all be gone?"
We're working on that, but the general assumption is that your personality data file suffered an unexpected corruption during transfer. We knew that it was risky when we decided to make the attempt, but hopefully we'll manage anyway. Your body is equipped with kinetic memory functions as well as a basic memory core that fills in all details needed to help you with basic necessities, like movements and operative actions. Fortunately, they both seem intact. Other than that, you'll have to adapt to what you encounter.
"I didn't know you were listening. I was just thinking out loud."
Sorry. We've decided to do a quick debrief on your way down to the Luna base. First, you will need to use your suit's ion thrusters in order to descend to the surface. Most of your systems are controlled locally, so you'll have to do it yourself. We'll walk you through it.
The voice then proceeded to tell her how to activate the interface and link her body to the suit, in order to synchronize the suit settings with her particular thought pattern. Blink once for confirm, squint for marking options, double blink for opening sub-menus, sift through panels by looking right or left, zoom by looking up or down. The menu wasn't visualized outside of her body, she realized, but was still visible to her. It looked like it hovered in front of her face, but that was probably just design flair. Blink, slide to the left, double blink, squint, confirm. Repeat.
Finally, the voice told her to execute the sequence of settings they'd helped her set up. It'll take you down close enough to help you get to your mission objective within our window of opportunity, while still far enough away from enemy fire for you to be able to get your bearings before executing your orders.
"So, what is my mission? Where am I heading?"
We need to evacuate all non-military personnel from the Luna facilities that are currently under enemy control. They launched a sneak attack at 0500 hours this morning and we've been under heavy fire here at the Luna headquarters ever since. We haven't been able to activate our emergency protocols properly. What we need you to do is infiltrate the peripheral areas of the main base and get as many civilians out as possible. A short pause, as if the speaker was bracing for what was to come, then: Without an official count it's impossible to say how many people are trapped behind enemy lines, but an early estimate puts the number at almost a hundred.
The ion thrusters had finally turned her around while she was being briefed, and now started pushing her towards the surface below. She was eventually able to make out a cluster of buildings and other facilities, faintly visible even from her altitude. "Has it been ascertained that the people down there are still alive?"
No, which is why we need you. Risking a whole troop by sending them into enemy territory, with our defenses crippled, would be a waste of lives. There's also a concern from our side that the enemy will start taking hostages, if they realize that we're preparing to abandon the station. But the odds for a single agent to sneak unnoticed through their defenses have been deemed favorable. Your body is equipped with stealth technology and should provide enough cover for you to make it inside the base unnoticed.
"How come you're only sending me in?" She was close enough to be visible from the ground now. As a security precaution, she manually altered the ion thrusters towards a crater, which she hoped would place her in a blind spot of the hot zone. "Wouldn't a small tactical team be able to produce better results? Seems like there's a lot hanging on my mission. Also, why was I floating in space? Was there a problem with launching me from somewhere?"
The first thing the enemy did was to bomb our orbital defenses, including the weapon storage where our artificial soldiers were kept. They were all destroyed, except the one you currently inhabit. It seems to have been flung into space by the impact blast, mostly unharmed. We discovered it a few hours ago, through a general vicinity scan. You volunteered for the mission.
"Copy that. By the way, I'm less than ten minutes away from the surface," she pointed out. "Final check: All systems clear. Standing by for deployment. Please repeat and confirm my orders." The ion thrusters slowed down and eventually flickered out, leaving only the momentum propelling her forward. Less than a kilometer left until she'd reach the surface. She'd have to get her act together quickly. "Also, I need a time line. Over."
Copy that. Lt. Berger. Stand by for your final information burst, based on data collected less than three minutes ago. We'll update if we receive more information. Your orders are to enable the evacuation of as many civilians as possible. You will secure each zone before alerting us of evacuation pickups. We can only give you limited air support, so use the opportunity for air strikes and evacuation conservatively. No repercussions will be given for eventual losses, but we expect you to do your utmost to rescue as many people as possible. Your time limit is ten hours.
Maps and blueprints of the Luna structures below her were being transferred directly into her mind, together with blurry heat scans, providing clues as to where she could expect to find people who were still alive. The data transfer felt vaguely unsettling, but as soon as the discomfort lifted, her mind began breaking down the information in order to plot different courses and strategies. It felt natural; as if this was something she'd done many times before.
"Why only ten hours?" She couldn't help asking.
That's how long we estimate that our ground forces can hold out, before we're forced to pull out and detonate the whole Luna base.
"Understood. I'm on it."
The landing went badly. She lost control of her suit temporarily a hundred meters above the surface and once it came online again, it was too late to reverse the thrusters in time for a smooth takedown. Her body slammed down into the crater at a steep angle and continued to slide forward for several meters until the friction made her stop. She winced mentally with embarrassment, but reminded herself that no one was around to see her disgraceful landing. After confirming that all systems were still online and her artificial limbs undamaged, she picked herself up from the ground and began running toward the base.
From now on, you'll be on your own. Only contact us once you've secured a zone. We can't risk alerting the enemy to your position while you're in the middle of a hot zone. Your suit will also collect and analyze necessary data between debriefs. Good luck, Lieutenant.
At first, following her orders was easy. The buildings on the outskirts of the base were easily evacuated and most personnel were in the process of heading to safety with or without her help. But as she continued deeper into the base, enemy presence became more prominent, keeping her constantly on her toes. Instead of just disabling a hacked gun turret or shooting down enemy lookouts, she was forced to plan further ahead as well as quickly solve unforeseen problems as they appeared.
Scanning the vicinity using the short-range heat monitor imbedded in the helmet visor, she plotted a course for her next target: three dots on the screen, one of them smaller than the others. A child? She quickened her pace. Time was precious enough as it was.
She reached the building, realizing with a stab of dismay that it was under siege. Bright lights of deadly fire smat
tered against the walls, causing flakes of superheated metal to fly through the vacuum. The flares looked like strange fireworks in the dim, gaseous light. They left trails on her artificial retinas. Would the metal alloy in the walls hold much longer? Someone inside the building was returning fire in long bursts, but judging by the way the bullets impacted the ground the shooter was using low-grade ammunition, probably from an automatic handgun or army-training rifle. A weapon like that wouldn't do them much good once the enemy breached the walls.
She sneaked past the enemy by activating her suit's stealth field. The field generator was resource-heavy and could only be used for a few minutes at the time, after which it would need to be repowered by solar energy or an external power source. Keeping it up for too long would also risk draining her shields. She currently only had access to the pale sunlight reflected by Earth – it would take longer to repower her suit than she could afford. The seconds were ticking down on the internal display, visible to the lower left on her eye screen. She hoped that she wouldn't lose her stealth field, or shields for that matter, before she reached the roof.
Once she made it onto the roof, she found cover behind a sealed maintenance shaft and flattened herself against the cold metal for a few seconds, before judging by the lack of commotion that she'd made it without raising any alarms. She checked her shields – only a few percent of their power supply left. Among the information received during the briefing, she found blueprints for the building – it was a generic living unit for personnel stationed long-term at the base. The maintenance shaft seemed to be the best way in. She immediately started working on the hatch sealing the narrow shaft, opening it up by short-circuiting the lock. She quickly crept inside and closed the hatch manually behind her. A shimmering force field, gleaming faintly blue, crept across the metallic walls in the cramped space around her. Instead of the dead silence of vacuum, sounds from an air pump reached her ears, as the vent filled up with air. She groped around and found a ladder, leading down into the apartment.