by Kyte, Adrian
‘The device may not wipe more than a millennium.’
The memory had surfaced, implanted from his sim clone, there when he most needed it. ‘I know that on a large scale it’s impossible to be more precise than a million years.’
‘We have refined the original model.’
‘Even so, you’ll wipe out all that cultural development and technology.’
‘We will retain the memory of it, for what it’s worth.’
‘The Earth sim, you mean? If anyone has the complete memory it is the Kintra.’
‘Yes, the Kintra haven’t left much but the memory of civilization If there are any humans or other advanced sentients still alive we have failed to detect them.’
‘I don’t believe they’ve all been processed into data.’
‘Believe what you wish, it will not change the outcome.’ The Elusiver backed away into the light.
Torbin found he could get up. It was only then he became aware of the wristband. Did it mean he had entered their altered time frame? ‘Wait,’ he said. ‘You have underestimated the Kintra, they have assimilated enough from the temporal device to know how to resist it. You’ll have to modify it. I can help. I can be useful.’
The Elusiver stopped retreating, its silhouette turned half round. ‘That is a presumptuous claim, Torbin Lyndau. We have captured a Kintra. They are not without limitations.’
‘If they know you’ve got one of their own, they will have to upgrade or kill you before their technology can be utilized’
‘Your logic is accepted. You may stay on a provisional basis.’ A swipe of the air with a long-fingered hand, an indication to follow. ‘This way please.’ The gangly Elusiver led Torbin to the place he had observed. The metal arachnid was still hooked up with various cables but now much of its innards had been dissected revealing something that surprised Torbin. Something wet, ridged and blancmange-like amid the complex circuitry.
‘Is that a brain?’ he asked the Elusiver who was now accompanied by another in a white (clean-room) bunny suit.
The other one acknowledged Torbin’s question with a look and a slight nod. ‘It is a recent development,’ that one said. ‘Although it appears counter-intuitive, it is but one adaptation – we suspect in order to comprehend biological intelligence.’
Torbin considered the irony of such a development. ‘Would that qualify it as being sentient?’
‘That’s a moot point, depending on your definition of sentience. It certainly has intelligence on a par with even our own. Currently we are trying to determine how much influence the biological component has over the artificial.’
‘Can they procreate?’ Torbin asked.
‘We believe so, but not through sex. There appears, however, to be a form of genetic code passed on, or at least a component of the code set.’
Torbin stepped in closer towards the spider. It was then he noticed it was still functioning, at least on some level: one of its legs twitched, a metal eyelid receded to reveal an obsidian orb.
‘It’s aware,’ he said more as a thought out loud.
‘We preserved its neural function in order to run comprehensive tests.’
‘Is it suffering?’
‘We do not know, since we cannot risk allowing it into our time frame.’
‘Why not enter into its time frame?’
The original Elusiver gave what he was sure to be a sigh of despair, somewhat muted, as if Torbin were some remedial pupil asking one too many irrelevant questions of an impatient tutor.
‘It would be more logical for you to do so,’ that one suggested.
Torbin considered this; the words ‘I can be useful’ rang in his head, desperate to get out.
The one in the bunny suit turned to face him, and said, ‘A neural interface would provide a most valuable insight.’
‘All right. All right.’ He spat the words out, teeth gritted. ‘Whatever it takes.’
It seemed they were prepared to do just that. He was instructed to sit on a couch that adjusted perfectly to his form so he felt almost weightless. The bunny-suited one pressed something on Torbin’s wristband, and immediately the creature jerked about becoming a blur of activity in the background.
A moment of disorientation followed, a shift of surrounding forms, a change in perspective, before the notion of Torbin Lyndau as a separate entity became an irrelevance. There was something far more profound now, but also deeply sorrowful – as the room iridesced and the pain became all-consuming.
* * *
87
Roidon observed what at first seemed impossible, then incredible.
The wrecked corpses of more than a thousand ships orbited the Elusiver homeworld; jagged forms dark against the deep blue and browns of continents that could have been either side. But also parts of Kintra soldiers: a dome head, a thorax, a leg and head parts. He imagined they had tried to escape but were targeted in the process. Kintra defeated? No, not so easily, even by the Elusivers. Perhaps they only wanted it to appear that way. But there was one object intact that stood out amongst the wreckage, and it approached his ship. It appeared in his 180degree view exactly eye level. Then it simply disappeared, whether becoming invisible or moving too quickly to perceive; he did not know.
‘Ship, what was that?’
‘An observation probe. Non hostile.’
‘B’tari?’
‘Cannot confirm.’
It figured. They’d been keeping an eye on the Elusiver homeworld. They never failed to be across anything.
It was a world not dissimilar to Earth. Even the Elusivers had once families, close ones they loved, partners, pets. Maybe they still had, sheltering somewhere; all weaknesses to the enemy. In a war of attrition can any side afford sentiment? It suited the Elusivers to maintain their god-like status, and they were still something of a mystery – their moral complexity seemed beyond his let alone the Kintra’s. But no advanced species can remain the same and survive. No perspective on reality can be unchanging and continually successful. Roidon felt (especially in times like this, regardless of being in a fully biological form) that he was somewhere between the two sides: the sentient without a natural origin, without ancestry, without a close connection to any other. Without – and this he could never declare to another being – love. How easy it was to seek out others to exploit for personal gain and simple pleasure, and be lost in that pursuit, rationalising it as all just more experience to be banked. How morally certain it seems to acquire knowledge at any cost; the most useful currency anywhere. But so easily misspent.
Yet war, he reflected, changes everything, resets the parameters, kills knowledge. Or at least distorts it. But any consequence of this latest battle was incidental to what might soon happen.
Roidon, as instructed – that is, he reminded himself, provisionally playing along with his latest assign role – headed down towards the heat signature. His small craft, adept as any shuttle, touched down on the barren land.
His “encounter” suit was something new. It was essentially invisible, only perhaps the faint outline of a helmet bubble. Otherwise he was dressed in his preferred black jacket and jeans (a style dating back centuries, which seemed to baffle the B’tari given the availability of smart materials, but at least this made him appear even less of a threat if no less eccentric). The feed into his retina was telling him the levels of radiation and neuro toxins were nothing short of instantly lethal. A small tab attached to his belt fed through the location of the signature.
Once there, he received the next instruction. FIND PRE-EXCAVATED HOLE, THEN JUMP THROUGH.
Much of the land was scorched, but there was a patch that appeared disturbed. He pushed at it causing the soil to cave in.
RECOMMEND INCREASING FIELD STRENGTH. Now the loose earth simply fell away from his hand. He found the best technique was a swimming motion, pushing away the material that refilled the tunnel, dug by? An ally, or just a Kintra drone on a reccee. There was still resistance; it felt like treacle, and bec
ame tiring after a few minutes. Until eventually he reached a stable tunnel, the slope so sharp he could literally jump through it. Within seconds his suit glowed vermilion. The speed too much to contemplate.
Then, after a free-fall that seemed to last hours, light. He was through into a sparse-looking hanger. And there, surrounding a cone-like device, were three metal arachnids apparently frozen in time.
‘What now?’ he asked the indeterminate AI.
APPROACH DEVICE. SWITCHING TO FIELD STATE 4 DELTA. Delta? Never mind, Roidon. Just be the obedient grunt now.
He got right up to it, and felt a modicum of surprise but far greater relief that he felt no physical effect. Even the Kintra continued to be held in their relatively temporally frozen state.
LOCATE INTERFACE MODULE ON RIGHT OF BELT, DETACH, ACTIVATE FUSION MODE BY COMPRESSING LONG EDGES, THEN PLACE ON TEMPORAL DEVICE.
The module was no bigger than his thumb and about a centimetre in depth. He did as instructed. He was told nothing beyond those instructions. Would it simply retrieve data to then be passed on for analysis?
No. Something much more. He felt the connection: a surge of comprehension; a pressure in his head. A physical paralysis.
Then he saw it – the universe. An acute awareness, as if he had returned to his AI overseer role. Yet even just a cursory reflection to realise what a pale representation of this experience. Here his mind felt limitless, a not unfamiliar feeling even as a man, but only enraptured of certain mind-altering stimulants. Not a drug-like high here, his mind totally clear. To see all life, to know every planet, every civilisation, their lives oblivious to the oncoming threat. The banality of ordinary living, that he would now embrace. Blissful ignorance. Then the worlds under the control of the Kintra. No emotional impact: a memory being replayed from the perspective of one of them here, the temporal device as much connected to them as to him. The mindless brutality of assimilation? No, he thought, not mindless but with a calculated purpose, a philosophy even. A logic within it that Roidon had no desire to unravel.
Now the conflict above this world. Hundreds, thousands of Kintra craft and individual soldiers eliminated without a sense of even a tactical retreat. They were many, they vastly outnumbered the Elusivers. Yet Elusivers still died, certainly in hundreds if not thousands, despite their caution. Deaths felt bitterly, seen through their eyes. The contrast could not have been starker.
But now, here, this entity at the centre of it all. More than the most sophisticated machine, greater than any known sentience. It understood – in a way that Roidon knew he would never be able to convey in any of the eighteen languages he spoke, or even a combination of them. Instead, he had but an inkling of that comprehension. It was both a relief and a revelation. All this time he thought he had a good sense of the universe, but all those years of being flesh and blood had obscured reality, or at least filtered it down to the personal, the self-serving, how it relates to his life – his survival. So confined his perception had been; the mind, the body, how they can fool you into thinking you’re getting a true picture. And mistaking having learnt of such limitations for wisdom. Now: there was no Roidon Chanley the individual, the question of such an individual even existing seemed meaningless, there was just the universe and all its components; collections of atoms. A liberation in being part of a bigger system.
Then the connection ended – so abruptly, and Roidon felt numb to his core. An organic body heavy lump within the suit. But it was just a readjustment, he tried to reassure himself. The suit was still protecting him from the immense forces. He pushed himself away from its locality. The weight of his torso causing his legs buckle, as the suit relented it protection field.
So alone, so longing, came the unbidden thought.
‘Get a grip, Roidon,’ he told himself.
He stepped further back and observed the device, with the metal spiders still trapped in temporal limbo. This was nothing like the original design his clone had created – a device to serve the single purpose of erasing time. Were the Elusivers trying to create a god, something that would act for itself: the ultimate moral agent?
Another instruction: RETURN TO SHIP.
‘How?’ he asked it. ‘You expect me to fly?’ There were no other craft in this hanger. Was it expected there would be?
He searched around, instructed his suit to scan for thermal or magnetic variations along the hanger walls. It vectored in on one area to the side. If not a door then a weak spot. When he got to it, he pushed in futile hope. Then, increasing disrupter field to maximum, something started to give.
* * *
88
‘I understand you must be concerned about your body in the tunnel network,’ the elder – in his white robe – said to her. ‘We have sent out a drone to locate it.’
Curious to think of her body as an it, not just like some separate entity but as a thing – a consciousness conveying machine. ‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘But what happens when I’m disconnected, and where will I be taken?’
‘You will be unconscious. Then ... well, that is your choice.’
‘I want to connect with survivors on the outside.’
The elder raised his head to the ceiling as white as his robe. ‘As far as we know there are none. Much of the planet has been irradiated.’
‘As far as you know? I want to search for myself.’
‘We cannot provide you with the means. We are not the B’tari that you remember but a beleaguered race.’
Zoraina found herself smiling. The idea of her people no longer in a position of power was absurd. ‘The B’tari always have a way of escaping hardship,’ she said.
The elder waved his hand, then a map appeared of Earth, floating semi opaque before her. He made an expansive gesture causing the image to zoom in to the Amazon region, a burnt forest. Then rushing along, just above ground level. There were no signs of life, but the sky was blue.
‘They annihilated everything they could not assimilate,’ said the elder. ‘It’s what you call a scorched earth tactic. Just to ensure no life could survive, at least in the long term. We did rescue some people and even their pets, then connected them to the network.’
The entire network of tunnels and holding compounds became visible in the now translucent ground. She was surprised at how two billion people could occupy such a small proportion of the planet, but when she saw the rows of pods lay side by side it made perfect sense.
‘Do the Kintra know what you did, know you’ve taken control?’ Zoraina asked.
‘Quite possibly. But it seems … now what’s the expression … they have bigger fish to fry.’
‘The Elusivers.’
‘Remember the Kintras’ original objective was to assimilate all biological forms to be held as data. The Elusivers did what they do best, what we were once past masters at – Elude. And, benighted themselves, they would have stayed hidden waiting for a right moment to return but for our interventions.’
‘Except they were already communicating with people on earth, assisting them.’
‘Yet we don’t know if they were seriously planning a return. Maybe in extremis. But you see, what happened to humans subsequently – providing them, albeit their converted form, some kind of life – was not an act of benevolence by the Kintra, it was a calculated move to avoid precipitating the wrath of those who believe they could fight them. Only, they miscalculated.’
‘Did we ever have a chance against them?’
‘Zoraina, we are not a warrior race. They are so many, and they are unafraid of being destroyed so long as their command structure survives … and their knowledge.’
‘But when they headed for our home world, did the inhabitants escape, or did they try to defend themselves?’
‘We escaped before they were even within visual range. Those who stayed … to be honest I do not know. I can only hope. It would be more sensible to self-annihilate than leave any technological traces or even knowledge.’
‘I want to go back,’ Zoraina
said. ‘Just to see if there is anything left.’
‘B’tar is six point two thousand light years away. Our ships are damaged or have been disassembled for their components.’
‘What about mine?’
‘Yours?’
‘My ship at the ocean floor.’
‘We have still to recover that. But I advise you not to raise your hopes of it ever being repaired; the pressure from---.’
The room blanked for what seemed like a second. Only, now, there was someone else standing before her. ‘What happened?’ she asked.
‘The drone has reached you in the tunnel and is in the process of disconnecting you,’ the medic said. ‘You will again lose consciousness any moment.’
The room blanked again, came back with others around. Then once more, and she was on a bed. A few seconds later...
* * *
89
They stood around him. But they were different. It was not merely that they were in some kind of bunny-suit costume (as if he were contaminated). He saw detail on their face that he had never before seen, magnified to reveal tracks of lines and etched in violets. It was not real time, he understood, but in his memory, as if he had taken a snap shot image. As he pulled his sight back Torbin became aware of a faint glow surrounding each of them, which at times blended with others as they darted about.
One of the Elusivers stepped forward carrying a silver probe, its end glowing blue. The probe he felt pressed somewhere between his eyes. As the pain intensified, the environment took on a watery quality, the figures flowing about sinuously. The pain was mercifully brief, the probe retracted; perhaps they knew he could not tolerate it. The effect of them racing around him in their time frame, gave a sense of dissociation but also – from his complete inability to interact – an utter vulnerability.
Even the pain he had experienced initially hardly compared with this new level of suffering. Thankfully because of the time differential it only lasted subjectively a few seconds. Afterwards there was a blissful lull. The beings retreated out of sight. Still total silence.