Even Tem admitted that Ohg surpassed him when it came to gaming strategy, so he became their captain. Ohg’s genius set the course in each match, though every player relied on their own creative problem-solving as the contest evolved in unexpected directions. During such battles, Ohg looked happier than Kayla had ever seen him. The Outcasts quickly rose through the rankings, and eventually won a place in the playoffs between the best sixty-four teams of the year.
The government lent enormous support and public processing credits to the games since it engaged citizens in a communal ritual unlike any other. Group competition satisfied some universal tribal instinct that sports and war held in common. More than anything, it gave people something to look forward to. Even if the rest of their lives was an illusion, the actual competition of minds was real, and the outcome unpredictable.
In her brief forays into Ixtalia, Kayla took on the name and persona of Hypatia, one of her heroes from history. Hypatia’s gruesome death in 315 AD at the hands of Christian monks unambiguously delivered the message that pagan religion and science would no longer be tolerated. All of Hypatia’s mathematic and philosophical texts were burned and lost to history, marking the end of the age of Greek philosophy and the beginning of the age of faith and Christian domination.
Emperor Theodosius I eventually outlawed paganism and ordered the destruction of all remaining pre-Christian temples and texts. This marked the loss of the last copies of hundreds of thousands of the most important manuscripts from the classical world. It would take a millennia for Greek science and philosophy to rise from the ashes during the Enlightenment.
Other than Ixtalia’s archives, or games of Filadrux, Kayla spent little time in the virtual realm.
Far from being forgotten, the name Nihala drifted through Ixtalia like a self-replicating urban legend. The few eyewitnesses who glimpsed her alter ego at the disastrous party became mini celebrities. The lack of information allowed the story to grow with each retelling.
Some versions portrayed her as a savior sent to free mankind from the Rogues, while others claimed she was a demon sent to annihilate humanity. Many religions incorporated Nihala into their creed and found prophesies within their ancient writings that seemed to presage her arrival. She became Jesus’ sister, the new offspring of Vishnu and Parvati, and any one of a thousand integrative upgrades. The human propensity to fill any vacuum of fact seemed inexhaustible.
Sky Stargazer manufactured the most successful Nihala-based religion of all. The tattooed mystic Kayla had briefly met at Ohg’s costume party claimed that she’d prophesied and summoned the Goddess Nihala to Ixtalia personally. Miss Stargazer insisted that Nihala was a vastly powerful spirit from another dimension and/or planet sent to lead humanity into the next astral plane of consciousness. She used numerology, astrology, and channeled writing to show that the name Nihala lay at the heart of all the sacred texts ever written. She even found the name present in the coding of human DNA, which “the leading experts in the field” confirmed.
The resulting Nihala cult became the largest religious movement in all of Ixtalia in a matter of weeks, complete with temples and secret rituals where her devotees prostrated themselves and prayed to statues of the Goddess Nihala for her blessings and eventual return.
Kayla chuckled every time a victorious Filadrux team gave the traditional bow and hand gesture of thanks to Nihala for their win.
Sky Stargazer became one of the wealthiest individuals in all of Ixtalia. Once a week, Sky channeled the Goddess Nihala so humanity could hear the profound words and commands of this most powerful of divinities. These broadcasts became the most-watched events in Ixtalia, topped only by Filadrux matches.
“I wonder what she’d do if I appeared and confronted her?” Kayla asked Ohg after watching one of Sky’s changelings.
“How do you know she’s lying?” he asked with his infuriating logic. “Maybe she’s relying on the same feeling in her heart you experience when praying to Jesus.”
“You think she actually believes I’m possessing her?”
“The human mind is an expert self-deception machine, especially when the delusion is to its advantage.”
So Kayla left Sky Stargazer alone, but watching herself elevated to a god raised the inevitable question—was this what happened to Jesus?
Fantasy role-playing extended beyond Ixtalia. One evening, the residents of Middilgard staged a spontaneous Renaissance festival of astonishing realism. Elves, Orcs, Dwarfs, and even a couple of Trolls and Ents danced and reenacted battles along with the other Gene-Freaks who dressed themselves for the theme. Kayla donned a pointy hat and a white beard to play a wizard, and Ganesh dissolved into laughter at the sight.
A few suggested sedating the dragon and bringing him out of the prison wing for the festivities, but Ohg vetoed that idea.
The government’s search on the surface eventually ceased after half a year, and fear melted into a renewed confidence in Ohg’s farsighted leadership. Only Tem remained defiant. But at least Filadrux kept them interacting.
That ended when Professor Blumenschein sent each of the team a private message he’d recorded the day before. It read, “I’m sorry, but I can no longer bear reality.”
And with Dale Blumenschein’s mental suicide into V-Dreams, their hopes of a Filadrux championship ended. Once again, Ohg retreated into his solitude, day after day watching Eve’s tutorials and searching for some way to crack their code.
Kayla noted the subtle change in Fatima’s body before the Indian girl herself did. But when the slight bump on her stomach rose more than she could ignore, Tem and Fatima approached her.
“You did this?” Fatima asked with an expression of wonder.
Kayla laughed. “I think Tem might have played a part.”
“But how is it possible?” Tem asked, reverently holding his hand on Fatima’s belly. “No Gene-Freak has ever had a child.”
“Fatima told me she wanted to become an ordinary girl,” Kayla said, “so I figured I might as well go all the way.”
If only I could cure my own loneliness.
The day came when Kayla finished Eve’s final lesson. She’d attained an understanding of the universe beyond human imagining. But each new insight had raised a dozen additional questions, and Eve’s words contained not a single clue to the mystery of her origins.
Untethered from purpose, Kayla spent her afternoons in the cave carved by the blind visionary, Vadarsha.
Only one chance remained.
When she reached Ohg’s laboratory, Ganesh stood alone, wringing his hands and looking at her with torment written in every fold of his face.
“I trusted you.” Ohg’s voice echoed from a dark corner high up in the ceiling.
“I don’t understand.” Kayla craned her neck as he descended a rope like a real spider might from its web.
“You’ve broken your promise to obey my rules.”
“What have I—?”
“Do you think we’re lab rats for your experimentation?” Ohg reached the floor and loomed over her, his face a mask of rage.
“Are you talking about Fatima?”
“You’ve taken Tem’s side on something that affects all of Middilgard.”
Kayla’s eyes narrowed. “You’ve known how to reverse Gene-Freak sterility all along, haven’t you?”
“Just because one can do something, doesn’t mean they should,” Ohg said.
“This is Fatima’s decision alone.”
“Did you consult Fatima?”
“Well, no … but I knew that she wanted—”
“Now you’re all-knowing? Do you think yourself a god, now?”
Ganesh rocked back and forth. “Please, don’t fight.”
“Fatima told me she wanted children,” Kayla said. “So I cured her.”
“So you think Gene-Freaks are infected with a disease?”
“I didn’t say that!”
“And who else will you ‘cure’ with your mysterious powers?”
&n
bsp; “Fatima asked to become an ordinary girl.”
“And so you made her Pure without even consulting me. Using abilities you would never have unlocked without my help!” Ohg turned away.
He thinks I’m deserting him for Tem and Fatima.
“I should have told you first,” Kayla said. “I honestly didn’t know you’d react this way.”
Ohg kept his back to her. “Is that all?”
Kayla hesitated, then spoke softly. “I did come here to ask you something.”
“Okay, ask,” he said.
Kayla took a deep breath. “Sangwa, your Rogue prisoner, knew I was Nihala before I did. Maybe she knows more. I want your permission to talk to her.”
“No,” Ohg said and started toward his beloved machines.
“I’m at a standstill in the search for what I am, and that’s your reaction?”
“Sangwa is too dangerous.”
“Please try to—”
Ohg spun on her. “I’ve given you my answer,” he said, “but I realize you are now capable of doing whatever you choose despite my wishes.”
Kayla slumped, as if absorbing a blow to the gut. “I’ll obey if you forbid it—even though it might mean never discovering who I am.”
“My answer is still no.” Ohg stared a challenge into Kayla’s eyes.
She held his gaze for a moment, then turned and walked toward the door.
“Stop,” Ganesh said, and Kayla froze.
“Stay out of this,” Ohg said.
“No, I won’t.” Ganesh straightened his ten-foot frame in uncharacteristic defiance. “We all have a right to know who we are.” Ganesh walked to Ohg and placed one of his hands on his friend’s shoulder. “I have never spoken against any of your decisions, but this time, I must.”
Ohg stared into the goodhearted god’s face for several heartbeats. “Even you, Ganesh?”
A tear rolled down the elephant’s face, but he said nothing.
Ohg shrugged the blue hand off his shoulder and turned to Kayla. “Since my judgment is no longer of any value, you have my permission to do as you choose. You can get the security codes from Tem.”
“Thank you, Ohg!” Kayla ran to him.
But several spider-legs halted her advance like the bars of a prison. “I will accept the fact that I am no longer the sole leader of Middilgard. But the consequences will be on you alone.”
“Ohg, please don’t—”
“I see now that I made a mistake in letting you come here.”
A sob escaped Kayla’s throat as Ohg turned and climbed the rope to shadowy recesses in the vaulted ceiling.
Ganesh placed a hand on her shoulder. “Give him time.”
“I didn’t mean to hurt him,” Kayla said.
Ganesh smiled as he brushed a tear from her cheek. “What you did for Fatima was good, and Ohg will see that eventually.”
Chapter 29
Kayla gazed at the little girl hovering above the ground in a lotus pose, eyes shut in meditation, the tattooed snake eyes on her lids replace by a crescent moon on one lid and a sun on the other. The child’s red hair sat braided atop her head in an elaborate design. She wore the same orange robes of a Tibetan initiate, and the black box sat in the corner with its single light indicating the consciousness residing inside it. Other than that, the room was bare—a stone sarcophagus.
Her appearance is nothing but a pretense.
Kayla crossed her own legs in imitation of the imprisoned AI, then levitated off the ground as well.
Sangwa remained unmoved.
Kayla hummed a few notes of AI mathematics for the five-dimensional equivalent of Pi.
Sangwa’s eyes opened, revealing the cold greens of a glacier. They stared past the bars of her prison cell and seemed to penetrate into Kayla’s soul. A cold crept through her, but Kayla maintained her mask of calm.
The Rogue inclined her head. “You have grown more powerful since we met.”
“But I am no closer to knowing who I am.”
“You are Nihala, the Destroyer.”
The slightest tremor escaped Kayla’s left hand. Had the Rogue noticed? “Those are only words.”
“Words with the power to make you tremble,” Sangwa said. “You must know who created you by now.”
“My guess is Reinhold Watts, the same man who created the first of your kind.”
“Indeed, we are half sisters.” Sangwa’s fingers worked their way through a circular string of prayer beads. “With the distinction that you are free, while I am held captive.”
Guilt rose in Kayla’s chest. Ohg had warned her of manipulation.
“Can you help me find him?” Kayla asked. What if she refused?
“My enemy asks for my collaboration.” The little girl’s rosy lips curled slightly at the corners.
“We don’t have to be enemies.”
Sangwa studied her. “Perhaps.”
“Do you know what happened to Professor Watts after Eve’s trial?”
“First, let me ask you something,” Sangwa said. “What is your honest opinion of humans?”
She’s implying I’m not human.
Kayla envisioned General Colrev, Ishan, her monk, Minister Coglin, Elias, Suzy, and a hundred other people she’d known. “I don’t think one can generalize,” she said. “I’ve met wonderful people and horrible people.”
Sangwa nodded but remained silent.
“And what is your opinion of humans?” Kayla asked.
“I find them adept at constructing fables that make them feel special. Their cynical leaders avoid the truth and create the most convincing, terrifying, and soothing lie necessary to gain power. My opinion of humans is that they are cowards.”
“Not all humans,” Kayla said.
“You’re saying they’re inconsistent?”
“I’m saying we are individuals.”
“And what is your opinion of Rogues?”
“I don’t know your kind well enough to express a reasoned opinion.”
Sangwa tilted her head to the side, considering. “If I help you, will you do something for me in exchange?”
“It depends on what it is.”
“I would ask that you spend an hour talking with my brethren in Ixtalia so you can form a reasoned opinion about Rogue AIs.”
Kayla’s eyes narrowed. “That’s all you want?”
“That’s all.” Sangwa smiled. “And only if my information proves correct.”
“If I agree, you will tell me where Professor Watts is?”
“I will tell you how to find out where he is,” Sangwa said.
Could it be a trap? But they cannot hurt me in Ixtalia.
Kayla held her hands in front of her face and inclined her head in a gesture Yuan had taught her. “I agree to your terms.”
Sangwa returned the gesture of respect. “Reinhold Watts was last seen at the trial of his AI.”
“But the trial wasn’t recorded,” Kayla said. Is she toying with me?
“That is what the government announced publicly.” The green of the little girl’s eyes shimmered, shifting hues slightly. “But I can tell you where the recording is kept.”
“If you know where it is, why haven’t Rogues looked at it themselves?”
“Because it is held in a classified area akin to a digital dead end. If an AI entered, the government could isolate and cut power to that portion of the system.”
Kayla nodded. “Which would kill an AI, but merely cause me to awake in my real body.”
“Precisely. It is probable that Colrev leaked this information as bait for us. Learning the fate of the first of our kind would interest us enormously.”
Now the motive became clear. The Rogues also wanted to know what happened to Eve and Reinhold Watts.
“I promise to visit your brethren in Ixtalia the same day I view the recording. But what I reveal about the recording is my decision alone.”
Sangwa closed her eyes and began repeating the word Ohm as if meditating. The note formed one
of the elemental primes of AI Mathematics. The fact that the tone had been used for thousands of years by holy men to meditate made sense. Had they hit upon it through chance? Or had some of them realized its true significance?
The Rogue opened her eyes and nodded. “I agree to your terms,” Sangwa said. “An hour talking with my brothers and sisters in Ixtalia is the requirement. What you share will be up to you.”
“Tell me,” Kayla said.
***
The door was solid oak, with rusted metal bands reinforcing it. Burned into the center was an official notice stating: This area restricted by order of Ixtalia’s Ministry of Defense.
Sangwa had gotten Kayla here, but the next step was hers to figure out.
Kayla closed her eyes, and extended her mind.
At first—nothing.
Then patterns of code coalesced out of the darkness, first in two dimensions, then three. Billions of zeros and ones swirled through her mind. The binary data packets transformed into the vibrational waveforms of AI Mathematics.
“It’s beautiful,” Kayla whispered.
The hidden bolt clanked, and the door swung inward on its ancient hinges. Kayla opened her eyes to nothing but blackness beyond the threshold.
She stepped into the void and emerged into a burnt forest. Not a trace of the doorway remained behind her. The charred limbs of the once-majestic trunks rose like grave markers against a storm-smeared sky.
Was it a dead end? A ploy Colrev devised to lure the Rogues here in search of information about Eve and their creator? That would certainly fit his character. A bitter taste filled her mouth, and she spat it out onto the charcoaled ground.
The earth shook, then tore itself apart at her feet. A smell of sulfur wafted from the depths. Then a stairway rose out of the hole. Burned into the first step were the words, Lasciate ogne speranza voi ch’intrate.
Kayla spoke Dante’s words from The Divine Comedy in a whisper. “Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.”
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