by E. R. Jess
Makz sauntered over to Jenna, who was resting uneasily on a stack of crates. An LCS guard paced by them, watching Makz like a hawk. Makz kept his face neutral.
“What,” Jenna said to Makz as he approached.
“I was wondering if I should snap your neck. But who gives a shit. You are absolutely the most hated person here. And that's a task. You used me, used Alessa,” Makz said.
“You're kidding, right? You were gunning for your new pal Kagan. What changed your mind again? Yes, the promise of a good fight. Well, the fighting is over,” Jenna said wearily.
Makz nodded in approval, “Could be, but what if I got you a handheld?”
Jenna sat up a bit, but then slumped back down. “No, there's no time. We're going to be brainwashed any moment now.”
“In other words, you're going to make a break for it when you see an opportunity. Come on, partner, let's try to work together again,” Makz said honestly.
Jenna winced as her arm leeched pain all through her body.
Makz smiled uneasily. “Unless this is the end of the road. And I should just accept it.”
Jenna gave him a dark look, then turned on her other side.
Makz rubbed the back of his head where his implant sat dormant. “I don't have any more tricks. I don't know what to do.”
Vorn tossed Makz a bottle of water. Makz caught it and sighed.
Vorn said, “You can help me hand out food and water to the old folks. Make sure they're okay.”
Makz agreed, albeit reluctantly. “Vorn, why did you join these pacifists?”
“To help out Eight, and Kagan. And I thought I could undo some of the mistakes. My mistakes. I wouldn't say I was a good pacifist, it's more likely the opportunity never arose to take out some mother fuckers,” Vorn answered, half jokingly.
“Well,” Makz added, “I'm glad that I was the last one you beat the shit out of.”
“Really? Thought I pulled my punches.”
Alessa and Kagan meandered to the nearest window. It overlooked nothing, just a stone wall. Guards glued their eyes on the two of them, lingering for a long while. Kagan said, “Soldier, we won't do anything to hurt our people.”
The guard seemed unfazed, then moved on.
Alessa looked up at Kagan, moving the hair from his face.
“Don't,” he said.
“What?” Alessa asked softly.
“Don't create any moments. We won't remember them anyway.”
“Jesus, Kagan. There's more than black and white,” Alessa said, chuckling.
Kagan said, “I doubt it.”
“Even if we got out of this one, what would we do.” Alessa stated instead of asked.
“All that I've been thinking of is the conformity,” Kagan said, his face pale and steeped in dread. “Do we retain anything? Will there be a remnant of what we are, the good or bad parts? Will Makz still act like an asshole, will Vorn be as loyal, but to UPC? Will Nanny grow up and keep her purity and joy? She's known only chaos and she gives only love. I cannot believe that any technology could erase that utterly. Sam has a brilliant mind, it's so destructive to wipe it and start over. Will she retain a shred of her resoluteness?”
“Will I remember you.”
Kagan stifled a sigh. He turned to the crowd spread out behind them, “Even Revan Kore. Will he feel his ambition slip? Will he know it when he's gone? Is there a sharp line between here and there? I don't think the answers are good, and I wish it on no one.”
“I betrayed everyone, Kagan,” Alessa said to the air, “Whoever I was is still there, and she was no saint. At least this way, that person will be gone. Jenna will feel no more want, she'll be healed and free of desperation. Sam's burdens will lift and vanish. Makz will feel the peace he's needed. You and I, you and I will have succeeded. We will save them. The pacifists will be fed and happy.”
Kagan put his head in his hands, “I don't want to go. Alessa, I think I'd rather die. I think I'd rather be gone for real.”
Alessa took his face and said, “We have to run into the desert between worlds. There are colonies out there, at the far outstretched fingers beyond the reach of UPC, at the distorted edges of telescopes. We have to go into that desert.”
“Alessa,” Kagan said, frustrated.
“There has to be a way.”
“No, even if there was, why would we deserve it? This is justice.”
“Kagan, you did the best you could. And your actions, violent or not, saved all these people,” Alessa said, looking up into his eyes.
Kagan exhaled and tried to calm himself. He kissed her, deeply and slowly, and held on to her for dear life.
Sam called out, “Kagan, you're going to want to see this.”
Kagan joined the others who had gathered around Mar. The guards watched from behind cautiously.
Mar, seated on the floor, was talking rapidly and quietly to himself. The words were jumbled and foreign, as if he was casting some kind of spell. Kagan looked at Meril, her face was emotionless.
“Kagan,” Makz said, and pointed to Omo.
Omo was also seated on the floor, a few meters from Mar. Kagan assumed that Mar was delving Omo, so he walked up to Mar to stop him.
Omo said in a low voice, “Here.”
Kagan spun around, “Eight?”
Omo opened his eyes and looked around. He threw his hand to his forehead and fell over from dizziness. “Kagan?”
Kagan hurried over and helped him up. The voice was eerily similar to Eight's, yet sterile and artificial. He asked, “What's going on?”
Omo looked up and blinked his eyes hard. He looked down at his stomach and felt it. “I'm healed?”
“Omo, listen to me, What did Mar do?” Kagan demanded.
Omo looked at his hands, puzzled. “Transfer?” he asked then looked at Mar. Mar was still and silent in the same position.
Kagan sat down with him, looking deep into his eyes. “Eight, are you in there?”
“Yeah,” he said, “and more. I have a lot of memories. I mean thousands. They're neatly ordered, but it's too much. I can tell I'm going to black out soon.”
Alessa gasped, “How is this possible?”
Meril laughed proudly, “He transferred your friend's consciousness and memories to that template.”
“There's more. I need everyone to listen to me,” Eight, through Omo's body, said.
“Eight,” Makz said, “I know you missed a lot buddy, but we're not alone here; prying eyes.”
Eight nodded and said, “Then simply do this, close your eyes, clear your minds. It is imperative that you focus your thoughts on nothing.”
Omo, Eight, began to slip into unconsciousness. Makz ran over and grabbed him, easing him to the floor.
Kagan looked at everyone and sent a sidelong glance around the room for the position of the guards. “I think we know what to do,” he said, making sure everyone understood.
Alessa ran her hand over Omo's forehead. He felt cold to the touch. Makz looked up at her, but kept a smart ass comment to himself. Alessa smiled at him for the effort.
Kagan went up to Sam. He said, “I think he's going to try to help us. Is everyone up to the task?”
Sam looked about the station room, counting the faces in her head. She looked down to Nanny, who was sleeping. “Yes. I've meditated, with some luck. But how is that Eight?”
Kagan didn't know how to answer. He inhaled and shook his head.
Sam looked at everyone and swallowed hard. She knelt down by Nanny, who was sleeping more or less soundly. She closed her eyes and almost instantly felt as if she was suspended over a massive dark space. It took her breath from her and she grasped around for something solid to hold onto. She opened her eyes with a short yell, as if she had just wakened from a nightmare. She checked Nanny again, who was quiet, then closed her eyes yet again. She fought the sensation, trying to do as Eight asked. She tried to cut out the stray thoughts and the duties. She concentrated on the blank space.
Vorn studied the
backs of his eyelids for a long while, trying to fight the noises in his head. Memories bubbled up to fill the spaces between thoughts. He ignored them. He was thinking about Eight, whom he was sure was lost to them.
Jenna was adept at meditation. Even through the pain her body was in, she was able to clear her mind. At the same time, she prepared a list of programs she could use as a defense against the Antikythera, but she was sure there was nothing she could do to stop it.
Meril had years of mental training to prepare her. She had no trouble. Revan had a little more difficulty, his thoughts were usually chaotic, but with three sets of memories clamoring for attention, it was worse. Revan remembered back to his home in the hills, and the restful state that it put him in.
Kagan said to Alessa, “I don't think I can do this.”
“Instead of focusing on nothing, try something for me. Think of that life that you fantasize about. The life you want,” Alessa said.
Kagan tried as she asked. The two of them sat together, breathing slowly and emptying their minds of all their troubles and worries, their desires and hopes.
Makz had the most problems. His body ached, his bones rattled. He wanted Pulse. He missed Glori. He wanted to bash the guard's heads in. He was starving and angry. He regretted killing Hadrian. He wanted to be conformed and he wanted the freedom to do whatever he wanted. Makz's mind would not be cleared, not by his own doing.
The rest of the pacifists managed to quell their fears and keep still and calm. Their shoulders, once carrying the weight of the world, lightened, and they felt some semblance of harmony.
Kagan found himself by the bank of his river. He was on the bridge he often dreamed of, watching the gray water slide under. Eight was there, dangling his feet over the edge. The dream was of a memory. Kagan threw his wedding ring into the river, then considered going with it. It was painful for him, shameful.
“I could remove this, you know, I could erase this,” Eight said, as his old self, he was healthy and well.
Kagan took in the night air and shook his head. “No,” he said, “You always taught me that these moments are important. Good with the bad.”
Eight patted his shoulder. “It is important. But without it, you'd still be you. You handle these sour times with much grace, carefully. It's not easy, I know. Now we have to do more.”
Kagan looked at him, curious. “What's going on?”
“Salvation,” Eight said, “Mar put me into that man's nearly empty mind. It's my body now. Mar and I saw the trouble you were in, all of you, so we came up with a plan.”
“You were alive in there? Conscious?”
“More or less,” Eight answered, “I am much more powerful than I thought. I've hidden everyone's memories, everyone's personalities and consciousnesses. No conformity will find them. The Antikythera will wipe empty minds.”
“Why would Mar help us?” Kagan asked warily.
“He did so for a price. I'll be carrying his mind's contents until I can transfer them to another template,” Eight said.
Kagan looked surprised and asked, “Will this actually work?”
Eight took his arm and lead him away from the bridge. “I don't know. It's an uphill battle.”
“If it doesn't,” Kagan began, “Then let me say thank you for trying. And it's good to see you, even once more.”
Eight smiled. He took Kagan to a precipice and stopped. “This is all there is. An expanse from one arm to the other; this is everything in your mind.”
Kagan looked out into a swirling cloud of color and images, sounds and scents. He could see flashes of his memory, faces of people he knew, some he missed dearly, some were mortal enemies.
Eight ended by saying, “From here, we can see the fog from before your self awareness, all the way to today. What I want you to do is compress it. From your arms outstretched, bring all of what you see into your hands. Press it down into a tiny point. I want you to take all of those moments, important and trivial, mundane and valued, and set them on the head of a pin. And if an old lover should fall between your fingers, if a particularly dark night should escape, don't chase them. We're more than our memories. You are more than you see before you. Hold out your arms and pull the total sum of your life against your chest until it's a single point of light. It will be waiting for you.”
Kagan saw his wife and the assassination attempt. He saw his child and he saw a length of rebar coated in blood. Kagan could, in one blink, see years at a time, and he wanted so badly to dive into the memories. He wept and tried to still himself. He was sure that it would be last time he felt those memories again. Kagan breathed hard and nodded. He put his arms out.
So Passes Away Earthly Glory
Makz yelled in frustration. He opened his eyes and everyone's eyes were closed. They were in deep meditation, where Makz should have been. He shouted again and slapped the sides of his head. “Shut up,” he yelled. The more he tried to clear his mind, the louder it got inside.
“Makz,” he said to himself, “there is nothing so important that it can't wait. Be quiet. Please be quiet.”
The station doors opened. A squad of LCS poured in, shouting commands. The pacifists were rounded up and put into a line. None of them seemed to mind. Sam and Nanny stood side by side, listless and docile. Vorn and Meril were walked into line with little prodding. Kagan, Alessa and Revan stood at the head of the line like it was any other day. Even Jenna got in line, walked there with Omo, both limping.
The room emptied, leaving Makz and Mar alone. Makz had a thought, that they had already been conformed, that it was over.
Elann walked in with six guards close at hand. She went first to Mar, who was lifeless, but breathing. She looked at Makz and said, “It's time.”
Makz looked at the exit, he put himself there in his mind. He tried to anticipate the response of the guards, guessed at how many guards were outside, he thought he had a chance.
“Don't,” Elann said simply.
Makz grimaced and kept planning.
“Don't or I will kill them,” Elann said.
He yelled again, this time into the air. “They'd be better off dead, and you know it.”
Elann looked at him, surprised. “I knew you never believed in conformity.”
“Loyalty,” he interrupted, “cheaper and easier. Conformity was never a useful tool. UPC could have made clones. If you want automatons, you have androids. You conform people to break them, nothing more. I don't see you lobotomizing yourself for the cause.”
Elann said patiently, “Conformity is more than a tool, it's a religion, Makz. When it is done, you will feel a peace unlike anything you've dreamed of. You've always wanted to be a part of it, and now you can. We all get what we want eventually.”
“And the pacifists?”
“They will never be hungry. Their children will grow up safely.”
Makz spat. “Jesus, you really think this way? It's a horrible existence and you know it.”
Elann turned around and went where the pacifists were led. She paused and said behind her, “Yet you still want them to live.”
Makz watched her disappear.
The pacifists were placed into modified conforming chambers. Antikythera devices were implanted behind their eyes. Kagan's Antikythera was removed and replaced with a newer one. Over the course of a night, every one of the pacifists were conformed. Kagan, Alessa and Revan were the first off of the hoverjets carrying everyone to the orbital elevator. Their eyes were empty windows.
Makz, who was carried with Mar, yelled out to them. He yelled their names. He swore and cursed. No one looked at him or whispered back.
Everyone was seated in the elevator, tucked in nice and neat and seat belted. No one really noticed the view, the sunrise from the top of the sky. They didn't seem to be fazed by the stars fighting through the bright fire of the sun, by the gentle curve of the Earth, turning away from them. The ground gave way, and for a few moments there was no gravity, only what they brought with them. They didn't m
ind.
They reached Ilios. Mar was taken from the elevator with Makz. Elann walked behind them. Makz felt dizzy and queasy, but hid it. He looked over at Mar, who looked like a walking corpse. Makz bit his tongue and kept as calm as he could. They were taken to a large windowed chamber that looked out over a shipyard. Dozens of space-faring ships sat nestled against airlock corridors. Elann gestured to the nearest, and saw the pacifists being lead down to an interstellar ship in waiting. Elann looked at Makz for some reaction, but found only the sterile air between them.
The halls of Ilios were quiet when Kagan and Alessa were brought through. They boarded the ship and the doors slid closed. The ship slid out of the dock and drifted from the shipyards into open space, hovering slowly across the Ilios skyline. The engines glowed. The ship began picking up speed. Before the pacifists knew it, the moon was directly to their left side. The Earth dropped off into the night.
Epilogue: Pack Your Bags
Makz put his face to the window. He didn't bother watching the ship pass out of sight. Elann touched his shoulder, gently. He looked at her. She took his hand. “You've done what you sought to do. Everything is over,” she said.
Makz replied, “They were the only people left.”
Elann squeezed his hand tightly, lovingly. “I know.”
Mar was taken to a chamber deep in the bottom of the Ilios platform. He was stripped and set into a metal sphere the size of a small room and sealed in. The device was activated, a cacophony of noise and light flooded the sphere, the opposite of a sensory deprivation chamber. He sat inside and stared blankly at the chaos.
Elann took Makz to a tower near the top of the station. The floor was a window, which looked out over the City-State and the Free City, clearly visible from space. Makz didn't look at the view. He closed his eyes and tried to clear his mind again, even though he knew it was too late.
Elann smiled gently.