by A I Zlato
By order of the Machine, he had been thrown into an investigation of which he knew little. Not only did he know little about suicide, expect what reports said in the news, but mostly he had not heard of the special agent’s profession. Collaboration with Baley had started on a negative note; she considered him useless, and he could not agree more. He found in her a slave to the Machine. The investigation had nonetheless increased in intensity, a turn that allowed Paul to find his place. She turned to him for information, and was now relying on him.
While she was on the ground validating their hypothesis and trying to understand the cult’s followers better, he had to study documents that had not been reviewed so far, particularly those about the fight against sects. Even if they did not always appreciate one another, now at least they were working together.
This brought him back to his conundrum. How could he study manuscripts in record time? He could not ask Baley to read further, because the remaining documents were old and difficult to access. The language had evolved over centuries, and unlike him, she had not spent her lifetime reading sentences the meaning of which had become cryptic over time. One possibility was that he had to involve other fellow researchers in the study, those with expertise in the antiquated language. Yes, that was it; he needed more resources. While walking toward the terminal, he fully became aware of the effect that Baley and the investigation were having on his mindset. His questions and his ramblings all seemed gone. His brain had shrunk and was operating in a straight line. It was efficient, certainly, but also linear, as if one part of his personality had retracted. He felt Edgard willing to engage in his mental peregrinations, but did not allow it to do so. At the edge of his consciousness, he just heard the kandron’s catchphrase, now a regular occurrence, followed by a compelling sense of urgency. Regardless of the litany, Paul focused on the concept of imminent threat in Edgard’s mind, echoing his own. He had to do something quickly, and find help.
Paul asked his terminal to put him in contact with the director of the research laboratory with maximum priority. Notwithstanding the late hour, he did not hesitate a second before sending this message, because he knew Jade Burton devoted all her time to her work, and she would understand the relevance of the request. He waited impatiently for an answer, leaving his hand on the wall of the black column in order to read the reply as soon as received. Minutes went by slowly, during which Edgard tried a new immersion in his mind.
“Edgard, I am busy.”
“I rather think you are not doing anything.”
“I am waiting for an important response.”
“And what do you do while waiting?”
“I am thinking!”
“Your brain does not seem very busy.”
“Edgard, I... What do you want?”
“You know.”
“Yes, so needless that I repeat myself.”
“I will stop when you start acting differently.”
“But I have been doing many things lately that are radically different!”
“It is not enough. The Gateways know.”
“Yes, the kandrons know my destiny. The Gateways know... that is great! I have an investigation to solve.”
“You are perceiving things without seeing them. Maybe your lead will take you where it is necessary to be. You must hurry.”
“That is what I am doing.”
Paul stopped the discussion, knowing pretty well that it ended with a misunderstanding, as he and Edgard were not talking about the same thing. Half an hour later, he received a connection request from Jade in her office, where she still was.
He had spoken to her on his first day at work, because she wanted to welcome all new researchers. This energetic, 50-year-old woman had impressed him. Everything about her reflected natural leadership, and in front of her, Paul had lost composure for a few seconds. She had welcomed him with the energy that characterized her, giving him a vigorous handshake, and said a few words to motivate him in his job. Since then, he had had the opportunity to see her in action, when they fought together to make sure each construction site was subject to archaeological excavation before work began. He thus had been able to appreciate her tenacity and pervasiveness. For Jade, failure was not an option, and she approached the problem as she had done for previous ones, that is, an obstacle she and her team would necessarily overcome. Her strong conviction had pervaded her speeches, behavior and communication skills. Thanks to her, most of the manuscripts had been discovered since the mandatory excavations began. Ever since, he had not dealt directly with her, but he had sometimes seen her in the lobby when leaving the building at the same time as he did. He could hear the characteristic clicking of her heels on the floor, her stare focused on the horizon, as if the world belonged to her.
“Paul, how can I help you at this late hour?”
“I know it is late, Madam, but I assure you this is an emergency. As you know, the Machine had appointed me to work on the investigation of the Problem. There is maybe a connection to a cult. I have, therefore, to study all manuscripts relating to that cult, as well as any book covering ways to fight it.”
“So what do you need?”
“A few researchers to help me so together we can compile these documents faster. I had thought of Sandra and Alexander, because...”
“They are yours. I will notify them of their new assignment. They will come to your office first thing tomorrow morning. I will talk to them about the confidential nature of this work.”
“Thank you, madam. I...”
The conversation was over. Jade was a very efficient individual who never wasted time on unnecessary sentences, and Paul could not utter the words of gratitude that were in his mouth.
“Are you happy with the conversation?” Edgard asked.
“Yes, Sandra and Alexander will help me. We will be able to move faster together.”
“Aren’t you going to focus on the beginning?” Edgard asked.
“That is the only thing I’m doing, Edgard. I work on the likely causes of child suicides, and I want to find a way to prevent a reoccurrence.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“Well, that’s what I do mean.”
Edgard withdrew from his brain in a gloomy mood, and fell onto the ground, shaking the walls of the house. Paul felt unhappy to see his friend in that mood, but he had no choice. Discussions with the kandron were for another day.
The next day, Paul arrived in his office at the same time that Sandra and Alexandra came to work — at dawn. Jade had authorized them to use the meeting room, as long as they needed to, so they went there to start pondering things. The room was small but operational, consisting of a circular table equipped with a digital column in the center. A simple verbal request was necessary to bring out the required number of terminals. Paul immediately requested three terminals, which materialized before them. Sandra and Alexander sat next to him, each in front of a terminal, armed with a notepad. Like most researchers at the lab, they loved writing on paper instead of encoding everything digitally.
Paul went straight to the main topic. It was useless to give them a summary of the situation, or to indicate this was an emergency. Jade had taken care of that aspect. Looking at both of them, he knew immediately that they had the same determination as he did. They were poised to review the manuscripts with the eagerness of people who knew that lives were at stake. They began by discussing the list of documents to study. For books on Chrijulam, Paul had already established the list with Baley; for those related to the fight against sects, all three spent at least an hour researching the database to make their selection. After agreeing on the final list, they allocated documents to one another, and loaded the list on the respective terminals. Their individual tensions percolated into the atmosphere with the Problem’s specter hovering above them.
They threw themselves frenetically into reading. Alex was in charge of the remaining manuscripts referencing Chrijulam, while Paul and Sandra reviewed documents covering s
ects in general. What Paul had read the day before on absurd and dangerous beliefs was enough for him, and he did not want to peruse other similar documents. He had a silent rage, however, that was compelling him to find a way to counter those thoughts, and to save the children from this scourge of horror.
He had on his screen How Sects Operate, Mental Manipulations and Cult Practices, Religions and Fundamentalism, False Prophets and Fight against Sectarianism. All these documents were penned during the same cycle, demonstrating that this problem had been a major concern at some point in time. Subsequently, the problem had either been eradicated or had fallen into oblivion. Paul hoped with all his heart that it was the former hypothesis, and that information in these books would be useful in the present campaign against cults.
He chose to start with the last document, Fight against Sectarianism, hoping to find a method in order to reason with the followers. His reading led him to consult other works in parallel, as he began understanding how a sectarian group operated. On his notepad, he drew some type of diagram, making connections between books. He noted in rectangles the book’s title, author and date of publication; on the lines connecting the rectangles, he indicated the logical path that had brought a document to another. The result looked like a huge pyramid structure, the head of which was the book Fight against Sectarianism. Paul felt dizzy, thinking about the implications of what he was reading. It was not only a question of belief; the sect, as a system, closed in on the believer and created mental barriers preventing him or her from even thinking about getting out.
What, though, was the difference between this mode of operation and the one in which Baley lived? She could not think of living without a chip; she shuddered at the idea of receiving less clear instructions from the Machine? Who decided what qualified as a sect, and what did not? How could a person know if he or she did not belong to a cult? Was Edgard his personal cult, which controlled so much of his thinking, and without which he could not live? Was the decision to categorize a belief system as a cult a sectarian choice in itself? Causes and consequences... Truth was nothing but a form of illusion. Reality is the imaginary of the majority... Was this imaginary a sectarian inclination? What were the limits of such inclination? The impasses? The majority... the mental pattern induced... at the beginning... to alter the beginning... the schema... the imaginary of the majority...
He wanted to chase away those ideas that steered him away from the main goal, which was preventing new suicides. All this could wait... and he felt Edgard’s presence in his mind scowl at that thought. Yet he had to. He continued his reading and immersed himself into the world of mental manipulation, the techniques that someone could use to lock a person out completely, to control him or her, and to make him or her accept anything.
Someone knocked on the door of the meeting room. Paul leaped from his chair, ready to kill the intruder, when he found out it was the director’s personal assistant, who brought... dinner. Paul expressed thanks vaguely, and put the tray on the table, while staring at the clock. Indeed, it had been 14 hours since all three started staring at their respective screens. A break was welcome. Sandra pushed aside her terminal, which reintegrated the column, making room for the meal tray. Alexander and Paul got up to walk a bit; to stretch their muscles, sore from hours of static posture. They all were grateful for the director’s kind attention. Jade had anticipated that they would be so absorbed in their work that they would forget to eat like most researchers in the building. While eating, they summarized their findings so far.
Alex had done a synthesis of Chrijulam, which overlapped in part with what Paul had read the day before. The sect came from a religion imported by the Elders of the Earliest Space. He could not determine whether the reduction in the number of followers had led to the radicalization, or whether the radicalization of their beliefs had scared away most believers. For Alex, some ideas, such as encouraging procreation, were commonly accepted among the Elders. At the beginning of spaces, however, they had learned past lessons and banned such thoughts, in order to achieve the Equilibrium. Only a few small groups had clung to their beliefs, but over time, most had disappeared. Chrijulam was one of those that survived, maintaining a stronghold on its members. The grip was even stronger, because their value systems were in total contradiction to the notion of space as it had been conceived. After hearing the summary, Paul was somber. He nodded. Alexander’s findings corroborated his own. How could such archaic beliefs have survived? How could followers close their eyes on things, and deny the very foundations of the city? That was beyond comprehension. At the edge of his consciousness, Paul again wondered if he also was not part of a sect... How were his own thoughts interpreted by others... the majority?
It was Sandra’s turn to speak. She had read a collection of testimonials, recounting how painful it could be to leave a sect. Those were the stories of people who had been caught up in the cult world at some point in their lives, as well as narratives by people whose relatives had joined such a group.
All those testimonials were consistent on one point — outside intervention. In each case, a relative had played that role, pulling the person out of the sectarian community. For Sandra, her readings showed that only outside intervention could enable an exit from the cult. The believer, incapable of rational thinking, could no longer analyze things objectively. His or her mind was completely locked. She did, however, draw the attention of Paul and Alexander to the fact that these stories only focused on one individual at a time. Unfortunately, she had not found a case of collective awareness about the problem at a family or group level. She wondered aloud, pondering whether what she had read could be transposable onto Chrijulam members. Was it possible to extract dozens of children in a single go? What should one do about the others, those who had reached adulthood? Should they be left alone under the pretext that they had passed the at-risk age? Sandra was slightly depressed. Like Alexander, she was now discovering a closed world; a horrible one, which children had wanted to leave by committing suicide. Paul, who had felt the shock before them and had recovered a little, cheered both colleagues up. This was just the beginning of a long research process; they had to persevere. They had to remember that failure was not an option. They had to succeed; Sandra and Alexander agreed with that, and prepared to get back to work. Before they did, Paul gave them a recap of his readings. He briefly explained techniques of mind control, which instilled in the believer a completely different sense of the natural world. He decided not to get into details at that point, as he wanted everyone to get back to work as soon as possible. Sandra dropped the food tray near the door, and logged into her terminal. Alexander logged into his, and both focused on their screens, taking notes occasionally.
Pondering the rest of the investigation, Paul reflected on what they had just said. All this information was valuable, but they had not yet found a way to save all at-risk children. All they had was the Chrijulam thought process as well as methods used and testimonials of former believers. There was colossal work ahead.
He went home that night anxious, pondering the information he accumulated during the day. He felt that Edgard wanted to chat, but did not have the strength or desire, being too concerned about the immediate future. He listened anxiously to the news of the day, hoping not to hear about new cases of suicide. Fortunately, there was nothing new. That was that day, but what about the next day?
His world epitomized a race against time; he was in permanent motion and no longer had a chance to discuss things with Edgard. The kandron was OK with this for now... and would instill thoughts in him in his sleep — Paul was sure of that. All his sleep nights were restless, replete with nightmares and inconsistent thoughts. Questioning the relevance of the Machine... of the Equilibrium... why now... why children... Chrijulam was a minor group... what if the scope of the malaise were wider?
Paul went to bed, and felt asleep. Immediately, his nightmare erupted. The city in flames... The Machine becoming immensely powerful... children... in cir
cles... Deep in his dream, Paul became convinced that the concept of circle was critical... but why? Where was he getting this certainty from? He also saw the first page of Anderson’s diary, written in letters of fire and blood... Any road followed precisely to its end... impasse or death... what difference?
Humans are illogical and irrational, while science is logical and rational. Is that really the case? Humans are after all the ones producing science.
The Spirit of the Multitude
CHAPTER 30
SPACE H. (1ST CIRCLE)
Baley woke up with a mind numbed by an exhausting night of fruitless reflections. She could not forget the malaise about the architecture she had seen in the pioneering area, the architecture of the Machine and the modifications that Lars had seen, the layout of the investigation, a possible link between the Problem and the first two points... All this was not rational, and did not fit her personality. Ideas surged without her having any control, invading her conscience and overtaking her entire mental arena. She felt annoyed and would have wanted to forget all of this in order to go back to her investigation peacefully, but she could not. Internal modifications in the Machine... modifications in the city, event triggering the Problem... There was necessarily a connection... Ideas came back and forth, endlessly like a downward spiral... the event triggering the suicides... why now... structural modifications in the Machine... Enough! Baley wanted to regain control; to get her logical and rational mind back.
The day was starting, and the night and dreams had to end, making way for efficiency and reason. She thought about all the tools she had at her disposal to chase this nonsense out of her head. An infusion, not too strong, would be good, or an intravenous sedation, but she would have an unproductive day; intense exercise for hours, but she had no time for sport... She knew. What had always helped her, allowed her to excel, gained her absolute trust? The Machine... “Nothing can match the Machine... My life is dedicated to the Machine, and the Machine is my life,” the Invocation read. The Machine would provide the solution as it always did. Baley then did something she knew was possible without having ever done it. She asked the Machine to intervene in her mental processes and relegate all her negative thoughts into oblivion. She needed to think clearly in order to focus all her energy on the investigation, and could not afford to allow intrusive thoughts, which opened doors she did not want to see. Not then... not at all... why? Perhaps... All that had to stop! She felt nervous impulses from the chip, removing thoughts that disturbed her, and helping to clear her mind. Baley could breathe freely again, something she had been unable to do for many hours. She was finally able to start her day, preparing herself physically by dressing up and swallowing two energy bars, and mentally by reviewing what she had to do. While doing her job, she realized what she had just done... she had asked the Machine to annihilate part of her brain... a request coming from her... for her own good... for her... or was it the Machine that... it was too late when she became aware of the price she would be paying, whole sections of her memory locked out, inaccessible for now... for an indeterminate length of time. She had a sense of déjà vu, of having already found gaps, empty spaces in her mind... but... when... for what occasion... she should not think about it. It did not matter; not one bit. What mattered was the mission, and she could now focus on it. Yes, that was it. That was what she had to do. She had made the right choice. Everything was clear. It was the right choice. That was what she had chosen... the investigation first and foremost... rationality and logic first and foremost. That was the best choice.