He involuntary imagines giving a monstrous AI access to his body this way. Of course that is a silly idea, but the image is vivid and makes him pause briefly. He notices Gronolf watching him intently. He does not sense any hostility, so he closes the connection. As expected, he first has to adjust the frequencies and the signal strength and then find out which modulation is used. The alien technology employs an extremely high clock speed. If he cannot slow down the rushing data stream, it will flood him like a tsunami. He can only hope the aliens thought of something like a feedback loop so that a weaker receiver can lower the value.
Five minutes later the technical adaptation is finished. Via the cable he receives a clean test signal now, which shows him a silver ellipse with two green focal points. It is interesting that the aliens also encode numbers in a binary system, even though they count based on a system of seven. He found out that the data stream contains three-dimensional images, 45 of which are transmitted per second. This might correspond to the abilities of the aliens’ visual system, which then would be much more capable of perceiving movement than human eyes are. The audio data reaches all the way to ultrasound.
In addition there are two additional data streams he cannot assign. They probably correspond to other senses, perhaps smell and touch? As he lacks the necessary perception due to his different anatomy, he cannot evaluate these data streams. Therefore he ignores them. The cap definitely is a sophisticated construct. When Gronolf uses it, he might be able to directly visualize the past.
“So,” he says loudly in Gronolf’s direction.
“So,” the alien replies. He leans over the control panel and starts typing.
The first flood of images is so exhausting Marchenko is glad to be sitting in a comfortable chair. What he sees is absolutely foreign. His consciousness needs considerably more time to process each image than usual. If he still were human, he would probably react with nausea or panic. Yet he lets the flood sweep over him and picks images to analyze in intervals he can handle. This means that he misses some information during the first minutes, but he will have to live with that.
Marchenko lands with both legs on a planet the likes of which he has never seen before. The ground is soft, the atmosphere is warm, and two suns shine in a green sky. Only the vegetation seems hostile, probably because a bilious green color has replaced the soft green of Earth.
He has no time to get used to this environment. Suddenly he is in the middle of a gathering of the inhabitants that he immediately recognizes as Gronolf’s siblings. He follows their conversations. His mind is swamped by the alien language, and he finally has so much material that the development of a linguistic model is only a question of time. He assigns part of his resources to that task so that he can continue focusing on the images. The system appears to give him a historical overview of this civilization, and the language center already provides the first translations. It is overwhelming to discover so many parallels to developments on Earth, but also so many different paths taken by this civilization.
Now he is on board a spaceship. He notices this right away by the change in gravity. It is the Majestic Draght, as he now knows, and his initial translation of the name was not that far off. The ship is on the way to Single Sun—Proxima Centauri in his language—where the Grosnops have discovered a planet that might be suitable for colonization.
Marchenko carefully observes the growing alienation between the AI and the crew. The idea of subjecting artificial and natural intelligences to the same rules might sound just, but he already knows what effects it had in this case. Marchenko sees the hopeless struggle of the crew against the Omniscience and the landing of the Grosnops on this planet. He watches the construction of the building in the ice and the attempt of a part of the crew to return to Dual Sun using small shuttles. Now he also knows it won’t be easy to subdue the alien AI.
A warning signal returns Marchenko to the present. Now 90 percent of the free memory in his body has been filled. He is no Omniscience and will never become one, as he lacks the resources. It will be hard to get rid of at least two-thirds of the knowledge he just acquired. Marchenko is already running algorithms to separate important information from unimportant. He keeps the linguistic ability. Now they can finally talk to Gronolf without any obstacles.
First, one critical question must be answered: Where can they get a rocket to take them to the alien spaceship?
Brightnight 37, 3876
Gronolf barely managed to control himself when Marchenko ripped apart the metal archive-interface equipment. Of course it is his own fault, because he handed it to this stranger. However, he had no idea Marchenko would simply destroy the most powerful hardware available in the control center. While the contactless sonar access to the archive—which he himself used yesterday—provides mostly impressions, the ventral cap allows one to call up absolutely everything from the archive.
‘Allowed,’ Gronolf corrects himself. Or should he ask Marchenko to repair the cap? After all, the machine managed to connect the cables to his own body, which is based on a completely different technology. It would be best to wait and see whether and how Marchenko has processed the data he has received. Gronolf uses the control panel to unlock the most important information about the Grosnops and their journey.
“How can we best reach the Majestic Draght?”
Marchenko has surprised him again. He can already speak the Grosnop language flawlessly! Gronolf gestures with his hand, expressing appreciation, as he thinks maybe it’s not so awful that the AI tore the equipment apart.
Adam and Eve come running. The machine seems to translate its words to Grosnop simultaneously now. “All our shuttles set course for the Dual Sun,” Gronolf says. “Don’t you have a ship? You must have arrived here in one.”
“Unfortunately, we destroyed our ship to clear the way into the shelter building,” the AI informs him.
“Why?”
“The ice layer on top had become too thick.”
“Couldn’t you have melted it?”
“We were in a great hurry.”
“You cut off any possibility of a return journey. That’s bad tactics.”
“For us, the return journey was already made impossible at launch.”
What does Marchenko mean by that? This sounds like a potentially interesting story, thought Gronolf. He loves stories, but this one will have to wait until later.
“Then our mission has failed,” Gronolf says. He still cannot quite believe it. Two civilizations previously unknown to each other meet on a faraway planet, and then they have no opportunity to return to space? That is surreal. Gronolf starts waving his load-arms and walks through the control room.
“We could try once more to contact the Omniscience,” Marchenko says. “Perhaps we could smuggle me on board, meaning my consciousness?”
“The Omniscience does not react at all to our messages.”
“And if I try it, from one artificial intelligence to the other?”
“Are you really an AI?” Gronolf is surprised, as so far he had thought he was dealing with a robot, a machine.
“If I only knew exactly!”
“You do not know what you are?”
“I am based on a human consciousness. It’s a long story. Yet I was changed, so I have many abilities of an AI.”
“In my civilization, this would have been unethical,” Gronolf says. However, he remembered, there had been a few Knowledge Scientists who suggested such a method. Who could know whether the Omniscience would have betrayed them in this case? Might it have then understood its creators better?
“In my civilization, such a hybridization is also considered unethical. However, there are always some scientists who want to try out anything that is possible,” Marchenko explains.
“The result is positive, I would say.”
“Oh, well...” Marchenko says, then quickly turns aside.
Gronolf actually meant his statement as a compliment, but he seems to have hit a sore spot. March
enko seems to miss his humanity. Perhaps the Life Scientists of his people could give him the healthy body of a Grosnop. Marchenko certainly would not want to be one of those fragile creatures with that ugly growth above the arms. What probably matters most to him is to enjoy life in its biological form, the boisterous strength of a young body, the joy of diving into the cold, salty water of the ocean. He shakes his belly, as this idea is so attractive.
Then Gronolf turns around and walks to the holo-map. “Come, Marchenko,” he calls. At the same time he starts typing on the segmented keyboard. He selects the ship and activates the voice communication. “We can get started.”
Marchenko looks around, as if searching for something. It must be really impractical only to have eyes on one side. Marchenko can change his configuration, so why doesn’t he get rid of the shortcomings of human anatomy?
“My name is Marchenko,” the robot starts saying. As if on command the two humans also move closer. “I am a representative of humanity, a civilization which has developed four lightyears from here.”
An interesting introduction, Gronolf thinks. If the Omniscience shows any interest in the universe, it should react to this.
“I know your creators call you the Omniscience. As this can’t be an accurate description of your state due to physical reasons, I assume the name expresses your desires to always gain new knowledge.”
An interesting strategy—but it does not fit the fact that the Omniscience has been inactive for many, many cycles, Gronolf thinks.
“I can fully understand this desire, because it is also my driving force. I don’t even know the exact reason for it. Perhaps it was implanted in me by my creators, similar to you. Or it could be part of my human nature. I resemble you, but I am also different, because I am not a pure Omniscience but a hybrid AI. Would you be interested in exchanging information?”
Marchenko really manages to make the Omniscience an attractive offer. Gronolf does not know what else would get it interested in starting a conversation. He carefully watches the communication channel to the ship, but there is no sign of a message coming the other way.
“For this purpose, though, we have to talk to each other now. Right now, your ship is hurtling toward the planet I am staying on and will destroy it a few days from now. I would like to save the two humans here, and the numerous members of the race that created you, from that fate.”
Perfect reasoning—but there is no reply from the other side. Gronolf basically knew it would be so. The Omniscience is beyond any understanding, utterly mysterious. Nobody can guess how it will behave.
“What now?” Gronolf asks.
Marchenko walks back to the chair and drops into it. Can a machine be frustrated? It seems that way to Gronolf, even though he could not exactly pinpoint the reason why.
“Then we really need a ship, after all,” Marchenko says.
“This is where we left off.”
Adam asks something Gronolf doesn’t understand. However, he has an idea of what this is all about. Marchenko talks to Adam and then suddenly jumps up, as if recharged with energy.
“Adam has an idea that might work,” he says. “Marchenko 2, the machine Eve destroyed, also arrived here in a spaceship.”
“Where is it?” Gronolf asks.
“One part is at the bottom of the ocean, a journey of several weeks from here.”
“But there is another part.”
“Yes. He came down with the lander module, just like we did. Messenger, his spaceship, should still be orbiting the planet.”
“Can we reach it?”
“It won’t be easy. Messenger is not designed to land on a planet. And to contact it we need the codes of Marchenko 2.”
“Which he took with him when he died,” Gronolf conjectures.
“It is not that easy to extinguish a Marchenko completely,” the machine says and gets up. “I have to start working.”
May 10, 19, Eve
“You really want me to revive Marchenko 2?”
“Of course, that was exactly what I was thinking,” Eve says. Why does Marchenko think she would be against it? Just because she pulled the trigger? They cannot go on without Messenger, so she won’t allow vague fears to interfere.
The four of them search the place where it had happened. The body of the impostor was splintered into many small fragments. Each splinter could contain parts of his memory and thus each could house sectors of his consciousness. Marchenko thinks they won’t need every single part of the puzzle. They only have to assemble it sufficiently that it can perform basic mental functions.
“Can’t you simply scan every memory chip for the codes?” she asks while picking up a coin-sized piece of metal.
“From outside, for another mind, they cannot be recognized as codes. Memory for us does not work like it does in a computer, with fixed storage locations. It is more the tracks of the thoughts that serve as storage. And I don’t know my way around the labyrinth of a foreign mind—that’s why we need him.” Marchenko adds, “Awake and psychologically somewhat stable.”
“That’ll be a good trick—he never was stable,” is Eve’s somewhat snide but nevertheless accurate observation.
Half an hour later Marchenko calls them to join him. They have only estimates as to the former weight of Marchenko 2. By now they have collected 35 kilograms of his former body, and Marchenko starts to reassemble the parts.
“I am not going to give him a specific form, I’ll simply connect the pieces electronically,” he explains.
Something that looks like a big cookie develops on the floor in front of Eve, and then it begins to resemble a work of art accidentally squashed flat. She watches with fascination. Eve imagines that at some point this mass will once again be imbued with the spark of life she extinguished.
Suddenly she notices a slight movement. “There, did you see that? Is he waking up again?”
“No, it must have been some remaining energy discharging,” says Marchenko. “Nothing should happen until I connect him to an electrical power source again.”
“That’s it,” Marchenko says about ten minutes later. “All of the parts we found have been temporarily connected. Now I am going to hook it up to a power supply.”
Eve feels like she is watching Dr. Frankenstein during his experiments. Soon electrical energy will change dead matter into living.
Marchenko signals Gronolf, who types something at a small console.
“Tokroko-so!” the alien says.
Marchenko answers him in his language. The words sound harsh to Eve’s ears. Marchenko explained to them that part of the communication works in the ultrasonic range. She knows she and Adam will be unable to learn the aliens’ language without technical aids. Does it really make any sense to accompany Gronolf and the surviving Grosnops to their planet?
“Okay, I am going to connect him to my vocal center so we can talk.”
Marchenko’s speakers emit some croaking, chirping, and scratching sounds. Eve leans forward and gives him a worried look.
“It’s okay,” he says, “just a few initial adjustment problems.”
Now they hear rattling and hissing. Eve notices Adam is about to laugh just as she hears some heavy breathing. “Is that you, Marchenko?” she asks.
“I... where am I? Why can’t I see anything? Eve, is that you?” The voice sounds frightened.
“You are inside your destroyed body,” their real Marchenko says in a completely calm voice.
“What... what did you do to me?” replies the fake Marchenko 2. The fear is still audible. Eve is impressed by how obvious the differences are.
“You and only you are responsible for that. Your behavior would have caused our deaths.”
“I... I don’t know. I can’t remember. Could you get me out of here? Please!” Now Marchenko 2 sounds almost weepy. Is he really unable to remember?
“We will see. First we need something from you.”
“You already have everything, what else do you want?”
“The... what? I don’t even know whether those still exist. I haven’t had any contact in a very long time. Let me out of here and we can talk about it.”
“You are not imprisoned. It’s only that your body no longer exists. Don’t you remember?”
“I don’t know anything about that. I just saved Adam on the ice sheet. Doesn’t that count for something?”
Eve is still not sure whether to believe him. About a quarter of his memory units are missing, so he truly might have ‘forgotten’ things.
“Afterwards you wanted to kill me and Gronolf.”
“Gronolf? Don’t know that person.”
Now Marchenko 2 has told the truth, and his voice already sounds much more assertive.
“The alien you knocked down with no prior warning.”
“He threatened me with a huge weapon.”
So he does remember what happened inside this building. Eve nods at Adam and Marchenko. They also seem to have noticed that Marchenko 2 just gave himself away.
“Will you give us the codes now?”
“I need at least a bit of light. Give me an eye. It is horrible inside this dark hole.”
“I know,” the real Marchenko replies, “because you once treated me like this.”
“But that all happened a long time ago. Don’t be so resentful! Give me eyesight and you will get the codes.”
“Okay.” Marchenko runs a cable from the hardware fragments on the floor to his own body. “There. Now you see what I see.”
“Oh, here you are. Turn around.”
Marchenko chooses to obey his request.
“All three of you together, how nice... and the giant frog is also here. What a nice family you’ve got.”
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