Tabula Rasa

by Filip Forsberg

  She looked at her H-band. Quarter to nine. As she tried to decide what she would do, the door opened and her colleague Mike came in. Mike was tall, over one meter and ninety centimeters and his big wild hair stood straight out and his glasses were located so far down on his nose that he had to tilt his head backwards when he was looking straight ahead with them.

  “Hi, you.” He smiled as he walked with his coffee cup toward a desk.

  Her mind raced.

  “Hello.”

  Mike put down the coffee cup and pushed away a few books that were dangerously close to the edge of the table.

  “How’s it going, you look like you've seen a ghost” he laughed.

  Elisabeth struggled to sound normal.

  “No, not at all. A couple of problems with the data transfer but nothing serious. I fixed it by downloading a couple of new protocols from the main system.”

  Mike nodded thoughtfully.

  “Ok, good.” He continued, “It will be great when the headquarters take some time and update that entire part of the system. It is incredible that it should take so long for them to get it done.”

  Mike turned to her with a meaningful look, Elisabeth gave him a strained smile.

  “Yes, absolutely incredible.”

  Mike paused, pulled out the chair and sat down at the desk and took his coffee cup. Elizabeth walked over to another desk, picked up some papers and pretended to read. She could not understand a word of what was on the paper. A couple of minutes passed by. Her thoughts swirled. She has to get out of here. She could not just leave from there before their shift was over, Mike would be suspicious if she did. But she has to get out of there. Out and up to the parks. From there she could get to her apartment unnoticed and then on to her dad.

  Mike had picked up a small scanner and it looked like he was in the process of disassembled it. It seemed like he was debugging something in it. She was sitting no more than five meters behind Mike watching his back while he was working. The small cameras up in the ceilings moved in their normal rhythm, but she knew she could not continue to sit there like a petrified penguin. She stood up and pretended to read on her phone.

  “I have to get up to the control room on seventh to get a new pair of crypto keys necessary to install the new protocols.” She shrugged theatrically on her shoulders, “Damn it.”

  Mike looked at her with a doubtful look.

  “Can’t they just send the crypto keys?”

  Elizabeth grimaced.

  “No idea, but it's probably best I go up, don’t you think?” She pointed to the scanner in his hand. “How is it going with the scanner?”

  “Well, a bad data chip but nothing I can’t fix.” He looked at the broken device in his hand. Before Mike could say anything else, Elisabeth walked towards the door and when she disappeared through the door she shouted.

  “Good luck with the scanner.”

  Mike looked after Elisabeth when she disappeared and frowned.

  * * *

  The big elevator slowed down and stopped, the doors opened with a fizzling sound and Elisabeth stepped out. A human murmur reached her and she instinctively took a step back. She had reached the ground level and the central park, which was shaped like a figure eight and was more than six hundred meters at its widest point. It was filled with people who talked and laughed, her pulse calmed down when she saw the tall trees that stretched upwards. It was pleasantly warm in the air. It would have been a great day for a walk in the park and maybe she would have gone down to the two large lakes if she had not been chased. Now was not the time for a relaxing trip.

  She stood with her back to the lifts and about ten people moved around her, some on the way into the elevator, others on their way out. A smaller group of people, all dressed in a dark red monk-like suit with a gold-colored belts and bare feet, slowly walking together through the crowd of people. She recognized them as Undicier. The crowd opened up when the smaller group of Undicier walked through it. All Undicier was smiling with arms outstretched as they got ready to embrace someone. Elizabeth froze when a tall Undicier came up to her and took her in his arms. The tall man looked down at her and beamed.

  “How is my child doing? Are you ready for salvation?”

  Elisabeth looked up at his pockmarked face and grinned.

  “Thank you, but I think it's too late for me.”

  She took a step back and hurried on. In front of her was the oval shaped road that surrounded the central park. On the road in front of her, the traffic flowed clockwise. Small, silent vehicles slid in and out of traffic, stopped to drop off their passengers, pick up new ones and then slide out again.

  There was no need to get your own car in Tabula Rasa. The traffic system was structured so that with a payment card you had access to all the transport systems that was available. You could use all vehicles, such as cars, boats, slides and elevators. You paid only for the distance you traveled. The system was used to the fullest when no one owned a car or other vehicle that was collecting dust when it was not in use. There were only a few of the very highest positions in Tabula Rasa who had access to private transportation except for the police and rescue services.

  Her dad lived across the park, just over five minutes’ walk from where she was. To get there, she could either get through the park on foot or with one of the many taxis that circulated on the main road but she had to hurry. They were after her, and both she and her father were in danger. She took off her H-band, and when a taxi slowly slipped past her she held her breath and took a chance and carefully threw the H-band against the small antennas on the luggage compartment where it got stuck. She smiled when the taxi glided away. She quickly walked over the main street on foot and disappeared into the park.

  *

  Sydney, Australia.

  2048-12-27

  The aroma of the tasty salmon lingered in the room. Dennis and Kathy both helped to clear the table of the main course and when they would set the table for the dessert the holotelephone rang in the living room. Kathy continued to set up the plates for the fragrant tiramisu she had prepared and Dennis went into the living room, sat down on the couch and noticed that the dessert spoon was still in his right hand. He held the spoon when he pressed the button to activate the holotelephone which was built in their coffee table.

  Four smaller bent metal arms stretched from the edges of the coffee table, and above them a hologram was projected of the person that you spoke with. The lamp under the holotelephone began to flash green to indicate that it was running.

  “Hi, it's Dennis.” He said.

  Silence. The space above the metal arms was empty. He thought the holotelephone maybe was broken and moved the hand in the air where the hologram would normally be. His fingers sparkled as they did when a phone was on. Slowly he leaned himself closer.

  “Hello? Is there anybody there?”

  He waited. Nothing. The seconds passed by. He thought he heard something breathing but was not sure. No shadows that moved, no face that appeared. There was also no clicking sound to indicate that the call has ended, the silence dragged on. Just when he was about to press the button to end the call, a faint sound was heard. A couple of seconds passed.

  The sound was heard again. It was weak but it was there. There was still no hologram in front of him, but he heard something that resembled a voice, that he was sure of. It was not possible to understand what the voice said but it clearly said something. Words. Dennis struggled to understand and leaned forward. It sounded like the voice repeated words over and over again, he focused but could not understand what the voice was saying. He sat for several seconds and looked intently in front of him in the empty air. Nothing moved. The green light continued to flash.

  “Hello?”

  The voice was thin but at the same time deep as if it was talking into a box. The normal frequencies found in the human speech that made a person understand what another one said, did not seem to be there.

  Without warning, the holotelephone cl
icked, the green light went out and the call was interrupted. Dennis looked at the empty air and wondered to himself if there was someone who wanted to play a joke on him. His instinct told him it was not a prank. The discomfort in him grew. He stayed seated for a few seconds, uncertain what he should do.

  “Who was it?” Kathy said from the kitchen.

  He shook his head and hesitated.

  “Nobody. Wrong number.”

  Thoughtful, he looked at holotelephone, unsure of what he would do. Kathy stuck her head out through the doorway.

  “That was a long conversation for somebody who dialed the wrong number?” her face was skeptical. Dennis looked at her with a puzzled look and stood up.

  “Yes it was. There was someone there but I could not hear what she said.”

  “She?”

  Dennis nodded.

  “Yes, it was a woman. I am sure of that.”

  He hesitated for a couple of seconds. That was weird. He went out to help Kathy but he had only managed to take three steps when the holotelephone rang again. Kathy called out from the kitchen with a teasing tone.

  “She?” Kathy repeated with a cheeky smile. “You can tell your mistress to call another day. You're busy helping me.”

  She giggled. He wrinkled his nose and shook his head as he walked back to the couch and sat down again.

  “How can I have a mistress? My heart belongs to you.”

  Dennis pressed the button again but said nothing this time. The green light lit a second time but the air above the holotelephone was still empty. A mute, hollow silence spread out in the room. It spoke to him but said nothing. Kathy was still standing and leaning her upper body out through the doorway. She looked at Dennis and sounded more serious now.

  “Who is it?”

  Dennis did not answer. He stared at something in the empty air in front of him and he lost himself in it. Fascinated, he saw something dark, glittering that materialized in front of him. Weak, thin shadows moved hypnotically above the coffee table. He tried to distinguish what the shadows were. The strange pulsating sound he heard earlier came back. It sounded almost the same but a little bit different now. It was faint, like a low whisper. Almost inaudibly but as the seconds passed, it became clearer and clearer. A voice. A woman's voice. It sounded like the same voice he heard earlier.

  Dennis stared enchanted at the swirling shadows and he leaned forward to listen. The voice said something he could not distinguish. It sounded scared, frantic. It repeated the same thing over and over again. Like a robot stuck in an infinite loop. Kathy had left the kitchen and stood behind Dennis. She put her hand on his shoulder.

  “What’s happening?”

  An edge of worry had crept into his voice. Kathy answered something that he did not perceive. The voice sounded like it had something important to say. Something that could not wait. It was pushing. Became more and more agitated. More and more desperate to be heard. It was unlike anything that Dennis had heard in his life. Dennis turned to Kathy and saw her eyes widening. She lifted her hand and pointed past Dennis against the shadows above their coffee table. He tried to keep up with what happened, but he lost his grasp on what was happening around him. He could see Kathy's lips move but he could not understand what she said.

  Instinctively, Dennis turned around against the shadows that had adopted a more solid shape. He made every effort to understand what was happening. He froze. A creeping feeling of horror grabbed his interior and he looked down and saw that he was still holding the dessert spoon in his hand. The shadows were increasingly shaping a face in different shades of gray.

  It was a face filled with terror. A woman's face. Her eyes were wide open and Dennis clearly saw the whites of her eyes. The woman looked to be dark-haired, maybe around thirty years. Her beautiful features were disfigured with terror and her full lips were moving frantically. Kathy and Dennis were thrown back when the woman's voice penetrated the darkness of the shadows with full force.

  “Help! Help me!”

  *

  The jungle, Costa Rica

  2048-12-27

  In this location, light was no match for darkness. The sharp beam from Lisa's flashlight made no impact on darkness that was in front of her. She took a few deep breaths and began her descend. The deep silence that struck her was deafening. She walked with bent knees and Tim followed right behind her. The uneven surface forced her to move carefully not to stumble. Her backpack contained a number of glow sticks of the kind that gave a green light when you cracked them. She pulled out three of them, cracked them and threw them in front of her. Three green light spots landed in front of her and revealed that the surface was a mixture of rocks, stones and smaller pebbles.

  “How does it look? Do you find any way through?” Tim asked.

  She studied the terrain in front of her.

  “Yes I think so. There seems to be a slightly better passage near the left edge. If we walk about ten meters along the cliff wall, we would arrive at that plateau over there.”

  She pointed. Slowly and with extreme caution she hunkered on. Each step was well balanced. She slipped and thought she would fall but finally she had covered the ten meters to a small ledge. Behind her, Tim had with experienced hands fed out the rope, now lying like a long snake between them.

  “What do you say? How does it feel? Is there a passage?” Tim's voice echoed silently against the walls. He used to like caves and to explore them, but this one gave him the creeps. There was something about it that he could not quite put his finger on. Normally, you could hear the echo of the sounds that bounced against the caves hard walls, but in this one he could barely hear any echo at all.

  * * *

  Lisa squinted against the darkness. It was if possible even more compact than before. No matter how much she moved the flashlight back and forth she saw no contours of anything in front of her.

  “Maybe” she replied, “It's so dark here that I don’t see anything at all. Wait a bit, I'll throw out some more glow-sticks.” She cracked three more glow-sticks in a row and repeated the previous procedure. Two of them hit the side walls and the third ended up a little further ahead than the others and its ghostly glow gave the passage a supernatural appearance. The narrow passage was from the plateau she was on, and in the weak light she realized that it continued for about ten meters before turning slightly to the right. The roof and walls sloped downward and inward and made the passage to resemble a tapered tube. She shivered. It was colder than it used to be in this type of caves. She was experienced and had explored a few cave systems in the past and enjoyed the challenge they demanded. She turned to Tim.

  “Tell Lars and bring a couple of our lights so we could see a little more of what this really looks like.”

  Tim nodded and brought a powerful lamp that was about a meter high and placed it on a flat surface and lit it. The powerful lamp spread a bright light to up to fifteen meters. Lisa heard Lars struggling and how Tim laughed.

  “Take one at a time, young man, it will probably be a little easier.”

  Lars was panting.

  “Yes, it's probably a good idea. I thought I would be a little effective instead, but it was perhaps a stupid idea.” He breathed heavily when he put down one lamp and took a better grip on the other. They had gone ten meters when they saw a faint glow. The light in the cave looked supernatural. Lisa had never seen anything like it. A faint blue pulsating light poured from a sphere that was in the end the cave. She stood petrified. She heard Tim's voice speak to her but she did not understand what he said. It was like she was immersed in a pool, and he stood at the edge of the pool and spoke to her.

  She stared at the sphere, unsure if she really believed her eyes. It was not big, maybe thirty centimeters in diameter. She could not see what it was made of, at first she thought metal, but when she saw the weak light strands that played over the surface she knew it was not right. It was like the light strands that moved over the surface of the sphere were alive. Extremely small and thin they danc
ed around on the surface and formed different patterns that disappeared as quickly as they had formed. She took a step closer. She was not afraid. Instead of fear, she was filled with a sense of calm. The sphere would not hurt her, she was sure about that. She gasped when she saw that the sphere did not rest on the ground in the cave. Instead, it floated weightlessly a decimeter above the ground.

  Tim had caught up with her and carefully came up next to her. He did not say anything, staring at the sphere that floated in front of them. Lisa stood like frozen to the ground. She could not move. She stared at the sphere, and it seemed to talk to her. It was a feeling she had never experienced before in her life. It was like a voice, which she did not understand, that spoke to her from within herself. She turned to Tim and cocked her head on the side as you do when you are listening for something. How long they stood there she did not know. She heard Lars shout. His voice was far away. Slurry. Unclear. She tried to turn to the voice but did not know where it came from. Instead, the sphere called her and she stood as nailed to the floor and could not move.

  Lars had caught up with them and called for both Tim and Lisa and when nobody had answered he had overcome his fear for the dark passages and headed in after. He stood up and waited by the lamp that Tim had set. Lars had walked on and discovered Tim and Lisa standing in front of what seemed to be a bright skinning sphere that looked to be floating above the ground.

  Slowly he moved towards where Tim and Lisa both were standing. Now he was close to them, less than a meter away. He repeated their names but they did not seem to react.

  “Tim, do you hear me? Lisa?” the supernatural light from the sphere gave the cave a surrealistic appearance. Blueish light played over the rough stonewalls and small shadows danced over the floor where they were standing. Small puddles of water on the floor was filled with a ghostly shine that Lars never had seen before. Slowly he leaned forward and grabbed Lisa’s shoulder and squeezed lightly with his hand. She did not move. Lars grabbed harder. He saw something glimmer on the ground under the sphere. It looked like a disc of gold with green inlays. The sphere floated above it. Small strings of glimmering stars glided between the sphere and the disc. The sight was hypnotizing.