“I can’t do this without you,” I say.
She drops her arms and steps closer. Her deep brown eyes hold the universe for me. “But you already have,” she says, like I’m a silly child spouting nonsense. “You did everything.” She means the fugue. That I don’t need her anymore to come here. Or to go back.
“That’s not what I mean,” I say.
I reach out to her cheek, but I stop just before my fingertips touch her. She’s already crossed over—she’s already on the far side of the bridge. Others on this side have touched me and given me the overpowering gift of themselves with a single finger to the forehead. That was knowledge to strengthen the bridge. Information to guide me.
That’s not what I want here.
I lean in close—close enough to kiss—but I hold back, guilt weighing me down. “You believed before you ever saw any of this.” I don’t deserve someone like her—this much I know.
She smiles, teasing. “And you saw and still didn’t believe.”
Then she closes the gap between us and kisses me. The feel of her lips on mine is as real as anything, yet it makes the world shine brighter and sing louder. I hold her tight—tighter than anything I’ve ever clung to in my life—and I believe I can make it happen.
Kamali’s lips move against mine, but they’re not kissing me—they’re gasping for air.
I pull back, my cheeks already wet with tears, but hot new ones now course after them. Her body convulses in my hold, but it’s just a cough of dry air working its way in and hacking back out. It’s the sound of her living… and it’s the sweetest music to my ears. I ease back, still holding her, supporting her as she struggles to tame the coughing spell.
She blinks rapidly, looking in wonder around her, still heaving in one breath at a time.
Glass crunches behind me.
I twist to see Tristan looming over us. “Oh my God.” He stares long and hard at Kamali, disbelieving and believing all at the same time. Then he slowly drags his gaze up to meet mine. His mouth is hanging open. “It really is you.”
Those aren’t words I want to hear.
I look back to Kamali. She coughs again and drags a hand across her face, looking in disgust at the red muck that comes away with it. Then she takes in the carnage all around us, wrinkling up her nose.
With a furrowed brow, she looks back to me. “Was I out long?”
I smile wide. “Not long at all.”
It’s been three days since I brought Kamali back from the dead.
I’m not sure why I expected Tristan to keep that a secret. Or why I thought that once he told someone, it wouldn’t ripple through the Resistance like a sonic boom, pulling at the bonds that hold everything together. He’s kept his distance from me, and I haven’t seen much of Kamali, either. She was popular even before she died and came back to life. Cyrus tells me that she and Tristan have broken up.
I’m back in the Resistance’s basecamp, only we’ve moved to Seattle. The mountains here are apparently filled with hidden camps, cloaked with invisibility shields and hiding the remnants of humanity who augment their bodies with ascender tech while freeing their minds of ascender lies. The people here believe humans should be free to choose their fates.
And there are some who believe I’m more than I am.
I’m sitting on the Dalai Lama’s meditation mat. No one questioned me when I asked for it. Then again, people are seriously uncomfortable around me now—even more so than before, which is saying something. So I keep my back turned to the rest of the tent while I breathe and clear my mind. I’m not trying to shift into the fugue state—I’m just spending some quiet time sorting and categorizing the multitude of lives I carry around with me. So many different perspectives. So many years of experience. I’m not in danger of unraveling anymore—the mental stitches are holding up pretty well—but it takes some contemplation time just to get a handle on it.
The Buddhist is his own master, the Dalai told me once. He uses his intelligence, his mind, to transform his emotions. He studies his world and his own mental system. With that understanding, it is possible for him to transform his own mind.
That scrawny kid knew things I’m just now figuring out. How I wish I’d been able to be there when he crossed—that I’d been the bridge for him. Then again, I can’t imagine how many lives he has locked away inside.
Not unlike me.
I have no doubt now that he’ll reincarnate. I haven’t gone looking for him yet, but I will. I need someone to help me figure all this out. Looking back on it, the Dalai Lama seemed to know far more than he ever said out loud—including the fact that I would be connected to his death.
Om mani padme hum. I breathe in, breathe out, and try to let the guilt of that wash away. The Buddhist is his own master—
—he transforms his own mind. It’s the master painter’s voice.
I didn’t mean to slip into the fugue state, but it’s so much easier now. Dangerously easy.
Truth is never easy, the master says. Yesterday, I finally searched the nets for him: Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn. A Dutch painter famous, among other things, for his religious paintings. He’s my default entry point into the fugue, although I’m still not completely sure why. I don’t want to talk to him today, so I hesitate, but then I open my eyes.
He’s working at his canvas again, rendering something in brilliant whites and flinty steels. I’m drawn to the vibrancy of the art, as I always am.
His painting is of a girl, my age, with a look of ecstatic joy as she tips her face up to the heavens. Her eyes are closed, and she’s clad in metal armor, but it’s coarse and beaten, weathered by time and combat. She clutches a broad-bladed sword in front of her, tip planted in the ground. The painting comes to life, and she raises the sword, only to stab the earth with it again. Then her eyes pop open, and she stares right at me.
You are not the truth, she says, speaking from the canvas. Her words are pure defiance fueled by gigawatts of anger.
They run a bone-chilling breeze through me.
Boots scuff the floor behind me.
The sound drags my awareness from the fugue. It’s too easy now, this slipping in and out. I almost miss the difficulty—the barrier—between the two worlds.
I pull in a breath and open my eyes.
Cyrus is squatting in front of me. “Hey man, how’re you doing?” His concerned face banishes the lingering chill from the fugue girl's message.
I channel the Dalai with my wide, goofy smile in return. “I’m fine, Cyrus.”
My best friend has had a permanent look of concern on his face since the rescue. He found us in the Oregon forest near Augustus’s Olympus-styled mountain estate, guided by a quickly-resurrected Marcus and assisted by a band of volunteer militia. Tristan, Kamali, and I had to carry out Nathaniel and Grayson, which was no small task, given the size of the men and Grayson’s incapacitated ascender-tech legs. Some maglev chairs converted to stretchers helped. Grayson quickly recovered, but Nathaniel was near death, and he’s still in the med pod. I’m glad we made the effort, even if Nathaniel’s fervent re-telling of the tale hasn’t helped with the rumors.
Before Cyrus came to rescue us, he did what I asked—he convinced Commander Astoria to decamp the Resistance and move away from Oregon. Not that it would have helped, had I failed. Augustus and his Mind would have found them eventually. And that may still happen. The Mind is gone, but I’ve been searching for Augustus. It’s too much to hope that he and Hypatia were destroyed by Leopold’s bomb, but they’re not an immediate threat, as far as I can tell.
Cyrus settles in, mirroring my cross-legged position on the floor in front of me. “Your mom is worried.”
“About Augustus? She should be.”
“Dude, that’s not helping.”
“The truth always helps.” I wince. Those are words the master would say.
He peers at me like he’s not quite sure who I am. And I can understand—because I don’t feel entirely myself anymore.
I glance at the freshly inked remembrance tattoo on my wrist—55 this time, right above the 17—so I understand the concern. “I haven’t sensed him resurrecting yet. I’m not sure why, but we’re not in immediate danger.”
It doesn’t help. Cyrus just cocks his head, giving me an even stranger look. “They’re saying things about you, Eli.”
“I know.”
He presses his lips together, holding something back.
“What is it, Cy?”
“You know my grandfather was a believer, right?”
I nod. He and I both grew up with the gruff but kind man who took Cyrus in after his parents were killed.
“The old man used to light candles and pray to saints, the whole nine yards,” Cyrus says. “He was Catholic like your mom, but way more mystic. I don’t believe in all that stuff, you know, the God who smites the evildoers—because, dude, clearly that hasn’t happened.”
“There’s always suffering in the world.” I’m using the old man’s words again.
They seriously freak Cyrus out. “Man, do you hear yourself when you say things like that?”
I blink. He’s right—that’s not Elijah talking, and I need to get a grip on that tendency to have a foot in both worlds simultaneously. “Sorry.” I gesture vaguely to my head because it’s definitely full of crazy up there. “Still coming back from all this.”
His hunched-up shoulders relax a little. “I know.” He pauses like he’s holding back something.
“So you don’t believe in the mystic god of your grandfather,” I prompt. “Duly noted.”
He grimaces. “Yeah. Except all along, I’ve had this feeling, deep down in my bones, that the old man was right about one thing—that there is something greater than us out there in the universe. I don’t know what it is, and I’ll be damned if the ascenders have anything to do with it, no matter how much greater than us they think they are.”
“They’re not gods, Cy. Not even in the way they think they are.”
He nods. “Now you’re talking.” He dips his head and plucks at the threads of the Dalai Lama’s woven rug. “Basha’s a believer.”
“I figured as much.”
He looks up. “She’s so utterly convinced. I’m not like that.”
I shrug. “It’s all right. I’m not sure what the whole thing’s about either.”
“But you’ve been there, man. Because that’s what the fugue is—isn’t it?” His eyes pierce me now, and I know this is why he’s come to see me. Because he’s hungry for the Answer. It’s the same intense look that Marcus and Leopold had when I spoke the Question about ascender souls out loud. Leopold—whose essence is now in that elsewhere. Or possibly just gone, splintered into a billion quantum particles, like the Mind.
Cyrus is waiting for my answer.
“The fugue lets me see more,” I say carefully because the thoughts are really forming even as I speak the words. “And I can act as a bridge between here and there. Only there isn’t some place or time or even a state of being that’s fixed and unchanging. It’s many different things, and I don’t understand them all. Not in the slightest.”
He frowns, and I know I’m disappointing him.
I drop my gaze to where he’s tormenting the mat. “I’m sorry I don’t have a better answer for you.”
He lets out a small laugh, then gives me a mock frown. “Yeah, well, get busy on that, will you? I mean, now that you’re done saving the world or whatever. Everyone needs to pull their weight around here.”
I grin.
“Speaking of which, Kamali was asking about you.” He smiles like this is the triumph of all his plans, and he’s fully taking credit for it.
I can’t help but have that bring me fully alert. “Yeah?”
He gives me a knowing smirk. “Something about you owing her a painting?”
My face heats at that, and I’m not exactly sure why, but it doesn’t stop the smile from breaking across my face. “I owe her a lot.”
Cyrus nods sharply, like this should be obvious, and climbs to his feet. He gives me a hand up, and once I’m standing, he claps me on the shoulder with the other one.
He scowls at me. “Don’t let all my hard work go to waste.”
“I’ll try.”
He nods his approval and hooks a thumb toward the entrance to the tent. We stride together past the few Resistance members who are lounging on the cots, reading their handhelds or playing games on their screens. I can feel the sideways looks as we pass, but I ignore them.
Just as we reach the door, the tent flap is shoved aside. It takes me a moment to recognize Marcus—I’m still not used to the fact that he’s in a rental.
“Eli, can I have a word with you?” Marcus asks in that stilted rental voice. It makes me think of Leopold, which squeezes a vise on my chest.
“Sure,” I say.
Cyrus does an admirable job of holding back his scowl, but Marcus gets a temporary pass from the Cyrus-hate due to being a key part of the rescue party that picked us up.
“Kamali’s waiting for you,” Cyrus says, pointedly, like I had better not mess that up. “She said something about a meadow, and you would know what she meant.”
“I do.” She pointed it out to me when we flew in—how the layout of our new basecamp came pre-stocked with a meadow for her to dance in. I know exactly where it is.
Cyrus gives me an extra scowl for good measure. I step outside the tent with Marcus and start walking in the direction of the field. Marcus keeps pace by my side. The camp is just a haphazard sprawling of canvas tents and gleaming silver pods with a shield overhead—like the last basecamp, only this one is twice the size. The combined forces of Commander Astoria’s diminished militia and the new reinforcements who rescued us from Augustus make for a bustling community of rebellious humanity. There’s a lot of laughing and hard work happening all around, but that all dims as I pass and gather up their stares.
I ignore them.
“How’s Lenora doing?” I ask Marcus.
“She’s better.”
I nod. I still haven’t seen her. Marcus tells me she’s too fragmented to be able to communicate verbally, and that it will take time for her to heal. If it takes much longer, I’ll step in and help—because I think I can—but I’d rather let her do it herself if she’s able.
I peer at Marcus. “Can I ask you a question?” I know he has something he wants to tell me, but we haven’t discussed what went down in Augustus’s lab. And we need to.
“Yes.” I can’t tell if Marcus’s obvious discomfort is due to the rental bodyform or the idea that he might answer my questions honestly.
“Once you had Lenora’s cognition, you uploaded together. But you knew Leopold didn’t have a backup. Why didn’t you take him with you?”
The twitch in Marcus’s bodyform reminds me entirely too much of Leopold. And makes me wonder if something deeper than just a rental body mismatch has happened to Marcus.
“I couldn’t.” We veer down a row of canvas tents. “I would have, Eli. He wouldn’t allow it. And it probably wouldn’t have worked anyway.”
“Why not?”
Marcus hesitates. Which also is unusual and draws a frown out of me.
“Leopold came to that mission ready to die,” he says. “He secreted the weapon away inside his body with every intent of using it to stop whatever Augustus was planning and rescue Lenora. He knew it was likely we would have to physically go to Augustus, and that you would be at risk as well. It was his last-ditch measure to ensure that, if nothing else, you would still get out of there alive.”
“Me?”
“He wanted to save Lenora—he knew she was key to guiding your development—but she would never forgive him if he let you die.”
I frown, but nod. All of this sounds exactly like Leopold. “His sacrifice isn’t one I’m going to forget.” I’m also planning on searching for him in the fugue state, once I get my mind settled again. But I don’t mention that.
Marcus’s rental
body’s emotional response is limited, but I think he feels the same debt I do about Leopold. None of us would have survived otherwise.
“But I still don’t understand,” I say. “Why not take him with you, like you did with Lenora?”
“Lenora was fragmented. Leopold was not. His mind would have dominated over hers.” He hesitates again. “And the truth is that carrying someone’s cognition inside your mind isn’t something that’s normally done. Ever. In fact, we weren’t entirely sure it would work.”
“Except that Augustus had already done it.”
“Exactly.” Marcus shakes his head. “But Augustus is different. Even before the Singularity, he was a mad-level genius. Afterward… well, there’s a reason he’s as powerful as he is. Even among ascenders, he’s a towering intellect. And in a society where intelligence is currency, he buys a lot of support with that.”
I’m nodding as he speaks. “You weren’t sure you could hold them both—Lenora and Leopold—and survive.”
“Cognition isn’t just a matter of adding more memory or capacity or pattern recognition routines—it’s a complicated dance and an emergent property that springs from not only the substrate that holds it but the patterns that form in it. Even when all the parts are working in perfect harmony, there’s only so much brilliance a given pattern of cognition can hold.”
“Pattern of cognition?”
Marcus grimaces, no doubt trying to find a way to explain it to my inferior brain. “Humans are limited by the wetware they’re born with. Ascenders are limited by their initial pattern, their initial cognition—the one that formed or rather emerged from the ascendance process. Initially, it’s merely the nanites enhancing your natural-born cognitive abilities. They’re a neural prosthesis that allows for expanded memory and pattern recognition—but the thing that emerges from that is something entirely different. It’s the spark that was there originally, only now grown beyond the bounds of the flesh or mechanical/neural substrate.”
“You realize I understand about ten percent of this.” I actually grasp more than that. I suspect my own pattern of cognition has been expanded in the process of all this—the blowing apart and then stitching back together. At minimum, my ability to process information has grown. I’m not really sure what that means.
The Duality Bridge (Singularity #2) (Singularity Series) Page 31
