by Seth Rain
‘Everyone?’ Freya asked.
Juliet bit her lip and nodded.
Noah was no longer eating, his hands frozen, eyes fixed on Juliet.
Freya spoke slowly. ‘You saw one date, didn’t you?’
Juliet looked defeated.
‘One date that came up time and again? What was it?’ Freya asked, knowing the answer.
‘I’m guessing it’s the same date as the one your friend has, the date you’ve seen written in many places.’
Freya’s shoulders slumped. She frowned, trying hard to work it all out.
‘What will happen on that date?’ Noah asked, placing his cake on the table, his face pale.
Freya waited, hoping Juliet wouldn’t say what she guessed she would.
‘You know what happens,’ Juliet said, staring at her hands now spread out on the table.
Freya paused, unwilling for her thoughts to be confirmed. ‘Everyone?’ she asked. ‘It can’t be. Not everyone?’
Juliet stood and walked to the kitchen window. ‘I still planted them.’ She pointed outside. ‘For so long, I ignored the AI’s date.’
‘Why haven’t you said anything to anyone?’ Freya asked.
‘I didn’t want it to be true. Besides, the people who are in power already know. They won’t do anything. The Department of Artificial Intelligence have done everything they can to stop it, to keep it hidden. But clearly, they’ve not succeeded.’
‘And is that why Gabriel wants Scott?’ Noah asked.
‘I guess so,’ Juliet said, tilting her head. ‘If Gabriel can show the AI is wrong, then there is a chance that many of the other dates will be wrong.’
‘We need to tell Mathew the truth,’ Freya said.
‘The truth?’ Juliet asked. ‘Mathew’s not interested in the truth. He believes what is written in the book of Revelations; his truth is different. He will do anything to make sure the dates are seen to be correct and that the Rapture comes about.’
Freya stood. ‘Do you think our friend’s date could be wrong?’
‘If both Mathew and Gabriel are searching for him, there’s a chance. They must be worried about it. When the dates were revealed, it turned out there was a problem that Mathew hid from me. It frustrated him. Gabriel told me the AI took longer to decipher the information for some of the dates. The AI provided a date, but Gabriel was convinced that was because of something Mathew did to the data. I believe Gabriel still thinks that date is wrong.’
Noah squinted. ‘And if Gabriel can kill Scott, and show Mathew and everyone else his date is wrong, there’s a chance the Rapture will not happen?’
‘That’s right. It won’t happen yet, anyway. You see, a paradox occurs when we discover these dates. A sort of self-fulfilling prophecy. If the date is common knowledge, humanity has the capability to bring about the Rapture itself. This is what Gabriel was always concerned about.’
‘But not one date has been wrong so far,’ Noah said. ‘Since the day the 144,000 dates were released.’
‘But you must see the paradox in this?’ Juliet said. ‘The Watchers enforce these dates.’
Noah appeared hurt. ‘It’s not like that,’ he said.
‘If you’re a Watcher, you must know what happens,’ Juliet said.
‘The Watchers only report the adherence to the dates,’ Noah said.
‘And what about the Watchers’ revolvers? The empty chamber?’
Noah stiffened. ‘I’ve never used mine. Not once.’
‘There’s no need,’ Juliet said. ‘The Chosen see the Watchers coming and do it themselves. Or some crazy religious zealot does it for them.’
‘You have to help us,’ Freya said. ‘You have to talk to Mathew.’
‘It won’t do any good,’ Juliet said. ‘The only chance we have of Mathew listening is if Scott dies on a date other than the one he has been given. And even then, I’m not sure it would make him change what he believes.’
‘It’s wrong,’ Freya said. ‘There has to be another way.’
‘I don’t see one,’ Juliet said.
‘But why Scott?’ Noah asked. ‘Why’s he different?’
‘Who knows?’ Juliet said, shaking her head. ‘There’s every chance he’s not.’
‘But what if he is?’ Freya asked.
‘Then the AI is wrong. And determinism, the way we understand it, is wrong.’
‘And if it’s wrong, then those dates the AI came up with – billions of them – could be wrong too,’ Freya said. ‘If we show people, then we can stop the paradox. If things stay the way they are, and no one believes the AI can be wrong, there’s a chance humanity will adhere to the dates given and bring about the Rapture. Will you help?’ she asked urgently. ‘If I can get you and Gabriel to the AI, will you help us to find out what’s happening with Scott’s date?’
‘And how do you plan on doing that?’
‘Will you?’ Freya asked again. ‘If I can?’
Juliet strolled to the window and peered outside at her garden. ‘Without Mathew knowing?’
‘Yes,’ Freya said.
‘I guess we have nothing to lose.’
Freya walked over to Juliet. On the windowsill rested several plastic trays. In each one, the tiny green two-petalled seedlings had broken through the soil and were leaning towards the morning light.
Forty-One
Scott was shown into a large room at the rear of the building. Waiting for him, on a low table beside a wide settee, was a tray of food.
‘Please,’ an elderly Watcher said, gesturing towards the table. ‘You must be hungry.’
Sandwiches were arranged into neat triangles and the fruit was pristine.
‘More than anything,’ Scott said, ‘I could do with a shower and some new clothes.’
‘Of course,’ the Watcher said, uncertain. ‘Let me see what I can do.’
When the Watcher left the room, Scott walked over to the table and scanned the plates of food. The smell made his stomach tighten and twist into knots.
The door opened. The Watcher entered, an assortment of clothes draped over his arm. ‘If you come with me,’ the Watcher said, ‘I will show you to the shower room.’ He glanced at the food, then at Scott.
‘I’m not hungry,’ Scott said.
The Watcher offered a faint nod. Scott followed him up two flights of stairs, along a short corridor and into a large bathroom. The Watcher stood in the doorway and offered Scott the clothes.
‘Thank you,’ Scott said.
‘I’ll be outside,’ the Watcher replied. ‘Please let me know if you need anything.’
Scott thanked him with a smile and locked the bathroom door.
The bathroom was ornate, from a different era. The roll-top bath beneath the large window was decadent, boastful. Scott walked to the bath and looked out at the London skyline. For so long, London, for all its new additions, had maintained its iconic appearance. But since he’d last been there, it had changed; these days there was more steel, more glass, transforming the city into a reflective surface that mirrored the slow-moving clouds.
Scott began filling the bath with hot water. He was conscious of his desire to lie in warm water, to close his eyes and drift off for a time. As the water splashed into the bath he recalled all the baths he’d shared with Rebecca. She’d lie in front of him and he’d wash her hair. Using a plastic cup, he’d tip water over her head. She’d tilt her head backwards, her hair falling over his skin, the water threading through it, making it straight. She would squeeze the shampoo into his hands and he would wash her hair. It always ended the same way … with them having sex.
The taps gurgled and the water splashed. The steam fogged the London skyline, and Scott found himself truly alone, separated from the present, returning instead to the past.
As he undressed, Isaiah’s revolver clattered to the floor. He picked it up and turned it over in his hands. An elegant piece of machinery. He opened the cylinder. Isaiah had replaced the bullet he’d used to shoot Gabriel. Still, as
with all Watchers’ revolvers, there was one empty chamber. The cylinder made a ticking noise as he rotated it. He watched the silver base of each bullet roll through its cycle. Clicking it back into place, he walked towards a full-length mirror on the wall opposite the window. He stood in front of the mirror, the revolver held by his side. There were bruises along his collarbone and shoulders. He couldn’t remember exactly how he’d got them. He stared at himself in the mirror and lifted the revolver and pointed it at his reflection. Closing one eye, he lifted the gun and aimed at his open eye in the mirror.
There was a way to prove his date was wrong. The water splashed into the bath. His arm and hand were reflected in the mirror, his date duplicated. 22.04. What was the year? None of that mattered if he used the gun on himself right now. He lowered the gun. A taste he didn’t recognise, metallic, like blood, made him swallow several times. His chest throbbed and his breath came quickly. A sensation like nausea flooded him – the rise of heat across his shoulders, that horrible dizziness before vomiting. The gun trembled in his hand. If he did it, now, it would all be over. Like Gabriel said, it could save millions of lives – maybe billions.
He imagined holding the revolver against his head, against his temple. He imagined putting the gun in his mouth; that made him want to gag. He imagined unlocking the door first, stopping the water tap. But maybe none of that mattered; whether he would do any of these things was already decided.
What happened to Rebecca had been decided long before he set foot on that train station platform.
He hid the revolver under his coat, which lay on the floor.
He stepped into the bath. The water was hot. He felt the urge to step out but he remained there, with the pain. One hand on either side of the bath, he lowered himself into the water. He braced himself. The rising water enveloped his skin and body. When it was as deep as it could be, he stopped the water, lay back and submerged his head. He emerged and wiped the hair from his face. His legs were bent so his knees and thighs were above the water. Since speaking with Mathew, his body seemed to have taken on a different form. There was something about the AI that made him aware of his body, of its structure, its limitations and specialties. He held up his hands and, as he’d done earlier, he turned them, flexed his fingers, rolled them into fists. The AI was all intelligence and none of this. He was a machine too, but he was a machine that had to live in the world. Actually in it. And to live in the world required him to interact with it physically. Those times with Rebecca in the bath had been about body and mind and something even more than that, beyond the physical. He knew this in the way you know someone else is with you in a dark room even though you can’t see them. The AI had a smell he recognised, a smell that was related to something organic, as though that was essential if it was going to be conscious. Maybe consciousness was the same as intelligence. And to call it artificial made no sense. There was nothing artificial about intelligence. Either it was intelligence or it wasn’t.
His body was submerged in hot water, inside a locked room, separated from the world. He saw Freya: her face, her hair, her eyes.
On the palm of his hand was a date – the date on which he would die. Why would they not tell him the year? It was cruel that none of them had been told. And why was that? The Watchers said it was to protect the notion of free will. The Chosen argued it was a form of control. There was a look in the eye of the Watchers when the date neared, a look of control. They knew, but the Chosen did not.
Through the window, he watched an aeroplane fly past, high overhead.
He wanted to see Freya. Isaiah and Noah too. Each of them was wedded to the idea of free will. If he told them, they wouldn’t believe him. They wouldn’t want to believe him. More and more he considered the belief in free will as something innate, like believing in God. He knew many people far more intelligent than he was who believed, and this was all the evidence he needed to make him realise that the capacity to believe or not to believe was unique to each person. No amount of explaining would convince the three of them that his date was correct and free will was an illusion. He’d always known this and so, intuitively, he’d never really argued against it. For a change of thinking so fundamental, it would have to come from inside. Freya, Isaiah and Noah would have to see for themselves that free will was an illusion. It was no use him telling them what he’d seen, what he’d experienced with the AI. There had to be a way to make them see for themselves.
He inhaled deeply, watching his chest expand before disappearing beneath the water. What happened to Rebecca was not his fault. His experience with the AI had removed all responsibility. He was a machine too, like all the other people whose dates were known. He didn’t know what it meant. Everything – the twitch of his finger, the deep breaths he took, the thoughts running through his head – was a part of something bigger, a part of a process that could only be deciphered by the evolution of the AI itself. It was breeding, learning, thinking, beyond the boundaries of human comprehension. The AI was predicting the future, recording events like words on a page. If time could be paused, it would be one of the pages near the front of a book, or in the middle, or near the end – who knew where? But it would be a definite page, one somewhere after the beginning of everything and before the end of it all.
There, lying in warm water, in London, on an island, on a planet spinning about a star, his thoughts were recorded in this book and the AI was reading it, writing it.
The warmth of the water was intoxicating. He thought of Freya.
Forty-Two
Freya pushed at a button that made the self-driver door slide shut. It was cool inside. Gabriel turned to Freya and Noah in the back seat. ‘Did she tell you everything?’
Freya glanced back at the house. ‘I think so. What will Mathew do with Scott?’
‘He will do everything he can to make sure Scott remains alive.’
‘Until his date?’ Noah asked.
‘The day many people will die,’ Gabriel said, nodding.
‘If the AI is correct,’ Freya said.
Gabriel stared at Freya. ‘So now you see why Scott is important. Why we have to find him.’
‘Your Watchers must know where he is,’ Noah said.
‘They can’t get close enough. We know where he is. In London.’
‘Juliet says the dates are correct,’ Freya said.
‘I know,’ Gabriel responded, bowing his head. ‘She always thought the same as Mathew as far as free will and determinism go.’
‘Why do you disagree?’ Freya asked.
‘I saw what happened with the dates. There was something wrong with the AI. The AI can get close to determinism. But there has to be a part of us that is unpredictable, that exhibits free will.’ Gabriel rubbed the back of his neck. ‘I know it. How else can we be judged? There has to be free will.’
‘But why Scott?’ Noah asked. ‘That’s what I don’t understand. Why him?’
Gabriel sighed.
‘You must have a theory,’ Freya said.
Gabriel leaned back into the headrest. ‘There’s no use guessing. We know we must find him. That’s all that matters.’
‘It’s not, though,’ Freya said. ‘Is it? There’s something you’re not telling us.’
‘Let’s go,’ Gabriel said to the car.
‘Wait,’ Freya said. ‘Don’t leave yet.’ She reached inside her coat pocket and ran the strap of the tracker between her thumb and finger. ‘I can find him.’
She felt them staring at her.
‘Freya,’ Noah whispered, ‘what are you doing?’
‘I can find him,’ she said to Gabriel. ‘But you must tell me everything.’
‘How can you find him?’ Gabriel asked.
‘First, I need to know what you’re not telling us,’ Freya said.
Gabriel checked his watch. ‘The truth is, I don’t know. But it seems to me, Scott must do something in the future that disrupts the AI’s ability to compute his date.’
‘But Scott has a date,
’ Freya said.
‘I think Mathew had something to do with that. I’m guessing it’s not genuine. The AI behaved strangely with that date. I can’t even be sure it was issued by the AI.’
‘What could Scott do in the future that means the AI can’t read him?’
‘I don’t know. But there could be more people like him. Mathew is hiding Scott’s date, and maybe others, that prove the AI is fallible.’
‘That’s not a lot to go on,’ Noah said.
‘If I could work with the AI again, I could find out,’ Gabriel said, puffing out his cheeks. ‘But Mathew would never allow it.’
‘If I help you,’ Freya said, ‘what would happen?’
‘I kill Scott. I show Mathew and the Watchers that his date is wrong, that the AI is wrong, or that Mathew has manipulated the dates.’
‘There has to be another way,’ Freya said. ‘If I help you, you have to promise to help Scott. We can get to the AI and find out.’
‘There’s no way Mathew would let me speak to it.’
‘But if we could, you’d be able to prove Scott’s date is wrong.’
‘It won’t be enough,’ Gabriel said. ‘Mathew has gone too far. He would never listen. I know him. It won’t be enough.’
‘It will have to be. I’m not helping you unless I have your word. We find Scott and Mathew, and we prove what you say by talking to the AI.’
‘If I can’t get to the AI then I have to kill Scott,’ Gabriel said. ‘There’s too much at stake.’
‘It won’t come to that,’ Freya said.
She didn’t look at Noah, but she was aware of his eyes boring into the back of her head.
‘How do we find him?’ Gabriel asked.
‘Don’t,’ Noah whispered.
‘We have to,’ Freya said. ‘Mathew will hide him until his date.’
‘We’ll get to him ourselves,’ Noah said.
‘We can’t do it alone. And if something happens to us, it’s all over. Besides, Gabriel would only follow us anyway.’
Gabriel waited, staring out of the windscreen.
