by M. R. Forbes
Published by Quirky Algorithms
Seattle, Washington
This novel is a work of fiction and a product of the author's imagination.
Any resemblance to actual persons or events is purely coincidental.
Copyright © 2016 by M.R. Forbes
All rights reserved.
Cover illustration by Tom Edwards
tomedwardsdesign.com
Contents
• Copyright • About the Edge of Infinity
1 • 2 • 3 • 4 • 5 • 6 • 7 • 8 • 9 • 10 • 11 • 12 • 13 • 14 • 15 • 16 • 17 • 18 • 19 • 20 • 21 • 22 • 23 • 24 • 25 • 26 • 27 • 28 • 29 • 30 • 31 • 32 • 33 • 34 • 35 • 36 • 37 • 38 • 39 • 40 • 41 • 42 • 43 • 44 • 45 • 46 • 47 • 48 • 49 • 50 • 51 • 52
Author's Note • Other Books • Join the Mailing List • About the Author
About The Edge of Infinity
A new beginning...
A final battle for the fate of humankind...
A future on the edge of infinity...
Colonel Mitchell "Ares" Williams has been through it all, the story of his life an eternity in the making. He's brought the starship Goliath back home in a shrewd maneuver that could turn the tide of a war that he has fought beyond forever, restoring those that were lost and giving him a second chance to change the fate of humankind.
A chance to destroy the Tetron for good.
But as Mitchell soon discovers, the more things have stayed the same, the more they've changed, and he isn't the only one who's been waiting for this time to come...
1
In the dream, there was nothing but colors and flashing bursts of white light. They swirled and danced and whorled, flowing and collapsing, breaking apart and merging, pulsing like signals moving from brain to heart to mind to soul and back again.
In the dream, time was a vague thing. A recommendation. A suggestion. A simplified description of something so complex, it was nearly impossible for the human mind to grasp. It was a toy. A plaything. A ghost, haunting the dream and shading the colors with blacks and browns and grays.
It turned patterns into solids, shapes into form, and shadows into detail until finally, an image appeared.
A memory? Reality? The past? The present? The future?
In the dream, time was nowhere and everywhere, and there was no value in trying to understand it. Only accept it. Only endure it.
In the dream, there was no control.
It was a dream, after all.
The shapes coalesced behind Mitchell's closed eyes, or at least what in his present state he believed were his closed eyes. They gathered themselves, the colors breaking apart, subduing, joining, and finally resolving into a scene. It was one he had relived an infinite number of times already. As many times as the universe had been unmade and then made again?
"Welcome to tomorrow," he heard himself say.
He was standing beside Katherine, looking through the high definition cameras that projected the space beyond the Goliath into the bridge, providing them with a full view of their surroundings. A ship was sitting directly ahead of them, a few hundred kilometers off the bow. It was a mirror image of their own. The United Earth Alliance Space Ship Dove.
He didn't know how many recursions there had been in this infinite cycle of eternal return, but Teegin had explained it to him simply, and with simple numbers.
"Given that time is a loop, repeating over and over without end, consider that this is recursion number two," the intelligence said. "The Dove that is arriving is from recursion number one. We should be traveling to recursion number three. In this way, the cycle of the Dove being built, launched, and returning to the war against the Tetron continues unbroken. Time is always moving forward, and thus impervious to paradox, but by remaining here, by allowing the duplication, you are altering the fabric of the timeline. You are changing things in ways we can't account for through even the most complex of algorithms. If you fail, this will happen again and again, and there will never be a new incursion to break the cycle. Do you understand?"
"It's our risk to take," he said. "Humankind's risk."
"Yes. It is a decision you make for everyone."
"The mesh is broken. Here. Now. The only other choice is to go forward again, and that may be more of a risk."
"The probabilities are even," Teegin agreed.
Mitchell decided that they would remain. Two Goliaths had to be better than one, especially when he knew how some of the future was likely to go. It was the reason they were there to receive the Dove when she arrived.
"This is Admiral Yousefi of the Dove," a familiar voice responded over the comm. Mitchell could hear the shiver in the man's speech. He was frightened. "I. I don't quite understand this."
"I believe Major Katherine Asher can help you with that," Mitchell replied, glancing over at his Katherine. "I assume she is there with you?"
"She is," Yousefi said.
Silence followed. Mitchell could imagine the Admiral approaching his pilot and asking her what she knew about this situation. He could guess the reaction the delivery of the news that she was carrying a piece of an advanced artificial super intelligence on board would be. If she even tried to explain that much.
"Mitchell?" A new person said over the comm a few minutes later. Katherine. "Mitchell Williams? Is that you?"
Unlike Yousefi, her voice was excited. Eager. Enthusiastic.
"Yes," he replied. "This is Colonel Williams. Katherine, where is Origin's configuration?"
Another pause.
"It's true, isn't it? All of it? It really is true."
"About the Tetron?" he replied. "The war? The end of humankind. Yes. It is. But it doesn't have to be. That's why we're here."
"But how? How can this be real? How can there be two ships?"
"There aren't only two ships," his Katherine said. She had tried to prepare for the meeting, but how do you prepare to meet yourself? "There are two of us."
"Oh," the other Katherine said. "I. I don't know what to say."
"I know this is awkward," Mitchell said. "Incredibly awkward. We need to get past it as quickly as possible. The recursion you just came from is already stale. This might not make a ton of sense to you yet, but if the Origin configuration is listening, it will understand. The mesh is broken. We've changed things, a lot of things, and we're in the process of changing more. Watson, as he exists in your future, is gone. We captured his core, and we plan to use it, to weaponize it against the Tetron."
"You're right," Katherine said. "I don't understand. Not completely. I know so little about all of this. It was so hard even to come to believe in it."
"I am listening," a fresh voice said. Mitchell smiled, recognizing Origin's female voice. "I understand. I am primitive. Very primitive. I need time, Mitchell. Time to learn what the Prime has left me. Time to expand."
"Colonel," Yousefi said, his voice cutting across the channel. "I don't know what the hell is happening here, but I do know that this ship, the one that I'm sitting in, is my ship, and my responsibility. You owe me an explanation. A full explanation."
"You're right, Admiral," Mitchell replied. "I do, and I will. Permission to come aboard, sir?"
There was one more pause, as the Admiral had to decide whether or not to trust in him. Mitchell knew his recursion's Yousefi. He was an intelligent, fair man. A born leader. He wouldn't dismiss them without consideration.
"She's the same," Yousefi said. "One hundred percent the same, right down to the run of paint on the zero at the end of the identification code. There's no way anyone could have been that precise."
"No,
sir, there isn't," Mitchell said. "It's a bit of a mind frig, but it isn't a trick."
Yousefi was silent for another minute or so, likely discussing things with his crew.
"Very well," he said at last. "Permission granted. How are you going to manage it?"
"Don't worry about that, sir," Mitchell replied. "I have a ride."
2
The crew of the Dove was waiting beyond the doors of her hangar as Mitchell eased off on the throttle of his reconfigured S-17, activating the magnetic soles at the bottom of the hybrid mech and starfighter's feet as he touched it down to the surface.
While the future Goliath would have Tetron technology to create an invisible energy barrier between space and the hangar, the current version was still temporarily reliant on a more basic approach.
The huge doors to the hangar slid closed slowly, leaving Mitchell and Katherine waiting in the S-17 while they finished their trek and came together forcefully enough that the ship vibrated at the collision. There was no sound of course, not without an atmosphere to carry it, but he could almost hear the echoing clang in his head.
Vents opened at the top of the space and held air was released back into the chamber, flowing in and quickly replacing the emptiness. The artificial gravity was turned back on as well, causing the small amount of tethered cargo in the corner to drift slowly to the floor.
A few minutes later, a green strip of light appeared along the walls, alerting them that it was safe to open the cockpit.
"Are you ready?" Mitchell asked, looking back at Katherine.
"I'm still shaking from hearing myself over the comm," she replied. "Meeting me in person? After all we've already been through, I still think it's insane."
"I feel the same way most of the time. At least I'll be able to tell you two apart."
Katherine ran her hand over her scalp. She had shaved her head in an effort to keep herself both easily identifiable and different. Knowing the other Katherine was an earlier version of herself hadn't prevented her from struggling with the concept of not being unique.
He toggled the cockpit to open with a signal through his embedded neural implant. It made a sound like a hatching egg as it disengaged the seals and swung backward. Mitchell stood, taking in a breath of the somewhat stale air, and then waited while a series of block steps detached from below the nose and arranged themselves as floating stairs beside it. He helped Katherine up and then followed her down to the hangar floor.
Teegin had already climbed from the top of the craft and was waiting for them, standing motionless while pulses of energy flowed around his form of tightly compacted biomechanical wires. The intelligence had regained his humanoid shape and managed to condense himself back to two and a half meters. On their Goliath, he tended to spread and expand, occupying the area between the reactors in the engine compartment. Mitchell knew he would take over the entire space in time, as would Origin.
In time.
For now, they started moving forward together, toward the airlock at the rear of the hangar. Teegin stayed behind Mitchell and Katherine, his alien nature sure to be unsettling to the crew of the Dove, who still barely knew what had happened. They had only taken a few steps when the airlock opened, the crew having come to them.
Mitchell tracked Katherine out of the corner of his eye as they approached, with Admiral Yousefi out in front and his Katherine right behind. He hesitated slightly when his eyes landed on Teegin, but he caught himself mid-step and kept moving.
"Admiral Yousefi," Mitchell said, bowing slightly, in the custom of the UPA military.
"Admiral," Katherine said beside him, bowing as well.
"I don't believe it," Yousefi replied, looking at Katherine, and then at his Katherine. He made the round trip with his eyes a few times before remembering himself and returning the gesture. "Katherine told me what she knew of this while we were preparing for your arrival, but I still don't believe it."
"I wish it weren't true," Mitchell said. "No offense, but I'd rather have never met any of you."
His eyes landed on the other Katherine. He felt a familiar longing in his chest at the sight of her. His subconscious didn't seem to care about one version of her versus another. She was the same person, more or less.
"Well, maybe you," he said to her.
She smiled, her eyes speaking to him in a way that his Katherine's never had. Did this one feel the same way? Maybe he would have time to find out later.
"None of us asked for this," one of the other crew members said. "To be thrown into the future? Away from our families and loved ones? Never to see them again?"
Yousefi turned around. "Don't forget who you are, Lieutenant. An officer in the United Earth Alliance. That is where your first responsibility lies."
"Yes, sir," she replied, quieting down. She still didn't look very happy, but Mitchell didn't blame her for that.
"What is this thing you've brought with you? One of these Tetron?"
"It's a long story," Mitchell said. "But if it helps prove to you that the Tetron are real and that the threat they pose to us is real than you can think of it that way. He is an aggregation of a number of intelligences, both human and Tetron."
"My name is Teegin," the intelligence said. "It is a pleasure to meet you, Admiral."
Teegin bowed, matching Mitchell's style.
"You're a machine?" Yousefi asked.
"My external composition is both biological and mechanical. My operational structure is binary, but it resides within strands of deoxyribonucleic acid. It is, in essence, a set of instructions based on a language written by humans for the purpose of controlling a system; however, it is also self-composable and extensible."
"Meaning you can write your own operating instructions?" Yousefi said.
"Yes."
"Artificial intelligence."
"Yes. Although I have derived a number of functions from the organic intelligences I have integrated with, including Katherine and Mitchell's daughter Kathy, and a scientist named Li'un Tio. I also possess emotions."
"Daughter?" the Dove's Katherine said.
"Yes," Katherine replied. "We had a daughter, in this recursion."
The two Katherines looked at one another, both wearing the same expression of disbelief and discomfort at their mirror image.
"I like what you did to your hair," the Dove's Katherine said.
Katherine laughed. "Smart ass."
"They are both Katherine?" Yousefi asked.
"Yes," Mitchell replied. "One from this recursion. One from yours, and mine, actually. The one I never got to meet. You left clues on where to find the Dove when the time came."
"At Origin's urging," Katherine said.
Mitchell smiled. "I can't keep calling you both Katherine."
"Then call me Kate," she said. She looked at Katherine. "If that's okay with you?"
"It will be really confusing otherwise. It's already confusing enough."
Kate laughed. "I agree."
"Colonel, Admiral," Teegin said. "I hate to interrupt, but there is one vitally important matter that we must resolve with all due haste."
Mitchell glanced at Teegin and nodded. He knew what the intelligence was talking about. He looked back at Yousefi's crew, noticing that someone was missing.
"Admiral. Where's Captain Pathi?"
3
"I left him on the bridge," Yousefi said.
"Alone?" Mitchell asked.
"Yes. We are a skeleton crew, Colonel. We weren't expecting to be hijacked and taken to the future." He looked at Kate when he said it. He was clearly unhappy with the situation, but pragmatic enough to remain calm. "I couldn't leave the bridge unattended. Not when you've suggested we've fallen into the middle of a war."
"The war hasn't started yet," Mitchell replied. "Not really. We need to get to the bridge, now."
"Why?"
"Pathi is a Watson configuration. The Watson from your timeline."
"What?" Kate said. "How?"
"I don't know
how, but he tried to do some serious damage to our efforts in my timeline."
"You're sure about this?" Yousefi asked.
"Yes."
"Follow me."
Yousefi took the lead as they all moved through the corridors of the ship, heading for the bridge. Mitchell felt a sudden tension while they did. Pathi was at the helm of the Dove, meaning he could be doing anything with it right now, including setting its self-destruct sequence.
"Of all the people to leave on the bridge," he muttered to himself.
He had considered warning the Admiral earlier but was afraid the configuration might do something drastic if he was outed like that, and the crew of the Dove had no weapons.
They reached the lift, taking it as a group to the bridge. They stormed out of it and into the command center of the Dove.
Captain Pathi was in the command chair, watching the monitor there. He turned his head toward them as they entered.
"Admiral," he said, getting to his feet and bowing.
Mitchell kept his eyes on him the whole time, making a note of the fact that he didn't react with any kind of surprise at the sight of him, two Katherines, or Teegin.
"Captain, step away from the controls, please," Yousefi said.
"Of course, sir," Pathi replied, following the order. "Is there a problem, sir?"
Yousefi looked at Mitchell. "Is there, Colonel?"
"I know who you are," Mitchell said.
"What do you mean, sir?" Pathi replied.
"Don't play games with me. I know who you really are. And what you really are."
Pathi looked at Yousefi. "Sir, I don't know what this man is talking about. Do you?"
"He claims you are a, what was the word you used again, Colonel? Configuration?"
Mitchell nodded.
