Chaacetime_The Origins_A Hard SF Metaphysical and visionary fiction_The Space Cycle_A Metaphysical & Hard Science Fiction Saga

by A. I. Zlato

  Throughout the trip back, Iris watched her world with two eyes. Back home, she watched this place as if seeing it for the first time. All the things she had stopped paying attention to, suddenly seemed noteworthy.

  Once the door to her bedroom gently closed, she sent, via her chip, a message to her parents, notifying them of her return. As they were probably sleeping, only their subconscious minds received this information, and they would only notice it tomorrow morning, but she knew that informing them now was the best way to prevent admonition.

  She was unable to sleep all night. Thanks to her double vision, she was no longer really part of Space H., and she would never belong to Space O.

  Suddenly, she knew why Mossa had inflicted her all that pain, and what he had wanted to do in reality. She had just discovered it in his memories. Iris then felt anger invade her. Her rage was all the more destructive that he had also proffered her a wealth of knowledge, which she intended to use well.

  A bacterium is deposited in a box on a nutrient substrate, which can nourish it for a considerable time. The bacterium divides itself several times, and soon thousand bacteria populate the box, but they still have enough to eat for a long time. The bacteria continue to divide themselves, so much so that they die of hunger ten minutes after the introduction of the first. Without the Machine, without the Equilibrium, the human being is not different from the bacterium.

  Internal Report, Server Index

  Chapter 53

  Space H. (1st Circle)

  Like an automaton, Baley woke up to a new day. All the alcohol she had ingested the night before made her nauseous and sullen. The impression of clarity she had had at the foot of the Tower, the connections she had seen between ideas, relevant issues ... all had evaporated, giving way to the bitterness of hangover. The alcohol and adrenaline of the night before were now gone, and she realised the extent of her failure, and was pondering the report she had to file. Traversed by an electric current, she would have to state the facts to the Machine, coldly and precisely, and expect no comfort from it. The nightmare was just beginning.

  Despite this bleak outlook, she got ready and went to the Tower.

  On the way, yet a very short distance between her apartment and the Machine, she met some people she knew. She greeted them but received no response ... people held her responsible for the Problem of yesterday; people despised her because the investigation was not progressing. The news channel was filing, in a loop pattern, countless reports on the subject, including images stolen from the suicide scene. Even taken from a distance, those videos showed dozens of Special Agents on site, as well as Baley, screaming. The journalist questioned the unprecedented deployment of crime professionals, who could not prevent anything, along with the mental health of the Special Agent in charge of the Problem. That Special Agent. In the eyes of the people she met this morning, she saw the reflection of these reports, the reporter's questions echoed by those of the City. Was she able to continue this investigation? How could she still show up in the City after so many failures? There were so many mute questions, which Baley felt, even when she looked down. Her ability to isolate herself from the outside world was not useful this morning.

  Suddenly, a man approached her and deliberately bumped into her. Destabilised, she stepped to the side, touching someone, who turned quickly in the offensive. Immediately after, a woman stepped forward and slapped her. People gathered around her more every second, to form a compact and threatening mass. Blows and insults rained down on her. She was the scapegoat of the City, which was evacuating on her all its anger and fear. She herself was frightened of all those individuals who were hostile to her. A rage that had been contained until then poured onto her arms, her legs, her face. She received the blows without saying anything, conceding at best. Replicating would have only served to stir up hatred.

  Thus, while covering her head with her hands, she ran and took refuge in the Tower, making her way through the crowd. People clustered around her followed her a few metres further, but then resumed a more normal attitude.

  She took refuge in the hall, head down, shoulders tightened, fists clenched. The physical pain was nothing compared to the mental suffering. She walked while throwing glances behind her, looking for attackers. Although she did not find them, she felt other heavy looks, even here, in a place where everyone usually had eyes for nothing but Machine. The men and women of the First Circle turned away whenever she was around, stopping for a moment their activities.

  She could hear them whispering it's your fault, incapable; it's your fault, and Baley could not prove them wrong. They were right; it was her responsibility, even if she still did not know what had happened. It was definitely the worst part of it all — not knowing why she had failed.

  Baley quickly headed towards the columns. Tears of rage and helplessness ran down her cheeks, blurring her vision. She ran her hands over her eyes, without stopping, and hit someone. She raised her head apologetically, ready to hear another flood of insults. Instead, silence. The man she had struck stared at her intensely, but without hostility. With a shaved head, of an indefinable age, he wore a brown robe, cinched at the waist with a rope belt. He was a Servant. It was very rare to come across one in the City, and even more on the ground floor of the Machine. She had never seen one so close. She had had a glimpse, in a previous case, but he was gone before she had time to approach him.

  She knew Servants only from what people in the City said about them, not knowing what was true in all those tales. Rumour had it that they had dedicated their lives to the four elements and led a life of ascetics, in the Circle Zero. Obviously, such a Circle did not exist. To Baley, it was a fancy way of saying that no one knew where they lived. Out of time, out of life, they were invisible in general. Except when trying to scuttle a fibroblast factory ... what were they doing here? And why precisely today? Were they a threat to the Machine? She looked suspiciously when her chip dissuaded her venture into this field. He was not an immediate threat, whispered a metallic voice. Since when did the Machine talk to her that way? Baley could not tell.

  She again lowered her head and quickened her pace towards the column. The Servant and his companions followed her gaze, pivoting on themselves as a single body. Uncomfortable, she put her hand on the column and jumped inside once she had access. Sheltered in the alcove, she realised that a period of twenty minutes had been granted. A considerable time slot, much more than she had ever had. The time needed to file her report, and .... what? Would the Machine withdraw her from the investigation, given yesterday’s fiasco? Would It relegate her to menial tasks? What would Its instructions be? Even more than people’s hostility, she feared the reaction of the Machine, which coldly calculated the best scenario to solve the Problem.

  Reasoning as a human, she was concerned about her personal situation, her future, her life. Hearing the noise characteristic of the column arriving at its destination, she reprimanded herself. How could she be so selfish? Who cared about her fate, when children were dying in scores! Only the investigation mattered. Above all, the success of this investigation. Apart from that, there was nothing else. Nothing mattered. She was nothing. No, she was nothing.

  Consistent with her state of mind, the first floor was dark and cold, swept by a freezing air stream. She connected to the Machine, and informed it of the disaster she could not prevent.

  She described the cyclone, the disappearance of children, the validation of her theory, the time lag, the two alert levels, and the reappearance of corpses. She realised that her report, uncharacteristically, was disjointed or incoherent in some respects. What was absurd yesterday had no more sense today. When she finished her story, she wondered what the Machine had indeed recorded as data.

  She decided to question It.

  “Conversation mode requested. What causes the time lag between the Special Agents and me? Is the cyclone behind the defer?”

  “Conversation mode engaged.

  Defers are temporary. Sync in Progr
ess.”

  Baley noted, except her, that the Machine had always answered Conversation mode activated, not Conversation mode engaged. The difference was certainly minimal, but ... She resumed.

  “I do not understand. What is synchronization?”

  “The Equilibrium dictates all actions.”

  “That, I understand. Defer times are temporary; we must wait until the Equilibrium is restored. Are the cyclone and the time lag related?”

  “These are two aspects of the same thing. The Equilibrium is the means and the end.”

  “The Equilibrium? But these phenomena are disrupting it. I'm completely confused.”

  “The end of young humans is a disturbance of the Equilibrium, and we must stop it.”

  “I know that very well. Thus, we must stop hurricanes and lags. What is the cyclone, exactly?”

  “A temporary event.”

  “Like the lags so, since it's the same thing ... but still?”

  “The temporary will disappear. The Equilibrium is growing.”

  “Am I to understand that You are the cause of these phenomena, to grow the Equilibrium?”

  “The Equilibrium is the Master Database.”

  “Are you the cause of the storm? And is the Problem only a consequence?”

  “The Equilibrium is the means and the end. The Equilibrium leads to stability. Synchronization determines the multi-master scheme. These are the laws.”

  “What laws? Only the first one is a law, the others ... Who are you?”

  A violent digital current traversed her. Her hand stuck to the membrane, unable to move, Baley suffered successive waves of pure pain. The Machine had never done that, It was so diff ... With tears in her eyes, fire in her veins, she stopped thinking so that the suffering could stop. She understood. She had been punished. She would not do it again.

  Anti-Machine children who gather in two series of circles around a phenomenon for which You are the source, yet I have to stop the Problem, which appears in these cyclones, all of which are only temporary and linked to the growing Equilibrium ... What should I do? What should I do?

  She was a woman of action. She knew how to evaluate situations, solve problems and act accordingly. This chain story of cause-consequence, which buckled on itself, made her sick. The only thing she wanted to know was the next step.

  The Machine remained silent, and Baley withdrew her hand, breaking the data flow. She had not made more progress; she had simply learned that the time lag and the cyclone were temporary phenomena, but she already knew that. The responses explained nothing; the Machine kept insisting on the importance of the Equilibrium. But she was already aware, like everyone else, of its importance.

  Without the Equilibrium, the Elders’ errors would inevitably recur.

  Without the Equilibrium ...

  yes, she already knew all this. She was about to turn on the column, when she realised that the time had not elapsed, far from it. The Machine had never made a mistake in setting the report delay, which meant she had certainly not asked the questions she should have asked, the right questions. If only she could regain the mindset she had yesterday ... at that moment, everything seemed so clear, the questions were obvious ... The part of her brain that contained these memories was silent. Yesterday, everything seemed linked to the Machine, the trigger factor, the Equilibrium ... Today, she had the opportunity to question, to finally get answers ... but the issues that really mattered were eluding her. She logged back in.

  “If I have to stop the Problem, I must be able to predict the occurrence of cyclones, to be on site before children arrive there, since they manage to outsmart the narrowest type of surveillance. How to do it?”

  “Unknown information.”

  “Who can help me?”

  “Unknown information.”

  “Where to find help?”

  “Unknown information.”

  Baley went back to the column eleven minutes after leaving it. She had no more questions. Never the Machine had granted her such a long conversation time. Something str…was happening ... no. The conversation with the Machine just made her puzzled. She had identified the children through their common point, but she did not know how they found the cyclone and why this caused their death. She had no trail.

  Arriving on the ground floor, she saw that the group of Servants had not moved, as if they were waiting for her. Again, they laid their eyes on her, intensely. She returned their gaze, and then walked towards the exit. While crossing the hall, one of them grabbed her by the arm and said, The Equilibrium is the beginning and the end. The constancy of the circle is a non-evolution. She knew it was useless to ask for an explanation. Servants did not discuss with the people of the City; they only uttered sentences, from time to time, that some people considered prophecies. That sentence resonated in her, as she had just exchanged a few words with the Machine on the Equilibrium precisely. With a different formulation, it was what the children had written before committing suicide. They said, We must break the circles. The Equilibrium is the beginning and the end; there is no longer a middle.

  The Servant has amplified their thoughts, and his group had worked against the Machine. Children and they were on the same team. It was all there. In her mind, the shadow zone fidgeted. She was so close to the solution, and yet so far.

  She went out, with apprehension, to the Square. The crowd was gone; only a few people were walking briskly or running to get to the Tower. Their chips forced them to accelerate, as they were late for their daily appointments. So they did not care about her, except for dark, sidelong glances. She did not, however, dragged her feet, and walked towards her building, not knowing what to do. She then remembered Paul, the teammate who had been assigned to her. He had been of great help when it came to finding information about Chrijulam. Despite their differences of opinion, he would not refuse to help her, even if he had abandoned her.

  He might have an idea. Anyway, she had nothing else to focus on.

  She went to his laboratory, while reflecting on the Servant’s words, without leading to more conclusions.

  In front of the cubic-shaped building, she saw Edgard, which stretched its neck towards her, blowing air on her face. This creature was truly strange, and she did not know what to think of it. A few weeks earlier, she was convinced Kandrons were irrelevant animals, which did not deserve the attention that the Machine gave them. As she progressed in her work with Paul, Baley had ‘rubbed elbows’ with his Kandron, sometimes convinced it was trying to contact her. Was that real? Her entire universe had been shaken by the investigation, her most fundamental beliefs challenged. She was no longer sure of anything. The doubts that invaded her filled the locked part of her brain, the barriers of which gave way during her sleep.

  She had asked the Machine to act on her brain, and that worked, at the beginning. Today, she doubted the effectiveness of Its action because this opaque area was trying incessantly to come out. As if the area were sending her a message she did not hear. She had to get her act together. The investigation first. She had made the right choice. Things could not be otherwise.

  She entered Paul’s office, and he greeted her coldly. Surprised to see her there, he hastened to put away the paperwork scattered on his desk. She shrugged. As if she could worry about the research of a historian ... The tension was palpable. He still held grudges against her and probably even more after the Problem re-emerged. He was part of this pack of people who hated her, and yet she had to coax him in any way.

  “Baley, hello! I heard about the Problem yesterday, I'm really sorry. Your trail did not work?”

  “On the contrary ... I identified the children concerned, but I failed to stop them ... But that, you already know. I had taken all the necessary precautions ... She told him what happened.”

  “Strange ... maybe you will now believe in the Presence I have seen in the cyclone, the last time.”

  “At the point where I am, I can believe anything, as long as I have a new trail. Do you think the
Presence would be responsible for the death of children?”

  “I cannot say that, and I don’t even think so. I wanted to suggest that this is not a simple weather phenomenon.”

  “I noticed ... So, since you've seen this Presence, could you help me? I don’t know, to detect a cyclone, to get in touch with this ... thing?”

  “I'm sorry, but no; I do not want to be part of your investigation. Your methods ... this is not possible.”

  “Let go of your moral considerations! The Problem must be resolved, no matter how!”

  “So your radical solutions have paid off ...”

  “You think I don’t hate myself enough the way things are? And you, who are you to dare refuse to help me? Would you rather continue seeing kids die?”

  “I did not say that, and you know very well. In addition, how could a person like me be of any use? What do you want, exactly?”

  “To have a trail. To take a step back. Help me think differently.”

  “Okay. I know how you reached your last theory, but which items did you use to validate it?”

  “I learned by chance that the deceased children all held, in one form or another, diaries. In them, I saw that they all had radically changed five days before their death. They all said, in essence, that the Machine was a monster.”

  “So, five days before, something or someone manages to question, in their minds, the very foundations of the City. Following this, they are able to predict the onset of a cyclone, unless someone or something that has ‘converted’ them into anti-Machine people informed them of the looming danger.”

  “I did not think about that…”

  “Then, they gather at the agreed place, and something or someone drives them to commit suicide or kill them ... by hiding it in suicide form.”