Noumenon Infinity

by Marina J. Lostetter

  “What was at map’s end?” Nwosu asked.

  “Many megastructures, we think. A field. Perhaps the key to understanding why . . . why do the structures exist?”

  Nwosu kept their theory about an Ultra Civilization to himself. Just for now, until he understood Seven-Point-Five better. So far, they were a strange people. Not at all as he’d expected. This pain, this distancing-through-proxy, this collectivism—it all intertwined like a mass of slippery eels inside Nwosu’s mind, urging him toward caution.

  “But, we are with you,” Noah said emphatically, voice building, full and taut and terrible. “We will fight the Web to end the Web alongside you. We shall hunt the others if the Nataré are still building.”

  It banged its metal fist on the side of the table with inhuman force. The entire board jumped, those closest to Noah reeling back.

  Nwosu leapt to his feet, as did Joanna, who was closer to the robot. Instinctually, she reached out as though the auton were human, grasping its shoulder. It stilled, looked at its hands as though surprised by what it had done.

  A long crack zigzagged like a plasma bolt away from the auton’s hand. It raised its arms stiffly, palms open. “We shall hunt,” the auton repeated darkly. It stood straight again, little flecks of green marble falling away from its fist. “To show our dedication, we bring gifts.”

  Nwosu wanted to shout Look what you’ve done! but restrained himself, as any good diplomat would. He felt his hands shaking, legs quivering. He kept his breath high in his chest, trying to inconspicuously steady himself.

  For the first time, he doubted the operator behind the controls. There was a barely restrained anger behind those automated eyes. Could whoever it was be lying to them? Not about the Nataré or the Web’s siblings, but about the other crew?

  They’re sleeping could easily be a deranged person’s euphemism for far worse.

  “What gifts?” he asked cautiously.

  Noah’s grit-covered hand went to its chest plate. With a few carefully placed taps, the front opened, revealing a compartment. Inside, tiny servo motors whirred. And, settled in the divot, was a cloth package, wound up with twine like something out of the seventeenth century.

  To Nwosu’s relief, it bore no stains. Red or otherwise.

  “These I must present to you,” Noah said, striding around the table, package outstretched. It left its compartment open, autonomic functions visibly chugging away.

  The “you” it was referring to seemed to be a pair. It settled itself between Vega and Min-Seo, neither of whom leaned away, instead sitting up confidently in their chairs.

  Noah held out the package expectantly, until Min-Seo took it. But the auton kept its palms outstretched, as though waiting for an exchange.

  Vega reached into her jumpsuit pocket. But before she could extract what was inside, she rose to her feet, peering directly into Noah’s digital face. “Caznal?” she asked. “Are you a clone of Caznal?”

  “I am No One,” Noah reiterated.

  “Our exchange was to be with either a clone of Caznal or a clone of Diego Santibar,” she said stiffly. “That is the right of our lines.”

  It was a shared heritage that had kept the Hansen and Park lines closely bonded for centuries, as was no secret.

  “We are Caznal, we are Diego, we are all, and I am No One,” said the auton.

  Nwosu tried to signal the women, to indicate they shouldn’t upset Noah’s operator. At this point, he was unconvinced of the individual’s emotional stability.

  But when Vega said no more and pulled her empty hand from her pocket, Noah simply dropped its arms. “The bodies you speak of are aboard Shambhala,” it said.

  Nwosu shivered. “Then we shall go aboard Shambhala,” he announced. “If, that is, Noumenon Ultra will have us.”

  “We shall have you,” Noah said evenly.

  Captain Nwosu did not disclose his fears to his first officer. He worried Joanna might try to bar him from boarding Shambhala if he did, which would have been a right and reasonable move on any other away mission. He was sure the only reason she was letting him go uncommented upon now was because—technically—there was no away mission. Shambhala was still Convoy Seven, still part of his fleet as far as Earth’s paperwork was concerned.

  Not that Earth’s opinion mattered, but it gave him precedence.

  With him were Hansen, Park, three members of the medical staff, and a security detail.

  Before their shuttle launched—with Noah accompanying the team—I.C.C. sent a probe to ping the three ships.

  “I cannot yet reconnect with Shambhala, Hvmnd, or Zetta,” the AI told the captain on his pressure suit’s private channel. “But the probe was able to interface with the ships’ baser systems. There are nine hundred and thirty-two active signatures aboard that could possibly be human. I do not think No One’s operator has murdered the rest of the crew.”

  Nwosu cringed. He hadn’t used that word, but I.C.C. only used euphemisms sparingly. It wouldn’t see the reason to gloss over the captain’s worries. “Thank you.”

  The ride over was brief, even if it was the longest single shuttle ride the captain had ever taken. When they docked, deCON procedures were much the same as Noah had endured, since the team wore pressure suits. The only difference was the cleanings were administered by autons—run by the same operator as Noah, as far as anyone could tell.

  “Why is it so dark?” Min-Seo asked.

  In Shambhala’s docking bay, there had only been a single spotlight. Now that they were past the airlock and into the ship proper, everyone had to turn on their suit’s exterior lights. They halted to check their instruments and get a readout of the darkened causeways beyond, the halo of light they’d created offering little confidence or comfort.

  “Noah, couldn’t you turn on the lights?” Min-Seo prompted.

  “They no longer function.”

  Glances swapped between all members of the away team.

  “Why is it so quiet?” Vega ventured—tone indicating she hoped for an answer from their host, but didn’t expect one.

  There was no echo of chatter beyond. No rustle of activity. Little more than the whirs and whines of the ship itself.

  “We do not snore,” Noah said—a joke, which eased no one.

  “Temp’s low,” Nwosu noted. “Barely ten C.”

  “It aids the sleep,” Noah replied. “Come. You wished to see dreamer Caznal and dreamer Diego.”

  It walked on ahead, with no regard as to the circumference of the light. Nwosu had to jog ahead so as not to lose the auton.

  Their footfalls were easy to distinguish on their external mics, which sent a chill up the captain’s spine. There had to be more activity, with so many signatures . . . He knew that on Hvmnd back in the day, those acting as servers had caretakers. Where were the caretakers?

  “Why is the entire crew asleep?”

  “They dream,” Noah said pragmatically. “It is collective. Giving all access to all.”

  “Is it like the mind-to-mind they did on Earth?” Min-Seo asked.

  “Better. Deeper. More creative. More intimate. You should experience our stories, fairy tales. You should hear our music. Besides scientific endeavors, we have contributed thousands of artistic works to the world.”

  “I look forward to viewing these works,” Nwosu said, glancing up and down the hall’s walls, looking for signs of struggle, of undo decay.

  Noah’s head spun, doing a one-eighty to face the captain over its shoulder, while its body barreled on straight ahead. Nwosu—to his credit—scarcely jumped. “The works can only be experienced in the dream,” Noah said wistfully.

  Nwosu averted his eyes, trying to blot out the robot’s eerie contortion from his mind’s eye. “Of course.” The way the operator spoke made him wonder if he was currently cut off from the collective. Though he was creating an experience for them, was he perhaps separate?

  A cacophony of sharp creeaaaaks struck everyone’s microphones, halting them all midstep. T
he clatter was immediately followed by a plethora of thumps that had everyone ducking close to the walls and covering their heads, as though parts of the ceiling might collapse on them.

  “What the hell was that?” Vega demanded.

  “The shift,” Noah said from far ahead. He never broke stride. “The sleepers move for their bodies’ health.”

  The image that conjured for Nwosu—of people rolling or flopping in their beds—was unsettling, but it was good to hear Noah speak of health.

  When the hall opened into a large space, the captain checked his map and realized they’d entered what used to be “dessert row.”

  Nearby should be stairs leading up into what was once a grand ballroom. Then, farther ahead, retrofitted crew quarters and food processing.

  Initially, the space seemed empty. Everyone’s night vision was shot, the lights on their suits becoming a hindrance more than a few feet out, so when Nwosu stumbled upon two people sitting at an ancient-style café table, hand in hand as though on a date, he reeled away.

  At first he thought maybe they were mannequins, they held so still. Then, with how pallid their skin was—one man’s a pale white, the other’s a washed-out brown—he thought, Corpses.

  But as he ventured closer, he could see them breathing. Could see the tubes threading away from them like puppet strings, and the thin bare-bones exoskeletons holding them in place.

  Other members of the away team gasped as they came upon their own sleepers. Each poised in a storytelling tableau, as though going about their lives one frame at a time.

  Standing next to the two men was a woman. Her eyelids were shut, eyes flickering wildly behind them, her lips quirked upward in a smile. Nwosu ventured closer, observing as much about the three as he could, taking measurements and notes aplenty.

  The creaking began again a few moments later, and Nwosu barely had time to duck as the sleepers moved. The two men let their hands drop, one taking the woman’s instead as she bent toward him, the other rising to his feet.

  “What are they doing?” Nwosu asked, turning, trying to find Noah with his high beams. He spotted the rest of his crew easily, but no one’s light fell on the auton.

  “Noah? Noah, where are you?”

  “Come,” called the auton from the top of the grand staircase. “I cannot give you your second gift until the first exchange is complete.”

  The captain backed away from the trio slowly, looking for any indications that they were in pain, that they’d become puppets against their will. But there was nothing. Only the occasional flicker of a happy expression.

  Taking the stairs two at a time, Nwosu was careful to avoid the grouping of children—children!—huddled around an open book as though marveling at its pages. The paper book was, in fact, blank. He stopped by their side for only a moment, looking up at the ceiling to note where their wires and tubes were attached to mechanisms running along tracks in the ceiling.

  They were like little figurines in an antique cuckoo clock, spinning out their mechanized lives at the striking of designated minutes.

  “Why are they like this?” he demanded, taking the top step to stand level with the auton. Its operator didn’t seem to understand the question. “Why are they all asleep, why are they positioned like dolls in a child’s playhouse?”

  “They are living their lives—many times over,” Noah said. “To be a dreamer is to live more fully, more efficiently. One can command automations to explore distant worlds while learning to play a classical instrument and making love to a partner. We used to experience events one at a time, like you—like I am confined to at the moment—but realized long ago that we could never do all we wanted, all we needed, that way.

  “The dream may be less concrete than your experience, but it is no less reality. No less living.”

  “But why the puppet show?”

  “Muscle memory is important. Human contact is important. The dream still consists of what exists in the waking world.”

  “I don’t like this,” said Donald Matheson, head of the security team, jogging up the steps with the rest of the away team.

  “Contact the convoy, make sure these ships are maintaining their same distance,” Nwosu said. “I don’t think they mean us harm, but . . .”

  Matheson nodded. “But,” he agreed.

  The captain’s notes indicated the ballroom had been transformed into a classroom before the split. But, somewhere along the way, the Nataré team had changed it back. There were elaborate sconces, and dormant chandeliers in its high ceilings. The wide open floor was littered with dancers—all perfectly still, perfectly poised, though none of the groupings seemed to be dancing the same dance.

  Nwosu could identify a couple mid waltz, and another near the end of a tango. Three women appeared engaged in a story told through Odissi, while others took part in tribal dances from around Earth and throughout its history.

  Noah wove its way expertly through the still crowd, coming to rest on the outskirts of a circle. Here, six people held hands, their heads all leaning to one side, their left feet all raised in a kick across their right shins.

  “Dreamer Caznal and dreamer Diego Santibar,” Noah indicated.

  The two clones did not move.

  “Wake them,” Nwosu said.

  Noah’s operator laughed. “They do not wake. They have never been awake.”

  But, just then, the creaking began—sooner, it seemed, then the last interval. But not everyone moved. Only Caznal and Diego.

  Their eyes were still closed, their bodies visibly at the whim of the exoskeletons. They let their circle partner’s hands go—the other dancers made no indication they noticed their physical absence, never wavering in their own stances—and turned toward the group. They stood with their hands overlapped and outstretched, Diego’s under Caznal’s.

  “They do see you,” Noah said, addressing Min-Seo and Vega. “I have made the dream clear. They are happy.”

  Min-Seo took Vega’s gloved hand and nodded. They both seemed to realize this was the closest they would get.

  Nwosu understood their disappointment. Tears glistened in both of their eyes—more obvious in the harsh glare of the suit lights than was normal—but they were not tears of joy. They didn’t know how to process this new culture they’d found, didn’t know how to reconcile it with their expectations.

  The captain felt similarly, but he knew he couldn’t be feeling it as starkly. These two had had the weight of anticipation tangled in their clone lines for iterations upon iterations. To expect one thing and have reality provide quite another was destabilizing. Confusing.

  Like finding out the Web was a weapon . . .

  But, we need to appreciate them for what they are, who they are, Nwosu told himself diplomatically. As long as this way of life is truly their choice, then we cannot call our expectations right and their existence wrong.

  Vega split the Velcro on one of her pockets, drawing forth three tiny resin cubes. Within were small sculptures, one of Hvmnd, one of Shambhala, and one of Zetta. She placed them in the open palms, then made as if to step back.

  At the last moment, she surged forward, throwing her arms around the stiff forms.

  The embrace was awkward, both the exoskeletons and the pressure suit’s helmet impeded the gesture.

  The joints on Diego’s skeleton, as well as the mechanisms above, made their telltale squeak as he moved once more, reaching a hand out and turning his head toward Min-Seo.

  Hesitantly, she stepped forward. When she was within reach, everything shifted. Both exoskeletons moved their bodies’ arms wide, then enfolded the two women.

  The group hug was strange, unlike any show of affection Nwosu had ever experienced. And yet, Vega and Min-Seo dropped their heads to the dreamer’s shoulders, squeezing back as the sleeping clone’s cheeks pressed against the swell of their helmets. A tear leaked out of the corner of Caznal’s eye, dropping to Vega’s visor, creating a single rivulet down its curve.

  Maybe this will
work after all. We are different, but maybe we are not so different.

  “Human contact is important,” Noah said happily.

  Their second gift was housed in a lab on the top deck of the ship. Though the sweet moment between the Infinitum and Ultra crews had taken some of the eeriness out of the dark, bizarre environment, Nwosu didn’t let his guard drop. Just in case. The two convoys still had a lot to learn about one another.

  There were many more dreamer clusters along the way, and the captain tried not to let them bother him. Besides their pallidness—likely from lack of exposure to even an artificial sun—they all appeared healthy. There was no stench of unwashed bodies, no visible sores or emaciated forms.

  “Where are the caretakers?” he asked eventually, remembering his question from earlier. Someone had to tend to the physical needs of the sleeping, to the maintenance and control of the ships.

  “Autons perform that function now,” Noah explained.

  “Run by whom? Someone else has to be awake, besides your operator.”

  “There is only ever one awake,” Noah countered. “And they are not awake long.”

  The lab was a clean room. But instead of a lower particle count, it seemed to be designed to maintain a high-density fog. They stopped outside, peering in through the windows while Noah explained.

  “We have a specimen from our last stop. We keep it in a constantly resanitized state, since we are unsure if we could corrupt it, or it us. Since you are all suited, you all may enter.”

  “Wait—a biological specimen?” Nwosu asked.

  “Yes.” Noah said. “Come.”

  The fog swirled around their boots as they entered the gowning room. It had seeped out of the main lab, and chased their heels like a puppy at play. Long flaps separated the fogged space from the gowning room, and they slid through them with hands outstretched. Everyone had to dim their suit lights, as the beams bounced off the fog, creating a harsh whiteout.