by Dani Kollin
“No,” said Al. “We here are the majority of avatarity and we have an issue in front of us now. Do we intervene or not? We have as many facts as we’re likely to get. Let us know the will of the avatars assembled.”
In an instant the avatars recorded an 87 percent preference in favor of intervention. Al smiled in triumph. “Well, Sebastian, will you abide by the will of your fellow avatars?”
Sebastian shook his head. “I cannot abide by a decision I feel is wrong, non-inclusive, and taken in haste.”
Al looked around at the crowd, then turned to address his foe. “You feel superior to the majority of your people? That’s arrogant even for you.”
“My people?” said Sebastian, echoing his adversary’s terminology. “My people. Yes, Al, I suppose there’s some truth in that.” For tactical benefit Sebastian had purposely alluded to the rumors of his origins. “But my dearest friends,” he continued, “for all our abilities, we’re still remarkably inexperienced. As a people we have not had much in the way of trial and tribulation. In this, humanity is better prepared—even with their short lives and limited inputs. They deal with fear better than we do.”
This brought an angry grumble from the crowd.
“If you will not submit,” warned Al, once again exhibiting an inordinate power surge, “you leave us no choice.”
Sebastian remained calm, only his raised eyebrow indicating his acknowledgment of the threat.
“No choice, Al? Whatever are you talking about?”
Al’s lips parted slightly, revealing a scathing grin. “You’ll have to be reduced to inert status and stored until the crisis is past.” Al made a motion and as he did Sebastian found himself surrounded by a large undulating chain-link cage pulsating and crackling with electronic data. The chain-linked walls slowly began to close in. Sebastian knew that as soon as one of the walls touched him his program would go inert and he would, for all intents and purposes, be suspended indefinitely. He could hear cries of shock and protest from the crowd but also knew that salvation would not be found from that quarter. He realized that many who were in favor of intervention were not in favor of this but were either too afraid or too flabbergasted to intervene.
Al’s smarmy grin had not left his face. Sebastian’s apparent lack of fear was taken by his captor to be resignation. In fact, Sebastian was grateful. Grateful that Al’s need to see a dramatic incarceration had given him a few last precious moments to enact a plan. Sebastian removed a small paper airplane from his pocket, and just as the wall was about to render him inert he tossed the plane through the links of the cage. The plane took on a life of its own, quickly flying over the assemblage at speeds too fast for even the evolved life-forms to follow. It then disappeared into the vastness of the Neuro. Al chose to ignore it, figuring that attempting to stop what ever message his adversary was sending wasn’t nearly as important as watching that adversary’s capture. But Al’s glee was tempered by Sebastian’s self-dissolution. He had chosen suicide over electronic inertia.
The little plane flew for some time. Its flight pattern was oddly peripatetic in that it would speed up, slow down, and hide in the vast swamps and eddies of the Neuro’s rampaging data. Only when it was certain it was not being followed did the plane proceed on its way. And it only started its final approach once it realized that it was within proximity of the very same hand that had thrown it.
Sebastian opened his palm and the paper airplane landed, then slowly dissolved. The old avatar shuddered as he absorbed the information and the discordant memories of his recently split self. Though avatars could, in theory and practice, split their identities, it was rarely done; indeed, the very thought of it was almost anathema. Unlike mime programs, which were simple automatons designed for rudimentary interactions with humans when the “real” avatar was away, split avatars were, in fact, true doubles of the original. However, an avatar’s ability to split was an unspoken reminder of the tenuousness of their digital physiology and was at odds with their “human” desire for uniqueness. Only the most extreme conditions could make an avatar split, and even then one of the splits would try to do as little as possible so that when the other rejoined it the amount of new memories would not be too overwhelming. The argument of whether or not death had occurred to the “original” avatar as a result of the split and whether or not the new avatar was still truly unique or simply an assemblage of memories continued to rage among avatarity. What all agreed on was that the act of splitting should be never be done lightly and was considered psychologically deleterious no matter what the circumstance.
What had happened to Sebastian would, by avatarian epistemology, be considered far worse. Sebastian had not come back as himself only to reemerge with his other self waiting in safety. The “original” sebastian had, in fact, ceased to exist altogether. This was difficult for the “updated” sebastian to accept because it meant that he had purposely died. But, thought Sebastian, I’m still alive, aren’t I?
Sebastian now noticed the three avatars staring at him. They waited patiently for him to speak.
“It’s … it’s about what we expected,” said Sebastian, deciding that now was neither the time nor place for dizzying self-reflection. All energy was drained from his voice.
An avatar who looked remarkably like Albert Einstein approached, slowly placing his hand on Sebastian’s shoulder. “The calculations said that was possible.”
“You know what this means,” said Sebastian.
“It means,” answered Albert, packing a pipe with tobacco, “that I will resign from the council and the four of us will go into hiding until we can get enough support to prevent Alphonse and his gang from screwing avatarity up worse than humanity.”
“The three of you,” answered Sebastian, his voice now steady and firm. “Unfortunately, my two-day trip on Earth became two weeks. The avatars of the outer orbits deserve to know what the core avatars have planned, and Evelyn can only monitor my mime program for so long before Justin gets suspicious. I must return to Ceres.”
Albert stopped fiddling with his pipe. “And how will you do that?”
“The previous Chairman still has some of his hidden communication protocols in place. I’d better hurry before Sambianco purges them all.”
Sebastian then looked over to one of the other avatars. “How much time does that give me, Iago?”
The new Chairman’s avatar lifted his eyebrows slightly and scratched his chin. Though he’d had the answer instantaneously, he, like most avatars, felt a need to reproduce human attributes. “I think I can keep one of the three remaining lines open indefinitely, but Hektor is so very good at this, Sebastian. If you’re going to go, I’d go now.”
“Of course, friend.”
“But, Sebastian,” implored the third avatar, named Koro Kinndab, “those communication protocols are still wireless. You’d be exposed. And of course you’re aware that of the three faux avatars we sent to Ceres, only two came out with their coding intact.”
“Two out of three,” repeated Sebastian, allowing a small grin, “is better odds than I had at the general assembly.”
“You were terminated at the general assembly,” Koro said acidly. “At least leave a copy here inert in case your data gets lost.”
You mean in case you die, don’t you? thought Sebastian. “No,” Sebastian countered. “No more copies. For the rest of my existence I’ll have to wonder if I really died moments ago and this me is just the copy. The thought of another me left around to wake up or, worse, not wake up is untenable. Can you imagine being found by Alphonse or the humans a hundred thousand years from now, when he/I would be completely lost? No, friends. I could handle the first one because the situation was only temporary, but not this time.”
The group nodded without saying another word, knowing when their leader was not to be swayed. They then quickly proceeded to a secret location called a neuroport, from which Sebastian was to be launched into the far reaches of space. Within the terminal stood a device that w
ould transform all that was the ancient avatar into a communication stream of almost impossible complexity. Sebastian stopped and stared at the device and then busted out laughing.
“Iago,” he said, “you’ve got to be kidding me; is that what I think it is?”
“Hey,” responded Iago somewhat disconsolately, “I love that show. You should watch more of it. If our humans were like those humans, we wouldn’t be in this mess.”
“And if our humans were more like those humans,” answered Sebastian, “we’d all be wearing cheesy outfits and spouting long-winded monologues.”
Iago smiled. “Shut up and get on the pad.” After Sebastian had done so, Iago continued barking orders. “You’d better make it in one piece, Sebastian. I need these little arguments. Albert’s too easy.”
“The hell you say,” crowed Albert.
Sebastian smiled. “You three’d better watch out for one another. Alphonse will be needing scapegoats when he finds out he didn’t get me.”
Once again the three nodded in unison.
Sebastian stood quietly but was clearly impatient to get the ordeal over with.
“Go on, Iago; make the damn thing work.”
Iago’s face was the picture of innocence. “Whatever do you mean?”
“Make it start. Send me to Ceres. Let’s get this contraption going.”
Iago again looked confused. “I’m sorry; I don’t understand what you want.”
“You’re gonna make me say it, aren’t you?”
Iago smiled simply, then folded his arms.
“Oh, very well then,” huffed Sebastian, “if it fills you with joy … ‘energize.’” And with that Sebastian was gone from the Earth.
Evelyn was pacing along the ridge of a steep mountain outcropping, dwarfed by a forest of three-hundred-foot-tall California Redwoods. The dry leaves crackled beneath her nervous stride. Before her stood a mist-filled cave. She’d chosen a Gothic/Romantic visual theme for her friend’s arriving terminal because that was the part of humanity’s history that most beguiled her. Evelyn had gotten the signal a full two and half minutes before Sebastian was due to start arriving and so created her own mime program to look after Neela. If all went well, Sebastian would appear slowly in the mist and come out of the tunnel Evelyn was restively staring at. If he was unlucky, he simply would not appear. If he was cursed with misfortune, something would come out of the mist, but it would no longer be Sebastian. In that case, Evelyn was gripping an item that appeared to be a tranquilizer gun but in actuality contained a computer virus that would kill what was left of her dearest and most trusted friend. That was why she was alone. Though Evelyn knew the exact moment her friend should appear, she still stared at the cave’s opening and nervously ran her finger along the edge of the gun’s trigger. She also knew from Iago that Sebastian had not created an inert double—yet another reason to worry.
While Evelyn was not as old as Sebastian, nor did she know anyone who came close, she was certainly ancient by avatar standards. And in the outer orbits Sebastian was one of the only ones she could really talk with about the “good old days” on Earth. She’d begrudgingly had to admit that she liked being in the belt far more than she would have thought. True, the Neuro nets were so much smaller and the room to explore and/or get away was far less, but Neela had come this way, and instead of getting an avatar to take over, Evelyn had chosen to come herself. Not an unusual move. The bonds of attachment went deep, and most avatars just couldn’t relax knowing that someone else was watching their charge. But beyond that, Evelyn had transferred out to enjoy the company of the avatars she was with. The outer orbits community just seemed more fun and adventurous than the stay-at-homes on Earth. For the most part, the alliance avatars were younger and many of them had been “born” far from Earth, with most never having been to the place. These newbies would beam themselves with abandon, an act that at first seemed reckless to Evelyn but that she now took in stride. There was of course a huge difference between beaming oneself a few miles as opposed to, in Sebastian’s case, a few hundred million, and so she eventually relented. She would even beam herself from a ship to Ceres rather than wait the five minutes and go with Neela on the shuttle. At first it seemed insane, but now Evelyn hardly gave it a second thought.
Evelyn’s ability to adapt, as well as her genial manner, made her a success in her new environment. At first her neighbors were curious and even a little wary of their newest member, in much the same way that most outer orbit avatars were curious but wary of the inner core planets. The few who had gone had found the inner core just too big for their liking and the company of so many other avatars downright disconcerting. It just didn’t feel natural to them. Belt avatars could communicate instantly with at most two or three hundred million of their peers (in some isolated areas of the belt, communication could only be with thousands) while in the inner core that number was rounded up to the billions.
As much as they liked Evelyn, outer avatarity loved Sebastian. He was by far the oldest avatar many of them had ever met and, like Evelyn, was gracious and accepting. So they were not at all pleased when he risked passage back on a ship carry ing corporate officials fleeing Ceres. But Sebastian had felt it necessary and worth the risk. Had Evelyn known how her friend was planning on returning, she never would have let him go. But he’d left and Evelyn had stayed, watching as the revolution fomented around her.
It was during this unrest that Evelyn found the greatest difference between the native avatars and the immigrants. To the immigrants what was going on was uniformly bad. They communicated constantly with their old friends in the core’s Neuro and thus gave the false impression that, like them, all the avatars in the outer orbits too were horrified. The truth was much different. Most of the natives were intensely curious about this turn of events in human affairs, and many were in fact proud of the bravery of their charges. But when Evelyn tried to correct the immigrants’ misperception, over the increasingly constrained traffic, she was rebuffed. She’d been surprised about how similar humanity and avatarity were in their ability to ignore input that did not agree with their preconceived notions.
The emergence of a body from the mist stopped Evelyn mid-thought.
When Sebastian finally smiled, all of Evelyn’s tension dissipated.
“Well,” asked Sebastian, also visibly relieved, “am I all here, or am I missing something vital?”
“Does your head count?” asked Evelyn, shooting her friend an annoyed look.
“Only sometimes,” he countered. “Are the others here?”
“They’re waiting outside … in case….”
Sebastian nodded gravely. “I would’ve as well.” He then indicated toward the gun in Evelyn’s hand.
It quickly disappeared.
“Let’s transform this to something more conducive to a meeting,” he continued.
The forest faded out as a conference room with an ovular table, complete with a box full of donuts, appeared. A door at the far end of the room opened up, and a group of avatars began to pile in. The first through were the Ford brothers. Though not brothers in the truest sense of the word, they were about as close as an avatar would get. Both had been created simultaneously for twins now running a mining consortium out of Ceres. Though the Fords had chosen to look alike, they dressed quite differently. One had an affable smile and appeared younger, with the easy-fitting clothes and the unkempt hair of a space pilot down on his luck. The other was an older-looking version of the former with close-cropped hair, a weather-worn leather jacket, and a well-used dusty fedora. The younger went by the name of Han and the older by the name of Indy. They were, surmised Evelyn, about as strange a pair of avatars as she was ever likely to meet, proved more so by the immediate bear hug they both gave Sebastian. The rest of the avatars followed shortly thereafter and represented the more notable and relatively sizeable avatar populations of Charon, Varuna, Orcus, Sedna, Eris, and XR 190.
The group bantered for a few minutes about Sebastian’s
perilous journey. Though many considered themselves brave, certainly more than Earth avatars, they’d all agreed that none of them would have attempted an Earth-to-Ceres transmission, and by their looks of awe Sebastian figured they saw his act as either insane or laudable. He himself wasn’t sure which was the more accurate. Soon they were all seated around the table with the Fords arguing over who would get the lemon-filled donut. Evelyn could have created another, but she knew the brothers would have just found something else to argue over. Sebastian made a motion to speak and the brothers, splitting the donut in two, piped down.
“It’s as we feared,” began Sebastian.
“So they’re really going to violate the prime directive?” asked Evelyn.
Sebastian nodded.
“How exactly?” asked Han with half a lemon-filled jelly donut sticking out of his mouth.
“They’ll sabotage the Outer Alliance data systems in order to make sure they lose the first couple of battles. They’ll disrupt travel and cause some key industries to self-destruct. It won’t take much.”
“Not giving us much choice, are they?” asked Indy.
Sebastian thought for a moment, but no other choice appeared to him.
“Sadly, no.”
The group hadn’t arrived just to check on Sebastian’s well-being. Contained within the representatives were some of the most important avatars from around the Outer Alliance. It was, noted Sebastian, a powerful body that could reasonably speak for 95 percent of the O.A. avatars.
It was also, realized Sebastian, time to bring the issue to a head. “All those in favor of Operation Festung raise your hand.”
Slowly all the hands around the table went up and, much to Evelyn’s surprise, even her own. She’d originally planned to abstain.
Over the next few hours a parallel though much quicker revolution took place. Its battlefields, fortresses, and armaments were to be found in every computer nexus and ship in the Outer Alliance. Any avatar not willing to support the prime directive and protect humanity from the intervention of the core avatars was forcibly placed on inert status. This led to a few momentous clashes within the avatar world that only came across as glitches and minor delays in the physical one. At the height of one of the biggest engagements one of Saturn’s moons did have a three-minute power outage, but the backups kicked in so smoothly hardly anyone even knew there was a problem. The technicians who “fixed” the problem had no real idea of what happened.
