The Man In The Machine

by Silas Vale

  Erile took one look at Willow, and his face lit up with recognition. He turned back to Blake with a sad sort of smile on his face.

  "Ah, I know who you are, now. You're Blake Medea. The one who scared off Marcus. On behalf of the entire FNA, I thank you kindly. We wouldn't have gotten the Willow Grace we know and love without you."

  Blake balked, then stood up, pressing the knife against Erile's throat.

  "Looks like you've got a stalker, Willow." She said coolly.

  Willow shook her head. "… No. This is something else." Her gaze was intelligent, calculating. It was strange seeing her so… Young.

  After a second, her eyes narrowed.

  "How do you know who I am?" She asked. "What's the FNA, and what else do you have in that bag?"

  Erile looked at her, a bit of hesitation in his eyes as he looked to Aisling's door. He then looked back to Willow and sighed. "I don't usually like telling children who I am, especially ones that I know I will meet later, because it gives them a sort of expectation. They become lazy, usually just waiting for me to come along and save the day."

  Blake had taken her blade from his throat, though she still held it at the ready.

  "So if you don't tell any of this to Aisling, I'll explain who I am, where I came from, and what the FNA is. Hell, I'll even give you a bit of info about yourself, Willow."

  That… Was interesting.

  Willow studied his face for a moment or two, before she nodded. "Okay."

  With that, she turned and walked off towards the living room. She groaned when she realized it was still trashed, and took a few moments to set the coffee table upright and wipe up the spilled beer. Erile and Blake stood awkwardly next to each other, one with a knife and the other with a bag almost half as large as he was.

  She gestured for them to sit as well, and sighed. "Alright. Speak."

  Erile nodded, following quietly, with Blake tailing him. Eventually, Blake and Willow were sat down on the couch, with Erile sitting in the armchair across from them. The smell of beer hung in the air, but he didn't seem to mind.

  "Alright. So, I suppose I should start with the fact that there's a God."

  Well… Not the most modest starting point, but a starting point nonetheless.

  "Well, actually, there are two, but you only need to worry about the one. The Afflatus. Good ol' Caligo, but he'll smite you if he catches you calling him that. He's… Well, he's the rougher of the two. You drew the short straw by being born here."

  "… The Afflatus?" Willow echoed, furrowing her brows. "What do you mean we drew the short straw? Who is the other god?"

  This was highly fascinating to her, and she figured that she really had no reason not to believe him. He had made her float, which was a feat that had been rendered impossible by science thus far. So she figured that there was something else at play here.

  Perhaps something magical.

  Either way, she wanted to be the first to have access to it.

  Erile chuckled. "Well you see, the other God, or Goddess per say, is way nicer to the beings of her realm. She actually visits them from time to time, instead of staying who knows where and causing catastrophes when he's bored."

  Yeah. Sounded like Earth.

  "You live in the Rith; the other God, the Muse, lives in the Ea. The only difference between the two is that in the Ea, beings can use magic. In the Rith, beings cannot. The Gods are the exception to the rule, but the Muse can't access the Rith and the Afflatus can't access the Ea. So they're usually in a turmoil. Ex-lovers, those two. Really need to figure out what they want in each other."

  Erile had the confidence of a man who'd come face to face with God and laughed at him.

  "Anyway, the gun I pointed at you wasn't anything magical. It's just from really far in the future, where the particle controlling gravity has not only been discovered, but manipulated. Science, not magic."

  Willow nodded slowly, copying down tidbits of his ramblings. Honestly, she didn’t even know what to write down; most of what he said was so crazy, it was burned into her memory.

  She was quiet for a couple seconds after she stopped writing, and then looked up at him with furrowed brows. "So how do you know who I am, then?"

  At the very least, this seemed like a wonderful distraction from what had transpired not even an hour prior.

  Erile laughed. "Well, Willow Grace, I can tell you that you become the richest woman in the world."

  Woah.

  "Alright, maybe not the world, but definitely the FNA. Until Jared Gnames, but you're gone long before he's even a concept yet. Anyway, the FNA, or Federation of Northern America, is the country that forms in the union of Canada and the United States. Sounds unlikely, I know, but a major epidemic called the Auranis sparks it. Me and your daughter actually meet during the Auranis, in fact, but that isn't important."

  He looked around the room, a bit of an odd expression on his face.

  "Where's Nych?"

  Willow was about to ask questions, to push further into this treasure trove of information, but when he asked about Nych…

  Her face saddened, and she looked away. The question was reasonable, and she wasn't upset at him for asking it, it just… Saddened her. Nych was gone, and despite probably being the smartest woman in Canada, she couldn't bring him back. She was useless at the only thing she ever wanted to be good at.

  "… Nych is dead." She said quietly after a moment. "He's been dead for years."

  Something strange happened as she said that.

  Erile began to smile.

  At first, it was a slight, hopeful thing, like when a parent hints to a child what they've gotten them for Christmas. Then, it grew larger, until it took up his entire face. "So that's what I was sent back to do."

  …What?

  He jumped up, which caused Blake to raise her knife in alarm, but all he did was begin to pace.

  "It makes sense! I knew that you shouldn't have been able to finish him so long before the AI revolution, and I've always wondered how you did it. Now I know that I am supposed to help."

  He walked back over to Willow and knelt down in front of her, grinning.

  "You have everything, correct? The brain, the robot body, all of it?"

  "… I- I do?" Willow stared at him, brows furrowed in confusion as she leaned away from him slightly. After a second or two she relaxed, letting herself sit up straight as she looked him up and down. And for the first time in many, many years… Willow felt the faintest glimmer of hope. That maybe he could help her. That Nych could be rebuilt, that he would live again and together they would make the world a better place.

  It was what she had wished for every day for so many years.

  "… Why?" She asked after a moment, reaching up to tuck a strand of orange hair behind one ear.

  Blake stared at Erile warily before she turned, tucking her knife back into her boot.

  "You two can talk about this future crap all you want. I'm going to Aisling's room to see if she's okay. Have fun, you two." With that, Blake walked off, just as Erile was answering Willow's question.

  "It's time to bring him back, Willow."

  That single sentence was enough to shatter, and rebuild, Willow's entire world.

  A Wayward Traveler

  Willow’s lips parted as she processed what the man in front of her had just said. Her dream, the thing she’d given up on years ago… Was it really possible?

  She stood abruptly, walking over to a door that was set into a small divot in the living room wall. She opened it, revealing a stairway that led downwards, and turned to Erile.

  "Come here. It’s… Everything is downstairs."

  Erile stood up, grinning, as he followed her down the stairway. He had seen technology that far surpassed Willow's, of course, but still… Her work was much more elegant than anything in the future. All of the prosthetic limbs, though more versatile, had a mass-produced feel to them in the future. Willow's felt all natural.

  Plus, the AI where he c
ame from all had the same names, spoke with the same voices, and learned the same way.

  Willow could build a person with his help.

  "Alright. So what have you had trouble with?"

  Willow flicked the light on at the bottom of the stairs, and glanced over at him. "Everything is complete. The body is fully ready to receive signals from the brain." She led him over to a large metal door, and tapped a couple buttons on the keypad beside it before she pushed it open. The lights turned on automatically, illuminating the large room of the basement that had been turned into her workspace.

  The lab was just as one would picture it. Metal tables were covered in contraptions that were all created by her. Arms, legs, strange robots with unknown design features. Along the walls were large shelving units, each marked with tape so that she would know what drawer stored what part. Blueprints hung on the walls, and any nearby surface she could find. It was an organized disaster.

  But it was dazzling.

  And so was the body that stood against the back wall.

  It looked just like him, as she had painstakingly crafted the man to look and feel exactly like a human. It had taken her years of hard work, but it was done. When it was complete, it would function just like Nych's old body had. But for now, it was propped up against a metal stand, wires running from various parts of the body and layers upon layers of blueprints coating the wall behind it.

  Willow walked over and examined the husk sadly. "… I can't figure out how to properly hook his brain up to the machinery." She said after a second. "I don't know how to make it function. I don’t know how to link the body with the brain." She buried her face in her hands and sighed. "I don’t know how to do anything."

  Erile chuckled, knowing exactly where she was going wrong. It was understandable; the laws of bioelectronics hadn't exactly been established yet, and she wouldn't understand most of them. But he could boil down the main one to a single thing that she could understand.

  "Well, Willow, there's a bit of a problem. You're trying to run an electrical body off of a biological brain. That can't happen, just like a flesh and bone body can't run off of a machine's brain. No, you either need all flesh, or all technology. Or in Nych's case…"

  He walked around the body, smiling and nodding his head. It was done well.

  "Both."

  He knew he'd need to explain.

  "You can't have only the brain hooked up. But if you were to implement a hard drive within the brain…"

  She hesitated, and silently mulled over what he was saying. It made sense, but she wasn't exactly sure how she could execute it.

  "… So how would I go about doing that, then?" She furrowed her brows, walking over to a safe she had on one side of the room. She opened it up, and from there pulled out all that was left of the man she had once loved.

  Nych's brain.

  She carried the box it was stored in over to a nearby table and set it down. She sighed as she examined it, and then looked up at Erile. "I don't want to cause any damage to his brain. If that were to happen, I… I might never get him back." She bit the inside of her lip, seemingly frightened at the thought. It would probably destroy her if she was the reason that Nych was never coming back, and she didn't want to risk anything.

  "Ah, well. For that, you'll need this." He laid his bag on the ground and knelt down beside it, rummaging around until he pulled out a strange looking needle. When he flipped a switch on the side, the point at the end begin to glow a light blue color.

  "This will fuse synapses and transistors. The brain and the hard drive will become one; Nych's conscious mind will exist on both the hard drive and the brain, without any loss of memory. The hard drive will, therefore, be attached to the body via… Whatever you used as a replacement for the spinal cord."

  That tool… No wonder she'd never been able to figure it out. It wouldn't exist for hundreds of years.

  He handed it to her, a bit of a smile on his face.

  "You're the doctor. You'll want to remove all of the parts of the brain that won't be needed. For example, robotic eyes mean that he won't need the occipital lobe, and so forth."

  She nodded slowly, biting the inside of her lip as she looked to the tool and then to the brain sitting on the table in front of herself. "I…" She sighed, and ducked her head as she looked away. As much as she didn't like the thought of it, she knew what she had to do. It would be the only way to restore Nych, and if she didn't…

  She wasn't going to get him back. Ever.

  "Is there anything else I should know?" She asked after a second.

  "Only that I know you'll succeed." He said, a small smile on his face. "I've seen Nych in his AI form before, Willow, which means that you won't fail. So don't worry too much about it, but worry enough to get it done. Just know that the future is never set in stone."

  With that, he turned around, heading back up the stairs. "I think you'll find that you're in the home stretch, Willow. There isn't much farther to go now."

  He then left, leaving her to her work as he walked upstairs.

  … To promptly hear a knock on the door, and then find it being practically slammed open.

  "Willow?!" There was a man standing in the doorway. He was on the taller side, slim but well-toned. His hair was ginger and somewhat scruffy, and he had the slightest stubble on his face. He looked very similar to Willow, the only major difference being in the color of their eyes. While hers were a beautiful green, his were blue.

  "Uncle Terry!" Aisling squealed from a couple rooms away, and after a moment came running out and hugged the man around the legs. "Hi!"

  Terry looked down at her, and after a second relaxed with a sigh. "Hey, kid. Where's your mom?"

  "She's downstairs. You know she's always working on something."

  Blake's voice carried down the hall as she walked towards them, a small smile on her face. She'd gotten to know Terry quite well after Nych died, considering he'd helped with Willow. The two weren't the best of friends, but they were pretty close.

  "Been a while, Terry." She said, wrapping an arm lightly around him.

  "Yeah, she's downstairs," Erile said, looking back down the way he came. "I wouldn't distract her right now, though; she’s had a breakthrough."

  "Blake?" Terry blinked at her, and then chuckled after a second and reached up to ruffle her hair with a grin. "God, it's been years. Where have you been all this time?" He looked to her with bright eyes, and then as he looked over at Erile, his grin faded. "… Who's this? And why are his clothes burnt?"

  "… Why are there a bunch of weird people around?" A young boy, only about ten years old, walked up to everyone and looked around at them with a frown. His hair was blond, his eyes blue. There was a frown on his face, and he didn’t seem happy to be there.

  "Hi Dean!" Aisling released Terry to grin at him.

  "Hi Ais." He peered past his father and into the house. "Who are these people?"

  "This is Blake!" Aisling wrapped her arms around Blake's waist with a grin, looking over at him. "She's really cool and she protects mom, and she has a knife and we were building with my Lego before you guys got here!" Apparently she really liked Blake. "… I dunno who he is though." She looked over at Erile and shrugged.

  Erile chuckled, looking down at Aisling before he walked up to Terry. "I'm Basil Connors. Specialist in the field of artificial intelligence, and I came when Willow called me to help her with Nych."

  There was a long silence, with narrowed eyes from Blake piercing every inch of Erile's body. He couldn't let Aisling know who he was. Otherwise… She might not survive the Auranis.

  "Yeah. He's pretty smart, gotta say it. His tech's impressive." Blake said, with all the ease of the truth.

  She was, after all, used to lying.

  Erile let out a sigh of relief.

  Terry nodded slowly, examining him before he slowly relaxed. Whoever he was, he wasn't going to pose a threat to his older sister or his niece, so he was good in his books. "… Willow told me
what happened." He looked towards Blake. "Where's Marcus?" His voice took on a lower, more threatening tone. Willow's entire family hated the man, and it was evident in just the way that they spoke about him.

  "Mama said he's gone." Aisling said quietly, still holding onto Blake.

  "That's good. I didn't like him." Dean said bluntly, and Terry sighed.

  "This is Dean." He rested a hand on his son's shoulder, looking up at Blake. "My son. Me and Julie are married now."

  Blake raised a brow, grinning. "That broad? Never thought you two would last." She was joking, because she'd used to hit on Terry constantly. She was happy for him, no matter what. The matter of Marcus, however, darkened her mood.

  "Yeah, that bastard's gone. I threatened him with a knife to the face and then broke his teeth before I kicked him in the gut."

  She was dead serious, evident by the look in her eyes.

  She then smiled, nodding to him. "But he earned it, so we're good."

  Terry stared at her for a second, before he chuckled and shook his head. "Honestly… Knowing you, I'm not even surprised. If you hadn't done it, it probably would've been me instead." He stepped inside and shut the door behind him.

  "I'm thinking I'll probably hang around for a day or so." He sighed. "Just in case the bastard tries to come back."

  "We can have a sleepover!" Aisling's eyes lit up, and Terry smiled at her. "… Could you stay too?" She looked up at Blake, lightly tugging on her shirt. "You're fun."

  Blake looked down at the kid, and a sad sort of smile laced her lips. She was about to tell her that she couldn't stay, when she thought better of it. What was waiting for her when she got home? An empty bed, stale coffee and old cigarettes, an empty fridge and some soiled furniture.

  "You know what? Why not?" She said, the sad smile turning to one of genuine happiness.

  Blake Medea hadn't been genuinely happy in a long time.

  "I… Guess that I won't be staying. I've already contributed all I can." Erile said, walking around all of them towards the door. He'd have to wait a week to travel again, and that sucked, but he'd figure out something to do.