by Alex Deva
“Yes. You see, religion has always been about faith, not fact. They claim that this is the first religion in the history of humanity which is based on clear, proven facts. The first true, certifiable prophet in the history of mankind.“
“Mhm.“
Toma frowned a little and looked to the side.
“Yes, I know you're a believer. I hope this doesn't upset you too much.“
“Oh, I was already having my own faith issues, trust me,“ answered the girl, quietly. “I just realised that I find more comfort in being part of Doi than in prayer. And when I say Doi, I mean both the ship and the three of us.“
“When you say two, you mean both one and three,“ smiled Toma.
“Yes, 'two' in English means 'doi' in Romanian.“ Doina smiled back, and then became serious again. “How could people believe him so readily?“
“How could they not? A man very obviously dead, who came back to life and started proclaiming he was the Prophet of the True Gods? Doesn't that sound familiar?“
“But the Eight are not gods. They're just different, that's all.“
“They are huge invisible beings who can predict the formation of star systems, live in space, are not made of matter and can somehow cure death. With respect for your faith, Doina, that's indistinguishable from godliness.“
“Well, not to me.“
“But to nearly everybody else. The Church of Eight practically exploded overnight. It sent every religion into panic. The Catholic Church is having the worst crisis since forever. They estimate that they've lost about ten million members to the Eight in the first couple of days alone. And a lot more are converting. Nothing even remotely like this has ever happened before. Millions of churches, mosques and temples have emptied, because their members converted. Eighters, they’re calling themselves.“
“How does one convert?“
“You have to say a specific phrase, which I won't repeat.“
“Really. That's it? What's the phrase?“
“I won't repeat it because, as soon as you say it, you hear a voice saying thou shall be saved in whatever your mother tongue happens to be. Everyone who says the phrase, hears the reply. It's pretty frightening.“
“And extremely effective, I'm sure.“
“Yes. This is the most convincing Act of God in the history of religion.“
“It's not an Act of God. It's a trick.“
“Can Doi do it?“
“Do what?“
“Project voices into people's heads when they say a special phrase?“
The girl said nothing.
“I'll take that as a yes. In fact, I think some of our own modern tech can do similar stuff. But can Doi bring a dead man back to life?“
This time, the girl spoke.
“No. That I'm sure it can't. But that must've been another trick.“
“Doina, we know about tricks. We've got some pretty amazing technology and we can do some pretty amazing tricks. We can easily make it look like someone shoots himself in the head and then comes back to life. But we don't think this was an illusion. We checked that man, and then we checked our recordings, and the people who were involved, and every last bit of brain on the pavement, and the cloth he'd had on his face, and the coffin and the table and the funeral home and the car that took him there and every person who had the slightest connection to this affair. We've had professional magicians analyse every record. And scientists. People who know what they're doing. People who desperately, more than anything else in their lives, wanted to prove it was fake. People whose lives depended on it being fake. Nobody found anything. Not one little thing. All there was, was a dead man who came to life and became the Prophet of the Eight.“
“Like Jesus,“ muttered the girl.
“Like the prophets of hundreds of religions. Including Christ.“
Doina looked sharply at her, and it seemed as if she started to say something, then thought better of it. She clenched her small right fist, then looked down at it. Slowly opening her palm, she asked:
“Did these Eighters build new churches?“
“No. Well, yes, but not physically. Everything is online.“
“On… line.“
“Oh. Let me explain. Most people on Earth are connected in a network,” explained the captain. “I mean, not the people,“ she blundered. “They have devices which are connected.“
“Those tabs.“
“Tabs, yes, compens, and others.“
“How do tabs replace churches?“
“Well, that’s not really new. It’s been possible for a long time, you see, to attend a religious service from a distance, and more and more people have been doing it in the past centuries. To have a church run exclusively like that isn’t all that revolutionary.“
“I’m not sure that’s a good thing,“ said the girl. “How do people receive the Eucharist?“
“The what?“
“The body of Christ. You know, bread and wine.“
“I can only presume that they stopped thinking that it was necessary to do that in person.“
The girl looked at her.
“You’re not Christian either, are you?“ she asked.
The captain drew in a deep breath.
“No,“ she said, directly. “I’m an atheist.“
Doina nodded and looked down at her open palm again, then said nothing for a while.
“I would’ve been stoned to death or something, in your days,“ continued Toma.
“What? No. Or yeah, maybe. I don’t know. I didn’t even know that atheist was a word, until Doi taught me.“
She looked around her and, for a moment, it seemed as if she was conferring with the ship. She half-walked, half-floated to a wall, and gently placed her hand on it. As always, without fail, a myriad of symbols exploded from under her palm. She hovered in front of a few of them, pensively, then turned back to the captain, who was observing her in silence.
“What do you want from us?“ Doina asked.
“What does the ship think about the Eighters?“ asked the other.
The girl waved her off.
“I won’t tell you that.“
“You have to tell us something.“
“Hmm. No, I’m sure I don’t. Anyway, why?“
Toma brought her hands in front of her chest and knitted her fingers, almost pleadingly.
“You have to understand me, Doina. I’m not just talking as an Eurasian officer. Your own arrival has thrown the whole of Earth into turmoil. Everything got turned on its head. Within a couple of months we had billions of people thinking that we should ally ourselves with the Builders, and other billions saying we should go with the Eight. Human civilisation has quite literally never been so divided. And now, this… man, prophet or whatever he is, he just showed up and made it even worse. He destroyed all balance. Such as it was to begin with.“
“And because Doi was sent by the Builders, you think I should fight him.“
“Nobody said anything about fighting.“
“All right. Then, because he’s destroying Christianity, you think I should fight him.“
Toma kept her hands together and looked as if she was really digging deep to find the best words.
“Look, I’m not trying to manipulate you.“
“You always try to manipulate me. That’s why you’re talking to me alone.“
“What?! No. We couldn’t risk sending you to Earth with Mark.“
“And I couldn’t risk leaving Doi, and you knew it.“
“Well, you could’ve had Aram here.“
“Aram is not my guard.“ And then, steely: “I don’t need a guard.“
You’re twelve, thought Toma. You need parents, not guards.
“Aram is doing a job that literally nobody else on Earth can do. The Eight may return anytime and demand their answers. Without Aram and Effo alerting us, we’d never know. Everybody in orbit is already terrified that they’re gonna be the next Yǒngqì. So we’re actually really grateful that h
e’s doing what he’s doing, instead of being here. But really, I’m not working you, Doina.“
“Yes, you are.“
Toma sighed.
“OK. Tell me one thing. Was Gaines working you? The American?“
Doina shuddered slightly. “Yes,“ she said in a low voice.
“Am I like Gaines?“
At this, the girl smiled slightly.
“No. You’re not. But you’re still trying to…“ — and she paused, searching for an expression in her freshly learned English lexicon — “…pull my strings.“
“That’s what people do, Doina. This is how we interact with each other. It isn’t wrong, unless you make it wrong.“
The little girl gave out a short, all-too-mature laugh.
“Yeah. I guess I don’t know much about that. I didn’t get to have a lot of friends. Not until Mark and Aram.“
“And Doi?“
“Doi is not a friend. Doi is a… sister. A twin sister, maybe,“ she smiled openly.
“But not a friend?“
“Quit it,“ laughed the girl. “Stop reading into everything…“
“I was joking, I swear!“ Toma joined in, raising her arms in surrender.
They watched each other; Toma looking reassuring, Doina looking perhaps a tiny bit reassured.
“Come on, help me out here,“ said Toma, still smiling. “Yes, I do have a job to do. But I’m also trying really hard to do it without being the asshole that Gaines was.“
“I know,“ nodded Doina. “I can see that.“
“I mean, do you have any idea how many child psychologists have offered to take this job? Do you know how many have been consulted by the military? Do you know what kind of lecturing I have to take from them, about what to say to you and what not? Do you know what kind of debriefings I have to go through after I spend five seconds in the same room as you? And how often I'm told that I shouldn’t have told you this, or that I should’ve told you that?“
“I knew you had to go through things like these, I suppose,“ said Doina. “But don’t expect me to be too sympathetic.“
“Why not? Wouldn’t that be the Christian thing to do?“
“Yes, but is it really so awful to be ‘debriefed’? If that even means what I think it means.“
“This isn’t what I’m trained for, you know,“ Toma said. “I just happened to be the only Romanian at hand when you popped up in the middle of our little Moon War. And now I have to account for every little thing I say, and I have to remember every little thing that you say, and even every little thing that you don’t.“
Doina looked sincerely surprised.
“I’ve never thought about that. Do you record our conversations?“
“If only I could! Well, I did, the first time, when we first met. We were all recording, of course. Every sensor in our suits was maxed out. I can tell you how Aram's body temperature changed during the whole day if you want.“
“Did it change much?“
“Not really. He’s one cool cucumber.“
The girl laughed again.
“But I’m not recording now,“ continued Toma.
“Why not?“
“I just thought it’d be rude.“
“You did? Or was it the child psychologists?“
“Half of them said yes, the others said no. And I said no, so that was it.“ Then she said, smugly: “They can’t afford to cross me, you know. Everybody agrees that I should be your contact. At least, everybody who matters.“
“Aren’t I important,“ mumbled the little girl, looking elsewhere.
She increased the gravity in the room and her feet touched the dark surface. Aren't I important, she thought. All I ever wanted was to be with my mum, and then she died. Then, all I ever wanted was to survive. Now I'm safer than I ever was, but people in lands I never even knew existed do nothing but think about me. I know I was chosen, by God or by Doi or perhaps by both, but what I don't know is how I’m supposed to feel about it.
I mean, does a normal twelve-year-old girl go through things like these? A normal girl from my age? A normal girl from this age?
What’s normal, anyway?
She looked at the Romanian officer, who was again watching her in silence.
I wonder what Simion would have done, she thought. I wonder how Simion died. Was he sick? Was he killed? Did he grow to live a long life? Did he have kids, and did his kids grow to have kids? Is he the ancestor of someone who’s alive today?
What if he’s this woman’s great-great-grandfather?
Imagining that little shepherd — the last human being she had seen in the twelfth century before being taken by Doi — growing old and being surrounded by kids, somehow made her feel happy.
“Doi is worried about the Squares,“ she said, suddenly.
The captain turned serious and attentive. She wanted to encourage Doina to continue but didn’t dare say anything.
“That yellow square is an alien being,“ she continued. “They're an advanced race of trillions of beings, who inhabit very narrow… bands in the atmosphere of… gas giants, you call them. But what they really are, is they’re Five’s lackeys.“
Toma looked like she would’ve given a year’s pay for a pen.
“If you can record this, Ileana, I think you’d better. Here’s how their prophet came back to life.“
VIII.
“They do it with a bubble,“ said Keai.
“Ninety-two years, four months, twenty-six days, one hour and just over ten minutes. And that is all you can come up with for the Council? A bubble?“
“It’s a very special bubble.“
The voice from the other planet sighed in the alien’s head.
“I am going to be lynched.“ And then, resignedly: “Fletcher Keai, why have you not manned your Blank yet?“
“I will. In fact, I wanted to talk to you about that, too. But this is more important.“
“Convince me.“
“Look, it took me decades just to invent the mathematical apparatus required to come up with a way to build a device that can detect this thing.“
“Which is terribly worrisome, because you are supposed to be particularly good at this.“
“I am particularly good at this. That’s why it only took a few decades. However, I wasn’t equipped for this, as you well know. I had to set up a laboratory first.“
“You’ve built stuff on their planet? That is against the rules. If you still care about the rules.“
“Of course I still care about the rules, Control. I’ll dismantle the lab when I’m done. Anyway, it’s inside a mountain. Quite inaccessible for the locals. They call it Kogainon.“
“How exciting that the locals give names to ground formations. Tell me about the bubble. Did you find anything that could possibly justify this extraordinary effort and general show of disobedience?“
“As I said, it’s taken me quite a lot of work to even detect the bubble. I don’t know what it’s made of, but whatever it is, I can tell you that it’s not all here.“
“You’ve discovered a pan-dimensional bubble?“
“I don’t know that it’s pan-dimensional. It’s pan-something.“
There was another sigh.
“Fine, go on. Give me more.“
“The locals, who call themselves the dáoi, often send some of their people there when they’re being plundered beyond their ability to defend themselves — and, by the way, that’s not often.“
“It’s not often that they’re plundered?“
“Yes, they are, a few times a year. But it’s not often that they can’t defend themselves.“
“Is their position easily defensible?“
“It’s not their position. It’s them.“
“Ah. I take it that woman and that child nearly a century ago weren’t a singular occurrence.“
“No. You see, Control, the dáoi often lure their attackers into that particular place, where they suddenly… fight better.“
“W
ere you able to determine how or why?“
“Whatever it is, it must be related to the bubble. I’ve had watchers in place and I’ve tuned them to record human body parameters. If I understand it right, as soon as they enter that clearing, they begin to experience everything about ten times slower.“
“Hence those reaction times, so incredible for their species. Would that not tax their physiology severely?“
“It does on the long term, but not noticeably. Few of them live to experience natural deaths anyway.“
“So they are archaic barbarians who can slow down time, and also have a bubble.“
“Yes. The bubble, whatever it’s made of, effectively hides them once they get inside, but still allows them to interact with their surroundings.“
“Often by shooting out plasma that should not exist.“
“Often that.“
“So explain me this, fletcher. Why is it that only the dáoi are affected by this phenomenon? Why not their attackers, too, and their animals? Or the local plant life, come to think of it? Why don’t they all experience life ten times slower?“
“I’m not there yet, Control. I don’t have that answer. But I believe that I will, and when I do…“
“…then you will have some potentially formidable arrowheads for your Blank.“
“Yes. If we can use whatever makes them special, this particular ship might be my greatest success as a fletcher. And our greatest success since we’ve started mining this region.“
The sigh that came this time was one of relief.
“Does this sound like something you might be able to sell to the Council?“ asked the alien, smiling humanly.
“For a start. If you give me more about that bubble.“
“It’s a spherical structure that extends under ground, and in which I would dearly love to be able to enter. The fact that it protects its occupants is most likely a side effect.“
“Here’s a thought. Did you ask the dáoi about it?“
“Yes. I’ve made inquiries, but didn’t find out much. They know even less about it than I do. It’s just a thing that’s always been there, and that works. Like the Sun or the air they breathe.“
“So they never waste time wondering about it?“
“They don’t wonder much about these things, as far as I can tell. But it does have another effect on them.“
