The Best of Deep Magic- Anthology One

by Jeff Wheeler

  “You are made of tougher stuff than you thought. If you’re in a safe place now, let’s continue. Otherwise, I do not want to distract you.”

  “I think I will stay where I am for a minute or two.” I lay there, looking up and marveling at the distance I had fallen. It must have been more than a thousand feet. From this angle, the branches above me reminded me of the thorn and briar barrier surrounding Sleeping Beauty’s castle.

  “I’ll continue, then.”

  Grandfather’s voice through the neurolink beckoned a memory of his face – laugh lines around bright blue eyes. His hair was still mostly dark brown, but at his temples and sprinkled throughout the rest, his age shone with silver. His brow had the creases of one who spent a lot of time in deep thought, but it did not detract from the levity in those eyes. Oddly, I tried to recall my own face, and struggled to remember it. Strange which memories came easily and those I thought should, but wouldn’t. I realized I had not been paying attention. “I’m sorry, Grandfather, I was lost in thought for a moment, would you begin again?”

  “If you’re sure the fall did not do more damage than you thought.”

  Although I may very well have sustained a concussion, I felt my cognitive processing was intact. “Please continue. I will pay better attention.” I felt a growing darkness in my mind, a feeling of foreboding that I was in danger, but could not perceive the threat. I remembered stories of people killed centuries ago by carbon monoxide poisoning in their homes, caught unaware until it was too late. Detectors and elimination of fossil fuels greatly reduced these problems in modern day, but that was on Earth. Who knew what poisons might exist in this terra.

  Grandfather’s voice pulled me back to reality. “Very well. As we discussed earlier, the preeminent global concern for most of the last century was the sustainability of the ever-growing human population on the Earth. The initial research and development centered on food production, water purification and desalinization. Food engineering made great strides and surpassed the needs for several decades, but the projections showed that the ability to increase productivity and the trend of ever-increasing demand would cross paths by the year 2225. We are now less than thirty years from that point.

  “Other approaches to the problem became essential. Some factions supported the idea that human nature would solve the problem. While it is true that starving people will fight and kill to survive, the vast majority of the civilized world rejected this theory. One theory that gained considerable momentum was adaptation to live and cultivate resources underwater. That is still an open branch of research, being pursued primarily through centers in Brazil, Argentina, Chile and Central America.”

  Absently, I thought, “I’ve never much cared for swimming.” I continued to look up into the branches above, watching them sway on a strengthening breeze. I wondered if I should be concerned about the wind picking up. Atmospherics in this world may vary to extremes. I realized I would likely need to find firmer footing soon. Great, something else to add to my worries.

  Grandfather chuckled. “You swim about as well as a racehorse flies, Levi. No, you were never interested in that field of study.”

  The winds continued to build, and the branch I was on swayed in an orbital motion. I was not in immediate jeopardy of being thrown off, but I was at risk of nausea and vomiting. “You have the subtleness of a sledgehammer, Grandfather.” I turned onto my stomach, taking care to place each hand and foot on a secure branch, and located a reasonably safe path down the last fifty or sixty feet to the bottom.

  “I like that one, Levi. I’ll store it away to use later without giving you credit. It seems like you are moving again. Shall I wait until you are settled before I continue?”

  “No need, I am nearly there.” I had to drop the last eight feet, and found the landing to be relatively soft, but a little sticky. My mind went to honeycomb, continuing the obsession with comparing this terra to food. “I hope you are able to guide me to food and water soon, Grandfather. I keep comparing the landscape to food in my mind. I imagine even if my body is fully hydrated and fed, I will be in need of both in the near future.”

  “It is a priority. But, your immediate needs should be met by your suit.”

  I should have guessed as much. At the base of the cliff, I found a fairly dry spot under a tree-like structure and sat down to let Grandfather continue. My arm brushed against the trunk, and even through the suit it felt wet and slick. Again, a sudden panic ripped through me. I hoped it was the mental fog that caused me fear, but my logical brain could not sweep the concern away like a patch of dust. My instincts cried out in warning.

  Grandfather continued, “As I was saying, scientific centers around the world have struggled with numerous approaches to solving the problem of a growing populace with ultimately finite resources. A popular theory is the alternate or multiple planet discipline. It originally gained prominence when global warming was a primary concern, but never lost momentum when resource depletion and overpopulation demanded attention. The romantic notion of finding another world viable for cultivation into sustaining a human population has drawn the largest grants and private donations of any scientific field. Although this field of study demanded many successes, including discovery of a suitable planet, travel, establishment, atmospherics, and countless other logistics problems, it has remained a favorite of scientists across the globe.”

  Although much of my recovery to this point had involved pieces of my memory fitting back into place, Grandfather’s words drew together a sense of purpose that resonated in my heart and soul, chasing away the grip of panic squeezing me. “Space exploration is my passion. That is why I am here.” It should have seemed obvious, given where I was, but this specific realization beckoned a wave of memories and thoughts related to decades of study and work in the field of space exploration. Theories and calculations flashed rapidly into place. I was lost in a torrent of recalled discoveries, feeling my passion attached to each success and disappointment in the failures. Many failures. When the rush subsided, I was glad I had sat down, and wondered how much time I had spent recovering. I realized there were still many holes in my mind, but I had gone from more holes than solids to a sturdy frame of myself with gaps in the structure left to fill. The task seemed manageable. The foreboding was muted, but still there, scratching to find purchase in my mind. I pushed it away.

  “Wow, that trip was like a flea hitching a ride on a bullet!” Grandfather’s chuckle was like a cozy blanket.

  Yet, the feeling of elation was fleeting. “I didn’t know the neurolink allowed that depth of shared thought.” With my brain function improved, awareness expanded the boundaries of thought and recollection. I realized more about my circumstances, including discomfort about pieces of reality that did not fit together.

  Before I could complete my train of thought, Grandfather continued. “You left your thoughts open to me as your pathways and experiences connected. This healing is good and important – you have just made an incredible amount of progress. However, I think you still have a substantial amount of work yet to accomplish. Your comment that space exploration was your passion may be true, but no more so than a childhood hero of mine, Michael Jordan, who once declared baseball to be his passion.”

  “Michael who? Before you answer that, Grandfather, I want to discuss the neurolink with you. I do not recall any personal involvement with the science behind the neurolink, but I believe I understand enough of the basic tenets to know that a connection spanning the distance between Earth and the closest potentially viable planet is not possible.” Discomfort about this realization firmed into a certain level of distrust. Perhaps this was the source of the foreboding I felt. Something told me there was more. I continued, “My two most logical theories are that either you are with me on this planet or you are artificial intelligence and I am linked to the transmitting computer from transport or the base on this planet. Please tell me you are here, Grandfather.”

  “Levi, I can sense your heart
rate and blood pressure rising. You must stay calm. I will help you figure this out, but there are other possibilities. And, you will see the whole truth very soon. The protocols have brought you this far, please trust in them to bring you the rest of the way.” Grandfather’s guarded tone left me even less trusting.

  “You did not travel with me through space, Grandfather. I know there is very little that would pull you away from Earth and the family you love. Unless the planet is in chaos, and survival were imminently at risk, you would not take part in exploration. That leaves me with the most likely option that you are artificial intelligence. Very convincing, with all of your trite phrases, sense of humor and inflection. However, I am familiar with artificial programming and the level of complexity and reality that has been accomplished in that field. The true give-away for me was your reliance on protocols. Grandfather is a much more liberal spirit and would not be bound by protocols. But, a machine certainly would.”

  I felt sick. I worried about vomiting in my suit and wondered what I would even be able to produce. I doubt my stomach held much of anything. In addition to nausea, I felt stupid. Not just the kind of stupidity that followed recovery from stasis, but an additional personal dose of foolishness in being duped by a computer, and the brazen degree of risk I took by transmitting that very doubt. It probably would not have mattered. The kind of neurolink I would have with a computer would allow the machine access to all active thought. Ultimately, I decided, even though I was not really talking to my grandfather, I was connected to a source of information that I would have to use to get me to a base of operation, if there was one. If there was no base… If the transport failed to land safely and I had no team to meet… Icy panic streaked across my consciousness. I was still missing something important, perhaps many things.

  “Levi, your concern is understandable, but it is also anticipated and I believe a necessary part of your healing. Will you extend a little more faith?” Grandfather’s voice seemed so genuine. The technology was convincing.

  As I weighed the limited options available to me, I also longed to recall the details of my mission, the planning for the transportation and to at least know which of the planets I had reached. Grandfather might be able to help me with that. “Perhaps not faith, but I will at least entertain my scientific curiosity by communicating with you further. Will you admit that you are artificial intelligence?”

  Grandfather’s chuckle felt warm. “Levi, if I was artificial intelligence, don’t you think I would be programmed to believe I was real. Only the programmer or authorized user would have access to an acknowledgement such as you seek. Of course, if I was artificial, I would not be able to tell you that much.”

  “Unless that kind of bullspit was the kind of logic Grandfather might have used, and then that is exactly what an artificial intelligence of high sophistication would be programmed to use.” My brain ached. I wondered if the suit had medications for pain, anxiety and other foreseeable ailments.

  “No sense arguing with you that I’m real. You have always been stubborn (my word) or determined (yours) once your mind was made up. I have said on more occasions than a porcupine has quills that once you set your path, if a mountain stood in your way, it was more likely the mountain would move than you would change course.”

  “Can you just guide me to the base? Unless our landing was so compromised that a base does not exist, I want to begin moving toward it. I am confident I have recovered sufficiently to allow safe travel.” I doubted this request would work, but it was worth trying. Feeling gullible, combined with a banging headache, I was ready to move past the ridiculous protocols and learn the critical information about my mission and the landing party. The thought of finding a safe place assuaged the ice crystals in my mind.

  “I think it is best to complete the proto-“

  “Don’t say it!” I interrupted, perhaps sounding more harshly than I intended.

  “Levi. Do you remember when you were a young boy, say nine or ten, and you wanted to learn how to drive my old Ford truck?”

  I remembered.

  “Do you recall how I promised to teach you to drive in a field just as soon as you were able to reach the pedals and see over the dashboard?”

  “Yes.” I was glad that memory was intact. I had thought I was big enough before Grandfather believed I was. I snuck out early one Saturday morning, found the keys above the visor, and fired the truck up. By the time Grandfather reached me in the field, the truck had both front wheels stuck in the irrigation ditch and the rear wheels digging holes in the mud as they spun.

  “Well, the stakes are even higher this time. Can you be patient and trust this old man, just a little?”

  He almost convinced me that he was my Grandfather. Whether it was trust or resignation, I decided it did not matter. Until I finished the protocols, Grandfather was not going to direct me to the base. “Proceed. But, I really think I need to find base, so let’s make this quick.”

  “Excellent. I was reciting the various approaches the governments of the world and scientific community were taking to address the problem of overpopulation and depletion of resources. The last of the highly funded approaches was genetic modification and species redesign. Labs in Australia, Europe, along the United States East Coast and New Zealand worked together to find ways to manipulate DNA, and change the nature of humankind further.”

  I felt a wave beginning to build within my head. The pain behind my eyes grew. I knew I was close to something big. “Grandfather, who wrote the protocols?”

  “That is the right question to ask.” Relief saturated his words. “You did.”

  The wave that hit me this time was like a sunburst, illuminating the dark recesses of my memory and burning off the fog. My headache waned, and my anxiety lifted. The terror of not remembering my mission was gone. The fear of what had happened to the landing party removed. The drive to know answers I believed could be found from my Grandfather, rather the AI posing as my Grandfather, subsided.

  I could feel the trembling in my neurospeech as I called out, “Grandfather. I am sorry I doubted you…” With my mind cleared, the sense of foreboding came clearly into view. I knew exactly where I was, and I was not safe.

  Not sure of when it began developing, a gel of some kind pooled around me. I scrambled to my feet and felt the ground beneath me shake. It was not gel, but mucous. I began to climb. Quickly. The winds blew, and death tickled on the breeze.

  Finding a thick branch, I searched for an opening. Desperation replaced panic and pushed at my logic centers to stall thought. For what seemed like minutes, I searched, knowing my death could come at any time. There. A small gap opened in the branch base. I reached in with both hands and pried a gap wide enough to slip my entire body through. As I started to pull with my arms, the structure shook and the wind blew in a torrent, ripping at my body and testing my grip. For a moment, I worried that my grip would not hold, but my strength persevered, adrenaline boosted me into the branch and fully into the opening. Immediately, my body was pulled deeper into the structure by a flowing wave of a thick, dark liquid through a series of pipes. This was better, I thought.

  “I am dying to know how you did it, Levi. But, if you need to reach your destination before we talk, I can wait a little longer.”

  I let my heartrate slow and checked through a quick series of relaxation techniques before responding. “You may have already noticed – I can be a bit stubborn. When my application to join the space exploration teams was rejected, I was furious. Just because I had accomplished more in the field of genetics, I should not be forced into that discipline by bureaucrats. There was only one thing I could do about it. Solve the problem for both disciplines at the same time.” I navigated the arteries, moving from one vessel to another. Several pinkish orbs began to treat me like a groupie at a Beastie Boys concert. Another Grandfather cliché based upon an embarrassing affinity to a fossil from the twentieth century. A groupie at an Orange Death concert would be more apt to the curre
nt day. I was able to keep the groupies away, but noticed more were following. By the time I reached the internal carotid artery, I was getting pressed by dozens of the pink orbs. I continued on, warily.

  “But how?”

  “The formulas, which I will be happy to share with you after I am restored, would fill every glass-board in every lecture hall in the American Science Institutes along the Eastern Coast. The short answer is that the Australian and New Zealand teams had the right idea, but they did not take it far enough. By modifying the genetic code, human beings could be shrunk, thereby reducing the space needed and resources required to sustain humanity. Perhaps it was the romantic tie to the works of Tolkien that limited their thinking, but New Zealand envisioned a hobbit-sized population, which would double, or possibly even triple, the number of people the Earth could sustain.

  “I thought, why stop there. If genetic manipulation can shrink people to half their normal size, further reduction is possible. The difficulties arise when one is shrunk beyond a factor of ten, and the normal skeletal structure of the individual becomes an infeasible model. That is where my studies in complex systems provided the answer. By calculating and inputing data for the environment into which the person will be placed and the size of the reduction, the models I developed allowed the human genetic code to become a living program that worked with my own algorithms and models to find a solution. If a solution could be found, the programs would find it and the proverbial green light would beacon.”

  I looked down at myself as I rode the wave of blood through the artery, white cells converging on me, pressing harder, causing pain. I struggled to relax, worried that fighting against them would trigger a frenzied response. I forced my mind away from the discomfort, ignored it. I found it interesting that my brain had concocted the idea that I was already on the space exploration team. No doubt, it was the easiest explanation for my landing in what appeared to be an alien terra. Additionally, my preoccupation with space travel must have played into the delusion. More interesting is that I had perceived my modified body to be a space suit. I could see now that my form was less human-like than I supposed. That was off-putting to a large degree. I had limbs, but they were covered by a hard exoskeleton-like shell. My hands had digits, but only three, and they were more like hardened claws with dexterous pads. I also realized I was not breathing through the suit, but drawing in oxygen and nutrition through my skin. I wished there was a way for Grandfather to put me under an electron microscope and photograph this form before I restored. Perhaps I would solve that dilemma next time. My eyes jerked back to my claws. Upon them were the shredded remains of several white blood cells. Bugger.