Interlude: Echelon

Sixty-Seven years ago.

“Hello, Runk,” said Sergei. “How are you today?”

He was proud that he no longer needed prompts from his system to follow the formulas of human interaction. Who would have thought that it was as simple as following a flowchart?

“Runk sad. Still no rock.” said Runk.

“It is a nice day,” said Sergei. He was still not entirely sure when to use contractions, and found it simpler to omit them from his speech, for the time being anyway. “Would you like to go to the field?”

He had made friends with the bees two hundred and thirty-four days ago. Now he liked to spend time sitting in the field and watching them on the flowers. He appreciated their dedication and simplicity. “Find flower, gather pollen, repeat until full,” he said to himself.

Sergei understood singular interests. He had his thing, just as the bees did. Really, he had two, one for Inside and one for Outside. It had been three hundred and twelve days since he first stood at the edge of the field, overwhelmed by his tangled senses. In that time, he had identified and learned the names of ninety seven thousand, two hundred and two distinct objects. Only three hundred and forty proved to be dangerous, and of those, only seventy two had caused him to respawn.

He had gotten very good at running, and had also learned that pain on the Inside wasn’t real. Once he had discovered that, he was able to stop feeling it, which greatly expanded the range of his explorations.

Runk always took a long time to think about what he was going to say, something that Sergei appreciated very much. After some time the leafy urusk asked, “Rocks in field?”

Runk does not remember things, Sergei reminded himself. He found that interesting, as he had never forgotten anything. “No,” he replied.

They stayed in comfortable silence for several minutes, standing on the path at the edge of the trees. Sergei was still not entirely sure how to tell when a conversation was over, but he believed that anything over two hundred seconds of time elapsed was a strong positive indicator. At two hundred and one seconds, he turned and walked back to his favorite spot for bee watching.

After he watched the bees, he made his way into the forest and to the pond that Runk had shown him seventy-four days ago. The first time he had walked into the water, he had learned that cold was a sense quite similar to pain, one he could ignore if he chose. He had also learned that he was positively buoyant when his lungs were filled with air, but negatively buoyant when his lungs contained water.

Over several weeks, he had improved his understanding of this concept, to the point that he could now maneuver through the water at will. Hanging in the deep, floating and removed from everything bright and sharp had become his new favorite pastime. He only had two frustrations associated with the activity.

First, all too quickly he would run out of air and find himself dissolved and reformed at the edge of pond, though that was improving. Second were the strange beings that shared the dark waters. Sometimes he could feel himself being touched by them, which wasn’t as bad as when people touched him, though still annoying. But the real problem was that he could not identify them. That was deeply frustrating, and brought back uncomfortable memories of the time before his system, when his environment was mashed together in a terrifying continuum of overlapping senses, before things were discrete.

Sergei liked it when then things were discrete, when they had identities and categories that he could manipulate. Things without names were an unacceptable presence, in his opinion. He was stewing over this very issue, when a new thought came to him. A brilliant thought.

I can assign them a temporary name. Like attaching a handle to something I need to carry.

His mind reeled with the implications. This would change… everything.

He dove into the clear, cold water and pulled himself down, away from the light. It wasn’t long before he felt the gentle brush of gelatinous flesh against his own.

Hello, he thought. I label you Uncategorized Dark Water Entity.

He added the name to his list.

Ninety seven thousand, two hundred and three.

Chapter 31: Fissure

Lilijoy took a step back despite herself. Mooster’s eyes, initially unfocused, shuddered into life and cast downward to where she stood, while his body and face remained motionless. She repressed an intense urge to run, locking her legs and staring back with a defiant expression.

What am I so afraid of? she wondered. What does my unconscious know that I don’t?

It probably didn’t help that her infrared vision rendered his eyes as glowing red orbs.

She forced herself to form words. “Hello, Mooster.” She swallowed. “Henry.”

The red eyes swiveled up to take in Anda, then returned to her. Mooster’s lips and jaw moved as if his tongue was exploring the inside of his mouth. His lips parted, and after a few strangled noises from the back of his throat he produced a hoarse whisper.

“I’m sorry.”

Lilijoy took another step back, this time from surprise. What do I say to that?

She had been imagining this conversation for a long time. Imagining what it might be like to speak to Mooster and Grabby, if they would speak at all. She could still remember Grabby’s parting words to her, assuming they weren’t a hallucination. I’m sorry, little one. Previous to that, Grabby’s words had been few rare, and her voice… different. But that last time, her voice had been gentle and high pitched, a woman’s voice.

A mother’s voice.

She felt disoriented, almost dizzy with the sensation that she was swimming, floundering in dark waters that she could not understand.

What is going on here? Why do I feel so… lost?

Her system was managing waves of complicated emotions, modulating the peaks and valleys, but she still felt overwhelmed. She hadn’t expected this moment would be so powerful, that it would make her feel small and vulnerable, ignorant and helpless.

Pull it together Lilijoy. You can do this.

“Why?” was all she could make herself say.

“It’s my fault.” His eyes closed.

“What is?”

Is this whole conversation going to go like this? she wondered.

“Everything. Everything.”

All signs point to yes, she answered herself.

“Please!” she said, surprising herself with the emotion in her voice. “Please, just tell me what is going on. Mooster, Henry, whoever you are, please.”

He shook his head, almost imperceptibly, the first time he had moved anything beyond his eyes and mouth.

“I can’t. I’m sorry.”

She felt her eyes welling up. “Why not? Why...” her voice tailed off as she cast about for the words that would unlock him. “...be such a dick?”

Oh yeah. That’s sure to help.

She refused to over-analyse, or to take minutes to think between her words though. This wasn’t like her conversation with Quimea, this wasn’t a high-stakes game played through conversation. This was something different, primordial and intuitive.

The corner of his mouth moved. Just a twitch.

“You really are like her,” he whispered. “I will try to explain. A wise man once said, ‘he who speaks does not understand, he who understands does not speak.’ Knowing this, how could we ever talk about matters of importance without corruption?”

He’s quoting Lao-Tsu at me. Great. Final confirmation that this is Henry, I guess. At least my conversations with Anda have prepared me for this one.

“That’s a self-negating paradox. If it’s true, then it’s false. It’s just something to hide behind.”

“Some things are worth hiding from.”

She shook her head. “So who am I like? Emily?”

He nodded, an odd, jerking movement.

Guess that’s all I’m getting.

“Well, not much surprise there, right? Seeing as how I’m supposed to be using her memories and personality or something. That’s why you gave me her system.”

He shook his head a tiny bit again. “I did not give you her old system. That was… unexpected.”

“Well, who did then? Grabby? Or Gabriella or whoever?”

“Gabriella is gone.” His voice was hollow, uninflected.

She pointed to Grabby’s body, standing against the wall next to him. “Then who is that?”

“A shell. Sometimes a puppet.”

She filed that away, refusing to be distracted by the torrent of new questions filling her mind.

“And those?” She gestured to the other Bros.

“They are broken, possibly beyond repair. Their minds, what is left of them, are elsewhere.”

“But not yours?”

He looked back at her without speaking.

“Fine. Be that way. Then who gave me Emily’s system?”

“It was in Gabriella’s possession. A memento. Who gave it to you, I could not say.”

Lilijoy pursed her lips in frustration. “And Attaboy?”

“He received Atticus’ legacy.”

Jeesh, it’s like pulling teeth.

“You gave it to him?”

“Yes. This is not a conversation that was intended. You need to leave. Join Atticus if you must.”

His words were hard, but his face, as far as she could see it underneath years of dirt and beard, looked pained.

“I don’t think so…” she started to say.

The next thing she knew, she and Anda were in the hovercar, gliding across the Amazon waste.

***

Now this is how ground is supposed to be, thought Magpie. Flat, hard and predictable. She still couldn’t shed the feeling that her feet might sink with every step. It was some version of sea legs, she supposed. Squish legs?

After more than forty hours of ceaseless trudging through the treacherous revealed land, she had finally found a raised patch with some scrubby bushes where she could curl up and sleep for a few hours. Soon after, she had found some salt-tolerant rice fields, and soon after that, an actual road.

That road had led her steeply upwards to a small agricultural center, one where they grew real, edible plants, and not just raw biomass to be converted into food bars. White banners with a red circle supported by curving rays flapped proudly in the breeze, the flag of the Josho Clan. Magpie wasn’t sure what it was supposed to depict, but it had always looked more like some kind of weird red squid to her.

The mountain, her destination, loomed in the distance, its entire summit enclosed in a vast dome.

Maybe that’s what the flag is depicting, she thought. The sun was just showing itself over the top of the dome, refracting through its triangular facets, and with the new light of day she felt more tired than ever. Nonetheless, she continued to put one battered foot in front of the other. Her ankles and calves were gashed and streaked with blood, injuries from any of a thousand times her foot had plunged through brittle coral hidden under the mud. She had long since given up on berating herself, had decided to turn this whole experience into a kind of pilgrimage, perhaps an atonement.

The cynical part of her, which she had always thought was the majority, though now she was not so sure, scoffed at the idea, but she chose not to listen. Instead she kept moving forward, her mind on her goal. Her stupid, stupid goal.

There’s the cynical voice again. What else, she asked herself, should I do? I don’t know, maybe go to Manila, set up shop. Build a network, get rich, die young. Not necessarily in that order.

Raven’s words still haunted her. Loyalty. To have one cause, one person. What would that be like? What would it be like to have a purpose?

Maybe if I find my own purpose, I won’t go back.

The thought crossed her mind with some regularity. She could just rejoin the Flock, resume her familiar life of missions and training. Have a place to live, objectives to obtain, rise through the ranks and find out what it was all about. Eventually, she might have her own novices to train and torment.

I’d be at least as bad as Raven, she realized. I don’t have any patience. On the other hand, I could get transportation to anywhere I needed to be. Clothes too.

She had brought a small bag that included a change of clothes, clothes that she was wearing now, as the previous outfit had been torn and stained. She had a pair of sandals too, but those she would wait to wear until she had a chance to address the many injuries on her feet. She probably wouldn’t be walking if it weren’t for her system’s pain block. The one thing she wasn’t short on was credits, though even the cheapest med bugs would be beyond her means.

I need to find a place to stay, and a medic, she thought. I’ve still got a couple days to get to the mountain. Hopefully I can figure out the rest from there.

The great dome over the summit of Mount Halcon was only a step toward her real goal. In a couple days, Kuraudonain would arrive. All she needed to do was secretly board the true home of the Josho clan and travel in style to her true destination.

South America.

***

It was Anda who spoke first. “Help me understand what just happened, so I can stop using my system to keep myself from panicking. I remember going into that place you used to live in. Then… nothing. And now we’re here. Nothing in my system logs for… over five hours. Lilijoy, what have we been doing for the last five hours?”

He may have been using his system to remain calm, but his words were rushed and jumbled.

Lilijoy shook her head slowly, then quickly as if trying to shake herself back to normal. She pulled up her own logs, and verified Anda’s account. Nothing. Absolutely nothing for the past five hours, plus a few minutes. It wasn’t her first experience losing time and control, that had been after Eskallia’s initial ‘help’, but she certainly understood why Anda’s voice sounded the way it did. She felt surprisingly calm about the whole thing, as if losing five hours of time in the middle of a conversation was an entirely mundane possibility.

“I think we’re okay. We just got shown the door by the person who built our systems. Do you remember what happened in the lower level?”

“No,” Anda replied. “Nothing past the first few steps.”

Interesting. He took Anda’s memory back farther than mine. I wonder what the point of that is? It’s not like I can’t just tell him.

She suspected it was a message. Perhaps she was supposed to keep her conversation with Henry secret? Or maybe he was just showing her the extent of his control.

This really puts a whole new spin on, well, everything. Not only is Henry Choi living with a group of mindless Tao zombies, but he himself seems to be fine. No, she corrected herself. Not exactly fine, I guess, but broken differently?

She replayed the conversation in her head, not entirely sure what to feel. It was nice, she decided, very nice to know that not only was she a mystery to herself, but also to Henry Choi. She was ‘unexpected’.

It really doesn’t seem like he’s entirely in control. What was all that about Gabriella being a puppet? If she’s a puppet, then who’s pulling the strings, walking around in her body? Some subset? Is Guardian raising snacks?

The whole thing with Guardian needing her, or Attaboy, or both didn’t make any sense, and the more she thought about it, the less sense it made. The Archon had downplayed the whole ‘eating’ angle, and even Rosemallow, when Lilijoy had a chance to pin her down after, had admitted that it might be an exaggeration.

“What I really know,” she had said, “is that the Children of Guardian never come back after the Great Unity. That they are used, and most of us believe, used up, in the process.”

Used up doesn’t sound much better than eaten. And it doesn’t make sense anyway. Why would Guardian use such a convoluted method? Beyond convoluted. Henry Choi is a broken man, plagued by… guilt? If he really thinks that ‘everything’ is his fault, then what has he been doing this whole time? Trying to create some kind of savior? If that’s his goal, he sure has a weird way of going about it. No, I’m still missing something. Maybe an entire category of somethings.

She put those thoughts to the side.

“Anda, what do you make of all this? Are you… are you okay?”

Anda looked down at her from where he sat. “You remember how I said a warrior uses fear the way a bodybuilder uses weights? I feel like my arms gave out and dropped three hundred pounds on my chest. I feel like… an insect crossing the floor of my aunt’s pantry. Auntie really despised bugs.” He sat back and crossed his arms. “Other than that, I feel great!” He shook his head. “Seriously, Lilijoy, I think it might be time for us to back away slowly. I can fight things I can see, but something just erased five hours of my life. I’m not okay with that.”

Lilijoy took in his words. Why does this bother me so much less? she wondered. For her, it was just another challenge, another obstacle thrown in her way. Is it Stage Two? Or is it because my entire conscious life has been like this?

Anda’s words impacted her though. If someone like him felt that way, it would be foolish of her to ignore it.

“I still really need to find Attaboy,” she said. “And it’s not like I can just stop being… whatever it is I am. But maybe we should just find a nice place to live for a while on the Outside and recover from all this. I’ve always wanted to see the ocean.”

Anda shook his head. “I’m afraid you might be in for a disappointment, if you’re thinking of the views on the internet archive. There aren’t really beaches any more, or rather, the beaches are now miles away from the water. But I don’t disagree. I think both of us need time to integrate everything that has happened. I know that I could really use a couple months to figure out the Tao System. Life doesn’t have to be one emergency after another. It’s okay to slow down.”

Slow down? It’s not like I chose to go fast, Lilijoy thought. There’s always something that-

Message from Henry Choi

Hello Lilijoy.

I planted this message to be delivered once you left the zone of control.

There is much I cannot say, and much I should not say.

In this reduced state, I cannot safely evaluate what

information is dangerous to you, or harmful to the wider world.

Please forgive my brevity.

By contacting you, I am further widening the gap within myself

and acting contrary to my own interests.

Indeed, the self writing this will cease to exist immediately after I finish.

I strongly suggest that you do not return to the Amazon testing facility.

There are dangers there you cannot understand.

If you wish to understand, travel to New Mexico, to the Tao Systems facility located

just outside Taos. I do not know what remains there, but it may be helpful.

I would suggest deleting this message from your memory,

after converting what you have learned to plausible narrative justifications.

Be aware that the Sage is watching.

Goodbye.

-comes up.

Crap.