5
Jordan squeezed me extra tight before we parted. We’d walked through the city to the half-way point between the Spire and his - our - house. I forced myself to let him go, and watched him head down the lane-way toward his home. When I could no longer see him, I turned my watery gaze toward the Spire. Its crystal-blue tower rose above the houses, pointing skyward, and I stifled the bile that tried to rise in my throat. It was still a place of death to me. It held the memories, the consciousness, the souls, of those who had been inserted and remained inside, either not ready, or not choosing, to come out. I forced my head down to stare at my feet, willing them onward, and I carved a speedy path toward the massive center building.
Once inside, a familiar face greeted me. She was the first person to greet me the first time I’d visited the Spire under not-so-pleasant circumstances. She was also the first person to find me during our attack on the city, and she’d tried to save me. She was always friendly, ready with a smile, and seemed happy to see me each of the few times that I’d visited, each time insisting I should visit more often. I’d learned her name was Irinhelle - almost as strange a name as Dagnija - and I hadn’t yet decided if I would call her Ani, or Nell. Either way, I was sure she wouldn’t mind.
“Lydia,” she exclaimed, almost squealing my name. “What a surprise! You’re here alone?”
That was the surprising part. I never went to the Spire alone.
“Yeah,” I admitted. “I need to see Mason, is he here?”
“Of course, he is. He’ll be happy to see you. Come.”
I followed her down an all too familiar hallway, forcing one step in front of the other, not particularly watching which way she was taking me, until she led me up a broad spiral staircase to the room at the top. It was a large rectangular room, with a jumble of clear screens hanging in the air, each displaying data that I couldn’t even begin to attempt to decipher.
“Mason?” Irinhelle asked.
“Yes,” he murmured. He looked up, appearing confused. Clarity then spread across his face as he realized he had visitors, and he strode toward us, walking straight through his air-screens as though they weren’t even there. “Lydia,” he said, when he reached me, and took my hands in his. “It’s been weeks. Is Jordan with you?”
“No, just me I’m afraid.”
“Just you,” he chuckled, then turned to Irinhelle. “Thank you,” he smiled, as she retreated from the room.
And once the door had closed, he whispered to me, “And she would prefer Ani, instead of Nell.”
“What?” I gasped, hoping I hadn’t spoken aloud earlier, and made a mental note to apologize to… Ani on my way out.
But he only laughed.
“So, what brings you to me? I thought I was the enemy.”
“Mason, you saved my life in more ways than I can count. You could never be the enemy,” I said, and smiled at him. I wanted to hug him. I couldn’t help but wonder how long it had been since he’d felt human contact, and I decided a hug was what he needed.
When I released him, I added, “And it’s actually been months, not weeks.”
His mouth dropped, and I paused to let him digest that bit of information before continuing.
“I have a few questions though, and I thought you would be the one to ask.”
“How does Jordan feel about you coming to see me?”
“He needs to stop blaming you. It was my decision.”
“One in which I led you to.”
“One that I would have discovered anyway. I’m sure it was exactly where Grid and Aleric were trying to guide me to, now that I think about some of the things they’d said.”
“It’s more than that, though,” he paused, and his eyes bored into mine as though he was trying to see what was behind them. And as the seconds ticked away, I began to fear that he really could see inside my head, and I restrained myself from stepping away from him.
“There’s too much that, at the time, Jordan didn’t need to know,” he finished. And if he hadn’t looked away at that moment, I think I would have run from the room.
“So, what questions do you have?” he asked, and held out his arm, inviting me to join him at a small table beside the wall, near to where the doorway would be… if it should open again.
Sitting opposite him, I cleared my throat, gathered my thoughts, and remembered why I was there.
“I need to know why… how,” I began, and explained the ocean and the sky. I questioned the ground we walked on, the air we breathed, the food we ate, the very people… It all came out in one tidal wave of questions that I didn’t know how to stop until he placed his hands over mine, calming the insanity that rampaged through me.
So much for not letting it matter.
“Lydia,” he began, and searched my face, before removing his hands. He seemed to be waiting for my thoughts to silence themselves, as though he could feel the numerous unspoken questions that continued to roll through my mind. “Everything is real.”
“It’s not…” I began, but he stopped me again.
“It is. The ocean Jordan is recreating, you have felt it, yes? Swam in its warm depths? Felt its spray upon your skin? Tasted its saltiness? Emerged upon its shore, dripping water, covered in sand? The ground you walk upon, is it not solid? The food you eat, has taste and texture? Is digested by your body? Nourishes you? Gives you energy?”
I nodded in agreement to every question. It felt real, smelt real, tasted real.
“But it’s generated by the Central Unit,” I complained. “It’s not naturally there.”
“Doesn’t matter where it came from. Whether it has developed over millions of years of evolution and climate change, or simply added to the planet’s surface in one massive alteration. It’s still real. Still made of the same materials,” and he hurried on, before I could object again. “Everything, everywhere can be broken down into its basic particles and then reformed, like building blocks. That’s what the world does, it’s what the universe does, from one through to the next, over and over. Everything is connected…”
“Mason,” I interrupted, almost breathless. I should have stopped him sooner. “I don’t need a biology lesson… or a… cosmology lesson…”
“I’m sorry,” he said, as he captured my hands that had begun again, to flutter before me as I spoke, and he held them between both of his. “I know there are a lot of things about this world that are new to you, different, they don’t make sense. But try not to think about it too much. Too often things are not as they seem. Just trust what you feel inside. Trust your instincts.”
There were questions that ran through my mind faster than I could catch and form into sentences, and they appeared to be mostly ‘how’ questions. But I wasn’t ready for a lot of the answers he may give, and I let those questions escape me, for now. At least, until I felt ready to attempt to understand the answers he may give. And so, I decided to accept what he’d told me so far. Just accept it as fact. The ‘how’s’ could wait. Well, all except one.
“How did you… this planet… end up like this? Generated.”
He sighed through a low grumble in his chest, and stared down at our hands now resting upon the table. “The Central Unit began as something much smaller. It helped maintain control of the planet, protect it for us and from us. It provided the necessities for everyone. But the people wanted more, and its power was expanded. It became the control center of the planet, and was eventually expanded to reach the outer realms. In some respects, your Earth is ahead of where we once were, for your people have already begun to pursue the possibilities of other planets. We delayed this step, choosing instead, to remain where we were, and develop what we had, until it was almost too late.”
He stopped a little too abruptly, but continued to stare down at our hands.
“What is it?” I asked him, hoping he would continue.
At the sound of my voice, his face rose to mine, and he gazed at me for several moments, as though deciding what to say. “I have something that may interest you.”
He pulled me up from the table, and led me further into the room. The back wall at first seemed a normal, solid surface, however as we approached, its depth revealed a concave semi-sphere. It curved from the floor to the ceiling, and from one side of the room to the other. We didn’t walk in. Instead, we remained near the edge. And I peered at Mason, wondering what it was used for.
My curiosity was without a doubt, apparent to him as he smiled at my questioning look. He turned back to the semi-sphere, and swiftly rose one hand up and out toward its center. The solid, white surface dissolved into darkness and from within it, shapes and colors formed into a multitude of stars within a colorful swirling cloud of dust and gas.
“Our galaxy,” he said. He turned his hand in a slow, circular motion, turning the stars as he went. “And this is us.” He pulled his hand backward. The action moved us forward into the swirling mixture, until a planet was before us.
“Threa,” he explained, large as life, nestled between various sized planets, moons, and other objects.
He moved the planet back, away from us, then slowly swirled the galaxy a fraction to the left. Within the stars and clouds, shone fourteen points of light, made brighter upon his command.
“And these are our colonies,” he continued. “Fourteen in all. Twelve planets and two moons. We are near their center. Here,” he pointed. “They are spread around us, throughout this part of the Galaxy. After the war on this world, the Central Unit continued to send and receive information from them, until one by one they stopped. All except Pelas,” he said, pointing to our nearest neighbor. “But even then, all we were able to receive from them was basic data, some images, not much, until even that stopped.”
“Have you been to any of them?” I asked him. My voice was barely audible, and I tried to blink away the awe that had me glued to the images. But I couldn’t look away. The sight was too beautiful, too amazing to believe it was before me.
“Several, yes. A very long time ago. Long before the war,” he said, but his voice was distant. And I watched him gaze at the colonies as though they were long, lost family.
It was then that I noticed two outlying planets, darker than the others. A faint circle of red surrounded each of them.
“What are they?” I asked.
For the longest time, he only stared at them. I wasn’t sure if he would provide an answer, and I began to wonder if he’d even heard me. But when a brief flicker of pain crossed his face, I decided not to push him for information. Satisfying my own curiosity was not worth causing him any amount of pain. However, before I could change the subject, he cleared his throat, as though the very thought of speaking had choked him up.
And once he did speak, I wished for a way to undo my question. There were some things I could do without knowing.
“Colonies, fifteen and sixteen. We couldn’t save them,” he said, and stared at the images a moment longer before continuing. “Each planet had their own Central Mainframe through which our CU would operate. It was one unit, but whose control spread across the colonies, all connected, all operating off the same information. When the outer colonies were overrun, the assailants tried to take control, but our CU severed all connections, to protect itself. What would have been left behind on each colony was a basic form of what we have here. Still functional, just lacking the all-encompassing power of our Unit.”
He stopped to stare into the scene as though remembering some distant time, and I knew he had more to say. A lot more. But considering how the memories seemed to affect him, I was sure he was finished with the subject.
With a sigh, he wiped his hand across the colorful scene, sending it back into the white concave walls.
“That’s not quite what I had in mind,” he said, and tried to smile. “But worth the visit, yes?”
I nodded. Despite the dark reminder of the countless number of lives that were lost, it was definitely worth the visit. I would come back just to gaze into the wonder that was his galaxy room.
He led the way to the far wall, where eight pearly-white chairs surrounded a long, wide table. The chairs were of a similar design as the table, and were spaced an even distance away from one another. The table was smooth, with rounded edges that curved under and then down, in one flowing movement. The base was almost a third of the width of the table top, and as long from end to end. Unlike the chairs however, the table was a slick mirror-black, but it reflected nothing. The shine that came from its surface seemed to originate from deep within.
We sat near one end, him beside me, and he picked up one of my hands. He then requested that I stretch out my fingers, and as I did, he laid my hand flat against the table center, and pressed gently into its soft surface.
Almost right away, images began to appear before us. Shapes rose from the table, taking a seemingly, solid form. People and places, moved and blended, overlapping one another. A jumble of whispered sound reached my ears, although I couldn’t pick out any exact words.
“You’re seeing memories, hearing them too. Perhaps a few too many at once.”
“Actual memories?” I whispered, trying to listen to the voices.
“Yes. From those in the Spire, and from those that were once in there. The Central Unit’s memories go back thousands of years. Though it essentially begins with the first people that were inserted. That’s where the memories come from.”
“How accurate is it though?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, back on Earth, people’s memories weren’t always that reliable.”
“That’s because they were recalling the images and the sounds. This is extracted directly from their brain, during the insertion.”
I suppressed a shiver. I hated hearing about the insertion process.
Wanting to move past that subject, I asked, “How can I narrow this down to one or two people?”
“Look down at the images and choose a person, then gently touch them.”
I did, and his voice came to the forefront as the other people lowered back into the table, disappearing. Only my chosen person and his surroundings remained.
The man stood before me upon the table, an almost solid form, three-dimensional, but miniature in size. Dressed in loose, long pants and a flowing shirt. His hair was pulled back from his face.
He turned so that his back was to me, and he then grew larger as he moved upward and closer, until his form encased me, and all I could see was what he could see. He spoke and moved as though speaking to someone else, and as he did I realized that I could feel him as well. His emotions filled me as though we were connected; his thoughts became my thoughts, and I felt all that went through his mind.
I gasped and held my breath as my own memories of the Colony invaded my mind. All of my thoughts and feelings while I was on Earth, communicating with Jordan, had been shared without my consent. Mine along with everyone else’s from the Colony before they were brought over. And I realized that this was where the Guardian had obtained that neat little trick from.
But I pushed my feelings aside, allowing the man’s memory to take over.
“To pause the memory, touch him and move him away from you,” Mason said. “Only you can hear them, their words, and their thoughts. Only you can feel their emotions.”
“Why?”
“Only your hand touched the table. You alone, are linked with them.”
When a second person’s voice responded, an image of them, seen through my chosen person’s eyes - and now through my eyes as well - also came to life, taking a solid form. When their conversation was over, the second person turned as though to leave the room. The memory had ended, and another began almost right away.
“Wow!” was all I could manage. I was mesmerized, watching the person move about his life, interacting with others, as his memories jumped from one scene to the next.
“It won’t show you his entire life,” Mason said, and I focused upon his voice instead of the memory. “This is where the Central Unit protects us, our private moments. When people go into the Spire they can choose how much of their life can be touched and visited by others. Everything else will remain solely with them.”
“Is that the case for everyone?” I asked thinking of Gia, Grid, and the others who had been forced into the Spire by the Guardian.
“Yes. While the Guardian had access to them before and during the insertion process, what can actually be shared with us this way, is limited. That is one of the reasons why the Guardian shared everything, every memory, every thought, every emotion, during inter-dimensional communication.”
I wanted to ask why, but I was sure he could see the question on my scrunched-up face.
“Because it could.”
“Why did you want me to see this?” I said, and paused the memory, moving the image away from me.
“Well,” he said, and grinned a Jordan grin. I hadn’t seen too many of Mason smiles, but the corners of his mouth turned up the same way Jordan’s did. Not surprising though, after hundreds of years of being in each other’s company, they were bound to be similar in some ways. “You didn’t want a biology lesson, and I remember you once said that you loved history, so I’m giving you a history lesson.”
“A history lesson,” I chuckled.
I loved Earth history. Where we once were, how we once lived. I had been filled with that inner longing to reach out and touch the past, to understand all of the things that brought us to the present moment, all of the decisions that shaped us, and our world.
This wasn’t Earth, but Threa was my home now. And it was Jordan’s home. The least I could do was understand what shaped him and his world.
“I thought so,” Mason responded to my unspoken agreement. “They’ll be in chronological order, for the most part. When you’re ready to move onto the next person, gently touch the one you have, and move him with your hand, back down into the table. You can then select another. If you slide your hand across the table, you can move through the many people that have come and gone from the Spire. The faster you move your hand, the quicker the years will pass. The technology of this is a little outdated,” he said, and then stopped to smile at me, as though remembering who he was talking to. “But it will get you to where you need to be,” he finished.
“Thank you,” I whispered, grateful for the privilege of bearing witness to their past.
“Let me know if you need anything,” he answered.
“You’re not staying?”
“I… can’t,” he said, rising from his chair, and indicated toward his work that still hung in mid-air around the room. “But I won’t be far.”
∞
The Spire memories were fascinating. I couldn’t tell how long I sat at the table listening, watching. I was absorbed by the people and places from years before, locations from all around the globe. At one point in their distant past, I could almost recognize an array of communication devices similar to what had been developed on Earth before I’d left. My current chosen historian spoke from a room filled with books, and I tried to focus all I had upon reading their titles. He pointed to one, and a light sprouted from the spine, creating a moving picture that hung in the air beside it, imaged from the words within. The historian spoke as he explained the scene, but his words barely registered. I was lost in the technology of it all.
“Our world had become so overpopulated that we came to the brink of another type of disaster,” he said. At this I was reminded of Earth, and I made every effort to focus upon him. “Food and fresh water became scarce. We developed sustenance-generators to ease this problem, but you can’t generate something from nothing. The very atoms that make up the food and water are in the very least, a minimum requirement, and our recycling of every discarded substance couldn’t keep up. The need to expand to other planets became crucial, and the development of inter-planetary travel and colonization became our primary focus. Until finally, we made it. And there was no shortage of volunteers.” He brought up before him, an image that hung in the air; the planet of Threa and the path through space, from one space station, natural or man-made, to the next. Until finally reaching the first colonized planet.
“Pelas,” the historian stated. “Our nearest habitable neighbor.” He zoomed in upon the planet’s surface. It was similar to Earth, rolling hills, mountains and oceans. “Over the many years of colonization, the relief it brought to Threa, changed our society, little by little, as societies will change. Our planet once more flourished. We had no need for anything,” he said, and brought forth other images as he presented a tour of Threa. They were divided into giant, self-contained cities. Each city nestled harmoniously within its landscape, completely self-reliant and self-sustaining. “And people for the first time, relaxed into the purity that our community had become.”
When he finished speaking, I waited for more, but he remained motionless, and I couldn’t move him forward. The historian had no doubt, finished his tour, but I was mesmerized and ready for more.
I followed the development of the colonies throughout the Galaxy, but with the next historian that overtook my senses, came an overwhelming sense of loss. Colonies, fifteen and sixteen were gone. The need to improve both the military and their defenses grew, and from this the initial plans for the Spire were developed. Their idea was to store the physical imprint, and the memories of every human, along with all known life-forms - every animal, every plant, every molecule, from every remaining world. And each person would keep their own memories updated, sending the data to Threa. And from this, should anything further occur, each person, along with all of the life on each world, would not be lost.
When the scene concluded, the historian whose memories I was viewing, ended my access.
I stared at the pool of people below me, in awe of their idea to save all life, and I could feel my antipathy for the Spire slipping away. And I wanted more. However, as I moved the historian back into the table, I felt my stomach growl, and I decided instead, to stop. I had no idea how long I’d been lost in their past, but I was sure Mason would have pulled me away if too much time had passed.
Not knowing how to shut it off, I looked up and about for Mason, but he was gone. There was however, a small, open doorway on the other side of the room, and so I strode toward it in search of him. But the only object within the room was a large, floor-to-ceiling, blue tube. It resembled the Spire, and I wondered if the tube was part of it.
At first, the sight was startling to see, and I paused in the doorway. But despite the surfacing memories of my fight with the ward, and my attempted self-insertion, I felt an urge to step forward, to inspect it closer. And as I did, I saw movement inside the tube. The blue contents appeared to be fluid, as they swirled back and forth, almost as though there was something inside. And the closer I got, the stronger the movement became.
I took another step into the room, but then stopped. I thought I could see a shape, or a shadow within, and I wondered if I would be able to see what was inside.
However, before I could get any closer, Mason grabbed both of my shoulders and spun me about so that my back was to the tube. Then grasping my hands, he pulled me from the room.
“Mason? Is there something in there?”
“Lydia,” his whisper was almost a growl. The shock in his wide-eyed expression however, told me he was not angry, he was concerned.
“What is it?” I questioned, attempting to look back at the blue tube, hoping to catch a glimpse of whatever was in there.
“Eyes on me,” Mason demanded. “Don’t look back.”
“Mason?” I questioned, startled by his tone. I’d never heard him speak so forcefully before. I didn’t think it was in him.
“Promise me, you’ll never go near it again.” He squeezed my hands, shaking them slightly. A sense of urgency overcame his tone, as he pleaded with me to agree.
“I promise,” I whispered.
He pulled me tight against his chest, squeezing me, before leading me away from the room.
I waited for him to say more about it, but he didn’t, not another word. I felt a need to ask him what it was that he was afraid of, but again I didn’t want to push him. I first wanted to reassure him that I would do as he’d requested. Perhaps then, he might entrust me with more of his secrets.
I pointed back toward the table at the other end of the room, and informed him that I was finished for the day, but I didn’t know how to turn it off.
He smiled, seeming relieved, and I followed him back to the table.
“Here,” he said, taking my hand. “When you’re done, if you decide to come back,” he paused, glancing toward the other room. “Place your hand on the table beside the image, let the Unit know your intention. Just a quick thought is all it takes, and it will suspend the interaction.”
“Seems too easy,” I complained.
He chuckled at my comment, “Most things are.”
I started to say goodbye, but the thought of Mason here, alone amongst all of his work, seemed more like an oppressive burden. He was so isolated.
“Do you want to come with me to see Jordan? He’s in his house, painting. Maybe have a bite to eat?”
“I would love to,” his smile was sad though, no doubt thinking of how Jordan would react to his presence. “But I need to be here,” he finished, and glanced about the room at his many screens, and I followed his gaze.
“What is it you do here all day?”
“I’m analyzing the Guardian. Trying to figure out where it went wrong.”
“All of this, is the Guardian?” I asked. This couldn’t be good.
“Not quite,” he chuckled.
“You didn’t destroy it?”
“Destroy hundreds of years of programming and AI evolution?” He paused to stare at me in disbelief, before resuming. “I… need to understand it. Find out what language, what string of words it picked up on, that led it down the path of destruction.”
I moved amongst his screens, fascinated by the code, the words, and the images that appeared. But in spite of not understanding any of it, I was still amazed at the volume of his work.
“Any chance it can find its way back into the Central Unit without you knowing?”
“No. The Guardian is not connected in any way to the CU,” he said. “This room is its own power source.”
I was relieved to hear him say this. Glad at least, that I didn’t have to worry about its return.
“When can I come back?” I asked him. I wanted to talk more with him about his work, and view more of the memories of Threa, but in that moment, my need to return to Jordan was greater.
“You’re welcome to come back whenever you choose,” he said, his smile brightening his face. “I’ll be glad of the company.”
∞
I made my way out with his directions, back toward the front of the Spire building. However, I wasn’t entirely sure which path would lead to Jordan’s house, and so I closed my eyes, hoping the Central Unit would sense my need to find him. After several moments, images of the roads and the lane-ways that I needed to take, formed inside my mind, and I saw a clear map to him.
However, I decided to go one better and will myself to Jordan’s house, to save the walking time. But also, to see if it would actually work… for me. I hadn’t tried it before. I’d never had a good enough reason to even want to.
As I made my request to the Central Unit, I felt a gentle push around me. As though everything, the air and all of its particles rushed toward me, forcing me out, to fill the space that I was vacating. No air filled my lungs, and for the briefest of moments, it didn’t matter; I didn’t need air. Then the softest sound of a whisper rushed through me, as the air was shifted from its place, dispersed by my growing presence, and forcibly pushed aside to allow the substance of me to fill the void it was now forced to vacate.
And then it stopped. The gentle movement of air and space settled around me. I opened my eyes, and smiled. Before me were the two wooden steps leading up to Jordan’s front door.
“Thank you,” I whispered to the Central Unit. Whether it could hear and understand I didn’t know, but I felt the need to show my gratitude anyway.