Evelith and Leste stared at me, both bewildered by the sudden change of subject. “Dream? What dream are you talking about?” The atmosphere had completely changed just by speaking those two words. “Well, a dream I had that first night on your couch.” I told them what I had seen, omitting the parts about a lack of clothes on certain persons and the detail that I’d seen Evelith herself too. I almost never remember my dreams, so it was strange how I could bring the whole thing back completely and describe it in details.
They didn’t seem to know how to react, but at least neither of them laughed it away, and apparently it was up to me to break the uneasy silence. “Is there really a wall then? Is there something like an outside to this city” I asked, hesitatingly. I had never heard such things addressed on the infoscreen broadcasts at all, in all of my life, nor had the educomputers ever mentioned such a thing. But I knew now that there were more things that had been conveniently left out of my education, like the existence of the fundless in The City for example; or the state my own species was in. “Surely there is, The City certainly doesn’t span all of the world, we’re still a round planet you know. There is a wall around it, strengthened by a strong force field. There’s also the oceans too for example. And we’ve long wondered whether there were any humans outside of The City worth connecting to. But even the fundless didn’t want to answer that question until now.” Leste clarified, but Evelith seemed to have another concern. “So who is she?” She looked very serious now. “Berla? Well, you could say my only attempt at a relationship I’ve ever had. But I broke it off because of work and stuff… If I’m honest I had completely forgotten about her.”
She didn’t say a word but her eyes told me she was angry with me now. Strange how I in my state as almost-robot could so easily pick up on her feelings now. “Hey, that was the old me from long ago. And if my dream is true, she’s not only a married woman now but also a mother. At least she is not furthering extinction but getting a baby once in a while like you want humans to do… And anyway… She’s much better off without me. She’d always have been.” I could see in her eyes that she didn’t seem to be convinced. “You disappeared into your lifeless job and left her. So you just did a light-version to her of going to the thanatorium. She wasn’t worth sharing a life with at all. And for what? Work and screentime?”
Oh-oh… She was both furious and serious now, and I wasn’t really into the complications of real humans right now.
I defended myself: “The past is the past. I’m different now.” But it was easy to see that she wasn’t really convinced. “Barely. You’re just becoming human again after a half-life as a machine for most of your adult years. And even that is only because I stopped you from leaving the bar a few days ago. Otherwise you’d still have been Mr. Roboman on autopilot, being lived by his job, until you’d be worn out and sent to the thanatorium as discarded garbage goes to a recycle bin to be recycled after being taken apart to separate atoms first.” I felt an uneasy feeling in my throat now. “Don’t you see what you’ve done? Work and screens as the opiate of the people. You’ve been drugged by them and had your life sucked out of you. And she had no choice but to accept you were a dead man walking and leave you behind. I know how she must have felt”
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“Evelith, please!”
Leste stared at her, and then at me with wide open eyes, unable to say anything. This clearly was’t a comfortable subject for him. I didn’t know what to say either, with Evelith so triggered and suddenly having lost her usual rational outlook and intuitive optimism.
A sudden voice broke the tension and brought the conversation back on topic. “The dream was probably right. It might have been a message even. We must try to reach the community behind the wall, and even fight the mentioned feral killerbots if needed. At least that part is indeed known to be true.” San Yaoyao the artificial monk said suddenly as out of nothing. No one had seen him arrive as he had made no sound at all.
“Do you know more about a community behind the wall then?” Evelith looked at the sentient flying holograph. ”Les always says that even the fundless won’t ever say anything about the outsiders, if they exist at all.” The projected entity looked from her to Leste and back. “Not much indeed. If the fundless know something they keep silent about it for their own reasons. There was some whispering about those things on the networks years ago, before they fell silent. I know that there are indeed people outside of the wall, and at least one tribe of them that has been in contact with people in the City through a place called Lahkap.” I saw Leste nod as if he knew that name. “So Lahkap exists? It’s not a silly myth?” The monk nodded. “No, it must exist, but no-one knows where except for those who hide it from both sides on the wall. Most fundless have no clue either as far as my data can tell…” Leste looked a bit disappointed, but San Yaoyao wen on. “But there is more truth to the dream: there also is a unit of feral police-bots that is said to roam outside the City attacking that tribe. And the Wall is endless and virtually impossible to get through though. Behind it there is a wilderness.”
“Where do the pigeons and that raven come from then? And the plants? Aren’t these from the wilderness behind the wall? Doesn't that mean there's an opening?” Evelith asked. He nodded “There might be a small hole indeed, somewhere, that lets those lifeforms in indeed. But they are birds and plants with small seeds, so it might just be a hole in the force field, somewhere high in the sky. And that can’t be how your friend ended up on the other side. She probably has found the house of Lahkap then, or another way through it that we don’t know of. I suppose that your dream-friend had more luck than my informants in finding it.”
Leste drank the last bit of beer in his glass and looked uncertainly at the foam. “So what do we do now?” “What can we do? Not much more than what we were doing already… Just try to find and unite all humans and sentient beings that are left over, and try to not just connect with the fundless along the way, but also with the outsiders… But for now, let’s just drink one more beer…”