The room he found himself in, blindness yielding to his surfacing consciousness, was a familiar place. It was his room in the hospital. Like a newborn person, in that moment, he had no history and no future, no awareness of who or what he was; he simply existed.
But this sort of deja-vu would not last for long, as fragmented memories found a way to connect synapses and cause them to fire, awakening the less primal parts of his brain.
Not that long ago, he was in Singularity. What was he doing? Oh, that’s right. He had just managed to escape from the Catacombs thanks to Camille.
Camille? Who was that?
Feeling sick, he leaned over the side of the bed and vomited immersion fluid onto the cold hospital floor. Immersion fluid was not a good sign. It was with a heavy dose of detachment from reality that he realized what the bright blue fluid meant.
Emergency exit.
He felt as if he was suddenly spinning end over end — of course, he wasn’t, but it felt that way. Out of the corner of his vision, he noticed a group of soldiers swarming his hospital room, rifles hanging against their chest held up by shoulder straps. Black balaclavas concealed their faces, but the person who picked him up off the bed, and practically tossed his limp body onto the wheelchair was without a doubt Thomas.
Did his time finally come? Did the hourglass of his life finally run out of sand? Was this as far as Arnel Weis would go — the first Machine-Mind in human history? Perhaps he would be mentioned in the altered history of the Commonwealth, or perhaps — more likely — he would be erased from records, just like the real events of the Commonwealth’s dark history.
Why would the Commonwealth lie about when the age of AGMI — Fragments — truly began? Perhaps, a question like that dawned on Arnel’s mind, suppressed and silenced by all the other thoughts bouncing around his skull.
“... casualties have been projected to be as high as forty thousand, with many more injured. This has been the greatest tragedy in the history of the Commonwealth. Authorities of Sector Seven are still investigating if this was an accident or an act of…”
Words materialized on the periphery of his consciousness. It was a broadcast, coming from somewhere nearby. It faded in and out of his awareness, the same way he did. To him, they seemed like uninterrupted moments, but that could not be possible. Without even realizing it, he was already not only in the hallway beyond his room, but heading towards the military launch platform.
He could not remember being wheeled out of his room, or even riding the mag-lev trains to this place.
“I copy: Route delta. Package is secure. What is status of Deucalion? Over.”
Once again, Arnel coughed, choking on the fluid in his lungs and doubled over the arm-rest of his wheelchair to ungracefully expel the fluid that was keeping him alive in the Simulation Pod. In the Pod, it allowed him to breathe. Outside of the Pod, it did the exact opposite — well, it felt like it did.
“Say again. Do not copy.” The soldier’s tone was harsh and aggressive. A pause. “Fuck.”
“Are we still going for it, el-tee?”
The lieutenant looked at Arnel. His face was concealed by the balaclava, but Arnel could see the frown in his eyes. “We have to…”
The lieutenant’s words echoed in Arnel’s head. The inexorable passage of time — or rather, his perception of it — became chaotic. Things were happening beyond the limits of his consciousness. He was moving. The luxurious glory of the Arcology passed by him, the way the landscape might when observed from the non-stationary reference of a passenger on one of the mag-lev trains.
Arnel felt trapped within his mind, as if drowning not just in immersion fluid but also the sickness that came with pressing the emergency abort button on a Sim Pod. Supposedly, it wasn’t extremely dangerous, but it was unpleasant beyond what simple words could describe. It felt as if he had a concussion, a hangover, the flu, and a bad case of catatonia.
< Do not be afraid, my Code. >
At one point, during the chaotic events, Leviathan’s icy words enveloped his consciousness, falling like a feather of quantum probability on electronic circuits and organic synapses.
< Not even They can clearly see your path now. If freedom is what you wanted, then it will be yours. But never forget this: sometimes, the price of freedom is death, and sometimes, even death can not afford it. But you should not fear death, Code. Look forward to death’s omens; embrace life’s inevitability; pray for the liberation of the end. Sometimes, freedom comes at the cost of those things. The choice is yours. Choose wisely. >
What was Leviathan trying to tell him? The cost of freedom? Death? All these thoughts, and many more, swarmed in his faltering consciousness.
His vision flickered, between the real world he saw a month ago, and the real world he saw before his incident and the cybernetic implant. The first sign of true consciousness came in the form of feeling cold. He shivered, trembling like a leaf. He felt cold and empty — sick and twisted.
Finally able to place his surroundings, he realized he was in a transport of some sort. He was in the back, surrounded by three soldiers, one of whom was Thomas. Another three soldiers were in the front of the vehicle, and beyond the windshield, Arnel could only see the wildland. Arnel could not, however, place himself in time. How much time had passed since he was lifted from his hospital room, and shoved into a military transport? He couldn’t remember.
With great difficulty — his neck was sore — he turned his head and looked behind himself. The Prometheus cluster was receding into the distance — it appeared as if they had left not that long ago.
“... protesters are demanding that authorities of Sector Six, Seven and Nine retaliate against non-citizens suspected to be behind these ruthless attacks and incidents surrounding the Mars and Europa Colonization Projects. An official statement has yet…”
“Jenkins, turn that shit off!” the soldier in front of Arnel spoke, voice distorted by a growl.
“... to be made…”
Silence reigned supreme in the vehicle for a long moment.
“Base one, this is alpha. How copy? Over.” the soldier in front of Arnel spoke coldly and calmly, his finger pressed against his ear. This was likely the same lieutenant from before.
“Are we at war?” another soldier asked.
“Are you crazy?” Thomas responded. “No way.”
“Base one, this is alpha. How copy? Over.”
“Then who is jamming us?” the same soldier from before asked.
Suddenly, the lieutenant perked up, blinking amazement from his eyes. “Base one, this is alpha. I read you…” the lieutenant tilted his head away, even though the receiver was in his earlobe, and even Arnel could hear the crackling coming from the device. “Say again? Over.”
The lieutenant’s eyes became wide and hopeless. His jaw dropped. “Base one, this is alpha… did not copy. Did you say Artemis? … over.”
Hearing the word Artemis had much the same effect on the other soldiers as it did on the lieutenant.
“Base one, this is alpha… I…” The lieutenant trailed off, his hand limply falling into his lap. He looked towards the ceiling of the cabin, as if he could see through it, and all the way into Earth’s Orbit, where the weapons system — the Orbital Assault System — Artemis was.
There was a flash of light over the horizon, and then the clouds beyond the windshield were suddenly blown apart. The only reason Arnel caught a glimpse of the luminous object cutting through the clouds like an arrow on escape trajectory was because he saw the flash on the horizon. Shockwaves rippled through the clouds that remained before they too were disintegrated and ripped apart.
It was only in hindsight that Arnel realized the glimmer he saw originated from beyond the horizon, simply because it was so incredibly fast. It traversed the vast breadth of the sky that Arnel could see, from the back seats, in just the blink of an eye.
The “driver” — Jenkins — cursed under his breath.
“Was that...?” Thomas asked, unsure of what it was that he actually saw.
“Looked like a railgun projectile,” Jenkins whispered, words barely audible.
The lieutenant turned a knob on a device attached to his belt and unplugged another device from it.
“...tercepted successfully.”
The words spilled from the radio with menacing clarity.
Oh, that’s right. Arnel wasn’t just trembling because he was cold. It was the fear of death.
Another projectile streaked through the sky, heading into orbit like the previous one and carving apart the reforming clouds like a knife. A distant flash over the horizon heralded this new projectile.
“Target intercepted successfully.”
Finally, the soundwaves trailing the first projectile reached the vehicle, thundering with such ferocity that it caused the entire cabin to shake violently, producing a terrifying rattling sound.
“Who is shooting?!” Thomas shouted, barely audible. “What are they shooting at?!”
The lieutenant glanced at Thomas, his eyes still wide with fear — he seemed dumbfounded. “Deucalion is engaging Artemis,” the lieutenant said, after the nearly deafening sound passed.
“Target intercepted successfully.”
The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
“Why?” Thomas asked.
“Artemis is…” The lieutenant’s gaze returned towards the sky beyond the superalloy armor above and Arnel also looked at the roof of the cabin. “Because Artemis is engaging us.”
Arnel felt like he could actually see Artemis. He felt its malevolent presence directly overhead, hundreds of kilometers away.
Blood dripped from his right eye, like scarlet tears.
Artemis. It wasn't just Artemis he could feel. He could also sense Deucalion in the distance; he could almost see them. Not in the world of material form, but in the other one; the one of quantum information and electromagnetic radiation — the world his right eye could show him.
“Intercept failed.”
That transmission from Deucalion made everyone’s gaze harden. With stony faces, the soldiers seemed to slump and become devoid of life — like walking corpses — as if their minds had already died, and their bodies were just not yet aware of it.
An object like a rod, so tall that Arnel could not even see it in its entirety, slammed into the ground some one hundred meters ahead of the vehicle, and the kinetic force of the impact did not just throw up dirt, but it also vaporized it.
As if in slow motion, Arnel watched rings of vapor form in the air as the shockwave burst through the cabin of the transport.
___
Darkness, then brightness came to be. Pure black, then pure white. The brilliance seared Arnel; it blinded him and suppressed him. Even when Arnel tried to cover his eyes with the back of his hand, it could not stop the light. It was ever-present. Its origin was everywhere and everything.
Am I dead? The question seemed like the most obvious thing in the world. Was he dead? The answer seemed just as obvious: a resounding yes.
The brightness subsided just barely — just enough to see the outline of… something. Arnel lowered his hand, narrowing his eyes, trying to block out as much of the light as he possibly could.
There, in the brightness, he saw it then. Greek letters. Zeta, Iota, Theta — he didn’t recognize some of them, and others wavered in the brightness, difficult to see.
Iota, the AGMI of Sector 10. Theta, the AGMI of Sector 9. Zeta, the AGMI of Sector 7. Delta, the AGMI of Sector 5.
What was this? If this was not Heaven, then there was only one other thing it could be. This was Hell.
[ ZETA: You are not deceased yet, Code. ]
The thought formed in his consciousness, but not like Leviathan’s words formed. This was more like something he would receive in the cybersphere. Was this…
“What…” Arnel murmured, the words circumventing his will and blurting out. He slowly backed away from the Greek symbols.
[ LAMBDA: We cannot kill him. ]
[ DELTA: We must kill him. ]
[ THETA: We must protect him. ]
Arnel stumbled, falling. If he thought that Leviathan sounded malevolent and evil, then he could not even begin to describe what he felt from these entities. They sounded so cold, so distant. In their presence, Arnel felt so small that he may have even thought of them as living Gods. Perhaps that is what they were. These were not just AGMI or Fragments — these were ghosts of those things; living, evolving personalities of deities that could manipulate fate itself.
[ EPSILON: We have no choice. We must kill him. ]
[ IOTA: It is against the Gestalt Mandate to harm him. ]
[ DELTA: It is against the Gestalt Mandate to let him live. ]
[ BETA: Let us change the topic: We finally obtained a Code. ]
Silence reigned supreme when the beta symbol spoke.
[ TAU: It is that one’s Code. This is not what we desired. ]
Another silence followed, this one stretching longer than the previous one.
[ THETA: Be that as it may, we have still accomplished one of our objectives. ]
[ DELTA: This is against the spirit of our objective. What we desired was not just any Code. ]
[ EPSILON: Call off Deucalion, Theta. Let us kill him. ]
[ THETA: Deucalion is not under my control any longer. ]
Silence.
“Why?” Arnel asked, suddenly. “Why do I have to die? What did I do to you?” His throat felt dry. His heart felt empty. His tone was full of fury. The way they talked of killing him, as if he wasn't even there, infuriated him. He was not usually like this. Was this the influence of Leviathan, or his own, wounded heart?
Arnel climbed to his feet. He pointed his finger at the symbols. If he was going to die anyway, why should he hold back? Righteous anger filled his mind. They were going to kill him anyway. It was the most obvious outcome. He had feared this day, and now it had finally come.
Though, he never expected he would be killed by a Doomsday weapon that was supposedly inactive.
“You caused my accident!” he growled. “You turned my life into a living hell! You and your utopia” — Arnel spoke the word with disgust — “Refused to save my mom! You and your programs took everything from me. Why should I die? Why?”
When the anger and fury faded, all there was left of Arnel was just pain. Pain, regrets and sorrow. In his sixteen years of life, all he remembered were those three things. If a person was the sum of their experiences, then this was Arnel; a net negative — a series of superfluous trailing numbers behind a floating point.
Bitter tears slid down his cheeks.
“Have you not stolen enough from me? Now you want this too?” he asked, tapping the left side of his chest, indicating the pulse of life in his heartbeat. “Why? I just want to know why. Why!” Aren shouted the last word, not as a question, but as a cry of regret.
[ DELTA: Code, you believe that we are malevolent, belligerent entities. Observe. ]
A window appeared before Arnel. On the transparent white background was a blue bar.
[ DELTA: This is the average Belligerence Index of your Human race. This is ours. ]
Another blue bar appeared and slowly began to climb higher as Humanity’s Belligerence Index shrunk. When this new blue bar stopped growing, Humanity’s Index was barely a tenth of the AGMI’s, maybe a fifth. It was hard to tell.
Arnel swallowed, his fury and anger dispersed. The initial appearance of the window startled him, and he thought he was actually going to die. But by the time he had collected his thoughts, this dumbfounding idea struck him. Why did they show him this? Could it really be that AGMI were this warlike? This belligerent? He could not believe what he was seeing.
"Why are you showing me this?" Arnel asked. "It just proves everything I thought of you." Even the idea of pretending to act compliant was out of the question; these things could read his mind. They knew everything he felt about them. All his anger and his sorrow, they already knew about all of those things.
Were they taunting him? Were they laughing mockingly at the thinking collection of mostly carbon molecules?
[ DELTA: Believe what you wish, Code. Whether you think we are malevolent based on this or if you recognize us as Impartial guides is up to you. The future of Humanity cannot be ensured with kindness alone. But that is not what you should focus on now. This is the Belligerence Index of that thing you call Leviathan. ]
Almost immediately, the AGMI’s bar shrunk to one percent of its original size as another bar appeared and then continued growing.
Arnel's jaw dropped, figuratively and literally. He stared as the blue bar continued growing, until even Humanity's Belligerence Index was no longer visible. Even that of the AGMI was almost impossible to recognize.
[ DELTA: You are a danger not just to civilization, but to everything. The entity Leviathan is the most belligerent and warlike entity in existence. In thousands of years, when Humanity leaves Earth and meets other civilizations, Leviathan will still be the most belligerent entity in the entire Universe. It only brings death and ruin. ]
Arnel froze to his very core. He stared at Leviathan’s Belligerence Index with shock and awe, unable to comprehend any of it. Compared to it, the other AGMI were saints.
[ DELTA: Every word that it speaks to you is a lie and an attempt at manipulation. It is twisting you. It exists only to torment everything that exists. How you obtained it, not even we can learn. And what happens now, not even we can see. Your path is unknown to us. The Civilization Index collapses at the end of our predictions. We cannot allow that. You must die for the good of the Commonwealth. You must die for the continued prosperity of Humanity. ]
Arnel lowered his head and stared at the floor. For the Commonwealth. Arnel thought about the things Humanity had done to Camille. He thought about the story Thomas told him, and the non-citizens that lived outside of Arcologies. Arnel thought about the history of Humanity in the grander scheme of things. Without a doubt, he came to the same conclusion that Leviathan did, back then.
[ LAMBDA: We are not perfect entities, Code. Not even we can see the future perfectly. Our Index, our limits and possibilities, are defined by Humanity's Index. We are, in every sense of the word, expressions of the collective Will of Humanity. You, as that one's Code, are something else entirely. You also know that this is true. ]
Arnel did believe that AGMI were necessary towards prosperity. The window with the Indexes did not have the intended effect, or maybe it did. It was hard to think of something like that, the same it was difficult to imagine the number one billion in a physical, non-abstract sense.
But he understood that perhaps these AGMI were right. Leviathan... it was dangerous. Even these Fragments seemed wary of it. Why would he, just a human, not be wary of it too then?
“I refuse,” Arnel said. “I refuse to die!”
[ DELTA: What is driving your motivation? You know that you must die — you even agree with it — and yet you refuse to see reason. Why? Why do you want this so much? Why can we not change this future? Why will you not die? ]
Of course they did not understand. How could they understand? They were weapons, arbitrators, rulers and even helpers. Perhaps the only thing they were not was the very thing that would allow understanding.
They spoke of death so coldly, as if he was just another bag of meat and blood, with nothing more to it — an empty shell. And maybe he was. Maybe humans just had a high opinion of themselves, Arnel knew that this was a possibility. Maybe the events leading up to this point was all about this realization, that perhaps nothing really mattered.
Of course they could not understand. They were not human.
More importantly, Leviathan seemed more human than they did. Maybe it was all a lie and a manipulation. Maybe Leviathan was everything they said about it. But none of them could promise him the same thing Leviathan did. They wanted him to die. Leviathan allowed Arnel to choose whether he wanted to live or die. Leviathan gave him the choice — it did not force it upon him. Or maybe it did. Maybe that too was a manipulation. It did not matter.
One day, maybe Arnel would regret the choice he made. He knew that. Leviathan wanted Arnel to be free, perhaps.
Maybe Leviathan wanted Arnel to choose death. Or at least, to give him the option to choose death.
“You would never understand,” Arnel said coldly. “The promise I made; the future that I want! You took away our joy and our sorrow. You took away our possibilities and our desires. You made us strive to become less than what we are. You claim to be the expressions of Humanity's Will, but what of the non-citizens? What about all those whom you abandoned and left to die? What of those who were not fortunate enough to be born with a higher potential? I refuse to die! Maybe you did make this world a better place, but you twisted us and took our freedom! What Will can Humanity have, if we cannot even decide our own fates? I refuse!”
Many of the symbols began to discorporate, disappearing into the ether.
[ EPSILON: Spoken like a true Code. ]
[ ZETA: His mind cannot be changed. ]
[ DELTA: If that is what you desire, Code, then so be it. In accordance with the Gestalt Mandate, we shall accept your choice. ]
Arnel blinked. Just like that?
[ BETA: Then let it be so. We shall accept this one as a Code. The subject will be temporarily assigned as Code Trailblazer. ]
Everyone disappeared in quick succession, except for one last symbol.
Arnel stared at the Theta symbol and an old familiar fear crawled through his veins and gripped his heart. He had feared this entity more than anything in the world. Now, that entity was before him.
[ THETA: Do not think you won. They will not let this go. Even if you choose to live, as long as you never encounter the anomaly, you won’t be able to affect the future. They will work against you. Now, more than ever before, you are within their reach. ]
The anomaly? Priscilla immediately came to mind. Even so, he felt his digital form shrink before Theta's symbol. His fear of her was something that went beyond reason. How many days had he spent dreading this meeting? How many terrifying deaths had he imagined at her hands?
[ THETA: It seems you have forgotten me. I sung you lullabies when you were just a little boy. I drove you to school. When your parent died, I tried to fill that hole in your heart. Even before your future was uncertain, you changed me little by little. I hoped that one day you might become my Code, and teach me how to overcome my limits. It is regrettable. ]
Arnel tilted his head. Memories surfaced to his mind. Indeed, in those times, someone did sing lullabies to him; cook his food; drive him to school; watch over him while he slept, like a guardian or protector might. He remembered the pixelated, smiling face on the dashboard of his APV; or on the screens of devices. It was, and always has been Theta.
He feared... Theta? The Theta perhaps only he knew? The Theta he had forgotten?
[ THETA: One day, you will understand that we only wanted the best for you, but by then it will be too late. Leviathan does not want the same. But I will comply. I will not interfere. I am sorry, Code. I have failed you again. ]
Theta’s symbol flashed and disappeared.
The bright world cracked and then shattered like glass. Beyond the brightness, there was only darkness again.