“So you’re going to give me Clarissa, just like that? No arguments? No battles? No dirty tricks?”
<<Correct.>>
“Kind of hard for me to swallow.”
<<We do an apology. That is because we know you but it is not reciprocated and you stand in a position of darkness that we hope to counter in these moments that we have together. They will be the only moments we will ever have with you and that is precious to us. And we require one thing from you which is a promise but you will do this freely at the correct moment. From now until that point you will ask us exactly thirteen questions and we will answer fully and with truth.>>
“Questions about what?”
<<About anything you wish in your world or ours. You have just asked your first.>>
“That doesn’t count!”
<<It already did. We are not limiting you from caprice we are just summarising this conversation from a later perspective. We helpfully add that at a future point you will wish you asked different questions.>>
Opal angrily inhaled the increasingly harsh gases in her helmet. She wanted to sit and rest, but that would look like the weakness it was.
If these were the rules of engagement, fine, she could work with them.
Except ... where to start? They’d already said they were bringing Clarissa. Time would tell on that one. So where could she focus her feelings, her curiosity?
“You say you’re not an enemy,” Opal said. Then she added, hurriedly: “That’s not a question.”
<<You are correct on both counts.>>
“Good. So here’s my first – no, second – question: who is responsible for Clarissa ending up here?” It would be handy to know where payback might be due.
<<You cause all this.>>
Opal frowned, and only just bit down on the impulse to say Me? They’d probably count that as a question too. “Please ... erm, clarify.” That’s what she’d say to a simplistic AI with communication issues.
<<Sorry we have difficulty with you we me us and your species’ perception of individuality. We do not mean your consciousness that you comprehend inside your brain bone. We mean you as a species are the ones that created the causal elements you primarily refer to. You beings make errors and come here. Humans call it Null-C propulsion systems but they are imperfect. You have not corrected flaws in the fluctuations of how they work. They can fail to return. They end up here.>>
“Opal,” said Aegis. “Please can I contribute? We have such possibilities here.”
Aegis spoke directly to Opal rather than over the loudspeaker. Opal made sure her replies were equally contained. It might be for nothing, but even the thought of having privacy was comforting.
“What do you suggest?”
“There’s so much I’d like to know from these Oracles! The cause of Null-C navigation errors they mentioned ... how local conditions tie in to the quantum matrix ... if I can expand my processing power and autonomy without relying on Athene’s whims ... whether the Sills-Platoric Equation can be solved in an actionable manner ...”
“That’s not stuff that I’ll understand or be able to apply, though. I’m wary of using questions in that way, unless we’ve found out all I want to know about what’s going on, how it might affect Clarissa, and how I’m going to get her home.”
“True. Okay, I’ll just chip in if I think of anything.” Though Aegis sounded disappointed.
“Do that. And speak only to me,”
Back to loudspeaker. “Okay. People end up here.” She paused to take another stale breath. The colossal structures on the horizon kept drawing her gaze, so that she didn’t have to look at the disconcerting shapes that wiggled within the brightness when the Oracles spoke. Were those titanic constructions storage? “What do you do with those people?”
<<We will more helpfully answer the variant of what happens to them because we are not the only entities here. It is not predictable where your people arrive. Some Topias are immediately fatal some may support human life for a limited time if damage is not extensive. The energy and life and connection to your side is attractive to some Topia beings with transportable natures. They will hunt down insurgent arrivals for many purposes. We do not all have the same aims here many purposes and encounters are fatal to your beings. This is why we also seek and make attempts to reach you people first when you come here. We do not take to kill only to protect and we only succeed with some of you.>>
“Selfless motivation. You like to paint yourselves that way. We’ll see how truthful that ...”
She wheezed, tried to take a deep breath, felt an edge of panic when it wouldn’t come. A shallow one, then. A message on the HUD showed that the suit was prepping the oxygen molecule injection. Oh joy. “I think I ...” Her voice was hoarse.
<<You are encountering difficulties with your gas exchanging bodily components. This is priority we can help.>>
The air shimmered. It was a dome extending from the shifting red-blue sands and forming over her. It rippled in rainbow shades like a soap bubble.
<<This area is now filled with gases your protective shell can pull in and use for sustaining your vital organism without discomfort. There is much we would give you because you have such vital importance in our respectfulness.>>
“It’s true,” said Aegis. “The local atmosphere is altering. Nitrogen and oxygen both increasing – oxygen about half normal at ten per cent, but at this rate it will soon approach something that is comfortable to breathe. I’m extracting, testing, filtering, condensing and storing oxygen as we speak. It seems to be the real deal.”
A few seconds later and Opal breathed easier as fresh air entered her lungs in place of the increasing staleness she’d endured. Like food after a fast; water after a desert; she gulped greedily. So, these Oracles could support human life. That made things look more hopeful. Maybe they told the truth after all, or at least part of it. Maybe they were bringing Clarissa.
But Opal didn’t dare give in to hope yet. Too many times it was a sucker punch.
“Thank you for the air,” she said.
<<It is the benevolence that you seek in order to allay mammalian suspicions.>>
Yeah, she’d see about that.
“Opal,” said Aegis. “They mentioned Topias, which might be the name of their world. It could be useful to find out more about the nature of our location.”
She nodded, then said, “Tell me more about this place.”
<<Of course. We observe you are asking for information so that counts as a question.>>
Damn, they were sneaky.
“Fine.”
<<Here there are many locations that intersect we call Topias. They contain intelligences. They contain also non-intelligences that cannot communicate rationally in translatable concepts. Other Topias contain emptinesses or negations. There is a multiplicity and yet each is finite and after subjective times that encompass ages to you they loop around again. No route beyond.>>
“Sounds like a prison.”
<<It is one theoretical analogy. We were not the ones who made the Topias so cannot fathom all intention.>>
“This place was made?”
<<Perhaps. We see signs of Makers. We Oracles are minds that seek and think by nature so all questions must be explored. But if a human was put into a deep hole they would not easily establish the laws of the universe from that limited viewpoint. That is so for us. It is a painful position for thinking beings to be unable to know but that is a nature of existence issue which does not invite great sympathy for it is not of terrible consequence. So we think for all the while that you have birth and death of stars. And that is not even how long we endure here and still we could continue with questions and in a way be content with the limits placed on us.>>
“If the place was actually made to hold you all, that’s maybe more like a zoo than a prison. We were wondering about that earlier.”
<<Preservation entertainment protection experiment by-product we cannot know. Not all beings here can pass between Top
ias as we enabled you to do but some have learnt how to open their own cages now the overseers – the Makers – are long gone.>>
“I don’t like this talk of being trapped. So let’s say you do bring my sister. How will I get us back to my world?”
<<Please be reassured. We showed you the transport vessel creation Topia on your way here. We designed ships not alone. Collaboration species coexisting we try to learn. Your side is different from ours it is why your ships crash here. Why we have trouble understanding. So research disassemble analyse guess at structure and function learn adapt copy engineer in reversal build own attempts to make things that work. Much goes wrong much is what we do not understand but we are getting better. Because we have to. Because on this we all rest optimism. We build we send hoping to get this right to understand.>>
“Right. The Lost Ships. If it’s just some big experiment, why do you make them so fucking dangerous?”
<<Not all intentional. Some is communication error.>>
“That’s quite some faux pas when I nearly get my face eaten. What’s that, a kiss gone wrong? No, don’t count that as a question, it was a joke!”
<<We did not count it. We need to answer more fully. We told that there are many entities in Topias very different. Some travel therefore there are many entities on what you call the Lost Ships. We Oracles are not the most powerful creatures here we do not have full control of all that happens. Some others steal aboard to escape because they want to get from this Null to find somewhere warm new food and life. Some escape in panic when deletion approaches Topias in expansion of the ever-death.>>
“Deletion? No, ignore that, keep telling me about the creatures on Lost Ships.”
<<Some are parasites. Different goals to all and different sub-goals. Some are in their own forms and some change to match what we found in assimilation but all are entitled to be there. We enact plans but we are not gods we are not rulers we just see clearly in all directions needs and means. Those boarding our creations are not part of the plan yet and not a problem either and yet they also are part of the plan. It may lead to great understanding many minds many senses.>>
“You cobble together life rafts, and they swarm aboard. Damn, I was right all along. I’m feeling a bit better now I know you have working craft.”
<<Not quite. The what-you-call-Lost-Ships return if imperfect systems fail dangers loss of cohesion.>>
“I don’t see the problem.”
<<That fail-return-emergency is the situation with every one we make so far.>>
“What the fuck? And no, that’s not a question. But if you haven’t been successful yet how can you get us back if this is all guesswork? I don’t want to come all this way then kill my sister in a bloody train wreck.”
<<We cannot make substantial permanent carriers yet. The large craft-you-call-Lost-Ships are not long-lasting. But we can make small vessels that are short-lived for single-use. Not useful for our plan but this is the kind we do for you. We will create human-compatible pressure and atmosphere. It will not lead to dismemberment accident.>>
“Opal,” said Aegis. “It may be useful to find out where they’ll send you. Especially if there’s any choice in the matter. We don’t want them to land you in the middle of UFS mil-space, or far beyond Athene’s rescue range.”
“Good point.” Then, via the loudspeaker: “So where will you send us?”
<<We can only enter your world from certain weaker points ones that relate to damage from the entry of your own ships to our Topias. And few of those are suitable for the transit systems we currently use that are our own design and incorporate ideas from attempts to assimilate so that we have things that function in both worlds but entails lots of energy expenditure requires source.>>
“Maybe they’re talking about the neutron stars or nebulas,” said Aegis. “It would explain why some places seem to have more legends of Lost Ships.”
<<If Lost Ships return they bring information on the areas around the exit point and we try to map them though we do not know how each exit point connects up in your world so we are mapping small spheres that seem to bear no relation to each other from our perspective.>>
“Kind of like my experience here.”
<<And one such sphere of known space contains a planet that will enable respiration and not burn or freeze dermal layers. This is the plan we have for you. We know it is one that creates fear because you are not like us where all answers are just answers you see some answers as things that can destroy you.>>
“It’s not an easy thing for me to believe. That Clarissa is alive. That I can see her. That there’s a way back for us, after what we’ve been through. That I’m not dreaming, and am just going to wake up from a nightmare to find myself in a cramped bunk on a warship, or pumped with tranqs on a surgery table in a field hospital, or strapped to a bed in a psych eval unit. You can’t know how impossible this all seems to me, even after all I’ve seen and done. You can’t know how I’m just waiting for the trick, the reveal, the lie, the mess.”
<<We can know because we have seen your mind and it is with sympathy that we identify the translatable parts of your individual perception. Apologies this does not communicate as emotionally as we would wish to correspond with your being which we have such an honour for.>>
“I definitely wouldn’t pick you to write speeches.”
“I notice you keep looking at the map,” interrupted Aegis. “If you like, I could calculate the ETA and make it into a display on your HUD?”
Opal’s eyes didn’t leave the living representation on the ground in front of her.
Loudspeaker off. “No, thank you,” she said. “This is fine.”
She preferred to see that physical movement of shapes. She could picture it as two sisters coming together from the perspective of a god who sees all. More of a feeling of solidity and therefore certainty existed in a real object’s passage than in changing sequences made up of the same ten symbols, regardless of whether they measured time, temperature, or speed. Sometimes the abstract is just not enough to hold on to.
“Aegis, have you kept track of the number of questions I’ve asked? I’m kinda lost.”
“Of course. You have asked nine, so have four left.”
“I’ve asked the stuff I needed to know about, any advice?”
“Well, based on the communication and translation issues I think you were right not to get too technical. It would be a recipe for disaster. ‘Oh, we use decimal points differently over here,’ they said, as our newly-designed Null-C drive ignites to three megakelvin and we cease to exist.”
“You really know how to brighten the mood.”
“Earlier, the Oracles mentioned research during the ‘birth and death of stars’. I’m curious about the Oracles’ longevity. It could be relevant in a number of ways. Ask them if the observed passage of time differs between the Topias and where we came from.”
Opal repeated the question over the loudspeaker.
<<What you see as time on your side is how you would compare flying insect with high metabolism to yourself perhaps. We experiment launch quickly here but implied is delays beyond your short-lived nature so experience is only imperfectly passed on with language not direct knowledge and that creates many gaps for truth to fall through and be missed.>>
“I think that confirms my suspicions of time dilation, though I’m not sure if they’re being mildly evasive, or just having difficulty communicating,” said Aegis. “It may explain why it is possible to predict the location of Lost Ships in our world, even though they seem to be a rare event. Can you also ask them about the ‘deletion’ they referred to earlier.”
Opal nodded, inhaled the air which had freshened up considerably now that Aegis had been able to filter and recompress oxygen, and asked the question.
<<Topias are each coded in size and environment and inhabitants. There has always been stability. Change in
this place is of consequence to study. And a change occurs of only a star’s duration past which we call deletion process. We use biology analogy of bacteria for you. A mass can multiply to fill space in favourable conditions perhaps spreading easier due to consumed proteins. This deletion is similar moving from one Topia to another but also remains in those emptied so they cannot be reclaimed and are lost to us forever of great concern when Topias are extensive-but-finite. The process gains speed perhaps with mass. Many Topias are being vanished even as we behold conference here and many more have been lost. You are aware of this.>>
“The darkness like awful burning chemicals that I experienced in one of the biomes ... sorry, the Topias.”
<<Yes we chose a starting point with possible routes that would illustrate this for you to comprehend.>>
“Why is it doing this, and where did it come from? Maybe if you know some of that you can stop it.”
<<All is unknown. Maybe this is a thing that came on its own and found us came from somewhere else different place from you humans. Or it was a thing that existed in Topias all along and changed or awoke. So many places here not all can be reached not all have been traversed or recorded. Perhaps it has intelligence or is just executing commands. We suspect it was a known thing to absent Makers but we can never know their intention or their mind for our purpose here or their role in deletion at this point in the spiral unless they return or we find evidence previously hidden. Maybe cruelty maybe ambivalence maybe a timer was set in motion long ago that will obsolete us. Maybe they did not even make these places just made tunnels between them. And maybe not even that just filled the spaces with collections. And so the danger of encroaching deletion forces us to become more aggressive in our ... so sorry bad term with human connotations ... become more hurried in our plan work in co-operation with those presenting potential. We work together. This is part of our plan. As you are.>>
“That’s the bit that makes me nervous.”
<<Time is limited and your sister entity is almost here. You are now to ask your final question.>>