[New Voices] The Girl Who Became Tomorrow
When her world literally exploded around her, it wasn't too concerning. Because she'd planned on being attacked. And that enemy couldn't now see what they'd unleashed...
Speculative Fiction Short Story by J. R. Kruze
- - - -
NOTICE: The length of this - novella/novelette - means viewing this on the app or a browser to get the surprise ending. And my own notes…
OUR PLANET'S POPULATION was addicted - to their own brain chemistry.
Because their own electronic gizmo's made them that way.
Built and sold by people who had only their own selfish greed as motivation.
The problem was that their own narcissism kept them from thinking anyone else would ever find out. Because they had already paid off the politicians of most of the largest nations.
They thought themselves above any laws - even when they hired some terrorist mercenaries to bomb their competition.
That just set in motion an unknown force that now had “nothing to lose.”
This story isn't about some corporation taking on the government and other vested interests just to help humanity for a noble cause - although that happened, too.
It's about a very brilliant genius girl who found herself in the cross-hairs of all those above.
But the first thing she had to do this morning was survive her own office exploding around her...
I
I TORE OFF THE HEADSET with it's VR goggles and earbuds. They skidded across my massive desk, scattering papers and files like a mini cyclone. Only stopping when they wrapped around the very solid, unmovable gray base of Lady Liberty.
Someone had cast her as a thick bronze piece, originally created as a classless idea of a lamp support. I took out all that wiring and plugged that hole so she again stood for something. It's original message of friendship between two nations, united in the birth date of universal independence and freedom, had been altered by marketing to mean wanting "...huddled masses yearning to breathe free."
But those weren't my favorite lines, which were at the beginning, "Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!"
I stood at that thought, and walked over to the two walls of plate glass, floor-to-ceiling windows that overlooked that N'Yack harbor. Clear days would allow you to see that Gray Lady standing with her back to us, far out in the harbor.
And my thoughts always went back to my own grandmother and her grandmother - who had started and fostered a lineage of independent geniuses, ones who kept that legacy of pushing forward the technologies of this culture.
They didn't come here through that harbor, but instead were born and raised in the Heartland. Extreme geniuses with talent far beyond their time, education, and sex.
All we ever wanted was to improve the quality of life for the average person. Longer, more fulfilling lives. Technology that helped people reach their inner, greater resources that were always just below the surface. Just asking to be put to use.
Along with that natural-born freedom to think, to innovate, to create a better world than the one we each were born into.
But now most of our progress was crashing down to a dull brown mud of addicted conformity and blind compliance – all to get a dopamine rush as payment.
I brushed a black lock out of my eyes and swung the rest of that long dark mane out of my way. And put my arms akimbo as I stood there, defiant against the history that had brought me here to this point in time, this office.
That's what I thought as I looked far out across that harbor, looking for the real Gray Lady out there.
Not for long.
Because right about the time of that thought, I got a blinding flash of intuition and my reflexes soared me into action. Literally.
I ran, leaped, and flew across to the other side of my up-armored desk, where I landed and curled into a reverse-rolling ball of tucked knees and arms. A ball that bumped to a stop back under that tiny desk crawlspace.
Just before the explosion blew what was left of those two glass corner walls out into the streets below. And ignited the rest of my former office into a fireball.
At least that's what they later told me happened.
II
“IS SYBIL OK?” ABE ASKED me before he hardly had entered the room.
“As far as we know. The escape hatch had been activated and no human remains were found in the office.”
Abe Smythe sank his long frame into the nearest chair and passed a hand across his forehead, smoothing down his dark chestnut hair with a gesture of relief. “We didn't calculate that an attempt on her life would come this soon. At least her training may have kept her safe. That we can hope.”
“Juice? Water? Something more toxic?”
Abe smiled back at me. “You remind me of your grandmother, Steve. Always considerate of guests and family.”
I just smiled back, glad to have something to smile about. All I had been thinking about since the news of the explosion was my only sister, Sybil.
“So what do we know? What does your 'advanced retrospective analysis' predict will happen now?” I handed him a thin citric juice blend he preferred, and sat with my own iced water in the padded chair opposite his. A single dark oak side-table separated the two, holding only two cork coasters on its polished top, one for each of our drinks.
Abe sipped and took his time in replying. This office had been his once, and little changed since then. It had always been the Corporation Manager's, and never enlarged beyond the original, while banks of secretarial and administrative help took up the rest of this floor, a converted hangar. Gray carpet covered the floor, a tight weave that softened echoes, but was fast to clean.
The Manager's desk still stood in the corner, a bentwood swivel chair at it's center, matched by its twin at the right end of that sturdy dark oak desk.
The various computer screens on its surface had been replaced from time to time, along with the powerful computers they connected to. But the knick-knacks and photo's on the desk and surrounding walls went back in history to Steve's grandparent's grandparents.
The walls were wallpapered and wainscoted in a style of over a hundred and a quarter centuries ago. Only identically replaced as time had taken its toll.
Abe himself seemed hardly changed in the half-century he'd been working in and around Kane Industries. A few gray hairs here and there, some more laugh lines at the corners of his eyes and mouth.
Retirement, if you could call it that, suited him.
“Steve, I hate to sound conspiratorial, but this work has the signature of certain characters I'd thought were long gone. If it's not them, then it is a carefully-trained set of replacements tracing their footsteps closely.”
“That bad?”
“Worse. The destructive technologies they have access to now are a hundred times more powerful than when your grandfather-namesake and I helped your grandmother build their small flying business into a global corporation.”
“All of our offices have been put on alert, and any non-essential personnel have been evacuated.”
“That is probably too late. Evacuate the rest – give everyone an extended paid holiday to mourn.”
“But she can't be dead!”
“No, of course she's not. Even if we can't prove it. What will happen in the next few hours, days, or a few weeks will be the destruction of Kane Industries as we know it.”
“Our back-up plan....?”
“...Is already in motion.” Abe looked at a complicated time-piece on his wrist and adjusted it's position. Rising with a smooth motion, he set his drink down on it's cork coaster as he did.
I rose on cue as well, my own drink meeting its coaster. We turned as one to face the single, flat and solid wall of that office, where a hidden door eased open toward us. Lights came on along the narrow hallway beyond it, in a series. I followed Abe's quick-step lead into the long hall.
As the heavy door behind us shut, we heard a muffled boom and the floor shook as from one of the typical California earthquakes even our remote landing field was not immune from.
Offices were replaceable.
From my own time-piece I triggered the evacuation call as we continued our quick walk, one which only confirmed the orders that Abe had already sent out. Hopefully, all our irreplaceable personnel were already safe.
The next few days of our future looked to be interesting ones.
III
I WARILY POPPED THE seal on my tube capsule. Sniffing the air and feeling the humidity reassured me that the escape plan had gone at least OK. For now.
Only a few bruises to show for being blown out of the sky literally.
Those long hours of having trained first in the gym and then in my own office all gave me the necessary training to survive what would have killed most any of the crack military types. And we'd hired many of these over the years as our security, and picked their brains for all sorts of details they thought was just our morbid curiosity.
That we'd paid for too many of their accidents and even funerals and while providing well for their survivors, those curious and morbid details had kept all the rest of Kane Industry staff safe.
This was the third tube ride I'd taken in a very tight sequence. Multiple other tube capsules had been launched for every new one I entered.
This was my final stop. And yet, I still was only as safe as I was vigilant and prepared. Before I opened the capsule door any further, I armed myself with all the small and powerful weapons the capsule contained.
While there were hundreds of capsules that had now reached their destinations, they were all empty except for this one. All identical decoys. We hoped.
And trusted Abe's “retrospective analysis” to predict our future-past and give us the optimal choices to survive this coordinated attack.
All I'd taken with me from that office was the thin tear- and moisture-resistant gray jumpsuit I was wearing. With the Kane Industries logo on its chest. My eccentric habit was known to my staff, and had become a fixed dress code recently. Because we had known this attack was coming, but the timing of it couldn't be known with any exact precision.
Abe had been away traveling for the last couple of decades. I didn't blame him or sympathize with him. He wouldn't tolerate either. First his wife, and my grandmother, had died suddenly. Within a few years, my mother and father had both been victims of a strange accident.
While others figured that Abe's touring and travels were his way of mourning, I knew him better than most.
Abe always looked ahead – to verify the predictions that were determined from studying the past hard-wired habits of our “human race”.
That I was standing here today was the result of Abe's far-seeing approach. I'd never had to use these tunnels and their capsules, but knew how they had been financed. And saw his hand in every screw, bolt, and weld that built them.
Right now, I was on guard and was making all those long hours of physical training earn themselves. Measured breathing kept me alert, but relaxed and ready to respond.
The landing bay I'd entered was only a little larger than the capsule. All nondescript gray concrete, lit with low wattage illumination that gave no one an advantage here.
Once I stood, the little gray capsule sealed itself shut, then shuttled off in its tube again, as did all the hundreds of capsules that had gone traveling that day. Start, stop, start again. That pre-programmed sequence would be running for the next 24 hours.
I only knew that the way ahead of me should be clear. Should. Yet the small pulse weapon in my hand was able to drill several large holes through the concrete walls around me if need be. Humans didn't need to get in front of it. Their choice.
The gray halls were barely taller than I was. Abe would have to crouch slightly. But I was the only one in this space. Their slight angles, plus their non-parallel surfaces ensured my footfall echoes were canceled – but didn't offer any concealing corners to hide behind. While I couldn't hear anyone ahead, they also couldn't hear me coming.
- - - -
WITHIN A FEW MORE BENDS, I could smell the fresh air and scents of humid forest ahead. No human had come this path recently. I was still relaxed and ready, but was reassured after the hours I'd spent traveling all that day – since the moment my office had exploded around me.
The air was fresh, and the fragrances of various flowering plants, shrubs, and trees told of a tropical or sub-tropical environment outside.
At last I saw a crafted wooden door, hung on ornate hinges. No doubt this either led directly out or to a patio or entry room that did.
I found a tall, quaint cupboard recessed into the wall just before the door jamb of that outside door. Inside were a neat selection of folded silk kimonos with intricate patterns woven into their fabric. On lower shelves I found some heavier plain outer robes of some dark brown wool-blend fabric – also folded with care. Umbrellas were arranged in their own vertical nook inside that cupboard, standing in their own small brackets.
Meaning a change of weather is possible, then. The air draft's temperature, plus the humidity, showed that the silk kimono would be more appropriate. Giving me a little more color over this plain gray jumpsuit.
“Few airplanes to fly around here, I suspect.” I said to no one.
The kimono I selected was an easy fit over the top of my jumpsuit. I chose colors of greens and browns that would more likely give me some camouflage. My mechanic boots would pass for the light boots that were sometimes worn with that silk outfit in lieu of sandals. At least in our contemporary times. My form-fitting jumpsuit also didn't distract from the lines of that kimono, looking more like a long sleeved undergarment with leggings.
And I have to admit that wearing something more feminine, even if just a covering, gave a little lift to my attitude.
I flipped my long black hair back as I tied the sash and adjusted the kimono's fit. Then squared my shoulders and pushed the door open with one hand, the other still holding that pulse weapon.
IV
“ANY NEWS ON SYBIL?”
Abe's face in the grainy monitor only shook no. Worry lines crossed the forehead of that frowning face. “I have a couple hundred more obvious endpoints to check, plus any of the transfer points could have been an exit. We will probably be waiting for her to signal us somehow.”
“Meaning that while we still have every hope that she is alive and well, we won't contradict the official news-speak that she died in that explosion.”
“Or those that say we are both dead. Our planning long had conditional actions for that. Regardless of whether those deaths were factual or not.” Abe rubbed his forehead. His eyes showed the lack of sleep as well as the stress he was under.
“How's your bunker – comfortable?”
Abe smiled at my joke. We both knew these emergency quarters were equipped with every needful luxury and supplies for any extended stay. The term “bunker” was the giveaway.
“Like a 'pig in a poke'.”
That old joke was almost before my time. But I liked reading Will Rogers and other classics. So I chuckled – as much for Abe's benefit as my own.
“These plans we developed will keep me busy for months, regardless of surfacing or not.” I lifted one of the large binders to be visible to the camera. “How many clerical assistants did we pay to get these all cross-referenced and indexed?”
Abe replied with a wry grin. “Not that many, but they were paid very, very well. I do think you'll be able to surface sometime later this week. All the planning takes care of that.”
“It would be nice to get some fresh air and real sunshine again. Plus, these quarters don't have a workshop, much less a hangar where I can tinker on something.”
This also made Abe smile. “At least you have a nice library of books there, both non-fiction manuals and a vast selection of fiction books and videos.”
“Just not the same, somehow. I do my best thinking while rebuilding a carburetor or tweaking a new ram scoop.”
“I understand. And not to rub salt in the wound, but I just wanted to remind you that I'll be out of touch for awhile.”
“And I don't envy your having to be in disguise just to move around out there.”
“Nothing I haven't had to do before, or will never do again. And what is mundane for me is nerve-wracking for others – besides, that's where I get my best inspiration.”
- - - -
WE'D TALKED BEFORE in the odd moments about his advance math of retrospective analysis until I had to beg off. Abe wanted to teach me all I could swallow, but it required a peculiar talent for numbers and logic that didn't fit my own hardwired talent for hands-on mechanics.
Sybil could do the math in her head without needing a calculator, but then her genius was so far beyond most people that only Abe could keep up with her in any serious conversation. She also had my knack for mechanics, plus an uncanny ability to deal with animals and plants on their own level. Even the wildest horses or guard dogs would almost fawn on her after just a few moments in her presence. And plants would grow and flower for her that no one else could even get to sprout.
With her as my older sister, I was lucky that she was also considerate of my own genius limitations. She also was the only family I had after our parents had died in that strange accident. We were both in high school – if a private one for exceptional children – when we got the news. So it was Sybil who shepherded us both through our college years to aggregate the sheepskins and initials we needed. As well as the paid internships with business partners – in order to help us master what passed for marketing and sales these days.
But that's to be expected when your grandfather is a mysterious time-jumper like Abe. He never showed either of us how he did that, only saying it was the applied math he used. And if anyone could master what he knew, it would be Sybil. Talents like hers and Abe's showed up one in a billion, if then. Most of them were self-trained. Sybil soaked in everything Abe could teach her, and still had more questions.
Abe held the corporation together while we finished our training. And then between the three of us, Kane Industries flourished as never before. Abe gradually moved off the management lines to do his own advanced research.
That left Sybil and I to become the visible faces of Kane Industries. But just like growing wheat – the tallest and most outstanding stalks get clipped, sooner or later.
- - - -
THE HEADLINES SCREAMED for awhile about the CEO's death in a mysterious explosion, and the destruction of the main office and manufacturing facilities for Kane Industries.
On the financial page, the articles were about how the stock of that company had plummeted.
If it was mentioned at all, there was usually a tiny and short sentence about the stock shares being bought up by the surviving executives and the company going private.
Not too long after, some other disaster pulled the “news” monkey's chains to focus their ilk-spreading over to other subjects. It was either some “celebrity” making some radical comment – or was it another politician caught in a career-changing faux pas – nothing anyone involved in rebuilding Kane Industries could care much about. We had a lot of work to do.
I was busy getting a head count of our employees and ensuring they had all survived without even a scratch. Then any who wanted could retire or move other positions within what was left, or with our partners – who had been recruiting many of them for years already.
As for work, we still had several government contracts to finish up, and our most secure R&D was untouched. Because just as we work generations ahead of the culture, to protect and guide its progress, working unseen and unknown has always paid the best dividends.
All those explosions and accidents just involved the very public faces of the company. As far as the actual resources we had, it was more like getting a skinned knee or a barked shin. Hardly enough to need a bandage.
A great deal of the “stock plunge” was our own planning. Much of it was very legal selling off of stock from a host of nested and dis-related foundations, then buying it up at reduced prices through other very legal nested and dis-related foundations. All that had taken generations of work to establish – and was now paying off when it became needed.
While I disliked the process itself, someone had to keep an eye on the people who did. And that is where those thick manuals came in. Quota's, sell-off dates, various trigger points – all these were in those manuals. It was more like a massive fire sale where you are both seller and highest bidder – all through very legal proxies.
Those coordinated arsonists and terrorists had just triggered a series of events that enabled us to take our operations private again, and even more off-radar.
Bless their souls.
They didn't see how they had forced our hand. And then it would probably be far too late for them to do anything to thwart our actions.
V
THE PATH LED DOWN A steep hillside with winding turns and switchbacks that exposed travelers and left them no alternative. Much like equipping everyone with the same weapon makes everyone safer. If no one can hide, then no one can attack from hiding or defend themselves by hiding. It make more sense to get as close as you can to them first – but they'll always see you coming.
After an hour or so of seeing no one on these well-maintained, but very deserted foot paths, I holstered my pulse weapon hand gun and started really enjoying the view.
By the time I was just about on top of the first checkpoint, I was very relaxed and even smiling. Happy would be another word. While just a few hours prior I had escaped certain death, and now considered humming a tune – all that led me to conclude that there was something else in this valley I'd need to investigate once I got into the nearest village.
The checkpoint didn't help much.
All it contained was a visitor's log. Completely voluntary. The hut wasn't even long enough to lie down in. A simple table that held the log book up to elbow height for an average American female. On the opposite wall stood a simple backless bench. The door was pegged open with a small, sturdy cord attached to the wall. Small window openings above both table and bench had hinged windows that were also latched open, leaving a screened opening for nice weather – like today.
In storms, or winter, the hut could be shut up tight, but the latched-open arrangement probably said more about both the predominant weather patterns and the relative security of this valley.
I saw all this from the open doorway, and skipped signing in or leaving even footprints to show any evidence of my presence.
The borrowed kimono was the only sign I'd left so far. And that would be read only by someone who was intimately familiar with this valley. Other than a mole, it would take someone with Sherlock Holmes' observational abilities to see I'd been that way.
If I was supposed to be dead, then I needed to keep playing that part.
That wouldn't stop Abe from deducing I'd been there – but his rare talents couldn't be stopped anyway.
As I continued down the steep and winding paths, I was missing any quiet signs of village life. Through the tall trees, I started to see tiled pagoda roofs. But no sounds or signs of any soul present other than the chirping birds and insects.
The architecture meant I was more than half-way around the globe. I ruled out a Hollywood-type set, as even the most remote of those are still placed in smog-ridden valleys and surrounded by housing, paved streets and the usual saturation of populated areas. A fake reality is better disguised when the “actual” reality around it is just as fake.
With this location, plus the absence of human activity, I suspected that even though this was neither Shangri-La or Shambhala, it was isolated enough to serve.
Meaning many generations of someones had go through some very special arrangements to keep this secret. How they maintained all this would require a small army of gardeners and maintenance people. All devoted to its secrecy and solitude.
I had to smile that Abe had not only found this, but arranged to have a tube-tunnel bored into the side of this valley with their permission.
And where Abe was involved, it meant this was going to get very interesting...
VI
TYPICAL ABE. A SEALED letter, pre-dated by a decade, and delivered by special courier. From a lawyer firm I wasn't familiar with.
The contents were almost as mystic:
“Sybil is alive and well.
“Shambhala.
“Do not try to contact.
“More information coming soon.
“Abe.
It was written on hand-laid parchment, in Abe's unique handwriting. And while the envelope was a modern white stationary, the parchment itself could be of any date back hundreds of years. The ink would be archival-quality, and itself perhaps mixed from ancient ink sticks, or even cooked walnut husks – strained for use with a dip pen. No telling when it was written except for a very expensive carbon-dating process.
Probably the point.
So I wasn't going to send it out for analysis. That would be a futile waste of time. If Abe said don't contact, then that's the plan. His note was just reassurance. So I could focus on what I needed to do next.
Which was to take the fight to our enemy.
Just as soon as we narrowed down who they were.
- - - -
THE LOGIC SAID IT WAS corporate warfare. Not just your typical cut-throat competition. Someone willing and able to use terrorist tactics to destroy people's lives in order to gain – what?
The papers had minor stories saying that the investigation was going nowhere fast. Some dis-related terror groups had all claimed they had done it.
Back-channel contacts with all the intelligence agencies said they were mystified themselves. Since we dealt with all of them (and often gave them some nifty spy- and weapon-gadgets we developed on the side) none of them wanted to cut their nose off to spite their face on this one. We meant too much to them for them to even hide any inkling they'd heard about the prior attack.
Meaning that this was not an ordinary enemy. Not in these times. Someone with a lot of foresight – or hindsight.
- - - -
OUR PROFITS (AFTER all our R&D was paid off, and sharing hefty dividends to our stockholders) were held in non-profit educational foundations that quietly found genius-types and sponsored them to master whatever studies their talents interested them in.
Those brainiacs, as individuals and in their networks, were who I turned to almost right off.
Their breakthroughs had led to practical inventions and gizmo's that forwarded Kane Industries' progress – and that of our culture. It's genius-types (or genii) who have always pushed this culture forward, in spite of the colluding criminals who simply wanted control of everyone and everything they could get their hands on.
Even the government wasn't there to protect the people and ensure their security. They were there to protect their own jobs and their own retirement – and their own bottom line, to be frank, was “us first, constituents later”.
Our freedoms had always been bought and paid for with innovation and free thought.
And that freedom was bought with the persistent blood, sweat, and tears pouring out to make inspired, passionate creative thought into advanced reality - not in some dim future, but starting now.
As long as free businesses and free thinking stayed free - and that freedom required responsibility.
Sure, there were physical battles and skirmishes – mostly in backwater “developing” nations where anyone with two genius braincells to click together had left long ago.
And we supported our own military with weapons and equipment that would save lives on both sides of those battles. If we couldn't change where those battles were going to take place, we could limit the human losses.
Our freedom-loving genii were working for us, and quietly using the most secure communications we had. While some in the government hated that we could keep our secrets away from them, they also had to respect that we kept bringing them new devices just as they found they needed them. So the NSA and other spy networks simply took it for granted that we weren't to be hacked – not if they wanted their next generation spy gear to arrive 'just in time” again. We called it the “Golden Goose” strategy.
Our analysis came back to whoever those someones were behind the social media and entertainment coding. Cabals of programmers had figured out how to tap yet another hard-wired human-brain dopamine rush - just so their masters could profit insanely.
So far, we'd found that they had just wanted people to stoke up on fast food and then glue themselves to their TV's and gaming devices. Shortened their lifespans, but that was about it.
Until we got a glimpse of what someone was orchestrating. The code behind all this was just a tip of the iceberg. Someone was getting these people addicted to their tweets and likes and inane “reality TV” shows – then harvesting their reactions. Not just to sell them more stuff at the expense of their “privacy”.
They were using all these people to write code. Enslaving code.
Very crude, almost wholesale – or so it seemed. The code was just spring-boarding off their wired-in addictions. Salt, Fat, Sugar – that was just the beginning. And those three themselves were getting a fair amount of push-back. People started seeing that the obesity epidemic and their rising healthcare costs were starting to limit their mobility and their choices – other words for freedom.
That code was supposed to nip those urges in the bud, and get them back into blind conformity – all under the guise of Fear of Missing Out.
These shadow programmers also tied together social media with politics and entertainment – to made sure that people were only served up their own interests. This further polarized the media and so fired up their reader's and viewer's emotional responses. This split nations into two or more armed camps. And kept them at each others virtual throats.
Those results then elected clueless and polarizing politicians who just kept the pitched battles going. Of course, nothing changed in Washington or other governments. They never did, other than to find more ways to give money away they never had to begin with. Other than feel-good resolutions, the politicians only passed laws that made it easier for their constituents to rack up debt so they needed to keep their jobs. And so they wouldn't start free-thinking businesses on their own. And that chain of events just kept spiraling down tighter and tighter. More polarization, more crushing debt, more need for the dopamine rush to make it “all just go away”.
Finding that code gave us a clue. Even though we couldn't work out where it was going to or coming from.
That coding was in everything through the Internet once we started looking for it. One reason they had switched from shipping cheap DVD's to streaming. Because that code was found in everyone's entertainment. Those “set-top” boxes and “smart TV's” not only delivered those games and films, but did their data collection as well.
Global. Insidious. Addictive.
At least we had a trail now. And “all” we had to do was to be so effectively creative that their defensive counter-efforts fell useless.
Because if we didn't, we would all end up just as addicted and dead-headed (or dead) as if we didn't try at all.
The result was the same.
What these people didn't realize was that they just invented their own worst enemy. Fueled by something called: "nothing to lose."
They'd struck first. They thought to take out take out the only people who could find and neutralize their efforts to enslave humankind.
They just didn't know what they didn't know. Their own narcissism led them to believe that no one was smart enough to figure out what they were up to.
And that was our advantage. We knew just a hair more about them then they did about us.
That hair-line crack needed to widen.
So our genii network got to work.
Our only problem is that we were already far behind.
And Abe brought us our next tip – one where I really wished we had Sybil's help to implement it...
VII
THE FIRST AND ONLY person I met in that village was after a long search. A very long search.
Because the place was immaculate. And empty.
Convoluted, twisting streets all ended on a central boulevard – if you could call it that. Hardly wide enough for two ox carts to pass in between the walls and the flower boxes.
If it weren't for the complete lack of ox-carts, oxen, or life of any sort. Otherwise, it seemed that flowers were the main population of the place. All sorts of annuals and perennials. And planted more by color than particular species of plant or type. If it could grow outside in direct or indirect sunlight, it did. Wild flowers, cultured hybrids, thorned, thorn-less, bulbs or seeds or rhizomes – every possible type in riotous combinations.
Orange flowers in one section, with blue and green highlights. Blue flowers in another section with orange and yellow highlights. Tall, short, it didn't matter. Everything growing with their own display and none upstaging the others. Each unique in all possible combinations.
And the scents were a riot for the nose. While breezes would shift and take some scents away, only to replace them with others, tempting to you with new smells – always just ahead.
This main boulevard just flowed in curves and twists right up the opposite side of the valley. All to a monastery-like building that rose with white, steep walls above the narrow valley floor.
If this place was ever invaded, it seemed a pretty simple conquest. Just charge up this main street and divide the city.
For the exception that nothing lived here except flowers. Not worth conquering.
Well, maybe their caretakers. But those were missing, too – and had to be around here, somewhere.
I dared not call out, for fear it was all a trap, an ambush.
My soft-soled mechanics shoes made no sound as I walked carefully up the winding and ever steeper boulevard as it became more curved and twisting.
That steepness finally gave way to paved steps. Ones that started out wide and long and then became taller and narrower until my foot barely fit on a step and I was having to take large steps to mount each one – until the stairs started twisting on their own switch-backs, only wide enough for a single person.
At last they stopped twisting on themselves as they reached a narrow porch that split evenly across the entire front of the monastery building. The nearest windows were a couple of stories up from there. Meaning that I chose one or the other halves of that porch, hoping to find a door to the inside at their end.
On that choice, I sat to rest.
Even as good a shape I was in from all my regular workouts, my progress to this porch from where I'd emerged from my capsule was a trek in itself. The apparent high altitude didn't help. My lungs were working overtime.
Of course the view from that porch was just heart-stopping. No cinema or camera had ever captured a beauty like this. The colors from the flowers all blended into some sort of pointillist painting, until they in turn blended into the various green swaths of the trees and shrubs on the other side of the valley, rising into the blues and whites of the mountain sides above them. At last the tops of those mountains were hidden in whitish mists and clouds, where the sun only appeared as a fuzzy yellow globe.
Then I felt it. To call what came over me as “a peace that passes understanding” would be the understatement of the century.
How long I sat there, transfixed, I had no way of estimating. Because I didn't even care to look at the special time-piece on my wrist. All my concerns had dropped away.
At last the yellow globe had moved down almost touching opposite valley wall, and the shadows had become deep nearly half-way across. Then a chill wind came up and brought me to my senses.
I was wearing a thin jumpsuit and a thinner kimono – not one of those thick wool-blend robes I'd passed over when I came into this valley. I could only hope to get inside for some comfort before whatever passed for weather here made me wish I had made a sturdier choice.
Even as I thought that, the sky darkened and the wind rose. Rain was on its way.
- - - -
TAKING THE LEFT-HAND porch also put my pulse weapon on the outside, where I could get to it fast. If this porch narrowed, then flattening against the wall hid that weapon where any potential assailant wouldn't see me pull it. Knives were at my right hand, but I could throw as well with either.
So I started my quick-step along the porch. The incline gradually increased, but not enough to require steps until the end – which just dropped off into a wide cleft. Straight down into stone flower boxes below – hardly enough to cushion a fall. Across was a sheer blank wall with no foot holds. I could see where it had been carefully hand-chiseled flat. Here were the defenses for this monastery.
Looking up showed the roof well above us had narrow openings, no doubt where burning oil could be spilled on attackers.
A tiny few devoted followers could hold off everything except artillery – but airlifting anything into this valley that could make a dent in these thick walls would cost a small fortune – and would have to arrive for assembly. Meanwhile, guerrilla forces could attack any landed ground troops and hide from overhead sniping.
My mind was racing with very uncommon thoughts for me. I was usually building new devices in my mind, to fill very human needs that would make it possible for people to free up their own minds to better uses than just eking out a living on this planet. Combat tactics and strategy wasn't wired into my main logic processes. But this morning had started out with an attack, so – what's good for the gander...
Somehow, all this experience would give me some new inspiration for counter-measures that would make this all unnecessary. That was my real hard-wired circuits. No matter what the adversity, finding the opportunity underneath – once this was all over.
- - - -
A TURN AND A FEW STEEP steps to my right put me onto another long, empty porch. While the darkness gathered and the glowing ball of sun started to be covered behind thickening dark clouds.
My quick-step turned into a trot down that porch, regardless of my lungs and tired legs.
In the center of that porch was a single set of steps up to a pair of matching orange-lacquered doors, trimmed in dark brown. Both tall and massive. And in the center of each door was a polished bronze ring, hanging above it's own polished bronze plate. Each ring was as wide as my shoulders, as thick as my forearm. If solid, the ring would weigh as much as a full sack of feed, or an ox-cart wheel.
Door-knockers? Doubt it.
Yet that was the next trial, apparently. No other handhold in the smooth wood. No outside latch or even bell cord.
And then the first drops started falling. Across the darkened valley the wind picked up more, sweeping my long black hair both into and out of my eyes as I turned for a glimpse of the curtain of rain coming toward me.
Up the few steps to stand on a narrow foot-wide door sill. And reaching up to just get my fingertips underneath that ring – standing on my tip-toes to get that much.
The rain began in earnest right then, and the wind was shooting it as small pellets into my back. Even as water-resistant as my jumpsuit was, in seconds what wasn't soaked was dripping onto the parts where it was. All the while, the wind had increased into a fierce gale at my back.
No, I hadn't gotten the massive ring to move.
But then the door did move on its own.
I just saw a fleeting glimpse of a smiling face in an orange robe – when a sudden gust of wind pushed me right by him and through the doorway.
Then I stumbled and fell – into darkness...
VIII
ANOTHER OF ABE'S MYSTIC letters was delivered, from that same unknown lawyer firm. (Yes, I did look them up, and found no address for them. Only the firm's name printed on the envelope flap. Not registered under any phone directory or commercial listing anywhere. For all I knew, these things were coming via “owl post”.)
The letter read:
“Alternate solutions create alternate futures. Sybil and I will be back with you sooner than late. Consider your genii options with care. The unexpected has no military response. Beware the fixed-bayonet charge.”
Must be writing from some other time-space and unable to violate their rules. Otherwise, this is something that makes no sense. And Abe always made sense, in his sometimes cryptic fashion.
The only non-cryptic sentence was “Sybil and he would be returning,” probably in the nick of time.
The rest I started deciphering.
“Alternate solutions. Unexpected has no military response.” Those were practical. Meaning we couldn't just attack back.
This wasn't a chess game with a fixed number of moves and stratagems possible. This was more like Go – a matter of philosophy – but more than that, since anything with a limited playing field was zero-sum by definition.
“Fixed bayonets.” Now, that could mean the old-style, over the ramparts rushing at the enemy. Always a way to lose most of your men in any battle. The next-to-last order those men ever heard was to “fix bayonets” – for when your bullets ran out. Suicidal.
Like the red-coated British stood in “proper” ranks while the colonial resistance took cover behind bullet-proof trees and boulders, reloading their single-fire muskets in ease and behind shelter. Picking off British standing out in the open and reloading only by order.
What's that term? Asymmetric warfare.
Non-governmental agencies had attacked us with violence. And our response had to be unexpected. Alternate. Asymmetric. Like withdrawing all our known pieces from the board and taking the corporation private. Their next action following would be to attack that private corporation via lawsuits and regulatory commissions. And tie us up in legal maneuvers while they used the legally-required “discovery” to find our other resources – and then attack them with terrorist-blamed violence.
“Consider your genii options with care.”
Probably meant some serious brainstorming. Or non-serious.
Avoid the zero-sum outcomes. Game theory – but probably MMO or Ender's Game rather than typical think-tank clumsiness.
The flash of inspiration hit me.
We had that time drive of Abe's. And the lunar dirigible of my great-great-grandmother's – that pilot design first engineered and built to run on Radium...
- - - -
WE MET OUTSIDE OF ANY known space-time.
(How's that for asymmetric?)
All our network of geniuses were “borrowed” from their own hectic and busy lives so we could get them into a singular space-time without needing the overhead of hack-proof communications.
(Yes, in case you're wondering, Abe has been tinkering with those drives for the past 40 years and they've been stable for at least the last 20. As long as he was operating them, that is. So we're running on his detailed directions...)
We arranged to use an old moon base on its far side that had been decommissioned, but was still in maintenance mode with plenty of air and artificial-gravity generators. No one had been there for years, but that didn't mean we weren't under a time crunch to come up with solutions.
So we also stocked it with all the favorite frozen sandwiches and pizza's as well as non-caffeinated energy drinks and other goodies selected by survey. We could theoretically make any “runs” we wanted for hot, fresh food, but that just ran the risk of a major blown cover. Something we couldn't afford.
Because the future of the humankind civilization was at risk.
So we just “made do” and got to work.
IX
I AWOKE TO SOMETHING like an old movie I'd seen.
Hu-u-uge bed. Bigger than King size.
All to myself.
White cotton sheets, white canopy over the whole thing. White quilted comforter over that. I was warm and comfy-cozy.
And buck-naked underneath all this comfort.
The bed was in a huge Oriental-styled bedroom. And I got a brief idea that I'd swallowed some Alice in Wonderland potion to shrink down to tiny.
Sure, there was a pull cord on each side of the bed – but I didn't want to bother getting out of my little warm spot to slide across those cool sheets to pull on it – and then what? Try to warm up that new chilly spot or scoot back across the bed to this warm spot I was already in?
At least I didn't have long to figure it out.
Across that huge gulf between the foot of this massive bed, the opposite wall held an immensely tall pair of hand-crafted orange-lacquered doors with intricate inlaid patterns, flanked by ornate tapestries on each side.
And as I looked, one of those crafted doors cracked open.
In stuck a small, shaved head with a wide smile.
“Good morning, sunshine!”
I had to smile in return. Sitting up and clutching the sheet and comforter to my chest, I returned the second line: “What makes you come so soon?”
“You used to come at 10 o'clock,”
“And now you come at noon.”
The smiling head now entered on top of a monk's orange-robed body.
Of course the relative sizes of everything in this room made him look small. But if this was the same monk I glimpsed just before I stumbled into this place, he was about my own height.
“To whom to I owe this honor of my naked self in this massive bed?”
“Oh, yes. Introductions are in order. You're Sybil, of course, and you can call me Akashi.”
“As in the Akashic records?”
“One and the same. At your service.”
“But as I recall the legends, there are only answers to questions, no hints or tips otherwise, no indexes or keyword searches.”
“True. Unless...”
I raised my eyebrow. “Unless?”
“See – you're a fast learner. Unless – you like to trade jokes or can whip up a really good stuffed pastry.”
Akashi snapped his fingers and in his hand appeared a pastry, which he took a bite from with delight. His eyes closed, his head tilted, and he seemed to have reached nirvana with that one bite.
Then one eye opened to look at me. (Which was a bit comical, as his head was canted to the side and white powdered sugar circled his mouth.)
“No, I didn't forget you. Blueberry or lemon cream?”
“Lemon cream, of course.”
A small rustle occurred to my left and there appeared a small china plate with my own stuffed pastry – it's tell-tale yellow dot evidence where it had been stuffed, and gave its flavor away. A fine cloth napkin laid folded beneath the plate.
After what I'd seen of this valley and this monk, some sleight of hand was acceptable.
And for the next few minutes, we only shared that nirvana as we munched in quietude.
Wiping my mouth with the napkin, I asked my first question: “Where am I?”
“In bed. Naked, as you pointed out.” Akashi smiled and pulled a napkin out of his own sleeve to wipe the pastry excesses from his face.
I just smiled and shook my head. This could be funny or it could be trying.
I tilted my head to the side. “What is the continent-country-city that this bed is located in?”
“None that you'd recognize. Call it Shambhala.”
“Like the mysterious 'Shangri-La.”
“Only without the Hollywood actors, bestselling book, and cheesy dialog.”
I chuckled. So this was going to be fun, then.
“Meaning I can't get there from wherever I started?”
“Well, you did, so you can.”
“Is there another way I can get data out of you than these round-about questions with witty repartee answers?”
“Oh – yes and no. Yes, there is a way, but no – my repartees are as witty as I can make them.”
“Can you give me specific directions as to how to get data out of you other than round-about questions?”
“Now you're getting the hang of it. Let's talk about it over breakfast.” Akashi snapped his fingers and an intricate cheongsam appeared on a valet stand, just to the left side of the massive bed. My jumpsuit, soft-soled boots and underthings were cleaned and neatly folded on it's small bench seat.
At the surprised look on my face, Akashi only grinned and snapped his fingers again. A small door opened out of the wall, just a short distance behind that valet. It was lit from inside, with a small cloud of steam escaping.
“A bath awaits the lady if you wish.”
“Well, thank you. That is much appreciated.”
“You're very welcome, nothing is too good for our guest. Oh – and when you're done freshening and dressing, then we'll have some breakfasting - a wholesome all-you-can-eat morning meal of crispy bacon and scrambled eggs, plus fluffy hand-made biscuits, real butter, and spun honey. Oh – fresh whole milk plus some marvelous roast-blend coffee. All-American Heartland and served hot – if you are quick enough.”
He turned and glided out the door as it started shutting on it's own. But I heard his voice clearly before the door finished, “Just keep taking 'right-hand turns' and you'll be there before you know it...”
- - - -
I BATHED AND DRESSED quickly, then wound up after only a few right-hand turns at a long dining room with a matching table with two settings on its farthest end. Covered dishes on warming trays steamed as they waited for me.
That gave me an odd thought - what is it about this place that everything is so big and so far away at the same time?
Akashi rose from his distant chair and bowed to me, while I walked as quickly as I could without running to meet him for this gracious breakfast.
- - - -
I DON'T KNOW ABOUT Akashi, but I ended up stuffed. The smells of this food, all fresh and steamy hot (or ice cold, in the case of the milk) got to me. And it was probably due to something along the line of the stress I'd been under and not having eaten for a day or so during those tube rides.
After the classic Heartland breakfast, came more stuffed pastries complimented with hot, glazed cinnamon rolls.
So I finally pushed back from the table with my second mug of honey-sweetened roast-blend coffee and luxuriated in my private audience with the one person who knew more about everything than anyone.
All I had to do now was to ask him the right questions.
X
THE OBVIOUS “USUAL suspects” were those who had the most to gain from keeping humankind addicted – or “enslaved”.
But unlike our own corporation, we could assume that their public face wasn't their effective base. While Sybil was the very public (and very pretty) face representing our corporation, it's not guaranteed that these other companies behind the social media and entertainment broadcasting did the same. It was more probable that there were puppet masters behind the puppets.
What we did know is that they were pulling all this data and doing something with it. Not just selling more ads by giving away people's private data. Something far more sinister and convoluted.
There was the suggestion of simply moving to a future time and seeing what they were attempting to build.
Unfortunately, Abe's “time drive” didn't actually change time as it did save it. The device was more accurately called a “space-folding drive” as you wound up in a different space without the time it took to get there. And the resultant energy generated was captured in fuel cells to power conventional engines through normal space-time.
Of course, our little group of genii loved being picked up in an antique steampunk dirigible in our modern age, one equipped for routine moon excursions – then simply arriving at the far-side moon base with by engaging a single lever after a couple of dials were set.
If my great-great-grandmother could just see us – she'd be grinning from ear to ear and so very proud.
Yes, the answer would be in the future. But we had to rely on our wits instead of the science we hadn't yet developed.
One side project we did have was to set up some “space-folding” circuits to “bleed off” the information we needed from the electronic data gathering. This meant that the information was being borrowed and copied, then returned into the same data stream with an almost imperceptible delay. And we pulled only from satellite feeds to disguise that lag as solar activity.
Of course, the biggest flood of data was moving though landlines and undersea fiber-optic cables. But touching those would give our operation away within nano-seconds. And after all, we only wanted representative data. Such that we could form and test our hypotheses. We just wanted to know who these people were, what they were really after, and then an idea of how to stop them.
So far, we were still hitting blank walls with each of these questions.
But the data we were siphoning off had started showing some routine patterns of how all this could be put to use.
Even if those uses were more black than white.
XI
AT LAST, IT WAS TIME for questions. With or without the witty repartees.
“How is it that I awoke nude in a huge bed?”
“It is what you expected to find, my princess.”
So I paused, since just asking that statement as a question would give no further clarification.
“What frame of reference do you suggest I used to create such an expectation?”
Akashi beamed. “You are such a fast student. Very good question. Your answer is: probably some film you saw as a young child. Or perhaps a combination of them. But the size of everything would be as a small child finding themselves in a large bedroom. I won't touch the concept of “nude” with a barge pole, as there are many possible films you may have watched where the lady wound up nude under sheets. It was my privilege to have your clothing reappear cleaned and folded.”
“So you simply are producing what I imagine.”
Akashi simply nodded at my conclusion. It was no question.
I paused again, to consider my question carefully.
A sip of honey-sweetened roast-blend helped my thoughts settle.
“You are then an actual being, but perhaps your shape and appearance are my own imagination?”
Akashi smiled. “Yes, my bright young one. Your extreme brilliance is only matched by your incredible beauty. I do exist. And you have been looking for more knowledge. Imagination is simply the doorway to possibilities. What you do with your answers is up to you.”
“Well, I thank you for your hospitality. There are much worse things I could imagine.”
“And yet you imagined getting answers from an infinite storehouse of data such as the Akashic Library. What better place for such a massive knowledge base than an unknown and unreachable place of legend and fantasy?”
“Yet here we are. Are you saying that this library is in you?”
“With all humility, I am but a portal for everything you want to know.”
“The flowers are beautiful. And so is the architecture.”
“Thank you for your images. The world is just a reflection of your thoughts.”
“Wow. Is that ever familiar.”
Akashi just smiled and sipped his brew, eying our platter of stuffed pastries – one that could slide within his reach at just a gesture.
I leaned forward and pushed the platter toward him.
“And I am blessed that you are so courteous and thoughtful.”
“Like you, the phrase I think goes: 'As within, so without..'”
Akashi nodded, his mouth once again filled with exquisite sweet nirvana, and his eyes closed in rapture.
“The rules to finding out whatever I want are simple – I have to form an exact question.”
Akashi opened his eyes and placed the remainder of the pastry on his plate. He nodded assent as he used a napkin to dab the powdered sugar away from his lips and cheeks. That napkin revealed his smile once again.
“And it seems I can make statements to get a positive or negative reaction.”
Another smiling nod.
“So I found away around the clever repartees.”
Akashi only shrugged, but was still amused.
I sat back in my chair at this.
“This would then mean that we are present somewhere beyond time and space, affected only by my own imagination – such as the rain storm that drenched me just before you let me in?”
“Both the rain storm and getting 'let in' were your own making. And I have to congratulate you on your choice of breakfast as well.”
I had to smile at this. “You're welcome. My grandmother's cooking she learned from her mother and grandmother, as well as the love for tinkering with machinery.”
“Of course, we have a complete lab and machine shop here, if you wish...”
“You are so gracious. Of course this brings up the question about karma...”
“...being a double-edged sword that cuts both ways.”
“With the idea of it being a “be-yatch” is just returning what people have already put out. You can only get what you give.”
“And what goes around, comes around.”
“So my ability to access all the information of the universe...”
“...is due to your being so gracious to help others find the information they look for.”
“Like all those genii we have been sponsoring for so long.”
“And again, your beauty is only exceeded by your brilliance.”
I shook my head and took another sip of sweet, dark brew. “Akashi, your flattery may serve other purposes, but I find it cute and endearing.”
“We are only here to serve, m'lady.” Akashi sipped from his own mug in return.
“May I know what hasn't happened yet?”
“You can find out anything here – you just have to pay the price.”
“And get only as I've given.”
Akashi nodded.
“Meaning that my own self-confidence is the only true limit.”
Another nod.
“So what is the rules for seeing the future?”
“It is based on karma. It is based on probability. While you can tell anyone else whatever you want, your idea of a future isn't theirs – and doesn't predict theirs.”
“Could I have a companion for my trip to my own future?”
“Certainly.”
The room started shifting around us.
“Akashi, wait!”
The room settled back into it's earlier shape.
I leaned in and reached over to take his hand. “Will I be able to see you again?”
Akashi smiled. “Whenever you want, little darling. I'm at your beck and call. Always.”
He extended his other hand to turn mine over. Then formed my own thumb into a touch of both my index and middle finger.
Looking deep into my eyes, he smiled again. “Always.”
Then my idea of Shangri-La shimmered from view, along with the smiling face of Akashi – who still had a touch of powdered sugar on one cheek.
XII
ONE OF THE OLD SCREENS from that moon base control room flickered to life. It was rather like a view from a vintage black and white TV set.
Abe's face filled the screen. With a raised eyebrow and a wry grin.
“Well – hello, Steve. How's things?”
I looked up surprised from the notes in my hand. “Could be better, Abe. Some progress, but no breakthrough yet.”
Abe shrugged. “Something is better than nothing.”
“Should I ask where you are 'calling' from?”
“Probably better not. But I thought you'd like to see my homely face again right about now.”
“A sight for sore eyes.”
“What I can tell you is that your precautions will keep you safe for some months. I think your frozen pizza will run out sooner.”
“As well as our tolerance for re-heated food.”
Abe smiled at my joke. “Too true.”
“Any news about Sybil?”
“She's better than fine. Got some rest and some good food, plus she met an old friend – and about to make some new ones. Other than that, I don't think I'm allowed to say. But I can tell you that she's about to make a breakthrough.”
“That's my sis. Count on her.”
“But she could only do what she does with your help.”
“Meaning that we should keep forging along.”
“Yes. What you discover she will be able to put to use. But the old phrase goes: it takes two to tango.”
“Well noted.”
Abe turned to look at something off-screen, then turned back with a more serious look. “Oops. Gotta go. Give Sybil my love when you see her.”
The screen darkened. But not my spirits.
I turned and left the control room with the notes I'd come for. The genii squad would be encouraged by this.
Probably Abe's point.
Regardless, we really needed to pour on the juice to make whatever breakthrough Sybil was going to need.
XIII
A GRAY ROCK AND STEEL space dock formed in front of me.
And I was facing two young women about my own age, dressed in red and gray jumpsuits. One with wavy light brown hair, the other with straight strawberry-blond.
I was in my own gray Kane Industries jumpsuit again. Complete with dark gray mechanic boots. No weapons in my pockets. Meaning that these two must be friends – or will be soon.
The one with light brown hair spoke first. “Hi Sybil, I'm Carol and this is Mysti.”
Mysti nodded. “We've been told you need our help.”
“Glad to meet you. I was only expecting a single companion.”
Carol smiled. “Well, it's a question of talents and abilities. Seeing your own future is one thing, making sense of it is another. I'm the time-bender of us two, Mysti is the sense-maker.”
Mysti smiled at this. “At least we aren't limited to just answering questions. We probably have a few of our own.”
Carol came forward to touch my long mane. “Like, who does your hair? It's gorgeous.”
I had to smile. “Do you mind if I give you both a hug? It's been awhile since I was with real people – Akashi is nice and all, but he never seemed huggable.”
So we had hugs and smiles all around.
Mysti gestured toward a space yacht, moored into magnetic clamps nearby. “We borrowed this for the trips we need to take. Figure that you'd be more at home in a flying ship than just 'shimmering in' and 'shimmering out' like some Dickens ghost.”
Mysti led us toward the control cabin hatch, while Carol came with me behind her.
“Sorry we don't have much 'time' to gab right now. But you're on a tight schedule else-when. There will be time for girl talk later. I know this great restaurant on the Nevada boarder and there's a cook there named Hami...”
Mysti had the cabin hatch hiss open and entered. I was next, and Carol closed it behind.
The control room was small, and had seats for three at its front. Carol took navigator controls, while Mysti took the helm. I was over at co-pilot, with a duplicate of Mysti's controls.
“Like Carol said, we're on a tight schedule. But if you watch what I do, I think you'll pick up the co-pilot duties pretty fast. And by the way, it's great to work with you – we've both been looking forward to this for...”
“...some 'time'.” Carol finished with a grin.
At that, Mysti hit a switch and the magnetic clamps disengaged. Rumbling outside told that the outer door was dilating. Through the viewscreen in front of us, black space started growing larger. Just over to the right was a small blue-white globe. Earth.
“We've got Abe's time drive installed, but Carol will be doing all our hops in actual time itself.”
Little balls of light appeared to circle around Carol's head.
I craned to look at them.
Carol noticed and smiled. “Oh, those are called 'tessies', which is short for organic time-bending tesseracts. They also make some incredible weaves which are essentially bullet proof and can be used in deep space if you have to...”
Mysti cleared her throat.
“Oh, sorry. Like I said, we've got time for 'girl talk' later.”
I had to smile. These two were used to working together. This was going to be fun.
Mysti moved the throttle levers forward and we eased out of the space lock. Once cleared, she shoved the steering yoke forward and turned its wheel to the right – and Earth seemed to move directly in front of us.
She set some dials and touched a button right next to the fuel gages.
Within split seconds the view screen was filled with Earth's round shape. Mysti pulled the yoke and twisted the wheel, while simultaneously pushing foot pedals.
“The controls are a bit like the old biplane controls – rudder, ailerons, flaps. Just converted to various pulses like the old jet-thrusters, but using energy from the time drive to adjust our position.” Mysti explained as her hands and feet were busy. “We're trying to get into a geostationary orbit right now, without taking out or bumping into the space junk – er – satellites that are up here in this continuum.”
Carol leaned forward to explain. “We're looking for a specific location that is empty during all the instances that we'll be visiting. It's a tricky setup, but I've got the specs dialed in. Mysti is just getting them all lined up.”
I saw the gauges that Mysti was frowning at as she pulled, pushed, and turned the the controls. Starting out all in the red, they each gradually moved up into yellow and then green. Where she then flipped an switch labeled “auto-pilot” overhead. And relaxed in her seat, hands off the yoke and feet off the pedals.
Mysti then turned toward me and smiled. “Yes, of course there are more efficient models than this. But we wanted something that is so primitive that it won't be registered as such by any of the star-wars-type weapons. The ones from the near-futures that will be scanning for targets in the various 'times' we'll be visiting. To them, this is just another piece of left-over space junk they'll only note for later salvage.”
I frowned at this, and Carol noted. “No, we won't be around long enough for them to “salvage” us at all. Just moments in each time point we will be visiting.
Mysti turned to Carol. “So, shall we begin, 'Maestra'?”
Carol's “tessies” started spinning faster around her head and upper body.
Her voice took a sound of excitement. “Just watch the viewscreens and enjoy the ride...”
XIV
“WELL, THAT'S DIFFERENT.”
A blob of gaseous substance was in the air lock of the moon base. Waving and streaming around as if trying to get out and at me.
I'd just turned off the siren, but the hazardous substance light was still flashing.
The cute-looking medium-height gal who delivered this to our moon base was still standing there, her red and gray jumpsuit molding to her curves. And those led my eye up to her simple, freckle-nosed face topped with wavy brown hair.
She nodded in reply. “Yup, that's the stuff I'm supposed to bring you. Kills humans dead if it ever gets into the atmosphere.”
I moved to put a electronic lock-out on all those controls, one that required a clearance.
That action brought a quiet smile to her face. “Smart move.”
I stuck out my hand. “Oh I don't think we've been introduced. My name is Steve.”
She took my hand and shook it. “I'm Carol. I've been looking forward to meeting you. Abe says hi, by the way.”
“And you know Abe by...”
Carol smiled. “Our paths have crossed more than once. I bend time and space naturally. Abe does it by his mathematics. And sometimes I give him a lift somewhere – like cutting a huge Gordian knot of complex algorithms for him. Oh, and he's saved my butt a few times, showing up just before I got into some serious trouble.”
“Yet Abe just sent me a potential WMD for humans.”
She just shrugged. “Weirdest thing I've ever delivered for anyone. Had to create a little vacuum pack for it. That's it down at the bottom of the air lock. When you want to send it anywhere...” She patted down her jumpsuit pockets and pulled out a little key fob for me. “Just push that button and the gizmo will start pumping it back in.”
They both looked at it for awhile through the airlock windows.
“Almost like it's watching us.” I said at last.
“It is. Some kind of sentient virus. Probably only one of it's species.”
“That fits our luck. Our research is only turning up bad news.”
“How's that?”
“The best calculations we have is that they have a 90% chance of wrecking all humankind progress since the Stone Age – if not its very existence as a species.”
Silence hung heavy outside that airlock. The shifting gases inside didn't help the mood.
“Well, I'd stay here and try to cheer you up, but I've got a list as long as my arm to get done. Abe's delivery was at the top. Nice to see and meet you. Hope I can bring you better news next time.”
At that, Carol shimmered out with her flying 'tessies' all about her.
- - - -
THEN SEEMED TO SHIMMER right back in again. With a visitor.
“OK, I felt so bad that I just had to do something. This is Mysti. We also brought something for you and your crew. There's a whole buffet of fresh-cooked food in your mess hall. It's going to go fast, I'm sure, so...”
Mysti jumped at the chance to speak as Carol took a breath. “Hi, Steve. Glad to finally meet you. The other surprises we brought are also waiting. More like a very social debrief for you and your crew. We want to know all you've found out.”
Carol looked at Mysti and they both grinned. Then they got on opposite sides of me, taking an arm each with a firm grip.
Carol smiled and kissed my cheek. Mysti just hugged my arm and took my hand.
They led me down the gray hallway toward the obvious sounds of a party starting up.
Life had its perks sometimes.
XV
“AND THAT'S WHERE IT ends? I was hoping for something a little more optimistic.” I slouched back in my seat as the viewscreen went blank.
Carol tried to cheer me up. “Again, what you just saw was the probable outcome, the probable future. And that doesn't mean it's going to happen that way.”
Mysti was more direct. “All we just went through, the snippets of existences, were only based on what your particular line of thoughts up to this point will extrapolate out to.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Didn't know I was that dark in my thoughts.”
Mysti put her hand on my shoulder. “Meaning – perhaps we should look at changing your thoughts a little bit.”
Carol cleared her throat.
We both looked over. Carol was grinning for some reason.
“May I suggest a little pick-me-up? A little out-of-the way place where we can relax, refresh, and do our rethinking...”
Mysti then looked back with me with a similar devilish grin.. “Over some fresh cheeseburgers on buckwheat flat-bread with sweet potato fries?”
“...and chocolate shakes made with real ice cream as in 'just-milked-this-morning' fresh?”
I had no clue what they were talking or grinning about, but it sounded delicious.
Mysti took the yoke and disengaged the auto-pilot.
Carol just grinned wider. “Please, allow me.”
And our viewscreen and control room shimmered to nothing.
- - - -
WE ALL ARRIVED SITTING in the same position, but in a row of bentwood chairs facing a round table where three settings of steaming cheeseburgers with a platter of sweet potatoes sliced into thin strips and fried to a crispy brown were waiting. And each plate had its own tall chocolate shake with in old-fashioned fluted glasses. While moisture condensed on their sides.
This was just one of the many round tables in that old saloon-turned-restaurant. The long solid wood bar with antique mirrors behind it still set the atmosphere – but it looked to be used more as a buffet these days, since the shelves behind it were filled with home-made jams and jellies, plus pictures of visitors. Not a beer or beverage advertisement in sight.
Carol, still grinning, stood slightly and scooted her chair up to her setting. “I had to 'cheat' a bit and place our orders ahead of us. Just so they would be ready when we 'arrived'.”
I scooted my own chair forward and noticed a tall red-headed young woman gliding toward us. She was in jeans and a plaid rolled-sleeve cowboy shirt, behind a sturdy and flour-dusted apron. She came forward with a platter of fresh-baked toll house cookies in one hand and a pitcher of sweet tea in the other. Behind her came a red-headed teenager with another platter holding even more settings and mugs.
“Hi-ya gals! You must be Sybil. I'm Hami,” she said with a wide smile. “Don't know if you've met little Rochelle yet. She's visiting from just up the road from here and is my little exchange student. Meaning – I'm exchanging my tips on cooking for her teaching me more about the Lazarai talents she's discovered.”
Rochelle was similarly dressed, her own apron just slightly less floured. She just nodded and smiled to each of us as she arranged all the additional settings to make six of us at that table. Then picked up the empty platters and glided away.
“Well, do enjoy. Our other visitors will be here shortly, so we have to get back to getting their orders ready.” Hami nodded and swept back to her kitchen in the rear of the long building.
Mysti and Carol wasted no time in digging into the hot food. So I followed their example.
Perfect end for an imperfect day.
Well, except for the mystery of who these extra plates were for.
- - - -
OUR CHEESEBURGERS WERE now crumbs, the platter of fries were only a layer of paper towels with grease marks. And our chocolate shakes were making impolite sounds of empty-straw sucking noises.
All while our too-full stomachs were more than filling the middle spaces of our jumpsuits.
Then the front screen door opened. And I jumped out of my seat to run to the first person inside – my brother Steve.
That hug lasted a very long time.
Then I saw who was behind him, and turned to hug him even more tightly – it was Abe.
At last, I saw the third person and let Abe get his breath again as I let my bear hug relax.
“Oh, sorry. This is a bit rude of me. I haven't allowed myself to be introduced to your friend.”
Abe just smiled and shifted his position so that he kept one arm around my shoulders so my right hand was free. “That's OK, he knows about you already. Sybil, this is Peter.”
I shook his hand and resulting warm smile also seemed familiar to me somehow.
Giggles behind me made me turn my head and see Mysti and Carol both out of their seats and grinning. Tessies were flying about the table, rearranging the place-settings.
“I take it you all have already met?”
Carol and Mysti both almost ran over, and another round of hugs ensued. I was a little curious about how they had all met, but these two new friends of mine were full of surprises.
About that time Hami and her assistant Rochelle came out with a platter of mini cheeseburgers and small sweet potato chips, plus more toll house cookies and a refilled pitcher of sweet tea.
Everyone sat down and nibbled at these. I suspected that the men had just eaten recently, as we had.
Steve was between Mysti and Carol, who were doting on him. No doubt they had found out how eligible he was, but he also was wisely asking them about their own background stories.
Abe and Peter were swapping stories with each other as they sat on both sides of me, each story filled with mathematical references as illustrations. Of course, I would simply raise an eyebrow if they were obviously telling a tall tale or the math didn't add up. Then they'd laugh it up – busted.
At last, and with another platter of cookies as well as a third sweet-tea pitcher refill, we were ready to talk.
- - - -
CAROL WAS FIRST TO spill the beans. She reached across Abe's setting to take my hand. “I'm sorry Sybil, but we've already started this briefing earlier. I had to do a delivery to Steve, and things just got out of hand.”
Mysti spoke up. “Of course, it was simply seeing Steve just as frustrated as you were with the state of things. So her idea was to lighten him up – as he'd been working so hard with his genii crew...”
Carol jumped in “Not to say you haven't as well – and I was time-slipping along and noticed that you both were being entirely too serious about your work...”
“That we thought to get all three camps together, starting with Abe and Peter meeting Steve and his guys. And that naturally led to...”
“A party here at Hami's!” Carol grinned as both she and the smiling Mysti sat back, looking for my reaction.
I just had to laugh out loud. “I couldn't have a better set of friends than everyone here today. With all we have to face, knowing that friends and family have your back is the greatest and most heart-warming feeling a gal could have.”
Abe lead us all with a toast to that as we raised our tumblers of iced-tea.
Then the “serious” discussion started.
Abe confirmed how black things were. “Peter and I have been comparing notes, and all our calculations show the same scene. Pretty dire, as your eyes confirmed. There is less than a one-in-ten chance of pulling this off and saving humanity itself, even though the complete collapse of the economic systems is probably a necessity.”
I just sat back. Shocked. “Meaning Kane Industries...”
“Will never recover to where it once was. But there is some good news.”
I became alert. Mysti and Carol were watching my reactions with interest. Peter and Steve were more calm, analytical.
“All our employees can live their full lives in comfort. And that means very full, healthy lives – regardless of what happens to the global culture. In fact, we're counting on them being around to help rebuild.”
I had to raise an eyebrow at that. “So my part in this...”
“Is key. You are our secret weapon. And your .9 percent is what stems the tide of destruction.”
“Wait a minute – are we talking the same thing here? Look, this is what I saw:
• Polarized society factions allow the major cities to simply secede to themselves.
• They develop fusion drives to take their cities out as domed space ships and set up colonies on the moon.
• But release deadly plagues which wipe out nearly all of humanity.
• And those moon colonies themselves are wiped out because of some allergic disease in the moon dust itself.
• Within a few generations, humankind is back to tiny, isolated armed camps with even local trade impossible due to fears of a new plague outbreak. “
Abe and Peter nodded. Steve just looked down into his tea. Mysti and Carol had long faces.
Abe turned to me directly. “Now, since Peter and I are in your current space-time, even though this isn't the one we're from, we can tell you the narrow path we have to walk that can have a hope of re-routing this disaster scenario.”
Again, I raised an eyebrow. But I'd take any chance I could to save at least part of what I'd spent my life building. Especially saving my friends and family members.
“This isn't going to make any sense if we try to tell you the time line of what has to happen. So we're going to tell you the pure math of it.”
He turned to Mysti and Carol. “Don't try to follow this. If it seems over your head, it is. Peter and I have spent several lifetime's worth just learning and fine-tuning these equations and calculus. One result is that we can shift time and universes. But the agreed-upon space-time laws only really allow us to represent these possible outcomes as purely theoretical.
“Meaning – we won't object if you go into the kitchen and share stories with Hami and young Rochelle.”
Mysti looked at Carol, then back at Abe. “No, we're agreed. We're here for Sybil. Whatever she needs. We don't have to understand more than our small part in this. But we promise not to go to sleep, like in a college lecture.”
Abe and Peter both smiled.
Steve jumped in. “Well, it's way more interesting than college. In a way, it's kinda exciting. Not like racing aircraft, but building something worthwhile has its own rewards.”
I took a deep breath and relaxed. So everyone else would as well. “Then let's get started.”
Peter looked at Mysti, then Carol.
Carol gestured and her tessies produced large sheets of writing paper and markers for us.
Abe started simply, but we quickly filled dozens of sheets with calculations as he told us the one-shot plan we had, and what had to happen when and where to pull off any chance of saving humankind from itself.
XVI
THE PLAN WENT OFF AS smoothly as was possible.
Yes, the worst disaster was averted.
No, our erstwhile enemies didn't foresee the results of their plans, nor our response that saved their bacon along with ours.
“Sybil Kane” as an empty coffin was buried with a huge ceremony. It was somehow assumed that her remains had disintegrated in that office explosion. She got a big press send off.
Steve and Abe very publicly sold their “interests” in “Kane Industries”.
Steve went off to build racing planes from a private airfield close to the Nevada border. There were some glossy tabloids trying to identify a couple of “mystery women” who visited “the world's most eligible bachelor” regularly. (One with wavy brown hair, the other a striking strawberry-blond.) Eventually, even the tabloids lost interest as Steve himself didn't race, and the tabloid's telephoto lenses couldn't see inside their hangers.
Too boring to sell from supermarket checkout lanes.
Abe disappeared again, as he was prone to do. At least he never showed up in the press again.
What remained of “Kane Industries” went into bankruptcy proceedings and restructured in order to complete existing contracts and obligations.
When the existing government contracts with Kane Industries completed, the final payments were donated to charity.
Existing manufacturing plants were deeded over to creditors or bought at below-market prices by business partners.
All former employees of Kane Industries were given ample retirement packages, and many self-relocated to rural villages where the cost of living was much lower so their pensions lasted longer. Many of these villages contained long-term care facilities (“homes”) that were owned by the Kane retirement trusts. Nursing schools were established in those villages as part of caring for these residents and ensure they always had the best of care.
All the “genii” personnel formerly attached to Kane Industries were given “genius grants” that they could spend as they wished. Many of these converted those funds into trusts and started isolated research projects well away from existing metropolitan areas.
- - - -
EVERYTHING THAT WAS predicted, happened.
• A vial of a very deadly virus was stolen from a government research lab and converted by terrorists into a WMD. It was set off near a Cook County civilian hospital, killing all patients and staff – except the babies in the maternity ward.
• The government found these babies themselves were infectious and transported them to a remote facility for study. This began the Lazurai project.
• The larger cities did secede, did share their technology of fusion domes, did take off for the moon, did release pandemic plagues as they lifted off. And all in the name of “saving the planet.”
• Then the remaining “best and brightest” all came down with incurable disease from the moon dust.
And meanwhile, all these selfish and greedy actions were prevented from backfiring.
The original Lazurai found and raised babies to become responsible young men and women. And those second generation adopted orphan babies and raised them to become sensible adults as well. They learned to retrain their “gift” into valuable healing instead of destruction.
Peter and Abe appeared at various times and places to make necessary changes. As a result, the villages with Lazurai-staffed nursing schools were able to prevent the pandemic from becoming global, and were able to keep the majority of the Midwestern land-mass (outside of the metropolitan areas) unaffected.
Of course, when the cities left, they cannibalized the global satellite systems as their last parting acts. But local mesh technologies had been preserved, as well as caches of electronic-based college and university libraries. Much earlier, these higher-learning facilities were given grants to prepare for such eventualities. Such prepared data centers were usually placed well outside college towns, often in retrofitted former missile silos. Often where prepper villages had formed.
The mainstream press went along with the cities when they lifted. With the satellites and social media disappearing, very little of their “news” ever was spread after that. It seemed people were too busy rebuilding their society and it's infrastructure to care about “celebrities”, “politicians”, “likes”, “tweets”, or anything that wouldn't help them improve their lives directly. Like gardening or machinery-repair tips.
- - - -
ALL THESE REBUILDING efforts seemed somehow connected to a unique person with long black hair and an engaging personality. Someone who could communicate with animals almost like telepathy, and who could help plants to grow and flourish where no one else could.
And that someone seemed to have unlimited resources and advanced technologies.
She was rumored to appear suddenly in an area and solve situations that had come up – or provide life-saving equipment just in the nick of time. But then disappear almost as suddenly, asking nothing in return.
When the larger carnivore species started communicating telepathically with each other and certain humans, it was surprising to many but not all.
Legends from these sentient animals told of “elementals” who had appeared around the time of the cities leaving the planet. Elementals with a unique understanding of what the living beings on that planet were going through. Almost as if they had been informed about events before they happened.
Other stories could be found in these remote villages where the nursing schools had been established, where an influx of patients reportedly from “moon colonies” had appeared in massive numbers. All without spaceflight – which had been destroyed by the cities when they lifted.
All these stories and legends were not corroborated by investigation. Because those who told them were also known to write fiction for their living. And if pressured, would admit they only wrote fiction – so there was no reason to believe them.
And these stories, if you ever pieced them all together, would factor back to a certain young, raven-haired beauty who only referred to herself simply as “S.”
True or not, it was a great story.
About the girl who became tomorrow – in order to save it from itself.
But her stories didn't end there...
Related links:
Book Universe Notes: Now you meet Sybil, the best and brightest of the Kane clan. The story is about her end and her beginning. The chronological events of these female geniuses are told in their collection - The Girl Who Built Tomorrow Collection. (And there are four stories in total, one more after this one.) Sybil appears in several stories later. Again, we mention the mysterious Rising where the cities took off for the moon. (Described in The Hooman Saga series.) The enigmatic Abe Smythe has more of his life told here than almost anywhere else, except the story NaN. And of course, you meet Akashi once more…
This one story starts to tie the Book Universe together - at least, up to this point…
While we have three more stories in the Ghost Hunters Primer, we’ve only scratched the surface. At least now I’ll be able to link back to origin stories as I tell the rest…