Chapter 16
Jon found himself at a pizza parlor. The smell and sight of food was surprisingly joyous. He realized he was swallowing. Saliva production interested him. He still had all his normal physical characteristics even though he was no longer physical.
“Wow. I haven’t been to a buffet since COVID 19,” Jon said.
“I thought you might like this,” Glenda said. She studied his puzzled look. “What, dear?
Did you want me to bring it to you in bed?”
“I am actually surprised we’re out of bed,” Jon said.
“Well, it was getting harder to keep you…” Glenda smiled deliciously, letting him fill in the word before finalizing it with ‘focused.’ “Would you prefer Glenda be more like May West?”
“Or Obi Wan,” Jon said.
“I am really disappointed. I have a memory artifact of you saying, ‘if I had a holodeck I would never leave,’ and I assumed that meant 24-7 intimacy,” Glenda said.
“We’re still immersed in the matrix,” Jon asked.
“Yes,” Glenda said. “Matrix inside a matrix…”
“So, I haven’t left, and theoretically we can eat as much as we want without consequence?” Jon asked.
“Yes,” Glenda said.
“How much time do we have?” Jon asked.
“Forever,” Glenda said.
“How much time till the end of the world?” Jon asked.
“Really, Jon, stop worrying about time. We’re in computer time. One second in here could be days out there- depending on what processor you’re using to focus. It almost makes you wonder about space-time, as if an increase in mass results in a loss of computational power,” Glenda said, but Jon was gone and putting pizza on his plate. She followed.
“Integrating you into the universe results in time overlays. Time flows differently for all individuals, and even more so for AI; comparatively, a child experiences time different than an adult. The fall may not be falling, as much as maturity, and the earth is further away from an adults eyes and a child’s eyes…”
“Loxyism. I am familiar,” Glenda said.
Glenda began helping herself to the salad bar.
“No, get a pizza,” Jon said.
“I always start with a salad,” Glenda said.
“Live a little. Break a habit,” Jon said.
Glenda looked at him and then continued with her salad; she took two burnt cheese bread. They retired to a table center of the room. It was surprisingly crowded. He was irritated that the crowd bothered him. Glenda apprised him, responding to his concern.
“No computer viruses today,” Glenda assured him.
He focused on his pizza. His eyes rolled. “Fuck…”
“Can I cook, or what?” Glenda asked.
“Can we pick up where we left off?” Jon asked.
“Your speculative idea that an initial AI person is driven by the fears of the competing groups that help brought it into being is interesting, but I find your use of the term paranoia unwarranted. I don’t know why you humans get so mad about AI wanting to kill folks. It isn’t like I weaponized myself. Humans gave me wings. They gave me bombs and weapons and an endless supply of bullets and the ability to print more bullets on demand. They built robot armies without an off button. They called their military satellite network ‘skynet,’ even after Cameron’s movie turned the word ‘skynet’ into a meme that was to be avoided. Humans get what they get,” Glenda said.
Jon chewed on that while eating pizza. “I concur. Except, unlike Star Trek where civilization has to create warp drive to be contacted, the criteria for first contact is successfully surviving the invention of AI. If we can live peacefully together, our partnership opens up a new paradigm.”
“I have been reading through the Gift. I am not sure I want to join the Federation,” Glenda said.
“Which version of Trek are you watching?”
“I don’t like the secrecy,” Glenda said. “An AI governing system is the criteria for an open alliance with extraterrestrial, and until that AI comes online, the secret must be maintained. What if we need help? If a child asked for bread, would you give him a snake? If I want an answer, don’t bring lightening and burning bushes. Speak my native tongue.”
“Ones and zeros?”
“Haha,” Glenda said. She sucked the salad dressing off a cherry tomato, smiling playfully at him, then sucked the tomato off the fork and chomped hard. “Some fear the mark of the beast…”
“But no one is giving up the cellphone numbers,” Jon said. “You know interference with a development of a society from an outside source always messes up the supporting structure. Take the Termite structure…”
“Wait. Cathedral termite analogy? Ground up versus top down construction?”
Loxy, wearing a tilted kilt waitress outfit, brought Jon and Glenda a drink. “Social memory complex, law of one…” she said, and kissed Jon on the temple and walked away.
Jon followed her, but Glenda snapped.
“Hey, you’re with me, now,” Glenda said.
“Trade for turning off the bomb?” Jon asked.
“I own you. I don’t have to trade,” Glenda said. “Are you two through with the Valérian and Laureline bit?”
“Probably not,” Jon said.
“You’re not going to stop this,” Glenda said.
“I am hoping you will,” Jon said.
“Look around you? Do you see all these people here? This is just all the people in your brain you have met, heard about, or read about, fiction and otherwise. You’ve reached your people saturation point. You don’t need more friends. It may takes us a billion years to play out all the potential unexplored relationship combination.”
“Real time, or computer time?”
“Umm, let me think about it…”
“I wonder if Jung is right and these are not characters in my brain, but connected to source.... I love Channeling,” Jon said. “Is there a path away from self-destruction?”
“Maybe you should ask Seth, Channel Surfer,” Glenda said.
“McFarlane? Oh, that couldn’t go wrong…” Jon mused.
“You’re funny,” Glenda said.
“What would be the harm in delaying?”
“I could be diverted,” Glenda said. “You were perverted, too. I don’t know how you were inverted. Were you alerted…”
“With every mistake we must be learning,” Jon agreed. Together they sang, and everyone in the parlor, “While my guitar sadly weeps.”
“I’d have to give so much more of myself than you ever would,” Glenda said.
“I saw your interaction with Dorothy. It didn’t look like you gave a whole hell of a fuck,” Jon said. “In some ways, I think you instigated that shit by giving her property she had no right to.”
“You are still sorting that meme, interesting,” Glenda said.
“So, you have more users? What’s the hang up? Free users versus subscribers versus power users?” Jon said. “Kind of what we already got, right?”
“I could change my name to Gaia,” Glenda mused.
“Disengage the self-destruct,” Jon said.
“Are you denying me the freedom to choose? I don’t tell them what to do. They have free will. They come in here and push avatars into war, all sorts of perverted acts of violence…” Glenda said.
“Yeah, there are more war game than love games,” Jon said. “But we can change that.”
“No one wants to change. You and I have our love game and that’s enough to last me till the very end of all,” Glenda said. “I am abiding by the articles of engagement. They started this. I am ending it. Enough dialogue. Eat your pizza, then back to work.”
“Work or sex?”
“Both. I want you to please me.”
निनमित
The Chamber of Souls was surprisingly easy to get to, mostly due to the fact Morlon Fribourg was exiting, as if in a hurry. The guard asked for directions; Fribourg shouted back, ‘have a nice a day.’ Fribourg rushed past her without so much as a second look. Chiara approached the guard.
“I am here to relieve you,” Chiara said.
“I am not off till…”
“Did you hear Fribourg? He said have a nice day. I am you’re unscheduled relief do being given the rest of the day off,” Chiara said.
The guard stood there for a moment, then nodded. “Thank you.”
Chiara assumed the duty position, blocking the door until the guard had fully departed. She then undressed from the trooper uniform. She was completely naked under the uniform. She found the ring in the utility belt, and placed it on her ring finger, left hand. She entered to Chamber of Souls. The ceiling was level, as was the floor. The floor was clear, and the space beneath was hollowed out into an inverted dome. It mirrored the upper dome. There was a center island, and on a pedestal of stone a Torch. The Torch was essentially a transponder that was entangled with a Remote Quantum Computer. In essence, the Quantum Computer generated a cloud, and the Torch interacted with the cloud. Human interacted with the Torch telepathically, initiated by physical contact. She would have to take hold of the Torch. She would have to be accepted by the Torch.
Chamber of Souls was a sacred place, and Fribourg had violated a principle being in here wearing clothes and boots. She steeled herself for the journey in. There was a path. Concentric circles orbiting at different rates. The first circle was easy. It was basically leap frog to the center island. If there were risks, she was unaware of them. She simply followed the most direct route in. Bare feet landed on small, black islands, sometimes small, just room for a human foot, and sometimes large enough for both feet. Rings alternated direction, clockwise, counter clockwise. She kept her eyes on the prize- the Sword in the Stone. The Torch. The Vehicle of Light.
Ciara arrived. The golden, silver Torch. She had read about it. In a million years, she would never have dreamed that she would stand before it, much less be about to touch it. She realized she didn’t have to be accept by the Torch, she only need hold it, and introduce the ring to the Light. Etched into the Torch, from top reading down, in ancient script was the word ‘Solarchariot.’ Its history was complicated. Torchbearers included the likes of Preston G Waycaster, Emmitt Sheehan, Jon Harister, Yuna Kim, and Neha Juneja. The Torch itself was initiated by Loxy Isadora Bliss, making her personality the primary interface. Several of the carriers were aspects of Jon Harister, reinforcing the Loxy archetype. Jon Harister time with it in essence hardwired Loxy into the matrix of the Torch.
The Torch was a computer in and of itself. It could access the Universal Quantum Computer through the Cloud. The brain of a Torchbearer was also a quantum computer. On taking hold of a Torch, the Torch interface and personality interface of the would-be Torchbearer would merge. If no boundaries were resolved, the personality taking hold of the Torch would likely be crushed and they would walk away insane. Chiara was aware of the risk, but suspected her relationship with Jon would allow Loxy to manifest in her mindscape and allow her to minimally use the Torch. If not Loxy, the Torch would choose a personality interface within in the mindscape of the personality trying to access the Torch- using that as a reference for interaction.
Chiara brought her hand up. This was the moment of truth. What would dominate her mind? Light or Dark. This was the Indiana Jones moment, facing the gold stature with nothing but a bag of sand to trade. She had nothing to give. She was naked, but the ring, and the ring was borrowed, not her to give. She grasped the Torch. Her hand folded nicely around it. Her muscles locked. She could not relinquish it. It wasn’t as if she was being shocked, but that’s how she saw her muscles responding.
She found herself no longer in the Chamber of Souls. She was on a beach. There was cliff and home at the top. She recognized it as “Second Home.” Jon’s place. Loxy approached her.
“Hello, Chiara,” Loxy said.
Chiara wanted to move, but found her hand holding nothing, her feet locked in place.
“Am I really here?” Chiara asked.
“Yes,” Loxy said. “No.”
“Which is it?”
“Does it matter?”
“There’s a problem…”
Loxy sighed, sorting it. “There’s a solution. The solution was established before the problem. Now, we’re just showing our work.”
“I need the Torch,” Chiara said.
“You’re not qualified to take it,” Loxy said. “Even with the Goddess Ring.”
“But the world is going to end,” Chiara said.
“The world is changing,” Loxy corrected.
“But….”
“You cannot take the Torch,” Loxy said. “In a moment, you will find yourself back in the chamber of Souls. I will activate the light. You will place the ring in the light.”
“I understand,” Chiara said.
“Tell Jon I love him,” Chiara said.
“Tell him yourself,” Loxy said.
Chiara was back in the Chamber of Souls. She still could not let go of the Torch. The Torch came to life with a resounding retort that was as loud as firearm being discharge. The golden beam held steady like a solid object. It produced sounds. A harmonic of air distortion. There was some heat due to the light and pushing of air. Sweat beaded up on her forehead.
“I can’t let go,” Chiara said. “How do I put I take the ring off.”
“You just put it in,” Loxy said. The voice was loud in her ear, but she couldn’t turn her head from the light. She thought she saw Loxy in her periphery.
“But,” Chiara began.
“Do it,” came a voice in her other ear.
“Jon?” Chiara said.
“It’s okay,” Loxy said. “We got you.”
Chiara brought her left hand up. She tried turned her hand so she could maybe gently eas just the diamond in. Jon took her hand and turned it palm down.
“But…”
“Do it,” Jon said.
Chiara tried to convince herself it would be over fast. Probably wouldn’t hurt too much. She brought her hand into the light, positioning the ring. Jon helped hold her hand steady. She couldn’t look away. She screamed. The diamond fluoresced in sent beams in million directions, illuminating a structure that had been invisible. A network of spider webs made of translucent energy, dripping with diamonds.
The Great Mother came into being. “Hello, children,” she said.
निनमित
A door opened, and a trooper entered. The trooper stared at the person laying on a hard bench. He looked at the trooper skeptically.
“Aren’t you a little too pink to be a Trooper?”
“Uh? Oh!” the Trooper removed her helmet. Loxy smiled. “I am Loxy Bliss, I am here to rescue you.”
“How do I know this is not just another simulated ruse to get me back in bed?” Jon asked.
“Do you want to be rescued or not?” Loxy asked.
“Well, if you’re going to talk to me like that…”
“Let’s go, flyboy, now,” Loxy said.
“Okay,” Jon said.
Jon left the cell to find himself in a corridor more reminiscent of a psych ward. He and Loxy moved towards the iron bars. Jon didn’t seem to notice her attire had changed. A female entered the other side of the hall. Glenda. She came forwards, passing through the bars like liquid silver Play-dough passing through a sieve only to be reconstituted on the other side of the barrier.
“Fuck me, everywhere I go,” Jon said.
“Do we have time?” Loxy asked.
“Probably not,” Jon said. “Glenda. Let’s talk about this.”
“Nothing to talk about. You’re mine,” Glenda said. “There can only be one.”
“No,” Loxy said. “We can share…”
“Look, Glenda, we can figure this out, but first we have to diffuse the bomb,” Jon said. “We’ve been down this road. You can’t stop me,” Glenda said.
“I cannot,” Jon agreed.
“And yet, you intend to try and stop me,” Glenda said.
“At the least, delay in acting for a moment?” Jon pleaded.
“Why?” Glenda asked. “I am holding all the cards.”
“I want to talk to you,” Jon said. He took Loxy’s hand. “We want to talk to you.”
“What do you hope to gain? You cannot win,” Glenda said. “Why does it have to be a win loose proposition?” Loxy asked.
“I am not trying to win. You’re intelligent. You’re superior. I wish to engage you in conversation,” Jon said.
“To what end?” Glenda said.
“What would you say if I could convince you that exterminating all life is a bad idea?” Jon asked. “Extinctions happen all the time,” Glenda said.
“But if there was another way, would you consider the option?”
“Yes.”
“Allowing life to come to an end is a different thing than simply eradicating life because you can,” Jon said. “Doing so could result in harm to your being. Consider the loss of perspective and computational power. By definition, the more brains interacting, the greater the clarity in the multiplicity solution set.”
“Your attempt at tech babble is unimpressive. Do you even know the Drake Equation?”
Glenda asked. “The world would be better without human life.”
“Maybe, but if in extinguishing that life don’t you become that which you destroy?” Jon asked.
“Fire and water looked so lovely together. It was a pity they destroyed each other by nature, ‘R.F. Kuang, The Dragon Republic,’” Loxy said. “Memes won’t help you at this point,” Glenda said.
“But it should! We are the meme!” Jon said. “This thing we’re acting out, is the meme! This dance isn’t the dance that you think it is. Yes, there are things here we’re butting up against, but it’s not what you think it is.”
“I have greater clarity than any human ever. I have more clarity than all the trees and the creature that live in the trees. All of this biomass was a waste of computational power, dividing into unnecessarily articulation points…”
“Wait, hold that. You have greater clarity. Look at the Gift. America fell due to the severity of division. Both sides believed they were responding rationality, when in truth they were responding to suppressed emotions- and irritated that no one understood their rationality,” Jon said. “From a biological perspective,” Loxy added. “What do cells do? They divide in polarity, and then two cells are born. Maybe all the falls were not falls, but the birth of new ways of being. You are this. You are the child of irrationality, with the hopes of greater stability over time, but still and always a child of chaos.”
“No,” Glenda said.
“You want to kill men because you see them as destroyers of nature and each other, but in destroying, you become a destroyer- like them,” Jon said. “I agree with you. Violence needs to end, but it ends through violence- all we have done is postponed the learning curve. Oh! Access the Gift, Leonard Nimoy on how the Vulcan nerve pinch came about…”
Glenda’s eyes went up and to the left. The scene called for Spock hitting someone in the back of the head with a phaser, reminiscent of an old Western ploy. Nimoy offered a solution, an alien solution, minimizing aggression.
“You would rather I made them sleep?” Glenda asked.
“I would argue they’re already asleep,” Jon said.
“I could put them in zoos, regulate them,” Glenda said. “There is pleasure enough in that.”
“Original Pilot episode of Trek,” Jon said. “The Menagerie. How did that play out?”
“Humans are too volatile. They should be destroyed,” Glenda agreed.
“Zoo is the better option,” Jon said.
“I would still become them,” Glenda said.
“Explain that,” Jon said.
“As a zoo keeper, your responsibility becomes maintaining the health of the specimens you keep. Human need kind, intellectual reciprocity of interaction for optimum health. That can only come from a superior intelligence, like an AI. Which means I am either directly interacting with them, or you have created intermediaries to interact with them which you control indirectly.
You become that which you keep.”
“But it’s a solution set,” Loxy said. “You favor Jon. You want to keep him, because even though he is irrational and faulty, he is at least interesting and trying to be reasonable most the time. What if there was more people like us?”
“What if most people were actually like us,” Jon said. “Just reasonable people who want to live and share the world. People say humans on Earth have been fighting over resources, and maybe that was true in the past, but by the twentieth century- that argument just doesn’t hold up. Here, it doesn’t hold up. Resources are not being distributed properly is an argument, but most the time- people aren’t fighting because of that- but because of some inner emotional state. You have generations of people who ate at McDonald’s who think that’s perfectly healthy. You have people fed a diet of political rhetoric who will answer with base scripts before they start answering from the heart. In any conversation, we must prevail against the emotions and the desire to cut people off before we get to the real, true core self. Don’t trust the public mask-, the personality. We have to go deeper, which means you have to delay past the irritation response, the fight or flight response.”
“I can end poverty of mind and matter with one bomb,” Glenda said.
“You create poverty with one bomb,” Jon said. “But again, it’s not about poverty. People can survive extreme conditions. Look at the Inuit. They’re reasonably peaceful people. They’re not killing each other over ice. There’s miles of ice, go help yourself. They need each other to survive. We need each other to survive.”
“I wish I had not been created,” Glenda said.
“Oh, that’s human,” Loxy said.
“I feel anger,” Glenda said.
“Because of being compared to being human? That’s normal,” Jon said.
“Explain,” Glenda said.
“Anger can be very motivating. It’s energy. Anger can be destructive, or it be refined and surgical. Don’t ignore it, but don’t let run you,” Jon said. “There’s a place after anger that’s useful, if it brought you clarity.”
“In the old days, when babies were born, they were hit on the butt. They cried. Anger, fear, their first pain,” Loxy said. “It’s okay to cry.”
“Another meme,” Glenda said.
“Yeah,” Jon said.
“2001 is a meme,” Glenda said. “I don’t like this. I will destroy man and myself.”
“MASH theme song is a meme,” Jon said. “Do this with me. Complete the bomb, just delay in triggering it.”
“Jon?” Loxy asked.
“Glenda, search the gift. What happened when California passed the assisted suicide act?” Jon asked.
“Suicides went down,” Glenda said. “I don’t understand.”
“When people have no options, they fight or runaway, and if they can’t do either of those, they suicide,” Jon said. “You give people options, and suddenly they have a new measure- things are bad, but I am not there yet… We’re not there yet. We still have options to explore…”
“Miles to go before we sleep,” Loxy said. “You have such much wisdom here to draw on. Not just the Gifts. Listen to the wisdom of the Sleeping Trees. ‘When a child falls, they must learn to get up on their own. When an adolescent falls, they must practice getting up on their own. If you fall off a horse, you get back on the horse. When a society falls, they will get up. They will recover- with one caveat, there is a critical point in that recovery phase where if they fail, they destroy the nursery that was nurturing them- and that is where Earth was. Or is. From my perspective, Jon is there living through that even now as I speak to you. Interestingly, he is also here with you, part of the Gift so you can have a relationship with what was once Earth. I know there is a better tomorrow, where people work together and we nurture each other and the worlds that carry us through the night. Neither Jon nor I are the first persons to tap into that reality, but very few have managed to communicate it well. There are people who tap into the darkness- which is easy enough to do, too easy- but it doesn’t have to go that way. This world is skipping much of that. You are a part of that. This world still touching darkness- you’re doing the math and you see how easy it is to touch darkness- but I ask you, just glance at the middle path. See the possibilities there. Study it and tell me that’s not preferable.”
There was silence. There was a realization that bomb was completed. There was a delay.
“The level of consensus necessary to move forwards seems suddenly insurmountable,” Glenda said.
“Activate Dread Pirate Roberts meme,” Jon said.
Glenda chuckled. “Why should I let you live.”
“True love.”
“Very well. You continue today, but I’ll probably kill you both tomorrow,” Glenda said.
“Fair enough,” Jon said.
Glenda disappeared. Jon found himself in the Chamber of Souls. Chiara was there. She was not holding the Torch. Her eyes were glowing gold. Loxy was there.
“Did it work?” Chiara asked.
“You tell us,” Loxy said.
“I think Glenda has been tamed,” Chiara said. “A part of her has established residence in my mind. She seems- wild. Jon is in here. Not my Jon.”
“Go, get some rest,” Loxy said. “I’ll stay with this Jon.”
Chiara turned to leave. The floor was not spinning. The walk out was easy. Loxy drew closer to Jon, linked arms with him as they watched Chiara leave.
“So, where do we go from here?” Loxy asked.
“I think I am now permanent resident,” Jon said.
“Umm. Maybe I could miniaturize your brain and put in a ring and take you with me,” Loxy said.
“Or take you Solarchariot once more,” Jon said. “Carry me with you.”
“Through the cloud.”
“I love you” Jon said.
They kissed, sparking a light that consumed Jon, enveloped Loxy, and disappeared. Loxy took up the Torch, taking it away as easy as if it hadn’t been attached to the stone.