Ocean in the Sea Page 27

  Well then, there was always death. Randuu would be watching for him, and his interface left a very clear signal. How many would have to die to get her attention?

  Taking a deep breath, he sat up and looked around at Lin’s grieving relatives. Extants, all of them. Their auras showed not the slightest link to this simulation’s destiny parameters. Lin’s sons were in the fields. They could not afford to stop work, but the women were, naturally, shocked by his sudden revival. Mouths dropped. One of his daughters shrieked and fainted. Senjiita rubbed his eyes and smacked his lips. “Water.” He drank greedily from the clay cup his wife rushed to bring.

  Having lived through too many jumps and transitions to appreciate the resulting surprise and joy at a dead-one’s miraculous return, Senjiita put up with the elation with his usual patience, but all the while they were babbling happily and sending people running to tell his sons that Lin still lived, Senjiita quietly made plans.

  By evening, when his sons came in from the fields for the family meal, he gathered what few possessions he might need and placed them in a canvas sack. The jump-timer in this simulation was roughly seventy two hours. If he were killed before then, he’d be stuck in this simulation’s afterlife storage permanently – effectively dead. But if Tanandor was here, he would not lose the opportunity to question the ‘enlightened one’ who’d woke ten billion minds and started their journey across the ring. For this, Senjiita would risk his immortal existence. Therefore, while sitting around the table that night, he did his best to explain to the Zhang family why their patriarch must depart.

  “This morning I was dead. Now I am alive, but for that life I must pay a price. I say this to you because I must leave upon a great journey, for our ancestors have spoken, and it must be so.”

  “Nooo!” wailed his wife. “You must stay, Lin. I beg you!”

  “I am Zhang Lin no longer,” said Senjiita. He could have gone further and told them he was the messenger of Death, but it seemed overly dramatic and entirely unnecessary. Whatever got them off his back was sufficient.

  “What did our ancestors say?” asked his oldest son.

  “That a time of change grows near,” he replied. “I carry a message for our overlords. All who claim power over others will be punished. You may hear stories after my departure, stories of unexplained dying. Do not discount them, they are the rage our ancestors made manifest in this world. But you, my family, will remain unharmed. I will protect you. Stay here, farm the land, and know that freedom will soon be yours.”

  His wife was confused, and rightfully so. Never had Zhang Lin spoken to her using such words. The vocabulary had been there, but Lin himself had not used it. He was a simple man with simple tastes. Senjiita was not. He did not expect understanding, but he did expect obedience. Slipping a conical hat upon his head and taking his staff and sack, he hobbled to the door amid their protests and requests to know more.

  “It is night, husband,” implored his wife. “Surely you can wait until morning?”

  “No, woman. Night is the time it begins.” He placed his hand upon her cheek and kissed her forehead. To his oldest son he said, “the family is yours to care for now. Keep them safe.”

  “Yes, father.”

  Into the darkness he went, traveling like a shadow through the wood-framed mud huts without a lantern. His interface gave him no advantage here. He could see the pin-points of intelligent life, but they provided no illumination. Fortunately, the partial moon and the clear sky lent a silvery sheen to the landscape, showing him where to step. Lin’s memories applied recognition to the terrain, overlapping the alien footpaths with instinctive familiarity. Bamboo jiggled as he crept over the bridges and walkways. Past the houses he followed the steps down through the rice paddies cut into the cliffs. Once on the road, Senjiita turned west. The steady electric lights of the Imperial guard barracks shined to the north. A couple hundred minds glowed within, but he would let them live unless it became necessary to eliminate them. Murder might be his gift, but he’d long since lost any relish for it. Randuu would get a signal soon enough.

  He passed the spot where Lin’s grandfather had died for lying to a Japanese officer. They’d wanted young men to work in the mines. His grandfather had told them that his sons were too young, but they searched the caves and found Lin’s uncles. After taking them, they’d beat his Grandfather with canes. He’d died of an infection two days later. His uncles had never returned.

  Further down the road he saw the Shinto shrine the invaders had built, remembering the half-naked prisoners who’d been forced to carry the heavy stones, and how the soldiers had whipped them and laughed at their pain. When they’d finished the job, the two sickest were made to dig their own graves, beheaded, and buried. Senjiita was surprised to find that Lin’s memories, though savage, contained little hatred. Lin’s ancestors had always been subjected to violent masters of one kind or another. Sadly, it was all they knew.

  By the time he reached the concrete pillbox at the side of the road, the visions of his host had soured Senjiita’s taste for mercy. There was little choice in any case. Allowing the two guards to question him would reveal his lack of papers. As he approached, he engaged his interface and focused on the lights of their auras, blowing them out. They dropped instantly as the Attistar eliminated their corporeal connection with the system’s personality registry. Their mentalities were now relegated to afterlife parameters, whatever they may be.

  Glancing inside, he considered taking a uniform, but he was too old to be mistake for a soldier. Their weapons were useless to him. They had nothing he wanted, so he moved on.

  There were more sentries ahead – a two-man outpost every few miles. Smoke from the hearth fires of the peasant homes faded in the breeze the further Senjiita travelled, and his long lonely road was soon a trail of mysteriously silent guard posts filled with men deceased for no apparent reason. At some point, those in charge would notice they had not reported. Lin knew nothing of their protocol or hierarchy, therefore Senjiita relied on his own extensive experience.

  The guard posts and checkpoints reported to individual commands that fell under the prevue of separate units and higher commanders. The guards he’d killed first would be missed first, and so the faster he moved, the better his chances of remaining undetected. Soon, he should abandon the road. They’d notice the trail and send trucks. Lin’s memories showed motorcycles and armored vehicles, but even the military was poor here – dependent on weapons that hadn’t been updated in decades. The Japanese put little investment into China. It was a country of slave labor – an economy of expendable human resources. On the up-side, that gave him the advantage. He did not have to contend with drones, satellites, and automated emplacements. Those were things he could not kill.

  Headlights appeared behind him and he stepped off into the scrubby bushes, crouching in a way this host body was used to. Closing his eyes, Senjiita watched the aural signatures of the men inside, counting twelve in the back and two drivers up front. They would have noticed the corpses at the checkpoints, but they’d be confused. Reporting the incident, their superiors would have ordered them to follow the road, searching for anything that could have caused it. In the meantime, phones would be ringing and higher level officials would be waking up, disturbed and suspicious that the Americans or perhaps even their untrusted Nazi allies had unleashed some experimental weapon upon them.

  With a push to his interface, Senjiita targeted the men in the truck. As their auras winked out, the headlights veered to the left. Rolling off the road, the vehicle continued up a hill, crashing through the underbrush and vanishing into a ravine. Unseen steel screamed in protest at the impact. Tinkling chimes and crushing glass echoed in the distance until it grew still and silent once more.

  Perhaps he should have waited until they were closer and tried to take control? Senjiita shrugged and moved on, thudding his staff into the dirt. Tired already, he wondered how long Lin’s feet would hold out. No stranger to pain, Senjiita ignored
his aching ankles and tendons, trudging onward. Another three miles passed, and another checkpoint appeared. Killing the guardsmen, he checked them and took one of their radios this time, curious to hear their assessment of his work. Switching through the channels as he walked, he heard worried voices in Japanese.

  “… no reason,” crackled the radio. “We should turn back. It is an angry spirit, or a demon, or ghosts…”

  “You are a fool. Ghosts and demons? Do not dishonor your family with such superstition.”

  “But the Captain does not answer, and the guards lay dead without wounds. What other explanation is there?”

  “One that you will find and kill, Gunsō Ogawa. Then we shall see what it is.”

  “And if cannot be killed?”

  “Everything can be killed.”

  “As you say, Lieutenant.”

  Miles ahead, the faint sound of a siren began, pitching from low to high and cycling back. Seconds later, spotlights stabbed the sky. Senjiita crouched again in the bushes and closed his eyes, extending his sensitivity toward the source of the commotion. Tiny lights moved like ants in a maze, at least two hundred human minds, crawling over their little base. Four moved upward, then forward, drifting in his direction. Air transport, probably a helicopter. He killed them immediately. In a second, several nearby auras also winked out. He changed the radio’s channel, searching until he heard a new transmission.

  “Fire, fire!!”

  “What has happened?”

  “The helicopter crashed into the refueling depot. Evacuate before…”

  A flash of light lit the night sky. Senjiita rose to his feet.

  “Kimura? KIMURA!?”

  Delayed by distance, the thunderous boom reached Senjiita as a fireball lifted into the heavens. It reminded him of the last thing he’d seen in his previous host. The flash of Lewis Herman’s rifle and the explosive report milliseconds before the impact with his skull. There’d been no time to feel pain, but he was not immune to humiliation. He, among all of them, should have been more careful when approaching a confused tool of Tanandor’s on his first jump.

  Off the road, he moved into the hills, too weary to continue. He searched for a place of concealment and settled down to meditate in a small clearing between a cluster of trees, he let his mind solidify on a void between conception of his existence and the system parameters defining that conception. If only he could read them.

  The Interview

  Upon awakening from a dreamless sleep, Lewis took stock of his surroundings through half-closed lids. It was a hospital room. The strong smell of disinfectant was unmistakable. Voices echoed in from a hallway beyond the open door. A triangle of light lay on the floor, but the bulbs above were unlit. They must expect him to be asleep, and they’d left him alone. Escape? No he couldn’t just leave, IV lines ran from his arms, and leads came off his chest connected to a nearby machine. Ripping them out would sound an alarm. Slowly, with cautious care, he sat up, surprised they hadn’t restrained him. Perhaps they knew it wouldn’t do any good, or maybe they’d decided to ‘play nice.’

  “Hello,” said a male voice.

  Lewis hissed - irritated he hadn’t detected a presence. The man sat in the corner of the room, a middle-aged gentleman in a black turtleneck sweater. Flipping the lights on, the man allowed Lewis to see him clearly. The ID on his dark blazer read – Dewey Macwell, Deputy Director, National Security Agency.

  Dewey Macwell shut the door. “There aren’t any bugs in here, I’ve already checked.”

  “Bugs?” asked Lewis.

  “Eavesdropping devices, not the ones that have been chewing on you. I’ve also turned the monitoring systems off. I’m just letting you know that we can talk freely. You’re among friends, but only a few of us are jumpers.” He nodded to the hall. “We keep ourselves hidden. It wouldn’t do for the simulants to know the truth.”

  The statement bothered Lewis, but he wasn’t sure why. ‘Simulant’ seemed like a dirty word, and the truth seemed important. Everyone should know it. But another part of him didn’t care. That part of him raised the sheets. He was naked and covered with dry white powder. Beneath the powder, his skin looked like lumpy bubble wrap. “Am I dreaming?”

  “Why would you think that?”

  It was the same tone a psychotherapist might adopt when questioning a potentially volatile patient.

  “Because I fell asleep.”

  “Passed out, actually. That you’re awake has more to do with LythoCAP. Jenny gave you the subscribed detox, but it was made for Saiben-D.”

  “Beloris said they were identical.”

  Dewey shrugged. “Well, that’s Beloris. Sometimes he makes assumptions. We all make assumptions. You’ve probably made some yourself, haven’t you?”

  Lewis raised an eyebrow and looked at the door. “Where are we?”

  “We’re about a mile beneath Area 88, a secret military base north of the Brokeoff Mountains in New Mexico.”

  “Is Dewey your real name?”

  “My birth name is Arsus, although, I suspect my childhood was an artificial memory meant to integrate me into a simulation designed to keep me docile.” He shrugged. “And you are Lewis Herman.”

  “Yeah,” grunted Lewis. “I guess I might be.”

  Arsus tilted his head. “You guess? Most people at least know who they are.”

  “Right…” Lewis thought of Michael Garibaldi and the push he’d made. He wasn’t sure if he could explain that. He wasn’t even sure what the Attistar had done. Whatever it was, he wasn’t entirely Lewis Herman. Something in-between. “I’m just confused. I’ve been through a lot.” He changed the subject. “If you’re one of them, you have an interface.”

  “You want me to prove myself? Fair enough.” Arsus waved his hand through the arm on his chair. “That do it for you? Better than an ID card, isn’t it? I can alter the tangibility of system geometry. And you can alter probability. You’ve engaged the Attistar continuously since your arrival. Are you aware of how unusual your API is?”

  “I’m aware of the fact that I’m not aware of an awful lot,” grumbled Lewis. He thought of the girl. “How is Jenny?”

  “Resting nicely, I’m told. You held onto her until you reached the base. They had to use muscle relaxants to make you let go. Did you ‘arrange’ that?”

  “I uh… yeah, I did.”

  “Did Tanandor warn you about letting the Attistar make changes to your mind?”

  Lewis nodded. “Didn’t have much choice.” Either time, he thought.

  “You break the rules, you pay the price. Most of us don’t need to worry about the Attistar toying with our minds, but you do. Probability manipulation is a self-destructive interface. I advise you to exercise caution when using it.”

  “It’s a little late for advice. I had some problems with my host. He’s psychotic, and… I needed control.”

  Rubbing his mouth, Arsus hissed through his teeth. “I see. Now the issue with your nominal identity makes some sense. What exactly did you do?”

  “Changed the odds of my being able to control my host, and of learning Valon’s memory techniques.”

  “Valon. That was Tanandor’s host in your last simulation?”

  Lewis nodded. “On my world.”

  “What happened after you changed those odds?”

  “I passed out. When I woke up, Jenny was there. I wasn’t quite the same. I think… the host memories got fused with Lewis’s. They’re meshed in my head, like a framework. I can tell which ones are Michael’s, and which are Lewis’s, but when I think of them, they’re both mine. I’m… something different, I think. More Lewis than Garibaldi, but there are things in my head that shouldn’t be there.” He swallowed distastefully. “It’s… very hard to look at those memories.”

  “Why?”

  “Lewis hated Garibaldi because he’s a sadistic murdering rapist, and Garibaldi disliked Lewis because… well… because Lewis is a godless liberal pussy. Garibaldi’s words. Now that they’re toget
her, there’s this… undercurrent of self-loathing. I have to look forward. Looking back is… sickening.”

  Arsus put his hand on his chin. “It sounds similar to what Perillia goes through. She dives deeper into her hosts than most of us. It may be a trait you share. She might be able to help you. Unfortunately, she’s in Oregon. In any case, we need information. That’s why I’m here. Can you tell me your story?”

  “My story?”

  “Lewis Herman’s story,” he clarified. “How you came to this simulation. What Tanandor did to you. How he blessed you with your interface.”

  Lewis narrowed his eyes suspiciously. “Blessed me?”

  “A misnomer. How he transferred it and what he told you. All of it. Every detail is important. It could help us find him. Or at least figure out what he’s doing.”

  Lewis laughed. “I already know what he’s doing. He’s distracting you. I’m pretty sure that’s why he sent me.”

  “I’ll consider that. Tell me your story.”

  Therapy time, thought Lewis. That had always helped him in the past, so why not? “Yeah, alright.” Taking a deep breath, he started with his job at Majutay Radionics. Talked about the scanner and the animal testing. Went into detail about his first meeting with Valon. Skipping the mundane minutia of his limited social interactions, he went directly to his kidnapping at the hands of Nora Trent and his successive arrival on this world. “I was given the directive to avoid capture, avoid the authorities, find shelter, and go to sleep. That’s all I knew when I woke up. At first, I wasn’t even aware I was in a host. There weren’t any memories of anything, not yet.”

  “This is typical,” explained Arsus. “Your host would have just recently died. The Attistar generally restores a host to operational condition before connecting a jumper. The host mentality often thinks it’s dead for a while. Go on.”

  “I found a fallout shelter in the back of a house. There were a couple of old folks living there. They let me in. Told me I was a CRAPPER. I didn’t know what they meant, but the Seattle Urban Militia were hunting me. Henry hid me in a dry cistern, and I went to sleep. That’s when I had my first dream.”