Infinity Machine Page 4

  I sit there with Ajax for a while, feeling vastly unequal, but for a moment, like equals, like children with a friend, both without a full concept of home or life, a quality we might be stuck with… forever.

  17.

  Ajax rises. His tone has shifted.

  He has an agenda; I feel it moving. “Dorn, you are going to learn how to use the Multi-Plexus. No part of the Subvoxian technology can be used without it. The Multi-Plexus is how I am here with you, and also with the other 35 humans at the same time. The Multi-Plexus is how I am controlling the Shangri-La.”

  I am staggered by this, “Ajax, you are controlling that entire ship yourself?”

  Ajax laughs, “Impressed I see... it will be hard for you to understand. We can talk about this later, but right now, we must increase your capability. There are many tiers of understanding. There is much we must see.”

  Ajax continues, “The Plaidan were a superb species. However, there were specific tendencies and nerve variations that led to the inability to direct the technology in a productive way. It didn't take.”

  I interject, “So the Plaidan were not morally corrupt in a way that led to their destruction? They didn't nuke themselves? They just... flinched, or played a bad game, or needed a different prescription?”

  Ajax says, “There were small problems with all of the above.”

  “So, you are here to test our humanity... and skill first?”

  “Yes. We have studied

  humans for quite some time, with our preliminary field labs. These are automated systems, smaller ships. When the Shangri-La arrives, it is the last test.”

  I reply, “So if you cannot help us, what happens to our planet.”

  Ajax says, “emanant destruction.”

  I reel.

  “I am kidding, Dorn. We will disseminate simpler technologies to help cure diseases, reverse this global warming, new energy systems, and restore the oceans that humanity has recklessly destroyed. We will instill a new informative education technology that will slowly, over the next 200 years, train away the primitive mentality. It will possibly take another thousand years to evolve humanity into congenial alignment with the Subvoxian technology. The alterations would be too much for simple DNA alteration. It requires systemic change. You must understand, your scientists have discovered much technology from vessels that we left behind millennia ago.”

  I can’t even reply. I finally ask, “And if we do qualify, now?”

  Ajax says, “Then by the end of next year you will exist in a reality that you cannot understand today. It will be as unfathomable as your meeting with that Subvoxian. In one year, humanity will evolve 1,000 years into the future. In ten years, you will be a new kind of creature.”

  My expression contains a brief mix of awe and trepidation.

  Ajax laughs, “Think positively. I see that twinge of horror, Casey. I see it right there.”

  Ajax peers toward the sky and turns my way, “So Casey, shall we move on?”

  I insist, “One last thing — why must we learn this tech individually — will we have to operate these machines manually?”

  Ajax says, “If the Subvoxian technology can be applied to your species, what you understand as 'work' and 'machine' will be drastically changed. In fact, the very nature of reality itself will be changed. It will redefine everything.”

  I feel puzzled.

  Ajax says, “I control the Shangri-La; at the same time 36 iterations of myself are teaching 36 humans at once, Dorn. Think about it… it will all change.”

  18.

  I have given up control. I am doing what Ajax asks. I'm am subjected to a series of experiences.

  Ajax pushes me again into multiple phases of alternate reality.

  I push the realty around, with my... mind... or body... it's hard to tell how this functions.

  I am in a long deep space tube. There is a starry sky at the end. Around me, walls of metal panels, alien-like. I am pushing massive spheres of energy ripples, transparent through this tube.

  “Again,” says Ajax. “Again,” for hours.

  I am now in a training ground, the floor is made of cubes, the cubes lift and fly at me, and I bend their flight.

  I process complex situations. Simulations. Earth with be destroyed or saved. My mind fills with information panels, holograms that feel real. I fail 60, 70 times. As soon as I save the Earth, Ajax loads up a double iteration of the same exercise. I try to save two Earths at once. I fail.

  “Again,” says Ajax.

  “It's impossible... to solve two problems at the same time!?”

  Ajax says, “This will help.” He pushes against my middle back, and my consciousness takes on a sort of split focus.”

  “Woah, okay, I can manage,” I say… it's a dramatic shift.

  Ajax says, “Maintain this split array — even a human can manage two or three iterations.”

  Suddenly, I stand within a ship.

  “It's a real ship,” says Ajax, “this is no simulation.”

  I stand in front of a screen 30 feet wide, a screen, not a port, I think. I am flying over the Earth. I have no buttons to push, no levers. I will the ship to move. I push the ship to greater speeds.

  The land moves so incredibly fast.

  “Sonic boom,” says Ajax. “Faster, Dorn.”

  I push the ship faster. The features below blur.

  “Faster, Dorn,” says Ajax.

  I push the ship faster. I see the alternate screens that show the ship's exterior; we are scorching the air.

  We vibrate.

  I feel suspended.

  I see the ocean coast below.

  We travel across a sea.

  I spot the next coast.

  More land passes.

  Another ocean.

  “Dorn, you are limited by your concept of what speed is.”

  I feel obsessed, exhilarated, powerful. I increase the speed.

  Land below.

  Ocean below.

  Land.

  Ocean.

  Ajax laughs, “Do you think we traveled light years like this, Dorn?”

  I yell, “Seriously? How do I do it?”

  Ajax says, “Like this.” I feel a superb wave of energy behind me. It fills me with a clarity of understanding unparalleled. It causes me to motivate forward in a new way...

  The air around us, the ship, inside the ship, takes on a new nature, there is a pressure change, incredible pressure, there is a moment of dulled sound, then a small ringing and whooshing grows — and suddenly... there is a felt gush.

  More gushing...

  The air curdles...

  And then a very deep — POP.

  I stand there, star-struck, my whole sense of self pauses. My arms outstretched.

  “HOLY SMOKES DORN, WE'RE GONNA HIT IT,” yells Ajax's voice.

  I stare at the screen and see a massive white star slamming towards the ship, we are moving millions of miles an hour.

  “STOP THE SHIP” yells Ajax, “OR YOU WILL DIE IN THE FIRES OF THAT STAR.”

  My consciousness seems absent.

  “DELAY,” yells Ajax. “DELAY.”

  Something engages, the ship slows down. I seem grenade-shocked still unable to move.

  “Wow,” says Ajax, “you took us very far. I am somewhat impressed.”

  I feel something remove the gridlock inside me, my guts engage, then my heart, then my mind, and when my mind engages, my heart thuds so hard. I feel like I'm having a heart attack; my heart is walloping my chest; I can feel blood gushing through my elbows and wrists. My legs feel like 1000 pounds.

  “Breath... just breath...” says Ajax. “Your heart is young again, from our healing, you will live.”

  I heave and heave.

  “There is so much more,” says Ajax, “so much...”

  “Your obsession tendency is quite high, Dorn. I barely had to nudge you...”

  19.

  We sit suspended before that incredible star, a star that fills the screen, a st
ar that must be hot to the extreme. I follow Ajax's commands as he pushes me through more tests. “Your memory is quite bad, Dorn! Reflexes are okay.”

  “Your sense of humanity is decent, but I already knew this.”

  I say, “How did you know?”

  Ajax said, “Because you arrived to the Shangri-La.”

  I think about that terrifying journey, how my truck almost flipped twice, I say, “Yeah about that, I thought I was going crazy… after a while, I could tell you were pulling me to the ship.”

  Ajax says, “You were riding an energy, an energy that triggers consciousness and insights a specific action.”

  “Yeah, I'm not too comfortable with that.”

  Ajax says, “I know, you don’t like to lose control. You don't like to be manipulated, and you don't like to control others either. That's why you are here, specifically.”

  I say with hesitation, “... well, it is true... but it feels invasive for you to tell me that.”

  Ajax says, “The energy we send out calls people of your, how shall we say, orchestration.”

  I reply, “So what do you mean: if you send out 'happy' vibes all the happy people show up?”

  Ajax says, “Sure. Like music, or food — it attracts those who want it most.”

  “Except you forced me to drive like a maniac toward an alien ship, while everyone else ran away.”

  Ajax looks at me, “Dorn, we cannot put advanced technology in the hands of corruptible, Machiavellian scumbags right?”

  I feel pressed to concede a little and work up a laugh, “Well...”

  Ajax says, “The Plaidan, even their worst criminals would not kill another Plaidan. They were evolved at least 2,000 years beyond the human species, yet, their planet was destroyed. Despite that fact, even though there are terrible, corruptible, ruthless human beings — here we are, considering helping Earth...”

  I think about my bitter, sour attitude towards decades of world news and local political corruption. “That is kind of amazing, but didn't you say the Plaidan had moral imperfections.”

  Ajax says, “Incredible power can lead great people down paths unexpected. When the Subvoxian technology is installed, very tiny flaws of mentality are given tremendous effect in the power flow and the effect can play out in mere moments.”

  I say, “What were the Plaidan flaws?”

  Ajax says, “The Plaidan are a species still, and we don’t expose the weakness of species that can be exploitable or become too libelous. That’s information is not shared, even to me.”

  “Well, did the Plaidan attack each other?”

  Ajax said, “It cannot be described like that. The Subvoxian technology did not run rampant. The adhesion process did not achieve pure compatibility.”

  I feel the gravity of the situation, having seen that planet die.

  Ajax says, “Picture a fast spinning sphere. If you spin it faster and faster, it seems incredibly smooth, the great weight and movement achieves sublimity. Yet, the faster the sphere spins, the more potentially volatile it becomes. Even a very, very small wobble will send the sphere flying away.”

  I nod.

  Ajax says, “When you change reality itself, such problems are magnified. You see how intense this technology is, and you have only scraped the surface of the surface... The technology you've seen so far is only 4,000 to 6,000 years beyond Earth technology.

  To avoid my feelings of obliviousness, I interrupt, “And you said the Subvoxians are 400,000 years beyond us.”

  Ajax replies with much gravity, “There is much to be seen, Dorn. The Subvoxians are benevolent, and have great motivation to help others. They are so advanced. They assist for many reasons, but one reason is a personal “humanitarian” reason. They know how living beings suffer. Subvoxian technology improves everything about reality. When they bypass their technology for themselves, they consider normal existence a hell in comparison.”

  I say, “They are trying to... liberate others?”

  Ajax says, “It seems like that.”

  For a moment, I think about myself, how I am pulled into this experience. I finally say, “This is not a Trojan horse it is — find a way in, and take us over from the inside out?”

  Ajax says, “The Subvoxians have everything they need, they quest through the universe looking for answers and purpose. They look for equals, and empower younger species to grow towards becoming equals. Also, they long to catch a glimpse at species more advanced than themselves...” Ajax smiles, “which they have found.”

  20.

  I exclaim, “OH REALLY? You mean there are creatures beyond these Subvoxians? What the...”

  Ajax smiles and interrupts, “I can show you an image, but you'll never meet them not ever in this lifetime.”

  Ajax swings up a hologram. The image is partial, the area is white, there is an outline of a pale blue figure. That figure is long, it's head round and good looking. There are pencil-thick, transparent, prismatic strands like hair coming of its head in a bundle.

  Ajax says, “The Opthalians.” He smiles as he looks at the image. He clearly feels warmth towards them. He beams a little, like he is enduring a crush.

  I just watch him for a second.

  Ajax turns toward me and says, “The Opthalians imparted a great wealth of technology. They are a sublime race, and they live a more ethereal existence. The Opthalians gave the Subvoxians a lot of the energy manipulation tech. The Subvoxians gave the Opthalians much travel tech and material building tech. The Opthalians are nearly non-real. It took much time until I could endure their presence, but if you stood near one today, your consciousness would disseminate, because you would abandon your body — and their energy has a way of permitting you to do that. It's not allowed. Once in touch with such an experience, those of a more primitive development simply do not want to come back — reality is too painful by emotional and natural suffering.”

  Ajax says, “As you've seen,

  the Subvoxian presence is more than you can bare, but when you are put back in place, you still want to be human.”

  “Are there other beings, beyond the Subvoxians?

  Ajax says, “Yes...” he grows more serious, and takes a few steps, “we are now to the point where we must talk about the Rhionak. They are a species beyond the Subvoxians in technology only. The Rhionak are far below many species in cognizance and demeanor. The Rhionak are, as most define them, permanently centered around their own interests. They do things most consider to be evil. They take slaves. They take planets. They 'ensure their survival for eons to come' as they say themselves.”

  I am shown images of the Rhionak. They don't look particularly evil. They are of pale greenish skin on the front, and warmer, redder skin on the back. They have strong faces, thick hands with 4 triangular fingers, wide at the base with fine fingertips.

  Ajax says, “Part of why we are here, is to protect the Earth from the Rhionak, and their helpers, the Harrish; a secondary race they work with.”

  I see images of a terrifying being. They are dark gray below the chest, and oily black arms and faces. There limbs look strong, cut to the muscle. Their fingers are very long, blackened claws.

  Ajax says, “The Harrish were a species once, but the Rhionak slaved them, then evolved them over and over again until we see this horrible beast.”

  Ajax changed the imagery again, “The Harrish were derived from members of the Elaxian species. The Elaxians still exist.”

  I see images of a lean being, strong lean arms, arched back, legs with a slight bird-like bend. Faces congenial, a thin blonde mane on the males, a thrush main on the females.

  Ajax says, “If the Rhionak invade, you do not see them, you see the Harrish, and their ships are devices of horror.”

  Ajax continues, “We do not know why the Rhionak are so terrible, yet speculate it is a hormonal resistance in several of their functional glands. That unique aberration is resistant to DNA modifiers as well. Because of this issue, they have an intrinsic thirst for domin
ation and self-species unity. They are no match for the Subvoxians, the Opthalians, or a dozen other advanced species, but for everyone else, the Rhionak do what they please. This is why the Subvoxians first developed such a strong outreach.”

  I really don't know how to respond, “Do you communicate with the Subvoxians a lot?”

  Ajax stares away for a second, “You could say that.” He looks away and smiles, then looks back at me, “Dorn, I am an evolved creation of the Subvoxian race.”

  My brows raise as high as possible.

  Ajax continues, “I have been made for this process, specifically.”

  21.

  Ajax says, “There is so much going on when we introduce ourselves to a new species — when everything is quite new. After several ruckus attempts at a normal interaction, that plan seemed impossible to work with. Yet, a smooth introduction occurs if I project myself as the same species as the planet we visit.”

  “Oh really?” I say.

  Ajax nods.

  “And....”

  “Well, it's time to reveal myself, Dorn.”

  The air around Ajax shifts. Lighted squares move around him, literally in the air. There is a glitch, lines of light. The Ajax I've seen disappears, and written into the air at the very same time is an alien being — a being over 7 feet tall. This being has a head as wide as a basketball, eyes the size of grapefruits, deep glassy black eyes. A small chiseled mouth, huge cheekbones, hair like tightly formed flattened dreadlocks, skin of smooth, tough, dark opalescent material.

  I’m nearly staggering in fear; my breath is heaving. I stare without remorse — the being has hands with four fingers that look like giant thumbs, and it’s wearing a brown vest, brown pants, a colored, threaded belt. I look down and see no shoes, instead three-toed-feet with black claws, feet that look much tougher than a bird’s.