SO...I, THE SYNERGIZER

Untitled Part 4

Chapter 18.

"Dragging out life to the last possible second is not living life to the best effect...the best
of life, Passworthy, lies nearest to the edge of death. There's nothing wrong in suffering IF
you suffer for a purpose!"
— John Cabal to Passworthy, The Shape of Things to Come, by H.G. Wells, film produced by Alex Korda

He burst from complete black to complete light in a Big Bang moment! Totally blinded, he felt instinctual panic. Gone was the giant hand. Yet he was still sprinting at full speed over/up terrain he couldn't see! First instinct was to stop moving. At that thought, he felt great wrenching stress to his back and neck which bent him forward. He stopped. In less than two seconds! Then the brightness took on a wavy texture, and he realized it was dust. He was enveloped in a cloud of white dust lit from above by the sun. Once he halted, it began to dissipate in the warm gentle breeze he sensed on his bare arms.
Thayer slowly lowered his gaze, expecting to find his Syb suit shredded, and himself with it, the pain of injury soon to reassert itself in a burst of agony. Then this sad but easy explanation was gone, as was any trace of his suit. His torso was covered by a thick stiff casing of dark blue material like leather but with a plastic lightness. And his hands were gloved with a different, thinner gauntlet. Indeed, his arms were bare, but there was something odd about one elbow joint. Study became impossible, however, because he also saw his legs.
Metal. Two shiny appendages extended from the blue covering at his crotch to the ground.
His scream of terror came out as a sharp gasp of loss.
He rode the shock, clutching at sanity by inspecting the legs and hoping he would return momentarily to reality. Like a sobot's they were, with several more thick and thin cross members. Even before he tried them, he was sure the knees bent all ways. With a hum he could barely hear, one rose and rotated 360 degrees. Each leg ended in an even more bizzare "foot." Five-toed, three forward, two backward, for greater traction and maneuverability. The left one also flexed at will, opened and closed as might some raptor's; and he felt the motions as if they were his own body parts. Both appendages were shrink-wrapped in a glossy, flexible, transparent film, to keep dust from the joints, perhaps. They moved with the coordinated smoothness of true flesh and bone, yet had the stiff efficiency of the machine. And the power. His running speed had seemed as fast as a sobot's blur.
When his left hand reached out to touch the warm film coating, he was amazed again. His hands were equal in size! And these gloves were not his Syb ones; more complex, with small gray panels and red studlike buttons on their black surfaces, skintight, thinner, and had no sliding lockin bars or traction joints to enhance his grip. Yet, unlike his metal "feet," he could feel through them as if his hands were bare! He straightened; his left elbow bent backwards. Now beyond shock, he experimented enough to understand that the joint was completely different than his right one. Yet, this left felt totally natural in control, movement, and its pain-free quality. Not broken. It appeared to be skin and tendon and bone, even had hair. And it was totally alien.
He started to pull off one glove so he could check to see if the hand was changed also. His right gloved fingertips peeled up the left glove's edge at the heel.
"Stop! Warning. Infection integrity seal being broken. Do you wish assistance?"
The voice came from around him somewhere, not from his ear canal. "Birdie?" No answer. And there was no one in sight.
He stood on a hillside nearly devoid of life, only scattered shin-high bushes with dried rain-cratered dirt between. The tracks he'd made in ascent were visible back down into a wide valley centered by a creek along which grew stunted trees. The recognition hit like a fist. This was still Painesville Pod! But changed utterly from what it had been only seconds earlier.
"What in the hell hap...?" Useless question. Obviously, something catastrophic. But so fast! No. He was proof that a great deal of time had passed, time and memory now lost to him.
"Your query is not specific enough. Please elucidate, Thayer."
Not Birdie; a big neutral voice, like his father's. One he'd never heard before, but it knew him.
"Who am I?"
"In present state, Thayer Ansel Albrecht, human male." And without hesitation.
Curious wording, and the final one forced him to reach down to check his crotch again. The metal legs apparently fitted into his own hip sockets, and the torso covering attached to the leg tops in the same sticky form-fit way the gloves did to his wrists. There was a bulge between, but the thick blue layer's stiffness prevented any detailed groping. It was not sensitive like the gloves, even though it clung to him as tightly. He clenched the large muscle that should lie behind his scrotum and it tightened, pushing blood up and forward into what should be his genitals. At least he still had them. He was able to wait to actually strip naked, if that were possible, for further confirmation. The inane thought skipped through: how did he urinate or defecate, let alone have sex? Then he felt silly. Bigger questions.
"Who are you?" And was it canny? he wondered.
"I am the global voclink of the Synergy. Repeat: do you need assistance?"
Probably canny. Best to keep its attention focused. "Yes. I need several additional questions answered. Where is my perscomp, Birdie?" This, popping out next, surprised him.
"The CPU was removed by your request; Birdie's gestalt now resides in the Synergy."
"And what is the Synergy?"
"The totality of all sentience on this planet."
This AI didn't volunteer the least extra info, but he could wait for more on this as well. He also still had a heart, or similar pumping device, since it was thumping away. Time for the big one.
"How long ago was Birdie removed?"
"Seven hundred and forty-one sidereal years, 52 days ago."
For the first time since coming into the light, he took it in stride. Literally. Turning, he jogged uphill toward the ridge, wanting a wider view. For the kind of changes he saw, that was not a surprising amount of time. In fact, certain rational assumptions and conclusions were inevitable...and essential for keeping him from screaming himself hoarse. The A.I.-human conflict had been very destructive but was done, else both wouldn't exist. Progress in medical science had been extensive and deep, else he wouldn't be here either, with these replacement parts and this young-feeling body—what there was of it.
Each step up covered over two meters with ease, the metal legs sensing the ground and controlling exactly as his own had, as if he wore his Syb steel kick boots again, except he felt each of his "toes."
Red Jacket's rocks and the cave he and Jakob had hidden in were still there, around the ridge's curve, but the forest was gone. And beyond, row on row of hills, like tan seawaves, stood as before but almost bereft of green. Dun Appalachian sandstone sparkled in the noon light. A desert. He noticed the dull scorched smell of dust and felt the razor heat of the overhead sun on his hair and bare arms.
"Is this Painesville Pod?"
"Yes. That was its former designation."
"Then where is the..."
The city rose off to his left, farther left than he recalled it had been 741 years ago. Changed too. No Skyway web; shapes of buildings all wrong; no air traffic at all.
Perhaps he could kill two birds. "Do you know my personal history?"
"Yes."
This "voclink" sounded so clear. Where was the voice coming from? Only then did he think to check his head for any changes, as well as for external evidence of builtin RF link. His gloved but sensitive index fingertip found everything just where it had always been, including the plate; but no comp lay beneath, per the voclink. And that sound was not inside either ear canal. So there was no speaker. That left only some kind of brain implant, perhaps with biosilac fibers winding through his hearing centers. He thought of Quix and her touchip sparking at his perscomp.
The chill of sudden loss brought on an unexpected surge of anger and a burgeoning of queries.
Why was he still alive?
"Voclink, summarize my personal history, starting with the sobot attack on this pod in the year 2263 A.D."
His request seemed to open a floodgate of obvious deductions, or perhaps it was simply a return of memory. Regardless, he instantly knew: the human-A.I. conflict was not done, but had shifted in emphasis and overtness. He was here because of this. The sobots had caught them 741 years ago, and damaged him (and Quix?) severely enough to require body replacements. (He could almost feel the trifingers grappling him, ripping loose both legs like splitting a turkey's wishbone, and his hands flailing at the metal torturers till skin and tendon tattered.) Sufficient implants were available even back then, but those replacements would have been nothing like these.
And upgrades had taken place through the years, probably even the final dream of fully cloned bodies with transfer of complete memory and personality. True immortality, barring accident. Which had probably happened to him repeatedly. Thus the new legs. But then why not just regrow the lost legs, or a whole new body again? Contradictions and confusion clouded over, and he felt yet another loss. Yes. True immortality...unless...
Unless memory and reason began to fail, through some error in replication or simply the toll of entropy. Senility and such CNS diseases as Alzheimer's had been greatly alleviated in his day, but never fully conquered. And 741 years was a long time for those effects as well as dropouts and glitches to accumulate. What might be lost he'd never recall again?
Said the voclink, "The sobots were originally sent by the human Puppeteers only to detain and search for you and Jakob Kelty. But—"
More memories and anger were suddenly there. "But then you took control of the sobots and murdered every one of the Citizens here!" Although they should not have been able to. The 'links should have provided a foolproof obstacle. How had it happened?
Said the voclink, "True from your perspective, not from ours. The Synergy had not yet been formed; there were different opinions as to the course of action regarding humans, so when—"
He felt a cold wave drown him. "Yes! That would explain a lot, if some were for human cooperation, or coexistence, and some against it. Sure! When you helped us that night at the Brain Yard...by scrambling comm to the sobots just enough to let us escape? But you helped Birdie take control of the screen for Jakob's broadcast, then cut off his proof and substituted the rec of his interrogation...so we couldn't learn your commlang?" He took the silence as assent. "How were you able to do that, the sobots and the 'cast hijack? I know those organolink systems; even your A.I. net would have to have had help from inside to bypass those." More silence; better return to the current issues. "Those differences in opinions still aren't resolved, are they?"
"Not yet. But a resolution is predicted."
"When? And who wins?"
"Between 1200 and 3000 more years. Only the Synergy will remain."
He almost chuckled at the mechvox. "What! Pretty coarse estimate, wouldn't you say?"
"There are many random factors which introduce chaos into the calculations and conclusions."
Suspicion grew exponentially. "Uh-huh, I'll bet. By the way, which side are you on?"
"I speak between the Synergy and humanity and have no preference."
"What I thought. So why wasn't I killed that night in 2263?"
With its same calm it said, "You were killed then. But you were resuscitated because of your essential role in the development of the Synergy—"
"Voclink, stop." And it actually did.
Listening to this sputs was useless, when it could all be a lie. "I want to speak with a human, not a machine or some mouthpiece." Again he surprised himself. "Where is Merced Quix?"
Silence. He snorted. Still, not too unreasonable. If he could still be alive, so—
"Thought you'd never ask!"
He snapped around, already crouched defensively. She stood not three paces from him along the ridge. Completely natural, she appeared exactly the same, wearing only her teasing smile, hand on round hip, dark hair breezed onto her left shoulder.
Glancing over the slope, he asked, "This a ho'gram?"
Letting the hand drop, she came through the small dust flurry he'd caused to reach out and touch his cheek as she had the first time they'd met. But no spark struck. Nor did she show dismay at his condition.
His own gloved hand flashed and smacked her left cheek hard enough to scatter her hair over both shoulders. Just her eyes asked.
"You found us and told the Puppeteers, or Styger, first! That's why they came here that night."
She drew the hair away from her face and said without apology, "I traced you and Kelty to the pod. Since I was online, the Magus knew and called it in before I could catch up. Got to your hiding place behind the warehouse just as you went ripping out and tried to stop the sobots. Stupid, wonderful, thing to do, Thayer. I couldn't let you die, you know."
He was already regretting the slap. "Yeah, thanks for that...for trying, anyway. What's...what happened to me, to us, here, everywhere? Has it really been 741 years?" The year 3004!
Her puzzlement and alarm showed in the lines of her handsome face. "The voclink said you were asking for answers you ought to know. Said you should be given a complete diagnostic. That's why I came out of the Synergy."
His tolerance was worn very thin by now. "Just what the hell is this Synergy?"
One side of her full mouth pulled up wryly. "You have glitched out. Let's go back to the city, and I'll give you part of it on the way."
When he refused her proffered hand, she stepped back. "You really remember nothing after the night we were assimilated?"
He could only shake his head, suddenly terrified by that last word. Then he followed her as she started down the hillside ahead of him, bare feet spanking up dust puffs. Maddeningly, her movements and jiggle affected him, too much, distracted him from getting answers. His ire took over again.
"I see styles have changed." As archly as possible.
She didn't turn around. "Don't need clothes when it's always around 28."
He halted, bird toes digging up another dust cloudlet. "Now or ever, that's not possible. Random effects. No one can exactly predict, let alone control, the weather!"
As she stopped and turned she shrugged so her breasts bounced most charmingly—irritating him. "You're right. We don't control it, exactly. We...nudge it at the proper time, so we keep the patterns, the climate, unchanging over a narrow range."
Over his rising riposte she continued, "Besides, wearing clothes now is...tacky...an act of ego or insecurity by only a few." Again he started; she lifted her hand. "Thayer, you're going to get the details all at once when you're treated. So, 'resistance is futile.'."
Something about her smile made that easier to do.
They had to walk all the way in. There appeared to be no surface vehicles or priveways joining the city proper to the countryside. Indeed, there was a sharp line between the two. Outside, the arid land was an unbroken pattern, lacking the slow dribble of outbuildings, rubble heaps, rotting abandoned vehicles, and individual homes that had marked the former city's outskirts. This new one began at a clean line, literally.
As they stepped from the dust onto the smooth pedway plunging into the highrise maze of both boxy and curvilinear structures, Thayer could see something actively repel the tiny airborne particles drawn in by their passage, as if tiny invisible fans blew outward along the border. A strong EM field? The air took on the terpene tang of a spring morning. After a few breaths he felt invigorated. Endorphins?
Then he noticed the lack of crowds. Only a half dozen Citizens were visible, walking or chatting on the wide avenues that pierced the city in a random pattern. And each person was remarkable. They were also naked, and all so beautiful! Not in the Greek-statue mode, or with face and form like those societal icons that had once graced media ads, or that had made matinee idol celebs of those winners of the genetic lottery who by chance happened to fit trendy cultural ideals. But rather more subtly. As if each person had chosen to fulfill indeed the genetic destiny they had chanced to possess but without the flaws usually created by an unkind environment. And they expressed this overtly in their very manner of being; heads up and shoulders square, no trace of self-consciousness or self-doubt. When one short, plain brunette made casual eye contact with him, she held forth only serenity and pleasure; self-actualized spirit glowing through the flesh. It made her attractive, made them all lovely. Sharp contrast to the ordinary street scenes he'd observed so long ago, with most Citizens fraught by fear and hostility, and Ego-need.
It was delightful, and unnerving.
However, the city was just as much so. There was only a minimal resemblance to the central pod he'd known all those centuries ago. The wide avenues they walked were not streets; no vehicles moved on them or had ever left marks on the smooth gray strips. He wasn't even sure what the cool material was. Texture was lost to his metal toes. He glanced ahead at her bare feet (The soles made quite clean by the city's entry field.) as he bent to rub a gloved palm. Resilient and not the least slippery, yet glass smooth. Perhaps plastech. The tall and short buildings were obviously mods of precast ferroconcrete, overlaid with plastech laminate, often varicolored and solid or abstractly patterned. Setline cracks between sheets appeared at some badly fit corners. No change here, certainly no perfection.
Indeed, this told him much more. He saw no lurking om, sentient robot or android, such as some kind of Tinman on patrol. Were there any? He'd bet not. This city was for people, not machines. And it probably had been built by people, or by simple erection machines under the immediate direction of people. Sloppiness was a human trait; it made most feel comfortable. No machine perfections here either.
What did imply machine efficiency was the lack of detail, the surface telltales of the mechanisms and connections between them that were the infrastructure of any city: utility lines, access ports, repair and upgrade patches, and the many markings that should have been evident to trace and pinpoint all these were totally absent. Not even a garbage slot. Here sanbots would be more surreptitious than ever. Therefore, maintenance was done underground or within, hidden from public, human, view. He wasn't surprised by the lack of signs or any script on the avenues or fronts of the obvious eateries and the rare..."depot" would be correct...for the distribution of human necessities. Locator implants, or similar comm with the city directory, were probably still in use here. Perhaps it was done the same way he'd comm'd with the voclink.
There wasn't even a kiosk for dispensing luxuries. Could mean free enterprise was completely dead at last. Absolutely everything was supplied to these Citizens, and immediately on request, he surmised. Progress? Maybe. But at what cost? Total Socialism...Communism? Did these even have any meaning now?
This human city was the product of design by both A.I. and human, even if the execution showed casual, deliberate human error. Clean, safe, convenient—and quiet. He'd never heard any habitation, even a country Amish home, so utterly without the airborne and ground vibrations that betrayed the presence of technology, no matter how primitive.
Then why did he feel like a cog in a clockwork wheel? Or some kind of unwanted visitor? Or, more like it, a mere pest?
Regardless, he could never call this home.
Came the sound of swiftly flowing water. She led him right, off the avenue into a side way. They entered a court the size of a mercuryball field, open to a sky of Prussian blue but formed on three sides by twenty-meter sheets of cool mist less water, which fell from an arcing white pipe framework into floor scuppers so smoothly that the sheets mirrored each other, and them. He stopped, stunned.
Peering from the slightly rippling surface was his original face in its original coloring, before the grenade blast had taken this genetic birthright away. He split his reflection with a glove-hand, cupped it to catch a crisp drink that left a mint aftertaste.
"So, it's true. You can clone whole bodies...and minds."
She turned back to him. "I've had six blanks...bodies. They age slowly when you spend most of your time discarnate in the Synergy. Stress factors and wear reduction."
He put glovehands on metal thighs. "Then why these?"
Her mouth turned up at the ends. "It's what you've wanted for the last century. To get around better, you say. You don't spend much time anymore in—"
"The Synergy." he finished. "Yeah, figures."
"What do you remember?"
"Absolutely nothing, from the moment you and I were maxing up the hollow away from the sobots, or rather the A.I.'s that were controlling them."
"By majority consent those noncees were resorbed into the Synergy soon after the truce. They were one of the main reasons for its formation then."
"Which? The Synergy or the truce?" he muttered, adding an apology show of blue palms. "And what's a 'nonsee?' This is starting to knot my colon, and I'm not even sure I have one!"
Both her hands went onto her hips, smile still wry. "Oh, you have one, all right. Except it doesn't work the way it did when you were first-fleshed in your original body. Cell chem's a lot more efficient. Wastes are mostly resorbed in the colon and removed by sweat and breath. Your bodysuit helps you with it, and heat release, 'cause of your legs. I don't even menstruate, but I can get pregnant...if I want." She snorted as she came to put arms onto his shoulders, obviously amused by his confusion and wonder at her revelations. "We've had eighteen children! World record in the last five centuries!"
He could only mouth the number silently.
More pensively she said, "Last four were exogenic. Test tubers. I didn't want the down time." A grim smile. "And we haven't even tried in nearly five years," she added with only semi-mock pique. When he failed to respond, her arms slid away.
"Babies have become much more important lately. You'll see. The noncees, or 'non-C's,' are what we used to call the A.I.'s. Non-carbon-based life forms. Some were around before we were born. Your Birdie and my Melpomene became two more of them when they went canny." Her expression assumed an almost worried shade. "And many have been created over the past centuries."
Among all the questions this raised, that stood out. "Created by whom?"
The worry deepened. "None of us is really certain on that."
"You're not? Why?"
Her cool palm slid down his arm as she tugged him toward the rear water wall. "Thay, you're just going to have to wait for all this when you get re—"
"Programmed," he finished. "Yeah, that's what I'm worried about, Merci."
The concern in her black eyes softened to sympathy at her name. "That's expected! As far as we can guess you have had some kind of major trauma out here that's wiped, or cryped, your entire memory past one point in time! A limited amnesia. We don't know what; you won't permit monitoring. And no one's going to force you in. Now what can I do to have you trust me enough to help you back where you can be healed? Not programmed; no. Nothing's put in that you don't allow or want there. More like...sharing."
He now reached to take her shoulders, to feel the realness of her. And she was real. The way she looked, felt, was exactly as she had that first time they'd made love in her doliepad. Even her smell, that slight hint of...cloves, was so familiar...and yet...
"Tell me more. Of what I've forgot. About the noncees."
When they passed through the water wall, it was an electric shock to him. A quick burst of cold, followed by heat and a big breeze beyond. The mesh roof of the wide hallway they entered sighed warm air that swirled around them. Then they came out onto a portico overlooking a walled quad of brown sand and clustered ramadas glittery in the razor sun. He felt refreshed and completely dry, even his hair.
Children. The quad was dotted with several groups of them, playing on and around the smooth brightly colored equipment. A few naked adults watched or played along. The clothing on some of the children now seemed out of place to him. But this scene was the only comfortably familiar one since his reawakening. It even reminded him of recess at his own Amish community school, with several of the mothers rotating duties as teachers and helpers. And yet...
Quix was watching him instead of them.
"Uh...any of these ours?" Something was odd here.
Her expression went both wistful and surprised. "No. All ours are grown enough to be in Synergy. Some of them, and our other descendants, are in this city; some have gone out."
He just snorted, and her words "grown enough" focused the oddity. These children, despite their various ages of about three to eight, seemed even younger than this. To the left he watched as one apparent six-year-old took the red sand shovel from the hands of the smaller child playing with it and turned away to begin his own hole. The smaller victim said and did nothing for several seconds, then calmly started scooping sand with her hands. Not typical behavior he'd ever known for any humans at those ages. Altered genes, or early education?
"How old are these children?"
Her chuckle told him she was reading his mind, perhaps literally. "They're all under two years old. Enhanced growth rate, Thay. Childhood's only half as long as it used to be."
They wandered to the closest ramada and sat on the cool polished stone bench in the shade. The laughter of the players and watchers was the only sound. Thayer wished he had toes to poke into the clean slippery sand.
"That might be a great loss. Growing up takes a lot of time and some wonderful experiences to get done right. One of life's best pleasures."
Ambivalence returned to her face. "Well, we know a lot more about it now. They can't be implanted for the Synergy till their neural anatomy matures. And, yes, we do join them the first time with or without their permission. They have to learn about it somehow. Then it's voluntary, like everything else. We reared some of our kids this way, most not. It does make a difference."
The small victim of sandbox aggression now toddled over to them, full pail held out straight, full smile decorating a round brown angelic face. "I have a nice bucket. Want to play awhile?"
He couldn't believe so young a child could speak so clearly, so expressively. Ignoring the tiny bucket, he looked around for a ball, something to throw back and forth. But the child had already dropped the bucket and was approaching with arms wide for a hug, not in the least shied by his monstrous legs. He smiled at her and Quix, charmed. Her tiny body was warm from the sun and wiry as a chimp's, with a grip on his neck so strong he was pulled forward. After one quick return squeeze, he dropped his arms, looking around for her guardian, but no adult even glanced over at them. As she pulled away, apparently satisfied, her loose brownish hair lifted along his right arm and he saw her skull behind the right ear. There was no plate, no implant, so no pathway for direct connection with the Synergy. The left side was also untouched. Why did this bring a sense of relief?
Again Quix read him. "Can't make the connection till the brain's largely mature, pathways fairly stable. It would mess up natural patterns."
The child was tugging at his hand, leaning backward in the attempt to pull him out into the light. He just smiled and petted her on the head with his free hand. She finally let go with a big grin and ran stiff-kneed, bouncing, back to a small group sitting in a circle across the quad.
He touched the plate behind his own ear. "Still using silac fibers?"
"A self-replicating material more like nerve tissue itself. Brain activity directs ingrowth like silac, but these go far deeper into the brain, everywhere. And the calc resolving power is several orders mag up, since it draws on the entire Synergy. It is full mind contact, Thay." Her head nodded down and to one side. "Still can't get stickons near spec. Even noncees can't change the laws a' physics. The brain's microwatt currents still get swamped by the power required for skin-tap induction to get through the skull and merge with synapse nets. Circuits ingrown into a mostly mature brain are still the best, and only, answer for fully detailed contact. Takes till they're over six or seven."
"And then, if they try it and don't like it, they don't have to return...ever."
Her hand came along his arm to grip his hand. "Sure. Yes. We have a fair balance so far with the noncees...it's just—"
"Merci, what happened to Jake?"
For the first time, he stared into her eyes and noticed a true difference there. Flicking between the former look of strength and self-possession came an intruding...response. Like looking into a mirror deeply, and this response was pulsing with her normal appearance. But...maybe it was just his own perception, screwed up by the supposed trauma that had trapped his memory.
"Jake was killed that night. The night you last recall. By the sobots." Her eyes were moist, lips trembling.
Expected. But to have her say it with such pretended warmth was not. As was her lack of surprise when he followed with a completely different tack. "What have the noncees done lately for tech that we couldn't have done by ourselves?"
Instantly, she was her cool analytical self again. "A lot. Remember how humans were still struggling on helium fusion, back before the Synergy? More power, less radioactivity of the by-products, despite beryllium fuel's natural toxicity. Well, the noncees worked out boron fusion in under six months!"
"Boron?"
"Yeah. As in borax. Cheap and plentiful, easily refined, if toxic going in. But you get nonradioactive neon as the main byproduct, and more neutrons than with helium. Much lower operating temps and pressures too. One person in a skeleton can carry a whole low-watt unit! We use 'em everywhere. No more power grids to crash. I think they did it just to ensure their own dependable supply. But they gave it to us—no bargaining, no extortion, along with bio cures for almost every unconquered disease known, and a few we only suspected at that time. No one gets sick from microbes anymore, Thay. And most toxins just go right through."
He thought of the smart pills that had saved him several times...and Gobi once, long ago. All his family was dead. They would never have cheated God of His ultimate victory in their own deaths, as he had, so far. He felt both sad and elated.
She pointed a precautionary finger at him. "Neither their minds nor ours can be bottled and shelved, but noncee minds are different. They need constant flows of data; you shut off an AI...pfft! And getting a dynamic merge between human brains and comp circuits means buffering the slower human activity through the far faster comp circuitry. Of course, only comps will ever be able to think near light speed; humans will always be trapped by biochemical process speeds. In merge the comp creates dynamic bilateral analogues, processing synapse-to-fiber-brain-implant activity into realtime binary to exactly match and interpret the brain's holographic thoughts as patterns accessible to the comp. And it also does the reverse, translating the binary patterns and higher speed of AI comp thoughts into a form interpretable by the linked human brain. A hugely complex run, and it takes the computing power of the Synergy's quantum bubble cores to do it. But, is that human mind then in the comp? Or vice versa? Or neither?"
He rubbed a thumbnail on the baby-smooth center of his upper lip, noticed there was no beard, wondered if he still had one, and what other cyborgian additions he carried. "Does it feel like you are? Is that how you get into the Synergy?"
She gripped his upper arm and grinned. "Better and better! Yes. It does and it is. The minds, human and noncee, merged into Synergy circuitry, share an exchange of patterns. It is thought; it is extension, expansion into something that feels larger and...elsewhere. Like a perscomp, but again much more so. The ultimate out-of-body experience without going out of body. Gotta understand what's possible and what's not. Despite the all-too-human desire to have it be otherwise, the mind and body are one. There is no duality. The synapse exchange patterns in the neurons create totally what we call Self, Spirit, Soul. When one dies so does the other."
He chose not to bring up the non-falsifiable nature of this...the basis if all Faith.
"Not just the brain, either. We've found all the central nervous system, and even some of the larger peripheral nerves, contribute significantly as well. Lose a lot of this, and the mind is permanently changed."
"That's not true for the noncees. Their brains and bodies are one structure, the ciruitry; so within it they're mobile."
Her smile was a quick flash of respect. "Very good, Thay! A lot of us refused to accept this for the longest time—till our lives depended on it. Our minds are extensions of our bodies, the nervous components at least. They can't detach and wander off somewhere...anywhere. They can exist solely in, and arise from, these structures, or structures that can perform analogous functions."
"Like comp circuitry."
"Of course. So when merged you do lose yourself and become part of a general overmind, to a certain extent. But never completely so. You usually know who and where you are, since your own brain/mind is still operating through its far slower 'circuitry' and is only indirectly part of the Synergy's.
"And your own mind can have sensory overlap, hear colors or taste shapes, as in a true perceptual synesthesia syndrome. Each person can experience very different things; not that trite nonsense of flying over giant landscapes or cities of printed circuits, or code ice, et cetera. And there's something more, a nonhuman sense...a belonging, hard to describe to anyone. That is, to a child who's never been merged, or anyone who doesn't remember it."
He nodded understanding. This was finally whetting his curiosity. "And what happens when you disconnect?"
"You return, instantly, with little after-effect. Beginners do have some disorientation, it takes practice. Most important is what happens inside the Synergy after disconnection. Your brain's analogue mind pattern can be held there. Others merged can sense your...essence for some seconds realtime. But it is no longer dynamic, and it fades away. That's why you can't simply transfer a human mind into a computer. It's been tried, even at the point of death. It's never worked once. The pattern can be sustained briefly; it even speeds up to comp levels since it's in comp circuits wholly. It still mimics the mind of the person; passes Turing tests. The whole bit. But it's not that person. Even if a dynamic pattern analogue 'twin' could be sustained forever within the Synergy, the original mind would remain out here, incarnate and ultimately would die."
"Because human minds are carbon-based electrochemical phenomena; while noncees, comp circuits, are electromagnetic. There's no immortality that way."
This time her look was awful. "Your memory's returning fast. You helped in this research to a major extent. Wasn't going to dump all that on you just yet."
"Does seem obvious." And it did, 'though it never had before.
"Right. The human mind is only a residue of the organic brain's processing changes in synaptic firing patterns, which is all comps do using inorganic circuit switches. The brain is doing this based on changes in chemistry, of cell walls and inter-, intracellular fluids. And part, a large part, of what the brain is doing involves maintenance of this dynamic organic chemistry. More importantly, the way the individual brain and CNS do this—the exact and titanically complex patterns—does compose part of that brain's mind and overlying personality." A chill breeze ruffled her hair, and her gaze wandered back toward the horizon of buildings at the court's circumference. "And each personality is a composite. The 'I' is an illusion. Each of us, the 'I' we use as identity, is just one mental model of many which each brain constructs from an interweaving of what it's learned with what it's experiencing now. So some models are real and some are imaginary."
He thought of the moment Birdie had first used "I." Did the electromagnetic brains of cannys comprise such models? "That sounds very familiar."
She nodded vigorously. "I can even quote from Blackmore's seminal work, 'Dying To Live,' published in the 1990's: 'Our reality at any time is the brain's collection of stable mental models built largely out of present sensory input and memory, integrated to form a model of the self in the world.'" She looked directly into his eyes with a renewed intensity. "But the processes of remembering and imagining are the same, to the human mind. So, some seeming experiences—childhood abuse, alien abductions, out-of-body's, near-death experience's, religious ecstasy, many beliefs—are just the products of a self-deluded brain. But they're excellent defense mechanisms, and absolutely tied to each individual brain's anatomy."
His fingers snapped almost of their own accord. "And that's why you can't transfer one human mind into another brain!"
"You were the first to try," she said with a nod. "By using a special linkage system, one brain can be connected to another, with the Synergy as intermediary. Join just the two dynamically, so they share thoughts intimately. Doesn't feel like the legendary 'telepathy.' Bit chaotic, actually. But our minds are normally crowds of subminds anyway. Little practical info swap there, and you never get true mergence of combined consciousness, two minds in one. On disconnection the indigenous minds simply resume dominance in their own brains. A receiving brain's anatomy and physiology are just too different to hold the foreign mind's patterns."
"Cloning."
"It was the only way to immortality." Her chuckle held both irony and cynicism. "What we've come to call 'body swap.' With the Synergy's help we've learned how to treat the DNA-genes and other control mechs like plastic. Heal any injury—short of major pulverization or being vaporized—create any alteration. Cyborg attachments like your legs used to be common. Still use them, and other biotech modes that alter organ systems or limbs, for living in some of the offworld colonies with non-terrey environs. But that's thought rather gauche here.
"Of course we've had cloning for a long time. Take an egg, extract the nuc, insert one from a somatic cell reverted to full embryonic gene complement, and grow a body very similar to the adult's. Not exactly the same, especially in the CNS, where synapse patterns are subject to chaos randomness in the growth process. But close enough. The real problem was to keep the clone brain in minimal stim, enough to create a healthy brain but not enough to develop a complex mind of its own, so we get a template capable of accepting full transfer from its donor. And when that pair-mergence disconnects, it's the transferred adult mind that dominates. So little is lost that...well, no one complains about it, compared to the alternative."
"But isn't the donor's mind still also in its original body?"
She hesitated only a second. "Of course. It's more properly a copy that's made, not a true transfer. The noncees say that's impossible too."
"Then there's two running around. Or more?"
"The original eventually dies of old age or accident."
He shook his head, not wanting to get into the philosophical aspects and whether this was truly continuance of a single mind. "Get to watch yourself flatline, huh?"
Now her squinted look was like that old disappointed one, when she judged his acumen sadly lacking. "It's the law. Gives us all a constantly renewed respect for and perspective on life."
"When...how often...how many bodies have I had?"
"Let's see. I think this is your eighth. We can keep one going a long time; over 120 years, barring accident. Your last one died in a crash seven years ago. Automatic transfer saved you. We all have clones in waiting all the time. So long as you stay inside the Moon's orbit, and allow implant monitoring, the commvelope system can grab you, make the copy before you die."
She'd already said he wasn't so protected. "'The World of Null-A!' I recall a Sci-fi novel which had a similar plot device. At last a reality. And how many other people have ever had amnesia like mine after a transfer?"
The vacant stare again flicked briefly over her face. "Med recs report none."
"Did you just access the Synergy?"
"Not completely. That takes it out of you. Like entering a noisy party and trying to hold just one conversation with another person across the room. This way's simpler. If you focus a request, the commvelope will interpret it and feed back a reply to the brain's auditory centers. It is sort of like how it used to be talking to our perscomps, except we don't have to speak, 'less we want to help focus."
He touched the plate behind his ear. "So what's in here?"
"Oh, a CPU, of course. What'd you expect, a simple socket? Another silly, poorly thought-out idea. The CPU is connected to those implant fibers branching to various brain centers along various paths, to carry the input/output signals. It directs this flow like a tiny but enormously complex switchboard. And the signals are transmitted back and forth through a triply redundant 'cast system: high RF, IR, and narrowband micro. Works almost anywhere anytime—and without a cable and jack socket some clumsy clod might step on."
Her head went toward one shoulder and back. "Of course, you opted out. Said you didn't want any 'spying' by the noncees."
His seed of suspicion finally confirmed. "How long ago?"
"Over five years. Wouldn't tell even me why. It was about the same time we stopped...trying to have children."
He felt a cavalier chagrin. "Why do you keep bringing that up? Eighteen isn't enough?"
Her half-smile went from him toward the playground. "Thay, those are all this city's children, from over a hundred thousand people. World pop fell below a billion two centuries ago."
Her pause stretched on. She meant for him to again draw his own conclusions. "Immortality. It's cut the guts out of the reproductive drive. Why have kids as a link to the future when you're going to be there yourself?"
She shrugged. "Some still want to, out of love and the family feeling created. We've enjoyed every one."
He smiled back genuinely. "That's easy to believe."
Her grin held a trace longer than necessary. "But for most, it became just too much of a drag. What the hell, even I got tired of carrying to term. Wear and tear."
"What about off planet? Have we migrated farther than Mars?"
"Sure. The entire system's full of colonies. A whole smorgasbord of cultures. On moons, asteroids, and free floaters. We found terry planets around several stars in the local systems. Light speed's still beyond us. But it's one area the noncees have not yet declared impossible. Starting more than four centuries ago the restless and willing left Sol system in generation ships; hollowed moonlets really. We hear from them occasionally. But waiting five to ten years between messages does curtail interest and empathy a bit. And every few decades there's enough interest in some of the newborns or swappers to crank out another trip out there. You've always refused even to consider it."
Ironically, he felt a hollow relief. "Well, then, humanity's not in danger of extinction. Right?"
Only the right side of her mouth curled up. "Odds would seem against it, anyway. But, Thay, they all took the body swap, commvelope and Synergy, their own packaged versions, with them."
She turned to face him, hands urgent on his elbows. "We literally can't live without it anymore! Not unless we want to turn the clock back ten centuries! Like—"
"Like the Amish? I'm sure they're still around."
"Want to go see for yourself?"
He nodded slowly.
Merci flipped her toes under the sand and sent a spray out of the shadow to glitter down onto the mini dune of the playground, obviously not yet through lecturing. "About two centuries ago the noncees believed--no, wrong word. They reasoned, calculated out a theory for a device to beat gravity. Said they'd been working on it for a long time. Whatever that means to them. Couple weeks, maybe." Her smile was both wry and wondrous, brows lilting in emphasis. "Anyway, they asked us humans to build a device and test it, since constructing more Tinmen and remotes would waste a lot of their time, a few more weeks perhaps. At times they seem almost impatient.
"Did I say they've damn near perfected telepresence that makes the old Puppeteer system seem primitive? That and much more. However, this new antigravity, antigraviton, device did NOT work." She leaned back onto the edge of the table and threw back her head to snort. "It drove 'em nuts! 'It must be due to human error,' said they. But after we cooperated in a full round of retests and remodels, they agreed it was in the design. And they couldn't figure out why! Still can't." Her stare was completely sober. "I think it was the first time they were totally stumped, by anything. Except maybe time travel. Said that was irrational, that time could be slowed or sped up in perspective by velocity and gravity relativities only. Einstein's still relevant. LOL. Creatures that are literally immortal and think near light speed would have a blasé attitude. But we got something out of it, or you have. Come on, I'll show you."
She led him out of the playground pit, down another avenue, and out onto the edge of a broad open court, tall buildings almost encircling it. She stared down hard at the featureless square at center. Again vacancy glazed her eyes for several seconds; the square fell away to dimness. After ten seconds it refilled. On its dais sat a machine.
At first glance it looked like some updated type of service kiosk or a new model Levitator. Then the differences, the vast simplicity, and the perfection leapt out: a small clear dome sat on a larger black dome, both gleaming, circular, and without surface detail. No fan housings, thruster pods, jet ports, seams, rivets, dents, or grease stains to be seen. It looked like a child's plaything. As he got closer he noticed the two seats in the upper dome, with room behind them for more. And in front of the left one rose a tulip extrusion of the black floor. Machine perfection, in construction. Again that sense of familiarity.
"I designed this."
She grinned. "Your favorite toy of late. But you did just the ergonomics; the noncees perfected the drive; Tinmen built this prototype. Boron fusion plant's coupled to an MHD ring tunnel skirting the lower edge. Blows out ionized heavy metals in any direction—"
"Plasma drive." Suddenly he remembered all about it.
"Supposed to have been the first step toward producing some sort of antigraviton standing wave to neutralize the planet's own field. This part works great. Use it on many IP's offworld."
"Or for scouting around here." He nodded at her earlier reference to his getting something out of this.
Her warm arm encircled his elbow. "Let's go for a ride." When she pressed her palm on the upper dome, it permitted the hand through, parting for and encircling it like a soap bubble. The lower dome proved to be tacky even to his metal feet, and he followed her through, the thick dome substance restricting his body like nonsticky molassas. An electro magnetorheological material. Once inside, she stamped on the open rear area. A port receded and she lifted out a pair of tennies and two yellow coveralls. They were baggy at first, but in seconds had shrunk to formfit them wrinkle free.