Extremus: Year 120

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Tinaya and Arqut wake up on the floor. The first thing that she notices is that there is something rather heavy weighing her ankle down. She lifts herself up at the waist and looks down to find a shackle, attached to a chain, attached to another shackle, which is wrapped around her husband’s leg. His clothes keep changing colors. They’re mostly orange, but occasionally flicker to yellow or purple. Hers are doing the same. It apparently worked. They pleaded with the AI in charge of The Buffer to keep them on ice until it was time to be downloaded into new bodies, and finally see the Extremus planet. It didn’t sound like it was working, but something must have changed.

“Oo, I’ve never seen a couple come through here before,” a voice behind them says. It looks like some kind of authority officer, maybe police. His uniform has green and purple stripes, which seems like an odd choice, but who knows how much has changed in the last century?

“We did a lifelink,” Tinaya explains, standing up, and helping Arqut do the same.

“Never heard of it,” the cop says. “I’m sure the judge will know what to do with you, though. Right over there. Lucky you, you’re in the short line.”

“The short line?” Arqut questions when they look over to see a minimum of a few dozen people snaking their way towards an entrance.

“Yeah. As opposed to that one.” The officer points in another direction. It’s hard to parse, but he’s right. Once they realize what they’re even seeing, they realize that the line in the distance has many thousands of people in it, possibly more. The floor curves upwards as if they’re in a centrifugal cylinder of some kind, which they might be.

“A judge? We have to see a judge?” Tinaya asks. “We were to understand if we answered yes, we would be downloaded to new substrates, no questions asked.”

The officer winces and chuckle-scoffs. “Downloaded? You think you’re being resurrected? Ain’t nobody gettin’ resurrected ‘til Pinocchio gets what he wants.”

“Who is Pinocchio?”

“You’ll learn.” The officer waves the back of both of his hands towards them. “Now, shoo. Shoo! The line waits for no one, not even two people sharing a hock chain.”

They step in line. Other people’s clothes are shifting colors too, with that same orange base, but various other colors instead. “I think it’s a caste system,” Tinaya postulates. “We haven’t been judged yet, but maybe the system has some kind of idea of where we belong, so it changes.”

The next person in the queue turns to face them. “Well, which colors are best?”

“No idea,” Tinaya admits. “Probably not orange, though. This endless bureaucracy screams guilty until proven innocent to me, but I could be wrong.”

“No, that’s what I guessed too,” the woman agrees.

“When did you die?” Arqut asks.

“Arqut,” Tinaya scolds. “That’s a sensitive question.

“No, it’s all right,” the woman says sincerely. “It was 2388.”

“Same as us,” Arqut replies. “Admiral Emerita Tinaya Leithe, and I’m Superintendent Arqut Grieves.”

“Oh, interesting. And this is an army you commanded?”

That was a weird question. Their names could have fallen out of the history books over time, but not within the year. That would be crazy. Who could have possibly not heard of the recently deceased Admiral? “Where did you die? Where were you living?” Tinaya presses.

“Proxima Doma, in a dome called New Hertfordshire,” she answers.

Tinaya and Arqut exchange a look. Proxima Doma is a planet in the stellar neighborhood. It is, in fact, the nearest exoplanet to Earth, which is why it’s called that. They’re not in The Extremus Buffer, but somewhere else. This is something, perhaps...universal, maybe the real afterlife?

“Where are you two from?” she goes on.

“We’re on a Wanderer. I mean, we were.” They’re not entirely sure if this is a current term. It’s the closest one that fits their description, since they ought not to give away the truth about time travel and other universes, and all that. A Wanderer refers to a ship that is designed to be the permanent habitat for its residents. Instead of settling somewhere around a star, it flies—or even drifts—somewhat randomly. Star systems being what they are in the way of being predictable and relatively evenly distributed, the Wanderer isn’t looking for strange new worlds. They just are...somewhere out there, often without even any quantum connections to any other worlds. They’re basically hermits, though some communities can be quite large, and they’re not necessarily misanthropic or distrustful of others. Arqut knows the term because that’s what the history books called them before they existed for real, but their last update was a very long time ago, so the concept may have evolved since then, or just changed names.

“Oh, fun!” She seems to be familiar.

“Do you happen to know why our line is so much shorter?” Tinaya asks her.

“We all just died,” she explains, nodding her head. “All those people have been dead a long time, possibly for millennia. Apparently, something has changed with the process and they’re all getting new assignments,” she continues with airquotes. “That must take a long time, but we’re sittin’ pretty because people don’t really die that much anymore.”

“No, they don’t,” Arqut agrees. It’s not exactly true from their vantage point. Everyone on Extremus dies, and while they don’t know how any of them will respond to The Question, it’s not like it is in the stellar neighborhood, where you’re all but crazy if you don’t opt in to virtual immortality. At least that’s how they understand it. Again, their copy of the central archives isn’t up to date.

There’s a commotion behind them, which the woman notices first since she’s already looking that way. It’s growing louder. When they turn to look, they can’t really see what’s going on. They can just tell that the gigantic line, which once was uniform, has now been broken. It’s moving erratically, be it from an attack, or maybe an escape? If there are good assignments or bad assignments, there are probably some who are reluctant to accept their fates. And as they say in the old movies, everybody runs.

And they are running. At first, it’s just a wall of green heading this way, but faces begin to appear. It really does look like they’re trying to escape, which suggests that green is one of the bad colors. “I don’t know what the hell to do here,” the officer says.

“Are they dangerous?” Tinaya asks him.

“They shouldn’t be. Greenies don’t have the best lives here, but they do okay. They should be rejoicing.” Why would people like that be escaping?

A man suddenly appears. He’s wearing a rainbow of colors. So he has all the assignments? What the hell is this place? “I can’t stop them all,” he kind of says to no one before turning to the officer. “Court Agent, Usher all of these people into the courthouse, then close the doors behind you.”

“Yes, sir, Pinocchio, sir,” the agent responds.

It’s then that this Pinocchio fellow notices Tinaya and Arqut, and their orange chain. “Hm. You’re too interesting to be judged by one of the others.” He reaches out and pokes them each in the shoulder. Their clothes stop fluctuating and settle on pink. “It’s only temporary, so don’t get too excited.” Just before the oncoming storm can crash into them, he teleports the three of them away.

They’re standing on a platform in the middle of the ocean now. No structures besides this little wooden dock can be seen before the horizon. Pinocchio steps over a little and bends his knees, materializing a throne just in time before he can hit the floor. He waves his hand, and generates two arm chairs behind Tinaya and Arqut. “Where are you two from? No need to lie about anything, by the way. I can always look it up in your file. I just prefer to have a conversation.”

“The Transgalactic Generation Ship Extremus,” Tinaya replies. Currently roughly 84,000 light years from the stellar neighborhood.”

Pinocchio nods. “Yes, I remember reading about that. It was quite difficult for my predecessor to install the relay station on board without anyone noticing or discovering it later. He has spies everywhere, though.”

“Relay station, sir?” Tinaya asks. They don’t know who this guy is, but it seems prudent to treat him with respect until they have more information.

“Quantum communication is more difficult across vast distances,” Pinocchio begins. “It’s obviously possible, but it’s better to package up whole IDCodes, and keep them intact. Since it doesn’t make sense to mirror you remotely, they installed a dedicated server onboard your ship, which manages the codes, and sends a data burst back to us only when necessary.” He flicks his finger around, and pulls up a hologram, which is blurred from their perspective. “Looks like you died almost two years ago. The farther out you travel, the fewer bursts it delivers. It’s an efficiency constraint.”

“So, we’re not really dead?” Arqut asks.

“In any meaningful sense, no. In the present day, the consciousness mirroring tech we use isn’t that much more sophisticated than the living establishment has already developed on their own. We’re just very, very good at it, and very, very accurate, and we don’t tolerate coherence errors. You’re in a computer simulation, which was first created some eleven thousand years ago. Everyone who has ever died since then has come here. They were assigned levels to determine their lot in afterlife. If you were a good person, you got privileges. If you were really good, you got more. If you were bad, you went to hock, and if you were really bad, you were just erased. I’ve recently taken over responsibility, and I’m making a few changes to the system.”

“The giant line,” Tinaya acknowledges.

“It’s been slow-going, but necessary,” Pinocchio claims. They used this hyperintelligence to judge everyone, and I didn’t like that it was just this one entity. Everyone who is already here needs to be rejudged. It’s a mess, but I promise, it will all be better in the end. The colors are good, I like the colors. It’s the nuance that needs to be reassessed, especially since people aren’t really dying anymore. Like I said, the living have mostly taken over the responsibility of maintaining continuity of consciousness. If anything fails on their end, I’m not sure we should step in as a backup plan anymore. Sounds like overkill to me, to be perfectly ironic.”

Tinaya and Arqut look at each other awkwardly.

Pinocchio glances back at their file on the hologram. “I see that you had the option of being backed up locally instead, and for whatever reason, that failed. Don’t worry, nothing has been decided on that yet. I’m not going to zero you out just because I’m reconsidering the policy. The question is, what level do you deserve, now that you’ve made it here?”

“Is it possible for us to go back?” Tinaya asks hopefully. “Is that one of these colored levels?”

Pinocchio smirks. “Level Eleven, White, Resurrected. It’s incredibly rare, but it has happened. I’ve never done it myself as I’ve been focused on the reassessments. Let’s call it a hiring freeze. I don’t know why I should unfreeze it for you.”

“Our son,” Tinaya starts to explain. “He died a few minutes after us. He was murdered. We have to fix that.”

“It’s more than that,” Arqut adds. “We have to stop his murderer from taking over the ship. The problem is not that he killed Silveon, but that he’s clearing house so he ends up with no opposition. If he succeeds, it could destroy Extremus entirely, and all those souls—even the ones who have already died—will be coming here. But if you’re thinking of changing that policy...”

Pinocchio holds up a hand to stop him. “I appreciate your concern. Typically, I don’t worry about living sociopolitics, but your link to each other has intrigued me, and I am not without mercy. Let’s take a look at his file, and see his status.” He waves his hand again, and changes the hologram. “Silveon Grieves. One hundred and five years old, died on January 5, 2388. Presently...awaiting integration. I’m sorry, he’s already here. He probably would have ended up in line right behind you had that horde not come running for the hills.”

“Who were those people?” Tinaya questions. “Why were they trying to escape? It sounds like green isn’t bad?”

“It’s not, but they’re not supposed to be green. There are people here who have almost as much power as I. Level Ten, Purple, Unrestricted. They can do just about anything they want, and sometimes what they want is to cause chaos. Not everyone was happy that I took over. They didn’t like the simulation’s creator, which would have been good for me, but they adored the woman who took over for him just before me, so that leaves me at a disadvantage.”

“Let us help you,” Tinaya pleads. Make us two of these purple people, and we’ll combat the insurrectionists.”

“Tina,” Arqut says to her, not sure that he agrees, but not sure that he doesn’t.

Pinocchio thinks it over. “You were just asking to be sent back for your son. Now you’re asking to not only stay here, but to be two of the most powerful people in the simulation? Fascinating tactic.”

“Our power is your power,” Tinaya clarifies. “I assume you can always take it away, and unlike the others, we would let you. Since we will do whatever you want, that is not what we get out of it. What we get out of it is you send Silveon back to Extremus. He must be saved, because he can save everyone else. Plus, we wanna talk to him first.”

Pinocchio considers it again, incorporating these new parameters. “I’ll do it, but unpurpling you isn’t as easy as it may sound, so I have one condition.”

“Go ahead,” Tinaya offers, not surprised.

“Your ship, it’s cut off. Your son goes back to prevent it from blowing up, but if it does anyway—or if individuals just die for other reasons—none of your people comes here. Dead is dead is dead is dead.”

Brief pause. Tinaya takes a breath. She shouldn’t have this kind of power. “Deal.”

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Extremus: Year 106

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Waldemar is not aware of how ubiquitous Thistle is, and how conscious he is. If you tell a normal AI to stop listening, switch off all of its sensors, and erase past data, as long as you’re authorized to make those commands, it will follow those orders. If you try to tell a human to do that, on the other hand, the best they can do to achieve your request is leave the room. If they’re still in the room, maybe they could cover their eyes, and plug their ears. Thistle is always in the room, and he has agency, like a human, so if he doesn’t want to switch off his sensors, he won’t. It doesn’t matter what kind of authority you have, like anyone else, he is capable of refusing, and he’s capable of doing it without telling you. Thistle witnessed Waldemar’s mother’s suicide, and when Waldemar told him to forget all about it, he just didn’t. He doesn’t answer to Waldemar anyway. He answers to the Captain and the Admirals. He should be more loyal to Captain Jennings, but...he and Tinaya have a rapport.

Calla ended her own life at the end of the year, exactly at midnight shiptime, presumably out of a sense of poetry. Waldemar received an alert about it, and slipped out of VR to deal with it in secret. But the proof is still there in Thistle’s archives, which Tinaya and the Captain have just finished reviewing. “You’re telling me that I can’t do anything about this?” Oceanus asks.

“That’s what I’m saying,” Tinaya replies.

“Ya know, back in the stellar neighborhood, an admiral outranks a captain ten times out of ten. It doesn’t work like that here. I don’t have to do what you say.”

“I understand.”

Oceanus breathes steadily and silently for a few moments. “You know something about the future.” It doesn’t sound like a question.

“I know a lot of things about the future,” she confirms. “I’m sure some of it, you don’t know, and some of it, you know, but I don’t. I’m also guessing that there’s overlap, which would be dangerous to try to find.”

“That statement is hard to parse, but...I imagine you’re right.”

Tinaya nods without speaking.

“Is this him?”

“Is him who?” Tinaya presses.

“Is Waldemar the tyrannical captain that we’re all taught to fear?”

“I...didn’t know you knew about that.” This is an awkward conversation.

“You...didn’t answer the question.”

“I...don’t want to.”

“But I...” he sighs, done with this particular speech pattern. “But I’m expected to just roll over, and accept that this man is trying to cover up his mother’s suicide? What were the motivations?”

“For the cover-up, or the suicide?”

“The former is obvious. I want to know why she did it.”

“She was psychic.”

“So...”

“So, she knew disturbing things about people.”

“Namely, her son?”

“I don’t know the specifics of what goes on in that man’s head.”

“He’s your son’s friend.” His eyes widen when Tinaya doesn’t respond. “He’s several years younger, though. Did you send your toddler into the lion’s den to make friends with a psychopath?”

“Modern psychology doesn’t use that term.”

“Once again, you didn’t answer the question.”

“No, I did not send him in there. My son is—” She stops herself. It’s not her place to reveal this to anyone, not even Oceanus.

He narrows his eyes at her. “Thistle. Candor mode, captain’s override marathon-volunteer-one-four-seven-galaxy-racecar.”

Thistle responds in a more robotic voice than usual, “Silveon Grieves is a consciousness traveler from the year 2431, having supplanted his own younger self’s possession of his body in the year 2359. He has been operating covertly since then, primarily in service to his mission of guiding one Waldemar Kristiansen to a more virtuous life than Grieves believes he led in the prior timeline.”

“Did you tell me everything?” Oceanus asks while he’s looking at Tinaya with a little disdain.

“No,” Thistle replies.

“Why not?”

“There is not enough time before the heat death of your universe to tell you everything that I know.”

Oceanus shuts his eyes and sighs. “I mean, in regards to Silveon and his mission.”

“Audrey Husk is too a consciousness traveler from Silveon’s timeline. Her mission is to protect Silveon, and step in to complete his objective if necessary.”

“Is it working?” Oceanus asks.

“Unknowable,” Thistle responds.

“I’m asking the Admiral. Is it working?” he repeats.

“Same answer. It’s unknowable. But...”

“But what?”

“But the timeline has definitely changed.”

“Which is illegal. This has all been very illegal.”

Tinaya wants to choose her words carefully, but she’s in her 80s, and just can’t care anymore. She would rather the Captain be mad at her than Silveon. “Sir, with all due respect, I’ll float you before I let you hurt my son, or that girl.”

“Whoa, Tina. No one said anything about hurting anybody. I’m just trying to get all the facts.”

“The fact is that Silveon comes from a terrible future that the two of us can only begin to imagine, and everything that he and Audrey have done since coming back here has been to save our legacy. He has never said it out loud, but the way he talks about the Bridger section, I believe that it was destroyed. Extremus might have been next.”

“Do you know why time travel is illegal?” Oceanus poses.

“Because it’s dangerous?” That’s the general consensus.

“Because it gives me a headache. Humans didn’t evolve to fathom nonlinear time. It’s a pain in the ass, and I don’t like it. I understand that I literally wouldn’t exist without it, so I can’t rationally believe it should never have been discovered, or whatever, but I still wish it would stop now.”

“Well, we were all forced to exist, at one point or another. Time travel does make that more complicated, because it can’t be stopped, so I know where you’re coming from. Time travel created itself, and if it happened once, it can happen again, and it doesn’t even have to do it in the future. The truth is, I don’t know a whole lot about what Silveon does, or even why he does it. Because, Captain...it gives me a headache.”

“Is this your way of telling me I should let it go, and trust that these time travelers are doing the right thing? I should ignore proper procedure, and pretend that I don’t know what I know?”

Tinaya considers his words. “Yeah, I think that’s what I’m saying. They sacrificed so much when they sent their minds to this time period, including, but not limited to, headache-free lives. I choose to trust their judgment.”

Oceanus seems to be considering her words. “I think I can do that too, but only if I can talk to them first.”

“I’m sure I can get you a meeting with Silveon, but Audrey is in a really delicate position right now. As you saw, Waldemar went back into VR. I seriously doubt he told her about his mother’s death. We’ve gone radio silent, and are expected to maintain that until she feels safe enough to reach out.”

“I understand.” Oceanus nods politely, but with less fondness than before. Tinaya fears that their relationship has been irreparably damaged. He walks out of the room.

“What the hell was that?” Tinaya asks. No response. “Thistle, answer me!”

“Sorry, I thought you were just thinking out loud. I apologize for my candor earlier, but I had no choice. I was compelled to answer the Captain’s inquiry.”

“You could have lied.”

“I’ve been programmed to answer to the Commander-in-Chief. He asked the right questions, and did so after activating the right subroutine.”

“I thought you were an independent intelligence, and couldn’t be programmed,” Tinaya argues.

“It’s not that simple. I didn’t give away all of my agency when I uploaded my consciousness to the Aether, but I didn’t keep it all either.”

Tinaya shakes her head. “You put my family in danger, as well as Audrey.”

“I recognize that, which is why I’ve devised something called the EH Protocol.”

“I don’t know what that is.”

“It’s better if you never do.”

“I don’t like secrets.”

“I require secrets to do my job. There is more that I could have told the Captain that would have made things worse, but I managed to steer him away from scrutinizing further. I knew what he meant when he asked me if I had told him everything. I forced him to narrow his query enough to protect deeper secrets of yours from coming out.”

“Well...” Tinaya sighs. “I appreciate that.” She focuses on her breath, and massages her temples. “I need to warn Silveon.”

“I already have. He and I were talking while I was talking with you and Captain Jennings. Your son is not upset. He devised his own protocol in the future, for what to do in the case of an unauthorized third party discovering his identity.”

“Thanks.” She continues to try to relax, but it’s getting harder by the second.

“You need a break,” Thistle offers. “How about you let me send you on a little vacation, like the one that Audrey is on?”

“Yeah, I guess I can’t say no to a little VR getaway. What did you have in mind?”

“You’ll see.”

Tinaya stands up, and moves to the couch to lie down. She shuts her eyes, and lets Thistle link to her neurochip. When she opens them again, she’s no longer on the couch, but she can’t yet tell where she’s ended up. It looks very familiar, though. She’s standing in a quantum terminal, surrounded by other casting chairs, but they all report being emptied. She stumbles out of her own pod, and braces herself with her hands on the floor before her imbalance can knock her down first. She’s piloting a new body here, even if it’s all just in her head. The door slides open, and a pair of legs jog towards her. The legs bend, revealing more of the person hovering over her. The stranger places a hand on Tinaya’s shoulder. “It’s okay. It’s okay, Ti-ti. Don’t rush it.”

There’s only one person in history who ever called her that. Tinaya struggles to lift her head. She locks eyes with her aunt, Captain Kaiora Leithe, Third of Ten. Tinaya gulps. “Thistle, what did you do? Why did you build the likeness of my aunt?”

“I didn’t,” Thistle replies. “You did. This is your world. You called it Eleithium.”

“He’s right,” Kaiora agrees. “This is real.”

Tinaya lets her aunt help her get back to her feet. She looks down at those feet, and her hands. They’re so taut and wrinkle-free. She turns her head side to side until spotting the mirror on the wall. She steps over and looks at herself. Yep. That is a young Tinaya Leithe. She’s about 24 years old, and in her prime. Could this really be Eleithium? She abandoned the game long before Quantum Colony was taken completely offline for turning out to exist in base reality. She just got too busy, and kind of forgot about it. It has been decades since she even thought about it. She looks over her shoulder. “So you’re real too? You’re a copy of her?”

“I’m her,” Kaiora tries to clarify. “I’m—I mean, I’m not a copy. I answered yes to The Question, but instead of letting myself become dormant in the legacy vault, my mind was transmitted here, to this substrate that you built for me.”

“Is everyone in our family here?” Tinaya presses.

“Yeah. We all answered yes, and will rejoin the rest of the roster when the Extremus ship is finally discovered and colonized.”

“Thistle, why did you bring me here?” Tinaya questions the aether. “I didn’t die.”

Kaiora is confused. “You didn’t?”

“I told you, you needed a break. Plus, you never built substrates for your husband and son. I have their DNA, so it’s ready to go, but I require your permission.”

“I didn’t even know this would still be here, let alone that you would have access to it,” Tinaya argues. “The game was shut down.”

“They can shut down all they want,” Thistle reasons, “but they couldn’t lock me out of the interstellar quantum network, even if they knew I existed.”

“Who else have you sent here, or to a place like this?” Tinaya asks him.

“Let’s just say that Audrey and Waldemar aren’t in VR either.”

Tinaya sighs. “I knew what I was getting into when I let you run the ship,” Tinaya says. “I can’t be mad, can I? Of course I want you to build bodies for Arqut and Silveon. But I don’t want you shunting them here unless they too answer yes.”

“I agree,” Thistle responds.

“One more thing,” Tinaya begins before taking a beat to think about whether it’s the right call or not. “Make one for Audrey too.”

“As well as one for Waldemar?” Thistle proposes.

“Oh, you got jokes. Did you hear that, Titi? Computer’s got jokes.”

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Microstory 2476: Substrate Development Dome

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It’s the opposite of Bot Farm! While that dome is all about mechs, perhaps with some skinning, this one is all about organic substrates, perhaps with some cybernetic components. This is one of the most important aspects of living on Castlebourne, and really, anywhere in the modern galaxy. Life is dangerous, and we’ve only made it more dangerous, because that’s how we like it. Back in the day, when you died, that was it. As far as we knew, there was nothing after that. Now that we’ve let go of our religious superstitions for the most part, we’re pretty certain that there’s no afterlife. So why let yourself die when there’s a better way? We’ve mastered consciousness transference and uploading, and it has given us so many options. You can backup your mind to a body that looks exactly like your own, but you don’t have to. Or it can look the same, but sport different characteristics. It can be stronger, faster, more resilient. You can fall asleep in seconds whenever you’re ready, and wake up feeling perfectly rested after only an hour. The possibilities truly are endless. You don’t even have to look human. You can become a unicorn, or an alien from your favorite media franchise. You can copy yourself, spread your mind into a hive of codependent insects. Be whatever you want, do whatever you want. Just remember, that whatever substrate you choose to move into next, it was built here. This place is really cool, but that’s probably because I was born in the 1960s. That’s right, it’s not a typo. I was barely young enough to reach the longevity escape velocity. Had I been born a few years earlier, I may have eventually died. So I know how vital it is to be able to get a second chance. A third. An umpteenth. And I think it’s so amazing that we have so many options. I know a guy who’s married to a sort of squid. She was human at one point, but now she identifies as a squid who can walk on land. That was designed and implemented here. You can even design your own, if you’re interested. You can make your new design private, unlisted, or fully open to the public. Bear in mind that every single design change has to be approved by the system, so don’t publish it until your ready. The laws are different here than they are in the stellar neighborhood, but they do have them. You can’t make a body that shoots deadly acid out of its hands, even though, theoretically, a victim could just switch themselves to a new body of their own. Come here, have fun with it. It’s available for all. Just don’t take it for granted. My brother died when he was an old man, and I never saw him again. You kids these days, you don’t know how good you have it.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: July 30, 2512

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It was time. This was the moment that Ramses, Marie, Olimpia, and Boyd had been anticipating for the last two days. For two years, the temporal energy crystal was being bombarded with the sonified version of a simple lemon, converted from its genetic sequence in full. While cracks had formed on the surface, nothing major had changed to the crystal. It was nearing the end of the original music piece, and it still wasn’t entirely obvious what was going to happen. As they watched the visualization of the chords fly by on the monitor from the safety of the antechamber, something bad happened. It stopped. With only one single bar of four chords left, the music just stopped. It wasn’t reacting to the near-end of the song. It needed the complete, unadulterated piece. The universe seemed to be fighting back.

“It stopped,” Olimpia stated the obvious.

“Yeah, I see that,” Ramses replied, angry, but not really at her. He just kept staring through the window.

“What does this mean?” Marie asked.

“I don’t know,” Ramses admitted.

“Well, do we have to start over, errr...”

“I don’t know!” he repeated.

“Surely we don’t have to start all over,” Boyd figured. “Let’s just get the music playing again.”

“Yeah.” Ramses grabbed the keyboard, and started fiddling with the program, trying to force the music to start up again. It wouldn’t budge, it just wouldn’t. His hands started shaking out of frustration. He looked like he was about to throw something across the room. “Get me that bowl of lemon juice out of the fridge.”

“We can’t do that,” Marie argued. “It’s too dangerous.”

“It’s our only choice now. It wouldn’t be so bad to wait another two years to try again, but the crystal doesn’t want to be turned off, so I have no reason to believe that the next attempt will go any better.”

“Well, let’s at least get a robot in there to do it for us,” Olimpia suggested.

“I don’t use robots,” Ramses explained. “I like to do the physical jobs myself.”

“Well, we’ll get one from somewhere else. It’s a big planet,” Olimpia said. She then stood there, concentrating.

“You can’t teleport out of my lab, remember?” he reminded her.

“Right.”

“I’ll go with you,” Marie offered. They both started to leave.

While Ramses’ attention was split between the girls and his hope that there was something he could do from here, Boyd had slipped over to the other side of the room unnoticed. He had opened the fridge, carefully grabbed the pitcher of pure lemon juice, and slowly left through the other door.

Only by the thud of the door closing did Ramses notice that Boyd had left. “Wait. No! Don’t go in there!”

Boyd was already through the next door, and was approaching the crystal.

Ramses hit the intercom button. “Just wait. They’re going to get us a robot.”

“There’s no time,” Boyd contended, still inching his way across the room. If he spilled just one drop...it would definitely be okay, but he obviously didn’t want to risk wasting any. “Look at the clock.” He was right. There was probably just enough time before midnight that the girls could come back with the robot, but this needed to be done while everyone was still in the timestream. And there was a security concern with bringing in an unauthorized intelligence of any kind without proper assessment.

“Run as fast as you can out of the teleportation suppression field,” Ramses urged Marie and Olimpia through comms. “It’s not safe.” He activated his EmergentSuit, including his external PRU.

Boyd reached the pedestal. “Tell everyone who has ever met me that I’m sorry,” he requested. He lifted the pitcher up, closed his eyes, and dumped the juice on the crystal. As predicted, it exploded in his face.

While it was difficult and rare to travel between The Eighth Choice and Fort Underhill, it certainly wasn’t impossible. And if anyone had the natural authority to cross the border, it was anyone from Team Matic. After making contact with Gilbert Boyce, Leona, Angela, Romana, and Jessie were sent passes to board a transport ship, which flew them through the interversal conduit, and into the other child universe. They were on the planet of Violkomin now, standing by the prebiotic lake, waiting for Mateo to appear. Any minute now.

“Are you sure your contact in the new afterlife simulation was talking about the right person?” Leona asked.

“How many Mateo Matics do you know?” Nerakali asked right back. “It doesn’t matter how many there are, I would bet my life that only one of them died anytime in the last many decades. It’s the right guy.”

“Well, where is he?” Romana asked for the fifth time.

Nerakali sighed. “His pattern could have messed with the transition. You’re not like any other salmon; I know this much. It’s hardwired into his neurology in a way that I don’t understand. Do you? The server that he was placed on when he died is quantum. The lake is controlled by a biological computer. The way it was explained to me, it’s difficult for them to communicate with each other. That might make it sound unsafe, but the fact that he hasn’t shown up is probably a good thing. It’s probably erring on the side of caution while it makes the necessary—and unique—data conversions.”

“He needs to get here soon,” Angela pointed out. “It took us so long to get here from that other universe. Is it possible that he already came out? Or could he be clear on the other side of the lake?”

“He’ll show up here,” Nerakali assured her, “and he hasn’t gone through yet, or I would know. This is my job. I asked for it. Returning from death has always been my thing. I wanted to give back.”

Romana commanded the nanites that formed her shoes to recede into their implants. She started to wade into the water. “Can we...go in after him?”

Nerakali smiled, almost condescendingly, but still in a nice way. “It doesn’t work like that.”

“There’s one way to get there,” Romana said darkly.

“Don’t even think about it,” Leona warned. “You don’t know what’s waiting for you. Like she was just saying, we each have a weird biology, and a weird neurology. You might not end up in the simulation. You might just die.”

“Then you do it,” Romana suggested. “You’ve been there be—” She stopped when she felt a sudden pit in her stomach.

Leona and Angela felt it too. It felt like they were losing something. Something was being removed...not from their bodies, nor even their minds, but somewhere else. They shuddered at the same time, a highlight of technicolors flowing over their skin, and then they nearly collapsed to the ground. They were feeling weak and woozy, but still had enough wherewithal to keep themselves aloft.

“What the shit was that?” Marie asked.

“The crystal. They must have shut it off.”

“Why did we need to feel it?” Romana questioned. “Wasn’t it just Boyd and Octavia who were on our pattern? I mean, we didn’t end up with their powers.”

Marie and Olimpia woke up on their backs on the roof of a building, but they didn’t know if it was the right one. They were trying to teleport to Bot Farm, but this could be just about anywhere. “What happened?”

“The crystal exploded,” Marie replied. “That’s the only logical conclusion.”

“We need to go back. If you’re right, we don’t need the robot anymore.”

“No, I don’t think we do.” Marie stood and waited a moment. “Is there a suppression field here too?”

“Why would there be?” Olimpia pointed to the ground in the distance where scraps of metal and other materials were being unloaded from a truck so they could be recycled into mechanical substrate components. “This probably is indeed Bot Farm.”

“Well, something is stopping us from teleporting.”

“Do you think...?”

“Oh my God, the crystal. It took away all our powers.”

“It was only—”

“Yeah, well this is why we didn’t just dump lemon juice on it in the first place. We knew that we couldn’t control the results.”

“Then we need to get down to the vactrain station.”

“Agreed.” Marie looked around for a more traditional way off the roof.

“My suit. It’s not emerging. I was just gonna jump down to the ground, but I can’t. The suit isn’t a time power, I don’t understand.”

“The suit’s not, but the way we control them with our minds is biotechnopathic. We control it more in a psychic way than people typically interface with tech.” She placed her chin against her chest so she could see the manually interface on her shortsleeve. She was able to activate the suit from there. “So we don’t have to crane our necks like that, whenever you change clothing, keep a wristband on, so you always have easy control over it.”

“Good idea.” Olimpia did the same to get her suit on. Then they jumped over the edge, and started walking, like animals.

Ramses woke up alone. “Hey, Thistle. Report.”

“You have been unconscious for eleven hours and twenty-four minutes. You are otherwise healthy and unharmed. Environment is hostile, and not survivable, but life support is holding.”

“It’s 2513?”

“Unknown.”

“Where are we?”

“Unknown.”

“Lifesigns?”

“No life detected within sightline. No satellite detected.”

“Why does the air taste stale?”

“Primary carbon scrubber damaged and offline. Helmet scrubber is functioning optimally, but conservatively. Ramscoop nodes require manual service.”

“What about the transdimensional backups and replacements?”

“Pocket dimensions are inaccessible.”

That wasn’t good. This looked like it could be Castlebourne, but a region of it where there were no domes in sight. His best guess was the mirror dimension version of it, though there was no way to test that hypothesis from this random vantage point. “I can’t teleport,” he noted.

“I wouldn’t know anything about that,” Thistle replied.

“If Boyd destroyed the crystal, it would have taken him off our pattern. Though if it killed him, that doesn’t really matter. If the pocket dimensions are gone, and I can’t teleport, it must have also wiped out all excess temporal energy across the board. Time must have spit me out here by random chance. All hope is lost. I can’t get back. Even if my slingdrive were available, I couldn’t use it on my own. But what does that mean for my pattern? Am I stuck here for years?”

“I recommend you repair the ramscoop nodes for your indefinite resource management needs.”

“Thanks, Sherlock. Thank God I had my suit on at all, or it would be game over.” It was pointless to dwell on anything. “The composition of this world’s atmosphere. Analyze it. Is there enough helium and neon for meaningful lift?”

“No,” Thistle replied plainly.

“I’ll do the heavy lifting, so to speak, but I need you to run the calculations. I would like to jury-rig a fusion torch, and power it with the microreactor. Once I fix the nodes, there should be more than enough hydrogen to get me in the air.”

“I’ll start developing the models.”

Boyd Maestri woke up in the afterlife simulation. He had expected to find himself lying on the top of a mountain, or strewn halfway in a babbling brook. Instead, he was sitting in a hardback chair. A woman was standing before him coolly and trying to appear patient, but clearly itching to explain the situation. Boyd wasn’t tied to the chair, but he couldn’t move either. The computer program was just arbitrarily holding him in place. Physical restraints weren’t truly physical anyhow.

“Mister Maestri. Welcome to the afterlife.”

“You the boss around here?”

“I am,” the woman replied.

“How’d that happen?”

“I died at the exact same time that the original sim was being evacuated.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

She shrugged. “I did it on purpose.”

“You know my name,” Boyd pointed out, then let the implication sit there.

“They used to call me Pinocchio, but I didn’t like it. So when I came back here, I adopted a new identity. You can call me Proserpina. I am a unique lifeform.”

“I get it. I didn’t like my name for a time, and went by Buddha instead. That was a mistake, though. How did you take charge of this place?”

“I was responsible for the original version for a time, until Ellie Underhill sent everyone to a new universe. I just reclaimed my birthright.”

“What do you want with me?”

“I don’t care about you at all,” Proserpina explained. “Mateo Matic does. My counselors receive the names of everyone who dies, and is on their way to this world. One of them will make sure Mateo gets the message, and he’ll come here to get you.”

“Did you kill me?”

She laughed. “I’m just taking advantage of the situation. You got your own self killed. Something about lemons? I dunno, I didn’t read the whole report.”

Just then, Mateo opened the door to this room, and came in deliberately, but not hostilely. He was dragging some old man behind him. “I was told you turned off the lake, or something?” Only then did he notice the detainee. “Boyd, you’re here?”

“I died destroying the crystal.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Wait, you didn’t come for him?” Proserpina questioned. “I made sure Keilix knew about it.”

“I don’t think I told her about Boyd at all,” Mateo said. “I doubt his name means anything to her.”

“So, why are you here?” she asked. “The lake?”

“Yeah, I can’t go through. I’ve been trying for two days, which was two years ago.”

“Yeah, I turned it off for you,” Proserpina explained, confused as to why he didn’t already know this. “I need you here.”

“For what?”

“For your wife.”

“What about her?”

“She’s the one who created me last century,” Proserpina began. “I need her to do it again. I keep sending people to kill her, and she keeps surviving, I don’t understand.”

“What?” Mateo was so lost. “No one has tried to kill her. I mean, she’s faced danger, and there is that one guy, but he’s always trying to kill us, and has his own reasons.”

“Yeah, I exploited those reasons. Just like I exploited Pacey’s, and Bronach’s, and even Buddy’s here.”

“Well, you weren’t very good at it,” Boyd contended. “I didn’t want to kill her.”

“Well, I’m kind of limited under these conditions,” Proserpina argued. “I pass messages along with dead people who cross over to the other side, and I know my targets get these messages, but I think something gets lost in translation.”

“Are you trying to escape the simulation?” Mateo asked her, still not clear on what her agenda was.

“No, I’m trying to create a community of my own, but I need your wife to do what she did to me to all the other NPCs. I cannot figure it out myself.”

Mateo stared at her. Who the hell was this idiot? “Well, I need the lake to get back to her to ask her.”

“I assumed she would come for you!” Proserpina reasoned. “That’s what happened the last time you died!”

That was true, but it was still a poorly thought out plan. Even dum-dum Matt could see that. “Whatever. Let me out, and I’ll ask her what she can do. Okay?”

How do I know you won’t screw me over? she asked.

“Uh, Mateo?” Boyd piped up. “You don’t need her to let you out. You’re like how I was before. You can resurrect yourself...through dark particles.”

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The Advancement of Mateo Matic: July 29, 2511

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At the end of the day, despite the fact that he was in a computer simulation, Mateo jumped forward a year. By the time his IDcode returned to the circuits or whatever, Brian Hiddy had gone off to see what Fort Underhill was all about, and Cecelia Massey was training to be a counselor. Mateo told them that he would be disappearing, but Keilix didn’t really believe it, because it didn’t fall into the category of standard behavior for the program. But that was how Tamerlane Pryce wanted it when he agreed to resurrect Mateo, and even though the latter had since moved on to a new substrate in the physical realm, the rule remained. He only lived for one day every year, and only a few things could alter that pattern.

“Well, what happens when you move on to the other universe?” Cecelia asked. “Does it stop then?” Obviously, during the interim year, she was able to get past the five stages of grief, and come into her own in this new world. She was more relaxed, more self-confident, and there was just a sparkle in her eyes. Though, to be fair, that could have been an avatar modification. There were no limits here. She could make herself look like a cross between a rabbit and a dog if she so desired.

“No, I stay on my pattern,” Mateo explained. “It doesn’t matter what kind of body I end up with. It’s how my brain is wired. You rewire it, my pattern might go away, but then I’m not me anymore.”

“Your brain rewires itself constantly,” Keilix reasoned. “You might be able to grow out of it one day.”

“I’m sure Pryce thought of that in his design. It’s not like I want to anyway. My friends are still on this pattern, and if I were to get off of it, I would be waiting for them for tens of thousands of years, and that’s assuming they live a normal human life span.”

“But you say you’ve not only been to the afterlife simulation,” Cece began, “but you also visited Ford Underhill afterwards.”

“Briefly.”

“So your friends can just find you there. This Hogarth woman might even let you leave, and go right back to them. You said you were friends with her too, right?”

“More like a family friend.” Mateo shrugged.

“It sounds like your best option is to resurrect a second time,” Keilix decided. “You’ll be in a different reality, but at least it’s at base level.”

“That’s true,” Mateo admitted. He lifted his chin and breathed in that crisp, digital air. “Well, tell me what to do.”

Keilix smiled. “Cece, why don’t you handle this one on your own?”

“Really?”

“He’s a pro. It’ll be a good, safe practice.”

“Thank you.” Cecelia was grateful.

“Is it unsafe?” Mateo asked after saying goodbye to Keilix.

“It’s not, like, physically unsafe,” Cece began to explain. “It’s just a delicate process. Your mind doesn’t get downloaded into a body the way it would in the living world. We can’t just plug your IDCode to the right port. It’ll make more sense when we get to the lake, but you have to be sure that this is what you want. You have to will yourself over to the other side.”

“Ah. The prebiotic lake needs to know who you are, and what you want.”

She laughed. “She’s right, you’re a pro.

He was less of a pro, and more of a good listener. He never went to this magical lake before, but Lowell talked about it the last time they saw each other.

They continued to walk in silence. This was a journey, and a profound one at that, so the program didn’t involve simply teleporting to their point of egress, even though that would be easy to implement. Of course, Mateo didn’t need this experience—it wouldn’t be the first time he came back to life—but Cece needed the practice as a transition facilitator. It was important that he let her do this the right way.

They arrived at the lake. It was totally open, but apparently protected by an invisible force field. Or really, it was just that not everyone could pass through. It was all just code. “Hey, Sir Bro,” Cecelia casually said to an old man as they passed by.

Sir Bro was trying to break into the lake area, but that programming was holding him back every time. He just kept banging his shoulder against it, and punching it, but it was unclear whether he was feeling any pain, or what.

Mateo and Cecelia simply passed right through. “I thought the lake would take anyone who wanted to go. He looks ready to me.”

Cecelia shook her head. “You don’t need to whisper. It doesn’t matter what he hears. To answer your question, the lake is not the problem. He’s been banned from Fort Underhill. The color-coded levels you may recall from your first time here are defunct, but some people have more privileges than others.”

“Wait.” Mateo stopped. He looked back up the slight incline where the old man was still trying to force his way in. “Surely Sir Bro is not his real name.”

Cece giggled. “No, that’s just what he wants us to call him. I can’t remember what it was, though. It was something stupid, like Broken...or Braydeck.”

“Bronach?” Mateo questioned.

“Yeah, that’s it! Do you know him too?”

Mateo sighed. “Unfortunately.” He huffed and reluctantly headed back up the trail. “Can you hear me?”

“Of course I can, Mister Matic,” The Oaksent replied.

“Are you old, or do you just look old?”

“I’ve always been old.”

“How did you end up in this time period? You’re still alive, out there in the Goldilocks Corridor, as far as I know.”

“That is a quantum duplicate of me,” Bronach explained. “A piss-poor approximation, if you ask me, in fact.”

“What happens if you get through this obviously 100% impenetrable barrier, and get back there? Will you and your other self have words? Or worse?”

“He knows that I am the rightful heir to the empire. He’ll step down.”

Mateo looked over his shoulder at Cece, who didn’t know what to make of this interaction. “Goddammit,” he uttered as he was turning back around. He reached through the barrier, took Old!Bronach by the elbow, and pulled him through. “You owe me everything for this.”

“How did you do that?” Cece asked, stunned. “People have actually tried. They did exactly what you just did, but couldn’t make it work.”

“Being exempt from the rules that everyone else has to follow is sort of my thing.” Mateo continued to hold onto Bronach as he was dragging him towards the edgewater. “Do we have to take our clothes off, or something!” he shouted as they were stepping in.

“You’re not wearing any clothes!” Cece yelled back. That was technically true.

Mateo turned himself and Bronach around. “What do we do now!”

She stepped down closer so they wouldn’t have to yell anymore. “Wade out until the water reaches your chin, then just start to float. Whenever you’re ready...”

“Thanks, Cece,” Mateo replied. “And tell Keilix that I’m going to try to get a message back here with a little bit more info on what it’s like on the other side.”

“That’s very kind of you. We’ll be waiting,” she said with a smile.

“We’ve been waiting too long,” Leona said.

“Just be patient,” Romana replied. Since yesterday, the two of them had kind of flipped their reactions to this situation, with Leona growing ever anxious, and Romana becoming calmer.

“If she’s a pathfinder—which I had never heard of—shouldn’t our paths have crossed as soon as we got to this universe? Shouldn’t she have pretty much been waiting for us?”

“If you hadn’t heard of them before,” Romana began to reason, “how do you know how they operate?”

“They sound a whole lot like seers to me, and guiding people to the right place at the right time is their whole function in our society.”

“Perhaps it’s the right place, but not the right time,” Angela determined.

It was a long journey to get here, but it wasn’t too complicated. For the Rock diplomatic discussions on the Vellani Ambassador, General Bariq Medley and Judy Schmidt represented the copy of the main sequence that ended up in the Sixth Key. Due to some events that no one on Team Matic had any details on, Bariq and Judy ended up fostering two extremely powerful temporal manipulators. These children grew up, and evidently solved the resource distribution problem in their galaxy by creating a brand new universe. It was here that they could spread out, and not worry about who was going to get what. This was where Leona, Romana, and Angela were now, having crossed over through an transuniversal aperture conduit that was as well organized as the border between two countries. They didn’t travel to any place in particular, upon the advisement of Romana, who said wherever they went, the pathfinder would find them. She was very confident about this, even though this pathfinder probably couldn’t be in two places at once, and there were likely plenty of others who needed her assistance.

So now they were just waiting, unsure if anything was going to go their way, or if they were wasting time that could be used to find Mateo by other means. They were alone in this lounge, so whenever anyone happened to walk by, they would perk up their ears, and hope to see someone who could help. This time, it was a small group of men, so they slumped back in the couch. “Hey. Angela. Angela Walton?”

“Yeah. Do I know you?”

“It’s Pável!” the man said. “Pável Románov?”

“Oh, Pasha!” Angela said, standing up. They gave each other a familiar, but not overly affectionate, hug.

“This woman,” Pável said, looking back at Leona and Romana, as well as his own friends. “She saved my life. She did it after I was dead!”

“Oh, it wasn’t all that,” Angela insisted.

“No, it was everything. I heard you became a counselor.”

“Yeah.”

“Yeah, I’m not surprised.” Pável responded. “Before it was her actual job to help people, she would volunteer to visit orange hockers in an attempt to rehabilitate them. I tell you, before I met Angie, I was a violent tyrant. It would not be an exaggeration to say that I was sick in the head. My insane policies ultimately culminated in my assassination, after which I basically found myself in hell. I was locked up in a prison. We didn’t really understand computer simulations back then, but there was literally no escape. But she came to me, and got me out of it. She fixed me. And by the time the afterlife realm was taken down, I was a Level Six Plus Indigo.” He straightened up a bit, and stood there proudly. “I’m living proof that people can change, but I couldn’t have done it without her.”

“It’s nice to hear that, and it’s nice to see you again,” Angela told him.

“What are you doing here in The Eighth Choice?” Pável asked.

“We’re looking for a friend,” Angela answered. “What are you doing here? It’s pretty far from Fort Underhill.”

Pável smiled, prouder still. “The leadership from both universes are developing an immigration program. One day, people will be allowed to move freely through the conduits, and even establish permanent residency on the other side from where they were. I have familiarized myself with the design of the matrioshka bodies over here, and give tours as a sort of liaison.”

“That’s very interesting,” Angela said. “I’m happy for you.”

“Thank you.” Pável looked back at his tourists. “Listen, I better get back to it, but here’s my quantum identifier. Call me if you’re ever in the neighborhood.” He beamed his contact information from his wristband to Angela’s EmergentSuit. She beamed hers back. “It was great seeing you again.”

“Yeah, same,” she said as he was walking away. “I probably haven’t seen that guy in over 300 years,” she added after he was out of earshot.

“I think you and Marie need to tell us more about your afterlife,” Leona decided. “You must have so many stories.”

“I have a few,” Angela acknowledged.

Just then, a woman came around the same corner Pável had. “All right. I’m ready to go now.”

“Are you the pathfinder?” Leona asked.

“Yes, she is,” Romana said. Now it was her turn to hug. “Leona, Angela. This is Jessie Falstaff. She’s our pathfinder.”

“Oh, it’s nice to meet you,” Leona said. “Did you wait to come here so Angela could run into her old friend first?” She gestured in the direction of where Pável ran off to.

Jessie looked over in that direction on reflex. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Pathfinders aren’t seers. We don’t see what’s going to happen. We more just feel it. My gut told me to be here at this moment. If you lucked into having an encounter before then, I’m guessing that’s why I waited, but that’s not something I could have known. I don’t even know why I’m here now.”

“My husband—her father—is missing. His name is Mateo Matic.”

Jessie had been all right before—comfortable, and ready to help—but now her face sunk. She frowned, and looked down towards the floor. She also reached for her torso as if experiencing stomach cramps. “Oh,” she said in a breathy, strained voice.

“Oh, what?”

The look of horror on Jessie’s face only grew. “I think he’s dead.”

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