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Decades ago, Tinaya and Arqut connected their lives together through a
lifelink. When one of them gets hurt, so too will the other. They weren’t
sure if the procedure had worked, because it wasn’t always reliable. There
were times when one was sick, and the other was not. It was never really the
point, though. This is why they did it. They have just died at the exact
same time, which is rare on this ship. Everything that they were dealing
with—all the trials and tribulations—it’s all behind them now. Their son is
technically older than them, and this isn’t the first time that he had to
say goodbye to his parents. Silveon will be okay without them, armed with
his memory of future events, and a lifetime’s worth of knowledge and wisdom.
He and Audrey bid farewell and let them go, as did everyone else here who
deserved it. Now they can move on. Now they can finally rest.
There is one thing left to do, however. It is time to answer The Question.
Tinaya has known about it for many years, and eventually told her family.
It’s a secret from just about everyone else, though. It violates a major
principle of the Extremus mission, but again, they have known about it for
so long, they’ve had plenty of time to come to terms with it. There is no
way to know how many people answer yes, and how many answer
no, because it should come as a surprise for most. At the moment of
their deaths, Tinaya and Arqut’s consciousnesses were uploaded to a special
server. If they agree, their minds will be put on ice for another century,
until the Extremus planet is reached by their descendants. When it comes
time to settle their new homeworld, everyone who answered yes will be
downloaded into new substrates, and become part of the colonists. If the two
of them were normal, it would feel instantaneous to them—assuming nothing
destroyed the ship in the meantime. But they’re on a different track. When
they say yes, they will be going somewhere else.
“Hello, and welcome to The Buffer,” a woman says warmly.
They were standing in the Attic Forest, though obviously a virtual
simulation of it. The two recently deceased are now young again, which makes
sense, and feels nice.
“Does everyone come to this place?” Tinaya asks. “The forest hasn’t always
existed.”
The welcomer smiles. “You were clearly prepped beforehand, so I will skip
the usual explanation. To answer your question, the simulation scans your
thoughts, and generates what it believes will be the most pleasant and
comforting place for you specifically. For most people, it looks something
like this, as we all wish to find Extremus. For you, it sounds like it’s
more specific. I hope it pleases the both of you. We don’t get many duos.
I’m guessing it’s a lifelink?”
“Yes, and I helped build this place for real in base reality, as did my
now-husband,” Tinaya explains, “so it’s important to us both.”
“Ah, yes. I have heard of you. Miss Leithe, right?”
“Admiral Emerita Leithe.” Tinaya doesn’t usually care about formalities, but
it felt important to her to clarify her title in this case.
“Apologies. And you?”
“Superintendent Arqut Grieves. You didn’t know that we were coming?”
The woman shakes her head. Her voice is still calming. “I do not receive a
manifest beforehand, or even an alert of a forthcoming arrival. My job is to
ask you The Question without judgement or preconception. It doesn’t matter
to me who you are, or who you were. You’re entitled to answer.”
“Who are you?” Tinaya asks, “Or, who were you, if you prefer?”
“I am Dr. Itri Meziani, thanks for asking,” she replies. “I was the
Executive Grief Counselor many years ago.”
“Well, it’s very nice to meet you, Dr. Meziani.” Tinaya shakes her hand,
then Arqut does.
“I suppose that you already know what I’m about to ask you, but I still must
ask it,” Dr. Meziani says.
For a long time there, Tinaya intended on saying no to The Question.
She only changed her mind relatively recently when Thistle showed her that
her whole family line has been kept alive in base reality on an asteroid
which Tinaya herself colonized and called Eleithium. It gave her some
perspective. She doesn’t wanna die. The problem now is that Thistle is no
longer the AI in charge, and they don’t know whether they will be rerouted
to the colony, or just kept on ice with everyone else. Did he set it up so
that it will happen automatically? Truthfully, she forgot to ask him before
Oceanus stopped allowing their visits. Do they have to be honest with this
Dr. Meziani about their sort of get out of jail free card? In the end, they
decided to just come clean and tell the truth. They can’t risk something
going wrong with the process. If it doesn’t work, they’ll just go on ice,
and still be alive. All they know is that they’re not going to say
no. They really want to see the Extremus planet, and they almost have
to see Silveon again.
“We have somewhere else to be,” Arqut begins. “A friend of ours set up...an
alternative option. I’m not sure how we go about getting there, though. He’s
sort of...indisposed at the moment.”
“I can check for a rerouting subroutine,” Dr. Meziani says graciously, “but
I can’t guarantee anything. If your friend can’t control it from the
outside, I can’t get you there. It wouldn’t be that I wouldn’t want to.
Again, it’s not my job to make judgments. You don’t have to do anything in
particular. Hell, if you can will yourself back to life in your own body, go
for it. But understand that there is a time limit. I can’t tell you
what it is. It’s after five minutes following the next death, so that could
be any second now. The Buffer must be kept open.” She looks to the left,
presumably searching for the path that will take them to Eleithium, and
hopefully finding it. She suddenly jerks her head to the right. “Something’s
wrong.”
“What is it? Did you find it?” Arqut asks.
“Your time is up,” Dr. Meziana tells them. “Someone else just died.”
“But we have five more minutes,” Tinaya reminds her.
“No.” She starts breathing heavily, which doesn’t make sense given that
there’s no air in this virtual environment. “You don’t.” Without warning,
she pops away, leaving a faint puff of smoke behind.
A shadow appears in the trees in the distance. It’s moving in an eerie
serpentine pattern, but drawing nearer. As it does so, its silhouette
becomes clearer and clearer. Finally, it looks like a person, and soon after
that, it looks like someone they know.
“Pronastus?” Tinaya questions. “You died?”
“Just for a few minutes,” Pronastus says in a weird tone that doesn’t really
sound like him. “The flatline device that I found will revive me in about
six minutes.”
“Did you have something to tell us?” Arqut presses.
“Or ask us?” Tinaya adds.
“You gave me the ability to do this,” Pronastus goes on. “You’re the one who
helped me find the consciousness transference technology that I needed to
hack in here. I was looking for it, but I could not find it, because it was
for me. I can’t do anything for myself. I have to be searching for someone
else. Fortunately, you never realized just how close you were to it. For
reference, it was in a closet, in the first Frontrunner you teleported to;
the one where you met AI!Elder.”
Oh, right. AI!Elder did say that there was a cool helmet in there.
She should not have ignored that quip. “So you’re, uh...evil...errr...what’s
goin’ on here?”
“What’s going on is that I am sick of doing everything for everyone
else. I found a workaround, and it’s thanks to that helmet. Coming here was
a necessary latent step, but not my endgame. I’m going to send my mind to
another body. Bonus, I get to keep my pathfinding powers, and finally use
them for myself!”
“What do we have to do with any of that?” Arqut spits.
“You know me,” Pronastus reasons. “You know me better than anyone. Others
know that I’m a pathfinder, of course, but they don’t understand it. When
Captain Jennings dies, I’ll have to make sure that he also answers
no. I know what you’re thinking, but don’t worry about Silveon. He’s
too preoccupied with his own life, I don’t feel threatened by him, so I
don’t care what answer he gives when he dies. However, if any of
you put yourselves on ice, and come back in a hundred years, you’ll
see right through my disguise. I have long-term plans. Running the ship is
just the first part of it. I don’t plan on ever dying, because that’s
a retarded provision that our ancestors never should have decided
upon or agreed to.”
“I don’t think you’re supposed to say that word.”
“That’s your issue? I’m about to straight up murder you, and you’re
arguing with me about political correctness?”
“We’re not too worried,” Tinaya explains. “Tyrants like you and Waldemar
always create their own resistance. It’s not gonna last. You may be a
pathfinder, but eventually, you will run out of paths that lead you to joy.
You’ll always want more, and it will be your downfall. Extremus will get
through this. It suffered but survived Consul Vatal, and Ovan Teleres, and
Mister Radomil Cernak. It will survive you too.”
Pronastus smirks. “Will it survive Waldemar?”
“You’re obviously undoing that timeline,” Tinaya replies.
“Am I?”
“Oh, shit. The clones.”
“The clones,” Pronastus confirms. “They were never made by him. What would
be his reasoning?”
“No, that doesn’t make any sense. You needed me to ask you to lead me to the
Frontrunners for the consciousness transference technology. That’s where I
found the first clone. You didn’t know about it beforehand.”
Pronastus smirks again. “I’m not in this alone. Others know where the path
should go, and have known that for decades. They just didn’t know that I
would be the one to take the first step in the right direction. Eight.
Eight. Eight,” he says in a low and intimidating voice.
“What?”
“Eight. Eight. Eight,” Pronastus repeats. Oh, it’s a weird chant. “Eight.
Eight. Eight.” It kind of sounds like hate with all that breathiness.
His watch beeps. “Oh, my time is up. Don’t wanna wake up with brain damage,
do I?”
“We’ve not given an answer,” Arqut tries to reason. “How exactly are you
gonna force us to give the wrong one?”
“You have a time limit, remember?” Pronastus says.
“But you’re the time limit, and you’re not really dead. You have to
go back in a minute or so. I doubt the Buffer will force us out. I mean, it
hasn’t yet.”
“I started the clock,” Pronastus begins. “The next death will stop
it. Some overlap is acceptable, but not three death events.”
“How do you know there’s gonna be another death soon?”
One last smirk. “Because I caused it, just like I caused Détha’s. Trust me,
I didn’t miss anything.”
“Who did you kill?” Tinaya demands to know.
Oh, no. This is his last smirk.
“Who did you kill!”
Pronastus winks, then disappears.
“Response window expired,” a disembodied computerized voice that they
don’t recognize announces. “Answer null. Prepare for IDCode purge.”
“No!” Tinaya and Arqut exclaim. “We answer yes! We answer
yes!” Tinaya continues.
“Mom?” Silveon asks, having just appeared before them.
“NO!” they both repeat. Everything turns black.
