Clavia detailed her history, and how she came to be the consciousness of a
tree. She’s actually an amalgamation of multiple people. They were all dying
next to this tree’s parent—for lack of a better term. The tree was dying
too, under attack from a small but powerful enemy. It provided them with one
last hope in the form of a seed that could one day be replanted. The fruit
containing this seed ended up in the mouth of one of the allies, a woman by
the name of Ingrid Alvarado, who is now the primary intelligence of the new
tree. That wasn’t blood on her face that Echo saw when she first showed up
here. It was the juice of the fruit. Her body was dead, though, so at
least he didn’t bury someone alive. It’s a good thing that he did, because
it’s what allowed the seed to find purchase, and grow into the magnificent
specimen standing here today. The humanoid form of Clavia is an extension of
it, and as of yet, it’s unclear how far she can stray from her home. For
now, she’s been mostly staying in the garden. Together, they hope to work
through ways to protect themselves from any hostile forces.
Echo doesn’t know how fast the ships can go, but his original guess was that
it would take two years for another one to arrive, if it ever did. They
evidently detected Clavia’s birth, but it was a year before the first
strangers came. If it took them a year to get back to wherever they
came from, no one else will be able to make it until another year after
that. According to Clavia, however, this is wrong. The people here
are capable of traveling a lot faster than that. They can cross the whole
galaxy in a matter of moments if they use the right equipment. Echo doesn’t
really have the frame of reference for what she means, so she has started
giving him some schooling. His parents educated him in science a little
while they were alive, but it seems they deliberately chose to leave some
things out. He now believes that they didn’t want him to develop too much of
a sense of wonder for what might be hiding amongst the stars. It’s not that
they were trying to protect him from the dangers, but they no longer had the
means to reach such great distances, or even communicate to others. They
didn’t want him to long for something that he could never have.
Looking back, their reasoning was sound, but it is now out of date. Their
shuttle is not irreparable, not with a superintelligent tree around. Clavia
is getting smarter and stronger every day, which is good, because someone
else does appear to be on their way here. She once again doesn’t know who
they are, or what they want, but the two of them are going to be more
prepared than ever. Despite their ability to travel so quickly, the oncomers
are moving at a really slow pace. Clavia doesn’t know why that is either,
but they’re going to take advantage of the delay.
They spend the next week on an intensive crash course so Echo can
learn all he needs to know about the universe. He learns that it’s made up
of five conflicting cultures, which were once separated across different
realities. Each one had everything they needed until they were thrown
together and suddenly had to share their resources with each other. That was
a hundred years ago, and this new society had been on the brink of war ever
since. The only thing that has kept them together is the result of a series
of diplomatic discussions amongst the leaders, and a healthy interest in
everyone minding their own business. They’re still pretty separated, which
sounds like a bad thing, but it seems to be going well. At least for now.
What they need is a true leader. They need someone to unite the
civilizations. Everyone needs to be following the same rules, and listening
to the same visionary. For some reason, Clavia believes that Echo can be
that leader. He’s not so sure. He’s never led before. Until recently, he
hadn’t even met anyone before.
“You didn’t talk to people in your simulations?” Clavia questions.
“They were mostly only there as background,” Echo explains. “I don’t think
that the program was all that sophisticated. They allowed me to feel like I
was doing a number of activities, like swimming, piloting a spacecraft, or
even flying through the air. However, they didn’t have any socialization
functions, as my parents would call them.”
“Hm. Well, I have simulations of my own, and they don’t have any limits.
Would you like to try one of them?” Clavia offers.
“Sure, I wouldn’t mind seeing something new.” Echo doesn’t want to seem too
eager, but he is.
“Do I have permission to touch you?”
“Go ahead.”
She opens her arms, and walks up to him, taking him into a hug. His mom and
dad hugged him all the time, but this is different. He’s feeling something
he hasn’t ever felt before. Sure, there were stirrings, but nothing this
substantial. They’re probably bad thoughts, so he shoves them to the side,
and lets Clavia do whatever she’s trying to do.
He finds himself falling through the air. No, it’s more like the ground
disappeared, and now air is rushing up past him. New ground gets larger and
larger until he’s standing upon it. It’s not a desert, nor a garden, but the
trees of a city. Cars are moving next to him. They’re honking their horns,
and yelling unintelligibly at each other. People walking by him on the
sidewalk are talking, to each other, and on their little computer boxes.
Flashing signs litter the tops of the nearby buildings. He can read most of
the words, but he doesn’t know what their purpose is.
“Advertisements,” Clavia explains. She’s walking up to him wearing something
that she wasn’t wearing before. Her dress was simple and unremarkable, only
there to cover her skin. It wasn’t all that different than what Echo wore
before he put on his father’s suit. Her outfit now is stylish and fancy. Her
pants are gray and slick. She has a gray jacket over a white blouse, showing
some skin in between the two sides. Echo is having those stirrings again, so
he shakes it off, and tries to focus on her eyes. And that hat. What kind of
hat is that? “A fedora,” Clavia answers.
He didn’t ask that out loud. He just thought about it. “Huh?”
“I can read your mind in here,” Clavia says. “This isn’t like one of
your simulations, where you just connect to a piece of technology.
We’re sharing a brain, and with that, our thoughts.”
Oh, that might not be good.
She smiles. “It’s okay to look. You’ve been alone your whole life. It isn’t
natural. They should have given you friends...like these.”
A man wearing a chef’s uniform walks up to Echo out of nowhere. “Hey, Mister
Cloudbearer. How you doin’?”
“Good, good, thank you.”
“All right, my man,” the cher responds.
“Hey, Echo.” It’s a young woman. She’s quite pretty, and she looks
interested in him. She smiles but doesn’t stop walking by.
“Echo, what’s up, dude?” A teenager is standing on a mailbox. Some people
are paying attention, but others are ignoring him. “Check this out!” What is
he holding? It’s long, and has wheels on it. He’s never seen it before,
but the word suddenly comes to him. It’s a skateboard. The kid holds it
out in front of him, then jumps off of the mailbox. He lands on the board,
and starts rolling around, much to the annoyance of the nearest passersby.
One of the wheels hits a pebble, and he falls forward, but still manages to
land on his feet. “Ah, boofed it. Maybe you can show me again later?”
“Sure, kid.” Why did he say that? Echo never taught this non-existent person
anything.
Other people start approaching Echo. They all act like they’re friends, and
that they admire him greatly. He’s on top of the world here; a real popular
guy. He was once afraid to talk to other people. He didn’t think it would
ever happen anyway, but he was scared out of his mind that he would screw it
up if the unthinkable happened. But you know what? Even though none of this
is real, he did encounter four people the other day, and he handled it well.
He wanted them to leave, and they eventually did. He won the argument.
Despite his lack of experience, he could do this. When this new group of
people come here, he’ll take care of them too, no matter what they want from
him, or the tree. If they don’t have honorable intentions, they’re gonna
wish they did.
“All right, that’s enough,” Clavia declares. The crowd freezes, though
they’re all still looking at Echo enthusiastically.
“You can make anything?” Echo asks her.
“Like I said, it’s not like one of your parents’ sims. I don’t have to
program anything. I just...think of it. What else do you want to see?”
Echo looks up towards the sky, and thinks about it. “Hmm. The whole galaxy.”
“Easy,” she says. The street and buildings in front of them begin to roll
away. Then the entire planet that they’re standing on does the same, like a
giant marble spinning through outer space. The two of them keep flying
backwards as the stars fly away from them, and then start to streak across
the sky. Suddenly it all stops, and they can see a galaxy, rotating at an
angle in the middle of a black void. It’s so beautiful, glowing with the
fire of hundreds of billions of suns.
He admires it silently for a few moments.
“Not one second has passed for us in the real world,” Clavia claims. “I can
teach you so many things while we’re in here. I can make you feel like
you’ve lived an entire lifetime in one day. I can show you what life has
been like for everyone else; in the five original realities, and after the
creation of the Sixth Key. I can turn you into the leader that I know you
can be.”
“What do you get out of this?” Echo asks.
“Why would I need anything out of it? Is that how your parents raised
you, to need something for your efforts?”
“They did not, but in the regular simulations, I often had to wait in line,
like if I wanted to go on an amusement park ride, or order food. I couldn’t
carry on a conversation with one of the backgrounders, but I could hear them
talk to each other. I noticed a drive towards balance. Unfairness meant one
person having something that the other did not. They wanted everything to be
even. No one wants to lose, or sacrifice. And I always had to pay. It was
fake money to me, but real to them.”
“Well,” Clavia begins, “I’m not one of your background actors. I’m a tree.”
Echo chuckles. “True. I recognize that I don’t know how humans work
regardless. Yes, Clavia, I would love it if you showed me.”
She smiled wider. “Great. Then let’s get started. How about we go back to
the beginning, during a little event that we call...the big bang?”
