The Advancement of Mateo Matic: August 12, 2525

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No one chased the team as they fled the city, probably because they hadn’t done anything wrong, so the locals had no reason to try to apprehend them. Most of the team didn’t even know why they were running. They just trusted that Leona had good reason to order them to. She had to remind them to slow down, though, because their bodies moved too fast. They were supposed to be normal humans who were born a few decades ago, and would die several more decades from now. Finally, when they were out of the city limits, and safe within the coverage of the trees, they were able to stop. “Rambo, you understand what’s going on?” Leona asked him.

“I have an idea. Fascinating development. I need to get my hands on the slingdrives, so I can figure out why we’re off the mark. Proxima Centauri is close to Sol, but it’s not Sol. We also jumped to our next year too early”

“No, I mean, with the people in this dome. Do you understand why we ran?”

“Oh, of course I do. The Oblivios.”

“Then please go check the perimeter. Do it quietly. There could be campers or homesteaders, or just hikers. I’ll explain what happened to everyone else. I’m not sure if they’ve ever heard of Oblivios.”

“On it, boss.” Ramses left.

Leona caught her breath so she could think more clearly. “Okay. Oblivios. They came to this planet with the intention of living a more simple life, with very primitive technology. It’s like Castlebourne’s Dome for Pioneers, but for real.”

“They don’t look like pioneers,” Angela pointed out.

“That was 300 years ago. The reason they’re called Oblivios is because they had their minds wiped. The first generations didn’t remember advanced technology. They didn’t even know that they were in a dome, so they didn’t pass stories onto their children. Most of the criticisms of the project were about how they would eventually end up like this. You can’t stop progress. Since whatever dogma they had against tech was lost to them, they couldn’t instill such values into their descendants, so those descendants kept trying to make their lives better.” She pointed back in the direction of the city. “This is where that leads.”

“You’re gonna wanna see this, sir,” Ramses said through comms.

“If you see people, don’t talk to yourself.”

“I’m sure they’ve developed short-range wireless by now. There’s something I don’t think they’ve made yet, though, and I’m looking right at it.”

“Be right there,” Leona responded.

The group walked over to Ramses’ location, and before they caught up, saw what he was referring to. A gargantuan tower rose up into the sky, and disappeared above the clouds. The city they came from was advanced, but not like this. It took the kind of megaengineering that the hosts needed to build the domes themselves. It was hard to tell, but it might have risen all the way up to the ceiling. It might have been structurally necessary, since this dome was so much older than the ones on Castlebourne, but probably not.

Leona tilted her head. “That looks familiar to me. Why does it look familiar?”

“We’ve seen towers before,” Mateo pointed out.

“Yeah...” Leona wasn’t so sure. It was of plain design, but not generic.

“There’s no one around,” Ramses informs them. “Let’s just jump over to the base, and see what’s up with it.”

Leona was hesitant, but she looked around too, and checked her lifesigns detector. They were calibrated for human life, and sufficiently related cousin species, so they should be pretty accurate in a world that didn’t have transhumanism yet, but there was no way to be sure. They weren’t even worried about naked eyes anyway, but surveillance. “Okay, fine. Let’s just slip back into the trees first.”

They hid away, and then teleported to the tower. As soon as they appeared, a door opened up, likely via motion sensor. They all stepped into the elevator, and let it take them all the way up to the top, which yes, was right there at the dome’s zenith. A woman greeted them when the doors opened. “Greetings, travelers. I saw you teleport in. My name is Aeterna Valeria. I run this joint.”

“The tower, or the dome?” Mateo asks.

“Both, I guess.”

“You’re related to Tertius Valerius,” Marie guessed.

“Yeah, he, uhh...he was my father.”

“We just saw him not too long ago,” Romana explained. “He’s still alive.”

“I don’t really see it that way. It’s been something like two hundred years for me.”

There was an awkward pause in the conversation, which Leona needed to break. “So...report?”

“Yeah, we’ll get to that. Are you hungry? I have a synthy. It takes a few hours, but I’ve already synthesized some mashed potatoes and green beans for myself, if you’re interested in joining me. I like leftovers, so I always make extra.”

None of them was hungry, but they agreed to eat to be polite. It was good, and interesting to go back to regular food, instead of just programmable dayfruit or dayfruit smoothie. Leona needed to break the silence again while they were eating. “The people down there. What do they think of this tower?”

“They can’t see it,” Aeterna began to explain. “I have my father’s powers. I make them forget. I make them forget the tower at the same time they’re looking at it. It’s not technically invisible, but effectively so. I exempted you from it when you showed up.”

“Did you notice that they have moved past their original mandate?” Marie pressed.

Aeterna rolled her eyes. “Of course they did. We knew it was gonna happen. Our key contact died, but before she did, she and my father would fight all the time about keeping the dream alive. He said he promised he would erase people’s memories, but that he wouldn’t govern their thoughts. If someone came up with the lightbulb, they could have a freakin’ lightbulb. So that’s what they did, and they kept doing it, and now they’re here.”

“They said something about tunnels,” Mateo brought up.

“Yeah, they interact with the other domes,” Aeterna confirmed.

“How does that work?” Romana questioned.

“The others are pretty good about it. They don’t understand the technology, and they certainly don’t know that there’s a pretty girl up in this tower with magical memory powers, but they play their parts. Most of the nearby domes were also once intentionally primitive, though with no one like me. The Oblivios don’t really get how the dome works, but they know that they can’t go outside. They used drones to find the wall a long time ago, in defiance of the sonic deterrents, and for some reason, they didn’t freak out about it. It looked like a barren wasteland, and it made them sick, but they saw through the ruse anyway, and now they’re about to figure out the whole thing. The weird part about it is that they simply accepted that this was how their little pocket of the universe functioned. I was expecting riots, but everyone’s okay. It’s crazy really; a fascinating social experiment, I’m sure.”

“If they know they’re in a dome, why are you still here?”

“They know they’re in a dome because the data told them so. The drones kept crashing into the holographic walls, and I can wipe their memories of it all I want, but they’re gonna look back at that data, and it’s going to challenge their beliefs. So yeah, I gave up. But they still can’t see the tower. I’m still making them forget that they’re looking at a superscraper in the middle of it all. It’s limited in area, so it’s easier. They’re not looking for it, whereas they were looking for a way through the wasteland.”

“You ever thought about just stopping?” Romana offered.

Aeterna consulted her watch. “Yeah, won’t be long now.”

“What do you mean?” Mateo asked.

“The planet is going through a period of instability,” Aeterna went on. “Back on Earth, technologies like LiDAR were inevitable. Earth is too big, and you gotta navigate it. It’s easier to let computers do it for you. Here, in this cramped space, they didn’t need it. Human-driven cars are fine. You never have to go very far.”

“The tremors finally gave them a reason,” Leona realized.

“Bingo. Necessity being the mother of invention, it was suddenly absolutely necessary that they build sensor arrays to measure the world around them. Weather, for the most part, can be controlled in here, but we can’t stop the ground from shaking. They feel it just like everyone in all the other domes does.”

Ramses nodded. “And as soon as they turn on one of these sensor arrays, it’s going to pick up on the tower that humans keep forgetting, even when a camera records video of it, and plays it back later.”

Aeterna nodded back. “I won’t be able to combat that. And honestly, I shouldn’t try. The tower was a dumb idea that my father had, and I stuck around because once it was built, it couldn’t be dismantled, or it would ruin everything. They thought that someone with our power would have to stay here forever to keep it working, but the scope of this place is not limitless. They were always going to find the wall, and the data from their geological surveys would always contradict their perceptions. The ancestors thought, if they just went back to the way things were, they would stay that way. But that’s not what happened before, or they wouldn’t have needed to leave Earth to reclaim that way of life in the first place. So shortsighted.”

“Why did Tertius leave? He didn’t even tell us that he had a daughter,” Mateo said, worried about how she would react.

“Well, he gave up on the Oblivios a long time ago. I don’t know why I’ve been holding on. I suppose in rebellion to him. I told him, if he left, he couldn’t come back. He has respected that, which I appreciate.”

“It might not have been as long for him as it’s been for you,” Leona reminded her. “I didn’t get the sense that it had been a full 300 years since he last saw me.”

Aeterna shrugged. “Whatever.”

“What if...” Romana began. “What if you did see him again? Would you be mad?”

Aeterna considered the question. “A year ago, I might have been, but as I said, this is all ending anyway, so it would be fine. I’m not gonna break down crying, and hug my daddy, but we wouldn’t fight. Well. I wouldn’t pick a fight. Let’s just say that.”

Romana accepted this answer, and decided that this somehow translated to her taking a matchstick out of her breast pocket, and setting it down on the table ceremoniously.

“What’s that?” Mateo asked.

“It’s a muster match. Light it, and Tertius Valerius will appear.”

“He gave this to you?” Mateo pushed harder. “Why would he do that? Did he know that we would end up here? Did you?”

“Of course she did,” Ramses deduced. “She brought us here.”

Romana’s demeanor didn’t change. She remained cool. “I spend more time in the timeline. I get to know people. He asked me to come here. He said that anytime would be all right, but he clearly really wanted it to happen by 2525, so I’m glad we got a move on with it.”

“I don’t like that you did that,” Ramses admitted. “I don’t like that you messed with my slingdrive.”

“I don’t like that you lied to me,” Mateo added.

“This is between a father and his daughter, but a different father and daughter,” Romana defended. She redirected her attention to Aeterna. “He asked me not to light it. He said that you have to do it, so it’s up to you if it gets lit at all. He did want to be here with you when the tower becomes detectable, but he understands if you’re not ready, and will accept it if you never are.”

Aeterna stared at the match for a moment before picking it up. She held it between her thumb and forefinger for another moment, until slipping the other end between the thumb and forefinger of her other hand. She was about to break it, or was at least contemplating it. No one knew what was going through her head, but it looked like an internal debate as her nostrils flared, and her lips moved, suggestive of the words that she was thinking of. At last, she let go of the match with one hand, and scraped the head against the wooden table. A flame burst out of it. It looked like any normal lit match.

For a second, nothing happened, then a smoke portal appeared a couple of meters away. When the smoke cleared, Tertius was standing there. He smiled kindly at his daughter, barely registering that there were other people in the room. They just regarded each other, her not being able to move, and him not wanting to make the first move. Suddenly, Aeterna burst into tears, and ran over to hug her dad.

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Microstory 2498: Conjunction 11

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These are vactrain hubs, and there are twelve of them. They’re evenly spaced all over the planet, according to an icosahedron model. While the world is obviously a sphere, an icosahedron shape can be overlaid on it in order to minimize the number of Conjunctions needed. It would be utterly impractical to have a vacuum tube that went from one dome to every single other. While there’s technically space for that, it would require far too much management and maintenance. So many of such tunnels would not be used very much, or at all. How many people are going from, say, Ancient Egypt to Prairiedome? It certainly wouldn’t be an impossibility, but that tube would likely be sitting vacant most of the time. Layovers have been a staple for our civilization for centuries, but this system is a lot better than its predecessors. First off, while the tubes themselves are limited, the trips are often exquisitely planned. Because each dome does have a direct line to each of the twelve conjunctions. As you would expect, a dome will have twelve stations, and you go to the one that leads to your destination. Currently, most trains leave about an average of every thirty minutes, but that fluctuates, and will continue to change, because it’s based on demand. If literally no one is going from Conjunction 6 to Conjunction 4, then it’s not even going to bother leaving. It will just sit there until someone signs up prior to the next cycle. I probably don’t need to tell you all this, because there is already sufficient literature on how to travel around the world, but I’ve always loved transportation, so while I’m finding lots of enjoyment from the other domes, I tend to focus more on the logistics than most visitors do.

So let’s talk about how it works once you’re in the Conjunction. As I said, each dome has a direct route to every single one. That’s important. I read up on the history, and the original plans called for multiple layovers, where you travel to your nearest hub, then the hub nearest your destination, and finally your final destination. That would be so bad, but I’m sure most people are glad that they ended up building up the infrastructure much more than that. The Conjunctions are so well-designed, and there is so much redundancy. If you are in a train car with visitors who are going through the same Conjunction, but different final destinations, your car will stop, and have you get off. At that point, you will just about immediately step into a private multi-directional elevator pod. It can only fit eleven people, but if you have luggage, obviously fewer. If you’re in a party of one, you can have a pod to yourself, and if you’re in a party of 22, you’re gonna have to split up. That’s just fine, they have enough to accommodate everyone who can fit in any given train car over only a few moments. Your pod will take you to your next station, where a second train will come for you to deliver you to the right dome. You might still be alone, but the builders thought of this. Not all vactrain cars are the same size. That’s why you tell the system where you’re going, so they can prepare the right one for you, to save the larger ones for more popular domes, even if the popularity shifts hour by hour. It’s such a robust system, I’m so impressed. There are so many things going on in the background, but you don’t have to worry about that. You just get on, get off, pod over, get on, and get off again. Despite there being more than three times as many stations worldwide than there have ever been airports on Earth, travel has never been simpler. And your trip will never take longer than three and a half hours from anywhere else. And that’s assuming you stop for coffee.

Microstory 2471: Hubdome

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It may be boring, but someone’s gotta do it. Centuries ago, mail was all the rage. You could send someone a letter a thousand kilometers away, and it might only take a month to get there, or never! Doesn’t that sound neat? Over time, of course, speed picked up as infrastructure was developed, and efficient methods were discovered—or rediscovered, as in the case of relay stations. In the late 20th century, they invented electronic mail, which may lead you to believe that regular physical post was all but eradicated, but not so fast my friend. Adoption was slow, and...people are dumb. They still sent letters. Plus, the population was booming, so even if any given individual wasn’t sending as much, the volume was still increasing overall. It did eventually die down, but one thing that didn’t go away was package delivery. Instead of just the written word, real, useful items had to be transported from one place to another. There was no way to send that electronically. Or was there? Of course there is! It’s called additive manufacturing, and it’s been improving too. Not everyone has their own industrial synthesizer, and there are some things that standard feedstocks can’t handle. If there are too many different types of materials in one item, you can’t expect every end user to maintain each type in their private space. And even if you did, the feedstock itself has to be delivered, right? That’s where this dome comes in. It’s a hub for all your shipping and delivering needs. It doesn’t take weeks to get to its destination, though, unless whatever you asked for hasn’t been built yet. I say, if something you ordered takes more than a few hours to reach you, there’s probably something wrong. Shipping was one of the easiest industries to transition to automation back when human employment was something necessary in order to maintain a stable economy. You pick this thing up, put it in this box, seal it up, and move it to its destination. The programming couldn’t be simpler. Only one human works here. He walks up and down, making sure that things are okay. Obviously, the robots do this too, but they like to put  a human touch in everything, and that’s true of pretty much every planet, except maybe Glisnia. Come here for a tour if you have a few hours to kill, but you could also probably just read the more detailed literature on the prospectus, and get just as much out of it.

Microstory 2466: Grand Central Sewage

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According to lore, this was originally called Primary Sewage Treatment Dome. They changed it, because they wanted it to sound a little more fun. Because in reality, it’s not fun at all. It’s the grossest aspect of this planet, in my humble opinion. Let’s start with the water. Every sufficiently completed dome handles its own water treatment for the most part. Using state-of-the-art plants, the sewage is collected, filtered, and recycled as needed. This clean water is then pumped back into their own pipe network, and if there’s any excess, it can be returned to the planet’s water table. There isn’t much of a water table, but it does exist, and it’s growing every day. What’s left over after all of the water has been reclaimed is called sludge, and while it’s absolutely disgusting, it is absolutely not useless. There are all sorts of goodies in your waste. It can be used for biogas, fertilizer, and even feedstock for additive printers. That’s right, the device you’re using to read this review may be made out of poop! It’s a...different circle of life. Certain useful ingredients can also be extracted from the sludge, like phosphorus, nitrogen, and cellulose. These chemicals are all processed here, and redistributed as necessary. But first, it has to get here. As I said, each individual dome reclaims its own recycled water, but since there’s only one Grand Central Sewage, it all has to be pelletized, sealed up, and transported somehow. Enter the vactrain network. That’s right, the same tubes you use to travel from your residential dome to, say, Archidome, are also used to transport waste. Don’t worry, though. They use entirely different trains, and entirely different train stations. It’s probably right under your feet, though. If you were to step through a maintenance door, and walk down the steps, you could end up in a second station where waste is moved into the tubes. Scrap is shipped from here as well. Every time you throw away some packaging, or a part breaks off from some equipment, it goes to one of these hidden stations too, so it can head off to a separate dome, colloquially known as The Scrapyard. I reviewed that dome as well, because I actually like the utility domes. I find the secret, underground means by which we live to be more interesting than what we do on the surface. It’s not pretty, and it’s not glamorous, but it is monumentally important. Yes, it might be a little weird to know that the chair your sitting on could have been in someone’s body at some point, but trust me, this is better. We used to just dump our waste in a hole, and leave it there forever. Talk about disgusting.

Microstory 2439: Dome for Pioneers

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Ha! Dome for Pioneers. That’s so on the nose. That’s really what it is. You’re almost starting from scratch here. You don’t go all the way back to the beginning, like Paleodome, but you’re not provided with much. Like other lifestyle domes, you’re expected to stay here for an extended period of time, like years; not days, not even months. You’re here to get an idea of what life was like for people in 19th century New World. Everything you need is here, but you have to process it yourself. There’s wooded areas, arid desert, prairies, some small lakes (maybe ponds?) and rocks. They dress you in very simple clothes that look like they’re handmade, but I’m guessing they weren’t really. They give you a metal bucket, a few basic tools, and one wagon per ten or eleven people I think? I don’t remember what they said. If you have too few people, you don’t even get a wagon. There are some cows of some kind wandering around nearby, so if you do get one of the wagons, you have to put those two things together yourself. Good luck, dude, I actually think they’re real cows. While they’re not aggressive, they don’t want you tying ropes to them, and do you even know how to put a cow before a wagon? Didn’t think so. It’s the year 2500, we don’t have to do stuff like that anymore. That’s what’s so interesting about this place. If you wanted to know how the real pioneers survived with what little they had, and while enduring everything they had to, you had to have done your research ahead of time. There is no education here. I understand what they were going for, but that was probably a mistake. There should be a museum where they give you such education, not so you’re better equipped, but so you have a real appreciation for what you’ll experience in the simulation. What were their goals? What mistakes did they make? What kind of class divide was there, if any? I mean, you could turn your lot into a mountain man survivalist situation, and stay there for just as long, but that’s not what the pioneers were trying to do. They were digging in, founding towns, making a legacy for themselves. If people start using it right, given enough time, it’s possible that Dome for Pioneers might have to change its name to Dome for an Extremely Advanced Civilization. All the tools are there, it will just take time for us to relearn how to use them, just like our ancestors did. I think that it’s a really interesting social experiment. I just think it might not accomplish the right goals if management doesn’t guide the narrative in a proper direction. But don’t listen to me, I’m nobody.

Microstory 2431: Melodome

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Don’t let the name fool ya if you’re interpreting the pun to be mellow + dome. It’s not about melodrama either. It’s the first part of the word melody + dome. This is all about music. Recording studios, concert halls, smaller stages, other interesting venues, and even sports stadiums where no one ever actually plays sports. This dome has it all. You can make music, listen to music, watch music. Every genre, every level of interaction; everything. No place like this exists on Earth. Even the cities known for music, like Havana and New Orleans, still had to leave space for regular living. This is the Music City, no matter what Nashville tries to tell you. There are some things that I’m not entirely sure about, unfortunately. When my great great grandparents were younger, they remember a trend where dead musicians were starting to be resurrected through holograms. This isn’t the kind of volumetric immersion that you’re used to in the present-day. It was very crude, and very obviously fake, even if you didn’t know that the subject wasn’t alive anymore. They recall being quite upset by this, not because it was macabre—which it is—but because it was disrespectful. These were real people who lived their lives, and then those lives ended. Before virtual immortality was invented, that was just what happened. These musical artists were immortal because of their legacy. That was what they were striving for, because they probably didn’t even guess at the future of life extension research. Their flame burned bright, but it was short, and that’s what was special about it. If you missed it, that was sad, but it was sad in a good way. The holograms robbed the industry of these artists’ authenticity, and sadly, that never went away. The technology kept improving, and the industry kept embracing it, despite pushback from the audience. There was evidently enough money in it, probably because of people’s morbid curiosity. Melodome has not shied away from this concept. They’ve brought the dead back to life using realistic androids. Not all of them are even dead, but living performers who just aren’t freaking on Castlebourne. I guess they signed away the rights to their likeness, but that doesn’t make it okay. I’m not going to name real names, but if John Doe can’t be here, then I shouldn’t be able to go to one of his concerts, and watch a convincing facsimile reenact his set from X number of years ago. I get that these are at least historically accurate shows, so they’re not merely contriving something entirely out of thin air. They justify it by saying that it’s like watching a recording, but I don’t consider that the same thing. There’s a lot of great things to see here. If you’re an artist, and you want a venue, they will find you one. I doubt the demand would ever surpass the supply. So if you’re a music fan who wants to discover someone new, you can do that. There’s always something going on, and it’s easy to find new acts on the dome’s prospectus, but there’s also this other side of it. They should really lean into the aspect of originality, because the reenactments are unethical at best. But maybe that’s just my point of view. You have to decide for yourself where your line is.

Microstory 2430: Advanced Research Dome (ARD)

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In the early days of interstellar colonization, they largely expected you to start from scratch, though the definition of this term is a little loose. I mean, they had domes too, because almost none of them had an atmosphere that was breathable by organic Earthans. So there was some technology right from the start, and they were making scientific advances on their own, but Earth remained front and center in the industry. You just can’t beat that kind of established infrastructure and strong, lasting institutions. I’m not sure that’s true anymore. While Teagarden took over the majority of the military needs of the Core Worlds, that was mostly for political reasons. They wanted to erase any sense that it favored the nations of Old Earth. Physics research didn’t have to switch homes, but it has. These new reframe engines people are using to travel at faster-than-light speeds? Those were apparently invented here. Developments in anti-gravity; induced stasis; transhumanistic enhancement, including bioforming; terraforming; power generation and distribution...it’s all here. Dare I say, we’re now more advanced than Earth is, even with all of its advantages? I’m sorry to tell you that that is my conclusion. If you’re interested in furthering our understanding of physics, biology, chemistry, or any other scientific field, your best bet is to come here. Earth’s programs are nothing to scoff at, and I don’t think they’re doing anything wrong, but at some point, the brightest minds in the galaxy evidently decided to move, and before anyone realized what was happening, the power shifted here. Good or bad, that’s what happened. This power may shift once more, back to Earth, or perhaps some third star system, but for now, this is the nexus of scientific exploration. The silver lining is that they’re not hoarding it any more than Earth did. They’re sharing what they’ve learned with others, so we’re at least safe from the privatization threats that we’ve faced in days past. Word of warning: this dome is not for visitors, really. You can come, and they’ll let you walk around, but we’re dealing with a lot of dangerous things here, so the majority of the sectors are off-limits without proper authorization. People keep randomly showing up, believing that we have something to show off, but that’s not what we’re doing here. This is just for us. If you want to join, fill out the right application. If you don’t yet qualify, find a learning platform, and catch up. There are no limits to who can help humanity and its offshoots achieve everything we ever dreamed of.

Microstory 2410: Mildome

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This dome is for flowers. It’s a self-sustaining ecosystem, and it’s growing. Here’s the thing, at the moment, it’s mostly just grass in the center of a vast desert. There are pockets of flower gardens here and there, but they are going to spread over the course of the next several decades. This was done intentionally, not because the builders were lazy, or something. It’s all about the pollinators. You got your bees, you got your butterflies and moths, you got your flies. Not houseflies, that’s not what we’re talking about, nor blackflies. Those are gross and annoying. Don’t ask me the exact species of any of these things, I’m not that big of an expert. I just really like flowers. Continuing on, you got your hummingbirds, you got your honeyeaters and sunbirds, you got your bats. I looked it up, there are other animals that are good at pollinating on Earth, but they either don’t have them on this planet, or it’s taking time to engineer them. I doubt that they transported live specimens clear across the interstellar void. I don’t think you can do that legally, unless they qualify as a pet. You know what I learned while I was here? Humans are pollinators too. I don’t just mean that we plant plants. Obviously we do that, but we also have a history of lifting pollen, and carrying it to other places. Isn’t that cool? Well, you can do that under Mildome, if it strikes your fancy. The creators want this space to be the culmination of the hard work of millions of living organisms, including people like you can me. One day, the whole surface will be one giant garden, like a little microcosm of the world. I will be coming back regularly to see how it progresses, but I can’t wait for the “end” result. Of course, it won’t be finished at that point. The pollinators will continue to do what they do best, and this dome will thrive. Without any negative environmental factors, like climate breakdown, there’s nothing standing in its way. That’s something you have to see if you’re here on the planet anyway. Plus, there’s tons of honey, because of the bees. In addition to taking care of them, and learning about them, you can also eat however much honey that you want. If that doesn’t convince you, I suppose nothing will.

Microstory 2201: Understanding of the Data

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I came back into the office today. Actually, I got in really early, before the sun came up, but I just watched a nature show on the gargantuan TV until it was time to “clock in”. What happened was I woke up at the end of a cycle, and couldn’t get back to sleep. I didn’t find myself drifting away during the day, though, so I think it will be okay. Sometimes, fighting insomnia is worse, and it’s best just to accept what your body is trying to tell you, even if you’re better at math, and you know that it’s wrong. I won’t be making a habit of it. After everyone else came in, we put a meeting on the books. My Data Analyst wanted to put the finishing touches on his presentation. He gave us his initial findings. He now understands how jail guests are currently scheduled, and as we suspected, it really doesn’t have anything to do with group dynamics. There is so much data, and so many variables to deal with, this is going to be a difficult task, but I know that my people are up to it. The majority of the rest of the team will begin next week. They’ll be spending time on their training, and getting to know each other, so it won’t be until about mid-August before we start making progress, but that progress will happen. The presentation was interactive, with the other team members asking questions, and already contributing to the understanding of the data. He actually rewrote some of the slides while we were all there together. Right now, I’m consolidating and organizing the information that I’ve received in my brain, and thinking about ways that we can tackle this issue in the future, and I’ll continue to do that after I fall asleep tonight.

Microstory 2137: A Specific Person

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I’ve been experiencing a lot of depression lately, which is understandable, and also not at all surprising. I’ve suffered from depression and anxiety my whole life, and sought professional help for it on a number of occasions. It’s never really helped, and I’ve not been able to speak with my current therapist recently, because of my physical medical issues. We try to talk on the phone, but I’m absolutely terrible at that. I have trouble interpreting how other people are receiving what I’m saying in person, but it’s even worse when I can’t see them at all. Plus, in therapy, there need to be moments of quiet that can be filled with nonverbal cues, or even the lack thereof cues, so the therapist can gain insights into one’s condition by that silence. When you’re on the phone, well maybe, you actually are talking, but it’s a bad connection, or the call has been dropped entirely. I’ve had varying qualities of success when it comes to therapy, so even if I could talk to someone in the way that I need, it probably wouldn’t work anyway. I have too many character flaws that I don’t want to get rid of, because doing so might make me more like other people. Normal people eat fecal matter, murder each other, and vote against the greater good. As hard as it is for me to live with who I am, I wouldn’t wanna be much like you either, because at least I can look in the mirror and see a specific person, instead of just a facsimile of everyone else in the world. I’m not special, but I’m not typical. I know, I’m rambling, and not saying anything of any value or meaning, but that’s what happens when I’m struggling with my mental health. Like I was saying, I’ve always been depressed and anxious. It’s my resting state. I think I stopped trying to get help with it because I got so used to these feelings, and never thought they could be fixed. I’m still not sure about it. I’ll go back to therapy when I’m literally fit to go do so again, but I don’t expect any semblance of progress. If it’s happened before, it was so gradual that I didn’t notice. I don’t like things that can’t be measured, and I don’t know what happiness looks like. My guess is that it doesn’t exist beyond the abstract, like dark matter, or a man who’s eaten his own head.

Microstory 2127: Too Tired to Relax

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I accepted one of the jobs, and respectfully declined the others. I’ll be working from home, which is something that I always wanted to do before all this time travel and universe-hopping. It saves on gas, and other transportation, and it allows me to work for anyone in the world. I thought I was going to be able to tell you what I’ll be doing, but my employer doesn’t want me to divulge such information. They may allow me to say certain, carefully crafted things at a later date, but for now, I should just treat it as privileged information. They didn’t make me sign an NDA, but I’m obviously going to respect their decision. All I can say is that I’m allowed to work whenever I want unless I’m scheduled for a meeting or a call, and it’s by the week, rather than the day. So if I get all of my work done at the beginning of the week, I can take a couple of days off, and still get paid the same, because I covered my hours, and was sufficiently productive. We’ll see how it goes. Before I left my original universe, people were pushing for a four-day workweek, but I’ve always believed that it would be better to work shorter hours across more days than to get entire days off. I would rather take minimal breaks in between than work my butt off non-stop until I crash on the weekend. I’m too tired to relax at that point, ya know? I know that sounds dumb, but if you’ve ever been there, you understand what I mean. Anyway, most of my last several posts have been on the longer side, so I think I’ll just do a little of that relaxing that I was talking about. I’ll have more to say tomorrow, because my new job isn’t the only thing I have going on. I’m this close to selecting an apartment. I found a nice complex with fully furnished units, but new, so I don’t have to worry about others having gotten their grubby little hands on the furniture—or worse—smoking around it. I’ll still clean everything. I’ll also need to tell you what my therapy was like, because I’m writing this prior to my evening session. I think I’ve already told you that, as a patient, I’m none too worried about the confidentiality of psychological and medical treatment. I expect my provider to respect my privacy, but I’ll say whatever I want about myself, so you’ll be hearing about my progress in the next coming months.

Microstory 2124: Suppose Makes Me Sexist

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Therapy time. Part of my sentence requires that I participate in regular psychological treatment with an approved provider. Interestingly enough, while it’s fine for them to dictate the pool of therapists that I am allowed to choose from, it’s not legal for the court to determine the length of treatment. They can’t tell me how long the sessions should be, or how often they should be, or even how long I have to keep doing it. It seems weird, since the only thing stopping me from only meeting someone once can be found in other sections of the sentence, like the part that discusses making significant and quantifiable improvement in behavior. I could theoretically only go the once, and then just work on myself on my own, but that’s harder to demonstrate, so continued participation is the easiest way to measure progress, for everyone. The therapist doesn’t even have to sign anything to prove that I’m going regularly, or submit reports to the court. It’s basically on the honor system, though my parole officer will be able to give anecdotal evidence one way or another. I’ve spent all day narrowing the list of providers online to see who I might want to speak with, reading their bios, and taking note of their specialties. I immediately ignored all the male therapists, which has made this go a lot faster. I know what you’re thinking, but it’s not as bad as it sounds. I just feel more comfortable around women, I always have, especially when it comes to medical professionals. It’s not even a sexual thing, as I’m also attracted to men. I’ve just always found women to generally be more patient, compassionate, and understanding. And also less violent, though that doesn’t mean any professional has ever attacked me, or anything. I just have a preference, which I suppose makes me sexist, but I think it’s okay. The problem with sexism is that it leads to discrimination, and in my case, my feelings are never really to the detriment of others. I’ve never been in charge of hiring anyone, or firing them. If I were, I would easily be able to set this all aside, because it’s really just about how comfortable I am around them. I rarely go out of my way to make myself comfortable, and I recognize that there’s a difference between that and competence, intelligence, or social or professional fitness. Anyway, as per usual, I won’t give you any names, but once I find the right person, I’ll tell you a little bit about her, and will probably be mentioning our work periodically as I continue telling my story.

Microstory 2123: Still Weighing My Options

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All of my interviews today went pretty well. Most of the interviewers went into it under the assumption that everything on my blog is true, and I am indeed from another universe, allowing me to answer questions about my past experiences in the workforce that didn’t take place in this particular force. They even let me bring up things that I know about my alternate self, who has gone on to have new experiences since we diverged from each other. A few of them were clearly not a good fit for me. I don’t have the skills or education relevant to do the work effectively. I’ll say this, even though it’s a little mean, one of them was obviously confused about what the word “remote” means. No, I can’t go into the office twice a week. That is called a hybrid schedule, and it’s only for local workers. They’re in Utah. I’m not flying down to Utah just so I can remind you that my body extends beyond the lower portion of my chest. I don’t want to go to Utah for any reason. He couldn’t really explain why he ever wanted me to be there in person. They never can—not even just in terms of these interviews, but in general. Companies are losing money on office space by letting people work from home, so to get a better return on their investment, they artificially limit the practice, but they can’t admit that it’s because of that, so they sort of waffle, and come up with bogus reasons about it being better for productivity. Unless you’re in sales (or maybe even if you are) being at work in person for a job that’s performed exclusively on the computer is simply not necessary. Most of the interviewers seemed to understand that, and are eager to draw from a pool of talent outside of a reasonable driving distance. I can’t tell you any specifics about who I spoke with, or who I’m leaning towards. I never will.

All but one of the people I talked to who were still interested after we got past some of these other miscommunications understood that I’m never going to stop blogging. If I end up taking their job, they’ll let me say whatever I want as long as I don’t name names, or place any of their customers or clients in any sort of risk. They’ve all seen that I’ve never done that before. Honest hour? As honest as I am on this thing, I sometimes adjust details to protect the innocent, or even the guilty. I’ve been known to spend hours coming up with a fictional company that I mention only once in a story just to avoid using a brand name. That policy has extended into writing about myself. I’m not making any commitments yet, I’m still weighing my options. Two interviewers had to schedule for tomorrow, and another one had to reschedule for tomorrow, so I still have three more companies to consider, and who still need to consider me. Once those are done, I’ll use my pros and cons charts to organize my choices from most preferred to least interested, and go from there. There’s a chance that the search could go into next week, but I hope to have at least one good offer by then. They were all pretty certain that they would be ready to get started quickly, so I’m figuring only a couple of weeks before I clock in for the first time. One last thing, I’m scheduled to meet my parole officer on Friday. He or she will escort me to the jail for the first time since orientation, not because they don’t trust me, but because it’s procedure for them to personally inspect the facility for the safety of those in their care. They’re either still deciding who will be assigned my case, or they’re just not ready to tell me yet. I’ll let you know how that all goes too.

Microstory 2122: Sounds So Familiar

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Two months ago to the day, I wrote a tiny little baby post for babies about the beginning of my search for an apartment. I wasn’t ready to put any money down, and by the time I was sturdier on my feet, I was getting sick, and then running away from all of my many, many problems. So none of that came to fruition. Back then, I was hoping to find a place that was close to where I worked, but that’s not liable to be an issue this time around. Organizations are approaching me from all over the country, and one of them is international. Well, it’s Toronto, which we practically share with Canada. It might not matter where I live if I end up being offered a position at one of these places. They’re fully aware of where I’m located, and also that I can’t leave. That’s the best part. I used to be so nervous about having to be truthful during the application and interview process, not that I was always in as bad of a position as I am now, but it’s a relief to have my ugliness out in the open. I don’t have to worry about them asking me if I’m good with people, because I think we all know that I’m not. I don’t have to wonder if they’re going to pick up on my autism, or if I should say something ahead of time, so they don’t interpret my behavior as just being an aloof jerk. They can read all about it and more on my website, so if they let me get to the point where I’m answering questions directly, and they miss something about me, it’s kind of their fault, right? They all know that I’m in intermittent jail right now, and are still offering me to start the process.

Anyway, I’m talking too much about my job prospects. This is meant to be about my hunt for a place to live. While I’m not in jail, I’m still staying in the hotel, but the FBI’s patience is wearing thin on that. Or at least, I assume that it is. No one has said that I’ve overstayed my welcome, but you don’t want it to get to that point, do you? That’s something you fix before it becomes an issue. So I want to get out of here, and start making my own way. God, this all sounds so familiar from earlier this year. Once again, I have a benefactor who I can’t tell enough how appreciative of them I am. I’m looking for a job, and a place to live, and I almost feel like I’m coming down with something. My former employer even says that they’ll loan me last month’s and first month’s rent at a new place once the FBI stops covering, as long as I have a job offer in my inbox. I don’t even have to take the job, though I’ll probably accept one of these soon. I can’t imagine that the interviews are as important as they usually are, because as I said, everything about me is out there for anyone to read at will. That’s why they’re reaching out to me in the first place, because they already know what I’ve been going through. They really shouldn’t be surprised by anything I say at this point. Today is all about finding somewhere to dig in, while tomorrow is filled with virtual interview after virtual interview. No one is making me go in to their offices in person, which will make the process a whole lot smoother. Unlike some people, I’ll be wearing pants throughout. I know that it’s, like, a thing, to make conference calls in only your underwear, but that’s not me. I just wanna put that out there. I don’t find being half comfortable any more comfortable than being totally uncomfortable. That didn’t make any sense, but you know what I mean.

Microstory 2121: Try to Escape, Blah Blah Blah

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I’ve been calling this weekend jail, but the real and official term is intermittent jail. I don’t know about anywhere else, but the people of this Earth decided that they wanted a lot of their criminals to be able to serve their time while still being able to contribute positively to society. Some prisons offer some sort of work program, but this is difficult to regulate, and studies a long time ago discovered a lot of exploitation, and unfair wage practices. The reason it’s called intermittent is because not everyone can do it on the weekends, because that makes the process too complicated. Everyone who works there would be really busy during these short periods of time, and they don’t want to have to do that. It’s actually harder to get a weekend schedule, because that’s what everyone wants, for obvious reasons. I was able to secure it because of my rising readership count for this website. They argued that my blog was a fixture of public interest that had the potential to paint the court system in a positive light. The system is not known here for its negative press, but good publicity is always welcome, and the judge agreed. So here’s what happened. I checked in at 19:00 exactly on Friday night. First, I should say that there are entire facilities dedicated to intermittent jail time, but some of them cater to mixed populations. You may end up as a cellmate to someone who has to stay there the whole time. In this case, we were all there for the same thing, and I think they’re going to try to keep me with the same cell mate each time, though that might not always work out. I have no feelings on this matter yet, as I have not even had a cellmate, because I was in the intake section.

The intake section is meant only for people who are going in for the first time. Well, it doesn’t have to be their first time full stop. If they’re a repeat offender, they have to go through the initial intake process all over again, so some of the people I saw there might have already known what to do. That’s the point of all this, to familiarize residents with the process before throwing them in with everyone else. So I got there at 19:00, and started filling out forms, and confirming information with the intake officers. After that, I was asked to place all of my belongings in a box after they were logged, and hand it to one of the officers while I went into a privacy room, and removed all of my clothes. It wasn’t that private, though, because we were all in there together, which I didn’t have a problem with; I just tend to notice funny language errors like that. It was just a locker room. So I removed my clothes, and put on an ugly multicolored striped shirt and ugly multicolored striped sweatpants. These did not have any pockets, because there is no reason to carry anything, such as—you know—weapons? Why were these striped and ugly? Well, if anyone breaks out, they want them to be immediately identifiable by their attire. It would be crazy for someone to break out of intermittent jail, since you would only have to wait a day or two, but I suppose there might be extenuating circumstances, like a dying loved one, or some other emergency.

After I got my new clothes on, I tucked my regulars in an aluminum tub, along with my other personal objects. I then put that whole thing in a big locker, the combination to which is known to the officers, and not to me. The normal lockers inside the privacy room serve no purpose from what I can tell. They led me down a hallway where I continued the intake process, which involved another physical exam, as well as a psych evaluation. All of this stuff is mostly for the first time you go there, but they warned me that they will periodically make me go through it all again, so I should never try to rely on a consistent schedule. Once I was cleared for lockup, they gave me a quick tour. The facility is not complicated. The common area is a hexagon in the center, which includes a gym, the cafeteria, chairs, televisions, and a few recreational amenities, like a pool table. That’s where the phones are too. On the first side of the hexagon is the Intake Sector, where the entrance is, as well as all the stuff that I’ve been describing, plus I think some offices on the upper floors. The common area is only a few stories high but the other sectors go up fourteen stories. The actual cells are in the middle levels of that first sector. The other sides of the hexagon are dedicated to all of the other cells, which is where I’ll go at the end of this week.

My first two nights here weren’t too terribly bad, but again, we were all in the same boat. Everyone there was scared, nervous, anxious, or just unfamiliar. Once I get placed in gen pop, I’ll start running into people who know the ropes. There could be drugs in there, or fights; who knows? I can’t give you a full impression since I’ve had such a limited experience so far. They did lay out the rules for me, most of which are obvious, like don’t cause trouble, or try to escape, blah, blah, blah. There are some less obvious ones too, like when mealtimes are, and how often I’m allowed to use the phone. There are times when I have to be in my cell, and even times when I’m not allowed to be in my cell, even if I just want to go in there to be alone or sleep. These vary by the sector, and by my current privilege status, so they’ll inform me of those specifics later. They will continue to update me with my status as my behavior continues to be monitored and appraised. For the time being, it felt more like staying in a hotel in Iowa. As we all know and agree, Iowa sucks, so if you have to be there for whatever reason, there’s no other reason to leave your hotel room. It’s not like there could be something that you would like to see or do, so staying in the room is the only rational way to pass the time anyway. I’m sure that it will start to feel more like a prison the more I’m obligated to go back, so stay tuned for my shifting perspective.

Microstory 2120: Expect Me to Be Grateful

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My Rehabilitation Plan ended up being a lot longer than I thought it would be. I just kept thinking of more detail that I wanted to include, and one of my biggest weaknesses when it comes to writing is cutting out what I’ve already written. That’s why these posts are usually so short, if you can believe the irony. If I wrote everything that happened to me in a given day, then it would end up two or three pages long. The only way to produce it with only the relevant information is to make my cuts before I even start writing. I try to think about only what’s important, and ignore all the little things that readers won’t find interesting anyway. I guess I end up going overboard with this, since it’s not that hard to refrain from transcribing the unnecessary thoughts when I focus so much on just the important stuff. But, so you have an idea, my basic plan is to attend weekend jail for about the next five months until I’ve completed my thousand hours. I’m going to focus on finding and keeping a job on the weekdays, which means putting the community service off until I’m finished with jail. That will make the schedule much simpler, and less stressful. Plus, the therapy isn’t something that I can put off, because it’s crucial to my consistent progress, so I’ll be signing up for evening sessions, depending on what my work hours end up being. I don’t think that it will be that difficult to find something this time around. My readership is growing day by day, and people are already contacting me about open positions. Some are from people who are just aware that such jobs exist, but a few are actual employers with the power to fill those positions. It’s weird to see these messages. I’ve never been recruited before. In the past, companies would always expect me to be grateful just that they gave me the time of day. I don’t have time to look through them yet, so the job hunt starts first thing Monday. Until then, I’ll be in jail. In fact, my ride is waiting. See you on the other side.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: August 9, 2398

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Marie badges herself in, and heads for Ramses’ area of the lab, which is farthest from the elevator. His hair is mussed up, and the table is full of chemicals, some of which may be drinkable, placing the whole operation—and his life—in danger. He doesn’t even notice her approach. “Rambo.”

He’s startled, but he doesn’t make eye contact. “What?”

“You haven’t been sleeping.”

“I can sleep when it’s over, Angela.”

“I’m Marie.”

“I’ve heard it both ways.”

“Have you made any progress?”

He laughs at the very idea. He’s run so many tests on the Insulator of Life, and the Livewire, trying to figure out how to get Trina back, or at least confirm where she is. He hasn’t worked on anything else since the incident, and he’s no closer to solving the problem. Cheyenne is going to need the Insulator back pretty soon, so either she’s going to have to come to them, or he’ll have to find another way to the answers. “Nothing. I have absolutely no idea how either one of these things works. No moving parts, no obvious unusual properties. If I didn’t know any better, I would call it magic.”

“Maybe that’s what it is,” she offers.

He scoffs.

“Why not? When I first found out that time travel was a thing, I immediately started questioning everything I thought I knew about the physical world. Ghosts, sorcerers, even God; perhaps they were real. I’ve not seen any evidence of such things so far, but maybe these two objects are evidence of something.”

He shakes his head. “It doesn’t work like that. Time travel is crazy, but it’s not magic. Magic inherently doesn’t make any sense. It doesn’t have rules. If you need something done, there’s a way to do it, and any failure to accomplish it is based solely on your lack of imagination. Science has rules, whether we’re cognizant of all of them, or even any of them, or not.”

“Well, I’m not going to argue with you about it. I’m your elder, but you’re much smarter. I’m not here to convince you to stop trying, just to take a break.”

“I can’t do that. People are counting on me.”

“I’ve spoken with Bridgette and Cheyenne. They’re moving into the Lofts.”

Now he finally looks directly at her. “They are?”

“This floor is exclusive to travelers, which Cheyenne is. Angela is moving back in with Kivi, even though Kivi just moved out of Angela’s place.”

Ramses is happy for a moment before he realizes that this only solves one issue. “It doesn’t matter. The McIvers need me to find their sister. Yeah, it’s great that I can keep working with the Insulator, but I still can’t waste time sleeping. Trina needs me.”

“She needs you to be at the top of your game,” Marie corrects. “Sleepy Ramses is sloppy Ramses. Who knows, you might even come up with a new angle to tackle the problem when you let your brain rest a little.”

Ramses argues more, but Marie calls Leona to ask her to give him an order, so he reluctantly goes upstairs to sleep on it. She was right, a weird dream gives him an idea.

Microstory 1683: Death Introduced

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The battle was over, and the majority of the crew of The Crossover left Providenciaverse to get back to their mission of cataloging the bulkverse. Only 148 Maramon were left to settle on the planet, one of which was the original captain, who was mostly there out of a sense of obligation to them. Still, he did not complain. He continued to lead his people, so that they could thrive on their new world. His last order as captain was to erase all navigational data, so that no one else could return to this place. He didn’t want the leadership back on Ansutah to decide that the deserters needed to be punished in some way. If they ever, ever figured out where Providence was, then they would be able to arrive for extraction immediately. Hell, they could even come at some point earlier in the timeline if they wanted. So the settlers didn’t hold their breaths for long. After a week of no retaliation, they were confident that their location would forever remain a secret. They began to get to work, building infrastructure to make their lives easier, and forming a radical propagation plan to increase their numbers as quickly as possible. In ancient times on Ansutah, Maramon felt compelled to have many children. This powerful instinct had to be quelled once the people realized that their universe was not vast enough to accommodate infinite expansion. Such population control was no longer necessary—not here—and they had no intention of taking that for granted. Despite being left there with no advanced technology, the settlers developed fairly rapidly. However, their choice to stay was not without cost. They were born and bred to be immortal, but those rules did not apply in every universe. Here, they would age. Here, they would die.

It was a pretty hard thing to digest, the fact that a universe was capable of not only having different proper physics, but that it could somehow transform a lifeform on an organic level. Their ancient texts spoke of death in the early days of their homeworld, but for most of history, the idea was more academic. Only recently was it reintroduced to them in full force when they discovered the limited scope of their universe. Even then, they remained ageless, and really only died due to the resource wars. It broke their hearts to learn that this was just the way they would live from now on, just like the way humans evolved naturally. And if they were no better than humans, as they had been taught their entire lives, what other lies did they believe about life, the bulkverse, and everything? Fortunately, their new state of being did not cause them to resort to something irreversible, like war. Not long afterwards, the original settlers all died out anyway, leaving their descendants to move on without them, having never experienced the immortal lifestyles of their forebears. They continued to progress, just as any moderately peaceful civilization will, while always keeping the environment in mind. The settlers had dedicated themselves to not teaching their young ones too much about where they ultimately came from. If the species was going to survive, they would have to think that the way things were was the way things had always been. Some stories held on better than others, but overall, the society that formed over the centuries was normal. Some people were bad, some were good. They tried to do the right thing, and made mistakes. They explored the solar system, and sent probes and colonists to the nearest stars in the neighborhood. Their Maramon brethren never did come back, for any reason, but the Ochivari did come, and that’s when things got interesting.