The Advancement of Mateo Matic: July 30, 2512

« < » > Table of Contents

Generated by Google Gemini Pro text-to-video AI software, powered by Veo 3

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 since yesterday, which was a year 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?”

“Okay!”

“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.”

« < » > Table of Contents

Extremus: Year 100

« < » > Table of Contents

Generated by Google Gemini Pro text-to-video AI software, powered by Veo 3

After months of investigating and compiling data, Tinaya and Lataran had to put the inquiry on hold for a bit while the latter gave birth. She named her daughter Sable, and obviously started to focus on her while Tinaya continued. It was months more before she realized that she trusted the wrong people, and a few months after that before anyone agreed to sit down with her to explain the situation.

They’re in this meeting now, in the former mirror room, of all places. This operation is clearly completely off the books, but it goes pretty high up the food chain. Tinaya still doesn’t understand why. A representative from the Bridger Section is here. She hasn’t ever met him, and doesn’t know what his role is. Also present are Doctors Cernak and Gunnarsson, proving that she was right to conscript a third party physician from Verdemus. The current Consul, Head of Security, and some woman that Tinaya doesn’t know either are all sitting opposite her, but still separate from the others. They’re apparently waiting for someone else, and being very quiet while they do.

Finally, Captain Jennings walks in. “Oceanus,” Tinaya exclaims, standing up. “You’re in on this too.”

“Whatever this is,” Oceanus replies, “decidedly no. I’ve been told something has been happening under my nose, and it has to do with you and Lataran, but I do not yet know what it is. Explain, Darling.”

Consul Darling clears his throat. “It’s not my place. I was only recently made aware of the project when it became clear that Admiral Leithe was getting close to figuring it out on her own.”

“It’s not a project if no one knows about it,” Tinaya argues. “It would be an operation. But I just call it a conspiracy.”

No one responds.

“Who is in charge here?” Oceanus demands to know.

The Bridger stands. “Please have a seat, Captain.”

Still seething, Oceanus sits down next to Tinaya. They take each other’s hands. They’ve grown close over the course of the last year, having spoken nearly every day as he’s gotten better at seeking her counsel. She didn’t read him in on her side mission because she didn’t want him to be distracted from running the ship.

The Bridger makes one step away from his seat. “As you all know, Bridgers have access to future knowledge. We use this knowledge to guide Extremus on its mission, protecting its mandate at all costs.”

“No,” Tinaya interrupts.

“No...what?” the Bridger asks.

“No, your job is not to protect the mission at all costs, but to a reasonable and ethical degree. Your predecessors understood that. Why don’t you?”

“I misspoke,” the Bridger claims.

“I don’t believe you. You’ve been violating people’s bodies on a repeated basis. I don’t care what reason you think you had for this, it’s wrong.”

“You might not agree once you hear those reasons,” the Bridger claims.

“Well, get on with it, then,” Oceanus spits.

The Bridger sighs. He kind of looks like he wants to sit back down, but he has the floor. “As I was saying, we are aware of future events. Sometimes we can change them, sometimes we can’t, and sometimes we shouldn’t. This particular issue is hopefully the former, but we’re still not sure. It’s unclear how successful we’re being, if at all. We still don’t understand what the source of the problem is, but the problem itself is totally unambiguous. We have a population decline issue.”

“What?” Tinaya asks. “Population growth is a matter of public record. Our numbers have been rising.”

“You’re right, they have,” the Bridger agrees, “but not at a fast enough rate. One day soon, this number will plateau, and then it will start going back down. Trust me, I’ve already seen it play out.”

“So you rape women?” Tinaya questions. That’s a serious accusation.

Dr. Cernak shoots out of his chair like it’s on fire. “That is not what we’re doing! Don’t you ever frame it that way!”

“Doctor. Please,” the Bridger requests.

“Ah, so it’s a framing issue,” Tinaya sees. “You’re not denying breaking the Synthetic Age Oath of Ethical Medical Practice. You just don’t want me to talk about it. I get it.”

“No, you don’t get it,” Cernak insists. “We don’t even take the full SAOEMP in its original form. We have to take a modified version of it since we don’t accept certain forms of lifesaving procedures, like healing nanites or consciousness transference.”

“Don’t you?” Tinaya questions. She leaves it at that, because Consul Darling may not know about The Question, and the Head of Security almost certainly doesn’t.

Dr. Cernak huffs. “We didn’t impregnate anyone. We simply gave them the option to procreate by hastening the degradation of the silencing enzyme.”

“Without our consent, nor our knowledge!” Tinaya shouts.

“Admiral Leithe,” Consul Darling scolds.

“No, I’m not going to calm down. You think what you did is okay because of some future problem that almost no one knows about? I don’t care which ethical oath you took, it’s either not enough, or you broke it! This is unacceptable. It is a violation of our rights to identity and self-determination. That’s why we switched from the Hippocratic Oath in the first place, because it was woefully insufficient for the needs of a population in a world where death is more of a question than an inevitability. Yeah, Cernak, I actually do understand that you take a variant of the standard ethical oath, but that involves more restrictions on care, not less. Consent is everything, and you should have known that. I swear to God, you two, despite my lack of power as an admiral, I will see to it that you are both dismissed, delicensed, and sent to hock.”

“You don’t have that power,” Consul Darling states the obvious. “Not even the Captain can do that much.”

“I can.” It’s the mysterious woman who has been sitting quietly until now. Everyone seems scared of her, even the Bridger. She stands and stares at him to strongly suggest that he sit back down. “My name is Tiere Victorian, and I serve as the Superintendent of the Bridger Section. My power lies in personnel decisions, rather than policy, just like Superintendent Grieves. I am the sole voice who decides when and if it is necessary to replace an executive crewmember of the Extremus with a Bridger alternate. So I was not made aware of this operation before, because it was not required to do my job. But I have the authority to dismiss or discipline anyone on either ship for any reason with impunity for myself. I could fire you, Dr. Cernak, because I don’t like which side your hair is parted on. I suggest you start being less defensive, and more contrite.”

He shrinks.

Tiere goes on, “I have reviewed the data that my colleagues have made available to me regarding the population crisis, and again, I do not have the power to end the program, but I can make one vital change that will most likely end it anyway.”

They’re on the edge of their seats.

“I can place Admiral Leithe in charge of it,” she finishes. Yeah, that’ll do it.

Tinaya can’t help but smirk. She’s going to shut this down, effective immediately, and come clean—if not to the whole ship, then at least to all aggrieved parties. “I’m going to need everything on this. I wanna know who came up with it, who else was involved, and who was aware of it. I need to know who on this ship was impacted by it, either directly or indirectly. I need names and details, as well as any ancillary records, messages, and notes.”

Dr. Cernak stands now. “I’m not giving you jack or shit unless I’m guaranteed to hold my position as Chief Medical Officer until such time that I retire.”

There’s a quick silence. “I’ll get you what you need,” the Bridger says to Tinaya. She still doesn’t know his name. That’s probably by design.

“You don’t have the medical files,” Cernak reminds him. “Those are confidential.”

“Doctor,” Tinaya begins, “when one crewmember leaves their post, and that job is backfilled by another, what happens to the data that they collected during their shift? Do you think they take it to the grave?” It’s a rhetorical question, but she pauses a moment anyway. “When you’re officially let go, you’ll lose all access, and your replacement will gain it. We don’t need you anymore.” She looks over at the Head of Security. “What did you know of this program?”

“Dasher Bruin, sir. Head of Security, Year Ninety-Six to Year One-Oh-Three, sir. I was read into the situation on day one of my shift, sir, and was told to not ask questions, sir. I did my job, protecting the interests of the ship at the behest of my superiors, sir.”

“I am your superior,” Tinaya tells him.

“Yes, sir,” he agrees.

“Escort Misters Cernak and Gunnarsson to a holding cell in hock, please.”

What little light was left in these former doctors’ eyes now fades. She does not have the power to strip them of their medical licenses, but she’ll make sure it happens. However long that takes, they’ve each seen their last patient.

“Yes, sir.” Dasher lifts his watch to his mouth, and whispers, likely for a security team to come assistant him in his task. He takes two packs of dynamic EM tethers out of his pocket, and tries to fit Cernak and Gunnarsson with them. They can hold their wrists between fifteen and twenty-five centimeters apart, but if they try to pull them beyond that range, the attractive magnets will activate, and if the try to push them too close, they will switch to a repulsive force. They come in specific pairs, but Dasher accidentally mixes them up, which leaves the prisoners tethered to each other. They look like lovers, their four hands hanging together like that. “Oh my God, sorry.”

“Officer Bruin, are you nervous?” Tinaya asks.

“I just don’t know if...if this is it for me. Should I put a couple of these on myself too?” Dasher asks.

Tinaya considers it. She makes a decision quickly. “You’ll be turned over to a new Head when one can be found and appointed. You’ll face no criminal charges, though. You can tell people that you wanted to spend time with your family, or start a family. I can’t say the same for everyone else.” She looks around at the people in the room.

Dasher is clearly relieved. He deftly swaps the cuffs out so they’re back in their right pairs, and starts to leave. The cuffs also have a feature where the detainee can’t stray more than four meters from their escort, or can’t get closer than two meters. So they start being dragged behind him. “I think I’ll see if I can’t start a family,” Dasher says as he’s exiting. “If the ship needs more kids, I’ll give it more kids.”

Dasher is not alone in his line of thinking. As it turns out, honesty is the best policy. Tinaya’s new temporary job as Head of Population Sustainability not only involves ending the unethical program, but finding a suitable replacement. She’s still an admiral, but she has all these other responsibilities too. Shutting down the program isn’t as easy as flipping a switch. Thousands of aging women were injected with the intentionally defective silencing enzymes, and all of them need medical appointments to correct that. But before that can happen, new professionals need to be hired to actually perform these procedures, and that’s complicated, because Cernak and Gunnarsson were certainly not the only ones on the medical team who were a part of the conspiracy. To fill the ranks, a few doctors and nurses are recruited straight out of medical school for positions that were just a tad bit above their qualifications. As a precautionary measure, they will always have oversight, and their teachers expressed confidence in their abilities to perform admirably, and more importantly than ever, ethically.

As the proverbial swamp is drained, and replacements are selected, murmurs of what’s going on begin to echo throughout the ship. Some learn the truth outright, at least from the perspective of those who had to be told something ahead of the shipwide announcement. Others just notice that the crew shift changes are out of sync with the schedule, and very fishy. There’s a lot of confusion, though, and things need to be cleared up. Once all the prep work is done, Tinaya stands on stage, and makes her broadcast speech. She reveals the truth to everyone, in disgusting and uncomfortable detail. She explains that she herself was the victim of this morally bankrupt operation, as was Admiral Keen. The reaction is angry and visceral, and not at all unexpected. People are pissed about being lied to, and about the deep breach of ethics that these people committed.

There’s no violence, though, and once the fury subsides, the outcome starts to emerge. Dasher fathers three children with three different women within one year, with plans to conceive even more in the future, though he will hopefully slow down as there is a limit to how many younglings that a parent can responsibly raise at the same time. Others end up feeling the same sentiment, and begin to conceive more children than they were apparently planning. It’s not this big, advertised movement. People are just independently inspired to aid the cause. Tinaya doesn’t have insight into any changes they might be having on the future. Tiere is executing her own disciplinary action in house, and isn’t being any more transparent than the Bridgers have ever been. But it seems to be working. They have to hire more medical staff than ever to care for the baby boomers. For a hot minute, everything seems okay. Then they encounter at least one unfavorable consequence. Twenty-year-old Waldemar is just as inspired to support the population growth efforts as so many others. He ends up getting a now fifteen-year-old Audrey pregnant, and it is not immediately evident if it was consensual or not.

« < » > Table of Contents

Microstory 2470: The Empyreamax

< > Table of Contents

Generated by Google Flow text-to-video AI software, powered by Veo 3

Before virtual reality and volumetric immersion holograms, people used to watch media on 2-dimensional screens. I won’t get into the whole history of film—you can look it up your damn self—but suffice it to say that they were extremely tiny compared to what we have here. This is the Empyreamax. It is the largest film auditorium by orders of magnitude. You would have to project a movie on the moon to be larger than this. Towering 22.2 kilometers over the surface, this image covers an area of roughly 5,030 square kilometers. You can see it from anywhere, though of course, the center has the best seats in the “house”. Or should I say they have the best beds? Since you’re looking straight up, regular recliners just won’t do. You can adjust it to your liking, but they lay down completely flat, and let you look straight up at the movie. Obviously, they’re quite comfortable, with the standard firmness adjustments, heating, cooling, and vibrating features. If you’re an organic who still needs to eat, each bed comes with an interface that allows you to order concessions. If you’re not in one of the designated viewing loungers, you can request a mobile interface, and they’ll deliver to you wherever. There’s a Castlebourne-specific three-word address for wherever you happen to be. Actually, one little problem I noticed is that you can input any valid Castlebourne address, and they’ll try to get there, even if it’s on the other side of the planet in a different dome, so I hope they fix that dumb little bug. You can bring your own bed, or sprawl out on a blanket. There are several swimming pools and lakes that you can float on while you’re watching. One couple came in with an autotrampoline. They lay on their backs, and let the motor bounce them as they were watching. It sounds distracting to me, but who am I to judge? As far as sound goes, the options are limitless too. You can connect with your conductive implants, or your internal speakers, or your external headphones. They have ground speakers and pedestal speakers as well, but those are only allowed in certain areas. And that’s because some areas allow for regular conversation, and some are quiet zones. They provide you with an interactive map, so you can find out where you wanna be. While the ground is pretty flat here, they also have some hiking trails, so you can kind of keep an eye on the film while you’re walking with your honey, so that’s just a little thing that I’m not sure people would ever want, but it might as well be there. It’s not like we’re short on space. Again just about everything is up to you. They have a movie playing all the time on the big screen, but it’s not the only one going. They also have smaller screens lining nearly the entire perimeter. Each one is about 100 meters wide, and 40 meters tall, with a capacity of around 750 people. There are 1,699 of these, allowing for 1700 simultaneous shows in total. I’m not sure how many people could be here at any one time, for the big movie, or all of them combined, but I’m guessing it’s a pretty high number, even though we’re not vertical, on top of each other, like other domes. I know it’s old media, but there are some really great gems here. I saw one the other day called The Mystic, and it was basically the best movie musical I had ever watched. Even if you’re not interested in what’s playing, you can request a time slot for a specific title, and use one of the smaller Ultramaxes. One thing I’m not sure is right or not is that you can’t request a private auditorium. You can choose a movie, if there’s space available, but once it gets into the system, anyone can RSVP for a seat, so just bear that in mind.

Microstory 2469: Gambledome

< > Table of Contents

Generated by Google Flow text-to-video AI software, powered by Veo 3

Here’s the thing about gambling in a post-scarcity society...it’s not any fun! When money isn’t real, the stakes aren’t real, and there’s nothing interesting about it. The creators of Gambledome have managed to subvert this about as well as possible without completely shifting the paradigm of the economy. In Gambledome, money kind of is real, but only here. You start out with a modest amount of cash to spend on chips, and as you play, you win and lose those chips. If your stack starts piling up, you can cash them out, and spend it on things. You can get yourself a nice, luxurious room to stay in. You can spring for the (faux) lobster at dinner. You can give it away to your friends to make them like you. This is how it worked in other gambling communities on Earth back in the before-fore times, like Las Vegas. Here, it’s a recreation, which may make you think that your life can only get better, but that’s not true. If you run into the negative, you’re in trouble. You can’t leave the dome, and go back to the utopia that vonearthans have created since automation made fiat-based economies obsolete. You have to stick around, and pay off your debts. That’s right, there are real consequences. Some of the humans walking around as staff may be there because that is the experience that they have asked to be assigned while staying in the dome, but some are there because they have to be. Don’t come here if you don’t genuinely want to pretend to be an ancient human, because that’s the thing about gambling. You don’t know if you’re gonna win, and people lose all the time. A note on cheating: while they won’t torture you, it can land you in jail, where you’ll pay off your social debt by being locked up in a cell, unable to leave. We still have jails in the 27th century, of course, but the percentage of incarcerated individuals has never been lower, so this is rare. One woman lost her money on purpose, threw a tantrum, and tried to steal it all back, specifically so they would throw her in a cell, because it just doesn’t happen all that often anymore, and she certainly didn’t want to break any real laws. She didn’t want to go through the real justice system, and go to a real jail, where she might never get out. Overall, this place is a lot of fun, but only temporarily. I wouldn’t want to spend the rest of my life here, and I certainly wouldn’t want to live in a world where people are sincerely desperate enough to gamble because they think they have no other choice. I don’t know if Gambledome is fostering any real addicts, but I sure would be interested to know if it’s happening, and if it is, whether the creators have any plans to do anything about it.

Microstory 2468: Internal Security Dome

< > Table of Contents

Generated by Google Flow text-to-video AI software, powered by Veo 3

I can’t say too much about this dome. It wouldn’t be secure. But I can assure you that security personnel have ears and eyes everywhere while still managing to protect your privacy. Internal institutional domes like this one don’t typically have a review section for obvious reasons, but my boss asked me to write something up after my audit in order to maintain at least some connection to the public. I don’t work in ISD, but in Castledome. An unattached intelligence will periodically be sent to any given dome at any given time to assess productivity and general soundness of the facilities in question. Of course, each dome handles its own internal audits, but it’s always good to have a second opinion. It’s not that we don’t trust our various branches and divisions. We’re not trying to catch them in any mistakes, but you know, things break down, and procedures start to drift. Or they can, rather. The system overall on this planet is quite robust, full of non-wasteful redundancies, and resource-efficient protocols. The security is good. I only suggested minor improvements, but that is to be expected. There are more people on this planet today than there were yesterday, and there will be more tomorrow. The number of people who visit far outweigh the number of people who leave. We have a very low turnover rate in general, and that makes security an ever-changing beast. It is not easy to keep up with it, but our security team manages to do it with flying colors. I kind of wish that I could keep auditing it myself, but as I’ve explained, that would defeat the purpose of it being impartial, and having fresh eyes. It’s the only one that gets these evaluations on a very strict basis, but now I have to move on to something else, and let one of my colleagues handle the next one here. I’m sure they’ll pass the test just as well next time. I have full faith in these intelligences.

Microstory 2467: Tagdome

< > Table of Contents

Generated by Google Gemini Pro text-to-video AI software, powered by Veo 3

This is a funny one. It’s several giant games of tag, each one made up of a lot of other subdivisions of tag. You can come in here with just about any substrate you want, but you’ll be grouped according to strength and speed. We can’t have superstrong mechs barreling through normal organics, now can we? There aren’t too many of what they generally call weight classes, but you stay in your respective sectors, and don’t interact with the others. But you do interact with everyone else in your sector. That sector is further divided into regions, zones, districts, territories, and neighborhoods. I honestly couldn’t tell you how they decide where you’re assigned beyond the weight class for fairness. But whatever it is, the divisions are based upon the modern standardized Dunbar grouping system. Your neighborhood will have 21 people total, which is a fairly normal and manageable number of contestants to contend with. You will ultimately compete with other neighborhoods. Seven neighborhoods makes a territory of 147 people. There are three territories in a district of 441 people, then four districts in each zone of 1,764, and four zones in each region of 7,056 players. Finally, there are seven regions in the whole sector. Sorry if that was confusing, but this game is confusing, by its nature. The best players are the ones who can figure it out. How about gameplay? You play a simple game of tag in your neighborhood for some period of time, based on your sector’s weight class. Higher classes theoretically have more stamina, and can go for longer. Don’t worry about those. Only consider your own. We’ll use the example of a normal organic human sector, which is only expected to play for half an hour. As you play against each other, your points start racking up. The longer you avoid becoming a Pursuer, the more points you end up with, and the longer you are the Pursuer, the more points you lose. At the end of your neighborhood’s allotted time, your points will be tallied up. It’s entirely possible that the entire game only ever had one Pursuer who never managed to catch anybody. That’s okay. They’re always watching you. Some people got closer to being caught than others. There will be leaders on the leaderboard, who will move on to compete at the territory level. The top seven will represent their neighborhood in a game of 49 players and begin to run as a team. Things start getting more complicated here as you can work together to build enough points to open gates to other territories. If you invade them, you can get in on their game as an opposing force, and start taking away their points while making some more of your own. The games get progressively more complicated, with more intricate environments, obstacles, and even vehicles like bikes and cars. Everyone wears special clothing, which color-coordinates the teams and alliances in realtime, but it’s not uncommon to get lost and confused. That’s part of the game, and your intelligence is factored into those weight classes I was telling you about. I know this was less of a review, and more of an overview, but I don’t really want to give you my opinion. I want you to see it for yourself. If you’re not much of a runner, or you don’t feel ready for the competition, there is a spectator component, so you can just check it out to get a better sense of what I’ve been talking about.

Microstory 2466: Grand Central Sewage

< > Table of Contents

Generated by Google Flow text-to-video AI software, powered by Veo 3

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.

The Advancement of Mateo Matic: July 29, 2511

« < » > Table of Contents

Generated by Google Gemini Pro text-to-video AI software, powered by Veo 3

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.”

« < » > Table of Contents