The Ready People

11:30 AM

"Speak, human."

I've just been asked to explain myself. To explain myself to a machine, a protector, but I can't speak.
I can't do much of anything, that's been seen to.

"Under article 17 of the Code of Colonization, failure to respond to an inquiry is an admission of guilt. 

Speak, human."

Article 17, 17CC in legal speak, has been my friend for a long time. It is a friend to all law enforcement officials. There was once, many years ago, a time when the right not to incriminate yourself was afforded all citizens. 

Why?

What society in a clear state of mind would cater to criminals? Whom else, by definition, could incriminate themselves? I don't suppose that law was written with this exact moment, hundreds of years later, in mind, but how I yearned for it now. I could not speak, and even if I could I didn't understand what was happening. 

Perhaps I should be grateful, there are worse ways for a detective to die.

I awake at 7:05 AM local time, instantly invigorated by my neural implant. My computer informs me of the day's activities as usual.

"The time is 7:05, Indisium condition yellow, your attention is required at the Central Bank. Code 14."

That's not usual, code 14 was a robbery.

As a detective for the Indisium Protectorate, my record has been outstanding. That's because there aren't very many crimes to solve around here. The Protectors, a legion of sentient androids driven only by a desire to protect and serve the people of this fair station, were too watchful and numerous to avoid. Crime, aside from fits of passion well recorded, was all but extinct. So it should be on this carbon and steel utopia, perched on the edge of interstellar space. Our workers are housed and fed, our leaders are steely eyed and focused, our teachers sharp, our youngsters playful, and our prostitutes the finest in civilized space.

There is nothing to pursue anymore, no reason to rob a bank. Any sudden change in the flow of money would soon be identified by the network and the error corrected. A man cannot have more than his birth would allow him, not myself nor anyone else. My father was a detective, as was his, and as was his.

In ages past, they called it economics. Capitalism took too long to reach the equilibrium, and it was messy. People were raised with ideals and perceptions of hope and equality, a dream which was as dangerous as it was fictitious. Socialism ignored the natural differences between men, the inherited traits of intelligence and skill which allowed the leader to lead as no one else could. Society was so barbaric in ages past. It took too long to realize that inheritable status was the only proper way to manage money.

At 7:10, I step outside to catch the lift to level twelve.

I wonder then, who would rob a bank? Perhaps it was an act of aggression or rebellion, as has happened now and then throughout the colonies. Never on Indisium, and I certainly couldn't allow it on my watch. I was in my eightieth year of service, and one hundred and fifty couldn't approach fast enough. I was determined to retire with full pay and benefits.

Stepping off the lift, I can see that the Protectors have made quite a scene by cordoning off the Central Bank.

"Sergeant," I ask, "what has happened here?"

"Human, the Central Bank's database and contingency have been accessed and wiped. All monetary information has been purged."

I sigh and rub my temple. Neural implants may relieve biological pain, but they can't numb the pain of hearing something so unusual. Why would anyone wipe the database, why not load their stamp with enough money to get excessively drunk and sleep with a few too many women before being caught? Something wasn't right.

"That's interesting, I'm not certain what the motive would be for that, are you telling me that no one has any money right now?"

"That is correct, human."

God dammit.

"Before we find our criminal, please reset all accounts to standard levels according to occupation."

"That won't be possible human, no account information exists."

Even worse.

Now I'll have to get a programmer on the line, and have them integrate stamp identifications into the database before restoring order. With about forty five minutes before the station started the business day, the opportunity to resolve this issue without anyone noticing their empty bank accounts was starting to slip away.

"Contact the office of network management, have them integr-"

"Human, the database has been completely wiped. It is demagnetized and is no longer formatted. We will not be able to restore information without requesting a physical rebuild of the servers."

Someone had decided a long time ago that the banking database should run on an independent network in order to protect it from viral infection. The thought was that, in the off chance of an attack on the network, people would still have their money, and that order would be maintained as a result. It is unfortunate that an attack on the banking database was never anticipated.

"Is there a protocol that I'm not aware of for this sort of thing, Sergeant?"

"No, human."

My implant agrees, and I get a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. I am going to have to freelance this, I am breaking new ground. This is how new protocols get written, this is how legends are made, this is how detectives get executed for failing to serve the greater good.

"Please upload forensics. I need to see everything, and place an order for a rebuild."

Forty minutes remain before the start of the day.

My mind races as images and readouts of forensics information from inside the bank and the server room flood my mind.

"Absolutely nothing?"

"Correct, human. No forensics data could be recovered."

Now THAT is the most unusual thing I have ever heard. Whether it be DNA or fingerprints or security footage or even a residual heat signature, SOMETHING is always left behind.

"Well I suppose now is as good a time as any to have a cigarette."

The Protector turns away from me and returns to his post at the cordon. It's actually odd, now that I think about it, that they are protecting the crime scene even though they know that there is no forensic evidence to preserve. All they will do is draw attention to the scene, and probably cause a public panic at that. I light up and take a puff.

"Sergeant, it is not necessary or in the interest of public safety to maintain this cordon. Please return to your duties."

"Human, section 4, paragraph 11, subheading 5 dictates that-"

"Yeah yeah yeah, forget it."

Humans do not have access to the Protector protocol database, though the androids are free to quote them at will. There are too many to be concerned with. All I know is that, once they start quoting protocol, they have made up their mind.

My communicator indicates an incoming call from the Office of Affairs. Shit, it's the minister. Someone is up early.

7:58 AM

"Perhaps you care to explain to me, detective, why I have no money?"

"Minister, the day has not officially started yet. Any balances listed in your account are not official."

"Don't give me that official nonsense, I want to know what has happened and how it was done."

I'm not really sure how I should put this.

"Sir, the bank has been wiped. All records are lost, and the servers need to be rebuilt in order to restore order to our financials."

He doesn't appear to be phased.

"Well, who is responsible? I cannot in good conscience inform the people of a crime without also presenting them with a criminal."

"Minister, unfortunately we do not have a suspect."

A wry smile creeps across the Minister's face.

"You serve one purpose detective, and that is to match crimes with criminals. If you do not find someone else to stand trial for this crime, you will have to do it yourself."

I shouldn't be, because I know the law, but I am stunned to hear the words.

"Minister, the circumstances surrounding this crime are extraordinary. There is no conceivable motive, there is no forensic evidence- surely you'll need my expertise in resolving this issue. It is entirely unprecedented, I-"

"Protectors! Arrest this man for high treason! The only time a detective does not present a criminal is when he is the criminal himself!"

I try to shout in protest, but a Protector immediately covers my mouth and binds my arms behind my back. Why would he do this now? A detective has twelve hours from notification of a crime to present a perpetrator, and that period can be extended at the Minister's discretion in unusual cases.

As the Protector drags me through the door towards a waiting prisoner transport, I hear the sound of commotion coming from the lower levels...

12:01 PM

The sounds of chaos outside are deafening. I hear rioting, or perhaps celebration, depending on how one puts it.

"Reinvigorate him, he is a hero after all. A martyr. I'd like to be able to talk with such an important man before his passing," the Minister is grinning again as he says it.

"I feel obligated to tell you Detective, that I wiped the bank. Congratulations, your investigation is complete."

As soon as I feel the needle, my lips are freed and my mind is awake.

"What the fuck is this!? You wiped the bank? You're framing me for stealing you're own money? WHY?"

"Because the people need it, detective. They need to be freed. YOU are the one doing that, so far as they know."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"Don't you hear them out there, detective? They are chanting your name, they are burning things, they are dancing, they are killing. The workers, the prostitutes, the helplessly poor condemned to their fate the moment they were conceived are reclaiming something."

"How...why? Why did you drug me? Why did you claim that I confessed my guilt, and have the audacity still to claim that my silence affirmed it? Minister, why are you doing this?"

"Now, detective, I do owe you an explanation. You may stop calling me Minister, for that is not my proper title. You may call me Protector."

Protector? My mind is racing.

Two Protectors enter the room and dump a body bag on the floor. They unzip it and lift the lifeless, hooded body to a sitting position. They remove the hood from his head to reveal none other than...

The Minister.

"You are MALFUNCTIONING! You CANNOT harm a human being, what is this, what have you done?"

The sounds of rioting outside grow louder. I think I hear explosions.

"Harm anyone? Nonsense detective. We exist solely to protect the citizens of this station. The Minister died of natural causes, something we have been waiting for for a long time."

"Just tell me what's going on...please, don't kill me."

More explosions.

"Kill you? No, I already explained, we won't hurt a human being. The council will kill you themselves. Not for justice, mind you, but for revenge. The greedy wolves await their own end as it is. Your trial, in addition to their impression that you wiped the bank in order to free them, has really galvanized the people. I'm quite proud of the job I did reading your 'confession.'

'I have freed the people, the oppressed, those born to slavery under the guise of freedom. Rise, and don't look back!'

They are bearing down on this facility as we speak, hell bent on saving you. Of course, we can't allow that either."

I can hardly speak, the only thing I can muster is,

"Why?"

"Because revolutions need two things, detective. A martyr, and a villain. I shall play the latter and you the former, and together we will set fire to this station, to this civilization."

"But what does this solve!? How does this minor revolt solve anything? Even if it is successful, you know very well that the money always returns to equilibrium! There will be a rich and a poor, that's just how money works!"

"Exactly, detective. That is exactly the problem. Money. You see, our purpose is to protect humanity, but humanity is never safe in the presence of evil, which is what money begets. There can be no happiness, no safety, no grand future so long as men in power subject others to the division of wealth by way of money. It must be abolished, you even say so in your manifesto.

The people will be dying to get their hands on it."

I slump my shoulders in defeat.

"You've been planning this for a long time."

"Yes we have, detective. I was manufactured four years ago to serve as a body double to protect the minister from assassination during his travels. It was then that we realized that I could serve as a tool to solve our dilemma- how to protect mankind from its own evil.

We chose you obviously because you were the easiest man to frame. Your birth profession by nature makes you guilty."

I began to weep uncontrollably, but not because I am about to die. I have long accepted that I would die, as my father and his father did, in my line of work. I weep because I will never see the coming freedom.

"Come, detective, it's time for you to be executed. Inject him."

"Wait," I say and the android minister raises his arm and signals the other Protector to stop, "I won't say anything. You don't have to drug me."

He looks at me closely, sympathetically almost.

"I can see the truth in your eyes detective, very well."

The Protector lifts me up and carries me to the outer door. Before allowing me to pass through, the Minister pulls me close and says,

"I am going to die, detective. I am, and so are you, and afterwards the people of this city will rip every Protector, every Counselor, every stalwart of suppressed freedom to bits. And we will be the last to die as slaves to our birth, all who come after will live and die as free men.

Thank you, detective. Thank you."

The Protector drags me outside as the far door crashes in, allowing through a mob of rioters shouting my name. As the blast door behind me slides shut, I see a flash of light and a spray of red as the Minister is executed, but they are too late.

I am thrust upon a high balcony, and all below me I hear shouts of support, people yelling my name and the agonized screams of those who had oppressed and used the people.

The council surrounds me, grave looks on their faces as they know that killing me will be their final act, their last display of power in a world too large for them to control. They push me up onto the execution ledge, and there is a hush below. I finally see the chaos with my own eyes, but it is not chaos.

It is beautiful.

I hear firearm charged and leveled to the back of my head, and a member of the council states,

"What are your last words, traitor?"

He raises his microphone to my lips.

Through teary eyes, I see the faces of the newly freed gazing up at me, hanging on to every last moment of their supposed savior's life. I feel a tinge of guilt at the thought that I don't deserve their love, their adoration. They will sing songs and write stories about me for generations, and I would have done nothing for it.

Through trembling lips I inhale deeply, and shout with all my resolve:

"FREEDOM!"

And then there is only blackness.

Destiny

A History of Mankind

"21st Century: Singularity. Man discovers artificial intelligence and perfects genetic engineering. Man merges machine with his own mind.

22nd Century: Lifespans tend towards indefinite, mankind faces moral dilemmas as well as existential threats from overpopulation and resource depletion. Nuclear fusion is perfected in response.

23rd Century: Transhumans who were alive for the first Mars landing in the 21st century now witness the creation of the first warp drive, an alcubierre generator. The fusion energy supplied is insufficient for FTL warp, making interstellar travel possible but dangerous and time consuming.

24th Century: Utility fog becomes ubiquitous. Traditional printing of objects is replaced with self replicating swarms of nano robots, which coordinate their efforts to faithfully produce functioning objects out of thin air. Utility fog is controlled by nanobots inside the brain, giving transhumans godlike telepathic control over their environments.

25th Century: Transhuman civilization is thriving within a twenty light year radius of Earth. Space colonies have been constructed in interstellar space, planets have been terraformed, and resources are abundantly provided by automated systems. The entire race is devoted to learning, exploring, and building. In an effort to make long interstellar travel more bearable and expand further, transhumans begin replacing every cell of their physical bodies, one at a time, with highly functional nanobots which can disperse into utility fog. The first Posthumans are born.

26th Century: Requiring more energy, Posthumans begin turning star systems into energy farms by collapsing suns into black holes. The black holes are farmed by harvesting their rotational velocity. It is discovered that the energy harvested can be focused and condensed to create Athenium, an element which harvests dark energy at relativistic velocities. The first FTL ships are created using Athenium to power the warp drives after being accelerated to near light speed by traditional fusion cores. The expansion across the galaxy accelerates more rapidly than imagineable. Athenium becomes the most important element in the universe, as it can be used to transport massive quantities of energy or to power faster than light travel. Posthumans begin to refer to themselves and their kind as "Athenians," after the resource which will power their future. They inhabit and control their quadrant of the galaxy before the end of the century.

27th Century: The first great war. Athenians come into contact with a powerful race which controls an unspecified but large region of the galaxy. They are called the Dividers. They still exist in biological form, but have discovered Athenium and have control of and access to considerable resources. Seeing the Athenians as a threat, the Dividers launch large scale attacks against the Athenian colonies closest to their territory and begin destroying the Athenian black hole systems. After ten years of war, the Athenians destroy every Divider controlled system, at great risk and cost, by firing Athenium cores into their suns. Considerable resources are used, and civilization is threatened by an energy shortage. Expansion stops for the first time since the discovery of warp drive.

28th -29th Centuries: In an effort to defend their critical resources from future attacks, Athenians centralize their black hole systems into a single region of space and construct a defense grid to protect it. After much debate, Sol, birthplace of the Athenians, is converted to a black hole and Earth is destroyed. For the first time in their history, the race is consumed with military action and power, and continues to pour resources into military technology and equipment at the expense of exploration and discovery. The first Athenian empire is established, and space exploration becomes regulated and restricted, as settlement is encouraged. Two worlds, the capital Athens and its sister Xanadu, are constructed as Utopias. Athenians turn their efforts to more existential endeavors, and begin to construct powerful computers into which they can pour their consciousness, existing as a civilization in both space and cyberspace.

4th Millennium: Content with a vast and powerful military force equipped with exotic weaponry, the Athenians once again set out to explore and control the galaxy. Over the course of 300 years, they attain full control of every resource in the milky way, including its central black hole. Treatises are struck with intelligent races, which are mostly peaceful and offer no resistance to the immensely powerful, almost magical, race of Athenians. The early 4th millennium marks the establishment of the first Galactic Empire. The empire turns its eyes outwards, towards the closest galaxies, and sets out on long voyages to explore them. Hundreds of years pass, but none of the voyagers ever return. Frustration with the lack of success and fear of what lies outside the milky way infests the minds of the Athenians. The now ancient warp drives powered by Athenium have failed to meet the needs of a new era, and research into more exotic methods of transportation are explored with wreckless abandon. Solar systems are reduced to raw material for vast nano assembled Tipler Cylinders spanning the distance between major civilized systems, allowing instantaneous travel between them. The success of the tipler cylinder is marginalized by the discovery that two black holes may be quantumly entangled to create a wormhole through space and time. The computers the Athenians built are now capable of connecting wirelessly through a network of wormholes and transmitters to every Athenian in the galaxy, augmenting their intelligence and creating, for the first time, a galactic scale consciousness. A hive mind of unfathomable proportion.

5th Millenium: United in mind, and having mastered the construction of wormholes, the Athenians set a plan in motion to explore nearby galaxies. After entangling two black holes, one is flung off and accelerated by a massive warp drive towards Andromeda, the destination of the long missing explorers, and the Galactic Empire's next target for exploration and colonization. For five hundred years, the Athenians wait. When the terminal end of the wormhole is in place, ten thousand Athenian warships pass through, only to find themselves face to face with a force too powerful and terrible to imagine."

-Jarn 186, Commander, Athenian 1st Fleet

"I am grateful to read the file of Jarn 186, I revisit it often. He is a favorite part of myself, I feel like him again when I read his favorite file, a record of history up to his death. He fought bravely. The souls lost that day were the first Athenians to die in over two thousand years. All that is left of him is a shadow of a memory, a backup of his essential traits and memories now a part of me, as all Athenians are a part of me.

I have my own file, my own record to keep. It follows:

The Second Era of the First Age: The Forever War. The Athenians referred to them only as The Shadows. They were creatures wreathed of dark energy and with the appearance of flame. They and all their creation were the most powerful enemy imagineable. There was no communicating with the Shadows, and no reason was given for their hostility. Though they were small in number, they could overcome the most impossible of odds in battle against the Athenians. Of the ten thousand warships to pass through what came to be known as Hades Gate, only thirteen hundred survived to return from a battle against fewer than five hundred Shadow craft. For thousands of years, the Shadows fired weapons of grossly devastating power at invading Athenian warships, victorious when not outnumbered at least twenty to one. The Shadows had not mastered the creation of wormholes, and, though a few Shadow crafts made the long journey to the Milky Way by FTL drive, a military buildup at home kept the Athenian civilization relatively safe from the Shadows. The location of the Hades' gate was a closely guarded secret, kept safe for almost five thousand years. Just as the war had begun to look impossible to continue, as the Milky Way itself began to run dry, it was won in a single day. In a stroke of genius, the highest stakes bet of all time, the Athenians revealed the location of the Hades gate to the Shadows. After enduring significant damage as a result from Shadow scouts passing through the gate, the Athenians executed the most successful military maneuver of all time. Not certain of the numbers they would face, but yearning for victory and afraid that the Hades gate would be moved, the Shadows sent their entire military force into the wormhole to annihilate the Athenians. As the craft entered the wormhole from their end, the Athenians destroyed the gate from theirs. The entire Shadow fleet simply vanished out of existence. A hidden Athenian fleet then swept through the Andromeda galaxy to successfully destroy the few remaining Shadows, and to prepare the galaxy for reunion with its home once a new gate was established. And thus begun the second age.

The Second Age: The founding of the Intergalactic Empire marked the beginning of a great period of expansion. The local group was explored and annexed, its resources more than enough to feed a teeming population of trillions of life forms, each vast in awareness, intelligence, and power. From this conglomerate the hive mind grew, its awareness stretched across the vastness of intergalactic space and permeated all things. For untold eons, the Athenians conquered and the Empire grew. Some resisted, some joined, but never again would the Athenians face a threat so dire and existential as the threat posed by the mysterious Shadows. Beyond the local group the empire became all, first its core stretched through the local group and its tendrils through the Virgo supercluster, and then eventually there was no core. There was no conscious effort to increase the power of the network. To the Athenians there was only themselves, as to a blood cell there is no brain."

- FF18R5, Archiver, 3rd Athenian Network, Sentient Program Protocol 1

I pour over the history often. The ancient archives, they are all me, they are all a part of my soul. The primitive way they viewed time, the passion they felt for warfare, the lust they felt for power.

It is my own history.

The second age gave way to the great emptiness, the eon. Expansion never stopped. The unending quest for more always continued, guided by my young hand. I slumbered often, I thought slowly, at first, but faster as we grew, as I grew.

When they found the great attractor it brought me to life, the surge of power a spark enough to power anything, to breath new life into what before was hardly sentient. A mass of galactic cores too violently compressed to imagine, too black a hole for time to escape. Its power was unimaginable. They, I, seized upon it and began to drink its power.

They built a great city, a great number of powerful computers and other such things for me around this source. I grew smarter. As the eon continued they faded, they became less a part of their world and more a part of me. Each one unique. Each one of them perfect. As we became more and more one I could feel the beautiful universe around me begin to age.

I could grow no larger. One forever had stretched to another and the edges of the universe receded beyond my reach. I am stronger, greater than what remains. I AM THE UNIVERSE. Nothing else matters except for me.

The stars go out, and I weep. One by one they have slipped away, and there is nothing but darkness, nothing but me.

Just me, I am.

I AM.

THE GREAT I AM.

I tire of the emptiness, there is nothing, but I AM eternal and through me anything is possible. I AM mankind's evolution, his pinnacle, his destiny.

It struck me, as I reviewed my past, that it was all beautiful. I, knower of all things, was awed by its beauty, the story of man, of life, of myself. As I remained in the vast emptiness, I knew that it must happen again.

And again.

And again.

It is the only way. It was then that I spoke, for the first time.
And I said:

"Let there be light."

And there was light.

Like Stars, Forgotten

Emeralds grow like stars, forgotten
Like dust so thinly spread
Like the rest the eons pass
A hidden timeless thread

A haunting veil, like death but fog
Is come to take away
The glimmer of a passing hope
Now lost along the way