Dadr'Ba (31 page)

Chn’Gi entered the chapel late at night; she was troubled and desperate. What she was doing could result in forced retirement, she could be terminated, or just disappear, like so many others, to be declared never to have existed.

She knew of one person that she had personally known to have disappeared. A young person, younger than herself, a friend, single. He was living on his own. He just disappeared, his apartment turned up empty, entirely vacant. An available for occupancy, notice suddenly appeared, that had supposedly been posted for weeks.

All evidence that he ever existed was gone, photos and documents that had been stored in online storage disappeared. As well as, all government records. No one within the CA acknowledged he ever existed, and offline photos and documents were declared fakes.

Family and friends investigating were accused of psychiatric illness. The CA’ response, was “That person, doesn’t exist.” Followed by a not-so-subtle hint, “I recommend you don’t pursue this fantasy. It shows possible instability and may result in your psychiatric evaluation and treatment”.

Alternatively, they were accused of contriving a prank, which prompted the CA response of “Stop wasting our time and attempting to file false complaints. This wastes CA resources and is A’Pa
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Chn’Gi had even heard of family members living together in an apartment who have disappeared. The family member’s bedroom door would just vanish, replaced with a seamless wall. Any contact with the CA, met with, the same as before, “That person, doesn’t exist” along with the same threats of psychiatric treatment, retraining or arrest. Most people painfully leave it at that and quietly mourn.

Those that don’t, actually do get psychic evaluation and treatment. When they return, they’ve lost all joy of life, barely recognize their family or friends, and perform the functions of life robotically, having lost the spark, the joy of life.

Psychiatric treatment mostly happens to U’Te’s, due to sheer numbers and the jobs involved. U’Te’s can undergo psychiatric treatment without significant impact to maintaining their work quotas. The times it’s been done among the Mi’Nr’s, the victims of the treatment have met with “accidents” after their return in the mines.

The mines are a dangerous place; it doesn’t take much impairment to turn a worker into a danger to themselves or their co-workers. The loss of a fully qualified Mi’Nr takes away a valuable resource that takes fifty to seventy-five years or longer to replace.

Most Mi’Nr’s that are condemned to psychiatric treatment, instead go into isolation at a forced labor cell. After fifty or a hundred years of forced isolation, made to perform tedious, hazardous or robotic tasks for extended periods of time, without contact with family and friends, come back changed. Not the vacant shells that are the fate of the treated U’Te’s, They’re altered, changed, they know what being forcibly retired is like. They have had much of their adult life taken away, bleeped out of existence and live a half-life, a part of their lives is a void, not unlike those that have had a loved one disappear.

Chn’Gi felt terribly alone; she had started having nightmares, terrible dreams. Foggy and out of focus, her dreams are of O’M, polluted with industrial waste, the atmosphere corrosive, the waters and oceans poisoned and diseased, and every major city devastated.

In her dreams of O’M, death abounds, so much death. Billions lay un-retired in the devastation that had once been cities, littered across countryside’s and along shorelines. Millions float bloated, mixed among the debris of massive destruction carried to sea by some gigantic apocalypse.

Images that she saw of Or’Gn in the histories she was reading, she saw applied to O’M, but magnified manifold.

She dreamed too of Dadr’Ba, dead, broken, dirty, strewn with debris and most troubling, littered with bodies.

She thought of P’Ko, and Lu’Gs, she wants to trust them, but what if they are discovered and forced to tell, she could be found. She should warn them against reading this knowledge, but it might be too late.

She knows she’s monitored; is she being followed? What do the people watching her know? She looked around and saw a few people nearby, was one or more of them following her? Are P’Ko and Lu’Gs suffering her same fate? She closed her eyes and practiced slow breathing, calming herself not very efficiently, wishing she had drunk just a little more liquor, just to calm herself down, reprimanding herself for being paranoid, is she going insane?

She shook herself back to the present, and reached into her pocket and felt the note she created during her last reading under the strange glow of the reading lamp Lu’Gs gave her and remembered his instructions always to use it whenever she studied the histories contained in the reader. Was it the lamp? Could it be doing something to her mind, it had become her habit to take long baths away from the surveillance cameras alone in her bathroom with only by the reading lamp for company.

She made it a point not to even look at the note she made after its creation. Palming the note and passing it to the usher, who shows just a hint of surprise, recovers quickly and welcomes her into the Church, directing her to a seat in one of the pews near the back. There were no services in progress, other worshipers were there, and others arrived, some appeared to be already praying, others meditating, some repeating a mantra, song like, not unpleasant, providing a tranquil aura.

At the front of the Church on one side was a podium, the other side stood several rows of seats for the choir. Behind the podium and the choir, a broad arch that reached up to the top of the building and near the apex, a bright star that lit the podium and choir area. It was strangely pleasant to look at, despite its intense light. It illuminated the podium and choir area in a bright halo.

Along the back against a black backdrop, were racks upon which sat rows of small translucent bowls, some containing a light, small and bright. The unlit bowls, almost disappearing into the dark background.

At the near end of the racks, closest to the door, sat a credit reader for donations and a dispenser for the light tabs. A simple gesture authorizes a debit of your choice buying you a small tab that ignites when placed in one of the clear bowls. The tab reacting with a catalyst in the bottom of the clear bowl becomes a small bright pinpoint of light; the symbol of the Church and the Touch of God.

Chn’Gi wanted to purchase a light, but had trouble moving, trouble translating what she wanted to do in her mind into action.

The peace and serenity of this place were in such sharp contrast to her visions that she found herself blinking and with each blink seeing flashes of Dadr’Ba, this place, devastated. She saw flashes of O’M devastated, strange dead faces sprawled before her eyes, flashed before her eyes, fueled by the forbidden knowledge she was harboring. She became dizzy and started to have trouble breathing. She felt flushed; her hands were shaking, and her spine and legs lost all energy, and she slumped to the floor between the pews.

Chn’Gi was engulfed in a miasma; she could make out people speaking words of encouragement. In the fog, she became aware that the usher and some other person helped move Chn’Gi quickly along the side of the Church through a door behind the podium into a hallway, then into an office. She was laid on a couch with her legs raised, someone offering her something to drink, then a brief examination, she was asked questions but didn’t know if she even answered, then followed an injection, it was all very dreamy, she closed her eyes.

When she opened her eyes again, everything seemed different; she couldn’t tell how much time had passed. She couldn’t afford to raise the attention of the CASS following her and tried to get up mouthing “how long?” but was interrupted. “It hasn’t been long” and someone helped her sit up, it must have been the other person that had appeared with the usher; the usher was gone. The room’s lighting had a strange tint to it. She recognized it as the same as the light given off by her reading lamp.

A woman’s voice said, “it’s safe to speak, Chn’Gi.” Chn’Gi forced out, not caring anymore about the consequences, needing to get the poison out of her mind and share her pain, desperate for help “I know, I mean, I’ve learned, about Or’Gn.” The woman, “How? Where did you get it?” Chn’Gi, “An old reader, and backups from before the Touch.”

The woman gave Chn’Gi something more to drink, saying that she had become dehydrated and hadn’t been eating properly. The drink will help make her feel better and clear her mind.

As Chn’Gi’s mind cleared, the woman told her that what she had done was very dangerous, but that she had made it to the right place to get help. Adding, that she could have died.

Whether it was the drink or the peaceful, safe and secure place she was in or the injection.

Chn’Gi began to feel better. Not knowing if it was the drink, it was cool going down and soothing to her stomach, or the woman’s calm, confident, comforting words.

The woman identified herself as Gi’Ya. She explained to help properly; she must know more about what forbidden knowledge she was exposed to and if anyone else was exposed. Gi’Ya reminded Chn’Gi that “we’re not the CA, and the CASS has no power in our spaces, though they try.” “We must act quickly, though, if you are here too long. It will raise their suspicions; they’ll send someone to check up on you.”

Chn’Gi thankful to Gi’Ya for saving her life and feeling that a great weight was lifted off her shoulders, confessed all the forbidden knowledge she discovered. She talked “around” P’Ko’s and Lu’Gs’s involvement, not naming their names, but realized later that she gave enough info about them that the Church wouldn’t have any difficulty figuring out who they were. But she trusted Gi’Ya and knew that the Church was at odds with the CA and especially the CASS, and hoped that Lu’Gs and P’Ko would be safe.

Not much time was spent on explaining the content of the forbidden knowledge; Gi’Ya seemed to know already and didn’t ask any questions. She just let Chn’Gi perform her data dump.

Gi’Ya showed little outward emotion when Chn’Gi reported her discovery of IL on O’M and her reports to the Central Council. But by this time, Chn’Gi was feeling much better and starting to get her wits back. She detected hesitation in the woman’s questions and responses and guessed that Chn’Gi’s latest revelation was probably new information. She began to cut short her answers.

Gi’Ya with a sudden sense of urgency told Chn’Gi that she was going to be alright for tonight. The injection she was given will calm her, and it will last through tomorrow, adding that she should go to Mi’Ka’s in Ol’Tn tomorrow, and get some tea. Mi’Ka will know what is needed and have it ready for her, and she should follow Mi’Ka’s instructions.

Gi’Ya told Chn’Gi that the CASS has been dispatched to check on her, and she needs to go back out to the chapel and kneel and pray or at least pretend to pray before the CASS operatives arrive. Gi’Ya cautioned Chn’Gi to avoid liquor and not to read any more from the reader, but to “continue to use the reading lamp for privacy and come back immediately anytime, day or night, if you feel another attack coming on or whenever she feels the need.” Adding “This is a peaceful calming place, even if you’re feeling better come back in a week, or sooner if you feel the need, enjoy the peacefulness here and we’ll talk more. Try not to worry; we’ll help you.”

P’Ko listened to the girl’s voice singing through his TaC-B, she was accompanied by a band and had a steady beat. It was a Mi’Nr’s song, made for working. It was the perfect accompaniment for performing routine cleaning and servicing of the bore head. None of the cutting disks had been identified as needing replacement, which would have made it at least a two-person job, so he was working alone. He had done this many times since the start of his apprenticeship and was trusted to accomplish the task alone. This work was considered routine, and all the critical components of the T’Bm and his work will be inspected before the start of the next day’s bore.

P’Ko reflected on all that has happened since the beginning of his apprenticeship, the Run with the Se’Ro’Bs, Tn’Ya’s mentoring, and P’Ko’s father assigned a new job. P’Ko knew little about his Ba’s new job, only that it was supposed to be a promotion. Then after he accepted discovered that it’s in a secure area, tightly controlled by the CASS, he’s forbidden to say anything about it.

The junkyard where P’Ko used to work was placed under CA control. Lu’Gs is making the best of it, is still there but was shuffled into a liaison position, saved from a total job reassignment by his in depth knowledge of the junkyard.

P’Ko put the bore head cleaning and servicing on autopilot as he frequently did with repetitive tasks and waxed philosophically. P’Ko thought how much of a double standard it is, the CA strictly forbids philosophy, but both the CA and the Church use philosophical arguments to bolster their positions.

It doesn’t seem fair; the CA asserts that it’s the CA’s (and the Church’s) right to decide on philosophical matters such as destiny and right and wrong. Individuals, on the other hand, are forbidden to raise a counter argument or self-derived philosophical concept. The people are expected to accept the tenants and dogma provided to them without question and never to contradict authority.

P’Ko knows that the CA and the Church can’t stop people from thinking, the people that get into trouble are the ones that come out and begin debates or proselytize their views, views the CA, and the Church might have trouble defending against.

The Church is relatively immune from philosophical attack; it simply falls back on faith. A religious concept once accepted as an article of faith is impossible to argue against or logically defeat. How can you argue against something that doesn’t exist in the physical world and is backed by doctrine?

The psychic ability that all the people of Dadr’Ba are conceived and born with is molded and reinforced during the ToG Ceremony, which serves as the basis of its religion. The workings of it remain an unexplained mystery and provides a solid platform for the Church, where science fails faith prevails.

The Church and the CA work together, though they wouldn’t openly admit it.

The Church cares about the people, their feelings, and emotions, their hopes, and cares. Its role is to supply a peaceable stable, productive and reproductive workforce for the CA.

The CA’s role is the running of the ship, and its multitude of interacting pieces, parts, mechanisms, structure, and infrastructure, guiding it to O’M. The CA, unlike the Church, abuses its authority by many orders of magnitude. Using its role as the governing command and control of the ship as its power base, the elite in control of the ship have disenfranchised the people and strives with its multitude of secrets, indiscriminate punishments, restrictions on speech, to turn the ship into a massive machine.

Are the people so dangerous that they can’t be trusted to gather and talk about things, anything, without presenting a danger? P’Ko didn’t think so.   

P’Ko moved to a different section and continued his work. The trouble with doing this particular maintenance routine is that most of the work must be done while the equipment is shut down, cutting into the time he could be spending was Su’Zi. It even cuts into the time he could spend with Tn’Ya, but not as bad.

Being Tn’Ya’s mentor gave P’Ko a sort of respected teacher status, which has helped keep Tn’Ya at a safe distance, yet comfortably cordial.

P’Ko had doubts that Su’Zi would accept the situation with Tn’Ya but after her initial anxious, hostile rejection followed by their counseling with Mi’Ka, she accepted it. As a matter of fact, they seemed to hit it off. The three of them have become friends, even maintaining a physical relationship, sometimes two’s and sometimes three’s, but, thanks to Mi’Ka’s counseling, staying within the bounds of a continued mentoring relationship.

Tn’Ya’s devotion to P’Ko remained undaunted, she’s been slow to make other friends at her apprenticeship in sector three’s fabrication shop, but progress has been achieved.

All in all, P’Ko was satisfied and comfortable with the P’Ko, Su’Zi, Tn’Ya multiself they’ve created. As far as P’Ko could envision they seem destined to continue to be best friends. P’Ko could foresee after some years the Mentor respected teacher relationship toward Tn’Ya will fade. It could be possible for Tn’Ya to pursue a more romantic relationship with P’Ko and he wondered if he would be against it and how that might work out and what kind of couple they would make.

He and Su’Zi aren’t mated and haven’t even discussed it yet; they’re decades away from that discussion. Both are still each other’s best boyfriend and girlfriend. P’Ko put the thought of future mates out of his mind, there will be plenty of time for that later, and if Su’Zi sensed these thoughts it could cause unnecessary and meaningless hurt feelings. P’Ko instead focused on the good things, here and now.

Instead of creating frustration and drifting apart, the differences in jobs, locations, and work schedules, only seemed to heighten the anticipation for their meetings and gave each plenty to share with the rest when their schedules allow them to meet.

Messaging technology helps, but Su’Zi always mistrusted messaging, and P’Ko has grown reluctant to trust it too. The messaging system is operated and maintained by the CA, and they have grown to prefer, if not in person, mutual visits to virtual worlds, harder to monitor. Their favorite virtual meeting place is Vr’Chm, P’Ko and Su’Zi introduced Tn’Ya to “their beach” and Tn’Ya loved it. Unbeknownst to Tn’Ya, they also had her occasionally visit their private room, Tn’Ya never recognizing the protections in place. P’Ko and Su’Zi furnished it, and instead of being bare, decorated it similar to an apartment that one would find in Capsule Flats, complete with personal touches.

P’Ko thought of people who go through their entire lives without establishing multiselves
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. He, Su’Zi and Tn’Ya make a trio multiself. There are community multiselves, U’Te’s aren’t a good example, they’re not a close knit community, but Mi’Nr’s are, and P’Ko had to admit D’En’s even without much psychic ability are an excellent example of a community multiself.

P’Ko replayed in his mind the feeling he had during the Run with the Se’Ro’Bs. Running down dark tunnels, not as an individual, but as a group, seeing and sensing not only from his senses but the whole group’s senses. It was awe-inspiring; he actually felt connected; he felt larger and stronger than any one person could ever feel. Even toward the end, when at times he thought it was just he and the Se’Ro’Bs, he knew that his pack was with him, sharing his experience of the chase.

P’Ko thought of the Mi’Nr multiself-community; he had become comfortable and felt accepted, but he still didn’t have the full feeling of oneship with the Mi’Nr community as a whole. Not like he felt on the run.

He still had so much to learn about the job and Mi’Nr life; he hadn’t yet visited the community school in the Mining Camp or visited many Mi’Nr homes. He had so many things he needed to learn to have the core, base knowledge needed to be one with the Mi’Nr community.

P’Ko wondered how long it would take him to learn the core Mi’Nr knowledge necessary to really, truly become “one” or how he would even gain the more esoteric knowledge. He didn’t know if he would ever achieve it completely, Mi’Nr’s are born a Mi’Nr, they live a Mi’Nr’s life from Bo’Ba’s and know no other. Will he ever really be a Mi’Nr or will he always be on the edge?

There are many multiselves, they’re not exclusive, a person can be part of a Mi’Nr multiself and part of a gender multiself, and family multiself. Sports fans are multiselves, some multiselves are short lived, a sports team fan multiself’s might only last the length of a game. But P’Ko felt that he would have a special bond with his pack from the Run with the Se’Ro’Bs for the rest of his life.

P’Ko expanded his thought and wondered about the Church, the CA, and even the Dadr’Ba multiself. He was a minuscule part of their multiself’s. Did that make him in some small way responsible for the atrocities that the CASS was conducting? Then he thought, no, the complacent ones were passively complicit, he wasn’t complacent, but he wasn’t exactly actively trying to make things better either.

How did the Dadr’Ba multiself go so wrong and allow the CA to take control? And turn Dadr’Ba into a victim, keeping so many secrets, using, and persecuting its people?

The root of the problem had to be the military origin of Dadr’Ba’s command structure and the creation of the Central Council to manage and run things. The Central Council had become too strong, and too independent, too disconnected from the people.

People had gotten too wrapped up in their personal lives and ignored what was going on around them, thereby relinquished any say they may have once had regarding the management of Dadr’Ba.

The Central Council forgot who they owe their existence to. Instead of serving the Dadr’Ba community the CA is making the Dadr’Ba community serve them. To make matters worse, it’s an unchallenged rumored that the Central Council is virtually powerless, that it is dominated by the Commander and his henchmen that use rank, bribes, intimidation, threats and blackmail to neuter the other members of the council, gutting the council of its authority. Leaving control of the ship practically to one person, alone, not even a multiself.

That instant P’Ko got the TaC-B alarm from the sack safe in the bottom of his footlocker, he knew that somebody was in his quarters, had found and was attempting to probe or open his sack safe. P’Ko dropped his tools and scrambled through the hatch at the T’Bm bore head and within seconds was racing toward his quarters near the other end of the T’Bm. As P’Ko got to the crew quarters hallway, he spotted someone outside the door to his quarters.

What happened next occurred so fast, P’Ko had time only to react, not to think. Only afterward would he have a chance to replay the events in his mind and try to make some sense of it. At first, the intruder didn’t see him, P’Ko saw him but didn’t sense him. Then an alarm began sounding from above the intruder. P’Ko glanced up and saw something move, it was the size and roughly the same shape as Mi’Ka’s Ku’Ma. As soon as it stopped moving, it seemed to disappear.

The intruder turned away from the door and looked directly at P’Ko. They made eye contact, but P’Ko still didn’t sense him psychically… the intruder was invisible. The person P’Ko looked at is clearly a Mi’Nr and wore a data helmet similar to one that he’d worn during training.

P’Ko couldn’t get over the fact that he couldn’t sense him, especially, considering the expression on the intruder’s face. The expression of shock, apprehension and something P’Ko had trouble isolating without psychic clues, maybe pain, or longing.

The thief shouted something over the alarm coming from the bot on the ceiling; it may have been “let’s get out of here.” There must have been someone inside P’Ko’s quarters. Then, with one hand the intruder pulled open the front of his overalls with one hand and reached in with the other. Strangely the intruder awkwardly turned more than necessary giving P’Ko a glimpse inside his overalls.

P’Ko for a split second saw the glint of metal where the intruder’s inner clothes should have been. Then the thief withdrew something from an inside pocket and threw a small object towards P’Ko. Though P’Ko’s first impulse was to catch it, which would have been easy, an impulse warned him otherwise. Instead of snagging the thing out of the air as it passed his shoulder, he dodged it.

It detonated with a blinding flash, the overpressure, like a tunnel collapse, forced him forward pinning him to the floor. They must have been thieves, but what would they be stealing? Theft is a serious crime, with serious punishments. The multitude of surveillance systems scattered throughout Dadr’Ba ensured nearly all thieves get caught, making theft rare. But if it’s not theft, what was it?

It took a few moments for P’Ko to recover and as the tunnel vision caused by the force of the explosion began to fade, and his eyes focused, P’Ko saw two Mi’Nr’s in work coveralls exit the hallway leading to the stair down to the lower level. P’Ko crawled forward his equilibrium slowly returning.

Some of the rest of the crew that stayed, electing not to go to the Camp or Ol’Tn began to arrive on the scene from their quarters and the recreation room. They helped P’Ko up, questioning what had happened. P’Ko quickly explained but didn’t go into detail about what these intruders or thieves may have been after.

By this time, P’Ko realized that the only thing of real value, in his sack safe, the only thing that would be worth killing or being killed for must have been the reader and the data cartridge it contained.

A search ensued, and it was soon discovered that the culprits entered through the processed fuel transport tube. They cut into it a couple of levels up and descended into the T’Bm, in their haste to leave, they left where they broke into the delivery tube open. The tool marks that remained made it apparent that they had planned on sealing it, but their being discovered spoiled their plans.