Paradox (42 page)

Restday. Leaning back on the steps, eyes closed, listening to the ripples. Children playing.

Rippling outwards:
Bursting onwards,
Entropy and Destiny
.

Moving waveform
Traces outlines
Diabolic and divine;

Only children
Brave and foolish
Cast their laughter against time…

It had been such a long time since he had composed a poem.

“Mister, mister.”

“Hello.” He looked at them: girl and boy, maybe seven SY old. Stuffed white unicorn in the girl's small grasp.

“What happened to your arm, mister?”

Glanced at his left shoulder. “Lost it. Pretty careless of me, don't you think?”

The little girl giggled; the boy grinned.

“I lost Fredo”—the unicorn—“but Mummy found him for me.”

“Oh, right.” Tom kept his face straight. “See if she can find my arm, will you?”

“OK.”

More giggles. Behind them, two slender adults appeared—with the similar gaits of long-married couples, hair tied back with identical bandannas—followed by more children, perhaps twenty of them.

“Have you been bothering the gentleman, Linya?”

Solemn shake of the head.

“They've been fine, ma'am,” said Tom, and nodded a greeting to the man.

“That's good. Come along, children.”

“You bastard!”

Tom flinched and turned, but there was laughter as the two youths tussled on the ground, close to the waves. Three others watched, then one of them tried to deliver a playful jumping-kick—as Tom winced: terrible technique, a threat only to the kicker's own ligaments—and all five of them mock-fought while Tom shook his head, smiling.

One of them had had some lessons, and afterwards they all tried to perform a traditional form—awkwardly, without balance—until they got bored and wandered off.

That evening, on the way home, Tom bought a second-hand cylindrical canvas bag—military-issue duffel, supposedly—from Narvan's store.

It took a few days to find sufficient rags to stuff it tightly. On the eighth day, after his morning run, he carried the bag to the shore and hung it, by one end, from the underside of the elevated footbridge which ran out to the Pavilion School.

Alone on the smooth stone, underneath the bridge, he worked the bag: circling around, keeping his footwork mobile as he dug in with the punches, whipped the curved elbow-strikes, threw kick after spinning kick into the thing—counting in his head: two-hundred-second rounds with forty-second rest intervals—over and over until he could barely stand.

“Izvinitye
…” Gaunt woman standing in the doorway.

“We're not—” Tom paused, mop in hand.

Two thin children were behind her.

Blinking, he gestured them inside, made them sit. Digging a cred-sliver from his waistband, he inserted it in the socket behind the counter; then he fetched rolls and fruit from the kitchen and put them down before the starving trio.

“Waifs and strays?” Vosie, her big form almost filling the doorway.

Tom shrugged.

“Good man,” said Vosie. “But I'm afraid they're not the last we'll see.”

News of distant events was slow to arrive, but Tom had heard the rumours. Far upstratum, fighting and chaos. Vosie might be right: if trouble was on all sides, where could refugees go but downwards?

Was it the Prime Strike? Or had plans changed since Tom's time?

Behind Vosie, two others: Tom recognized the bandannas.

“We heard”—the woman spoke hurriedly—“that they were here, and only spoke Laksheesh. Are they all—?”

“
Sprazitne mir Laksheesh
,” said Tom, and smiled at the startled family at the table. “But we haven't needed it so far.”

A grin widened across Vosie's broad face. “Tom? Do you know Rislana and Trilvun, the school principals?”

“Only by sight.”

They shook hands all round, then reassured the nervous woman with her children, and sat down to draw up plans for their welfare.

“
Hee-ya!
”

Tom spoke without thinking: “Keep your back straight. Twist your hips.”

The youths—there were seven of them this time—stared at Tom. One of them, who had been carrying a small pebble in his hand, turned and threw it out across the waves; it vanished with a small splash.

“So what do you know about it, mate?”

“This.”

Tom was standing side-on to the youth. Murderously fast, his leg whipped out: hooked
over
the boy's head, flicked back—instep against temple—hooked heel against the other temple—then lightly tapped the blade-edge of his foot against kneecap, hip and—as the boy involuntarily stepped back—stopped his foot just millimetres from the boy's throat.

Stunned silence.

Then, “Bleedin' Dissolution!”

The youths looked at Tom as he lowered his leg.

“Er, mister, could you teach us how to do that?”

“See you tomorrow night, Tom!” “Yeah, we'll be here.” “Tomorrow!” “Thanks, Tom!”

Tom called after them: “Don't be late.”

And turned away, grinning, to find the school principals, Rislana and Trilvun, looking at him.

“So,” said Trilvun. “Fighter and linguist.”

“Teacher, too,” his wife said.

“I—” Tom shrugged. “I guess so.” Looking back at the seven youths in the distance. “Guess I've got a commitment now.”

“And they'll bring more of their friends tomorrow.” Trilvun looked to Rislana for confirmation and she nodded.

“How many languages do you speak, Tom?”

A pause, then, “Seven fluently. Some smatterings.”

Indrawn breath, but the couple did not look greatly surprised. “Anything else?”

“Logosophy…” Tom looked out across the sea, at the reflected ripples on the cavern ceiling. “All disciplines.”

“Er…” Exchanged glances. Rislana said: “Only Lords study every branch of logosophy.”

“Nevertheless.”

Tom let the silence stand.

He watched as the couple communicated in the near-telepathy of long-term partners. Then they looked at him.

“Did you know,” asked Rislana, “that Niltiva”—she meant the refugee woman—“used to be a cook?”

“Ah, no.”

“Thing is,” said Trilvun, “she needs a job, and Vosie's place would be ideal…”

“…and it's really time,” Rislana finished for him, “that you moved on, Tom.”

“I don't…”

The ground seemed to shift beneath Tom's feet.

“So you're starting with us tomorrow.” Rislana.

“In at the deep end.” Trilvun, grinning. “You'll be teaching the seven-year-olds. Poor you.”

“I…”

“The phrase you're looking for,” said Rislana, “is thank you.”

Tom swallowed. “Thank you.”

And he loved it.

Teaching. Academic classes during the day—the youngest children at first, then the older ones, with a chance to extend the curricula—and the physical arts in the evenings. At first only the boys learned to fight, then some girls—fascinated by Tom's regained lean good looks, giggling when they had to practise with the boys.

After a while, though, some of the girls took to the art for its own sake; soon groin-protectors as well as gum-shields were mandatory for the males.

Four times, Tom refused principalship of the Pavilion School when Rislana and Trilvun tried to step down in his favour.

But he kept reworking the curriculum: another three years, and he would have all the foundations in place. The eleven-year-olds who started on his accelerated programme at that time would eventually, aged eighteen, leave with an education equal to any Lord or Lady of the Primum Stratum.

A decade until the first of those students graduated. Tom looked forward to the day.

Only one year after Tom's arrival, though, his morning class was interrupted by a breathless student skidding to a halt in the room's archway.

“Sir, sir—”

“What is it, Filgrave?”

“It's…” Catching his breath. “Soldiers, sir. Down at the waterfront.”

“Show me.”

Outside Vosie's, the four soldiers were mirror-visored and heavily armed, guarding the doorway. They made no attempt to stop Tom as he strode inside.

“Are you OK, Vosie?”

“I'm all right.” She nodded, clutching her white apron.

At one of the tables, near the back, an officer was sitting. There was a glass of warm daistral in front of him, and his helmet was beside him on the bench-seat.

“I'm a local schoolmaster,” Tom said to him. “May I ask what's going on?”

“A magister, eh?” Raised eyebrows, then a gestured invitation. “Please sit down.”

Tom slid in, facing the officer across the table.

“I'm Colonel Rashidorn,” the man added. “And I have to say, I've heard good things about you. The Pavilion School, that is.”

Tom grew cold. “What about the school?”

“That its reputation has grown somewhat…unusual. Excellent, of course.” The colonel sipped from his daistral. “So much so that bright children are now being sent
down
to attend it, from two strata above.”

“We try our best.” Tom kept his voice neutral, watching the man's face, but his mind was racing: plotting ways out of the trap.

My fault, yet again
…

The colonel moved and Tom's nerves screamed. Sweat broke out but he was only taking something from his pocket, that was all.

“And your best is impressive.” If Rashidorn had noticed Tom's reaction, he gave no sign.

But Tom noted: there had been no blossoming of red dots across his vision. He had suspected it from his training sessions, but this was proof. His tacware was gone, disintegrated in the abuse of his two lost years.

“As is the breadth of subjects,” added Colonel Rashidorn. “Including disciplines one would hardly expect to find this far down.”

Clenched fist.

“This is for you. A token.”

Tom made no move, so Colonel Rashidorn opened his hand and laid the thing on the table between them.

“Do you know where the Community Hall is, Mr Corcorigan?”

Lord Corcorigan, to you.

But, “Of course,” was all Tom said. “I live here, after all.”

“The general will see you there tomorrow morning, at oh-eight-hundred.”

Which general?
Tom could have asked, but said nothing as Colonel Rashidorn stood.

Then the colonel left, passing through the doorway, and his soldiers fell in step behind him. Their diminishing bootsteps echoed back from the boulevard outside.

“Tom?” Vosie, fearfully.

But the thing on the tabletop was a small stallion attached to a black cord, and there was only one person both subtle and knowledgeable enough to have sent that as a token.

You found me.

They attacked from all directions.

The backdrop: icy Alps, grey and blue, capped with breathtaking whiteness. Clean, crisp air. A panoramic window displayed the view.

But in the blue-matted dojo, bodies were flying.

From every conceivable angle, they made their unrehearsed attacks: fit-looking white-jacketed men and women charging with strikes and kicks and attempted grabs, but they crashed into each other, were dropped in their steps or flung suddenly through the air.

At the centre of the maelstrom, the slender woman moved.

Her attackers tried again, but once more the bodies became entangled as she danced among them, long, grey hair flying, and the sunlight glinted from the silver sockets where her eyes should have been.

And then it was over.

“
Mokosu
,” she ordered, as they knelt in straight ranks, and the class slipped into meditation.

As the trainees limped to the showers, their faces were drawn and bloodless. No-one spoke. There were twenty-one of them in total; after
showering, they put on white UNSA jumpsuits and, bone-tired, made their way outside to the waiting silver bus.

“What a hard-ass!” said a young woman.

“Kicked the shit out of me.” A big, wide-shouldered man with buzz-cut hair. “Jesus Christ! And she's so small.”

Footsteps crunched on the gravel.

“Be thankful”—it was a black-jumpsuited nun who spoke, and the trainees stiffened—“that you have her as your teacher.”

Behind her, a small boy waited silently. The UNSA trainees looked uncomfortable.

“Sorry, Sister,” said the big man.

“Probably no-one's told you, but Karyn's classes have the highest pass rates of all Pilot Candidates.”

The trainees exchanged glances; this was news to them.

“Can we watch Ro play now?” The little boy's upturned face was eager. “Please, Sister?”

“In a moment. The thing is”—a half-smile—“getting your asses kicked by a little blind grey-haired woman is the good Lord's way of encouraging some humility. God bless you.” Then she took the little boy's hand and led him inside the building.

“See?” breathed one of the men. “Hard-asses. Every last one of them.”

In single file, they trooped aboard the UNSA bus and headed back towards the Flight School.

Wooden dagger, gleaming.

The girl attacked.

Effortlessly, the grey-haired woman moved, blended, pinned the girl's arm to the ground. Then they regained their start positions, kneeling, facing each other.

The girl—young woman, now—was nineteen years old. Both women wore white jackets and black split-skirt
hakama.

Over and over they worked the formal routines, from kneeling and standing, empty-handed and with weapons, while the nun and the little boy watched from a balcony. Then the two watchers departed.

“Your
shiho nage's
improving,” said the grey-haired woman.

Rare praise, indeed, from a sensei.

“Thanks, Mother.” The black-haired girl smiled. “But it'll never be as good as yours.”

Karyn gave a short bow of acknowledgement. Her daughter could be right: at ninth dan, Karyn McNamara was the highest-graded aikidoka outside the Kyoto
honbu.

“See you later, Dorothy,” she called, as her daughter bowed out and left the
dojo.

After meditation, Karyn left by the side door leading out into the cloisters. She had never seen the garden beyond, but knew it intimately by touch and smell; she smiled, breathing in the cold alpine air, enjoying the warm feel of sunlight upon her face.

There was a beeping, and the black-haired girl gestured: a holocube opened at her bedroom's geometric centre.

“Hello, Ro.” Chojun Akazawa's head and shoulders filled the display volume. “How are things?”

“Hi, Uncle Cho.” Sitting down on the bed, Ro folded her legs into lotus. “Let's see. Mother still calls me Dorothy. The place is still staffed with bloody nuns—
I admire their discipline, Dorothy, not always their beliefs
—and I'm still waiting for my exam results.”

Chojun laughed.

“And apart from that,” he said, “everything's fine?”

“I guess.” Ro grinned.

“I'm lecturing students in the flesh.” Chojun grimaced. “Would you believe that?”

“You love it, Uncle Cho. What else are you working on?”

“This.”

The image of his head shrank and moved off to one side as a Four-Speak text lattice took over the volume.

“
Self Awareness in an N-Dimensional Continuum
.” Ro magnified the image. “What's this?”

The movement of her eyes was impossible to see.

“You're publishing this?” she added.

“What, and lose my tenure?” A wry smile. “I'm posting it anonymously, on a non-reviewed board.”

“It'll be a hit anyway.”

“Yeah, sure.”

Chojun Akazawa had gained his Ph.D. at UTech the year Karyn had returned there to teach, when Ro was three years old. By the time Karyn and Ro had moved to Switzerland, four years later, Chojun had jumped on the connectivity-theory bandwagon, and his academic career was assured.

Ro downloaded the text and magnified Chojun's image.

“Will you let me know,” he asked, “when you hear about your exams?”

“Of course, Uncle Cho.”

“I'll be off then. Give my love to Karyn.”

“Ciao.” She blew him a kiss.

The display shut down.

Absorption.

Quickly, the last motes dwindle into nothingness. The ship is gone, evaporated, melded into the fabric of mu-space, as scarlet lightning flickers.

The pattern evolves, adapting to the new structures; changes recur infinitely through all the levels, instantiated in infinitesimal time.

None-life
…

Strategies. Goals. Self-modification.

…
becomes life.

In realspace, life is a paradox: DNA manufactures proteins, building bodies
…
but also replicates, builds copies of itself; a factory which is simultaneously
its own blueprint, its own maker of factories. It is an impossible loop—which comes first, blueprint or factory?—a contradiction resolved only because an outside factor, RNA, triggers the process.

But in mu-space, self-referential conditions are not unsatisfiable. Patterns, spreading
…

The ultimate closed-feedback loop is conscious thought: neural processes which can perceive themselves; the essence of self-reflexiveness.

Consciousness.

And in mu-space
…

It spreads, everywhere
.

…
self-reflexiveness is always resolved.

Chojun's article concluded with some observations:

1) That the incidence of lost mu-space ships dropped almost to zero immediately after Pilot Dart Mulligan's demise, and has remained low for almost two decades.

2) That the surviving Pilot, Karyn McNamara, reported in her debriefing a
sudden feeling of euphoria, of love
, immediately before her reinsertion to realspace.

3) That adaptive self-modification has been observed in many other…

A knock sounded on the door.

“Come in,” said Ro. “Oh, it's you, Sister Francis Xavier.”

It was the nun who had been watching earlier.

“Since you're home from college, Ro,” she said, “would you like to come to evening prayers? It would be—”

“You don't give up, do you, Sister?”

“From you, that has to be a compliment.” The nun glanced at the holotext, still glowing in mid-air. She stiffened. “
Self-Awareness in
…Does that mean what I think it does?”

“You were on your way, I believe”—Ro spoke carefully—“to pray to an anthropomorphic omnipresent consciousness, of whose existence you can have no direct proof. Am I right?”

From the cloisters outside, a ringing bell sounded.

“I'm late. I'll”—with a last glance at the holo—“talk to you later.”

Sister Francis Xavier swept out.

Ro's silence lasted only a few seconds.

“Maybe your God is imaginary…”

Eyes of pure black, devoid of surrounding white. Orbs of jet.

Her voice rang out in the empty room.

“…and maybe not…”

Suddenly, golden fire coruscated across those eyes, and the whole room lit up.

“…but mine is real, for sure.”

Then, slowly, the golden fire faded, was gone.

In its aftermath, Ro's obsidian eyes glittered, cold as stone, totally unreadable, as hard and implacable as death.