Labyrinth of reflections (44 page)

– No.

That's it. I understand and it makes no sense to talk any further.

– I just live here. You can't even imagine Leonid how different we are. I'll never step on the ground – I have nothing to step with, and I won't be able to shake your hand – I don't have any.

– But you're human here! – says Vika.

– Yes. If you want to know the sky – become one. If you want to know the star – become the star… – Unfortunate glances at me and smiles, – If you want to know the deep – become the deep. I became the human, as much as it was possible.

– It's your method of knowledge? – asks Vika ironically.

– Yes.

– What for, if we are so different? If we don't need each other?

– I'm tired. I was alone for too long. – Unfortunate either apologizes or tries to convince her, – I needed this memory… the city and the people, the taste of coffee and the smell of fire. It all was alien for me but now will stay forever. Your distrust and Leonid's faith. Those who were killing me and those who were rescuing. I didn't mean to cause any trouble for you, I didn't want to meddle. This is a norm… not to cause harm.

– Your norm… – I say.

– Yes. You live according to the different laws. It's not for me to judge which ones are better.

– Then you found the best place to appear on Earth, – I nod to Unfortunate, – The freedom and no interference, all life's colors, from black to white.

– Of course.

– For some reason I thought differently, – I say, – That you could not only take from us… the tastes and smells, the words and colors… but also to teach us at least something… No, sure not how to extinguish clouds or to cure flu… At least – kindness.

– Leonid, kindness is just a word. I can't kill a living creature. But it's not a moral, it's more of a physiology.

Now it's really finish.

I wished to find an answer, an ideal, to find a miracle which didn't have a place for it on Earth for a long time. The one that came from the stars or was born by the Net – it doesn't matter. Maybe Man Without Face understood that when he offered me to go into "Labyrinth".

But the miracle doesn't care about us, it's completely alien and its kindness is not more elevated than a contented belch.

– If I try to explain you my ethics, – says Unfortunate, – I'll have to switch to the language of Physics laws and mathematical formulas. If I try to explain science – I'll have to write poems and to paint. Do you understand? The difference is not in the level of development but in the basis itself. We have nothing to take and nothing to give to each other. Whatever I've got is just memories, emotions. But do you really think they'll retain their human form?

– Yes, so I thought.

– It was a mistake, Leonid. I'll leave you soon and everything will change. I'll change myself, and so will my memory.

I step from the table and look into the window, at Deeptown's illumination flashing outside. Man Without Face, maybe you were right? It's impossible to approach Unfortunate with human measures. I tried – and look what came out of it.

– Let's assume, – says Vika behind my back, – that you're not lying. You're really an alien. The one from the stars, let's say, the one who has nothing in common with humans. Then tell me…

Maybe Vika really starts to believe. Now, hiding behind the words "let's assume" she will try Unfortunate about his ethics and culture, about his ship's construction and interstellar journey principles. Good idea too…

– I'll leave you for a minute, – I say without turning around.

Vika doesn't protest, probably she thought I gonna exit the deep temporarily.

Nope…

The drawn wall, the drawn window – I break through them, make a step and find myself above the city. Buildings, neon signs, pedestrians, cars… I'm not here anymore, my body have vanished, I just glide in the air, as if hackers' dreams and Hollywood directors' fantasies have become true, it's the virtuality as it must be, the freedom of directions and forms.

Further… further…

I make a round around Microsoft's palace, a huge, monstrously bloated building all covered by windows, descend trying to determine the direction towards the Elvish server. Just along this street…

Most likely I'm invisible for others.. I speed above pedestrians' heads, faster than Deep-Transit's cars, switching from server to server.

What am I looking for anyway? For the trace of the battle that was over a couple of hours ago? The virtual time is condensed, there's no traces to find anymore but I must do it anyway.

Here… An Elvish hut, an empty street. A taxi cab blinks in the distance and vanishes. I step on the pavement and turn back into human.

Dibenko's bodyguards' corpses have disappeared already, either they were removed or decomposed by themselves. But at the place where the werewolf was fighting with Man Without Face the asphalt is still melted and pressed in, the only token. So what will it give to me?

I walk around the dent considering whether it'll make any sense to drag search programs from home and to reconnoiter the space. Of course not, the ordinary methods won't help here.

A taxi cab drives from the alley slowly and approaches me, too slowly for it to be a coincidence, Deep-Transit is famous for its speed. Oh well, I had to expect the ambush.

I'm so sure that Dibenko will emerge from the cab that I don't immediately recognize the man that appears.

– Gunslinger? Huh? – exclaims Guillermo cheerfully, approaching me, – You, Gunslinger?

I stay silent. I still like "Labyrinth"'s chief of security service and this is very vexing.

– You're Gunslinger? – requests Guillermo, – I just want to be sure, tell me!

– Hi Willy, – I say. He beams in a smile:

– Hi! I knew it, I knew… – Guillermo eyes the melted asphalt and tsks, – Cool. It was tough. Yes?

– Yes.

– Gunslinger… – Willy parts his hands, – It's really-really unpleasant to me, honestly! I was even against charging you in damages! But there, – a hurt glance up, – they decided to scare you. This isn't the right method!

– So what's now?

Guillermo sighs and sits right onto asphalt without mercy to his fancy suit. I sit by his side. So here we are, by remains of Romka's funeral fire, like two hippies of different generations, one is settled down but still liberal, the other one in the height of his protest.

– I did suspect that this accident was caused by you, – says Willy, – quite unusual and bloody fight. Yes… I was waiting for you on my own… errr… risk.

– Why? – I ask, – Will you try to detain me? You'll fail. It couldn't be successful before, and even less now.

Guillermo pricks up his ears but doesn't ask anything:

– No-no, Gunslinger! It's absolutely not that I'm sure that our troubles is your fault! Maybe some frictions with Al-Kabar were the reason? Huh?

He winks conspiratorially. Like a quiet rebellion against "Labyrinth"'s management.

– Gunslinger, I'd like to restore our cooperation. After all, you were the first to suspect something unusual in Unfortunate and you shouldn't suffer for that!

– Thanks.

– But we can't be left aside either! Penetration have happened on our territory, right? In juridical sense the question is very complicated, it's easier to solve it in a good will… in a human way. We're humans, aren't we?

What I'd never expect from "Labyrinth"'s guys is such pep. How quickly did they get what's going on!

– Willy, – I say, – It's useless. You know what our common problem is?

– Al-Kabar? – asks Guillermo quickly, – Or Mr X?

– No. Willy, we all want something from Unfortunate. I was dreaming about some kind of goodness for everybody. You know, a common, abstract happiness and stuff which he could bring…

Guillermo nods in understanding.

– You obviously wanted to become famous, to get your share in distribution of technologies that he could give…

A protesting handwave. Oh yeah, sure, "Labyrinth" is not a commercial organization, we heard these songs before…

– Willy, he doesn't want to communicate with us! At all. He doesn't need us.

It seems that I've really shocked him.

– Doesn't need us? – he exclaims.

– Absolutely. He stopped here to get some rest and now he's going to resume his journey amongst the stars.

Guillermo makes a couple of chewing motions and asks again:

– A journey amongst the stars?

– Yes…

– What stars?

It seems we don't understand each other…

– Willy, Unfortunate is an alien form of life, I think some energy based one, his mind cardinally differs from…

I shut up. Somehow ridiculous does all this sound! Now, when Unfortunate is not near, I feel a kind of scepticism Vika felt.

– Energy based form of life… – repeats Guillermo very politely and gently, as if talking to a sick person, – Yes. Interesting.

Which one of us is the bigger idiot?

– Willy, let's exchange information. To begin our cooperation.

– I think I know your information already, – Willy winks slyly, – Huh?

– But I also can meet Unfortunate at any time and talk to him. Huh?

– Do you have him? – asks Guillermo quickly.

I remain silent.

– As a token of cooperation… – mumbles Willy. Oh, it wasn't his initiative to come here! Or at least, not only his. Now "Labyrinth"'s management decides in panic whether to allow him to talk to me openly or not…

– I can leave, – I note.

– Okay! – Willy raises his hands, – I surrender! You've won, Gunslinger! You've won as usual!

I ignore the compliment but Willie doesn't expect any reaction. He rubs his forehead and pronounces solemnly:

– It was not at once when we evaluated the Unfortunate's phenomenon. It's our big mistake. "Labyrinth"'s attention to its customers have played the positive role though… When yours and our divers' efforts proved useless, we started to search for Unfortunate's entering channel. We searched and searched… and failed.

I'm waiting for the next part. Guillermo winks cunningly and goes on:

– Are you familiar with the parallel worlds theory, Gunslinger?

– From sci-fi literature.

– It's quite a serious theory, Gunslinger. Other worlds might exist in parallel with ours, invisible, unreachable… but quite real ones. We can't

– yet – communicate with them in a normal way. But virtuality is a different thing. Flows of information live according to their own laws. Computer network is the most powerful device for entropy reduction in the history of mankind. Independently from our will or wish it influences the physical laws of the Universe. Information flows stream along the Net, they condense creating the centers where the very nature of the Universe transforms.

– Information can't change the laws of nature, – I say quickly.

– Oh yeah? When the structure complication happens in the limited fraction of space – it influences the whole Universe. Very weakly of course but the bases of the world vibrate a little anyway. Every object created by humans contained both positive and negative 'charge'. The club carved from the tree branch wasn't just a weapon, no! It was an anomaly phenomenon, an ordered structure in the chaotic world. But this was compensated – at least by the pile of shavings and sawdust. The book became a bit more complicated structure. The volume of information and chaos caused by its creation were not exactly equal already but this phenomenon was also compensated after all

– at least by the fact that many books were not worth the trees cut to make paper for them. What added to that for the first hand, were the books that beared an anomalous complication of information in themselves. I'm not talking about reference books that mostly reflect well known and useless information but about those that led to the birth of new ethics and perception of the world. They started to influence the people's life, to lead to entropy, to destroy. It was like a curse: the more informative the book is, the more did it shake the world. The humans were unable to simultaneously bring an order into the world and not to add chaos. Computers is an absolutely different case, it's information in its purity. It arrives from different directions, it gathers, multiplies. It doesn't vanish without a trace – to give away a file with data is absolutely not the same as to give away a jewel or a favorite book. It tears the Universe's space, violates the balance between the order and the chaos.

Guillermo silences to catch his breath. He's excited, he definitely wanted to tell all this out.

– And so, in such points where the human deeds create the new understanding of the world, where the very human look at the life changes – the unusual happens. The border between the worlds breaks there, and the miracle is being born, and the creature from the other world, maybe a human, maybe not, right?… is able to come to us. To encounter our moral, culture, our dreams… to absorb all net's knowledge in itself… and to freeze, terrified.

What can I answer him? To tell about the fallen star?

– As far as I understand, Unfortunate declared you that he's an alien from the other planet? – asks Guillermo.

I nod. Maybe it's not exactly so though, he never told me directly, he just never rejected my guess.

– Was it his own version or he confirmed your guess?

– Confirmed… – I mumble.

– A normal thing to do, – decides Guillermo, – To admit his own alien nature but to give a wrong direction. He has a right to fear us. His civilization is a peaceful one most likely while we are not the kindest creatures…

It was a long time since I was nudged face forward into the dirt this way.

– We considered different theories, – says Guillermo, – We analyzed Al-Kabar's versions – about the machine mind, mutation that gave birth to the 'human computer'. But… our specialists tend to smile. We were thinking about an alien from the stars. This would be beautiful… too beautiful to be true. We have a good team of psychologists, they work on the data available to us, we have good programmers, they are working too. But still, the theory of parallel worlds remains the most likely one. Al-Kabar worked with people too little, their approach is mechanistic and Urman is too far from modern technologies. No-no. Not a computer mind, not a human merged with a machine. Maybe… – a condescending smile, – an alien. Maybe, – Guillermo's face becomes serious, – a creature from a parallel world. Let's find out together. Without a force, without… any fights, – Guillermo pokes his hand at melted asphalt with disgust, – Let's sit together and talk. Let's forget mistakes, offences, claims. Let's explain that we're not so bad after all, that we shouldn't be feared. Let's stretch our hand…