We were not alone. There was a gasping ahead of us. The faint scratching of claws against metal could be heard distinctly in the distance. Aeniah looked towards me. I knew now that I had not been the only one hearing it.
‘Sean, what is that?’ Aeniah whispered through her teeth.
The noise from Aeniah’s lips must have been picked up by the thing in front of us. In an instant it could be heard rushing towards us, growling as if through barred teeth. Aeniah grabbed my shoulder and we ran. I could not tell you where. We just kept moving, faster and faster. No matter how we ran, whatever was behind us was still there.
Rounding the next corner Aeniah flashed out her arm and from it flew a huge spark that exploded against something. Visible for that moment the creatures face could be glimpsed. It had no lips, its teeth were long and jagged, its skin was white and oozing fluid. Great red holes perforated its abdomen as the shot hit. But still it continued towards us. I almost thought I heard it laughing.
Seized with terror I dragged Aeniah around the next corner. Then another. We ran at a tremendous speed, but it was not fast enough. The monster was getting closer. Aeniah discharged yet more sparks into the creature, but this had little effect. It staggered only for a second, and then continued after us faster than ever.
Sliding as we turned, Aeniah lost her footing and crashed to the ground. Her lights went out instantly. I spun on my heel racing back towards her. I could hear the stampeding feet of the creature and knew that it was seconds away.
It was meters from us now. It was close enough to smell. Part way through lifting Aeniah to her feet a colossal impact punctured my body and I was on the ground feet away.
Aeniah screamed but I could not see her. Terrified beyond all belief my mind began to separate itself from reality. Searching for an energy I did not have, my mind connected to some innermost repository of knowledge and blinding light filled my vision. Like before the light danced and spun about the surfaces. It appeared from no apparent source and moved outwards like spears. Ahead of me the creature was visible, making its way towards Aeniah. She screamed again. In that instant, it was gone.
There was a stunned silence before I had the sight of mind to do anything other than breathe but it passed quickly.
I ran towards Aeniah and grabbed hold of her hand and ran.
Possessed by some abstract thought I followed some path laid out by providence in my head and we arrived. I am not sure where we arrived, but it was better than staying out there.
It was too dark to see.
‘What the fuck was that?’ Aeniah demanded after we had caught our breath. She was staring straight at me accusingly.
‘I don’t know,’ I returned truthfully.
‘I do,’ chimed a musical voice ahead of us. Sean was humming to himself as he glided around the room revealing strange half-seen instruments and architecture from his blue glowing body as he moved. The stupid machine had not even bothered to help.
‘What?’ stated Aeniah, ‘how can you know what that is?’
‘Simple, you asked me to find out and I did. Well at least partially.’
‘Well?’ she replied impatiently.
‘Genetic scans confirm that the entity is of unknown origin. Not simply unknown in terms of the Earth species chain, but unknown in terms of design and genetic configuration. Simply put it is not even made of the same building blocks that you are. In all probability it did not even share the same genesis.’ Sean replied in a self-satisfied manner.
‘So essentially, you don’t know’ I replied, tiredly. I really was beginning to lose interest in this whole end-of-the-world chased-by-monsters thing.
‘On the contrary George I have gleamed a vast field of data. For instance they heal quickly. Sensors estimated that it took the entity four point nine seconds to recover from Aeniah’s pulse blasts’
‘And what exactly was that Aeniah. I thought you said that we weren’t allowed to bring any weapons with us.’ I flashed my eyes accusingly towards her. Instead of seeming startled she laughed briefly with mirth.
‘Oh no, you misunderstand me. I said that you couldn’t bring any weapons with you. I on the other hand don’t go anywhere without one.’
‘So what exactly do you bring about with you’ I enquired.
‘Why a pocket-plasma-launcher of course.’ Seeing my confusion she continued. ‘Ah, of course, little before your time I suppose. Well before the Wars PPLs were all the rage. People practically couldn’t visit another country without one. Mine, I suppose, is one of the last ones left.’ She turned thoughtfully back to Sean. ‘Where exactly are we.’
Sean began to glide around the room again and restarted his infuriating half musical humming. He appeared to observe the room in the way a child might observe their presents wrapped beneath the tree. He was full of glee.
‘Why Aeniah, can’t you see, we are inside a data control nexus’ he replied.
‘And what exactly does that mean,’ I enquired.
‘DCN’s were commonly used as part of a chain link network of processing for United World nations. Activating one link in the chain allows another link in the chain to come online. With each link in the chain activated more and more meta-systems come online until a complete AI is formed. Most importantly each DCN contains all the basic power and processing requirement for the section in which it is placed.’ Smugly Sean turned towards Aeniah as if looking for approval. Aeniah did not appear to be in the mood for giving any.
‘So effectively, we turn this on and this section functions at a basic level. Turn them all on and we get all the bells and whistles’ she stated dryly. Without waiting for a reply she grabbed hold of his frame and said ‘then turn the bloody thing on.’
‘Aeniah you, perhaps, are better suited to activating these systems. United World systems typically reject unauthorised computer entry. Manual interfacing is always preferred, and with your background...’ He trailed off.
Aeniah strode over to a large slab of glass surrounded by many others at different heights and orientations. Placing her hands above the glass she drew images into life. The slab had become a screen and the language again was unfamiliar, radically different and yet somehow meaningful. Aeniah appeared to have no trouble understanding it as her fingers began to fan wildly about the screen. She proceeded to spin a box this way and that, enter text into another, then rotated a pulsing circle. In all the entire procedure seemed needlessly complex. Surely a simply on button couldn’t have hurt anyone.
Suddenly there was a chiming followed by a laboured dialogue in that same strange unfamiliar language. The crass and unyielding language sounded so familiar and yet it was completely incomprehensible. The ground beneath my feet started to hum, I could feel it all the way to my ankles. Our helmets opened and detached. Incredibly I began to smell fresh air, with a purity and fragrance I could not describe.
If the room had appeared large before it was massive now. Lights that had been dormant for so long began to force their way into the room. Blues and purples and reds burst into existence. The world became warmer, better, greater.
The room (if it could be called such a thing) now revealed itself. It curved at either end and expanded in the centre, the effect was a room shaped somewhat like an eye. Huge diamond pyramids rose and tapered like sculptures. Within them was imprisoned a violent blue light, which performed motions almost too fast for the eye to see. In the centre of this eye was its pupil, more exactly a huge ring around which pure energy, immediately visible to the naked eye, rose in spirals. It appeared organic. It appeared alive.
Aeniah turned to me quizzically and opened her mouth, ‘George the system says that a language update is available for you.’
‘I don’t understand’
‘It appears your...modifications, have given you the ability to receive, as it were, updates.’
‘Like genetic memory,’ I enquired.
Sean spoke the words ‘exactly’ before Aeniah could open her mouth. Crossly, Aeniah tu
rned to me and asked, ‘well do you want to update or not?’
‘Go for it’, I reasoned. ‘What harm could it do.’
Aeniah turned and began to suck on her bottom lip as she began to play her fingers about the screen. Soon, gradually, I felt a slight tingling. It was curious that the information did not appear to come from anywhere other than me. I felt a foreign presence but could not distinguish what was in my memory from what was being given to me. It felt odd not to know reality from fabrication.
Then I felt it. My eyes were opened. Images I had mistaken for art became letters, and slowly, ever so slowly, became words. I saw the words ‘Blue Clarity’ rise from the centre of the ring of energy.
I asked Sean the question ‘What exactly is ‘Blue Clarity’?’
‘Blue Clarity is a type of energy production. It is named after the way that it appears to the naked eye. Blue Clarity is by many degrees the perfect source of energy. It produces power infinitely, never running out’ Sean answered amicably.
‘But why didn’t they continue using it after the resource wars? Surely if we had had that technology I might still have had a home. We might not be living through this nightmare.’ The more I reasoned the more anger I felt at us for forgetting it.
‘Of course, many of the problems experienced by your society could have been alleviated through much of the technology available here. However, after the Resource Wars, the two major competing parties were largely destroyed. Around 78% of the world was left permanently inhospitable to human life. The societies that emerged were but a shadow of their former selves, ignorant and blind to the majesty of the past. It would never have been possible for them to produce anything quite as exquisite as Blue Clarity.’ Sean for the first time appeared saddened. He did not speak these words with his usual sense of joy, instead he appeared to mourn the loss. Indeed he mourned for it almost more than the loss of the world. Stupid machine.
I shook myself, thinking that a machine had emotions, it was insanity. No matter how good software is it is not sentient. He, it, was nothing more than a hunk of metal, complete with wire and a speaker. Nothing more.
Aeniah who appeared to sense what I might be thinking, swiped at Sean and a thud bounced off his metal exterior. Sean was pushed to the side and appeared to dip before gradually restoring his normal altitude, just at head height. ‘See, he’s not smart enough to avoid that,’ she announced smugly.
Smiling at this I began to look around for more of this new language to read. Aeniah, however, was having none of it.
‘Listen ladies, whilst I’m sure some ancient and magical generators could keep us primitive beings entertained until the cows come home, we have to start this hunk of metal up.’
And that was that, Aeniah strode away from us at a fast pace. Turning to one another briefly in annoyance, Sean and I followed her lead.