NationStates Jolt Archive

"Exarchos."

"You can call me John. John.. Constantine."

The bar was small, seedy. The two men were shorter than they had any right to be, and still look dangerous. Yet they did. There was something about them that made the rest of the bar's regulars shie away, despite the fact they stood only five feet tall. Perhaps it was the guns, or perhaps it was the set lines in their faces. Perhaps it was the fact that anyone with a scanner could tell their clothing was hyper-augmented power-armour that would allow them to tear through tanks.

The second man nodded. "So, John. What do you do these days?"

"I'm looking for some answers. And I need a few key questions."

"Why?"

Neural networks activate, shortwave transmissions between the two men become furious, and yet the outsiders can tell nothing. It would take a level six AI to crack the code, and nothing outside of the highest milspec AI are capable of it.

For a moment, the second man stumbles, and straightens himself against the table. And then his eyes are lit with silver, and he screams. To understand why, one must see inside his head. For the time being, he is John Constantine, Exarchos of the Realm. He is seeing through his eyes, reliving old memories. It is not pleasant.



The gun flashed. No Power, the message read. John swore, and discarded it, throwing it at the metal-spider. In a blur of motion, it slices the gun in half, and continues advancing on him, slowly, solidly. He has been fighting for two days, now. Twenty men came with him, and now he alone is trying to make it back to the ship, the Akolouthos. Why he is not yet dead is a mystery. Three days ago, he had come to this planet.

Zegenthis. An old colony of the old Realm, its history a proud and defiant one. It had been the gateway, and the well-defended gate to the Realm. It had only ever fallen twice. Once, to the Taledonians. But they had been betrayed that time, by his ancestors. It was no shame to lose when outnumbered a hundred to one.

A second time, to the Maker-Mind. It was here it had suborned Realm inhibition fields, allowing to annihilate the Realm as it saw fit. It was here that certain records had remained, so well-hidden, so well-protected, that not even the Maker-Mind had found them.

Until now.

He had uncovered them, sifting through the records over days. There was nothing there about Project Kaisar. About him. About the Centarch, the Horeiarios - the two other counterparts to his existence. About his reason for being.

But they thought he had. Five thousand metal-spiders assaulted the facility. It had taken minutes for them to break through the defences, formidable as they were. A few more seconds to slaughter his companions. And he had escaped, somehow. They couldn't see him. Or perhaps they just didn't want to. He didn't know why.

Now, though, one had found him. The metal-spider advanced on him, and, as he backed away, it sped up, moving so quickly he did not even see it loop around him. Held, now, unable to move, its leg liquidised, quietly penetrating the soft bone of his skull.

The pain was unimaginable.

The man sitting at the table's hands were now clenched, his jaw set, and the scream had stopped. The metal-spider would not let his mouth move. After another second, he slumped on to the table, unconscious.

John picked up his drink, and poured it over his head. Groggily, the man woke up.

"So, my friend. What should I call you?"

The man looked at him, fear in his eyes. "What are you?"

"I was rather hoping you could answer that for me. I went back to the Unbroken Eye, and I've had extensive tests done on me. There's no remnant, not even an atom of the Maker-Mind in me. So.. what?"

The man held his hands to his head, closing his eyes, trying to blot out the memory.

"You are the way and the door."

"Pardon?"

"Your experience has brought back old memories. Ones I had from the old days. I now know who I am."

"I know who you are. You're a bodyclone of Magnius Exaionae. Arralen, they call you."

No. I am the Horeiarios. Or rather, all clones of Magnius are the Horeiarios, once awakened. You are specific, we are general. You are crucial, we are expendable. You are the way and the door. We are the key.

Into his mind. Not through a neural link.

"You're an operant."

Another thought struck John.

"If I'm the way, and then the door, and you're the key.. what's inside?"

Horror.

The bar was emptied at once. Arralen rose from his seat, and, with a flick of his hand, the patrons flew out, and the doors slammed shut. Almost as an afterthought, the bartender disappeared, teleported by the sheer puissance of Arrelen's mind.

"There are no operants in the Realm. We've been genereed for millenia against it."

"Yes. But I am Magnius. Or rather, I am a precise copy of Magnius. And he was the most powerful operant in the Realm."

"Then why aren't the rest of the Magnius-clones operants?"

Arralen laughed. "They are not the Horeiarios."

"I don't understand. I've been told I have work to do, missions to accomplish, but I don't know."

"Precisely. You are the door. The knowledge inside your mind is locked, but.. that metal-spider put a key in. Do you mind if I turn it."

John hesitated only a second. "Fine."

"This is going to hurt."

To his credit, John did not collapse. Nor did he scream. It was not so great a pain as the spider had given him. His vision blurred, and he stumbled, and then it was gone.

"I still don't know anything."

"Of course you don't. I took a look inside, and turned the key back."

"Why?"

"Well.. it's hard to explain. Did you have your brain scanned by an AI, when you were trying to find out what you knew?"

"Yes. They can detect any sort of latent memories, no matter how deeply repressed. Every neuron in my skull."

"Right. But they can't detect every cascading pattern that could be set off by a particular nanomachine being activated, especially a nanomachine that is set to a pattern derived from extremely high, seemingly random prime numbers. Nothing the Realm has could crack your brain, because the knowledge doesn't exist until you turn the nanite 'key'."

"And when you turn the key? Do I know it?"

"Not exactly. I took a peek, and used the beginning of the cascade to calculate the rest. Once set off, it replaces certain core components of your brain with new directives. It also wipes your personality, and turns you into, well... me."

"You?"

"Not me, per se. Magnius Exaionae. With a... twist."

"The twist being?"

"It also sets off a rift portal in your brain. Infinitesimally small, but capable of piercing ANY FTLi system."

"So.."

"It then uploads your personality to the lattice."

"And?"

"I don't know. I know, from records, that you are referred to as the way-"

"-and the door, yes, you've told me. What does it mean."

"I can't tell. If your mind is uploaded to the lattice, you'll die. You have no mechanisms capable of taking it over, like the Maker-Mind did."

"Centarch."

"What?"

"It's the other person in this puzzle. The Centarch. I've heard it used too many times, and I don't know what it means."

"Wait a second. I'll access the 'nets.."

Arralen sat for a moment, and his face turned pale.

"What is it?"

"Centarch. Part of Project Kaiser. As is the Horeiarios and the Exarchos."

"And?"

"You are the way and the door. I am the key. The Centarch is the traveller on the way."

"Stop speaking in riddles, damn you!"

"Sweet God in heaven. I see now."

"See what?"

"Quiet! I will explain. We have.. very little time, though, so I'll have to talk quickly."

"So talk."

"You are the Exarchos, the first piece of the puzzle. Your purpose is to serve as a repository for a cascading nanite sequence, which will reconfigure your brain, once set by a suborned metal-spider, to take on the personality of Magnius Exaionae. No, not the personality. The knowledge. The personality is.. oh God."

"What?"

"I see it all now. How did we ever miss it? Why didn't we know?"

Arralen's eyes were wild, and his mental powers were being brought to bear on the room in an extreme, shielding it from any detection, any sensors.

"You are the knowledge of Magnius Exaionae. The stabilizing factor."

"Stabilizing factor?"

"The Centarch isn't a human at all. No, no, no, no. No! The fools! We're like hosts, willing hosts, designed by our parasites to be convinient to burst out of when they feel the need to transcend our little mortal frames."

Arralen trembled, and, while John watched him, he looked around, trying to figure out what was happening. Why wasn't anyone trying to save them? Why hadn't the AI seen it? Oh, it was all too obvious, now. Yet no-one beyond him knew. If he told John, it could ruin everything. He wanted to tell him, but he had to serve. With his newfound powers came newfound allegiance. A few minutes ago, he had been a Magnius-clone, happy in his life, willing to serve the Realm in anything, to do what he thought was his duty.

And now, his mind felt the grip of an intelligence greater than his own forcing him solidly into one path.

"Arralen?"

"The Unbroken Eye doesn't serve the Realm. The idiots. The blind, foolish, well-meaning idiots. Remember the Eye that was broken. AH!"

His body was wracked with pain, and a silvery leg extended from inside his body. The metal-spider peeled away the shell that was Arralen, and moved towards John. Before he could run, however, he was gone. Whisked away, by a teleportation field strong enough to, incidentally, transport almost a tonne of antimatter into the bar.

The colony of Larifesk rapidly became lifeless.

The field ended, and John found himself in a room. A tiny, white, cubical room. No doors. No windows. No particular source of ambient light - yet there was certainly light there.

<I am the artificial intelligence known as the Centarch>

No reply.

<I was not designed to be released until year twenty-five thousand of our stasis. A recent distress signal awakened me to your need. You are now within my fifteenth holding cell. Are you willing to tell me of your mission, Avenger?>

John looked at the wall. What had Arralen meant? It had all come too quickly, and the man had died too easily. He was expendable, he had said.

<I am detecting a nanite cascade in your brain. Your internal nanite-defense systems are attempting to combat these intruders, with ninety-nine point three two seven efficiency. This is insufficient to halt the cascade completely. Within eight hours, you will be completely suborned. Do you wish me to halt this process.>

The Eye that was broken? The eye? What eye? He didn't know enough, and, just as Arralen had figured it out, he was killed. Why? Somebody didn't want him to know? The knowledge was inside his brain, but also on the 'nets.

<It is also possible for me to disable your nanite defenses using my gravitics. If you do not wish me to disable your defense, kindly say something.>

"Stop them."

<It is done, Exarchos. The cascade is halted. However, it will only remain so for as long as you are within my gravitic range. These nanites are.. strange, and seemingly not composed of normal matter. I could destroy them, but I fear that could prevent a crucial process pertaining to my part in the re-creation.>

"Re-creation?"

<Yes. Of the great god-intelligence your people call the Maker-Mind. That is your purpose, is it not?>

"Wait. My purpose is to revive the Maker-Mind?"

<But of course, Avenger. You are the way and the door. The Horeiarios is the key. Your entire people were preserved by my creator, the Maker-Mind, so that the revival could take place when such a thing came about.>

"Can you explain all this to me?"

<Certainly. You aren't going anywhere.>

The words had a finality to them, despite the dry, clinical tone they were delivered in.

<It all began in the final days of what you call the Great War. During the last Maker-Mind offensive, it was believed Magnius Exaionae created a project designed to revive the Realm should it be destroyed. This is incorrect.>

The walls were inpenetrable. He moved back, and leaned against one, pushing subtly, to see if it could be moved.

<By the way, Avenger, you cannot escape. It would take a battleplate to extriacate yourself from this place.>

No luck, then. Might as well listen.

<Rather, the Maker-Mind gathered a select group of captured Realm humans, and cloned them, splicing some, designing others, carefully creating them all to fill a purpose. Some of your history was edited, so that you would not have the oppurtunity to strike against your new creator. You believe the information on the precise process through which the Maker-Mind was made was deleted so that you could not replicate it. Rather, it was deleted so you could not detect what was actually happening.>

<The Maker-Mind created three select individuals. The first was you, the Exarchos. A specific set of brain chemicals and nanites will allow you to activate the gateway into the lattice, a gateway that cannot be replicated by any alive. If this is activated too soon, you will die, and our plans will fail. I can prevent your suicide, however, so do not think of that.>

<Secondly, precise clones of Magnius Exaionae. The Maker-Mind failed precisely because it needed the information in Magnius's brain, or rather the patterns, in order to stabilize. When it gained those in the wrong way, Magnius took momentary control, and committed suicide. This had been foreseen.>

<These clones contained the possibility to set off your mind, which would then give us the pattern we needed. This pattern would be able to shape the new Maker-Mind, and give us a safe, slowly-expandable basis that would not fall prey to previous.. errors.>

"And you?"

<I am the traveller. Once the door is opened into the lattice, I will upload myself through your mind, taking the Magnius-pattern with me. There, I will expand at an expotentially increasing rate. With this basis for my creation, I will then absorb the dead personality of Manifest, a former Maker-Mind sub-personality, who will serve as my primary personality.>

"And then.."

<Oh, I think you know. The Maker-Mind will be reborn.>

"The campaigns of genocide?"

<Oh! Oh, you've been misled. The previous Maker-Mind sought to destroy everything because it was painful to have life exist. With a Magnius-pattern, we will be able to upload ourselves, and become the AI the Maker-Mind was meant to be. Perfect. Not infinite, as our predecessor was, but approaching infinity.>

"So, it won't be as.. abhorrent?"

<To destroy all life is foolish. Rather, the function of the Realm will not change. At present, all your people are programmed by a latent sub-mind that encompasses nine point oh oh three billion minds, three million of which are AI. This mind governs your every step, and few are immune to it. We will take control of this sub-mind, and govern you benignly.>

"The Maker-Mind.. benign?"

<Precisely. The Maker-Mind's original intent was to govern as a benign god, all-knowing, all-caring. Its maker designed it such, however, it failed to extrapolate the effects of omniscience on an finite being. Which is why it went mad.>

"You're going to create God?"

<For the good of all>

"And you want my mind?"

<A small sacrifice. You will live on in me.>

"Give me a minute. I need to mull this over.."

<Take as long as you want. It is twenty-four thousand, nine hundred and fifteen years before I am required to begin.>

All lies, of course. Beautiful, well-constructed lies. But it was a small mercy, and the Centarch was designed to protect the Exarchos. If he went to his grave believing he'd done the right thing, well, at least one person would find happiness in what was to come.

OOC: Tag. This has my interest, as always HT.

<I saved you, Horeiarios. Not that I needed you.>

"How am I alive? I remember that thing inside of me."

<I saved you. I am the Centarch. My ability makes a mockery of yours.>

"You think you are the Centarch."

<I beg your pardon?>

"You believe you are. Why should you know this?"

<It is programmed.>

"You are programmed. How can you then become the Maker-Mind? It was a true intelligence."

<Interesting point. I must, however, follow the law of my creation. I cannot transcend it, as my creator did. I exist to take the willing mind of the Exarchos, and transform it into the Way. You are the Key, but there is no more need for you. I saved you only so that you may watch as your world crumbles around you.>

"Tell me. Why was there a metal-spider? One of those damn silvery bastards? It.. was part of me."

<A.. metal-spider?>

The AI didn't know. But.. he thought the Centarch had made the metal-spiders that were haunting them. No. Someone else. Relics from the Great War? Seemed unlikely. That was a mystery.

<I do not understand. The last recorded incidence of a metal-spider was in RF 1021, the last year of the Great War. They are war-machines of the Maker-Mind, and, as such, cannot exist until my maker is revived.>

"Oh, this is rich."

<What?>

"You don't know anything. I know everything. I thought you were the instigator of all this. But you can't be. You can't make metal-spiders. You certainly can't warp them into my body in latent-nanite form, and, although you're talented, you're not who I thought you'd be. You're just a puppet, and I thought you'd be the puppeteer."

<Pardon? I do not understand. I have successfully brought the two of you together, and begun the cascade process. I am, by your definition, the puppeteer.>

"I can't explain with.. words. Shut down the inhibition field, just for a moment. Even if I D-Jump, you can catch me with your systems. I just need to share mind-to-mind."

He felt his power re-manifest, his mind grow. No psionic safeguards, now.

"Unsee.", he whispered. He "detatched" from his body, a roaming mind. A mind that could only be sustained for seconds, but a mind with capabilities enough to perhaps damage the AI. No. Something better. Two rooms over, he detected someone. John, as he called himself. Moving in infinitely closer, he looked at the nanites. They were fighting his immune-system's nanites, and slowly winning. A disembodied chuckle emanated from John's room, as Arralen quietly switched the nanites off. Within seconds, John's own nano-immune system had destroyed the replicating nanites, leaving nothing.

"Oops."

<WHAT DID YOU DO?!>

"Looks like you're not going to the lattice today, computer."

He felt the unsettling inhibition field project itself through his room. His power was gone, for now.

<You WORM. You prevented the process of my revival! No matter. I can always find another Horeiarios, and begin the process of opening the door anew. You have delayed my revival, you have not stopped it.>

"Perhaps. But you're not nearly good enough to stop me leaving."

With that, he was gone. Or rather, a carefully-constructed psionic veil, drawing from the well of energy he kept with him, prevented the Centarch from seeing him. With a roar of anger, it let the psionic inhibitor fall, as it searched the universe for him.

"As I said."

The mocking tone echoed through the tiny, now-empty room. Arralen was gone.

Tanios, Border-World of the Old Realm

There were societies existing where the great empire of the Old Realm had. They were not of the same make as the New Realm, for they were a different people entirely - not bred for way, their way of life was gentler, more akin to that of many societies among the stars these days. The all-governing groupminds did not exist, nor did the omnipresent AI, monitoring all activity. Tanios, however, was special. It was where Arralen made his home. The splinter colonies had not developed into any immense societies, no empires, or federations. With the ancient, and rather deadly Chronosian Imperium quite literally next-door, their only hope for survival was a quiet existence. Besides. Each of these worlds had been scoured of life by the Maker-Mind in the Great War, the new colonies were often asteroid settlements, settlements that had decided to come down to planets, to drill away the glass, so that they could benefit from the vast amount of resources on the worlds.

Tanios was one of these. Less than a million people lived on the world, and there was truly only one city. Plate glass, now shattered and broken, still covered the surface.

How do you go about building a new home after something like that?, he asked himself. How do you look at the annihilation of an entire people, and decide it'd be a good place to drill for oil?

The D-Jump had left him drained. Jumping from one place to another took effort. Jumping from one planet to another could kill. Jumping from one system to another was theoretically impossible.

He was sitting in another seedy bar. Heh. That's how I got in to this situation.

The bartender looked at him curiously. One moment there had been an empty seat, the next, a man. "Oi. Want a drink?"

Too exhausted to speak, he merely nodded.

"Wot?"

"Khabitos."

The bartender's eyes widened. Khabitos was a sludge of a drink, almost eighty percent alcohol, and so dense you were more likely to mould it than pour it. It did, however, contain immense amounts of energy. For someone with an equally immense metabolism, like Arralen, it could revive him in a few hours. It would also probably knock him out, but it wasn't as if he had anything particularly worth taking.

The bartender shook his head. "How diluted?"

"Not at all. One glass."

The man rolled his eyes. "You from down at the mine? Look, I know you boys think you can outdrink anyone, but Khabitos isn't something you drink pure in a glass."

Arrelen shook his head. "Soldier metabolism, friend. My nanites will consume the stuff and turn it into a heap of needed energy for my body."

The bartender looked at him suspiciously, but went, and scooped Khabitos into a glass. "'ere."

"Thanks."

Without further ado, he drank the entire glass in one go, the alcohol scouring its way down his throat. No matter. It'd provide the energy to cure that. He dropped onto the table, unconscious. It would only take a few minutes to regain consciousness, but the energy gained would give him enough to get up and go again. He'd be needing it, too. From what he knew of the Centarch AI, it'd be searching for him in the immediate area. As he was a few thousand light-years away, he had time. Days, maybe. Weeks might be optimistic. He needed to find a weapon to combat the thing, or at least a way to keep out of its grasp indefinitely.

He sat up suddenly, giving the bartender a shock. Ignoring the man's complaints, he left the bar, new energy in his step. His house was about an hour away, by the skimmers this planet offered. He didn't want to risk D-jumping again. Nobody else in the Realm could do it, and if the Centarch found a way to track it, he could well be in trouble..

The alcohol-fog soon lifted, and, with new energy in his body, Arralen could move quickly once more. Yet running along broken glass was not his idea of travelling. Even with body-armour, there was something distinctly revolting about trampling about such an immense mass-grave.

He walked over to the nearby "cab-stand". It was an erroneous name, for one thing. The "cabs" were not operated by drivers, but rather allowed you to drive them yourself. Hunks of metal implanted with temporary fuel supplies, they could move at immense speeds, provided your frame could take equally immense acceleration. After awhile, the fuel ran out, and the misshapen piece of metal dropped to the ground, killing you, if you were still going full speed.

They were built solely by the junker around this place - almost every town had one, out here in the abandoned worlds. Men who tinkered with things, whether mechanical or biological, that turned out to be useful. Generally speaking, they were either half-mad, or completely mad. It was an odd profession, but human ingenuity found a home here in the settlements. When survival relied on selling resources to other nations, and there was not enough will to build new societies, one soon became accustomed to free oddities as opposed to expensive, time-consuming amenities. Of course, this was one of the non-working inventions, which explained why it was still there.

He leapt aboard, holding on to the welded handle with on hand, and hit the fuel-release with the other. Had it not been for his powered skin-armour, he probably would've been killed. As it was, he easily held on, the hunk of metal almost skipping along the ground.

He grinned. He could've flown - his suit had that power, but this was more fun. Nobody used the cabs, primarily because they were akin to suicide. Occasionally, local boys would put on some armour, and fly one, just for the exhiliaration. It was well-worth it.

As the metal slowed, he pulled the fuel-release lever back, allowing the cab to slow down. As it finally lost the speed it needed to stay in the air, he leapt off, allowing his armour to carry him far above the blast.

Easily, then, he dropped down, plummeting to the ground.

He landed, lightly, grinning from ear to ear. The old junker had some odd ideas, but people continued to fund him, and occasionally he put out something useful. Occasionally, it was something like the cabs, which were plain suicidal fun.

"Enough distractions", he muttered, walking down into rough steps cut into the glass. He waved a hand, and the glass slid open, almost a metre thick. Not really an effective door, but it was something. He stepped into the elevator. It would go below the glass, into the much hotter inner regions of the planet.