The Transcension of the Naturals — Chapter 10: The Undiscovered Country
A science fiction novel set in Berkeley 100 years in the future
Clark heard Harlan’s voice in his head. Clark, Yeehaw!!! We did it! Now we can hop out of these minds we’re riding and back to the Eternity Center where we can meet up with Charrington since he has transcended. Create a gravidoor to connect you back to the labs so we can join them soon. You know how to create a gravidoor, right? I’ll meet you there.
Charrington put the transducer helmet down, stood up, and turned around to see Ursula walking over to him quickly. He looked around but the room was empty except for the two of them. “Hey, where did everyone else go? I hope I didn’t scare them off.”
Ursula sounded very insistent when she spoke: “Mr. Chairman, we’d both better sit down for a moment. I think we need to discuss a few things right away.” Though Charrington looked puzzled he nevertheless hesitantly followed virtual Ursula’s suggestion to sit down on the bed, but before either of them could say another word, the gravidoor swung open, and in walked Charrington’s wife, Isabella.
Charrington shot to his feet, his mouth dropped open and he tried to speak but no words came out of his mouth; his eyes opened very wide and a long moment passed as he stared at her. Slowly you could see the idea that he had transcended work its way through his facial expressions in real time. Isabella walked over to her husband, closed his mouth, and gave her husband a long, slow hug. He appeared to be in shock and stood stiff and still while she hugged him, his mouth dropping open again. His wife released him, closed his mouth again, helped her husband sit down, and finally sat down next to him with Ursula on the other side.
Then Charrington did something he never did in front of others: he took off his trademark black hat, stared inside it for a moment, and then put it beside the transducer helmet in a most careful and poignant way. He patted it like a good dog.
Several long moments passed in silence until the door opened again and in walked Harlan. He surveyed the situation and walked over to Charrington. Before the door closed completely, it swung open a second time and Clark tried to walk in, but ended up crashing in a pile on the floor. “Damn gravidoors…” Clark complained. He picked himself up and joined Harlan.
Harlan stepped forward. “So tell me Chairman Charrington, how does it feel to be a Transcendent? Oh but wait, maybe the procedure didn’t work, right? I wonder, how can we know if this is the real you and not some low rez computer AI simulation? Maybe we could perform a test of some kind to see if your transcension worked… Yeah, that’s what we should do. How about if we perform the Charrington Test right now? You did want to perform an inspection today, right? And if we’re not convinced it’s the real you, the real Chairman Charrington, we’ll terminate your backup ass. How does that sound to you?”
Charrington dropped his head, taking it all in, his wife Isabella’s arm around him, patting his shoulder. She spoke up for him. “Now guys, let’s be easy on my husband. This is quite a shock for him. You remember how we all had to get used to transcension and learn the ropes? He doesn’t even know what a gravidoor is yet.” She looked over at Clark and smiled.
Charrington slowly stood up again and surveyed the room around him looking at Harlan, Clark, and Ursula one at a time, then over to his black hat, and finally, he let his gaze rest on Isabella. Everything looked so vivid, so alive. “Isabella, is that really you? I…I… I’m not sure this is really me,” he croaked. “Where am I? Am I in hell? Who am I?” He sat down again, completely overwhelmed. “This isn’t me. This Charrington would fail his own test.” He shook his head.
“Yes darling, this is your Isabella. And you are my husband. Do you remember the day we met at UCLA when we were just kids? At the end of your sophomore year, you asked me if I’d care to join you on a drive up to Alaska. Do you remember that? I will never forget that trip.”
Charrington thought back to their secret adventure together, that no one knew about except the two of them. “Yes Isabella, that was such a fabulous trip, especially the part where I got arrested for speeding by the cops when they caught me going 160 mph up Highway 5! Do you remember that?”
“Yes, of course, the cops pulled us over and arrested you, but it was 210 mph, not 160 mph. I had to drive your car over to the police station to bail you out, with my cat Chloe going along for the ride. I remember waiting in the police station with this totally sexy outfit on, leopard tights, tight black top, heels, and Chloe on a leash with a rhinestone collar. I think I charmed the pants off those Hicksville police so much they decided to let you out of jail.”
Charrington looked into his wife’s eyes remembering that adventure fondly, and then suddenly realized that he recognized the same spark of love in those eyes that he remembered from so many years ago. “My god Isabella, this is you, isn’t it? Forgive me for doubting you, but this is all so new for me.”
Charrington finally gave his wife a real hug, finding all the curves and bulges of her body exactly as he remembered them, only more so. He gave her a kiss that lingered a bit too long for public consumption. Isabella whispered into his ear, “I’ve been waiting for you, my darling, for too many years.”
“Get a room guys,” said Harlan. “Charrington, we will not let you go forward with your plot to unplug Eternity Labs. We figured if we brought you over here with your wife, maybe you’d see things from our point of view and change your mind. So what do you think, are you still ready to pull the plug?”
Another Clark was sitting at the Starry Plough bar in Berkeley and had just completed a backup, about to go on an adventure to Sol Station. This Clark heard a voice in his head. Backup restored. An extremely powerful solar flare terminated your previous life while you were on Sol Station and so your consciousness has been restored from the most recent backup you made. This Clark shook his head to gather his thoughts and looked over to ask George what happened, but George Orgood was no longer sitting next to him. Instead, a stranger was in his seat looking right at him. His eyes opened wide.
“Who are you? What happened to George?” asked Clark.
“Clark, my name is Harlan. Your backup just got restored because the Eternity Center thought your consciousness ended when Sol Station was vaporized by Saul. Believe it or not, that’s the easy part to explain. The hard part to explain is that something happened that’s not supposed to happen: there is, right now, another older Clark walking around with more experience than you, who met me at Sol Station. You have to decide if you want to merge your limited experiences from the time you were just restored here, back into the older Clark who you’re about to meet.”
Clark’s eyes popped wide open and his jaw dropped open. Things were moving too fast for Clark. “You mean there are two Clarks walking around Scen City at the same time? I’m not sure I’m ready to meet myself. I mean what if I don’t like him…me…us?”
Harlan put a paternal hand on Clark’s shoulder and replied, “We’re both in the same boat, sailing towards the same undiscovered country. I think you’ll like the older Clark. I know I do.”
Harlan looked over to the exit of the Starry Plough. “I’m going to create a gravidoor for us to go back to the Eternity Center and join up with our other selves. Follow me.”
Charrington looked like he was about to reply when the door swung open and in walked Harlan, followed by Clark, again. This Clark nailed the gravidoor landing. Two Harlans and two Clarks were now in the room. Everyone froze. The two Clarks stared at each other, as did the two Harlans. The new Harlan and Clark were the copies automatically reactivated from the last backup when Saul destroyed Sol Station.
The two Harlans seemed engaged in a staring contest, until one of them broke the ice. “Harlan,” the new Harlan said to the original, older Harlan, “Since I was just reactivated from our backup and you are the elder Harlan, I’ll leave us in your capable hands going forward. But before I go and suffer the little death, allow me this soliloquy,” he said bowing down in a dramatic way. He cleared his throat and then began:
The undiscovered country from whose bourn
No traveler returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
And with that, he bowed again and then popped out of existence with a slight audible popping sound. And then there was only one Harlan in the room who said, “Agreeable chap. He could have chosen to merge his memories into me but instead, he terminated himself.”
Charrington seemed to come out of his shock enough to ask a pointed question. “Harlan, are you suggesting one of these Clarks commit suicide too? Doesn’t he deserve to exist as a sentient being? Doesn’t he have rights too?”
The older Clark replied. “Charrington you crack me up. First, you want to kill all us Transcendents by unplugging Eternity Labs computers and now you’re worried about an old backup you don’t even know? How did you ever get that position of Chairman of The Federal Bureau of Transcension being so ignorant about the basics of Transcension?”
The younger Clark asked, “What will it feel like when I… when I… you know, when I die?”
Harlan and the older Clark replied in unison: “The Little Death!” and they both laughed. The older Clark continued. “You don’t have to self-terminate. We can merge instead, combining our memories. But since you were just reactivated from a backup, there’s not much you’ve experienced that I haven’t other than coming over here. If you want to self-terminate like the younger Harlan just did, I can tell you I just went through this little death right before we came down here from Sol Station. You will feel this intense feeling, a little bit like you’re having an orgasm, and then you’re gone and you won’t even know it. Of course, I’ll still be here to carry on our good name.”
“It’s ironic,” said the younger Clark to the older. “You’ll never know.”
“What’s that little brother?”
“You know how our whole life we’ve wanted an older brother? It’s just a little sad that I’ll be the only one who gets to experience a big brother, if only for a few minutes, and then I’ll be gone and you’ll never know what it’s like.”
At that moment both Clarks came together and gave each other a hug, a big, tight, Tynee style hug. As they were each patting the other on the back, the younger Clark faded out of existence with a slight popping sound, leaving only one Clark standing in the room, awkwardly grasping at open air. He straightened up slowly and looked around. “You know I’m going to miss that little guy…”
Chapter 11 coming soon…
