The Machine in the Garden of Eden
This story was written for a Science Fiction Challenge, on the subject of cyborgs ... 1408 words.
*
Those who say the body and soul are different have neither. - Oscar Wilde
* * * * *
Emma knelt in the chapel in the Monastery of the Desert Fathers, head bowed. Ending her prayer, she looked up at the large crucifix that hung on the wall behind the altar. So authentically human, she thought, tracing with her gaze the lines of the body on the cross ... and, of course, divine.
"Emma?"
Standing, she turned to see Father Jared striding down the aisle towards her, his black cassock swirling in his wake. He seemed worried and her sense of foreboding increased. "Is something wrong, Father?"
When he reached her, the priest placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder. "No. Well, nothing new, anyway. It's just that we don't have much time."
The young woman nodded and searched the priest's face to remind herself of why they had to leave this place, the only home she'd ever known ... Father Jared bore an uneven scar that ran from the front of his right ear, past his temple and under his dark ruffled hair - the result of an inexpert effort to remove his cranial-jack. The rest of his body bore similar signs of augmentation reversal. She gently touched his sleeve where the pale tip of a stump protruded. "Do you miss it?" she asked.
Jared hesitated, then smiled. "My cybernetic hand? Nope. It was like having a Swiss army knife sprouting from the end of my wrist. I still have it around here somewhere - I use it to pull corks from bottles of sacramental wine."
His smile faded as a loud thumping reached them from the front of the monastery. "The Cybernetic Community. I didn't expect them this soon. The doors should hold them for a while, but we'd better hurry."
"Wait, Father." Reluctant to leave the peace of the chapel, Emma plied the priest with questions. "What will CyberCom do to us if ... if they find us? Will they truly steal our souls?"
Impatient, he replied, "The short answer is yes. Now, let's go."
Refusing to move, Emma demanded the long answer, and with a sigh, Jared gave in. "Okay ... people have always wondered if the soul truly exists, and if so, where it resides. Does it dwell within the body or the consciousness? Those questions were answered when physical augmentation and neural interfacing became mandatory at infancy. The soul seems a result of being wholly human." Jared held up his stump. "I've learned from personal experience that if one surrenders too much of body or mind to the machine, one can lose the ability to encounter the living God. Now, can we get the hell out of here?"
Nodding, Emma gave him her hand and they ran from the chapel.
* * * * *
Tom stepped out from behind a heavy chapel tapestry where he'd hidden while Father Jared and Emma conversed. He felt a twinge of guilt at having betrayed them and the others to CyberCom but he rationalized the remorse away as he walked toward the front of the monastery and the heavy doors that held back his saviors - the cyborgs.
Like Emma and the other children at the remote monastery, he'd been raised here since infancy, "rescued" from the Cybernetic Community. Except that he hadn't wanted to be rescued. For as long as he could remember, he'd been fascinated by technology and his dream had always been to join CyberCom. While the other kids had played or done homework, he'd been down in the bowels of the sub-basement, building and using a jury-rigged net connection made with stolen parts. It wasn't the same as jacking-in, wet-wiring, but even so, the sensation was powerful, compelling. When he'd learned that the priests planned to move them all to a safer location via a series of underground tunnels, his need for a more complete cybernetic experience had driven him to divulge everything to CyberCom.
Tom stood before the huge monastery doors, their thick steel-reinforced timbers barely vibrating under the onslaught from without. Once again he felt a stab of conscience. It wasn't that he harbored any animosity toward the priests who'd raised him ... they'd been responsible, kind ... but they were holding him back from a union with something greater than himself - the Community. He thought of Father Jared's words to Emma ... about encountering the living God ... maybe if he'd ever ... but, no. With a mental apology and farewell to those who'd been a family to him, Tom unlocked the doors.
* * * * *
Father Jared herded the group of children and the two elderly priests down into the darkness of the sub-basement, to the junction with the tunnel system. Emma, the eldest, comforted the other children as they navigated the narrow dripping passages with flashlights. As they traversed the dank corridors, the steady thundering of CyberCom against the monastery doors accompanied them. When they finally reached the heavy iron door that opened into the tunnels, Jared removed a key on a chain from around his neck. He unlocked the ancient portal and it took all of his strength to pull it open, its unused hinges squealing eerily. Fathers Edwin and William passed through first and then the children, Jared checking each with his light as they passed. Only then did he realize that Tom was not among them.
"I'm going back up to find Tom," he said to Father Edwin. "If I'm not back in ..."
Everyone froze in place, the sudden silence deafening in its implications. Jared felt his chest tighten ... the cyborgs had broken through. Everyone had passed beyond the iron portal now but himself. He leaned through and hugged those he could reach, then began to push closed the heavy door. When the others understood his intent, they protested, but they hadn't the strength to stop him and he refused to listen. As the door thudded shut, Jared locked it and then, with a final effort, broke the key off in the mechanism. He'd be damned if the cyborgs would pass this way.
The priest's thoughts then turned again to Tom and he ran back up through the tunnels ... with luck, there was still time to save the boy. Just as Father Jared reached the upper floors, hordes of cybernetically enhanced individuals overwhelmed him. Some continued down into the tunnels and the rest pressed against him, carrying him out into the cool air of the desert evening. Through it all, an ominous unnatural silence reigned, the cyborgs communing with each other in a way more immediate than speech. Some of them held him down against the slate tiles of the monastery's portico, their augmented strength more than a match for Jared's desperate struggles.
The familiarity of his situation did nothing to assuage Jared's horror but rather increased it. Memories of his last contact with CyberCom, memories of the loss of his most intimate self, threatened to crowd out his last shreds of composure. Those members of the Cybernetic Community not holding him seemed to melt away as one individual approached with what looked like a pistol. The priest recognized the cranial-jack auto-loader and it took his every resources to fight down his panic.
* * * * *
Tom leaned against the outer wall of the monastery, distractedly watching as Father Jared was brought once more into the Community. His own cranial-jack had been implanted just ten minutes earlier and he was still being tossed to and fro on the heady wash of so many other's thoughts, feelings. His mind cringed away from the invasive nature of the the Community ... he'd had no idea that an organizing element would be forced upon him in his vulnerability or that he'd be so open, exposed, to any and all. Nothing seemed as he'd expected.
Just as Tom began to despair, he felt the soothing touch of a familiar consciousness - Father Jared. How beautiful that mind was in its warmth and integrity ... Tom felt himself grow calm, relaxed. As he did so, he became aware of something unexpected. And he was not the only one to do so ... connected through every thought and feeling, t he whole of the Cybernetic Community gazed as with one stunned eye at what Father Jared's past experiences allowed them to absorb ... the felt presence of God.
* * * * *
Emma knelt in the chapel of St. John's Abbey, a prayer for Tom and Father Jared on her lips. As she turned her gaze to the one she loved on the crucifix, she had the feeling her prayer had been answered.
#
*
Those who say the body and soul are different have neither. - Oscar Wilde
* * * * *
Emma knelt in the chapel in the Monastery of the Desert Fathers, head bowed. Ending her prayer, she looked up at the large crucifix that hung on the wall behind the altar. So authentically human, she thought, tracing with her gaze the lines of the body on the cross ... and, of course, divine.
"Emma?"
Standing, she turned to see Father Jared striding down the aisle towards her, his black cassock swirling in his wake. He seemed worried and her sense of foreboding increased. "Is something wrong, Father?"
When he reached her, the priest placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder. "No. Well, nothing new, anyway. It's just that we don't have much time."
The young woman nodded and searched the priest's face to remind herself of why they had to leave this place, the only home she'd ever known ... Father Jared bore an uneven scar that ran from the front of his right ear, past his temple and under his dark ruffled hair - the result of an inexpert effort to remove his cranial-jack. The rest of his body bore similar signs of augmentation reversal. She gently touched his sleeve where the pale tip of a stump protruded. "Do you miss it?" she asked.
Jared hesitated, then smiled. "My cybernetic hand? Nope. It was like having a Swiss army knife sprouting from the end of my wrist. I still have it around here somewhere - I use it to pull corks from bottles of sacramental wine."
His smile faded as a loud thumping reached them from the front of the monastery. "The Cybernetic Community. I didn't expect them this soon. The doors should hold them for a while, but we'd better hurry."
"Wait, Father." Reluctant to leave the peace of the chapel, Emma plied the priest with questions. "What will CyberCom do to us if ... if they find us? Will they truly steal our souls?"
Impatient, he replied, "The short answer is yes. Now, let's go."
Refusing to move, Emma demanded the long answer, and with a sigh, Jared gave in. "Okay ... people have always wondered if the soul truly exists, and if so, where it resides. Does it dwell within the body or the consciousness? Those questions were answered when physical augmentation and neural interfacing became mandatory at infancy. The soul seems a result of being wholly human." Jared held up his stump. "I've learned from personal experience that if one surrenders too much of body or mind to the machine, one can lose the ability to encounter the living God. Now, can we get the hell out of here?"
Nodding, Emma gave him her hand and they ran from the chapel.
* * * * *
Tom stepped out from behind a heavy chapel tapestry where he'd hidden while Father Jared and Emma conversed. He felt a twinge of guilt at having betrayed them and the others to CyberCom but he rationalized the remorse away as he walked toward the front of the monastery and the heavy doors that held back his saviors - the cyborgs.
Like Emma and the other children at the remote monastery, he'd been raised here since infancy, "rescued" from the Cybernetic Community. Except that he hadn't wanted to be rescued. For as long as he could remember, he'd been fascinated by technology and his dream had always been to join CyberCom. While the other kids had played or done homework, he'd been down in the bowels of the sub-basement, building and using a jury-rigged net connection made with stolen parts. It wasn't the same as jacking-in, wet-wiring, but even so, the sensation was powerful, compelling. When he'd learned that the priests planned to move them all to a safer location via a series of underground tunnels, his need for a more complete cybernetic experience had driven him to divulge everything to CyberCom.
Tom stood before the huge monastery doors, their thick steel-reinforced timbers barely vibrating under the onslaught from without. Once again he felt a stab of conscience. It wasn't that he harbored any animosity toward the priests who'd raised him ... they'd been responsible, kind ... but they were holding him back from a union with something greater than himself - the Community. He thought of Father Jared's words to Emma ... about encountering the living God ... maybe if he'd ever ... but, no. With a mental apology and farewell to those who'd been a family to him, Tom unlocked the doors.
* * * * *
Father Jared herded the group of children and the two elderly priests down into the darkness of the sub-basement, to the junction with the tunnel system. Emma, the eldest, comforted the other children as they navigated the narrow dripping passages with flashlights. As they traversed the dank corridors, the steady thundering of CyberCom against the monastery doors accompanied them. When they finally reached the heavy iron door that opened into the tunnels, Jared removed a key on a chain from around his neck. He unlocked the ancient portal and it took all of his strength to pull it open, its unused hinges squealing eerily. Fathers Edwin and William passed through first and then the children, Jared checking each with his light as they passed. Only then did he realize that Tom was not among them.
"I'm going back up to find Tom," he said to Father Edwin. "If I'm not back in ..."
Everyone froze in place, the sudden silence deafening in its implications. Jared felt his chest tighten ... the cyborgs had broken through. Everyone had passed beyond the iron portal now but himself. He leaned through and hugged those he could reach, then began to push closed the heavy door. When the others understood his intent, they protested, but they hadn't the strength to stop him and he refused to listen. As the door thudded shut, Jared locked it and then, with a final effort, broke the key off in the mechanism. He'd be damned if the cyborgs would pass this way.
The priest's thoughts then turned again to Tom and he ran back up through the tunnels ... with luck, there was still time to save the boy. Just as Father Jared reached the upper floors, hordes of cybernetically enhanced individuals overwhelmed him. Some continued down into the tunnels and the rest pressed against him, carrying him out into the cool air of the desert evening. Through it all, an ominous unnatural silence reigned, the cyborgs communing with each other in a way more immediate than speech. Some of them held him down against the slate tiles of the monastery's portico, their augmented strength more than a match for Jared's desperate struggles.
The familiarity of his situation did nothing to assuage Jared's horror but rather increased it. Memories of his last contact with CyberCom, memories of the loss of his most intimate self, threatened to crowd out his last shreds of composure. Those members of the Cybernetic Community not holding him seemed to melt away as one individual approached with what looked like a pistol. The priest recognized the cranial-jack auto-loader and it took his every resources to fight down his panic.
* * * * *
Tom leaned against the outer wall of the monastery, distractedly watching as Father Jared was brought once more into the Community. His own cranial-jack had been implanted just ten minutes earlier and he was still being tossed to and fro on the heady wash of so many other's thoughts, feelings. His mind cringed away from the invasive nature of the the Community ... he'd had no idea that an organizing element would be forced upon him in his vulnerability or that he'd be so open, exposed, to any and all. Nothing seemed as he'd expected.
Just as Tom began to despair, he felt the soothing touch of a familiar consciousness - Father Jared. How beautiful that mind was in its warmth and integrity ... Tom felt himself grow calm, relaxed. As he did so, he became aware of something unexpected. And he was not the only one to do so ... connected through every thought and feeling, t he whole of the Cybernetic Community gazed as with one stunned eye at what Father Jared's past experiences allowed them to absorb ... the felt presence of God.
* * * * *
Emma knelt in the chapel of St. John's Abbey, a prayer for Tom and Father Jared on her lips. As she turned her gaze to the one she loved on the crucifix, she had the feeling her prayer had been answered.
#
posted by crystal | 8:18 PM
<< Home