Inform. Addicts

  Inform. Addicts

  By Joshua Wilkinson

  Twitter:@JoshuaWilkinjp

  Self-Published. Copyright © 2015 by Joshua Wilkinson. All Rights Reserved.

  Cover Image Credits

  Book cover photo - Dariusz 'Nivelis' Mysłowski

  Model and costume - Ewa 'Santa Evita' Barylińska

  Photo shoot - 'Cyberpunk', Pospolite Ruszenie Fotograficzne

  To enjoy further works of science fiction art like this e-book’s cover image, please check out http://www.deviantart.com/

  “What information consumes is rather obvious: it consumes the attention of its recipients. Hence a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention, and a need to allocate that attention efficiently among the overabundance of information sources that might consume it.”

  -Herbert Simon

  Stratum 1: “Tears for Abaddon”

  A thick fog blanketed the area surrounding the Louisissippi State Penitentiary, most of its opaque body composed of rogue nanomachines that had once controlled rain patterns in Texas, before the cyberattacks of the Third World War made the continent into a holy mess. Now these cloud combers were merely trinkets from a bygone era, an age before the New American Republic. Father Pahaliah did not dwell on the results of hubris that now swirled past his window, a nanome supported by mind boggling symbiotic relationships and feedback loops.

  The Jumbee 344 cyclocopter that carried the priest towards the prison was piloted by two particularly foul mouthed Escorts, and though he did not care for these acquaintances, Escorts were the only ones allowed in the skies these days. As a thalassocracy that merely remained a part of the NAR for the sake of military protection, Louisissippi had very strict borders by land. Its shores, particularly around Neo Orleans, were the most crowded areas, and Pahaliah needed to get to the penitentiary quickly if he was to have his conversation with Garth Abaddon before the man’s execution. Even if he hated hearing God’s name abused by those miscreants, he would have had to put up with more of it if he took a boat full of swearing sailors into a Neo Orleans entrepôt.

  “Thank you for flying with Kim and Calix’s air service,” the copilot said from the cockpit’s speakers. “We may not bear you as well as angels’ wings, but we have helluva a lot better scenery.”

  Pahaliah tried not to look at the nude photos pinned up all along the inside of the cyclocopter’s interior. When the door to the aircraft opened and he was given the okay to exit, he could swear he barely heard the pilot’s laughter over the deafening roar of the rotors. The holy man clutched the stannic briefcase in his hands tightly.

  “Father Pahaliah I presume?” a squat man with a conspicuous cyborg eye shouted above the noise.

  “Yes, and you must be Jago?”

  “Correct. I’m here to see that you are guided successfully throughout the prison and treated with the respect you deserve.”

  The priest kept his smile internalized, since letting his pleasure in the authority granted by a republic with a theocratic legal system show visibly would not be very humble. His breathing mask, for the area had more dangerous materials than nanomachines floating around in its atmosphere, had the emblem of the Judicial Church, or the other J.C. as some liked to joke, stamped on the end of its snout. Pahaliah liked to think of the cross with its double halos as a talisman against not only demons, but also harmful bacteria in this context.

  After passing rows of police tanks, tankettes and hovercraft, the two men strolled through the bullet proof glass doors in the entranceway and approached the welcome desk. A burly man with a handlebar mustache sat behind it and leaned towards a computer monitor in an eyeball frying proximity.

  “Kolibri, Father Pahaliah has arrived,” Jago said with a rather harsh intonation in his voice.

  A smile crept onto the priest’s lips, and he wished that he could see Jago’s face at that moment, as the man stood in front of him, his expression impossible to read. Pahaliah could swear that he saw the “receptionist,” he had a hard time thinking of the gruff Escort this way, sweep a hand grenade into his desk drawer.

  “The GREENLINE race is on,” Kolibri answered with a growl. “Keve Lozano is leading the pack…the nasty foreign bastard.”

  “Kolibri!” Jago’s voice broke.

  “Don’t get your prick in a knot,” Kolibri replied and pushed a button on his console. A heavy metallic door across the room opened with a shudder.

  Jago gave an exasperated sigh before leading his charge to the station’s finest private meeting room. Pahaliah assumed it was anyway, since it smelled less like sweaty bodies than the rest of the station, including the lobby. The chair in which he set his thin body even had comfort adjustment settings. The priest wondered if it had been brought from Jago’s office, just for him. A glass divider ran the length of the room, though its presence did not fully relieve Pahaliah, as a permanent blood stain was visible on the prisoner’s side of the barrier.

  “We thought it wise to bring Abaddon in after you were settled, since this will put you in a position of power from the get go,” Jago spoke encouragingly. “Here’s a uni for the communicator.” He handed his guest a small verdant coin.

  Pahaliah inwardly cringed at the term uni, which was a shortening of “universal credit.” At least he had not referred to the currency as UC; pronounced “uck” like so many teenagers seemed to do these days.

  “You charge people for talking to prisoners? What about their lawyers?”

  Jago smiled. “We all have to make money in this crazy world in one way or another.”

  The priest shivered at the discussion of money, something he thought himself above, most likely because the state provided him with everything he could ever need. Sliding the coin into the designated slot, he exhaled and gained his composure as the communicator showed a green light. A few seconds later, the handcuffed prisoner was ushered into the room by a wheeled, autonomous Escort with a sonic cannon trained on his head.

  “Good day to you Father Pahaliah,” Abaddon said and took a seat. The sound of ankle restraints clicking into place followed shortly.

  “I am sure you know why I am here today,” the priest said.

  “Oh yes, of course. Nothing would look better than for a ‘war criminal’ to convert to the state religion just before his execution, and who else to send for such a task than the Fabric’s most cherished religious authority?” Abaddon had a mouth like the orifice on a VHS player.

  Chafing at the term Fabric, Pahaliah tried not to let his displeasure with such a trivial matter show outwardly. As an individual who remembered the old terminology, the days when Internet was the established phraseology and this form of digital interconnection was mediated solely through devices external to the human brain, Father Pahaliah did not appreciate the new changes as much as he let on. Certainly, the Fabric gave him the opportunity to reach more people, but that did not mean he had to like the system.

  “Yes, I am here to answer all your questions about God, the afterlife, this life…”

  “Look, let’s cut to the chase.” Abaddon yawned and scratched his shaved head. “They are serving some tube grown wubb as my last meal, and I don’t want to miss it.”

  “Do you know that you are a sinner, and that you must accept Christ to be saved?”

  Abaddon grinned this time. “It depends on what you call sin Father. After all, there is very little I did during the war that you did not do yourself. You were an interrogator stationed in Hidaj, right? With a specialization in understanding the Muslim mindset, you had the tools to elicit more information from our enemies.

  Not a muscle in Pahaliah’s face twitched. He knew that a man of such a reprobate mind would not miss the opportunity to call a religious individual’s past into question.
>
  “Well, I did not betray my nation, or my God.” He fixed the prisoner with an iron gaze.

  “Would you believe me if I told you that I did not sell those secrets to the Russo-Sino-Iranian Alliance? Is it really so hard to believe that I was set up by the very people I spent thirty years slaving for?”

  “Oh I am sure there is a perfect conspiracy to explain away your incarceration.” The priest smiled slightly.

  “The funny thing is that there are perfect conspiracies everywhere.” Abaddon’s grin was neither slight nor pleasant. I used to be the guy who designed and implemented them, remember? Take what I was just watching on the telesight before they brought me out here – a sitcom. See people think that the term ‘sitcom’ is short for ‘situational comedy,’ but it really stands for ‘sitting communication,’ as it was the first genre to fulfill this role.

  As it became more abundantly clear that leisure time mattered to modern man, the sitcom became the perfect way to understand the idle individual. ‘Which program would John or Jane Doe want to watch in their free time?’ experts would ask. ‘What values do they wish to have reinforced through entertainment?’ Now our telesights even have built in cameras to detect what mood one is in and what program is recommended. Just remember next time that you are sitting around watching a televangelist program that men and women like me are learning everything about you, and as a bonus, communicating to you what values we want reinforced in the American public.”

  He tried hard not to, but Father Pahaliah laughed openly. Perhaps he wished to feel less awkward in a conversation with a member of the FSO (Federal Surveillance Organization). Perhaps the thought of such a sinner implying that he knew so much about the population made him even more uncomfortable. Surely such intrusive surveillance was God’s right and not man’s.

  “Speaking of the telesight, my favorite show is coming on fairly soon, and I would like to watch one last episode before they hang me. Surely you’ve heard of Schadenfreude?”

  “That’s the one with embarrassing and painful videos of people in accidents, right?” Pahaliah asked.

  “Yes, it makes absolutely no sense to me why watching others’ pain should entertain me, but I am glad at least that I am not the only one with this sadistic nature. Truth be told, we all have this dark side, even you Father.” Abaddon licked his lips when he said this.

  “We are all of a fallen nature.” The priest took on a more serious expression. “But thankfully, we can be redeemed by…”

  “By the same kind of power that allowed me to spend years brainwashing kids to serve their government?” Abaddon looked at Jago with a sinister grin, but the man had his attention focused on a Megaminx he had brought with him, the puzzle managing to thwart his solutions.

  “The NAR certainly appreciates the lengths you took to protect freedom and democracy throughout the…”

  “I tortured over a dozen preteen boys and girls, injected them with mind altering chemicals, and subjected them to some subtler means of behavior modification that I won’t disclose, even to you.” Abaddon scratched the bridge of his nose. “By the time I was done with them, they would burn their own parents alive. They were the perfect assassins, as their records demonstrate. One hundred and eight high profile assassinations in less than thirteen years is not a bad record at all.”

  The automated Escort who rested in the corner of Abaddon’s side of the room made a whirring noise, and a triangle of red lights on its “face” dimmed. Presumably, even when it entered a power saving mode, sensors in its body would alert it if Abaddon somehow managed to escape or threaten the situation in any way. Its rotating turret was still positioned with its sting ball firing cannon facing its charge.

  “I am not here to question your record,” Pahaliah said. “You can claim that you never really sold information to our ungodly enemies, but you have been found guilty of these crimes, and you will be executed in only a matter of hours. It is your eternal soul we must discuss. Abaddon, are you listening to me?” It concerned the priest that the godless man before him no longer looked him in the eyes.

  “Do you know my real name?” Abaddon asked seriously.

  “No.”

  “Funny, I don’t either. I’ve completely forgotten it. Abaddon seems to suit me just fine, since like the destroyer in your religion, I get very little thanks for carrying out the tasks for the alleged god of this nation.”

  “You seem to be skirting around the fact that I am here to teach you the message of salvation.” Father Pahaliah sighed. “Mocking God will get you nowhere.”

  “Be honest with me.” Abaddon leaned forward. “You think I’m the practical spawn of the devil, regardless of what I tell you otherwise. It will sound terrible to your enlightened mind, but the parallels between my own life and that of your religion’s villain are tantalizing. Don’t get me wrong, I suffer from no delusions of grandeur.”

  “To my eyes there is very little good in you,” Pahaliah said and shot a quick glance at the holographic watch embedded in his skin. “Though God judges in matters of the heart, it is possible to know a person better in this day in age.”

  “Who do you think you’re talking to?” Abaddon brightened. “I popularized Loquacitas as the leading truth serum in the NAR’s various secret services. Getting inside peoples’ heads is my job.”

  Pahaliah cleared his throat. “I seriously doubt that any words that escape my mouth will deter you from your destructive path. It came as no shock to me to hear that you secretly weren’t a believer all this time; however, if you will allow me, I would like to truly get inside your head.”

  Jago looked up from his Megaminx with a shocked expression on his face. Shortly after he took his eyes off of it, he dropped it unceremoniously.

  “What exactly do you mean by that?” the guide asked.

  “I’m sure you are familiar with a Rodzanice sir?” Pahaliah cleared his throat.

  “That again.” Abaddon shook his head and chuckled.

  “When determining Mr. Abaddon’s guilt, only a select committee was permitted to investigate his mind with a Rodzanice system.” Jago pulled at his collar nervously. “No one is permitted to look inside a prisoner’s head following a conviction. I have an order from the top, saying as much.”

  Father Pahaliah stood and faced Abaddon. “I will speak to the warden and return shortly.”

  “I’m not going anywhere,” the prisoner said.

  “Augustine asked in The Confessions, ‘What indeed is more pitiful than a piteous person who has no pity for himself?’ I wonder what Augustine would say in your case?” Pahaliah turned and left the war criminal behind without even a glance back at him.

  ***

  The priest imagined that Warden Puce would enjoy having some power of the clergyman. Jago merely followed orders, but the warden did have the option of saying no to Pahaliah’s request, since he had full authority on the premises. Many people still harbored negative feelings towards the priest class, since the establishment of the Singular Church had forcibly eliminated the boundaries that had separated the various dominations, and the Judicial Church branch had lobbied for some controversial changes, such as increasing the amount of paperwork necessary for an execution. Having done his research, Pahaliah knew that Puce had been an extremely devout Catholic before the S.C. arose, and he vocalized his distaste for the church’s announcement that it had considered severing all ties with the Pope. Even though such a motion was overruled, the relationship between the NAR and the Vatican was still on shaky ground. Some tact would be necessary when dealing with Puce.

  A long corridor stretched between Pahaliah and the warden’s office, the ceiling and floor tiles lending it the ambience of a hospital’s hallway. Viridian beams of light shot into both the priest and his guide’s heads from several meters away.

  “What in God’s name was that?” Pahaliah asked.

  “The latest in identification technology,” Jago stated proudly. “I sent a memo to the warden’s office ahead of tim
e, letting him know we were on the way. The NIDS – Neurological Identification System – scanned both our biological brain tissue and cerebral nanotube matrices.”

  Pahaliah felt a bit self-conscious being reminded that he had miniscule wiring running through his brain, allowing him to mentally connect to the Fabric and other people without other mediating devices. He liked to think that being a religious zealot also entailed nonconformity to a certain extent – in the world but not of it, so to speak. Well Paul the Apostle claimed to take on the form of the people he wished to convert. Did one of the NAR’s most famous religious figures not have the same right?

  As the heavy blast resistant doors to the warden’s office creaked open, the priest could not help but cover his ears slightly. Looking into the extremely spacious office, he could see a man of short height but great build staring at him from behind a dull, metallic desk. The entire wall behind him was a massive aquarium. Father Pahaliah felt pained to think back on the days he spent admiring the sights at Shedd Aquarium, before his hometown of Chicago became a crater, another casualty of the war.

  The footsteps of the two men sounded like Norea bombs thanks to the echoes of the mighty chamber. Unpleasant memories of his overseas experience flooded back into Pahaliah’s mind. At least another sound broke the silence – a model train running about in the corner of the office.

  “Ah, an old model of a Garratt,” the priest said aloud, with pleasure recalling the train’s identity.

  The girl, who the priest assumed was the warden’s daughter, did not look up from her loco, as if the regal guest did not warrant her attention. She was nothing more than a “whisp of a child,” as Joyce Carol Oates would have put it. Pahaliah secretly esteemed children who held hierarchal rank in very low regard, even if he could not say the same for adults.

  “I always preferred model aircraft myself,” Warden Puce said. “As a matter of fact, I still have my old Dornier Do-28 Skyservant somewhere about the house, though Jess seems to enjoy her trains far more.”