Forest for the Trees

‘Are you sure about this?’

Rinako looked around the huge avenue. The stone walls stretched up out of sight punctuated with huge circular columns that made the place feel somewhere between a cathedral and a lithified forest. They were somewhere in the lower districts though Kurama hadn’t exactly been clear on where. She wasn’t even sure if they were inside or outside. With the darkness and height of the walls it amounted to the same thing. The walkways above had become enmeshed, whole streets swallowing themselves and vanishing off the grid.

‘It’s where Takeru said.’ Kurama’s voice echoed harshly against the stone around them.

Occasionally there would be some burbling noise and flashing of lights in the distance. The technology here was ancient, door locks hadn’t been upgraded in centuries. She could see why they called it Ocean’s Floor. She had the feeling it could become its own ecosystem, old circuit boards rotting and devolving into new forms of life. She whirled with a start as a bleeping whirring noise came from beside her… then slowly lowered her breaker. One of the old maintenance bots shot by her on its triangular tracks, following some decades old routine for a population that had long since died or moved on. The place was like an asylum for machines.

What kind of creep chooses to live here?

A groan came from a shape she had thought a gargoyle against the wall. As it shifted she saw it was a man, completely bald, covered in a tarpaulin sheet and dust so thick his skin seemed to be made of stone.

Takeru…

Back at headquarters Kurama had gone off to speak with the chief tech on his own. Told her to wait in his office, he wouldn’t be long.

She stepped over a pile of mechanical parts.

She hadn't meant to. She’d tried to resist. It really wasn’t her fault. Her head had still been swimming from their trip to VisAge. That had been dumb. She closed her eyes a moment.

He was asking for it really. Who leaves their data pad lying open on their desk?

I mean when you think about it, who wouldn’t take a quick look?

She was an investigator. Who could blame her for getting curious? If he’d been keeping her in the loop in the first place she wouldn’t have looked. If he’d taken her to see Takeru, for example, she wouldn’t have even been in the room. But that would mean she might actually have some idea what they were doing…

She winced.

Ahead of her the cone of Kurama’s torch swung around the open spaces, gouging chunks out of the darkness.

He hadn’t even logged out. It was just there, the only source of light in the room, a little gleaming rectangle like the contents of a treasure chest.

It was fine. Really.

So why do I feel so bad… ?

It had been like at Intraderma, scrolling through the client data.

The first thing she’d done was search Takuya Pass, the road where she’d seen him make that weird drop off.

A bunch of things came up, mostly violent crimes. Then a residential address. Listed for a previous officer. Ichihara Jiro.

After that she’d become brave. Typed the letters in.

Kurama, Sato.

Prospector.

Former Inspector.

That had been the first shock.

She had no idea he’d been an inspector. It should have ended there but once you start, it’s like running downhill… and the question had jumped out at her. Why would an inspector become a prospector? It wasn’t so much a step down as a step off a cliff.

His Inspectorial record ended abruptly… but not with a discharge. He had quit. She’d never heard of inspectors quitting. They always seemed like they born inspectors, and went out that way, a separate species.

She scrolled up. Funny how ten years of time was just a few inches of screen space. And how ten years of trust could evaporate in a few seconds…

Status: Divorced.

Children: One.

That was the second shock.

A child. She looked down. The date of birth… it matched the year he had become an inspector.

‘Ok?’

‘Huh?!’

Kurama was looking at her. His voice was like an alarm going off inside her head.

‘Oh… yeah, sure.’

Why can’t I look at him…

‘Ok, then. We’re gonna have to take the vacuum-tube.’ He was looking up at a lift shaft that vanished off into the unknown expanses above them. Cobwebs covered the doors, one of which hung crooked.

He tapped a dimly lit button and they stepped inside and turned around.

The doors closed.

It really wasn’t her fault.

***

The lift was surprisingly quick and released them surprisingly alive. After jerking to a halt, the doors opened automatically. Kurama checked a number written on his hand then took a left into the corridor.

He walked to a door at the far end. White steam crept out from beneath it.

Of course, it had to be the one with the steam coming out of it.

The door was slightly open. And there was no buzzer.

Rinako reached for her breaker but Kurama placed a hand on her forearm and shook his head.

‘Hey! Uhh, anyone home?’ He shouted, then pushed gently through the door.

It looked like a normal kitchen. Normal for light-addicts and recently passed corpses at least. The table and surfaces were littered with burnt pots and pans, as though whoever lived there preferred to buy new ones rather than washing up. The floor was covered in a thin carpet of steam, which seemed to be coming from a doorway at the back. They walked through it into a large unlit room. It took a few moments for her eyes to adjust and notice the figure silhouetted against an array of vast holo screens at the far end of the room. Tall wardrobe sized machines whirred beside them, generating the steam.

Coolant system…

The screens were showing some kind of weird liquid slideshow.

‘I thought you weren’t allow pets anymore... ’ said Kurama.

‘Ideas are not anyone’s property.’ Said the silhouette. He turned in his chair, revealing an unshaven face surrounded by wild hair and a pair of metallic wraparound lenses. ‘Good of you to visit, Kurama. I thought you’d forgotten me.’

‘I tried.’

The man smiled. It wasn’t an entirely reassuring expression. ‘I assume you haven’t come here just to catch up on old times.’

‘You always were smart.’ He said.

***

‘How is Takeru?’ Said Itari, apparently their host’s name.

‘Oh you know, they keep him in machines and he’s happy enough. You know how these tech perverts are.’

Itari smiled.

They were sitting at a low table drinking oolong tea. Rinako still hadn’t got over how remarkably civilised it was.

‘He’s a good scientist but… limited.’

‘Yeah, I can see you really spread your wings since leaving.’ Kurama looked around at the peeling wallpaper and boxes piled against the walls.

He continued. ‘He never was able to accept what they say about us.’

‘So you’re saying its possible?’

‘Intelligence?’

Kurama thought for a moment. ‘Coordination at least.’

Itari paused. ‘Let me explain. What we think of as the geist decision making center is a coordinate where all of its functions, desire, hunger, tiredness, everything that maintains its survival overlap.‘

‘So they come from it, this coordinate.’

‘No, it comes from them.’

Kurama frowned.

‘In the many strata of theory space which exist beneath our world, there are various currents of mathematical possibility. Normally they dissolve before anything comes of them. But sometimes they become entangled and in that tangle a self perpetuating system emerges. Homeostasis.‘

‘Right, the miracle of life.’

‘On the contrary, it’s impossible for it not to happen. Because the only universe in which it is able to exist, is the one in which it exists.’

‘Ok. Moving on…’

Itari took a moment. Rinako had the sense he was unused to having to prepare his thoughts for others’ consumption.

‘Do you know that trees can communicate?

‘Itari. Am I going to have to call someone?’ Kurama looked at Rinako and was surprised to see her sitting transfixed.

He continued. ‘Beneath the ground, their roots are connected by miles and miles of fungal networks. These networks transport information - nutrients, phytochemicals and such - to wherever they’re needed, across huge distances like messages.’

‘What we experience as geists are just where they project into the parts of light-space we can perceive. Like the peaks of a mountain range… but beneath that, they’re all joined, all in commune.’

‘You’re saying they’re telepathic.’ Said Kurama.

‘It’s not telepathy because they’re not seperate beings. We wouldn’t say the forest is telepathic.’

Steam rose from the cup in Kurama’s hands. ‘Takeru said—‘

‘As I said Takeru is a good man. But limited.’

‘Like a tree.’

Itari smiled and sipped his tea. ‘In theory a certain arrangement of geists could triangulate a larger intelligence. There is an idea that we only see the intelligences we are intelligent enough to perceive.’

Kurama made a face like there was a piece of grit in something he’d just eaten. ‘But what would that intelligence be? I mean.. I’m just a dumb cop, right. What would it look like, to us, something able to coordinate large scale geist movements.’

Rinako listened amazed, too many questions going through her head at the same time. She felt like someone must have slipped something in her tea.

Itari shrugged. ‘How would I know? All I can say is that coordination means purpose and purpose means intelligence. But remember what we’re calling intelligence is as much produced by its functions as they are by it. It’s just we’re a little biased… ’ He paused. ‘But come in, I’ll show you.’

They followed him through two sets of metal doors into a room at the back. As he turned a key in the door behind them, Rinako threw herself back against the wall.

‘Shhh.. please.’ Said Itari. ‘He’s quite shy.’

Across the room, its eyes staring at them from the ends of an array of leaf like antennae, was a geist.