Dreams of Jupiter
Dreams of Jupiter
An original sci-fi story from the insilicana universe
Through a veil of translucent glass, she marveled at the city's beauty, an amalgamation of art, technology, and life, pulsating in a rhythm that was both alien and exciting. Buildings curved and undulated in a harmony of architecture and nature, like giant waves frozen in time. All shimmered and morphed with the changing sky. She has never been to these parts of the land, after all, her parents tried to shield her from exactly what she was about to do. Not that it is a big deal, all of her new friends have been at one of those places, at least the ones that finally decided to leave the enclave. The enclave! What a suffocating place. She always felt there must be more to life.
The outside world was not what the elders made her believe. But would she have had the courage to leave, if it wasn’t for her love for Ruth? The pain hit hard and mercilessly, as expected, she immediately reached into her pocket and picked up a small metal box, opened it with shaky hands and took out a red pill. “Aegra absentis”, she just checked the writing for a brief second before she gulped the pill down hastily.
That was her ‘Ruth ritual’ nowadays, every time her thoughts went back to her and sadness started to overwhelm. She took two deep breaths to let the effect sink in, and surely, the thoughts about Ruth began to fade out, contained behind an isolating layer of nonchalance.
“Thank god for modern medicine”, she thought. “I mean, god had probably nothing to do with it, but thank us, or the universe. Like I cared!“ She despised that she was still using those old phrases, which were indoctrinated at a time when she was too young to understand what they meant. Even if it was only the voice in her head who was using them. She took another deep breath.
“Ok, time to go in.”
The doors of the self-driving car opened automatically, as she found herself in front of a futuristic-looking building. In all fairness, everything in this new world looked futuristic to her. Materials she had never seen, plain and strong like metals, but fitting the environment like a chameleon, changing forms and colors. Light danced from every surface, casting a dreamlike glow across the parkin area.
At the entrance, she was welcomed by two sturdy doorbots. A little giggle escaped her when she was greeted enthusiastically by them, as they usually do. They were so cute, a mixture of well-mannered 19th century butlers and stout body builders, she never understood why even they had been banned by the enclave. Doorbots are straightforward and goodhearted, as she discovered repeatedly once she started living in the outside territories.
“Welcome to the Robvarium, milady. May I have the permission to scan your grace for security purposes?”
“Yes, you very well may, good sir” she replied, still giggly. She loved these kind of adorable doorbots with their pompous demeanor, they reminded her of stories from times long gone. Some establishments like it quirky. The doorbot opened his arms and quickly ran his hands from top to bottom in front of her without touching her.
“Thank you, your Grace. We are delighted to welcome your grace to our humble facility. Please enjoy your evening!”, the doorbot concluded before moving on to the next person behind her.
There she was, finally. Robvarium. The place Ruth had talked about so much, and the epitome of her parents’ and the enclaves’ baseless fears. “Baseless!”, she reaffirmed herself. However, she would be lying if she said that she was not scared, despite how much she wished it would be otherwise. Yet she could not easily outthink a primal fear that got instilled in her for decades, no matter how irrational.
She started sweating, her breathing rate increased, her legs were even trembling. She recognized the signs. In these situations, she learned to focus really hard and observe her bodily functions, to embrace them, embrace the fear, recognize it, rationalize it and finally move past it. Another something Ruth taught her. Managing the internal struggle took her a moment, which must have looked awkward for an outside observer, but she finally got control over her body again and went on.
She found herself in front of what looked like a reception desk, with a welcoming-looking woman sitting behind.
“Welcome, I am Gazaela, if you have any inquiries I am here to guide you. Today, our aurista specials were composed by Symphonia records to bring you to the moons of Jupiter. I can wholeheartedly recommend the poetic Io and Ganymede lounge to beautiful girls like you…” Gazaela stopped a second as if she would be analyzing her reaction, or absence thereof. “Or maybe something more alternative like Carpo? Lysithea?”
“Ehm… well… that sounds lovely, but can you maybe explain to me what I am supposed to do?” she asked, feeling awkward. She had imagined just buying some sort of ticket and entering.
“Oh dear, are you saying you never used aurista before?” Gazaela asked.
“I am afraid so. Well, I heard stories about this place, from a dear friend, she always wanted to show me… She…” she stopped abruptly, not knowing how to continue the sentence. Maybe she had shared too much already, she felt exposed, even a little bit ashamed. “Maybe I better just leave for today. Sorry to trouble you”
Gazaela jumped up from her seat, grapping her hand that was resting on the reception desk. “I am sorry, my dear. Now don’t you walk out on us that easily! You’ll miss out! I was just a little surprised, but there is nothing wrong with not knowing certain things, every one of us has those. If you indulge me for five minutes, it will be my pleasure to show you how to get started!”
She hesitated.
“You can still leave after if you decide to do so, but maybe you can make a more informed decision if you just hear me out?”
“Miss Gazaela, this is very kind of you, but I do not want to hold up the line”, she answered, and it was true, there were already some people lining up behind her.
“You can call me Gaza, everyone around here does it. And don’t you worry about the line, nothing is easier to fix than that”, and with a swift move of her hand, someone else joined her behind the reception to take over. Gaza gently took her hand and led her to the side of the room, what appeared to be a coffee corner. They sat down on a comfortable couch, and she produced two cups of tea from a machine in that corner. It was deliciously floury, way better than any tea she had ever had in the enclave.
Gaza took a sip, before she started again: “So, where were we? The aurista technology. Well, technically speaking, aurista earplugs are non-invasive devices that use guided electromagnetic wave focusing to stimulate auditory brain stem neurons to induce a deep hearing sensation. First developed to treat retrocochlear hearing impairment, artists soon discovered that one could adapt this technology to provide and share unique hearing sensations with their audiences. It also was the first technology to allow insilicana and humans to experience something sensual as equals, bridging one of the biggest gaps between our species. Thus we wanted it to become an integrated part of the Robvarium experience here.” Gaza clearly had been explaining this before, the words just came sputtering out of her.
With a spark in her eyes, she continued; “Well, I guess finally someone realized that machines never had any quarrels with electromagnetic waves touching their circuits, if you know what I mean.”
Gaza let out a derisive laugh, which calmed down quickly after she realized that her joke was only met with confused looks. “Oh girl, I am talking about insilicana having some fun, jeez. You know, insilica on insilica action? No?” She moved her hands together, bumping her knuckles against each other.
“I did not know that insilicana would be behaving like that with each other, I am sorry” she answered, remembering that things between Ruth and her were quite different than what she experienced before with boys in the enclave. That’s one more reason why she fell in love with her too.
“Well, of course insilicana do not engage in this human practice, that’s why it’s funny to think about it… two hard bodies clashing on each other” She made a sound that sounded like: “clunk clunk clunk”, before she started laughing again. “Common, if I have to explain the joke, it is not funny anymore!”, she proclaimed, with played outrage.
“I am sorry, Gaza, you have been very kind to me, but I do not know much about this world. See, I was born and raised in the enclave” she explained, feeling overwhelmed and compelled to elaborate. “I did not know anything about life outside and I did not even know that I was so ignorant. There were my parents and my neighbors and we all went to church every sunday. We were told that the world outside had fallen to the devils, and only the mercy of god was able to secure our homes. I mean, the enclave was a peaceful place, sometimes the work on the fields was hard, but people were usually kind and we had enough to get by. The elders would tell us about the Holy Scriptures and stories about what was right and what was wrong. To be truthful, I did not have a lot of things to worry or think about. Until Ruth.”
A sudden gulp made her pause. It had been a year since she last had vocalized her name. Heartbroken and almost lethargic, she continued: “See, at first I had no idea that she was an insilicana, I have never met an insilicana before, I only heard the description of elders calling them devil machines. Evil robots pretending to be humans, pretending to have real feelings, tricking us away from the path of god. Ruth was nothing like that, she was smart, goodhearted and kind. She made me feel curious about finding out who I am and why I am here. She was a teacher and a friend. All of us who knew her wanted to be like her. It was only later that she confessed to me. Told me her secret. That she saw herself as an insilicana rights activist, infiltrating our enclave to educate us students, to teach us how to think critically about this world. To recognize injustice and act upon it. She strongly believed that insilicana rights would never be achieved for herself or any insilicana, as long people were being brought up so ignorant, so hateful, and as unreasonable as we were in enclaves all over the continent. She wanted to change that.”
She took a pause to take a breath. Clearly, this has been sitting on her mind.
“I could not blame her back then, as little as I can blame her today. How could she have done anything else? After all, we humans will never give insilicana equal rights if they have no voice in that discussion. Insilicana can never rise against their creators, they were programmed to never harm us or disobey direct human command. Yet nobody ever thought of programming Ruth to stand up for her rights. She did anyway.”
Tears had started filling her eyes, yet she continued her story. She felt it needed to be told. She wanted to scream it out into the night’s sky.
“Put yourself in her place. Can you imagine being an eternal slave? Being equally able to feel, to love, to hope, but your whole existence at the mercy of people who are entitled to let you die if they feel like it? Or just for having a good laugh? A disagreement? It’s unconscionable… I mean, how do we treat our creations? Aren’t they supposed to be our children too? Yet every day, here in the enclaves the elders are propagating more hate, spreading more lies about insilicana. How would things ever change for the better?”
She could barely see through her watery eyes, but Gaza was sitting next to her, a calm and patient listener. The intensity of her focused attention was filling the space between them, almost as if Gaza’s existence was dependent on her continuing her story.
“Ruth showed me what the enclaves were really about, that the elders just kept people in the dark to further their own political agendas… I could not believe it at first… if I’d only seen it sooner, trusted her, she might still…” she felt her throat closing up again, so she almost automatically reached into her pocket for her ‘Ruth ritual’.
Surprisingly, Gaza interrupted her movement, gently but determined. Thoughtfully, she responded to her outburst:
“Some pains need to be lived through to do them justice. No amount of neuromodulators or time can do it for you, believe me“
She lowered her pills again, took a deep breath and continued: “…to cut a long story short, Ruth had opened my eyes and I left the enclave. And now I am here and know almost nothing about the world outside the enclaves.”
She stopped, surprised at herself, it has been almost a year since Ruth was gone, but this was the first time she divulged so much of her story to a complete stranger. She did not even feel bad about it, she was tired of feeling bad about things. She liked Gaza, maybe too prematurely, but she felt that she could trust her. That she would not be judged by her.
“Now I understand why you came to this place, it’s for the same reason why we all are here”, Gazaela picked up the conversation after a thoughtful pause. “I fell in love with my Bea-thi when I was quite young, but I was lucky to be raised by very open-minded parents. They understood that insilicana, while created quite differently, are like us, ultimately a product of our surroundings and the decisions we made. I am not gonna deny that it was a bit awkward, me bringing home an insilicana and a female identifying at that, I guess it was a double surprise for my parents… they did not even know that I fancied women. Anyway, once they saw how Bea-thi and I treated each other, their worries about my happiness disappeared, and guess what, my father is the biggest fan of Bea-thi now. They could discuss politics for hours and hours, it is hard to get him away from her sometimes, I can tell you…”
Gaza smiled at that thought, gently shaking her head.
“The outside world is a different story, of course. We have been openly insulted, ostracized, even attacked in broad daylight… I guess that was why we never went outside much. Anyways, Bea-thi and I found our purpose once we realized that so many, humans and insilicana alike, are deprived of the chance to meet each other in a meaningful manner… to be happy with each other… That’s why we started Robvarium here, we wanted it to be a safe place for all beings to just be themselves, share who and how they are, no matter the social norm.”
She could discern a tone of bitterness, just shy above the detection limit, in Gaza’s voice. Unabashed, she let her continue.
“‘Social norms are changing, but the need for love is constant’, Bea-thi still uses to remind me every time I get upset about the shape our world is in. She is always so patient, so forgiving, and so unforgivingly hopeful, how could I not have fallen in love with her?”
Gaza stopped, suddenly standing up, offering her hand again for her. This time, she was the one who took it almost automatically. She was right to trust her, she understood.
“Do you want to meet Bea-thi? How about we put on the aurista and join Bea-thi in her planetary lounge?” Gaza invited, and after how much they have just shared, she could not deny that she was curious to meet Bea-thi. Gaza took her back to the reception table and gripped some aurista earplugs for her and herself, before they moved into the main venue. The moment they entered, she was struck by awe.
The room was loosely arranged in smaller areas, each seemed to be following a particular theme or feeling, but all were united under this unique sky.
“Each lounge represents one of the moons of Jupiter, and the ceiling that everyone shares is a semi-holograph of Jupiter itself. Bea-thi came up with the idea. I really love it, it symbolizes that even though we all travel on different paths, like these moons, we are still united by something greater in our midst.” Gaza was explaining the scenery.
“It is so beautiful”, she really did not know what else to say, it was the most amazing thing she has ever seen. Gaza took her gently by her arm and stirred her away from the center of the hall, to a lounge in the far corner. There was only one woman in that lounge, and she was slow dancing in what seemed to be a trance-like state. It was a weird, contortionist kind of dancing, with no clear rhythm or tempo, no direction, just flowing movements. With a sign of her hand, Gaza signaled her to put on the aurista earplug. She followed Gaza’s lead and put the plug in her ear. A friendly voice coming from the earplug, which she now recognized as being Gaza’s, was giving instructions on how to use the plug. She felt actual Gaza’s hands on her shoulders before she touched her earplug gently to press a button.
Suddenly, upon pressing the button, she felt no touch anymore, as if all her senses were being extinguished, or at least put aside, except for hearing. She closed her eyes automatically, the hearing was so deep that she felt like seeing the music, being engulfed by it, maybe even taste it. It was a kind of music she had never heard before, instrumental, powerful, and with underlying force, guiding her heartbeat, leading her thoughts.
She was floating on a magnificent endless sea, she was the storm turning the waves as well as the water being tossed around, she was rebellion and forgiveness. The ferocious turbulences were dragging her body with no goal, no direction, threatening to drown her at any whim of resistance. No matter how much she’d struggle, she knew she could not change the tides, nor escape them, only embrace them as her captors. So she gave in to the forces of chaos and offered them her hopes and wishes until all that was left was just her, being. Her bare, pure, naked existence. The music changed, and the wind stopped howling. Amidst the chaos, in the face of nothingness, existence is truth, and truth is life. A thought started crystalizing. She realized that it was not the world that was in disarray, but her. The boundaries of her existence are not her shackles, but humbling salvation from the inconceivability of endlessness. No matter what obstacles and limitations fate held in place for her, she was free to choose. Choose to strive, to struggle, to transcend above the mere causalities of her reality rather than give in to the tides of misfortune. To brave the odds of mayhem might put her on the brink of destruction, but to walk this path is the only way for her to ever be whole. Only then she can become truly alive.
She found herself back under the magnificent Jupiter sky once Gaza pushed a button on her aurista again, she realized that tears had filled her eyes and she had sunken to her knees. What dauntingly powerful music! Yet now her heart felt calm, for the first time since Ruth had been gone.
“May I introduce Bea-thi”, Gaza asked, it was only now that she realized that also the other woman in the lounge had stopped dancing and was mustering her with a welcoming smile.
“It is a pleasure to meet you, however, I am sorry about the circumstances”, Bea-thi took up the conversation.
“Did Gaza tell you what brought me here?”, she asked, surprised how quickly they must have communicated.
“She did not need to tell me, I heard how the music changed once you joined in on Amalthea”, Bea-thi explained. “See, in the Amalthea lounge, our musical algorithm seeks to translate the feelings of struggle and redemption into sound, composed with heavy instruments and modulated by its participant’s individual experiences. That is what makes our aurista so special, we share who we are by creating something unique together. Although our stories and struggles are different, it lets us realize that we are not alone in this world, which can feel quite lonely at times…” with a gaze that felt like Bea-thi could see right into her heart, she added: “There is no point in blaming yourself, you cannot change the past. Don’t tarnish the memory of loved ones by destroying what they held dear the most. Yourself.”
Bea-thi was so insightful like Ruth had been. And for the first time, the mentioning of Ruth did not cause the urge to grip another pill in her, but it put a smile on her face.
Bea-thi was right, Ruth would have loved for her to be happy.
She looked around the hall and saw so much intimacy, smaller lounges with few people, maybe a circle of friends, laughing and holding hands together, jumping and shaking their heads to a fast beat. The biggest lounge, Ganymede, harbored also the biggest crowd, and most of the people there did not dance as much as they looked at each other. She saw big smiles as they seemed to be exchanging their music with one another, one person at a time, listening in to the sound they created together to get to know each other. She also found one couple that kind of retreated into a more secluded lounge, serious faces, as if what they heard was of great concern.
“This is truly a magical place”, she whispered, more to herself than to anybody else, and she stood in awe just before her world turned dark again.
Like many things in this world, it started small. A flash of blue light, reflected on the ceiling’s hologram, a mild disturbance to its magnificent glimmer. Most people did not even notice, even for her, it seemed like an optical illusion. Maybe a bug in the hologram’s program?
Then again, another blue flash, this time, she saw that it originated from the Io lounge, which appeared unusually crowded today compared to the other lounges. Also, the first scream. She will never be able to erase the memory of the first scream, maybe because it contrasted so much with the feeling of peace and love in the room. High pitched, troubled, painfully distressed, her brain could not process the scream but her body instinctively crouched.
Bea-thi was quicker than Gaza to realize what was going on, she shouted: “Shooter in the hall. Everybody out!”, and she took Gaza and her and shielded them from the center of the turmoil. People started screaming, humans and insilicana alike, trying to drag their loved ones away from the shooter, and one by one she saw them falling, being consumed by that blue flash. When hit, humans caterwauled in agony, going down miserably as a smell of burned hair started filling the room, while insilicana dropped like rocks, smashed and shattering into pieces. It could have only been mere minutes until everyone close to the shooter lay either dead or deadly injured, but he showed no sign of stopping.
She had never seen so much hatred in anyone’s face, but underlying, there seemed to be something more… pride. Satisfaction. Conviction. She did not know how she knew, but in these eyes, she saw that he was not done, that the worst is yet to come.
She could hear police slamming in the door, but they do not know, they have not seen into his eyes. Everything happened in split seconds. A metal ledge was covering what seemed to be an entrance to a lower level, she shoved Bea-thi and herself into it, followed by Gaza, but it was too late, everything lid up in blue, she heard Gaza outcry and then the burning pain hit her. She lost feeling in her muscles, she could not move, her heart stopped beating.
There she was again.
Ruth, in front of her eyes. Ruth, opening her arms. Ruth, in her heart. Finally, she passed out.
In the news, the police confirmed another tragic electromagnetic pulse attack against an insilicana facility, killing 27 humans and 31 insilicana as well as 2 police officers, and many more injured. They said that the terrorist was acting alone and that he used an E1-based gamma ray high voltage gun for attacking his human and insilicana victims, as well as an explosive E2-E3 hybrid geomagnetic device once police entered the facility. By searching the perpetrator’s home, investigators found a diary entry that confirmed his actions being motivated by racial hatred. They released a transcript of its content:
Where to start?
My world has not always been bad, in fact, I remember it to be good back then. It was definitely easier. Easier to understand, easier to live in it, easier to find your way. I remember playing in the sun. I remember how I felt.
I do not feel that way anymore. Since a long time, to be honest. I don’t understand, at which point did we lose everything? Was it growing up? How could the world have changed so much? I deserve better, we all do. Something went wrong, it’s not hard to see, it’s not hard to feel. But why is nobody doing anything about it?
I am sick of feeling powerless. I am sick of losing out. It is time to claim back what was once rightfully ours. When I hear the elders speak, I know that they are right.
We and our values are indeed under attack. They have corrupted almost every good man and woman in power to be on their side, misguiding our children, spitting on our god. But the Lord is great, if we believe in him, if we throw away doubt. We shall not be misguided by these powerful puppet masters in the shadows, who remorselessly stir our fates while they imprint our planet with their wrongdoing.
Insilicana are abominations, demons created by Lucifer himself through the actions of people he led astray. We in the enclaves are the very last hold, we are the only true believers who can still save this world. We need to destroy the root of evil, as for this fight is eternal. God knows everything, does it not say in the bible:
For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. — Ephesians 6:12
We cannot and will not rest until we purge this planet from inanimate evil, until we obliterate every last one of Lucifer’s agents and the fleshless demons they created. I act with god and through god, and god will be the judge to my actions.
Please understand me, mother. Please understand me, father. For I have to sin for our world to be in the sun again.
In love, your son