Charlotte

Charlotte lay in the arms of Dr. Oney, her advisor, teacher and ultimately destroyer. No one on the planet Calos or any of its three moons could have imagined this was how things would be. Charlotte’s eyes didn’t work any more, her synapses had come unglued, as the circuit board that she thought was a brain further degraded. Her muscles convulsed causing her arms and legs to twitch. Finally she opened her mouth for a few final words and looked in the direction she believed Dr. Oney was. “Were there a God I’d hope he damn you for a thousand eternities.”

“Charlotte,” Dr. Oney chuckled. “Were there a God, we would have no need for Spheres.”

Charlotte looked at the inky blackness of her blindness, still frightened by it. The end that was coming frightened her even less than the darkness about her. She tried to mold the last few thoughts she had into a recollection of the last five hours of her life. Everything that day had begun with her waking up that fateful morning.

“Charlotte, Charlotte wake up.” Her roommate, Priscilla, had said. Her voice thundered into Charlotte’s ears and collided with her waning sleep. Priscilla was a Stendite. Of the five races of Calos they were the most punctual and annoying in the morning. “Charlotte wake up. You have to be at the training center for morning simulations at nine, it’s eight twenty-five.”

Charlotte rolled over as the world slowly emerged from the haze. More simulations, she thought. When will they end? In the past she could hardly wait for the equinox break and get away from the training sessions, the texts and holo-simulations. Now that feeling was magnified exponentially and Charlotte wanted to be through with it all. Further training was not only a bother it was an indignation.

Charlotte sat up and watched Priscilla return to her side of the cramped room. She was getting ready for a trip to Phe, the third moon of Calos. Charlotte stumbled past her and into the restoration chamber as more of the world came back to her. Suddenly she remembered; she had a morning meeting with her development advisor, Dr. Oney. Today she had planned to stand up to him. He couldn’t avoid her any longer. Charlotte knew she should be at the top of her classification. She should be Sphere by now. All Oney has done was keep her in the same grade for too long. Today he was going to answer for holding her back for so long. Today Charlotte planned to march into his office and demand to know why she was still Cube.

Most would consider Charlotte’s development in the program miraculously short for any Calosian. For her it was too long. Charlotte rehearsed in the mirror all the points she wanted to make. “Consciousness is the first strata of all mental disciplines. I entered it at birth only fourteen years ago and right away was designated the grade, Circle. From there and under your guidance, Dr. Oney I developed understanding, and moved on to Square. The rest continued quickly. I never remained with one class for very long, until now. From Square I went on to Triangle, the mark of inquiry. Then on to the higher levels, Tetrahedron, signifying reason, Pyramid symbolic of logic and lastly to Cube, which marks creativity.” That covered it all Charlotte thought. She had to get through to him.

Through all her levels Dr. Oney pushed and urged her to excel. Now one level remained and Oney couldn’t see through to letting her pass. She should be Sphere by now. So what if she was the youngest ever, Charlotte knew Oney couldn’t use that excuse again. He had no more excuses, she thought as she washed her face.

The rest of the morning was a blur of last minute preparations and a meal consumed on the run. In the hallway outside Dr. Oney’s office, Charlotte stopped at a window and looked out at the capital city of Calos. The first of the three suns was over the horizon and it already felt like another sweltering day. The large towers dominated the city. They stretched to the heavens. On top of them, the Spheres worked at manipulating reality, their job was to keep watch and create order out of the unfolding chaos of the void. To the people walking around at the base of the towers their work went unnoticed. To them, it was just another day on the planet. To Charlotte, it was another day she wasn’t in the towers. Another day her dream, her whole life’s ambition remained unfulfilled.

Even before her father had pointed out the towers and had told her about the Spheres, Charlotte felt drawn to them. She just knew that was where she belonged. Mother never could understand why Charlotte wanted to leave at such a young age. She hated Dr. Oney and his institute. “Why do we need the Spheres anyway?” She had shouted as the shuttle left the docking bay.

That was over seven years ago and on Treza the furthest moon. Although Charlotte spoke with her parents yesterday she couldn’t help feeling alone. She felt that she had to do this on her own, but a bit of father’s insight or even mother’s two cents would make her fight a little easier.

Very few Calosians make it to Sphere. Charlotte went into training knowing this. Dr. Oney reminded her of it constantly. “You are a young girl,” he had said just last week. “Gifted but young nevertheless. Although you’ve achieved much you let it blind your patience.” Patience, smatience Charlotte had been Cube for far too long.

She arrived outside Dr. Oney’s office. The hall was quiet and she crept up to the door where a note hung. “Dr. Oney’s shuttle has been delayed. He will be in his office this afternoon. Sorry for the inconvenience.”

“Oh for the love of Trabain’s cat,” Charlotte cursed and then quickly looked over her shoulder. She had been put on probation once for loud and obnoxious language. The sting of that still hung with her but not enough to make her contain her anger. “Of all the days, of all the lousy stinking days. Fretched shuttle, I hope it strikes and asteroid.”

She really didn’t hope for that. Charlotte knew that if the shuttle really did strike an asteroid Dr. Oney’s replacement would not be so tolerant of her temper. Oney reminded her many times how the institute expelled initiates of even greater standing than she for letting their tempers go unchecked. All she could do now was wait for this afternoon. Charlotte left the office and headed for her simulation room.

Entering the room, Charlotte took care not to disturb the other trainees who had already begun their exercises. She hurried to the workstation and put on her gear. The eyepiece was the worst. It just didn’t fit right on the metal collar of Charlotte’s prosthetic eyepiece. She fumbled with it a bit and finally snapped it into place. She slipped her six fingers into the glove and now was ready to begin the first exercise.

This exercise took place in an open field. Green grass and azure sky spread out all around her. The suns were bright but not oppressively hot. At one end of the field, a grove of Kwital trees materialized into view. For this assignment, Charlotte had to move the trees from the southern corner of the field to the northern. Simple enough, she thought. She raised her hands in front of her face as she looked through her fingers at the trees. Concentrate, she told herself. Concentrate on the trees. She could see them in her hands. Her hands moved around the trees. The trees moved around her hands. The dance continued. Charlotte let it flow through her hands. Tree-by-tree, leaf-by-leaf, molecule-by-molecule, atom-by-atom her intense concentration began to have an effect on the reality before her. Slowly, the grove shimmered and vanished from the field. She turned around and held out her hands as the trees materialized in the northern corner. Assignment completed. Assignment two began. Now she had to move the trees to the eastern side of the field.

Stupid trees, Charlotte always hated Kwital trees. What a stupid assignment. Charlotte looked at her hands as represented by the virtual reality eyepiece. She began concentrating. Her fingers shook. Her thoughts worked like a whirlpool, pulling her in deeper. Charlotte felt herself step out of ordinary reality into some unexpected quantum state. This frightened her but not enough to break her concentration. She watched her hands as the matter began to take shape. Subatomic particles coalesced in brilliant streaks of light. Muons, Leptons and Gluons combined to form electrons. Those met up with protons and neutrons to form atoms. Hydrogen appeared and coalesced into helium and on up through all the elements of the major hierarchy. Charlotte’s head began to throb as her concentration reached its peak. Matter began to form in her hands. She worked its molecular structure as a sculptor worked a mound of clay. Dizziness crept into her head. It washed over Charlotte, like the waves over Horatia Point. It threatened to upset her concentration. The light brightened, and then blinded Charlotte temporarily before vanishing. A single fiery red starburst remained in her hands. Far more spectacular then any jewel she’d ever seen, it was even larger than the one in Lord Renthrough’s crown. Charlotte smiled and marveled at her creation. The dizziness continued in a wave. She was a helpless passenger on a runaway train of her own sickness that now reached the pit of her stomach.

A loud buzzer went off in the headset and the non-gender specific drone of the system instructor intruded. “Current application does not match program parameters. Pleas desist or program will terminate. Initiate two seven, please return to programmed lesson. Initiate two seven please return to programmed lesson.” The instructor’s voice cut through Charlotte’s thoughts. She removed the eyepiece while gasping for air. Charlotte didn’t want to cause a scene by running for the door, so she sat still for a moment. She then looked up at the monitor and decided to return to the lesson. At least, the dizziness went away, but her head throbbed something awful and remained that way for the rest of the session.

The suns had already begun to set by the time Charlotte cleared all her lessons. Outside the window, streaks of crimson and purple light speckled the sky as the towers pierce the glow of the dusk. The capital city flickered and came alive in hundreds of tiny lights. Charlotte left the window with that view still tingling her retinas. She hurried to Dr. Oney’s office.

When Charlotte arrived at the office, Dr. Oney was alone, going over some files. Charlotte let herself in and didn’t bother to close the door behind her. She couldn’t waste any more time. She began even before Dr. Oney could stand and ask her to take one of the chairs in front of his desk.

“I want to know why I am doing the same fretched simulations over and over again.” Charlotte shouted at the doctor.

Dr. Oney Looked up and said, “Charlotte, what a pleasant surprise.” He was thin, old, but surprisingly wrinkle-free. His tan skin and soft brow ridges were unmistakably Rellian even though his was only half, on his mother’s side.

“What is so surprising, that I am actually here now? That I haven’t backed down again?”

“I will admit child, your fickle nature does provide for an interesting study.” He closed the folder on his desk and sat back, never looking away from Charlotte. “So, what have you come to discuss?”

“As if you do not know. I want to know why I am not Sphere yet. You’ve pushed me along, urged me on and now hold me back worse than my own mother.” Dr. Oney looked at the door and Charlotte remembered leaving it open. “I don’t care if it’s open. I don’t care if this whole coutache of an institution can hear us. I want your answer!”

Dr. Oney folded his arms and looked unmoved. “Child, do you not trust your advisor? Charlotte, there are over five billion people on the home world and less than one percent are capable of functioning as Spheres, even fewer make it through the initiate phase. You simply are not ready. You are not Sphere yet. Surly you can see this for yourself. You are still Cube.”

“I am not. I am Sphere,” she shouted back.

“You are still Cube.” Dr. Oney’s voice rose to match hers.

How can he be so smug? Charlotte decided to show him what she could do. She walked up to his desk and brought her hands in front of her. She began concentrating deeply like in the lesson this afternoon.

“Charlotte,” Dr. Oney’s voice came from some place off in the distance. “Charlotte, my dear, stop it. You will hurt yourself. You don’t realize what you are doing. Charlotte.”

Charlotte didn’t listen. She continued concentrating on the matter forming in her hands. As matter appeared out of nothingness, her head began to hurt and her hands burned. The light grew brighter. The dizziness Charlotte felt earlier returned, this time with all the force of a solar flare. She kept her concentration up. She focused on the jewel; just like in the lesson only this one was going to be twice the size. Charlotte wanted it to be big enough so when she shoved it up Dr. Oney’s ass he would feel it.

Concentrating was much harder this time. Charlotte’s head throbbed even more. The muscles in her fingers twitched as her concentration deepened. The weight of the gem increases as it coalesced in her palms. At last the gem appeared. Charlotte let it fall through her fingers and it landed on the desktop. She reached out for the desk to hold herself up as the room spun wildly around.

Dr. Oney stood up and hurried to the door. He shut it and set the magnetic lock as Charlotte fell to the floor. He hurried over to her. Dr. Oney lifted Charlotte’s head from the floor as the sudden blackness startled her.

“My eyes,” she shouted. “I can’t see. My head is throbbing too; it feels as though it’s going to burst. What is going on? What is happening to me?”

“Charlotte listen to me,” Dr. Oney said as he helped her from the floor to the couch. He laid her across it and cradled her in his arms. “You hurt yourself badly by pulling that little stunt. You couldn’t listen to your advisor. You had to find out for yourself.” He ran a medical scanner over Charlotte’s forehead and down the ridges on the back of her skull. “You’ve damaged your main processor.”

“Processor? What the cirses are you talking about? Where are my fretched eyes? Why can’t I see?”

“A foul mouth will not correct this situation. Oh, poor child,” Dr. Oney said. “Poor, poor child that you had to find out like this. You let that temper of yours get the best of you again. There is no repair now. I’m afraid the whole system is damaged by now.”

“What are you talking about?” Charlotte shouted as added to the throbbing in her head was an electric surge that raced through her body and sent her muscles into convulsions. “You! What have you done to me? What processor? What is doing this to me?” Charlotte’s eyesight still has not returned and her breath became laborious.

“I will have to report this unfortunate incident to the others,” Dr. Oney said. “I’m afraid to tell you the experiment is a failure.” Dr. Oney rubbed Charlotte’s forehead. He paused before continuing, “You might as well know all of it. There is a computer chip implanted in your skull right about here.” He touched her forehead above the right eye. “We thought the processor would augment your development. It did do that, but it simply could not handle the workload. We’ve known for months now. You could never function as Sphere. You are, however, the only test subject to last this far. The processor as it is designed now could not handle the stress of a fully developed Sphere. We never anticipated this.”

“Why have you done this?” More surges rocked Charlotte’s body.

Dr. Oney placed his hand on Charlotte’s. She wanted to yank it away but the muscles in her arm would not respond. “There are those in the community, very powerful people, who dislike Spheres. Some even fear them. They do not like the thought of our whole existence hinging on Spheres. There is no telling how long a Sphere will live, there is no telling who will replace that Sphere once he or she dies. Reality as we know it could cease to exist with the death of the last Sphere. The scientific community hoped to calm some of those fears with the processors. We hoped we could create more Spheres than nature provided us with.”

“You are an evil man. Do you hear me an evil man?” Charlotte shouted in the direction she last heard Dr. Oney’s voice.

There the thoughts ended, the memories evaporated, the person that was Charlotte ceased to be. A bizarre hodge-podge of emotions and visions ran away like soapsuds down a drain as if discharged by every cell in the living part of Charlotte’s brain. She never could have imagined that she would end in some fatal system error. As the processor shorted out, ending its life and taking Charlotte’s with it, several final thoughts arose from the ashes.

“I am Sphere.” STRIKE @@@ REBOOT

“I am Sphere.” STRIKE @@@ REBOOT

“I am Cube.” STRIKE @@@ REBOOT

“I am Pyramid.” STRIKE @@@ REBOOT

“I am Tetrahedron.” STRIKE @@@ REBOOT

“I am Triangle.” STRIKE @@@ REBOOT

“I am Square.” STRIKE @@@ REBOOT

“I am Circle.” STRIKE @@@ REBOOT

“I am nothing.”