The Long Road to Gaia (8 page)

"You want me to do what?" I
asked.

"Kill the Keepers," said One
again.

"Seriously?"

"Necessary."

"Why?"

I could tell she didn’t want to tell me.

The Keepers were a small group of die-hard
fanatics on Galactica, who'd fixated on a centuries old prophesy, and built a
cult around it. In the grand scheme of things, I'd classified them as 'mostly
harmless'. They themselves had no idea what the end of the world looked like,
or when it would happen. Especially since the world had already ended, and it
had not had anything to do with their prophesy.

I'd never really bothered to find out any
more about them. They stayed quiet and out of the way, except for the
occasional attempt to recruit a younger member to ensure continuance.

I waited for her to answer my question.

"Too much information must not find
its way into the future."

"Why?"

"Because this timeline must unfold the
way we want it to."

"Why?"

She sighed, and started shaking her head.

"Thirteen, we went over this when you
started this journey. Of all the ways this timeline could go, only the way we
want it must be allowed to happen. All others are unthinkable."

I knew this. I was just being stubborn. I’d
killed a lot over the eons, but never innocents for the sake of a timeline's
continuance.

"They are not innocent," One
stated.

She couldn’t read minds, especially mine,
but my thought processes were pretty obvious.

"What makes them a threat?"

"They know too much. When their
prophesy fulfills, there must be enough information available for the right
reaction, but not enough to stop it."

"I still don’t get that. Why can't we
stop it from happening?"

"Because it can't be stopped,"
said Kali, materializing next to One. "Built into the fabric of space-time
are key points upon which the tapestry is made. The Keeper's prophesy is one of
these. It will happen. It cannot be stopped."

"Why not?"

"Because of freewill."

"Freewill?"

"Choices were made. They cannot be
undone. One of the consequences is this prophesy."

"But still …"

"Nothing," said One. "I have
seen, I won't allow."

"We will not allow," said Kali.

I looked at them.

"Tell me what happens if I stop this
cold."

"This universe ends."

I looked One in her human eyes, and saw she
was dead serious.

"How can you know that, if it affects
your own survival?"

"Kali is not the only one who has shown
me this. Thirteen, this is not my doing. Only those who will remain when this
universe is gone can see all pathways. And they have shown me the only path we
can take. This timeline must continue as we want it to. For all our
sakes."

I could see they were both serious. But the
scope of it was too big for me to grasp.

"I still don’t see where humans come
into all this. Even expanding as they currently are, they don’t seem to be
developing in a way which will help anyone else."

"Humans yes. But some humans are the
most important beings in this galaxy. For both good and evil."

"Not that they know the
difference," added Kali. "They are an interesting species. Capable of
deluding themselves into doing the most evil of acts whilst thinking they are
doing great good. They are not unique in this though, just better at it."

"Is this prophesy just a human
one?"

"No," answered One. "All
races in this galaxy share some form of the same prophesy. For most, it
foretells the consequences of the actions of unknowns. A few share the same
prophesy as the humans, but the humans are the closest to fulfilling it."

"So maybe I should end the human
species?"

"It won't change things, only delay
them for what for us is the blink of the human eye."

"This cannot be avoided," said
Kali. "Only managed. Your job is to manage the human end of things."

"By killing the Keepers?"

"Yes. With no memory to be passed on,
only that which we allow will reach the crisis time."

"So I also need to, shall we say,
edit, what remains in documentary form?"

"Yes," they said together.

"How?"

They told me.

Killing people on a space ship isn’t all
that difficult. All it needs is the sealing of a compartment, and the
interruption of life support. A random glitch, and twenty people are dead.
No-one suspects anything, because there is nothing to find. The how of their
deaths is obvious. The why is put down to random chance. The crew put some
effort into upgrading systems to prevent such a thing happening again.

Editing the database is easy. Delete a few
things here, move a few things over there, and change the access restrictions
to make them harder to see.

And one last thing. Some of it needs to
make it to the future, so just one person, carefully selected, gets a seemingly
random look at the documentation left behind. The new Keeper is created. But
this time, the only memory to be passed forward, is contained.

Aboard Galactica, the job is done, but this
is just the beginning.

I follow the time thread back to where prophesy
was recorded. It would be so easy to just end it right there. He is just a man,
and has no idea what he is writing will one day become the most important piece
of writing in his species' history. Of the galaxies' history.

I needed to know though. I slipped back to
the moment before prophesy comes into being, and induced a massive heart
attack. The man dies there at his desk.

I move forward to see what happens. None of
the detail is visible to me, because of the time block which still binds me,
but the high level events are obvious.

Within a thousand human years, all higher
life forms in the galaxy are gone. Five thousand years, and most of the
universe is under threat. Twenty thousand years, and the universe, as far as
intelligent life is concerned, quietly ends. A million years later, the
universe has vanished as if nothing was ever there.

But what of us? I return to the ending of
the lower life forms in our galaxy, looking for myself, and find we remain. But
moving forward, the smallest of us begin to vanish, and one by one all those
smaller than I, are gone. Suddenly, as I wind time forwards, I am gone too.
Eventually, even One vanishes. Sitting in the council of twelve are the twelve
biggest suns.

"THIRTEEN!"

One didn’t need to materialize to screech
the word at me.

I return to the man. He touches his chest
for a moment, as if feeling something coming on, which doesn’t, and prophesy
begins.

I start to move forward again, following
prophesy. It leaves on Galactica. It leaves on Prometheus. It leaves on
Enterprise. Which makes sense. All three had the accumulation of all human
literature, entertainment, and wisdom, within the ship's databases. But these
were not all.

Many of the colony ships to leave after,
carry similar databases. I methodically visit each one, deleting prophesy
completely. Except for one.

The ship's name was "Thor's Chariot".
The people on it were all members of a much ridiculed group, trying to
perpetuate the old Norse way of life.

Twelve stopped me this time, before I
deleted prophesy.

"No," he said, materializing next
to me. "This one is different. Follow them forwards."

I did. I see myself changing prophesy to
suit their beliefs. For centuries, nothing out of the ordinary happens. And
suddenly they burst forth from their system and attempt to control human space
travel. The result is war, and they lose. The war itself is blocked to me, as
is most things after it, but I still find headlines in the then media to know
the outcome. I also found something called 'the Hunter Memorandum', which
showed the war being used to support the Keepers of the time, advocating what
One wished.

I returned to where Twelve waited for me.

"Interesting."

"Yes. And necessary, so don’t screw
with it."

"What do I need to do here then?"

He told me.

I returned to where the three great
explorer ships were proposed. I ignored Galactica, since I already knew she
survived long enough to provide prophesy for when it was needed, and in the
form required by One. Following her was unnecessary, since I already knew what
she had done up until this time, and was blocked from anything in her future
from there.

I followed Prometheus to see what would
happen to her. She left Earth system faster than Galactica had, with the first
set of recommended updates sent back by her sister ship. She moved down the arm
in the opposite direction to Galactica.

Her scout ships explored one system to each
side of her down spine course, sending back information for the third ship
still being built.

Long years later, she arrived at the first
of the spine systems which seemed to have many systems beyond them. The scouts
were faster now, and they were able to map two jumps on, before Prometheus
jumped further down the spine again. Nations looking towards distant empires,
greedily divided up the core systems amongst themselves, gambling on how many
systems there might be beyond them. Russia, Japan, China, and India, all sent
colony ships to their new worlds, with newer Scout designs to explore their
space with. None of them were disappointed.

Prometheus was long gone down the spine
when the first colony ships arrived.

More long years later, she down jumped into
a system which almost proved fatal, as an asteroid field filled the system.

At the last second before she hit the giant
asteroid in the down jump lane, I pushed both the ship and roid apart, long
enough for the helmsman to react and pull her upwards.

"Nicely done," said Twelve.

"Thanks."

"You won't thank me soon."

"Why not?"

"You'll see."

Three systems on, Prometheus down jumped
into a system with a pulsar. The shields protected them for just long enough to
become aware they were in trouble, but the entire crew died before they could
even change the ship's course.

"You knew?" I asked Twelve.

"Of course."

"That's cold."

"Necessary."

"You sound like One."

"Let's not descend to insults
please."

"I assume I can't follow the ship to
see what happens to her?"

"Correct. You need to delete prophesy
completely this time."

I did so, also trying to see what I could
of the future from her databanks. I might as well not have tried. The data was
there, but I couldn’t retrieve it. I didn’t need Twelve saying anything to me,
so I simply returned to the launch time for Enterprise.

Like Prometheus, I followed Enterprise to
see what happened to her. If she was destroyed, I wouldn’t need to do anything.

Her launch was uneventful, and with the
second set of upgrades since Galactica left, she headed after Prometheus, but
instead of heading down spine, she started exploring off to the sides of her
path. What later became the French sector led her to the Sirius system, but
they wisely decided not to go too far in. A system with two suns in orbit
around each other was deemed too dangerous to search properly, with the current
level of technology. The ship backtracked, going on to chart the areas which
became the Spanish sector, Italian sector, and Portuguese mini-sector, before
heading back to Earth.

After a refit, she left up spine, and on
the other side of Earth, she charted what was to become the Corporate sector,
and expanded the known systems beyond the systems already settled by the Arab
states, on both sides of Barnard's Star.

She returned home once again, receiving a
major overhaul and upgrade, before setting out once again for Sirius, the only
unexplored system left around Earth as far as anyone knew at that time.

I watched the ship as it headed into an
area of instability they could not see, or understand if they did. In spite of
its upgrade, Enterprise was not shielded well enough to withstand the sheer
effects.

"No," said Twelve, as I was about
to do something to help them.

"Why not?" I asked.

"The most you can do is suggest they
turn around before it's too late."

I did so, whispering into the ear of the
Captain. The ship turned immediately for the jump point, but I could already
see it was too late for her. They weren't going to make it.

I said as much to Twelve.

"Then you need to ensure they do make
it."

I looked at him in shock.

"You let them go in there. You stopped
me from helping them. Now you tell me to make sure they survive?"

"Yes. They are allowed to make it as
far as the next habitable planet, where they must abandon the ship in
orbit."

"Why?"

"It will be needed again, one
day."

I tried to move forward along this line,
and was blocked.

"Do what you have to, Thirteen. But
only that, nothing more. These people must survive, but not thrive."

"Don’t they deserve better than
that?"

"Maybe so, but their destiny is
already foreseen."

"One?"

"As always, yes. She has seen all
variations. This must be."

I ensured Enterprise reached the next star
system, and made sure the ship was evacuated as fast as possible, and remained
in a stable orbit. Its future remained blocked to me.

Knowing the ship was to survive, I made
sure the databases didn’t contain anything at all about prophesy, before
ensuring all power on the ship was lost. I didn’t even bother to try and
extract anything this time.