The Quantum Connection (15 page)

No longer embarrassed by my body, I stood up in the tub in front of Tatiana and she gazed at me with a voracious and lustful smile.

"Very hot!" she said in Russian. And then she rose from the tub as well. I whistled my sentiments right back at her.

I was learning the nanomachine game now and so I didn't bother with towels. I had the nanomachines dry us off and dust us with cologne and perfume. On the way to the king-sized bed I had a bottle of champagne and two champagne flutes appear in my hands. I winked at Tatiana and when I did I had the cork on the bottle pop. We giggled at how cheesy that was, but we drank the champagne anyway and then crawled into bed. We were drunk and giddy and happier than either of us had been in at least . . .
Three years seven months two weeks four days thirteen hours and twenty-seven seconds.
Who was I kidding? It was the happiest I had ever been in my life.

I gently laid Tatiana across the bed and kissed her from head to toe without missing a single spot. I squeezed her to me gently and met her gaze several times, noticing that she would occasionally chew on her bottom lip and roll her eyes back. She pulled me to her . . .

Yes, Steven! That's it, ahh. . . .

I continued to nibble at her ear.

Don't stop. Right there, she said . . . She hadn't said that at all!

I realized that Tatiana was speaking directly into my mind in the same way that Mikhail or Mike would. Of course, why couldn't she?

Mikhail.

Yes.

Open a channel between Tatiana and me and always keep it open unless otherwise programmed.

Okay.

Tatiana?

Steven! What kept you, honey?

I guess I'm not as quick-witted as you, gorgeous.

We'll worry about that later. For now, yes, right there, RIGHT THERE!

You mean, that?

YES!

We made love six times more before exhaustion took over and we fell asleep in each other's arms with Titan overhead now and Saturn below us.

CHAPTER 13

Tatiana was still asleep and I didn't want to wake her. I slipped out of bed quietly and stretched and stood up. As I did I had a pair of cotton athletic shorts materialize on me. I looked in the mirror at my new appearance and was startled at how handsome and dashing I was. I had never been this person in my life and it was quite overwhelming. Just for fun I played around with the color of my shorts for a few minutes until I finally had the nanomachines settle for red.

Again for fun, I sat down into a materializing chair and had a small table appear as well. I took a drink from the soft drink can that solidified in front of me and then leaned back and relaxed a bit.

Mike?

Yes.

Call me Steven.

Okay, Steven.

Good. Any luck figuring out why Tatiana could not access you?

None, Steven.

Maybe we are thinking about this in the wrong way. Have there ever been other abductees that would not have been allowed access to you?

None have ever tried.

I see. But, would there have been any not allowed to access you if they had tried?

No way to know. Not enough data.

Hold on a minute. I don't believe that.

Please refine the question, Steven.

Take all the data that you have stored about every human abductee and assume that they are here and trying to gain access to you. Which ones of those would be given access to you assuming of course that they have my permission?

Yes, Steven, that data is available. I am checking it now.

Okay, good.

I have the list and it is long. Do you want the knowledge downloaded to you?

Not yet. First tell me, were there any that would have been denied access and what type of percentage of all abductees that would be?

Yes, Steven. Out of two million three hundred one thousand nine hundred eighty-one abductees, two hundred eleven thousand and one would not have been allowed access. That is approximately nine point two percent of all abductees.

Wow, that is a lot of abductees. Over what period of time were these abductees taken?

Please refine the question, Steven.

Oh, uh, when was the first abductee taken and when was the last one taken and what is the time distribution of the abductions?

Yes, Steven. The first human abductee was taken five thousand two hundred and seven years ago and the last one was taken about four minutes ago. More precise times are available if you desire them. Also the distribution is basically a uniform random function across the timespan with peaks--by your calendar--at three thousand B.C., twenty-five A.D., ten ninety-nine A.D., thirteen ninety-six A.D., fifteen seventy-eight A.D., sixteen eighteen A.D., seventeen seventy-six A.D., eighteen sixty-two A.D., nineteen seventeen A.D., nineteen forty-four A.D., nineteen fifty A.D., nineteen sixty-six A.D., nineteen eighty A.D., nineteen ninety-one A.D., two thousand three A.D., and the largest peak starting in two thousand eleven A.D. and continuing to present day with the peak's maximum at two thousand eighteen A.D.

Interesting. Show me the plot.

Okay.

Then a plot appeared in my head and I understood it almost as soon as it appeared there.

The plot consisted of the number of abductees on the vertical axis and the year along the horizontal axis. There were two curves traced on the plot. One was a bold black line, which represented the total number of abductees as a function of time. The second trace was a thinner gray line that represented the percentage that would not have been allowed access to Mike. The majority of the "isolated abductees" appeared at two peaks. One was near 1944 and the other was centered at 2018.

Mike?

Yes, Steven?

I am not a history buff, but don't most of these peaks coincide with a war of pretty good magnitude? I mean, you got peaks during the Crusades, the American Revolution, the Civil War, the World Wars, et cetera. Isn't this true?

You are correct, Steven. All of the peaks correspond to major wars.

"All of the peaks correspond to major wars . . ." I mumbled to myself. "All of the peaks . . ." I mumbled it again. "All of . . . Holy Shit! Mike can't tell lies and that would imply that there was a major war in 2018! But . . ."

Mike?

Yes, Steven?

The peak in 2018 A.D. was The Rain, not a major war, right?

Yes and no.

Yes and no? Yes and no! What the hell does that mean?

You are both correct and incorrect.

Please refine your answer, Mike!

Okay, Steven. The event that you refer to as The Rain is indeed the event the peak of the abductions corresponds with. However, the event that you call The Rain was indeed a major war.

"The event that you call The Rain was indeed . . ."

Mike, you must be confused. The Rain was a bunch of meteor impacts. You know, meteor rocks from outer space collided with the Earth.

Please refine the question, Steven.

"Goddamnit!" My frustration forced me to forget to think at Mike when I cursed him.

Goddamnit, Mike! I mean, aren't you confused? The Rain was a bunch of large meteors that impacted the Earth, correct?

No, Steven. I am not confused. The Rain was due to impacts of multiple collisions of the Earth with arbitrary and artificial gravitational field bubbles in the spacetime continuum. It was not meteors.

What the hell are arbitrary and artificial gravitational field bubbles in the spacetime continuum?

I am sorry, Steven, but you do not have a knowledge basis for which I can begin explaining to you.

You mean I'm not smart enough to understand the explanation?

No, Steven. I mean you have no basic knowledge of the subject for me to explain it to you.

What basic knowledge do I need?

You would call it math and physics, but more specifically your species understands it as General Relativity and Quantum Physics.

No shit? Then teach me all I need to know to understand.

Okay. It will take a few seconds.

A few seconds later and I was a Nobel Prize-caliber physicist. I understood about spacetime curvature and mass-energy density and wormholes and warp drives. The math that I had learned was incredible. I could understand all of the gravitational effects in the universe with a simple tensor equation. Five seconds ago I only had a vague notion that tensors even existed.

Okay Mike, you are telling me that The Rain was a bunch of warp bubbles colliding with Earth at high warp velocities?

Yes, Steven.

Then aliens attacked Earth?

No, Steven.

Then where did these warp bubbles come from?

Earth.

Earth! We don't have that kind of technology!

Please refine the question, Steven.

You understand damned well what my question was. For an information distribution and management intelligence you aren't very intelligent. Start anticipating questions from voice inflections and such and improve your conversational skills, damnit!

Yes, Steven. I see. Yes, humans have developed warp technology and have ventured as far as seventy-six light years from Earth. The warp war was humans against humans.

Warp war?

Yes, Steven.

I had sat there quietly in the chair for twenty or more minutes thinking about that; a warp war. The Rain was actually a war, something that we had done to ourselves. It was hard to believe. As I thought about it I got angry at the damn humans that started the war and caused the deaths of millions . . . including everybody I ever knew. I also thought more about poor JackieZZ and Mom and Dad and Carly, which led me to thinking of good ol' Lazarus.

I snapped myself out of the bad line of emotions--something I couldn't have done with that damned implant in my head. Recalling the conversation and the abductee data brought my focus back to my original conversation with Mike. The original topic was why had Tatiana and a couple hundred thousand others not been allowed access to the alien computer system and why did the number of abductions increase during wars? I asked Mike but he didn't have a clue. The only thing we did decide was that there was a definite relationship between them. It was interesting also that the number of the isolated abductees increased nonlinearly within the time period of The Rain. Then it also dawned on us that the increase in abductions started before The Rain actually took place, several years in fact. Mike correlated that to the first detected warp experiment on Earth.

What did all of this mean? We weren't sure but we were certain that the Grays had been watching us very closely since the beginning of our civilization. Mike didn't know why and that seemed odd to me. If he was to manage information for the Grays, why were they keeping some of that information from him?

Something else had occurred to me, as well. I had not remembered any of my abductions and Tatiana had said as much to me on several occasions. So, did some of these abductees remember their experiences?

Mike?

Yes, Steven?

Tatiana and I don't remember our abductions. I mean, we have no recollection. In fact, I didn't even really believe in alien abductions, before. So, why are there so many stories about them?

That is a good question, Steven. I think that is part of what the aliens are trying to find out, because my records show that no human in the history of the abduction process has ever been left with any knowledge or means of recalling their abduction experience. The abduction myths are just that, myths, since no human has any physical memory of them. The nanomachines erase all memory of the events. Therefore, the abduction stories are not because of these alien abductions. Odd, is it not?

Perhaps the aliens were just sloppy?

I do not think so, Steven. The records I have show the abduction process very clearly and there would be no residual traces of the abductions that humanity could find. You would need nanotechnology at best.

So, nobody can remember the abduction . . . hmm . . . then why do the stories describe the Grays to a tee?

Again, I do not understand that and I think neither do the aliens.

It appeared that Tatiana was going to sleep all morning--or whatever the hell time it was--so I decided to have Mike make me smart. I spent all morning having things downloaded into my memory--all sorts of things. Mike also had to alter my memory neural networks so that they would remain as permanent and/or long-term memories. I told him to fix it so that I would remember to the minute detail anything and everything that I sensed from now on. He did. In less than an hour I became the smartest human being that had ever lived. With a technology like this you can imagine how far we must be behind the rest of the high-tech aliens. If all the Grays had this type of knowledge--just imagine a race of beings where each being was smarter than the entire human race! The thought was discouraging, frightening, and enlightening all at the same time. The only thing that bothered me was having to wear the damned headband all the time. After discussing this with Mike, we figured out a way to have a small implant placed just under the skin in several places around the scalp that would be a permanent connection without a need for the headband. I guessed that since the aliens didn't have hair it didn't bother them wearing the headbands. Tatiana was thrilled to not have to wear the thing any longer. She complained that it was bad for her hair.