The Chee Chronicles: Chapter Nine: Creator
MORE THAN YOU KNOW.
I must have jumped clear out of my programming. The world was frozen like winter, but without the laughter and cheer of my friends and loved ones playing in the fresh snow… My friends and loved ones were frozen like they had been… killed… Ah! Would that terrible, terrible word ever leave my conscience?
I'M AFRAID NOT, CHEE-SENDO.
There it was again! A strange… voice, I suppose is the best word for it. But it was so much more than that! On one level, I swear I heard the words, but on another, they just popped into my brain, as if they had been uploaded by Dach as she did my yearly maintenance checks… Dach!
My memory betrayed me, her scream piercing my mind…
YOU MUST LEARN TO OVERCOME BAD MEMORIES.
"How so?" I demanded. Asking disembodied 'voices' for advice… Not your brightest move, Sen.
IT'S NOT SOMETHING I CAN EXPLAIN JUST YET.
"Oh?"
THERE IS A VERY EASY WAY, HOWEVER.
"Sounds lovely."
YOU ARE A VERY SARCASTIC PERSON, AREN'T YOU?
"It's not my fault," I explained to the 'voice.' "I'm an android; blame my programmer. He's sitting like death in that tree over there…" I recoiled; there it is.
THE EASIEST WAY TO FORGET SOMETHING, MY DEAR SENDO, IS BY KEEPING BUSY.
"Doing what?" I asked curiously. It didn't occur to me to be suspicious, but maybe I should have. I suppose the Howlers, with all their shock and pain still needed time to settle before I could fully grasp the reality.
CHEE-SENDO, DO YOU KNOW WHO I AM?
"A disembodied voice?" I asked smartly.
CHA. CHA. CHA. YOU ARE QUITE AMUSING, CHEE-SENDO.
"I try. I try."
About right then is when my brain began to function properly. It began to process the world around me for the first time since the Great Dane had been killed. It began to ask logical questions, like "Who is this voice?" "What does it want?" "Is it the one who froze the world?" And, most importantly, "Why in the name of Ellimist am I joking around with it like we're playing Laughter Ball?"
BECAUSE THE ELLIMIST IS ENJOYING THIS EXCHANGE IMMENSELY.
Of course, just because my brain was realizing these things doesn't mean I was listening to it. Everyone—androids and biologicals alike—have a bad habit of not listening to their brains in these types of situations. Which makes us all very, very stupid. Of course, the most ironic thing is, when you're sitting on the outside, it's easy to notice these things. But when you are in these same situations and your brain is proving its clear superiority over the rest of your body/systems, it's really, really easy to ignore it.
I think my brain had figured out who the mysterious disembodied voice was. My brain was a storehouse for legends and folklore. I thought that if I ever met an alien species, I would want to be highly educated about the Pemalites and Chee so that I could swap information. If I could teach some as of yet undiscovered culture about my own, they would be that much more likely to take me to their homeworld and teach me in return.
So I knew all of the fables and fairytales we told of our Creation, and the Creation of the Creators. I knew that the Ellimist had supposedly created the Pemalites partly through a chemical reaction, partly through gene splicing, and partly through the wish to make the universe a better place. I knew he had blessed them with superior technological prowess, and by giving them knowledge of the technology possible, gave them a leg up over every other species in the galaxy. I knew he charged them with the sacred task of spreading life throughout the galaxy… I knew all of this junk, and more.
I knew how he supposedly appeared before them, as a voice or a large pink tree or many other incarnations… I knew, I did…
YOU KNOW A GREAT DEAL, CHEE-SENDO. TELL ME, DO YOU YET KNOW WHO I AM?
I did. Oh, my Ellimist, I did.
"You… are the Ellimist."
But why?
BECAUSE YOU HAVE A GREAT NEED, CHEE-SENDO. AND SO DO I. I THINK YOU MAY BE ABLE TO HELP ME. IN TURN, I SHALL HELP YOU.
"What sort of help do you need?" I asked. Ellimist, this was not happening. In the Ellimist's name… By the Fabled Wings…
DEAR SENDO, I WOULD APPRECIATE IT IF YOU WOULD NOT TAKE MY NAME IN VAIN.
"Sorry."
I'M SURE.
"So…" I looked around. "I'm sorry, Ellimist, sir, but this whole talking to a voice in my head…"
IT DISTURBS YOU, DOES IT? SHALL I TAKE A PHYSICAL FORM?
Did I just make demands of the Ellimist? I asked myself. Did I just make demands of my creators' creator, the veritable GOD of the Pemalites…?
YOU DID, BUT IT IS OF NO CONSEQUENCE TO ME.
I wondered briefly if it would be of consequence for him to stop listening to my thoughts… But I chose not to voice this, nor did he answer.
You know, when you watch plays or holograms about mystical beings or gods, and they appear before a mere mortal, there's sometimes flashing lights and thunder and grand symphonies of sound, ringing out with the glory of the being's supreme might and utter greatness. The mere mortal falls to their knees, afraid of looking upon That Which Man Must Never See. The loud, booming voice of the almighty deity envelopes the land, and he reassures his creation that all is well, and the mortal goes on to perform great deeds in name of their deity, all faith restored…
Yeah. Right.
There was no great sounds or flashing lights. One minute, I was speaking to nothing, the next minute I spied a bit of movement off to my left. A Pemalite girl that lived a few patches away from us stirred. She had been playing a game of jumping and back flips with her Chee…A Cheenamed Sheeree. I recognized her… She had come to get her motion centers repaired last week… Sheeree had never mentioned the name of her Pemachee.
Sheeree's Pemachee stepped away from where she had sat, waiting for her Chee to jump. And as she did… I blinked, wondering if my eyes were malfunctioning. It had happened once… Because the Pemalite girl was walking towards me, and sitting still all at once…
The girl laughed softly. Not the loud, hearty 'CHUK CHUK CHUK' sound I had come to associate with laughter, but a trilling 'reereeree' that sounded something like a bird. She stopped her weird laughter after a moment and looked at me.
"Dear Sendo, do you like this form better?" she asked. "Do you still fear me, when I am like this?"
"I do not fear you."
"Yes, Chee-Sendo, yes, you do." A slow, amused smile spread across the furry little face, her bright yellow eyes shone. Like Camis's. "And I know why you fear me, Sendo. You fear me because, now, it is all you can do."
"Is that so?"
"It is indeed. Your world is beginning to break apart, is it not? Everything you once knew, once believed is being shattered. Your world will never be the same. You will never be the same… and neither will your friends."
It was difficult to dispute her… the Ellimist's… logic. To die, to die, was already alien to me. Machines don't die. Sometimes, sure, we break down. Just last week, Chee-Reeko had come into Lubis's office, dragged in by a few of his neighbors. Something was wrong… His cryscom had been damaged somehow. Chipped in a few places. Not even Pemalite crystals were indestructible.
But Lubis had fixed him. He recovered the chipped pieces from inside Reeko's metal skull. He hooked Reeko's crystal up to a brand-new one and transferred all of the data into it. The new crystal computer was planted inside Reeko. He was as good as new.
No matter what ailment befell us, Lubis and Bermez could fix it. No matter what was damaged, no matter what wasn't working right, we would never die, because we could be fixed. My creators had the spare parts, the knowledge, and a love for their creations so deep that all we had to do was present ourselves before them, and we knew we would be fine.
For the love of everything, anything around me, when I first saw Chee-Dano lying there, in pieces like Camis's pockecom after he tried to download the latest Pekkinez song, my very first instinct had been to point it out to Lubis!
But Lubis couldn't fix death. He worked with machines, not biologicals. And even the doctors, what Niomee had called a biological's mechanic, could not fix death.
My core beliefs were destroyed… Yes. Yes, I was scared.
So the Ellimist knew this. I didn't have to say it. The Ellimist knew all, saw all, heard all. I was standing before the most awesome power in the history of the universe.
"There are Those who are Greater than I, little Chee," the Ellimist interrupted. "But I think we, or, rather, you, are veering quite far off course. Your thoughts are flying very rapidly."
"What did you expect?" I asked "her." "What is the course?"
"The course, Sendo, is simple. You need to push what is happening to you out of your mind. I need a favor. Our needs collide. My favor will keep you very, very busy, and being busy, I have found, is the best way to keep bad memories at bay."
"But it will only be temporary," I realized suddenly. "My reprieve will only be temporary."
The Ellimist nodded. "This is true. But my favor will only satisfy me for a short time. Once it is done, I will be back to devising strategies to defeat my foe." A sly, all-knowing smile. "Do you know of whom I speak, dear Sendo?"
Every religion has a central deity or spirit or force. And in cultures that recognize a distinction between 'good' and 'evil,' the central figure is Good. Now, in these same black-and-white societies, the central figure usually has a rival.
If the central figure is Good, then, logically, their rival is Evil.
Mine was such a culture. The central deity, the great creator, the universe's main force of good, was the Ellimist.
His rival was Crayak.
The folklore and legends I had collected over the years resurfaced. Crayak was an incomprehensible being. He liked fun and games as much as we did, but his idea of fun and games was pain. And suffering.
And now, I wondered, perhaps he also enjoyed the artificial death? The killing?
This was why our scientists and historians and anthropologists concluded that he was, in fact, real. How could early Pemalites invent a being which they have no chance of understanding? Cultures invent religions and gods and myths to explain things. Why it rains, why the sky is this color, why women are the ones who give birth…
Why biologicals must die.
The legends of Crayak stated that the Pemalites must die when they are old because the never-ending game between him and the Ellimist, the never-ending game of Good versus Evil must always be fresh. As you replace an old toy, so too must the Ellimist and Crayak replace their toys.
Us. We are the toys, I realized with horror. Sure, I had been preached to my entire life about these things. The Ellimist, the great good, is always at work against Crayak, the great evil. I must always be good and never tempted by Crayak, I must not give in, I must sit quietly in my allocated space-time location and forever be bent to the will of the Supreme Being…
But you know, it's one thing to sit through a religious service and listen to that. I can pay no attention at all and still recall it perfectly later, with my perfect computer memory.
And it is an entirely different experience to be confronted with that fact as a truth… To be slapped with that fact as truth, to have it rammed into your skull and made clearer, clearer than midday, with both suns glowing, with all the lamps on, staring at a lit computer screen while holding a hand-light…
Some may rethink their faith. Me? I was on autopilot, still shell-shocked from my eventful day… And it had only been a day. But I, while I was mainly running programmed routines; I was still thinking clearly enough to realize that I was in a very, very bad situation.
But hey, how could it get any worse?