Stephen Baxter - Transcendent

He tapped his ear. “I have my own channels.”

Shelley glared at him. “Who are you? Have you got something to do with this?”

He wouldn’t answer. He said mournfully, “It isn’t personal. Please believe that. I as an individual in fact sympathize with your goals, on this specific project; the hydrates are clearly a menace. But it’s what you represent, you see. The movement of which you have become a part. The philosophy behind your actions. The futile attempt to resist a change in the world’s natural order, when we should be relishing the opportunities opened up to us. The curtailing of our liberties in the process. The accruing of power by unelectable and unaccountable organizations and individuals.”

It was a type of argument I had heard many times before. But this wasn’t the time for bullshit. I tried to grab his collar, but he was a VR; my hand passed harmlessly through his shirt, scattering flesh-colored pixels. I snapped, “If you’ve got some information, say so.”

“I apologize,” he said almost formally. “Sincerely. I like you, Mike. I do, really!” He winked out of existence.

And, two kilometers out to sea, the bomber pressed his trigger.

“Awareness is the core of the Transcendence,” Leropa said to Alia. “Think of it as an awakening. In sleep you are aware only of yourself, your dreams and hopes and fears. It is consciousness of a sort, an awareness of self. But as you awake from sleep, you become more aware of yourself, and of a wider universe beyond your own head — and of other consciousnesses like your own, your parents, your siblings. It is essential. You must see the universe through their eyes, understand how they feel, before you can care. ”

“It is more than care,” Alia said. “It is love.”

“Love, yes! Love is the full apprehension of another soul, and the cherishing of her. And through love you awaken to a new level, a full awareness of others, so your own consciousness expands further. This is a deep root of our very humanity,” Leropa said. “It is believed that consciousness evolved as a way to deal with other consciousnesses. So full self-awareness is not possible in isolation, but only through an engagement with other minds. And the deepest such engagement is through love.

“Thus the Transcendence is built on awareness. On love as you have experienced it. But it is more than that, for the Transcendence is more than human.

“The Transcendence reaches across all of space. Each new soul drawn into the Transcendence, like yourself, enriches the whole. And each new form of humanity, each with its own unique way of perceiving the universe, deepens and widens our apprehension of the universe. All of this is brought into the center and shared among all. It is no coincidence that the Transcendence’s political presence is called the Commonwealth, for this merged awareness is the true common wealth of mankind.

“And there is more still. By reaching around the curves of time, the Transcendence is awakening to the past, too, awakening to the rich experience of every human who ever lived. This is an extension of the Commonwealth in time as well as space, to kinds of people who once existed, as well as those who exist now. In the end the universe will be like a jewel held in the palm of the hand, its every facet and glimmering refraction — yes, and every flaw — fully known and understood. This is the ultimate prize.

“Why must the Transcendence aspire to this? Because it is essential if we are to survive. Alia, the more awake you become, the more control of your environment you acquire, and the more power over your destiny you acquire. We must escape from our long dreaming if we want to live!

“And then there is our greater fate. Beyond the walls of time there are greater minds still, Alia. We call them monads. Our universe might not have been; there were other possibilities. Why our universe? Because of us — because of our potential to grow into a full apprehension of the cosmos, an expression of the objective cosmos in subjective awareness. So you see, Alia, we humans, through the Transcendence, will become the consciousness of the universe itself — and we will, we must, fulfill the great project of the monads.

“And all of this is built on love!”

Once more Leropa had met Alia on Earth, beneath the ruin of the ancient Wignerian cathedral. After the intensity of emotions on the Nord, it was dismaying to return to the drab, subdued community of undying. Even Leropa was like a shadow. The undying aspired to something higher, but it was as if they had forgotten what it was to be human, Alia thought.

It was almost a relief to plunge once more into the mysteries of the Transcendence.

Now, with Leropa’s guidance, she thought she could see its immense transhuman ideas like vast clouds in the dark, and the thoughts that crackled like lightning between those clouds. And in every direction she could see the awareness of the Transcendence elaborating, multiplying, exponentiating, its vast intellect growing as she watched.

But as they floated through this sky of consciousness, Leropa was not literally a guide for Alia, her words not a literal whisper in Alia’s ear. This was the Transcendence; Alia and Leropa were both parts of a greater whole, and yet expressions of it, as Alia’s own consciousness might briefly be focused on a bruised finger. But the mote that had been Alia found it helpful to cling to the metaphor of novice and guide.

And now, here in the dark, Alia had come to learn the truth about Redemption, and she listened to Leropa speak of love.

“The Transcendence loves you. The Transcendence loves every human. It must, for love is the full apprehension of another, and so of oneself. Love is the foundation of everything, Alia. Can you see that? And it is love, the cherishing even of the unhappy past, that has led to the Redemption. For the Transcendence to become complete we must redeem the suffering of the past — we must — and we can only do that by apprehending it, loving it.

“First there is the Witnessing — a trillion tiny viewpoints like yours, Alia, each studying some corner of the past, some tiny lost life, and integrating it into a greater awareness of the whole. The next level of awareness is the Hypostatic Union, in which your consciousness is merged with your subject in the past — and you express your love for her by sharing every particle of joy in her life, absorbing every morsel of pain. A full Hypostatic Union of every soul in past and future with every other, the ultimate logic, would require an infinite effort. But the Transcendence will be/is infinite and eternal; for such an entity an infinite recursion is possible, and so it will/ must come to pass. You understand that now.

“But all of this, even the fully realized Hypostatic Union, is a mere viewing. And even when viewed the suffering will still exist out there in the past.”

“Yes,” Alia said. She was on the verge of understanding — almost thrilled by the intoxicating ideas. “Even Hypostatic Union is not enough. We must do more.”

“Yes,” Leropa said. “And we can do more.

“It is as if, up to now, we have viewed the past as a magnificent tapestry. We follow every thread, every life, as it weaves its unique way through the tremendous patterns of the whole. But we have seen the past as a fixed thing, frozen; we have never allowed ourselves to tamper with it, to change the slightest detail in the weave — not even to repair the most obvious flaws, or to amend the most grotesque suffering.”

Suddenly Alia saw what the next level of Redemption must be — what the Transcendence had done.

“We have touched the past,” she whispered.