Stephen Baxter - Transcendent

I said, “I still don’t see what is has to do with me.”

Rosa said patiently, “The Transcendence wants redemption, Michael. In the Christian mythos, the redemption of mankind was achieved through the sacrifice of one man—”

“Oh,” I whispered. “And this time it’s me.” I was numb, neither hot nor cold. I wondered if I was dreaming all this, if I was delusional somehow.

Everybody started talking at once.

Rosa said to me, “Think what this means, Michael. I listened carefully to the way Alia described all this to you. You would be a ‘representative’ of mankind, in some way.”

Shelley said, “That sounds like the feudal stuff. What did you call it?”

“Substitutionary atonement, yes. Michael will be our champion before the Transcendence, somehow able to deal with it as an equal, as Anselm imagined Christ negotiated with God over mankind’s sins.”

“But what does it want me to do? Apologize?”

“Oh, I don’t think you have to apologize for anything,” Rosa said. “It is the Transcendence that is seeking redemption — not the other way around.”

“So it wants to apologize to me? For what?”

“You will have to find that out.” Her face was close to mine; she stared at me, intent, hungry. “ But this is why you must become elevated to the Transcendence yourself, Michael, so that you will be worthy of absolving the Transcendence, as no mere human could be, if you deem it the right thing to do.”

My sense of unreality deepened. “I don’t know what to say. Why couldn’t I be a normal crazy?” I whispered to Shelley. “Why couldn’t I just think I was Napoleon Bonaparte? Why did I have to go all the way to the big JC?”

Shelley grabbed my hand. “Michael, I’m not about to let some posse of superhumans nail you to a metaphysical cross.”

“But there may be no choice,” Rosa said.

I said, “This is insane, Rosa.”

“Yes,” she said urgently. “That is precisely what it is. Insane. The Transcendence may be reaching for godhood, but it is somehow flawed, Michael. Otherwise, why would it put itself through such anguish, such contorted apologizing? Yes, it is probably insane.

“But it is powerful, remember. We know it can reach around the curve of time. We know it can bring the dead back to life. An insane god is unimaginably dangerous. That is why we must find a way to deal with it.”

John stared at her, and burst out laughing.

“I feel like laughing myself,” I said.

“I understand,” Rosa said. “Really, I do. This is too big for us to imagine. But this strange responsibility has descended on us nevertheless.” Earnest excitement showed in her face. “We truly find ourselves at the fulcrum of history, Michael. You do.

“I know you are full of doubt. I know that you don’t feel you are up to this challenge. You think you may be carried away by megalomania; you don’t even trust yourself. But you will do this, Michael. You will call Alia again. You will let her take you into the Transcendence itself. You will do it, won’t you? I can see it in your eyes. It isn’t in your heart, your soul, to turn away from this…”

I hated myself for it. I couldn’t bear even to look at Tom, or John, or Shelley, those representatives of my common sense, my conscience. But Rosa was right. She knew me too well. Even if the ghost of Morag hadn’t been involved, I would have gone in there.

Rosa said, “Just remember the Transcendence isn’t omnipotent.”

“It isn’t?”

“We know that. The substitutionary atonement it is seeking proves that much: we surpassed that in the sophistication of our thinking centuries ago. We are small, slow, stupid, weak compared to the Transcendence. But there is at least one way in which it is inferior to us. Michael, you can deal with it.”

As we broke up, John had one more question for Rosa. “Suppose all this is true. That the future folds over onto the present and the past, that our far-future descendants will become godlike. What chance will you Catholics have then? The game is up, isn’t it?”

Rosa smiled thinly. “The Christian Church survived the fall of Rome, and the science of Aristotle and Newton, Galileo and Copernicus and Einstein. Catholicism even survived Martin Luther. I think we will survive this.”

And she disappeared.

Tom came to me. He didn’t bother even to ask whether I was going to do it. “Just when,” he said. “Tell me when, Dad.”

I shrugged. “Tomorrow, maybe. Why not? I’m not getting any braver.” Not that I was sure if I needed courage; if something is so far beyond your imagination, it’s hard even to fear it. “You aren’t going to call me an instrumentalist again, are you, Tom?”

“No. I can see you aren’t doing this for yourself, not at any level. You’re doing it for the same reason you went straight back to the hydrate project after the bombing. You’re going to do it because you think you have to.”

“The Transcendence chose me…”

“I know.”

“But I’m sorry, Tom.”

“For what?”

“Because I’m going off and leaving you again. Same old story.”

“OK. But at least I have warning this time. Have you got any dinner plans?”

That took me off guard. “I guess not. What are you thinking, a Last Supper?”

John and Shelley joined us. John said, “A last beer may be a better idea.”

Shelley put her arm around my waist. “Do you think it will make any difference if you have to go off and slay demons in the far future with a hangover?”

“It might actually help,” I said. “OK, first round on me. What do you prefer, water or wine?”

Leropa and Alia walked in the lengthening shadows of the cathedral’s titanic ruin.

“So you visited him.”

“It was — strange. Difficult.”

Leropa made no comment.

Alia said, “I believe Michael Poole will do what we ask of him.”

Leropa eyed her. “And that pleases you?”

“Shouldn’t it?”

“There is one corollary to our discussion I didn’t want to raise in front of your sister,” Leropa said.

“Corollary,” Alia said dismissively. “The Transcendence believes it is a creature of love. But its language is all logic.”

Leropa raised a hairless eyebrow. “Let us talk of logic, then. You are not the first to have pointed out the ultimate logical flaw in the Redemption program.”

Alia nodded. “No matter what you do, even if you change history to eliminate every element of suffering, the suffering will still exist—”

“In a wider universe of possibilities. Yes.”

“So Redemption is impossible.”

“Not necessarily,” Leropa said. “Your sister was right to intuit that the Redemption is not for those who suffered long ago; it is for the Transcendence itself. It is hoped — but it is only a hope — that somewhere in the Levels of Redemption might be found sufficient solace. At some point we might be able to say: this is enough. And with the past redeemed it will be possible to look to the future — to look outward, not inward.”

Alia nodded. It was a valid hope. But — “If that point is never reached? If there is no solace to be found? What then?”

Leropa sighed. “If suffering exists, no redemption may be possible. But need it have been so? What if humans had never existed at all? What if the Earth had remained lifeless, like the Moon? Then there would have been no suffering to atone, no evil to redeem — no sin to expiate. Perhaps that would be a better state of affairs than to allow ineradicable suffering to exist, without the possibility of healing.”

Alia stopped in her tracks. “Are you serious?”