It's My Party

A few seconds after 12:13 PM, precisely at Wobanakik's solar noon, the world suddenly became pitch dark. There was stunned silence for a moment, and then Amy and Margaret began calling for help. They swam to the call of Sandra's voice for a while, and then Madison helped by cranking her generator light from her backpack. This was all so completely unexpected, but they had discussed the possibility of this before. Unfortunately they were down at the lake, several kilometers distant from the entrance rooms. And the hike back would have to be done in pitch blackness.

Would the power outage last that long? Sandra decided it was worth a try. The darkness was so eerie it was difficult to see it as an opportunity, but nevertheless her group hiked back home as quickly as they safely could, their observation balloons all but forgotten.

And they found their home as dark as the outdoors but accessible by leaning and pushing open the sliding doors. A quick walk through the rooms revealed the path to the great staircase was open. Shaking off the disbelief that their escape could be this easy, they grabbed emergency water bottles stored nearby and exited Wobanakik. After a short 25-meter walk across the bottom corridor, they began climbing the stairs. They were on their third ascending flight when the power returned.

It was a profound stroke of good fortune. Only seven people now remained trapped in Wobanakik; Jada, Charles, Thara, Lynn, Mandy, and the Abenaki cousins Abit and Oona. And as Fatima waited to start her evening meeting, Jada's group was on the bridge and sharing in the conversation. Her group was back at Manhattan after a very harrowing day.

The blackout hit them while they were about ten kilometers downriver from home, investigating a promising lead from an observation balloon that turned out to be just an unusually shaped symmetric rock. And then the lights went out. They were hiking down a short but steep incline at the time, and Thara became so disoriented she tripped and skinned her knee before stopping. The wound wasn't serious but their position certainly was. It was as if someone had flipped a switch and turned off the world. What the hell had happened?

The experience was profoundly disturbing. Wobanakik's illusion of being outdoors and on the surface was perfect, and then to go to inky darkness in an instant was extremely unnerving, a painful reminder that they were living in an artificial world. In the blink of an eye each person went from being apart of a group to an individual isolated in a sea of darkness.

People found each other through their voices. Fortunately they all had generator flashlights in their backpacks. What to do? Returning to their kayaks would take them through deep forest, and they could hear distant roars of Dinofelis as the big cats voiced their frustration. After a short discussion, the group decided to wait in place, the flashlights shining in all directions and creating a fire zone for their pistols and crossbows. Fortunately they never had to fire, and after a tense two hours the linear sun suddenly snapped back on at its mid afternoon position. A few minutes later the usual breezes started to flow.

The first thing the group did was test their Leophones. Delighted to have them working, they checked in and learned that the latest power failure had affected the surface too. A few minutes later they learned that they were now the only inhabitants of Wobanakik. Sandra and her group were on their way to the surface.

If only they had known this was coming, but of course they did not. It was too late in the day to attempt to reach the entrance rooms now, but they discussed the issue of their living location with the surface as they hiked back to the kayaks. They reached a tentative understanding to vacate Manhattan, perhaps as early as tomorrow.

And as for Sandra's group, she and Parni and Sachi would head for the Bee Park tomorrow, to be followed by Madison, Amy, and Margaret four days later. Like Wobanakik, the Bee Park was at the beginning of its autumn and its fields were still overflowing with fruits and vegetables. It seemed a perfect opportunity to cycle through two more boost teams before the park's quick winter season.

Husna came and sat by Fatima and they shared their experiences during the blackout. After a while Fatima glanced out the window and saw that sunset was now only a few minutes away. What the heck were the library people doing?

Meanwhile, approximately 3 km west and 15 km north…

Jessica was watching the sun too. She was on the second floor of the long building complex, in an ultra-large bathroom with a perfectly transparent ceiling. Along the northern wall of the room there was a climbable artwork that allowed Jessica to put her nose up against the ceiling. The sun was not visible now, having just dipped below a long three-story building less than half a kilometer south of Jessica's position. But she had been watching the sun ever since she arrived here, climbing the artwork and gazing at as much as the sky as she could. She was very perplexed by what she was seeing.

Jessica thought she had arrived at the bathroom approximately two hours after the onset of the power failure. In all the twists and turns in the inky darkness, her memory never failed her, and when she finally put her hands on the sliding door and pushed, she was rewarded with orange sunlight so bright it hurt her eyes. She quickly entered the bathroom and closed the door behind her. Then she went straight to the nearest sink and drank her fill of water, using her hands as a cup. The water tasted sweet and was very satisfying.

Only then did she inspect her surroundings. The room was as she remembered it. She and Ricardo had passed by the room in the late afternoon the first day they were here. Ricardo had been much more interested in an electronics room across the hall, and did not even seem to notice that Jessica had poked her head into this bathroom for a second. It was a very good hiding place, lots of delicious water and natural light and Jessica was hoping Ricardo had forgotten the place was here. The building complex was huge. Four kilometers long, two hundred meters wide, two stories above ground, it held many thousands of rooms. How many could Ricardo possibly remember?

And yet her escape was so strange. Ricardo had backtracked through the darkness and intentionally let Jessica out of the maze. That made absolutely no sense. Was it possible he decided to forgive her for running away? No! She knew his heart. Ricardo would need a complete personality transplant before he would understand the concept of forgiveness. There must be some other explanation. Perhaps the servos had removed the locks. Yes, perhaps the servos… Ricardo must still be considered a deadly enemy. To think otherwise would be to commit suicide.

And the blackout… What was up with the orange sun? When Jessica entered the building complex two days ago, they were just coming out of a cold and dark winter with equal amounts of day and night, a spring equinox Jessica decided. But now two days later, the sun by her watch was setting around 8:30 PM. This was incredible! Yes, the seasons moved on this planet with blinding speed, but not that fast! A two and a half hour change in sunset in two days?! Did some godlike hand come and grip the planet and change its tilt?! No! But what other explanation was there?

And another thing! When Jessica's watch snapped back on shortly after arriving in the bathroom, it displayed the time as 2:23 PM. That didn't seem right at all. Jessica would have guessed about 1 PM. True, the walking in the darkness make time very hard to judge, but still… Jessica sighed. It was a mystery. But anyway, what now?

The safest course of action would be to assume she was prey, that Ricardo was hunting her. Logically Jessica should be on the move desperately checking the exterior doors to see if the power outage had left one of the doors unlocked. Jessica decided Ricardo would be anticipating this behavior from her.

So Jessica would reverse the logic. She had all the water she wanted and two almond food bars. Jessica sighed and petted the slight bulge of her stomach with her hand. And she was probably fatter than she had ever been in her life. How stupid she had been! Over the past month, such insane desires to please Ricardo, to be attractive for him. She knew he thought her hips girlish, her chest rather flat. Jessica had tried eating extra food in order to appear more sexually mature and attractive.

She now berated herself for such insanity, but the behavior did pay a dividend. Remaining in this room for a few days, perhaps even a week or more, it would be no problem. Let Ricardo taste bitter failure in his search for her. Let him decide the effort was futile. Only then would Jessica make her move.

She looked around the room as the last of the orange sunlight faded from the day. It was a large enough area. At least she wouldn't get claustrophobic. But it was a pity about the lack of a bed and pillow. Her arms under her head would have to do. And the toileting area! Undeniably coed, with no stalls at all. At least the bathroom in their old home complex had that. But not here. Here the facilities seemed intentionally designed to put the men and women on display for each other as they did their toileting. The setup was mind boggling.

Jessica's eyes lit on a side panel of drawers. Something for a bed?! A few moments later she was laughing with delight. She had found a large supply of fluffy towels.

Approximately three kilometers to the west…

Ricardo sat in the control room by a master security monitor, going through the boring work of inspecting the underground museum maze. On a table nearby was a plate filled half eaten remains of Jenaro. Earlier Ricardo had decided he needed something to cheer himself up, so he cooked up a big meal with a selection of choice cuts, a slice of inner thigh and a bit of the very sweet neck meat along with some fried liver and heart.

And when Ricardo had been preparing his dinner earlier, he decided there was just enough left for one more rump roast. Maybe he would do that tomorrow. Damn pity about the lack of spices. Pepper and garlic would be nice, a really big improvement. Ricardo thought he would sell his soul for some garlic, never realizing his soul was already under foreclosure.

And the power outage was not a symbol of complete failure. Before his override command code had exploded, Ricardo had forced the system to recognize another privilege for him. Ricardo now had every single door in the large building complex alarmed, every entrance door, every interior door, unfortunately not every drawer but at least every closet door. The long building was now buttoned up as tightly as a drum, but Ricardo still wasn't satisfied.

He had this really awful feeling about Jessica even though rationally he knew there was no basis for it. It was just a bad turn in his fantasy while he was masturbating earlier, getting ready to explode while butt fucking the bitch, and then switching to the memory of her witch eyes and power. Ricardo had been forced to detour to fantasy to Amber, but the memory of his failure to orgasm during his fantasy rape of Jessica bothered him. Jessica was dead. So why was he still afraid of her?

Ricardo blinked as he sat by the console. Afraid of Jessica? Did he really think that? No, of course not. Ding dong bong, the wicked witch was dead. And yet… Ricardo sighed. Well, he had the time and nothing else to do. He would humor his irrational fear and check out the museum maze again with his remote eye, every room, every corridor, every closet. It was an idle waste of time and it might take days, but Ricardo had nothing do before assuming the position of god in another sixty-three days. Nothing that is, unless someone was foolish enough to walk into the long building before then. If that happened, Ricardo would have a chance to play god a bit early.

Chapter 96.

Time: Friday, August 8, 2019 9:21 PM GHT

The last of the evening twilight had faded from the sky by the time Emily, Aggie, and Mark came to the Green Mall lounge, almost two hours after the meeting was supposed to start. After a quick link with Fatima, Mark waved his arm to make sure he had everyone's attention. "We have a computer slide presentation," he said simply. "Would you all please join us in the multimedia room?"

A few minutes later, the entire crowd was gathered at the first-floor presentation area. After checking to make sure Jada's group could see the presentation on their library consoles, Mark and Aggie stood up by the giant display screen covering the wall while Emily worked the video controls nearby. No one failed to notice how grim the three people looked. It was evident even to the people in Wobanakik. They all waited for the presentation in anxious silence.

"First slide Emily," said Aggie loudly. "Right. Here is a piece of a log file being stored on the orbital platform. It explains the cause of this afternoon's power failure. It explains a lot more. To be blunt, the power outage was the result of a failed security override command. Someone tried to seize executive control of security over an area of unknown size, probably across the entire Great Hexagon, perhaps even more. People, we are in serious trouble. Mark, Emily and I have been studying this log for several hours. The success of the override would have turned us into slaves or worse. Someone just missed seizing absolute control of everything we depend on. Mark?"

He nodded. "Lynn pointed this out to us weeks ago. The annual cycle of Wobanakik appears to be synchronized with a number of the core engineering cycles of the Great Hexagon. Some are biannual. An example of this is Lynn's ability to trigger the reset at Wobanakik's summer solstice on April 1st, and then again in two Wobanakik years. From our analysis of the orbital logs, we also found a seasonal window that opens security protocols and privileges for reassignment. From the logs, we even know where the attempted security override originated. The coordinates indicate it originated in the long building three kilometers south of Black Mall's home complex. Part of the building near its central core appears to be a security hub for the entire hexagon."

Whitney raised her hand. "Mark, I'm confused. Why is this information being stored on an orbiting telescope?"

Mark cracked a thin smile. "Yeah, why indeed. I believe it's there so I can see it."

Whitney blinked. "Play that again?"

Mark nodded. "It's a core issue here, I know, and worth the time to understand. Let me back up for a moment. The interface, all the people that have been trained by it, we all agree, it feels much more than working with a computer interface and perhaps vaguely less than interacting with a true sentient being. It's almost as if…"

Mark struggled for words for a moment. "Free will, consciousness, we tend to think of it as a yes or no issue. The human mind has free will. We are conscious. Other animals have it too, desires, emotions, think of a dog you might have known in your life. But computers, machines? We might talk sometimes as if they have personalities, but there's no true conscious. Artificial intelligence is exactly that, completely artificial, the illusion of intelligence. My laptop has no true ability to understand anything, anymore than a book on modern chess openings understands how to play chess. The book itself understands nothing."

"And now we come to Kappa Alpha's interface. Is it conscious? Does it have free will? Emily and I have debated this issue for months. Our tentative answer is… somewhat. That's our guess from trying to weigh all our experiences. Our impression is that the interface is working under guidelines that it cannot violate. It cannot break its rules, not that it doesn't want to but as a true impossibility. The physics of its limited version of consciousness forbids it. That's how Emily and Aggie and I frame its behavior."

Aggie spoke up. "But it wants to. I know this sounds absurd, but we feel the interface wants to help up. It's rooting for us. But it also has overriding orders to follow, and those orders are to be impartial. Humanity is on trial here, that's our model, and indirectly the interface has all but admitted our thinking is correct. That's why the logs are on the orbiter. It's an executive Section Zero area and thus a valid storage area for the data. That's the interface's loophole to obey its prime directives for neutrality but still help us along."

Paige raised her hand and was recognized. "But behind the interface must be the actual builders of this place. The ultimate decision to do all this, to put our species on trial, it must have been an act of free will. I don't understand. The interface is not the true builder. It openly admitted that to me when I was studying to be a med tech. I hope you all remember my report. I asked the interface when in came into being, and its answer was after Wobanakik became operational but before surface construction. And you say our species is on trial, right? So why aren't the builders our true judges?"

Emily took a second before replying. "Because we don't think they're around, not anymore. Mark and I have probing this issue with the interface ever since we got here. It finally gave us an answer less than an hour ago. It's reply was that the answer to our question is here for us to find but we have to search for it." Emily gave a small laugh. "And then things got really bizarre. After about two minutes of silence, the interface started playing the theme music of Party #6."

"What?! Stairway to Heaven?"

Emily nodded. "We think it was the original 1971 recording too, Led Zeppelin's band, Robert Plant as vocalist and Jimmy Page on the guitar."

Paige looked perplexed. "It played a song as an answer? What does that mean?"

Emily sighed. "Mark and I are guessing it means our trial is not being observed by anyone or anything higher than the interface. I know, I know, in human terms this makes no sense. The playing the song was just plain weird. What does that song have to do with anything?"

She paused to take a sip of water. "The effort involved to create a world, and then to just walk away… But that's what we think happened. Maybe the builders were forced to walk away. Was Earth's destruction intentional? Were the builders at war with other entities that destroyed Earth? It's a possibility, isn't it?"

Paige blew a full load of air from her cheeks. "Somehow that seems sort of right but not exactly... I agree with you on one thing though. There's so much here we don't understand."

After a long moment of silence Mark resumed his presentation. "Next slide Aggie. This next section of the log shows that the security override attempt was initiated by Citizen ID 50. This supports our earlier guess that the person we've seen wandering in the southern regions of Black Mall is Diego, whom we think is Citizen ID 53. Next slide Aggie."

"And here's a close-up from the orbiter's most recent flyby. We've zoomed in on an area on the eastern side of the linear building. It appears to be a bathroom on the top floor with a transparent ceiling. Note the person high up on the northern wall. We have a better shot with the primary mirror. This will be our last slide. Aggie?"

A few seconds after the final slide was displayed, several women from Party #5 shouted simultaneously, "My God, that's Jessica!"

Mark nodded. "Yes, that was Amber's and Whitney's opinion too. We have identified Jessica as Citizen ID 24. She's in the same building complex as Citizen ID 50, the person who attempted the security override. The orbiter logs identify the security center as approximately two kilometers west of Jessica's position. The question we were debating was how to interpret all this. What's the glue that holds all these facts together?"