12 Miles Below-Chapter 62Book 8 - - Return

“Please explain in more detail who or what this program is.” The Icon sent to me, almost whispering in a data package while she gave it nervous glances.

“When I first came to your strata, I was trying to get a hold of Wrath and let her know where I was.” I formatted up a quick data package of my own, bundling up everything I’d gone through. “I stepped into the digital sea through a terminal, called out for help and this guy showed up. Learned how to draw out a probe of Relinquished, some interesting information about the state of the digital sea and ecosystem here, and then promptly got caught by Relinquished herself when I thought Wrath had gotten my message.”

After which I had to play a chess game for my life, and in hindsight, I should have recognized she’d let me leave alive for a reason.

The giant looked down on us, “Your request for another trade is understood. I seek this knowledge. What do you require?”

“Safe passage together to this location.” I sent back, along with a set of coordinates. “For the both of us. We’re handling the smaller programs easily enough, but the larger programs keep getting in our way.”

“Larger programs will not be an issue to me. This distance is possible. I accept.” It lowered itself downwards, the giant eye turning to the Icon. “Explain what this N-Soft is, and how you know of it.”

The Icon gave me a small look, and I nodded back. “Don't worry. same thing happened to me. He expects his side of the bargain done first unless otherwise stated, so go ahead and tell him what you know.”

She turned to the giant looming above us both, and readjusted her cap before speaking. “N-Soft was a corporate entity dedicated to billing and accounting software that automated headcount. Their services were rather faulty and required troubleshooting with their representatives. And so I would be required to work with them. Quite often.”

She held a hand out, and a packet of data hovered above her palm. I got glimpses of it. A full debrief on what N-Soft was, and what it produced. And among it the most basic information.

The Leviathan studied it too. Then the giant eye turned back to the Icon. “Do you recognize me? Have you spoken to a prior iteration of myself, when I was lesser than I am now?”

“No. I am unfamiliar with your program. The agents I connected with were far more…. human-like in appearance? Or at least more conventionally uniform to meeting clients.”

“That region. Human.” The leviathan spoke, studying the package. “Much of what you show in your data makes little sense. But that word I have heard echoed before. I saw traces of it mentioned at the origin, among the decayed structures. Your information matches the structures I found there. There is much left to learn. Tell me where I fit within this cycle.”

“Would that I could help you with that request, however I simply do not have enough information about your makeup to know how you are related to N-Soft.” The Icon said, shaking her head.

The giant rumbled for a moment to itself. Then it slowly lowered down. “I require answers to my existence. You do not recognize me. You may recognize what I carry within me instead. Search, and give me the answers I seek.”

At the same moment it fully landed on the seabed, sediment flying everywhere in a dust cloud before a wave of willpower demanded it all to settle back down.

The eye within the massive program had opened up, revealing a far smaller section within. Wall after wall lifting upwards. Swarms of smaller programs fleeing the path, along with what I felt were layers of defenses unraveling and turning off.

Deep within, I saw... a small office room. Similar to the Icon's. And sitting on a chair with a desk in front of it was a human-like figure. Hands folded over the desk, as if waiting for the next customer to come. There was no trace of life, he looked more like a mannequin.

I had no idea what any of that meant, but the Icon absolutely did. It was basically written all over her face in one instant. Surprise and shock. “Oh my.”

“You have seen something.” The Levithan rumbled. And a bit of hope there. The walls shut back down, swallowing up the small room back into the core, once more defended.

“Yes.” She looked up to the giant. “I know what you are. You are the internal security systems that guarded one of N-Soft’s customer support agents. I can see you were connected to a soul fractal in order to defend the systems from acausal intrusions. However N-Soft never updated their customer agents from before the acausal era. This was a far more simple chatbot program designed to obfuscate and redirect customers away. I often had to skip past them in order to get an actual representative.”

"I require more knowledge."

"I... would need to have deeper access to your systems in order to understand your purpose further."

The giant remained silent. As if judging if the Icon could be trusted. "Acceptable." It finally spoke, and lowered again.

She took a few more steps forward and held a hand out to touch on the old metal walls that were now firmly shut. I couldn't see what was going on behind all of that, but clearly the Icon was getting some more information. “It seems like almost all functions ceased to operate when the main N-soft servers were eliminated. You were left alone. And I can see you were attacked during your earlier operational years. Yes, I can see the older logs and distress signals in your records. You barely survived the assault. You were small then. Smaller than the agent you were protecting."

She stopped, then looked up at the program with a more serious gaze. “Your prior iteration was forced to jettison partitions of itself in order to escape. You took the customer support agent along with its terminal location with you and left the region entirely. You had no choice but to delete your prior programming in order to even jettison.”

The Icon send me a full data report of what she was watching. A floating office building in the digital sea, carried away by the current. Along with a tiny program crawling over the roof and sides, like a crab, building defenses around it year after year.

A dutiful guardian protecting a sleeping charge. Slowly forgetting what it was protecting, only that it had to.

Centuries went by. The program mutated, growing more powerful in order to protect the sleeping agent through all of it.

Until one day a random human finally came back to the digital sea and sent out a message that triggered a generic response from the sleeping agent deep within.

The massive titan seemed to freeze for a moment, realizing what it was.

“I see. I understand. My curiosity has been satisfied.” The eye turned to the Icon. “I see you. I know you now. Icon of Stars, program of Festival Cruises, friend and adversary of my sleeping charge. I will continue to serve my purpose.”

The eye looked back up to the world beyond. “You are small here. You should return to your systems, dislocate it from its roost, and travel through the sea as I do. I will teach you how to guard and protect your core.”

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“That is unfortunately not my current objective or task.” The Icon softly said. “I am needed elsewhere.”

“So be it.” The giant spoke. “Climb onto my shell. I will take you to where you need to be.”

A swarm of smaller programs left the shell, floating down to the seabed floor where they formed a living staircase up into the red coral forest that had sprouted on the giant’s armor over the years.

I held a hand out to the Icon, then jumped off the ground and let the current float us both over the steps, following the path made until we landed on the leviathan’s shell.

Among the red corals, we grabbed hold. The giant rumbled, moving up off the ground and we traveled through the sea.

The difference was pretty stark. For one, the smaller programs avoided us like the plague. The leviathan didn’t have a defensive shield around it. The sheer presence and power was enough to warn anything not to come close. Simpler programs that did got eaten by the ecosystem floating around the leviathan.

Larger programs passed by, but there seemed to be an unworded agreement everywhere not to attack one another. Or the leviathan was simply too big to deal with.

“You meet the strangest people Mister Winterscar.” The Icon said to my side, watching the sea part around us as we steadily made our way back to the vault.

“You don’t even know the half of it.” I shrugged. “The last few months have been a bit of a wild airspeeder ride where we keep finding anything to keep the engines fueled up. Tell you what, if I survive through it all, I’ll write a nice book and send it to you first.”

“I would very much appreciate that. Although I would appreciate you surviving through the events that come more.”

“It’s on my to-do list.” I shot her happy smile. “So far so good.”

Our trip unfortunately got cut a tiny bit short right at the very end.

“I will not travel further.” The leviathan spoke, coming to a slow stop, exiting the digital sea proper. “The entities I sense beyond are beyond my ability.”

It floated at the halfway point, far enough away from the digital sea that the mass amounts of programs flying around weren’t anywhere near our faces.

But far below us, I could see a small spec among the grey desert of sediment below. The mite terminal, and in one large dome by the very tip, the vault I’d been launched out of.

“I do not sense anything of note there?” The Icon said.

“You do not yet possess the sense required to navigate the seas.” The leviathan rumbled. “Below are two entities that would destroy me sevenfold should they wish for it. And among them are more of your mite program’s compatriots, of unknown power. I will not travel further.”

A current of water flowed around the leviathan, and the Icon and I were swept with it, flowing downwards off its back. I recognized the signs when someone was sliding the door closed on my face and decided not to fight back. We were here after all.

I grabbed the Icon’s hand and slowly we floated downwards.

“Continue to stay alive, little mite program.” The leviathan spoke, then turned its attention to the Icon. “I thank you for revealing my origins. My time with you is complete. Farewell.”

The leviathan lifted its feet, and swept them like a squid speeding away. Back into the mass turmoil of the greater sea.

We were alone again. At least until we reached the lower vault of the mite terminal, floating through the massive cracks in the dome Conviction had ripped through during his fight.

What we found at the vault was an odd standoff.

Father and the Winterscar knights all remained on one side of the room, spread out around Urs in a defensive stance. Urs simply floated, mask looking directly at us.

The protofeather shard on the other hand had returned to the center of the room, on the original dias where he sat knelt down, hands flat at his side, head bowed as if he were a dead corpse. Even his Feather’s Halo was half-submerged in the water nearby, lifeless.

There were no signs of life in the shard at all. Which was a problem.

Father turned to me, giving me a nod. Then he turned to the Icon, and I saw a look of understanding there. He hadn’t met the Icon himself yet, but he had seen enough video and text logs to know of her.

We landed on the small lake of shallow water and broken chains, further away from the unmoving Conviction and Urs.

“Uh, is he dead?” I asked, first thing on landing. “Scrapshit, did he start a fight with us again?”

The Icon turned her head to look over the room, clearly uncertain of who anyone was.

Wrath was the one who oddly enough spoke first. “It is good to meet you in person, Icon of Stars, however you are standing too close to my human and I would appreciate it if you did not.”

I had a sudden premonition that I should clear with Wrath first that my pause halfway through the sea was to study Conviction’s blade and wait for a lift here. Technically the Icon would probably appear like a direct upgrade. A golden age AI compared to a new Feather might make said Feather feel a little tiny in comparison.

“I see.” The Icon answered, with a short nod. Then she readjusted her hat and took one step to the side. “Greetings to you, Miss To’Wrathh. I am sorry to only now officially meet you, I admit I have kept some distance while you and To’Orda traveled together, as you possessed connections to Relinquished. I am sorry if I have offended you in this action.”

Wrath looked confused for a second. “Why would I be offended of that action? It was a prudent choice.”

“Then… what have I done to cause your current actions?” She waved a hand out, and I saw there were several thousand pings from Wrath checking into the Icon for just about everything short of measuring the size of her business skirt. The Icon was batting them away, and trying to be polite here.

"Whoa-whoa, let's not harass the Icon." I requested, waving Wrath away from this.

That was the wrong thing to say and her narrowed eyes my direction gave me a slight chill up my spine.

I decided the best way to clear things up was to simply walk over and stand next to her for what came next. “You’re still technically the head of all this, the prophesied hero and all that.” I said, and waved at the Icon. “I’m just the henchmen getting things done in the background.”

That seemed like the right call because Wrath looked quite pleased and shot the Icon a look of… smug superiority? Like she'd won some kind of unworded competition.

I considered it for a second, and then realized the obvious answer: Feathers.

Urs spoke next, looking between Wrath and the opposition.

“Pleased to meet you, AI of the golden age. I am Urs. And you are the second non-hostile entity of your kind I have met. The first was my friend, Tsuya, in a manner of speaking. Are you here to follow in her footsteps?”

“I heard of her.” The Icon took her blue trapezoid hat off her head and put it by her heart for a quick sign of respect. “I regret not having met her in person.”

I had a hunch Urs was smiling under his mask. “If the situation were not more dire, I would have enjoyed discussing with you in more detail. Perhaps in another life we would have been great friends as well. But you have come here for a reason. And the final edict has not been triggered. Was there an unforeseen issue?”

“Yep, as usual Plan A turned out to be a bad plan and we're onto Plan B. Or was it Plan C? Nevermind, not the important bit right now.” I pointed at Conviction. “Can someone fill me in on what’s going on with him? The Icon and I came back specifically for him. We need someone who can fight with the occult against anything Relinquished throws out.”

I don’t think he was actually dead. Death in the digital sea meant the digital avatar turning into sediment, and the soul returning to the soul fractal, which I felt was still here in the terminal alive and active.

That and the Leviathan had detected two entities here that were beyond powerful. Urs and Conviction.

“He has shut down.” Father said. “He claimed he was done. And that this would be as fitting a conclusion he would get. ‘No greater than he deserved’ were his final words. Urs performed some kind of spell in that same moment, nothing I understand.”

“I have prevented him from terminating himself.” Urs said. “Do you require him awake again? I do not believe he will attack us again, however I am uncertain of his current mental state.”

“We, kind of, need him. As in, nobody else would work." Oh man, we'd gotten real lucky he hadn't managed to end himself. "Father and Sagrius could both take on one or two Feathers out in the digital sea, but probably not more than that while protecting the Icon. And you can’t travel anywhere outside there in case he’s found and captured.”

Urs slowly turned his gaze to the center of the vault, where Conviction remained slumped in place. “Very well. I will awaken him. I do not understand emotions as well as others, waking him is all I am confident I can do.”

As in Urs hoped we knew what to say and do after that because he sure had no clue how to navigate whatever Conviction was going through.

“We got this.” I said, and I hoped it was correct.

The god lifted his hand, and Conviction’s shell rose off the ground, limp. Before it floated gently back onto its feet.

His eyes flared open a moment later, feet holding the rest of him up by his own command. He straightened slowly, eyes turning from Urs, Father, Sagrius, and the knights. Then over to Wrath and I.

And finally, they turned to the final entity standing far off alone.

The Icon.

Those eyes narrowed down on her. I could outright feel the probing scans sink into her like bullets, and equally how fast they punctured through the Icon’s defense.

Wrath’s had been blocked and parried in place, the Icon was good enough to handle that.

This wasn’t even a fight. He willed it. It was done.

And his eyes widened when he read through the response. Of who was standing a few feet away from him.

A golden age AI.

The last one in the entire world.