The Compound, perched like an aerie on the edge of La Mesa de Los Muerto, overlooked Ciudad Esparanza with its winding streets and picaresque adobe houses. La Mesa—which wasn’t really a mesa at all, but a geological shelf about 350 meters up the face of El Pared Magnifica—retreated beneath the pounding rain of La Cascada and emerged again, smaller, on the other side of the great falls. Gabe Proctor gazed out the cafeteria window at the tumbling water and idly wondered if it might be possible to traverse behind the falls, from one side to another—a more tangible puzzle than the theoretical one he had spent most of his morning trying to solve. Since joining the cloister twelve years ago at the precocious age of eleven, he had often imagined jumping the railing and exploring, but courage always fled before the act. It wasn’t the physical danger that held him back, but the social ostracism of breaking the rules. The former prodigy blamed this timidity on his mother, who had given him over to strangers at such a young age, to be educated among a small cluster of elite scientists intent on discovering the very nature of the universe itself.
He knew it was a childish impulse, but all Gabe really wanted to do at the moment was jump that rail and find a place to hide, damn the regulations. The thing in his mind that made this morning different was the imminent arrival of the Sofias. The Sofias reminded him of the hypocrisy behind his own privileged existence, that, in fact, the Sofias, the Sisters and Brothers, and the Temple of New Life itself, existed for the sole purpose of protecting the Compound and its vaults and laboratories interred deep in the cliffs of El Pared. The Sofias were not bearers of wisdom, as popularly believed, but master manipulators who wove spells to enthrall the masses, and it insulted his own humble origins. Gabe’s view of the Sisters was no secret to his colleagues, many of whom shared it, but avoiding their benefactors was frowned upon by some of these same peers, who viewed schmoozing as a public duty.
Gabe slid open the glass doors which led to the veranda and casually strolled out to the south gardens, as far as possible from the Compound proper, where he could feel the thunder of the falls and the promise of its spray cool on his face. He grabbed the rail and swung himself over, landed on firm ground, and trekked the fifty meters to the falls. Each step he took toward the edge felt like a step toward himself. He arrived at the falls unprepared for the sheer power of the water and the incredible distance to the basin floor; his stomach reeled, his balance shifted, and he stumbled back from the abyss. Pausing to wait for the vertigo to pass and for his knees to stop shaking, he now saw the water-eroded contour of the shelf as it disappeared behind the spray. It seemed to him that a path existed, wide enough to walk safely upon, at least as far as he could see; he could always turn around, come back if it proved to be impassable. He summoned his courage and moved forward cautiously. Behind the falls, centuries of water had carved out an indentation deep into the soft cliff, but it also left the ledge muddy and dangerously sloping toward the precipice. A very narrow passage, a half meter wide, hugged the wall, and Gabe edged along in small, cautious steps, keeping his eyes on his goal until the ground felt safe again beneath his feet.
Beyond the falls, the shelf widened out once again to fifteen meters or so, and extended another hundred or so meters before narrowing and vanishing back into the face of the cliff. The ledge was flat and grassy, with a few small pine trees and scrub oaks clumped near the wall, giving him plenty of room to stretch and think. He located a comfortable spot and laid back in the grass to fritter away the remainder of the day. For the first time in years, Gabe thought about his childhood in the hills of eastern Oklahoma. They had been hard but happy days with his parents and extended family, Keetowah Cherokees, a tradition which went back all the way to his famous outlaw ancestor, Zeke Proctor. But his parents were academics and cultural traditionalists, not in the least bit religious; for them, as for the scientists who had educated him, the scientific method was all of the religion they needed—and it was all the religion Gabe needed.
In many respects, his childhood was a normal one; tramping the fields and hills of the western Ozarks, his uncles had taught him to hunt and honor his prey, to bathe in the river, and to fend for himself in the woods—what little was left of the woods. He learned to play soccer and stick ball and run with the boys from the neighboring farms, but these hours were strictly limited, and his parents expected him to spend much of his time studying.
“You have been given a gift, Son,” his mother would tell him. “It is your responsibility to develop it and use it for the good of the people.”
Gabe’s gift was math. At four years old he had an uncanny ability to solve complex mathematical formulas. By the time he was six, his extraordinary intelligence could no longer be hidden from the world, and he had attracted the attention of important government and academic players. A tug of war began for Gabe’s soul, but his parents, sympathetic to the Bolivarian Alliance and its call for indigenous ascendancy, had discovered the Temple of New Life and another option for their son’s future—Sweetland.
The memory of his arrival on Sweetland had a bitter taste for Gabe; his father, Nathan Proctor, had died crossing over, and Gabe and his mother, Carla, eventually settled in Echota with several other Cherokee families. Carla taught Earth History and tried to keep alive the Tsalagi language at the University of the South. But Gabe became a lost, lonely child. He made the University library his home, and spent every waking moment hiding behind a book. So, it was no surprise that he said ‘no’ when the scientists came from Esparanza to offer him an elite education in The Compound. But Carla had been insistent.
“This is your chance to develop your gift, Gabe.”
“I can do it here in Echota, Mom, with you,” he had reasoned.
“You can do better than that, Son.” And so it went, around and around until he relented and, swallowing his tears, left with a guide for the long journey to Esparanza. Gabe received a letter from his mother every Primerdía, without fail, but he missed her terribly, and he missed his father, and he missed the Cherokee hills of Oklahoma.
Back in his quarters that evening, Gabe began writing a proposal. He knew it had little chance of success—return to Earth was essentially limited to the Sofias and the inner circle of senior scientists—but the more he thought about it, the more important it became in his mind. The difficulty would be in convincing the Directoriat that a junior quantum neurophysicist had a legitimate reason to go to Earth.
One thing might get their attention, he thought, and that was his work on neuro-entanglement and his theory about the origins of the mysterious disease, popularly called the saudades. A number of suicides over the past several months were believed triggered by this condition, named by the Galician immigrants, who described it as a sort of heart sickness. Saudades was approaching pandemic dimensions in the Communities. It was a long shot; the theory wasn’t much more than a postulation at this stage, but if he could conduct tests on some of the tiny number of permanent returnees, then perhaps he could learn something.
There were so many buts and ifs, and late in the night Gabe nearly gave up on the whole idea. He knew the proposal was dishonest on its face, that his true motive was his desire to see his childhood home once more. On the other hand, it would be truly useful research. Finally, in frustration, he put down his pen and turned in. He could decide tomorrow.
* * *
After two weeks, no word had come about Gabe’s proposal, not that he expected any news, he told himself, unless they meant to humiliate him, which he probably deserved. He dove deeper into his work, thinking it might help offset the imagined guffaws issuing from the assembled senior scientists.
On occasional days, like today, he utilized his private hideaway to think and unwind from the frustration of work, and laying in the shade of his tiny oak thicket, Gabe pondered his morning conversation with Caleb Jacobsen, from the Astrophysics Department. Caleb, who was a few years older than Gabe, had requested to join him for breakfast, expressing an interest in Gabe’s proposal.
“You know about that proposal, huh?” asked Gabe, surprised.
“Yeah,” said Caleb. “The Department Chair mentioned it, yesterday.”
“Don’t tell me, he was rolling on the floor with laughter.”
Caleb gave Gabe a look of consternation. “No. Actually, he thought it was quite an interesting idea.”
“He did? You’re joshing me, right?”
“Gabe, do you realize how much respect you have among the Physics faculty?”
Gabe was astonished. “Not really.”
“Well trust me, even over on my side of The Compound. So tell me about this idea of yours, the gist of it.”
“Sure..okay. You know about the Omiyoko Study, about three decades ago?”
“Is that when they confirmed the ability of certain plants to communicate with their cloned offspring?”
“Yes. They proved that these plants communicated with one another via entanglement, and could coordinate survival responses to drought and disease. Now, what I am suggesting is that we too are a sort of clone, created by entanglement. What if the entangled particles produced in the process of quantum transference effect one another in some similar way? What if something about the entangled particles on Earth results in the saudades here on Sweetland?”
“You’re suggesting that the saudades is caused by crossing over, that it’s a disease of quantum entanglement?”
Gabe nodded. “I’m close to demonstrating the possibility mathematically, but there are some glitches. Holes you could sail a ship through, actually.”
“For example?”
“In the Omiyoko Study, the original plants and their offspring were all still living at the time of the study. In the process of quantum transference, on the other hand, the original in most cases is no longer alive. Transference involves hundreds of billions of entangled particles, and I can’t represent this change mathematically if I have no idea what entanglements are involved, or how they are involved.”
Caleb looked at him, thoughtfully. “So, what’s your current line of inquiry?”
“I’m playing around with network theory and multiple entanglement.”
“Multiple entanglement? It’s been done in the laboratory, I suppose, but—”
“Yeah, see what I mean? I’m forced to posit a whole new kind of particle that works like a neurological network, entangled with multiple other particles—a real can of worms.”
There was actual excitement in Caleb’s face. “But Gabe, that’s brilliant. Our quantum people have been looking for some fresh way of thinking about entanglement, and they’re going to be all over you with questions when this goes to review.”
Gabe had just shaken his head; peer review had been so far from his mind, and so far from reality at this stage. He only wanted to go to Earth, and now he had overhyped a half-baked idea. The conversation was playing over in his mind when Ellie Fontinot emerged from behind the veil of La Cascada. He sat upright, brushing the oak branches away from his face. Damn, he thought, how the hell did she find me here? A graduate fellow and doctoral candidate, Ellie was also the department gofer, and her appearance meant someone further up the food chain was seeking him out.
“How did you find me?” he complained, irritably.
“Don’t get your shorts in a twist, Gabe.” Ellie grinned at him. “Everybody knows you come over here to be alone. Even Arkady.”
“Arkady knows?” It was a bit of a let down to find that his little act of rebellion was common knowledge, and even tolerated by his department head, Dr. Arkady Zharkov.
“You jump the rail right outside the cafeteria window, for crying out loud. And besides, there are perimeter cams all around the compound.”
“I guess I didn’t think of that,” he said, sheepishly.
“Well, Arkady wants to see you, pronto, and he has Dr. Yoshito in his office.”
Without another word, Ellie disappeared behind the falls and left Gabe sitting on the ground, contemplating the meaning of his summons. Dr. Rebecca Yoshito was the lead scientist in the Quantum Neuroscience Unit, Gabe’s immediate supervisor. Were they going to chastise him over his inadequate proposal? or his absence from the last interdisciplinary staff meeting? Absentmindedly, he picked up the handful of seeds he had gathered and dropped them in a jar beside him in the sand. Then, he closed the lid and replaced the container in the cliffside nook where he stashed it. He wasn’t sure why he was collecting seeds, it just seemed right somehow, some habit from his childhood when the trees of Earth were dying, and everything seemed suddenly hopeless.
* * *
When Gabe arrived at Arkady’s office, he found an additional guest—a stranger—with Zharkov and Yoshito. When he saw the red robes he lamely attempted to excuse himself, “Sorry, I must have made a mistake,” but Arkady motioned him inside.
“Please close the door, Dr. Proctor,” said Arkady. Gabe winced. He hated that rhymey Doctor Proctor bullshit. “Gabe,” continued Arkady, “I would like you to meet Sister Magda. Sister is Mother Hierarch of Esparanza. She has taken an interest in your…uhm…theory of complex entanglement.”
Gabe stood, mouth agape, unable to utter a word. They had even given it a name. He interpreted the tone of the “uhm” however as a clear signal that the senior scientists weren’t entirely happy with the idea, and perhaps a bit miffed that the Sisters had somehow got wind of it.
“Please sit, Gabe. Sister needs to hear your ideas explained in lay terms.”
“Yeah…yes,” Gabe stammered, then froze once more. He felt totally incompetent.
“You are wondering where to begin,” Arkady offered and Gabe nodded. “Sister only knows the basics of quantum theory, and very little of our recent research. Why don’t you tell us a bit about the spin states you have been investigating.”
Gabe felt a slight sense of relief. Explaining basics would give him some breathing space while he figured out how to talk about his ideas. Arkady probably thought he was doing Gabe a favor by providing an opportunity to think things through for a lay audience, but in truth, he wasn’t prepared for this yet. His little scheme was about to backfire horribly.
“As you may know,” Gabe began, “we have long been able to emulate quantum spin, generating up to nine distinct energy states. This is the heart of qunit-based computing developed on Earth in the mid twenty-twenties, and it was this development which enabled the d-gates and other teleportation devices which are responsible for our being here on Sweetland. While this has been a useful technological tool, we also know that naturally occurring quantum spin can have a number of measurable energy levels. Until recently, that number has been nine, but our new equipment has significantly improved calibration.”
Rebecca Yoshito smiled at him, encouragingly, and Gabe relaxed a bit. He still had no idea what to say about his half-cocked theory. Sister Magda cleared her throat. “So, young man, what does all of this have to do with the saudades?”
Here we go, he thought. “You know about network theory and how the brain’s neurological system works as a kind of distributed network?”
Sister nodded. “I think I understand basic network theory. If I want to circulate a piece of information, instead of sending it out individually to each recipient, it is much more efficient to send it to social organizations or mobe trees to which those individuals belong.”
“That’s the general idea,” he said. “When we speak of the brain, we’re talking about a much more complex network, but we can use an algorithm to model it.”
“And the saudades?” the Sister prompted again.
“As you may know, animals teleported to Sweetland also suffer from the so-called saudades—something which resembles clinical depression on the surface, but which responds to no treatment we have found, and in our animal victims this often results in a physical wasting. Rebecca…Dr. Yoshito discovered—a few months ago—a strange anomaly in the neurological system of these animals. It’s…well…it’s at the quantum level.”
Gabe looked pleadingly at Rebecca, who came to his rescue. “The anomalies were in the the marginal division, at the caudomedial border of the neostriatum. The MrD is one if the areas associated with memory.”
“What do you mean when you say they are at the quantum level?” asked Sister Magda.
Gabe picked it up. “When Dr. Yoshito observed quantum particles from this region of the brain, she should have seen a random distribution of the observable quantum states. Instead, what she found was that fifty-three percent of the particles were in an identical state.”
Sister Magda seemed puzzled. “Isn’t that a reasonable margin of error?”
“If we were talking about two binary spin states, yes, but we are dealing with nine detectible energy states, so those results are not statistically possible without some sort of additional factor which is missing from our theory. To complicate matters further, our new equipment, which is able to detect even smaller fluctuations in quantum energy levels, tells us that many of those quantum positions do not match up to our nine observed—”
“—meaning we have several more possible quantum states to plug into the formulas,” Rebecca finished. “As you can see, if these observations hold out, we are looking at rewriting much of what we know about quantum theory. Gabe…” Rebecca was turning the conversation back to him, and he felt the blood draining from his face. This was it.
“I’m proposing that there are an infinite number of possible energy states and that there is a particle X which acts as a distributive network. When we observe a particle which is entangled with particle X, we fix its state, and that, in turn, fixes the state of all other particles entangled with particle X. It’s the only way I can bring the theory back in line with what we see.” He was floundering, but Sister Magda regarded him with a keen interest.
“So, young man, back to the saudades.”
“Well, this all leads me to conjecture that saudades is a result of entanglement, possibly associated with the teleport gates.”
Gabe saw Arkady roll his eyes. He wasn’t buying it.
“It’s just a postulation,” he explained. “I know I need more empirical data before I can even call this a theory. But it’s more than a stab in the dark, and the situation is critical.”
Sister Magda looked at him thoughtfully. “We are in complete agreement there, Doctor. So, you are proposing a visit to Earth in order to obtain some of this empirical data?”
He looked from stone-faced Arkady to Rebecca, who nodded her encouragement. “Yes,” he said. “If I could set up some experiments on the other side, I think it may help me obtain valuable data I need to confirm my hypothesis and develop the theory.”
Sister Magda smiled a slight thin-lipped smile. “Thank you, Doctor. I now have a much better understanding of your work.”
Gabe felt as though he were being dismissed, and looked to Arkady for confirmation.
“Thank you, Dr. Proctor,” said Arkady. “You may resume your…uhm…valuable work.”
©2010, Duane Poncy, all rights reserved.
go to Chapter 3, New America »
