STRATEGY TEAM LEADER: “That’s our working hypothesis. Should raise some eyebrows at High Command, and we need that sort of boost right now.”
SCIENCE TEAM SENIOR TECH LIEUTANANT: “Sir, am I being ordered to confirm that this is—”
ONI COMMANDER: “How many of these devious bastards are out there, anyway?”
STRATEGY TEAM LEADER: “One per Halo, so far. As for this particular monitor—I certainly hope it’s the last. Yes! So designate. But bury it somewhere in the political report. Give us all some cover in case it blows up in our faces.”
ONI COMMANDER: “Say the damned thing infiltrated our secretarial pool.”
SCIENCE TEAM SENIOR TECH LIEUTENANT: “Sir, shall I actually say that?”
STRATEGY TEAM LEADER: “Christ almighty. No!”
AI TRANSLATOR: Monitor language stream resuming. It is incomplete but recoverable.
Chapter Forty-Two
THE DIDACT’S SHIP lifted away from the fog-shrouded wheel as it rotated above the greater Ark, that vast, life-bearing, regenerative flower floating in the dimness above the galaxy’s margins.
No more Halos issued from its Forge.
My flesh had been shriven. My humanity had come to an end, and yet I had become the Finger of the First Man, as Gamelpar had told the story—built to last thousands of years . . . built to serve Forerunners.
But also made as a gift for the Librarian.
And given the opportunity, finaly, to testify to you, the true Reclaimers.
In time, my numbness developed into something richer, something that could survive thousands of centuries with only a minimum of madness creeping in. To contain multitudes is a definition of madness, is it not? I have rarely been able to remember which of my fragmented selves has performed any particular action.
I see in your records that one of me caused you considerable difficulty—and then, assisted you! How like us. But never did that monitor reveal its origins, or the motives behind its perverse behaviors.
Perhaps now you can guess.
As Reclaimer, it is your privilege to shrive me again—not of the flesh, long since turned to dust, but of my rich confusion of sins.
The Forerunners had, for a time, the Domain. I have never been able to access the Domain. Perhaps it no longer touches any part of our universe. If that is the case, then nobody wil ever understand the history or the motivations of the Didact or any other Forerunner.
. . .
That means, however long I continue to exist, I wil never understand why any of this had to happen.
I last observed the Didact in company with the Librarian on the Ark. They were walking on a high ribbon over the greatest biological preserve I had yet seen—dwarfing any such on the wheel. Thousands of kilometers of varied habitats, containing the accumulated life stores of wel over a thousand worlds—and stil, in the time remaining, she was planning to gather more.
That was also the last time I saw Vinnevra. She had become part of the Librarian’s core population of humans, minus, of course, the representatives from Earth—from Erde-Tyrene, I mean.
I was no longer responsible for her; she could not even recognize me. Yet ever since I have missed her.
Riser had survived the removal of his imprint—a very tough cha manush indeed—and had been returned to our home. Or so I was told. I vowed at the first opportunity, I would look for him.
I would do everything I could to find him.
But the location of Erde-Tyrene was concealed from me for many years. And when I was finaly given the freedom to search, it was already too late.
I miss him to this day.
I miss Vinnevra, and Gamelpar, and my mother.
I miss them al to this very instant.
At the command of the Didact, who rarely commanded his wife about anything, those processed by the Composer, those who remained on the fog-shrouded wheel, along with the remains of al the other Flood victims and the deactivated Graveminds—of which ten had already formed—and the last of the functioning monitors keeping perpetual watch—al on the wheel and the wheel itself were sent through a portal for one last time, never to be used in that same way again.
It was known as Instalation 07.
It has become a sacred tomb for milions, though some may stil live.
I do not know.
The Librarian was very interested in my report on the conditions of Erde-Tyrene, which she had not visited for many years. To my
Erde-Tyrene, which she had not visited for many years. To my dismay, I had to acknowledge that it was likely not her touch I had felt at birth—not her personal touch—but that of an automated imprinting system. Now that I was no longer flesh, that revelation did not disturb me. Much.
I stil kept a firm record of how the original Chakas had felt about the Librarian.
The Didact returned to the graces of the newly constituted Council —for a time. The Librarian’s power, of course, rose along with that of her husband.
Know one knew of the actual fate of the Master Builder. It was assumed he had died somewhere on Instalation 07.
The debate about strategies against the Flood was renewed. As I said, neither of the Arks were manufacturing Halos, though they were certainly capable of such. This fact, which seemed inconsequential at the time, would eventualy be hidden from me in the name of “compartmentalization.”
I see very clearly how much the Librarian has shaped humanity since the end of the first human-Forerunner war.
Whenever you look inward and see an ideal female . . . whether it be goddess, anima, mother, sister, or lover . . .