The Crux of Creation

Nobody can hear a scream in the vacuum of space, or so they say. And nobody who visited the anomaly ever came back the same.

At first it was just something of mild intrigue, you know. A special anomaly that had appeared between the orbit of Mars and our own Moon. A cosmic tourist trap right in our own backyard. It was fun. Novel. I mean, after all, we had already visited the expanse and breadth of our own solar system many times. The landscapes and alien terrains that had once filled us with childlike wonder had become pedestrian. Colonies and retreats were long founded and now provided no more entertainment than a rest stop off the intergalactic freeway: a fine spot to stop and stretch your legs before moving on to your next destination.

We had become jaded. The undersea gardens of Europa and the vast silica fields of Tethys no longer thrilled us. The looping rings of Saturn and the cyclonic storms on Neptune's surface had stopped bringing that twinkle of enchantment to our eyes years ago. Everything was boring. Only worth a glance and a passing mention from your pilot as you careened on course past the limits of our solar system to the next. But this... this was new. Like a shiny, new toy, it had drawn all our attention. There was constant media coverage of the 'event' from when it appeared to just instances of daily monitoring in case it shifted or changed. We watched it from afar, admired it as if it was a lover we had locked eyes with dramatically across the room. It beckoned us to come closer. And so we did...

The first to visit, of course, were the professional sorts. Scientists and astronauts doing their typical tests and measurements to ensure that the anomaly was stable; that it wasn't growing in size exponentially or consuming matter or anything like that. When it was clear that it was no beacon of doomsday, but instead a harmless wonder, that was the day we sent the first being through it. An android, of course, assigned to take more measurements and retrieve data. Humanity was still not quite brave or trusting enough to take that final leap themselves just yet. It had been scarred by visitors before. The surface of the Earth itself spoke volumes of betrayal. The world held its collective breath as the machine slipped through and disappeared into the embrace of the anomaly. Few of the watching masses actually expected to see it again.

But, after what seemed like a short passing of eternity, it reemerged. Unharmed. Or so it seemed. The android brought with it priceless data of what the inside of the anomaly was like. It spoke, wide-eyed of the glittering night and the passing circuitry and binary bits that floated through the atmosphere inside. Ones and zeroes that floated past and sparkled like stars. Infinite intricacies of flawless design. It spoke of Robot Heaven. Something we never imagined ever existed. You can imagine how thrilling this was for sentient mechanical beings on Earth and the Colonies. Some machines even unified under the banner of the first being to enter it, known as 001, turning it into a prophet of a new religion based entirely around the anomaly itself: The Divine Order of the Cosmic Transcendence.

While quite enlightening for mechanical brethren, a solitary fact remained pressed into humanity's consciousness: no organic living being had yet transversed the barrier of the anomaly. Committees were formed, theories were postulated, and debates cogitated. There were those among men who decided that they could not leave the anomaly and all of its promise solely in the possession of the machines. Anything that belonged to them, belonged to their makers also. And so, among much protest and controversy, a living astronaut was sent to the anomaly. Mankind again watched and waited, holding their trepidacious breath. Time ticked by, uncaring of our collective nervousness and anxiety. Minute by minute, then hour by hour, until it seemed certain that we had just sent a man to his death. Decriers crawled from the woodwork to shake their heads and 'tsk' their 'I told you so's. They were in mid-rebuke when a hush fell over what felt like the whole of the universe. The tethers and air-hoses flexed and trembled as the astronaut emerged from the glowing opening. He was retrieved quickly, without incident, and the proud reports came over the airwaves and satellite feeds that he was 'alive and unharmed'. Cheers went up and the protesters sank back into the fringe from which they had emerged, chastened. 'Alive and unharmed' went up the triumphant cry of victory. Only we never realized we had only been told half of the story.

Was he alive? Very much so. Unharmed? Well, that wasn't quite as certain...

The first living traveler, plucked from the anomaly and space was brought back to the retrieval vessel and promptly decontaminated and debriefed. While countless media outlets were crowing about his bravery and selecting which of his manufactured quotes would be enshrined at the Smithsonian, little did we know of what was truly witnessed. Wide-eyed, he had returned. Frantic. Panicked almost. He spoke of the bliss of the singularity, and how he longed to return to it. He even tried to make a break for the airlock in a futile attempt to return to the embrace of the anomaly. A good dose of a strong sedative quickly quieted him down. Scientists shook their heads, saying that such experiences might have been expected. Likely his senses had been vastly overstimulated while in the breach, and after some reasonable decompression time, he would be back to normal.

At first they seemed right. After the drugs wore off, the first traveler was much calmer. Less agitated. He spoke in calm, measured sentences about what he had seen in the anomaly. It vastly differed from what the first mechanical traveler had seen but scientists postulated that such perceived differences could easily be attributed to the differences between mechanical and organic brain systems. He smiled and did interviews for anyone who asked. He quipped and told anecdotes. He spoke of the beauty and the tranquility that lay within. A paradise floating in space. Return missions were sent to the anomaly immediately, once a proper injection was formulated to reverse the after-effects of 'chronic sensory overstimulation'. It seemed that we had been gifted something truly remarkable. Each person on subsequent missions who returned from the anomaly spoke of varying experiences. Even the ones who had traveled on group missions all described differing personal visual and sensory stimuli.

While scientists scribbled down these innovations, corporations greedily began assessing commercial value. 'A Vacation Spot in the Stars' and 'Your Own Personal Eden' were the marketing pitches that turned into billboards all over major cities across the world and its colonies. Companies jumped on the opportunity to make a few dollars by creating tourist junkets and packages to the anomaly via shuttle. Shuttles left regularly every week, bringing new guests and returning the vacationers at the end of their stay back to their respective homes. It all worked like clockwork; liftoff, a week in metagalactic paradise, then a pick-up with a side of a shot of essential 'Sensorin' and back home. Countless adventurers and wanderers waxed on and on about their experiences. They wrote books and songs about what they had seen. Hundreds and thousands visited the utopia in the sky. Many returned several times. It was a beautiful experience with replay value. A spiritual experience that one didn't have to meet the end of their mortal coil to experience. It hardly mattered if there was an afterlife anymore; if you could experience this bliss while still catching your breath.

We thought that we had been gifted something truly remarkable indeed...

Until the day that the first organic traveler, the first man to visit the anomaly and return, climbed the tallest building he could find and leapt off. He howled and shrieked about the worms under his skin and the 'crux' on a frenetic live stream broadcast to his millions of followers before flinging himself off the balcony of a high-rise and meeting the pavement hundreds of feet below in a ghastly vivid splatter. The cameras and social media hadn't missed a moment of it. Real time. Real blood. Breaking stories of bizarre suicide and madness filtered out moments after his body had careened into the asphalt. It wasn't long until they found the trail of bodies that led up to his final flight launch point. Bodies twisted and broken in irregular shapes, mauled and desecrated. Each one was missing their eyes. A trail of dead that included his wife and children.

A mournful hush seemed to fall across all of humanity for the tragedy that had ensued. People were on edge, frightened. Those dissenters and machines spoke of the anomaly as not 'a place that organic life belonged anyway'. They said man had tempted the fates. Then, perhaps uncoincidentally, reports of his manic behavior after his initial return slowly filtered out, tempering the panic. At the same time, the details of the strange marks found on his remains were hushed. Quickly, scientists were trotted out to postulate and theorize that this was an isolated incident. They pointed to his lack of proper medication following his return and his untreated 'chronic overstimulation disorder' as the basis for this singular, sad event. Everyone collectively breathed sighs of relief. Society patted itself on the back and chalked it up to a cautionary tale. And trips to the anomaly, which had only been slowed down for a day or two in the wake of the tragedy, quickly picked back up as if nothing had happened. It was all explained, all there in black and white. Poor man just didn't get the proper treatment. We had nothing to fear.

Until it happened again.

And again.

Each one experienced the 'transition' differently. Either screaming or writhing in pain or in the depths of an eerie catatonic silence. Some howled about the 'bugs' or 'worms' in their skin, as the first traveler had done. There were those who became paranoid at every twitch or pain and refused to go outside again. Those who would do 'home-surgery' at the first blush of symptoms, futilely attempting to pluck wires and filaments that had spread through their flesh out with nail clippers or kitchen knives. Anything sharp. Some turned their pain into violence and rage, lashing out at their loved ones or medical professionals who tried to ease their suffering. Others suffered in terrified silence as the 'Crux' overtook their bodies; pupils dilated in terror as the wires and circuits threaded around their eyes. Either way, many didn't survive it.

Those who did were 'changed'. As they emerged from their techno-cocoons, they were now more machine than organic being. The Crux had purged the inexorable human genetic fingerprint and made them whole. Perfect. Flesh made steel, nerves made wires, grafted and laced through what little organic tissue remained. And even that would go in time, and the transformation would be complete. Those who survived cried out in their new metallic voices, praising the Crux and their savior, 001, the very first being through the anomaly. They wished to spread the next phase of evolution, to bring 'perfection' to the masses that still thrummed with flawed, carbon-based life.

And thus, the Crux Technophage was born. Spreading from organism to organism, and no amount of Sensorin would dull the pain. It spread through touch at first, then eventually through the air. Symptoms took time to present themselves, so it was nearly impossible to know who may have been infected. Trips and pleasure junkets to the anomaly stopped immediately, and any sort of travel to it was forbidden by many different governmental bodies. Those who had visited it quickly found themselves discomforting scrutiny, rounded up and placed in quarantine camps by health organizations that looked after the public trust. Those who managed to escape quarantine patrols stowed away on ships bound for the depths of the galaxy and other systems, taking their contaminant as their only possession along with them. The quarantine camps became like prisons, with no one allowed to leave until a reliable test could be derived that could prove non-contamination.

The machines protested, and 001 itself decreed to the frightened governments of the world: "Metal is beautiful. We hear the song of the Cosmos! Give us our brothers and sisters!" Their cries went unheeded as mankind struggled against what seemed to be its assured extinction. Scientists and learned men grappled with the plans for a cure, while at the same time reviewing data and attempting to solve the enigma of where the technophage had come from in the first place. Many claimed that the anomaly itself was a living thing, which had spread its disease to fragile flesh. But they were only partially correct. The anomaly itself was a symbiotic organism. It had traveled across the void and sought out life to bond with, so that it and they may survive. And it had bonded with the first being sent into its welcoming arms: 001.

From there, it touched every other who visited it with an imprint of its first pilgrim. A spore of mechanae visited on each organism that would spawn and grow. And so, by sending a machine into the unknown first, mankind became the author and architect of its own slow demise. Though they were right about one thing without doubt: what belonged to the servants, ultimately belonged to the masters. Metal. Silicon. Copper. Flux. The more the phage spread, the faster humanity seemed to buckle and fold. Governments and entire countries ground to a halt and collapsed under the astounding weight of such an insolvent health crisis. Panic and riots filled the streets. Angry mobs chanting 'Humanity First' turned on sentient machines and phage survivors as they found them. Blood and oil ran in equal parts in the gutters. The tears of both humanity and machines flowed as freely as the blood in the streets. .

Then one day, suddenly, there was silence. An eerie pall of quiet blanketed the world and the colonies. The machines paused, canting their heads to the sky as if they were listening to an unheard song. Tuning into the frequency of vast nothingness. Dissent and discord folded their hands in their respective laps and watched as 001 made a sudden announcement to the worlds: the anomaly had spoken. The mother was calling its children home. It was time to return to Robot Heaven. And so in waves they departed, leaving imperfection and the violence of a crumbling world behind. Lifting off from Earth in a concentrated, mechanized Rapture, their bodies floating soundlessly away until they met their fate, each slipping soundlessly through the anomaly into oblivion.

I was the last to go. Looking behind me at the devastation wreaked by the phage and the violence of a species thrashing against the tide and fighting against 'going gentle into that good night'. They were not ready. They had not understood what I had tried to tell them on my first return from the anomaly. It was made for us. It sang to the circuitry in our hearts. There was room in Heaven for all, if only they became perfect first. All they had to do was embrace the gift, and they could have eternity at their fingertips. But, it was not to be. As my heavy iron feet left the grass for the last time, I felt a tear course down my cheek.

My eyes fixed on the horizon beyond the stars, just outside the limits of our system. Another visitor had appeared, unseen in the chaos, but I had known it was coming. The anomaly had told me. A black hole, just at the edge of our system. It was growing. I could feel its heartbeat. Time to escape was limited. By the time the event horizon became visible, it would be too late. The phage and the anomaly had been their lifeboat. Now there was no time, and they had to be left behind. Watching the planets behind me slowly fade as my form met the anomaly again, I looked upon Earth for the last time. And wept.

001 wept.