On the day of Ada's 12th birthday, she would have, at the Shareplace, been granted the privilege of monitoring the station's control AIs.
Sol arrived earlier than lunchtime, surprising the girl. She was wearing a sleeveless black tunic and waited until Ada finished a chapter of her book before speaking. Sol handed her a short silver chain.
"For birthdays in the HS, we give gifts. I thought this kind of ritual might bother you, so I kept it simple. I got you a little gift. It's a small chain for attaching Léon."
Ada accepted the chain and silently fastened Léon to her belt. The way she was dressed made her resemble Sol slightly. Ada also wore a sleeveless tunic, though hers was pale blue and had the word CITIZEN printed in black along one leg. Her hair was starting to grow out; at the Shareplace, heads were shaved, and the fibers were recycled for various uses.
"We're going out to Calchas Prime today. I'm taking you to a restaurant. Well, technically, the HS is treating you. You'll see—it's nice."
Sol feared Ada might resist, but the girl smiled sincerely. Poor thing, she needed to see the world.
They left the room without the escort drone, and for the first time, no doors locked audibly behind them. For the first time, the elevator descended. Ada had never seen the building's entrance, having been brought there unconscious. Her heart pounded.
The doors opened onto a vast, dark blue entry hall equipped with screens, reception desks, and holographic guides projected by AIs. The hum of drones—both controllers and messengers—filled the air. Men and women in officer uniforms and formal attire bustled about. This was clearly a special facility. A slender, three-legged Xeno turned its eyeless head in every direction, wearing a brooch with the HS insignia. Though everyone was busy, they all greeted Ada as she passed:
"Good morning, Sol. Good morning, Ada."
Ada nodded, stunned that so many people knew her.
"They all like you," Sol said simply with a smile, only to be interrupted by a stern-looking blonde woman with her hair in a tight bun under a cap.
Sol stood at attention before her.
"Ada," said the woman, lowering her gaze to the girl, hands clasped behind her back, "The Human Society is honored to have you as our guest. And when I say guest, I do not gloss over the circumstances that brought you here. Upon reaching adulthood, you will be free to go wherever you wish. But if you choose to stay here, you can count on us to treat you better than our own."
The woman gave Sol a stern look, tapped her collar twice, and walked off. Sol, fumbling nervously, pulled a golden trident-shaped Psi brooch from her pocket and pinned it to her tunic. Her superior nodded, smiled apologetically for her perpetual severity, and moved on.
The Xeno leaned its agile head toward Ada as she passed. Ada extended her hand but froze when it sniffed audibly, retracting before any contact and returning to its tasks.
Finally, the double doors opened to sunlight.
The administrative detention building stood on the edge of a circular plaza, surrounded by towers reaching into sunlight amplified by the refraction of water. In the distance, the rumbling roar of cascading waterfalls formed a constant backdrop, while the bustling crowd moved to and fro, seemingly indifferent to its own enormity and the peculiarities among it.
Ada was awestruck by the Xenos, trying to catch the eyes of children her age. Most were absorbed in portable EVs or invisible virtual games. Others, grounded in reality, played tag among the legs of a large, gray creature resembling an elephant but proportioned like a centipede, moving slowly.
Sol led Ada to an elevator that plunged into the shadowy depths beneath the administrative district—a structure with countless floors, possibly hundreds. So many that small elevators served different levels, while massive Xenos descended a circular ramp spiraling around the central shaft. The light faded into artificial illumination.
Ada and Sol leaped laughing from the elevator, holding hands. Ada checked to ensure Léon was still securely attached to her. The area was filled with residences, drone merchants, and custom AI programming offices. A Xeno painter, its tentacled appendages hairy and extending from a round body covered in dots, captured the scene in surreal purples, save for the orange glow of the overhead lights.
Sol guided Ada into a building with large windows—"Food from This World and Others."
Ada pressed her nose to the glass. The interior featured tables for humans and counters for Xenos, where steaming bowls of food were being served.
Sol stepped away to a nearby shop. A poster showing a cross-section of a human with a brain emitting radiant beams obscured most of the window, though inside, a couple of anxious-looking individuals sat in the waiting area. The sign read, "Goodbye Worries," with another poster on the door:
WE'VE ALL HAD DIFFICULT MOMENTS
or carry with us memories that
HAUNT US IN OUR DREAMS.
TIRED OF NIGHTMARES?
Want to FORGET a moment from your past
that no longer matters to you?
WE CAN HELP.
Psi techniques are painless and do not alter
your personality in any way.
We identify the memory and remove itfrom your psyche.
Our process includes THREE
follow-up sessions to ensure complete success.
MEMORY ERASED OR YOUR MONEY BACK!
Our practitioner is a Psi graduate of Prospero University.We do not treat Xenos.
"I doubt he went to Prospero," Sol muttered.
Ada saw her mentor frustrated for the first time.
"Are they liars?" Ada asked."Oh no. I'm sure he's competent and does his job well. The HS takes Psi work very seriously." Sol snorted like an annoyed animal. "We have Psi Controllers… really no-nonsense types. Barely human. We call them the Empty Eyes. No, Ada, here's a vital lesson. You're young, but I know you already have bad memories. The kind that will haunt your dreams forever. Would you have them erased?""I'm not sure. Well… it's about my brothers and sisters who died, but if I forget them…""Exactly. Your memories, Ada, are your life. Fear is a tough emotion. It often overwhelms us. But it's also precious information. It's there to protect you, to say: Be careful, something's wrong. Act! Observe it, respect it, and it will help you. Fight it, and it will hit harder. But no matter what, never forget. A living being is the sum of their memories."
She took Ada's hand and led her to the restaurant. A Xeno resembling a slug taller than Ada when upright, with four eye stalks, blocked their way. A flying drone translated its gurgling speech in a clipped tone:
"Welcome to Food from This World and Others. We offer three options: Human Society Citizen, including a complimentary daily special; Xeno; and à la carte. I assume you are not Xenos. Today's special is pasta soup with yellow salt from Calchas-3. Highly recommended.""HS citizen here, and the child is a ward of the HS. But we'll go à la carte," Sol replied."Please follow me," the drone translated, humorously, as the Xeno moved at a slow crawl.
Ada and Sol followed, eventually settling in a quiet corner overlooking the chasm's dark wall, where phosphorescent, lizard-like creatures scuttled endlessly.
As they sat, Ada whispered, "At the Shareplace, we were scared of Psi agents.""Because you depended on Antioch. Antioch has its own Psi agents, and they have a terrible reputation. They wear red and hurt people."
Forcing a smile, Sol added: "The HS Psi agents? We're the good guys."
All eyes turned to a giant screen broadcasting PanHS's Question of the Day, featuring the Wau. Ada pretended indifference, ashamed of her fascination with the League of Antioch's enemy. But as soon as the Wau appeared on-screen, she was captivated, not even noticing when the slug maître d'hôtel delivered the menu and Sol ordered an assortment of dishes: "It's her birthday. She's an HS ward."
The Psi clinic lingered in Sol's mind, but her contempt was reserved for the Wau, whom she considered indecisive fools incapable of real action.
In ancient days, during training, examiners would mock underperforming students:
"What do you want to do with your life? Open a worthless Psi shop on a backwater planet to reconcile couples?"
Once, Sol had thought to herself, "And being a teacher is better?" The professor had smiled maliciously in response.
Psi universities were strictly regulated institutions located on human worlds with populations exceeding a billion—just a handful of planets. The "Big Five" included Prospero, of course, along with Antioch, Alonso, Titus, and Munich on Earth, the latter a place many dreamed of attending. Rumor had it there was an experimental center on Lennox that collaborated with the Xenos, officially operating as an Earth branch of UniPsi in the former Germany. This institution, a sanctuary for the brightest minds in the HS, trained the Empty Eyes, elite Psi agents tasked with monitoring the Psi Corps and punishing offenders.
Anyone could apply for Psi training, provided they accepted the prerequisite: a CRISPR vaccine that genetically modified the body and brain, administered before the age of 20. There was no going back. The cost was steep, a price only understood once someone became Psi, despite numerous warnings and rigorous preliminary tests designed to weed out the unfit.
Having the eye of the mind reveals a disconcerting truth: sentient beings are exceedingly polite. They avoid mentioning the times they hate you, wish you were dead, or, when they love you, how selfish their love often is—because it feels good for them. Even with preparation and cynicism, the initial shock is overwhelming: a vertigo-inducing realization that everyone acts out of self-interest and that each person is destined to be alone. In sensitive cases, this revelation leads to madness or an early departure to the After.
Many were drawn to Psi studies after watching Sherlock 3000, a daring series that reimagined the intelligent detective as possessing empathic and telepathic powers. This well-written AI-produced show lured hundreds of naive individuals to UniPsi, only for most to be broken in the end—despite the fact that, as far as Sol knew, private detective agencies didn't exist anywhere in the universe.
Sol had been a girl with a heart full of sunshine. But in reading the hearts of others, she had died a first death long ago.
Surviving the vaccine and the First Shock wasn't the only challenge. UniPsi's exercises opened the mind to the mental murmur of worlds populated by billions and to the labyrinthine, terrifying psyches of utterly alien Xenos. Everyone had stories of classmates who had gone mad, wandering Xeno worlds in search of answers to mystic questions fallen from the stars, or who died of malnutrition, lost in their nightmares. There was no final exam at UniPsi—surviving was the only achievement.
The Psi Corps, while strictly independent, worked closely with law enforcement, the judiciary, and contract negotiation bodies. With specialists capable of probing thoughts, the judicial process shifted: it no longer concerned itself with determining facts, motives, or the sincerity of repentance—these were unquestionably established—but rather with how to address them.
The military recruited Psis as spies, sometimes employing them as morale specialists for troop detachments.
Sol had trained at Prospero, and her stabilizing ambition had carried her through. Officially a messenger, she had been assigned to counterintelligence. She traveled between outposts aboard a Raven, hunting traitors working for the current enemy (at the time, the Escalusian tribes). On Escalus, a captain of staggering intelligence, coupled with a mind so intricate it felt like a three-dimensional labyrinth, had approached her. They had an affair, and, to her regret, Sol suspected she might have loved him.
One day, he had asked her to erase memories of his past—an act that, for an active-duty military Psi, was a court-martial offense. She developed a fierce hatred for him, realizing he had initiated their relationship solely to make this request and use it to manipulate her.
In her fury, she reported him. He was reassigned to a museum ship, despite his clear trajectory toward high-ranking positions. For fraternizing and succumbing to weakness, Sol was relegated to working with prisoners of war. That memory, she thought bitterly, was one she would have gladly erased.
But rules are rules. Wiser people than us, Sol thought, declare that it is wrong to erase memories, no matter how unbearable our negative emotions. Ada, Sol, and you too, my beloved Andreï, so strong yet so fragile—we must, they say, live with our sorrow.
So be it.