ABLE (Jim Able: Offworld Book 1) by Ed Charlton (the first e reader .TXT) 📕

Sopha said nothing, returning his attention to a lengthy contribution on the upper left screen, which seemed to center on the disputed definition of an archaic word.

After an hour of waiting and watching, Jim had learned a few things about the computer setup. He saw that the screens along the side walls were linked to various lower levels within the Regdenir world. The grid was devoted to Regde3, which Jim knew from his message address was Sopha’s level. Near the door, he found one machine that was linked to a database in the Deneb system. In a folder lying on the table nearby, he found a picture of himself, the details of his position in the OEA, and a printed copy of the message to Sopha where he had given him his name.

Without turning to see what Jim was up to, Sopha began to speak.

“This computer system is called the Regdekol. Do you understand the word?”

“Regde...kol,” Jim repeated. “Yes, ‘kol’ means ‘sculpture.’”

“Almost. It means both sculpture and architecture. It means the artistic creative process and the care with which the brush is applied to the canvas. It means both to create with steady skill and to control the growth of a living organism. Do you understand?”

“I think so.”

“Its founding minds laid down the rock—the Holy Works. Each generation that has followed has built upon this foundation. We see the holy words and the blessed commentaries of our greatest minds through the years, dissecting, expanding, enlivening, and...What is the word for ‘mikfasal’?”

“Umm...’midwife’?”

“Yes, being midwife to the birth of new meaning.” Sopha’s voice showed an excitement that Jim had not heard in it before.

“Each commentary is also studied. The works of the scholars wrap around them like the ornamentation on a pot. The learning of each new generation increases the total of our knowledge. Do you understand?”

“Sure.”

“Your audnir scientist might put it like this. The Holy Scripture is the first dimension. The commentaries of the teachers are the second dimension.”

“Okay,” said Jim, without quite meaning it.

“Now what you see here,” he said, gesturing to the grid and the rest of the room, “these are the third dimension. Every teaching has ideas common to other teachings. To find the commonality, you would have to search through each two-dimensional entry, yes? We have built the Regdekol to follow the three dimensions of truth through all the commentaries, all the learning, all the discussion and study. All the relationships are here.”

He looked at Jim, his eyes bright in the shadow of his overhanging brows.

“For us, divine truth is a three-dimensional thing. Each contribution, each contributor, brings an expression of interlinked truths. We can see the links in each other’s thoughts. We can follow the routes of study of hundreds of fellow minds as we explore deeper and deeper into those truths.”

Jim looked at the message lists, growing and splitting before his widening eyes. “You can cross-reference everything you write?”

“Better yet, we can, as you say, ‘cross-reference’ the ideas we contribute across the whole of the Regdekol. When I said to you this was the recorded wisdom of the Regdenir, you perhaps thought I meant it to be some sort of library of documents, yes?”

Jim nodded.

“It is far more.”

“How can your mind cope with it all? I knew already that you did things in a meticulous way. But—such a broad scale—all that detail? You were splitting your concentration across up to twelve different topics.”

“‘The effective mind is a trained mind,’ as I tell my sons. But surely in your work you must deal with many small details at once?”

“What about things that you don’t agree with?” Jim asked, “There must be ideas that you don’t go along with.”

Sopha hesitated. “There are times when an idea is deemed heretical. The great teachers who, you see, are Regde1, they can so...,” he paused, “wrap around an idea, in all its referents, such that only they can see it. They can ‘encapsulate’ perhaps, or ‘seal it off,’ yes? But even then, their commentaries upon it may become the bedrock of new learning and new layers of thought.”

Jim began to reply, but something Sopha had said had started a chain reaction in him: his job was based on details. He was constantly trying to be meticulous, as scrupulous with details as Sopha seemed to be. He was suddenly overtaken by a memory of the detail he had missed.

It was to do with a human, one not born on Earth.

***

He was working as a courier for a couple of the larger bulk shippers.

The first time Jim interviewed him was to check on a forged security clearance that had turned up in a burned-out flier. The fellow had complained about signing any physical forms. He had a real aversion to committing his written signature to anything. He wanted everything to be done electronically.

The second interview was at a pleasant Sin Har spaceport called Ch’Garratt. That was a routine check. It was just a matter of going through his logbook and cross-checking it against the filings received at the OEA.

It was his watch—a simple wristwatch. At the first interview, he had worn it with the face slung inward under his wrist rather than by the back of his hand. It was on his right hand.

The second interview had taken place many months after the first. The man had signed the printed list of variances without a word of complaint. The watch was on his left wrist.

Over the course of nearly a year, the image of the watch had become clearer and clearer. Jim could count the hairs on the man’s wrist, sticking up around the strap of the watch.

But he hadn’t noticed then. He wasn’t suspicious enough when it counted.

Somehow he had known it wasn’t the same man. Somehow he had seen the change in attitude. He had seen the wristwatch, but when a mental alarm should have sounded, Jim had had no reaction.

The police flier had taken off almost at the same time as the courier’s ship.

Whoever he was, he panicked.

He