Among the Grigori, Peg and crew are led first to the infirmary where the injured Völund crew members are transferred into beds and hooked to critical care monitors. The facility aboard this ship was far superior to anything Peg had ever seen in Zion. Apart from the atmosphere suit-armored ground crew that guided Peg’s team, everyone they encountered wore generic white scrubs with the red sun logo on the chest.
Red remained in the infirmary to watch over the Völund crew’s care. The rest were taken to a meeting room three levels above. The room was very clean with blank, light-gray walls and a V-shaped table in the center lined with chairs.
Four guards invited the Enoch crew to take seats at the table and then posted themselves along the wall. They continued to wear their atmosphere suits and shoulder their rifles, but they made no threatening moves toward Pegasus or her people.
Tobias leaned to Peg and whispers, “Who are these people?”
“We are the Grigori.” Peter’s voice came from the opposite side of the room. He entered through a door hidden in the wall. Sometime after boarding, he had separated himself from his platoon and had changed out of his suit into a white robe with a red scarf draped over his broad shoulders. The ends of the scarf were adorned with white sun logos. Without his helmet, Peg could see that his head was clean-shaven and his neck was muscular. Peter was tall and intimidating and his amber eyes felt as if they burrowed deep into Peg’s being.
“I’m sorry.” Peg stood. “Thank you for the save. We-” She paused. “We honestly had no clue any other humans existed. Especially humans with such advanced tech.”
Peter lifted his right hand as if to calm her. “No. It is I who should apologize. If I had known your ship was of human origin, I would not have shot her down.” Peg reclaimed her seat and Peter sat in the larger chair at the head of the table. “We assumed it was a new machine weapon of some sort. Never would I have guessed that other humans survive.”
“What was that weapon you used? You wiped out that squiddy storm like it was nothing,” Uriel blurted.
“Squiddy?”
“The sentinels,” Peg corrected. “We have never seen a targeted weapon work as well as our E.M.P. against the machines.”
“Ah. I see. I am surprised you still use that ancient technology. The electromagnetic pulse was effective against machines, but it shut down nearby human electronics leaving soldiers virtually blind and defenseless but for explosive ordinances. Range was a significant limitation in the early days of our retaliation against the machine uprising.
“Rather than expand the range of those early pulses, we learned to focus the electromagnetic disruption into projected blasts.”
“Amazing,” Tobias fawned.
“That is incredible,” Quan added. “If Zion’s ships had those cannons, we could take this war directly to the machines.”
“Zion? There are more of you?” Peter asked.
Peg cut her eyes at Quan and he understood her shut-your-mouth message.
Peg sighed. “Yes. Zion is our home.”
“It is a human city? With multiple ships?” Peter leaned forward curiously placing his elbows on the table.
“Up until today, we thought it was the last human civilization. Zion was established deep within the Earth to both protect ourselves from the machines and to use the planet’s core for heat. Its location is a secret and unauthorized passage through its protective walls is impossible.”
“Interesting.” Peter leaned back in his seat with a slight smile. “And impressive. Warning noted. I shall not press further on Zion until we know more about one another.”
“Is this ship typical of your fleet?” Peg asked.
“The Grigori is both who we are and our home,” Peter responded frankly. “There are no other ships. Our order has remained apart from the rest of humanity long before the machine uprising. We are not of this world but of God’s. We wrestled against the principalities, against the powers, and against the rulers who reigned through the darkness of this world.”
“You’re a religious order?” Tobias tossed out.
“We have been blessed by the Numinous to safeguard the righteousness of humanity despite the wickedness that damned this world to… well…” and Peter waved his arm as if to present all of reality as proof of his claim.
“Wait. You said ‘before the machine uprising,’” Quan realized. “You remember it?”
Peter chuckled. “I mean, not personally. It’s hard to measure years, but I’m somewhere in my mid-thirties, young man. But the Grigori have existed for more than thirty generations.” Peter pressed a button on a panel inset in the table in front of him and the wall behind him slid open revealing a bank of monitors. The monitors displayed images of humanity throughout time: Mayan and Grecian ruins, art from the Chinese Ming dynasty, New York City in the nineteenth century, early twenty-first-century Johannesburg and Tokyo. “We witnessed what had become of humanity as it industrialized and separated from the Creator and we were disgusted.
“In open rebellion, the first humans defied God’s orders and, in return, were banished from Paradise. Instead of seeking forgiveness, humanity decided to remake creation in its image. As we moved farther and farther from the Grand Design, humanity industrialized and polluted every part of creation it touched. The Grigori rejected the destruction of God’s good work at humanity’s hand and the first of us retreated to an isolated land in hopes of reconnecting with the Divine.”
The monitors changed to images of robotic workers and machine-driven public transport. “However, when humanity birthed its own creation, artificial intelligence, and enslaved it to every human whim, the Grigori emerged from our isolation to warn the world against its hubris. Our warnings fell on deaf ears and, just like the original rebellion, humanity’s perfect creation rejected its creator.” The monitors again shifted and images of machines decimating modern cities created a mosaic of death and destruction behind Peter.
“Our imperfect species had imperfectly manufactured the machine soul and given it the ability to power itself using God’s life-giving energy source.”
Uriel interrupted, “The sun. You’re talking about before we scorched the sky and the machines had the sun at their power source.”
Peter looked curiously at Uriel. “You scorched the sky?”
“I mean… uh…” Uriel dropped his gaze to the tabletop.
Pegasus rescued him. “We don’t know who scorched the sky. Only that humanity did it to stop the machines.”
Peter laughed and stood. “We scorched the sky.” Peter strolled around the opposite side of the table and began again. “Humanity refused to listen to our warnings. As it was falling under the might of the machines, our forefathers decided to end the creation of man and return Earth to the Kingdom. Wormwood was forged using the very technology we initially rejected. As the atmosphere burned and blackened, the machines began to fall.
“The war should have ended. The machines were all but destroyed. However, the corrupted creation of man was as resourceful as it was damnable. The machines looked to humanity for sustenance and found all they would ever need.”
Silence hung thick in the room as Peter paused.
“My people constructed our first ship as an ark. However, an off-planet escape was not possible. So we submerged into the oceans as the machines remade the face of the planet into fetal fields. That was three ships and hundreds of years ago.
“We continue to strengthen our technology and, by the will of the Divine, the Grigori defy the extinction brought about by the machines and we watch over the Earth hoping still to deliver creation back into the hands of the God it abandoned.”
Red sat in a hard metal chair about two meters from where the Völund injured were being treated. For a few seconds, one of the survivors flatlined, but the Grigori medics moved quickly and stabilized him.
With them both in stable condition, the doctor had a scan bar wheeled in.
“What is that for,” Red asked.
“This is passed over the body and we scan for internal injuries,” the doctor responded. “It helps to find and treat those early before they become challenges.”
Red looked impressed and watched enthralled. The scan was passed over the bed of the first and Red could see the internal scan on a nearby monitor. The scan was a splattering of color illustrating the green circulatory and purple nervous system over blue skeleton and pink musculature. Organs appeared and disappeared in various colors as the scan focused. Empty black areas showed up where the matrix jack was implanted at the bases of their skull.
The doctor was silent as he scanned both patients and inspected the readings. Several times, she looked over to Red but said nothing. After inspecting both, she called a nurse over and whispered into his ear. His jaw dropped for a moment before the doctor barked inaudibly at him. He then quickly exited the room.
“Is something wrong?” Red quizzed.
“Everything is fine. They’re both in stable condition despite their injuries,” the doctor responded before leaving the room.
Red could hear a different tone in the doctor’s voice. She was hiding something.
Red leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes to meditate.
“Wait.” Realization dawned on Peg’s face. “Are you saying that everyone within the Grigori was born free from the matrix?”
Peter turned toward her incredulously. “Of course.”
“But you know what the matrix is?”
Peter smiled. “Walk with me.”
They all stand and follow Peter out of the meeting room and down the corridor. The four guards that were stationed within the meeting room followed keeping a comfortable distance.
Peter continued, “At first when the fetal fields began to be built, we couldn’t understand how a once-great and rebellious species could so willingly submit to subjugation. The concept that a creation that would throw off the yoke of love coming from service to the Almighty would then willingly give up its free will to serve as nothing more than batteries for its own creation sounded obscene. We soon learned the truth. Those in the pods were asleep and dreaming the dream of the enslaved.”
Peter led them up some stairs and to an open floor filled with white pods. “Once we learned of that abomination, we learned how to tap into the transmission.
“These are virtua-pods. Inside one of these, we can participate in the matrix without being corrupted by it. This allows us to study the machines. Gather intelligence.” Peter smiled. “Explore their weaknesses. We have not given up our goal of wiping them from the Earth.”
Peg, enamored of his clear loathing of and single-minded desire to eradicate the machines, watched as one of the Grigori stepped up to a pod, genuflected, formed a circle out of her hands, and held it above her bowed head as an offering to the air. She then climbed to her feet and stepped in. Peg crept closer to one of the open pods and looked inside. Quan and Uriel followed her lead and inspected the pod.
“Oooh! Look! High-resolution digital interface projectors. Hundreds. Neural transmitter electrodes. Rapid-relay cabling. This is a beast!” Quan rattled excitedly.
“A work of genius,” Uriel approved. “Our in-matrix presence would more than quadruple with tech like this. Everyone in Zion could join the war in the matrix.” Then, to Peter, “How do you load without being directly wired?”
“We have a bank of amplifiers that access the machines’ network enabling a direct projection into the abyss,” he responded.
Peg caressed the smooth skin of the pod with a sly grin. The idea of an army of free humans working in unison to free every mind from the matrix and then overpowering the machines within the very source of their control excited her in the darkest of ways.
“Tobias,” Quan called back. “Come take a look.”
“I’m good. You guys explore your toy.” Tobias was more concerned with the man in scrubs who had just entered and rushed over to whisper into Peter’s ear. “Hey, Peg.”
Peg turned to him as he nodded his head to where Peter listened with an alarmed face. She pulled away from the pod and focused on Peter, who spoke to the nurse excusing him before looking at the Enoch crew.
“You never told us your injured were fetals.” There was a tinge of anger in the man’s voice.
“Fetals?” Peg responded.
Peter pointed to somewhere beyond the ship. “Machine-grown.”
Realization hit Peg. “I am sorry. It’s hard to fathom an entire society that was never born into the matrix.” She smiled in that way a captain needs to to calm a crew on the verge of panic. “Yes. They were born in the matrix but were freed as children and live in Zion. So very many in Zion were.”
The shock evaporated from Peter’s face. “Come. Tell me more about your people.” Peter walked to the stairs and descended with Peg, Uriel, Tobias, and Quan following. As before, the four guards bring up the rear. As Peg spoke, Peter led the crew around the ship exploring the galley, the quarters decks, and general gathering areas.
“Zion’s lineage is not as clearly documented as yours seems to be. Before our foundation, the first of us lived within the matrix. A man was born inside who is said to have been able to do amazing things. Impossible things. He could bend the code and do things no other human or machine could. He freed those who would go on to establish Zion.
“After he died, a very wise, very old woman foretold his return. Until then, she would live within the matrix and guide and test potentials. The mission of Zion became to free as many people as possible until everyone was liberated from that prison.”
Peg told him of their mission; of how their goal was to free humanity from the machines and to give the Earth back to humanity.
Every step carried them past the everyday life of the Grigori and every word painted Peter a picture of a noble yet unending struggle against an impossible evil. She told of those within Zion’s ranks still searching perpetually for the return of the One, but how she believed humanity could win the planet back from the machines without mystical stories. She talked of how they used the jacks at the base of the skulls to upload their consciousness through a load program into the matrix hoping to destabilize the system from within. Peg’s story ended as Peter spun a wheel on a secure metal door and walked them into the connected corridor. Lining the corridor were barred cells.
“You are fetals?” came his first question.
“Where are we?” Peg responded.
“You speak heresy. You are grown by machines, not born of humans. You are the unholy weapons of the Enemy.”
“We’re human,” Peg objected.
Peter raised his hand and signaled the guards who aimed their tech rifles and herded the Enoch four into separate cells.
Some time ago, Peter had stopped making eye contact with Peg. She hadn’t noticed before a guard was closing her door and he was refusing to look at her or respond to her continued protests that they meant the Grigori no harm and that they were allies in the war against the machines.
Instead, Peter spoke to the guards. “Bring the other one down here. I must consult with Samyaza.”