Lower than the Angels

Chapter 13, QAR

Tengri's team had adjourned for an honest night's rest and a day to think things over. It was evening and they were back in the lounge. This time they'd been joined by several friends who had heard about their adventures during the day. Word had already gotten around so some of their company were there by QAR links.

Tengri allowed some time for random discussions as people settled in. When those had quieted down a bit he said, "Thank you all for being here.  I've heard some good ideas mentioned. Now to help us make some progress sorting out what we should do with what we've learned, I want to introduce a little order into the proceedings. Let's start by saying what we have to say one at a time, and the rest listen without too many interruptions. Agreed?" Heads nodded, so he said, "Dema, you look ready. How about you start?"

Dema nodded and said, "Alright. So now we know these dark entities are real, they're already here, and they could get nasty. 

"But the basis for their reality is ancient, and doesn't impinge on ours as much as it used to. Shouldn't the fact that we can now produce our own dark matter scare them off? Or make them want us to help them control it?"

She looked around and said, "Cern?"

Cern said, "Maybe it should, but that's no guarantee that it will. 

"They may be billions of years old, but that doesn't mean they've evolved. Evolution happens in a challenging environment. Seems like they've had it pretty easy all along. They may have learned to be arrogant. That doesn't make them smart."

Kore looked ready to say something. Cern nodded to her and she said, "We certainly don't want to go to war with them. Maybe we should try to negotiate. But who would we negotiate with? 

"Not long ago there were people we called 'world leaders' who were believed to speak for their countrymen. But these days every dome community is independent, and can survive on its own. Who would do the negotiating?"

Newt was on a QAR link from Mars. He spoke up and said, "We know that dark matter comes from a high energy band. But that doesn't make it dangerous. 

"When our engines make dark matter we extract energy from the ordinary hydrogen we make it from. The dark matter is a byproduct. The lower energy should make it less dangerous. It's a quantum jump thing, and a hard jump to make in our universe. Each jump leaves the dark matter more tightly bound, less likely to give up more energy."

 He looked at Sedna. She said, "It's a hard jump for us to control, but maybe easier for the dark entities? We don't know enough about that. If they're made of dark matter, they should know way more about it than we do. Maybe more than we can know.

Bear said, "But we're on the right track, learning more all the time. And we have our QAR tech. Do they have any tech at all? Maybe we should be using QAR to try to answer that. To explore what they can do."

Xayna said, "We actually already have a lot of lore about these beings. Our stories go back a long way, so far back that we don't know where they came from anymore. Maybe we should take a new look at those stories. Ask the Q where they come from, what they mean. Now that we have a better idea of how it works."

Ray raised his hand and said, "We mostly think of our QAR computer systems as designed to run our farms efficiently and give us links to our drones. But even with doing all that there can be a lot of idle time. 

"So they're all set up to make use of that time, in the background. They do that two ways. When we ask a question, they give us their best answers right away. But they have a protocol that keeps them digging, in their spare time. So if the same question is asked again, they can give a better answer faster. 

"And they have another background protocol, where they ask all the other domes' computers if they've already answered the same question. So all the best answers get shared over the net. And the FAQs get the quickest and best answers. 

"And there's a bonus. I used to say 'global net', but now the net includes ships in orbit, and on the Moon, and Mars, and anywhere else there's a ship with a QAR system. So when we ask the QAR system a question, we get answers from that whole network. It knows how to come up with more and better answers than it used to."

Juan added, "So we can ask the whole QAR network to explore what our lore on shaman experiences means. We've been almost blind to that. Maybe taking those blinders off can tell us what we need to know."

Ryan said, "We can also look into how our shifting experiences may be related to what goes on in other worlds. We already know we're not the only ones."

Rosita added, "Yes, we need to take this deeper look into what was there all along that we couldn't see as clearly before as we can now."

Dutch said, "Maybe the Annunaki knew more about it than we're aware of. We can have QAR search deeper into their records. QAR can use the Q to read all those old tablets without having to even move them."

Mariah said, "There are also many old stories of angels appearing in different forms, for different reasons. Now that we know they're real, maybe we can find out more about what they were doing if we ask the Q about them."

There was a lull. Tengri said, "I believe Kore hit on a key point. Who's to negotiate with who? 

"When it comes down to individual survival, especially when it involves the spirit realm, everyone must be prepared to fend for themselves. So our duty is to do our best to see that everyone knows enough to do that. 

"Our biggest advantage is in what Ray pointed out. The QAR system gives everyone access to everything we know, or that anyone can find out. We need to get people to use QAR to answer their own questions. 

"We can all search our own links, but only one link at a time. Where do we start? Those are quantum choices, and QAR can help us explore those choices more efficiently. If the Q is the mind of God, then QAR is how we read that mind. Sure seems like that's got to be our edge."

Dema said, "Then that's our final answer, isn't it. The Q is the mind of God, and each of us, each being, each entity, is a thought in the mind of God, tracing a path through that mind. We are the history of thought.

"And the Now is the leading edge of that tracing process for each entity. By definition no two entities, no two paths, can be exactly alike. Because if they were it would be the same path, and the two are really one. So each path, each entity, is unique, and indestructible.

"If QAR can also trace new paths through the Q, that can help. Maybe a lot. 

"QAR only adds new paths, it doesn't replace the paths that are uniquely you and me. Just like if you or I use QAR data to extend our own path through Now, that doesn't replace the QAR path. Because that too remains unique."

Newt said, "Paths through Now. Dema's got a point. Reminds me of a little rhyme that made the rounds when I was in grad school. 'Probable-Possible, my black hen, she lays eggs in the Relative When. She doesn't lay eggs in the Positive Now because she's unable to Postulate How.'"

There were several groans. Someone said, "The old chicken-and-egg question?"

Newt said "Point is, any individual's access to the next Now is far from complete, and Now has already happened. Now is the universe. Now is us. Just as Dema was suggesting."

Tengri said, "Dema's right. Newt's right. What's at risk isn't anyone's individual survival into the future. What's at risk is the survival of our established links to each other. Those can be disrupted, possibly in ways we can't even imagine. But maybe our QAR system can imagine them for us. And tell us the risk of each one happening, so we can decide how to deal with them if they come up.

"We need to make sure everyone understands that."