The vision…
I will never forget the morning I came down early to find Georgie glued to the screen. He looked like he’d been up all night. ‘What’s happening, Blank-Blank?’ I asked him. His words… ‘They’re changing, Two-Blank. Changing!’
The wanderers had started to adapt to the system. Not in any deep sense, you must understand; merely that some of them were joining together, to make a single, more powerful entity. The agents were flying around, going crazy at this new burst of knowledge. It was Georgie, again, who had suggested the agents should look like insects, with wings.
To think back upon that morning…
It was the start of the second phase. Over the next year we recorded at least ten new species of wanderer. Some of them you may have read about: Chancer, Casanova, Warrior, Seducer, Cartographer, Jester, Sheep and Shepherds, Builders, Backsliders. Their names are like poetry to me now, long-lost poetry. Each amalgam would have its own unique qualities that allowed it a different way of negotiating the maze. It wasn’t long, of course, before they started fighting each other for the privilege of the centre’s prize. This was a totally unexpected outcome of the system, although inevitable in hindsight. We had created a world inside the computer. It was the law of the jungle, with its own secret dynamic.
I think it was Susan who suggested the next step.
Because fighting wasn’t the only thing the various wanderers were interested in. Some of them had started to reproduce. It was a basic operation, analogous to a single-cell creature splitting in two. The fascinating results were never the same; for instance the amalgam of a builder and a jester would split apart, but never into a mere builder or a mere jester. It was always some new offshoot they produced.
It was Susan who said, ‘I think they’re trying to have sex, Max.’ And Malthorpe who said, ‘Aye, they want to fuck each other.’ And Susan who said, ‘Let’s give them some DNA.’
That was it. The third phase. None of us was expert in that particular field, so a period of research was required. Meanwhile, we were constantly upgrading to the latest technology, to increase the complexity of the system. We managed to write a new program that copied a very simple form of genetic structure, which we introduced to a new batch of wanderers. These creatures were very quickly subsumed by the more experienced wanderers. It took only a short while for the effects to take place.
Again, it was Georgie who first spotted the carnal act. As far as I knew, he’d never known a woman, not in the basic sense. It was like pornography to him, I think, watching a Seducer and a Cartographer come together in this blatant way. The next day they had already produced their first baby: a seductive map- making creature, who charmed his way around the pathways, recording every twist and turn as he did so. We called this new creation a Columbus unit. Why am I calling him he? Because he was! He had a capacity to inject his DNA into another creature, preferably a female unit, who had the capacity to take in the offered sperm. I’m sorry, I can’t stop using these ridiculous terms.
There were no textbooks to consult, you see. We were on the edge of a new kind of mathematics, based on sex. It was Georgie who came up with the name for all this activity. Susan had been going on about how the information was being passed on through the genes, and Malthorpe had called one new creature a right little nymphomaniac! ‘Nymphomaniacs!’ cried out Georgie. ‘They’re doing naughty nymphomation!’
It was my job to work out the equations of this new process, a task that pushed me to my limits. This is when your father joined us…
Play to lose
‘He told me that you’d “used” him?’ said Daisy. ‘Is that right?’
‘Used him?’ said Hackle. ‘Yes, I suppose we did. But only for his extra knowledge. He was always the best of us, remember, despite the fact that he didn’t have our training. Maybe that gave him an advantage. And, when we found him, he was at a low ebb. No real job, no real friends. He was pleased to be part of our group. We found him a job, a wife…’
‘A wife? My mother, you mean?’
‘Yes. She was an employee at the bank where Susan employed him. We gave Jimmy a purpose in life. And he loved the work we were doing. He was excited by it.’
They had come to another clearing in the labyrinth, where they rested. A series of painted light bulbs was strung along the passageways, giving a low, blue cast to the damp, cold space. Professor Hackle had slumped down against one wall, breathing heavily after his account. Daisy was leaning against the opposite wall, wondering if she would ever find her way back to the house.