The Logs and Letter of Victor Smirnov (The Intelligence's Machine)

Victor's Letter

To all those within the Russian Space Institute charged with the investigation of the Nexus Incident,

My name is Victor Smirnov, crew member and survivor of the Nexus. I am writing to you from my grandmother's cabin in the Russian countryside to tell you that I am alive and to give you details on the machine the press has said you found within the wreckage of the Nexus. I have seen that my logs have been found among the wreckage and published. I would like to finish their story for you now.

Among the wreckage of the Nexus you found the machine erected by the intelligence. None of you knows its purpose and neither did we, the remaining crew, know then. All we knew was that the intelligence's strange machine had begun to kill us one by one and so we saw it as nothing more than a death ray erected by a deranged killer. But the intelligence's goals were larger than wonton murder.

We six had been selected, groomed physically and mentally by the intelligence, left to marinate in our chambers till we were the perfect subjects for use in the machine. The intelligence killed many of us in its testing, but we did not realize that that is all it was doing: testing. After each failed attempt the intelligence would tinker with its creation, turning its knobs and dials, slowly closing in on its goal. I believe that I was the intelligence's first successful test.

The intelligence prompted me to the metal pedestal at the end of the hall, same as everyone and powered on its machine. I was confident that I would meet my maker in a few short moments. Regrettably, this did not happen.

The light from the machine started at the other end of the long tubular hallway and from behind me and immediately my mind felt like it had exploded, my body hurt everywhere, I could see everything all at once. I could feel everything, every corner of the universe. I was suddenly everywhere and aware of everything in existence and I passed out. My being had been spread like soft butter across the entire fabric of space time and my mortal mind was not up to the task.

But time was irrelevant to me and as I passed out I simultaneously came to while still managing to sleep for an eternity. I continued this quantum state of wake and sleep as my senses were flooded with all the information of the universe, known and unknown, and my mind felt like it broke repeatedly. The experience was excruciating and felt like it went on for a literal eternity, but an eternity is a long while and so I had much "time" to think.

I thought for so long that I forgot many times who I was, the Nexus, and everything I had experienced and began to consider my current state of being stretched from end to end across the universe normal and without beginning, but I was always brought back to a distant memory when I blinked and saw every corner of the Nexus in my field of view. I doubt that human beings are meant to retain so much information as I experienced and so I easily forgot vast and vaster quantities of information than I received, but I remember watching Ana. I watched her for so long. My lasting companion in my final days before my life in this unending hell.

Ana's image was burned into my mind. I saw her in every nebula, every void, every star, every rock. She was the only thing that managed to keep me sane in my timeless state. I focused every bit of my weak strength on her. My imagination ran wild with nothing to stop it. I saw Earth in my field of view. I saw a small house in the Russian country. I saw me and Ana married happily and living out our lives. I fell in love with Ana and imagined moment by moment, long lives and happy deaths together, many times over.

Finally, I stood again aboard the Nexus, but on a different metal pedestal than I had stood before. I had been teleported to the other end of the hall. It is my belief that this is the purpose of the machine: teleportation. However, I can't begin to fathom were the intelligence discovered the principles for the device or how to construct it or even why it would want to construct it, but I can wholeheartedly attest to its wholly unethical and inhumane operation. I implore you, do not attempt to use the machine. The machine broke me. The human psyche cannot be prepared for that amount of abuse.

When I stood again aboard the Nexus, I broke down in sobbing for the indescribable mental anguish. I had lived longer in every corner of the universe simultaneously than I had lived before a became a crew member on board the Nexus. The clocks on board the Nexus read that less than a minute had passed, but I felt several infinities. I remembered so much, but had forgotten so much more. But I still remembered Ana.

I had lived many lives with her and in less than a second she had become the object of my deepest desire. I looked to her and she seemed overjoyed to see me still alive. The intelligence seemed overjoyed as well.

I was instructed by the intelligence to return to my chamber, presumably so that it could perform physical and mental tests on me, but I had no desire to be a captive any longer. I stood in defiance quickly trying to think up an escape.

My mind was racing, but it seemed the intelligence held all the cards. While I was thinking, however, the intelligence dealt its final devastating blow to my broken form as it set its power drills to Ana's chest. I suppose the intelligence figured that it had been successful in its endeavors and didn't need any other extra humans besides the test subject and so eliminated the rubbish. The woman that had kept me sane, the only thing that meant anything to me anymore and with whom I had lived a thousand lives, was taken from me in an instant.

Devastated though I was I recognized this as my escape. The only effective weapons the intelligence possessed were its power drills and these were currently busy down the hall. I took a piece of debris and began indiscriminately smashing at any piece of electronics that I saw, releasing all my hatred for this bastard of a robot. The intelligence was not fast enough and I managed to cripple it before it had time to react and after some more time, I completely decommissioned it. I was now the only living thing aboard the Nexus.

Unable to go back into cryogenic sleep without the help of the onboard computer, I spent the remainder of the 9 year journey home repairing the damage I had done to the controls in my indiscriminate smashing and guiding the ship home manually. I disposed of the rotting bodies of the crew through the airlock. Ana was the hardest to let go of. I cried for many days after her disposal. As I approached Earth, I slowed the ship to less than 1% of c and abandoned the ship in an escape capsule, leaving the Nexus to crash into the Pacific. I wanted nothing to do with that ship and wished it would incinerate on impact.

Upon landing, I made my way to my late grandmother's cabin deep in the Russian country, wishing to be left alone. Please do not try to find me. I only wished to tell you my story so that you may understand the danger of the machine you have uncovered and to dissuade you from ever attempting to use it. As for me, I am alive, but I'd rather I you keep thinking that I'm dead.

Victor Smirnov