Classified Quadrillionaire
A Science-Fiction Novel by Horus
Michael
Copyright © ® 2021 Horus Michael, All
rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be
reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or
mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any other information storage
and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the author. Reviewers may quote brief passages. Trolls
will be eaten by Ammot.
This book is a work of
Fiction.
Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s
imagination or are used fictitiously.
Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead,
is entirely coincidental and should not be inferred.
This book was published in the United
States of America. This book is a product of the Kingdom of Niihau © ® Horus Michael 2021.
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Chapter
1:
A thousand
miles of land stretched before us in the dimly-lit cabin on board The Gallant, our maiden yacht. On both sides of the ocean channel our ship
squeezed through like a fat cork in an old bottle of Scotch. Eventually we found a clearing and then the
cork literally popped.
For two
years we scoured the seas looking for remnants of our old Guild Master, Lord
James Michael, The Richest Man in the World.
It seemed even our modest quest was not without a few hiccups. That Lord Michael was even out here in the
barren lands of Elam would suggest
another purpose for his interests, considering he owned all of it once.
“Lady
Evelyn,” shouted a deckhand. “We will
reach the Port in twenty minutes.”
“I will
alert the Captain,” I echoed amidst a gale force of wind and sea foam. Time wasn’t our adversary. The Captain was below deck, monitoring his
digital sextant.
“Captain, a
moment,” I said briefly. The Captain was
a native of Elam, with his nautical
white-and-blue cap atop a clean shirt of rugged cotton and plaid trousers. He smiled slightly.
“M’lady?” he
asked solemnly. “Is it time?”
“Port is in
twenty, and the deck is clear,” I replied.
“Agreed. Prepare to lay anchor then,” he said while
flipping digital control switches.
Above deck,
the coast was littered by a recent typhoon.
In the distance one could glimpse a line of limestone Pyramids leading
to a walled city. Formerly this was all
desert land until Lord Michael purchased it several decades ago. He
built the city and the Pyramids with
his fortune.
What lay
ahead was difficult to express exactly. The
dock was once a pinnacle of honor and glory, where all of the flag ships that
reached Port were gathered together like children around a glowing log in a
campfire, ready for marsh mellows and hot Chocolate. Now the dock was desolate. A ruin of costly stone and weathered timber
was its only survivor.
The Captain
appeared unhinged as he opened a portal hole in the side of The Gallant. “Well, so much for laying anchor.”
We decided
to drop anchor at the closest beach head and disembarked onto the dry misty
sand. The Captain remained behind to
guard the ship.
We marched
into the tropical marshes that led to the walled city. This took about an hour on foot. I led the party of five wearing my adventurer
garb – tactical blue denim jacket and pants, with black laced-up half-boots and
a pith helmet with a leopard print scarf.
My fellow shipmates wore seafaring attire. Two of them had preloaded assault rifles in
case of angry feral cats, as Elam once produced a population of cloned
Saber-tooth variety. I felt secure holding my trusty laser dagger with solar
charger, and a bandolier of sonic grenades. Cats don’t like loud noises.
We
approached a stone wall of polished granite.
The gilded iron gates were positioned in between a pylon of similar
materials.
“Locked,” said Gaius, our Engineer. “There must
be another way inside.” Gaius searched for a hidden latch or button. Lord Michael was fond of such
concealment.
Two lion
statues made of granite concrete faced a shallow pool littered with coins of
tarnished bronze and silver. A fountain
once sputtered water from its center. Although
there did appear to be missing something.
“Wouldn’t
the lions be facing the fountain?” I
asked the group. I checked each lion
head looking for metallic holes. One was
clogged with muck, so I inserted my laser dagger and activated it until water
spewed forth into the pool. I did the
same with the other lion. I heard a metal-on-stone
noise behind us. The gates opened!
“Success!” I
replied in satisfaction. “Let’s go in.”
A walkway
spiraled about leading to a massive building.
Along the way I saw numerous, once-extinct tropical plants dotting the
pathway. The path itself contained
silver nuggets embedded in the cement. An
unlocked door lay ahead.
The room was
dark and musty. We lit up some electric
torches for lighting. Upon doing so the
interior reflected our strobes from glistening suits of stainless steel along
the walls, complete with halberds. A
quick gray rat scurried by unnoticed.
We followed the floor tiles to an indoor
swimming pool overshadowed by this large sandstone statue of Lord Michael as an
Egyptian Pharaoh complete with striped Nemes headdress and crossed
scepters. His eyes once contained
inlays, I think.
“His eyes
are missing,” Gaius suggested.
“I gather
that, too,” I replied in interest.
“Well the
pool is warm at least. Shall we go for a
swim?” I added. The others smiled.
“I’d just
focus on why we’re all here,” said Jervis, our Guard.
“Yes. Of
course, we shall move on then?” I said.
A hallway
emptied into a Museum, which led us to the Library where most of Lord Michael’s
famed novels were kept. One novel was
entitled “Creator of Thrones.” It was housed in an armored glass case
resting on a soft pillow of silk. Towering
cedar wood shelves tiled the room. The
floor was fashioned of Mahogany with traces of gilding in intricate letters,
possibly hieroglyphic.
“So, where
is it?” asked Jervis impatiently. “Where
is Lord Michael’s Crypt?” Jervis paced about while brandishing an assault rifle
like it’s a toy squirt gun.
“I’d be
careful with that. Lord Michael’s tomb
is up ahead. Look for a stairwell or
chasm,” I added.
“Evelyn,
wouldn’t his Crypt be mentioned in one of his books?” asked Gaius. “In the Tower
of Faust he wrote about a chamber concealed by a portrait of his
mistress. And in Evermore Ether the tomb was hidden by a lever and a trap floor.”
“You know,
Good Idea! Guys, look around for a switch along the walls, or a statue. Any loose objects will do. I am going back to the Museum Lobby for
something. I will join you later,” I
said.
The suits of
armor seemed lively for inanimate objects.
It was almost as if they could see me.
The Museum Lobby held this majestic chalice of calcite contained in a
locked glass chest. I wondered if that
was connected to the Pool’s statue?
I fidgeted
with the lock using a screwdriver I had connected to my keychain. Then I realized something. Each tome in the Library was numbered in Fibonacci Sequence using the Library Computer. If I add the first two digits I create the
next number, and if I use the next number with the created number I create the
next number in sequence. So it is only a
matter of calculating where the tome is that will lead me to the key. I
searched the Library Computer here in the Lobby. Turning it on wasn’t a problem but it was
slow, as it hadn’t been used for quite some time. It asked me for a pass code when I typed the
command to open the chalice’s lock. So I
entered “8 13 21,13 21 34, 21 34 55” and “34 55 89.” I heard a click behind me. There was a hidden panel in the side of the
desk behind my chair. The panel
contained a brass key. I inserted the
key into the lock guarding the Chalice.
It fit, much to my pleasure.
I opened the
box and removed the Chalice. Turning it
about in the available light, I could see it was written in old Egyptian Hieroglyphs. On the bottom where I expected to see “Made
in Egypt” was a taped key of stainless steel.
I peeled away the blue Duct tape and placed the key into my jacket
pocket.
I alerted
the others back in the Library. Gaius
was reading through a collection of Lord Michael’s Effective Egyptian Magic Spells books, the ones with Sakhmet on the cover. Jervis had been seated on a plush couch,
cleaning the barrel of his assault rifle with a white cloth.
“Good. I was starting to become bored,” Jervis
said.
We walked
back to the swimming pool and I studied the statue of Lord Michael, especially
around its missing eyes.
“Eyes, eyes,
what is so special about his eyes?” I pondered.
The missing
eyes stared into the pool itself, so this gave me and idea. In his first novel, Creator of Thrones, Lord Michael wrote about how Eyes are the Origin of the Soul. So his soul is missing. But, his eyes are directed into the pool.
“Alright, we
need to drain the pool. Gaius, find the
control panel for the swimming pool in the Boiler room. I will wait here,” I ordered.
The pool
took a few minutes to empty. I descended
a few feet to the bottom floor of the Olympic size pool. I looked about for any hidden devices.
“There’s
nothing here,” I concluded. “It just
needs some… light,” I said, realizing the skylight above had a covering on
it. “That’s strange. Why would an indoor pool have its skylight
shielded?”
Gaius
glanced upwards. “Here, I can reach the
rope to the covering,” he said. “There.”
Gaius pulled down the gray cotton tarp. Light
immediately poured into the room, sending a bolt of light into the statue of Lord Michael through its eyes, this illuminated
a small panel on the bottom of the pool.
“Hmm… It’s
loose,” I said while flipping open the plastic panel, this revealed a key
hole. I remembered the key from the
Chalice and inserted it.
Suddenly the
whole bottom floor of the swimming pool descended into a staircase and
ramp. I looked up to see our group’s
smiles in astonishment.
We descended
the staircase, lighting our electric torches along the way. I could hear water dripping in the musty
air.
The tunnel
led to three Antechambers. The first was
supported by a forest of Palm tree pillars.
The second had colonnades forming a perimeter shaped like a square. The third was supported by Papyrus pillars
engraved in recessed Hieroglyphs. Inside
the Pylon gateway was a small tunnel leading to the Crypt.
The Crypt’s
walls had been decorated in mid 19th Dynasty painted murals, mostly
about technology and hunting scenes. A
concrete sarcophagus stood in the center of the room, shaped like a Scarab
beetle. Nearby was a statue of Anubis,
it was holding a staff held in its hands.
“Well, where
are the fabulous treasures you
promised us?” Jervis asked sadly. “All I
see is this big stone bug!”
“It’s
Concrete, and that’s not an ordinary bug.
It’s a Scarab, symbolic of resurrection,” I corrected him. “We just need to open it. Jervis, if you
mind, tug on that staff that the Jackal god is holding. I think I may have an
idea.”
“Aye,
Professor,” Jervis relented. Jervis
pulled the staff and then he twisted it like a ski pole until hearing a click.
The Concrete
Scarab’s wings opened up to reveal another enigma. A large black metallic box with wires,
tubing, and electronic technology displayed an opaque window.
“What is this?” Jervis scoffed.
“It’s a
Cryogenic Chamber, the first working one I’ve seen,” Gaius said studying
it. “You see, there’s a network of tubes
leading in and out of the box, supplying liquid Oxygen to the interior, which I
suspect is feeding its occupant. The
lights are on, indicating whoever is inside this is still alive.”
I wiped the
window with a clean cloth. I noticed
fine golden lettering imprinted on the opaque tinted panel.
“Lord James
Michael, Occupant,” I said at length.
“Gaius, how long would it take to revive him?”
Gaius stared
into the contraption, his brilliant mind calculating mathematical
formulae. “I can have it… in about… 10
minutes, given the technology here.”
“Do you
require any special equipment?” I asked him.
“No. It
seems to be self-contained,” Gaius replied.
Jervis stood
his ground, his assault rifle at his side.
The remaining two deckhands assisted Gaius with the equipment.
Internal
gases flowed about within the opaque sarcophagus as we pressed glass buttons on
the control panel. Within minutes the
vacuum-sealed chamber released converted Oxygen along the edges as the canopy
opened and retracted within. Lord
Michael started to breathe on his own from a tube harness placed over his face,
his slick gray hair slightly moving in the still air. Then his eyelids fluttered, slowly opening to
the sound of technology within the contraption.
I decided to
introduce myself. “Lord James Michael, I
am Lady Evelyn of the organization you founded 300 years ago. We have awakened you because we need your
assistance…”
A slight
grin appeared onto his parched lips as he spoke. “It’s the Ushabtis
Project, correct?” he asked me.
“Yes,” I
replied. “We need some advice on how to
contain their unnatural growth and social interaction,” I said.
For those
who do not know, the Ushabtis Project
was Lord Michael’s gift of technology to the World, which made him a Quadrillionaire over 23 years. Ushabtis
are a replacement of living people with technology. Slowly in the 21st Century did
technology replace workers, first with telemarketing, garbage or recycling
workers, cashiers in restaurants, to soldiers in the field of battle and
eventually leaders of Nations. Humans became consumers only, as all labor was
now regulated by machines. The Ushabtis self-created their own numbers
from automatic factories, and controlled society. Humans served as technicians to program the Ushabtis or do repair work. Since Humans are susceptible to Pandemics,
the Ushabtis virtually took control
of society. The purpose was one of
survival. Now Humans are an endangered species. So for that reason we sought to awaken the
founder of this project, whose existence was classified by the World
Government to prevent people from finding him. Not everyone likes machines replacing our
people.
Lord Michael
used revenue from his many best-selling novels to purchase technology and robot
companies, later he bought ranches to build his own factories. The mass production of this technology
greatly influenced our economy. Lord
Michael created Elam, a technology
city-state in the Sahara Desert, from his extended revenue. With his trillions he purchased Libya and
part of Egypt, along with mainland China to access his technology. The World Government annexed Elam a few
decades ago, and exempted it from taxes.
Lord Michael sought to escape this world by sleeping in his Cryogenic
Chamber until society corrected itself. But
now we need him more than ever. The
World Government renewed a form of Technology Feudalism, hence why we have
titles.
Chapter
2:
Lord James
Michael wasn’t always a Technocrat. Originally he was the inventor of a Genetic Escape Room in the 21st
Century. He also invented holographic sculpture so that everyone
could view ancient artifacts without actual ownership due to legal issues with
certain governments. His many novels
elevated him to celebrity status later on.
After
removal from the Cryogenic Chamber, Lord Michael activated his city-state from
a room within the main building, previously locked. Gaius and I helped order some rehydrated food
from a replicator in Elam’s cafeteria, while Jervis guarded against rogue
robots.
Ushabtis are color-coded. Most are constructed of Marbleized Titanium
with Beryllium. Gold Ushabtis are programmed for Government work only. You can see them in the Bureaucracy, copying
digital papers and recording events. Blue Ushabtis are the Police force in
the form of flying Drones that speak any language upon hearing the first vocal
sounds of a Human, and then automatically translate them. Blue
Ushabtis will eject either a stunning electric shock as a warning in case
of violence, or a clinging blob of mesh to apprehend suspects. Green
Ushabtis are environmental servants, cleaning the debris from roads and
cutting lawns; they also recycle human evidence. There are rumors of a secret
secular group called Red Ushabtis,
but we are presently unsure of their purpose. Most Ushabtis appear as walking statues with
limbs, antennae, or helicopter wings; under development are ones that resemble
humans with latex skin, red lubricating fluid, crystal eyes, and scented
steam.
Jervis was
fumbling with the lock on his assault rifle. He clearly was disappointed.
“Hey
Jervis,” said Fang, one of the deckhands.
“Why so glum?”
Jervis
looked upwards as if pouting. “Where’s my treasure?
You said we’d be rich!”
Lord Michael overheard the conversation. “Gentlemen, how much do you want in compensation?”
“Golden
treasures would be great,” Jervis said in a monotone voice. “Not paper.”
“Has he seen
my Vault?” Lord Michael asked me, turning his gaze. “I have this locked in case the World stopped
accepting Geo Credits.”
Lord Michael
pressed a panel in his chair, which popped out to show a red switch. He pressed it. The floor opened up before us and a staircase
elevated itself to meet the surface. Then lights along the passage ignited into
simulated holographic torches. The
interior resembled the original contents of a Ramses-size sepulcher. Jervis excitedly descended the black marble
staircase into the chamber. He found
gold rings of various sizes, emeralds the size of baseballs, alabaster vases,
gold and silver coins of varied cultures, oil paintings of the Grand Masters,
and the like.
“You are
welcome to anything down there, as most of it is obsolete in our Present era,”
Lord Michael said. “But if you want Geo Credits, I have those too. Just let me know and I will send a link to
Elam’s Banking Institution.”
“Obsolete…,” Jervis started. Then he
stood up and dropped a few gold bars back into the pile. “Nah,
you keep it.”
We ventured
outside after lunch. Lord Michael
operated a flying chair skiff to view his city-state. Upon pressing several integrated red switches
in his chair panel, the grounds lit up with solar-electric lighting. Blue Drones exited from camera-shutters in
the ground, and flew about to enforce Elam’s
Code of Conduct. Ushabtis marched in
double file down the concourse. Some
lesser Bots scurried about on the floor like tiny skateboards.
We saw Green
Drones watering the various exotic plants, trees, flowering gardens, and fields
of wheat and barley. Date Palm trees
dotted the perimeter of the city-state, and four rows of which formed a carpet
towards the entrance. Other Ushabtis
offered a traditional role as
harvesters and farmers.
Further down
the estate we noticed Ushabtis as Miners, hauling rocks to be processed into
metals and the remnant into sand and later concrete. Ushabtis drove automated vehicles, and
delivered items to their appropriate corresponding locations.
Inside an
auditorium, Ushabtis played different musical instruments to a recording from
the 22nd Century. Some
Ushabtis even sang vocalizations of human origin. One wonders who programmed them.
Outside in
an alley, I noticed one Ushabty bully two lesser Drones like a child at
school. Mostly the larger one tampered
with the antennae or service panels of the lesser ones. I wondered if the bully was programmed by a Blue Jay bird.
We entered a
classroom for Ushabtis. One Instructor
Ushabty recited a series of scripts for the lesser ones to record and repeat in
exactness. Another Ushabty appeared to
be a Journalist recording and disseminating the local News broadcast. All of this left me wondering, where are all
the Human people?
Chapter
3:
A few days
later, Lord Michael was giving a speech in one of Elam’s Universities to a
group of Human Graduates concerning our technology and humanity’s place in
it. For the most part, Humans lack the
essential qualities for success in an Ushabty society. We have become a minority. Technology was originally designed to make
life simpler, not replace us. The Human
Graduates numbered about 10, while the Ushabtis had several thousand; our
numbers included accelerated genetic-modified teenagers.
After the
empathic speech, Lord Michael was approached by a woman with flowing dark hair,
business attire and matching silver heels.
She asked to speak to him privately.
“James
Michael, I am an admirer of your work,” the woman said while escorting him to a
maintenance closet at the University. “Do
you think the robots will ever
understand Human mating rituals, or complexities of that nature?”
“I have the
utmost certainty of that strong possibility, Miss,” Lord Michael replied. “Your name escapes me. Is it Jill, or
Juliet?”
“My name is
not important. I value intellect over
identity,” the woman said while unzipping her shirt and removing her silver
heels while in the closet. She grasped
her hands across Lord Michael’s cotton blazer and lifted one thigh to meet his
gaze, resting a foot against a table and drew him closer. Then she pulled him up against her semi-bare
chest and started licking his neck. This
continued for about five minutes. Afterwards,
Lord Michael was injected with a sedative while resting on the table and the
woman left the closet, locking it.
A pounding
was heard from the closet as I entered the University. I noticed the door was locked from the
outside with the Master Key. The key was
actually an electric one the size of a thumb
drive from the 21st Century.
My Sphere contained a duplicate of the Master Key; Spheres are what we
use in place of Cellular Phones now. A
Sphere is like a holographic projection with other features when we revolve the
image about using an integrated dial. I
unlocked the closet door and met Lord Michael, whom was somewhat
underdressed.
“What
happened?” I asked him in disbelief.
“Did you see
that Synthetic?” He asked me in
bewilderment. “There was a woman here,
but she wasn’t what I thought. She was
a Latex Ushabty. I think she was after my Tech Key or
something.”
“How do you
know she was a Synthetic?” I asked him.
“Well… We
had coition, but it was bad
coition. Once, I think it was a fake
orgasm? She didn’t feel right. Oh…” he
stopped while looking out the window with a sense of fear.
“What? Are
you well?” I asked.
“Oh… She
wanted my semen to clone me for my
access to the Database,” he said, embarrassed.
“My Security feature from 300 years ago was programmed with my Genetic
code. Only someone with my DNA can
access it.”
“Damn,” I
said at length. “What should I do?”
Lord Michael
dressed himself and we exited the closet.
“Lady
Evelyn, I want you to tell the Blue
Ushabtis in the Elam Security Department everything I just told you,” Lord
Michael replied as we were walking outside the building.
“All right,
if you feel that is necessary,” I said while watching a slim jet soar in the
air above us.
“I have to
visit Elam’s technology center,” he answered.
Titanium
bars kept flowing into the factory line as machines constantly forged new
Ushabtis by the minute. A forklift
carried shrapnel from damaged creations to the smelter, which melted them down
into basic components. Legs, arms, feet,
and heads became attached to abdomens of similar material, with veins of copper
wire and gold foil skin. This was the
Elam Ushabty Factory, the technology center for the city-state.
Endless
hallways of packages, crates, and finished creations lined the main
thoroughfare here. Marching to the tune
of Mozart entered rows of varying colored Ushabtis. One even played a drum like a human marching
band, with banners waving from its headgear.
“Lord
Michael! Master Lord Michael, what a surprise,” said a new Latex Ushabty named Intef-44. It walked like a man but with a tractor
footpad.
“Hello
Intef-44! It’s been ages,” Lord Michael smiled.
“Allow me
some introductions,” Intef-44 said on its electronic voice-wave screen. “Here are your new Secretary, Cal-77 and her
assistant, Roger-AA” he said while pointing to robots.
“Greetings,”
said both in unison.
[End of Excerpt].
