[What Might Have Been 04] Alternate Americas Read online

  “Yes, but there are few people. Large areas seem uninhabited.”

  “Where will we find slaves?” asked Gisco, the farmer, whose fields had fed the army.

  “There will be no slaves in the new world,” Oceanus replied. “I see our city growing outward, inviting other peoples into a cooperative system of states. And we will prosper because all will benefit, and we will be just!”

  —and at this point the historian crouching inside Oceanus disengaged from the virtual figure and raced forward through the variants to see what had happened to the ideals of these Carthaginians, who shared experiences of persecution with the fleeing immigrants of other variants. He caught up with the Niña, Pinta, and Santa María as they sailed within sight of land, and slipped into the figure of Columbus as he stood on the deck of the largest vessel, looking excitedly at the small islands ahead, expecting the Asian shore, with all its riches, to slip into view from over the horizon.

  But instead, on the starboard side, three smoking dragons climbed over the edge of the world. The crews of the Spanish ships cried out in fear and cursed their fate.

  Columbus shouted, “Fear not, they are not what they seem!”

  The men quieted and watched the approaching creatures, and soon saw that they were large metal vessels without sails.

  The linear history machine begat the cliometricon, which simulated all that had been from a database so vast that no organic mind could traverse it. Every scrap of fact, speculation, audio and visual drama, as well as records of locales went into the burgeoning synthesis. Gaps were filled in, melding all documents and references for events and personalities into a tree of information that branched endlessly into probability. Everything became history, erasing all discontinuities, all distinctions between what was true and untrue. It made no difference, the cliometricians concluded, because so-called falsehoods canceled each other out in the cross-referencing mass of information, which was one with the very stuff of being that was the ground of every possible actuality. History’s willful tree grew into infinity under an alien, unreachable light.

  At first, only data that had been selected and shaped by licensed linear historians had been allowed to infect the cliometricon, before it taught them that everything was essential, no matter how false or trivial, because the cliometricon had the power to shape and reshape a large, incomplete database, and to present the otherwise unseeable to the historian. Like an optical telescope, it gathered and focused ancient light into a coherent image. The endless input of information was at first an indirect view of history, but this event horizon was pierced by capturing all unavailable information through simple brute enumeration—by running all possible variants of human history. The human genome was part of the cliometricon’s database, so it simulated the past and present actions of all human beings who had ever lived and displayed their lives in dramatic form, even indicating their thoughts from observed behavior. Although the number of human variant histories was infinite, the number of significant past personalities was finite, and their actions capable of exhaustive representation.

  Some historians dreamed of placing sensitive collectors a million or more light years beyond the solar system, with a cliometricon at the focus of the electromagnetic radiation cone, to extract all actual human history, as a check on the cliometricon. But other historians argued that this purely technical feat would only duplicate what the cliometricon had already done by the brute force of enumeration. No difference would be observed between history as it happened and what the cliometricon displayed in all possible variants. This had been demonstrated by blind comparisons of forced historical versions with well-documented events, which always turned out to be identical. An infinitely objective eye would see the same sum of histories displayed by the cliometricon.

  It was observed that historians in every variant saw themselves as embedded in the classical path, but as use of the cliometricon spread through the variants, this idea was abandoned. All variants were real trajectories, even though some personalities were alive in one variant and not in another.

  The deconstructing historians worked the variants like solitaire players uncovering cards, seeking related sets of differences, hoping to find variants that might mean something, whatever their significance. All finite bits of information available when someone died, the kind of data that had once been built up into a work of fiction, a drama for live players, or a film, was run through the probabilities and interpreted until the dead walked again in virtual embodiment. Detailed histories were observed and recorded, and the past lived and grew anew, resurrected in the cliometricon, developing in a secondary universe of information identical to all beings….

  Towed by three Carthaginian coast guard vessels, Columbus’s ships entered the harbor of an impossible city. Towers of twenty and thirty stories rose above the water on the same site where New York stood in other variants. Large ships were loading and unloading at the docks. Well back from the harbor, towering above everything, sat a red pyramid. As the historian watched him in the guide monitor, Columbus, gripping the rail of the Santa María, astonished by the sight of such advanced commerce, wondered how he would ever be able to make his fortune here. This land was far greater than the China, India, and Japan that had glowed in his mind. No navy he had ever seen could stand against these ships. At best, Spain might hope to become this city’s inferior trading partner, and the life he had spent in preparing for his voyage west would be lost in a world that was larger and richer than anyone he had ever known had imagined. The hundreds of crosses in his hold would not be planted in this land. There would be no gold to pay for the liberation of the Holy Land. His people would curse him for opening the way to humiliation.

  Carthage lived in this variant, far from Rome, yet the two would conflict again, unless New Carthage had forgotten the death of the old. Or was vengeance coiled in all the variant hearts of this new city?

  In another variant, a confederation of American States had broken with Great Britain, seeking refuge from European ways. They had sought to make the past count for less, but had failed by the third century. To escape the constraints of the past was the test of a civilization, and in the infinity of variants they all succeeded in one way or another, except the historian’s own panoptic civilization, whose past could not yet be properly judged, since it had existed for less than a century. Observations of its own variants tended to be alike: endless series of observers processing information like sand through a sieve, seeking some significance beyond the peeping of one’s neighbor.

  Among the infinity of historians, there were those who chafed at the fact that Panoptica was locked in observational embrace with every variant of its past, from which it could learn nothing, while access to the future was forbidden. History seemed to be at an end.

  Historians dreamed of looking ahead. Would the cliometricon escape the infinitely variable fiction of its database? Or would it begin another endless effort of capturing actual futures by sheer force of enumerating the possible, as it did with the past, making the distinction between reality and simulation meaningless? The resurrection of the past had started from an initial database, but futures also rested on that base, so brute force should not be overpowered in completing the empty spaces. Past, present, and future would then be transformed into information, completing panoptic civilization, and all consciousness would become a sluggish cursor lost in the infinite ocean of data….

  The future was a constant temptation—greater than the compulsive hours the historian spent examining the private lives of individuals, varying sets of events, and details within details.

  The romance of past time was hypnotic. The historian set the safeties to break the virtual embodiment before addiction set in, and gazed at the serrated skyline of New Carthage in the guide monitor. The program eased him forward in the sequence, toward the great pyramid where Columbus was now imprisoned, into a windowless cell with a table, chair, and bed. An electric bulb burned on the square ceiling. Columbus stood by
the door, listening to the silence, and the historian heard the explorer’s doubts, as recorded by Walt Whitman:

  What do I know of life?

  what of myself?

  I know not even my own

  work past or present;

  Dim ever-shifting guesses

  of it spread before me,

  Of newer better worlds,

  their mighty parturition,

  Mocking, perplexing me.

  Finally the door opened, and a man entered. Columbus stepped back. The man was dressed in a dark green suit of pants and jacket, buttoned at the neck.

  “Good evening,” the man said in perfect Spanish, and gestured for Columbus to sit down.

  Columbus remained standing. “Who are you, Sir, and why am I a prisoner?”

  The man smiled and licked his thin lips. “Be patient.”

  “Who are you?” Columbus demanded.

  “The Duke of Norfolk, and the English Ambassador to New Carthage, Captain Columbus. Please, do sit down.”

  “My rank is that of admiral,” Columbus said as he obeyed.

  “Forgive me.” The Ambassador was silent for a moment, then said, “We’ve been in touch with the New Carthaginian States for some time, ever since Henry Tudor won the throne, with only His Majesty’s Court and our allies knowing about it.”

  “States? Where then is China?”

  The Ambassador shook his head in amusement. “These states extend as far as the river that divides this continent. There is another ocean to cross to reach China. The native peoples of this hemisphere and the Old Carthaginian settlers have made quite a confederation for themselves. My question to you is, where will your sympathies be? With Rome and the Spanish Court?”

  “Where can they be?” Columbus said.

  “With yourself, I would hope,” the Ambassador said. “You know quite well that Roman Italy, together with its Spanish allies, intends to conquer Europe. Perhaps you would wish to help oppose the coming tyranny? You are without a doubt aware that we have only recently ended our civil strife.”

  Columbus nodded, irritated by the man’s directness.

  “And it was our good fortune,” the Duke continued, “to find new allies across the sea. Our latest information tells us that Germany is gone, and much of Europe, right up to Moscow, is threatened. England will be next unless something is done.”

  Columbus stood up. “All of that is now happening?”

  The Ambassador nodded.

  “But how can you know that?” Columbus asked.

  “We have long-range communications that can bring us messages almost instantly. We knew you were coming. Our observers are very thorough.”

  “But what could I do for you?”

  “You’re an educated man and a skilled seafarer. I think you would be happy to learn new ways. But the basic question is what do you want from your abilities as a navigator, captain, and adventurer? You may be completely candid with me.”

  “My greatest desire is to secure wealth, power, and glory for myself, my family in Spain, and my heirs.”

  “But don’t you also love knowledge, seafaring, and exploration?”

  Columbus nodded. “For myself—but I am by nature not a generous man. Why are you asking me such questions?”

  “To learn whether you wish to be of service to us,” the Ambassador replied. “I note that in your words you have left put any mention of Isabella’s Castile and Ferdinand’s Aragon, from which I conclude that they do not mean much to you, except as a means of support for your ventures. I can assure you that if you join us, you will have all that you want. We will remove your family to England, of course. Please understand that the New Carthaginians, and we English also, think it wise to control the coming contact with Europe, for the sake of all. Uncontrolled, it would be devastating, both physically and economically. You are quarantined here, for example, because of diseases you may be carrying. You seem fairly healthy, but medicines have been given to you with your food.”

  “But why do you ask me to join you?” Columbus asked.

  “Do you think yourself unworthy?” the Ambassador replied. “Our agents in Europe have observed you long enough to know how familiar you are with the Spanish Court. And we know that you take a lively interest in world affairs, despite being vain, boastful, and a bit dishonest.”

  “Exactly what is it that you will ask of me?”

  This Columbus had not been greeted by gentle natives, ripe for Christianity, welcoming him as a man from heaven. He had been the backward native, arriving in creaking ships. Here, as in other variants, he would not become admiral of the ocean sea and viceroy of all discovered lands. His voyages would not be a victory for Christianity, leading to the growth of Spanish power. The Papacy would not divide the new lands between Spain and Portugal and convert the natives, or cover the ceilings of European churches with stolen gold. Columbus would be spared the need to seize slaves for profit, and he would not be arrested by Spanish authorities for incompetence as governor of Hispaniola, where half a million natives would not perish within the four years of his rule. He would not die in disgrace and obscurity. There would be no disagreement over where his bones were buried. Europeans would not discover and claim other peoples’ lands and start new countries within them and confine native cultures to museum displays and small tracts of land. Carthage and the natives would come together as a confederation of states, along ideals developed by the Iroquois and the Athenians, ruling as the metaphoric gods of Plato’s Forms. The hemisphere that was called the New World in other variants would here evangelize the Old.

  How simple were the old variants, the historian thought as he withdrew from Columbus and sat in the virtual chamber, listening to the ever-branching forest of the mariner’s thoughts. Puzzles of power and rivalry—nothing like what his panoptic civilization faced. Columbus was eager to learn more, and the English needed puppets in Europe. The Carthaginians still carried their hatred of Rome. The dream of Aeneas Oceanus would be fulfilled in this variant. Across a million variants it would not be otherwise.

  Alone in his cell, despairing of his fate, Columbus prayed to his God and searched within himself for an answer to his predicament, fearful that the empire of the Carthaginians was perhaps the main course of history, the true descendent of Paradisio—and Europe a hell reserved for sinners, where he had suffered half a lifetime of delay, waiting to voyage west, and to which he could return only as a failure, if he returned at all.

  He thought of Doña Beatriz, the widow who had been appointed Governor of Gomera in the Canary Islands because the women of the Spanish Court feared her beauty. Although she had provided the safe harbor needed to repair the Pinta’s steering system and replace the caravel’s sails, and had expressed admiration and approval of his enterprise, she had turned away his love because he was, after all, only a sailor whose place in the mappæmundi was far from certain.

  As he reentered the figure, the historian caught the Admiral transfixed by his own image in the full-length mirror on the wall, as only a man who had never seen good mirrors could be affected. The stocky, well-built figure, taller than average, stood perfectly still, pale eyes in a long face gazing into themselves in bewildered solitude. The aquiline nose remained confident, while the thoughts lamented the blond hair that had turned white at the age of thirty. Nevertheless, he told himself, historians might still find him impressive looking, if he amounted to anything.

  What would become of him? The Carthaginians would imprison him for the rest of his life, he realized, if he refused to be their instrument; but if he agreed, they would give him everything he had ever wanted—position and wealth, and revenge on his enemies. The Holy Land might still be freed from the infidel, making way for the Second Coming. No other life would ever offer him more, he told himself. No nation in the world could ignore this great power, which sought to remake the world in its own image. Perhaps God had finally raised him up to act on the true stage of the world. He could cower in this cell and weep for himself,
or he could embrace the true scale of the world, reach out and transform the world he had known, not with gold, silver, and slaves, but with the wealth that would grow from knowledge.

  And Doña Beatriz de Peraza y Bobadilla, the most beautiful woman he had ever known, would certainly accept his justly won nobility.

  Admiral Columbus shivered slightly as he stood on the open bridge of his iron whale and peered into the mists of the English Channel. A fleet of twelve submarines now hunted the Roman armada. He had spent a year improving his navigational skills and learning all he could about the Carthaginian continent. After the war he would be installed as governor of Spain, a role for which he was deemed well suited by his new patrons. His oldest son would become the governor of Italy. There would be time to write memoirs, especially now that the New Carthaginian physicians had so improved his health. He especially liked the new set of teeth they had given him.

  A signal light flashed at his right. He went below and stood by his Captain at the periscope as the submarine submerged.

  “Only a few minutes until dawn, Admiral.” The Captain, a descendant of a northern forest people, spoke Carthaginian with an accent, forcing Columbus, who had so recently learned the tongue’s rudiments, to listen carefully. “The sun will burn off this fog in an hour or two. They’ll never know what hit them, even if there are survivors. They might even think it was sabotage of their powder stores, or a storm.”

  It still startled Columbus to think that he had slogged across the Atlantic in three slow, pitiably small ships, while these undersea vessels slipped over in three days or less, even though the globe was a quarter larger than he had calculated. A quarter larger! Steam and electricity were wonders to him despite his efforts to understand them, and would probably remain so for the rest of his life.

  As soon as the Roman Armada was sunk, the English-Carthaginian invasion of the continent would begin. From the east would come the English Crown’s Russian allies, and Roman power would be crushed forever. The world through which he had risen with so much pain would die. He now believed that Vatican Rome was not the true City of God, which still remained to be built. His love of the sea and sailing, his dreams of going beyond the walls of the world, had brought him to New Carthage, the true center of the globe.