Year 20, Crisis Era(1)

Distance of the Trisolaran Fleet from the Solar System: 4.15 light-years

Rey Diaz and Hines were awakened from hibernation at the same time to the news that the technology they awaited had appeared.

"So soon?!" they exclaimed upon learning that just eight years had passed.

They were informed that due to unprecedented investment, technology had progressed with amazing speed over the past few years. But not everything was optimistic. Humanity was simply making a final sprint across the distance between them and the sophon barrier, so the progress they were making was purely technological. Cutting-edge physics remained stopped up like a pool of stagnant water, and the reservoir of theory was being drained. Technological progress would begin to decelerate and eventually come to a complete halt. But, for the time being at least, no one knew when the end of technology would arrive.

* * *

On feet that were still stiff from hibernation, Hines walked into a stadium-like structure whose interior was shrouded in a white fog, although it felt dry to him. He couldn't identify what it was. A soft moonlight glow illuminated the fog, which was fairly sparse at the height of a person but grew dense enough up above that the roof was obscured. Through the fog, he saw a petite figure whom he recognized at once as his wife. When he ran to her through the fog, it was like chasing a phantom, except that in the end they came together in an embrace.

"I'm sorry, love. I've aged eight years," Keiko Yamasuki said.

"Even so, you're still a year younger than me," he said as he looked her over. Time seemed to have left no mark on her body, but she looked pale and weak in the fog's watery moonlight. In the fog and moonlight, she reminded him of that night in the bamboo grove in their yard in Japan. "Didn't we agree that you would enter hibernation two years after me? Why have you waited all this time?"

"I wanted to work on preparations for our post-hibernation work, but there was too much to do, so that's what I've been doing," she said as she brushed a strand of hair from her forehead.

"Was it hard?"

"It was very hard. Six next-gen supercomputer research projects were launched not long after you went into hibernation. Three of them employed traditional architecture, one used non–Von Neumann architecture, and the other two were quantum and biomolecular computing projects. But two years later, the lead scientists of those six projects told me that the computing power we desired was impossible. The quantum computing project was the first to be terminated, because it failed to find sufficient support in current theoretic physics: Research had run into the sophon barrier. Next, the biomolecular project was discontinued. They said it was only a fantasy. The last to end was the non–Von Neumann computer. Its architecture was actually a simulation of the human brain, but they said it was a shapeless egg that would never turn into a chicken. Only the three traditional architecture projects were still ongoing, but for a long time there was never any progress."

"So that's it.… I ought to have been with you the whole time."

"It would have been no use. You only would have wasted eight years. It was only recently, during a period of time when we were totally discouraged, that we came up with the crazy idea of simulating the human brain in a practically barbaric way."

"And what was that?"

"To put the previous software simulation into hardware by using a microprocessor to simulate one neuron, letting all the microprocessors interact, and allowing for dynamic changes to the connection model."

Hines thought about this for a few seconds, then realized what she meant. "Do you mean manufacturing a hundred billion microprocessors?"

She nodded.

"That's … that's practically the sum total of all the microprocessors that have been manufactured in human history!"

"I didn't run the numbers, but it's probably more than that."

"Even if you really had all those chips, how long would it take to connect them all together?"

Keiko Yamasuki smiled wearily. "I knew it wasn't workable. It was just a desperate idea. But we really thought about doing it back then, and making as many as we could." She pointed around her. "This here is one of the thirty virtual brain assembly shops we had planned. But it's the only one that got built."

"I really should have been here with you," Hines repeated with more emotion.

"Fortunately we still got the computer we wanted. Its performance is ten thousand times better than when you entered hibernation."

"Traditional architecture?"

"Traditional architecture. A few more drops squeezed out of the lemon of Moore's law. It astonished the computing community—but this time, my love, we've really come to the end."

A peerless computer. If humanity failed, it would never be equaled, Hines thought, but did not say it out loud.

"With this computer, research on the Resolving Imager became much easier." Then she suddenly asked, "Love, do you have any idea of what a hundred billion looks like?" When he shook his head, she smiled and stretched out her hands around her. "Look. This is a hundred billion."

"What?" At a loss for words, Hines looked at the white fog around him.

"We're in the middle of the supercomputer's holographic display," she said as she manipulated a gadget hanging at her chest. He noticed a scroll wheel on it, and thought it might be something like a mouse.

As she adjusted it, he felt a change in the surrounding fog. It thickened in what was clearly a magnification of a particular region. Then he noticed that it was made up of an uncountable number of tiny glowing particles, and these particles were emitting the moonlike illumination rather than scattering light from an outside source. As the magnification continued, the particles became shining stars, but instead of seeing the starry sky over Earth, it was like he was situated at the heart of the Milky Way, where the stars were dense and left practically no room for darkness.

"Every star is a neuron," she said. Their bodies were plated in silver by the ocean formed from a hundred billion stars.

As the hologram continued to enlarge, he noticed innumerable thin tentacles extending radially from every star to form intricate connections, wiping out the starfield and situating him inside an infinitely large network structure.

The image enlarged further, and every star began to exhibit a structure that was familiar to him from electron microscopy, that of brain cells and synapses.

She pressed the mouse and the image returned instantly to the white fog state. "This is a full view of the structure of the brain captured using the Resolving Imager scanning three million cross sections simultaneously. Of course, what we're seeing now is the processed image—for the convenience of observation, the distance between neurons has been magnified by four or five orders of magnitude so it looks like we vaporized a brain. However, the topology of the connections between them has been preserved. Now, let's take a look at a dynamic view.…"

Disturbances appeared in the fog, glittering points in the mist that looked like a pinch of gunpowder sprinkled onto a flame. Keiko Yamasuki enlarged the image until it resembled a starfield, and Hines saw the surging of startide in a brain-universe, the disturbances in the ocean of stars appearing in different forms at different locations: some like streams, others like vortexes, and others like the sweeping tides, all of it instantly mutable and giving rise to stunning pictures of self-organization within the teeming chaos. Then the image changed again to resemble a network, and he saw myriad nerve signals busily passing messages along thin synapses, like flashing pearls within the flow of an intricate network of pipes.…

"Whose brain is this?" he asked in wonder.

"Mine," she said, looking lovingly at him. "When this thought picture was taken, I was thinking of you."

Please note: When the light turns green, the sixth batch of test propositions will appear. If the proposition is true, press the right-hand button. If the proposition is false, press the left-hand button.

Proposition 1: Coal is black.

Proposition 2: 1 + 1 = 2.

Proposition 3: The temperature in winter is lower than in summer.

Proposition 4: Men are generally shorter than women.

Proposition 5: A straight line is the shortest distance between two points.

Proposition 6: The moon is brighter than the sun.

The statements were displayed in succession on the small screen in front of the test subject. Each proposition was displayed for four seconds, and the subject pressed the left-hand or right-hand buttons according to his own judgment. His head was encased in a metal cover that allowed the Resolving Imager to capture a holographic view of his brain, which the computer would process into a dynamic neural network model for analysis.

In this, the initial stage of Hines's research project, the subject engaged in only the simplest of critical thinking, and the test propositions had concise and clear answers. During such simple thoughts, the operation of the cerebral neural network was relatively easy to identify and provided a starting point for a more in-depth study of the nature of thought.

The research teams led by Hines and Keiko Yamasuki had made some progress. They discovered that critical thinking was not produced in any specific location in the cerebral neural network but used a particular mode of nerve impulse transmission, and that with the powerful computer's assistance, this model could be retrieved and located from among the vast network of neurons using a method quite similar to the star positioning the astronomer Ringier had provided to Luo Ji. Unlike finding a particular position pattern in a starfield, in the universe of the brain the pattern was dynamic and was only identifiable by its mathematical characteristics. It was a little like looking for a small whirlpool in an expansive ocean, which meant that the computing power it required was many orders of magnitude greater than that of the starfield and was only feasible on this latest machine.

Hines and his wife strolled through the cloud map of the brain in the holographic display. Every time a point of critical thinking was identified in the subject's brain, the computer would indicate its position on the image with a flashing red light. This was actually just a way to provide a more intuitive feast for the eyes and was not strictly required by the study. The important thing was the analysis of the internal structure of nerve impulse transmission at the point of thought, for there lay hidden the mysteries of the essence of the mind.

Just then the research team's medical director came in and said that Subject 104 was experiencing problems.

When the Resolving Imager had just been developed, scanning such a huge quantity of cross sections generated powerful radiation that was fatal to any life being scanned, but successive improvements had brought the radiation below the danger line, and a large number of tests had demonstrated that so long as filming was kept below a set length of time, the Resolving Imager would not cause any damage to the brain.

"He seems to have caught hydrophobia," the medical director said, as they hurried toward the medical center.

Hines and Keiko Yamasuki stopped in their tracks in surprise. Hines stared at the medical director: "Hydrophobia? Did he somehow get rabies?"

The medical director raised a hand and tried to sort out his thoughts: "Oh, I'm sorry. That wasn't accurate. He doesn't have any physical problems, and his brain and other organs have not been damaged at all. It's just that he's afraid of the water, like someone with rabies. He refuses to drink, and he won't even eat moist food. It's an entirely psychological effect. He just believes that water is toxic."

"Persecutory delusion?" Keiko Yamasuki asked.

The medical director waved a hand. "No, no. He doesn't think that anyone put poison in the water. He just believes the water itself is toxic."

Again, Hines and his wife stopped still, and the medical director shook his head helplessly. "But psychologically, he's completely normal in every other way.… I can't explain it. You've got to see it for yourselves."

Subject 104 was a volunteer college student who had come to earn some pocket money. Before they entered the patient's room, the director told Hines and his wife, "He hasn't had a drink in two days. If this continues, he'll become severely dehydrated and we'll have to hydrate him by force." Standing at the door he pointed to a microwave oven, and said, "You see that? He wants bread and other food baked completely dry before he'll eat it."

Hines and his wife entered the patient's room. Subject 104 looked at them with fear in his eyes. His lips were cracked and his hair disheveled, but otherwise he looked entirely normal. He tugged at Hines's sleeve and said in a hoarse voice, "Dr. Hines, they want to kill me. I don't know why." Then he pointed a finger at a glass of water sitting on the cabinet next to the head of the bed. "They want me to drink water."

Hines looked at the glass of clear water, certain that the subject did not have rabies, because true hydrophobia would cause spasms of terror at the mere sight of it. The sound of running water would induce madness, and there might even be an intense fear response if others simply talked about it.

"From his eyes and speech, he ought to be in a normal psychological state," Keiko Yamasuki said to Hines in Japanese. She had a degree in psychology.

"Do you really believe that water is toxic?" Hines asked.

"Is there any question? Just like the sun has light and the air has oxygen. You can't deny this basic fact, can you?"

Hines leaned on his shoulder and said, "Young man, life was born in the water and can't exist without it. Your own body is seventy percent water."

Subject 104's eyes darkened, and he slumped back in bed, clutching his head. "That's right. This question tortures me. It's the most incredible thing in the universe."

"Let me see Subject 104's experiment record," Hines said to the medical director after they left the patient's room. When they reached the director's office, Keiko Yamasuki said, "Look at the test propositions first."

The test propositions displayed on the computer screen one by one:

Proposition 1: Cats have a total of three legs.

Proposition 2: Rocks are not living.

Proposition 3: The sun is shaped like a triangle.

Proposition 4: Iron is heavier than cotton of the same volume.

Proposition 5: Water is toxic.

"Stop," Hines said, pointing to Proposition 5.

"His answer was 'false,'" the director said.

"Look at all parameters and operations following the answer to Proposition 5."

The records indicated that once Proposition 5 was answered, the Resolving Imager increased the strength of its scan of the critical thinking point in the subject's cerebral neural network. To improve the accuracy of the scan of this area, the intensity of the radiation and the magnetic field were increased in this small region. Hines and Keiko Yamasuki carefully examined the long list of recorded parameters on the screen.

"Has this enhanced scan been done to other subjects and on other propositions?" Hines asked.

The director said, "Because the effect of the enhanced scan was not particularly good, it was canceled after four tries due to fears of excessive localized radiation. The previous three…" He consulted the computer, and then said, "were all benign true propositions."

"We should use the same scanning parameters and repeat the experiment for Proposition 5," Keiko Yamasuki said.

"But … who will do it?" asked the director.

"I will," Hines said.

Water is toxic.

Proposition 5 appeared in black text on a white background. Hines pressed the left "False" button, but he felt nothing apart from a slight sensation of heat produced by the intensive scanning at the back of his head.

He exited the Resolving Imager lab and sat down at a table, as a crowd, which included Keiko Yamasuki, watched. On the table stood a glass of clear water. He picked up the glass and slowly drew it to his lips and took a sip. His movements were relaxed and he wore an expression of quiet calm. Everyone began to sigh with relief, but then they noticed that his throat wasn't moving to swallow the water. The muscles of his face stiffened and then twitched slightly upward, and into his eyes came the same fear Subject 104 exhibited, as if his spirit was fighting with some powerful, shapeless force. Finally he spat out all of the water in his mouth and knelt down to vomit, but nothing came out. His face turned purple. Hugging Hines to her, Keiko Yamasuki clapped him on the back with one hand.

When he had recovered his senses, he held out a hand: "Give me some paper towels," he said. He took them and carefully wiped off the droplets of water that had splashed on his shoes.

"Do you really believe that water is toxic, love?" Yamasuki asked, tears in her eyes. Prior to the experiment she had asked him repeatedly to replace the proposition with a false one that was entirely harmless, but he had refused.

He nodded. "I do." He looked up at the crowd, helplessness and confusion in his eyes. "I do. I really do."

"Let me repeat your words," she said, clapping him on the shoulder. "Life was born in the water and can't exist without it. Your own body is seventy percent water!"

Hines bowed his head and looked at the water stains on the floor. Then he shook his head. "That's right, dear. This question tortures me. It's the most incredible thing in the universe."

* * *

Three years after the breakthrough in controlled nuclear fusion, new and unusual heavenly bodies had taken their place in the Earth's night sky, up to five of them now simultaneously visible in one hemisphere. The bodies changed dramatically in luminance, outshining Venus at their brightest, and often blinked rapidly. Sometimes one of them would suddenly erupt with a rapid increase in brightness, then go out after two or three seconds. They were fusion reactors undergoing tests in geosynchronous orbit.

Non-media radioactive propulsion had won out as the research path for future spacecraft. This type of propulsion required high-powered reactors that could only be tested in space, leading to these glowing reactors thirty thousand kilometers out in space known as nuclear stars. Every time a nuclear star erupted, it represented a disastrous defeat. But contrary to what most people believed, nuclear star eruptions were not explosions in the nuclear reactor, but the exposure of the core when the outer hull of the reactor melted from the heat produced by fusion. The fusion core was like a small sun, and because it melted Earth's most heat-tolerant materials as if they were wax, it had to be contained by an electromagnetic field. These restraints frequently failed.

On the balcony of the top floor of Space Command, Chang Weisi and Hines had just witnessed one such eruption. Its moonlike glow cast its shadows onto the wall before disappearing. Hines was the second Wallfacer that Chang Weisi had met, after Tyler.

"The third time this month," Chang Weisi said.

Hines looked out at the now-darkened night sky. "The power of these reactors only reaches one percent of what's needed for future spacecraft engines, and they don't operate stably. And even if the required reactors were developed, engine technology will be even more difficult. We're sure to encounter the sophon block there."

"That's true. The sophons are blocking our every path," Chang Weisi said as he looked off into the distance. The sea of lights in the city seemed even more brilliant now that the light in the sky had disappeared.

"A glimmer of hope fades as soon as it is born, and one day it will be destroyed forever. It's like you said: The sophons block our every path."

Chang Weisi said, with a laugh, "Dr. Hines, you're not here to talk defeatism with me, are you?"

"That's precisely what I want to talk about. The resurgence of defeatism is different this time. It's based on the drastically reduced living conditions in the general population and has an even greater impact in the military."

Chang Weisi looked back from the distance but said nothing.

"I understand your difficulties, General, and I'd like to help you."

Chang Weisi looked at Hines in silence for a few seconds, his expression unreadable to the other man. Then, without replying to his offer, he said, "The evolution of the human brain needs twenty thousand to two hundred thousand years to achieve noticeable changes, but human civilization has a history of just five thousand years. So what we're using right now is the brain of primitive man.… Doctor, I really applaud your unique ideas, and perhaps this is where the real answer lies."

"Thank you. All of us are basically Flintstones."

"But is it really possible to use technology to enhance mental ability?"

This got Hines excited. "General, you're not so primitive, at least compared to others! I notice you said 'mental ability' rather than 'intelligence.' The former is much broader than the latter. To overcome defeatism, for example, we can't simply rely on intelligence. Given the sophon block, the higher your intelligence, the more trouble you have establishing a faith in victory."

"So give me an answer. Is it possible?"

Hines shook his head. "How much do you know about my and Keiko Yamasuki's work before the Trisolar Crisis?"

"Not too much. I believe it was: The essence of thought is not on the molecular level but is carried out on the quantum level. I wonder, does that imply—"

"It implies that the sophons are waiting for me. Just like we're waiting for them," Hines said pointing at the sky. "But right now, our research is still quite a ways from our goal. Still, we've come up with an unexpected by-product."

Chang Weisi smiled and nodded, showing cautious interest.

"I won't talk about the details. Basically, we discovered the mind's mechanism for making judgments in the cerebral neural network, as well as the ability to have a decisive impact on them. If we compare the process by which a human mind makes judgments to a computer's process, there's the input of external data, calculation, and then the final outcome. What we're able to do is omit the calculation step of the process and directly produce an outcome. When a certain piece of information enters the brain, it exerts an influence on a particular part of the neural network, and we can cause the brain to render a judgment—to believe that the information is genuine—without even thinking about it."

"Has this already been achieved?" Chang Weisi asked softly.

"Yes. It started with a chance discovery, which we subjected to in-depth research, and now we've done it. We call it the 'mental seal.'"

"And if the judgment—or if you will, faith—is at odds with reality?"

"Then the faith will eventually be overturned. But the process will be quite painful, because the judgment produced in the mind by the mental seal is particularly stubborn. Once, this had me convinced that water was toxic, and it was only after two months of psychotherapy that I was able to drink unimpeded. That process is … not something I want to remember. But the toxicity of water is an extremely clear false proposition. Other beliefs may not be. Like the existence of God, or whether humanity will be victorious in war. These don't have a clearly determined answer, and in the normal course of establishing these beliefs, the mind is slightly tilted in a certain direction by all sorts of choices. If the belief is established by the mental seal, it will be rock-solid and absolutely unshakeable."

"That is truly a great achievement." Chang Weisi grew serious. "I mean, for neuroscience. But in the real world, Dr. Hines, you have created a truly troublesome thing. Really. The most troublesome thing in history."

"You don't want to use this thing, the mental seal, to create a space force possessing an unshakeable faith in victory? In the military, you have political commissars and we have chaplains. The mental seal is just a technological means of accomplishing their work more efficiently."

"Political and ideological work establishes faith through rational, scientific thinking."

"But is it possible to establish faith in a victory in this war on the basis of rational, scientific thought?"

"If not, Doctor, we'd rather have a space force that lacks faith in victory yet retains independent thought."

"Apart from this one belief, the rest of the mind would of course be entirely autonomous. We would just be performing a tiny intervention in the mind, using technology to leapfrog thought to implant a conclusion—just one alone—into the mind."

"But one is enough. Technology is now capable of modifying thoughts just like modifying a computer program. After the modifications, are people still people, or are they automatons?"

"You must have read A Clockwork Orange."

"It's a profound book."

"General, your attitude is what I expected," Hines said with a sigh. "I'll continue my efforts in this area, the efforts a Wallfacer must exert."

* * *

At the next PDC Wallfacer Project Hearing, Hines's introduction of his mental seal triggered rare emotion in the assembly. The US representative's concise evaluation expressed the feeling of the majority of the attendees: "With their extraordinary talent, Dr. Hines and Dr. Yamasuki have opened up a great door into darkness for humanity."

The French representative left his seat in his excitement. "Which is more tragic for humanity: the loss of the ability and right to think freely, or defeat in this war?"

"Of course the latter is more tragic!" Hines retorted, standing up. "Because under the first condition, humanity at least has the chance of regaining independent thought!"

"I have doubts about that. If this thing really does get used … Look at all you Wallfacers," the Russian representative said, raising his hands toward the ceiling. "Tyler wanted to deprive people of their lives, and you want to deprive them of their minds. What are you trying to do?"

His words caused a commotion.

The UK representative said, "Today we are merely proposing a motion, but I believe that the governments of all countries will be unanimous in banning this thing. Regardless of what happens, nothing is more evil than thought control."

Hines said, "Why is it that everyone gets so sensitive at the mention of thought control? From commercial advertising to Hollywood culture, thought control is everywhere in modern society. You are, to use a Chinese phrase, mocking people for retreating a hundred paces when you've retreated fifty yourselves."

The US representative said, "Dr. Hines, you haven't gone just one hundred paces. You've walked up to the threshold of darkness and are threatening the very foundations of modern society."

Another commotion swept through the assembly, and Hines knew that now was the time to seize control of the situation. He raised his voice and said, "Learn from the little boy!"

Sure enough, there was a lull in the noise after his utterance. "What little boy?" asked the rotating chair.

"I think we're all familiar with this story: In a forest, a little boy got his leg caught under a fallen tree. He was alone at the time, and his leg was bleeding uncontrollably. It would have killed him, except that he made a decision that would shame every one of you delegates: He took up his saw and sawed off the leg that was pinned, then climbed into a car and found a hospital. He saved his own life."

Hines saw with satisfaction that no one in the meeting room had attempted to interrupt him, at least. He went on. "Humanity is now facing a life-and-death problem. The life or death of our species and civilization as a whole. In these circumstances, how can we not give up a few things?"

Two light thumps sounded. The chair was banging the gavel, even though there wasn't much noise in the assembly. The attendees were reminded that the German man had maintained an unusual silence during the course of the hearing. In a gentle voice, the chair said, "First of all, I hope that each of you can take a good look at the current situation. Investment in building a space defense system is constantly increasing, and the world economy is experiencing a sharp recession during this time of transition. The prediction that the standard of living will retreat a century may come to pass in the not-too-distant future. Meanwhile, space defense–related scientific research is running up against the sophon block, and technological progress is slowing. This will trigger a new wave of defeatism in the international community, and this time, it may cause the total collapse of the Solar System Defense Program."

The chair's words calmed the assembly completely. After a silence of nearly half a minute, he continued. "Like each of you, when I learned of the existence of the mental seal, I felt the kind of fear and loathing I'd get from seeing a poisonous snake. But the most rational approach to take right now is to calm down and seriously consider it. When the devil does actually appear, the best option is calmness and rationality. At this hearing, we are simply putting forward a votable motion."

Hines saw a thread of hope. "Mr. Chair, Representatives, since my initial proposal is unable to be put to an assembly vote, maybe we all can take a step back."

"No matter how many steps back you take, thought control is absolutely unacceptable," the French representative said, but in a slightly softer tone than before.

"And if it weren't thought control? Perhaps something in between control and freedom?"

"The mental seal equals thought control," the Japanese representative said.

"Not so. In thought control, there must be a controller and a subject. If someone voluntarily places a seal in their own mind, then tell me, where is the control in that?"

The assembly fell silent again. Feeling that success was near, Hines went on, "I propose that the mental seal be opened up, like a public facility. It would have but one proposition: belief in a victory in the war. Anyone willing to gain that faith through the use of the seal could, totally voluntarily, take advantage of the facility. Of course, all of this would be conducted under strict supervision."

The assembly opened up a discussion and added to Hines's basic proposal a fair number of new restrictions on the use of the mental seal. The most crucial of these was the one limiting its use to the space forces, because it was relatively easy for people to accept the idea of uniform thinking in the military. The hearing continued for nearly eight hours, the longest ever, and eventually formulated a motion to be voted on at the next meeting, and which the permanent member states would take back to their own governments.

"Shouldn't we come up with a name for this facility?" asked the US representative.

"How about calling it the Faith Relief Center?" the UK representative said. The British humor of the odd name drew a burst of laughter.

"Take out 'relief,' and call it the Faith Center," Hines said, in all earnestness.

* * *

At the gate to the Faith Center stood a reduced-scale replica of the Statue of Liberty. Its purpose was unknown—perhaps it was an attempt to use "liberty" to dilute the feeling of "control"—but the most notable thing about the statue was the altered poem on its base:

Give me your hopeless souls,

Your fearful crowds that thirst for victory,

The dazed refuse of your treacherous shoals.

Send these, the downcast, wand'ring ones to me,

For lo, my lamp of golden faith consoles.

The golden faith of the poem was prominently inscribed in many different languages on a black granite stone called the Faith Monument that stood beside the statue:

In the war of resistance against the invasion from Trisolaris, humanity will be victorious. The enemy invading the Solar System will be destroyed. Earth will endure in the cosmos for ten thousand generations.

The Faith Center had been open for three days, during which time Hines and Keiko Yamasuki had been waiting in the majestic foyer. The smallish building erected near the United Nations Plaza had become the latest tourist attraction, with people constantly coming up to take photos of the Statue of Liberty and the Faith Monument, but no one had entered. They all seemed to be maintaining a cautious distance.

"Do you get the feeling we're running a struggling mom-and-pop store?" she said.

"My dear, one day this will be a sacred place," Hines said solemnly.

On the afternoon of the third day, someone finally walked into the Faith Center. The bald, melancholy-looking, middle-aged man walked unsteadily and smelt of alcohol when he approached. "I've come to get faith," he slurred out.

"The Faith Center is only open to members of national space forces. Please show your ID," Keiko Yamasuki said while bowing. She seemed to Hines like a polite waitress at the Tokyo Plaza Hotel.

The man fished out his ID. "I'm a space force member. Civilian personnel. Is that okay?"

After inspecting the ID, Hines nodded. "Mr. Wilson, do you want to do it now?"

"That would be great," he said, and nodded. "The … the thing you call a belief proposition. I've written it here. I want to believe this." He pulled a neatly folded piece of paper from his breast pocket.

Keiko Yamasuki wanted to explain that according to the PDC resolution, the mental seal was only permitted to operate on one proposition, the one written on the monument at the gate. It had to be done exactly as written, and any alteration was prohibited. But Hines gently stopped her. He wanted to take a look at the proposition the man had submitted first. Unfolding the paper, he read what was written on it:

Katherine loves me. She has never and will never have an affair!

Keiko Yamasuki stifled a laugh, but Hines angrily crumpled up the paper and tossed it in the drunken man's face. "Get the hell out!"

After Wilson left, another man passed the Faith Monument, the boundary beyond which ordinary tourists maintained their distance. As the man paced behind the monument, he soon came to Hines's attention. Hines called Keiko Yamasuki over and said, "Look at him. He must be a soldier!"

"He looks mentally and physically exhausted," she said.

"But he's a soldier. Believe me," he said. He was about to go out and talk to the man when he saw him heading up the steps. The man looked about Wilson's age and, though his Asian features were handsome, it was like Keiko Yamasuki had said: He seemed a little melancholy, but in a different way from the previous hard-luck case. His melancholy looked lighter, but also deeper, as if it had been with him for years.

"My name is Wu Yue. I'd like to get belief," the visitor said. Hines noticed how he referred to "belief" instead of "faith."

Keiko Yamasuki bowed and repeated her earlier line: "The Faith Center is only open to members of every country's space force. Please show your ID."

Wu Yue did not move, but he said, "Sixteen years ago, I spent a month serving in the space force, and then I retired."

"You served for one month? Well, if you don't mind my asking, what was your reason for retiring?" Hines asked.

"I'm a defeatist. My superiors and I felt that I was no longer suited to work in the space force."

"Defeatism is a common mentality. You're evidently just an honest defeatist, and stated your own ideas forthrightly. Your colleagues who continued serving may have harbored an even stronger defeatist complex, but they just kept it hidden," Keiko Yamasuki said.

"Maybe. But I've been lost all these years."

"Because you left the service?"

Wu Yue shook his head. "No. I was born into a family of scholars, and the education I received made me treat humanity as a single unit, even after I became a soldier. I always felt that a soldier's highest honor would be to fight for the entire human race. This opportunity came, but it was a war that we were destined to lose."

Hines was about to say something, but was interrupted by Keiko Yamasuki. "Permit me to ask a question. How old are you?"

"Fifty-one."

"If you are really able to return to the space force after obtaining faith in victory, don't you think that at your age it's a little late to start up in the service again?"

Hines could see that she didn't have the heart to refuse him directly. No doubt this deeply melancholy man was very attractive to a woman's eyes. But this didn't worry him, because the man was obviously so consumed by his despair that nothing else had any meaning for him.

Wu Yue shook his head. "You misunderstand. I don't want to gain faith in victory. I'm just looking for peace for my soul."

Hines wanted to speak, but again Keiko Yamasuki stopped him.

Wu Yue went on. "I met my present wife when I was studying at the naval academy in Annapolis. She was a fervent Christian and faced the future with a calmness that made me jealous. She said that God had everything planned out, from the past to the future. We children of the Lord did not need to understand his plans. We just needed to firmly believe that this plan was the most reasonable one in the universe, and then live peacefully according to the Lord's will."

"So you mean that you've come to gain a belief in God?"

Wu Yue nodded. "I've written out my belief proposition. Please have a look." He reached into his shirt pocket as he spoke.

Again Keiko Yamasuki stopped Hines from saying anything. She said to Wu Yue, "If that's the case, then just go and believe. There's no need to resort to such extreme, technological means."

The former space force captain showed a trace of a wry smile. "I grew up under a materialist education. I'm a staunch atheist. Do you think gaining this belief would be easy for me?"

"Absolutely not!" Hines said, getting out in front of Keiko Yamasuki. He decided to clear things up as quickly as he could. "You ought to know that according to the UN resolution, the mental seal can only operate on one proposition." As he spoke, he took out a large, exquisitely fashioned red card case and opened it up for Wu Yue to see. There, on the black velvet lining, in letters engraved in gold, was the victory oath from the Faith Monument. He said, "This is a faith book." He took out a set of cases in different colors. "These are faith books in different languages. Mr. Wu, let me tell you how stringent the supervision is for use of the mental seal. To guarantee safe and reliable operation, the proposition is not put up on a display but is given to the volunteer to read from this primitive faith book. As a reflection of the voluntary principle, the specific procedure is completed by the volunteer. He opens up this faith book, then presses the Start button on the mental seal device. Prior to actually performing the procedure, the system will give three confirmation opportunities. Before each procedure, the faith book is inspected by a panel of ten special commissioners from the members of the UN Human Rights Commission and the permanent member states of the PDC. During the operation of the mental seal device, the ten-member panel will be on site to strictly supervise the entire affair. So, sir, your request can't be fulfilled. Forget about your proposition for religious belief. Changing even one word in the faith book is a crime."

"Then I'm sorry to have troubled you," Wu Yue said, nodding. He appeared to have anticipated this outcome. As he turned to walk out, he appeared lonely and old from the back.

"The rest of his life will be hard," Keiko Yamasuki said softly, with a voice full of tenderness.

"Sir!" Hines called, stopping Wu Yue just outside the door. He ran out to where the light of the setting sun was reflecting like fire off the Faith Monument and the glass-walled UN building in the distance. He squinted his eyes against the flames and said, "You might not believe me, but I nearly did the exact opposite."

Wu Yue looked puzzled. Hines looked back and, seeing that Keiko Yamasuki had not followed him, took out a piece of paper from his pocket and opened it for Wu Yue. "This is the mental seal I wanted to apply to myself. I was hesitant, of course, and in the end didn't do it." The bold text on the paper read:

God is dead.

"Why?" asked Wu Yue, raising his head.

"Isn't it obvious? Isn't God dead? Screw the Lord's plan. Screw his mild yoke!"

Wu Yue looked at Hines in silence for a moment, then turned and walked down the steps.

When Wu Yue walked into the shadow cast by the Faith Monument, Hines called after him, "Sir, I wish I could disguise my contempt for you, but I can't."

The next day, the people Hines and Keiko Yamasuki were waiting for finally started to arrive. In the bright sunshine that morning, four people walked in, three men with European faces and one woman with Asian features. Young, standing straight and tall, and walking at a steady pace, they looked confident and mature. But Hines and Keiko Yamasuki saw in their eyes something familiar, the same melancholy confusion that had been in Wu Yue's.

They set their documents neatly down on the reception desk, and their leader said solemnly, "We're space force officers, and we've come to get faith in victory."

The mental seal process was quite fast. After the faith books were passed among the ten members of the oversight panel, each of whom carefully checked the contents, they signed their names to the notary certificate. Then, under their supervision, the first volunteer received the faith book and sat down in front of the mental seal scanner. In front of him was a small platform on which he placed the book, and which had a red button in the lower right-hand corner. When he opened the faith book, a voice asked, "Are you certain that you want to obtain a faith in this proposition? If so, please press the button. If not, please leave the scanning area."

The question was repeated three times, and each time it was asked, the button glowed red. A positioning apparatus slowly contracted to fix the volunteer's head in place, and then the voice said, "The mental seal procedure is ready to start. Please read the proposition silently and then press the button."

When the button was pressed, it turned green, and after about half a minute, it went out. The voice said, "The mental seal procedure is complete." The positioning apparatus separated, and then the volunteer got up and left.

After all four officers completed the procedure and returned to the foyer, Keiko Yamasuki carefully looked them over, confirming almost immediately that her perception of their improved moods was not just her imagination. The melancholy and confusion had disappeared from the four pairs of eyes, which now were serene as water.

"How do you feel?" she asked, smiling.

"Excellent," one young officer said, returning her smile. "How it ought to be."

When they left, the Asian woman turned around and added, "Doctor, I really feel great. Thank you."

At that moment, the future was certain, at least in the minds of those four young people.

From that day forward, members of the space force came without pause to obtain faith—at first mostly on their own, but eventually in larger groups. They wore civilian clothes at first, but later most of them wore military uniforms. If more than five people came at a time, the supervisory panel convened a review meeting to verify that no one had been coerced.

One week later, more than a hundred space force members had obtained faith in victory through the mental seal. They ranged in rank from private to senior colonel, the highest rank permitted by national space forces to use the mental seal.

That night, in the moonlight at the Faith Monument, Hines said to Keiko Yamasuki, "Dear, we need to go."

"To the future?"

"That's right. We're not any better than other scientists in the study of the mind, and we've accomplished everything we needed to. We have pushed forward the wheel of history, so now let's go to the future and wait for it."

"How far?"

"Very far, Keiko. Very far. To the day when the Trisolaran probes reach the Solar System."

"Before we do that, let's go back to that house in Tokyo for a while. After all, this age is going to be buried forever."

"Of course, dear. I miss it too."