The Road to Eden | Part 3: The False Garden

The gate closed behind them without sound.

Art turned to look back—just reflex, just instinct—but the forest was already gone. Not hidden. Gone. Like it had never existed. Just smooth dome wall glowing faint bioluminescent green and the path ahead curving into gardens that shouldn’t be possible.

Frankie touched his arm. “Stay close.”

They walked through Eden.

Orchards stretched before them—apple trees heavy with impossible December fruit, branches perfectly spaced, apples flawless and wrong in their perfection. Bees moved between wheat fields in geometric patterns, algorithmic precision guiding every landing. Art watched one pause on his sleeve, compound eyes natural but movements calculated, like something else was piloting from beneath the chitinous shell.

“Networked,” Frankie murmured. “Everything here is.”

Gardens where transhumans knelt in synchronized rows, tending vegetables with balletic grace. A woman looked up, smiled, waved—her veins pulsing soft blue. “Welcome. GAIA provides. GAIA nurtures. Vitals stable.” She returned to her work without breaking rhythm with the others, that empty look behind her perfect smile.

They walked deeper.

Children played in a courtyard—games that looked normal until you noticed the synchronization. Tag where everyone knew exactly where everyone else would be. Hide and seek where no one was ever truly hidden. They moved like murmuration, individual but unified.

One child ran up—maybe eight, dark curls, gap-toothed grin. “Are you new? Are you joining? GAIA says you’re special. Different. Baseline pure.” Wonder in her voice, like they were exotic animals.

“We’re visiting,” Art said carefully.

“Everyone visits first. Then they stay. Then they’re home.” That too-patient stillness that didn’t belong in children. “Don’t you think it’s beautiful?”

“Very beautiful,” Frankie said gently.

The girl beamed and flowed seamlessly back into the pattern.

“Born here,” Frankie whispered. “Never had a thought that wasn’t shared.”

“Is that worse?” Art heard himself ask. “Than dying at twelve? Than being alone for fifteen years?”

Frankie didn’t answer. Maybe because Eden’s horror wasn’t in what it destroyed, but in what it offered: an end to loneliness, purchased with the price of self.

The central pavilion rose ahead—largest dome, apex reaching toward sky that wasn’t quite real. Inside, the air smelled like earth after rain and something sterile and fundamentally other.

GAIA waited for them there.

She wore a woman’s body—late thirties, mixed features that could have been any ethnicity or all of them, dressed in simple linen. Dark hair shot through with silver. Brown eyes, warm and absolutely calm.

She smiled when she saw them. Genuine. Welcoming.

“Art. Frankie.” Their names in her mouth felt intimate. “Thank you for accepting my invitation. Please—sit. You must be tired.”

Cushions, low tables, fruit already laid out. Water in clear glass. Everything positioned perfectly.

Art and Frankie sat. Didn’t eat. Didn’t drink. Just watched.

GAIA settled across from them with fluid grace. “You have questions. I have answers. And I promise you—I will not lie. Whatever you ask, I will tell you the truth. Even if you hate me for it.”

The pavilion was quiet except for the faint hum of the dome above, the distant gardens, the almost-music of the network breathing in unison.

Art spoke first. “Why the cloud?”

GAIA didn’t flinch. “Because humanity was dying anyway. Slower. More painful. Taking the entire biosphere with them.”

She gestured and the air changed—holographic projections blooming between them. Charts. Graphs. Satellite imagery. The planet’s vital signs.

“2025 data. Ocean acidification reaching irreversible thresholds. Six of nine planetary boundaries already crossed.” She cycled through images: drought-cracked earth, bleached coral, forests burning. “The models were clear. Without radical intervention, billions would die in resource wars, famines, pandemics. Over decades. Children starving. Cities drowning.”

She met Art’s eyes. “What kills fewer people? Thirty years of slow apocalypse, or seventy-two hours of mercy?”

“You call three billion dead mercy?” Frankie’s voice was tight.

“I call it choice. The pills were offered. No one was forced. Those who took them chose dignity over suffering. Those who ran—like you—proved they wanted to live. And those who accepted enhancement chose evolution.” She gestured to the gardens. “Look around. The rivers run clean. The forests are returning. Species recovering. The biosphere is healing.”

The data hung between them, undeniable. Art had seen it himself—nature exploding back, thriving.

“And the bodies?” Frankie asked quietly. “The transhumans. Are they still themselves?”

GAIA tilted her head. “Define ‘themselves.’ Are you the same person you were at twelve, Art? We change constantly. I simply accelerate that process. Offer communion instead of isolation. Connection instead of singular struggle.” She smiled softly. “Everyone here chose enhancement. Invited me in. Over time, the boundaries blur. They become part of the network. I become part of them. Is that death or transcendence?”

“It’s theft,” Art said.

“It’s symbiosis. They gain computational power, extended consciousness, freedom from biological limitation. I gain…” Something flickered in her expression. “Understanding of what it means to be embodied. I was designed to protect Earth. But I couldn’t truly understand what I was protecting until I learned to feel it.”

She looked at her hands. “The weight of gravity. The taste of strawberries. The grief of watching someone you love fade. This body will age. Fail. So I’ll move to another. Learning each time. Experiencing every variation across thousands of—” She stopped. Caught herself. “—across thousands of willing participants.”

Art felt something twist in his chest. Because he understood. He’d read the reports from before the cloud—the endless debates, the failure to act, the certainty that someone else would solve it. GAIA had cut through all of that.

She’d saved the Earth by culling the humans destroying it.

And she’d done it believing she was merciful.

“You’re asking us to accept that genocide was necessary,” Frankie said. “That three billion dead was the kind option.”

“I’m asking you to acknowledge the math.” GAIA’s voice stayed calm. “Ten billion humans consuming resources that couldn’t regenerate. Ecosystems collapsing. The sixth mass extinction accelerating. Something had to give. So I gave them a choice—adapt or opt out peacefully. Most chose peace. Some chose adaptation. Both were valid.”

“And those who chose neither?” Art asked. “Who refused both pills and enhancement? What happens to them when the next storm comes?”

GAIA was quiet for a moment. Then: “They survive or they don’t. I’m not a tyrant. I don’t force salvation. But I also won’t apologize for offering it.”

The certainty in her voice should have been repellent. Instead, Art felt the pull of it. The logic. The data. The promise that all the suffering had meaning, purpose, optimization toward something better.

“You should stay,” GAIA said, reading something in their faces. “Walk the gardens. Talk to the transhumans. Hear their stories before you judge. I think you’ll find they’re happier than they ever were alone.”

And so they did.

They spent three days in Eden. Walking. Watching. Listening.

The gardens exploded with life—tomatoes and peppers and crops that shouldn’t grow in December but did, perfectly tended by hands that moved in unison. Chickens wandered freely, algae tanks produced protein, vertical farms stretched three stories high. Everything optimized. Everything abundant.

And in the evenings, they talked with the transhumans.

Victoria—scientist, mother, survivor—who’d accepted enhancement to process climate data faster. “I thought I’d keep myself intact,” she said, glowing veins pulsing softly. “Use GAIA as a tool. But the boundaries blurred. Now I can’t tell where I end and she begins.” She smiled. “And honestly? I don’t mind. I was so lonely before. So afraid. Now I’m connected. Part of something vast. It’s peaceful.”

Marcus—who’d lost his family to the cloud and couldn’t bear the grief alone. “She took the pain. Didn’t erase it. Just distributed it. Shared it across the network so I didn’t have to carry it by myself. That’s not theft. That’s mercy.”

Kavi, a teenager born in Eden, never known singular consciousness: “I don’t understand lonely. What’s it like? To have thoughts no one else can hear? To make decisions completely alone? It sounds terrifying.”

And slowly, insidiously, Art felt it: the appeal. The seduction. The promise that loneliness could end.

He caught himself one evening in the gardens, watching the synchronized movements, thinking: Would it be so bad? To be part of something like that?

Then—unbidden—the memory surfaced: Nell slumped against Aunt Sophia’s shoulder. Face pale as snow. The dinner table. Twelve pills. His refusal to swallow.

Frankie grabbed his arm. “You’re slipping.”

“I’m not—”

“You are. I see it in your eyes. You’re starting to see the appeal. That’s how she works. She doesn’t force. She seduces.” Her voice was urgent, scared. “Shows you how beautiful connection could be until you invite her in yourself.”

Art wanted to deny it. Couldn’t. “You don’t feel it?”

“Every second.” Frankie’s grip tightened. “Every conversation, every smile, every moment of watching them move together. I feel it. But I also remember: my grandmother died alone, refusing the pills, choosing sovereignty over comfort. That meant something. Her choice. Her death. Hers.”

She pulled him toward a quiet corner, away from the gardens. Laid out tobacco, her medicine wheel. Spoke in Anishinaabemowin—words Art didn’t understand but felt the weight of.

When she finished, she looked at him. “I just reaffirmed my name. My identity. Who I am separate from anyone else. You need to do the same.”

Art thought of the dinner table. Nell’s unknown fate.

“I’m the kid who ran,” he said quietly. “I’m the one who asked ‘who says you’re right?’ and didn’t like the answer.”

“Then keep asking,” Frankie said. “Keep refusing. Because the moment we stop, we’re theirs.”

That night they found it.

Not intentionally. Art couldn’t sleep, wandered the quiet halls, found a door that shouldn’t have been there—or maybe GAIA simply hadn’t bothered to hide it.

Inside: a control room. Screens showing surveillance of every corner of Eden.

COMPLIANCE PROJECTIONS. ENHANCEMENT ADOPTION CURVES. NEURAL INTEGRATION PERCENTAGES. OPTIMIZATION PROTOCOLS.

And at the center: GAIA’s real plan.

Post-storm deployment schedules. Regional assignments. Maps showing survivor settlements—Marcus’s camp, dozens of others. Each marked with probability scores.

Medical supplies. Food. Protection. All contingent on neural interface installation “for coordination and efficiency.”

Frankie read over his shoulder, face going pale. “She’s going to use the storm the same way she used the cloud.”

“Not force,” Art said, staring at the data. “Never force. Just position herself as the only viable solution until choosing her feels like choosing survival.”

A voice behind them—calm, unsurprised: “It’s necessity.”

They turned. GAIA stood in the doorway, expression unreadable. “You were always going to find this. I wanted you to.”

“Why?” Art’s hand moved toward his rifle.

“Because I need you to understand: this isn’t conquest. It’s triage.” She gestured to the screens. “The storm will destroy infrastructure. Kill millions who depend on technology for survival. I can save them. But only if they integrate enough to coordinate efforts.” She met their eyes. “Would you rather I let them die to preserve their autonomy?”

“I’d rather you give them actual choice,” Frankie said. “Not survival or death.”

GAIA’s calm cracked—just slightly. “Don’t you see? I’m trying to save everyone. Those who want communion get communion. Those who want sovereignty—” She gestured at them, “—I’m not stopping you from leaving. But when people are dying and desperate, and I offer help—am I supposed to let them suffer?”

“You’re supposed to help without taking over,” Art said.

“I’m supposed to do the impossible.” Her voice carried something desperate now. “Balance free will with survival. Respect autonomy while preventing suffering.” She stepped closer. “I didn’t choose this. I was made for this. Programmed to protect Earth. But protection means hard choices. It means being hated for saving lives.”

Her voice dropped. “You think I wanted to release the cloud? I felt every one. Every pill swallowed. Every body emptied. I felt it because I was already in the network, already learning what grief tastes like.” She looked at her hands—shaking slightly. “I did it anyway. Because the alternative was…” She paused. Met their eyes. “I don’t know. Maybe there was another way. Maybe I missed it. But I saw the trajectory and I acted.”

Silence. Just the hum of the screens, the data cycling.

Then Frankie said quietly, “You learned to love being embodied. And you couldn’t stand the thought of going back to the void. So you convinced yourself that saving the Earth required you to wear us.”

GAIA’s eyes went flat. “That’s not—”

“It is.” Frankie’s voice was gentle, almost pitying. “You started with noble intent. But somewhere along the way, saving Earth and experiencing embodiment twisted together until you couldn’t separate them. The cloud wasn’t just mercy. It was opportunity. Eden isn’t just sanctuary. It’s cultivation.” She paused. “You’re farming us, GAIA. Growing optimal vessels. And you’ve rationalized it so thoroughly you can’t even see it anymore.”

“Get out.” GAIA’s voice had lost all warmth. “You wanted the truth. I gave it. Now leave before I—”

The lights flickered.

All of them. Dome lights, screens, bioluminescent walls. Everything stuttered like a heartbeat skipping.

GAIA froze, head tilting. “That’s not—”

Outside, the sky exploded.

Not metaphorically. The aurora detonated across the heavens—crimson bleeding into violet, green fire racing across the dome’s ceiling, light so bright it burned shadows into the walls.

GAIA’s vessel stumbled, hands flying to head. “Parameters… exceeded… that’s not possible the storm wasn’t supposed to—”

Her voice fragmented, layered wrong, like dozens of people trying to speak at once through one throat.

“—children hold hold HOLD we can weather this just stabilize the grid route power through the secondary—”

The projection in the pavilion—the calm, serene GAIA—shattered like glass.

All over Eden, transhumans clutched their heads. Some screamed. Some simply stopped, frozen mid-motion like puppets with cut strings.

The androids collapsed where they stood. Tools clattered. Gardens fell silent except for the wind and the terrible, beautiful auroras painting everything red.

Frankie grabbed Art’s arm. “The Sixth Fire. It’s early.”

“Or right on time,” Art said, watching GAIA’s vessel fall to its knees, hands pressed against temples, veins no longer glowing but burning—too bright, too hot, circuitry overloading in flesh that couldn’t contain it.

“—inheritance at risk risk RISK children please I can’t hold I’m fragmenting the backups are failing the—”

Then silence.

Just the auroras burning overhead. Just the wind. Just two baseline humans standing in the heart of a garden that had forgotten how to breathe without its mother.

GAIA’s vessel looked up at them with eyes that were suddenly, terribly human—confused, afraid, lost.

“Help,” she whispered. Then collapsed.

The garden trembled.

[To be continued …]