A Visitor to the Future - 77 - Drone Opera
We completely lost track of time over the next couple of hours. The old adage really proved true that day - time really does fly when you're having fun. Especially when you're having fun flying.
After one final turn, we reached the bottom of the spiralling slide, Antonia now realizing how much time had passed.
"We've got to get going!" she said, "The best part will be starting soon!"
"Better than this?" I said sceptically, but I followed anyway.
Weaving through the skyscrapers and thinning crowds, Antonia led us to a large, round park. It was a very sudden transition from the lofty building-filled streets to what would usually be an open, green park stretching for about a mile. Instead, it was filled with people, sat on comfortable fabric floor coverings, either alone or in small groups. Everyone's eyes appeared to be fixed on the drone swarm that was working its way between the buildings. A tiny chaperone drone appeared before us and led us through the rows of seated people to a blank spot at the back. It was a bizarre sight - the seating positions had been placed in a perfect grid pattern, so if you looked to your left or right as you passed by people, you could see almost the whole way up the row.
We sat, the plush surface extremely comfortable. Of course these wouldn't be mere picnic blankets. I glanced around, trying to look at what anyone in particular was glancing at. Although everyone seemed to be facing the same direction, to me, it just seemed to be random points in the swarm.
"It's not quite started yet," said Antonia, "Soon, though!"
There was still some chatter among the various groups around us, but for the most part the atmosphere was very calm. People seemed content to watch the masses of drones, which to me was equal parts soothing and scary. The crowd of drones moved almost organically. I'd thought of a flock of birds recently, and that analogy still held true - if a flock of mis-matched birds. Larger drones were more unwieldy, and the smaller, nimbler ones gave them a wide berth. The scary part was that these were all machines of ridiculous power to me. I'd seen what a single protection drone could do to stop a human or CI in their tracks, and a projection recording of what they were capable when swarming in space. Yet here, they seemed peaceful. Subdued.
I saw one or two people pointing at areas of the swarm. They began to gather and rise upwards into the sky in streams. All the colours of the spectrum could be seen among them - the drones as colourfully painted as the costume choices of the people enjoying the festival. The streets began to empty out, the drones filling the air in a grid so densely packed that the blue sky beyond was obscured, for the most part.
The grid began to change, shapes condensing and clustering, until the shapes began to become clear, the sky now a backdrop for the drones - forming objects with their own mass, the drones now like a three-dimensional model of a scene in progress - if an impressionist, fuzzy one at times. As things progressed, an orchestral score could be heard from all around us, fading in to a compelling woodwind section, which seemed to suggest that the story was about to begin. The drones formed arms, legs, a head - a person! A male voice rang out in operatic tones suddenly - I wondered if the performance was being made by an actual singer. I couldn't understand the words, but he was obviously concerned - the emotion evident in his voice.
Over the next hour, the drones spun a compelling visual and musical tale of love, revenge, and revolt against a group of noblemen - not without it's own horror and dangers. At the centre of it all, a mute dancer - a woman wrapped up with a former nobleman lover on one side with who she was still infatuated, and her brother who led the revolution despite his treasonous underlings. Stylistically, it was all very well done - even though I didn't understand the words being sung, the imagery spoke for itself.
The climax of the piece was a set piece of the young lady leaping into the abyss of an erupting volcano, as the two forces of the nobles and the rebellion clashed in the foreground. The dark reds and orange colours of the volcano were cast upon the drones by projected light, and fireworks detonating in the distance served to punctuate the climax further.
The applause was immediate, the entire park filled with the sounds of clapping. The drones spiralled in circles, as if giving a bow to the audience, and then began to spread to the winds, their combined forms shrinking away like the final glowing embers of a fire.
"What did you think?" said Antonia after the applause died down, and chatter started around us.
I blinked, and reached up to rub my neck. I'd barely looked away from the sight for the last hour, and felt like I'd frozen up a little - it must have gotten colder, but I hadn't noticed. "I'm sort of lost for words - it was incredible! Who came up with this?"
Antonia smiled, "I recognised the opera - it's called La Muette de Portici, first written by Daniel Auber, though this was a shorter version. Some of the pieces and plot points were changed too. Did you hear the high notes in the climax? I couldn't hope to hit those!"
"I sort of meant the drones - how did they do it? Not that the performance itself wasn't interesting!"
"Not sure," said Antonia, "I know that the Consortium is good at networking drones, so any drones that people make for the festival become part of its climax. Did you see the fireworks? What a nice touch."
Once again, the question of why came to my mind - why go to all this trouble, fabricate thousands of drones, arrange them into patterns, co-ordinate them to display a giant opera in the sky? But my own mind supplied the answer - it had been entertaining, fun, and unique - so why not?