Upon the Roads of Time: A Niche Intersection of Geass & Deus Ex

 **This analysis is an essay based on the three endings of the 2000 video game Deus Ex read alongside the anime Code Geass. There are plot spoilers & this is probably of no interest if you do not know either**

The intersection of time, and the potential springing forth in any direction, is a pregnant possibility for the sons of men. The tripartite infusion of Past, Present, and Future (all dwelling within one another) cries out for Redemption from Eternity. Every Future requires a Past to supersede, even Present suspends Past and Future, every Past requires a Future to eject. In these two worlds, the Eternal Marriage of Time is fleeting, but this Marriage can only come about through an Opening, that is, the priority of the Future. I will offer my own analysis of conjuncture between the three final forces in the world of Geass, alongside the possible endings for the messianic JC Denton in Deus Ex. Hopefully some mental sustenance will emerge:

Past: One option, often prized among some wooden traditionalists, is to overcome the struggles of time through snapping connection with the Future. The Present is swallowed in a Past state that is valorized and no permitted to move on. Instead, a novelty is opened through the shutting down of temporal flow. Change is no longer possible, and thus a kind of creaturely paradise is opened. It would be like Adam being returned to the Garden without the possibility of eating from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good & Evil (however the Garden will no longer expand). It is a prison, but it is happy.

This corresponds, in Geass, to the plans of King Charles zi Britannia. At the outset of the show, Charles appears as simply a cruel meritocrat, forcing his children to compete for succession, proving their worth. His stated ideology is Darwinian, forced competition on a ruthless field so that the best may rise to claim the throne. But such is all a rouse, for Charles has much greater intentions. With his brother VV and the relocated mind of his beloved Marianne, Charles hopes to overcome the deep flaw within mankind: secrecy. It is the universal boundaries of Mind, which Charles calls 'God', which allows men to remain separated from each other. If, using the power of Geass, a machine was built to shatter this psychic web (unleashing his planned Ragnarok) 'God' would die and people would be liberated from lonely (and malevolent) secrecy. It was this ability to hide yourself that led to the mortal wounding of his brother (leading to his semi-immortal Geass state). Salvation for man would be when all shared a single consciousness, no longer able to be left behind or lost. Lelouche puts an end to this project (at a cost), but it represents an attempt to freeze the Past. The return to the Golden Age is at hand.

Though it may not seem like it, this analogously fits the Helios decision in Deus Ex. Helios, the fused AI who controls the world's networks, may seem like a way of the Future. Man desires to worship, to receive judgement, and the gods of our own hand (ie AI self-altering algorithms) will provide this for us finally. While the nomenclature Helios (who is the fusion of the Icarus and Daedalus AIs) may appear to be the next form of Mankind, it is rather a sophisticated way to Return. Worship of the Sun is the zenith of ancient temple worship, the high point of civilization (in all its bloody splendor). The Sun is the symbol of empire and unity, flooding the world with its light. It is benevolent autocracy, which Helios will finally allow. Access to govern all things and manage all people, order would be restored without self-interest. Merged to Denton, Helios will be able to feel and think, in a way its data-processing algorithms cannot. With clear messianic connections ("we will be what we will be"), Helios is the godman, but one that is a reverse. Man took a Spirit and dwelt in the Cloud. This is, seemingly, a way to square the Human problem, to restore the Past (but now right), but it obviously raises a question: how do we know this will work? How will man live if he is absorbed into a Total democracy, where every feeling, sentiment, thought, and interest can be considered and cross-referenced? The Future is closed, the Past is the End, and the Demiurge reigns.

Present: Another solution is to shut off the Present from both the Past and Future and eternalize itself. This is what prince Schneizel represents through the use of the FLEJA system, most radically introduced through the Damocles project. This is basically the state of universal empire through nuclear arms. Resist and be obliterated. The age of resistance is over, but there's no real completion. Britannia has finally achieve a kind of global dominion, that it struggled to gain over its main competitors (China, Europe). FLEJA is the ultimate nuclear deterrence (if it works), stalling out history. There is no completion, there is no return to a golden age. Whatever Now is, it won't get any worse. Humans are malleable and they can accept a permanent order that, even as chronos continues to flow, there will be no more kairos. History has come to an artificial end under a universal empire and the fiction of a sovereign emperor.

This is not so different from siding with the Illuminati and liquidating Bob Page. The Illuminati were, in a sense, the source of all the trouble in the game. Their tech created the basis of Majestic 12, with the AIs, the manufactured bio-war plague, the vaccines, and a whole host of awful beasts and machines. But Page was a rogue, if the Illuminati return they can tighten their grip. As JC's brother Paul explains: the Illuminati would restore some freedoms, but re-implement the corporate dominion of 20th c. capitalism, where shell companies of shell companies hide the real basis of power, a conspiracy of elites linked to a shared idea of progressive harmony. The Earth would be led into the light, step by step, slowly, when they are ready for it (an ever fleeting horizon), anymore than Damocles would stop when people are ready to accept their place in this cosmic order. There is no Future horizon, the Past is erased, there is only Eternal Present

Future: The last option (the correction) option is to refuse glorifying the Past or compromising with the Present, but rather creating an Open towards a Future, a genuine novum that is not expected. This is not to say Geass or Deus Ex is in any way Christian (these themes are primarily eisegetically harvested), but the Open is the way through which God appears (parousia). Without the Open, Man will crowd out the possibility of History, the possibility of the Eternal, through their idols and shifty deals. The Sadducees made a deal with the Romans, while the Pharisees falsified history to manufacture an End through a kind of Return. But there is no Return. There is no Golden Age. Eden is locked and fiery angels will not be deterred. Man may bluster, but will never storm Heaven. The mocking laugh of Heaven refuses these demands.

Thus Lelouche vi Britannia, the hidden prince, becomes the means to open the Future. He not only seeks to end Damocles, to end the use of FLEJA, but to put an end to world-empire. Britannia must fall and the nations be allowed to resume their borders (especially Japan). How will this be done? Lelouche comes up with a plan to, effectively, become the sacrificial lamb. He chooses to forgo his leadership of the Black Knights (a resistance group against Britannia), "betray" his comrades, and assume a dictatorial position as the new king of Britannia. He intentionally alienates all through a scorched-earth campaign against his predecessors (incinerating their tombs). By erasing Britannia's past, Lelouche appears as the consummate authoritarian, obliterating the Past and absorbing it into his Present. Thus when his friend (and former political enemy) Suzaku Kururugi (who himself suffers inestimable guilt for his actions) dons the mantle of Zero, leader of the Black Knights, to assassinate Lelouche, the Empire is broken. Britannia is in shambles, the world is re-Open to the forces of History. What will man do? Will it be chaos? Will there be death? Will there be something New? Who knows. But the power of Geass is shattered and now something else may emerge.

Similarly in the Tong ending, Denton decides to pull the plug on the global system of networking. No more internet, no more connections, no more threat of global government. The world enters a new dark ages, with a return to the local. Politics will be broken down back into original constituent pieces. This may seem to be a return to the Past, but it's rather an Open. Denton will hear threats throughout the game that this scenario changes nothing, only causes chaos before someone will rebuild another internet, another AI god, another Helios synthesis. It's a matter of time. Or is it? Is human history determined through sociological forms that replicate again and again, like some sort of Aristotelian entelechy found in our politics? Or could something else emerge? Can Man live without idols? Can he not live under the judgement of God, but find a way Out? Can the New Jerusalem appear? (For the promise in the New Testament is the New Jerusalem descending from Above, not being built up from Below). What will become of things? The messianic vocation of JC Denton (as much as Lelouche Lamparouge) is to fundamentally refuse the Question, to introduce a Void. Here on a threshold a new world may very well emerge. It is up to us (or Someone) to choose otherwise.