"Just help me start cutting it away from the deck, Giger," Aldo said.
"Who's Giger?"
"He was an artist who might appreciate this on an off day," Aldo said. "You should bone up on your art history, you'd probably like his stuff."
"If it looks like this, hell yeah," Dori said as she joined Aldo down near the base of the chair and started discussing how they would cut it away from the deck.
"What do you mean, you want to use this for us?" Boro asked over his private channel with Spin.
He was wise to have the conversation outside of the Sector Jumper. "I misspoke," Spin said. "For me and anyone who wants revenge against the Lux family, Kort included." Adding the last point was unfair. She knew that Boro wanted revenge against Kort especially. She wondered if he would turn away from family for a chance at it.
"I hope you include me in that. Sign me up."
"I'm not assuming anything," Spin said. "You should go with your brother, take Nigel and anyone else who wants to go with you. They're in the middle of a war, but I'm going on a revenge trip that will probably centre on setting thousands of dolls free. It's going to be a hard road, and I might have to be satisfied with that as my revenge."
"Costing them billions of platinum? I'll take that," Boro said. "I'm not going with Shamus. Even before you were thinking about this revenge trip, I was staying unless you were following him to the Haven System too."
"I can't handle that responsibility, Boro. You're too good a man to follow me wherever I go. If I had to choose a leader from our little band, it would be you, no hesitation. You shouldn't follow some synthetic girl around, especially if it could get you killed."
"There's nothing synthetic about you, at least not to me. I don't care if you were made or born, and I might have pretended that I thought you letting go of ideas of revenge felt right, but I don't think anything else makes sense. I'm following you because you will always do your best, and you're a better thinker than me on your worst day. You got a few hooks in me, too, woman, whether you like it or not, and I don't want 'em torn loose."
"Boro, we're not together, don't bet on that. I don't know if we ever will be," Spin replied, looking away, glad that there was heavy armour between them. As far as her promise to Shamus to convince Boro to follow him to the Haven System was concerned, that was fulfilled. Telling Boro that there may be nothing romantic between them hurt her more than she expected, it was as far as she'd go to try to shake him loose. "You follow me, and you're going to get into trouble. I don't want to have to make the decision that will cost you even more than you've lost."
"You know it won't be like that," Boro said. "Not out here. This isn't some military outfit, maybe this tech my brother brought with him has you a little tricked. Every order, every decision you make might not be questioned, but your crewmembers aren't past refusing. You may give the order, but we all decide whether or not to follow, keeping the blame squarely on their shoulders. We follow you because we want to. Don't get high and mighty, thinking that you can lead me to do something I don’t want to. As for the other thing, who says I won't win you over? Some people send flowers and charm the pants off their conquests. I’m not that type, I'm more like erosion. I make sure I'm around so much, wearing you down with my slow charm that you don't know what to do when I'm gone. You'll see," he told her with a crooked smile that she could just barely see through his visor.
Spin laughed and turned away, hoping he couldn't see her blushing. "That's so cheesy." She brushed his promise to stay close aside for the time being. "If that's how you and the crew will follow me, then I don't feel so bad. It is going to be a revenge trip, though, even if I want it to be a profitable one."
"Piracy," the word rumbled, he spoke it so low through a smile that she could feel the audio vibrate the air around her ears. "Sounds like a good time."
"But you're going to send Nigel to the Haven System," Spin said, giving that one more try for Nigel and Shamus' sake. "Along with anyone else who wants to go."
"He's not going to like it," Boro said. "But I looked at the Haven Fleet Academy info, I want him to join. Della will go with him, probably try for a civilian citizenship."
"I hope so," Spin said.
"Hey, are we good to finish cutting this thing away and bag it? The download done?" Dori asked. "I saw something back there move, I wanna get outta here."
"I told you, that was in your head. There's nothing on sensors," Aldo told her.
"The download's finished," Spin said, locking the massive file collection inside her dermal computer then deleting it from the command and control unit on loan to her. "Cut away, we'll get the containment bag ready."
Fifty-Three
At the rear of the armoury and storage compartment of the Sector Jumper sat what remained of the Prince. The night before, while the ship was under way at its best speed to Beta Bio, Spin had a dream, no, a nightmare about it. In it, the prince and the tubes, arms and other pieces pinning him to the chair became part of him. He stood, and the black containment bag that was keeping his body from rotting became his onyx skin. "I will forever rule the Emerald," he said in a voice that sounded more like a harsh wind. "My legend has grown."
The prince creature shambled forward, and she woke with a start as soon as he planted his second step. They were all in bunks. Across from the narrow aisle, Mirra snored softly. Spin watched her face in the low light, wondering which way she'd go once it was time to finally decide.
After checking the time, she realized everyone was going to be rousing in twenty-four minutes and went to see the prince after donning her vacsuit and her own jacket. There was no one in the few corridors, everyone was exhausted after coming down from their capers the previous day. Shamus didn't even speak to her, something about bringing the prince's remains aboard put him off, and she was too tired to find out what his problem was.
The prince sat immobilized and vacuum sealed in the temperature-controlled bag. She could see the outline of him; he was all spikes and command seat, you could barely tell there was a corpse in there from the outer shape. "What happened to him?" asked Ashley, who was in her own vacsuit, only changed to a glossy blue colour. "I know the bots killed him, but I've never seen them do it like this."
"You've seen bots kill people?" Spin asked.
"After Iron Mind came I was able to see everything that the station's sensors could. I just didn't come out of the sealed habitat."
"Oh? Why not?"
"I let them seal me in because I thought someone would find a way to free the rest of the synthetics in storage, and I thought I'd wait until then so I could help. It was boring, but I know I'd be needed when help came."
"You were," Spin said. "I wish we got more of your, I mean our, people out."
Ashley approached the covered command seat, gingerly touching one of the points that looked like it could poke through the containment bag if it pushed from the inside. "I think it's okay," she said, her lisp lending an innocence to her manner. "I know the difference between a doll who’s been awake for a while, has their own quirks and experiences to draw on and one that hasn't breathed on its own yet. It's sad that so many had to be destroyed so a few of us could be saved, but they can be made somewhere else, brought to life exactly as they would have been if we rescued them yesterday."
"I'm sorry, that's a surprisingly pragmatic point of view."
"I had a lot of time to think about it. The dolls in stasis didn't know they could ever be alive. The activity in their brains was tightly controlled, all imprinted, so when and if they woke, they'd know their situations like they were remembering something they experienced, but until then there would be no awareness. They were never alive, not really."
"Sophia made it sound like they were all in a controlled dream," Spin countered.
"Even Kline thought so for a while, then I showed them the way the computer programs them, the way they were held on the threshold of life but not alive. We're all just science until we wake up. The magic only ha
ppens after we open our eyes for the first time."
"I like the way you put that." Spin watched Ashley walk around the command seat, inspecting the shape of it and the protrusions under the thick, black containment bag.
"I cried about losing the dolls because we lost potential, and that's sad, especially now. It was unfair. We did our best and it still wasn't enough. Oh, and I still haven't thanked you for saving me properly," Ashley said, looking up and smiling at Spin. "I'm planning to stay on, if you'll have me. I can code, and I learn quickly, so I know I can be helpful. I also know where the Iron Mind took the fifteen synths he could save and how to get to him without getting killed by the other gangs there."
"Welcome aboard," Spin said, extending her hand, looking up into her dark eyes.
To her surprise, Ashley embraced her warmly, holding her close for long moments as she said; "I haven't done this before, but I think I'm a hugger. Yup, this is nice, I'm definitely a hugger," she sighed, resting her head on Spin's shoulder. It was comfortable and innocently affectionate.
Happy that she was the first-person Ashley took physical comfort in, Spin squeezed her back for a while and was released. "You really were alone in your habitat for your entire life?"
"Well, not alone. Supervised, allowed to be with other control dolls and human workers who were all in isolation suits, but we weren't allowed to have contact. If any control doll is contaminated or interfered with beyond its limits, they stop collecting data and either sell us off after our minds are wiped and reprogrammed or dispose of us completely. I've been around for a long time, so I would have been killed and recycled if I was tainted."
The thought made Spin shudder. Ashley seemed as unique and well-rounded as any normal person. The thought of her being killed and broken down somehow so her bio-matter could be reused seemed unbelievably cold. "I'm glad you're coming with us instead."
"So am I. I can't wait to see more of the galaxy. I read so much about it, watched I dunno how many hours of holos and played simulations after the Iron Mind unlocked data access. You know, I thought I'd be ready for whatever kind of freedom I eventually found, but I'm not. I feel like a babe in the woods here. I'm just glad you saved us, so you could be the first person to show me a purpose. I don't know what would have happened if I saw Shamus' presentation first."
"Presentation?" Spin asked.
"You didn't get it?"
"No, I don't think I did." She checked her command and control unit for data received overnight or early in the morning and found nothing. "Let me guess, he offered everyone a place in Haven Fleet?"
"In the Haven System," Ashley nodded. She projected a hologram of the presentation, hosted by a repurposed holographic image of Ayan, as she spoke. "There is a short tour of Haven Shore, Haven Landing and a couple stations that are being built. He goes through how we can help as civilians, then he goes into the military and made sure that anyone watching knew that he's leaving with all his technology when we arrive back at Beta Bio. He mentioned that you have a ship of your own too."
"That was nice of him," Spin grumbled. The hologram silently took the viewers through the interior of a comfortable, vibrant looking apartment. It had a large fish tank as an interior wall, and a view of a tropical forest through tall transparent sections. She wouldn't admit how impressive it looked aloud, but she liked the design.
"Anyway, I liked what he said, and he seemed honest about the impending invasion, but it looks like they'll survive. It's about fifteen minutes long, and when it was over I made my mind up and went to sleep. Kline didn't bother watching past the civilian part. He was made to be a soldier and has some kinda grudge against the people who designed him. I never really understood it, especially since I tune out his rants after a couple minutes. They all start sounding the same after a few years."
"So, it sounds like he's staying too," Spin said.
"He thinks you'll be going after other facilities," Ashley said. "Freeing a lot of dolls from there and the galaxy in general, so I guess that's enough for him. Yeah, he's definitely staying. He's always had this scary fantasy of getting a whole bunch of Klines together, though, so I'd watch out for that. He thinks he and five or ten more of himself could set fire to the galaxy, but I think freeing a lot of dolls will scratch his itch."
"I honestly don't know if that'll be our focus. I want to free as many synthetics as possible - human, Nafalli, Perlan, and whatever hybrids we find - but we'll have to earn or steal platinum too."
"Oh, I get that. I've never had money before, so I'm eager to get my fair share so I can have some of my own. It seems really important outside of containment," Ashley said, nodding, her eyes wide.
"Friends are more important, but it's good to have a stash of platinum, definitely. Did you get a feel for who else might be staying?"
"I kinda drifted off to sleep. I thought I'd be nervous spending time with other people outside of containment, but I'm either numb or just not made that way. I actually feel better now that there are so many people around, I think."
Boro and Hal walked into the room, each chewing a nutrition bar. Leaper was on Boro's shoulder, licking a tiny part clean, holding it in his small hands then popping it into his mouth, where he rolled it around before putting it back into his hands to continue licking. It was as if he was pretending to eat so he didn't stand out. "Are we talking about my brother's pitch?" Boro asked.
Dori and Leland came in behind them chewing meal bars as well. The alarm to wake everyone had gone off. "Yeah, I guess he laid it on pretty thick," Spin said. "What does everyone think?" She watched with interest and amusement as Ashley offered Boro a welcoming hug that lasted a few seconds longer than simple friendliness demanded.
"Well, he didn't change my mind," Boro said, looking over Ashley's shoulder. When she finished squeezing up against him, he smiled and said; "Good morning to you too."
She moved on the Leland, who was ready for her and gave as good as he got, making her giggle when he squeezed and rocked her enthusiastically. "I hope you're sticking around."
"I am," Ashley said cheerily before moving on to Dori who eyed her apprehensively before she was embraced. "I'm a hugger."
Leland shook his head and looked away from Ashley, back to Spin. "Right, the presentation was tempting, but I'm sticking around. You need a good sawbones to keep your crew on their feet, besides, I never liked how dolls were treated, so I'm here until you tell me it's time to go."
"Thanks…" Dori told Ashley as they parted. "That was nice." She looked to Spin as Ashley turned towards Hal. "The more time I spend with you the less I feel like a freak, so good luck getting rid of me."
Hal resisted Ashley's embrace at first, stiff and wary, but melted into it after a few seconds, sighing and allowing himself to be squeezed. Ashley didn't release him right away when she was finished, either, leaning back instead and smiling at him. "You should grow a beard, it would look good on you."
"Um… regulations. Gotta keep it neat," he replied bashfully.
"Thank you for flying the ship," she told him before letting go.
"No problem, and, uh, speaking of that…" he said, turning to Spin and the rest of the group. "We're going to be in Beta Bio in two hours. We pushed the drive pretty hard."
"Oh, so it's decision time, then," Nigel said, stepping into the increasingly crowded compartment. He had Della and Mirra with him. "Looks like I'm staying." Della looked at him uncertainly.
There was a moment of uneasy silence as Spin and Boro locked eyes with each other from opposite ends of the compartment.
Nigel pushed on, but even Ashley could see there was something wrong, and she moved to stand beside Hal. "I mean, everything looked amazing in the whole presentation," Nigel said. "The Academy looks awesome, and I was never one for school, but he was right to focus on that for his pitch, at least for me. I know the civilian life stuff looks really cool too, they're really building something, but there's something going on here. I'd feel…"
"You have to go," Dori
said firmly. "Look at your girl, there. Della's already half way gone, she may as well be there already from the look on her face. Besides, I know I don't want you here, not after what you did."
"Listen, I'm tired of you giving me shit for saving your life," Nigel retorted. He was about to go on but Dori interrupted him.
"You didn't do that out of love for me. You did it to make yourself feel better. If you actually thought about how it would be for me, getting rewired up here," Dori pointed to her head, finger jabbing, "Pushed into a whole new existence whether I liked it or not but still ending up a cyborg in the end no matter how human I look or feel, then you would have realized that I was going to die either way. Pieces of who I was after I was rebuilt, after I went psycho are coming back. That was no existence, I should have died in the accident and stayed dead, but if I really tried, I could remember what it was like to be Dorian, just a human guy. Now I've changed so much, been altered so much that I don't know who I am anymore. Dorian is dead, your friend is gone, and I can't fucking stand you because I know you did it. You may as well have held a gun to my head and pulled the trigger."
"I'm sorry, man," Nigel said.
"There! Right fucking there! Stop it! I'm not even a man anymore! If I could have chosen death or life as a chick for myself, I probably would have chosen life, but you chose for me and you still see Dorian. That's not helping, I need to figure this shit out and the more you remind me of what I used to be, the harder it'll be. Get gone." Dori looked to Spin, lowering her voice. "I'll be in my bunk until we get back." Then she left the compartment.
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