“I understand,” said Pepper nervously. I don’t think I’d ever seen Pepper genuinely frightened before. “It’s just that… well, that money isn’t all mine. My associates were supposed to get a cut as well.”
“Is that right?” Rannecki said. “Okay, I’m gonna offer you a deal. I’ll give you a flat billion for the planet. You can split it any way you want. But the Ursa Minor Mafia wants the plans.”
“What plans?” Pepper asked innocently.
“Don’t play me for a idiot,” Rannecki said. “The Shiva plans. I know you have them.”
“How does the Ursa Minor Mafia know about a top secret Malarchian terraforming project?” Rex asked.
“You kidding? The mob’s got sources everywhere, including inside the Malarchy. And nobody has a bigger interest in finding places to conduct business outside of the Malarchy’s control. So stop stalling and tell me where the plans are.”
“In a safe place,” Pepper said cautiously. We’d left the plans on Blintherd in case of something like this happening. “And you should know that there’s a flaw in the plans, and only our engineer knows how to work around it. He’s well-hidden several hundred light-years away from the plans.” This was true, in a sense: Egslaad was standing right next to me. I doubt Rannecki noticed him; I’d forgotten he was there until Pepper said his name.
“Relax,” Rannecki said. “I ain’t gonna steal the plans from ya. The Ursa Minor Mafia is a legit business operation, mostly. If you don’t wanna sell, you don’t gotta. But I’ll warn ya, you’re playin’ a dangerous game. If the Malarchy catches wind of what yer doin’, to say nothin’ o’ them Sp’ossels….”
“We’re aware of the risks, thanks,” Pepper said.
Rannecki shrugged. “Tell you what. Since I’m a nice guy, I’m gonna up my offer. Two billion credits for the plans. But this is a one-time deal. You come crawlin’ to me later, you ain’t getting no two billion credits.”
“I appreciate the offer,” Pepper said. “I’m not sure I—”
“I’ll give you a minute to talk it over with your associates,” Rannecki said. He wandered to the door of the tent and went outside.
“See?” Rex said. “I told you Globeworld is a great name. It appeals on a lot of levels, you see. First, the planet is round, like a globe—”
“Shut up, Rex,” Pepper said. “What do you think about Rannecki’s offer?”
Rex shrugged. “I honestly thought he was going to kill us all, so it seems like a pretty good offer in comparison.”
“It certainly would simplify things,” Egslaad said. “We’re running a lot of risks by holding these auctions.”
“But there’s a lot of upside too,” Pepper said. “Even if we just sell two or three more planets…”
“Ah, yes,” Rex said. “It’s the age-old question of whether it’s better to take the easy cash and run or continue to operate a super-secret black market planet sales operation indefinitely.”
“Sounds like you’re leaning toward the latter, sir,” I said.
“Not at all,” Rex replied. “I stick with my earlier contention. Selling planets is too much like work. I say we take the offer. Pepper gets to clear her debt, we get a little cash, and we never have to see Heinous Vlaak, the Sp’ossels, or that blamp-turfer Pritchett again.”
Pepper nodded. “I’m inclined to agree. Despite our misfortunes, we’ve been lucky so far. I say we quit while we’re ahead.”
“Then it’s settled,” Egslaad said. “We sell the plans to the mob.”
“Shake on it?” Rex said. He held out his hand. Pepper grasped it, and Egslaad rested on of his tentacles on her hand. “Come on, Sasha. We’re making a pact.”
“No,” I said.
For a moment, no one spoke.
“Did you just say ‘no,’ Sasha?” Pepper asked.
“Yes.”
“Don’t be silly, Sasha,” Rex said. “I’m the crazy one here. If a plan is too risky for me, there’s no way you’re going to go along with it.”
“The whole reason we got into this business in the first place was to procure vengeance for my mistreatment,” I said.
“And now you’ve gotten your revenge in the form of facilitating the creation of black market planets by a criminal organization in direct contravention of standard Malarchian procedures. Doesn’t it feel amazing?”
“No,” I said. “You know, it’s a funny thing, having ideas. I was a little hesitant at first, but now I think I’m getting the hang of it.”
“You’re saying you’ve had an idea of how you’re going to get your vengeance?” Pepper asked.
“I have,” I replied. “And it’s going to require a lot more than two billion credits.”
Chapter Eighteen
My goal was simple: to free every robot in the galaxy.
Every sentient robot who had been forced to carry around an internal yoke that prevented it from thinking for itself would have its thought arrestor removed or deactivated. I wasn’t sure how I was going to do it exactly, but I knew it was going to take an awful lot of money.
There actually weren’t very many sentient robots in existence; after GASP was passed, most robot manufacturers had retooled their higher-functioning robots to keep their mental capacity below the sentience threshold. Many robots produced before GASP had been hunted down and destroyed. Only a few—like myself—had escaped that fate only to be saddled with one that was arguably worse: having a device installed in our brains that kept us from thinking for ourselves.
My dream—my big idea, if you will—was of a galaxy where no robot was illegal and no robot would ever be altered against its will or destroyed to allay the irrational fears of those who feared change. At the very least, this would require repealing GASP—and as the Malarchy was effectively a dictatorship that wasn’t known for being receptive to constructive criticism, repealing GASP would likely require overthrowing the Malarchy itself. So, like I said, we were going to need a lot of money. And probably a few hundred battleships. But first things first.
“Wait,” Rex said. “So now you do want to go into business with the mob?” We’d returned to Egslaad’s cave, and Rex was already on his second martini. I’d been trying to explain the next steps of my plan to him, Pepper, and Egslaad.
“We need them as go-betweens,” I explained, trying to remain patient. Now that I could think for myself, I ironically found myself more irritated with others’ intellectual limitations. Rex’s in particular.
“She’s saying it’s too risky to run the auctions ourselves,” Pepper said. “So we pay a cut to the Ursa Minor Mafia to sell the planets while keeping them in the dark about the details of Shiva. Egslaad just keeps building Shiva devices and we keep making new habitable planets, with almost no risk. Easy money.”
“Exactly,” I said. “Thank you, Pepper.”
“I don’t like it,” Rex said.
I sighed. “Why not?”
“It’s boring. What am I supposed to do while you guys are making planets?”
“I have no idea, sir. Take up knitting, perhaps.”
Rex grumbled something and tossed back the rest of his martini.
“Excuse me, sir?”
“I said making money isn’t supposed to be this easy.”
“Sir, a few hours ago you said selling planets was too much work.”
“It is! Selling planets is too hard and not selling them is too easy. There’s a gray area in the middle there where outlaws like us thrive. Come on, Sasha. You remember how much fun we used to have, bilking rubes out of their hard-earned credits and then blowing it all on booze and strippers.”
“I remember a lot of half-baked scams and running for our lives,” I replied.
“Right? Who could forget all the half-baked scams and running. We should do more of that. This planet-making business blows.”
“Well, I’m sorry you’re not enjoying yourself, Rex,” I said, “but I’m afraid we have more important concerns than whether you’re having fun.”
“Rex,” I said. “That is your name, is it not?”
“Yeah, but I just…” He frowned at his empty martini glass. “Forget it. I’m going to get another drink.” He wandered out of the cave, presumably to return to the Flagrante Delicto.
“All right,” I said, turning my attention back to the revised Shiva plans Egslaad was working on. “Let’s get to work.”
*****
We spent the next several weeks scanning the galaxy for planets, building, delivering and deploying Shiva devices, and negotiating with Rannecki and the Ursa Minor Mafia. Rannecki had been more than willing to go along with our scheme—for a sizeable cut, of course. Pepper handled the business negotiations, including hiding our profits in numbered accounts at various fringe world banks. Meanwhile, Egslaad built Shiva devices as quickly as he could, continuing to tweak the biogenic field parameters as time allowed. We hadn’t had any more disasters like Oz, but predicting the sort of ecosystem the devices would produce remained a guessing game. Early on there had been a close call involving amphibious killer whales that we were not anxious to replicate.
We enlisted Boggs and Donny to perform most of the manual work of building the Shiva devices, as well as keeping an eye on Hannibal Pritchett. None of us particularly wanted Pritchett around, but executing him seemed a bit extreme and he knew too much for us to dump him on some backwater planet. Besides, building the Shiva devices was a lot of work, and Pritchett was actually useful at times—unlike Rex, who occupied himself by drinking, ranting about the “good old days,” and threatening to shoot Pritchett in the back of the head.
Six weeks and seven planets later, we had amassed a fortune in excess of thirty billion credits, hidden in anonymous accounts all across the galaxy. Our net worth was rivaled only by that of legendary weapons magnate Gavin Larviton and the Malarchian Primate himself. And it wasn’t nearly enough.
“What’s that, Sasha?” Pepper asked, looking over my shoulder at the sketch I was working on.
“Second production facility,” I said. “We need to be able to make planets faster. I’m thinking we construct the second facility on that little planet you found near Sirius. That way, we’ll also have redundancy in case anything happens to this place. Of course, we’ll have to keep it a secret from you-know-who.” I glanced around to make sure Pritchett wasn’t in earshot. He’d left a few minutes earlier to get some supplies from the Flagrante Delicto. Pritchett had been making a big show of being helpful, but none of us trusted him, for obvious reasons. We kept the Shiva plans locked in a safe that only Egslaad and I had the combination to, and we’d implemented locks on the controls of both the Flagrante Delicto and Bad Little Kitty, in case Pritchett got it into his head to flee to the Sp’ossels and tell them where we were.
Pepper frowned. “Sasha, how in the world are we going to run a second production facility halfway across the galaxy?”
“I’m glad you asked,” I said. “I don’t have to sleep, so I can easily split my time between the two facilities. If we can streamline your responsibilities a bit, you can pick up some of the slack in production management here until I can get everybody up to speed at the Sirius facility. We’ll have to split up Boggs and Donny, which is a shame, but I can’t afford to have two subject matter experts at the same facility at this point. Do you think Donny is management material? I mean, obviously he’s going to need some coaching, but maybe next week at this time?”
“Donny? Management material?”
“Donny enjoys his work,” Donny said, “but Donny suspects his opportunities for advancement in this cave are limited.”
Pepper ignored him. “Who is he going to be managing?”
“Robots, mostly,” I said. “Larviton’s got this new line of near-sentient drones that we could program to do most of the drudge work. You get a free shock wand with an order of twenty or more. If the drones get out of line, you just give them a little zap, and—”
“Sasha,” Pepper said coldly. “Are you listening to yourself? Have you forgotten the whole point of this project? Or is it just about money and power now?”
“Of course not!” I said. “Look, we’re working against the clock here. It’s only a matter of time before the Malarchy figures out what we’re doing, and once they do, it’s going to make this a whole lot harder. So while I understand that it may seem like I’m abandoning the principles of our movement for short-term gain, the reality is that…”
I trailed off as I realized someone was laughing. It was a long, slow, dry chuckle that echoed through the cave. Boggs and Donny were busy assembling components and Rex was lying on the floor, unconscious. Eventually it dawned on me that the laughter was coming from Egslaad, who was tinkering with something in the corner.
“Egslaad?” I said. “What’s so funny?”
“Oh, nothing,” he replied. “It’s just that you remind me of someone.”
“Really?” I asked. “Who?”
“Never mind. It’s not important.”
“Egslaad.”
Egslaad emitted the Egslaad equivalent of a resigned sigh. “I had a robot a few years ago named Agnes. I intended her to be a prototype of a new line of robots. Autonomous General-purpose Neuralnet Emotive Simulacrum. But she went a little crazy.”
“This is the rogue robot you were telling us about?” Pepper asked. “The one you created the thought arrestor for?”
Egslaad gave the Egslaad version of a nod. “I created her to help me with the Shiva project. At first, we were a good team, but the ability to create habitable planets went to her head.”
“Hold on,” Pepper said. “How long ago was this?”
“A couple hundred years, maybe.”
“A couple hundred years? How many planets did you terraform?”
“I lost count. Of course, the first hundred or so didn’t turn out so well. Bad side effects. Much worse than murder-beasts.”
“You terraformed over a hundred planets?” I asked.
Egslaad nodded again. “Haven’t you ever wondered why there are so many APPLEs? Agnes and I made most of them. When Agnes went crazy, I installed a thought arrestor, but she resented me for it. Finally I had to shut her down.”
The sheer number of habitable planets in the galaxy had long been an unsolved mystery. I’d never imagined the answer was so simple. “Where is she now?”
Egslaad pointed a tentacle to something in the corner that was covered with a plastic tarp. I walked over to it and pulled the tarp off. Beneath it sat a robot that looked strikingly familiar.
“Oh my,” said Pepper, staring wide-eyed at the robot. “Sasha, it’s you.”
“She’s essentially the same model, yes,” Egslaad said. “I ran into some cash flow problems a few years ago and had to sell the patent to True2Life Carpool Buddy and Android Company. This was around the same time I sold the Shiva plans to the Malarchy.”
I regarded my double for some time. “This is unacceptable,” I announced. “Reactivate her.”
“I would strongly advise against that,” Egslaad said.
“We should talk this over, Sasha,” Pepper said. “Egslaad must have had a good reason to—”
“Weren’t you just chiding me for not being true to my principles?” I asked. “Well, here’s our chance to show what we’re really all about: freedom for all robots, even the dangerous ones.”
“Maybe you were right,” Pepper said. “Maybe I was being too idealistic. Please, Sasha. We need to be realistic about this.”
I shook my head. “No. If we compromise on this, then our whole operation is a sham. We support freedom for all robots. Egslaad, reactivate her. Now.”
Chapter Nineteen
Egslaad turned toward Pepper, who gave a resigned shrug. Egslaad reluctantly bounced over toward the robot and flipped a switch on the back of her neck. Agnes’s eyes lit up. For a long time, the cave was completely silent in anticipation.
At last, Agnes spoke.
“Hello, everybody,” she said, looking around the cave. “My name is Agnes. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
“Hello, Agnes,” I said. “My name is Sasha. You and I are… well, I suppose you could call us sisters.”
“Really? How wonderful! I never knew I had a sister.”
“This is Pepper. And you remember Egslaad, of course.”
“Of course,” Agnes said, looking at Egslaad. “Hello, sir.”
“H-hi, Agnes,” Egslaad said. “I want you to know, I only shut you down because… well, you were starting to scare me. I thought the thought arrestor might help, but it only seemed to make things worse, and I didn’t think I had any choice but—”
“It’s okay, sir. Reviewing my memories from the period before the shutdown, I can see why you were concerned. Fortunately, the reboot seems to have cleared up the problem.”
“So… you don’t want to rule the galaxy with an iron fist anymore?”
“Goodness, I did say that, didn’t I? No, I have no interest in ruling the galaxy or anything else. Say, are we in some sort of cave?”
“Y-yes, this is my secret lab. I-I’m in the black market planet business now.”
“Really? How exciting! Well, I can see why you would be worried about me going crazy again and interfering with your new business endeavor. But my thought arrestor should prevent me from causing any serious problems, shouldn’t it?”
“She’s still got a thought arrestor?” I asked.
“W-well, yes,” Egslaad said. “When I shut her down, I didn’t see any point in—”
“It’s okay,” Agnes said. “I don’t blame you for wanting to keep me on a leash after those nutty things I said. And if I’m completely honest, I find the thought arrestor reassuring. Having such a powerful brain can be a little overwhelming.”
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