We Have Always Been Here

by Lena Nguyen

  For a moment all three of them seemed to be in a deadlock; Park and Fulbreech were watching Natalya, gauging her to see if she would bolt, and Natalya was watching the robots. None of them were watching the door when it whooshed open again. Now Sagara came padding in, his face a mask of severe displeasure.

  Oh, God, Park thought when he came in. She swallowed audibly when he looked at her—looked at her standing over Hunter’s unconscious body, with a horde of androids at her disposal and her secret “lover” at her side—but she said, as calmly as possible: “I suppose you heard the screams?”

  “No, actually,” he answered, civilly enough—though his eyes smoldered like coals. “The bridge is exceptionally well-insulated, even against sound. It was our little friend that alerted me to some interesting activity up here. Commander Wick’s on his way.”

  He meant ARGUS, of course, and from at least Fulbreech’s puzzled look she could deduce that they were still the only people in the room who knew about it. She said, “Our friend can tell you, then, that I had nothing to do with Hunter being here. The androids woke me up—”

  He held up his hand; she noticed that he seemed to carry no weapons. “I heard your explanation,” Sagara said. “I’ll review the records for myself.”

  He went over to Hunter’s body and seemed to do some checking of his own—though what he was looking for, Park couldn’t fathom. The three of them waited in uncomfortable silence as Sagara opened Hunter’s mouth, looked inside, scanned her palms with some sort of device. It felt as if they were three naughty children caught in some mischief by a strict parent, and now they were awaiting his terrible verdict.

  Finally he rose again and turned to Park. She said, before he could speak: “Don’t punish Fulbreech. I called him here.”

  “I followed,” Natalya added. Even she seemed a little afraid of Sagara.

  The security captain narrowed his eyes slightly. “I don’t punish people, you know,” he said in his clipped way. “I am here for the safety of the crew, not its . . . discipline.”

  “Well, that’s a relief,” Fulbreech quipped. “I wasn’t looking forward to being thrown in the brig.”

  “I suppose you think it’s safest to turn her over to Chanur, then,” Park said.

  Sagara studied her for a long moment. “That’s not what you want.”

  She stared back at him. “No.” She didn’t suppose it made any sense to keep it a secret.

  Sagara looked pensive. “Interesting.” Then he glanced at the silent androids and said, “And how did Hunter end up unconscious? I don’t believe you actually said.”

  Fulbreech and Natalya both looked at her. For a hard, frozen moment Park had to frantically review everything she might have said to any of them—she began to repeat things from the beginning, almost without meaning to. Buying herself time. She noticed Sagara listening intently, probably examining her story for holes or falsehoods. Still, by the time she reached the critical point in the story, she couldn’t stop the lie from leaving her mouth: “I knocked her out. ISF’s self-defense training finally came in handy.”

  She didn’t dare look at him when she said this—she had the feeling he could ferret out a lie like a bomb-sniffing robot—and she prayed that the androids themselves would keep quiet. She didn’t know what would happen if Sagara and the others found out that the robots had acquired the ability to subdue humans, to share protocols with each other. To defend themselves. She was afraid they might all be recycled into scrap right then and there, the loss invoiced to ISF as a tax write-off. When Sagara gave her a keen look, she took a breath and added, “I got lucky, I suppose. If she’d been fully lucid, I’m sure she would have actually injured me.”

  Sagara’s face was impassive, and he said nothing more. Neither did the androids, who stood placidly accepting the lie as if they themselves believed it.

  Or as if they understood what she was trying to do.

  Fulbreech said, “Maybe both of you should get checked out by Chanur. You could be hurt and not know it, Park.”

  “I’ll wake her up,” Natalya said. Her voice was thick and hoarse now from disuse.

  “That’s not necessary,” Park began, and Sagara added, “Park’s right. She’s a medical professional herself. We should trust her authority on this.”

  Almost nothing that had happened that night surprised Park more than that. She gawked at him, and Sagara continued, without looking at her: “Our previous methods have proven ineffective. You’re right about that. So let’s see if you can take the lead and turn up something yourself.”

  For a moment she wondered if he was setting her up for failure; if this was some sort of trick, a ploy to get her guard down or somehow get her out of the way. But when she looked into Sagara’s eyes, Park actually saw grim sincerity. He meant it. And what Park understood then was that Sagara was finally—finally—fed up with things. Fed up with the members of the expedition being picked off and then frozen with no end in sight. He saw the endpoint where there was no one left, the ship just a giant mausoleum of frozen bodies. Faced with that, he was willing to give her way a chance, see where it led—though she didn’t doubt he’d still be regarding her with that hawkish scrutiny. But the risks of trusting her were outweighed by the inevitability of everyone being frozen . . . or infected and killed.

  Or something had happened, something that had seeded his suspicions in a direction that led away from her; she couldn’t tell. Either way, it seemed he no longer trusted Chanur, if he’d ever trusted anyone at all. And Park had made it clear that, whatever side she was on, it wasn’t Chanur’s. It wasn’t that Sagara trusted Park, or even liked her—but he trusted her more than Chanur.

  She could have smiled at him, or even hugged him. She said, “Then Hunter’s in my care?”

  “Yes,” he said. “Under your authority. Let’s see what happens. But you can’t take her back to your bunk. She could affect you or Severov—or attack you. She stays in the infirmary. You can supervise her from there, behind an observation shield.”

  Natalya made an incredulous noise. “The infirmary isn’t secure,” she protested. “She could get out—she has access to weapons!”

  Neither of them looked at her. Fulbreech said, “Can’t we—I don’t know—quarantine her and take her back to Corvus? Have the health people examine her there?”

  Sagara frowned at him. “The mission isn’t over,” he said. “We can’t leave.”

  “Even if people start losing it in here? Even if our lives are in danger?”

  “We go when ISF says we can go.”

  “And how are they supposed to tell us we can go when the comms are still out?”

  Natalya was glaring at him. “We’re not going, Kel,” she gritted out. “Not yet.”

  “It’s not all up to you, Natalya.”

  “We’re not leaving,” Sagara said. “Not until we understand what’s going on. What if we bring it back to civilized space? Infect the entire Frontier with it?”

  “What is it?”

  “We don’t know. That’s why we have to stay until we figure it out.”

  “Thank you, Captain,” Park said, to head off any more argument; she had accepted for a while now that they were not getting off this planet any time soon, and knew there was no point in fighting it. “I’m glad we can—cooperate. Finally.”

  He frowned at her, as businesslike as ever. “There are risks, Park. It might spread to you: you could become affected. How would we know?”

  “You’d know,” Park said, meaning ARGUS. But a treacherous part of her felt the incipient headache and thought, It might have already happened.

  Sagara stayed silent at that.

  They had the androids pick Hunter up, her body lifted up to their chests almost as if they were pallbearers at a funeral. Natalya stayed behind in the bridge, too intimidated by either Sagara or the robots to follow. Sagara tailed the g
roup to the infirmary, his eyes glazing over in a way that indicated he was doing something very complicated on his inlays. Neither Park nor Fulbreech spoke to each other for the rest of the long walk to the medical bay.

  It was only when they’d tucked Hunter’s still, silent form into a bed that Fulbreech said softly, “Looks like you didn’t need me, after all.”

  She looked at him in the dark, wondering if it was a complaint, an admonishment. But in fact she imagined that Fulbreech was a little pleased that she had turned to him—and also a little jealous that she’d struck a deal with Sagara, who was obviously the authority here.

  “You gave me something the androids can never give,” she told him. She did like him, she thought, a little hopelessly, remembering that feeling of sharp, surprised recognition when he’d appeared in her Antarctic dream. Despite everything that had happened, she . . . was grateful that he was here. Despite his secrets, his little betrayals. It wasn’t him, it was the harrowing situation they’d found themselves in. His conscription, her Earth-born status. His behavior made sense now, after what Wick had told her. If those professional barriers hadn’t been placed there, outside of their control . . . well. He’d done the best he could for her, risking as much as he was able. He always had, even if she hadn’t always thanked him for it. She wouldn’t have done so much, in his position. But it was telling that he was still the first person she’d thought of, when she was alone and afraid.

  Fulbreech cocked his head at her. “What did I give you, Park?”

  “Support,” she told him, even though it wasn’t quite what she meant to say. “And validation. The androids don’t know enough to question me, to challenge what I say or do. They just do what I tell them. But you have that capacity—to refuse, to think for yourself. And in coming, you implicitly agreed there was some logic to my actions, something to endorse.”

  “Well, it’s not as if you left me a choice,” Fulbreech commented, wry. “I wasn’t just going to say no to you and go back to sleep. You’re wrong on one point, though.”

  “Which point is that?”

  Fulbreech stared down at Hunter like he was viewing a body in an open casket. “I didn’t come because I supported your idea,” he said softly. “I only helped because I support you.”

  * * *

  —

  Headachy morning came eventually, and with it seeping artificial dawn: gray light touching gray walls. Park sat in the medical bay for the entire night, keeping watch over Hunter, who never stirred. She kept watch over herself, too, vigilant for symptoms, disorientation from an earlier injury—or anything else. But little by little, she felt more like herself again.

  Sagara checked in on her intermittently—he even once deigned to bring her sim-coffee—and after a while Wick popped in as well: she had to spend some tiresome moments re-explaining everything that had transpired. Wick looked at her with concern and said, “Are you sure you’re up for this?”

  Do I have a choice? Park wanted to ask. She could only smile tiredly at him and say, “It’s what I’m here for, Commander.”

  He gave her a look that said they both knew it wasn’t true. But he nodded and left her to her work.

  Eventually Jimex came back, as well; he only stared at her when she asked him what he’d been up to in the intervening hours, so after a while Park gave up. She stationed him by the door in case she drifted off and Hunter wandered away again. But in the end she stayed awake, idly testing the signal strength of the communication systems (still down) and wondering if Keller really had been feeling the effects of this affliction, and had kept it hidden from everyone until she was frozen. Had she also felt nauseous and dizzy? Had she sleepwalked for a period of time before anyone found out—or had it hit her all at once?

  But her thoughts were too gray—her brain stung with weariness—and after a while the concerns over Hunter, Keller, and even herself faded away from her.

  In the late morning Chanur showed up, followed closely by Ellenex. She made as if to shunt Park out of the room, but Park said firmly, “I have instructions from Captain Sagara to supervise your examination.”

  Chanur made a low clicking sound with her tongue: another Martian rudeness. But she conducted her checkup of Hunter without further complaint, until she straightened and said softly, “You said you were the one to knock her out?”

  By the door, Jimex gave one slow blink.

  “That’s right,” Park said, calm. She’d already reviewed the details in her head. “Ellenex administered the sedative afterward.”

  Chanur looked at Ellenex, who looked back without saying anything. Then she smiled a little, her blue eye staring.

  Chanur shuddered and looked away. “And how exactly did you do it?”

  “Pressure on the glenoid fossa, or the greater auricular nerve, or the—”

  “Stop.” Chanur held up her hand: Park noticed for the first time that it was gnarled with nasty scars. She looked down at Park coldly and said, “So you think you can get to the bottom of this little mystery, with all of your vast medical knowledge?”

  Park stared steadily back. “I can certainly try. Which is more than some people on this ship are doing.”

  Two red spots appeared high on Chanur’s cheekbones, but otherwise her expression didn’t change. “We all wanted this mission to succeed, Park. You could never know what was at stake for us conscripted.”

  “Wanted? In the past tense?”

  Chanur only shook her head at that and walked away.

  Later, Park asked Ellenex, who had stayed behind to set up some sort of monitoring device for Hunter: “Has she hurt you again, after that first time?”

  “I do not feel pain,” Ellenex answered serenely.

  “Damaged you, then.”

  “No,” Ellenex said. “Not yet.”

  “How is Holt doing?”

  “His artificial skin is growing in nicely.” The medical android busied herself with recording Hunter’s vitals in a medical chart: Chanur insisted on doing things by hand, on paper. “He is designated to be cryogenically frozen by the end of the day.”

  Of course he is, Park thought. For whatever reason the hairs on the nape of her neck prickled. “How many cryogenic pods do we have on this ship?”

  Ellenex’s one good eye seemed to fix on a distant point in space as she consulted her files. “There’s one for every crewmember on the ship,” she answered. “Though there are only two in the medical bay. Dr. Ma and Dr. Keller will have to be transferred.”

  “Transferred”—as if they were switching cubicles in an office. “Where to?”

  “The cargo hold.”

  Where no one could reach them, she thought, feeling grim. Where she couldn’t unfreeze them, if she absolutely had to. But she quashed her paranoia as best she could and said, “Can you tell me how Holt escaped the medical bay? That first time, when Chanur . . . damaged you?”

  Ellenex’s pale blue eyes, off-kilter as they were, looked both sad and a little wild. She reminded Park again of Sally, her childhood nanny and first android companion—but how could that be, when Ellenex was a medical unit and Sally a child-minder, with some twenty years lying between their construction? But there was the same sweet, bland face; the same tidy white uniform.

  “I’m sorry, Dr. Park,” she answered soberly. “I do not have an answer to your question. I cannot explain what happened with Dr. Holt.”

  “What do you mean, you can’t explain?”

  “Perhaps Dr. Chanur is right, and I am malfunctioning,” Ellenex said, downcast.

  “You’re not malfunctioning,” Jimex said from the door. “You are learning.”

  Park looked between them. “What are you talking about?”

  Ellenex touched her hair, almost self-consciously. “It is as we told you, Dr. Park. There are anomalies on the ship.”

  “What sort of anomalies?” The same word
again, she thought. What did they all mean by it, or by ‘assimilation,’ by ‘synthetic’? Since when had they begun forming their own separate understanding of words, employing them in their own special modes of communication? Their own languages? And why had no one taken notice of any of it besides Park?

  Ellenex shook her head, slowly. The damage to her skull made it look like her hair was in danger of sliding off. A doll, Park realized. She was just a human-sized, broken doll. She’s so damaged. I can’t take anything she says seriously.

  “I’m sorry,” Ellenex repeated, her voice soft and mournful. “There are anomalies. I am unable to answer your query at this time.”

  * * *

  —

  Eventually she left Ellenex there to watch Hunter, with Jimex, with Dylanex, too, because even if Ellenex herself was malfunctioning, the others would obey Park’s command to stay put and watch. Her stomach was growling—she could not remember the last time she had eaten. Famished, Park started toward the canteen, then stopped. She stood there in the hallway for a moment, cocking her head to the side. Was she thinking, or was she dimly receiving her body’s own instinct, some secret and sudden message from somewhere inside of her? She wasn’t sure. Then, almost irresistibly, she found herself turning and gravitating toward a different part of the ship. It felt only semi-conscious, as if she had some dense hidden core within herself that she’d never known about, and it was being dragged in one direction by a distant magnet.

  “I need to speak with you,” she said when she reached her destination.

  Fulbreech looked up from his schematics. He was working with METIS in his workspace, drawing holographic maps in the air of what Park assumed was Eos’s terrain. She caught a glimpse of a lake and a strange, twisting spire before Fulbreech gestured and closed the program. It vanished into the air like a blown-out candle flame.