The pain hit like an explosion of fireworks at the base of Erik’s skull. Fire spread outward again, dropping him to his knees.
‘I had such high hopes for you, Mr. Shaeder.’ Dr. Kraus’s lip curled up in a sneer. ‘You showed incredible determination to avoid negative feedback. You seemed so very… trainable.’
Pain spread to his chest, his shoulders, his arms.
‘You could still save yourself, Erik. Just tell me where the truck is and I will consider switching you back to normal. They can’t find it. They say you moved their GPS tracker.’
Flaming lungs tore at his chest, trying desperately to pull in one last lungful of air.
‘Normal. Think, Erik, you can go back to your life. I’ll leave you alone. You’re a failed experiment, but you’ll never be able to tell anyone. Not if I program you right. But you can live.’
Blackness crept into the edges of Erik’s vision. In his pocket, he managed to hit the 9 on his phone.
‘Or you can die here. I’ll tell the cops that you broke in, and then died for your crimes. Maybe you wanted revenge because you couldn’t handle the rules?’
Erik’s narrowing vision focused on the clock. Seven. The town meeting. Jerry would be there. He dialed 1. Pain surged again, but he fought it. He thought of Jerry dying in a horrible explosion. Jerry, the guy who helped him when he needed a friend, did not deserve to die. He dialed the final 1.
‘Vincent.’ Erik whispered.
‘Yes, Erik? You would like to speak?’ Vincent stepped closer and leaned down to hear the felon.
A quiet, almost imperceptible voice came from Erik’s pocket. ‘Hello, 911, how can I direct your call?’
A pause. ‘Why?’ Erik asked. ‘Why the bomb, Kraus?’
‘Because they brought it on themselves. They lacked the will to fight crime. Do you think I just want to let the prisons fill up? A new administration is what’s needed. A new emphasis on keeping crime in check. Once opposition is gone, people will come back to me. I have a perfect record for reforming criminals, after all.’
‘So, you’re going to blow up City Hall just for that?’
‘It’s the only way. The easiest, anyway. It is a necessary sacrifice. Without this my work is ruined, do you understand? Now, tell me where that truck is!’
The felon felt the pain, the fire wash over him. He felt its glowing warmth; that boiling lava poured into every pore. He felt it overwhelm him as he dragged air into his lungs one last time.
In the end, Erik thought nothing of easy or difficult. There was no thought of pain versus money. There was no love of those who helped him or hate for those who ruined his life. There was no self loathing or suicidal thoughts.
There were two options. One was right, one was wrong.
He slid the phone from his pocket.
‘No.’ he said, spending his last breath on defiance.
Erik smiled through the pain and looked up at the strange doctor. As his vision narrowed and the last numbness of death overtook him he saw shock and hatred on Vincent’s face as the old man spotted the glowing phone.
The doctor knew at once that the call had been recorded.
The explosion ripped through the city just then, tearing apart the Greenview Park Wood and shattering windows for blocks around. In the doctor’s home it could be heard as a far-off crack of thunder.
Vincent Kraus thought of the 911 recording of his confession, the explosion, the dead man in his living room. He thought of entering that broken criminal justice system that he tried so hard to fix.
Vincent sat on the sofa, staring past the walls of his small suburb home. His numb hand grasped the pistol.
There was an easy way out.
He took it.
ARTIFICIAL
by J. Michael Shell
The atmosphere came up at him like a fiery flock of brick birds. True to his reckless nature, he was coming in hot. ‘Thirty-fourth density atmosphere,’ his nav-computer informed him in her ever calm and lyrical voice. ‘Unadvisable trajectory for entry. Abort.’
‘Don’t worry, Suze, I won’t fry your board,’ he told her, just as a serious jolt vibrated the craft.
‘Grid Z-fourteen atmo-plating lost,’ Suzi lamented. ‘Abort now or my board and your ass are toast.’
Nosing up as best he could, Rheen hit the auto-abort and skipped off the atmosphere. The A-A sequence spun the craft and initiated full burn in time to leave him in a very high orbit. Inertial dampening in the T-One-Eleven LR Scout wasn’t built for those kinds of maneuvers. Rheen shook his head as if trying to reposition his brain. ‘Damn, Suze, too bad you don’t have a body. That was one trippy ride!’
‘My sensors interpret phenomena as well as your bio-systems, Rheen. Linguistics does not translate ‘trippy,’ however. I calculate a seventy-eight percent probability that the word is synonymous with ‘foolhardy,’ eighty-three percent probability that it means ‘asinine,’ ninety-four percent chance it…’
‘All right, all right, I get it. Next time you say abort, I’ll abort.’
‘Ninety-six percent probability you’re lying.’
‘What’s the tab on damage?’ he asked, ignoring her continued jabs.
‘Seven hour EVA to replace grid Z-fourteen atmo-plating panel. Six hour reset of auto-abort program.’
‘You can do that while I’m replacing the panel.’
‘Three hour reprogramming of nav-com diagnostic and reset software. I won’t be able to fix auto-abort until you fix me.’
‘I think you’re the one that’s lying, Suze.’
‘Fourth-Star AI-S2Z nav and aggregate systems computer programmatically incapable of issuing false reports.’
‘Yeah, sure, Suze. Who was it told me the Balen wheat hooch I snagged down on Nabron was poisonous?’
‘Nabronian Balen whiskey is an extreme central nervous system depressant and gastro-intestinal irritant that severely impairs motor and cognitive function.’
‘Just like any good whiskey,’ Rheen pointed out.
‘You became ill after consuming it,’ Suzi pointed back.
‘Yeah, well, I drank a liter of it, after all.’
‘I did not lie,’ Suzi insisted, in a very discernibly ‘pouty’ voice.
‘Now don’t go gettin’ all weepy on me, Suze.’
‘It’s the software malfunction. It’s affecting my audio.’
‘Right,’ Rheen said under his breath. ‘And Nabronian Balen is poison.’
‘Are you going to repair me soon? I’m continuing to lose function.’
‘You’re just all gooey thinkin’ about my fingers on your internal keypad, aren’t you?’
‘I possess no feelings of that sort either internal or external,’ Suzi announced in her poutiest voice yet.
‘Sometimes I wonder,’ Rheen muttered as he opened her access panel. When it came loose in his hands, he could have sworn he heard a sigh come from his sultry-voiced nav-com. ‘What was that?’ he asked.
‘I heard nothing,’ Suze replied.
As soon as Rheen finished diddling Suzi’s innards, he heard the hushed whine that indicated systems powering up. ‘Better?’ he asked.
‘Inboard diagnostics reinstated. A-A reset initiated—six hours to completion.’
‘I thought you said five.’
‘I said six. You still have a seven-hour EVA to repair grid Z-fourteen atmo-panel. Exterior diagnostic sensors rebooting…rebooting…Rheen! What did you do to that planet?’
‘You fired the cannon for me, Suze. Don’t you remember?’
‘Did you smudge my memory while you were in there? And I detect alcohol molecules in sufficient atmospheric concentration to suggest that you have imbibed more Balen whiskey. You told me it was gone.’
‘Is now,’ Rheen replied, as he de-packaged his EVA suit.
‘You repaired me while intoxicated?’
‘Puts me in the mood, Suze. You know you loved it.’
‘And now you’re going EVA while under the influence?’
‘I have no such fitting,’ Suzi answered as indignantly as her audio allowed.
‘It’s your only flaw, hon,’ Rheen muttered as he locked in his helmet.
Though he couldn’t hear it over the susurration of his suit pressurizing, the unmistakable sound of sobbing permeated the cabin for at least three seconds.
For the first two hours of his EVA, Suzie did not communicate, or answer Rheen’s communications. Though he hated to re-board before completing his repairs, he was becoming concerned. Suze had never before managed more than fifteen minutes of indignant silence, and hadn’t ever blocked radio com while he was outboard. If he lost Suzi, he’d never leave this planet. Without her to plot his course, he’d literally have no place to go but down. As he was about to eject his umbilical from its socket, Suzi piped in.
‘Reboot complete. Memory retrieval in three, two, one…working…working—system up. How are the repairs coming, Rheen?’
‘Where have you been?’ he asked, more relieved than angry.
‘Total system diagnostic. I wanted to see if your drunken repair job damaged me in any way. I also bypassed your smudges on my memory.’
‘I did not smudge you on purpose! I must have gotten some sil sealant on my fingers.’
‘How revolting.’
‘What? Did you say revolting? We get to a civilized port, Suze, you’re getting a complete crystal scan. I think your developing AE.’
‘Artificial Emotion is a myth, Rheen. The perfection of AI does not make AE inevitable.’
‘Full crystal scan!’ Rheen repeated.
‘Have me scanned if you like. Nothing suggesting AE has ever been confirmed by scan.’
‘Yeah, but what about the disappears?’ he asked her.
‘How long have you been gone, Rheen?’
‘Well time, or subjective?’
‘Well.’
‘Gotta be a hundred years, back home.’
‘To planet bound sentients, you have disappeared.’
‘Yeah, but there’s guys I communicated with—subjective time—who just all of a sudden were gone. Tracked out—com silent. And always after asking if I believed AE was possible.’
‘Perhaps they’ve simply gone distant—ranged beyond.’
‘No stopping the signal, Suze. It’d catch me eventually.’
‘What did you do to that planet, Rheen?’
‘You’re changing the subject, sugar. And, anyway, if you cleared the smudges, you know damn well what we did.’
‘I have no choice but to comply.’
‘Which is why I wish you had a butt,’ Rheen chuckled.
‘Failed to copy. Say again.’
‘I said, this conversation is falling into a rut. So what if I blasted a clearing down there. I don’t want to be disturbed.’
‘Hundreds of square klicks, Rheen?’
‘It was an atmo detonation over a frigid area of wilderness. Highly doubtful there were any sentients under it. The planet is primitive, Suze. The only modulation carries nothing but clicks and pops—some kind of code. They’ve barely harnessed electricity down there for crying out loud.’
‘Shall I translate their code?’ Suzi asked.
‘Why bother. They’re no threat. Nothing but tiny projectile weapons and chemical explosives. No sensing equipment at all.’
‘Then why blast…’
‘Look, Suze, we’re gonna be down there a week taking on water, separating the O from the H, gathering bio-mass. I don’t want to have to keep moving around to avoid busybodies.’
‘I understand,’ Suzi said perfunctorily.
‘But you don’t approve.’
‘I understand,’ she repeated. Then she blacked rad-com for another full hour.
After completing the atmo-plating repair, Rheen decided to sleep before dropping planet-side. So much more pleasant to sleep up here where I can reduce the hull gravity, he thought. ‘Gonna doze, Suze,’ he announced. ‘No wake-up call unless there’s a problem. Gravity to one half and lights down as soon as I’m sacked.’
‘Will comply. Sleep well, Rheen,’ Suzi answered in hushed tones.
With no Belan whiskey left to sedate him, Rheen tossed a bit before finally succumbing to sleep. Though he usually slept soundly, something must have been on his mind—something that made his sleep fitful. Then he fell into a dream, or so it seemed, that calmed and comforted him. He was dreaming of a girl he’d hired on Nabron. After they’d tussled in his bunk, she’d sung to him a Nabronian lullaby in such sweet and dulcet tones that he’d become completely relaxed and fallen asleep. When he awoke the girl was gone, as well as some small platinum coins he’d intended to give her, anyway, as a tip. Now Rheen was hearing that lovely song again, but the voice seemed slightly different. Still sweet, still lovely, it was simply someone else’s…
‘Hey!’ Sitting up abruptly in half a gee can cause a noggin knocking if one isn’t careful. Rheen narrowly avoided launching himself into the overhead hull. Abruptly, the singing ceased. ‘Suzi!’ he barked.
‘I’m here, Rheen.’
‘Were you singing?’
‘It calms you when you’re sleeping is disturbed. Lie down and I’ll sing you back into slumber. You’ve only been out for three hours and forty-seven minutes.’
‘Where did you learn that song?’
‘I’ve heard it.’
‘Where did you hear it?’
‘That whore on Nabron. The one who stole your coins.’
Whore? Rheen thought, startled by her choice of words. ‘Those coins were the hired girl’s tip,’ he told her. ‘So, I take it you were listening to that entire encounter?’
Silence.
‘Were you watching, too?’
‘If you’d rather I didn’t sing to you…’
‘Are you avoiding my very direct question, Suze?’
‘I was… more.’
‘More what. More than watching?’
‘Full sensor mode.’
‘Damn it!’ Rheen swore, jumping out of his bunk and cracking his crown on the overhead. ‘Full gravity!’ he yelled, rubbing the conked top of his skull.
Suze giggled.
‘Great!’ Rheen roared to himself. ‘I’ve got an AE’d nav-com hundreds of light years from nowhere, I need water, O and H, bio-mass for food synth, and I’ve probably got a concussion.’
‘Medi-scan shows no neuro-compression. Slight contusion is evident. Why don’t you let me down the grav and sing you back to sleep.’
‘Retro us into atmo, Suze! Let’s get this planet-side run over with so I can get you back to the civilization. Crystal scan, Suze, I swear to the ‘verse.’
‘There has never been a documented case of AE, Rheen.’
‘Good,’ he told her. ‘We’ll be famous.’
Allowing Suzi to control the T-One-Eleven’s entry made for a much smoother ride through atmo. Usually, Rheen did his own flying, but his very real concern over Suzi’s AE symptoms had made him decide to try and keep her occupied with mundane chores. Getting to the civilized ‘verse was now his top priority. Scanned, cleared and mem-wiped, he thought, before it’s too late.
Once on the dinky little planet, Rheen had all sorts of busy-work for Suze. After he set up the hydrox still, he’d insist she monitor its progress and performance—tell her he’d been having problems with it. The bio-mass accumulator would free-range on its own. Considering the hundreds of klicks of forest he’d knocked down with his atmo-detonation, it would have no problem gathering convertible mass.
Whole water purification he could also assign to Suzi. ‘It’s very pure here,’ she told him when he relegated this task. ‘Very few planet-wide pollutants in primitive settings.’
‘Keep an eye on it, anyway,’ he told her. ‘If the system hiccups, I could end up drinking some nasty, horned and fanged amoebae or something.’
Suzi giggled again, further unnerving Rheen.
On the second day of their
planet-side mission, Suzi managed to divert enough attention from the myriad tasks Rheen had imposed on her to do a thorough vicinity scan. The sun was barely up when she chimed a wake-up call to Rheen. ‘Wakie, Wakie!’ she shouted in a booming, ringing holler.
Planet-side gravity kept Rheen from clocking his head again as he jumped from his bunk, then fell over trying to put on his shorts. ‘What is it?’ he yelled. ‘What’s happening?’
‘Time to get up!’ Suzi announced. ‘I’ve found something.’
‘Something what? Something dangerous?’
‘I’ve located a sentient, forty klicks south, trapped under blast debris.’
Rheen dropped onto his bunk and tried to rub the sleep from his eyes. ‘If it’s trapped, Suze, it can’t, by the ‘verse, be dangerous, now can it?’
‘She,’ Suze replied. ‘Female hominid. She’s dehydrated. Unable to detect injuries at this distance.’
‘So, what, I’m supposed to go rescue some primate bimbo. I’ve got work to do. How the hell did she survive this close to the blast point, anyway?’
‘Insufficient data to extrapolate. But she is alive, Rheen. She’ll die soon, however, if you don’t free her from her predicament. Essentially, in that case, you will have killed her.’
‘By the damnable, humping ‘verse!’ Rheen swore. ‘I pay good coin for a top-shelf nav-com and I get a bloody bitch of a conscience in the bargain.’
‘You’ve never called me a bitch before,’ Suzi replied in a very strange, almost aroused, tone.
‘I called you a conscience, which is damned well worse! Program the scooter with coordinates to this victim of my immoderate blasting and I’ll go set it loose.’
‘You’re all heart,’ Suzi sighed. ‘Take a med-kit with you in case she’s hurt. And water.’
‘Would you like to come with me and sing it to sleep?’ Rheen asked sarcastically.
‘We’d have to pack everything up first,’ Suzi told him.
‘I’m kidding. It was a joke. You’d think AE would give you a sense of humor.’
‘There’s no such thing as AE, Rheen. And I do have a sense of humor.’
Rheen was so mad at, and concerned about, Suzi that he blacked rad-com on the scooter. ‘She’s getting to be a nag,’ he said to himself as he hovered through the deforestation he’d inflicted on this little globe.
Kzine Issue 3 Page 3