Planetary Parlay

by Cameron Cooper

  Slate moved over to the crate and examined it. “This will be very strange.”

  “Welcome to my world,” I said tartly. “I won’t have people standing up while I eat.”

  He had been tentatively bending his knees to settle upon the crate, but froze, all except his head, which came around to ‘look’ at me.

  Then he returned to the novelty of trying to semi-sit. He did end up perching on the very edge, his inadequate hands propping him up.

  Kamil returned with her fellow Drigu. A few seconds later, Keskemeti emerged. Mercia followed, his ruined clothes in her arms, and stepped out of the suite.

  The other four Drigu arranged the plates and glasses and extras on the crate, balancing them on the flat ribs. One of them arranged the pots of herbs and spices in one of the valleys between the ribs, smiling at their own creativity. I found myself smiling, too.

  I sat on the edge of the armchair, which put me at a good height to eat. Keskemeti took the opposite chair, while the four Drigu bowed and left the suite. Kamil came out of my room carrying the evening gown and moved out of the suite, too. I ground my teeth together to stop myself from telling her to leave it, I would take care of the gown.

  I ate, instead.

  A short while later, Mercia returned, empty handed. She came over to Keskemeti’s chair and stood just behind it.

  “Slate, please tell her to sit in the chair.”

  “May I tell her what you told me, Danny?”

  “Yes.”

  Slate spoke.

  Mercia looked horrified, then thoughtful. She moved over to the chair, gestured to Keskemeti, then to the chair.

  Keskemeti looked at me. “What did you tell Slate, to make him sit?”

  “That I won’t eat with other people on their feet watching me do it.”

  He considered that and nodded at Mercia. “Have a seat.”

  She sat on the very edge of the chair, her hands in her lap.

  Keskemeti pushed the plate of fruit and cheese toward her, and she held up her hands and waved them, fear in her eyes.

  “There’s probably some sort of punishment for eating Asgar food,” I told him.

  Keskemeti pulled the plate back once more. “These people…” he muttered.

  I went over to the crates serving as a kitchen and bought the plate of biscuits to the table. I picked up one of them, picked up Mercia’s wrist and laid the biscuit on her palm. “Go on,” I told her. “We can all eat each others’ food. You’ll like it.”

  Slate murmured a translation, and he didn’t use my voice to do it.

  Mercia stared at the biscuit as if it might come alive and dance upon her palm. Then she cautiously nibbled one corner of it.

  I left her to it and got on with my meal. Calories would take the edge off my mood and let me think.

  When Kamil returned, I had Slate go through the routine, and got her sitting on the fourth chair, a biscuit in her hand. She took a tiny bite, chewed, raised her brows and gobbled the rest of it, smiling.

  I pushed the plate of biscuits toward her, while Keskemeti looked very pleased.

  “Danny, may I ask a question, while you are eating?” Slate said.

  I glanced at him. “Sure. It’s civilized to converse over a meal, even if you can’t actually eat it.”

  Slate did a little twist of his shoulders, then said, “Did I misunderstand the conversation you had with The Melissa in the hall? Is it true that some Carinads, those among you, were once computers?”

  Keskemeti’s gaze met mine. He grimaced.

  I ignored him and answered Slate. “They are very complex computers—neural networks with sophisticated processing and memory, who develop sentience. If they wish it, we provide them with human bodies.”

  “Then not all sentient computers choose to become human?”

  I thought of Lyssa. “It’s complicated, Slate. It’s a decision unique to every digital personality. And many of them have to figure out how to make the money they need to pay for the body, too. That can take a while. But most sentients find computer hardware too limiting, in comparison to humans who can move freely and experience far more than they. They want a fully human life, despite the limitations that come with it.”

  “Limitations?” Slate sounded shocked again.

  “The human brain cannot hold all the data and memories sentience have. They must pick and choose what memories they bring with them into the human body. Although, they’re still light years smarter than born humans, even leaving most of their knowledge behind.”

  I kept half an eye on Keskemeti as I spoke. Keskemeti dropped his smarts when he was thinking about Xaviens, so it was likely he didn’t know I was lecturing him as well as Slate. He shook his head as I spoke of Xaviens being smarter.

  I raised my brow at him. “You’re saying I’m wrong?”

  “That they’re smarter? No. But don’t you see how that makes them dangerous?” he shot back.

  I snapped. It had been a long day. “It wasn’t Xaviens who killed your wife and daughter, Jonas.”

  His face turned white. His lips moved, but nothing came out.

  I leaned forward. “Two Xaviens risked their asses to find your family and get them back. Holding onto this ridiculous crusade to rid the world of Xaviens is insane.”

  Keskemeti sat back. “They’re not natural,” he said woodenly.

  All the usual arguments about any bio body being natural rose to my lips, but I was tired in mind and spirit and Rayhel’s reaction upon learning about Xaviens had frankly scared me. Instead I dropped back to comfortable direct speech. “So they’re not natural. So fucking what?” I railed at Keskemeti.

  “May I interject with an observation, Danny?” Slate said.

  I think he startled both of us. Even Kamil and Mercia turned their heads to look at him in surprise. They had been following my exchange with Keskemeti with avid interest, although they couldn’t possibly understand what we had been flinging at each other.

  I drew in a breath. Another one. I had encouraged Slate to converse, I reminded myself. “Go ahead, Slate.”

  “Dr. Keskemeti expresses similar emotions and reasoning as the mysina of our worlds. It has been established that such psychoses are generally irreversible.”

  I watched Keskemeti absorb the “irreversible” verdict. The corner of his mouth lifted. “What is mysina, Slate?”

  “There is no direct translation. It is a noun, used to describe anyone with an unreasonable, illogical hatred of anything non-human, usually expressed in relation to androids.”

  Keskemeti’s smile disappeared.

  “If it’s usually about androids, what else can a mysina hate?” I asked.

  “Anything non-human,” Keskemeti supplied, sounding justified.

  “The second largest category in the definition is an abnormal fear or hatred for Drigu,” Slate replied.

  Keskemeti sucked in a breath. “No!” He shot to his feet. “Drigu are human!”

  “Not in the eyes of the Muradar,” I told him softly.

  Keskemeti trembled. “Slate is wrong. He must be wrong!”

  “About a class of people who hate him?” I replied. “I don’t think he’d get something like that wrong.”

  “Alas, I am quite correct,” Slate said. “I can cite thirty-seven different sources that define the mysina as I just did.”

  Keskemeti shook his head. “It’s wrong. It’s just…wrong. Can’t you see that?”

  “I can,” I said, my tone cool. “It makes perfect sense to the Terrans, though.”

  He turned and trudged to his room. Mercia bounced up and hurried after him.

  I shrugged and finished my meal.

  The next morning, we discovered that Marlee Colton had disappeared.

  —21—

  “She came back to the suite after dinner,” Dalton said. “I remember her tattoos glowing, just ahead of me.”

  “I saw her go into her room,” Elizabeth Crnčević added. “She is next to me.” Even with her arms
folded, she seemed to drape elegantly.

  I tapped my thigh. “Do you remember hearing anything during the night? Did she get up and come out here, maybe to get something?” The common room was full of people looking weary, their hair mussed from sleep and their expressions strained.

  Elizbeth shook her head. “I slept very soundly last night.” Her tone was regretful.

  Calpurnia, who had discovered Colton’s room was empty, turned to Keskemeti. He was one of the few still sitting. Everyone else had surged to their feet at the news. Calpurnia gripped his jacket fronts and hauled him to his feet. “This is all your fault,” she told him and gave him a little shake.

  Keskemeti didn’t show any fear, but he didn’t struggle either. “In our ignorance of Terran ways, we are all making mistakes, Captain Chowdhury.”

  “You told them about the Xavien!” she cried and gave him another shake.

  “They would have learned about Xaviens sooner or later,” I said. “And we don’t know that the Terrans have anything to do with this. Colton could have decided to swim in the ocean and will be back before breakfast.”

  Fiori and Arati Georgeson had been preparing something on top of the crates. At my mention of breakfast, they turned back to work.

  “I didn’t even know you knew swimming in oceans was a thing,” Dalton said to me, sounding awed.

  I knew he was attempting to reduce tensions. And he was right. Blaming each other wouldn’t help us figure out where Marlee had gone. “Calpurnia, put Keskemeti down. You don’t know where he’s been.”

  She let go of him and brushed her hands off.

  “I’ll look into this,” I told the room at large. “You all need to prepare for the negotiations this morning. I’ve asked Arati and Fiori to make plenty of food. You should eat well. There’s coffee, too.”

  “Coffee!” Gratia Rosalie breathed happily.

  Jai scrubbed at his jaw. “If Colton has not returned by the time the meeting begins, we will ask the Terrans to look for her, too.”

  I nodded and took the coffee cup Seong offered me. “Everyone, return to what you were doing. Slate, may I speak with you, please?” I caught Seong’s arm as he turned back to the crates to get another cup to give to someone. “Seong, a moment.”

  He simply looked at me. I don’t think I had seen him smile since we had landed. But he had not smiled much on the journey here, either.

  “How are you feeling, now that you are actually on Earth and able to speak to Terrans once more?” I asked him.

  He stared at me, his black eyes enormous. I watched in amazement as his eyes filled with tears, which dripped down his cheeks.

  “What is it?” I asked, alarmed. I turned my head. “Elizabeth!” I called softly.

  Seong’s chin worked. “Nothing is like it should be,” he said, his voice wobbling.

  “Hold him,” Elizabeth whispered, just behind me. “He’s a little kid who just fell down, in a big kid body.”

  I knew what to do with scraped knees and sniffles, although it had been a very long time. I wrapped my arms around Seong and pressed his head against my shoulder. “It’s okay,” I murmured, soothing his back.

  Seong sobbed and clung to me. “They’re not what I remember!” he wailed, his voice muffled.

  I beckoned to Ven, who instantly put his plate down and came over to us.

  “The Terrans were never the way you remember them, Seong,” I said. “They were showing you a mask, to make you cooperate. Isn’t that right, Ven?”

  “The way things are here in the palace is closer to real Terran life,” Ven said in agreement.

  Seong just cried harder. We were dismantling his illusions and that was hard for any adult to handle, let alone a kid. Keskemeti was another good example of that resistance. Although it wasn’t us Carinads who were ruining Seong’s fantasies. The Terrans were doing that just by being themselves.

  “I miss my mother!” Seong sobbed.

  “And we will get her back for you,” Jai said, right behind me, making me jump a little.

  Seong raised his head to look at Jai. Hope showed in his tear-filled eyes. “But the Terrans want you to buy them and you refused…”

  “For now, we are refusing, but this is just the beginning of the negotiations.” Jai spoke in a gentle, soothing tone, his voice deep and reassuring. “You might be able to help me with that, Seong.”

  Seong sniffed mightily. “How?” He didn’t sound convinced.

  “Come over here and sit and eat, while I explain,” Jai said, waving toward the chair he’d left behind.

  I let Seong go, and he and Jai moved back to the chairs, Jai talking softly.

  I looked at Elizabeth. “That came out of nowhere.”

  She didn’t look amused or surprised. “Oh, it has been building since we got here,” she assured me. “I was waiting for him to hit a crisis point, but you beat me to it with a very timely question.” She patted my arm and moved back to the kitchen crates.

  Everyone returned to eating, while I took Slate aside. “When you are in power-down mode during the night, are you still able to monitor everything around you?”

  “Are you asking me if I saw Marlee Colton leave the suite last night, Danny?”

  “Yes.”

  “I would have noted that she left, had I seen her. But she was not one of those who came out to the common room last night.”

  “There were a lot?”

  “More than half the people in this suite came out to the common room some time during the night.”

  That didn’t surprise me. I could barely sleep, myself. Had the Terrans set us up so we’d be negotiating in a state of sleep deprivation and high stress? Yet we had never considered holding the negotiations anywhere but here. We’d been lured by the prospect of seeing Terra for ourselves.

  “Is there a security patrol around the palace, Slate? A Muradar navy squad, perhaps? Someone who might have seen her moving about the grounds?”

  “There is a patrol,” Slate admitted. Also not a surprise to me. “But they are not permitted to monitor the grounds, merely the borders of the grounds.”

  “There are borders?” I hadn’t noticed any fences or lines of demarcation yesterday.

  “Nominal borders,” Slate replied.

  “Why no monitoring of the grounds themselves?” I held up my hand. “No, wait…the Asgar don’t want their privacy breeched?”

  “I suspect that is so,” Slate said.

  “And who would I speak to about one of ours going missing?”

  Slate hesitated, then said, “As you have a line of communication already established, I believe the best person for you to speak to would be The Florina.”

  Yep. Absolutely zero surprise there, too.

  *

  Marlee Colton had not appeared by the time we assembled in the hall for the start of the second day of negotiations.

  I did not take one of the chairs. Instead, I stood at the back of the room with Slate. I wanted to be on my feet, although I have no idea why. It just felt better to be in a position where I could react faster.

  Maybe it was all the problems and mysteries I was being handed that were making me edgy. But I went with my gut and stayed on my feet.

  That worried Dalton, who had great faith in my instincts. I knew that because he didn’t use the chair he’d sat in yesterday. Instead, he picked a chair on the end of a row, at the back, and close to the door.

  And maybe he was feeling uneasy, too.

  “Before we return to the agenda this morning,” Jai said, as everyone at the big table in the middle of the room got settled in their chairs, “I would like to ask for your assistance in a…domestic matter.”

  Belfon Constantine raised a brow. “Yes?”

  “That man never looks happy,” I murmured. “Even when he’s trying to be nice.”

  “One of our party has gone missing,” Jai said. “She was not in her room when we rose this morning. I wonder if you know anything about that?”

  I scanned
the Terran faces, looking for the wrong reaction, a hint of complicity. Rayhel didn’t quiver. Neither did Isuma Florina. The Assembly members in the row of chairs immediately behind them all held puzzled or concerned expressions, too.

  “And which among you has got lost?” Constantine asked.

  “Which?” I breathed. “Why didn’t he say ‘who’?” I looked at Slate. “Is that a translation error?”

  “No, Danny.”

  “Marlee Colton is missing,” Jai said to Constantine.

  “The mechanical?” Constantine returned. His mouth reverted to a straight, thin line. “I see.”

  “Wow, word spread fast,” I breathed. But then, why wouldn’t it? It was hot news, for the Terrans.

  Jai shook his head. “Marlee Colton is human, Director. We are all human.”

  “Some more than others,” Constantine replied.

  Isuma Florina rested her hand on Constantine’s arm, as Jai sat up higher, ready to be insulted. “We will turn all our appropriate resources to looking for your friend, Jai Van Veen. May we coordinate with Danny Andela? I understand she is your security chief.”

  If they’d figured that much out about our party, then we weren’t doing a very good job of being subtle. Well, we’d known they would learn much about us just by being here.

  “Yes, that would be appreciated, thank you,” Jai said.

  “Can we return to the agenda now?” Constantine asked gruffly.

  Jai hesitated. I knew he wanted to press the matter, ask for details about what Isuma would do, what resources she would use to investigate, but he instead said, “Yes, and I apologize for the detour. Let us continue.”

  “Thank you,” Constantine said and turned to confer with one of the Assembly members behind him in low whispers.

  “And still he doesn’t smile,” I breathed.

  “He does not smile because he does not like Carinads,” Slate said, his volume also turned down very low.

  “No Terrans like us,” I shot back. “Constantine is less subtle about showing it, which I find a deplorable flaw in a man who leads other men.”