All the Difference

by Edward McKeown

  “How is that bad?”

  “Not sure. He just strikes a false note with me. Then again, he is a politician. In any event, you will meet them soon. We are invited for dinner later this week, and I said I’d bring you.”

  I am pleased by this development.

  “The only thing is…”

  “You do not want your sister to know what I am.”

  “Only because I don’t trust her or her husband, and for no other reason.”

  I nod.

  “You believe me about the no other reason, right?” His face is anxious.

  I laugh. “Yes, Wrik. You are a terrible liar at the best of times and, worst of all if you try to lie to me. I believe you.”

  “Good. However I did wish I had brought some presents for the kids. Hey, could you have Dusko fly a few things out to us?”

  I nod. Wrik describes the items he wants as presents for the children. I will inform Dusko later. There is no reason to wake him for this task.

  We walk arm in arm back to the house.

  “It is a beautiful night,” I say.

  “Now,” he agrees, smiling at me.

  We retire to our bed. Wrik is asleep not long after his head hits the pillow.

  When I wake, I find Maauro on the bed next to me, her head resting lightly in what has become her spot on my left shoulder. Her eyes are closed in her latest bit of fiction, but I know it is because she values these moments. She has nothing that she would rather do, or nothing she cannot also do while in this position. She smiles despite her closed eyes, and I suspect she knows exactly what I am thinking. We have come a long way since we quarreled on the deck of a flatboat heading into the jungles of Kandalor, with me referring to her as a “killbot.” I find the remembrance of my saying it, suddenly painful.

  Maauro’s eyes flick open. “What is wrong?”

  “Nothing.”

  “You tensed suddenly.”

  “A bad memory of something stupid I once said.”

  Her eyes search mine. “I wish your memories did not so plague you.”

  “It’s in the nature of the sort of beings we are.”

  She nods, and a strand of her long hair tickles my nose. “Yes, you don’t have the advantage of being able to delete a memory. Of course, I did,” she rose up on her elbow, “until I promised you that I would never delete a memory with you in it. Now I find that I treasure them all, the good and bad, the full record of the life that I am having.”

  “And none of them cause you pain?”

  “Some do. You, shot on Kandalor because I failed to anticipate what you and Lostra would do. Worst of all, when M-7 and I were battling for control of this body, I shot you, a nick on the cheek, but it was all I could then manage against my other self. These memories cause me some distress, but not the way they do for you. For you, it is sometimes as if you are experiencing the event again. For me, though I have perfect recall of all I see and do, it is merely a recording of something that has happened, unalterable, despite any wish of mine.”

  I sighed. “Sometimes I envy you the detachment, the calmness, and the distance from pain.”

  “Even that has changed for me. Once, as only a machine, I recalled my past perfectly, but never looked forward to a future, as there was no chance of a change for me. M-7 I was and would be. It’s not as if I was going to grow up, grow old, have children or retire, all the changes you face. So in a sense, I lived only in the present.

  “In my life with you, I have discovered change. I no longer exist to kill. I explore, I make friends, I help people, and I fall in love. I am no longer a frightening monster, but a pretty girl—”

  “A very pretty girl,” I said.

  She smiled. “But with that has come the fear of loss, the concern over hurting and being hurt. I dread most that something could happen to our feelings for each other.”

  “It won’t.”

  She hesitated, then blurted out. “It did between you and Jaelle.”

  I was quiet for a few seconds, thinking. “I guess I shouldn’t give reassurances as if you were a child, or even a young girl, not with Jaelle as an example and Olivia as well. I guess I can only say that, as a man, this is the thing I am most certain of.

  “Sometimes, I worry the same on my end. I mean, you really don’t need me for anything anymore. There are braver, stronger, and more successful men out there. Then there’s always the worry of that handsome boy-robot showing up sometime.”

  She laughed lightly. “Now it is my turn to offer assurances as if you were a child, or a young boy. See, we are the same in more ways than you think. Whatever and whoever else is out there, somehow I know this is best for me. What I want most for myself. Variety would just be variety. Of course,” she poked me in the ribs with a finger that contains a high speed flechette gun, “you males seem very interested in variety in females, like bad children taking a bite of all the cookies on a plate. Our friend Delt seems to be a good example of this.”

  “God,” I responded cautiously, “has both a sense of humor and a lot to answer for in the way he put men and women together.”

  I heard sounds from downstairs.

  “Your mother is up,” Maauro added, “doubtless filled with curiosity over your visit with Rena.”

  “Doubtless,” I said, sitting up.

  “And it gives you a badly needed escape from the direction that this conversation was heading in,” she added archly.

  “Which I am promptly going to avail myself of,” I said, heading for the bathroom.

  “Resistance is futile,” she called from under the blankets.

  Showered and dressed, we joined Mom for breakfast. I filled her in on my brief and curious interlude with my sister and her family.

  “I should have thought about presents for the grandchildren,” she added.

  “Is that the takeaway here?” I asked, amused.

  “Hard to quite say what the result is,” she said, throwing up her hands. “Honestly, that girl has never made anything easy.”

  “The contact was at least not confrontational,” Maauro added.

  “There is that,” I said.

  The rest of the day was spent helping mom with some repairs on her house, with Maauro playing a combination of plumber, electrician, general contractor and factory. As long as we had metal to pour into her, she could come up with any part that we needed. I was a little distressed over the number of things that required repair or replacement. Money had indeed been tight and the landlord not very forthcoming. That would stop, I determined.

  Some of Mom’s friends came over in the evening to say hello, and this turned into an impromptu wine and cheese party. Word had gotten round about Wrik Trigardt now, and it seemed that, so far as these folks were concerned, the acts of Wrik Trigardt had buried the failures of Piet Van Zyle, the latter name everyone knew better than to utter in my mother’s house. All of them were clearly fond of my mother, including Dr Stasoon, who she sometimes worked for, and the town mayor, Lindanal Cook, who seemed a free-spirited woman for Retief. The town in general seemed to have little use for the politics of what some of them called the “Old Retief.”

  I found myself the center of attention, telling of Seddon in an easy, edited version of the story that was becoming second nature to me now. A couple of women had me blushing, when they talked of not having brought their eligible daughters because of a slim, beautiful girl who’d already won my heart. Maauro, for her part, played shy and retiring, probably feeling somewhat overwhelmed by the free-flowing interaction of so many biologicals in such an unstructured fashion.

  As the last of the neighbors leave Eldra’s house, my intruder programs aboard the satellite over Rena’s home signal me. They have detected a major increase in coded traffic. I have prepared for this moment carefully. My programs have gradually infiltrated, analyzing and developing antibodies
to the virus protection. One by one, the satellite’s protective programs have fallen to me without ever triggering their defenses.

  The attack barrier remains, and it is a different matter. I use the same worms I unleashed on the Voit-Veru world when I took over that planet’s terraforming equipment. My worms enter the barrier, though I think the odds are even as to whether they will trigger it. The barrier itself does not concern me. It is too feeble to damage me or my programs, but it will alert the biologicals that I have breached their security. In .0080097487 of a second, the battle is over. My worms breach the attack barrier and lower it without generating an alert. I have been lucky.

  On the other side of the barrier is a wealth of military and tactical information. Much of it is encoded. My cryptology programs swing into full deployment, and information begins to flow to me. Initial indications are that this is likely a simple, but effective book code. Unless one knows the book, such are often impossible to break. This would stop the attack of most AIs, but I am M-7, a quantum computer optimized for data extraction. The struggle is now an exercise in sheer computing power, and I doubt that a group as provincial as the Retief rebels would base their ciphers on books from alien species. Correlating Retief history and human literature allows me exclude many other Terran root languages. I begin running 2,981,013 works simultaneously to see which books generate sensible information. Some, obviously not correlateable works, I drop and replace. Gradually I realize that the book code involves several books, and I hone in on those volumes.

  The database begins to yield to me. I learn the truth of what I suspected. There is a large and amorphous resistance movement to the Confederate presence on Retief. Much of it is cultural, even near ceremonial, but there is a more active branch. It is to this more active political branch that money and materials have been flowing, money for armaments. Grieg Nazir is indeed involved in the rebel movement with the rank of Lt Colonel in the Phoenix Commando.

  The single largest expenditure in the last two years is attached to his name and the military wing of the resistance. I focus and find data indicating that someone has contracted for an offworld mercenary force, one to be inserted by starship, a small force but very demanding of high tech supplies.

  Lilith. A cold wave of shock rolls over my systems. Lilith is connected to Nazir; who is networked to Wrik through Rena. Wrik has been there, without my protection, in a command post of the enemy well known to Lilith. Clinging girlfriend or not, this will not occur again.

  Problems multiply. Beyond these basic communications, lies a command channel to Lilith, accessible by Nazir and others in the Phoenix Commando. Pain me as it does to admit it, if I follow that channel into the multiverse, I will be fighting Lilith on her home ground, in her citadel, and the odds of survival, much less success, are poor. Even touching that channel will alert my enemy.

  But while she protects her own communications and whereabouts, the rebels around her cannot keep me out. I see orders for a concentration of forces, comments on a cyberattack made before I drove Lilith into her citadel and out of Retief’s net. Apparently, she has blinded any orbiting satellites to the movement of a land force that will assemble north of the capitol, and strike the Confederate base near the spaceport where Stardust sits.

  Grieg Nazir is a prime mover in all of this. He has taken Wrik’s appearance as a sign that he is under suspicion, or threatened, having been informed through Lilith of our Confederate connections. Lilith has not informed him of what I am yet, perhaps out of a desire not to panic her onworld connections. Those connections know they cannot keep Lilith on the planet and inactive for long. If they are to use her, they must do so now.

  I must get free to counter the Rebel attack, if I can. I open up my internal communications as I help pack away some leftovers from the impromptu party.

  “Dusko.”

  “Here.”

  “I need you to pick me up with the heavy duty flitter again.”

  “Affirmative, where are you?”

  “We are staying with Wrik’s mother. I have uploaded the coordinates to the ship’s computer. I also need you to pick up my armspac from where I cached it near Delt’s field; it has a transponder set on our #7emergency frequency.

  “I will arrange to be on the beach, two kilometers south of Wrik’s mother’s house at 11 PM. Pickup should take no more than twenty seconds.”

  “Understood. Care to tell me why we are making this clandestine rendezvous?”

  “Lilith is on the move. My intel is that she is preparing a strike with rebel forces on a Confederate target near the spaceport.”

  “Lovely. Do you plan to battle this insurgent force entirely on your own?”

  “Are you volunteering to help?”

  “No.”

  “I appreciate your frankness.”

  “I doubt it.”

  “Be on time.”

  “I will.”

  “One additional thing,” I give him the list of presents.

  “You’re kidding me.”

  “It’s not like I asked you to wrap them,” I snap, “and you are coming this way anyhow.”

  “Whatever,” he cuts the circuit.

  Waiting is tedious but there is no help for it. After the guests are gone and we have cleaned up, we gather in the living room. Eldra puts on some music. Wrik scans the entertainment channel without finding anything of interest. I begin to emit a light soporific gas, not enough to make anyone ill, or even aware of the effect. My aim is drowsiness. The soporific, along with the meal and the stresses of the day does its work. Wrik and his mother are quickly heavy-eyed. Benton, plops down in a corner and is soon unconscious.

  With sleepy goodnights, we all make our way upstairs. Wrik drops into bed and with a quick kiss, lies back. Now I administer a proper sedative through a needle so slim it barely registers as it slides in. He will sleep well into the morning. I sneak next door and repeat the procedure on his mother.

  I slip out of the house into the darkness, and move to the edge of the small town, rapidly and unobserved.

  I detect the ship’s flitter by its IFF signal. Dusko does his usual good job of settling on the beach, the sound of the small ship’s engine fades as I run aboard the flitter. It lurches skyward again. I join the Dua-denlenn, sliding into the second seat.

  “Are you sure about this?” Dusko says, sparing me a glance as we climb out. We are subsonic until we are far from Eldra’s home, then pile on the Mach numbers to the flitter’s maximum short duration speed.

  “Why? Are you worried about me?”

  He returns his gaze to his instruments. “That’s not the way of my people, as you know. Say rather that I would find your death inconvenient and possibly a factor in my own.”

  I nod. This, at least, is in character for the Dua-denlenn. “I must deal with this attack,” I reply. “There is no choice. Now is the only time I can do so without revealing this conflict to Wrik.”

  “If he finds out that you have been in battle without him, he will be very cross with you.”

  “It is my intention that he not find out. However, my review of romantic writings indicates that even the closest and most devoted of couples keep secrets from each other.”

  A snort escapes from him. “Hmmm, Maauro, I do believe you are getting the hang of biological relationships—you may well be prepared for marriage.”

  I sigh. “‘Do you remember when you were terrified of me? I look back on those days with a form of nostalgia.”

  “Yes, I remember those days,” he says dryly.

  And so do I. The memories of Dusko as our old enemy, clash with those of him as a member, however ill-fitting, of my network.

  “I regret what I just said,” I add on a sudden impulse

  He looks at me, his expression unreadable. “That was then.”

  “Yes,” I reply. “We are no longer enemies.”


  “Don’t be quite so nice to me. It’s unnerving.”

  “I’ll remember that.”

  We settle in as the flitter eats up the kilometers to our destination north of the capitol.

  “Two minutes to insertion point,” Dusko says.

  “Remember to pull out to the east after insertion.”

  “I’d be closer if I circled the area,” he said. “I can make a faster pickup if you’re in trouble.”

  “Thank you, but there is too great a danger of your being shot down. Or, if someone were to take a radius of your circle, it would aid them in locating me.”

  “Good thinking,” he grunts. “IP in sixty seconds. Get ready.”

  Dusko touches down in a small clearing, near to the treeline. I leap out, armspac webbed across my chest. In 1.13 seconds, I am among the trees, listening to the sounds of Dusko drawing away as directed to await my pickup call. I speed into the forest, launching more of the spybees that I had earlier surrounded Delt’s airfield with. I also sample the air, hoping to detect my enemy, but I am unlucky, the wind is against me, and I can pick up no trace of the rebel attack force.

  I link up to the few satellites that cover Retief’s weather and surveillance needs. None are in positions to overlook the area I am in operating in, or have the resolution or instruments to be useful. This backwards world is beginning to annoy me. I briefly consider having Dusko return, but the flitter is too vulnerable, even if Lilith were not present. I must rely on my spy-bees. This slows my advance as the bees, with their limited power, cannot keep up with me.

  I wait impatiently as the bees spread out, but my wait is not long. Spybee # 13 detects the enemy moving down a logging road north of the spaceport. The Confed compound sits at the north end of spaceport, which is north and east of the city. The logging road comes down on a surfaced secondary road, which links up to a highway passing near the compound. It is a sensible attack profile for a force of wheeled vehicles.

  Spybee 13 rests in a tree and I watch through its sensors as the enemy force rolls by. The polyglot force is what one might expect from a rebel group. The column contains eight vehicles. Four of them are commercial vehicles modified to carry light weapons or loaded with armed humans. The other four are military vehicles, two jeep hovercars, with 100m magazine-fed recoilless rifles on them, and, leading the column is a Leyland armored car with a 50MM high-velocity gun and a grenade launcher. Behind the Leyland follows an APC, an older Confed model that predates the first rebellion. Atop the armored personnel carrier are three of Lilith’s HCRs. They carry the most recent model Confed triple-autos; formidable weapons that, with a sustained burst, could destroy me. Certainly the Leyland’s 50MM could finish me. I must prepare my attack carefully.