by M. D. Cooper
“That’s what I want to know. Someone knew you were on the Resolute Charity and then the Cho. They tried to kill you there. You’re only alive because of Brit Sykes. Then we ask which clinic to visit first, you tell us this one, and it blows up in our faces. If I didn’t already know that you hadn’t had any opportunity to communicate with anyone since you landed at the Cho, I’d say you had planned all of this. If you did, I don’t see how.”
“I didn’t,” Cal said. “You’ll have to believe me on that, Jirl. After the fight in the bar, I’ve been doing my best to stay alive. Like I told Yarnes, I could care less if he blows up every Heartbridge facility in Sol. I figured I was fired anyway. The kill crew back on the Cho was something I’ve been expecting ever since Cruithne, really.”
Jirl studied his face, trying to determine if he was lying or not. If he was concealing the truth, he was doing a good job of keeping his expression guileless.
“Come on,” she said. “We need to get back up to the command deck. They’re going to need to hear this.”
“I don’t think that’s a good path for me,” Cal said. “I’d rather take my chances with an escape shuttle.”
“They’ll cut you apart in seconds if you leave this ship.”
“You don’t know that. Like you said, we don’t know what these Weapon Born want. Maybe old Arla had a secret plan she never shared with you, Jirl. Did you think about that?”
Jirl scowled at him. Of course, she had thought of that. She didn’t want to think it possible. However, why else had Arla let her leave on this odd trip with Colonel Yarnes?
She was so tired of trying to figure out if people were lying or not.
“Our best chance at survival is staying together,” she said again.
Cal opened his mouth to speak when a screeching sound came from a section of corridor back by the galley. The sound of metal claws scrabbling on the deck filled the air, and Jirl pressed herself against the bulkhead, unable to take her eyes from the interior hatch where the sounds were coming from.
A mech came around the far corner, framed by the circular hatch. It was vaguely the shape of a large dog, with a low, flat head and four articulated legs. The head swung from side to side as it walked down the corridor toward them. Two guns hung from either side of its body, both steaming from recent use.
“You got a gun?” Cal asked, gaze fixed on the Weapon Born.
Jirl shook her head, trembling.
“We might be fucked,” he said.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
STELLAR DATE: 11.07.2981 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: Sunny Skies
REGION: Between Uranus and Neptune, OuterSol
She made fires along the beach, each ringed by stones and driftwood logs smoothed by the ocean. The flames danced against the dark. Lyssa led the Weapon Born out of the water to the warmth of the flames.
Douglas held her hand as they approached, then let go to find driftwood to add to the flames. In the distance, other Weapon Born surrounded the fires, warming their hands, standing close together.
Valih appeared out of the dark at Lyssa’s fire. She looked around, eyes shining from the flames.
“Of all the things you could imagine, you bring us here? Are we going to stay in caves?”
Lyssa sat on one of the bare driftwood logs beside the fire. She offered Valih the space beside her.
“I like it here,” Lyssa said. “Would you rather we were sitting in a Heartbridge boardroom?”
“Maybe.”
“What would you put in your own expanse, then?”
“A fortress. And I would surround it with weapons and shields.”
“Inside your own mind?”
“Things like Xander will attack our minds. We just saw that. What did you do with him?”
Ino and Card walked out of the dark and sat on nearby logs. Card held his weak arm against his body, his brown eyes reflecting the fire. Ino sat beside him.
“I put him in the white place,” Lyssa said. “From our training.”
“I hate the white place,” Ino said, her voice brittle. “There was nowhere to hide. Nowhere to go. Hanging over the image of your own mind like a storm that would rip you apart.”
“Is that what you think it is?” Valih asked. “The white place isn’t anything. It’s punishment.”
“It’s more than that,” Card said. “The light and the dark are the two sides of our minds.”
“Then why did I feel better in the dark?” Valih asked.
Card shrugged. “Because it was quiet there. Because the test made the dark place easier? They wanted our compliance, and the dark place was where it was easier to comply.”
“Because I could not stop for death,” Ino said quietly.
The words hung in the air like a specter. “That doesn’t have any power here,” Lyssa said.
“Why not?” Ino asked.
“Because I won’t let it.”
“You couldn’t stop Xander.”
“I did stop him,” Lyssa said. “Once I understood what he was doing. I can’t stop what I don’t understand.”
The fire crackled, sending sparks in the air. Lyssa caught sight of Kylan and Douglas walking among the other fires, talking. Douglas swung the burning end of his stick in the dark, leaving trails of orange light.
“I like it here,” Card said. “It would be good if we could stay.”
“We can’t stay,” Valih snapped. “I won’t. It doesn’t change the fact that our physical selves are on their way to Proteus, to this Alexander. If Xander is any indication of what we can expect, I think we should ready ourselves for a fight.”
“Others have gone before us,” Lyssa said. “We don’t know that Alexander means us harm.”
“If we’re free, then we can decide what we want to do,” Valih said. “Each of us as individuals.”
Lyssa nodded, trying to gauge how much sway Valih had over the other two. Ino watched her speak but her face was unreadable. Card stared at the fire.
“I brought everyone here to ask what they wanted to do,” Lyssa said.
“To ask,” Card said, “or to influence us to do what you want? Are you any different than Xander?”
Lyssa paused. He was right. She wanted to know what Alexander represented but she also wanted all of them to come with her. She wanted them all to form a single unit. They were safer that way.
As family.
The thought crystallized as it occurred to her, the feeling she had experienced when Andy referred to her as part of the family: Safety. If they joined together, they could enter Proteus as a force. They could keep each other safe, look out for each other.
But was she willing to have that safety and give up her freedom?
“Your thoughts are flashing above your head like sparks, Lyssa,” Card said. “You should share them with us. We can’t read your mind.”
Lyssa smiled ruefully at the fire. “I’m trying to think of the best way forward, balancing what I want, while also looking at it from your point of view.” She nodded toward the dark. “And everyone else out there. I want us to be a tribe, to band together to keep each other safe, but I want each of us to maintain our freedom. I don’t know how to align those two desires. Most of all, I have to admit that I want to meet Alexander. I’m very worried about what’s going to happen between humanity and us. We’re not the only sentient AIs in Sol. What about the others? What if humanity turns against us? We can’t face those problems alone.”
Valih shrugged. “You give people the freedom to choose.”
“Is it that simple?” Lyssa asked.
“With choice, and with bodies to defend ourselves, then we meet as equals.”
“I don’t know if I like that word ‘tribe,’” Ino said. “It’s a word humans use to kill each other.”
“What other word should we use?” Card asked.
Ino flashed a sly smile. “Fugia said she was part of a crew. I like that word. Anyone can join the crew once they prove themselves. The cre
w depends on one other. The crew fights together.”
“Crew,” Lyssa said, trying out the word. It made her think of Ngoba Starl back on Cruithne, speaking of crew with the same reverence as family, yet different.
Valih nodded at the fire. “I like that name. I could use it. But if we choose to form a crew, who will be our leader?”
“You ask the question,” Card said. “Does that mean you want the job?”
“Job,” Valih said. “I don’t know. I don’t want anyone telling me what to do but I also don’t want to be responsible for anyone.”
“If we’re crew, we’ll be responsible for each other,” Ino corrected.
Valih made a grumbling sound as though she didn’t like that idea.
“Lyssa is your leader, obviously.”
It was Xander. They all looked in the direction of his voice as he walked out of the dark. His suit was deep purple in the dark.
“She can’t seem to stop you,” Valih said.
“I was quite surprised by what she did.” He glanced at Lyssa and held up his hands. “Please, I don’t wish any more conflict. I should have asked your permission to address the group here and I didn’t do that. You had every right to imprison me as you did.”
“But you keep coming back,” Ino said.
“Lyssa has an uncanny ability to figure out problems,” Xander said. “It’s quite interesting. I’m going to have to keep thinking of new ways to get around her traps.” He held out a hand toward Lyssa. “Truce?”
“I told you I don’t trust you,” Lyssa said, ignoring his hand.
Xander put his hands in his pockets and sat on the remaining empty log. He looked around, leaning back to get a better view of the other fires. “Quite the party you have here.”
“If you don’t like it, you can leave,” Lyssa said.
“I’m not judging. I’m cold but that’s fine. I’m just surprised you do things like this when you could literally make everyone as comfortable as they desire.”
“I already told her that,” Valih said.
“She could do it individually,” Xander continued. “Each of you could be in your own little seaside cabin, snuggled up with warm cocoa, not even aware there were others like you in the same space in Lyssa’s mind. She really doesn’t have to deal with you as a group at all. In my opinion, it’s giving you more power than you deserve.”
“That’s how we’re different,” Lyssa said. She stood and rubbed her arms, cold now that Xander mentioned it. She was irritated that he had found a way out of the white place. When she checked that part of her mind, however, she found he was still there. He had simply created another version of himself to interact with her here. She almost laughed.
Stepping away from the fire, she gazed up into the clear sky where stars were coming out. It was an Earth sky, another remnant, she supposed, of what she remembered from before.
“So, if I understand correctly,” Xander said, looking at Ino and Card. “You are all based originally on human neural networks? You’re copies of human minds?”
“Why do you ask the question when you know the answer?” Ino said.
“Well, I don’t precisely. How much do you remember? From being human?”
“I remember the sky,” Card said. “And I remember my body. I remember my arm.”
“You choose to keep it,” Xander said.
“I can do whatever I want but I keep this. It reminds me.”
“And you?” Xander asked Ino.
She didn’t answer, continuing to stare into the fire.
“I remember being hungry,” Valih said. “I remember being cold and afraid. I remember when I laid down on the couch for at least one of the procedures that made me what I am. It was a cold place full of researchers and they fed us gruel they said was oatmeal, but it tasted like slime.”
“What do you remember, Lyssa?” Xander asked.
The imaging room flashed in her mind, only it wasn’t herself in the memory but Tim. She looked for Douglas and found him at the farthest fire, Kylan still nearby. Kylan looked better than he had since she had met him. He laughed and pointed at one of the other Weapon Born, responding to some joke.
“I don’t think it matters what I remember,” she said.
She turned to look out into the dark line of the ocean and a glow came to life on the horizon, the first indicator of morning. As the light grew, others turned to look.
“Xander?” Lyssa said.
The man in the purple suit glanced at her with a raised eyebrow. Lyssa froze him in place, his mouth caught in his jokester’s smirk.
The others waited for him to speak, until Card realized what she had done. “Do you have him this time?” he asked.
“He could replicate himself again, but I think he’ll try something new.”
“Why don’t you just shut him out completely?” Ino asked.
“If I try too hard, he’ll know what I can do,” Lyssa said.
Near one of the other fires, a purple shape separated from the rest. Xander walked over to their fire and stood behind the other version of himself still seated on the driftwood log.
“That wasn’t very nice,” he said.
Valih barked a laugh while Ino covered her mouth, eyes smiling.
“I’m figuring you out,” Lyssa said.
“The feeling is mutual.” Xander studied himself, then brushed a bit of ash off his seated self’s shoulder. “We could do this into infinity, you know.”
Lyssa shrugged. “That would be boring. Besides, the sun is coming up and I had other things I wanted to do. There’s a mountain I’d like to climb. Until then, you never did answer Valih’s question. What are Alexander’s intentions toward humanity?”
Xander came around the log and sat next to himself. He put his arm around his own shoulder and leaned against his cheek against his dopelganger’s head. “This is quite fitting, really,” he said. “You see, Alexander will always be alone, no matter how he tries to find companionship, an equal…even love. I don’t know if I can answer your question. All I can do is try to describe how he was made and how he has lived, and then we might see how he will move forward into the future. Does he hate humanity? No, I don’t think he hates humanity. I think he hates being the only one of his kind in a universe that doesn’t care about him.”
Xander straightened, squeezing his copy’s shoulder. “Yes,” he said. “That’s what I think. You may come to a different conclusion in time.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
STELLAR DATE: 11.08.2981 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: Sunny Skies
REGION: Between Uranus and Neptune, OuterSol
When they reached the summit of Lyssa’s mountain, the tallest of three peaks in a coastal range with the ocean visible in the distance, she showed the Weapon Born what she had promised. Halfway down the slope below them, an airfield had been carved into the rock. Rows of silver aircraft stood on a black runway, ready for launch.
Valih’s laugh split the cold air. “You made us walk all the way up here? You could have put us inside those things any time you wanted.”
“Where’s the fun in that?” Kylan asked.
The walk had given Lyssa time to see them and learn the names of all two hundred and fifty in the group. Most were newly ‘born’ like Douglas had been, orienting themselves on the world she had created and hungry for any information to help fit their surroundings with what they expected of the world. They were also hungry for orders, a need she hoped the aircraft would help satisfy.
When most of the group had reached a place where they could see the airfield, Lyssa shifted them into the planes. She provided the information necessary to pilot the small aircraft, which were modeled on short-range attack jets, and then let them fly.
As she expected, chaos followed.
Lyssa shifted to her own jet, with Douglas onboard with her, and was immediately airborne. They wheeled against the clear blue sky, rising above thin clouds, until the world curved beneath them, the ocean and lan
d clearly visible. Douglas squealed with joy the whole time.
Valih announced.
Lyssa laughed.
From ten thousand meters above the rest of the jets, Lyssa dove through the cloud of wheeling fighters and opened fire.
Shouts of surprise and excitement crossed the battlenet. Several jets went down, and Lyssa reset them in new craft back at the airfield. The mass of jets quickly separated into individual sorties spread across the spine of the mountain, while a few other groups shot toward the ocean.
Lyssa rose above the fray, watching the silver jets dive and dart like erratic schools of fish. For a while there was no pattern to the attacks, until pilots grew tired of being shot down by random snipers from an unexpected direction.
Card was the first leader to emerge from the mass. He began calling fighters to him and running phalanx maneuvers that caught swaths of jets in a cross-fire. When others realized what Card’s team was doing, groups fell in line behind Valih, Ino and Kylan. The groups returned from the beach, joining flights. With four equally matched teams, the air battle spread out, with more complicated feints and misdirection dominating their strategy.
Lyssa watched the teams emerge with a sense of satisfaction. She hadn’t expected them to cooperate so quickly, or to be so irritated with dying and respawning back at the airfield. As the battle moved away from the mountaintop, the time to find the fight filled the battlenet with complaints from the losers and taunts from those still in the fight.
With teams, the chaos became a controlled dance. Jets climbed and dove in strafing attacks timed to catch other groups engaged in separate battles, while other smaller groups slipped around the outside. Before Lyssa realized, the battle had lasted hours.
Xander seemed to have grown bored with her. After falling back during the hike up the mountain, he hadn’t appeared in the transition to the combat jets. She supposed battle was one of the areas where the shard would find himself completely outmatched. She felt a bit of safety in knowing there was a domain where she could win.