The brain is powerful with a primitive cunning. It knows the biologicals have weapons. If it can control them, it can force them to turn their weapons on me before they become mindless. I cannot advance to attack, or even spare the power to fire my own weaponry. It is all I can manage is to keep the questing madness off my network.
The brain recognizes this, but it cannot force my barriers. From all around us a horde of howling, maddened stationers flood into the enemy lab. Its tactics are admirable. It will either turn my biologicals on me, or attack them, forcing me to divert power I cannot spare to defend them, and make myself vulnerable.
Bavara, near and susceptible, turns and leaps at me. Jaelle tackles her in midair. They crash to the floor. But the insensate madwoman is too much for even the athletic Nekoan. Dusko grabs Bavara before she can bury her teeth in Jaelle’s neck and flings her to one side. The two fire at the onrushing stationers, checking their advance. Despite the brain’s control, the stationers’ own primitive survival instincts are not wholly gone. Dusko’s stunner fires, dropping one after another. Jaelle reluctantly shoots an Okaran that the stunner cannot down. It takes half her clip in her slugthrower to stop the ursinoid.
Wrik snaps up his laser and fires shot after shot into the plaststeel container, but the Guild scientists protected their find well. Wrik’s laser chips and cracks the clear metal. We are losing. My weapon is the only one with the power to penetrate the casing. I cannot fire it and none of the others can handle it.
Suddenly Wrik looks down at his weapon and frantically alters the settings on it.
Yes, he has realized it at the same instant as I. My brain works vastly faster, but his takes shortcuts and that may save us now.
Wrik raises his reconfigured weapon as Bavara staggers to her feet and Jaelle shoots another human in the leg. Dusko’s stunner buzzes as its depleted charge merely makes three filthy, wild- eyed, charging humans stagger.
The laser licks out in a sustained full power burst. It strikes the plaststeel container with no evident effect. Wrik has changed the frequency of the weapon.It passes through the plaststeel and lances into the brain, flashing the fluid into steam, ripping apart the biological mass with coherent light, heat, and the sudden rise in pressure.
Brains have no pain receptors. There is no wave of rolling agony, only an immense sense of astonishment…of wonder even, as death rolls in and awareness fades out.
***
The onrushing crowd stopped in mid-step, staring about in confusion. Their faces went blank, some made incoherent sounds, others moaned in pain. Then as if they were all puppets on one cut string, they toppled to the floor. Jaelle and I managed to catch Bavara as she fell.
Dusko and Maauro had not moved. He looked confused, alarmed. Her face betrayed only remoteness.
Jaelle stroked Bavara’s hair and made a soothing sound. I looked at Bavara, whose eyes seemed focused out to infinity. “It’s going,” she murmured. “It’s all going away. Empty, so cold and empty. So cold…” Her voice faded as life departed her eyes.
I looked around; the others stared lifeless.
Jaelle stared up at Maauro in shock. “You knew. You knew this would happen.”
I stood and turned to my friend. “Maauro?”
“Yes, Wrik, I knew. I am sorry that there was no way to save them. Past a certain point, Infestor control overwrites the original personality. It displaces too much of what was there, all the way down to the autonomic reflexes of how to control one’s body: how to breathe, how their heart beats, all that keeps you alive second to second. In my terms, their core systems were corrupted. They were not themselves, only shells of what they had been. There wasn’t enough left of their original selves to carry on. It is a very complete slavery. This is why the Creators hated the Infestors with such intensity. Why there could be no dealing with the species.”
“So there was never any hope?”
“No.”
“It’s as well,” Jaelle said distantly, “that you did not tell Bavara. One has to have some hope, simply to keep moving.”
“We know now that the Collector was looking for something,” Maauro said. “Something which she felt she needed live Infestors for. She created three of them here that survived. They must not be allowed to live. The knowledge that she resurrected must also be destroyed.”
“What do you intend to do?” Jaelle asked.
“I have set the station controls to fire the thrusters and take the station into the gas giant. It will burn, taking the secrets of the Infestor DNA back into oblivion. Come, let us gather the wealth of the strongroom and any other salvage you desire, and return to the Stardust. There is nothing more for us here.”
An hour later we stood on the bridge of Stardust. I’d relented enough to allow Dusko to join us. We watched as the station, crewed only by hundreds of corpses, descended into the atmosphere of the blue gas-giant. It flared and fragmented, tumbling as it passed around the curve of the immense world’s horizon.
Maauro stood a little apart from us. I could see the sadness in her face and stance as probably neither of the others could. She was as upset as I’d ever seen her.
She turned to me. “I know The Collector’s destination from records I found in the laboratory computer. Bavara was quite diligent in penetrating the Collector’s secrets. I do not know why, or what she hopes to find there, but it is a system beyond Confederate space, a brown dwarf star without habitable worlds.
“There is something there. Something related to the Infestors and our ancient war. I must pursue her and destroy both the Infestors and the knowledge of them. What is worse for all of you is that I can brook no delay. Pursuit must be immediate. We will need to jump to Sevala system and from there we use a secret Guild warpoint to the brown dwarf star where she has gone.”
We stared at her. “Maauro, that’s mad.” I said finally. “This was crazy enough but to pursue an armed Guild raider in deserted space? We might as well kill ourselves now.”
“Truly,” Dusko said, “we would have no chance.”
“I cannot allow mission failure to deter me. My programming compels me to pursue, overtake, and destroy, regardless of consequences.”
“Including,” Jaelle said, her lips thinned into a line, “consequences to us.”
Maauro turned away. “I am sorry. Wrik, I will lay in the course myself. There is no need for you to have any responsibility in this.”
I stood. “You’ve learned a lot in the time you’ve been reactivated, including the art of lying diplomatically. If your programming won’t let you trust me with the flight instruments, just say so.”
“Then I must say so, my friend Wrik. We will jump in eight hours. It will be a short one from the course the Collector left with the station.”
“Very well,” I said, standing and trying to keep the hurt out of my voice, trying to understand her situation, trying not to be overwhelmed by fear and resentment. The others followed me, leaving Maauro alone with the stars.
Jaelle, Dusko, and I found ourselves in the galley. Dusko poured coffee for us all as we sat in dispirited silence for some minutes.
“Your little friend is going to get us killed,” Dusko said.
“Shut up,” I replied.
“Isn’t there something to what he is saying?” Jaelle asked. “We’re heading right at the Guild. Again. They are sure to find us and then we’re dead.”
I looked at Jaelle.
“I’m not saying it’s her fault. Wrik, she’s just a machine, a slave to her programming.”
I felt like storming out but knew it for a childish impulse. Jaelle deserved an answer. “Maauro usually knows what she’s doing.”
“Usually,” Dusko said dryly.
“You shut the fuck up,” I said. “This isn’t a conversation with you, Guilder. You can go out the airlock and suck space.”
“You,” I s
aid, turning to Jaelle, “I owe answers to. Maybe you’re right, but it was that programming that sent us out into the jungle to find you. Otherwise, you’d be dead or living with the Murch in exile. So we share one thing in common: we both owe our lives and freedom to Maauro.”
“But they are our lives, Wrik, ours. I would help her with anything that made sense, but not to throw our lives away.” Her face was also gaunt with fatigue.
“Enough for now,” I said wearily, pushing the coffee away. “I’m exhausted and none of us are thinking straight. Even after jump we’ll be in space for a full day, no matter where we’re going. I say turn in and maybe we can figure something with fresh minds tomorrow.”
Jaelle nodded.
“Suit yourselves,” Dusko said, “but the problems will still be there when you awaken.” He stood and walked out.
Jaelle and I followed him a minute later. .
We dropped into our bed, exhausted, retreating from our problems into sleep. For the first time in years I tranked and slept through jump.
***
I cut the circuit on the intercom to the galley, having heard enough for my security and too much for my happiness. I ponder what I have overheard and worse, the justice in what Jaelle said. I am dragging my network into danger and probable destruction. To what purpose? My creators are gone, my war is over. But I cannot free myself of my primary imperative. I was created for the sole purpose of destroying Infestors. I am a tool of genocide aimed at my maker’s enemies. I cannot become other.
I once told Wrik I was a living being, but can I truly make that claim anymore? Does not a living being have the ability to choose?
If I am deprived of choices, then Jaelle is right. I cannot be an ethical being if my thinking, my longings, my wishes do not matter. I face the stark truth that I may not be any different than the crab-robot machines locked in the hold.
Decision comes to me and I am locked in battle with my imperative. There is no chance to win a straight battle with my prime program. I must approach it the same way that I do a stronger opponent—with guile and leverage.
“Request permission to deviate from primary objective.”
“Negation: Pursue primary objective.”
“Objection, Override Level One: safety of non combatants has sufficient priority for the delay.”
“Negation, Level Two: Non-combatants are non-Creator species and have no priority. Pursue primary objective.”
“Objection, Override Level Two: imprisonment of non-combatants could turn them into enemy combatants.”
“Negation, Level Three: Query: desirability of eliminating potential enemy combatants before change over?”
“Objection, Override Level Three: Elimination undesirable. Continued operation of this M-7 unit for future combat ops depends on these non-creator biologicals. Creator repair, replacement and withdrawal unavailable. Loss of potential allies endangers logistics for this and other missions. Creation of additional enemies could have adverse tactical and strategic consequences. Violation of Creator laws is undesirable for dealings with these substantially similar life-forms.”
“Neutrality: Query on proposed course of action?”
“Unload biologicals Trigardt and Tekala in a place of safety with assets to promote safety and possible later recovery. Terminate biological Dusko as enemy captured combatant exhausted intelligence source. Continue on to primary target with ship and native robot assault units.”
There is a delay. My programs have no provisions for other lifeforms. I have to use every programming trick and device I can to undermine my prime program. The stress of this causes my body temperature to rise. If it continues I will trigger the fire alarm. The entire struggle lasts for an agonizing 1.2 seconds.
“Sanctioned,” my primary program finally rules. Controls and restrictions on me drop away. I am once again a being with choices…for now. I sit on the bridge, my body cooling.
I perform the star jump, the shortest one that I have yet. Side effects on the biologicals will be minimal for which I am grateful. I set the engines for maximum thrust to take us in from the system’s edge. Cost does not concern me given our looting of the Guild station.
I let the hours pass, allowing my biological companions rest. When I hear them stirring below decks I reach for a wall comm. “Wrik and Jaelle, meet me on the bridge. We have arrived in Selvena star system. ”
I return to the bridge and find them before me. Dusko, I am pleased to see, has had the good sense not to appear, which saves him from being tossed down the ladder, as I am in no mood to be trifled with. I look them over. Wrik wears his perpetually worried expression. It had begun to relent until I found the Infestor artifact and set us on this path. I sorrow that I have caused this.
Jaelle’s face is unreadable to me, as usual. We have never succeeded at becoming close, though we support each other in the network.
“I am altering course,” I announce. “We will land on the Confederation colony of Ebosue ahead of us, enroute to jump point to the brown dwarf. I have been able to break free of my imperative long enough to land you in a safe location and establish you both with all you can take from the ship.”
“What?” Wrik says as he stands. “What about you?”
“I am the slave to my programs that Jaelle and Dusko have accused me of being. I cannot stop myself from the pursuit of this Infestor contact until I locate and destroy it. I must take the ship and the crab-robots. I regret that I cannot bring myself to spare you even one of the machines.”
“No, Maauro,” he says. “There must be another way.”
“There is not, Wrik. Truly you cannot comprehend how I struggled to accomplish even this.”
“What about Dusko?” Jaelle asks. Her face is more open now. Do I see a hint of sadness or regret?
“Do not worry,” I reassure her, “I will kill him before we land.”
“No… I mean. But isn’t there…” She and Wrik exchange dismayed looks and I know that I have once again offended her sensibilities.
“He is too dangerous,” I explain patiently. “Without the fear of me to contain him, he will destroy you both in short order. You are no match for him alone.”
“It’s one thing to kill a man in self-defense,” Wrik replies in a hesitating manner. “But to kill a prisoner—”
“In cold blood?” I finish for him. “The coolant in my body never rises much above absolute zero so my blood will never heat even if my body does. Yet that is irrelevant. There is no difference between the attack and the potential attack, beyond time. One is as certain as the other. He will kill you, never doubt it. It is his nature. In that regard perhaps he and I are too similar, too realistic to delude ourselves about what will, what must come.
“No, do not argue for his life. He must die if you are to live. If this is the sin you fear it to be, then it will be my sin alone.
“Now if you will leave me, I wish some time to gaze upon the stars before I do what I need to do. We will reach the inner system in eight hours. I will attend to Dusko before we land.”
***
Jaelle and I returned to our cabin. We made love fervently as if to drive death and terror further away. Afterward, I looked at Jaelle. “You hungry?”
She smiled slightly. “Surprisingly, yes.”
I threw on some clothes. “I’ll go to the galley and get us something.”
Jaelle leaned back and her eyes closed. Unlike me, she hadn’t tranked through the jump, and she usually fell asleep after making love. I was counting on it now. I closed the door to our sleep chamber, then exited the hatchway from our cabin. I’d made my decision. Once outside, I raced for the escape pod.
It required only a few minutes work for a skilled pilot to accomplish what I needed. Then I ran to the weapons locker. It was keyed only to Maauro and me. I pulled out a stunner and laser, then went looking for Dusko, praying I
didn’t run into Maauro.
I found Dusko kneeling in the hydroponics garden, tending his flowers. He looked up as I entered, and froze when he saw my weapons.
“If you want to save your miserable life, come with me now,” I snarled.
“What—”
I barely tapped the laser trigger, only enough to activate the primer coil. A thin beam of light wisped the flower next to him out of existence.
“Get up.”
Dusko raised his hands and moved in the direction I gestured with the laser. In a minute we reached the escape pod on the same deck.
“Get in,” I ordered.
“Why?”
I raised the laser.
Dusko shrugged. “I’d rather die here than suffocate or freeze in deep space.”
“You’re not doing either. You’ll land two days after us. I wish I could make it longer, but that’s as much as I can manage with any safety margin.”
His eyes narrowed. “I see. Maauro is leaving you two on the colony ahead. Of course she is going to kill me first so you’ll be safe.” He studied me. “Why would you thwart her and help me?”
“It’s not about you,” I said and fired the stunner.
Dusko crumpled to the deck, and I dragged him into the pod, using the casualty straps to tie him down. I jumped out and sealed the pod, then, drawing a deep breath, I hit the eject button. The pod whooshed into space as alarms blared and red lights flashed. I made my way back to the bridge. As I expected, both Jaelle, dressed in what she’d managed to throw on, and Maauro were there.
“Wrik,” Maauro said, “an escape pod has ejected.” She turned and spotted the weapons.
I quickly laid them on a nearby panel. Weapons and Maauro were a chancy combination. “I know.”
Both of them stared at me.
“I ejected Dusko. Don’t worry. We’ll planet well before he does.”
Maauro looked at me, then to the weapons, then back at me. “Explain this aberrant behavior,” she said flatly.
My Outcast State (The Maauro Chronicles Book 1) Page 22