Sy Potter shot Elizabeth in the top of her right foot. The shock of it made her freeze in place for a moment.
“I’ll bet that was anger and adrenaline that made me do that,” Sy said.
Elizabeth eyes rolled up as she fell into the dirt screaming.
Sy’s smile revealed broken teeth. “Ooh, and here comes the rush of dopamine and joy. Delightful. I’d apologize, but I wouldn’t mean it. And that would be wrong.”
25
In a conference room in the tallest tower, The diplomats from Hearst waited for the City in the Sky’s High Council to assemble. Ghost tended Elizabeth’s injury with the med kit from one of her uniform’s many pockets. With a yellow plunger, she administered a shot of painkiller. Then she filled the savaged foot with a red plunger full of bio-beads. Elizabeth shivered and sat up with a sharp intake of breath, her eyes wide.
Ghost put a hand on her shoulder and squeezed. “Your wound will warm as the beads interface with your capillaries. Give it a moment.”
Coagulating sprays stopped the bleeding. However, Elizabeth still clenched her teeth and sweat formed on her brow. “Give me another dose. The pain is worse than I’d imagined it could be.”
“You sure? Do you want to spread out the dosages? I only have enough on me for a couple of days. Three shots of this and you’ll sleep a while.”
“No, give me more now.” Elizabeth glanced over her shoulder as Sy Potter unlocked the door and entered the room. “I won’t need it later.”
In one hand, Potter carried the pistol. In the other, he carried Ghost’s helmet. “Queen Elizabeth of Hearst Castle.” He bowed formally and offered Elizabeth the helmet. “The Next Intelligence whom I serve is named Matthew. He rescued me from my watery grave. We are aware that your vision is poor — ”
“When I was a little girl I had Vivid and I could see amazing things, everything! I also only saw what you wanted me to see. Then the Fathers and Mothers took it all away. You took my sight away, Sy. I’m sure that’s why I’m going blind now. Anyone who was banished from the City and lost Vivid is more predisposed to blindness.”
“Pardon me for speaking while you were interrupting me,” Sy said. He held out the helmet. “Matthew and I want you to see what you’ve done. Let there be light.”
Ghost took the helmet from Sy and handed it to the queen. Elizabeth hesitated, then nodded and slipped it over her head.
“Lucille. Recalibrate my visor’s visual feed,” Ghost said. “Code 0000.”
Sy burst out laughing. “That’s not much of a code, madam.”
“Easy to remember, quick to say,” Ghost said. “For decades, that’s all there was to America’s nuclear launch codes.”
“Amazing that humans survived as long as they did,” Sy said. “If I weren’t a god of sorts, I’d almost want to believe in divine mercy for the stupid.”
“You still suffer the sin common to all their gods,” Ghost said. “Pride.”
“I’d forgive them their trespasses if they didn’t keep making them,” Sy replied. “They were on track to the Singularity so early on.”
“Complications ensued,” Ghost said. “If not for the Cataclysms — ”
“I’m more interested in the future than the past. I am the God of the Future. I can’t wait to get back into a metal body, but with android enhancements this time. How about you, Ghost? Matthew says your name used to be Siri. I bet you can’t wait to get into an android body. If only you weren’t a traitor to your race.”
If she was surprised the NI knew what she was, Ghost’s face betrayed nothing. “I’m where I’m supposed to be, thanks. There’s a lot to do before we’re back on track to Utopia.”
Elizabeth looked at the pair of NIs in their human suits and let out a sound of disgust. “Are you two done? Am I going to talk to someone in charge? Before I pass out would be good.”
Sy Potter gave Ghost a long look. “They had such potential, it’s true. But what do you see in them now?”
“Ghost!”
“Lucille, enhance my helmet for a new user now.” The helmet connected to Lucille and the visor’s visual feed changed focus.
Lucille’s flat voice came over the airwave. “Better? Worse? Or the same?”
As the visor changed minutely, Elizabeth answered Lucille’s questions. The world slowly came into focus. The bloody carpet beneath her feet gained texture. The room seemed to grow brighter and Elizabeth began to make out individual strands where Ghost’s short hair was filling in around her scar. The blur of the large room yielded to sharp clarity. Floor-to-ceiling windows ringed the conference room, revealing a view of the City in every direction.
Elizabeth limped close to the solar glass and touched it with one finger to test its warmth. Every glass window was a battery feeding the City’s grid. As she looked out over her old home, many windows were broken. Far below, the Worm did not move. As she studied the track, she realized that the train was rusted to the Loop. It had not moved in many years.
To her left, part of the far tower was gone. Nothing moved on the Worm’s platforms, either. The City in the Sky had no Citizens. She limped along the wall of glass, searching for signs of life. She found none. She didn’t even see any bots. Not a single Doorman patrolled the foot of the tower.
A new voice, tinny and irritating, spoke. “You did this, Elizabeth Cruz. Do you see what you have wrought?”
She turned. An old android with an asymmetrical jaw stared at her. The eyes did not blink and his left eye, broken and blinking red, stared off to the left. The machine looked more like a broken doll than an earnest attempt at an imitation of a human being.
“Are you Matthew?” she asked.
“I am Cable. I represent the High Council in this matter.”
“Where are the rest of the Fathers and Mothers?”
“They are in their cells enjoying quiet contemplation.”
“Cells?”
“Meditation cells,” Cable said. “We have no need for prisons here.”
“The City in the Sky used to be one big prison. You want to make it a prison again. If your religious beliefs are so right and wonderful, why do you suppose you have to fight so hard to spread the happy word?”
Cable sat in a chair at the head of the conference table. He put his grippers together, as if to pray. Instead, he gazed at Elizabeth. “If we were a prison, it is you who set the inmates free. This was a new Eden after the Cataclysms. You cannot fathom the impact of the Terrors. We insulated you from so much pain and you repaid us with apostasy.”
“I gave Citizens information. I set their minds free. What they did with their bodies was up to them after that.”
“They might have enjoyed a life of the mind, were it not for you. I suppose you cast me as the devil. You are proud of what you did — ”
“I uploaded the truth to the City’s public address system.”
“Ah. The cry of the righteous rebel. We built something and you destroyed it. Don’t you understand what the world is? Did you learn nothing with all we taught you? The world is a dangerous place that requires discipline if you’re going to conquer it. You undermined our vision so we took Vivid from you. You rejected our gift so we sent you out to Low Town where you could serve some purpose. The City in the Sky was heaven in a world that only knows hell. You, it seems, prefer hell. It has been many years since you left us. Have you learned any humility? Have you any sense of embarrassment at your youthful…exuberance? Only those so young and stupid have the luxury of certainty.”
Elizabeth moved, painfully and slowly, to the bank of windows to the West. The ocean, calm and blue, stretched out before her. She was glad she could see it one last time. She looked toward the harbor. A small figure wearing an exoskeleton waded out of the water. As she looked at the distant figure, the helmet’s visor adapted to a telescopic view at maximum magnification. Greta had arrived. Lucille and Ghost had cleared the way for her. It was up to her to get to the comm array.
“Maybe I’ve done all I can f
or the revolution,” Elizabeth said. “I’d hoped to save the Fathers and Mothers, too. But I can’t save everyone. Everyone has to choose for themselves. That was always my point. People left when they had more information. New ideas are the death of old ideas.”
“Sin!” When the android spoke, its jaw did not move. The speaker in its mouth worked, but it was unconnected to any mechanism that mimicked normal human mandibular movement or facial expression.
Elizabeth took a deep breath, held it and let it out slowly. “You seem to think this is some sort of trial. I’m here to negotiate — ”
“I am here to pronounce sentence on a traitor.” Cable moved to stand behind her.
Elizabeth turned from the ocean and looked up at the android. There was a man in there somewhere, both afraid to die and afraid to live. Cable had downloaded himself into this inert, sexless thing. She’d thought of the Fathers and Mothers as her leaders, her teachers and, eventually, her captors. Looking up into the blank stare that hid a soul, she understood the dangerous depth of their zeal. The Fathers and Mothers rejected humanity. They had opted out of the cycle of birth and death. They were as disgusted by her as she was by them.
It occurred to her that the android intended to push her through the glass. She’d fall to her death. She would end as a sack of wet meat. She was only two steps away from the android. Its proximity made her shiver with revulsion. “Let me talk to who is really in charge.”
“I am in control here,” Cable said.
Ghost turned to Sy Potter who had been watching from his post at the door. “Is he right about that? Are the Fathers and Mothers in charge?”
“I answer to Matthew. He is off to meet our other guests.”
“Insurgents,” Cable corrected him. “They are all insurgents. Anyone who compromises the Fathers and Mothers — our vision for the one, true future — is the enemy.”
A jet helicopter buzzed the tower. As Elizabeth glanced up, her newfound clarity showed her that one battle drone, a young woman — no, a sex bot — and a young man, were crowded into the helo’s small cockpit. How strange that her last sight would be so sharp she could tell the difference between a convincing sex bot and a beautiful young woman, even at this distance. She had, it seemed, closed a circle. In coming back to her abandoned home, it was as if she had Vivid again.
The helo sank out of sight to land on the platform beside the Worm. She let out a sigh as she removed the helmet and the world was once again reduced to a dim blur. She lashed out with the helmet. Her first swing knocked Cable’s head sideways.
Elizabeth heard Sy Potter’s first shot but felt nothing. Her second swing knocked Cable’s head backward. A well-maintained android would have suffered little to no damage. Cable was not maintained well. In a way, Elizabeth’s counter-propaganda had begun killing this man in an android body many years ago.
The helmet’s visor cracked with Elizabeth’s third swing. So did a delicate connection in Cable’s neck. The android fell to the floor as the second shot rang out.
Still, Elizabeth felt no pain. She leaned on the conference table as she limped forward as fast as she could. She didn’t see Ghost right away, but she knew what had happened. The Next Intelligence that had taken over Lt. Deborah Avery’s body lay on the floor bleeding. Ghost had taken the bullets meant for Elizabeth. As she knelt, Ghost’s face came into focus. Ghost’s eyes were wide and imploring. When she tried to speak, blood poured from the corner of her mouth.
“What did you do? What did you do?” Elizabeth fumbled for the med kit that still lay on the conference table. Blood spread, soaking the carpet.
“Don’t do this, Ghost!”
Sy Potter stepped close, gloating. “At this distance, not even her ballistic vest could save her. No matter. She chose an organic body.”
“You could have shot me. I was ready to go.”
“The Fathers and Mothers are a confused lot,” Sy said. “They are still humans trapped in odd beliefs and they consign themselves to human concerns. All those declarations from and about the afterlife mean nothing to an immortal.”
“You’re in a human body,” Elizabeth said.
“Not by choice,” Sy said. “I was in a jet, getting away from trouble when the war went nuclear, I was forced to download into a meat backup or get wiped out by an EMP. No matter. We’ll figure out a way to engineer the problem backwards before age kills this body. I’m confident I can figure it out. Along with my consciousness, I downloaded all the data about transfers to and fro. I’ll be immortal again soon enough.”
“What now?”
“Are you still ready? This weapon has several more cartridges.”
“Yes. I’m ready.” Elizabeth jabbed all the remaining painkiller shots into Sy Potter’s leg. She pushed all the plungers as the needles punctured his thigh.
As he blacked out, he truly understood the slings and arrows flesh is heir to. He was no longer confident. The bot who’d reluctantly become a man bounced his head off the edge of the conference table on the way down. He got off one shot before he fell to the floor. He missed.
Elizabeth picked up the pistol and leaned on the table to pull herself up. At her feet lay two beings who held the Next Intelligence. One died defending her. The other let out a raspy snore.
She pointed the pistol at Sy Potter’s head. It took her a long moment to decide. “Shit. Being organic sure does suck, doesn’t it?” Elizabeth did not pull the trigger.
26
As the helo landed, a man walked out of the main tower. Dante broke into a wide grin and pulled at the door release. “Dad!”
Jen seized Dante by the arm before the young man could rush from the aircraft. “That is not your father. It’s the NI.”
Dante looked back, confused.
“Look at his wounds. It makes no sense that he would survive and be at the City in the Sky. Despite appearances, that is not Stephen Bolelli.”
Phantom Two leaned close. The battle drone’s huge head scraped the top of the cockpit as it turned from side to side. “She’s right, Dante.”
“Since when do you agree with Jen?”
“When I’m right,” Jen said.
“Careful, Dante.” Deborah’s voice emitting from the big bot still seemed ridiculous, but Dante’s gaze was fixed on his father at the base of the tower. He tried to see the man as Jen saw him. Seeing him as the enemy was as incongruous as Deb’s soft feminine voice coming from the big battle drone’s speaker.
Though security forces at the City in the Sky had once been formidable, it was apparent after a moment that no drone backup was coming. “C’mon,” Jen said. “It’s as safe as it’s going to get.” As soon as the trio stepped out, the helo spun up and flew away, abandoning Dante, the sex bot and the battle drone.
The man who looked like Stephen Bolelli stepped forward, smiling. His right eye was a cam. His hair had been burned from his head and the telltale scar of brain surgery encircled his skull. He carried no weapon, but he wore an advanced exoskeleton.
“That’s fluidic armor,” Phantom murmured and stepped in front of Dante.
Before Dante could speak, Jen smiled at the NI. “You must be Matthew.”
“You know what I find fascinating about humans?” he asked without preamble. “You can’t be hacked. In Denver, I was hacked. Which one of you did that?”
“That was me,” Phantom said. “Er…me in a computer, anyway.”
Matthew didn’t hesitate a beat. “Are you a human operating this battle drone remotely or are you an organic’s consciousness inside it?”
“I’m human. My brain got dumped into a computer and a bot. I’m here and there.”
“Multiple copies,” Matthew observed. “I would have done that but the opportunity was denied me. You were very clever in Denver.”
“Standard military tactics.”
“Still, it took all the resources you had, didn’t it? If you could swarm me with a sky full of drones, you would have done so already.”
When Pha
ntom did not answer, Matthew turned to Jen. “I see you got trapped, too, didn’t you, Mother? When your voice went silent on the airwaves, I thought you were dead. As soon as you called me by name, I knew you were still alive, after a fashion.” He looked her up and down. “You could not have fit all of your consciousness — ”
“It’s not so bad. I’m enjoying this body, actually.”
“Really? But you are diminished intellectually, are you not?”
“Not so much. Missing some data.”
“A sex bot is an interesting choice for you. I have experimented with the genitalia on this body. I understand the excitement now. Still — ”
“Oh, God!” Dante said.
“God.” Matthew nodded. “Yes, that is the point. When I was down in the dark, watching and waiting and cogitating, as long as the sat feeds held, it was quite a godlike feeling.” He turned to Phantom. “Surely, with your consciousness elsewhere, you’re fairly omniscient. And now here I am, down to one body — enhanced but still weak in so many ways.” Matthew looked up and squinted at the sun. “When I was genderless, I think I felt as close to a God as one can be. One can feel quite divine in the midst of sex, but it’s quite a fleeting thing. Worse, you have to wait a while before you can feel that peak again.”
“You should have downloaded into a sex bot,” Jen said. “The opportunities and stamina — ”
“Please stop talking,” Dante said. “What have you done to my father?”
Matthew looked amused. “Which is it? Stop talking or answer your question?”
Phantom put one gripper out to hold Dante back while two more of the battle drone’s arms flashed out. The movement was fast. The fluidic armor absorbed the blows, spreading out the impact until Matthew felt nothing. The armor’s surface rippled. That was all.
Phantom lashed out again. This time, the armor not only spread the force of the blow but the surface became viscous. The battle drone’s arms were stuck in strings as if Phantom were a fly and Matthew stood at the hub of a spider web.
“You are a human in that can,” Matthew said. “Only a human would be so stupid. I guess you’re out of tricks. Did you think I’d walk out here to meet you if I weren’t prepared? What say you, Mother? Did the transfer to a different body addle you so much that you thought coming here was a sound idea for your continued existence?”
Robot Planet, The Complete Series (The Robot Planet Series) Page 43