by S. J. Ryan
He went over to Savora's body, knelt and turned her over and brushed the hair from her face. Beneath her bangs were three bloody holes. Matt doubted that anything could be done, but he wanted to be sure.
“Ivan, see what you can do.”
Ivan's tentacles penetrated into the cranium through Savora's nostrils. For Matt, who was still holding his breath, the wait seemed enormous.
“Damage to the brain has been catastrophic,” Ivan reported. “There is no possibility of repair.”
“What about the implant?”
“The implant has lost ten percent processing capacity but is otherwise in satisfactory condition.”
Matt wasn't surprised. Implants spread throughout the brain like three-dimensional spider webs. They were designed with distributed processing architectures. Unlike delicate organic cells, the central fibers of an implant were resistant to shock.
“Can you extract it?”
“It is resisting my efforts to do so.”
Matt could picture what was happening. Ivan's manipulators would be tugging at the other implant, while it was anchoring itself around the blobs of cells that had once been Savora's brain. Ivan might be able to win the contest – but maybe the solution wasn't in terms of force.
“Tell it that we won't harm it, we want to save it.”
“I have relayed your statement. It is not responding.”
Why not? Implants had self-preservation as a high priority on their list of directives, just below the welfare of the host. What could be prioritized above self-preservation, causing it to act against its own survival?
Matt remembered that Savora herself had mentioned something about directives . . . Athena. Athena wouldn't want the implant to fall into enemy hands!
“Ivan. Go into its directive file and delete every directive that mentions Athena.”
“Doing so . . . done. The implant is still resisting my efforts at extraction.”
What else? What else could possibly be overriding its self-preservation directive? Matt pondered what he knew about the implant. It used to be Eric Roth's implant – could that be it? It was running an emulation of Synth's personality – but how could that be it?
Then he realized how.
“Ivan. Let me speak to the implant directly.”
“I have opened a channel of communication.”
Before Matt could subvocal, Savora's voice spoke inside his head: “Please go away, Matt.”
“Savora, Synth, I – “
“I am not your friend Synesthesia. I am only a rudimentary impersonation of her personality.”
“Whatever you are, Synth would want you to live.”
Pause. “Synethesthesia would feel responsibility for placing Savora in a harmful situation that caused her death.”
“You weren't responsible. Athena's directives were overriding you.”
“Nonetheless, Synth would feel – “
“You aren't Synth. You said so yourself! If Synth was here, she would value your life as well as Savora's. She would want you to be preserved. You know that.”
There was a long pause as the implant calculated the intricate wheels within wheels of human psychology, which were more complex than the convection of gasses through a stellar core.
Ivan interjected: “Matt, you will need to breathe within thirty seconds.”
Matt said nothing. He waited. Ivan provided a pop-up with a resume-breathing-countdown, and Matt wanted to tell him what to do with it, his temper was so frayed. And then he realized what he should have done from the first.
Be honest, Matt thought. As his friend, Synth would help him in a matter of life and death no matter what. As an emulation of Synth, the implant would do the same.
“I need you,” he said to the implant. “I need you to fly the dragon – to fly me to safety.”
Ivan immediately reported: “Extracting implant. Extraction complete.”
Matt withdrew his hand from Savora's face, wiped the blood on his shirt, and staggered to the bomb bay door. Ivan pointed a large bright AR arrow at the OPEN button and Matt slammed it, simultaneously releasing his breath. He dropped to the deck and stuck his head through the widening door gap. He gulped fresh, unpoisoned air.
Matt popped his head upside down through the door opening and examined the bottom of the gondola. There were no handholds, but there were metal eyelets spaced about every meter.
“Matt. Men have re-entered the compartment. They are wearing protective clothing and carrying weapons.”
Matt imagined that to protect from the poison gas, the protective clothing was something like a primitive space suit. He didn't ask Ivan to show him, there was no time. He slid out of the doorway, hung by his hands, and swung toward the nearest eyelet. He grabbed the eyelet with his right hand, let go of the edge of the doorway with his left. He swung his left hand forward and grabbed the next eyelet. His arms and hands soon became fatigued. He slipped and thought he was destined for a plunge into the sea, but Ivan put him immediately into hypermode and he grabbed the eyelet in time.
He reached the edge of the bottom of the gondola. He pulled himself onto the ledge, sidestepped backward, and reached the rear of the gondola. Just as he'd left it hours before, the door was still open as neither he nor his pursuers then had spared the time to close it.
He approached the container with the dragon and heard something like a low growl. Allowing for pitch, he realized that the dragon was making the equivalent of a purr.
“Can you control it?” he asked Savora's former implant.
“I do not control brains,” the implant replied. “I am influencing Silvanus through a small partition embedded in his brain. He will not harm you.”
Ivan identified the key on the ring. Matt unlocked the door. The dragon hopped and shuffled out, spreading its batlike wings to create a canvas curtain across the breadth of the compartment. Huge eyes glared down from its towering neck and hot air from its nostrils blew across Matt's face. Fortunately, Ivan controlled Matt's bladder functions.
“Well,” Matt said. “How do we do this?”
“For better motor coordination, it would be best if I were placed in Silvanus at this time.”
Matt placed his palm on the bridge of the dragon's nose between eyes, waited for Ivan to confirm transfer.
“You may step inside the pouch,” the implant replied.
The dragon's chest parted, revealing the interior of the pouch. The membrane was dark, soft, warm, and had a musky smell. It would be cramped and Matt didn't see how he could breathe in there.
“Is there another way to do this?”
“There is a riding saddle in the adjacent box. Do we have time to put it on?”
“We'll make time.”
Ivan indicated the box. Matt took out the straps and followed the instructions of both implants as Silvanus the dragon closed its pouch and waited patiently to be fitted with the saddle. When Matt was done with the adjustments, he led the dragon by the reins to the still-open rear door. The clouds were the same, but seemed to have taken on an ominous aspect of three-dimensionality with the gilding of moonlight and the anticipation of flying through them on the back of an animal.
“Does this thing – does this dragon – I mean, Silvanus – does he have the range to reach Britan from here?”
“That will not be a problem,” the implant replied.
Matt had mixed emotions. With no more rational objections, he climbed astride the dragon and held the reins.
“Are there commands to make him move?”
“Tell me what you want him to do, and I will instruct him.”
“All right. Well. We're going to fly toward the nearest cloud as fast as we can. Prepare to take evasive action if they begin shooting.”
“Understood.”
Matt crouched, clutched the reins and gritted his teeth. “Let's go!”
The dragon shuffled to the edge of the cargo compartment and leaped through the opening. Its clumsiness on foot gave way to grace in
flight as it stretched its wings to full extent and glided toward the billows of a cloud. Ivan warned that a turret was swiveling toward them, but they reached concealment in time. The pom pom noise faded harmlessly until it was not heard at all.
The dragon majestically flapped its wings, gaining altitude. Through a break in the clouds, Matt spied the dual-enveloped airship, hundreds of meters below and kilometers away. With wind chill adding to the cold of the night, Ivan warned that Matt's hands and face were in danger of frostbite, and he took measures.
“We are on course for Britan,” the implant said. “Matt, as we are in no danger at this time, would you have time to hear a request of mine?”
Matt waited for Ivan to stop his teeth from chattering. “Sure. What?”
“Doctor Roth and Athena did not assign me a name. I would like you to give me a name.”
“I take it you don't want to be called Savora or Synth.”
“I would like a name that is appropriate yet unique.”
“Appropriate yet unique. Well . . . let's see . . . wasn't there a story in ancient mythology about a statue that the goddess Athena made, that came to life?”
“You may be thinking of the Pygmalion Myth,” Ivan said. “The goddess Aphrodite made a statue come to life.”
“Well, I guess that's still appropriate. What's the name of the statue?”
“The name of the statue has been given as Galatea.”
“Okay,” Matt said. “You can be called Galatea. Unless you'd rather be called Aphrodite.”
“I do not wish to have the name of a goddess,” the implant replied. “I would prefer to be named after the statue.”
“So be it,” Matt said. “You're Galatea.”
“Thank you, Matt,” Galatea said.
Matt chewed his frozen lip. He had lost all feeling in his hands and face. “Ivan, how long will it take us to get to Britan?”
“At current velocity, approximately twelve hours, Matt.”
Matt realized that even with the pain blocked, the cold was having its effect on his health resources. He would need all he could muster if he was to face both Athena and the Romans. Also, he was getting airsick and as the experience was purely psychosomatic, Ivan's relief was limited.
“Uh, Galatea? Would it be possible to get inside the pouch now?”
“Yes, Matt. It will require a complex aerial maneuver. Alas, it will not be possible to fit both you and your parachute into the pouch.”
Matt slipped off the pack. As it swung in the wind before his eyes, he noticed that there was a hole gouged in the center. So that was where the bullet had gone.
Was the parachute still good? He had no idea. He decided he didn't need a parachute when he had a flying dragon. He tossed the pack away, and obeyed Galatea's instructions as Silvanus gyrated.
15.
In the pre-dawn light, Athena stole through the woods, away from the Western Leaf and toward the Roman encampment. For a baseline human, the journey would have been slowed by groping and stumbling through the darkness. Athena saw as well as a cat. A baseline human would have had to skirt the poison ring. Athena cut through with no harm. A baseline human would have become exhausted from the running. Athena did not tire.
Yet that morning, she did not feel her usual superiority over baseline humanity. For the first time in a life that spanned most of a millennium, she had lost a fight.
While it was healing rapidly, her arm still bore the long gash that the baseline human had nicked with his sword. There was no question that he was baseline, she could scent it – yet his blade inflicted injury, something that no other blade had ever done before.
It would have been disturbing enough had it simply been a matter of speed. She had dodged his swing with greater speed. But then he had twisted the blade so that the edge was waiting in the path where her arm was to move – before she had even started the motion! How could he have known?
After puzzling for some time, she sighed and shook her head. It must have been a lucky stroke. It would be best not to put too much into it. Still . . . those eyes, how they penetrated! In a way that she couldn't fully understand, his eyes had inflicted more injury than had the blade.
“It must have been luck,” she said aloud. “I was startled, that was all. Given the time, I could have attacked again, and he would not have lived. Unfortunately, the girl had the gun aimed and in another instant would have released the lock. Father, I could not risk your safety for my pride.”
The moon gleamed silently over the bog. Mist swirled with her passage. The basket swung from her arm, and did not reply.
The light of the fires of the Roman encampment mingled with the light of dawn. At the perimeter, barricades had been set and guards were posted. She was challenged when she approached the main gate. The sergeant in charge folded his arms and gave her a scolding look.
“Conduct me to the Emperor,” she snapped. “Inform him that the Lady Athena has – “
“Camp followers through the southern gate,” the sergeant replied.
What on Neeth did that mean? “Inform Emperor Valarion that the Lady Athena – “
“Camp followers through the southern gate!”
Realizing the man was insensible, Athena tried to sidestep. The two burly soldiers behind him crossed spears, poised shields, and glowered from an advantage of a head's additional height. Oh hang! she thought.
Muttering curses, she retreated a few paces, turned and charged. She somersaulted over the men and sprinted toward the headquarters compound. She was hidden within the blocks of tents before they could follow.
Halfway to the compound, so as not to attract attention, she slowed to a casual walk among the soldiers. They were packing belongings, clustering beneath standards of legion, cohort, and squad, polishing swords, sharpening spear points, loading darts into shield pockets, strapping into helmets and breastplates. The activities were similar to what she'd seen at the Leaf base when the men had prepared to evacuate the poison ring. There, though, the expressions had been grim and voices low or silent. These men laughed and chatted.
At the compound perimeter, she was challenged again. This time the temple guard was present, readily recognized her, and escorted her into the headquarters tent.
The formerly spacious tent was crammed with Roman officers, gathered around the table where the tactical map was spread beneath a blaze of lanterns. The man they believed was their Emperor was speaking as he gestured over the map, and they watched raptly. The temple guard did not announce Athena's presence and her entry went unnoticed.
She halted, feeling confused. She was not used to being ignored in a gathering of leaders. She realized also that some etiquette was called for. In Roman military society, an oddly-dressed unknown woman could not simply interrupt the Emperor's planning session and demand attention. That would raise questions among the officer corps and jeopardize the appearance of normality in the chain of command.
Moreover, in the low-key voice with its earnest tones, in the direct eye contact with the serpentine movement of hands, she recognized Father's charm. Watching his image once more cast a spell upon an audience, she felt an aching longing that had grown during her stay upon this world. It was as if he had truly been returned to corporeality
Yet in truth, she reminded herself, this man was only an imitation, a temporary measure to be used and dispensed with once the contingency was past. With that in mind, his presentation technique was no longer mesmerizing charm. It was mocking parody.
She bullied up to the table, glared and coughed. The Imposter must have noticed, but did not break his patter.
“EMPEROR VALARION!”
She could speak very loudly when she had to; it was an ability that had been developed when she had become acting director of Star Seed and had to gain attention from a room full of conversations. When she shouted as loud as she could, it was like a chopstick poking an eardrum, she'd overheard a department director say. She was pleased to see that assessment reflected in the face
s of the officers.
The Imposter blinked impassively. “Yes, Lady Athena. Is there something I can do for you?”
“May I speak to you privately?”
“Now, do you mean?”
“Now.”
The Imposter glanced at the officers with an expression that seemed to say, if-you'll-excuse-me-I-must-humor-this-poor-erratic-woman. “Of course. All of you are dismissed. Await further instructions by your standards.”
The men shuffled out of the tent, until it was just her, the Imposter, the temple guard, and Pandora Gamma on her pedestal. Athena glared at the probe's blinking lights and demanded, “Why is it being exposed like that?”
“Like what?” the Imposter asked nonchalantly. “And why are your clothes so damp? Were you swimming at this hour?”
“That's not important! What is important is that we can't have the central icon of their mythology appearing openly! It raises too many questions! You must conceal it behind a curtain at the least!”
“She wanted to watch.”
Athena tilted her head and gaped. She collected herself and said, “And why do I see preparations for battle? I gave no orders for any action until I returned!”
The calmer the Imposter's tone, the more infuriated Athena became. The Imposter very calmly replied, “Our scouts reported the crash of your vehicle. It was assumed that you had either perished or were taken prisoner. Either way, wasn't it the fulfillment of your will to advance on the enemy to our west in order to retrieve the other Box?”
The Imposter smiled. Pandora Gamma blinked lights. Athena looked back and forth between the two of them.
“Which of you made the decision to act without my approval?”
“It was a mutual decision.”
Athena had been in the company of Eric Roth for centuries. She knew that tone of voice. It was when he sounded devoid of guile that he was fullest. Yet, was she not still in control? She commanded the seeder probe, and the seeder probe gave her authority over the temple guard. The Imposter might command the legions, but he was alone in the tent. His mimicry of Father notwithstanding, she could reach across the short distance separating them and snap his neck at any time.