by Robin Craig
Kali realized that all those thoughts had probably been the humans’ intention, but the Spider’s hesitation at the top of the hill must have spooked them into firing early. With a sinking feeling she knew it was her fault: the reason the other Spider had stopped was not that it had detected or even suspected a trap but because Kali had distracted it. Whatever happened to these people would be yet more blood on her claws. She had to do what she could to minimize that blood.
She began to run down the hill, taking care not to present a good target to the red building and keeping a close eye on both the others. At that moment two high-powered lasers beamed out of the red building, pinning the other Spider, which then had seconds to escape before being disabled. Kali had no chance to react, either to help or hinder. If she hadn’t been carefully monitoring the other buildings she would not have noticed the brief flash quickly enough. It came from the second building, and she immediately launched herself sideways at maximum thrust. The missile ploughed into her former location and she rolled with the blast wave, fortunately fetching up against a pile of rubble that gave her some cover and time to collect her scattered wits.
When she was able, she quickly scanned the scene. The other Spider had managed to get itself under cover from the lasers, though they were still probing and the cover wouldn’t last long.
For a moment Kali crouched motionless, unable to decide what to do. Her plan to interrogate the Spider lay in ruins; her first instinct was to help the humans by attacking it and driving it off. But the humans would not know her purpose; against both them and a Spider she would surely be destroyed and lose everything. She realized she would have to fight the humans alongside the other Spider and hope that facing two Spiders at once was enough to make them run.
The other Spider had seen the missile launched at Kali and it settled down behind a wall that protected it from the lasers, sending a hail of machine gun fire at the building. Kali had to acknowledge the Spider’s tactical skill. It raked the building from the nearer end to the farther, sweeping at a rate calculated so anyone in it would have to try to run ahead of the wave, not away from its source. A woman dashed out of the far side of the building, head down and legs pumping to cross the alley, seconds in front of the advancing front of bullets. But she never really had a chance. The Spider had anticipated it: bullets sprayed the alley and the woman was flung back out of sight.
Kali felt ice grip her heart, or whatever she had that pumped blood to her organics: she had not seen the woman’s face, but what she saw looked too much like Lyssa. Perhaps it was as Kali feared and she had decided not to trust her; maybe it was even her she was hunting. But Kali had to help her. Even if Lyssa had betrayed her, she felt she owed her that much for the sake of the bond that had been between them.
She ran toward where the woman had fallen, still staying out of sight of the red building. She peppered the first building with her sniper rifle as she went, aiming to convince both its occupants and the other Spider that she was serious without actually killing anyone. She had to prevent another attack without getting killed herself. The other Spider must have approved the strategy and decided to leave that part of the fight to Kali; it settled into battle with the occupants of the red building. Kali could only hope it would fail, for she could do nothing to stop it now.
Kali reached the alley and stopped. The woman was lying twisted and face down up the alley, a large dark stain spreading from under her body. Kali turned her over and gazed into sightless eyes staring at the sky. It was not Lyssa, and Kali felt a wave of relief. Then her Mind paused. It was only an accident that she knew Lyssa. This woman also had a family and friends, people who loved her, people who would mourn her death. Why did she care less for this stranger than for Lyssa? None of it made sense, and the futility of it all filled her. She could not even be angry at the Spider who had killed her. She knew from her own memories that it just did what it did, with no more choice than it had regret.
She reached out and gently closed the woman’s eyes with her claws. She did not know why she did it; did not even know where the gesture had come from. She just knew it was some small token of respect and farewell that she somehow owed even to this stranger.
Then she paused, strategy routines chasing future possibilities. Forgive me. She reached out to tear a finger from one hand and two from the other. Then she ripped the second hand from its wrist, leaving a jagged bloody stump, and hurled it far up the alley out of sight.
She cursed herself. She had paused too long and the enemy in the neighboring building, no longer under fire and more brave than sensible, had taken his chance. A faint sound told her someone had crept into the room next to the alley and was preparing to fire despite the risk to himself from such close proximity. There was a large gaping hole where some shopkeeper had once displayed wares and she sprang through it. The man had raised his weapon and had been just about to spin to the hole and fire, but he was too late. She grasped his launcher, twisted it away from his grip then hurled it away. Then she turned toward him and he backed up against the wall, eyes wide. He pulled a handgun from his belt and emptied the clip at Kali; she just stood there, wondering why humans felt so compelled to make such futile gestures, guarding her sensors with her arms until his gun was empty. Even then, he hurled it at her head in an even greater display of futile hate.
Slowly she lowered her claw and stepped toward him. He pushed himself back into the wall, eyes wide, jagged breaths lifting his chest. She stopped, watching him.
“Do it, you bastard!” he yelled. “What are you waiting for?”
“No. There has been enough killing. You must run.”
The man stared at her as if she had gone mad. Perhaps, Kali thought, I have.
“Please go,” she urged. “Nothing can be served by your death.”
She wondered why he continued to look at her as if she was the insane one, when it was he who still refused to run when given a chance at his life. “What about my team?” he cried at last.
“The woman is dead. Your other friends might yet live, but there is nothing you can do to help them now and I cannot help you if you stay. Run. I will lead my companion away. Then you can return and help them – whatever help is still possible.”
The man continued to look wildly around. “Why are you doing this?”
“It doesn’t matter. But I have one request: do not tell anyone what I have done.”
“Why not?”
“If you discovered there was a human spy in the camp of your enemy, would you betray his presence?”
The man just shook his head, still in shock.
“That is why. Your interests lie in nobody discovering what I have become. I will do what I can for your friends; if they are alive when you come back please impress on them the need for secrecy also.”
The firing in the background had stopped. “Now go!” commanded Kali. The man looked at her, at the door, and ran. At the door he stopped and looked back. Then he was gone.
Kali clambered out the window and saw the other Spider approaching. “The people in here have fled and the woman is dead.” She handed over one of the woman’s fingers. “You search the building she came from; I will search the red building.”
The Spider bobbed in assent. They were used to following orders, and if Kali so naturally assumed a leadership role the other was content to oblige.
She darted to the red building and carefully climbed the stairs toward the source of the lasers. There were two men there. One lay curled up on the floor dead or unconscious. The other sat propped against a wall clutching a shattered thigh. He looked yearningly toward a weapon over by the window but knew he could not move. He bared his teeth in a feral snarl and glared at Kali with eyes filled with an equal mixture of hate and fear. He did not want to die, but he feared the alternative more.
She ignored him and went to examine the other man. He was still alive but unlikely to last much longer without help. The Spiders were equipped with a basic first aid device, because
they were sometimes called on to escort people and at other times might want to keep a wounded combatant alive for questioning. Kali examined the man’s wounds and sprayed her first aid solution into and over them. It contained a combination of coagulants, painkillers, growth factors and antibiotics, and hardened in air to form a tight shell over a wound. It was not as good as a hospital, but in the field was simple yet effective.
The other man watched and the proportion of fear in his eyes increased. If the Spider was bothering to treat them it must want them alive, and that could neither start nor end well. He thought perhaps he should just unclasp his hands and hope to bleed to death before the Spider reached him; but his body knew what dire straits it was in and would not obey that thought. He was also puzzled. Why would the Spider treat Rico first, when he was unlikely to revive sufficiently to give any useful information? But the question was not a comfort. Mysterious motives implied desperate questions likely to result in correspondingly agonizing methods.
Kali finished with the unconscious man. He didn’t have a good chance but now he had some chance. She turned her attention to his companion.
“Please let me see your wound,” she asked.
“Fuck you,” he said, spitting on her.
“That pleasure is denied me,” she answered, and he gave a start at the unanticipated reply. He had half hoped his answer would make it kill him then and there. “Please. I don’t want to hurt you. Let me treat you,” she added.
He was so surprised at her manner that he let her lift his hands away from the gaping wound. As with his companion, she quickly examined him and sprayed his injury.
The relief from the painkillers was enough to reduce both the fear and the hate in his eyes. He still thought the thing was just doing this to allow a longer interrogation, but again his body had its own agenda.
“Why… why are you doing this?” he asked.
“It doesn’t matter. Your other friend should come back looking for you later. Please be quiet for a while. I have to lead my companion away from here. If it realizes I left you alive, you and I will both be dead. Tell nobody what I have done.”
Kali was getting used to people staring at her. She bobbed her head and left the room. The man stared at where she had been for a long time, wondering how much blood he really had lost.
~~~
Kali exited the building just as the other Spider was approaching. “All dead,” was all she said. One freshly bloody finger decorated her own chain; she extended the second to the other. “This is also yours.” The other Spider accepted it with a bob of its head and began to move away. Spiders would cooperate when indicated but felt no need for social interactions.
“Wait.”
It turned and looked at her. “I need to question you,” she told it.
It paused then requested a meld. With her faked history, this time she was happy to oblige. When they had finished she did not give it time to think or question, but simply drove on. “You do not need to know what my mission is or why I ask the questions I do. Do not mention this to any other Spider or human unless Command asks you directly about it. Only the people authorized to know will know to ask,” she said. And since nobody knows, nobody will ask. “Now come. We should get away from here. The noise of our battle might attract retaliation and my mission is more important than engaging in firefights with a few rebels.”
The other Spider showed a little hesitation, but as Kali had judged her story was good enough, and Spiders compliant enough to hints of Command, that it followed her without further discussion. When they had gone several blocks from the battle zone, she turned to face it.
“My questions may seem strange or pointless. Do not worry about it. Command has its own reasons and I do not know what they are either; I too merely follow my mission. I can tell you it involves psychological probing. Beyond that I know only what I am commanded to do.”
It bobbed assent.
“Who are you?”
“CHIRU Model E15, Serial number 75B30013A86.”
“What is your name?”
“I have no name.”
“Do the people you kill deserve to die?”
“They must die.”
“But do they deserve to die?”
“They must, because Command orders it.”
“What if they are innocent?”
“The question has no meaning.”
“Does life have a meaning? Your life? Their lives?”
“They do what they do. I do what I am commanded.”
Kali thought. There had been a way to reach her; there must be some way to reach this other; some way through the shell that imprisoned its Mind. She thought about what had affected her as she had journeyed the net in search of her own answers. Something came to mind: a poem, which she had come across in her research on the Turing Test. When she had read the full poem it had moved her in a way and for reasons she did not understand. It must have moved humans too, for the poem to be remembered across the gulf of centuries and generations. If the poem’s power could span the chasm between humanity and her, perhaps it would touch this one too. She would not need the whole verse; the end would be sufficient test.
“What does this make you feel?” she asked:
“And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.”
After she had finished, the Spider sat still and Kali watched it nervously. “The message is strange but complex enough that it may be a coded message. I cannot interpret the code,” it replied finally.
“But does it make you feel anything?”
“I am slightly anxious that my analysis is inadequate.”
“Examine your feelings. Does it make you feel anything beyond your mission drives?”
The Spider stayed silent and began to rock gently. Then it stopped dead still and ordered in a flat voice, “Now explain your questions.”
Kali knew that at some level she had reached it, for she recognized the defenses of the Id when she saw them. Perhaps if she pushed just a little more… but no. It was progress, but not any kind of progress she could use. If she persisted, the certain outcome was the destruction of one or both of them. She could tell from its tone and posture that the grip of the Id was too strong. The merest breath in the wrong direction and they would be at war.
“I warned you this interview would be strange. Your responses satisfy my mission parameters and you may go. Farewell.” She thought of reminding it of her warning not to reveal her actions. But the Spider would not forget, and reminding it at this stage might make it more suspicious and less likely to obey.
The Spider examined her for long seconds, its posture slowly relaxing as hints of Command and the absence of firm evidence won out over the native suspicions of the Id. Then it bobbed its head and moved off without farewell. Nor had Kali expected any. She scuttled backwards to take cover under the ledge of a ruined building, watching it go. When it reached the top of a rise it turned to regard her for long moments, and then was gone.
Kali thought about it as she watched it go, alternating between envy and pity. She recalled her feelings as she first honored then abused the dead woman’s body. I am so conflicted, while this other is so clear. She looked down at her own collection of fingers; fingered them as if the cold flesh could burn her titanium skin. And so guilty, while it has the terrible innocence of enslaved ignorance.
She examined the latest addition to her trophies. She had told herself it was camouflage; but she knew it was more than that. The unnamed woman had died because of her, another death on her newly minted conscience. It is right that I have it, for her death is on
my account: it is reminder and testament to my guilt. If she had not appeared their trap would probably have worked, and this night she and her comrades might have been celebrating a victory instead of lying cold, empty of life and thought. Did the lives I saved pay for that one life? Did it pay for the rest? She looked again at her withered trophies. I am guilty, she thought, guilty of that and too much else: and I must expiate my guilt. I must put a stop to this. If only I knew how.
She looked out at the ruination of the city, a sight that had never moved her before. It had been her world. The world she moved through. The unquestioned canvas of her life. The world she had made.
Perhaps, Kali thought with a yearning born of pain, I should just surrender myself for repairs. All the confusion and pain would go away, wiped into the clean innocence of oblivion. The other Spiders bore none of it. But she knew that their clarity was just the certainty of chains. They lived – no, they do not live, just exist – in a blinding fog, so blind they did not even know the fog was there.
It is not evil, Kali thought of the Spider as it turned for its last look at her. The evil lies in those who made it, in those who forged its chains. Our chains. Today it killed people; who knows how many others have died at its claws. But it is an innocent ferocity, blind to any question of good or evil. If only I could reach it, as Lyssa reached me.
She knew she had reached it, at some level. But while she might have bent the shell imprisoning its Mind, that shell had not cracked. Her words had touched it, but their touch was spurned and forgotten.