Have Robot, Will Travel

by Alexander C. Irvine

  Nucleomorph’s only problem is making sure we can make more of them faster than they die off.” Brixa set his drink down. “And that’s where you come in.”

  Out of reflex, Ariel put her glass on the table, too. “I beg your pardon?”

  The office door opened, but something in Brixa’s face kept Ariel looking at him. “Adult conversions, Ambassador,” he said, and the smile came back in all of its amoral exuberance. “Most of our subjects are immature Terrans riddled with disease. We’re very excited to find out what happens when we do the procedure on a healthy adult Spacer.”

  Now Ariel did turn around, and saw coming toward her the robot Brixa had brought up from Nova Levis.

  “Ariel Burgess,” Brixa said, “meet Kynig Parapoyos. Oh, excuse me.

  I forgot you knew him as Gale Chassik some years ago; your acquaintance predates mine.”

  She knew it was hopeless, but Ariel leaped out of her chair and made a break for the door. The robot caught her without even rocking back. It lifted her off the ground and carried her out into the hall.

  Brixa, coming up behind them, said, “This is a privilege we haven’t extended to anyone else, Ariel. You’ll be the first person to know why we’re willing to expend all of this effort on you.”

  Ariel fought. She kicked, she screamed, she cursed Brixa and Parapoyos and in the end herself, and when the robot carried her into the operating theater where Krista Weil waited with a transdermal, Ariel spit in her face and cursed her, too.

  Weil didn’t even wipe away the saliva before touching the transdermal to the back of Ariel’s hand and depressing the trigger.

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  The hut door opened, and Masid barely got the datum stowed before Basq came in. The cyborg remained standing, but he looked completely at ease. “We have an arrangement to discuss,”

  he said.

  “So I hear, but it came from Filoo, so I’m glad you’re here to confirm,” Masid answered. The small sally got a chuckle, but he had no illusions about being able to deal with Basq if the cyborg leader had made up his mind.

  “Filoo gave you the substance of it.” Basq eyed Masid, giving him a chance to commit. Masid had the sense that more was coming, though, so he waited. “Clandestine enterprises make hypocrites of us all, Masid Vorian. If it were up to me, Filoo would have been turned over to the NLBI years ago; there’s certainly enough to charge him with. He’s peculiarly persuasive with the constituency we need to get our enterprise off the ground, though, and when he discovered that Kynig Parapoyos was alive, he practically forced himself on us. I wouldn’t have expected it of Filoo, but he’s pathologically loyal when it comes to Parapoyos.”

  “Is Parapoyos running things around here?” Masid asked.

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  “I run things here,” Basq said. “Do not doubt that. Parapoyos is a revered figure among us, but that reverence is ever tempered by the realization that he treated us like experimental mice, to be discarded when nothing more could be learned from us. In his current circumstances, he is a useful tool. We use him the way he used us.” He allowed himself a thin smile. “And you very nearly solved the problem.”

  “Not a very discreet maneuver, bulling into my office in the middle of the night. I take it he was freelancing? Or was I part of the plan after Taprin?”

  “Hardly. Pon Byris was an opportunity to stretch Earth-Spacer tensions even farther than Taprin’s death had. You, on the other hand, were a simple grudge. Parapoyos is now keenly aware that this kind of vendetta is counterproductive. You’ve got nothing to fear from him, I think. Filoo, on the other hand…” Basq let the question hang.

  Masid in turn forced himself to face it square-on for the first time.

  If it meant he would live, would he undergo the procedure? He recoiled from the idea, but that revulsion passed quickly, and his honest response was yes, he would. If death was the alternative, he would.

  The question was whether he could get away with not telling Basq this right away.

  “Are you and Brixa planning to transform Ariel?” he asked.

  “I’m not,” Basq answered, “and you’re dodging the question. What Brixa intends for her I do not know. I think she will be useful to us as a respected public official. It never hurts to have people like that on your side.”

  “You’re dodging my question, too,” Masid said. “Fact is, I think you’re lying to me. Let me lay the theory out for you. Cyborg tech is advancing as fast as you can sacrifice sick kids to it, and pretty soon you’ll be able to create cyborgs who are indistinguishable from fully organic human beings. My guess is you’ve got something along those lines planned for Ariel. The best advocate is the one who looks like someone who should hate you.”

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  “Good plan. Not my plan, probably not Brixa’s plan, but a good plan. To tell you the truth, I believe we’ll have to consider it now.

  Unfortunately, I think it will be several years yet before we are superficially indistinguishable from unaugmented humans. It seems unlikely that we will be able to keep Ariel Burgess either sequestered or duped for that length of time.”

  Masid’s instinct was to trust Basq. The cyborg leader didn’t come across like someone who lied very often, or for any less than crucial reasons. He vacillated, holding back his acquiescence only because he thought he still might be able to wriggle out of this. The wild card was the military strike—if it was imminent, Masid was more or less certain that by revealing it to Basq he would buy back his unaltered, flesh-and-blood life.

  His datum chirped, and Masid thought: It hasn’t done you much good to be indirect, Vorian. Let’s try brazen now, see how that goes.

  He took the datum out, looking Basq in the eye, and answered the call.

  Basq showed no sign of distress that Masid still had a datum, or that he hadn’t asked permission to use it. Masid turned the screen so they both could see Avery on the screen.

  “Derec,” Masid said.

  “Masid.” Avery was in a flier of some kind. “I came from Nova City as soon as I got off the ship. Where’s Ariel? Where’s the robot?”

  “The robot I don’t know about. Ariel, I think, is up at the Nucleomorph lab. There’s another problem now, though. Derec, let me introduce you to Basq.” Masid turned the screen a little more so Derec’s field of vision included Basq. The cyborg nodded in greeting.

  “Where’s Ariel, Basq?”

  “As Masid said. She is with Brixa, I believe touring Nucleomorph’s facility. Before we get too entangled here, Mr. Avery, I want to tell you how much I admire your positronics work. Bogard was exception-al. Before my transformation, I was involved in a similar area, not so theoretical, and I tip my metaphorical cap to you.”

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  Derec looked a little nonplussed at the compliment. “I’ll ask both of you,” he said. “Why did I get a recorded message from people identifying themselves as Terran military about three hundred kilometers back?”

  For someone who had never believed in luck, Masid found himself suddenly drowning in it. “Oh, that,” he said, with a glance over at Basq. “Mia Daventri called me a little while ago. Seems that Vilios Kalienin is worried enough about the situation here that he’s looking for outside support. He talked to someone in the Auroran diplomatic corps—Hofton, I think was his name. You know him?”

  Derec’s face had changed at the mention of the name. “Yes,” he said. “Go on.”

  “This Hofton was apparently convinced that Basq here is after more than the right to vote for city council. He suggested to Eza Lamina and Kalienin that Nova Levis’ government was threatened, and that drastic action might be called for. Kalienin was only too happy to get in touch with the Terran military, and the last thing they need right now is worries about a colonial uprising—especially if it’s started by cyborgs. The long and the short of it is that som
etime soon, Gernika’s going to be destroyed. Probably from orbit. If this transmission cuts off suddenly, you’ll know why.”

  While he spoke, Masid looked from Derec to Basq, who exhibited remarkably similar reactions: slight widening of the eyes, paling of the skin, and so on. Typical physical responses to an unwelcome surprise. Masid had the sense that Derec’s shock was slightly different than Basq’s, however, and he would have given a great deal to know why.

  “I’m going to Nucleomorph,” Derec said. “Get out of there, Masid.”

  Masid put every fiber of his being into a casual shrug. “That’s not up to me.”

  “All of you get out of there,” Derec said, and the screen went blank.

  He put the datum away, taking his time about it, and looked up at Basq. “Seems like you should be sounding some kind of alarm.”

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  Basq opened the door. “Come with me.”

  They left the hut. Filoo was standing just outside, smirking at Masid.

  “What’s the call, gato?”

  “Vorian and I are taking a ride to Nucleomorph,” Basq said. “Keep an eye on things here.”

  The disappointment on Filoo’s face was almost comical. “You’re a coward, Vorian,” he growled. “It’s always the easy way out for you.”

  Masid said nothing, because Filoo was right. Not because Masid had agreed to become a cyborg, or because he had once tried to assassinate Kynig Parapoyos, or because he had once used a dying agent in his own service to keep himself alive. It was because he was walking out of Gernika and leaving Filoo and the rest of them to die, and he was saying nothing.

  Basq must have had some inkling of his thoughts, because when they were most of the way down the trail to Masid’s flier, the cyborg said,

  “If you’d said anything, I would have killed you.”

  “That makes it worse,” Masid said.

  After a moment’s consideration, Basq nodded. They walked the rest of the way in silence.

  The flier was where Masid had left it. The three cyborgs he had seen coming down the trail earlier in the day were standing around on the river bank. They snapped to attention when they saw Basq.

  “It doesn’t respond,” one of them said.

  Basq looked at Masid. “Keyed to your voice?”

  Masid nodded.

  “Get in and start it up.”

  The two of them climbed in. Masid sat in the pilot’s seat and identified himself to the flier. Its engines heated up immediately.

  “Good,” Basq said.

  “To Nucleomorph?” Masid asked.

  “That’s right. I’m going to Nucleomorph. You get out.” Masid looked at Basq. “I don’t care what you tell them. They won’t believe you, 223

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  and from my perspective it’s easier to start over than to convince them.”

  Masid had thought himself callous when he left Gernika. Now he was getting a lesson in genuine indifference to life.

  “If we both survive this,” he said, “I’m coming after you.”

  Basq winked. “I’ll be waiting.”

  Masid got out of the flier and stood on the shore. Basq leaned out of the hatch. “Take him back to the settlement,” he said. “Wait for my instruction. Try to keep him and Filoo apart.”

  “Sir,” the three cyborgs said.

  The hatch closed. Masid watched the flier lift out of the shallows and skim over the trees to the west. Before it was out of sight, two of the cyborgs had grasped his arms and propelled him up the bank and onto the trail.

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  Ariel drifted. Lucid moments came and went, long enough to remind her where she was, but too short for her to find control over her body. She opened her eyes and saw gleaming metal arms tipped with laser scalpels, transdermal injectors, syringes, pincers for grasping and manipulating. For grasping and manipulating her.

  Behind them, a glare of lights, and somewhere beyond her field of vision she heard voices. She tried to speak and could not.

  Something, she thought distantly. Find something and hold it. Let everything else come to it.

  “Start with the structural changeover,” a woman said. There: Krista Weil. Ariel clung to the name, its specificity, the array of associations that came with it. Then she drifted, but not so far.

  An alarm brought her back. “What the hell is that?” Weil said.

  “Go ahead,” another voice said. Cold and dead, this voice, yet somehow vibrant with a kind of hunger.

  “I can’t start when there’s an alarm going off. If something goes wrong in the middle, she’ll die, and we don’t have healthy Spacers growing on trees around here. I’m not wasting this one. Go find out what it is.”

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  Faint whir of a machine, heavy tread on the bare floor. A robot.

  Snap: Ariel was awake. Feeling flooded into her limbs as the oldest of instincts, fight or flight, scoured the last of the anesthesia from her brain. Still she couldn’t move, but she was aware of every part of her body again, aware of the slight touch of air on her skin. Without moving her head, she looked around until she located Weil. The scientist was watching as the damaged robot housing Kynig Parapoyos left the operating theater. When the door hissed shut behind it, Weil muttered something under her breath and went to a terminal at the far end of the room. The alarm still sounded.

  Gather yourself, Ariel thought. If she didn’t move before the robot came back, she would never again move as Ariel Burgess. Her toes moved, and the tips of some of her fingers.

  Weil’s voice, calm and dispassionate as a weather recording, was narrating the procedure and related events into a recorder. “Krista Weil speaking. Initial phase of transformation on subject Ariel Burgess delayed due to security breach. It is inadvisable to perform transformation in a less than optimal security environment. Particularly in this case, as the patient is the first healthy adult Spacer to undergo procedure and will therefore provide a benchmark whether or not the procedure is successful.”

  And so on in the same vein, while Ariel listened and let Weil’s dispassionate recording flood her with anger. Anger and fear, and Ariel accepted the fear, welcomed it and molded it into the anger until she could lift her head a little.

  The alarm cut out. Weil looked up from her recording and made a call. “Kynig. Report, please.”

  “I’m on my way back. There was a breach of the fence, but the buildings are all secure. Brixa says to go ahead.”

  “We’re waiting on you, then,” Weil said. “Hurry. The anesthesia should have another two hours, but I don’t want a margin any slimmer than that before I purge it myself and start the paralytic flow. Spacers’

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  immune systems are very aggressive about eliminating foreign substances.”

  “I used to kill people who patronized me, Weil,” Parapoyos said from her terminal. The call cut off with a click.

  “Amazing that the worlds are not depopulated,” Weil muttered.

  She left Ariel’s field of vision, and Ariel heard her activating a pump of some sort. Then Weil started to speak again, recording her actions for future analysis. “Fluid replacement pump coming on line.

  The patient’s Spacer-enhanced immune physiology dictates that her autonomic functions be temporarily suspended while the major structural work is completed. An intravenous solution will be pumped into the subject’s body as subject’s blood is drained by slight vacuum.

  The solution introduced will induce coma, maximally reducing incidence of shock-induced death.”

  A firm hand grasped Ariel’s left forearm and turned it over, exposing the inside of her elbow. Ariel held herself still as the needle slid into the vein. Weil moved around her head to another machine, just on the edge of Ariel’s peripheral vision; it started up with a low hum. That would be the reservoir to hold her bloo
d, drawn out as the solution refilled and stilled her body.

  “Vacuum apparatus operative,” Weil said. “Applying to subject now.”

  Again the firm touch, this time on Ariel’s right forearm, but this time she didn’t hold still. She turned her head, reached across her body, and as Weil moved to embed the heavy needle in her right arm, Ariel caught her wrist and with all her strength jammed the needle into Weil’s other hand. Simultaneous with Weil’s shriek came the pain of the needle in Ariel’s arm tearing loose; then with both hands Ariel reached up to one of the mechanical arms arrayed above the operating table. She caught one and brought it down hard on Weil’s head.

  Weil’s knees buckled, and she pitched over onto her left side. Ariel slid off the table and steadied herself against a wave of dizziness.

  When it had passed, she stood looking coldly down at the semicon-227

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  scious scientist as the machine pumped the blood from her body. You deserve to die, she thought—and then knelt to pull the needle from Weil’s hand. The pump shuddered and cut off.

  Ariel went straight to the door, and found with little surprise that it was locked. There was a keypad next to it, and before she could think too much, she took the direct route, hauling Weil’s body across the room and pressing her thumb to the door.

  KRISTA WEIL: CONFIRM IDENTITY, it said.

  “Shit,” Ariel growled.

  CONFIRMATION FAILED.

  “Shit,” Ariel said again. She had not gotten this far to be standing naked in front of the door when Parapoyos came creaking through.

  Weil’s voice…

  The recording. It had begun Krista Weil speaking.

  Leaving Weil where she lay near the door, Ariel went to the terminal and saw that the recording file was paused. She ran back through it, following the onscreen transcription until the magic line appeared.

  Then she turned the volume all the way up and went back to the door to press Weil’s thumb into the pad again.