by Isaac Asimov
“Reticula histiocytosis,” Shasma called back. “Incurable. It’s a consequence rather than a disease.”
“A consequence of what?”
“Living here.”
Masid watched her move with evident difficulty from place to place and felt ashamed for no clear reason. He felt pity for her, which he sensed she would resent, and he felt guilt over the act he had to maintain.
“Why are you telling me all this?” he asked.
She looked at him as though she had expected him to be gone already. She shook her head. “Why not? Honesty is cheap enough here. It’s not like you’ll be leaving anytime soon.” She smiled grimly. “You’re not a Spacer. That’s all anyone here requires me to determine. Your death will not be brought on by my involvement.”
“I —”
The door opened, and Filoo came in. “How is he?”
Shasma glared at Filoo briefly. “Fine. Clear. I’ve already treated him.”
Filoo frowned, but nodded. “Is he done?”
“With me he is.”
“Thanks.” He looked at Masid. “Come on. I want to show you around, introduce you to some people.”
Masid wanted to talk to Shasma further, but he stood and grabbed his jacket. He suspected that she had her lab shielded against eavesdropping, but he could not be sure. If anyone had been listening, he wondered what they might make of what had been said. “Fine. Maybe they have better conversation.”
She frowned at him.
“Ah,” Filoo said, “Dr. Shasma’s not bad. Keeps us all breathing. It just takes her a while to grow on you. Unlike most things on Nova Levis.” He laughed loudly.
“We’ll see,” Masid said.
Yalor died the next day. Mia saw the activity around his tent increase, cyborgs coming and going quickly. When she finally pushed her way through, Yalor was being zipped into a bodybag.
“Wait,” she said and knelt beside him. The burns on his face had changed, become pus-laden with sickly-green streaks tracing across the unburned flesh. Goo caked his eyes. He had not, finally, died of his injuries.
They finished sealing him up and carried the bag away. They did not allow her to follow. Mia stared after them for a long time. She felt responsible, certainly, even though she knew it was not ultimately her fault.
Mia wandered the camp unchallenged. She quickly realized that what she had taken as a disordered collection of domiciles, nomadic is nature, was, in fact, organized and stable in a fashion not immediately apparent.
They had settled in a shallow depression which Mia began to suspect had once been a small lake. A few of the sandy-colored rocks she examined showed signs of fossil remains. Burrows tunneled into the shallow-graded hillsides. Paths etched by constant use traced complex patterns. She saw a pair of the cyborgs laboriously laying stone markers along one of the more heavily-trodden walkways.
“Shelter” did not seem to mean the same thing to them as it did to her, at least not entirely. Many had tents, of course, but by no means most of them. Roofless stands of pylons and sheeting made small enclaves in which one or more of them entered and left in almost continual shufflings of residence. What Mia could see between gaps in the walls showed only bare ground without furnishings. Others among them would stop wherever they happened to be and stand or sit for hours on end, immobile. Against one wall of the shallow a row of huts stood in a good imitation of a block of offices. Within each, an individual sat, gazing out at the enclave.
In the center of the community stood a tripod supporting a heavy block-and-tackle rig above a deep pit. Every time she attempted to look into the pit, one of them stepped in her way and shepherded her off.
Mia did not know quite what to make of these... people. They all exhibited striking deviations from anything she would label “human,” but she could not call them robots, either. There had been rumors for months of some new kind of robot, something that set most Settlers on edge and justified the resurgent fear of Earth toward all things Spacer, but Mia had considered these stories exaggerations at best, the kind of spontaneous fantasies of frightened people confabulating paranoid myth at worst. Until now, it had not occurred to her that there might be something more, something tangibly different...
They’re organic, she thought, watching them. They have emotion, they are flesh... but not only...
She recalled more of her talk with Ariel on the subject. They had been discussing bioaugmentation. Earth used a variety of techniques to increase the efficiency and strength of certain branches of the armed forces — she remembered Bok Golner, the mercenary who had been part of the assassinations on Earth more than a year ago, a supersoldier, reflexes superior to normal humans, strength greater, survivability in extreme conditions enhanced — but Ariel had dismissed the idea that such augmentations constituted a cyborg.
“He was still human in his essential genetic structure,” she said. “The augments were all addons. A cyborg would be a true composite entity, the biological and the robotic symbiotically tied to each other in such a way as to define a new species. True cyborgs, for example, could never be returned to a human condition like your military augmenteds.”
“You sound as if you know quite a bit about them.”
“It was a line of research some time past,” Ariel had admitted. “It didn’t work. There are too many variables, too many unknowns. It’s not really feasible. Augments are much more efficient, when it comes right down to it. Fewer ethical problems, too.”
“Ethical?” Mia had prodded.
“Sure. By necessity, a cyborg would be a mule. You would be creating a species with no possibility of reproduction.”
“Humans have done that for ages.”
“True, but not an essentially human species. I rather doubt more sterile hybrids are aware of their sterility.”
“A cyborg would be. Why would that be a problem? A lot of people choose it.”
“Exactly. They choose it. A cyborg would have no choice.”
“You wouldn’t have to necessarily make it sterile, would you?”
“Technologically, no. But I wouldn’t want to create my own species’ replacement.”
“What about robots? They could always build more of themselves.”
“They don’t. The Three Laws prevent it.”
Ariel had then changed the subject. It had seemed at the time that she understood more than she had said, but Mia had dropped it. There were no cyborgs, so it was just talk.
Now, though...
Can you reproduce? she wondered, watching them. She had seen nothing so far to indicate separate genders — they all seemed, in general, to be males — but if they were an entirely new species, reproduction did not necessarily have to be sexual.
The variations in physical appearance did not suggest any kind of parent/offspring connection. They all seemed to be the same age, although she had no real basis for judging.
Mules...
They had salvaged a quantity of standard ration kits from the wreck, and every morning Mia found a couple of them inside the bubble tent she had been given. The food was bland, but kept hunger at bay. She never saw who left it.
***
On the third morning, she woke to find a rash on her left hand. By early afternoon, it had spread up her arm and a new spot had appeared on her face. That night, she shivered uncontrollably with fever and on the fourth morning her legs were weak. She vomited shortly after breakfast and lay, completely lethargic, on her bedding.
On the fifth morning, her head throbbed, and it hurt to open her eyes for long. Outside her bubble, several cyborgs squatted, watching her. She thought she heard them talking among themselves, but she could make out no words, only the susurrus of continuous conversation.
That afternoon, she felt herself lifted onto a gurney and carried across the camp. She draped an arm over her eyes to shield them from the painful brilliance of the sky. Then she was in a close, dark place. Presently, she sensed motion. After that, she slept.
Time compr
essed and expanded unpredictably. She felt she slept interminably, but then, in quick succession, motion stopped, light stabbed at her again, and she was being carried. Doors clanged, footsteps tapped on tile, she caught glimpses of a hallway and lights and people huddled around her.
“Am I back?” she asked once.
Her arm was prodded and stuck, her clothes removed, and then she slept again forever, her thoughts muffled in a thick nest of uncertainty. All she knew, all she could be certain of, was the persistent headache, but even that did not feel entirely within her skull, as if the pain existed a few meters away, hers to use if she cared to...
More sleep.
Then...
“I’m dying...”
“No.”
“Please.”
“Do you want to?”
“I don’t — no.”
“You don’t know?”
“No, I... no...”
“This might help.”
Later, she could not recall who had said what.
Mia opened her eyes, startled. The light was low and did not hurt. She lay very still, trying to get a sense of where she was.
A sheet covered her up to her throat.
The quiet pulsings of a biomonitor hummed rhythmically somewhere.
Bogard...?
The room smelled as if it had recently been decontaminated and washed.
A door opened, and then a woman appeared alongside her.
“Good,” she said, “you’re awake. How do you feel?”
“I don’t —” Mia’s throat caught, her mouth thick and dry.
“Oh. Sorry.” The woman placed a straw in Mia’s mouth.
She drew automatically, swallowing greedily at the cool water. She studied the woman while drinking — thin, harsh lines in her face, short hair, off-white smock, perceptive gaze, clinical...
Mia coughed. “Where am I?”
“The Nova City Free Clinic. You were damn near dead.”
“How long?”
“You’ve been here four days.”
“Who are you?”
“Dr. Shasma. You are Mia Daventri, Lieutenant, Terran Expeditionary Force security.” She gave a quizzical tilt of her head. “Are you a spy?”
“Not here.”
Dr. Shasma smiled. “No, I imagine not. I’m told you came down in a drone supply ship. Your partner died. Not very subtle.”
Mia felt herself grow warm, angry.
“Sorry,” Dr. Shasma said. “You can tell me when you’re ready. Or not.” She glanced away for a few moments. “You’re stable for now. I’ll be back later to administer another round of cyclines.”
“What... what did I have?”
“Not did. Do. You have an aggressive fungal infection. It’s permeated your lungs. We caught it before it had time to move into the lymphatic system. That would have been fatal. It’s in remission right now, but you’ll have to go through a complete cellular purge to be rid of it. We can do that, or just treat it symptomatically. You’re lucky it was this one — most of them show no symptoms until too late.”
“Cellular purge... that takes months, doesn’t it?”
“Several weeks. And it hurts. Get some rest now. I’ll be back in a few hours, you can ask more questions then.”
“And you’ll answer them?”
“If I can.”
“Answer one right now,” Mia said quickly as Dr. Shasma began to walk away.
“All right.”
“Those... people... who brought me here. I’m guessing they brought me, you didn’t just find me in an open field.”
“No, you were brought.”
“What are they?”
“Orphans. Discards. Nova Levis’s nasty little secret.”
Mia felt impatient. “That’s not an answer I can use.”
“Useful answers are at a premium here. Don’t worry about it for now. We can talk later.” She paused. “Why are you here? I didn’t think Terrans had any interest in grounding on Nova Levis.”
“Unplanned vacation.”
Dr. Shasma waited for more, then grunted. “Fine, have it your way. You’ll live, Lieutenant. Now get some rest, I’ll see you later.”
Dr. Shasma walked away. A moment later, the door closed.
Mia raised a hand. The rash was gone, but her skin looked very dry, very old. She let the arm fall and tried to sense her own condition. Tired, to be sure, and suffused with a not-quite-right feeling of somehow being different.
She let her gaze drift over the small clinic room. She stopped her examination at a small set of shelves against the wall opposite the door, filled with paper books.
Chapter 28
access Auroran comm matrix via coordinating R. I. Eos security obtained, vetting probabilities, originating communications, links, and associations assigned subject Aspil Tro, collating date/frequency, analyzing
subject Aspil Tro assigned residence on return from Earth, termination of assignment Humadros Trade Legation, Madarian Apartment Complex
comm traffic logs average thirty communications per day for period of eighty-seven days till reassignment of subject to Nova Levis negotiations team
resumption of name-specific comm traffic logged at five alternate residences, commencing fourteen days after subject was scheduled to depart for Nova Levis blockade, each address sorted by number of communications, duration, and return communications
analysis of comm patterns, voice, and semantic content of communication validates high probability that subject remains on Aurora, checking access to diplomatic registry, logs of extraplanetary agents, query specifically Aspil Tro, verify assignment to Nova Levis blockade, verify arrival, confirm all contacts, assess probability of separate identification protocols
probability plus ninety-percent Aspil Tro remains present on Aurora, communications logs verify continued contact with seven of the eighteen primary contacts registered prior to reassignment Nova Levis, tracing comm sequences now
error in routing, oversight R. I. dysfunction consistent with prior anomalous behavior, reference files Union Station D. C. Earth, forward analysis to Thales for independent corroboration, affirmed, request override on oversight R. I. to establish source of continued communications
verified, location, assigned parties, verified
secondary trace, location of primary subjects, protect protocols, subjects Avery Derec and Burgess Ariel, primary network indicates no trace, scan security network, sixth-level communications, isolated and routed through compromised R. I.
subjects located, condition verified through remotes assigned Security Lieutenant Craym
determination of Three Law response, report logged, as follows —
— primary subjects held incommunicado in violation of standard Auroran security protocols, condition optimal, no immediate threat, First Law obligation conditional upon change in circumstances, Second Law in force, initial task to locate potential threat Aspil Tro —
proceeding
DEREC WOKE FROM a brief nap and found himself gazing across at Dr. Penj, whose head lolled back, mouth open, snoring. The two guards still stood by the exit. Ariel lay sprawled on another sofa.
Clin, her trio of orbiting extensions hovering around her head like a loose halo, stood in the midst of the projection of Eliton’s death scene.
He slowly stretched and stood, keeping an eye on the guards. Neither reacted as he crossed the room and entered the projection. One of the little spheres moved to block him and he hesitated. Clin looked at him, briefly surprised.
“Allow,” she said, and the extension drifted back into its stand-by position over her right shoulder. She returned her attention to the corpse displayed at her feet.
“I have a strange question,” Derec said in a quiet voice.
“Yes?”
“How common is it for Aurorans to go without their extensions?”
Clin glanced at Dr. Penj. “He’s an anomaly.”
“Granted. And First Advisor Maliq? Security Chief Talas?”
>
Clin returned her gaze to Eliton’s body. “He was assigned six extensions. That’s the standard security perimeter for high level diplomatic visitors.”
“Difficult to disrupt, I gather?”
“Very. But Eliton wasn’t brought here with that status...”
She pointed. “Look at the pattern they fell in. Almost evenly-spaced around him. He was standing here when they failed —”
“— and standing there when he was killed —”
“— which meant that whoever killed him was in the room while they still functioned —”
“— and no alarm was sent.”
Clin straightened. “There ought to be some record.”
“Maybe,” Derec said. “Where did your orders to arrest me originate?”
“Cleared through Chief Talas.” She gave him an irritated look. “What does that have to do with this?”
“Who arrested Eliton?”
“Once he was removed from the Wysteria... Chief Talas.” She indicated the crime scene. “Do you have anything useful to say about this?”
Derec studied the projected image for a few moments. “It seems evident he was comfortable with whomever was in the room with him. He was completely surprised. We — I assume all of us — have been assuming it was just one person. But as far as I recall, we never made a connection directly between Eliton and Tro Aspil.”
Clin’s jaw worked delicately. “I think you should return to you seat, Mr. Avery.”
Derec moved away from her, glancing at the two guards. He sat down where he had been. Ariel was awake, rubbing her eyes.
“Problem?” she asked.
“A very big one, I think. Were you listening?”
“Mostly.” She looked casually around the room. “No comm.” She winced suddenly and grabbed at her calf.
Derec watched her for a few seconds. “Cramp?”
She nodded, her face distorted in obvious pain.
Derec moved over to her sofa, sat beside her, and began massaging her leg. Ariel reclined, moaning convincingly. “Sorry,” she said.