The Captured

by Kyte, Adrian

  ‘Impressive. But they’ll come back online, won’t they?’

  ‘Observe.’

  A member of the camp gingerly approached the mechanoid, produced what she saw to be a laser cutter, as he drew the beam across the silver head with a dexterity that suggested a well practised skill, and similarly when he removed its electronic brain.

  ‘You’d think they’d have adapted,’ she commented.

  ‘They will. Of course, they knew we would take one of their neural substrates. We’ve learned them to be laced with some type of explosive, which we can neutralist’

  ‘I understand. Anyone can use EMP bursts. Well, that’s not beyond human technology. It’s what happens afterwards, that’s where your special tech comes in. Still overconfidence---’

  ‘Can lead to carelessness. But our tech is really good.’

  ‘And do you keep the neural captures?’

  ‘We destroy them. They are the enemy soldiers, after we extract the memories for our providers.’

  ‘I see.’ Zoraina felt uneasy. Was this encampment part of a greater war than they appreciated? And if they knew the bigger picture, did it even matter that they were gladly the key participants? This was not the war she had anticipated – humans siding with an old enemy of the B’tari believed to have been vanquished if not completely annihilated. Rumour had it that for over a century the B’tari high command had searched for signs of this once powerful race during the years of the takeover (machine revolution, some would say), not to seek their help but to ensure they were truly gone. If the B’tari Central Council knew of their return, they would order a complete withdrawal of all intervention, or at the very least her intervention?

  So, for her mission to succeed she had to keep this extraordinary discovery a secret.

  Some chance of that, She thought.

  * * *

  3

  Torbin was at a dinner party when it again happened.

  His wife Delina decided after all that she would celebrate her fortieth at a rather high class restaurant; the type of establishment that was guaranteed to make him feel uncomfortable, with its mannered surroundings, the waiter who was distinctly and indubitably human (as opposed to a machine). Then there was the menu – the exotica, the refined and the downright avant-garde all there to make the task of choosing nothing less than uncomfortable. This was not about celebration, that was done the night before: a last chance to misbehave, he imagined. This was affirmation – of status. But of course he would never accuse Delina of this. No, he’d gone along with it with seeming alacrity, because for your fortieth you needed something worthy of such a milestone, an age that once conferred the beginning of a decline. In these times the phrase ‘life begins at...’ had never been so embraced. It really didn’t need to have any real meaning beyond a chronological mark. He thought of his own fortieth, in a sense he had celebrated it – the contented plateau on which his life rested. The doubts were not there back then. If only he could take himself back to that time. Or even just a few weeks.

  Torbin was never fond of the stretch before the first course arrived.

  A conversation got under way, initiated by Delina’s mother, a woman who would never accept that she was anywhere beyond early middle-age, wearing a black dress way too tightly for his liking (mother-in-laws were never supposed to look that sexy; though at least it augured well for Delina – if she opted for ‘the treatment’). Her much younger lover by her side – a twenty-something who appeared quietly embarrassed to be there – seemed to underline her denial of her true age. Delina disapproved as was only right, but tonight it seemed she would be keeping her disapproval well hidden.

  ‘I’m impressed with Choidry’s knowledge of physics,’ the woman said, who still sounded like a sixty-eight-year-old. ‘For a five year old that is quite something. I guess he’s a chip off the old block.’ Then, no more than two seconds later: ‘I’m impressed Choidry’s knowledge of---’

  ‘---yes, so you’ve just told me,’ Torbin interrupted. But he noticed people’s shocked reaction, even Delina.

  ‘Torbin, she was just saying.’

  ‘I know. Sorry.’ He amended, not wanting to stir things. But she seemed have repeated that sentence in exactly the same way.

  Delina said, ‘Anyway I think mum’s absolutely right...

  Torbin was distracted then by a man on the table opposite. He appeared to be on date; the woman had the kind of extravagant beauty to even put Delina in the shade. The man was staring at Torbin now, making him feel uncomfortable. But there was something else. He was sure he recognized the man, who persisted with his staring. Perhaps he knew of Torbin’s work. It got to the point where others on his table were noticing. ‘Looks like someone’s being a bit nosy,’ Delina observed.

  ‘Yeah.’ Torbin nodded. ‘Excuse me a minute.’

  No one seemed to mind that Torbin was leaving to approach the man. There was something familiar about him: that chiselled face, perfectly cut purple shirt over a gym-honed physique, eliciting in him a slight resentment which he couldn’t quite justify, much less explain. When he got to table the man was smiling at him. ‘Do I know you?’ Torbin enquired.

  ‘Perhaps.’

  ‘Then you know me?’

  ‘Somewhat.’ That smile again, it made him feel – irritated. An old foe?

  ‘So.’

  ‘So, you’ve noticed it’s happening again. It will continue to happen until you do something about it.’

  ‘What are you---Anyway who exactly are you?’

  ‘Why, I’m the man who has the one answer you seek most.’

  ‘Sure you do, but what is your name?

  ‘Roidon Chanley.’

  A shiver, like they say when someone walks over your grave. He never understood that expression, but here he felt it – that inexplicable shudder.

  ‘Your name is familiar but I’m afraid I cannot recall our association.’

  The man reiterated his broad smile. ‘Maybe you prefer not to, or maybe something here has taken your memory. It has been a while – eighteen years, though it may seem even longer. Anyhow, we were part of a team---’

  An explosion. Outside the restaurant but loud enough to drown out whatever the man was saying. The head waiter hurried over, a panicked look on his once immaculately impassive face. He said, ‘Sirs, a base charge generator has overloaded. We believe it to be foul play. This building is consequently no longer safe. You must leave immediately.’

  Roidon gave the man a disdainful look. ‘The work of someone with an impeccable sense of timing, I do not doubt.’

  ‘Sir?’ The waiter raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Never mind. It can wait.’ He looked at Torbin. ‘It was nice to be reacquainted. We must catch up on old times soon.’

  ‘Sure.’ Torbin nodded, before dashing

  over to his table.

  Delina’s mother was shaking her head, mouthing something before he could hear her words. ‘...Those anti establishment terrorists, I knew it,’ she said. ‘They’re trying to wreck what civilization we have. They’ll only be happy if we all went back to living in caves.’

  ‘Mum, it could just be some kid trying to steal energy,’ Delina said

  The head waiter was now heading for their table, gesturing campily for them to leave, while his assistant had their jackets ready. Even though no-one had yet eaten, everyone complied with the new directive, assured that no payment was required for the wine they had thus far drunken.

  As the others waited ‘a safe distance’ for their cabs, Torbin approached the charge point that bore the explosion. He only got near enough to notice the blackened charge-pad and the charred remains of its console pillar when he felt a hand on his shoulder.

  ‘Sir, I really would not advise you to get any closer.’ Torbin swivelled round to see the cop, smiling but in a strangely menacing way.

  ‘Oh. Dangerous is it?’ Torbin responded.

  ‘We have yet to ascertain the true cause of this explosion.’ From this few metre
distance there was no smell, or even smoke.

  ‘But you have your suspicions, right? You don’t think it was an accident?’

  ‘I am not one to indulge in speculation. Now if you don’t mind.’ The cop, who was at least five centimetres taller than Torbin and considerably wider, manoeuvred around to block his view of the explosion remnants.

  Without another word Torbin returned to the waiting guests. Delina was giving him an uncharacteristically stern look, conveying some silent rebuke understood only by intimates. She said, ‘The cab will be here any second. Are you more interested in that’ (she pointed at the charred charge point) ‘than coming home with me?’

  ‘No, no. Of course not.’

  ‘Good. I mean all you really need to know is that because of some idiot our evening was ruined.’

  A few seconds later their cab touched down. Delina’s friend, a willowy blonde called Sandria, suggested another restaurant they should all go to, but Delina declined, her bad mood obvious. The perfection had been ruined and that was it. Torbin couldn’t help but think his encounter with that old forgotten associate was somehow connected.

  It was going to be a difficult night.

  * * *

  4

  The man had invited Zoraina to his living quarters to ‘discuss strategy’, a suggestion she acquiesced to with reluctance. They sat on a large beige sofa, which seemed to encompass her body in a way that demanded her relaxation.

  At some point this question would arise: Where are you from? The man who asked her – knife man, whom she now knew as Ipcardi III, was studying her with an uncomfortable scrutiny, and for brief moments touched her shoulder, her arm. He said, ‘You a courageous woman to be venturing to these parts. We thought there were no true humans left. Where you from?’

  ‘A location I have sworn to keep secret,’ she told him. ‘You understand; their eyes are everywhere.’

  ‘Their eyes are everywhere … but here. Here you are safe.’

  She knew something of human male mating patterns; the need to search from outside the group was common across all species, logical for genetic health. And so here she was the outsider, a lone vulnerable female faced with a man possessing a healthy appreciation for logic and for – what he perceived to be – the human female form.

  ‘I must make a confession,’ she conceded. ‘I am not merely here to observe, but to plan a counter attack against the Machines.’

  ‘I know – we know. It is about survival.’

  ‘But in order to survive you have had to do a deal with a seemingly benevolent alien who may not be what they appear.’

  Immediately his countenance shifted from amiable (if lascivious) smiles and gestures to something that suggested he’d been affronted. He rose off the chair in a move that made her sink further into the couch’s envelopment.

  ‘What do you know of them?’ he demanded. He suddenly looked menacing again as he did when he first held the knife to her throat.

  ‘I...’ She was struggling for the words that would not give her true identity away. ‘I have studied accounts of the visitations. Was sceptical of their true power. But evidently they can be a formidable ally.’

  ‘If you deal with the devil, you have to give up your soul?’ he intoned.

  ‘No I didn’t mean---’

  ‘No?’ his voice almost a shriek. ‘Well, without their assistance we would not be here but one of the captured. We would no longer be.’

  ‘I am not judging you, Ipcardi. And I have no knowledge on the subject of souls, only of life’s preciousness. Perhaps your allies share the same beliefs as yours, perhaps their intentions are merely altruistic. It is only caution I am suggesting.’

  ‘Then you must trust me – my people, that we will not sacrifice our freedom or compromise our beliefs for anyone no matter how much they offer.’

  ‘You are a good man, Ipcardi.’

  He looked at her with an intensity she had never seen in a human. ‘If you truly believe that, then will you be with me tonight?’

  ‘Be with you? Oh, be with you.’ She wondered if this was when a human female should finally acquiesce.

  * * *

  5

  On a train journey to Toronto, Torbin remembered so clearly now, like it was yesterday. Thirteen years since he’d last seen her.

  His eyes closed, he could be there; his mind racing unconstrained with the possibilities. Butterflies in his belly.

  He was twenty-nine and single, and he had a history of failure – in love as well as work. But even then he still had hope for the future, that inchoate confidence of the young not yet bound by the disillusionment of accumulated experience. On that warm summer’s day he met a woman on a train – the scenic route between Banff and Toronto. The woman was occupied by her tablet; the glints of projected pulses into her retinas confirming that nothing else in the train would (or at least should) intrude. There was every reason not to interrupt. But that’s exactly what he did, because this was not the first time he had seen her. This had to be a regular journey for her, for he only did this four or five times a year, yet this was the second time in six months they had happened to be booked in the same coach. Not that Torbin was a believer in fate. Fate, acausal coincidence: these were irreducible by any scientific method he knew of. Or any at all, he suspected. More than merely a job – a scientist, albeit one struggling for recognition; a lab assistant for the most part, awaiting that grant.

  Anyway, good fortune favours the brave. But back then, he felt no braver than a boy on a quest for his first girl.

  He sat in the vacant seat next to her. Her hair: long, wavy copper-red, a slight plumpness about her face; the beginnings of a double chin as she looked down – which was quite unusual when you could choose to be slim without recourse to exercise or diet even if you were on a moderate income. Yet he could tell she did spend time working out by the hint of muscle on her partly-exposed upper arm beneath a white blouse, which held her in snugly and, when he looked down, prominent calves above flat faux leather shoes. The skirt she wore also revealed quite powerful thighs – as much as he could see, but, he wondered, the tightness of it perhaps constricting in a deceptively flattering way.

  There was no questioning her attractiveness, though she was not what might be considered conventionally beautiful. Or even average (an appearance men could feel at ease with) because both tended to be popular with the opposite sex. And that kind of popular was not a good thing for Torbin.

  Regardless of these careful observations he could tell, if only intuitively (and unscientifically), she would not be an easy pick-up. But he had no intention of going through the usual protracted process.

  He then said something he never believed he would. ‘Does a person’s history matter, if it is not dark or criminal?’

  ‘Excuse me.’ Her response was just what he expected. Her voice was what mattered: the way she enunciated, a precision, a slightly haughty irritation at the intrusion into her valuable time.

  ‘I mean it’s a game, isn’t it. With rules we’ve accepted because that’s how it was always done. Conventions---’

  ‘Conventions hold civilization together,’ she said, her voice measured, yet there was definitely a warmth now. ‘Without them we’d be no more than animals.’ If she was looking at him at all it was only in the most peripheral vision.

  ‘But we are. Only just more sophisticated versions.’

  ‘Huh.’ A sound of derision at his unoriginal statement, but she did look right at him for a brief moment, then back to her tablet.

  He persisted. ‘I’m just making the point: we take these conventions because that’s what we feel society expects. To not be excluded.’

  ‘It’s been nice meeting you. Now if you don’t mind.’ Her head turned abruptly back to her screen.

  He thought he’d probably blown it. Still, he had nothing more to lose. “I’ve seen you on this train several times, and I’ve wanted to approach you, because … because I find you interesting, because I’d like
to know you better. But I know time is limited, and you are a woman of high standards, for whom my own credentials may not be adequate.’

  ‘Well, you’re probably right there,’ she said at his truly brave words. ‘Nevertheless it is clear what you are after, and I’m sure there are plenty of women who appreciate such a direct approach and would ask nothing of your credentials. Perhaps just money.’

  ‘I’m just tired of playing the game,’ he admitted.

  She inclined her head sideways, then sighed. ‘And I’m tired of this conversation.’ Her weary words.

  ‘Can I even ask your name?’

  ‘If I told you would you leave me alone?’

  A reluctant nod. ‘Okay. If that’s really what you want.’

  ‘Then it’s Emelda.’

  ‘Torbin.’

  ‘Interesting to have made your acquaintance, Torbin. Now if you don’t mind---’

  ‘Sure.’

  Now he knew for certain – there was no chance. He returned to his original seat. His bitter thoughts: So much for the direct approach, and so much for bravery. But you have to know, when you’ve lost, when a situation is irredeemable.

  Except – as he remembered, and he felt it now – it only made him want her more. And when he last looked at her, the thought, no, the certainty that she would not be his was an agony that seemed rise in his chest. There, immediately; he wanted to tell her! How would she respond then? Too late, as soon he walked away.

  He was back in the present, disorientated for a moment. Only a few minutes had gone. A dream of the past triggered by that same journey, he surmised. It was odd how, looking back on it now, that she alone was ‘the one that got away’; more than just a missed opportunity for, well, sex. How could he not have realized love at first sight, when it was so clear to him now? Maybe he’d just forgotten, made himself believe that the woman he’d been with for the last eight years was the only one for him. Now he felt an emptiness. Loss. Strange, he was grieving a lost opportunity.

  Could anything be the same now?