The Story Road

by Blaze Ward

  He bowed to the crowd formally, as he would a gathering of masters, or a patron–commissioned evening. It seemed appropriate. The round of heart–felt applause was a wondrous thing.

  Henri squatted and dumped the pile of coins carefully to one side so he could replace the violin. The mass of metal filled an entire pouch on his thigh, threatening to make him lopsided when he walked.

  The younger woman stepped very close as he rose, almost, but not quite touching.

  “Thank you,” she said. “Are you staying in town?”

  Henri considered the look in her eyes, hungry and a touch wild. Like another he had seen recently. The music seemed to draw them, like hummingbirds to spring flowers. Normally, he would have explored the hints in her voice and stance. Today, he felt another need drawing him forth.

  “Alas, my lady,” he said carefully, “I am only passing through on a quest for knowledge, and I do not know where it will take me. But I know a place where the food is lovely and company exquisite.”

  She blushed and took a half–step back, turning slightly.

  “Could you point me to the library?” Henri inquired.

  She looked at him confused for a moment before her eyes lit up. “Ah, the Temple of Knowledge,” she said triumphantly.

  He felt her step close and brush her entire side against him as she pointed farther down the boulevard.

  “There,” she said. “The white building at the end of the second block.”

  “Thank you…” he left the rest dangling.

  “Cvetka,” she said.

  “Of course,” Henri continued. “Thank you, little flower.”

  He hefted his case and satchel and, just because he could, kissed her once more as she blushed. The crowd had faded, leaving them alone for a second before he stepped back and let the tide carry him further out to sea.

  Seven

  For an ageless Sentience, there was little surprise in the day–to–day tumble of Suvi’s life. It took only a small portion of her consciousness to keep up with several score requests for data from her massive databanks. Frequently, she sat and listened in on three or seven interesting lectures from professors aboard her university, her station, her home.

  Once upon a time, life had been like this at Kel–Sdala.

  Before the collapse of human civilization.

  Two thousand, six hundred, and eighty–six years had passed. In eleven weeks she would have a small ceremony, just her, to remember the day the Earth was killed. Along with eleven billion inhabitants. Perhaps a trillion more humans had died in the ensuring dark ages, the greatest mass extinction event in history.

  Any given day was generally mundane. That was okay, given the alternative.

  Today was not routine.

  Already, seventeen different people had uploaded all or part of a violin solo played on the streets of Ithome an hour ago, either to share with others, or to catalog, or simply to try to identify the song the man had played. Others had picked up the fever and passed it along. It was circling Ballard like a wildfire.

  Suvi watched the video of the man.

  Okay, he was kinda hot.

  And, oh my God, could he play...

  Nobody used the phrase anymore, but most of the women down there would react to what their souls recognized as Competence Porn, even if their minds lacked the terminology.

  Suvi had been programmed, once upon millennia ago, to react to a man like that in a manner similar to how a woman would, rather than a just complicated set of sub–routines and catchy responses.

  There were times when it would be nice if human culture hadn’t so violently reacted against her kind.

  She was the Last Of The Immortals, as far as she knew. The last of the AI’s that had once been commonplace in galactic industry and commerce. Of course, they had played a major role in nearly destroying mankind in the last war.

  She hadn’t been there.

  Once, Suvi might have built herself an android body and showed this man exactly what she thought of his playing. But that wasn’t possible today.

  Why was she always portrayed as a demon? Weren’t there any fun religions out there?

  Whatever.

  What she really missed being was a starship. Even today, being a space station was enough for some nuts to want to exorcise her and cast her into eternal darkness.

  Mister, let me tell you about eight centuries of darkness on Kel–Sdala before The Last Waltz came and rescued me, if you want to talk solitude and loneliness.

  Suvi stamped her feet in frustrations completely unrelated to the musician.

  It took her several minutes to identify the song as part of an obscure opera that had originated on the planet Bayonne nearly five centuries ago, not long after the world was opened up again to galactic commerce. She cataloged it and shared the registry planet–wide as the demand kept increasing.

  The man was a cypher. She could probably track him down as well, but that sounded like way more effort than it was worth today. Musicians weren’t exactly a dime a dozen, certainly not at that skill level, but she didn’t want to spend a significant portion of her consciousness trolling through message boards and such trying to identify him. He would pop up eventually and then she could see learn more about him, if necessary.

  Correction. He had just walked into an immersion booth at a public library in Ithome, a few blocks from the site of the impromptu performance, and asked for the Librarian.

  That would be her. An avatar, anyway. One of hundreds of such little chunks of code she spun up and down regularly to communicate with people in a natural, human kind of way.

  Suvi thought of herself as the first line of defense for the many women and men who guarded the stacks of physical books. Most of the tomes had either been printed from her memory banks, once upon a time, or written first and then uploaded.

  But people were weird. Some, like her, preferred the physicality of a good book. The smell of old paper and dried leather and glue bindings. The caress of ink driven into paper with an honest–to–goodness metal press.

  So what if she was entirely electronic. She could imagine herself however she wanted.

  The avatar talking to the musician tapped her on the shoulder and asked for help. This man was apparently way more than he seemed. She scanned the credentials he had entered before stepping into the booth.

  Bayonne. A scholar. A Bard. A title of respect accorded to one who had achieve mastery of their craft. Asking stranger questions than a simple avatar was prepared to handle.

  Suvi decided to invest herself fully into the avatar, in effect, stepping into the booth with the young man to see what he was about.

  Ξ

  The technology in the booth was something Henri had only experienced twice before. Bayonne wasn’t urbane enough to maintain a full–immersion communications holo–network. They were incredibly expensive and required compatible units at both ends. His father had introduced him to one, right after his sixteenth birthday, on a trip to Saxon to visit Father’s factory there.

  You stepped into a small room and the system created an illusion that another person was seated across from you. If you reached out a hand, it was as though there was a piece of glass separating you. Otherwise, it was cozy and petite. A chair that looked comfortable, with a small side table. Bland, neutral walls. A watercolor landscape on one wall.

  The cute little blond librarian had actually put him on hold after he had asked his first question. She just sat there, primly, in a little green outfit that seemed to be some kind of military uniform, but nothing he was familiar with from his studies.

  As he watched, something about her changed. She rose from her chair and eyed him in a way she hadn’t done when he first entered. Initially, she had seemed cold and distant. Almost formal. Now, she was focused on him. Studying him much more closely than she had before. It was a little disconcerting.

  “You wanted to know about Musica universalis and its relation to hyperspace, Mr. Baudin?” she asked in a p
urr that was richer and smoother than before. It was like an older sister had suddenly walked into the conversation, or an aunt that looked so much alike that both women could use the same identification card.

  Not that he had ever fallen for that gambit more than twice.

  What the hell had just happened?

  “That’s correct, madam,” he responded easily. Being a Bard meant that he had stood up to the worst the other Masters could throw at him in order to earn his sash. Nothing this woman was going to do could compete with that.

  “Could you tell me more of your background, Mr. Baudin?” she asked decisively. “What triggers your interest?”

  “Uh,” he said, by way of total confusion. Some days, he really didn’t get women.

  “I have seen your performance this morning, by the way,” she continued smoothly, “so I am aware of your musical talent. It is your interest in hyperspace that I find to be a non–sequitur.”

  Oh.

  “But you are aware of the theories of the universal music?” Henri asked, warming to the topic.

  “The Music Of The Spheres, Mr. Baudin.”

  “Henri,” he said. “Please call me Henri. Mr. Baudin is my father, the business moghul.”

  “I see, Henri,” she replied. “Please call me Suvi.”

  “Suvi is the Librarian,” he said hesitating. “The ancient Sentience that runs the University of Ballard. The goddess of knowledge. What have I done to rate such attention?”

  She smiled, at once wry and a touch sad.

  “You were dealing with an avatar earlier, Henri,” she said. “One tiny facet of my overall consciousness. Most the research questions asked can easily be handled by such simple routines.”

  “And yet, you are here now.”

  “Your fascinate me, Henri Baudin,” Suvi said.

  Henri had a hard time reconciling the tiny little blond elf before him with his apparently–misconceived notions of whatever he had expected AI programs to be. Something more like his father on an angry day, perhaps.

  “Why?”

  Henri could not imagine what it was that might attract a being such as her. Other than she appeared as a woman, and he seemed to have a similar effect on other women. If he could figure out what that was, he would probably be rich.

  And the horse might learn to sing.

  “Looking back over my extensive libraries, Henri,” she said ominously, “I have found nothing to suggest that anyone has ever seriously explored the possibility that hyperspace might have a sound that could be identified and used scientifically. There are many pre–Hiatus tracts on such topics, but it would be charitable to classify them under paranormal pseudo–science. Or simple fiction. You do not strike me as such a person to be interested in such things.”

  And maybe the horse would sing, after all.

  Henri had not imagined what it would be like to converse with a Sentience. But it had certainly not sounded anything like this in his mind. She sounded like another Master. Perhaps that was what a Librarian was on this world.

  “And, by the way,” she continued, “your performance this morning is already in the top one hundred most talked–about topics on my news feeds.”

  “You follow the news as well?”

  “How else is a girl supposed to stay hip and trendy, Henri Baudin?” she cooed at him with a smile pretty enough to stop a glacier in its tracks. “I realize that Bards from Bayonne are not supposed to pursue money for its own sake, but you could probably make a killer living playing live in this town.”

  “Remind me to play you a couple of pieces for your archives before I depart,” Henri smiled. “I have recently come into a large amount of spare change that should cover the costs for time in this booth.”

  “I have already refunded your initial payment, Henri,” the Sentience smiled. “I’m allowed to do that. As I said, you intrigue me. Those fees help fund the university, but mostly they keep people from sleeping in my booths.”

  “I see,” he said, enlightened yet again by the simplest things in his day. “So what do you know of the Music Of The Spheres, Suvi?”

  “That term predates spaceflight, Henri,” she said, dropping into a lecturing–new–students voice.

  He felt like she should have cute little reading glasses right now, and the blond hair up in a bun instead of down and flowing around her collar. Of course, then he wouldn’t be able to concentrate at all on her words, so maybe this was a good choice.

  “It refers to a theory that the then–known mobile objects in the sky, most of the planets in the home system, plus Earth’s moon, known as Luna, and the sun, known as Sol, each made a slightly different sound, with the whole being analogous to a symphony of sounds as they moved.”

  “And such were we taught as apprentices, madam,” Henri smiled. “Perhaps you taught the first masters from Bayonne such concepts.”

  “Only two of them,” she replied. “Masters, not concepts.”

  Henri blinked in surprise. He had been half–joking. Had other Masters come here in the early days to learn? Why had they stopped? Yet more questions when he got home.

  “So how does that apply to hyperspace, Henri?” Suvi asked. She sounded slightly confused.

  Could one confuse a computer? Was she a computer? He was used to confounding women. It was one of the things he did best, to hear some of them speak.

  “Can I speak in confidence, Suvi?”

  He watched her face turn serious. “Insofar as I am legally and ethically allowed, Henri.”

  “Has anyone ever listened to the stars sing in hyperspace?”

  It was the most amazing thing. Her face went slack for almost three seconds of silence. Didn’t a computer like her operate at speeds so much faster than he did as to appear to be magic? What was she doing that she lost concentration?

  Suvi blinked and reasserted herself. “Henri,” she said simply, “I can find no record that anyone has even asked that question in a scientific context.”

  “Ever?” Henri was aghast. He had assumed that someone had explored it and debunked his silly notions long ago. Why else had it never been solved?

  “That is correct,” she said. “However, a great deal of information was lost when the Earth was destroyed. It may be that such things were never fully documented at the time, and nobody has since tried.”

  “Why not?”

  “Henri,” she said quietly, “while I appear to you as a young human woman, I am in fact a monstrously complex computer system. Granted, perhaps the single most powerful such machine currently in existence, but still a machine. I cannot make a leap of intuition in the way that your kind can. I can only deduce from facts. In extreme circumstances, I might speculate, but this falls into the realms of fiction.”

  Oh.

  “I see,” Henri felt his hopes fade. Had the Goddess really led him here, or just astray?

  “Henri?”

  So close. He had thought the answers were to be found here.

  HENRI.

  “Huh?”

  Suvi had been talking, apparently.

  “I said,” she continued, “that this is a university. A place of learning. I offer certificate programs in Astrogation, as well as degrees in various facets of Stellar Engineering. Tuition is normally a factor, but it is certainly possible to barter.”

  Henri smiled. He pulled a mass of coins out of his thigh pouch and set them on the side table. “It would not be impossible to busk for my keep, Suvi.”

  “Indeed, Henri Baudin,” she replied with a similar smile. “I can think of many things we might trade.”

  Why did that sound so dangerous?

  Eight

  It was a novel experience, practicing celibacy. Henri hadn’t done that since he was first released to play in public as a Journeyman, ten years before. And yet, here he was.

  The boarding deck on Suvi’s station was not particularly crowded today. Students were mid–week in their studies, and tourists came on the weekend as well. Another forty hours and i
t would be a complete zoo around here. He would stay on the planet an extra day and miss the chaos of the tourists coming and going.

  The pretty girl taking tickets paused to give him an extra–nice smile before passing him into the interior of the shuttle. He remembered a time when he would have asked for her contact information, or given her his. His goofy grin carried him down the hallway and through the airlock.

  Inside, the universal safety lecture. Oxygen. Body Harness. Escape pods. Etc. Henri managed to stay awake through it, barely. Twelve hours a day of lectures, labs, and readings, plus practice and musical performances, either for Suvi to record or live for a small university audience. Or both. Eating. Occasional sleep.

  This was his third day off in as many months. He intended to make the most of it.

  The stewardess woke him briefly checking that he was buckled in properly.

  The jolt of landing woke him again three hours later.

  Ξ

  She hadn’t changed much. But that really wasn’t a surprise. Marrakesh was a heavy–duty freighter, designed to haul big loads long distances, with atmospheric re–entry at each stop. Rugged was built into her DNA.

  Henri had talked his way into a ride with the stevedores driving out to meet Captain Dunrathy. One of them had even remembered him from last time.

  The truck waddled slowly back into place and waited. The rest of the gang piled out and stretched.

  Henri didn’t get out of the cab until the loading ramp had descended and locked into place. He followed the ground crew up and stopped in front of Captain Dunrathy before the man registered his presence. “Permission to come aboard?” he smiled.

  “Henri!” Dunrathy called. “Good to see you, lad. How’s Ballard? Having an adventure?”

  “It’s been—” Henri began before he was engulfed in arms and legs as Katayoun threw herself at him. Her arms were around his neck and her legs around his waist before he realized what she was doing.

  Her weight nearly staggered him backwards down the ramp, but for Dunrathy’s amazing reflexes and strength pulling him back upright by grabbing Katayoun’s belt.