by Jones, Raya
I told him facts. ‘She has an implant tag that broadcasts her ID. Ivana is her real name. She’ll be nineteen in three weeks’ time. She’s absent without leave but Goodwell Mining hasn’t issued a warrant for her arrest yet. What did you tell her about us?’
He grimaced. ‘I didn’t tell her anything. Only that we’re on the way to Ronda-6. I was so cagey, you’d be proud of me. I don’t know what I’m supposed to tell people. You didn’t brief me. What’s our cover story? What’s your name?’
‘Al.’
‘And our story?’
‘We are going back to Earth.’
‘Good story. The truth is buried deeper when it’s covered up by truth,’ declared Freedom, and beckoned Ivana. As soon as she was near, he asked her whether there was anywhere decent where we could kill some time, such as a gym. She said that the gym was closed for repairs. He asked, ‘Is there even a toilet in this place?’
She pointed to a wall and told him that when he waves his hand in front of the toilets sign he’d be teleported to the public facility, and be charged on his visitor pass. Freedom burst out, ‘That’s taking the piss! Why don’t they jiggle with my pattern and extract the urine while they’re at it? Work on that conundrum, kids. I’ll be back in a moment.’
‘Is he always like that?’ Ivana asked.
I sipped some water and stared at the adverts.
‘Do you mind me coming along with you?’ she pressed, and started to tell me how she hated being a miner. I didn’t respond.
We sat in silence until Freedom returned. ‘He’s always like that,’ Freedom told her. But even he ran out of small talk, and suggested going back to the port so that Ivana could get a boarding pass. We already had ours.
The foyer was busier. There were long queues for ticket dispensers. Ivana took her place in the line, and Freedom and I went to the kiosk. There was a slow queue. Junes were offering people to queue on their behalf. Freedom chuckled, seeing me watch them. ‘The sparkle’s back in your eye. You’re positively glowing. Is this electric love or what? She has such perfect binaries. Oops, sorry, neural whatsit.’
‘Give over, Freedom,’ I muttered but couldn’t help smiling, seeing how Junes deliberately kept their distance from me.
We reached the head of the queue. A June was serving behind the counter. The andronet could avoid contact with me only by disconnecting its unit from the root. The unit was capable of dealing with a food order on its own. It smiled a happy hostess smile and listed options. ‘There’s nothing I want to eat here,’ I told it. ‘I know you can hear me, June. If you keep it up I’ll get suspicious and initiate an inquiry. What are you hiding from me?’
‘I’m still comparing offers for your associate’s runabout,’ June said, unsmiling.
Freedom told it that he didn’t feel like eating anymore.
We moved to stand out of the way. Across the foyer, Ivana reached the head of the line. Freedom chatted. ‘What is it between you and that android? She’s terrified of you. I know, I know, it’s not a “she” and they don’t have emotions. Same thing, a survival instinct. What exactly did you do to January?’
‘I killed it.’
‘You did what?!’
‘My job.’ I was hired to test how vulnerable the andronet was to infiltration. Its self-destruct protocol was activated when it discovered my shadow.
‘Your shadow,’ Freedom echoed, shaking his head. ‘But how did June recognise you?’
‘Cyboratics must have put my image in it. Probably all Gen-5s have it with a health warning.’
Freedom laughed. ‘Wow, like an archetypal memory. No wonder it was spooked to see you. You are their bogeyman, their devil. You walk on the dark side for sure. I’m discovering things about you today. I saw you give a child a ride on your mat.’
‘That was innocent.’ But I thought about one of the sites the boy had visited. Nothing I do is innocent, I realised.
Just then a commotion started across the foyer. Ivana was punching and kicking at a ticket dispenser. People around her became angry, and it looked like a scuffle brewing. Freedom immediately started to head there. I stopped him. ‘We don’t get involved, Freedom. She can’t get a pass. Goodwell Mining won’t let her leave.’
Ivana shot out of the queue and rushed towards us with an agitated human attendant at her heels. She turned and lashed out at him. A June instantly materialised there to restrain her. ‘Now we get involved,’ I said and broke into a run with Freedom right behind me.
Ivana was wriggling to free herself from June when I reached them. ‘Let her go, she’s with me,’ I told June.
The android informed in a man’s voice, ‘I’m the Guardian Goose duty officer speaking through June. What’s your connection to this woman?’
‘None of your business. Let her go and she won’t cause any more trouble.’
‘She is already in deep trouble. She’s AWOL and has damaged Port property.’
I activated the CSG badge. ‘Goodwell Mining will take the appropriate disciplinary action against her. Are you getting my badge?’ The stony silence told me that his system verified it. ‘Please send me copies of your application and our approval for deploying android units as proxy guards.’
The male voice in June’s body cussed, and then pleaded, ‘It’s an emergency, mister. There’s a rescue operation in progress on the surface. A mining rig collapsed and most of our personnel have volunteered to help. What am I supposed to do?’
‘I haven’t logged our conversation yet. Perhaps it has never happened. But I’ll have to log it in 15 seconds if we continue to talk.’
‘Thanks, thanks… He’s switched off.’ June informed in its usual feminine voice.
Our ferry was already boarding. People heading to the gates pushed past us. ‘I’ll be in touch, June,’ I promised. The andronet retorted that there was no need. It has sold the runabout and credited my associate’s account. And promptly whisked away its android.
‘Who are you guys?’ Ivana stared at me, and then at Freedom. He told her, ‘Best not to ask.’
She couldn’t figure out why the machine wouldn’t issue her a boarding pass. She gave a false name and was paying cash. I asked her whether she knew about her implant. Of course she did. ‘All surface workers have it. It’s activated if we need pulling out. They’ve activated it, didn’t they?’ Tears started streaming down her cheeks. She wiped them with the back of her hand but they kept coming. ‘Seven people are dead and more are still trapped in the rig.’ She couldn’t suppress her sobbing.
Freedom put his arm around her shoulders, comforting, but there was nothing encouraging he could say. The loudspeaker announced the departure again. ‘We must go now. I’m truly sorry, Ivana,’ he said softly.
I intervened. I could get her out of Clay Valley. But where will she go? Goodwell Mining can get her anywhere.
‘I wasn’t planning on staying in Ronda.’ She stopped crying and said in a steadier voice, ‘I’m going to Earth. I’m going to Ground Zero.’
Freedom went on ahead. Ivana and I were among the last to board. Entering the cabin he had booked for us, I asked her to leave us alone. Freedom suggested that we all dine together later. She went away. I sat down opposite him. There was hardly any room between the berths. If we sat directly opposite, our knees would touch. ‘What have you done?’ he asked, studying my face with that thoughtful look of his.
‘I had her wear my headband to block the implant. That’s not what you’re asking. Freedom, what have I done?’
‘You’ve complicated things no end for yourself. Have you told her about our destination?’ I shook my head. ‘She’ll find out if she manages to board the ship. What are the chances of that?’ It was a rhetorical question. Her chances were slim. We still didn’t have passage for ourselves, and the next ship to Sol was due in two years’ time.
‘I have to see this through, Freedom. I’ve got her out of Clay Valley. I can’t abandon her to be arrested in Ronda-6.’ I closed my eyes to think. Only the Western Rim came to m
ind, an image of the cliffs as seen from the factory’s roof where I used to climb on a clear day to see them.
When I opened my eyes, Freedom was still studying me thoughtfully. ‘It’s not like you to take leave of your senses the moment a girl starts to cry. Is it some battle of wits with the andronet?’
‘June has nothing to do with it.’ But privately I recalled the boy surfing on my mat and unexpected connections, and wasn’t sure anymore. Aloud I said, ‘A mining rig collapses, people die, and we don’t even see a newsflash about it. It’s such a routine event. Can’t they develop robot rigs to operate the mining drones? I guess that’s too expensive. Human beings like her are dispensable!’ I was astonished at my own emotion. My cheeks were flushed with anger.
‘So it’s the principle not the princess that gets you going,’ Freedom mused. ‘What’s the plan now? You’ll singlehandedly take down the entire mining industry?’
‘We can’t survive without the mining industry. They’re not the villain.’
‘Who is?’ He didn’t wait for an answer. ‘You and Suzie alike! Let me tell you something about her. She wasn’t meant to marry into Cyboratics. She broke off the engagement that her parents had arranged with… whoever he was. I can’t remember. Wye Stan Pan paid him off. It wasn’t for the love of Wye Stan that she did it, but for love of his technology. She was on the team that developed the first andronet. Did you know that? I guess not. Your Yoko couldn’t tell anyone about her past. She used to be happy working on those damn things, and then one day out of the blue something snapped. Just like you now, she started talking big ethics, and then threw her life away. Al, don’t let it happen to you. I couldn’t bear it.’ Choked, he rose to leave.
I blurted, ‘Sit,’ in a voice that sounded strangled in my ears.
He hesitated.
‘Please.’
He sat down.
‘You have to know this about me, Freedom. My mother made me study hard so that I won’t end up like her. She said that if something happened to her when I was still a child, I must continue to make the life I want for myself. This is the life I want. You have to know,’ I said like taking a plunge, ‘I was in a similar situation before. There was a woman who desperately tried to escape from Cyboratics, and I wasn’t… I couldn’t…’ I couldn’t bring myself to tell him about Fairweather. ‘I don’t want to talk about it.’
He nodded and didn’t probe. He said instead, ‘These benches pretending to be beds can be folded up. There might be just enough room for your mat. I’d better go and find Ivana. It seems like we’re stuck with her all the way.’
‘Not if I can help it. Don’t tell her anything yet. Let me handle it.’
As soon as he left I folded up the berths and rolled out the mat in the tight space. I accessed Clay Valley Guardian Goose, found their footage of Ivana and me returning to the foyer, and altered her image so that she couldn’t be visually spotted. It was possible to track her through the teleport trail if anyone bothered. I gambled that she wasn’t worth the trouble for her corporation. Then I set my locusts to devour evidence of my passage through Clay Valley. I did the same with the ferry’s records before disembarking. Freedom still travelled alone, occasionally conversing with diverse avatars replacing my true likeness.
He sat with Ivana at a diner unit. I squeezed next to him.
‘Thanks for doing this,’ she said.
I asked her what she intended to do in Ronda-6.
‘I’ll get on the ship to Sol. I know, he’s told me it’s difficult.’
Freedom corrected, ‘Nigh on impossible.’
‘What will you do after seeing Ground Zero?’ I asked.
‘I don’t know yet. It will take me years to get there.’
‘Only three years if you get on the next ship, and you’ll be in cryonics most of the time. It will feel like arriving after a few days. You’ll see the crater and still be in the same situation you’re in now,’ I pointed out.
‘There’s no Goodwell Mining in the solar system. There’s nothing left to mine there.’
‘Are you good at doing something else?’
Her face puckered, holding back tears. ‘How do I know? We’re all miners. My father and boyfriend were killed on the rig two days ago. My mother was killed on the ground four years ago. Everyone I know in Clay, anyone who’s still alive, is in the industry. I can’t do it anymore. I don’t care what happens to me, I’m not going back.’
‘Start caring or you’ll end up back. You know about the Backs, don’t you?’ It was the local equivalent of the Edges, located in Section-9, the major urban area on Ronda-6. ‘People can disappear there but people also come out of there. Contact SocServ. Tell them that you grew up in the Backs and they’ll help you to get citizenship doing something other than mining.’
She wiped her eye. ‘It won’t work. The implant…’
‘Not a problem. It’s deactivated.’ She stared at me puzzled. I spelled it out, ‘Forever. It can’t be reactivated. Your details have got corrupted at the source.’
‘How?’
Freedom intervened, ‘Best not to ask! I’m ready to eat. Shall we order already?’
I left them after we ate.
Many passengers didn’t have a cabin. People slept anywhere they could. Noisy children were everywhere. I wandered the length and breadth of the ferry, and finally stopped a crewmember in a narrow corridor to ask where I could use a portable portal. ‘We only have desktop decks. If you go to…’ she started. I indicated the rucksack, ‘I have my own. I just need some floor space and privacy.’
She laughed. ‘You’ll be lucky! This is a ferry.’ When I commented that it seemed busier than usual, she said sarcastically, ‘Aren’t we lucky. When the exodus is over we’ll be running at a loss. Come back next year and you’ll have plenty of room.’
‘How about the hold?’
‘Not allowed, sorry. It’s probably too full with cargo anyway. When people relocate to another star system they bring their entire belongings.’
I took my entire belongings off my back to let a man pass. He told me that I could use his cabin. The crewmember made a quick getaway. ‘What do you want in return?’ I asked. He was middle-aged, well groomed, and wore a flashy designer biosuit. It was unlikely that he wanted cash payment. ‘You don’t recognise me, do you?’ he inquired. ‘I saw you at the OK bar. I bet you’re fast. You can get in and out without being noticed.’
‘If it’s illegal, forget it.’
‘Let’s call it a grey area of the law. Like how you handled the matter of Guardian Goose using androids as proxy guards.’
‘I’m listening.’
‘My cabin is over there.’
When I was alone in his cabin, I contacted my apprentice, glad to find him online. The boy used a Sherlock Holmes cartoon as his avatar. Mine was just a blank placeholder. ‘Have you found out about the headband yet?’
‘What headband?’
‘The one I wear when working on my mat.’
‘It’s you! How can you be Harvey Schmidt?’
‘It’s not my only name. I didn’t expect to meet you in Clay Valley, Rinzler.’
He asked what I was doing in Ronda. When he applied to be trained by me, he had tracked my signal to Tao Ceti. That’s why I took him. ‘You’ve been routing via Tao Ceti all along,’ he realised now.
‘Safer that way. Do your work through my office from now on. If anyone tracks you down, the trail will end up in Tao Ceti. You must be extremely careful not to give away any local knowledge that could place you in Ronda.’
‘I thought this Cordova case is a peronal archives job.’
‘It is. There’s something else. Make sure you don’t do anything offline that might connect us. In the OK bar, if you didn’t go to my office I wouldn’t have known it was you. That was careless of you.’
Rinzler pointed out that nobody but the two of us knew the site marker that he used. He didn’t expect the stranger in the bar to know it. ‘I’ve always pictured you sitt
ing in a plush office in San Francisco.’ He meant the Tao Ceti planet.
‘I would have let you go on thinking that but something’s turned up. It’s like that spot-and-zap game you were playing. People out to get you pop up where and when you least expect them. Someone saw us there. If things take a nasty turn, it might occur to him that there’s a connection between us. I won’t be there to protect you. Take care of yourself. Get us a result for Cordova by the end of the month if possible. I might be offline for some time. I’m trying to go to Earth.’
‘Are you going to Ground Zero?’
‘What makes you say that?’
‘The ET competition. Don’t you know?’
I didn’t. He sent me a poster that ET had distributed in schoolyards. It invited young people to Section-9 to compete for a trip to Ground Zero. The winners will carry monitors in their brain, and their experiences will be used in ET products. ET’s ‘actual realities;, so-called acts, let you see things as if through different eyes by means of a temporarily grafted personality with its own memories and emotional associations. But genuine experiences can’t be created artificially. To feel what it’s like to be a young person from a remote colony coming to Earth for the first time, ET must copy a real person. Their poster didn’t mention the mental health risks.
The ferry sped on.
Freedom found me in the observatory watching streaks of stars. He whispered, because people slept nearby, ‘Why don’t you go use my bed, get some sleep?’
I declined.
‘Is it because Ivana is there?’
Sometimes in the wastelands a lost sprite latches on to you. Schoolchildren create them for fun and then abandon them. Sprites are interactive and adapt to their environment. A sprite looks and behaves like a person, animal, mythological creature, anything it’s designed to resemble. They can be very difficult to shake off.
‘Is Ivana our sprite?’ he asked.
‘No, she’s a human being. A sprite is a configuration of probability statements that can be dismantled.’
‘Once in a lifetime, kids, you’ll probably never see a sight like this again!’ Freedom exclaimed. The three of us stood on an elevated gangway looking through glass panels at the lobby below us. It was teeming with human mass on the move. Throngs of emigrants swarmed towards transfer lounges, heading for the convoy to the latest remote star system to open up for grabs. ‘I should be taking pictures. Are you recording this, Al?’