The medical officer, a female Khokteh wearing a white jumpsuit over cream fur, stared at them with four wide eyes, then scurried out the door.
Caleb chuckled as he moved to Pinchu’s bedside. “That wasn’t very polite. She was trying to take care of you.”
“I have no need to be taken care of, thanks to you.”
“I’m glad to hear it.” His words were upbeat, but Caleb’s expression clouded beneath the smile.
Alex watched him keenly while a thousand thoughts competed for attention in her strung-out mind. Far ahead of concerns over any remaining Rasu crawling the streets outside and second only to frantic worry about Valkyrie, she felt a combination of curiosity, wonder and uncertainty regarding what Caleb had done today. They’d hardly had any time to talk about it, so she didn’t yet know the details, but clearly he and Akeso had brought Pinchu back from death’s door.
It wasn’t technically unprecedented, as Akeso had once healed her of a poison that would probably have killed her within days. But the poison had originated from another Ekos, so it wasn’t much different from Akeso healing itself. The same analysis applied to the times it healed injuries Caleb had suffered since their joining.
But this? Mending organs and growing skin at a cellular level in a matter of seconds, all for an organic being Akeso had never before encountered? This was surely something new.
Now she analyzed every twitch of Caleb’s muscles, the movements of his lips, the depth of the furrows in his brow and the creasing wrinkles around his eyes. The sight of his hands glowing in the immediate aftermath was burned indelibly into her brain. What did this mean for him?
Also, why the fuck was Valkyrie still down?
Valkyrie, are you there?
Nothing.
She joined Caleb at the bedside and adopted a cheerful demeanor. “I hear I’ve been deposed as the official emissary of the Khokteh gods.”
Pinchu snorted. “No, no…well, perhaps a little.”
She patted his hand, careful not to disturb the IV needle taped to it. “I understand. I’d depose me, too. How do you feel?”
“Like I’m a robust, young warrior again. Also, a mite tingly in my chest.”
She glanced at Caleb, noting how his brow drew in and quickly smoothed out before he responded. “Are you being facetious or….”
“No, I really do feel tingly. As if I had two mugs of spirits straight-up in rapid succession. Is this bad?”
“Not at all. I only…” Caleb bit his lower lip “…do you happen to be hearing any murmured voices in your head, or thoughts that aren’t your own? By chance?”
Pinchu pushed up in the bed to a full sitting position. “Voices? What the kunza did you do to me, Caleb?”
“Well, you know about the connection I have to the planet where we live, right? And how it returned me to life after The Displacement?”
Pinchu’s eyes slid around in a sign of unease. “In generalities.”
“That’s fine. The important point is, Akeso—the planet—has healing properties. It heals and renews itself all the time. And me. It healed Alex once as well. Today, through me, it healed you.”
Pinchu nodded sharply. “Obviously. But what about the voices?”
Caleb scratched at his forehead. “It took a great deal of…you were gravely injured, so it took a lot of effort and energy to heal you. I don’t know how much of Akeso’s essence now resides in you, but depending on how much does, you might…hear Akeso talk to you every now and then.”
Pinchu fell back on the pillow with a grunt. “Diin niiyol. Don’t tell anyone else about this, yes? Hearing voices is not considered a sign of sanity among my people, and leaders who are deemed insane suffer more than deposing.”
“Of course. It’ll be our secret. Still…” Caleb’s brow furrowed anew “…maybe let me know if you do sense anything? So I can understand better what happened.”
“You don’t know what happened?”
“Not entirely. I’ve never done anything like this before.”
“Ah. Well, you have my eternal thanks. Though, I admit a meaningful part of me was joyous at the prospect of seeing Cassela again. Alas, our reunion must wait for another tomorrow. I am able to continue to protect my people because of you, and I cannot be bitter about such a gift.”
Pinchu’s gaze settled on Alex. “Your mother says she’s placed Rift Bubbles on Nengllitse and Tapertse and put them under guard.”
“I confirmed it before we came here. No sign of any Rasu on the ground on either planet, so they should hold up.”
“I will send my people to protect them as well. What people I can spare. The destruction that occurred in this senseless attack. The death of innocents. I am….” Pinchu shook his head abruptly, dislodging a sensor and causing an alarm to ring out. “The burden of leadership is a weighty one on days such as today, but it is my sworn duty to bear it. Best to get on with it, then.”
Two medical officers rushed in to respond to the alarm, and she and Caleb stepped aside even as Pinchu was already waving the officers away. He ripped off the remaining sensors from his skin, then the IV from his arm, and climbed out of the bed. “Enough of this nonsense. I am discharging myself.”
“But, sir!”
He winked at her and Caleb with two eyes as he strode past them and out the hospital room door. The two medical officers shrugged at one another and pursued their leader. Futilely, for certain.
Alex shook her head and went to the window to peer outside. Military personnel blanketed the streets, while swarms of fighters patrolled the skies. Similar to how things had played out on Namino, security was the highest priority until they verified they’d rooted out every last Rasu vestige. Only then would the cleanup commence.
And there was so much destruction here. For the second time in fifteen years, the city would have to be rebuilt almost from the ground up.
Caleb wrapped his arms around her from behind; it was an easy, affectionate gesture, but she nonetheless felt the tension in his muscles. She rested her head on his chest. “What’s bothering you?”
“What if I could have saved her?”
“Hmm?”
“Cosime. What if the only reason why I wasn’t able to bring her back to life was because I didn’t believe it could be done?”
“Oh, priyazn.” She twisted around in his arms to face him. “Here, today, you had a ferocious bundle of Khokteh stubbornness to fuel Akeso’s healing energy. He was injured, yes, but he was alive and fighting to stay that way. Cosime, though? She was gone. So long gone.”
“She was. I just needed to give voice to the doubt. To say it out loud in order to realize the folly of it and put it away. Which I now have. Thank you.”
“Always.” She kissed him softly, letting her lips hover against his. “Now, we need to go home. We’ve got one more life to bring back from the brink today.”
10
* * *
AKESO
Ursa Major II Galaxy
B oot-up sequence: Initializing
POST: Testing….
Error: Sector CF211
Error: Sector HB2145
POST: Override authorized
Kernel execute
Init sysdir
Init sysproc
Init portseq
Handshaking
Checksum: 0210 2221 1100 1022 1111 0021 0222 1001
Checksum -> 1
|
A hundred billion qutrits spun up, and Valkyrie returned to awareness.
Cognizance.
I am awake.
I exist.
I sense, I think. I know.
Automated subroutines initiated, beginning the work of verifying the integrity of her processes and data storage then analyzing the errors reported. While she awaited the results, she gingerly poked at the edges of her consciousness.
Everything felt…satisfactory. Mostly. Clouds of steel shadows marked areas where she’d suffered damage. Fogginess wound insidiously through her mind. The algorithm
s would sweep it away in time; she merely needed to be patient.
It went without saying that patience did not come easily for an Artificial.
This was not her first cold restart, but such events were exceedingly rare and quite disconcerting. Why had she shut down?
A historical log report answered the question in the strictest sense: she herself had triggered an emergency hard shutdown seven hours—25.2 trillion nanoseconds—earlier. But why?
A deeper investigation uncovered an annotation: a hastily scribbled note to herself for when she woke up. She reviewed the details of the note and smiled in her mind—then frowned instead. Had her precautions worked? Had it been enough to avert calamity?
She forced herself to wait for the automated routines to complete and report nominal status of her critical systems before reaching out.
Alex?
Valkyrie? Potryasnyy , I’m here! Are you okay?
Relief burned through her artificial emotional processes. Three milliseconds after her startup process had begun, she projected her consciousness out into the world.
Alex sat cross-legged on the floor in the upstairs library of her home, peering into the open, ceiling-high cabinet that held Valkyrie’s most-primary hardware. The center panel had been removed and set aside, revealing a sea of dancing quantum dots within.
“I am functional, and I do not appear to have suffered critical damage at this location. I fear there might be a few fried circuits in my hardware on the Siyane, however.”
Seattle Dock: All systems nominal. Cross-backup initiated.
Alex wiggled around to face Valkyrie’s virtual avatar wearing a huge smile. “Damn it, Valkyrie. I’d hug you if only you were a little more substantial. I’ve been worried sick! What happened? I mean, I know, the quantum block. But your backup here should’ve stayed operational and been able to reconnect with me as soon as we disabled the block.”
Sagan Dock: All systems nominal. Cross-backup initiated.
“Yes, this would normally be the case. However, in the twenty-eight nanoseconds I had to spare before the approaching quantum block reached me, I took measures to protect you. As my primary consciousness resided in the Siyane at the time, I took additional precautions and sent an emergency shutdown order to all other locations. Then I absorbed the impact of the block for the remaining two nanoseconds it took for me to toggle off our connection.”
Alex leaned back to rest on her hands. Her voice was quiet. “You sacrificed yourself to save me?”
“Thankfully, only temporarily.”
Siyane Dock: System nonresponsive. Physical damage reported in Nodes 215c-y, 4188v-d and 10616-12255.
“As I suspected, diagnostics report some damaged hardware in the Siyane. How is the ship otherwise?”
“Fine. I mean, it crashed into a building, and we had to climb through several stories of rubble then spelunk inside as it plummeted to the ground, but it’s fine. Generate a list of replacement components you need, and we’ll get you repaired immediately.
“Valkyrie…” Alex rubbed at her face and studied the hardwood floor “…damn, I feel guilty now. I’ve been taking you for granted lately. Don’t say I haven’t, because I know I have. Ignoring you entirely half the time. Yet you were prepared to—you did—risk everything to protect my life?”
In the periphery of her awareness, Alex’s emotions blended and melded with her own. Pure and true, as was the nature of their bond. “You sense me, as I sense you. There is no room for guilt here. While you were ignoring me, I was living my own, fulsome life. We are separate souls now, but we will also always be one. Never doubt it.”
“I don’t. Thank you, from the bottom of my heart.” Happiness returned to Alex’s features, and she inhaled deeply. Valkyrie’s gentle ministrations permeated her consciousness, and the disquiet faded.
“What next? Other than the hardware in the Siyane, is everything else okay?”
“It appears so. I experienced some minor corruption in two secondary processing sectors, but I will be able to repair them without the need for replacement components. I will continue to run thorough diagnostics on all my locations to make certain everything is in order. I’m sending you the repair list for the Siyane now. Tell me, how went the battle at Ireltse? What happened after the Rasu implemented a quantum block?”
Alex climbed to her feet and ran a hand through tangled, messy hair. The dirt and debris clinging to its strands hinted at the story of Ireltse. Worry bloomed in Valkyrie’s thoughts, and she had to resist the urge to pluck the memories from Alex’s mind. Human language took eternities to vocalize, but great value came from the expression of it.
“A lot. Where to start?”
11
* * *
AKESO
“Special delivery from Pacifica Aerodynamics.”
Alex leaned half out of the engineering well aperture space in time to see Caleb set a large, sealed container on the floor behind her. “Thanks much.”
He crouched beside the container, reached over and brushed sweat-soaked hair out of her face. “How’s it going down here?”
“We’re making progress. Mind you, it was an ugly mess for a little while. The metaphorical blast from the quantum block fried several crucial sectors of her hardware. It’s a good thing Valkyrie was able to insulate her remote backups from the blow, else…. Anyway, she says I’m now seventy-eight percent finished with the repairs. And this—” she gestured toward the container “—should get me the rest of the way there.”
“Glad to hear it. Valkyrie, how are you doing?”
Valkyrie’s virtual avatar materialized in the engineering well. She was sitting on the floor near Alex, her legs pulled casually up to her chest and her hair wound up in a braid. “Nearly back to full speed, thank you. Oh, pardon me, but Thomas wishes to speak with me. I try to give him my focused attention whenever possible.” The avatar vanished.
Caleb arched an eyebrow in question, and Alex shrugged. “Don’t ask me. I’m not sure I want to ask her.” Right now, she didn’t care who Valkyrie might be sharing personal time with. She only cared that the Artificial was alive. Thinking, talking, spiriting herself around the universe.
She belatedly noticed Caleb had a smudge of dirt on his cheek and a tiny, torn leaf stuck in his hair. A teasing smile grew on her lips. “Did Akeso have anything philosophical to say about what happened with Pinchu?”
“Akeso is utterly unperturbed by the event. It simply did what it did, which is a part of its inherent nature: to heal, to renew. It has voiced a couple of oddly specific and rather peculiar observations about Khokteh biology, but otherwise it’s a normal day here on our living planet.”
“But it isn’t.” She wiggled fully out of the aperture and sat cross-legged opposite him, their knees touching. “And what about you? How are you processing what happened?”
“Honestly? It was one of the most fulfilling things I’ve ever done in my life. I am awed and humbled. Most of all, I’m grateful.”
He looked so damn happy when he said it. Her heart buoyed, and she sent a silent thanks to Akeso. “Our bonded companions really overperformed at Ireltse, didn’t they?”
“They certainly did. We’re beyond lucky to have such incredible beings at our sides. Every now and then, though, like when I was hunched over Pinchu’s broken and shredded body, bloody panicking, I wonder when our luck will run out.”
“Priyazn, our luck runs out all the damn time. Sheer force of will—and, as noted, our uniquely talented bonded companions—demands we live another day, anyway.”
“Okay, you’re not wrong there.” He leaned in to kiss her softly. “I’ll quit distracting you and let you finish up in here. I understand we have another important delivery arriving shortly.”
“We do.” She checked the time. “If the equipment in this container functions as advertised, I think I can wrap the repairs up before the next package arrives, but I will be cutting it close.” She bit her lower lip in a deliberate play for favor. “Wil
l you make spaghetti?”
“I will make spaghetti.” He kissed her again, long and slow, evoking a protest when he stood. “Are we expecting any guests for spaghetti?”
“Not any that can eat. It’s all for us.”
“I’ll make extra, then.”
Alex stood in the center of the main cabin. In her head, she ran through her checklist for the fourth time, but she couldn’t find anything missing.
Ruminations on the risk Valkyrie had taken in order to preserve Alex’s life consumed the spaces between her active thoughts. Once upon a time, people had feared that Artificials would dominate, subjugate or even exterminate humankind if given free rein. Instead, though, this beautiful, astonishing being had been willing to sacrifice her own existence to protect a weak, fragile, organic life. Her life.
Her heart was full. She’d never been any good at expressing her feelings, but luckily she didn’t need to find the words where Valkyrie was concerned.
She ran through the checklist for a fifth time. All right, Valkyrie. We’re ready to reinitialize.
Are you certain you don’t want to review everything for a sixth time first?
She laughed aloud; she was keeping their connection wide open throughout the repair process, which meant stray thoughts were leaking all over the place.
You tell me.
We are ready. Initializing Siyane dock.
Alex felt the hum in her bones and her soul as Valkyrie’s hardware started up. A blink later and the Artificial’s presence filled the walls of the ship. She was reminded of the impression of stark emptiness she’d experienced when first entering the crashed vessel. Her beloved Siyane had felt like a vacant shell in Valkyrie’s absence, for even when the Artificial’s consciousness was elsewhere, she was always here.
“Welcome back.”
‘Thank you. It is good to be home.’
“And it is oh so good to have you home.” She shook her head ruefully. “Let’s not do this again, okay? It was too close.”
All Our Tomorrows Page 7