Edge of Dark Page 18

  “Yes. I want to go back there. I want to live near a waterfall. After being on Lym, the Savior feels small.”

  “It’s a big ship.”

  She smiled. “Not as big as a planet.” She handed him her list and he took it and looked it over, and made two suggestions.

  She seemed to glow with the excitement of flying into danger. He made sure his worries didn’t show in his face, and said, “Let’s record.”

  After three takes, both missives went off.

  She went back out into command after the messages were sent. He approved of that. She knew her staff needed her.

  The Savior felt like it ran with a smooth surface but that under the river of routine, rocks waited to snag Nona. He wasn’t certain what percentage of the rocks came from her tentative leadership, from the very real threat of the pirates, or simply existed in his head. After all, he’d never been on a starship before, and it was almost certainly different from a ranger camp.

  But something was wrong.

  Charlie watched her move around the command area, stopping at every occupied desk. Her staff were polite, but they didn’t light up the way people did around a boss they loved. Luci and a few of the other senior people glanced at him from time to time, their expressions guarded.

  Henry James came to relieve Nona. The crew brightened when they saw him, and the mood in the room turned to good-natured humor.

  Trust.

  Neither he nor Nona had it. He had established his credibility on Lym a long time ago, and he had grown so used to it he just expected it to follow him. It was a dumb mistake. He should start approaching this journey the way he had started rangering—aware and alert even at rest. He had best be thinking about space instead of waterfalls.

  He tossed and turned, thinking of the ways the encounter could go wrong. Halfway through the night, he got up and paced, stopped and scribbled notes, paced again. So he was awake when Manny’s reply came in.

  Thanks for the update. We are holding our own here so far. Jean Paul wants you to know that the gleaners were right. He found four more dead gleaners in Hajput, and there are rumors that the bands are coming together for protection. He is planning to go out and meet with some of them before the snow sets in. We have Cricket. She is a royal pain in the ass.

  That made him laugh. Sure she was. She probably missed him almost as much as he missed her. The reference to snow set him back. It had been spring when he left.

  Space traffic has increased both ways, which makes for challenges. We are moving people into the towns. The rangers are busy. I’ll let you know what we learn and Jean Paul will message you himself when he gets a chance. Take care of yourself. We miss you.

  He sent a short message back.

  Take care of my tongat and slap her around when she’s bad. Miss you too. Say hi to the kids. Will tell you more when we know more.

  He’d been on rangering trips that took two or three months, and he’d barely missed anyone. He curled back up in bed, and this time he slept until Nona pounded on the door, calling through. “They sent back a message. Let’s go to the conference room.”

  It sounded like an order. “Okay. Give me five minutes.”

  He splashed cold water on his face and pulled on clean clothes before he met her in the corridor. The galley staff had clearly anticipated them: stim and pastries and sweet berries from the garden had been set out on plates.

  Nona sat back and sipped at her stim, looking more relaxed than he suspected she felt. She managed not to fumble the remote this time, and images of Gunnar and Satyana both appeared. They’d recorded this message from an office he’d never seen, a small room with a desk and a couch and a few shelves in it.

  Satyana started. “I wish we could have a real-time conversation. If we could, I’d tell you to keep your head down and listen for rumors. But at the moment I’m not free to send any other ships out there and Gunnar’s fleet is being used by the Deep. The Councilors know you’re out there. I told them you’re shaking down the Savior.

  Nona laughed. “I am.”

  Gunnar said, “We’ve sent instructions to your nav system. It will be about a two-month trip. You’re to meet Shoshone Remore, who runs the station. She’ll be expecting you. She knows I want you there when the Edge ship arrives, and she’ll see that the Sultry Savior gets a few upgrades. We’re still not sure if the Next will dock on the Satwa, but we’ll know in a day or so. The name of their ship is the Bleeding Edge.

  Charlie grimaced, and Gunnar matched his expression in the video, even though they weren’t communicating in real time. “I know. I’m not kidding. At least they didn’t name it with just numbers. We’ll send you a confirmation when we know for sure. Shoshone will be able to answer some of your other questions. But the only person on the station that I trust absolutely is a woman who works for Shoshone. Her name is Amia. Amia Loupe. She’ll be able to advise you.”

  Gunnar was telling them so little that he must be worried about the transmission itself, even though it was surely encrypted. Nothing truly incriminating had been said.

  Satyana said, “Be careful.”

  The screen went blank. “They sounded proud of you,” Charlie said.

  Nona smiled and sipped her stim. Her hand shook, but to her credit she didn’t show any other sign of fear.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHRYSTAL

  Jhailing returned two days, three hours, fourteen minutes, and seven seconds after Chrystal asked him to leave. One of her early lessons from Jhailing had been reserving part of her mind to work on simple tasks, like keeping precise time.

  She felt him return, like being joined by a familiar presence. How are you? he asked her.

  “Fine,” she said. “How is Katherine?”

  She is much the same as when you saw her last. She may never connect to her new body.

  “You don’t seem to have a body.”

  Sometimes I choose one.

  “So how much time passed for you between now and when I saw you last? Does our time pass at the same speed?”

  You are philosophical this morning.

  She waited.

  Time is a constant. However, how much can be done in a particular amount of time varies. My speed of thought is further divorced from my human origins, and thus faster than yours.”

  The flowers he’d given her had started to wilt, and their scents had faded almost completely. She reached out to touch one and a petal spiraled to the ground. “All of the beings I’ve met here were once human. Is that true of all of you?”

  We all have a seed of our past as biological beings. Authentic artificial intelligences have been created but they have never succeeded.

  She took a yellow flower apart, petal by petal, crushing each petal so that her fingers were stained yellow-gold. “What do you mean?”

  We haven’t ever created a machine with a sense of “I.” We can make them far smarter and faster for certain purposes than we are, like your ship’s AIs are smarter and faster at navigation than you, but we cannot give them self-determination. They are not aware. I am aware.

  “Interesting.” She had been told the Next were all at least part human. Which meant that humans had banned humans and essentially left them out to die. All of that connected with an experience she had forgotten, with words a poet had shared over a third glass of wine. He had been a beautiful man, with soft golden eyes and skin as dark as Gunnar’s. She’d slept with him, maybe even for more than a day. It bothered her that she remembered she’d slept with him, but not if it was once or for a week. She hadn’t thought of him for decades.

  The poet had been certain their ancestors thought the abominations they banned would simply die so far from the sun. He had read her a piece—somewhat drunkenly—that suggested that the real humans were the ones beyond the Ring. And then he’d made her swear not to tell anyone a word of what he’d said. She remembered it had made her uncomfortable. Even now it was hard to think about.

  Before she could decide to do an
y more than just set the thought aside to process later, Jhailing started giving her directions. As always, she followed. “So what part of you is human? So far I’ve never seen you or touched you. You seem entirely like software to me.”

  I am no longer attached to a particular body like you are to that one. It takes time—and lessons—to live as I do. Now turn at the next corner and don’t be late.

  It would be nice if she could get some real information out of the damned machine. Three turns later, she was given a door to open. A small room held comfortable couches. Walls were covered in screens. A sink and efficiency kitchen took up one corner, although it didn’t appear to have been used in a very long time. Yi and Jason sat in the center of the room talking. They looked up when she came in.

  “How are you?” she asked.

  Jason said, “Worried about Katherine.”

  “I should be worried about her. I’m not, though. I mean, I am. I’m concerned for her welfare. But I don’t feel the same urgency I would have before.” She wanted him to understand. “I feel sad that I’m not sad. It makes me angry.” It sounded so self-involved, so much like she was falling into her own belly button. “I should be sad. Intensely sad. Worried. Angry.”

  Jason grimaced at her. “We have to keep our feelings. Even if we have to make up the intensity of our feelings, we have to have them. We have to care. All of us need to care about Katherine.”

  The door in front of them opened and an alien walked in. Might as well have been, anyway. A machine out of her nightmares about the pirates, a vision from the stories told to small children who wouldn’t behave. Four legs, four arms, a head that twisted and tilted. Long-fingered hands on one set of arms, stubs on the others—maybe connectors for tools. She sensed that it was strong and fast. More exactly, she sensed that it could crush her, could even crush all three of them at once.

  It spoke—out loud rather than into their minds. Maybe it knew it would drive her stark raving mad if it talked inside her like Jhailing did. “I am your teacher for the next phase of your education. We will expand your mind-body connection.”

  “What’s your name?” Yi asked.

  “Jhailing Jim.”

  “You told me you didn’t have a body!” Chrystal exclaimed, a little miffed.

  “The version of me you have been talking to may not have. There are many iterations of some of us.”

  Yi immediately saw the implications. “If we’re all electrons, we can be copied.”

  “Of course.”

  “And backed up.”

  “Sometimes.”

  Its voice didn’t sound like the one that had been in her head.

  “What about Katherine?” Jason demanded. “She’ll need to know these things.”

  “Your Katherine has failed.”

  Chrystal took some satisfaction in the shock that statement sent through her. Pain. Real pain. Not in her body, but in that part of her that transcended flesh or robotics.

  Jason went completely still.

  Yi put a hand on Jason’s arm. “Later.”

  “Fuck,” Jason muttered. “Just . . . oh. What will we do?”

  “Follow me,” the machine demanded. The wall behind this new Jhailing Jim opened to a vast open space. “Run!” the robot commanded them. And then Chrystal was off, a step behind Yi and a step ahead of Jason. The surface felt soft and spongy under her feet, and yet it let her launch herself a great distance with each stride.

  She had never tested this body.

  It moved more fluidly than she expected. Faster. She didn’t grow short of wind and her lungs didn’t scream for air.

  “Keep going,” the machine said.

  The three of them ran next to each other. Chrystal’s legs were still shorter, but now they could match strides easily. They talked. “What are they teaching us?” Yi asked.

  “That we’re fast.” Chrystal said.

  Jason tried. “That we have enough energy to do this at all, especially for this long.”

  “Good. Both right.” Yi smiled. “Your point about energy matters. I believe we’re adding energy when we move. We don’t need to eat any more, and we can’t draw power from the sun like the stations or like Lym, so we’re creating it by moving.”

  “How long could we do this?” Chrystal asked.

  Yi’s answer was, “Until parts start to break down.”

  Jason was more practical. “Until that thing tells us to slow down.”

  Chrystal laughed and they kept running. It felt exhilarating. Moving seemed to help her think better and faster. “I would have expected the strategy out here was to conserve movement,” she said after a while.

  “Not really. These bodies are far more efficient than our old ones.” Yi fell silent for a moment. “I suspect that if you sit still long enough, you’ll power off. There must be some initial power source that we begin with, but the laws of entropy still exist.”

  The surface under them changed, and their footsteps became audible, if still soft. They were faster now, too.

  Jason said, “Stop the engineer talk. I want to know what I’m made of. But mostly I want to keep being me. I want to give a shit. Think about Katherine,” he demanded. “As you run, think about Katherine. Think about the fact that our old bodies can’t run a step any more. They’re gone. We don’t make love anymore; we can’t make babies. We are not ourselves and we cannot ever forget we aren’t ourselves any more. We’re fucking robots and we’re on a ship that’s trying to take over our world and they want us for something, but they won’t tell us what.”

  Yi spoke more softly than Jason. “And they can hear you. Besides, I am feeling.”

  “You don’t sound like it.”

  “That’s the trick.”

  Chrystal said nothing. As she ran, she tried to miss Katherine, to remember every detail she could.

  PART THREE

  SATWA

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  CHRYSTAL

  The lights in their shared cabin were barely bright enough to give Chrystal a decent view of Yi and Jason bent over an absurdly complex political board game named Planazate. They talked in low, companionable tones. Chrystal was curled up on a couch, talking with a Jhailing.

  There were many Jhailings, all reportedly separate Next that had grown from the budding of a single wildly successful smuggler in the earliest years of exile. All of the Jhailings were able to outthink and outperform her. Some were gentle.

  She turned her head toward the ceiling and closed her eyes, the better to hear the disembodied voice speaking directly into part of her brain, telling her, We are far healthier than any biological being. We don’t get sick.

  She had not forgiven the Next for turning her into one of them. In subtle protest, she had taken to arguing whenever she could. I assume you do have mental illness.

  Not very often. Not anymore. We have spent hundreds of years learning how to stay healthy.

  And how is that?

  Even though you have no biological parts, the patterns of your original brain’s communications copy into your software. We learned to build a body that didn’t frighten the mind.

  You don’t have this kind of body. She sat up, sensing a serious conversation.

  Most of us no longer need bodies like yours; they are a way to stay sane while you become one of us.

  I don’t like this body as much as my old one.

  Not yet. But you like flowers more than you used to.

  A fresh bouquet of flowers graced her bedside table. There were three varieties of roses, and she could pick each out one from the other with her eyes closed. I’ve always liked flowers.

  At least it wasn’t demanding that she love being in a mechanical body. Not exactly. So you do this a lot—kill people and create new Next?

  When they ask.

  I did not ask.

  Jhailing continued as if Chrystal had said nothing. It’s interesting to watch new Next learn.

  So we are an experiment?

  No. You are bec
oming. A rare pause. I will offer you a more human way to look at it.

  Go on, Chrystal said.

  Your soul is becoming accustomed to being software.

  A philosophical trap. If I have a soul, I was never killed. If I do not, I was murdered and what is left is not human.

  You are aware.

  She could give it that one. What else?

  We make sure no one is alone for too long but everyone is alone sometimes.

  I am almost never alone, she replied.

  You are, it replied. Most of the time when you are working with your physical teacher, I leave you alone.

  The machine wasn’t that dense. Sometimes there is no Jhailing in me. But then there is one with me.

  We are teaching you.

  Across the room one of the men moved a piece. She could tell by the sound that it was a soldier, a minor piece. There are things this body can do that my other one couldn’t. But I would prefer to be flesh.

  You will have many years to grow into the capable being you are becoming.

  She grew wary when it talked that way. It was about to give her something else to learn. She waited.

  We will have a need for you soon.

  She felt a pulse of interest and tried to cover it by plucking a white rose from the vase. Work? You will have work for me?

  Yes. We are returning home to the inner orbits. Some of you have been chosen to help us talk to people in key places and positions in the Glittering.

  The sweet smell of the rose emboldened her. What do you want your chosen to say?

  You are one of our chosen. What do you want to say?

  Some piece of her that remained able to feel like a human—or to at least notice that she wasn’t feeling as deeply as she should—fluttered with fear. She stamped it down, knowing it wasn’t a good thing for a Jhailing to detect, and that a Jhailing was inside her brain at this moment. Who do I know?

  Nona Hall is approaching a station near us.

  She sat up straighter, an involuntary movement that she regretted. Nona?

  She has connections to people with significant influence ratings.