by Neal Asher
“We’re clearing the streets,” added the other, looking back the way they had come.
Cog gazed at their weapons and armour. “I’m going where I bloody well want.”
The first soldier gently lowered his weapon to point it at Cog. Doubtless it was set on stun. “I’m sorry, sir, but you are in danger here. Clade units—” He stopped talking as his companion turned back, got a proper look at Cog and then grabbed his shoulder.
“I think we’ll let the gentleman go wherever he wants,” said the second soldier.
The first turned to him. “You know our damned orders.”
“Jack,” said the second, “take another look.”
By now Cog was clenching and unclenching his hands. He wanted to stay in control, but some evil little imp in his mind also wanted an excuse to lose it. The first soldier took in his massive frame, and the weapons burns through his clothing. He perhaps saw some of the circular blue scars and realized he was not dealing with a normal physically boosted human being.
“Oh, I see,” he said, quickly lowering his weapon.
Both of them must have made queries by aug, because the first stepped back and the second said, “Captain Cog, excuse us. Is there any way we can help you?”
“No,” said Cog gruffly, and turned away, almost disappointed. He heard a low breathed “Fuck” as he marched off and felt it was nice that these ECS troops understood you didn’t stand in the path of an annoyed Old Captain from Spatterjay.
Finally getting his bearings, Cog took a side street and found the pedway he, Trike and Angel had come in on from his ship. He clambered inside and, just as he was about to move on, he remembered something and swung his pack round. It was a mess: holed and burned, and stuff had fallen out. He opened it and at first saw the spare energy canisters for his weapon, though he couldn’t even remember where he’d lost it. Rooting around a bit, he found the device he was looking for. He input new instructions, triggered it and slipped it into his pocket. The mines he had planted along here would not have detonated in his presence, but they might certainly be set off by some of the robots ECS had in the area. As he walked along, the device broadcast a signal to deactivate them—turning their explosive component to an inert chemical slurry. He couldn’t be bothered to collect them up.
Halfway along, he came to a section where one of the explosives had done what he had set it for. With satisfaction, he kicked aside the head of a Clade unit, before climbing through the twisted beams and warped wall plates ahead to get to the next undamaged section of pedway. Soon he reached the wreckage where they had originally entered and climbed out. A shadow fell over him and he peered up at a big grav-barge slowly passing overhead, ovoid ambulances clinging to its underside like ticks. He realized the vehicle was Jaskoran, so the ECS commander must have called in some or all of the local Disaster Response service.
As the grav-barge slid on into the city, he lowered his gaze to his ship and headed over. He could see no damage and the door remained firmly closed. That was good because, even though it was of no importance to the Clade, the swarm AI might have damaged or destroyed it out of spite. He walked up to the side, slapped his hand against the palm reader and stepped back as the ship lowered its ramp. Trudging inside, he headed directly for his medbay.
The injectors, for his own personal use, were in a case in one wall cupboard. He slid it out and opened it, peering down at the five squat cylinders. They weren’t the kind of injectors that squirted their contents into a patient using a cellular decoherer, or in micro-jets under high pressure. They just punched through skin and muscle, in an old-fashioned way. He picked one up and removed the cover from the thick, hollow needle. The thing was made of nanochain chromium and very hard and tough—just right for a hooper’s hide. He sat down in the surgical chair and, without more ado, stabbed the thing into his thigh, pressing down the enclosed plunger with his thumb.
It took a while. First his thigh felt cold, and that spread, down his leg, up into his groin and down the other leg, then gradually up his torso as if he was filling like a beer glass. When it finally hit his skull, a convulsion threw him from the chair. He sprawled on the floor, jerking and slobbering as the dilute sprine killed off a large portion of the virus in his body. He lost it then. Time went away as he jerked and twisted, and as hot and cold fled through his body like a high-powered terahertz scan. When it was finally over, he sat up and felt the end of his tongue. It was closed now. Looking down at his body, scattered with spots leaking black fluid, he shook his head, which was clear again . . . clear enough to know that Trike had gone far beyond this kind of treatment.
Cog trudged wearily up the stairs to the bridge and slumped down in his throne. Now he was more lucid, he realized he should have asked those soldiers where the main medical ship was positioned. No matter— he was ECS and had access. He was about to tell his ship AI Janus to open com for him, then remembered it had been destroyed. He swore and swung across his control console from the chair arm and did it manually. After a bit of rerouting, a face appeared in a frame on his screen—identified in text along the bottom.
“Commander Gemmell,” he said.
“I didn’t know,” said Gemmell. “You’re an Agent.”
“And I don’t want anyone else to know, boy,” said Cog.
Gemmell acknowledged that with a dip of his head. “What can I do for you?”
“Send me the location of your main medical ship or base,” said Cog. “You have a surgical AI down here?”
Gemmell winced. “Yes, we sort of have a surgical AI.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“We have something we are presently employing as a surgical AI.” Cog stared at him and waited.
Gemmell shrugged and went on, “It’s a forensic AI so more than capable in surgical matters.” He paused for a second, then added, “People tend to get a little worried when they hear that.”
Cog understood. Forensic AIs were the Polity interrogators who could take apart people’s minds and bodies to obtain every detail.
Sometimes they put them back together again. Sometimes they took them apart many times. They were considered a necessity by some and an evil aberration by others. Their reputation was not a good one.
“Where is it?”
“I’m transmitting the location now.” Gemmell tilted his head again and then demonstrated he was fully linked into the data sphere by saying, “When you land, a grav-sled will come over to transfer Ruth Ottinger aboard the medship. There is a queue, so Mobius Clean may take some time to get to her, unless you have some pressing reason for her to be attended to?”
Cog studied him. No sign of an aug on his skull, so probably something internal, likely a gridlink. He then considered whether the resurrection of Trike’s wife was pressing. Her presence might compel Trike to do something about his condition. Equally it might drive him further away. In reality, Trike and Ruth should not be his main concern. By handing Ruth over, he felt he would have discharged his responsibility for her. As for Trike . . . could he be brought back? Long-term suppression of the virus might help but Cog knew of no cure for a man occupied with Jain tech. However, if anything could return Trike to humanity it was a forensic AI.
“Yes, I have a pressing reason,” said Cog, returning his attention to his console and firing up his ship’s grav-engines.
BLADE
This one unit of Obsidian Blade resembled a splinter missile only at a glance. Closer inspection revealed the split down its length, the curve to what had once been sharp edges. Scanning strong enough to get through would also have revealed radical alterations inside. But no scan had yet penetrated any of Blade’s units, and the Clade unit ahead was too busy fleeing, having learned as the Clade entire how many parts of itself had ceased to exist. It shot around a corner above the water flow, ricocheting off one wall as it did so.
The pursuing Blade unit divided along its length and separated to reveal its silvery internal weapons, and extruded shear tentacles
from its fore. Part of its design had been taken from a weapons platform attack pod, the rest from hunting squid. It accelerated, drive system clawing at the surrounding walls of the drain, and itself bouncing off the wall at the corner. Around and on, and then slamming to a halt, sending up an explosion of water.
A trap.
Ahead waited ten of the Clade, revealing themselves from chame- leonware, while behind Blade detected others coming out of concealment. It opened fire with a mini-railgun, firing grains of matter at devastating speed. Two Clade disintegrated while the rest came on. Its particle weapon was tracking some across the wall, but there was limited particulate to use. A wave of ionized water travelling up the tunnel from behind—faster than the speed of sound here. Impact—and Blade lost sensors, then the Clade was on it.
Blade knew that this fight was lost the moment it started, but it inflicted as much damage as possible. As the Clade units attached to it like lampreys and began to penetrate, it ripped at them with its tentacles and shredded two of them. Then it reached its survival limit. If it waited any longer, the Clade would seize control of its systems. Blade detonated its power supply, and one small point of its awareness disappeared.
Blade overall hunted and fought on, soon seeing how the Clade was adapting to the new threat. Another of Blade’s units went down into a trap, but this time the Clade used a high-intensity maser to drill into its power supply to prevent detonation. Blade had to sacrifice it—a wipe program taking out its mind. This was a big loss because now the Clade had one of its units. The other swarm AI would be taking it apart, deconstructing it to learn its function and how to destroy others of its kind. Blade pondered, slowing down its pursuit of the Clade. It needed to destroy as much of the swarm as it could here but also to do the same as the Clade—capture one of them and deconstruct it. Thus far this had not been possible.
“Ican help,” came a broadcast voice.
Scanning back through the tunnels, Blade quickly located the source. The big blue monstrous man was wading along a channel; behind him came the android, Angel. Blade could see how Angel might help, but Trike? He was very strong and ridiculously rugged but how could a simple creature like him help in such a task?
“Check the link,” came Angel’s communication, ghosting into Blade’s mind before it posed a question.
Trike had called out his offer of help but Blade had received it through a complex data link as if from an AI, and Angel had ridden in on that. A simple organic creature could not possibly offer this kind of connection. And it had arrived at a moment that could not be coincidental. Blade cautiously took up the link, made connection, and was astounded.
It understood that Trike had not deliberately opened himself up so much through that link. He had been aiming merely for communication and perhaps did not understand the full extent of what he was. Blade immediately diverted one of its units to his area, and it sped along the tunnel towards Trike. It slowed abruptly to stop, then hovered in the air just ten feet away. Via the unit, Blade put an induction warfare beam on him for confirmation. He was big and the density of his body was up there with the packed technology of Blade’s own units. But this technology was of another kind.
“Does he know?” Blade asked Angel via the link.
“His human awareness is low but integrating,” replied the android. “However, he will soon be able to understand AI com and accede to requests you make.”
“How soon?” Blade enquired.
Angel hesitated, then said, “He will need some assistance.”
“Can you provide that?”
Again the hesitation, then, “I can assist, because perhaps I owe him that,” said Angel. “My own system is... divorced from the remainder of the Jain tech inside me, but I can bring him to awareness.”
“Why do you hesitate?” replied Blade.
“Because, though he fights it, he wants to kill me. I will be placing myself in great danger,” Angel replied.
“Then you have a choice to make,” said Blade, and waited.
Angel remained still for a long moment, then abruptly waded up beside Trike and reached out to grab his arm. “You need to integrate if you are to assist Blade,” the android said out loud.
Trike swung that awful head round to gaze at the android. The man, if he could any longer be described as such, seemed unaware of the shifting movement of Jain tendrils around Angel’s hand—the connection being made. Then the data package the android had injected must have impacted, because Blade detected energy surges and rapid changes to Trike’s internal structure. He snarled and lashed out, slamming Angel back against the tunnel wall, into the tunnel wall, compacting stone. A shockwave was transmitted throughout the underground that could be detected by Blade’s more remote units. Even Blade, who had used weapons that could tear apart planetoids, was stunned by the concentrated power of Trike. He had just crushed the chest of an incredibly tough android and the force of the blow had rippled out through Angel’s body, causing immense damage. But still, it seemed, Angel was functional.
“It is enough,” said the android.
But it wasn’t enough for Trike. The man stepped in, one clawed hand locked about the android’s throat and the other stabbing into his chest, fingers closing around artificial ribs. He was going to tear Angel apart, so Blade quickly focused on him again and, through the link, sent all the great mass of data it had on the construction of Clade units. The man tilted his head, as if listening to something half-heard, as the new knowledge found routes into his conscious mind, and as processing routes opened to the Jain structure that now formed a large part of his body.
“I need you to mind-ream the Clade through one of its units,” said Blade, from its unit.
“I don’t understand,” said Trike, but only as if testing the words. “I don’t know how . . .” Abruptly turning, he heaved the android out of the wall and hurled him across the tunnel into the other wall. Again there was a hard, shuddering impact that brought stone raining down from the ceiling. Trike took a step towards Angel, then stopped and held up his hands, Jain-tech veins writhing on them. He tilted his head back and his triangular-section tongue protruded, testing the air. Finally he focused back on Blade. “I need physical contact.”
“You will have it,” said Blade. “Follow.”
Blade turned its unit around and, via the other parts of itself, tracked the dispersed Clade throughout the tunnels. It began moving off, slowly because Trike was still fighting some internal battle and had not yet moved. Something then snapped into place and he began to forge through the chest-deep water in the tunnel. He reached out, fingers digging into the stonework, as well as toes. Though big and heavy, his strength was hideous, and ripping up stone he scuttled along the wall after Blade like some monstrous spider.
“You will survive?” Blade sent an enquiry back.
“I will,” Angel replied, focused on his own injuries and beginning to make repairs.
As they moved through the tunnels, another comlink opened—one Blade had used as it overflew the Ghost Drive Facility.
“What is it?” he asked.
“Now he is yours,” said Orlandine.
Blade understood at once. Trike had essentially been sequestered as a submind to Orlandine, or as haiman liked to call them, a subpersona. Angel had just detached him from her, which enabled Trike to take up the reins of his own being—to be aware of all he was without referencing the backup of Orlandine recorded inside him. He was integrating, becoming whole. However, Orlandine’s comment implied that Trike was now a submind slaved to Blade, and that simply wasn’t true.
“Not really, “ Blade replied.
“I was not clear,” said Orlandine. “He is your responsibility... for now.”
Blade mulled that over for a microsecond. “No, he is his own.”
After a long pause Orlandine said, “The Clade is out in the fleet at the accretion disc too.” She also attached an update on events out there.
“My task has begun,” was Blade�
�s only reply as it selected likely targets for Trike, and zeroed in on them.
16
Forensic AIs are supposedly the ultra-cops. The Polity calls them in when it is utterly essential to obtain data or evidence regarding major incidents. These include crimes that result in, or could lead to, mass death and destruction. They are summoned to interrogate Separatists who are planning to bomb a runcible or drop a cargo ship on a city.Or when a rogue AI has decided it might be fun to fire up a volcano or tinker with the orbit of a moon. They have the tools for obtaining information too. They can take apart a human being both physically and mentally and get to every detail. Some also have the capability to do this with other AIs. Undoubtedly, they have prevented hideous crimes, snuffed out murderous plots and averted major disasters. They have saved thousands of lives, stopped brush wars and the necessity for Line police actions. However, despite all this, they have a very bad reputation. Mention of a forensic AI conjures the vision of an Inquisition torturer laying out the tools of his trade. Still there remains in human consciousness the perception that what sits between a person’s ears is inviolate, until investigators find proof of guilt from another source.This attitude acknowledges the fact that a forensic AI may be able to take someone apart mentally and physically, but ignores that they can also put that person back together again, undamaged. Such examinations are a small price to pay for the safety of the public and of the Polity itself.
—from Quince Guide, compiled by humans
THE CLIENT
Fiery streaks cut down from a plasma storm across vacuum. Impacts across hundreds of miles, across a landscape of hills and valleys of hull metal. The Species ship was taking heavy damage. The Client watched the series of detonations: the bright flashes of antimatter and matter combining across that metal landscape, discs of fire expanding and melding. The great ship dipped and the terrain fell away. On the other side, a giant segment of its coil rose, shedding debris larger than attack ships, tilted up five hundred miles long, then slowly tore at its lower end and broke away.
