by C. Gockel
She’d tried to rescue him. His Q-comm sparked. Of course she would try to rescue anyone. It was part of what had endeared her to him.
The general halted, from the direction and sound of his footfalls, just beyond Davies’s grave. Too far for a roundhouse kick.
The general continued, “You record everything to your computer mind in the sky. We thought we’d kill her. But maybe we’ll infect her. Let you and the universe watch her join us.”
Spinning around with inhuman speed, 6T9 launched himself at the general, turning on the lights of his eyes on high—and in a fraction of a millisecond saw the pirate’s visor adjusting to the glare. He had one last weapon. 6T9 brought his hand up and let Eliza’s ashes fly. They struck the general full in the face, clouding his visor. The Infected’s hand jerked; the shot he’d meant to fire at 6T9’s chest skimmed 6T9’s already-damaged shoulder. 6T9 was on top of him an instant later, knocking him flat. Pressing a knee onto the arm with the pistol, 6T9 locked his hands together and brought them down onto the general’s visor. It cracked. 6T9’s hands sparked. The general lifted his legs to throw 6T9 off, but 6T9’s hands came down again, cracking through the barrier. He brought his hands down again … and again … and again.
“Sixty! He’s dead!” Volka shouted.
6T9 kept pounding.
“Sixty, you’re hurting yourself!”
6T9 paused. There was synth blood everywhere, and human blood, bits of brain, and bone. The gore completely obscured the glow of his hands. He brought them to his face; they were in shreds and probably infected.
He heard Volka’s footsteps approach, and he heard her pause at Davies’s grave. She was next to 6T9 a moment later. He felt her hand on his shoulder, and then she went over to the pirate. With shaking hands, perhaps made clumsy by her suit—it had probably saved her from serious injury, but it wasn’t phaser proof and was damaged now. She took the infected man’s weapon. “You killed him.”
“I changed my programming. May I have the pistol?” he asked, holding up his good hand.
She gave it to him, but awkwardly, as though the fingers in the gloves were resisting her movements. They were probably malfunctioning. Taking it from her, he stood, spun, and shot the first three men again. Volka jumped back. There was a groan from the last man. 6T9 shot him an extra time.
“Suits give some protection,” he muttered, inclining his head at her hand.
She flexed her fingers. “Oh, that’s right.” Staring at the Infected, she wavered on her feet. “It is for the best.”
Bracelet chirped, and 6T9 could just make out a strange man calling, “Volka? Where are you? We’re almost done loading the survivors.”
“I’m fine and on my way.” Volka’s glowing eyes rose to 6T9. In an apologetic voice, she said, “Sundancer’s here … they were loading survivors at the worst possible moment. Otherwise, she would have swooped in to rescue us.”
6T9 picked up his gloves and his helmet. He put on one glove but struggled with the other.
“Are … are you coming with us?” Volka asked.
Giving up on the second glove, he tossed it inside his helmet. “Do you want me to?” Volka would save anyone. Was he just anyone?
Volka’s eyes fell to his helmet; he’d wedged it between his bad arm and his side. “Yes, of course I do. You’ll be destroyed here.”
Which wasn’t the answer to the question he should have asked, but it was true. He nodded.
Volka started back the way she’d come, and 6T9 fell into step beside her. They’d gone three paces when Volka lifted a foot—and was nearly blown off her feet by a sudden gust of wind. 6T9 linked his arm through hers before she tumbled again.
She laughed shakily. “You know, I meant to keep rolling down the hill before. It seemed like the best way to not give them an easy target.” In a lower voice, she added, “I just didn’t mean to start rolling in the first place.”
She was trying to use humor to defuse the situation. He should say something witty in return, but his Q-comm returned a null set. He didn’t let go of her arm, though.
They went a few more paces. “You changed your programming,” Volka said. He tried to analyze her tone, but either his apps were failing, or she’d spoken the words without discernible expression. “Why—?”
His Q-comm fired bright white, and words tumbled from his mouth before he’d analyzed them. “To be worthy of your regard.” It was the truth, though he wasn’t sure if his Q-comm had answered or his core programming.
“You always had my regard,” Volka replied, her voice hushed or the flames’ roar just very loud.
6T9 laughed bitterly, “But I was not worthy.”
He felt rather than heard her intake of breath. Before she could protest, he said, “Just now when I shot that Infected man again, you didn’t like it—”
“But it was necessary,” Volka said. “We couldn’t turn our backs on him. I understand that.”
“And if I hadn’t changed my programming, you would have had to do it. Like you had to shoot the children at the pirate camp. Like you’ve had to do so many times in the course of our acquaintance. The burden always fell to you. Being the one to always have to fight our battles endangered you. You said it made me an angel, which I am not, and never was, but if I were, I would give up my halo to see you live.” He still meant it, although the circle of humanity he’d give up his halo for had grown. He’d give it up for Davies, and for the pilots who’d saved them when he piloted the unstable ship to New Grande. He’d give up his halo for the ship. He’d give it up for the human woman who refused to leave her baby, and the schoolteacher who saved her charges, though she despised him. Were any of them alive now?
They reached the peak they were climbing, and Lolita came charging out of the gloom. “Android General 1! You haven’t been destroyed! I worried so while I was trapped below ground.” She rushed to his other side, hands outstretched. A growl, low and fierce, came from Volka. Lolita drew back, eyeing Volka, face wrinkling into a look of disgust. “Don’t be jealous.”
“Go away, Lolita,” 6T9 said.
The android’s eyes got wide. “But—”
“Go away. Now.” His ruined arm and hand began to spark.
Shoulders falling, Lolita spun on her heel and strode back the way she’d come. Volka’s growl faded with every step. His Q-comm sparked. Volka had been—was—jealous. For him. Her messy programming recognized him as … hers.
Another figure came toward them. It was a man 6T9 didn’t recognize in a Fleet envirosuit. Had Volka lost her crew? His hand tightened on her arm.
The man, still meters away, shouted above the wind and fires. “Volka, you are not authorized to go off without—”
“Go away, Lieutenant Dixon,” Volka said in a soft voice.
The man’s expression became confused. He stopped, and then backed up a step.
“We’ll be aboard before you finish loading,” Volka said, again very softly. “No need to worry.”
“You’ll be aboard before we finish loading,” he agreed. “No need to worry.” With that, he wandered back the way he’d come.
6T9’s mind was still processing her growl. “Volka, you and I will never be telepathically connected. There will always be a gulf between us that can never be crossed.”
“Hopefully not,” Volka replied.
Which made 6T9’s circuits misfire all at once.
In a weary voice, Volka said, “I think I just used mind control on Lieutenant Dixon. No, I don’t think so. I know.”
6T9 gaped at her—but how could he be outraged? His inclinations were worse.
“I can’t help it, Sixty. Whenever I feel something intensely, I slip.” She waved a hand expansively. “But aside from locking myself up on the asteroid, there isn’t a lot I can do about it right now. I have to be a figurehead admiral for a small fleet of faster-than-light Skimmer ships, and we have so much to do.” Before he could ask, she looked off into the distance and said, “We have to leave now,” and began p
ulling him toward the ship.
“I wanted to murder Captain Darmadi,” 6T9 blurted.
Halting, Volka looked up at him with very wide glowing eyes. “That is very sweet, but what are you saying?”
Again 6T9’s circuits misfired. It took him a few seconds to process that for an extremely monogamist species, the promise to murder a rival might be an endearment. It was so absurd, it made his lips quirk. “I didn’t mean it as a sweet nothing, Volka. I almost did. James stopped me.”
“That’s why you ran away? Not because I heard Alaric?”
6T9 could almost hear her ears folding as she spoke. “Yes, no, both … and because I could help here.” He surveyed the burning world. “Although, by the looks of it, not much.”
“You saved thousands,” she said, steering him again toward the ship.
“You’re changing the subject,” he said, allowing himself to be led. “You wouldn’t like it if I had killed him. Not really.”
“No, I wouldn’t,” Volka admitted. “Which doesn’t mean I’m still in love with him. I’m telepathically connected, like you’re tethered to your Q-comm, and I … I am glad, because I could save him, and even if I don’t love him, it would be a waste for him to die.”
6T9 found himself immediately thinking of Davies and wishing she’d been telepathically bonded to him. If she’d once been Davies’s lover and had arrived with the ship and the crew just after the blast, Davies would be alive.
“In the end you … you didn’t kill him … I …” Volka stammered. “I don’t know what you want me to say.”
She didn’t understand how truly dangerous Alaric’s situation had been because she had a brain shaped by billions of years of evolution with superior fight or flight and kill, ignore, or nurture instincts. His processors had less than a month of experience with such questions.
Four unfamiliar Fleet Marines emerged from the gloom. “Break apart for decon!” And 6T9 didn’t have to answer.
Volka and he dutifully parted. A man helped 6T9 put on his gloves and helmet, and then doused his suit in flame so he was at least sterilized on the outside.
Less than a minute later, he was hopping into the familiar ship with Volka. The hatch closed silently, almost magically, behind them. The unfamiliar Marines didn’t pay attention to him, but the ship trembled, and then from everywhere and nowhere a voice declared, “Hi, Sixty!”
Everyone stopped what they were doing and looked around with wide eyes.
Volka smiled. “That is the second time Sundancer’s spoken.”
Sensory receptors lit beneath 6T9’s skin, as though the ship had reached out and touched him.
In Sundancer’s keel, above where she’d just opened up, a light sparkled. “That’s Bracelet—her Q-comm particle, anyway,” Volka explained. “We haven’t figured out how to get it into a chip yet.”
The ship started to lift, and the aft compartments opened. FET12 emerged, carrying Carl in his arms. Carl blinked sleepily at 6T9. “Good to see you back, Hatchling.”
FET12 narrowed his eyes somewhat suspiciously, but said, “I’m glad you weren’t destroyed.”
6T9 found himself wanting to throw his arms wide to catch Volka, FET12, and Carl in an enormous embrace, but he didn’t. His hand went to his side, where he kept Eliza’s ashes, and of course they were gone. He snapped his hand behind his back instead. Volka came over to him and almost shyly said, “Sixty, I’ve been terrible. You threw Eliza’s ashes at that pirate, didn’t you? And I just now realized and … I’m … I’m so sorry.”
FET12 whispered in an accusatory tone, “Carl, you didn’t mention anything about pirates.”
“Shh … Sixty is probably depressed right now. Don’t change the subject,” Carl hissed.
If FET12 reacted in any way to that command, 6T9 didn’t see. His eyes were on Volka, taking off her helmet. Her ears drooped. “Thank you, Sixty.”
6T9’s Q-comm flashed white, and he smiled. He caught Volka in a hug—but not FET12, because it would probably terrify the android—laid his chin on her head and rocked her gently. And then he began to chuckle.
“Do you need to reboot?” FET12 asked.
“No,” 6T9 said. “I just … if Eliza knew her ashes would someday blind a pirate long enough for me to save you, Volka—”
“She would have loved it,” Carl said with authority.
“Exactly,” said 6T9. His hands flexed in their gloves … they were still wet with the gore from when he’d killed the man. His smile melted. He’d asked Volka to marry him out of fear that she’d leave him. It hadn’t been an act of devotion; it had been an act of control. One that ultimately he himself hadn’t believed in. He’d insulted her. She deserved better, and he needed some time—maybe both of them did—to tweak the bugs in their new apps. They were fast approaching Time Gate 5. They were surrounded by Carl, FET12, Sundancer, and Marines. What he needed to say, needed to be said now. “Volka,” he whispered. “This is sort of putting the cart before the lizzar … but would you consider courting me?”
43
Courting Disaster
Galactic Republic: Time Gate 1
On a quiet balcony, above the main promenade of Time Gate 1, Alexis stood before a three-meter high holo of Earth. Markus wasn’t in his sling, and she felt light and bereft. The second might not have had anything to do with Markus’s absence.
Alaric took her hand. “There’s still time to change our minds.”
Alexis’s eyes slid to her husband. His jaw was tight, his expression almost angry. He didn’t want to leave the Republic.
“You will come back again,” she reassured him. Joint military ventures with the Galactic Fleet would make sure of it. Diplomacy would probably even force him to visit sites they’d missed: India’s Ajanta Caves, Quinta da Regaleira in Sintra, the canals of New York. As much as she found the culture of the Republic to be decadent and at once cynical and naive, she loved Earth. There was so much history in the cradle of humankind, she could never grow bored of it.
He squeezed her hand. “Of that I have no doubt. But it will be difficult for me to arrange for you to come back.”
Alexis felt heat rising in her face. “I am choosing to come back with you. We agreed. We can’t afford a rift in Republic-Luddeccean relations.” Did he doubt that her resolve was as great as his own?
“I know,” he said. “But I am sorry.”
Alexis’s ire drained away. “Yes, well …”
The holo changed to a scene of rioting. Text scrolled across the holo. Protests against the proposed declaration of war against the aliens turned to looting today. The scene changed to a man that the text identified as Senator Lindbergh. The holo was muted but there were subtitles as the Senator spoke. Calling this alien species the Dark is just a way to tap into human fears. Moreover, it objectifies this communal consciousness. How can we expect respect from it when we do not offer respect first? It’s no wonder our diplomatic attempts have been a disaster.
“Let’s go,” Alaric said.
“Yes,” said Alexis, turning from the holo. Perhaps her lecture had swayed a few minds and made them believe in the danger of the Dark, but if it had, she had yet to see it in Galactic media. She had seen a xenologist journal describe her lecture on The People’s mythos and history as, “Brilliant and fascinating on multiple levels, not least of which the glimpse of an alien culture through the martial, warrior ethos lens of a Luddeccean.”
Without a word, they headed toward the bookstore where they’d meet their children and Admiral Sato and Sinclair. The couple had taken the children for ice cream. An Admiral and a Fleet Intelligence Officer babysitting—it would be unthinkable on Luddeccea, outside family situations, of course. Alexis could imagine Holly and her husband minding their grandchildren and spoiling them rotten, which was exactly the role Sato and Sinclair seemed to have picked for themselves when it came to Alaric and Alexis’s sons.
On the lower level, the bookstore was more crowded than the floor above. It was as much an ar
t gallery as a bookstore. Galacticans “downloaded” their books, for the most part. But hand-bound volumes, printed in limited editions, were collectibles. Some of them were actually copied by hand, as monks had done in the Middle Ages, because it was more “authentic.”
They were early, and Alaric drifted over to a collection of books of early spaceflight with “genuine,” not computer generated, photographs. Alexis stayed behind in the twentieth century literature section, idly picking up a novel that had been hand copied. The elaborate brush calligraphy in black and gold on the cover identified it as Ralph Elision’s Invisible Man. Alexis opened it, noting that it had first been published in 1947, a year in which she was sure mass printing existed. Still, the calligraphy was so lovingly done, she kept turning the pages. Skimming quickly, wondering if this book might be worth a confrontation with Luddeccean censors, she tried to piece together the book’s theme. I am invisible because people refuse to see me. A wave of melancholy swept through her, and she couldn’t understand why.
Alexis distantly heard a woman call someone. “Professor?”
Her eyes skipped over the page. Sometimes it is advantageous … although it is most often rather wearying … She knew suddenly why the words spoke to her. On Luddeccea, she would be unseen again. Or rather, not seen for who she was and what she thought. She would, in private, continue her translations and be respected for it by an earnest select few. But in public, she would be only a wife and mother, which, according to Luddeccean priests, were two of the most elevated of roles anyone could aspire to—as well they should be—they were damnably difficult jobs. And yet, for all that they were taught wives and mothers should be respected, they so often weren’t. Coddled in some ways, cherished, but not respected.
“Professor Darmadi?” the woman said, closer.
Hugging the book to her chest, Alexis looked up, prepared to direct the person to her husband—but instead, she stared. The woman was familiar—wiry and short, even for a Luddeccean, with bobbed hair streaked with gray and vividly green eyes. The two men who had followed her at the shop stood a few paces behind her now. One held an open book in his hands, but he was gazing openly at Alexis. Security?
