by Kate Kyle
"So, you not are Baron whatever, the famous biohacker?"
"No. But I do know Baron. We belong to the same… organization. Our goal is to investigate suspicious events and seek the truth. Since the Rebels have not responded to official requests for clarification regarding the recent surge of failing brain implants, the issue has been identified by the Seekers as demanding investigation. The Seekers is a secret organization, so this is all between us…"
She made a quick 'zip' move along her lips.
"My lips are sealed, and this conversation is not being recorded," she said.
"Forgot all about that. Shit! Blessing in disguise."
"Funnily enough, it's been a little bit like that for me as well," she said, looking away.
Interesting… What secret was she hiding?
"Care to share?" he asked.
"Nope. It's not relevant to you or our safe arrival. And back to you. Is there anything else you need to tell me?"
He considered his options carefully. Indeed, with some nutrients onboard, his body, and more to the point, his brain was returning to normal. He could and should be able to carry on without any more disclosure for this moment.
"No. At least not now. But I want you to know that it's in my deepest interest to arrive at our destination. All of us. Tell me how I can help."
6
Jax
His confession amused her. Why? She wasn't sure. Maybe because she'd half expected something like that.
Rutger's behavior was somewhat suspicious. Not entirely, definitely not all-alarms-blasting, but in a tingling doubt-filled kind of way.
But what if he was telling her only part of the truth?
And if yes, was there a way of finding it out?
No, probably not. Not a legal one, anyway. Although, with the comms down, she could always pretend that the alleged accident occurred when the ship was already out of Earth's jurisdiction.
Ha-ha.
She'd never imagined all those lectures about the jurisdiction lines would come so handy.
Ha-ha.
The same was true for her pregnancy, which she had just concealed from him. But he didn't have to know. On the other hand, as the ship's captain, she had the right to know the truth about her passengers.
Well, probably, also sort of…
Which reminded her of the key puzzle of this situation. Why did the ship decide to wake those two particular people up?
"So, since you're not Baron somebody, what's wrong with your implants?" she asked.
He chuckled.
"Nothing. I mean, I've got a pair, but they have not been properly integrated. They're for the show only, so that the port scanners can detect implants, but I don't use them."
"Cover story only? Or are the implants actually usable?"
"Usable, but minimally, since, as I said, they are not integrated. I have to use glasses as the interface, because these are actually bona fide Gen 1.1, tweaked to give readings like the new ones."
"What?" Jax interrupted. "Do you do it on purpose?"
"Do what on purpose?"
"Use big words. Want to prove your educational superiority over me?"
After all that initial suspicion over her not being a man, this latest annoyance actually felt minor. She could have shrugged it off if she didn't want to make a point. Only, she wanted to.
"Ah, sorry…" he said, confusion furrowing his face. "No, I've never meant to deride, I mean… belittle… I mean…" he exhaled loudly and wriggled in his chair. "You know what I mean?"
She folded her arms. He looked like a piece of damp soya-meat thrown onto a hot plate, all squirming around.
"Assume that I don't," she replied.
"Oh, for goodness sake, you're not dumb," he fired back. "What I wanted to say is that I don't mean to insult you or anything like that. See, that's just the way I speak. To be honest, I can't always find another word for what I want to say."
"Fair point. And why is it that you speak the way you do?"
"Blame my mother. She is French and insisted on providing me with a classical education. So, I suffered in classic Greek and Latin classes. Philosophy. Poetry. The art of debate. Thesis, antithesis, synthesis. All of which are completely and utterly useless given my subsequent career path in modern media, focused on entertainment value."
"Sounds like you had a lovely childhood."
"Sounds like you know what you're talking about."
She blinked. That was a strange comment. Or was she being paranoid again.
"What?" He looked at her curiously. "Didn't you have a childhood filled with happiness and family bliss?"
She tightened the grip on her arms.
"Didn't you?" she asked back. The tension in the air was palpable.
"Actually, I didn't. I'd say I'm a failure of the greatest childhood happiness project ever invented by humanity."
"You mean the baby license?"
He nodded ruefully.
"Yeah. I'm sure the idea behind it was laudable: to ensure that every child that is born is wanted, and that the people who want to bring him or her to the world are physically, emotionally and financially ready to do so, but… some people just…" his voice trailed off.
"Some people just should never have been allowed to have children," she finished his sentence and immediately regretted.
"This conversation is not being recorded," he said, as if reading her emotions. "That's what you said, remember?" His face was relaxed now, and he offered the hint of a smile. It seemed the smile of a person who knew what it was to be an unwanted child. A spare child. Or a wrong one.
"Thankfully it's not. And thankfully I don't have any implants to score my negative points on all… how would you say? Societal transgression?" She chuckled, surprised that she remembered the word. "Aren't yours scoring you?"
He joined in with a chuckle of his own.
"See, you can do it, too. Societal transgressions. No, mine are not like that. It's only the Chinese who do that. Mine are-" He paused and chuckled again. "As I was trying to say: mine implants are bona fide, that is genuine Gen 1.1 implants," he corrected himself. "Fitted on Earth, in an illegal operating theater. And to return to our original conversation, there is nothing technically wrong with the implants themselves. I've learned how to use them, but-"
"But you're not enslaved," she finished his sentence, watching him carefully. She’d just made one of the key arguments of all those against the implants, at least in the PanAm Confederation.
"No, I'm not."
"Are you one of the opposers?" She was curious. With so much political and societal differences between the confederations, a lot of information about 'the other side' came flagged as fake news. These days, you never knew the difference between truth and lies.
"No," he shot back without hesitation. "But I wanted to explore the way they work first. I mean to learn the truth. Seekers, we're all like that. We want to know the truth, what really happens. In short, we want to understand things first before we cast our own judgment and make our own decision."
"Interesting. So, you're still seeking truth about the brain implants?"
"I was almost convinced. Waiting for the new generation to launch. Gen 2.0, with a real internal interface, no need for glasses, or contact lenses or anything else to access the Net. The other thing is the price tag… It might have been great to have a pair of 1.2s, assuming they were working correctly. But it took me a while to collect enough money. And by that time, reports started to flow in about faulty operations."
"I've obviously heard about it. Does it concern all types?"
"No. Just the Gen 1.2 units fitted in Si-Carb facility in Segedunum over the past six months or so."
"Are you sure that hasn't happened to the ones made by the Chinese… I mean the AAPC?"
"Positive. We've investigated that thoroughly, through independent channels."
"So, what is she doing here?" Jax asked, pointing with her thumb behind her back, in the direction of her cabin.<
br />
"Good question. She may well have something wrong with her implants, but since they are made in one of the AAPC owned factories and fitted in their medical facilities, she should not be heading for the Si-Carb clinic. Besides, I can't imagine Rebels allowing any piece of AAPC-made electronics into their system. What if there's spyware in them. Wait," he gasped. "Gen. 1.2X are spyware. All those point-scoring, that's spying on their own citizens."
That was it! That was a good explanation of why Jax felt immediately suspicious of Lulu Zhou. The post-stasis effects must have been washing out of Rutger's system now; he was coming up with useful stuff.
"What's going on here?"
Rutger pursed his lips.
"Good question," he said after a short pause. "I have a tingling suspicion why the ship brought us to life."
"Fire away. I'm dying of curiosity. No sarcasm intended," she added, noticing a twitch of hesitation on his face.
"I'm only hypothesizing, sort of extrapolating from my situation, mind."
"Caveat accepted. Go on."
"My implants are not affected. I'm not in any way impaired by them. And this is certain. Given what I know of the implant issues, I can also assume that her implants are also unaffected. Hence I posit-"
"That the ship was smart enough to wake up two people who were most likely to be helpful because they had functioning brains?" Jax said, adding emphasis on the word 'helpful'.
"Sarcasm intended?" there was a note of hesitation in his voice.
"Not from the ship's point of view. The ship has no sense of humor. Sarcasm requires a healthy dose of that. I reckon the ship woke up those who were most able to help. Point."
He took a deep breath and sat back.
"Which takes me back to my earlier question. How did your ship know all that?"
"Good question. No answer," she replied. There was a simple explanation though. "Have you considered a leak within your organization?"
He nodded gloomily.
"I think it's highly unlikely, but even if that did happen, the issue regarding Lulu Zhou still remains. I doubt anyone from the AACP confederation would leak anything to a PanAm transport company."
"Agreed," she said.
She ran through all the information she had in her head. Leaks or no leaks, the ship's computer seemed to hide some of it from her. And if she was being honest with herself, the whole operation shutdown was a bit of a mystery. Why didn't the computer just informed her what happened? That there was a virus or whatever…
She chewed on the inside of her cheek.
"Jax?"
His voice brought her back to the present.
"Just thinking about this strange situation," she replied. "When I went to deal with the crazy professor, you were trying to find out what happened. You showed me a virus or something."
His face tensed again. Now, under the bright lights of the flight deck, she could see the shadow of a stubble on the side of his jaw. Stasis slowed down all the vital processes, but it didn't stop them altogether.
"This is a strange thing," he said.
Was there a carefulness in his voice, or was she being too suspicious again?
"And if you say you've never seen this sort of thing before…" he paused, no doubt expecting her to react.
"Definitely not."
"Could this be part of the ship's systems?"
"In what way? What were you doing when the image popped up?"
"I was trying to access certain files. Some files are inaccessible; they are 'read only' and probably stored on specific devices. The operating system has been shut down, and I can find no point of access."
He was meandering… playing for time.
"Yes, the ship's computer did that. So, what were you doing when the picture popped up?'
"I… tried to see what happened with the comms."
Blood hummed in her ears.
"You did what?" she said, grabbing the armrests.
"Nothing happened. The system didn't let me. That was when the image popped up."
The anger pushed her off the chair. She stood up but forced herself to stay on the spot.
Emotions are never good guide to decisions… breathe, Jax!
"Hey, I said I didn't open anything. Didn't tap on anything. The image popped up and I… I… stopped there."
She crossed her arms.
"And now you're going to do a three-finger salute and say, 'Scout's honor'," she snorted.
He lifted his right hand slightly.
"Only if you want me to," he said.
Crap. She always knew her suspiciousness and inability to trust people would paint her into a corner.
"Whatever." She shrugged. "The long-distance comms are down anyway. Physical damage from a fly-by asteroid I destroyed to protect a piece of equipment in the Belt."
"Sounds like we're going through a real bad patch. Any other damage?"
"Not as far as I'm aware. The ship's hull is intact. Unless you've released some monsters by tapping on an infected file. If this is the case, we'd already be doomed anyway, whatever we do," she said. "We'll all go down together, like that old ship… what was the name?"
"Titanic, you mean? But there were some survivors."
"People still in the pods. Maybe," she said and chewed on her cheek for a while.
Indeed, if Rutger had accessed any of the integral files, they were doomed. And she wouldn't know until it was time to know. Until then, she needed to behave as if they weren't in any more danger than what had already been revealed. So, she had to put her paranoia back to sleep.
Good, because she needed to think through the plan for reaching Neptune space and Segedunum safely.
"I need to recalculate the trip plan," she said, returning to her chair. She called the ship's current coordinates and the state of all the systems onto the screen. "Is there anything else I need to know?" she asked.
He shook his head.
"What are you thinking of doing? How many more days until we reach our destination?"
"That's exactly what I need to find out. With two more humans using the ship's limited resources plus the potential virus situation and increased uncertainty without comms, I need to increase the ship's velocity," she said calmly.
Yeah, she did feel calm about it. For real.
"How many supplies do we have? And isn't the ship recycling some of it?"
"This is a one-person-alive ship, if I may remind you," she said, letting some of her irritation color her voice. "And since it's supposed to be an emergency trip, she was equipped to prioritize safety of the medical cargo over speed."
"She?" There was a note of amusement in his voice.
Was he mocking her? Jax glanced at him.
"What do you mean?" she asked.
"How do you know the ship is female?"
Rutger's face was blank. No, there was a hint of curiosity.
Genuine?
Little risk in testing it.
"All ships are considered female in English. It comes from a tradition of considering your ship as a female figure, a mother or a goddess, protecting and guiding her crew."
"Ah, I didn't know that." A genuine-looking smile.
Jax relaxed her shoulders.
"They don't teach you history and culture at journalist university?" she asked, returning to her screen.
"They do, but it's rather limited." A pause. "Are you checking me?"
He was smiling.
"I would, if I were you," he added.
"No surprises, then," she said curtly. "I thought in Europe they taught you more history and… other stuff."
"History and other arts and farts?" he asked. "Yes. They do. But not as much as they used to, I'm afraid."
"So many things that people would rather do," she said, more to herself than in response to Rutger's comments.
"Yeah, life's too interesting to waste it on education."
She glanced at him. Was he being sarcastic?
"Education sector in PanAm Confederat
ion is focused on providing the best for as many as possible,” she said, beginning the lesson. “That's why we're teaching people only useful skills. Our resources are limited, and we want all our citizens to have meaningful activities, to contribute, to be…" she paused to swallow. She couldn't even think about this stuff without feeling guilty that her contributions might have not been as genuine as it should have. "To be good citizens. Happy citizens."
"Yeah, yeah. The usual culprit of limited resources," he grumbled.
"I thought you were all about sparing the Earth, preservation and fixing the sins of our ancestors. Rebuilding the planet in its former glory," she fired back.
"We are," he admitted. "But you lot, with your space expansion in search of unlimited supply of stuff… why are you still talking about limited resources? That was back in the time of the pandemics, the water wars, and the political upheaval."
"But it's true, isn't it?" she asked, now at least a little confused.
"It is, but I just hate how this is being used to manipulate people," he replied and paused, looking around. "This is not recording, right?'
Ah, a fellow paranoiac… Jax suppressed the smile creeping onto her lips.
"No, why?"
"Because my political views might not be popular with your government," he said. "Or with my own, too. Actually, all of them, including New China and all the other so-called independents. All modern societies base their politics around the issue of limited resources. Even the Rebels, because building a post-scarcity society means you acknowledge the reality is still scarcity-based. And it is so for a reason. Earth has limited resources, but it's humans who have driven it to the verge of collapse, to the point where we all scramble for the leftovers."
"Hey, don't forget the pandemics, the climate war and the drive to find other ways to preserve our civilization," she added. "People have pulled together so that humans could explore the cosmos. At least on my side of the Atlantic."
"Yeah, right," he cut in. "To plunder further afield, you mean. But I'm not exonerating our politicians, either. We have all been brainwashed to believe that we needed to retreat from our position and focus on our own issues. Let's not forget that the real threats to human existence have been used by privileged groups as an opportunity to grab power. So that we live in permanent fear, prolonged states of emergency, with our freedoms suspended, rules ever-changing, crimes applauded as humanity-saving actions, villains become heroes and the other way round, and all that in the name of a better future, because we deserve it."
