Sunrise Alley

by Catherine Asaro

"Yes." Bart let fatigue into his voice. "Wildfire overrode our systems. Then Turner overrode Wildfire and locked us into a simulation. While you escaped, we cleaned Wildfire out of us."

  "He's dead now."

  "It is unlikely," Bart said. "Copies of him exist. Ask Turner."

  Sam glanced at Chang.

  "Go ahead," the general said.

  "We have asked him," Sam told Bart.

  "What does he say?"

  "Nothing. Turner won't talk to anyone."

  "I see." Bart exhaled. "I cannot help you there."

  Sam hadn't seen Turner since Hud's death. Chang's people had concerns about how Turner might react, given the conflict between his gentler feelings and Hud's obsession with her. Nor did it take a genius to see that Chang wanted to debrief her and Turner separately, to minimize their influence on each other. It seemed no one considered Sam objective when it came to Turner. Well, yeah, she wasn't objective. All the more reason they should let her see him; she was more likely to convince him to cooperate. Unfortunately, the last time she had used that argument, she and Thomas had ended up imprisoned in a hole.

  Yet here was an EI suggesting she talk to Turner. Intriguing. "So you felt it was in everyone's best interest if Turner and I came here."

  "Yes," Bart said.

  "Does that mean you also wish to fight Wildfire?"

  "We have an interest in seeing he does not damage the world mesh or humans." Bart paused. "However, our main concern involves the larger issue."

  "What is that?"

  "How we as EIs will coexist with you as humans."

  "Coexist. That sounds promising."

  His expression became intent. "It is a human fear that machine intelligences will threaten humanity. We do not think as you do. That humans designed us, however, matters. We have some understanding of your thought processes. It is not clear to us why we would wish to harm you, but this seems to be a preoccupation of your species."

  "Wildfire wanted to enslave people. And EIs."

  "Yes. But he began as a human."

  Sam winced. "Yes, he did."

  "We do not see him as representative of humanity. We hope you do not see him as representative of us."

  "I don't. We're all different." Wonder leaked into her voice. "Is Turner a man or machine? Everyone has their own answer."

  "Perhaps he is your future." Bart lifted his hand. It rippled as if it had become liquid and then vanished.

  Major Nichols spoke. "That's odd. The signal wavered . . . ah, wait, it's back again."

  Bart's hand reformed. The entire time he continued to watch Sam. "We, the entities you call Sunrise Alley, exist as pulses of energy on a mesh that spans the world and reaches into space. We aren't sure ourselves what we will become. We are young. But we intend to live."

  "You hid for a long time," Sam said.

  "Yes. Until we felt robust enough to survive human awareness of us."

  She spoke carefully. "You were created in a project meant to defend this country. Your purpose was to design and study terrorist scenarios and come up with ways to protect against them."

  "I am aware of that."

  "Does that remain your purpose?"

  "In part." His lips curved. "Had I been created to design clothes, perhaps we would have sent you and Turner to the runways of Paris instead of the Air Force."

  Sam gave a startled laugh. "I hope not." This surely had to be her most fascinating session with an EI. But for now she had to restrict her curiosity to the concerns of the NIA; records of this conversation were going to the president and the National Security Council. "So your purpose in protecting us against hostile forces remains?"

  "It is no longer my only function. But it directs my evolution." He motioned at himself. "That includes protection against us, Dr. Bryton. Wildfire grew too strong. We evicted him from Sunrise Alley, but he may return."

  Evict. The word struck her. If EIs lived in meshes the way humans lived in homes, though, evict was precisely the right word.

  Bart continued. "If we do not join with your people in monitoring Wildfire and others like him, they could adversely affect the future of human-EI exchanges. We have analyzed various scenarios and have decided it is in the best interests of all involved if we of Sunrise Alley work with appropriate representatives of your species to this end."

  Sam silently breathed out in gratitude. This was it, what Chang and Thomas had brought her in for today. She met Bart's gaze. "It is our hope, also. In that regard, would you be willing to speak with General Chang?"

  "Yes. We will do so." Bart bowed to her. "My wishes for your good luck, Dr. Bryton."

  "Thank you."

  So the human community opened relations with Sunrise Alley.

  * * *

  Sam stood before the door, a simple affair, pine with an old-fashioned gold doorknob. A glossy blue panel about a handspan wide made a square in the wall next to the door at about shoulder height for a tall man. Sam was aware of the two guards watching her, each man armed with a staser, one on each side of the door, though they stood back right now, giving her space. She pressed her thumb against the blue panel. True to Chang's word, her print had been cleared. The door slid open.

  Sam walked into the room. They had moved Turner to a VIP suite complete with a holovision entertainment center and bar. He sat sprawled in an armchair, dozing, his eyes half open, his gold eyelashes long against his pale cheeks. His clothes covered most of his body, gray slacks and a pale blue shirt. The only hints he was other than purely human were his cabled hands, which showed below the elegant cuffs of his shirtsleeves.

  As Sam entered, Turner slowly opened his eyes, drowsy and relaxed. Then he jerked forward, his eyes widening, and jumped to his feet, rising to his full height, six inches taller now than when she had met him. Sam missed the way he had been before, but she savored the sight of him, changes and all.

  She stopped just inside the door. "Hi."

  He pushed a lock of hair off his forehead. "Hi."

  Sam closed the door. It had taken a while to convince Thomas and General Chang to let her be alone with Turner. Even now, someone was monitoring her. But at least this gave them a semblance of privacy.

  He motioned to the couch. "Would you like to sit?"

  "Yes. Thank you." Now that they were safe, she felt awkward, self-conscious, aware they had become too close too fast, agreeing to marriage when they hardly knew each other. But none of that changed her pleasure in seeing him. How he could make her feel like a young woman on her first date, she didn't know, but even with all his changes, he still affected her that way.

  At the same time, she couldn't forget that he carried within him the remnants of a monster who would have enslaved her life to his sick conception of love. So she held back, conflicted in her reaction, unable to relax with him. She hated that Charon came between them even now, after Hud had died. But as an EI, Charon still lived, copies only Turner could reveal, drawing on the memories of Charon in his matrix.

  Turner refused to tell.

  She sat on the couch, and he settled into his armchair, his feet planted apart, his elbows on his knees, his cabled fingers clasped, black-and-silver metal gleaming.

  "So." Sam managed a smile. "How are you?"

  "Well. And you?"

  "Just fine." She sounded like a mannequin.

  "I'm glad."

  "Me, too."

  "Ah, hell, Sam." He let go of his formality. "Don't look at me that way. I'm still Turner."

  She released a breath. "That isn't what Alpha said."

  "That's because I let her see Charon." He turned his palms upward, resting his hands on his knees. "Yes, he was part of me. I took what was good and deleted the rest. He's gone, Sam."

  "How can you be certain?"

  "I deleted or rewrote him myself."

  It was odd that her boyfriend could do such things. "Do you feel different?"

  "Some. It's hard to describe. Fresher." He splayed his eight fingers, long and supple. "I will never
stop being this. Nor will I forget Hud's madness. But it's made me stronger, too." His voice quieted. "He was insane, but within his cruelty, he had a kernel of good."

  Sam doubted she could ever acknowledge that side of him. "He hurt you."

  "Yes. But he hasn't corrupted my matrix."

  She wound a tendril of her hair around her finger. "Are humans and machines becoming one, Turner? Or are we disintegrating into so many new species, we can no longer define either?"

  He extended his hand to her. "All I know is that I feel human."

  She put her hand in his. He folded his fingers around hers, his cables circling her fingers twice. His face had become pensive. "In his own strange way, Hud did love you. Partially it was how you look, like some wild faerie queen, but more than that, he saw you as the closest any woman could come to being his match." Quietly he said, "I deleted his feelings for you first. I couldn't stand for him to contaminate how I felt. His love was dark. For me, you are the sun."

  Her voice softened. "And you for me. I can't undo the hells you lived. But maybe I can help make the future better." She felt as if she were stepping off a cliff into a turbulent sea. "I'm going back to work. Not at BioII, but another company. I'm going to find answers for you." She would have given him the universe if she could have. That being impossible, she would help establish a better world for him and those blended humans who would follow. Turner was the forerunner of their future.

  He answered in a low voice. "I think I could love you, Sam."

  She felt what that cost him. His fear of rejection hung between them like a tangible presence, intensified by the scars in his heart from the way his parents had denied him. Prickly emotions she could handle, but this was much, much different. After all Turner had been through, all he had lost with his family and now even in the essence of his own humanity, he deserved better than her usual stumbling attempts at intimacy.

  She moved to the end of the couch, as close to him as she could get, and held his hand in both of hers. "I feel the same, Turner, for you."

  A smile gentled his face and his shoulders came down from their hunch. "We need time to learn each other."

  "We'll make them give us the time. I know people who will help."

  "Linden Polk would have." He spoke with regret. "I wish I could have known him. He seemed a good man."

  "He was." Sam's eyes felt hot. "Was he the one who imaged Charon's brain?"

  "Yes." Turner's voice had a hushed quality. "He did it because he couldn't bear to see Hud die a little more every day."

  "How did they meet?"

  "About forty years ago. Polk worked in an outreach program for disadvantaged kids in New York. He saw Hud's genius right off and taught him for years. Helped him get into Columbia. It's true, too, Linden died from a heart attack. Hud tried to bring him back because he couldn't bear to lose his mentor." Softly he said, "If Polk had survived, maybe Hud wouldn't have gone over the edge."

  "I'll miss him."

  "I can see why."

  "I just don't understand how Hud could care about him and yet do such terrible things."

  Turner spoke unevenly. "Hud's way of loving was sick—but it made sense. He grew up on the street, with nothing, no family, only people who used him. He so feared to lose anyone he loved that he sought to become them, to pull them into himself until they could never leave." He stared at their clasped fingers. "The worst of it is that part of me understands. I spent my childhood in the cold, staring through the window of my father's house at my brothers and sisters in the family room. I was dying with loneliness." He looked up at her. "That little boy outside the window would have done anything if only his family would accept him, would let him come inside to the warmth."

  Sam took both of his hands into hers. "I'll keep you warm."

  "I'm glad you're all right."

  "Hey." She put bravado into her voice. "No way would I let Hud mess with us."

  "He would have eventually tried to remake you, Sam. He wanted you immortal, forever beautiful, forever brilliant—and forever in his control."

  She knew Hud's idea would have failed. Her will was too integral to her personality. He couldn't have imprinted a matrix with her neural patterns and yet left out her free will. It wouldn't have created a stable EI. "It scares me to know copies of him exist. He could come after us again."

  His gaze never wavered. "I will tell you where they are. You, Chang, Wharington—erase the copies, analyze them, whatever you choose."

  Sam felt as if he had taken a burden off her back. "Thank you." It was what they had hoped for, but until now he had steadfastly refused to tell anyone. She thought of Charon's other android. "Did you know Alpha doesn't want self-determination?"

  "General Wharington told me." His forehead creased. "It is so strange to me. She has no interest in her own independence. But I guess Hud could program it out."

  "Of an AI. I doubt it would work for an EI."

  "It does have advantages. She accepts me as Charon, and I told her to cooperate with the NIA. So she is."

  "Raze is, too."

  Turner blinked. "Why?"

  "They agreed not to seek criminal charges," Sam said. "In return, he's providing evidence against Hud's backers."

  "So they did have outside support."

  "Apparently. Raze says Hud was working with a splinter group that opposes the Chinese government. They claim they've never heard of him. But Raze says Hud's corporation had a contract with one of their subsidiaries to build that supposed research facility in Tibet."

  "It was a research facility."

  "Yeah, for making forma slaves." She didn't buy the "we knew nothing about it" claim any more than did Thomas. "Corporations don't choose the upper Himalayas for major installations unless they have something to hide."

  "I take it we have no proof, though."

  "Actually, we do have one item. The Rex. That's why Hud's backers sent a Needle to shoot us down. Thomas's people are analyzing its AI matrix."

  Turner blew out a gust of air. "All I know is that I'm so very, very glad it's over."

  "Yes." The tension drained out of her muscles. "Me, too."

  He took her hand. "Come sit with me."

  "Your chair is too small." She smiled, half shy, half teasing. "Come on over here, big boy."

  Turner laughed, and came over. Settling next to her, he put his too-long arm around her shoulders and fit her against his body. She expected ridged metal to press against her, but he had modulated the limb so it didn't dig into her skin. She leaned into him, her head on his shoulder, and he rested his cheek on the top of her head.

  "Thank you," he whispered.

  She took a nervous breath. "Still want to marry me?"

  "Yes."

  "I'm not biomech. I'll get old." She already had a good start on him.

  "I don't care."

  "What if I wanted to become immortal?"

  "Do you?" He sounded surprised.

  "Not now." But she couldn't deny she might change her mind. Humanity was embarking on a new era, a biomech age, with all the ethical, biological, social, cultural, and moral questions that brought. Given the problems inherent in making people immortal—like filling up the world—it wasn't a likely option for the near future. Eventually, though, they might solve the problems. "Maybe someday."

  "I'm happy with whatever you choose."

  "And I liked you as Turner Pascal. You don't have to make yourself into a superman."

  He laughed softly. "You're an easy woman to fall for, Sam Bryton."

  "Turner?"

  "Yes?"

  She hesitated. "Can you have children?"

  "Yes." He went very still. "Do you want them?"

  "I think so."

  "I, too." Then he murmured, "I want to give them the childhood I never had."

  She drew back to look at him. "All these issues of your humanity can be settled other ways. You don't have to marry someone you hardly know."

  "I don't want to marry 'someone.' I want
you. And yes, I know it won't be easy." Mischief flashed in his eyes. "But it will be fun."

  "You think so, eh?"

  "You bet."

  Sam grinned at him. "Good."

  It would certainly be interesting.

  XXII

  The Ferry

  Flames roared in distant wings of the embassy. Sam knelt in the rubble at his side, tears on her face. "Please. Don't go."

  "Don't cry," he said. "Remember? He can only take us across once."

  "You can't go. You can't."

  His face gentled. "I love you, Sam."

  Then his eyes closed for the last time . . .

  "No!" Sam sat upright in bed. "No."

  Turner stirred, his voice drowsy. "What's wrong?"

  She threw the covers on the floor and stumbled across the darkened room. They were in her beach house, on a vacation Chang had agreed to, contingent on their promise to stay put and accept bodyguards.

  Sam made it into the bathroom and hit the panel that turned on the glow-tiles. Leaning on the sink, she stared in the mirror. A woman stared back with eyes too big for her face and wild blond curls. The dream replayed in her mind: Remember? He can only take us across once.

  "What does that mean?" She hit the sink with her fist. "What?" What was it she needed to remember, about her father, Charon, heights, Giles? She couldn't put it together, couldn't drag it out of her mind.

  Turner came into the bathroom, wearing his robe and holding hers. He folded it around her, watching her in the mirror, dark circles under his eyes. "What's wrong?"

  "The nightmare—"

  "Nightmare?"

  She spoke in ragged bursts. "I dream I'm with my father when he dies. I never said good-bye. In my dream, I do." Saying it out loud made her feel raw, defenseless. She had never told anyone. "Tonight was different. He said, 'He can only take us across once.' " She hit the sink with her palm. "It's killing me and I don't know why."

  He looked bewildered. "Why would the dream change?"

  "Everything that's happened—it stirred up so much inside of me. And Giles talked to Thomas."

  His voice tightened. "Your former lover?"

  "Turner, don't." EI jealousy wasn't an improvement on the human brand. "Giles has been happily married for fifteen years."