‘Is Swift with you?’
‘Standing near us, polishing his pince-nez, trying not to look offended. At least one of us got what they wanted, anyway – to meet his maker.’
‘There must have been more to it than that.’
‘Some lofty ideas about deepening our understanding of the roles of the machine and the organic – trying to find a strategy for mutual coexistence. Just words, though. Meanwhile, our little jaunt has cost lives and anguish, and we’re no closer to understanding the Watchkeepers any better. Things are worse, in fact. If we hadn’t come here, none of the deaths would have happened.’
‘If there’s blame to apportion, you only get to take a share of it,’ Goma said. ‘None of us is an innocent party.’
‘Except, possibly, you.’
‘You underestimate me. I’d have climbed over a mountain of human bones to find the Tantors.’
‘Even though it was not the meeting you’d hoped for?’
‘It was a start. Ru and I spent our lives charting the fade of the Tantors – the decline of their cognitive signal. We never hoped to encounter a self-sustaining colony of Tantors, let alone the Risen. But yes, things went wrong. Human fucking stupidity. Fear and ignorance. As if the worst thing in the world would be to share it with another intelligence.’
‘People and elephants. People and robots.’
‘Maybe we should just let the elephants and robots live happily ever after,’ Goma said. ‘They seemed happy enough to take Eunice on her own terms.’
‘It can’t be that hopeless,’ Kanu answered, with a mixture of weariness and conviction. ‘I staked my life on brokering a peace between people and the Evolvarium. I’m old and foolish enough to delude myself that there’s still a chance of achieving that. Tell me you haven’t given up on the Risen?’
‘There aren’t many of them left.’
‘I gather there are a few on Orison, and shortly you’ll have a proper chance to know Hector, too. I was an ambassador to the machines, Goma. That was strange enough! Now the Risen will need to send an ambassador to us.’
‘They may need some persuasion. Earth’s not exactly their home.’
‘Mars wasn’t mine, but I found friends there.’
‘How is Hector?’ she asked.
‘No physical issues that we’re aware of. But the loss of Dakota has hit him hard.’
‘I wish I could speak to him now. Are you able to communicate?’
‘Our suits have a link, but it’s clumsy. Would you like me to pass on a message, for whatever good it may do?’
‘Tell him he is valued. Tell him that Ru and I can’t wait to hear what he has to tell us.’
‘I shall. Would you like to speak to Eunice now?’
‘Of course.’
She had been listening in all the while, naturally. ‘Goma. Good of you to remember us.’
‘As if I could forget.’
‘You did well. Kanu is right. Pride in another human being is an odd thing for me to feel – it’s usually frustration, bitterness, anger. You get used to that after a while – start to feel as if it’s the normal state of affairs. But look at you – you’ve made an old woman quietly pleased with you.’
‘That’s not why I did it.’
‘All the more reason to applaud your actions, then. You’ve had a lot to live up to, Goma, but you haven’t disappointed us.’
‘Us?’
‘Your illustrious ancestors. If I can’t speak for them, who can?’
‘I suppose you’re right.’
‘Not always. But on this occasion, yes. Very much so. Nissa is stable, you say?’
She would have gladly told Eunice how she truly felt about Nissa’s chances, but not while Kanu was still part of the conversation. ‘Mona’s doing her best.’
‘Yes. A distinct improvement on your last doctor, I must say. I much prefer her bedside manner.’
When the call from Goma was done, Swift was still there, leaning casually against the back wall of the shelf. He was the only one of them not dressed in a spacesuit, his stockinged legs crossed over each other, his pince-nez perched on the tip of his nose, and he was peering at Kanu with a certain provisional interest, as if he were a new species of sea creature discovered during some nautical expedition.
‘You really think my use for you is so shallow?’ Swift arched an eyebrow, inviting an answer.
Kanu answered subvocally, sparing his companions this exchange. ‘When the moment came, you couldn’t wait to show your true colours. You sided with that other machine – took events into your own hands.’
‘Only because I had the best interests of a friend in mind, Kanu. Need I labour the point?’
‘I’m sure you will.’
‘When you attempted to kill yourself on Icebreaker, I intervened. I did so because our twin fates were intertwined – if you died, so would I. But I also did so because you are my friend, and I believed that the situation was not quite as hopeless as you perceived it to be. I had, after all, already installed my image inside Icebreaker by then. I knew there was a faint chance of intervention, albeit under circumstances I had yet to foresee. But I also made a mistake. I denied you the free will I had always promised would be yours. And when you made me promise that I would not take similar action again, I held to that vow. Scrupulously. Even when it cut against every sensible instinct in my head. I mean, your head.’
‘That’s not funny, Swift.’
‘It’s not meant to be. My point is, I did not stop you entering Poseidon. We had the opportunity to turn around and only the lives of the Risen complicated that picture. To me they were a distraction, a nuisance. Statistical noise, interfering with my – what did you call them? Lofty ideas?’
‘The Risen are living beings. People.’
‘I came here to know the minds of machines, not mammals.’
‘You still had an incentive for carrying on. That was your opportunity to experience the Terror, to touch the M-builders’ minds. There was always something in it for you.’
‘Along with an excellent chance of dying. I would much sooner have abandoned the expedition, cooperated with Goma and organised an expedition under our own terms, rather than those of the Risen or the Watchkeepers. That point is moot, though. Did I break my vow?’
‘No,’ Kanu admitted, with a certain sullenness.
‘When everything was at stake, when my oldest human friend was about to throw himself into the fire for the sake of some elephants? Did I so much as tip the scales of his free will?’
‘No,’ Kanu said again.
‘Louder. I need to hear it.’
‘No. You didn’t. You kept your vow.’
‘Well, then,’ Swift said. ‘With that unpleasantness behind us, let us discuss the base cause of your present malaise.’
‘My malaise?’
‘I speak not of your present mental disequilibrium, occasioned as it is by the uncertainty surrounding Nissa’s condition. That is to be expected, and like you I hope fervently that she will come through this ordeal unscathed. My concern is a larger one – that the Terror has driven a gaping wound into your psyche, one that time and tide may struggle to repair.’
‘You were in my head when we felt the Terror, Swift. You got a dose of that as well. Don’t tell me otherwise.’
‘Yes, and the experience was every bit as bracing as I anticipated. A cold, hard blast of reality.’ Swift bounded to the edge of the groove with a chilling indifference to the drop beyond his toes. ‘What could be colder than being made to feel the utter futility of existence? To know that not only is there no meaning to anything, but there never can be? That life itself is completely devoid of purpose? That nothing will be remembered? That despite our grandest efforts, our boldest endeavours, nothing can or will ever be preserved? That the kindest acts are doomed to be forgotten, along wit
h the cruellest? All loves, all hates erased from the record? Yes, what could be worse than that?’
‘You tell me.’
‘Nothing. Nothing at all in the whole of creation. And if death troubles me – which, I am pleased to say, it most certainly does – then the idea of not even being remembered, not even leaving the tiniest quantum ripple in the wake of the coming vacuum fluctuation . . . well, that is a great deal more than troubling. We live by our deeds, whether we are machines or people or elephants. And if our deeds are meaningless and forgotten, what does that make us?’
‘Nothing,’ Kanu answered, fiercely enough that he spoke the word aloud. ‘Pointless interactions between matter and energy, doomed to be erased. That’s the message, Swift. That there’s no meaning. That we don’t matter.’
‘No,’ Swift answered, with corresponding force. ‘We do matter. This truth does not rob us of meaning – it gives it back to us. It liberates us from the burden of posterity, from the burden of deluding ourselves that our acts have some chance of outlasting eternity. If we are kind to each other now, it’s not because we’re hoping to be remembered well, to be lauded in some great accounting of things. It’s not because we want to be rewarded for our behaviour, or to be admired for the wonderful things we did during our brief span of existence. Exactly the opposite! Now that we know there is no chance of that, our deeds have no higher meaning than the context of the moment in which they occur. One decent deed, one kind gesture, enacted without thought of recompense or remembrance, performed in the full and certain knowledge that it will be forgotten, that it cannot be otherwise – that single deed refutes the entire message of the M-builders. They were wrong! There is no Terror, only enlightenment! Only liberation! And we will continue to refute their message with every gracious act, every decent thought, every human kindness – until the moment the vacuum rips.’
‘Just a fancy speech, Swift. That’s all it is.’
‘More than a speech, Kanu. A viable moral strategy for negating the M-builders’ nihilism. It’s a choice. A question of free will. Do you choose it, or reject it?’
‘You’re a machine,’ he said. ‘How could you ever understand?’
‘I was a machine,’ Swift answered. ‘Once. But then I spent too long in the company of the living.’
‘Over here,’ Eunice said sharply.
Kanu turned. He had been so wrapped up in his conversation with Swift that he failed to notice Ru was no longer standing. She had slumped over at the back of the ledge and was lying akwardly on her side. It was not the posture of someone who had sat down carefully with the intention of closing their eyes or conserving energy. He saw in the same glance that none of her suit’s status indications were glowing.
Eunice was quickly at her side, easing her into a more natural position with her back braced against the rear of the ledge, her legs stretched out before her.
‘What is it?’ Kanu asked.
‘I don’t think it’s the concussion – she was lucid enough when Goma called. That bump she took coming down here must have done more harm to her suit than we realised. There’s been a sudden systems failure.’
‘She said nothing.’
‘Then she couldn’t have got much warning. Wait a second.’ Eunice was repeating the exercise she had already performed on Nissa, flipping open hatches in the chest pack, squinting through her own faceplate with steely concentration, not wanting to miss a detail.
‘We still have oxygen and power,’ Kanu said.
‘That won’t help her. There’s a system failure deep in the pack, maybe a secondary leak here as well. It must have opened up as the ambient pressure reduced. She’s in trouble, Kanu. Plugging in more air and power won’t help – the fault’s too extensive. Did you see her go down?’
‘No.’
‘I saw her a few minutes ago and she was still standing so she hasn’t been down long. If we can restore air and heat, she’ll have at least as good a chance as Nissa.’
‘You just said we can’t do that.’
‘Not with the supplementary supplies.’ Eunice paused, turned from the slumped form. ‘There’s an easier way. It’ll give her a fully functioning life-support system for the rest of the trip.’
‘I don’t follow.’
‘She takes my chest pack. Watch what I’m doing very carefully – you’ll need to reverse these steps precisely when you reconnect my pack in place of hers.’
For a moment he did not quite grasp what she was proposing. The words, yes. The implication, no. But then the truth of it dawned with a sort of sick clarity. ‘No, Eunice,’ he said, dizzied. ‘This isn’t how it’s going to happen. My suit—’
‘Isn’t the same design as hers. Mine, piece of antiquated shit that it is, matches perfectly. Your chest pack won’t mate with her coupling systems; mine will. Watch.’ She ran her fingers around the edge of the pack, where the power and pressure valves connected with the rest of the suit. ‘Primary and secondary shut-offs. These have to be tight or the air inside her will vent the instant I remove the pack. Are you following?’
‘No. Stop. We need to think this through.’
‘Believe me, Kanu – the one thing you don’t do in emergencies is think things through. Thinking things through gets you a headstone and a nice epitaph. She thought things through. See how that worked out for her. Now watch!’
He reached out, tried to prise her hands away from the chest pack. ‘No. Not a life for a life.’
‘You think Ru deserves to die?’
‘None of us deserves to die! Not her, not you!’
‘Because I’m an Akinya?’
‘Because I will not let you give up your life for hers! For all we know she’s already beyond any hope of recovery!’
‘And Nissa wasn’t? We gave her a chance, Kanu – why not Ru?’
‘Nobody had to die for Nissa to get her chance.’
‘Ru wouldn’t be in this mess if she hadn’t come down for you.’ With a force that surprised him – far beyond what this small, bony woman looked capable of – Eunice reasserted her grip on the chest pack’s connectors. ‘I know you don’t want to see a death, Kanu. I know you’re not valuing my life over hers. You’re a good man and I understand your reluctance. But I won’t sit back and do nothing. You’re going to help me.’
‘I can’t.’
‘You will. Swift? Make him. Do this one thing for me. And listen.’
He tried to struggle with her again even as part of him surrendered to the logic of her sacrifice, while another part accepted that she would always find a way to be stronger if the moment depended on it. But then his own strength was gone. Kanu felt himself slump back, as if every muscle in his body had been given an immediate and binding command to relax.
He stared at the figure who stood watching proceedings, hands behind his back, expression observant but concerned.
‘Swift!’
‘I have no choice, Kanu. She made me what I am. I can hardly refuse a simple request from my maker.’
After that, he could only bear witness.
‘The connections are sealed,’ Eunice said. ‘I’m removing the pack now.’ She eased the buckled device from Ru’s chest, exposing the gold- and-chrome-coated interfaces and plugs where it had coupled with her suit. ‘Now mine. This is the awkward part – they don’t generally assume you’ll be doing this while still inside the suit.’
‘There’s a reason for that,’ said Kanu. He could not interfere, but he could still talk.
‘Yes.’ But there was a sadness in her answer, not the dismissiveness Kanu might have expected. ‘I don’t know how long I’ll have. It’ll depend on the tightness of the seals. If I can maintain consciousness and dexterity, I’ll do my best to reconnect the pack to Ru, but you’ll need to do it if I can’t – is that clear?’
‘You’re asking the impossible of us.’
‘No, I’m asking you to save a life. Mine will already be over, bar the shouting. This isn’t a moral conundrum. I’m sparing you that.’
‘Damn you. And damn you, Swift, for playing along.’
Kanu was still unable to do more than talk and observe, his own body refusing to respond to motor commands.
‘Don’t blame him for his loyalty,’ Eunice said. ‘Two kinds of machine are conspiring to save a human life.’
‘You’re not a machine now.’
‘No – but let’s face it, I’m not one of you either. And as for our mutual friend Swift – he’s a taxonomic headache all of his own. What a pretty pair we make, eh? Oh.’ She was suddenly silent. ‘This is trickier than I expected. I can’t get my fingers around these shut-offs, but the pack won’t release unless they’re closed.’
‘No. I know what you’re going to ask, and no.’
‘You’re wrong. I don’t even have to ask. Swift – help me with these fastenings.’
‘Don’t do it,’ Kanu said.
Swift walked over to the two Akinyas and Ru’s seated form. ‘I must, Kanu. Or rather, we must. Don’t you see? I came to meet Eunice, to know the mind of she who gave life and form to the Evolvarium. Her request is a simple one and it would be quite wrong of me to refuse.’
Swift’s image fused itself with Kanu, and Kanu found himself moving. With deliberation and calm and an absolute absence of volition, his hands reached out to address the complicated, foolproof fastenings of Eunice’s chest pack. He tried to resist – tried to generate the nerve signals that would override these motor instructions now being controlled by Swift, but the effort was useless. His fingers found the shut-offs that Eunice had not been able to reach.
‘Do not fight it, Kanu,’ Eunice said, not unkindly. ‘You are blameless in this.’
‘Tell him to stop!’
‘And do not blame Swift, either. Swift is only doing that which he knows to be right.’
Cold grey gas vented out from her chest pack. Kanu’s hands finished their work with the shut-off valves and grasped the pack on either side. Slowly he eased it away from Eunice’s suit, revealing a corresponding arrangement of interfaces.
Poseidon's Wake Page 69
