Travels of the Orphan (The Space Orphan Book 3)

by Laer Carroll

  She spent the next several days making up a performance list and practicing some of them or parts of them which were especially hard.

  Meanwhile she was exploring the added capabilities of her OmniSonar. One feature she found especially amazing: the machine's library of musical scores. There were billions of them, seemingly every single musical piece ever composed.

  The Confederation's invisible spybots had obviously been very busy in the century since Earth was discovered by its automated explorer. The spybots had also been very numerous, practically blanketing the entire planet. This pervasive surveillance made Jane a bit uneasy.

  She confessed as much to Susuki while chatting with her in a virtual room, virtual because her friend was on one of the moons of the planet.

  "I'm also amazed at how much all the information must take up. Many terabytes. And that's just of musical scores which are quite compact."

  "I know. It even astounds me sometimes how much information has been collected about any one planet."

  <>

  Finally the day came for her performance. She dressed in a sky blue evening gown with a silken shimmer, took up her OmniSonar, and went down to the back stage of the performance hall. At what would have been 8:00 pm on Earth she seated herself on a bench on the stage and positioned her OmniSonar on the small performance table positioned so that she faced the audience. She signaled Hotel to open the curtain. It began to slowly do so.

  The lighting on the audience dimmed but did not quit dim to blackness. The lighting on Jane grew, mostly a spotlight that gave shadows to her face and body. As the curtain drew back to each side she launched into a salsa piece.

  At first only one instrument could be heard, a pair of invisible bongo drums, one with a lower bass tone, the other with a higher treble tone. At first the rhythm was BOOM biddy-biddy BOOM. Then it changed to BOOM BOOM biddy BOOM. After a couple of seconds it changed back to the first rhythm, then a few seconds later the second rhythm. On and on the two rhythms alternated.

  Slowly in front of Jane there ghosted into seeming solidity a pair of waist-high bongo drums like large brown vases. Then a third ghost appeared, behind the drum set: a brown-skinned Latino wearing blue jeans and an armless red tee-shirt. His two arms and hands played the bongos.

  Now the sound of another instrument added itself to the drums: a scratchy sound. Scritchy-scritchy scritchy-scritchy, on and on. The player manifested: a Latino in short loose khaki pants topped by a white open-throated shirt bearing a pair of maracas filled with small pebbles.

  A third instrument spoke up: a saxophone. It sounded almost like a female voice singing Hey-oh, pause, Hey-oh, pause, Hey-oh, Hey-oh, Hey-oh pause. The saxophone which appeared was gleaming golden and two or three feet long and the player wore a white suit and white shirt and white flat-brimmed hat.

  Next came guitars, three of them, each with a different sound, a double-bass violin as tall as the man playing it, and a piano.

  By now the spotlight on Jane had faded to black and the lights on the eight players grown so that they stood bright and colorful. They played with much energy and smiles.

  Invisible behind the holograms Jane herself played, without the smiles but with just much energy, bent over the keyboard, her hands flashing across the surface of the OmniSonar, starting stopping and playing sections of the musical scores, absorbed in the music, BEING the music.

  The five-minute piece finished and she sat back temporarily. The ghosts in front of her disappeared. The hall filled with applause.

  Jane bobbed her head in brief acknowledgement, then raised both hands high over the keyboard. The hands paused as she bent her face toward the controls, then flashed down to begin another piece. The applause cut short as over two hundred augmented humans instantly reacted.

  Jane played a dozen different styles of salsa. These included the international version called salsa picante, or "very hot sauce," a very recent incarnation of the continuously evolving musical style salsa. They also included older forms: Colombia's cumbia, the Dominican Republic's bachata, Cuban son, and more.

  She ended the series with a favorite of hers, a fifty-year old piece by Mexican rock-fusion band Caifanes titled "La negra Tomasa." Very melodic to Jane's ears, it was more romantic ballad than salsa. A key part of the piece was a plaintive almost human-sounding electronic voice saying in near-words how much the singer missed his love, a black girl named Tomasa.

  The piece ended abruptly on a single guitar chord.

  The ghosts vanished to reveal Jane bent over her keyboard, her face hidden by her blond hair.

  The applause rose and rose and rose, bringing Jane to her feet. She bowed her head, then stood more upright, then bowed again. She remained bent over for long moments, then stood upright, raised her arms and hands high above her head, then brought them sharply down.

  All lights cut out--for instants. Then faint ghosts appeared on the stage where the salsa bands had stood. They brightened into seeming solidity.

  The middle of the four figures was a seated man in a black suit and white shirt decorated with a black tie. He was older with very curly white hair. Resting on one thigh was an accordion played with buttons instead of piano-like keys. His leg and the bandoneon rose and fell an inch or two as he kept time to the march-like music.

  On each side stood figures also in black and white suits, a young woman and young man, swaying as they played violins. The right-most of two other book-ending figures was a seated man playing a tall double bass violin. The left-most was a woman seated in front of a piano placed facing the bandoneonist so that she could only been seen by the audience from the side. She was like Jane a blond wearing a blue dress but with curly hair that ran far down her back and front.

  They launched into playing one of the oldest and most famous Argentine tango pieces: "La Cumparsita." After a minute a dim space between them and nearest row of the audience filled with couples dancing. Men and woman huddled close in an embrace, moving at a walking pace but turning in circles around their partners. The whole group moved like a carousel slowly turning counter-clockwise.

  Next came another of the tango pieces which many people back on Earth would recognize: "A Media Luz." Then several more, all from the Golden Age of Argentine tango when it was universally listened to and danced to, sometimes on dance floors the size of city blocks.

  Next she played an Astor Piazzola piece, the angry and propulsive and sad "Adios Nonino" which he'd written upon his father's death. The dancer carrousel whirled and vanished away as if whisked into nothing by a tornado.

  Lastly she played three nuevo-tango pieces. One was of a popular rock piece but with traditional tango rhythms and instruments. The other two used synthesized electronic music but still included the four traditional Argentine tango instruments.

  During those pieces she showed herself dancing the tango. These had been taken by Hotel from videos included in her video library and realized by the super intelligence to recreate the events where she'd done them.

  The first dance was a simple dance with Phil done no differently than the dances she'd shown earlier, with the simple dance moves on a crowded dance floor of any social dance. But in the last two she and her partner were alone on a stage. The moves were dramatic and acrobatic.

  Back on Earth she'd become the equal of any professional dancer, so she was able to perform with pro partners. The last of the two performances ended with her being lofted above the male dancer and dropped till she ended up with her forehead an inch from the floor.

  An instant after that she quit playing and all lights went totally black.

  Applause began. As it spread and became louder she brought the lights back up, revealing the raised stage empty of everything except her and her OmniSonar.

  About to play a favorite piece of classical music a thought struck her. A mischievous smile grew on her face. She merged with Robot.

  The cyborg JANE went subjectively 1000 times normal time. SHE composed an orchestral version of the Dr.
Who theme song, then dropped back to her biological self.

  Still smiling mischievously she triggered the first sequence of the theme, a bass line: da-da-dumm da-da-dumm da-da-dumm over and over. Out of the darkness came the source of the sound: two enormous brass kettle drums played by a muscular man wielding drum sticks.

  Violins quietly grew to sweeten the pounding, first as sound then as a dozen violinists seated in an arc behind the drums, violins small, medium, and large. Quickly they came to equal the drums, then to completely take over the relentless rhythm.

  For a bit the two rhythm sections competed, first one, then the other, then one again. Sometimes both sections would shout, then both near-whisper.

  Suddenly a wailing chorus of horns over-rode the driving rhythm. The lights revealed them, a dozen strong, of several kinds of brassy instruments. They seem to say I AM HERE over and over.

  This energized the two rhythm sections. For moments they sought to overpower the higher pitched chorus, then gave up to resume their place as backing.

  A moment later the horns were drowned out by a chorus of human voices wordlessly saying the same thing I AM HERE I AM HERE.

  Then the horns resurged, overriding the chorus, now saying other messages, speaking of strange adventures in strange lands. As they did so a final bank of lights revealed the human chorus in an arc behind everything else. A hundred strong they wore black robes so that only their throats and hands holding white scores could be seen.

  For a time horns and the chorus alternated, both speaking of mysterious events, faraway places, strange peoples and creatures.

  Then the two lyric instruments rose in great shouts, competing for attention.

  Then suddenly they peaked--and everything ceased. Gone.

  In their place was Jane. Seated. Golden head bowed. Done.

  Silence. Then the applause began. And rose. And rose.

  Every light went out. When they came on they shone only on the audience. Jane was gone.

  <>

  The applause went on for a little while but slowly then quickly died away when it became clear Jane would not return. Another clue to that fact was that the hall began to transform itself into a reception area with seating only around the edges. Tables of refreshments appeared.

  The crowd began to mingle and chat and drink and snack. After a while the word circulated that, exhausted, Jane would not return.

  This did not halt the festivities. Immortals were very good at partying.

  <>

  At the beginning of Jane's fourth week on the Confederation planet she received a video phone call from Lola. The background for the hologram was the same office Jane had seen weeks before, but the grey sea outside the big picture window was under a blue sky.

  "The Zone Guardian has returned and wants to speak to you. Could you come here three days from now? In mid-morning?"

  "I can. How do I get there?"

  "We'll send an aircar to transport you to and from the meeting." She named a time, about 10:00 in the morning Earth time.

  On that day Jane went down to the dining balcony level which served also as a flight stage a few minutes before the appointed time. Within minutes a round golden ball about twenty feet around arrived and nudged up against the flight stage, a tall door opening in its nearest side.

  Jane entered to find a half-dozen seats arranged in hexagonal pattern in the center of the vehicle. She chose one and from Robot's senses could tell that the aircar backed off a few feet then took off straight up. It sped spaceward faster and faster.

  A hologram in the center of the hexagon showed its path into the stratosphere. There its path curved westward and increased to several thousand miles per hour.

  Soon it approached a mountainous island several dozen miles around. Nestled in green valleys in the center of the island were large grey buildings. The ball dove toward one. At the last minute a hole opened in the top of one building and the vehicle settled gently into a hangar shared by twenty or thirty other golden balls.

  When she exited Jane found her way blocked a dozen feet away by a tall woman with curly red hair, her pale skin sprinkled with faint gold freckles. She wore a green form-fitting pants suit with showed an athletic form with wide shoulders and hips.

  "Hello, General Kuznetsov. I am Beth, the Guardian for the local zone. Welcome to Guardian's Citadel. Pardon me for not following your custom of shaking hands. Our protective augmentations might take a touch as a threat and engage in a duel which would do no one any good."

  The woman was smiling and seemed totally relaxed.

  She was also speaking English with the same American accent that Jane used.

  Jane supposed she should not feel surprise, though she did. The Confederation had been spying on Earth for over a century. By now they should have a linguistic library for just about every Earthly language. And with linguistic augmentation of her intelligence the Guardian could be perfectly fluent in English.

  "Thank you."

  "Why don't you accompany me to my office?"

  "Of course."

  Jane came close enough to fall into step with the woman as she turned and began to walk toward a tall double door with an arched top into the interior of the building.

  The woman said, "I've been refreshing my memory of what's happened on your planet in the past few decades. The reports make interesting viewing. I was impressed with your part in it."

  Near the end of the hall into which they'd entered was a gravity shaft. They took it up then in a curved path that led further into the building. A final short up distance the gravity well's force field let them into another hall. At the end of it a door opened into a large room with a desk on one side of it. Behind the desk was a huge picture window which showed the sea outside and a dramatically craggy grey landscape under a bright blue sky.

  The Guardian settled into an easy chair behind her desk and gestured Jane to one of three similar seats in front of it. As Jane settled into place the desk and the two extra seats disappeared, revealing them to be virtual furniture made out of force fields. The dim room lighting brightened and the picture window darkened slightly, shifting the focus from the outsides and to the interior of the room.

  "You may call me Beth, General. May I call you Jane?"

  "Of course. You have been told why I'm here?"

  "I understand you want help with an invading force."

  "Yes. We've developed a space force to defend us from an armada of Frogs. But a war would likely cause extensive damage to both sides. If we had a Guardian with us the Frogs might not launch a war at all. I've been told that they would likely proceed to the orbit of our innermost planet and settle there."

  "Yes. They are more a nuisance than a danger. But different groups of them have different cultures, some more warlike than others. So you are right to be wary."

  "So. Can you contact the Guardian responsible for our system and ask it to help us?"

  Beth smiled. "I have good news for you, Jane. The Zone Guardian for your sector of space resides on Earth. S/he is taking a vacation of a few decades. To add good news to good news, Earth also has had in residence an apprentice Guardian for the last twenty-something years. You can be sure both of them will offer assistance as needed."

  Jane stared at the woman. TWO Guardians were ALREADY at Earth?

  She spoke slowly. "That is good news. But..."

  She paused to gather her thoughts. And something occurred to her.

  "You could have told me this over the videophone. Why ask me to come out here? It's easy and quick to travel on this planet. But why bother with the travel?"

  "Because I wanted to evaluate you by means not available over a videophone link."

  "Evaluate away. Though it might not be a good idea to use active means such as radar probes."

  "That would be unethical. Besides, the technology behind your augmentation is quite advanced. It might resist active observation."

  Beth had got that right. Normally Robot would wait for Jane's slow b
iological brain before doing anything drastic, but there was no guarantee of that.

  "However, as you traveled here I've been able to use passive observation such as gravitic mapping to get some idea of what I'm facing. I can see that you have at least two defensive weapon systems inside you. Plus an energy storage unit of some kind which has a massive amount of energy already stored and is still collecting stray energy wherever you go."

  "That is true. I'd have told you if you'd asked."

  "Plus I've been able to observe you with ordinary human senses and judge your character the way anyone judges the people they meet. That plus the decades of experience you have displayed on Earth gives me a good idea of who you are and why you do anything."

  The two examined each other. Jane said, "And your conclusions?"

  "You are well meaning and generally succeed in being a force for good--good by our human standards, which the Lizards and the Cats mostly share.

  "Interestingly, you are from another branch of the Human Confederation, far removed in space and probably time."

  Jane had known this for years. But hearing it said out loud reawakened in her an empty feeling, a yearning for a lost home to which she wanted to return but never could.

  The Guardian said, "Do you have much information about that version of the Confederation?"

  "No. I was very young, perhaps three years old, when I was put into a protective capsule and time slowed drastically down. After some force launched it into space I drifted for perhaps half a million to several million years. My body matured to about fourteen years of age but my mind was asleep."

  She was silent for a few moments. She thought about revealing that Robot had recovered some of its memories of the ancient Confederation culture. However, it was so similar to modern Confed culture that what she could reveal didn't seem very useful to anyone. She remained silent about it; she didn't want to take time away from Earth's defense by talking about ancient history.