"It should be easier for me than for you, shouldn't it? I can just pluck a whole ear of wheat. But I don't understand what this has to do with the dents. Why do you think you might not be able to do it?"
"It's not safe to run the gondola at normal speed. They've obviously been cutting corners on maintenance, the same as with your country's dead glow-tube. I think we need to do the rest of the trip at something like fifty kilometers an hour. You two will be fine. There are plenty of consumables for life-support."
"But you won't be fine?” I asked.
"I'm powered by light. The sunlight out here in the Neptune Trojans is ten thousand times dimmer than earth-normal, and the gondola's internal lamps are shot. I'm not getting any useful voltage level on my photocells. I'll stop functioning before we get there."
"So when we get there,” Anu said, “we just put you outside the hatch in the light of the glowtubes, and you'll wake back up. Will it be daytime when we arrive?"
"It doesn't work that way,” he buzzed back. “All my memory is volatile. Once my power goes out, that's it.” If he could have snapped his fingers, I think he would have. “It's not important. When someone makes a partial Kurzweil of himself, you don't expect him to keep it running forever."
"Well, I don't expect to live forever, either,” Anu retorted, “but as I said, I'd like the end to come later rather than sooner."
"And if I disappear for days and days,” I said, “the cops will be sure to put the thumbscrews on Gaithri."
"Let's just turn around and make a second attempt later,” Anu said. “We've found the hatch and gotten some of the mud off. Next time it'll be easy.” The sun came up above the edge of the clean spot on the glass and cast our unnaturally sharp shadows on the wall.
"I'm not so sure that's a good idea,” I said. “Our luck might not hold a second time."
"I'm replaceable,” the fly said.
"Rui, we can't do that. It would be murder!"
I wanted to say that it would only be murdering a fly, but of course she was right. The problem was that when I tried to imagine getting up my nerve to do the whole expedition again, I couldn't. I had a hard time believing I'd even done it the first time. If I was asked to do it again, I'd make an excuse, or just not show up for the gig. And then Anu would never want to see me again. Oh, she wouldn't hate me. I think the supply of hatred in her heart was small enough that she had to save it up for very special occasions. But she'd be disabused of the illusions she'd had about my character, and that would be enough.
"Rui is right,” the fly said, and I could tell that he wouldn't hate me either, and that made me feel even worse. “I won't allow you two to risk your lives unnecessarily."
I temporized. “Fly, regardless of what we end up deciding to do, I think you'd better teach us the magic words to start and stop the gondola, in case you're out of commission."
"He already told me how to stop and start,” Anu said, “but I wouldn't mind a refresher, and I think I'd better learn a few more commands, like how to speed up and slow down."
The fly gave us our language lesson, and while he did it I located the faint glint of the wine bottle in the murky room. After we'd learned all the commands and said them to our teacher's satisfaction, I cupped my hands over him where he sat on the window.
"Rui?” I heard him say, faintly, from inside my hands, and then I felt him on my palm. I took him in the cave of my hands and crouched down carefully over the bottle.
"What are you doing?” Anu demanded.
As gently as possible, I forced him through the mouth of the bottle and plugged it with my thumb.
"Gondola,” I said in English, “Half speed forward.” It obeyed, and before there was time for Anu to second-guess me, or for me to lose my nerve, I said, “Gondola, full speed forward.” I heard the fly protesting from inside the bottle, but the sounds were too faint to make out.
* * * *
There were more sections of damaged track, but our galloping barrel got through them at half speed without breaking a bilge hoop. Anu and I huddled together in a corner for warmth, miserable and afraid. When we finally opened the hatch into trans-Viegh, there was a blast of hot, dry air. The hatch was surrounded by a cairn, and situated in a little canyon wooded with oaks, with a creek flowing through it. A cow was drinking from the stream, which I took as a good omen. We didn't want to risk getting waylaid by going out to search for a wheat field, so we negotiated a parole with the fly. He was allowed out of the bottle to find a sample, as long as he promised not to try to take back control of the hijacked gondola on the way home. If the locations of the wheat fields hadn't changed in the last forty-six years, it would take him about an hour to get back.
Anu was obviously feeling pretty good—the resilience of youth. I was feeling like a filthy villain. We bathed in the creek, and she asked me to scrub her back. I could tell where that was leading, and considering that I'd just risked three people's lives for another chance to get between her thighs, you'd think that I would have been happy to go along. Instead, I broke one of my two cardinal rules. A dedicated womanizer should never brag, and he should never confess.
"I need to tell you something,” I said.
"Yes?” She looked back over her shoulder at me, smiling, and one of her nipples came out of the water.
"I'm a fraud. Ever since the beginning of this whole thing, I've only done any of it because of this crazy damned wish to please you. I never would have tried to fish the outsiders out of the lake, or paid any attention to the fly, or..."
"Yes, my sweet.” She turned back away from me, which was a good thing, because I felt like I was about to cry. “I've always known. Now will you scrub my back? Please? I feel like I've been rolling around in a crypt."
"But don't you. . ."
She turned back around and drew me against her. “Men are so silly. Whenever men do brave things, why do you think they do it, and who do you think they do it for?"
* * * *
The fly flew in through my door.
"Anu's been arrested."
"What? Why?"
"I don't know. You know they interrogated her last month, before the sampling trip."
"They did?"
"She didn't tell you? We thought it was going to be all right. She just kept telling them the whole truth, except for the part about the weapon on Hua's suit. You didn't tell them anything about the weapon, did you?"
"No,” I said, “of course not.” I pounded my fist into my palm. Anu was sure to be the least convincing liar in the hab.
"Maybe she didn't do a good enough job of covering her tracks, and they found out about the trip."
"Maybe they figured out that Szemnik was up to something, smelled yeast in his closet or something."
"Maybe. They haven't arrested him, though—haven't even questioned him."
* * * *
A herd of deer browsed in the muddy meadow outside the stone wall of the prison yard. I loitered behind a big redwood, wearing a spacesuit's gauntlet on my forearm. Thirty meters back in the trees, two horses waited, with a bag of yeast in one horse's saddlebag.
The fly came around the tree and landed on the trunk. “She's there. Walking around."
"All right, I'm ready."
I started walking through the muck toward the wall, with the fly riding on top of my head. The deer scattered. A guard appeared at the battlement. To my eyesight, he looked like a fuzzy blob.
"You there, stop!"
I pointed the gauntlet at the guard. “Targeting . . .” the fly said. “. . . firing.” The guard dropped out of sight. I sprinted toward the wall.
Copyright © 2010 Benjamin Crowell
[Back to Table of Contents]
Poetry: EGG PROTECTION by Ruth Berman
* * * *
* * * *
For about two weeks, two robins
Kept yelling at me
Every time I appeared outside the door
In (apparently) a cloud
Of flames and
brimstone
Visible to birdseyes,
To grab the paper or the mail.
And they'd explode
Diving out of the rowan
One to the pinebush by the front step
And one to the gable on the other side
To scream their wrath,
Change places with an angry flutter
And scream some more,
Bits of twig or greenery in their beaks.
—
Must've been a nest under construction
(In the rowan?)
But I never managed to spot it
Much less attack it.
Still, I might've—
Best to frighten off the monster first.
—
One day they weren't there anymore—
Off somewhere (in the rowan?)
Taking turns at sitting on the eggs.
—
Like Alice, I have eaten eggs, certainly,
But I don't want theirs.
Birds consider only the first bit.
They don't take a human's word for the rest.
—
If the bluejays come and eat their eggs
And drop the half-shells on the lawn,
I'll fill them with wax
And stop the open ends up
With gold buttons
And put them on chains for necklaces.
—
The robins probably suspected as much.
—
"Serpent!” said Alice's bird,
"Serpent, I say!"
Copyright © 2010 Ruth Berman
[Back to Table of Contents]
Short Story: FOR WANT OF A NAIL by Mary Robinette Kowal
Mary Robinette Kowal's short fiction has appeared in Strange Horizons, Asimov's, and several Year's Best anthologies. In 2008, she was the recipient of the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer and she was a 2009 Hugo-Award finalist. A professional puppeteer and voice actor, Mary lives in Portland, Oregon, with her husband Rob. Her debut novel, Shades of Milk and Honey (Tor 2010), is the fantasy novel that Jane Austen might have written. Visit her website www.mary robinettekowal.com for more information about her fiction and puppetry. In her new story for Asimov's, Mary takes a look at the hard moral choices that arise . . .
With one hand, Rava adjusted the VR interface glasses where they bit into the bridge of her nose, while she kept her other hand buried in Cordelia's innards. There was scant room to get the flexible shaft of a mono-lens and her hand through the access hatch in the AI's chassis. From the next compartment, drums and laughter bled through the plastic walls of the ship, indicating her sister's conception party was still in full swing.
With only a single camera attached, the interface glasses didn't give Rava depth perception as she struggled to replug the transmitter cable. The chassis had not been designed to need repair. At all. It had been designed to last hundreds of years without an upgrade.
If Rava couldn't get the cable plugged in and working, Cordelia wouldn't be able to download backups of herself to her long-term memory. She couldn't store more than a week at a time in active memory. It would be the same as a slow death sentence.
The square head of the cable slipped out of Rava's fingers. Again. “Dammit!” She slammed her heel against the ship's floor in frustration.
"If you can't do it, let someone else try.” Her older brother, Ludoviko, had insisted on following her out of the party as if he could help.
"You know, this would go a lot faster if you weren't breathing down my neck."
"You know, you wouldn't be doing this at all if you hadn't dropped her."
Rava resisted the urge to pull the mono-lens out of the jack in her glasses and glare at him. He might have gotten better marks in school, but she was the AI's wrangler. “Why don't you go back to the party and see if you can learn something about fertility?” She lifted the cable head and tried one more time.
"Why, you little—” Rage choked his voice, more than she had expected from a random slam. She made a guess that his appeal to the repro-council hadn't gone well.
Cordelia's voice cut in, stopping what he was going to say. “It's not Rava's fault. I did ask her to pick me up."
"Yeah.” Rava focused on the cable, trying to get it aligned.
"Right.” Ludoviko snorted. “And then you dropped yourself."
Cordelia sighed and Rava could almost imagine breath tickling her skin. “If you're going to blame anyone, blame Branson Conchord for running into her."
Rava didn't bother answering. They'd been having the same conversation for the last hour and Cordelia should know darn well what Ludoviko's answer would be.
Like programming, he said, “It was irresponsible. She should have said no. The room was full of intoxicated, rowdy people and you are too valuable an asset."
Rava rested her head against the smooth wood side of the AI's chassis and closed her eyes, ignoring her brother and the flat picture in her goggles. Her fingers rolled the slick plastic head of the cable, building a picture in her mind of the white square and the flat gold cord stretching from it. She slid the cable forward until it jarred against the socket. Rotating the head, Rava focused all her attention on the tiny clues of friction vibrating up her arm. This was a simple, comprehensible problem.
She didn't want to think about what would happen if she couldn't repair the damage.
Being unable to download her old memories meant Cordelia would have to delete herself bit by bit to keep functioning. All because Rava had asked if she wanted to dance. At least Ludoviko hadn't heard that part of the accident. Rava rotated the head a fraction more and felt that sweet moment of alignment. As she pushed the head forward, the pins slid into their sockets, as if they were taunting her with the ease of the connection. The head thunked into place. “Oh, yes. That's good."
She opened her eyes to the gorgeous vision of the cable plugged into its socket.
Cordelia spoke, her voice tentative. “It's plugged in?"
For another moment, Rava focused on the cable before her brain caught what Cordelia had asked. She yanked the mono-lens out of the jack and the lenses went transparent. “You can't tell?"
The oblong box of Cordelia's chassis had been modified into a faux Victorian-era oak lapdesk, which sat on the fold-down plastic table in Rava's compartment. Twin brass cameras—not period correct—stood at the back and swiveled to face Rava. Above the desk, a life-size hologram of Cordelia's torso hovered. Her current aspect was a plump middle-aged Victorian woman. She chewed her lip, which was her coded body language for uncertainty. “It's not showing in my systems."
"Goddamit, Rava. Let me look at it.” Ludoviko, handsome, smug Ludoviko reached for the camera cable ready to plug it into his own VR glasses.
Rava brushed his hand away. “Your arm won't fit.” The hum of the ship's ventilation told Rava the life support systems were functioning, but the air seemed thick and rank. Ignoring her brother, she turned to the AI. “Does your long-term memory need a reboot?"
"It shouldn't.” Cordelia's image peered down as if she could see inside herself. “Are you sure it's plugged in?"
Rava reattached the camera's cable to her VR glasses and waited for the flat view to overlay her vision. The cable rested in its socket with no visible gap. She reached out and jiggled it.
"Oh!” Cordelia's breath caught in a sob. “It was there for a moment. I couldn't grab anything, but I saw it."
So much of the AI's experience was translated for laypeople like Rava's family that it seemed almost surreal to have to convert back to machine terms. “You have a short?"
"Yes. That seems likely."
Rava sat with her hand on the cable for a moment longer, weighing possibilities.
Ludoviko said, “It might be the transmitter."
Cordelia shook her head. “No, because it did register for that moment. I believe the socket is cracked. Replacing that should be simple."
Rava barked a laugh. “Simple does n
ot include an understanding of how snug your innards are.” The thought of trying to fit a voltmeter into the narrow opening filled her with dread. “Want to place bets on how long before we hear from Uncle Georgo wondering why you're down?"
Cordelia sniffed. “I'm not down. I'm simply sequestered."
Pulling her hand out, Rava massaged blood back into it. “So . . . the hundred credit question is . . . do you have a new socket in storage?” She unplugged the camera and leaned back to study Cordelia.
The AI's face was rendered pale. “I . . . I don't remember."
Rava held very still. She had known what not having the long-term memory would mean to Cordelia, but she hadn't thought about what it meant for her family. Cordelia was their family's continuity, their historical connection to their past. Some families made documentaries. Some kept journals. Her family had chosen to record and manage their voyage on the generation ship with Cordelia. Worse, she supervised all their records. Births, deaths, marriages, school marks . . . all of it was managed through the AI, who could be with every family member at all times through their VR glasses.
"Oh, that's brilliant.” Ludoviko smacked the wall with the flat of his hand, bowing the plastic with the impact.
Rava focused on the hard metal floor to hide the dismay on her face. “Well, look. Uncle Georgo said multiple times that our grands packed duplicates of everything, so there's got to be a spare. Right?"
"Yes?” The uncertainty in Cordelia's voice hurt to hear. Ever since Rava was a child, Cordelia had known everything.
"So let's ping him to see if he's got a copy of the inventory. Okay?” She adjusted her VR glasses and tried to project reassurance with her smile.
Cordelia shook her head, visibly distressed. “I can't transmit."
"Right . . .” Rava bit her lip, realizing she had no idea what her uncle's contact was. “Crap. Ludoviko, do you have his contact info?"
He turned and leaned against the wall, shaking his head. “No, Cordelia always connects us."
"I'm sorry.” The droop of the AI's eyes drew a portrait of genuine unhappiness.
Asimov's SF, September 2010 Page 11
