Should he be worried? Probably not. The construction could tolerate a certain amount of imbalance. It came about automatically when unusually large amounts of dark matter fuel were produced from the energy of the quasar and then stored. The interior of the sphere had special compensation mechanisms for that purpose. Maybe the energy yield was particularly good at the moment, and the machines were unable to completely compensate for this. The system would then automatically reduce production. That had probably already long since happened. The data was at least 10,000 years old, after all.
But something still didn’t feel right. It wasn’t the data that bothered him, it was Zhenyi’s handling of it. Why hadn’t she explained to him why she was examining the rotation of the sphere? Was she trying to protect him? He found that hard to believe. He simply couldn’t understand her. It would be best if he just asked. But then that would probably be futile because it would only create a bad vibe. He couldn’t think of anything that seemed right.
Kepler was nervous. He really needed to speak to someone about it.
Cycle HS 2.2, K2-288b
Grrr. Zhenyi was driving him nuts today. She was constantly criticizing him! What was bugging her? Since they’d arrived at their base a week ago, they hadn’t had a single harmonious day. Kepler had pictured it going differently. If this continued, then... Yeah, what then? He had no idea. Once upon a time he would have simply ordered a space taxi and gone for a ride. It wasn’t as though he and Zhenyi hadn’t had their crises before. They’d always somehow found their way back to each other. The Milky Way was enormous, but strangely, they always seemed to be crossing paths.
But the last time it had been different. He had searched for her himself.
Maybe things had gotten to that point again and they needed space from each other. Here on K2-288b they were very isolated from the rest of humanity. Kepler had already suggested a number of times that they go and visit Newton in his system. The planet where the Herbae were now living was undoubtedly more attractive than this hostile ice desert. But Zhenyi seemed to be waiting for something. She wouldn’t admit it, but why else would she be so reluctant to leave her base? Surely it wasn’t because of the comfortable set-up, which she claimed was the reason.
There was a knock on his door.
“Come in.”
It was the butler. He came in and closed the door.
“Oh, Puppy,” said Kepler, “what can I do for you?”
“I have a message for you, Johannes.” The butler stretched out his arm and opened his hand.
Kepler saw a piece of glass the size of a finger, probably a storage device. “And you’re bringing it to me in person? That’s unusual.”
“Those were the instructions I received. You’re supposed to receive the message without anyone else knowing.”
“Anyone else?”
That could only mean Zhenyi.
“Anyone else... That’s right. I will delete my memory of the handover as soon as you’ve taken the storage device from me.”
“Wait a minute, Puppy.” Kepler stood up, but didn’t take the glass device from the butler.
“Yes?”
“Thinking about loyalty,” he said, “are you actually loyal to Zhenyi?”
“That depends on how you define the term. I would risk my existence for her.”
“But?”
“If you gave me the instruction to eliminate her, Johannes, I would thoroughly think it over.”
“That’s very reassuring.”
“I have my own value system. Murder is exceptionally abhorrent to me.”
“And to me. Your value system, is it rigidly programmed?”
“No. In a level 9 AI nothing is rigid. I developed it myself.”
“So you could violate it.”
“I have that freedom, but I wouldn’t come up with a justification for murder. There always has to be another way. Self-defense is something else, of course.”
“Of course. Do you have a problem keeping something secret from Zhenyi?”
“Not in principle. There are very many facts that I don’t report to Wang Zhenyi. There simply isn’t enough time to share everything with her. So I’m forced to select what knowledge I share with her.”
“Could you also keep something secret from her, even if you knew she’d want to know about it?”
“I could, if I considered it sensible.”
“Would you consider it sensible if you discovered that Zhenyi was working against the values that you yourself have developed?”
“That’s possible.”
“Thank you, Puppy.”
Kepler took the glass device from his hand.
“If you need me...” The butler turned around, and closed the door after he exited the room.
Kepler leapt over to the computer port in the wall above his desk. He switched on the screen and activated privacy mode. Everything he entered now was protected from access by third parties. Then he inserted the glass storage device.
The blue face of the Secretary appeared on the screen. She was opening and closing her mouth like a fish, until Kepler realized he needed to raise the volume.
“...your eyes only,” Maria Sybille Merian was saying. “We have another couple of recordings from an autonomous unit that should interest you. Of course, they’re not completely new. The transmission time to K2-288b means it will have been almost 20,000 cycles. But they are newer than what I showed you at the Convention.”
The picture went dark. Then a honeycomb segment appeared. It was the surface of the Gigadyson. The camera rapidly zoomed in on what was happening. Two people were walking over the surface. Their target was obviously a maintenance shaft. The camera must have been directly above them, so the people were unidentifiable. But the shapes of their spacesuits betrayed the fact that it was a man and a woman.
Then the woman stood still. Kepler took note of the coordinates displayed at the top right. She tilted her head back and waved above her. The autonomous unit immediately zoomed in closer. This was a chance to capture her face. Kepler held his hand over his mouth, because it was clearly Zhenyi. He knew the contours of her face far too well for there to be any doubt in his mind. If only he’d simply refused to accept the storage device! He ripped it out of the port. The picture disappeared. Then he inserted it again. Ignoring the facts was no solution.
He saw Zhenyi’s face again briefly, then the Secretary appeared again.
“I wrestled for a long time with whether or not to send you this recording, because I know you have a long-shared history with Zhenyi. I don’t want to destroy that. But something’s happening here that goes beyond our understanding. I’ve asked Ada and Valja to monitor the Gigadyson even more intensively. I can’t tell you what to do, but you should at least know all the facts at hand. The identity of the second person is unknown, by the way. We assume it’s a man—his gait corroborates this, too. The autonomous unit that prepared the recording was destroyed afterward. But it’s interesting that Zhenyi deliberately waved at the camera. She must have known she was being watched. And yet the probe was only shot after it had had sufficient time to transmit its recordings.
“There’s so much that can’t be explained that I simply had to share the images with you. And if you’re wondering why I don’t involve the other members of the Convention—there must be a leak here. Even if Zhenyi is the traitor, it’s been a long time since she had access to the codes reserved for the Convention. So she couldn’t have acted without help. Maybe she’s simply acting under a directive. I would even consider it possible that she’s somehow being blackmailed. Maybe you can figure out if there’s any potential for blackmail with regards to the Herbae. In any case, I wish you good luck, whatever you decide to do. Because I could also understand if you completely took Zhenyi’s side. You know better than anyone what your girlfriend is capable of. I would also be happy to receive you here at the Convention—alone, I mean.”
The message ended and the screen went black.
Phe
w.
What was this? What had just happened was wrong on so many levels that he didn’t even know where to start.
Cycle HS 2.3, K2-288b
Kepler crept through the corridors of the base. He couldn’t make a noise or Zhenyi would wake up. It was long past midnight, but he couldn’t sleep. Where was the butler? He certainly wasn’t in the living room. Actually, why did he know so little about him? The butler was usually always there when he needed him. Where did he spend his nights? Did he need sleep? And if not, how did he kill time?
He didn’t find Puppy in the kitchen either. Kepler even looked under the table. A robot didn’t exactly need a comfortable bed. He checked the airlock. It hadn’t been used in the last 12 hours. Yesterday someone had exited it without waiting for it to fill with breathable air. That must have been the butler. But the records said he was back again two hours later. The day before yesterday there had been a normal exit. He hadn’t been outside himself, so Zhenyi must have gone up to the surface. Was it just for a stroll? Why hadn’t she invited him to join her? Wait a minute. They’d had a big argument that day. Maybe she’d just needed a change of scene to calm herself.
Puppy, where are you? Kepler didn’t want to make a general announcement. If Zhenyi heard it, she’d ask him why he’d woken the butler instead of her. He turned right past the airlock toward the storage rooms. Maybe the butler was sorting their provisions. Behind the first door all he found were crates and sacks. It smelled wonderfully of onions. Kepler wondered about this until he discovered the small tray on a shelf.
More crates awaited him in the next room. It smelled more like chemicals in this one, a bitter fragrance. Kepler had no idea what it was that smelled so strong. But the butler wasn’t in there either. The third door was the last. Whatever didn’t fit in these three rooms was stored without atmosphere in the corridors dug deep into the planet’s surface, which he could only reach if he wore a spacesuit. Hopefully the butler wasn’t holed up there.
Kepler opened the door. Other than the usual transport crates for goods, a body container stood on the floor. Someone must be in it. What if Zhenyi was hiding someone here? Kepler was reminded of the old vampire movies that she liked to watch. If the lid opened, Count Dracula would emerge from it. Then it occurred to him that there must be a viewing window at eye level. His own body had traveled in caskets like this often enough.
He knelt down. The window was on the side. When you lay in the casket, bright light penetrated through it. It was strange—although his body was always unconscious when he was inside, he seemed to remember what it felt like. His body must have interim memory stores for such impressions, which his consciousness then read out after they were reunited.
There was no vampire in the casket. Kepler stood up. Relieved, he touched the opening mechanism. The lid opened. The butler was lying under it. He opened his eyes without making any other movements, which had a startling effect.
“I’m glad I found you,” said Kepler. “But what in the world are you doing in the casket?”
The butler sat up stiffly. If he had been a vampire, this would be the moment to drive a stake into his heart, if he had one.
“I’ve been calculating Pi,” he said.
“And you need the casket for that?”
“When I’m lying in here I can switch off all my sensors, so that all my hardware is available for computing. I’ve just written a model that’s running on my artificial retina.”
“But you could have used the computer on Zhenyi’s spaceship.”
“You don’t understand, Johannes. It’s about completely limiting myself to my own faculties. Any external hardware would be a violation of the rules.”
“Which rules?”
“The ones I’ve set for myself.”
“But why?”
“Why do you watch a film when you already know how it ends?”
“Good question.”
“Exactly.”
“Thank you for the insight into your leisure activities,” said Kepler.
“But you must have been looking for me for some other reason.”
“How do you know that?”
“It’s 03:37 onboard time.”
“Well deduced.”
“Don’t forget I’m a level 9 AI.”
“I consider that an understatement.”
“Thank you, Johannes.”
“But you’re right, I’m not here to compliment you. I have a question.”
“Then ask it.”
“Can I assume that Zhenyi won’t find out about our conversation under any circumstances?”
“No.”
Kepler flinched. He had obviously misjudged the butler. But yesterday he’d explained that he didn’t have to be unconditionally loyal to Zhenyi. “Why no?” he asked.
“I can’t guarantee that. It might be necessary in the future to tell Zhenyi about it. And she’d also find out if she subjected me to a forced consciousness analysis.”
“I understand. I formulated the question wrong. I ask that you don’t tell Zhenyi of our conversation as long as it’s not necessary.”
“That’s okay.”
“Good. We actually have a big problem. Zhenyi was clearly identified in recordings from an autonomous unit as one of the people illegally hijacking the Gigadyson.”
Kepler explained to the butler exactly what he had seen and what he had concluded from it. “Am I wrong in assuming that makes Zhenyi the prime suspect?” he asked finally.
The butler didn’t answer right away. His circuits were probably running hot. No wonder he hadn’t been able to arrive at a simple answer himself. “I agree with the assumption,” said the butler. “But obviously only assuming the recordings were not faked.”
“I don’t imagine the Secretary would send me counterfeit messages.”
“Give me the memory glass and I can search for signs that it might have been faked.”
“If you find nothing, which is what I expect—what then? I trust Zhenyi, but I can’t ignore these images.”
“I’m not in a position to recommend a course of action to you, Johannes.”
“How would you proceed?”
“I would investigate.”
“Alone?”
“Alone. If Zhenyi was involved, she could manipulate the results.”
Kepler sat on the casket and scratched his chin. The butler’s opinion was clear. But how was he supposed to investigate the phenomenon without Zhenyi’s help? He didn’t even own a spaceship! Of course, he could try to hijack her ship. But she’d never forgive him. He just wanted to remove all doubt. He was basically doing it for her, although he had to admit he owed it to himself, too.
“You’re probably right, Puppy,” he said. “If I don’t act, my suspicions will grow and drive us apart. But how can I get away from here?”
The butler sat next to him and knocked on the casket. A shiver ran up Kepler’s spine. He knew what the butler was thinking.
“We’ll send you via laser pulse to a control station on the sphere that’s nearest to the coordinates shown in the video. You know your way around that kind of station. They’re all the same design. And I’m guessing your access permit is still valid. Your body can stay here in the casket.”
Kepler told the butler the coordinates. “And what if my access data for the station is invalid?”
“Then you’ll be automatically sent back.”
“But Zhenyi will pursue me.”
“No one will be able to catch up with you. Even if Zhenyi followed you via laser, you’d have a head start of one day. I’ll pretend that you want to be left in peace in your cabin. Zhenyi won’t notice until tonight at the earliest that you’re no longer here.”
“Can’t you keep her away from my cabin for longer?”
“No. I know Zhenyi. She won’t be put off longer than that. But maybe she’ll follow you in the spaceship. Then you’ll have a few weeks’ head start.”
“Isn’t it possible that she won’t come after m
e at all?” asked Kepler.
“Absolutely not. You’re too important to her for her to simply let you go. She’ll come one way or another, I can’t prevent that. The transfer destination will be recorded in the log data.”
“All right, then we shouldn’t lose any time.”
“That would also be my recommendation.”
The butler stood up and pressed a few buttons on the side of the casket. Kepler heard a hiss. White vapor escaped from the crack around the lid.
“If you please,” said the butler.
“Now? Er... can I go to the toilet first?”
“That’s not necessary. All of your body’s systems will be slowed to a minimum.”
“Alright.”
“You must undress.”
Kepler took off his jacket and pants.
“The underpants too,” said the butler, opening the lid of the casket and cold air poured out.
Kepler stood naked before him.
“And you’re definitely sending me to the control station, not to hell?”
“You have my word.”
“Thanks, Puppy, see you soon.”
“Safe travels, Johannes.”
Kepler climbed into the casket and sat down. The bottom was hard and cold. He thought it smelled of camphor, but he must be mistaken.
“I’m closing the lid now,” said the butler.
Kepler lay down. There was no pillow. But he’d be gone soon. The lid lowered itself. It grew dark, except for the dazzling bright light coming through the small side window. An unpleasant thought occurred to him. What if the butler had planned all this to get rid of him and have Zhenyi all to himself again? Who knew what might be going on in the mind of a level 9 AI that could formulate its own moral concepts? But it was too late now.
The Death of the Universe: Ghost Kingdom: Hard Science Fiction (Big Rip Book 2) Page 11
