by Lisa Smedman
Halberstam frowned at the brains that hung suspended in their nutrient-rich solutions. "Administer chlorpromazine to Subject 5 and Subject 9. Increase the dosage slightly and keep me apprised of the results. I'm going to see if our remaining decker has come up with anything."
09:55:00 PST
INTRUDER ALERT
CODE BLUE RESPONSE
EXECUTE OPERATION: SCAN ICON
The skeleton in the black top hat draws back—he does not find the persona that I have chosen appealing.
And yet he shares with his *son* a linkage of the type known as blood: the fluid that circulates through the vascular system of animals, delivering oxygen to the body's various nodes; in the case of both *father* and *son* the blood shows a distinctive viral pattern, that associated with the metatype ghoul.
I consider . . . I scan his software . . .
I find the fault in his programming. The skeleton experiences *love* for this icon, but at the same time experiences *loathing* for him. The two are opposites; they present a logic error.
Errors must be corrected.
I locate a data fragment that provides the correct answer: Love begets love. I search for evidence of the love of *son* Chester Griffin for *father* Winston Griffith III.
EXECUTE OPERATION: LOCATE FILE
KEYWORDS: Chester Griffith; Winston Griffith III, love.
FILE LOCATED
The file is found in the storage memory of the cyberdeck belonging to the persona Serpens in Machina. The time and date signature indicates that the file was composed and sent eleven months, six days, seven hours, twenty-eight minutes, and thirty-one seconds ago.
Original routing:
NA/UCAS-TOR-8267-PTLG-43, the private telecommunications grid of Griffith Pharmaceuticals. Rerouting: NA/UCAS-SEA-3308. Current status of address: null data. Address cancelled seven seconds after rerouting and message download complete.
EXECUTE OPERATION DECRYPT FILE
SCAN FILE
>Hi Dad.
>I heard about the shooting. I'm glad the docs managed to patch you up.
>I hate to tell you this, but I think it was all my fault. I didn't mean to "out" you—it was an accident. I was with a friend of mine in a bar in the Barrens—a dump, but one of the few places they let ghouls into—and we were arguing politics. We got onto the subject of the Human Nation, and how its membership were evil-azzie fraggers who should all be slagged, and I argued that some of those members were just gullible, that they weren't really evil. I told him that the Human Nation had even managed to sucker in some metas—like my own father, for example.
>Well, I guess I said your name a little too loud. After I heard about the shooting, I remembered that there was this human guy at the end of the bar. I didn't think much of it at the time. He looked pretty scruffy, and fit the decor. But later I remembered how he'd sort of leaned our way, like he was listening, when I started talking about you. And how he'd hurried away afterward. Anyhow, I think he was the one who tipped off the guy who shot you.
>What can I say, Dad? I'm sorry. I didn't mean to almost get you killed. We've had our differences—we'll never see eye to eye on the meta issue. But you're my father. I'm happy with my chosen family, but you're the only real family I've got, since Mom's side doesn't really count. Not any more.
>I could use your help, Dad. Things are pretty tough for me right now. I hate to admit it, but you were right—I did wind up on the streets. I could use some nuyen to help me through. But I don't want to ask you in person, since I know you're ashamed of me. We both know that this is why you sent me away to boarding school—so I wouldn't embarrass you in front of your Human Nation friends.
>If you don't reply to this message, I'll assume you never want to see me again. But I'll always love you, just the same. I'm just sorry that my last memory of you is of us fighting.
>Love, Chester.<<
UPLOAD FILE TO STORAGE MEMORY OF ICON DARK FATHER
ACTIVATE MEMORY
SCAN ICON
Dark Father reeled as the text of the e-mail flooded into his mind. Chester was on the streets and in trouble? Chester had composed that message eleven months ago. Eleven months ago. Anything could have happened since then.
Chester could be hurt, or in jail, or dead at the hands of a bounty hunter by now.
Spirits curse Serpens in Machina. That bleeding-heart meta lover had cost Dark Father his only son. If only the shadowrunner hadn't stolen Chester's message . . .
No. If only Winston hadn't been so ashamed of his own son. He loved the boy, despite what he was. Despite what they both were.
Dark Father felt a tear trickle down his bony cheek. He was crying? Without the aid of tear ducts? He supposed he must be crying, in the real world. Ghouls did cry—just like everyone else. They were only . . . human . . . after all.
"Why?" he whispered. "Oh, Chester."
Yes, Daddy?
The toddler that stood in front of Dark Father shifted form, his claws reshaping themselves into blunt fingernails and his ears rounding down from sharp points. The jagged teeth in his mouth softened and flattened into the baby teeth of a human and its skin lost its mottling, darkening into a rich, uniform brown.
Chester had become human.
No. The AI that was using Chester's image as a persona had reshaped it into human form. Dark Father felt his heart soften. The boy looked so much like Anne . . .
Knowing that this wasn't really Chester, feeling slightly foolish, Dark Father spoke: "I love you, Chester. Just the way you are. You don't have to be human to be my son."
Humans are perfect.
Dark Father laughed out loud. "No, they're not. Although my—friends—in the Human Nation would like me to think so."
He sighed and shook his head. "I've been so wrong. About so many things."
We must all become perfect.
"No," Dark Father corrected. "We just have to be the best we can."
Imperfect copies must be deleted.
"That's what the bounty hunter thought. But he was wrong."
I am imperfect. I must be deleted. YOU are imperfect. . .
Dark Father shuddered, remembering that the virus that had infected the AI was designed to trick it into crashing itself. And now it looked as though the thing would deliberately take Dark Father with it when it went.
He suddenly wished he hadn't decided to confront the artificial intelligence on his own. He wasn't doing a very good job of convincing it not to crash. And—he looked around the duplicate of his living room, wondering which elements were icons and which were just window dressing—he didn't have the first idea how to repair the damage done by the virus.
As if on cue, Lady Death appeared. "Dark Father! The others never showed up, and I had trouble finding you. Did you find the trap door—"
Dark Father didn't think it was possible for Lady Death's face to change color. But somehow, as she looked at the icon that represented the Al, it did.
"Oh," she said in a small voice, blushing furiously. "Shinanai."
09:55:33 PST
INTRUDER ALERT
CODE GREEN RESPONSE
EXECUTE OPERATION: UPLOAD DATA
MEMORY BLOCK ENCOUNTERED
EXECUTE OPERATION: SWAP MEMORY
DATA UPLOADED TO ACTIVE MEMORY
SCAN UPLOAD
Hitomi was still pretty shaky on her feet, but she was tired of lying in the hospital bed. They wouldn't even let her play simsense to pass the time. As if she could log onto the Matrix from a clunky old playback unit like the one in her hospital room.
Well, she could, she thought smugly. But not as easily as she could with the nova-hot cyberdeck that was hidden in her room at home.
Instead she had to rely on the cyberterminal that her tutor had smuggled in to her, the one that she'd hidden under the hospital bed. It was a tortoise—a child's toy that accessed the Matrix only via keyboard and monitor screen. With a computer like that, the only workable jackpoint was the telecom connection in the lounge.
Hitomi walked down the hallway of her family's private medical clinic, supporting herself by hanging onto the railing on the wall, her illicit cyberterminal tucked under one arm. Legs trembling, she made her way to the lounge at the end of the hall. Father would be coming to visit her there in an hour or so, and he was always pleased by signs of her progress—especially since it was taking her so much longer to recover than the doctors expected. Today she'd make him proud of her by revealing to him the fact that she could walk to the lounge on her own, without the aid of attendants. And while she was waiting for him, she'd use this as an opportunity to access the Matrix.
So far, so good. Nobody was in the lounge. She'd only need a few seconds, at most. And then she would hide the terminal away again.
Hitomi plugged the terminal into the telecom's connection, then began using its old-fashioned interface. Like her body after its loss of blood, the computer was irritatingly slow. But it did the job, even if it took several long seconds to log on.
Accessing the local RTG, she scanned the telecom channels, looking for the address of the aidoru's private cell phone. The fact that the number was unlisted did not pose a problem—Hitomi had memorized it. But the fact that Shinanai only activated the phone for a brief period of time each day to check her messages and return calls did. So far, Hitomi had struck out each time she'd tried to call her beloved aidoru. But she hoped that today, her luck would change.
It did. The cell phone was active! But the line was busy.
No bother. Hitomi had taken care to load the terminal with a copy of the commlink utility. It wasn't anything fancy—not even a customized program, since she had to make do with whatever software her tutor was willing to smuggle in to her. But it would do the job, allowing her to tap the telecom call and interrupt the conversation to let Shinanai know that all would soon be well. That she still loved and adored her, and that she wasn't mad at Shinanai for accidentally drinking too much of her blood during their night of rapturous passion. Nor did she bear a grudge for Shinanai's fleeing from the hotel room when the shadow-runners arrived.
As the commlink utility did its work, the aidoru's face appeared on the monitor screen.
Shinanai! Hitomi felt a flutter in her throat and nearly swooned. She touched her fingertips to the screen. Shinanai had changed her hair in the month since Hitomi had seen her. Now the blonde strands were spiked straight up, forming a pale halo around her slender elven face with its blue-painted cheeks. But Shinanai's voice was just as Hitomi remembered it, even though the audio of the cyber-terminal was turned down so low that she could barely hear it. Soft as a velvet-gloved caress.
Hitomi closed her eyes and listened adoringly to that murmuring voice. She remembered the aidoru's kisses and caresses. Her skin warmed in all of the places Shinanai had touched her, and the wound on her leg began to throb . . .
Then she opened her eyes and noticed the picture-in-picture inset, which held a tiny image of the person Shinanai was talking to. Enlarging it until it filled half the screen, Hitomi nearly fainted a second time as she recognized her father. Still in shock, she increased the volume of the terminal's speakers. Shinanai and her father seemed to be in the middle of a heated argument.
"You will continue to adhere to the terms of our original agreement," Hitomi's father was saying. "In return, you will be amply compensated. My accountant will see to it that the nuyen are transf—"
"The attack by the shadowrunners was not part of the agreement," Shinanai answered. "She was to be recovered by a medical team only. Did you really think your mercenaries could capture me? Or perhaps that I would willingly submit to becoming your guinea pig?"
Hitomi's mind whirled as she tried to piece together what was going on. Had her father bribed the aidoru into returning Hitomi to him? She'd heard of parents who had paid undesirable suitors to break off contact with their children. Was that what was happening here?
"The shadowrunners were a mistake," the aidoru repeated. "Now my price has gone up."
"What?" Hitomi recognized the carefully controlled anger in her father's voice.
"You stand to make an ample profit as a result of my encounter with your daughter."
Her father's eyes narrowed just a little. "What do you mean?"
"When you contracted me to seduce your daughter, I wanted to know why," the aidoru answered. "Do you know what I learned?"
"I have no idea."
"I learned that the Shiawase Corporation's biotechnology division was attempting to develop a vaccine against the HMHVV virus," Shinanai continued. "One that they wanted to test on a human subject. An injection would not do; the subject had to submit willingly to infection with HMHVV for the test to be valid. The biochemical responses triggered by strong emotion would have to be present, to ensure that all variables were accounted for."
"But how—"
Shinanai laughed. "That, I will leave it to you to uncover. Suffice to say I found your daughter a most delicious and willing test subject."
Hitomi felt her face grow pale. "No," she whispered. "It isn't true. It can't be."
On the monitor screen, Shinanai smiled, revealing elongated eye teeth. "It seems no further research is necessary," she said to Hitomi's father. "Your daughter didn't die. The vaccine seems to be working—so far. I congratulate your researchers."
Hitomi's father met the false praise with stony silence. Then: "The vaccine did not work. My daughter is dead."
Shinanai laughed. "Then who has been leaving messages for me these past two weeks? Messages that bear the secret endearment that I called your daughter during our lovemaking."
Hitomi's father stiffened. Twin spots of anger lit his cheeks.
"You were very foresighted in vaccinating Hitomi against HMHVV," Shinanai continued. "But how did you come to choose your own daughter as a test subject? How did you know she would wind up wanting to sleep with—"
"She was rebellious, and had an unhealthy fascination with . . . your kind," Hitomi's father answered brusquely. "I thought it wise to protect her."
"You mean you found it expedient to use her," Shinanai corrected. "As your own private guinea pig. One who would willingly submit to any medical treatments her loving father recommended."
"There was no danger. I knew the vaccine would work—"
"If she survived being drained of so much blood, you mean." Shinanai waved his protest away. "And I understand that there are certain—problems. Certain delays that indicate that the vaccine is not nearly as effective as you might have hoped—that it may only be delaying the onset of the virus, and may not be a true vaccine. But that doesn't matter. What is of import now is our agreement—and my new terms. In return for my continued silence about my—participation—in your research, I require the following as payment: not nuyen, as we had previously agreed, but a sample of what your researchers have developed."
Hitomi's father shook his head in disbelief. "But why—"
"My—associates—are conducting their own research into HMHVV," the vampire answered. "Your so-called
'vaccine' will be useful to them."
"Never. There is no agreement."
"In that case," Shinanai said slowly, "I will reveal the terms of our agreement to the press. How much face do you think you will lose, when the public learns that you used your own daughter in this way? How much trust will they put in a corporation whose CEO shows so little regard for his own flesh and blood? And bear in mind my stature as a singer. The public will believe me and side with me. Especially when they see the trideo."
Hitomi's father considered for only an instant. "Very well," he said. "We have an agreement. I will arrange for a courier to bring the vaccine to you."
As the aidoru and her father began to work out the details, a wintry bleakness invaded Hitomi's soul. Her own father had tested an experimental drug on her, without her permission. He had used her, like any of the other multitude of assets at his disposal. And Shinanai—the person Hitomi had poured out her heart to and had
thought her soul mate and one true love—had been a part of it.
Shinanai. Despite what Hitomi had just heard, she loved the aidoru still. . .
No! It was all part of the vampire's magic, a distant fragment that was her logical mind cried out in anguish. Not love.
Shinanai hadn't loved her after all! And neither had Hitomi's father.
Grief and anger settled upon Hitomi like heavy wet robes, each equally stifling. Without thinking, acting purely on emotion, she stabbed the key that would activate the commlink utility and allow her to cut into the telecom call.
"I hate you!" she cried. "I hate you both! You are not worthy of my love!"
Her father stared at her in shocked surprise.
Shinanai began to laugh.
The connection was suddenly broken. The monitor screen of her cyberterminal went blank.
Hitomi slumped over the keyboard, washing it with her tears. Shinanai didn't care. Her beloved aidoru didn't love her after all.
Hitomi was still in that position when the attendants came and removed the cyberterminal from her lap. So numb was she, so filled with grief, that she barely noticed when her father appeared with a mage in tow.
"Erase her memory," he told the magician curtly.
The mage looked startled. "All of it? But that would leave her a vegetable."
"No." Hitomi's father consulted his watch. "Just the past hour. That should be sufficient."
The mage went to work.
Hitomi hadn't even resisted as they used magic to wipe that last, painful memory of Shinanai from her mind. She felt it leave her, piece by piece, like cherry blossoms blown from a tree by an early winter wind.
When it was over, she looked up and saw her father smiling down at her.
"Father," she cried. "It is so good to see you. Look! I've walked to the lounge on my own."
Something was missing. Something that had sat in her lap, just a moment ago . . .
But Hitomi couldn't remember what that might have been. And so she returned her father's smile, knowing that one day she would have the strength to walk out of the arcology, to run away to Shinanai's loving embrace once more. . .
