Realms of Light

by Lawrence Watt-Evans

  “Clever,” I said, as Yoshio-kun argued with Shinichiro about which members of the family would be allowed to remain in the compound. “But it’s going to figure it out eventually. We need to get out of here, get you somewhere safe. It knows you shut down those floaters, it knows you’re up to something...”

  The old man raised a finger. “It is not certain of the floaters. The ship’s firewall recorded their last second or so of output and looped it, so my false son is still receiving transmissions, even if those transmissions don’t make sense. It can’t be sure of what happened; it is receiving error messages, not silence.”

  “That’s clever, too,” I acknowledged. “But it still controls everything outside the ship; are you planning to live in here indefinitely?”

  “No,” he said. “I am going to take back my home.”

  “How?”

  “Mis’ Hsing,” he said, “do you think I survived this long without learning to take precautions?”

  “I know that whatever precautions you took, that piece of gritware seems to have gotten past them and hacked the whole place.”

  “Shinichiro has indeed compromised the family nets. That can be dealt with.”

  “How? You can’t shut off access the way you would for an outside attack; it lives in the net! And it’s not stupid—it must be distributed all through the place, with back-ups everywhere, you can’t just cut its server out of the system.”

  “Nonetheless, I can deal with it.”

  “How?”

  “You will see. I dare not be too specific, lest Shinichiro might somehow overhear. Now, can you spare me some clothing? I prefer to be less recognizable.”

  I still had no idea what he was up to, but it was obvious I wasn’t going to talk him out of it. I decided to go along for the moment.

  My spare worksuit was small even for Grandfather Nakada, and he asked whether perhaps Minish Singh might have something he could wear. I explained that none of my passengers had had an opportunity to pack anything, that all three had come aboard with nothing but what they were wearing—which was nothing, in my father’s case.

  “Then this will have to do,” he said, starting to pull on the garment.

  I left the cabin, ostensibly to give him some privacy, but then headed to the control deck to talk to Perkins, and convince him to get us the hell out of there.

  He listened to me calmly, then said, “I’m sorry, Mis’ Hsing, but I take my orders from Mis’ Nakada. If he doesn’t want to go, then we aren’t going.”

  “But he’s going to get himself killed!”

  “That’s his privilege.”

  “Death isn’t a privilege, you blue-eyed fool!”

  “I hardly think racial epithets are called for, Mis’ Hsing.”

  I glared at him, and was about to say something else, when the old man came up behind me. He had Singh with him.

  “What’s going on?” Singh asked.

  “You are about to earn yourself a lucrative position with Nakada Enterprises,” Yoshio told him.

  “He is?” I asked.

  “He is. And you, Mis’ Hsing, are about to earn your fee and a generous bonus.”

  “How?” I asked.

  “By serving as my bodyguards while I put an end to this insurrection.”

  I looked at Singh. “Has he told you what’s going on?”

  “No,” Singh said.

  “There is a severe software problem,” the old man said, before I could speak. “I am going to deal with it. You two are going to defend me while I do it.”

  “Defend you from what?” Singh asked.

  “Floaters, probably,” I said. “Maintenance equipment, household security systems, that sort of thing.”

  “Precisely,” Grandfather Nakada said. “Mis’ Hsing has her own weapon, but I believe Captain Perkins can provide you with a sidearm, Mis’ Singh. The ship will be using its own armament, such as it is, to assist us.”

  “It will?” Perkins asked.

  “The ship has armament?” I asked.

  “It does, and it will.”

  Perkins and I exchanged glances.

  “My personal floater will also be aiding us, as it has not been compromised,” the old man added.

  “You’re sure of that?” I said.

  “I am.”

  “Where are we going?” I asked.

  “There is a service tunnel beneath my personal apartments.”

  “I’m sure there is. So what?”

  “I will show you when we get there.”

  Again, I looked at the others, but they seemed just as unenlightened as I was.

  “We should go, before Shinichiro can prepare further defenses.”

  I suspected it had all the defenses it needed, but I didn’t see any point in arguing. I was either going to go with the old man now, or I was going to quit entirely.

  And I didn’t think it was too late to quit. The Shinichiro upload might let me go; I sure didn’t think my odds of survival were any worse if I told Grandfather Nakada to flush his job.

  But I didn’t. I checked to be sure my gun was loaded and powered up, and then I said, “Let’s go.”

  We went.

  Singh and I came out the airlock door first, so that the old man would be behind us, harder to see. He had a holofield up to hide his face, but we didn’t think that would fool anyone for long, especially not in the daylight. The sun was low in the west, but still brighter than I liked; I blinked. A lot.

  There were long black shadows stretching across the landing field, looking ominous and alien.

  The blue-and-silver floater was waiting for us, and the four of us, three humans and the floater, moved down the ramp in a group.

  The cloud of floaters had surrounded the ship; now a couple of dozen of them came swooping around to intercept us. I tried to look innocuous, and hoped the others would follow my lead.

  “Hold your fire,” the old man whispered.

  “Excuse me,” Shinichiro’s voice said from one of the larger floaters, one with a red-velvet finish and a single gleaming, copper-colored hand. “Where are you going?”

  “Mis’ Nakada ordered us off the ship,” I said. “He told us to go to his quarters and wait there. Care to point us in the right direction?” I kept walking as I spoke; the floater turned to keep pace with us.

  “Mis’ Hsing, your employment is done,” it said. “You should leave.”

  “Tell the old man,” I said. “It’s his ship, and he ordered us off.”

  “Please identify yourselves. I do not recognize two of you.”

  “This is Minish Singh,” I said, pointing as we walked. “He used to work for Seventh Heaven Neurosurgery. And this is Zarathustra Pickens; he was involved in my little quarrel with your grand-niece Sayuri awhile back.”

  The floater’s camera lens swiveled, and then the upload said, “Father, that’s very clever. Who am I really speaking to on the ship?”

  The old man didn’t answer it; instead he tapped me on the shoulder and said, “Fire. Then run.”

  I didn’t need to ask what he meant; I brought the HG-2 up, pointed it at the big red floater, and pulled the trigger.

  I hadn’t had a chance to brace for the recoil, and the gun jerked in my hand as it locked on the target anyway, so it wasn’t pointing quite where I’d expected and I probably wouldn’t have been ready anyway. It knocked me off my feet. I hit the ground as the floater exploded, and kept rolling. I’d shot the thing at close range, and the HG-2 was designed to take out anything you’d find living in a gravity field up to three gees, so I’d expected some shrapnel, but apparently that floater had been carrying something combustible. It went off like a bomb, spraying glass and metal and plastic in all directions.

  Hell, maybe it was designed to, as a defensive measure.

  The blast left me slightly stunned; my ears were ringing and a sort of blurry after-image had me half-blinded. I rolled until I was on my belly, arms guarding my eyes, and I lay there for a moment while my symbi
ote started repairing the damage.

  When the rattle of falling debris ended I uncovered my face and looked around.

  The explosion had taken out several other floaters, but there were still plenty—but as I watched, most of the ones nearest the ship made fizzing noises and fell. I didn’t see anything, but I felt my scalp tighten and the skin on the back of my hands crawled, and I guessed it was some sort of electromagnetic pulse from Ukiba.

  The blue-and-silver one that was supposed to be on our side was zigzagging, trying to knock away more.

  And Singh had scooped up Yoshio and slung him over one shoulder, and he was running toward the door the old man had aimed us at. He was holding his passenger in place with one hand, and the other was waving the gun Perkins had supplied, but he wasn’t firing. He probably didn’t know how the thing worked.

  There was blood on the plastic surface of the landing field, but I didn’t know whose. The explosion must have cut someone up, I thought, but whether it was the old man, or Singh, or me, I couldn’t tell right away.

  The surviving floaters, other than ours, seemed to be disorganized at first, drifting about aimlessly, but as I got to my feet they began to reorient themselves, heading for Singh and his burden.

  I took a step while I checked my gun, then broke into a run, following the others.

  Singh batted a small floater aside, but didn’t use his weapon the way it was meant to be used. I was gaining on the big man; he wasn’t in great shape and he was carrying a passenger, which more than compensated for his longer legs. I could hear him panting, and I could hear the old man saying something, but I couldn’t make out the words.

  A big black floater with a golden badge emblem was approaching—a security bot. Singh wouldn’t be able to swat that one away. I lifted my gun and said, “The black floater.” I saw how close to Singh it was, and added, “Minimize collateral damage.”

  I heard the gun whir slightly as it readied itself. Then I squeezed the trigger.

  I don’t know exactly what sort of round the gun had selected, but it was a tracer—I saw the red streak as it punched a neat hole through the center of the security floater. Then I was sitting on my ass again; the HG-2’s recoil was more than I could handle while running no matter what it fired. I got back up as the black floater hit the ground; it hadn’t just dropped, it had veered off at an angle, still under power but no longer controlled. It bounced, hit again, then scraped along, twisting over onto one side.

  Singh had reached the door, but it didn’t open until Grandfather Nakada reached around and did something, I couldn’t see what. Then the comforting glow of artificial light appeared, gentler and more even than the harsh glare of Eta Cass A, and I ran for it, hobbling slightly—I’d injured my right hip somehow, probably from landing badly after I fired the gun.

  I caught up to Singh about three meters inside the passage, at the top of a metal staircase.

  I hadn’t seen a stairway like that in years, and with my hip not wanting to cooperate I was pretty awkward clambering down; Singh did better, even with the old man on his shoulder, and at the foot of the steps he set Yoshio back on his own feet.

  I was close enough now to see that Singh had a long cut on his face, from just above his left eye back to his left ear; a piece of that red floater must have gouged him there. Grandfather Nakada had several small gashes, as well.

  “This way,” the old man said.

  I glanced up and saw a line of four floaters approaching the steps. I started to say something, then saw that Yoshio had spotted them, too.

  “Through here,” he said, pointing at a door. Singh hurried over to it.

  It didn’t open. He looked for a panel or sensor and didn’t find one, but there was a round metal handle.

  “Turn the knob,” the old man said.

  Singh turned to look at him as if he’d gone mad; apparently he’d never heard of doorknobs, or maybe he just couldn’t imagine he was actually seeing one. I pushed past him, grabbed the knob in both hands, and turned.

  It turned easily, actually, and I heard a mechanism click, but the door still didn’t open.

  “Push on it,” Yoshio said, exasperated.

  I pushed on the knob, and the door swung open on hinges. The three of us hurried through, and I realized we’d lost our floater. It was probably still upstairs, trying to block the entrance.

  When we were through the door the old man turned and pushed it shut, then ordered Singh, “Hold it closed. Lean on it.”

  Singh nodded, and threw himself against the door, pressing his weight onto it.

  Yoshio nodded, then beckoned to me. “This way,” he said.

  I didn’t need directions; we were in a corridor that only went one way, straight ahead. I followed on the old man’s heels.

  We stopped in front of a metal panel in one wall. The old man worked a mechanical latch, and the panel swung open; he reached inside, grabbed a lever, and heaved.

  There was a loud clank, and the corridor abruptly went dark, utterly dark. Then there was a series of thuds, not quite like anything I’d ever heard before, marching away into the distance.

  And after that, the sound—I’d never heard anything like it. All the humming and whirring that was always there, everywhere I ever went, suddenly dropped in pitch and then died away completely. All of it.

  And there we were, in complete blackness and total silence, the most absolute silence I ever experienced.

  For half a second I thought I might have died, but then my eyes adjusted, and I saw the glow from the read-outs on the HG-2. I lifted the gun and checked the status display.

  It was perfectly normal. Whatever the old man had done hadn’t affected my weapon.

  “What’s going on?” Singh called from behind us, his voice unsteady. “What did you do?”

  “I cut the power,” Yoshio said.

  “To what?” I asked.

  “To everything. The entire compound.”

  I blinked at the darkness and tried to look around, but everything was black. I listened, trying to orient myself, but I couldn’t locate anything. I could hear my own breath; I could hear my worksuit rustling when I moved. I thought I might even be hearing my heartbeat.

  My wrist com still worked, though; it ran off my own body’s energy, not an outside source, and a glance at it showed a flurry of red alarm signals—the absence of normal data traffic had upset it. The HG-2 had its own power source, so it was still active, as well.

  “This is really creepy,” Singh said, and his voice seemed very loud in the stillness.

  “The floaters will still be functional,” the old man said calmly, “but they will no longer be receiving orders from the household nets.”

  “There’s no back-up system?” I asked.

  “Of course there is. I shut that down, as well.”

  “You can do that?”

  “This entire compound was built to my specifications; I had this cut-off designed to stop everything. Those sounds you heard after I threw the switch? Those were relays, shutting down every circuit and system.”

  I couldn’t help myself. “Why?” I asked.

  Yoshio sighed, the sound unnaturally loud in the quiet gloom. “When I came here, more than a Terran century ago, there was some doubt about how artificial intelligences would evolve. There were concerns that they might someday rebel, or perhaps merely transform themselves in incomprehensible ways. This was derided as a foolish worry, and given the derisive name ‘Frankenstein syndrome,’ and I gave it little credence, but at the same time, I saw no reason not to take precautions. I had this breaker, and the system of relays, installed for such an eventuality.”

  My symbiote fed me a referent for the name “Frankenstein.” I was a bit surprised something like that was still in my data banks. The Shinichiro upload didn’t bear any resemblance to Dr. Frankenstein’s creation, and it wasn’t exactly an evolved artificial intelligence, but I could see the correlation.

  “I guess they were right to be worried,�
�� I said. “I mean, here we are.”

  “So you shut down all the computers in the entire compound?” Singh asked.

  “I shut down the entire power grid,” Nakada replied grimly.

  I had been starting to relax, but at that I tensed up again. “All the power?” I said. “Then how can we breathe?” I finally made the connection with the utter silence. “Nothing’s circulating the air! We’ll smother in here—if we don’t freeze first. There’s no heat? No light anywhere?”

  “Nonsense, Mis’ Hsing. We can function without machines. Our ancestors did not evolve among generators and circuit boards.”

  “They didn’t evolve on this planet, either. This isn’t Earth.”

  “Nonetheless, we will not smother. There is plenty of air in this tunnel to live for hours without artificial ventilation. We will return to the surface long before we are in any danger of suffocation.”

  “But how will we see? How will we... oh, that’s why the doors work like that. And those stairs... you really did plan for this.”

  “Yes. Though I had not imagined it would be my own family that turned against me.”

  The old man tried to keep his voice even, and mostly succeeded, but I thought I heard bitterness and anger in his words. I considered saying something, telling him that the upload wasn’t really Shinichiro, but I kept my mouth shut—he knew everything I might say, and I respected him enough not to try to tell him what he already knew.

  “What about the floaters?” Singh demanded.

  “You have your gun?” Yoshio asked me.

  “Of course,” I said, raising it.

  “I doubt we will need it; I expect they will be paralyzed, awaiting orders. Just in case, though, be ready.”

  I checked the gun, and told it, “Four floaters. Minimize collateral damage.” Then I pointed it and waited.

  “Open the door,” the old man called.

  I heard the click of the latch, and the sound of hinges, and then a faint grayish light appeared, and the corridor walls were visible again. I peered up the passage, where Singh was a great black shadow against the gray doorway.

  There were no floaters in sight.

  Cautiously, gun ready, we moved back up the passage, through the door, and up the stairs, the light growing brighter with each corner we turned. Finally we emerged back out onto the landing field, where Eta Cass A had dropped below the western horizon, but its light still painted the sky in gold and pink almost as bright as the sky above the Trap. The air was a little chilly, but entirely bearable, even without any artificial climate control.