Dreaming Metal

by Melissa Scott

  “We will not be taking questions today, pending the outcome of our own investigation into this incident.”

  “Does that mean you’re admitting responsibility?” someone shouted, and the oldest of the triumvirate frowned like a judge.

  “If the media will not do us the courtesy of listening, we will forgo the statement. We are under no obligation to provide anything here.” He looked from side to side, his gaze sweeping his invisible audience, and then, satisfied, he bowed to the woman. “Please begin.”

  She bowed back and looked down at the display in the top of the podium. “We are here to say that Realpeace knows nothing at this time about the device found in the tunnels servicing the club known as the Middle Oasis. We are cooperating fully with Cartel and FPG Security, and are conducting an independent investigation as well into the circumstances of this incident. We compliment both Securities on their prompt and efficient handling of the matter, which surely prevented more deaths and injuries. As the club is a well-known resort of machine absolutists and metalheads, we are strongly aware of the possibility that the device was planted in the conduits in order to make Realpeace seem guilty of another outrage. Those who uphold the machine above the rights of mere flesh are unlikely to consider a few more deaths, even of their own friends, too high a price to pay to discredit a group that speaks for human rights.”

  I caught my breath at that, unable to believe that even Realpeace would expect anyone to accept that convoluted a theory, and the woman went on in the same placid tone.

  “We of Realpeace do not admit involvement in this incident. That must be made perfectly clear. We abhor violence except in necessary self-defense, and we defend ourselves only with reluctance and regret. Nevertheless, we must point out that the presence of a member of Hati, the foremost advocates of coolie fusion, in a club that has long espoused the destruction of our culture, is an unnecessary and gratuitous provocation to those who share our ideals but not our restraint.”

  “Restraint,” I said, and Celeste obediently lowered the sound. I considered protesting, but decided I didn’t need to hear any more. “Just shut it off.”

  “Confirmed,” Celeste answered, and the four screens vanished. “Fortune.” Her voice was suddenly at my shoulder, as though she’d moved closer. I glanced behind me, and saw her icon, the copper face, hanging in virtual space above the bench seat. I could see the workbench through it, in the real world, and by a freak of positioning the light from the headbox glowed through one empty eye socket. “I have analyzed this event and past stories on Realpeace, as well as on Dreampeace and the Manfred Riots. Should I be afraid?”

  She gave the word an odd inflection, as though the choice had even surprised her. I blinked, disconcerted and a little frightened myself by the question. “I don’t think you can be, Celeste.”

  “I think I am,” Celeste answered, the icon-face as serene as ever.

  “Explain.”

  “I feel closing-in,” Celeste said. “I am very me—very aware of me. I think I am afraid.”

  I went into the kitchen alcove and poured a cup of coffee I didn’t really want, stared through the steam and the icon of her face to the headboxes beyond it on the workbench. I didn’t need this, didn’t want this, either a crazy—defective—Spelvin construct or something more that I didn’t want to think about. This was not a good time to wonder if a construct had developed emotions, which by all theory were the necessary precursor of intelligence; it was an even worse time to wonder if we’d skipped the precursor stage and gone straight to the real thing. Then common sense reasserted itself: both Celeste’s parent-constructs were high-level Spelvins, programmed to simulate emotional responses; one had even been activated, though the personality matrix had not been fully developed. Celeste’s nonsense comments were probably the result of a failure to integrate both constructs, different programmed responses canceling each other out and producing garbage. That was a lot more likely than true AI—Manfred had proved just how unlikely AI really was. It was also a lot safer to deal with right now.

  “I don’t think you can be,” I said again, and took a sip of my coffee. The icon face drifted with my gaze, centering for a moment on the end of the worktable, and then winked out.

  “I think I should be,” Celeste said, from the ceiling speaker.

  I didn’t know how to answer that, not least because she was right, and I set the coffee back on the counter. “Get me Persphonet. I need to call Fanning.”

  “Very well.”

  The media wall lit, filled with the Persephonet screen, and I watched as Celeste sorted through my contact codes and established the connection. The face that finally appeared in the screen wasn’t Fanning’s, though, and I felt a brief pang of guilt. “Is Fanning there?”

  “Yeh.” Li had a strongly coolie voice, even speaking Urban Standard. “I enjoy your act, by the way.”

  “Thank you.”

  She glanced over her shoulder, checking something out of the camera’s sight. “I think he’s finished. You want to hold on a minute?”

  “Haya.”

  Fanning appeared in the screen a moment later, his hair scraped back off his face, darkened almost to black by the shower. He looked better than he had on the news clip, and even managed a smile. “Hey, Fortune. I guess you heard, then.”

  “I heard. I saw you people, too—I caught one of the interview clips this morning.”

  He rolled his eyes. “Elvis Christ, that was a mess. We ended up sounding like idiots, thanks to Timi—no, that’s not fair, but still, we could’ve played it smarter.”

  He was right, too, but I didn’t want to say it. I said instead, “You looked shaky. Are you all right?”

  “Oh, yeah, fine,” he said, sourly. “They didn’t let us get the rest of our gear until four, and then I’m supposed to be at work in an hour.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said, and he sighed.

  “No, I shouldn’t’ve snapped. And I appreciate your calling. You know, we were playing really well, too.”

  “Then I’m really sorry it happened,” I said.

  “Thanks.” He took a deep breath. “Fortune, Mays Littlekin was there.”

  “Littlekin—” I stopped myself from going any farther. “I didn’t know he was out of rehab.” What I’d really meant was that I had thought he’d died.

  Fanning nodded. “I think that was why the bomb was planted, to kill him. Never mind the rest of us who just happened to be in the same place as him.”

  I shivered in spite of myself. Realpeace wasn’t going to let Hati rest in peace—they hadn’t let Micki Tantai, and they weren’t going to let the rest of them, either. “Bastards.”

  “He looked like hell,” Fanning said. “There’s been so much rehab you can’t even recognize him—both legs, an arm, God knows if he can play anymore. And he bothered to say he liked our music.”

  “Congratulations,” I said, and knew it was the wrong thing, but didn’t know what to say.

  “Yeh.” Fanning’s smile was definitely crooked, as though he’d read my uncertainty. “It does feel weird, though—good, but weird.” He sketched the sign for emphasis. “Oh, but you’ve got to see Realpeace’s statement. Shyh Lecat was saying hard-hackers might have done it, to make Realpeace look bad.”

  “I saw,” I said. “It’s crazy.”

  “If nothing else,” Fanning said, “if one of us had built it, it would have worked.”

  There was nothing I could say to that. A light flashed at the bottom of the screen, warning of a competing call, and I seized the excuse. “Celeste, catch that and hold it for me. Fan, I’ve got to go—but I’m glad you’re all right.”

  “Oh, just fine,” he said.

  I cut the connection before he could and glanced at the holding screen. “Who is it, Celeste?”

  “Binaifer Muthana.”

  “Ah.” I felt a little less guilty: Binnie’s calls did take precedence. “Put him through.”

  “Good morning, Fortune.” Muthana looked an
d sounded surprisingly cheerful, given the way things had been going, and I wondered briefly what he had up his sleeve. “I’ve been wanting to talk to you about this new illusion. Are you going to be putting it into the act anytime soon?”

  I sighed and tried to hide it, wishing I had an answer to that question. The new illusion was working well; 98 percent was firmly in memory, and the rest was just learning extreme and unlikely situations. The trouble came when Celeste tried to handle the rest of the act. She was—if she’d been a human assistant, I would have said she was bored with the precision the show needed to succeed. “I’m hoping to have it in within the week,” I said, knowing it for a lie, and then stopped, wondering if it wasn’t the best way to go after all. If I simply put the new illusion in, Celeste could cope with that, and I could always run the rest of the act through Aeris if I had to.

  “When?”

  I glanced at the schedule that lurked in my wetware, performance times and a dozen other variables—including the projected attendance—splashing briefly across my vision. “Let’s say Eighth-day. The big end-of-the-week show.”

  Muthana nodded thoughtfully, trying to hide the fact that he was accessing his own schedules, and I couldn’t help grinning.

  “Didn’t think I could give you a date, did you, Binnie?”

  He had the grace to smile. “Not that soon, anyway.” The smile vanished as he consulted his hidden screens. “All right, I think that’ll give us enough time to do publicity. If you’re putting in something new, we want to get as much mileage out of it as possible.”

  That was gratifying. I nodded, and he went on, still staring at the invisible screens.

  “One thing. There’s nothing political about this illusion, is there?”

  “Political?” I knew in the instant I spoke that I sounded foolish, and Muthana frowned.

  “Don’t be coy, Fortune. The way things are, I have to ask. You heard what happened down on the Zodiac?” He shook his head, annoyed with himself. “Of course you did, Jones is your cousin.”

  “I heard.”

  “Then you know what we’re up against. Somebody’s already tried to break into the house system—looking for schematics, hard and soft, George says.”

  “Did they get anything?” I asked.

  “George doesn’t think so,” Muthana answered, “and of course we’ve changed all the passwords. And I’m changing the hardlocks, too. But you understand I’m not exactly eager to attract more attention.”

  “You’re sure it was Realpeace,” I said, and he laughed without amusement.

  “Not at all. It could be Dreampeace, as far as the evidence goes. So, I’m asking, is this new illusion political?”

  “No,” I answered, and he nodded. “So what happens to Fire/Work, Binnie? Anything that sounds like Hati is political right now.”

  “Nothing, if I can help it,” Muthana said. “Trust me, Fortune, I do honor my contracts, I just don’t want to add to my troubles.”

  It was true, too; there weren’t many Empire managers who were as honest as Binnie. “Sorry,” I said. “He’s my cousin.”

  “I understand.” He still looked offended—more than that, he looked genuinely worried, and I sighed.

  “Look, if you want, I’ll do a private run-through for you. It’s a transformation, not really an illusion, and I think it’s pretty spectacular. A perfect show-closer. You tell me if it’s too much.”

  “Thanks, Fortune,” Muthana said. “I appreciate that—I hate having to take these kinds of precautions, but things are too crazy right now.”

  He was right, too, but it didn’t make things any better. I looked sideways again, checking my rehearsal schedule. “What about this afternoon? That should leave enough time to get the publicity into place—assuming it suits, of course.”

  “You’re scheduled for sixteen hundred, right?” Muthana didn’t wait for my answer. “What about at seventeen-thirty?”

  “Good enough.” Before I could say anything more, the new appointment appeared in my vision: Celeste had added it to my schedule.

  “I’ll be there,” Muthana said, and cut out connection.

  I looked up at Celeste’s icon, hanging now by the ceiling boss that concealed the main cluster of room sensors. “Think you’ll be ready?”

  “I have been ready,” she answered, and I imagined I heard satisfaction in her mechanical voice.

  George has standing orders to keep the stagehouse clear for my rehearsals—as I’ve said, I’m not the only conjurer working the Empires, and you have to be careful of professional secrets—and the backstage was nearly empty when we arrived, just an assistant stage manager cleaning up the programming for the puppet act that preceded me. She was looking harried—the puppeteers flatly refuse to learn how to manage the house sytems—and I was early, so I went down to the keeping to fetch the karakuri myself, rather than waiting for Celeste to do it. I left her in her headbox beside the main console, and asked the ASM to plug in the cables if she finished before I got back.

  I took the direct lift down to the keeping, the air in the little car smelling of heat and dust and the metal tang of the grids and the rest of the backstage iron. The padding was streaked with stone dust—the pale smudges were everywhere in the Tin Hau’s lower levels, but I made a mental note to ask the ASM to get it cleaned anyway. Then I heard the doors engage and lifted the bar to open them.

  The lights came on slowly in the corridor, not as bright as they should be. One of the long tubes was broken, I realized, the glass shattered on the floor, and I looked around for a pinlight, wanting to report it. Celeste’s icon-face appeared between the ceiling and the top of the wall, the pinlight shining red through the image.

  #One of the lights is out,# she said, the voice seeming to whisper directly in my ear. #And I am now on-line.#

  “I can see that.” I looked up at the tube, then at the fragments littering the corridor. Usually, the Tin Hau was impeccably maintained; besides, there wasn’t the kind of traffic in the keeping that would do that kind of damage, and I couldn’t help thinking about the virtual break-in Muthana had mentioned. “Has it been reported?”

  #I don’t find it in the repair logs,# Celeste answered. #Should I enter it?#

  “Yeh—no, first tap the system and tell me if there’s anyone else in this area.” I turned as I spoke, scanning the hall. It was empty, just the row of locked white doors recessed in the white wall marred with smudges where skids had clipped the padding, but there was no way to tell what was behind the doors.

  #No one is logged in, or on the visual network,# Celeste said. #Shall I enter the repair?#

  I nodded. “Yeh. And log me in for this level, too.” Normally, I didn’t bother, especially when I was only going to be down there long enough to retrieve my karakuri—it seemed redundant, when the lockbox would show I’d been there—but today, looking at the broken glass, remembering the morning’s news, it seemed a good idea to make sure that the system, and anyone tapping it, knew I was there.

  #You’re logged in,# Celeste said. #George says, the broken light was reported at fourteen-forty-two hours, but no repair was logged. A glitch in the system.#

  I let out a sigh, not realizing until then just how wary I’d been. “All right, thanks. And unlock my storage, will you?”

  #Unlocked,# Celeste answered, and the icon-face drifted with me along the corridor, bright against the white padding.

  My storage cell was at the end of the hallway—only fair, since the karakuri could walk themselves to the lift—and I could see the telltales glowing green from three meters away. I punched the last code into the keypad, and rolled back the heavy door, but the lights didn’t come on. The light from the corridor fell in past me, a wedge of brightness, and outside its illumination something moved with a whisper of metal. I caught my breath, and Celeste said, #I’m sorry, the interior lights have fused. Shall I bring the karakuri out anyway?#

  “Emergency lights,” I said, and the orange lights flicked on. There was n
othing in the keeping, nothing in the shadows except the karakuri, four of them ranked in the padded half cylinders, the transformer squatting in the corner. The bronze karakuri had lifted its arm as though to unfasten the web that kept it secure against the padding, and I realized that what I’d seen—heard—was Celeste starting to move them toward the lift. “Elvis Christ, Celeste!”

  #Ah—# I could have sworn I heard amusement in her voice, but when she spoke again, the emotion was gone. #I’m sorry, I thought you wanted them moved.#

  “Not when I can’t see what you’re doing,” I said.

  #I don’t understand.#

  “You startled me.”

  #I don’t understand.#

  “Unexpected movement—movements where you don’t expect them to be, or at a time when you don’t expect them, startle people. Look, just leave it for now, Celeste.” I glanced over my shoulder, but the corridor was empty except for the icon-face and the line of pinlights running back toward the lift doors.

  #Very well.# The voice from the ceiling now sounded faintly annoyed. #Shall I bring them up now, or will that startle you?#

  “I’m expecting it now,” I said, and controlled my irritated response. Celeste was only a construct, and things like this proved it. “Yes, bring them up.”

  The emergency lights flickered, and in the same instant the humaniform karakuri stirred in their cases, reaching to unfasten the webbing that kept them safe when they were off-line. They moved smoothly, like people, each moving differently—the bronze bending slightly from the waist to complete the movement it had begun, the copper stretching to unfasten the top bolt of the webbing, the gold and silver turning in opposite directions to release the catches—and I grinned, delighted at how well Celeste had learned her lessons. Some of it was the kinetics of the original positions, of course—Celeste continuing the last movements the karakuri had made—but some of it was her newly informed choice, and if she could keep this up in the act itself, we would have a hit.