All The Frail Futures: A Science Fiction Box Set

by J Battle

  Base was a low slung, ranch style house; there was even a cactus in the yard.

  Debois sniffed when he saw Janice in the doorway. She was dressed in a dark grey suit, the skirt ankle length, the lapels a hazard to anyone within a metre of her. Not that there were many who would volunteer to get that close. Her dark hair was medium length, brushed off her face in some complicated, wave like, forlorn attempt at glamour.

  The sneer formed by her bright red lips was surely permanent; at least for him.

  ‘Took your time.’

  ‘I’m sorry, I was off com.’

  ‘In that dive, The Hanging Participle?’

  ‘Well, it suits me.’

  ‘Still poking the girls?’ She rested one finger on her crimson bottom lip, showing tiny white even teeth. On someone else it might have seemed a provocative tease. On Janice, it was really quite disturbing.

  ‘Where is he?’

  ‘Just go through.’

  The doorway was narrow and Janice wasn’t, so he had to squeeze past her to gain entry; he shivered as he felt something soft and squishy pressed against his hip. He did not want to know what part of her body had assaulted him.

  Inside there was a large over furnished living area. He was sure the Dralon was wrong era, but the linoleum looked about right.

  The room was empty so he walked through to the back porch where he found a swing seat and a rocking chair.

  ‘Hi Michelle. Thanks for coming. I understand you were with the delightful Allea; what was she wearing?’

  Debois shrugged. ‘The usual.’

  He was uncomfortable with this sort of matey casual talk amongst men. He never knew what was appropriate to discuss.

  And it was even worse with his boss Darnall, who effected the physical appearance of a 12 year old boy, with curly blonde hair (a little too long for the period) and rosebud lips.

  He was sitting in the rocking chair, a whiskey glass in one hand and what was surely a Cuban cigar in the other. One bare foot was balanced on his knee.

  ‘So, you’ve heard the news.’ His voice was that of a child, his diction, syntax and tone, that of a bi- centenarian. ‘Are you ready?’

  ‘Yes, sir!’ Debois felt a little macho surge.

  ‘You do realise that, if things don’t go to plan, you won’t be coming back?’

  ‘I’ve been preparing for this all of my life. To die for the sake of Earth would be an honour.’

  ‘Don’t get too gung ho on me Michelle. Subtlety is the watchword here.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Debois; subtly.

  ‘You’ll need to have your comms removed. He won’t risk any implants.’

  ‘No problem, sir. My organic enhancements are all up to optimum levels and I’ve done my full quota at machine speed.’

  ‘Yes, I’ve seen your test scores. Very impressive. Your ship will be recording everything and broadcasting to a fascinated world; you’re going to be famous.’

  ‘Will the Russell Project continue, after I am successful?’

  ‘There is still so much we don’t know. Don’t forget that you must make a final broadcast, before the end, if that is the way things develop. Fast-splat the data but, don’t forget, we want an emotional, heartfelt, tearful finale. If we don’t actually succeed in the mission, at least we can have record ratings. We should be early 21st Century Parody by then.’

  ‘Not the 1980’s?’

  ‘No, it’s all going to be about celebrity, reality TV and spurious wars. It’s going to be great.’

  ‘I was hoping for the 80’s.’

  ‘I can see why, but it’s hardly relevant now, is it?’

  ‘No sir.’

  Darnall drained his glass and slipped out of the chair. He stuck his cigar in the corner of his mouth and reached up and placed a hand on Michelle’s shoulder.

  ‘The world is watching, Debois. We know you won’t let us down.’ At least that was what it sounded like as he muttered around the cigar.

  Debois’s bottom lip quivered. ‘You can rely on me, sir.’

  Darnall grunted and turned away.

  Debois strode back through the house and accidently bumped Janice off the front porch as he passed.

  Chapter 13

  Debois moved towards Jack, placing a tentative hand on his arm.

  ‘Listen to me Jack. It’s going to be OK.’

  ‘They’re downstairs, I can go and see them now.’

  Debois couldn’t allow that. It was far too soon.

  ‘You don’t have to do that, Jack, you’re contact is back. And this time you will have full access to all of your memories. Nothing will..’

  Jack was no longer listening to him.

  He was walking down a narrow twisting country lane, with Ben on his back and Julie laughing by his side. They were all slightly damp from a recent shower and Jack was trying to sing a song, struggling a little as he couldn’t remember the words. Julie knew them, but just laughed at his wild guesses.

  Then, as the rain started up again, they came to a small cottage, hidden from the lane. It was their home. Of course there was a fire burning…

  ‘Jack. Jack. Listen to me.’ Jack wanted to push Debois away for disturbing his reverie.

  ‘We have to talk, Jack.’

  ‘Why do you need me now, anyway? I thought you were just dealing with my AI!’

  ‘Things have to be done and only you can do them.’

  Debois turned from him and seated himself in the chair. It seemed much more comfortable than before and was covered it what looked like pink velvet.

  ‘Let me explain. You have access to your full range of memories now, so you will be able to verify everything I say.’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘Over the many thousands of years that you have been travelling around the universe, you looked for ways to preserve yourself. I won’t make any comment about how egotistical that sounds now, I’m sure you felt your motives were perfectly valid. In your present form you are close to immortal, barring accidents, but it seems that was not enough. So you made seven copies of yourself, each one containing a cloned version of your precious brain, implanted with your memories. Each one was then hidden in secret locations across the universe.’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘I see we’re going to have a fine old time, conversation wise.’

  There was no obvious response from Jack.

  ‘From Earth’s viewpoint, you yourself represent a serious threat to the safety and smooth running of our empire. Seven further versions of you make it imperative that preventive action be taken.’

  ‘OK.’

  Debois hesitated.

  ‘We have already disposed of one of those seven; Number Six. We need you to finish the job and deal with the other six.’

  ‘Deal with?’

  ‘Destroy, kill, dispose of. However you wish to describe it, their threat must be nullified.’

  ‘How did you kill the one you killed?’

  ‘Your drive leaves a tell-tale signal when you flicker back in to normal space. We can usually track part of your journey. In this case we were able to back track and trace you to a particular group of stars. Then it was a needle in a haystack operation.

  ‘We found him hidden away in the depths of a mountain. We blew the whole thing up.’

  ‘Can you be sure that was enough?’

  ‘When the dust cloud cleared we sifted through what was left of the remains of the mountain and found the remains. We removed the remaining organic material and reduced the artificial parts to their basic component level. Those parts were later taken away for study.’

  ‘And the brain?’

  ‘Destroyed by fire.’

  ‘Very thorough.’

  ‘We thought so. It took us months, but we had to be sure.’

  ‘How will you know if I have fulfilled your request?’

  Debois pursed his lips. With no facial expression and precious little physical indication of his thoughts, it was hard to gauge jack’s mood and anticipat
e what could be a violent reaction.

  ‘Well of course I’ll be coming with you, every step of the way.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘When the task is complete, we will both return to Earth to a hero’s welcome and a nice warm happy ending. How does that sound?’

  ‘How did you get my AI to agree to this?’

  ‘I think it is only fair to say that your AI’s disagreement has been suspended, for the time being. I was able to appraise it of a situation that it had not previously been aware of.’

  ‘And at any time that disagreement might be re-instated?’

  ‘Yes. Exciting isn’t it?’

  ‘Do you not enjoy living, then?’

  ‘Of course, I can’t think of a better way to spend my time.’

  ‘What was the situation you felt it was necessary to appraise my AI of, without my presence?’

  ‘You know that I’m not going to tell you. Not now, anyway. When this all over, you will know the complete truth.’

  Jack took a moment to consider the lies he was being told; were there any that he had missed?

  ‘When do we start?’ he said, quietly.

  ‘Whenever you are ready. I suggest you review your newly expanded memory to ascertain where each copy is located and plot a course accordingly. Although I should say that we should get to Number Two as soon as it is practically possible.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It is eating worlds.’

  Chapter 14

  Debois watched Jack carefully but there was, as usual, no feedback.

  He glanced towards the door that led below. It had been close; he couldn’t have allowed Jack to go down there; not without the control of his AI.

  During his interface with Jack’s AI, Debois was able to view a little more than was freely provided. He could see part of the deception being perpetrated on Jack. If Jack had been allowed to see what the bay actually contained, it could have meant disaster for the mission.

  At some stage he would find out, but not until the job was complete.

  As Jack wasn’t doing very much, Debois moved to the opposite side of the room and adopted a pensive pose, his arms folded across his round stomach.

  He was aware that their every move and word was followed by the infrared cameras and microphones in the device he had stuck to the outer hull as he entered the ship.

  The images would be converted into a 3D docu-drama that would be broadcast to all the parts of the Earth that were not pretending to be in the 1950s, and even they would see the updates in their morning newspapers (on actual paper!).

  They would be stars for the next few years, until the last copy of Jack had been removed. Their names would be known across the whole empire.

  But at the end, if their mission was not a success, his heroic role would be tainted with treachery.

  **********

  Jack was not searching his newly updated memories for the location of the replicants. He was lost in the memories of his time during and after the Sunblind Operation.

  He flicked from episode to episode, mining each for some sense, some understanding of what he had done.

  Finding his companions dead, he was appalled that the knock-out drug had proved fateful. It was surely a mistake; not innocent of course, though unintended. The plan was for them all to survive, but if anyone failed to do so, it would be him.

  He had to carry on, for his family’s sake.

  So he had put his head down and tried to ignore his dead shipmates. But, after a few days the smell had become too intense to bear in the restricted space they shared. So he had donned his spacesuit and dragged each of them into the narrow airlock, one by one. The airlock was cramped; meant for one person in a spacesuit. Of course neither Davies nor Barnes needed spacesuits, so he managed to squeeze them out into the cold grasp of space.

  Then it was three months later and the last of a multitude of warnings had been given; he had one day to close down the operation and return to Earth to face the consequences of his crimes. The alternative was the destruction of the Sunblind by the hastily assembled Earth Space missile system.

  Jack had judged that the time was right and climbed into the return module, leaving the Sunblind in full operation.

  As he fired the rockets that would put him on course for a perilous atmospheric entry, he radioed Houston. A safe return was dependent on guidance from the ground. Without it, he would be unlikely to survive. He was hardly surprised when there was no response.

  Somehow, he survived. He didn’t burn up on entry, but he was travelling far too fast and the angle was too steep. When he deployed the parachute it was ripped from his craft almost instantly, doing nothing to slow his suicidal velocity.

  If he’d landed on water, he might have made it, if the fates were on his side. In fact, he missed the ocean by less than a hundred metres. With the sand slowing him a little before he ploughed into the forest, he was probably only travelling at 100 kilometres per hour when he hit the first tree.

  His rescuers, or captors, were close by. They had tracked him all the way. They were able to cut his mangled body from the wreckage and helicopter him to the nearest military hospital, which just happened to be on a Royal Naval vessel that had been involved in the operation.

  Although they expected to be delivering a corpse, somehow, part of him was still alive. The neck was broken, the body crushed, but the brain still endured.

  After days working on him, the doctors announced that there was nothing they could do for him, without mechanical aid he could not survive.

  But General Smythe would not accept that. As part of the joint Army Navy taskforce, he was in charge.

  ‘Is your diagnosis brain death?’ he asked, in his normal abrupt manner.

  ‘No, his brain is really in quite good condition, now that we’ve stopped the bleeding.’ Though the surgeon was a civilian, he still felt a strange urge to stand at attention and salute. The General had that effect on people.

  ‘In that case, he must stand trial for what he has done. We cannot let him escape justice. There must be something we can do. ’

  There was.

  Brian Hicks was the CEO of Hominids R Us. They manufactured high end personal robots for the rich and confused. Of course, they didn’t call them robots or androids; hominids were considered less threatening. Their hominids were short, bulky creations with flashing lights and jerky movements; designed not to resemble humans in the least.

  Hicks was so keen to produce the best possible pseudo human that, when the tender came out, his offered price was 1 dollar.

  Naturally he got the job.

  They told him what they wanted; easy. They told him the timescale; not so easy.

  The requirement was that Russell would be able to walk in to a courtroom, sit and answer questions. He was to look as human as possible so as not to inspire undue sympathy. And when the death penalty was pronounced, there should be an off switch.

  Now Hicks saw these requirements as minimums; he wanted to see how much better he could do.

  So the body he made for Jack moved like a human; a very tall human. To accommodate all the built in features, he had to be over 2 metres tall. But he could walk and talk; if he had to dance, that would not have been a problem. He could run like the wind and, although he couldn’t leap tall buildings, he was as close to superman as Hicks could make.

  He did have an off switch but it was a dummy. Hicks wasn’t going to let them destroy his creation.

  Jack was tried in an English court so, despite the protests and machinations of Big Bob, there would be no death penalty.

  Jack had hardly listened to the proceedings or the verdict; just before the trial he was told that his wife and child had been found dead, in his home. The weapon was a simple kitchen knife; the finger prints were his.

  Another two more crimes to add to the ever growing list.

  The verdict was life imprisonment; minimum term 50 years.

  It meant nothing to him.

 
‘Jack. Jack. Can you hear me?’

  Debois’s words brought him back to the present.

  ‘Can you remember where they are?’

  For a second he was unresponsive; then he nodded his head.

  ‘Can you plot a course?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Shall we start? Which order will it be?’

  ‘We can start whenever you are ready.’

  ‘I’m always ready, Jack,’ he said, archly.

  ‘You think this is an appropriate time for levity?

  ‘If not now, when? I know this must be difficult for you, but we have a long way to go. And we’re just going to have to get used to each other. I know your sparkling personality is going to be something of a trial for me. ’

  ‘And your drab conversation is going to be a challenge for me.’

  ‘Oh my. A joke even. This is going to work out fine.’

  Chapter 15

  The dust rises gently at every footfall, and seems to take an age to fall back to the rocky ground. Some powdery material remains clinging to his ankles as he walks towards the light, held by residual static.

  There is a clearly defined boundary he is about to cross; no fuzziness or twilight. He walks from absolute bitter darkness into the brilliant cold light of the sun. There is no atmosphere to soften either extreme, for this is the Moon and he has been hidden here on the dark side for millennia.

  But today his hiding has come to an end and there are things that will have to be done before he can allow himself to rest once more, and cherish the gift that was given to him so long ago, his very reason for existence.

  In the full glare of the sun, he bends to examine the array of sensors that have been keeping a close watch on his home world for more than a century. There are a multitude of tiny impact scars, caused by some of the millions of micro meteorites that hit the lunar surface each year but, otherwise, the equipment is fine.

  He sometimes wonders why Jack placed him here, so close to Earth. Was it just sentiment, or did he already know that the greatest danger to his continued existence would come from Earth? It didn’t really matter; he was here, and it was fortunate that he was.