by Larry Niven
Alice saw Lowdown that night too. She didn’t expect Wellman to be disappeared. She expected his deputy, Lisa Frost, to take over as AG when he retired for reasons of health. She started a security search of May Wyndham’s records and went to bed.
On Monday morning, Alice checked the results, then sent a message to May Wyndham’s old e-mail address. It hadn’t been used to send anything in years, but it had been a lifetime account, so she might still look in on it.
Subject: Launch system needed.
I work in DHS intelligence. Not all of us think the job consists of locking up people who object to us locking up people. The people at the National Appointee Sinecure Association are busy making the universe safe for robots, and we need something to get to the Rock before it gets to us. If you can help, I can get this approved as a Homeland Security Goal Project, and you will get paid.
RSVP.
Alice Johnson
That done, she went to the Games again and hunted up Mycroft Yellowhorse. She hadn’t been able to get a number or an e-mail for him at all.
The Indians were friendly, unless someone called them Native Americans, in which case there followed lectures about marginalization. (As a Wheaton-born third-generation U.S. citizen of Kurdish ancestry, who kept being called “Arab”-American, she had no inclination to do any such thing; they got along.) They did seem to have helpful intentions, but that was about all they had.
She asked a boxer, who’d just knocked out the Bulgarian heavyweight four seconds after the bell, “Where can I find Mycroft Yellowhorse?”
He grinned. “Unless you catch him at breakfast, you can either wait until dinner, or look for a cloud of dust. That’ll be where he was last.”
She told a woman in wrestler’s tights, “I’d like to get hold of Mycroft Yellowhorse.”
“Who wouldn’t? —Try the judges’ box. He likes to go grin at them.”
She got to the cordon around the box and called out, “Mycroft Yellowhorse?”
Several people looked frantically in all directions, then turned to glare at her. A security man said, “You might try the arcade. They blanked the high scores again last night.” He was smiling faintly. Interesting.
She rented a cart to get to the Village shopping mall, which she hadn’t seen yet.
She never did get to see all of it. The size record had once been held by a mall in Canada, but even West Edmonton didn’t have two Baskin-Robbinses.
After half an hour or so, and repeated checks of the numerous standing maps, she found the arcade, which was on a floor she’d missed before. She plugged in her cart outside it, ending the rental—there were plenty more when she wanted to leave—and went inside.
Her first thought was that she should have kept the cart. The arcade alone was about half the size of one floor of a normal indoor mall.
Her second was that the proprietor was a genius. Every kid who had been dragged along to the Olympics for purposes of cultural edification, and gotten fed up with watching sweaty people grunt, had come here. There must have been thousands. They all had somewhere to sit—even the ones who were waiting for a game to be available. The snack bar was essentially a regular mall’s food court.
She headed for the snack bar, which was suddenly very appealing. It had been a long morning.
There was a crowd of kids around a Mastershot game. Other games had crowds around them, and the kids there were yelling when the player did well. These kids were quiet.
The player was a tall Indian with a long black braid down his back. He was playing two-gun mode, and shooting the guns out of the targets’ hands while they were still drawing. The screen showed he had accumulated thirty-six free games. The number changed to thirty-seven as he shot the horns off a four-armed demon. Alice worked her way around until she could see his face; she knew who it was, but she wanted to study his expression.
He had none. He was just watching, firing, and watching some more.
The crowd’s manner altered, many getting even more interested and nudging and murmuring to the ones who hadn’t. She wondered what was on the screen now.
Yellowhorse blazed away at the bottom of the screen, then fired at something at the top of the screen, then raised the pistols. There was a loud wet crunching noise from the speakers, and all the watchers said, “Ahhhhh.” He glanced at Alice and said something to a fat blond kid to his left. The kid’s eyes bugged out, he nodded rapidly, and Yellowhorse gave him the pistols. The crowd applauded, and Yellowhorse raised his hands in acceptance and left the thirty-seven replays to the kid who’d evidently been watching longest.
He came over to where she was, looked around, and began moving toward the snack bar. People moved aside for him.
Once they were through both sets of doors it was quiet. “What did I just miss?” she said.
“Achilles,” he said. “He’s indestructible. It’s a building site. You have to tear up the ground he’s standing on so he can’t use his speed, then drop a truckload of wet cement on him. After him it resets to level one. Come on, I’m rich, I’ll spring for some pizzas.”
“Do they have sushi?”
“Yeah, but I had that this morning. You go ahead, I’ll still spring.” He waved at somebody, made some complicated gestures, and accompanied her to the Japanese section.
“I knew JNAIT was doing well, but how rich do you have to be to get tired of sushi?” she exclaimed.
He looked extremely pleased with her. “You must be a damn fine analyst,” he said. “Not that rich. You do have to be able to afford it whenever you want, but you don’t have to be Marcus Crassus rich. He said no man should consider himself rich unless he could raise and maintain his own army.”
“So you’re not that rich, then.”
“Sure I am. I’m just saying you don’t need to be. And it still takes a while. Pick and choose, the boats always include something weird.”
“I can do weird.”
He raised an eyebrow interestedly.
“I just mean I can eat stuff like blowfish.”
The other eyebrow went up, and he smiled faintly.
She was starting to think she should have spent another day in her room. She turned to the counter and ordered a medium boat meal. She looked back and said, “Aren’t you eating?”
“I already ordered. You don’t have to know sign language in your job?”
“No, thank God. There’s too much detail in my head as it is.”
“Everything reminds you of everything?”
“Yes, exactly!”
He nodded. “Once you have your pension you should write.”
“Hah. My pension is in U.S. dollars.” The Mint had just started issuing five-hundred-dollar coins because it cost too much to print the bills, and the end was not in sight.
“Take a lump sum and immigrate to JNAIT.”
“Retire to another country from an intelligence job? Not for long.”
“They don’t bother us. JNAIT has the Bomb.”
She was horrified. “You realize they’d just slaughter you all if you destroyed a U.S. city, don’t you?”
“What U.S. city? We made it very clear to the State Department last year that if they didn’t stop their harassment we’d nuke Mecca.”
Thereby starting total jihad. Islam worldwide had six times the population of the United States, and dynamite was cheap. “Jesus Christ!”
“I wouldn’t count on it.” He grinned like a carnivore.
Definitely another day in her room.
Which reminded her: “What did you do to me?”
“Not as— Order up.”
He was evidently at least as observant as she was. They got to the pickup counter at the same time as her tray, which she looked at aghast. She was accustomed to sushi being a sliver of fish you could read large print through, on top of about a domino’s worth of rice. This looked like some kind of international relief program. “This can’t be mine!”
“Soup, salad, twenty assorted pieces—including one coe
lacanth, and a bakemono maki,” he said. “It’s what you ordered.”
“Just wave and I’ll bring your ice cream when you’re done,” said the boy behind the counter.
She’d forgotten about the dessert. “So you’ll be here tomorrow?” she asked him.
He didn’t get it, but Yellowhorse did and laughed. “Give it your best shot,” he said. “You may surprise yourself.” They headed for a table.
“If I eat all this at one sitting I’ll turn into a blob,” she said as they sat.
He poured her some tea. “That would astonish me excessively. You just won’t get hungry for a longer while than usual.”
She used wasabi and ginger and took a bite to give herself time to think of an answer.
She ate four pieces before she could stop long enough to speak. When she did, she said, “There’s a question pending.”
It was his own line, and he smiled. “I didn’t do as much last week as you suppose. To give a more complete answer I’ll need you to keep your mind open.”
In the circumstances she was contemplating opening a lot more than her mind for him. “Could you hold off on the suggestive remarks, please?”
He raised that eyebrow again. “It didn’t come out that way over here. The problem must be at your end.”
After a moment’s thought, she said, “That one was on purpose.”
“Yes, it was.” He smiled, and was interrupted by the arrival of a pizza that wouldn’t have fitted on her nightstand at home. It was accompanied by two quart bottles of milk. He carded for them and began rearranging the bacon and pepperoni.
She spent a minute watching him meticulously ensure that every bite would have some of both. After some distracting thoughts about the precision of his hands, a connection was made in her head. “You’re the one they couldn’t find. Connors.”
He looked delighted. “Damn, kid, you are good!”
“I thought what you did to me was some kind of enzyme thing until I saw you fixing your pizza. Nanotechnology has to be right the first time and never go wrong, doesn’t it?”
“Right. We had to stop holding office potlucks because people were gaining so much weight. There were an awful lot of good cooks at Littlemeade.”
“That was what Watchstar used to be called?”
“More precisely—” He looked at her to see if she got the mild joke, and showed a flash of disappointment. “It’s what Watchstar bought out. Aside from people who worked there, there was only one investor in common with both. She wanted to be able to revive someone who was frozen after death. Third most beautiful eyes I’ve ever seen. I’m still working on that problem. Lots more details than keeping someone alive. As you say, it has to be right the first time.”
“‘Third most beautiful’?” He kept a list?
“You have already called attention to the fact that I observe rigorous standards in some things.” He uncapped a milk bottle, arranged a stack of paper napkins with the precision of a scrub nurse laying out surgical sponges, and started eating pizza.
It was searing hot and dripping oil, and he got none of the orange grease on his chin, his clothes, or anything but his fingers and the rest of the pizza.
He worked on the pizza with the dedicated resolve of a man with a commitment. She resumed eating her sushi.
She actually got that whole meal down without feeling gorged. He was almost done with his pizza, and she began policing the table. When he was done eating, he said, “You can smoke here, you know.”
“I quit eight yea— how’d— the table. Yes. We pick up after ourselves.” He was better at her job than she was.
He nodded. “We do. I quit in 2000. Lost a very foolish bet. Saved a fortune, though. —You know, this place should really be out in the arena.”
“The snack bar?”
“The videogame arcade. Whole point of the Olympics is to show what your people can do in war. Thanks to the Japanese we’ve raised three generations of kids who can knock down a flight of nuclear missiles with their thumbs. It’s certain to make a difference. —Now, as to your question: I sent a program to your bots. You were already saturated with them, like everyone else on the planet. Interesting that you figured out it was me.”
“Post hoc reasoning,” she said. “It was a miracle. You’ve been doing miracles.”
He nodded. “Post hoc does work sometimes. —I had them leave your finger and retina prints alone.”
“Good,” she said nervously. “—Wait, you say everyone has them?”
“Goat Flu. It was a bot. Used virus shells for raw materials. Now nobody’s getting colds, herpes, AIDS, cancer, or any other viral infection. Plus, no more hay fever, and insects that bite you die. The bots also eat pollen and chitin. They don’t last long if they dry out or get into the wrong pH, but they spread well enough by skin contact, and anybody with a cold or the flu sprayed them all over the place. I spent a few weeks at airport departure lines, shaking hands now and then with somebody who had the sniffles. Worked great.”
“Do the bots have anything to do with why I’m so calm about this?” she said with sudden suspicion.
He shrugged. “Not directly. The fact that you’re talking to a funny-looking, mostly white man, in his nineties, who was crippled from birth, but who is now a handsome Indian, a champion athlete, and young, may have had some influence on your thinking.” He put on an expression of polite inquiry. “Could it be that your willing suspension of disbelief has been melted to slag?”
She had to laugh at that.
She thought hard about asking him a question, but decided to ask what she’d originally intended. “Can you get me in touch with May Wyndham?”
“Interesting you should think so. Tell me why you do.”
“Nanotechnology. You must have known Toby Glyer, and he knew her.”
“Not bad. —I believe I could, but it would probably upset her. What do you need?”
“Something that can go up to that rock.”
“By next month?”
“She was the best there ever was,” Alice said.
Yellowhorse—Connors—looked at her for a long moment, then smiled in pure joy. “She was. I’ll find out.”
“What do I call you?” Alice said. “I mean, the different names—”
“Mycroft.” He smiled again. “Mike.”
“No, I like Mycroft. I’m Alice,” she said, and gave the back of his hand a brief pat.
She almost fell out of the chair. For the instant of contact, she was filled with a sense of vibrant health and serene patience, both sensations far beyond anything she had ever imagined. He braced her arm and pushed her upright, a fistful of napkins between his hand and her skin. “You okay?”
“What just happened?” she said.
“In certain circumstances, a woman with a bot network can feel what someone she touches is feeling. I was sick for almost seventy years. Not being sick was a tremendous contrast, and the difference was very hard to get used to. Sometimes it recurs.”
“It can pick up states of mind?”
“If I work at it, it can pick up whether or not you like your best friend’s middle name. I’ve gone into someone else’s head a total of twice. I regret both times. People have stuff they deserve to keep private, no matter how awful the people may be. Fortunately nobody else has that kind of control over the bots.”
“What if someone learns?”
“They can’t.”
“Why not?”
“I’m not going to tell you. I designed them to prevent someone from turning the human race into willing slaves. Whoever controls a communicable, linkable bot can do that. I’m the only person who I know, for a certainty, never would.”
She got her head straightened out—mostly; giving up all of that calm assurance was like swearing off hot baths—and said, “Only women?”
He looked self-conscious. “Um. Yeah.”
She felt her ears getting hot. She had a notion what those “certain circumstances” were. All at once she was
amused and indignant. “So you just make women get horny whenever you want.”
His face lost all expression. “Agent Johnson, I was sentenced to death for killing two serial rapists. Anybody can make one mistake. Don’t call me a rapist again. Fair enough?”
“I never said you forced anyone,” she said, startled.
“You said I compelled consent.” He stood, took a step back, and said, “That’s two. Initially it was nice meeting you. Good day.”
“It’s still consent,” she protested.
He looked down at her, inhaled and exhaled through his nose, and said, in a low, even voice, “Try to listen just as you would if you didn’t already know everything. It. Is rape. If the check. Bounces. Good day.” He strode out past the counter, speaking to the cashier as he went by. She had to go around the table, and then collided with the kid bringing her ice cream. By the time she got up he was out of sight.
Just so the forces of destiny could screw with her gloomy mood, the ice cream was wonderful.
XX
The business of America is business.
—CALVIN COOLIDGE
1
Toby was enjoying the women’s bicycle races, but on a few past occasions in the course of her work, May had genuinely found more interesting material while watching paint dry. She checked her old e-mail account, read a surprising message, Lilithed the sender, thought it over, and linked up to the system at their house. She’d downloaded her laptop files into it when they’d moved in.
Toby noticed. “Why so busy?”
“Sh.”
Business. He nodded and watched the race in progress.
A good deal later, May said, “Someone from the DHS wants to put up something that can meet the rock, and is offering to pay for help. I’m having our system burn a disc of some plans I made, back in the day. The Rukh assembly line is mostly automated, and if they haven’t changed the core programs it should be able to turn out the parts for our spaceplane in about a week. Another week to assemble, and they can make the fuel while that’s happening. The ship’s all modules. —So who won?”
“I didn’t notice. —Oh, stop grinning!”
