Edge of Dark (25 page)

We all have a seed of our past as biological beings. Authentic artificial intelligences have been created but they have never succeeded
.

She took a yellow flower apart, petal by petal, crushing each petal so that her fingers were stained yellow-gold. “What do you mean?”

We haven't ever created a machine with a sense of “I.” We can make them far smarter and faster for certain purposes than we are, like your ship's AIs are smarter and faster at navigation than you, but we cannot give them self-determination. They are not
aware
. I am aware
.

“Interesting.” She had been told the Next were all at least part human. Which meant that humans had banned humans and essentially left them out to die. All of that connected with an experience she had forgotten, with words a poet had shared over a third glass of wine. He had been a beautiful man, with soft golden eyes and skin as dark as Gunnar's. She'd slept with him, maybe even for more than a day. It bothered her that she remembered she'd slept with him, but not if it was once or for a week. She hadn't thought of him for decades.

The poet had been certain their ancestors thought the abominations they banned would simply die so far from the sun. He had read her a piece—somewhat drunkenly—that suggested that the real humans were the ones beyond the Ring. And then he'd made her swear not to tell anyone a word of what he'd said. She remembered it had made her uncomfortable. Even now it was hard to think about.

Before she could decide to do any more than just set the thought aside to process later, Jhailing started giving her directions. As always, she followed. “So what part of you is human? So far I've never seen you or touched you. You seem entirely like software to me.”

I am no longer attached to a particular body like you are to that one. It takes time—and lessons—to live as I do. Now turn at the next corner and don't be late
.

It would be nice if she could get some real information out of the damned machine. Three turns later, she was given a door to open. A small room held comfortable couches. Walls were covered in screens. A sink and efficiency kitchen took up one corner, although it didn't appear to have been used in a very long time. Yi and Jason sat in the center of the room talking. They looked up when she came in.

“How are you?” she asked.

Jason said, “Worried about Katherine.”

“I should be worried about her. I'm not, though. I mean, I am. I'm concerned for her welfare. But I don't feel the same urgency I would have before.” She wanted him to understand. “I feel sad that I'm not sad. It makes me angry.” It sounded so self-involved, so much like she was falling into her own belly button. “I should
be
sad. Intensely sad. Worried. Angry.”

Jason grimaced at her. “We have to keep our feelings. Even if we have to make up the intensity of our feelings, we have to have them. We have to care. All of us need to care about Katherine.”

The door in front of them opened and an alien walked in. Might as well have been, anyway. A machine out of her nightmares about the pirates, a vision from the stories told to small children who wouldn't behave. Four legs, four arms, a head that twisted and tilted. Long-fingered hands on one set of arms, stubs on the others—maybe connectors for tools. She sensed that it was strong and fast. More exactly, she sensed that it could crush her, could even crush all three of them at once.

It spoke—out loud rather than into their minds. Maybe it knew it would drive her stark raving mad if it talked inside her like Jhailing did. “I am your teacher for the next phase of your education. We will expand your mind-body connection.”

“What's your name?” Yi asked.

“Jhailing Jim.”

“You told me you didn't have a body!” Chrystal exclaimed, a little miffed.

“The version of me you have been talking to may not have. There are many iterations of some of us.”

Yi immediately saw the implications. “If we're all electrons, we can be copied.”

“Of course.”

“And backed up.”

“Sometimes.”

Its voice didn't sound like the one that had been in her head.

“What about Katherine?” Jason demanded. “She'll need to know these things.”

“Your Katherine has failed.”

Chrystal took some satisfaction in the shock that statement sent through her. Pain. Real pain. Not in her body, but in that part of her that transcended flesh or robotics.

Jason went completely still.

Yi put a hand on Jason's arm. “Later.”

“Fuck,” Jason muttered. “Just . . . oh. What will we do?”

“Follow me,” the machine demanded. The wall behind this new Jhailing Jim opened to a vast open space. “Run!” the robot commanded them. And then Chrystal was off, a step behind Yi and a step ahead of Jason. The surface felt soft and spongy under her feet, and yet it let her launch herself a great distance with each stride.

She had never tested this body.

It moved more fluidly than she expected. Faster. She didn't grow short of wind and her lungs didn't scream for air.

“Keep going,” the machine said.

The three of them ran next to each other. Chrystal's legs were still shorter, but now they could match strides easily. They talked. “What are they teaching us?” Yi asked.

“That we're fast.” Chrystal said.

Jason tried. “That we have enough energy to do this at all, especially for this long.”

“Good. Both right.” Yi smiled. “Your point about energy matters. I believe we're adding energy when we move. We don't need to eat any more, and we can't draw power from the sun like the stations or like Lym, so we're creating it by moving.”

“How long could we do this?” Chrystal asked.

Yi's answer was, “Until parts start to break down.”

Jason was more practical. “Until that thing tells us to slow down.”

Chrystal laughed and they kept running. It felt exhilarating. Moving seemed to help her think better and faster. “I would have expected the strategy out here was to conserve movement,” she said after a while.

“Not really. These bodies are far more efficient than our old ones.” Yi fell silent for a moment. “I suspect that if you sit still long enough, you'll power off. There must be some initial power source that we begin with, but the laws of entropy still exist.”

The surface under them changed, and their footsteps became audible, if still soft. They were faster now, too.

Jason said, “Stop the engineer talk. I want to know what I'm made of. But mostly I want to keep being me. I want to give a shit. Think about Katherine,” he demanded. “As you run, think about Katherine. Think about the fact that our old bodies can't run a step any more. They're gone. We don't make love anymore; we can't make babies. We are not ourselves and we cannot ever forget we aren't ourselves any more. We're fucking robots and we're on a ship that's trying to take over our world and they want us for something, but they won't tell us what.”

Yi spoke more softly than Jason. “And they can hear you. Besides,
I am feeling
.”

“You don't sound like it.”

“That's the trick.”

Chrystal said nothing. As she ran, she tried to miss Katherine, to remember every detail she could.

PART THREE

SATWA

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

CHRYSTAL

The lights in their shared cabin were barely bright enough to give Chrystal a decent view of Yi and Jason bent over an absurdly complex political board game named Planazate. They talked in low, companionable tones. Chrystal was curled up on a couch, talking with a Jhailing.

There were many Jhailings, all reportedly separate Next that had grown from the budding of a single wildly successful smuggler in the earliest years of exile. All of the Jhailings were able to outthink and outperform her. Some were gentle.

She turned her head toward the ceiling and closed her eyes, the better to hear the disembodied voice speaking directly into part of her brain, telling her,
We are far healthier than any biological being. We don't get sick
.

She had not forgiven the Next for turning her into one of them. In subtle protest, she had taken to arguing whenever she could.
I assume you do have mental illness
.

Not very often. Not anymore. We have spent hundreds of years learning how to stay healthy
.

And how is that?

Even though you have no biological parts, the patterns of your original brain's communications copy into your software. We learned to build a body that didn't frighten the mind
.

You don't have this kind of body
. She sat up, sensing a serious conversation.

Most of us no longer need bodies like yours; they are a way to stay sane while you become one of us
.

I don't like this body as much as my old one
.

Not yet. But you like flowers more than you used to
.

A fresh bouquet of flowers graced her bedside table. There were three varieties of roses, and she could pick each out one from the other with her eyes closed.
I've always liked flowers
.

At least it wasn't demanding that she love being in a mechanical body. Not exactly.
So you do this a lot—kill people and create new Next?

When they ask
.

I did not ask
.

Jhailing continued as if Chrystal had said nothing.
It's interesting to watch new Next learn
.

So we are an experiment?

No. You are becoming
. A rare pause.
I will offer you a more human way to look at it
.

Go on
, Chrystal said.

Your soul is becoming accustomed to being software
.

A philosophical trap.
If I have a soul, I was never killed. If I do not, I was murdered and what is left is not human
.

You are aware
.

She could give it that one.
What else?

We make sure no one is alone for too long but everyone is alone sometimes
.

I am almost never alone
, she replied.

You are
, it replied.
Most of the time when you are working with your physical teacher, I leave you alone
.

The machine wasn't that dense.
Sometimes there is no Jhailing in me. But then there is one with me
.

We are teaching you
.

Across the room one of the men moved a piece. She could tell by the sound that it was a soldier, a minor piece.
There are things this body can do that my other one couldn't. But I would prefer to be flesh
.

You will have many years to grow into the capable being you are becoming
.

She grew wary when it talked that way. It was about to give her something else to learn. She waited.

We will have a need for you soon
.

She felt a pulse of interest and tried to cover it by plucking a white rose from the vase.
Work? You will have work for me?

Yes. We are returning home to the inner orbits. Some of you have been chosen to help us talk to people in key places and positions in the Glittering
.

The sweet smell of the rose emboldened her.
What do you want your chosen to say?

You are one of our chosen. What do you want to say?

Some piece of her that remained able to feel like a human—or to at least notice that she wasn't feeling as deeply as she should—fluttered with fear. She stamped it down, knowing it wasn't a good thing for a Jhailing to detect, and that a Jhailing was inside her brain at this moment.
Who do I know?

Nona Hall is approaching a station near us
.

She sat up straighter, an involuntary movement that she regretted.
Nona?

She has connections to people with significant influence ratings
.

Her famous parents, but they were both dead now. Nona had messaged her after her mom passed, just before the jalinerines were approved. Satyana? Satyana ran concerts. Whatever the pirates wanted from the inner system, surely it wasn't music. Satyana knew people with power, and got her picture taken with high councilors from time to time.
Who in particular are you thinking of?

She didn't expect it to answer, but it did.
Gunnar Ellensson runs a fleet of ships that have been turned into a defensive force
.

The last time I saw Gunnar Ellensson, I wasn't even full-grown. I don't have any influence over him.

Satyana Adams is his lover
.

Oh. Good for Satyana. Maybe. Gunnar had a reputation for being ruthless. She remained silent.

One of the many things you may be asked to teach humans is that we can destroy their ships with no effort. Gunnar needs to know that
.

I'm fairly certain he noticed the absence of the High Sweet Home
, she said. Yi moved another piece, this time a bigger one. Maybe a general? No. A top merchant.
I want my family with me
.

Of course. That is part of how we stay sane; being close to people we care about
.

That's true for humans, and for that matter it's true for chickens and even plants. But is it true for you?

I am growing you flowers, aren't I?

Go away and let me think
.

It did, and soon she felt lonely. Besides, she had questions for it, and it was gone.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

NONA

Nona entered the command room and found Henry James taking quietly with one of the other crew members, a woman named Joi who monitored the ships' food supplies. Her eyes were wide, and her voice edgy and loud, although Nona couldn't catch her specific words. They both looked up at her arrival, and Joi, now off-shift, fled the room without saying anything to her. Nona glanced at Henry James. “Anything I should know.”