The Ghost in the Doll (Fox Meridian Book 6) (2 page)

Fox tapped her chest. ‘She’s in here. This thing has a fairly powerful computer so we can both run quite comfortably on it. I asked her to let me do this on my own. Uh… I think I was expecting more… of a reaction.’

Kit’s avatar, all large green eyes and foxy white tail, appeared beside Fox’s chair. ‘Good afternoon, Mister and Mrs Meridian. I told her you would understand, but she’s convinced people should treat her differently.’

‘Afternoon, Kit,’ Jonathan said, smiling. ‘Well, she’s right, but it’ll be people who don’t know her. And it won’t all be “bad,” though I doubt Fox will see it as good attention.’

‘The Church,’ Andrea said, nodding. ‘I mean, I can’t imagine many of the conventional religions taking this well, but the Church of God’s Mind is going to think you’re some sort of goddess, Tara.’

Fox sagged in her seat. ‘
No one
is to tell Danny Berkewitz about this. No one. Under any circumstances.’

Andrea developed what could only be described as a politician’s smirk. ‘What’s it worth?’

~~~

‘So your mother got another social out of you?’ Bart Wade said, smirking.

‘Blackmailed another social out of me,’ Fox replied. She was at the kitchen table, watching Bart and her parents eat. She was drinking wine, to be sociable, but she really did think wasting food on her was just about a crime.

Bartholomew Wade was the only other person in Topeka that Fox absolutely had to have in the know regarding her new condition. Even if she had expected more problems with her parents, especially her mother, she had known that Bart would take it in his usual, practical manner, and probably tell her that she was being an idiot. Bart was old, but only physically. His hair was grey, and increasing amounts of his body had been replaced with metal and plastic, but he had had a computer implanted long before Jonathan and his mind was as sharp as ever.

‘Blackmail,’ Andrea said, ‘is such an ugly word. I prefer “persuasion with menaces.”’

‘I’m not sure that’s better,’ Fox countered, ‘but the point is that I wanted you to know I’d beaten you hands down on the cybernetics, Bart,
before
Friday. That way I don’t have to explain in front of everyone.’

Bart gave a shrug. ‘I still hold the Tin Man title for the street. You’re just a visitor, so I can live with it.’

‘I figured you would. Though I recall you saying how big a can of worms this kind of technology was back in January.’

‘Sure is. When the news breaks, you’re going to be up to your neck in political and religious types. You’ll have the Church of God’s Mind demanding that the government legalise it, and they won’t be alone. And you’ll have the religious Right demanding it be outlawed.’

‘And probably that I get turned off. Yeah, I know.’

‘But you have that covered, right?’ Andrea said. ‘You said MarTech had come to some special arrangement for their first subject.’

‘I’m covered,’ Fox agreed. ‘I’m legally the same person. Huh, if the worst ever came to the worst, I could emigrate to Luna City. They have a pretty solid equal rights thing going up there. That’s why the American government agreed to hold my testing there before I was allowed down here.’ She rolled her eyes. ‘That was annoying and pointless.’

‘They were trying to make sure you were you?’ Bart asked.

‘Well, yeah, but it was an IQ test followed by some guy asking me questions I could’ve probably answered with an internet search. Seriously, mother’s maiden name. Name of my first school.’

‘You remembered my maiden name?’ Andrea asked.

‘Barlow. I do actually remember my grandparents, Mom. It was kind of slipshod, but I guess I shouldn’t complain. NAPA sent someone up to interview me too. That was more detailed, but mostly on what happened with Grant and Hannah.’

‘Kit got on the news about that Hannah girl. An AI giving evidence at a hearing and your testimony. You really don’t hold a grudge over her part in this?’

‘I do,’ Kit said from her position behind Fox, perched on one of the work surfaces. ‘Equally, she helped rescue Fox. I am conflicted on the matter.’

‘I…’ Fox frowned. ‘I guess I’m conflicted too. I’ve got some pretty obvious issues with her, but she was almost as much a victim as me and I think she deserves to be tried for what she did, not just turned off and scrapped.’

‘Well,’ Bart said, ‘you set the cat among the pigeons with that one. They’re still trying to decide what to do about it. Might go all the way to the top.’

‘I haven’t been paying a lot of attention to the news recently. Jenner’s pretty isolated and I’ve been avoiding anything controversial since I got back. I’ve got enough controversy of my own.’

‘Fair point. You won’t have seen that the Japanese have stolen MarTech’s thunder then?’

‘Oh?’

‘Some company over there has made the first artificial
biological
human. Well, not human, obviously, but you know what I mean. Bioroid, they call them.’

‘BioTek were working on it. Are working on it. They needed a variant of Yliaster to make it viable. So they can build an entire adult body instead of growing a cell up to adult size the normal way. An eighteen-year production cycle wasn’t viewed as ideal.’

‘Huh, no, I’d imagine not. Apparently someone in Japan has cracked it. Of course, it’s for sex. If they don’t actually invent something specifically for sex, someone’ll find a way to use it for that pretty quickly.’

Andrea giggled. ‘So true. It seems a shame that the first artificial life we make is for that though.’

‘Alternative is probably some sort of manual labour. Slave labour. Not good either, but I’m bringing the mood down.’ Bart flashed a grin at Andrea. ‘Nice outfit you’re almost wearing, Andy. I see the sparkle hasn’t gone from your renewed love life.’

Andrea blushed, but just a little. Her cropped camisole top and shorts
were
fairly brief. ‘Jonathan likes it. And so do you, you old letch.’

‘Not denyin’ it. Mind you, you’ve got competition. Your daughter’s not exactly covering herself up and she’s got more to show.’

‘Oh… Don’t remind me. I’ve always been a little envious.’

‘And,’ Fox said, smirking, ‘now there’s no danger of sag.
Ever
.’

Andrea mock scowled at her daughter. ‘You’re not too old to spank, young lady.’

~~~

Fox’s old bedroom had been redecorated. Gone were the trappings of a late-teen, replaced with a not-too-modern but certainly updated look in earth tones, which included a double bed that had a rather nice bronze-coloured, embroidered comforter over it. It had been done in the hope that Fox would visit with Jason Deveraux, her boyfriend.

‘We kind of planned to come over before he started his new job,’ Fox said. Her mother was seeing her to bed before joining Jonathan. Andrea was being a little more solicitous than usual, likely still worrying over Fox’s recovery. ‘Then I went and got myself kidnapped…’

‘I’m sure you’ll see him again, Tara,’ Andrea said. ‘I’m sure that bed will see some use at some point.’

‘Well, it’s going to see some now.’ Fox looked at the black box sitting beside the bed, already hooked up to the mains. There were indicator lights on it, showing that it was functional. A small camera mounted on the top was unmoving and there were a couple of cables coiled beside it. ‘I only need four hours’ sleep now, and this thing will be charged before I wake up, but I
might
still be in there if you come in in the morning.’

‘I’ll let you come down on your own. Take your time. You
are
supposed to be resting.’

‘Yeah. Look, do you mind if I do this on my own? It’s still a little…’

‘I’ll leave you to it. I’d imagine you can contact our implants if you need anything anyway.’

Fox waited for her mother to leave before undressing. Nudity was technically unnecessary, but she had slept naked for a long time and it made things a little easier. She pulled the comforter back on the bed and then picked up the thickest of the two cables. It ended in something that looked like one of those nerve-induction exercise devices people had thought were the answer to exercise without effort decades ago: a cloth belt with a pair of plastic pads attached to it. Strapping the belt around her hips, she made sure the two pads were roughly over her hip joints and closed the fastening.

Next came the second cable, much thinner with a small plug at the end. Reaching behind her neck, she felt under her hair for the small socket hidden away there and pushed the plug in. Almost immediately, a connection notification came through, followed by an authentication exchange panel.

‘All set up for us,’ Kit commented. ‘Jackson is really going out of his way to make sure this works for you.’

‘Yeah, well… He would. He always does.’ Fox started her transfer to the server and climbed into bed, pulling the covers over her. ‘I assume you’re coming over with me.’

‘Of course. I’ve some work to do, and you’ll want someone to talk to when you wake up hours before your parents.’

‘You know, not being able to sleep in is a major fault in this design. Turn off, “sleep” for want of a better word, and four hours later I wake up. Ding! Awake.’ Fox closed her eyes and watched the progress bar on her ba transfer. ‘And they need to give me a faster cable interface. I mean, Terri was talking about using wireless transfers sometimes, but that would take
ages
.’

‘I know. That’s how I usually travel.’

‘You’re used to it. This is all new to me. It’s so slow…’

‘You could be in Japan in five minutes, ten at the most. You could be on
Mars
in a day or so instead of weeks.’

‘I suppose that has some utility. If I’ve got a frame to load into once I get there anyway. Does Palladium have contracts on Mars?’

‘There are MarTech facilities on Mars
and
Venus, as well as the lunar sites, of course. Setting up a body for you on the Moon would be very easy. You need never ride in a rocket ever again.’

‘Huh.
Now
I see why Jackson wants to do this.’

‘Hmm, yes. He does suffer terribly from space sickness.’

Fox smirked. ‘I don’t think that quite covers the depths of his misery. He is a little better when he can have
some
gravity, but then the Coriolis effect tends to kick in with spin gravity… Yeah, he’d love just being able to radio himself over to Jenner. Transfer’s almost complete. I’ve programmed it to shunt me straight into sleep mode on the other side so… Night, Kit.’

‘Goodnight, Fox. Sleep well.’

‘Oh, like I have a choice…’

28
^th
March.

Possibly one of the most important advances in biotechnology this century, the new Japanese bioroid carried the name Yurei no Ningyo, which seemed to be being translated as Ghost Doll. Fox discovered the reason for the name when she located a video of the launch conference from the Aphrodite Cybernetics facility in the Chiba Industrial Zone.

Aphrodite Cybernetics built androids and gynoids more or less exclusively for the pleasure market. They did not come immediately to mind on the list of people who might scoop BioTek to the first artificial humanoid, but they did tinker with biotechnology: their high-end models used cloned skin to give a more realistic look to their robots. This made it strange that the Ghost Doll bioroids did not appear especially realistic. They had pale, almost white, skin with the texture of latex, very red pouting lips, and eyes that always seemed to be opened wide. They were walking rubber sex dolls and Fox found herself wondering what kind of mind came up with something like that.

‘I would suggest it was a male one,’ Kit said when Fox commented on the video. ‘Possibly one born last century. Perhaps the company was unable to create a working model with more natural skin, though it seems more like a specific choice.’

‘Yeah. If I discover BioTek are doing anything like this, I’ll… get very angry about it.’

‘I’m nothing but software, and I find it rather offensive. Perhaps it will fail to sell.’

‘Oh… Don’t count on it. Aside from anything else, they’re selling it as a luxury item. People with more money than sense are going to jump right in. I’d suggest that the Japanese market might be more amenable, but I bet you there are Americans trying to sniff out a way to import one right now. The interesting thing will be to see whether they create a male version.’

‘The market for pleasure androids still lags behind the gynoid market, though it is not far from parity. Have you ever tried one?’

‘No,’ Fox said. ‘Thought about it. There’s something to be said for a boyfriend you can stuff in a closet when you’re bored with him. Of course, now
I’m
a gynoid girlfriend.’

‘You know, I don’t think Jason will think of it that way. I also think that Jackson would not have been unhappy if you had stopped off at Prokhorov Station on the way to Earth.’

‘Maybe I didn’t want to test Jason’s reaction just then because I felt insecure. I’m still finding
myself
, Kit. If, and I’m not saying he would have, but
if
Jason reacted badly… Not sure I could take that right now.’ Fox checked the time. ‘Almost six. I’m getting up. Mom and Dad will think I’ve been replaced by a duplicate, but… I have, so it seems fair.’

~~~

It was a bit after six a.m. when Jonathan and Andrea came down to find Fox sitting at the kitchen table, eating something from a plastic tub which appeared to be Greek yoghurt. The smell of coffee pervaded the room as well.

‘Now I
am
starting to worry about you,’ Andrea said. ‘Up before us and eating yoghurt?’

‘Yeah, well, this way I don’t walk in on you two kissing like teenagers at a drive-in, and it’s not yoghurt.’

Frowning, Andrea walked over to the table and started reaching a finger toward the tub. ‘It looks like–’

‘Uh… Don’t. Seriously. It’s specifically for my skin. It’s basically protein and nanomachines.’

‘It’s poisonous to humans?’

‘Huh, no. It just tastes absolutely disgusting and it won’t do you any good at all. It’s indigestible and gross, but it’s got everything I need for a glossy coat and wet nose. And I turn off my sense of taste before eating it.’