The Ship Who Won (7 page)

to manipulate brushes, mixing paints-at first she gravitated toward the darkest colors and slathered them on

canvas so that not a single centimeter remained 'light."

Then, gradually, with healing and careful, loving therapy,

details emerged: sketchily at first; a swath of dark umber,

or a wisp of yellow. In the painstaking, meticulous fashion

of any shellperson, her work became more graphic, then

she began to experiment with color, character, and dimension. Carialle herself became fascinated with the effect of

color, concentrated on delicately shading tones, one into

another, sometimes using no more than one fine hair on

the brush. In her absorption with the mechanics of the

profession, she discovered that she genuinely enjoyed

painting. The avocation couldn't change the facts of the

tragedy she had suffered, but it gave her a splendid outlet

for her fears.

By the time she could deal with those, she became

aware of the absence of details; details of her schooling,

her early years in Centrals main training facility, the training itself as well as the expertise she had once had. She had

to rebuild her memory from scratch. Much had been lost.

She'd lost vocabulary in the languages she'd once been fluent in, scientific data including formulae and equations,

navigation. Ironically, she could recall the details of the

accident itself, too vividly for peace of mind. Despite

meticulously releaming all me missing details concerning

her first brawn, Fanine-all the relevant facts, where then-assignments had taken them-these were just facts. No

memory of shared experiences, fears, worries, fun, quarrels remained. The absence was shattering.

Ships did mourn the loss of their brawns: even if the

brawn lived to retire at a ripe old age for a dirtside refuge.

Carialle was expected to mourn: encouraged to do so. She

was aware only of a vague remorse for surviving a situation

that had ended the life of someone else. But she could not

remember quite enough about Fanine or their relationship

to experience genuine grief. Had they even liked one

another? Carialle listened to hedrons of their mission

reports and communiques. All of these could be taken one

way or the other. The nine years they had spent together

had been reduced to strict reportage with no personal

involvement that Cari could recall.

As occupational therapy, Carialle took a job routing

communication signals coming in to CenCom, a sort of

glorified directory-assistance. It was busywork, taking little

effort or intellect to do well. The advantage lay in the fact

that voices and faces surrounded her.

She was ready for a new ship within two years of her

rescue, and thank God for required insurance. As soon as

the last synapse connection was hooked up and she was

conscious again, Carialle felt an incredible elation: she was

whole again, and strong. This was the way she was meant

to be: capable of sailing through space, available and eager

for important missions. Her destiny was not to answer

communication systems or scuttle on a grav-carrier

through corridors filled with softshells.

The expenses of the rescue operation and her medical

care had been assumed by CenCom since that last mission

had been hazardous, but the new CX-963 got quite a shock

at the escalation of price in ship hulls. Her insurance had

been based on purchase, not replacement price. She'd

done a preliminary assessment of the cost but erroneously

based her figures on those of her original ship-self. Her

savings vanished in the margin between the two as unseen

as a carbon meteor in atmosphere. She'd have no options

on missions: she'd have to take any and many, and at once,

to begin paying her enlarged debt.

Concurrently her doctors and CenCom urged her to

choose a new brawn. After losing her last so spectacularly,

Carialle was reluctant to start the procedure; another

choice might end in another death. She agreed to see one

man who came particularly well recommended, but she

couldn't relate at all to him and he left in the shortest possible courteous time. She didn't have to have a brawn, did

she? Brainships could go on solo missions or on temporary

assignments. She might accept one on those terms. Her

doctors and CenCom said they'd check into that possibility

and left her alone again.

Though there were rarely so many, nine B&B ships

were currently on the Regulus CenCom base, either

between missions or refitting. She did have the chance to

speak with other shellpeople. She was made to feel

welcome to join their conference conversations. She knew

that they knew her recent history but no one would have

brought the subject up unless she did. And she didn't. But

she could listen to the amiable, often hilarious, and

sometimes brutally frank, conversations other peers. The

refits were five 800s and two 700s with such brilliant

careers that Carialle felt unequal to addressing them at all:

the eighth was preparing for a long mission, and there was

herself. On an open channel, the brainships did have a

tendency to brag about their current partner, how he or

she did this and that, and was so good at sports/music/

gaming/dancing, or how silly he or she could be about

such and such-but hadn't they discovered Planet B or

Moon C together, or managed to get germdogs to Colony

X and save ninety percent of the afflicted from horrible

deaths? The 800s were fond of reciting the silly

misunderstandings that could occur between brain and

brawn. Within Carialle, a wistfulness began to grow: the

sense of what she, partnerless, was lacking.

When the FC-840 related having to mortgage her hull

again to bail her brawn out of the clutches of a local gam-bling casino, Carialle realized with a sense of relief that

she'd never have had that Idnd of trouble with Fanine.

That was the first of the feelings, if not specific memories,

that resurfaced, the fact that she had respected Fanine's

good sense. More memories emerged, slowly at first, but

all reassuring ones, all emphasizing the fact that she and

Fanine had }^en friends as well as co-workers. Inevitably,

during this process, Carialle became aware that she was

lonely.

With that awareness, she announced to CenCom that

she would now be willing to meet with brawns for the purpose of initiating a new partnership. At once she was

inundated with applications, as if everyone had been

poised to respond to that willingness. She wondered just

how much the conversations of the other brainships had

been calculated to stir her to that decision. They had all

been keeping an eye on her.

The first day of .interviews with prospective partners was

hectic, exciting, a whirl of courtship. Deliberately Carialle

avoided meeting any who were physically similar to Fanine, who had been a tall, rather plain brunet with large

hands and feet, or anyone from Fanine's home planet. Fortunately there were few with either disqualification. None

of the first lot, male or female, quite suited, although each

did give Carialle a characteristic to add to her wish-list of

the perfect brawn.

Keff was her first visitor on the morning of the second

day. His broad, cheerful face and plummy voice appealed

to her at once. He never seemed to stop moving. She followed him with amusement as he explored the cabin,

pointing out every admirable detail. They talked about

hobbies. When he insisted that he would want to bring his

personal gym along with him, they got into a silly quarrel

over the softshell obsession with physical fitness. Instead of

being angry at his obduracy in not recognizing her sover-eignty over her own decks, Carialle found herself laughing.

Even when he was driving a point home, Keffs manner

was engaging, and he was willing to listen to her. She

informed CenCom that she was willing to enter a

brain/brawn contract. Keff moved aboard at once, and his

progressive-resistance gear came with him.

Just how carefully CenCom had orchestrated the affair,

Carialle didn't care. CenCom, after all, had been matching

brains with brawns for a very long time; they must have the

hang of it now. Keff and Carialle complemented one

another in so many ways. They shared drive, hope, and

intelligence. Even during the interview Keff had managed

to reawaken in Carialle the sense of humor which she had

thought unlikely to be resuscitated.

In a very few days, as they awaited their first assignment, it was as if she'd never been paired with anyone else

but Keff. What he said about spending almost all their

time together went double for her. Each of them did pursue his or her private thoughts and interests, but they did

their best work together. Keff was like the other half of her

soul.

Despite her recent trauma, Carialle was a well-adjusted

shellperson as indeed her recovery had proved. She was

proud of having the superior capabilities that made it possible to multiplex several tasks at once. She felt sorry for

nonshell humans. The enhanced functions available to any

shellperson, most especially a brainship, were so far beyond the scope of "normal" humans. She felt lucky to have

been bom under the circumstances that led to her being

enshelled.

Several hundred years before, scientists had tried to

find a way to rehabilitate children who were of normal

intelligence but whose bodies were useless. By connecting

brain synapses to special nodes, the intelligent child could

manipulate a shell with extendable pseudopods that would

allow it to move, manipulate tools or keyboards. An

extension of that principle resulted in the first spaceships

totally controlled by encapsulated human beings. Other

"shellpeople," trained for multiplexing, ran complicated

industrial plants, or space stations, and cities. From the

moment a baby was accepted for the life of a shellperson,

he or she was conditioned to consider that life preferable

to "softshells" who were so limited in abilities and

lifespans.

One of the more famous brainships, the HN-832, or the

Helva-Niall, had been nicknamed "the ship who sang,"

having developed a multivoice capability as her hobby.

Though she docked in CenCom environs but rarely,

Helvas adventures inspired all young shellpeople.

Although Carialle was deeply disappointed to discover she

had only an average talent for music, she was encouraged

to find some other recreational outlet. It had taken a disaster for Carialle to find that painting suited her.

Encapsulated at three months and taught mostly by artificial intelligence programs and other shellpeople, Carialle

had no self-image as an ordinary human. While she had

pictures of her family and thought they looked like pleasant folks, she felt distinct from them.

Once Carialle had gone beyond the "black" period of

her painting, her therapists had asked her to paint a self-portrait. It was a clumsy effort since she knew they wanted

a "human" look while Carialle saw herself as a ship so that

was what she produced: the conical prow of the graceful

and accurately detailed spaceship framed an oval blob with

markings that could just barely be considered "features"

and blond locks that overlaid certain ordinary ship sensors.

Her female sibling had had long blond hair.

After a good deal of conferencing, Dr. Dray and his staff

decided that perhaps this was a valid self-image and not a

bad one: in fact a meld of fact (the ship) and fiction (her

actual facial contours). There were enough shellpeople now,

JJ J

Dr. Dray remarked, so that it was almost expectable that they

saw themselves as a separate and distinct species. In fact,

Carialle showed a very healthy shellperson attitude in not

representing herself with a perfect human body, since it was

something she never had and never could have.

Simeons gift to Carialle was particularly appropriate.

Carialle was very fond of cats, with their furry faces and

expressive tails, and watched tapes of their sinuous play in

odd moments of relaxation. She saw softshells as two distinct and interesting species, some members of which

were more attractive than others.

As human beings went, Carialle considered Keff very

handsome. In less hurried situations, his boyish curls and

the twinkle in his deep-set blue eyes had earned him many

a conquest. Carialle knew intellectually that he was good-looking and desirable, but she was not at all consumed

with any sensuality toward him, or any other human being.

She found humans, male and female, rather badly

designed as opposed to some aliens she had met. If Man

was the highest achievement of Natures grand design,

then Nature had a sense ofhuinor.

Whereas prosthetics had been the way damaged adults

replaced lost limbs or senses, the new Moto-Prosthetics

line went further than that by presenting the handicapped

with such refined functions that no "physical" handicap