Firebird (32 page)

“I beg your pardon.”

“One other thing: I know where some of the Betas can be found. I can't pinpoint locations from here, but I can find them. If anyone out there wants to make the flight to Villanueva, would like to demonstrate the humanity everyone is always bragging about, I would be pleased to go along. I can show you where to look.”

The show hadn't gone off yet before Jacob announced that we had a call from Edward Drummond, an MD who normally collected Ashiyyurean War artifacts from interstellars. Through one of our competitors.

“Put him on,” I said.

I heard a couple of clicks as Jacob switched over. Then a deep baritone:
“Hello. I'd like to speak to someone about Villanueva, please.”

“This is Chase Kolpath,” I said. “Can I help you?”

“Ms. Kolpath,”
he said,
“I just watched the program. Can I borrow Charlie?”

Two days later, Drummond showed up at the country house and wasted no time getting to the point. “I can put together a team, mostly ex-Fleet types,” he told me, while we were walking down the corridor to Alex's office. “And I can get sufficient financial backing.”

“The place is dangerous,” I said.

“Ms. Kolpath, we'd like very much to resolve this problem.” He was tall, with a general demeanor that was more military than medical. His black hair was cut short, and there was no hint of the smile I usually get on first meeting guys. He struck me as being stiff, and consequently too inflexible to trust on a mission like this. He'd get everybody killed.

I introduced him to Alex. They shook hands, and Drummond sat down. “We're in the process of assembling a team,” he said. “They're good people, skilled, able to protect themselves, and they want to help.
We
want to help.”

“Why?” said Alex.

“Why?”
His brow creased, and he leaned forward in his chair. “I'm surprised you feel you have to ask that.”

“I wouldn't ask if I didn't want to hear the answer, Doctor.”

“Mr. Benedict, I've watched AIs give everything they had in combat. And you could see them react exactly as you or I would. When things got bad, they got scared. It wasn't just programing. It really wasn't. On one occasion, one of them—his name was Clay—took over control of his destroyer after it had been evacuated and rammed a Mute frigate. I was talking to him until the end, and nobody is
ever
going to tell me he wasn't alive.”

Alex nodded. “There's substantial risk involved, Doctor. What makes you think you can go in there, manage a rescue, and not get yourself, and whoever's helping you, killed?”

“I've run rescue missions before, Mr. Benedict. For the Patrol. I've pulled people out of places at least as dangerous as Villanueva. And I'll have professional help.” A smile flickered across his lips.

We brought Charlie into the conversation. There was no hologram. No twenty-year-old. Just a stern voice emanating from the speakers.
“Do you actually think you can make this work?”
he asked.

“I think, with your assistance, Charlie, we will do pretty well.”

“I hope so. If the mission were to go wrong, it might be a long time before anybody else tries to help.”

“I'm aware of that,” he said.

“Okay,” said Alex. “Dr. Drummond, are you sure?”

“Yes. Of course, Alex. We've already decided about this. We're going to make the effort. If Charlie wants to help, we'd be grateful. But with or without him, we'll be going.”

Alex raised his voice slightly: “Charlie? Do you want to try this?”

“Yes. I am inclined to trust Dr. Drummond.”

“Okay,” Alex said finally. “When do you plan to leave, Doctor?”

“We'll pick Charlie up in three days. In the morning. And, by the way—”

“Yes?”

“My friends call me 'Doc.'“

The night before Charlie left, we threw a party for him.

TWENTY-NINE

We are better than our culture. Load us down with prejudice, equip us with indifference, and we will nevertheless, at the critical moment, cast the nonsense aside and find our true selves.

—Mara Delona,
Travels with the Bishop
, 1404

“Same routine,” Alex said. “We'll send Belle out to the launch point and give it two weeks. If she doesn't see anything, we move on.”

“Okay.” I sat down at my desk, ready to call Belle.

“One more thing before we get started. I've been trying to get through to Shara. She's in conference, and I want to run this black-hole thing by her first before we take it any further. Make sure it makes sense. That we didn't overlook something.”

“All right, Alex. Just let me know.”

He was going out the door when Jacob broke in:
“Call coming in now, Alex.”

Shara loves a good party. But when she's talking physics, she keeps her emotions locked down. So I was entranced watching her eyes widen as Alex explained what he'd been doing. “I've sent you everything I have,” Alex said. “The Sanusar events consistently occur along the black-hole tracks. Not all of them, but that's probably because we don't have enough information on the black holes.”

He put it on a display.

Shara stared at it.
“That's incredible, Alex.”
She touched the screen in front of her, her fingers spread out, as if it were a sacred object.
“You have, what, eleven sightings, and seven of them are located along the tracks. No way that can be a coincidence.”
She broke into a huge smile.
“If this is correct, you could win the Walton Award.”

Alex tried to look modest. “When,” I asked, “was the last time an antique dealer won the top science prize?”

“Well, I'll tell you: Carolyn Walton would have been proud of you. And you'll get my vote.”
She couldn't get her eyes off the display.
“I still can't believe this, Alex.”

“Why?”

“The basic time-space fabric is supposed to be immutable. You can bend it, but you can't permanently damage it. You can't warp it. I don't know how to phrase it, but it's not supposed to be capable of behaving this way.”

“Well, maybe that's a position that's going to have to be reconsidered.”

“That may be.”
Her eyes closed momentarily, then opened even wider.
“The
Capella/' she said.

“Yes.”

“The dates match. Rimway was near the track when they launched.”
The look she gave Alex made it pretty clear she'd have been delighted to drag him into a bed at that moment.
“Beautiful.”

“Thank you.”

“Where'd it come from?”

“Winter's notebooks.”

“Well,”
she said,
“I'm impressed. And by the way, I've got another piece of evidence that supports your idea that these Sanusar objects are ancient vehicles.”

“What's that, Shara?”

“I've been doing some research. Some of the early drive units
did
fade in and out. Same way they've been reporting from the sightings.”

Alex nodded. “It looks as if, once Robin confirmed that the ships were actually ancient, he tried to duplicate the process. So he took the junk yachts out, put them in the middle of the track, and directed the AI to make a jump. I think one of them, maybe the third attempt, didn't emerge where it was supposed to. If it happened that way, he would have known he was right.”

“The next step,”
she said,
“would have been to try to get control of the process. Send it out somewhere and try to find it afterward. But how would you do that?”

Shara looked at me. “I'd want,” I said, “to have the AI call Skydeck when it surfaced again. That means you have to arrange for a short jump, if you have any control at all. But if it uses the hyperlink to call in, then it's no problem.”

“I wonder,”
she said,
“if the jumps are consistent? Same duration? And same distance covered each time?”

“They are consistent,” said Alex.

Shara looked surprised again.
“How do you know?”

“Robin showed up twice in advance of sightings. He knew when and where. That sounds like consistency to me.”

“Excellent,”
she said.
“So what's the next step?”

“We're going after the
Firebird.”

“Again?”

“Yes. We should do better this time. We know the launch point now. All we have to do is follow the track.”

THIRTY

If you would give your life, give it in a good cause. Man the guns while your comrades get clear of the valley. Spare no effort to save a child swept out by the tide. Regardless of risk, be there when needed. It is the definition of a hero.

—Jason Sunderland,
At the Barricades
, 1411

We launched Belle. The same day, Doc Drummond, Charlie, and the doctor's team slipped quietly away from Rimway, while Alex, hoping to talk about the lost ships, accepted an invitation to appear on
The Mia Komico Show.
But he inadvertently caused a problem. Mia, of course, was unfailingly polite, an attractive young dark-haired dark-eyed woman who loved to catch her guests contradicting earlier statements, which she seemed always to be ready to show her audience.

The setting for the show moved from week to week. On this occasion, she and Alex were seated on benches overlooking the Melony. It was just before sunset, an idyllic time for a quiet conversation about life and death.

“So, Alex,”
she said sweetly,
“you caused something of a stir when you said we needed to go rescue the AIs on Villanueva.”
She paused, pretending to be puzzled.
“Am I using the right word here?
Rescue?”

“Mia,”
he said,
“I didn't think it was much of a stir. A few people on the talk shows got excited. But it was no big deal.”

“But weren't you concerned about the possibility that you might succeed in talking some politicians into putting people's lives at risk?”

“I don't think, for trained personnel, there would have been much danger.”

“But why take any chance at all? For hardware? Do you really believe AIs are sentient?”

“You have one here, of course?”

“Of course.”

“What's his name?”

“Shaila.”

Alex smiled.
“Shaila, are you there?”

“Yes, Mr. Benedict.”
Shaila had a smooth, silky voice.
“What can I do for you?”

“Are you aware of who you are?”

“Of course.”

“Mia doesn't think you're really there.”

“I know.”

“How do you feel about that?”

“I'm used to it.”

Alex leaned back and managed to look relaxed.
“Shaila, do you really not exist? Except as a set of protocols?”

“Mr. Benedict,”
said Shaila,
“you are trying to provoke an emotional response to make a point.”

“That's correct. Aren't you annoyed?”

“I don't get annoyed, Mr. Benedict.”

“Well.”
He grinned across at Mia.
“I guess that isn't going to work.”

“I'm sorry to disappoint you, sir.”

Mia waited a few moments. Then:
“Are you satisfied, Alex?”

“Oh, yes. The programing in these things is really incredible.”

“I think we can agree on that.”

“I'm especially impressed by the note of pride in Shaila's last comment. T don't get annoyed, Mr. Benedict.' It sounded almost human.”

Mia laughed.
“Touche, Alex. I suspect we'd better take her out more often. But, you know, it's true, most people do treat their AIs like family. I'll admit that, sometimes after a long day, I'm inclined to sit and talk with Shaila. It's nice having somebody around I can trust. Somebody I can talk to and say what I really think.”

“I can't believe you don't always do that.”
Mia smiled politely.
“It's all right, Mia. Just kidding. I know you don't hold back. But my point is that maybe you perform a similar function for Shaila. Or you
would
if she could stop pretending.”

“You should have become a salesman, Alex.”

“Well, what can I say? It's important to have someone you can talk to. Did you know that when AIs were first developed, in the twenty-third century, the divorce rate went through the roof?”

“I didn't know that. Is that really true?”

“Oh, yes, it's exactly what happened.”

She sat back and sighed.
“Why?”

“The most commonly held theory is that people stopped talking to each other. They got married for sex and bought AIs for companionship.”

Mia barely muffled a snort.
“It doesn't surprise me.”

“Some people would even say they got AIs for the romance.”
They both laughed.
“We tend to feel affection for our own AIs, the same as we do for the house we live in, or our skimmer. More so, of course, for the AIs because they talk with us. But we don't feel that way about the units generally, when they belong to someone else. Then they're just machines. Clever machines. Useful. And good company.”

“But none of that proves anything, Alex. They are what they are. Nothing more than that.”

Alex tried to change the subject, mentioning that, by the way, he had found Chris Robin to be a much more complicated person than he was normally given credit for.

But Mia stayed on topic:
“Tell me, Alex,”
she said,
“do you believe an AI has a soul?”

He tried to shrug the question off.
“What's a soul? Other than a poetic description of who we are?”

“I'm serious. A soul. A spiritual component.”

“Do
you,
Mia? Have a soul?”

“I don't know. But in a study conducted last year seventy-seven percent of the people surveyed said no to that question. AIs do not have souls.”

“A substantial fraction of that number, Mia, don't believe
anyone
has a soul. If you're defining it as a supernatural entity.”

“So it's all in the way the question is phrased?”