Firebird (39 page)

Meantime, though the box controversy continued to rage, the crank messages had fallen off. Most of the attention now was being directed at organizations who were actually sponsoring the rescue missions.
“I'm grateful for that,”
Jacob told me.
“Reading the mail we've been getting is depressing.
I mean, I can understand some people might have a different perspective, but why do they persist in assuming that Alex is a maniac? Or a thief? At the very least, I'd think they would realize he has a filter and is not reading or listening to their tirades. That it gets left to somebody like me.”

“Human nature,” I said. “We seem to produce a lot of idiots. Maybe there's a nitwit hiding inside each of us.”

“I do not think you need to worry, Chase.”

“Thank you, Jacob.”

“And keep in mind my programing would not allow me to say that if I did not mean it.”

I wasn't sure, but I thought I caught a wink in there somewhere.

“We'll have to charter the ships,” said Alex.

“That'll be expensive. How many?”

“We'll be out there for at least four weeks. I think five is about as high as we can go.”

“All right.”

“What's wrong?”

“It's going to strain our resources. There's not much left after buying the lander.”

“I know. We're going to try to do this on credit.”

“Alex, nobody's going to lend you the kind of money you'll need to lease five ships for a month. That's crazy.”

“What's our option?”

“There might be another possibility.”

I went up to Skydeck the following day and got lucky. Dot Garber, an old friend, was in the Pilots' Club when I walked in. Dot owns a small company, Rebel Transit, that does sightseeing tours and provides off-world transportation for executives, celebrities, and people who just want to go look close up at a comet. She was at a corner table, part of a small crowd laughing and drinking the night away. I joined them and, when I got a chance, pulled her off to one side.

I'd known Dot since before I went to work for Alex. She always made it a point to tell me how lucky I was to have connected with him. This time, though, she just asked me how he was doing.

“Okay,” I said.

“He's taking a lot of flack.”

“He'll be okay. He's used to criticism.”

“I figured he must be.” She didn't waste time trying to charm people. Didn't need to, really. She was a tall blonde with classic features who was probably the most beautiful woman in the place. “I need help,” I said.

“What's wrong, Chase?”

I told her about the
Antares.
And I had to go through the process, that had by then become routine, of persuading her I wasn't kidding.

When we'd arrived at that point, finally, she took me to the bar and bought me a drink. “Wildest story I ever heard,” she said.

“Dot, I don't know whether you can help or not, but we don't have the resources to pay you much. Alex was going to borrow money to lease some ships, but we'd have to get pilots as well, and the truth is that it would be a serious squeeze.”

She finished her drink. “You're saying there might be people trapped inside this thing?”

“Yes.”

“Still alive after thousands of years?”

“Yes.
Maybe.
Time passes at a different rate inside the ship. In fact, when it's submerged, it barely seems to move at all. It's as if they jump from one era to the next.”

“What are the chances that these people will actually be there?”

“We don't know. We can't be sure about any part of this.” I showed her the pictures of the Alpha Object. “If it succeeds, if we're able to find the
Antares,
and board it, even if there's no one there, we'll be making history. Rebel Transit would become pretty well-known.”

“I think you know you don't have to persuade me, Chase. What actually would you need?”

“We'd like to lease one ship from you. And if you could volunteer a couple more, with pilots, we'd be grateful.”

She checked her link. “When did you say?”

I gave her the dates.

“That's a big chunk of time.”

“I know.”

“Okay. Look, we've got eight vehicles. None of them is actually available. But I can juggle the schedule. You can have three of them. For the price of one.”

“Dot, thank you.”

“It's okay. Get the paperwork to me tomorrow.”

“Will do.”

“You know what? I feel like a loon, believing there could actually be anything to this.” After we'd had a few more drinks, she discovered she could spare a fourth vehicle.

I stayed late. Prescott Tours agreed to provide a ship and a pilot, as did Orion Interstellar. Prescott thought it sounded like the opportunity of a lifetime, a chance to make the history books; and the Orion manager made the contribution because he said he'd always admired Alex. “If you were anybody else, Chase, I'd just laugh it off. But you guys— Look, if there are really people stuck out there, if I was stuck out there, I'd want somebody to come get
me.”

I also picked up three independents, pilots who were singles but who had their own yachts. Their only demand was that we meet their expenses, which of course we were happy to agree to.

Dot showed up with a friend, and when I staggered into my hotel room that evening, I had nine ships signed on. Or ten. My math was a bit shaky at that point.

I got back to the country house and passed the news to Alex just as a group of three persons identifying themselves as collectors announced they'd rescued an AI on Villanueva. “Her name is Oksana,” one of them said, showing her to the media. Oksana was a small rust-colored sphere.

Alex swallowed. “I hope she isn't a bomb.”

“You worry too much,” I said.

“Anyhow, you were great, Chase. I wish I could pay you what you're worth.”

I kissed him. Just as a call came in.

“Chase.”
It was Ron Fleury, who was the current director of the Fleury Archeological Initiative.
“I heard you were looking for research ships.”

I didn't know Ron well, but he had a reputation for getting things done. “We think we have a seven-thousand-year-old ship, lost—”

“I know,”
he said.
“We'll donate two vehicles. When do you need them?”

“How many do we have now?” asked Alex.

The number had been climbing steadily. “That makes fifteen, counting us.”

“Still not quite what we wanted. But it's a substantial improvement over last time.”

Twenty minutes later, Ordway Lessing called to ask for an appointment. Lessing was the director of the Civil Rights Union, which was known principally for conducting an ongoing campaign for AIs. Their catchphrase:
Prove they're sentient? Prove
you're
sentient.

Lessing's organization was small but active. I told Jacob to put him on hold while I consulted Alex. “He's the last thing you need,” I said. “Get connected with him and nobody will ever take us seriously again.”

“So what do you suggest?”
he asked.
“Tell him I've gone on permanent vacation? Set him up for tomorrow if you can. Preferably in the morning.”

Lessing could have been the ultimate politician, had his ambitions run in that direction. When he walked into the office and said hello, I liked him immediately. He wasn't at all what I'd expected. He was easygoing and self-deprecating, willing to ask questions and be guided by the responses, a sharp departure from the public-crusader image he'd fashioned. He didn't take himself seriously. Only the mission mattered. And the mission could not have been described as widely popular. “We've been refusing to face this reality since we first stepped off the home world, Alex,” he said. “What's happened is that the notion of an AI as simply a program has always been with us. It's part of the culture. It's in our politics. Anybody suspected of wanting to recognize that artificial intelligences—I don't even like the term—should have the same rights as the rest of us might as well forget ever running for office. People don't trust the boxes. Give them civil status, and where will it stop? And there's a religious dimension, as well. Humans have an afterlife. AIs just get turned off. As long as we fail to recognize AIs for what they truly are, as long as it hangs over our heads, we're never going to realize our full potential.”

He looked like an average guy, or would have had it not been for the energy. “Alex,” he continued, “I've always admired you. You have an incredible resume. Especially that business at Salud Afar. And I know you're taking a lot or heat right now for your stand on the AIs. But I want you to know that we're behind you.

“And by the way, I'm sure you've noticed that the Villanueva AIs have been arriving. I understand eleven of them have been brought back so far. Patrick Myers has one at his place. Rescued her out of an abandoned warehouse. Patrick's our chief public-affairs guy. He tells me she's”—he smiled—”pretty grateful. And people want to say they're just programs.”

“I'm glad to hear it,” said Alex. “It's the first good news we've had over this.”

“In my opinion, Alex, this is what you'll be remembered for. If we can help, in any way, please don't hesitate to call on us. To call on me.”

“Thank you, Ordway. That's good to hear.”

“Something else: Our legal people are working to overturn this new prohibition against Villanueva flights. They're trying to prosecute anyone who participates in the rescue. But we're going to win. There's no way we can lose. And when we do, we'll be launching several missions of our own. To be honest, we've always known about Villanueva, but it was just too big for us to tackle. Thanks to you, though—”

Alex held up a palm. “Sending people out there might not be a good idea. The place is extremely dangerous.”

“We'll be careful.”

When he'd gone, Alex collapsed into a chair. “Chase,” he said, “what have I done?”

“I don't know,” I said. “You almost sound as if you've switched sides.”

Shara's analysts, who'd been going through Robin's notebook, came up with news: They'd uncovered what came to be known as the Robin Equation, which laid out the characteristics that rendered a given vehicle vulnerable to the forces at work in a black-hole track. It was, as Shara had thought, a combination of vehicle design; of the mass imposed by the ship, its cargo, and passengers; of the power output of the drive unit; of the degree of damage done to the basic time/space structure by the passage of the superdense object, which did not necessarily have to be a black hole; of the elapsed time since passage; of calibration rates; and a half dozen other factors. “We're now in a position,” she said, “to determine where our vulnerabilities are.”

Shara and her people relayed the data to everyone who had an interest, manufacturers, transport lines, the Fleet, StarCorps, and everybody else they could think of. They made clear that experiments had not yet been concluded, and that the information was still tentative. But the warning was there.

THIRTY-FIVE

Intelligence and compassion are the heart of what it means to be human. Help others where you can. That is clear enough. But a Creator may well want us to open our eyes, as well. If there
is
a judgment, God may not be particularly interested in how many hymns we sang or what prayers we memorized. I suspect He may instead look at us and say, “I gave you a brain, and you never used it. I gave you the stars, and you never looked.”

—Marcia Tolbert,
Centauri Days
, 3111
C.E.

“I don't care,” Alex said. “Make it explicit in the agreement. When we encounter the
Antares,
nobody is to attempt to board. They are to notify
us.”

“Alex, you don't know these people. Impose that restriction on them, and they may pull out. Or if they
don't
pull out, they'll simply ignore it.”

“I don't want any more deaths on my conscience.”

“You're being unreasonable.”

“Put it in the agreement, Chase.”

We were out on the deck. Rain was falling steadily, and normally Alex enjoyed storms. But on that day it didn't seem to help his mood at all. “Look,” I said, “if one of these guys does actually find the
Antares,
and he tells us about it, it's not even likely that we're going to have time to get to it. So we can either let one of our pilots risk himself, or we can shoot down any chance of making this operation count for something. These people didn't volunteer so they could just go out there and hang around.”

“Chase, I hate this.”

“So do I. But you're being unreasonable.”

I listened to him breathing. “All right,” he said finally. “Let it go. But make sure they understand the risk if they try to board.”

“Okay.”

“I've arranged to lease some pressure suits. I think we cleared out Jupiter Supplies and the Wilson Off-world Equipment Company.”

“How many did you get?”

“About forty.”

“Where are we going to put them?”

“I'll leave that to you, Chase. Put two or three on each ship.”

“I hope we don't have to get forty people off.”

“So do I. The real question will be whether we can get to the ship quickly enough to evacuate
anyone.”

“Alex.”
Jacob's voice.
“Senator Delmar is trying to reach you.”

“Calling to lecture.” I could see what he was thinking.
Tell her I'm out.
But instead he took a deep breath. “Put her through, Jacob.”

We didn't have a visual capability on the deck, so the transmission was strictly vocal.
“Alex.”
Delmar sounded distressed.
“How have you been?”

“I'm okay, Senator. What can I do for you?”

“I was just calling to be sure you were okay. I know you've been under pressure lately.”

“I'm fine.”

“Also, I guess I wanted to pass on some news. We just got word that another group of people have been killed on Villanueva. Five or six of them. Details are still sketchy. But I suspect you'll be hearing from the media as soon as it becomes public.”

Alex's eyes closed for a moment. “You have any names?”

“I'm sorry to say the guy running the show was a friend of yours.”