Star Vigilante (Vigilante Series) (12 page)

But what bothered him most were the Restricted Rooms of the ship. They occupied half the volume of the ship, based on his own explorations. They had been placed off-limits to him and to all organic life. For his own good, she had said, explaining the Rooms were harmful to organic life. When asked how they were harmful, she had evaded. Matt didn’t like her evasion about the functions of the Restricted Rooms, and it was a seven year sore spot between them. But it was clear that
Mata Hari
had her own purposes, only some of which included him. And he would worry less over her evasiveness if she ever answered his first question on awakening from lifepod stasis. “Why did you rescue me?”

Matt shrugged as he walked down the Spine toward the Bridge.
Mata Hari’s other purposes could remain a future puzzle. An AI ancient when Cro-Magnons first appeared had to have had many adventures, many experiences, many encounters with other lifeforms. Since it was clear the ship could outlive any organic lifeform, it had always seemed obvious to him that he was merely her current symbiont. And right now, he had a Patron, a Job, and a conundrum—how do you save a planet without also destroying it in the process?

CHAPTER FIVE

Mother Tree Melisen filled the Bridge holosphere like a forest primeval, something druid-basic, a dark green biome that transfixed Matt. The millions of individual trees, each interlinked via a common root system and shared biochemistry, filled the holosphere as starship
Mata Hari
swooped down from orbit, aiming for an eventual hover-stop above Melisen. As Eliana stood beside him in a blue jumpsuit, his ship flew herself, not needing him in the Pit for something this simple.

The vast forest of Mother Tree Melisen stretched over six hundred kilometers long by three hundred wide, and towered a thousand meters high at Top Canopy. Each towering Trunk was supported by dozens of buttressing trunk-arches, much the way a Medieval Gothic church upheld its high roof with flying buttresses. Such was its macro appearance. At the micro level, each Trunk housed a Derindl Clan or an industrial process, and each sported scores of massive limbs covered in a riot of green. In Middle and Low Canopy, flying things flittered and swooped about, conveying alien people called Derindl, and also conveying—at the microbial level—biogenetic codings necessary to the proper regulation of Tree Melisen’s far-flung biosystems. A true symbiotic system that expressed pure mutualism, Mother Tree Melisen took in the solid, liquid, and gaseous wastes of three hundred thousand Derindl, purified and processed them, extracted minerals, nutrients and gases from the land and air, and repackaged them into food pods of many colors, flavors and sizes that provided all the amino acids, sugars, enzymes and minerals needed by the Derindl.

In return, the Derindl worked among the widespread limbs, leaves, and Trunks of the Tree, nourishing new growth, removing the larger parasites, alerting the Tree to the need for a new Spore, a new Antigen, or a new pathway for the slowly expanding rootstock of Tree Melisen. Much as ancient Earth monkeys groomed the fur of their fellows and extracted lice, so the Derindl “groomed” the foliage-fur of Tree Melisen. And the Tree rewarded them. Rewarded them far beyond the simple food and shelter exchange that had its origins far back in prehistory. Mother Tree Melisen protected the Derindl.

To the ultimate extreme.

No animal lifeform was permitted within the forested confines of the Tree—unless it possessed a temporary Immunity granted by a Genetic Donation, or a permanent Immunity acquired by taking within itself minute spores of the Tree. Thus did the Tree recognize “itself,” even if in humanoid animal form. The Mother Tree was not sapient, but it had a degree of autonomous behavior which bordered on the prescient. Only thermonuclear fire could exterminate a Tree—and no Derindl had ever used such weapons on the surface of Halcyon.

With professional detachment, Matt wondered what would happen when the Stripper met a Tree? For the moment, it ravaged south continent’s Meloan Desert, just south of them, a place of rugged xeric woodlands, harsh ravines and wind-blasted sandstone buttes. Mother Tree Melisen and the Stripper lay here, in south continent, still far away from the humans and other Derindl of north continent.

The ship came to a Hover stop above the Tree.

“Why aren’t we landing at the Port?” Eliana asked, turning to him. “I can assure you, the cross-limbs are strong enough to support—”

“Because I say so,” Matt interrupted, feeling irritable thanks to the lingering effects of his concussion. “You hired me. Now let me do my work.”

Eliana eyed him speculatively. “My, what a temper. Are we even going to see Autarch Dreedle?”

“We are. Now be quiet.” The holosphere shimmered as
Mata Hari
hovered on belly Nullgrav, at 4,000 meters MSL. Matt’s conscience niggled at him—what was it with him and his reactions to her? Did he really fear being close to another human, like her? Or worse, did he fear Eliana’s growing interest in him as more than an employee? Sighing mentally, he tried diplomacy. “Uh, be quiet please.”

She laughed then, but her eyes bored in on the puzzle of him, his cyborg nature, his motivations, on too many things that felt . . . personal, as if she really cared about him. “You know, you’re strange, Matt. On the way out here, you’re the soul of elegance and sophistication, patient with my naiveté. At my brother’s, you beat him at his own game. Even in the
Biolab, you understood my . . . well, you showed understanding of me as a woman.” She blinked slowly, her stare reaching deep into him. “But now, you hold yourself at arm’s-length from me. Why? Do I scare you in some way? And what about simple politeness? Is that something they forgot to teach you in Vigilante school?”

“Patron, we have no school other than reality.” Matt thought-imaged a command to his SQUIDs, turned and walked back to where Suit rested against the rear wall, wondering why—today of all days—ship’s lightbeams made his skin itch; absently, he shucked off his shorts as he went. Behind him, Eliana sputtered.

“Hey. Hey! I was talking—”

“Open.”

Suit obeyed.

It turned on waldo boots, bent forward, and split along its backspine, the rocket backpack hinging away as interlocking trapdoor plates opened in Suit’s midback—much like an antique zipper. Matt stepped into the tubular legs and pushed his feet into transducer-lined padding. Mid-calf support struts locked around his shins, then others about his thighs, ready to magnify every muscle twitch into a hyperkinetic kick-jump. He felt strong. From ten to a thousand times stronger than a normal human. Squatting, Matt thrust hands and arms into Suit’s outstretched armor-arms, felt similar struts lock-up, then ducked his head. He raised it inside the helmet and stood up straight. A rumble sounded from his back as Suit closed up, pressurizing its interior.

Sensors, transducers and padding now touched him everywhere. Flex-struts enclosed his midbody. Waste tubes connected to his penis and anus, while feeder-needles penetrated abdominal Contacts—for nutrient nourishment, drug injection, and blood gases monitoring. Finally, moving along the nape of his neck like a lover’s caress, Suit’s coaxial cable snuggled up. Thousands of optical fiber pins drove home, socketing into his cyborg implant at CV1. The omnipresent mental weight of
Mata Hari,
interrupted when he stepped out of direct lightbeam contact and into the shielding interior of Suit, returned with the cable connection.

“Hello, Matt. Feel good?”
Mata Hari
asked. Her voice sounded normal and reassuring.

“Good enough,” he said. “Is Suit outfitted for Antigen defense and any local bacterial and viral vectors on file with the Library?”

“Of course.” In his mind’s eye there materialized the image of a nude, black-skinned woman who smiled sensuously as she relaxed on a golden throne adorned with precious metals, gems, and ancient blade weapons. “Like my new look?”

Matt shook his head, aware that Eliana was growing impatient with his opaque faceplate and apparent silence, but feeling contrary. “Lurid. Very human. What escapist brain did you eavesdrop on for this image?”

“A human writer named—”

“Matt!” Eliana yelled demandingly over Suit’s intercom. She’d found the correct external control panel.

He blinked, clearing the Eyes-Up displays from his faceplate. She stood before him, her green jumpsuit tight against her curves as she stood with both hands clasped behind her back, looking at Suit and at him with unconcealed irritation. “Yes, Patron?”

“Are you done communing with that computer?”

“Just about.” Her mood change from apparent caring for him to distaste for Suit bothered him. And her AI xenophobia needed to be taught a lesson. Matt licked his lips slowly, with relish, making sure she saw him. “Why, this computer gives me a really hot neurolink to my pleasure centers! I just imagined—”

“Stop!” Eliana’s face darkened. “Before I gag.”

Matt felt brief guilt at manipulating her prejudices. He switched gears. “Patron, my equipment and I are none of your concern. Nor am I answerable to you for the ludicrous cyborg stereotypes spread about by your Vidcasters. Understood?”

Eliana looked startled, then guilty. She nodded abruptly. “I promised to try. But I’ve read that cyborgs are always—”

“Jacking in so their pleasure centers get unlimited orgasms, right?” Matt interrupted, still irritated with a Patron who paid too much attention to social stereotypes.

She blushed. “Yes. But it is possible, isn’t it?”

“So is overeating to give oneself the sensation of personal security. The fact it is possible doesn’t mean every human does it, just as pleasure neurolinking is not done by every cyborg.” He stared at her a moment, puzzled by her flip-flopping reactions to him. “Eliana, why do you hate AI computers?”

She looked haunted. Then she turned aside and stared at the holo of Tree Melisen. “Do you have to know?”

“Yes. It’s the least you can do . . . considering how you keep insulting my AI.”

“I have my reasons!” Finally she faced him, arms crossed, expression intense, aware of her discourtesy but not eager to admit it. “I detest AIs because of what one of them did to my Grandmother Miletus. She . . . she was elderly, lived by herself in the colony, and the house AI was monitoring her. She had a stroke and would have died—completely normal. But the AI resuscitated her, an aware mind in a body unable to move, unable to talk, tortured by continued pain and existence. For weeks the AI insisted on making her heart beat, her lungs breath, her organs work, with her unable to say
stop
! It kept on. And on!”

She seemed close to tears, head now downcast and black mane shadowing her eyes. “It was too stupid to let her die or call the colony for help, but had no orders to shut down. Worst of all, it didn’t
care
!” Eliana sobbed, a hopeless, heartbroken sound. “I’d stayed at the genelab too long, but eventually I found her and ordered it to shut down.” She looked up, her pain grabbing at him through the faceplate. “Don’t you understand? The AI didn’t know or care that it’s unnatural to keep someone alive after they’ve died. That’s why I
hate
AIs!” Eliana turned away, her shoulders shaking.

Matt reached out to comfort her. He patted Eliana on her shoulder. But he held back from hugging. If he hugged her, this would become more than just a Job. And he didn’t know if he could handle that right now. He cleared his throat. “Thank you, Patron. I’m very, very sorry for your loss. And my insensitivity.”

She rubbed her eyes and did not move away from his gauntleted hand. “When do we leave for the Autarch’s office Trunk?”

“Now.” Matt left on Suit’s external
speaker for Eliana’s benefit. “Patron, take my hand. Please.” She did as instructed, moving closer gingerly, her gaze still downcast. “
Mata Hari
—encapsulate, pouch us out of ship’s skin, and eject us on a bearing for the Autarch’s office.”

“Eject us? That’s—”

Eliana’s words died away as the Bridge ceiling flexed down, encapsulated them, pouched them out, and then ejected them like a seed from a stomped grape. In less than a second he and Eliana were in freefall, rushing down to Mother Tree Melisen.
Down
. Green arms reached up for them. Blue sky watched over them. Seconds later, they reached terminal velocity for an object falling in Halcyon’s gravity well.

Beside him, the wind lifted Eliana’s hair straight up. She opened her mouth to scream. That sufficed for atmospheric pressure changes in her ears as they fell like two rocks. Hand in hand, they fell ever closer to the tree tops. Had she ever done freefall skydiving? No. Suit’s readouts showed her double hearts beating in sync, at a high pressure reading. She was scared . . . and not about to show it. Instead, Eliana closed her mouth, turned away from the approaching ground and fixed on his eyes. His human eyes. She spoke loudly, to be heard over the wail of rushing air.

“Matt—we need to go by the Port first! Have to make the Genetic Donation for you. Have to!”