The Gap Into Vision: Forbidden Knowledge

  “Oh, please,” Godsen responded as if he didn’t want to be left out. “We’ve all read them. Eventually we’re going to go blind reading them.”

  Min ignored Frik. “Do you,” she continued, “understand what he’s done to her?”

  “Her?” Lebwohl’s blue eyes shone with knowledge, but he waited for Min to continue.

  “He gave her a zone implant so he could rape and use her. And that’s after she came down with gap-sickness and destroyed her own ship, killed her whole family. He broke her. None of us could stand up under that kind of abuse. Nobody could.

  “And then he gave her the zone implant control.”

  Locked in his own mind, Angus snarled obscenities that his computer couldn’t hear. Morn was like Bright Beauty: he’d used and tormented her horribly; but he’d also been faithful to her. The failure of his promise to her raised his rage to a new level.

  “Wait a minute,” Godsen objected. “How do you know that?”

  “He broke her,” Donner burned into Hashi’s gaze, “and he gave her a case of zone implant addiction, which is another kind of rape entirely, and then he handed her the control.”

  The PR director raised his voice. “I said, how do you know that?”

  “But she doesn’t have it now,” Min went on as if Protocol didn’t exist; as if only ED and DA mattered. “She probably kept it just long enough to complete her addiction. Craziness and zone implant addiction—those kinds of problems show. Succorso must have noticed them almost immediately. And when he did, he took the control away from her.

  “Now what kind of trouble is she in? She’s got gapsickness, she’s been broken, she’s a raving addict, and she’s owned by a man who’s only slightly more charming than Thermopyle here.” She slapped the back of her hand in Angus’ direction. “I want her back, Hashi. She’s one of my people, and I want her back.”

  “Listen to me!” Godsen roared like a klaxon. “How do you know he gave her the control?”

  Together Hashi and Min turned on Frik. “Because, my dear Godsen,” Hashi said placidly, “Com-Mine Security did not find it.”

  Gritting her teeth, Donner explained, “If they did, they would have executed him before we could stop them. Taverner wouldn’t have been able to stop them. They hate him too much.”

  “But that’s terrible!” Godsen protested.

  “So I’ve been saying,” drawled Min sardonically.

  “If word gets out, if people hear about this—” Frik sounded genuinely distressed. “One of our people, with gap-sickness and a zone implant, wandering around loose—under the control of a known pirate. People are going to ask why we let that happen. We’ve got to get her back.”

  “I agree,” Donner rasped. “We’ve got to get her back.” She turned on Lebwohl again. “That’s why I’m in a hurry. I don’t like any of this—and I’m liking it less by the minute.” The passion in her voice blazed higher as she spoke. “I want him ready and on his way. He’s my only chance to rescue her. If she isn’t past hope already.”

  This time Hashi looked a little nonplussed. “My dear Min,” he said as if he were breathing sand, “I am not certain that his programming can accommodate your wishes.”

  She poised herself as if she were about to draw her gun. “What do you mean?”

  “Forgive me. I spoke imprecisely. I mean, I am not certain that his programming will be allowed to accommodate your wishes.”

  “That’s outrageous,” snorted Godsen. “Of course he’s got to rescue her. You aren’t listening. I tell you, we’ve got a disaster on our hands. The only way we can salvage the situation is by rescuing her.”

  “I understand your concern,” Hashi replied placatingly. “However, you must realize that our position is not so simple. I mean, the position of those of us in this room. Let me explain with a question. When our Joshua was arrested by Com-Mine Security, your Morn Hyland fled with Captain Succorso. Why did we permit that to occur?”

  “We weren’t there,” Frik said. “We couldn’t stop it.”

  But Min had a different answer. “Orders,” she snapped.

  “Naturally,” said Lebwohl. “Of course. But that is not an answer. Why were those orders given? What reasoning lies behind them?”

  The ED director grew more bitter by the moment. “I don’t know. He’s keeping it to himself.”

  Hashi agreed with a nod. “So we must speculate.

  “Consider the hypothesis that Morn Hyland was a condition for Captain Succorso’s cooperation. He wanted her, and we want him. Therefore we had no choice but to let him have her.

  “This is plausible, but unsatisfactory.

  “It is certain that Com-Mine Station could not be allowed to keep her. If they did, they would inevitably have learned the truth—that our Joshua was innocent of the charge against him. Indeed, that the charge was invented by Captain Succorso and our valued ally, Deputy Chief of Security Milos Taverner. Then we would have been exposed. The Preempt Act would have failed, and our director of Protocol would have been faced with a disaster of”—his eyes gleamed—“astronomical proportions.

  “However, to relieve the dilemma by allowing Captain Succorso to take her is altogether questionable. Personally I would have preferred to terminate her. She is a random element—and Captain Succorso himself is a rogue. Together they will cause more difficulties than they resolve.

  “I cannot persuade myself that we have placed ourselves in this position merely to satisfy Captain Succorso’s wishes.”

  “In other words,” Donner said angrily, “you think there’s something else going on here. You think Joshua won’t be programmed to rescue her for the same reason we let her get away with Succorso—and we won’t be told what that reason is.”

  “In essence,” Hashi said, “yes.”

  Angus’ arms had begun to burn with strain, but he didn’t have the choice of letting them drop.

  “We’ll see about that,” Godsen proclaimed. “Protocol isn’t going to take this lying down. Sure, I’m all in favor of Joshua here. I hope he nukes Thanatos Minor to slag. And Captain Succorso with it. You’re right—Succorso’s a rogue. Having an agent like him isn’t worth the risk.

  “Some risks I’m willing to take. You know that. Using illegals like Succorso and traitors like Taverner to help us pass the Preempt Act and give us Joshua—that was worth the danger. In fact, it was my idea. If word got out, we were all cooked. But I don’t think we could have passed the Act any other way.

  “This is another matter. We have nothing to gain by taking the chance that Succorso and Hyland might go critical on us. We should have blasted them to powder as soon as they left Com-Mine. But we didn’t, so now we’ve got to accept the consequences.

  “I’m going to fight this one.” He faced Donner as if he expected applause—or at least gratitude. “You can count on my support. If we don’t at least try to rescue your Morn Hyland, we’re too vulnerable.”

  Min wasn’t grateful. She snorted, “What makes you think he’ll listen?”

  He? Angus thought. He? Were they talking about Warden Dios? The UMCP director?

  Who else could give these three people orders?

  Did the most powerful man in human space force them to let Morn go with Succorso?

  Godsen Frik’s voice had a petulant, almost defensive tone as he retorted, “I can go over his head.”

  Both Hashi Lebwohl and Min Donner looked away from the PR director as if they were shocked—or shamed. Studying the floor, Min said softly, “The way you did about the immunity drug.”

  Dangerous red flushed across Godsen’s face; but he didn’t respond.

  Still addressing the floor, Donner muttered, “I don’t like playing this dirty.”

  Now Frik spoke back. “Oh, don’t go all virtuous on us. You’ve got as much blood on your conscience as anyone else. Probably more. Why else do they call you his executioner?

  “You brought Joshua here, didn’t you?”

  “I obey orders,” she replied as if
to herself. “I trust him. I have to. But we’re supposed to be cops. What good are we if we aren’t honest?”

  Hashi shrugged delicately. “What is honest? We define a goal. Then we devise a means to achieve it. Is this not honest?”

  Some of the blood on Min’s conscience showed in her eyes as she glared at Lebwohl. “I’m getting nauseous,” she growled. “You said you’re going to tell us how he works. Do that, so I can leave.”

  A smile quirked the corners of Hashi’s mouth. “I will.

  “But I must warn you,” he said to both his fellow directors. “If you disapprove of the possibility that our Joshua will not be programmed to rescue Morn Hyland, you will certainly not be comforted by what I tell you now.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” demanded Godsen.

  “I will spare you the technical details,” Lebwohl replied. “A general outline is sufficient.

  “When Joshua’s programming has been designed, and all its priorities and variables have been approved, it will be written to the datacore of his computer. In effect, it will become an integral part of him. The interface between his mind and his computer will allow him to act on the basis of his experience and knowledge—as long as he attempts nothing which in any way violates his programming. He will have the moral equivalent of two minds. One, ours, will impose our instructions on him. The other, his, will act on those instructions.

  “Within its limits, the system is reliable. Because of the control supplied by his zone implants, he will be entirely unable to perform any action which does not conform to his programming.

  “Unfortunately the system is limited. Simply put, the difficulty is that we can never envision every situation or exigency which Joshua will confront. And if his circumstances become such that they are not adequately covered by his programming, he will be able to take independent action—action which might conceivably damage us or our interests. This you already know.”

  “Of course we know it,” Frik rumbled. “We aren’t stupid.”

  Hashi’s blue gaze appeared to reserve judgment on that point, but his tone conveyed no insult. “The solution we have devised is that Joshua will not work alone. He will be accompanied by a ‘partner.’ This partner will appear to be his subordinate, but will have the capacity to amend his programming as needed. Joshua’s computer will recognize his partner’s voice, and when his partner speaks the proper codes his new instructions will be written directly to his datacore.

  “Naturally, if we see reason to adjust Joshua’s programming ourselves, we need only contact his partner. Changes can be made in a few moments.”

  Both Min and Godsen waited as Hashi studied them. After a moment, the DA director said, “Joshua’s partner has already been selected and is now being trained. As you may imagine, he cannot be controlled as Joshua himself is controlled. If he were, his own programming limitations might well hamper Joshua’s effectiveness. But we have selected a man whom we consider peculiarly well suited for the task. And I can assure you that his training has been intensive.”

  Donner gritted her teeth and went on waiting.

  Angus didn’t have the capacity to clench his jaws; nevertheless he, too, waited.

  “Don’t drag it out, Hashi,” said Godsen. “Who is he?”

  Hashi Lebwohl beamed.

  “Why, none other than our trusted ally and colleague, Milos Taverner.”

  Somewhere in the back of Angus’ mind, a small hope flickered to life.

  “Taverner?” Frik spat. “Are you out of your mind? You’re going to trust this entire operation to a man like Taverner? He has the scruples of a trash recycler. He’s already sold out Com-Mine Security. All we had to do was pay him enough. He’s probably selling us, too. If he isn’t, he’ll do it as soon as he’s offered enough credit.”

  “I think not.” Lebwohl was unruffled. “We have several safeguards.

  “First, of course, a datacore is unalterable. Our Milos cannot effectively issue instructions which run directly counter to Joshua’s programming. And every instruction he gives—indeed, every word he utters in Joshua’s presence—will be permanently recorded. Our Milos will be unable to conceal what he has done.

  “In addition, his unreliability is known. We have all the evidence we require. If our Milos seeks to betray us, he will be destroyed. We have left him no doubt of this.”

  Hashi smiled benevolently, then continued.

  “In any case, whatever your objections, you must consider the question of credibility. Joshua’s partner must appear to be Angus Thermopyle’s subordinate. The Captain Thermopyle who is known upon Thanatos Minor would never serve under another—and would never accept as a subordinate any man who was not demonstrably illegal. His programming will allow him to expose his partner’s treacheries, to explain—and thereby protect—him. That will leave Milos helpless to do anything other than serve us.”

  Frik wasn’t satisfied, but Min didn’t give him another chance to protest.

  “No, Hashi.” She sounded almost calm. “It’s untenable. You can’t do it. I wondered why we took Taverner away from Com-Mine, but I assumed it was to cover all of us if he got caught. I never thought you wanted him for something like this.

  “He’s an impossible choice. You can’t give a known traitor control over a weapon like Thermopyle. One of my people is at stake here. I’m going to fight you on this.”

  And delay the operation? Angus argued in his paralyzed silence. No, don’t do it, you don’t want that.

  Hashi faced Donner squarely. “It has been decided,” he asserted. “The director approved the order weeks ago.” He paused, then added happily, “I am proud to say that the suggestion was mine. I consider our Milos the perfect choice.”

  Min bunched her fists, raised them in front of her. But she didn’t have anyone to strike. Through her teeth, she snarled, “Lebwohl, you’re a shit.”

  Hashi’s eyes narrowed. In a prim wheeze, he retorted, “It will not surprise you, I think, to hear that I hold you in similar esteem.”

  “Come on, Min.” An apoplectic flush covered Godsen’s face. “I’m going to talk to the director. I want you with me.”

  Min flashed a scathing glare at him, turned away roughly, and strode out of the room.

  “And when the director refuses to alter his decision,” Lebwohl said to Godsen, “you will again attempt to ‘go over his head.’ This time, you will not succeed. The game is deeper than you understand, and you will drown in it.”

  Sputtering, the PR director hurried after Min.

  When Donner and Frik were gone, Hashi spent some time playing with Angus before putting him back to bed. But Angus did his best to ignore the humiliation. He had no choice, of course—but now he suffered the way his arms and penis burned with less rage and old terror. He had been given something to hope for, something which helped him dissociate himself from his nightmare.

  He concentrated on that because he was physically powerless to castrate the DA director.

  CHAPTER 16

  When Captain’s Fancy hit the gap, she began to come apart.

  According to her chronometers, the emergency was brief, so brief that its extremity became almost incomprehensible. As soon as she gained the velocity he wanted, Nick engaged her gap drive, and she went into tach. And as soon as she went into tach, dimensional physics started undoing her atom by atom, pulling her to nothingness like smoke in a slow wind.

  For a few seconds she drifted along the rim of nonexistence.

  The gap field generator had failed at exactly the wrong instant.

  The crisis was too quick for logic. Only imagination and intuition were fast enough to save Nick’s people.

  Specifically Vector Shaheed saved them: not because he was a wizard at his job, but because he panicked. Inspired by imagination or intuition, he panicked in the right way.

  He was already afraid. The new Amnion equipment had passed most of his tests perfectly—and had come up blank on others. Those few tests had simply refused to
run. And that scared him.

  Alone in the drive space, with Captain’s Fancy’s survival riding on him—with Morn Hyland’s finger pressed to the ship’s self-destruct, and equipment he couldn’t trust in his gap field generator—calm, phlegmatic Vector Shaheed lost his nerve.

  When Nick ordered tach, Vector’s hands leaped like intuitions at his control board. Milliseconds after the gap field was engaged, he hit his overrides, trying to cancel the ship’s translation from Amnion to human space.

  In theory, that was the wrong thing to do. It had never been done before: no one who survived the gap had ever tried it. Captain’s Fancy should have winked away; should have become a phantom, a ghost ship sailing unchartable dimensional seas.

  However, in this case the theory itself was wrong. The gap field generated by the Amnion equipment was anomalous: open-ended in a way no sane gap field was ever intended to be. Instead of hastening Captain’s Fancy’s extinction, Vector’s overrides snatched her back into normal space.

  They also burned out all the control circuits and several components of the drive. Captain’s Fancy resumed tard with her gap drive slagged.

  She came out of the gap like a blast from a matter cannon; hit normal space with a dopplering howl, as if all the stars around her wailed. Instantly scan and navigation went crazy. Her velocity was so great, so far beyond anything her thrusters could have produced, that her computers weren’t programmed for it. Time-dilation effects distorted everything; sensors broke into electronic gibberish. The computers took long minutes to recalibrate themselves—to deduce the ship’s condition and begin compensating for it.

  When at last they were able to make sense of the new data, they reported that Captain’s Fancy was traveling at .9C: roughly 270,000 kilometers per second.

  That should have been impossible. No human ship was built to attain such speed. On the other hand, there was no g involved, no stress. Internally the ship might as well have been drifting. The dilemma was all external; and for the present it involved no immediate hazards. The computers were simply ill prepared to interpret the information Captain’s Fancy’s probes and sensors received from the starfield and the deep dark.