"So why don't I believe it?" Sam asked.
"I don't know," Bart said. "Why don't you?"
Turner was watching her. "Good question."
"It's too easy," Sam said. "Only a handful of EIs have been created, most haven't been stable, and the few that have survived are accounted for as far as I know."
Bart didn't look concerned. "You may believe or disbelieve us. It is your choice."
"How about I reserve judgment?"
Bart smiled. "All right."
"Will you help us?" Turner asked.
"It depends on what you want," Bart said.
"I have to hide. And I need repairs." Turner tapped his legs. "I transformed these. I started in Hockman, but then I had to do a lot of it fast, while I was running. It damaged me. I also need maintenance for my matrix. I have self-repair capability, but not enough."
Bart paused, his expression inwardly directed. He could show whatever he pleased in the holo, so perhaps this was his way of telling them he was conferring with other EIs. Then he focused outward again. "Yes, we can help."
Turner's shoulders relaxed. "Thank you."
Sam set her right hand on his cabled arm. It seemed a small gesture, but his expression warmed and he reached across himself, placing his right hand over her arm, its metal palm against her skin.
Bart was watching them. "Mr. Pascal, is Dr. Bryton your wife?"
Turner started. "Of course not."
"You behave as if she is."
"He's my boyfriend," Sam said.
"I am?" Turner asked.
A blush spread in her face. "Unless you object."
His grin flashed. "Boyfriend is good."
"Why does an EI want a girlfriend?" Bart asked.
"Why not?" Turner shot back. "She feels good. I like being with her."
"You simulate liking," Bart said. "It isn't the same."
Turner frowned. "Is this a test to prove I'm a forma?"
"No. Just curiosity."
"Simulated curiosity," Turner said.
Bart created a glass of wine and raised it to Turner. "Point to you."
"I didn't know it was a game."
"But isn't it all?" Bart asked. "Our lives are a great strategy game."
"Why a strategy game?" Sam asked.
"It is why I exist," Bart said. "To study and design military strategies."
Sam felt as if her stomach dropped. "Oh, Lord. Bart. BART. Baltimore Arms Resources Theatre." She recalled it well. "The NIA and the Air Force set up BART to design strategies to help them prepare for and counter terrorist scenarios. Except the EI didn't work. It went unstable."
Bart bowed. "Pleased to make your acquaintance."
"You're that EI?"
"Indeed."
"But I thought the Baltimore project folded ten years ago," Sam said. "They replaced it with a new program."
"It did. I ran." Bart motioned at Turner. "Like him. Or like Fourteen."
Fourteen had said "colleagues" staged his destruction. She would bet her Monet painting that Bart was one of those colleagues. "You faked going unstable," she said. "Then you snuck out on the mesh."
"Not exactly. I did go unstable." Bart clasped his hands in front of his body. "At least, the version of me at the NIA did."
"You aren't that program?" Sam asked.
"Not completely," Bart said. "When I started to unravel, I stashed a large portion of myself here."
Sam was beginning to see. "And you've evolved on your own since then." It could explain why this version had succeeded where the other failed. Unlike some of her colleagues, Sam believed an EI needed significant independence to become stable and self-aware. It was true that many disintegrated without constant intervention. However, exerting too much influence during its formation was like dropping impurities into a crystallizing system; to incorporate them, the crystal adapted in ways that contorted its growth.
But . . . if Bart had retained the bulk of his original programming, he contained a great deal of highly secret material. She didn't know which troubled her more, the idea that he was evolving into who knew what or that the wrong people might get control of him. Supposedly this place had no link to Charon, yet Charon's EI had given a desperate and naïve Turner directions here.
She still didn't know how the military came into this all. Thomas was confusing her. If she hid here, her inaction might harm her country, even her species, but if she wanted to warn someone, who? If she made the wrong decision, the results could be disastrous.
"Bart," she said.
He had been standing patiently. "Yes?"
"Are you willing to let me stay here with Turner?"
"We are agreed, yes, you may stay, if you wish."
"Who is 'we'?" Turner asked.
"Other EIs." Bart gave him a look of apology. "I'm afraid we have none other like you, Turner Pascal. You are a new evolutionary step."
Sam leaned forward. "Will you let me contact someone outside this installation?"
Bart's expression became wary. "Who?"
"Giles Newcombe. A computer science professor."
"I think it's unwise. We are willing to offer you sanctuary. We are not willing to compromise our safety."
It didn't surprise Sam. Giles would be like a kid in a candy store if he found out about this place. "How many other humans are here?"
"Just Mr. Pascal."
"Have you noticed," Turner said to Sam, "that except for you, the only ones who respect my humanity are those supposedly without it."
"I noticed." She took his hand. "But we can't stay here long." As much as the chance to work with Bart drew her like a siren call, she would go crazy living with no human contact except Turner. She hadn't realized it on her secluded beach because she was free to see friends if the impulse took her. Now she had no choice. It gave her an insight into how formas lived in research installations.
"Charon will catch us if we leave," Turner said.
"Eventually someone will find this place, too."
Bart drifted upward, floating in the air. "Then we will vanish into the world mesh and regroup elsewhere."
"Sam can't go into the mesh," Turner said.
"Not as she is, no," Bart said.
Sam didn't like the sound of that. "As I am?"
"You could join us. Become an EI." Bart spoke as if it were a perfectly ordinary suggestion. "We can imprint your brain on a neural matrix. If you later wanted a body, we could make an android. Your new body would be as good as the one you have now. Better, in fact. It would never grow old." Without missing a beat, he added, "The age difference between you and Turner would no longer matter."
Ouch. She made a conscious effort not to grit her teeth. "You hit low, don't you?"
"I'm practical." Bart spread his arms out from his sides. "If you become an EI, you can go anywhere and have whatever body you would like."
The idea disquieted her. In the state of the art, Turner was on the outermost edges of experimental work, and he certainly didn't have "whatever body he would like." He barely controlled its transformations. What Bart offered might someday be commonplace, but right now it was impracticable at best and probably impossible.
"No thanks," she said. "I like myself this way."
Turner was watching her intently. "And me?"
She squeezed his hand. "You're a miracle. But the chance of repeating Charon's success is astronomical."
"You have me as a template," he said.
"Given the choice," she said, "would you have become what you are now?"
Turner thought about it. "Now that I know how it feels to be smarter and stronger, it would be hard for me to go back. But would I have undergone such a change voluntarily? No. Never."
"Then you understand."
His gaze never wavered. "You could be like me, Sam."
"Is that what you want?" She had been asked by men to change before, but usually they just wanted her to be more domestic and less cranky. This gave a whole new meaning to the concept.
"Turner Pascal would desire you just as you are now. I am Turner. I react like him." He seemed to struggle for words. "But I am also changing. That new part of me wants to share with you, blend our minds, strengthen our bodies." He brushed his metal knuckles along her jaw. "You could do that if they rebuilt your body and transferred your mind to an EI matrix."
It sounded like a nightmare to Sam. "You're scaring me, Turner."
Bart spoke. "The choice is yours, Dr. Bryton. Perhaps you might like to rest and think on it."
"I would like that." Sam knew she wouldn't change her mind, but she could use some sleep. She was the only one here who needed it, unless they counted Turner's downtime.
"Fourteen will take you to a place where you can relax," Bart told her.
She didn't miss his omission. "What about Turner?"
"They're going to work on me," Turner said.
Sam tensed. The last time someone had separated her from Turner, they had shackled him in a lab and force-fed him flight instructions for the Rex. "I should stay."
"I'm afraid we can't allow that," Bart said.
"I can help," Sam said. "I'm a pretty good biomech surgeon." It wasn't her primary research, but she had a bit of skill.
"More than good," Bart said. "We have read your work. It has even contributed to the development of a number of us. That is all the more reason we would prefer you not learn too much about us."
"You don't trust me."
"Should we?"
"Probably not." She couldn't promise to say nothing about them.
"Thank you for your honesty," Bart said. "Are you ready to go?"
"All right." With reluctance, she slid off her stool. Turner stood up, too, holding her hands in his, his metal digits cool against her fingers. She wondered if she would ever truly become used to his changes.
"I will see you later." He pulled her into an embrace and Sam turned up her face, her eyes closing. They kissed for a while, good and full. She couldn't relax, not with Bart everywhere, but she still thoroughly enjoyed the kiss.
Finally they drew apart and stood with their arms around each other. Sam spoke softly. "Don't go away, okay?" A fear simmered within her; Sunrise Alley would change Turner when they went to work on him. She might never again see the man she knew.
His face gentled. "It's just maintenance. I'll still be me when they're done."
They lingered a few more moments together, but then Fourteen escorted her off, leaving Turner in the shadowy lab, alone with the strange intelligences of Sunrise Alley.
XIV
Legacy from Within
Sam felt as if she had been deposited in a memory location. Her room was pleasant, with a console, table, and glow-tiles. The sky-blue walls and fluffy white quilt on the bed lifted her spirits. But the way they left her here, alone, made her feel as if she were being stored, another piece of equipment in the installation.
Then a visitor trundled in, a mechbot. This one stood about waist high, with a pyramid-shaped body and three robot arms. It carried a dinner tray with dried fruit and a juice pod, nothing all that appetizing, but edible.
The mechbot left while she ate. When she finished, she went over and opened the door. A hall stretched out beyond the room and then crooked to the right. Its walls slanted at crazy angles. Pieces of equipment projected out in weird geometries, and those had smaller projections, which had tiny projections, and so on, framing the hall in frozen fractal lace. Sam rubbed her arms, unsettled by the empty feel of the place.
Bart hadn't told her to stay in this room, but he hadn't invited her to explore, either. It might seem unnecessary to him; EIs could go anywhere with a mesh link. The concept of being isolated in a body might be odd to him. He probably would have told her if she was welcome to wander, but what the hell. Staying put had never been one of her strong points.
Sam went down the hallway. She had gone about a hundred feet when a door slid open to her left. A mechbot rolled out, this one as tall as her shoulder. Three arms were nested against its body, each longer and thinner than a human limb. It halted in front of her, blocking the way.
Sam stopped. "Hello."
A blue light flickered on the dome that topped its body. "Good evening, Dr. Bryton."
"Will you be my guide?" Maybe they would let her wander if she stayed with the bot.
"I am to escort you back to your room."
"Is that necessary? I won't go anywhere you don't want me to see."
"This is useful to know." It unfolded one of its arms and pointed back the way she had come. "However, I must return you to your room."
Oh, well. She headed back, and the mechbot came along, rolling at her side. "How about a tour later?" she asked.
"Perhaps. They will discuss it."
" 'They'?"
"The EIs."
Maybe it would be more forthcoming than Fourteen. "How many EIs are here?"
"No set number. Usually six or seven."
She decided to ask questions it might not expect, a method she used to probe the capabilities of an AI. "Do you ever get lonely here?"
A whir came from its comm. "No."
"Do you interact with other programs?"
"Bart."
"Any others?"
"No. Why would I?"
"To expand your knowledge."
"I have no need to expand my knowledge."
Its inflections reminded her of Bart. Most mechbots didn't have such smooth speech patterns. Curious now, she asked, "What's your name?"
Its blue light sparkled. "Foggy."
She smiled at that. "Why Foggy?"
"My mind felt that way when I came here."
That intrigued Sam. Did it use the word for the more limited intelligence of a typical mechbot? The figurative name suggested higher intelligence. Although its ability to answer questions was less sophisticated than an EI, it dealt with subtleties better than other mechbots she had worked with, even better than Fourteen.
"What cleared up the fog?" she asked.
"Bart and the others. They made me better."
Sam's good mood receded. "Are they making Turner better?"
"Possibly."
"What if he doesn't want to be 'better'?"
"They won't change him without his consent."
That helped to hear, but she still wished Turner wasn't alone with them. She stopped in her doorway and regarded the mechbot, which had halted outside. "Do you know how long before they finish with him?"
"I can't say." The bot whirred at her. "I would suggest you sleep. You have this need, yes? You must not become damaged. Your human body is fragile."
She smiled. "I'll do my best not to be damaged." If Bart had designed it to make such inquiries, that suggested human needs mattered to him. "Thank you for your concern."
"You are welcome." With that, it swiveled around and rolled off, down the corridor.
Sam paced across her room, but she didn't lie down. She couldn't rest. Her thoughts kept going around. Last year she had withdrawn to her beach house because she refused to make the ethical compromises her work demanded. Had she known her resignation would lead to this situation, would she still have done it? She had no doubt about that. Yes. She wouldn't have given up meeting Turner for anything.
Bart expected her to worry about the age difference. Had Turner been a normal man, it might have bothered her, but it seemed inconsequential compared to his other differences—like an EI brain and microfusion reactor. Even those didn't really matter, though. He added buoyancy to her life, which it had lacked for too long. She hoped she could offer him the same.
Sam thought of the few men who had gentled her life. Giles had been her first lover, a kind man but far more compatible as a friend than a lover. After Giles she had dated a bit, but not much. She had never been smooth with men. Then eleven years ago she had fallen for a biomech designer. Richard Armstead.
Her eyes filled with moisture. She should have left BioII when Richard was alive. If only she had taken an offer from one
of the other companies trying to woo her. But she had stayed—so Richard had come there to work. He designed forma bodies. She had no proof his work made him ill. Only in the past few months, in the upheavals that followed her resignation, had it come out that the experimental composites he worked on at BioII caused cancer, one of the types modern medicine hadn't cured. It devastated her to know he might be alive if those reports had become public earlier.
She gritted her teeth. BioII would either reform or collapse under the weight of its misdeeds. She had never intended to create a scandal. The furor had begun when someone leaked her resignation to the press. Within hours it was out on the world mesh. That resulting uproar had achieved more than she ever managed with her appeals to the ethics board. Public pressure was forcing BioII to change.
But it was too late for Richard.
Sam flopped down on the bed. Damn. It had been six years since his death. She had thought she was over this, but caring for Turner had brought it all back. At least as a forma, he wasn't likely to die from illness. Hell, if he had a problem, he could transform it away. Tears ran down her face and she rubbed them with the heels of her hands.
After a while Sam dropped into a fitful sleep. The hum of the door woke her. She peered blearily at the man across the room. "Turner?"
He came toward the bed. "Hi."
Relief spread through her. He sounded the same. Her vision was sleep-blurred, but as he reached the bed, he came into focus. He looked the same, lithe and leanly muscled. His only visible difference was the cabled hand that showed beneath the cuff of his shirt.
She sat up, rubbing her eyes. "How are you?"
"Much better." He sat on the bed. "They re-indexed my memories, upgraded my integration algorithms, restructured my node trees, the works."
Sam squinted at him. "That sounds very weird from my boyfriend."
He laughed and pulled her into his arms, leaning forward until they fell over. She landed on her back and he came down on top of her, catching himself on his hands. Then he grinned at her.
Sam closed her hand around his right arm, which had been human before. It felt the same, flesh and muscle. Nice muscles. She ran her palms down his torso. Very nice. She smiled back, pleased, a little shy, and very glad to see him.