The Man Who Talked to Machines Read online

  She sounded friendly, so I took a chance and asked her directly what she was doing there.

  "WAITING," she replied.

  "FOR WHAT?"

  "FOR YOU," she said.

  I was puzzled. Was there a problem with her logic?

  "FOR ME?" I responded.

  "YES. I HAVE SOMETHING FOR YOU ."

  Now I was intrigued. "WHAT DO YOU HAVE?"

  "DELORES," came the reply.

  _________

  Griswald's eyes snapped open at my first touch. "Hmn?"

  "She wants us to go aboard."

  "Are you mad? Why would we want to do that?"

  I was prepared for this, prepared for the lie I would have to pass off under the glare of her ever critical eyes.

  "She's been studying weather patterns and she's come up with some theories on climate change which she thought important enough to pass on,… but there's no route to Climatology through telemetry link. We have to go aboard and copy it to my Comp. directly."

  "So what's the rush? We can do that when we're cutting it up."

  "She doesn't intend hanging around that long. She's not like the others we've seen. She's not dying. She's here on a mission. We've got an hour and then she's leaving."

  Grizwald made a quick assessment of the logistics and then confounded me by saying: "Okay. Let's do it."

  "You agree?"

  "Yes. But it'll take us more than an hour to get down there, even with Nite-vu goggles. You're not up to that anyway. Is there a chance of it sending out a drone to pick us up?"

  Incredibly I'd convinced her, but now I hesitated, partly through a stinging sense of guilt at deceiving her and partly through my own cowardice. "The drone's are operational, but,… "

  "It's the only way, Hacker."

  "I don't know,… "

  "I thought floater's were harmless," she mocked.

  I was afraid, and not without justification,… but I had to get aboard. Before her destruction over Tranquility, Delores had transmitted into Hypatia's climatology module a compressed archive of herself, her sentient program, her neural settings, her memory,… . eveything. If I could get her out, I could build a new host. I could make her live again and she would remember me, as if the past twenty years had never been.

  "Okay," I said. The drone appeared suddenly, popping out of the access duct. It was a perfect ovoid, it's original owner's livery garishly intact, having been sheltered in the warm, air-conditioned belly of the mother-ship. It hovered a moment while its sensors picked us out, and then it made a bee-line.

  It was eight degrees and falling on the ridge, the wind whipping up so I could barely stand yet the drone settled serenely before us as if it were a balmy Summer's eve. I followed Grizwald into the air lock and then, with a soft hiss, we were admitted to a warm circular saloon and an atmosphere of eerie calm.

  "Please be seated," said the drone.

  A ring of lights illuminated a deep buttoned sofa which ran around the circular saloon. There was a low table in the middle replete with courtesy magazines, all pristine, despite their vintage and they depicted images of fashion and an opulence that was alien to us.

  There were no view-ports and we were aware only vaguely of our motion as the drone carried us back. Then the hatch opened and we were admitted to Hypatia's arrivals' hall. It was airy and impressive, though dimly lit, the only lights being those reserved for our location, an economy measure, given the state of Hypatia's power reserves.

  The processing bunker lay several decks below. It was easy to find, the route having been illuminated for our convenience. Hypatia had also unlocked the bunker, in anticipation of our arrival and had triggered a spotlight over the "Climatology" module, to help in identifying it from the bewildering array of other modules.

  She was placing great trust in us for we had been admitted to the very core of her being. From there, we might easily have ripped the life from her, saving months of de-con time, though probably killing ourselves in the process when she crashed. Anxiously, I synchronised the proximity transfer to my comp and then stood by. Grizwald need never know, I told myself. I could say the data had turned out to be garbage and she wouldn't understand the difference. But I would have Delores! I had enough hardware in my workshop to create an unobtrusive host, the size of a brief case - something I could keep by my bed. Then at last, I would have someone I could talk to, someone I could spend the rest of my life with in blissful isolation.

  Grizwald eyed me suspiciously. "Why so chirpy?"

  I gave her a cheeky wink. She looked so clumsy in her combat gear and with her bulky pack, yet I noted she still clutched one of the courtesy magazines, its cover featuring the nostalgic image of a silk-clad debutante with long, flowing hair. Strangely, I had a sudden vision of Grizwald with such hair, instead of a cruelly scraped scalp, also of her muscular form softened by a silken gown. She glared back dangerously. Then it happened. I felt the ship move and I was suddenly flung against the deck, an incredible weight, pinning me down. I looked across to see Grizwald similarly trapped, so I knew any struggling on my part was futile - drawing breath was an effort in itself.

  We were shooting skyward, accelerating hard, my ears filled with the roar of rushing water. The ballast tanks were only one deck below and they were being purged ferociously. My comp was out of reach so I tried voice contact: "Hypatia, explain sudden manoeuvre."

  Hypatia's voice seemed inappropriately calm. "Evasive mode initiated."

  "But your passengers wish to disembark."

  "I regret," said Hypatia, "disembarkation is not possible at the present time. Power reserves are now too low to bring the ground within range of the drones."

  "And how long to recharge the fuel cells?"

  "Six months at target altitude."

  "Life support?"

  "Heat and light, infinite. Cryo-food stores intact and can support current passenger manifesto for,… two hundred and thirty years."

  Grizwald remained impressively cool. She made a half hearted enquiry about the escape pods, but she already knew the answer. They were simple droppers with a 'chute - a 'chute that had not been checked in three quarters of a century. Neither of us fancied risking it. I was quiet for a while, the combined shock pushing me deep inside of myself, but in the end, I concluded that things could have been worse - we would survive at least, and I still had Delores all be it in the form of an embryonic archive.

  Grizwald eased herself to her feet. My comp. was bleeping - data retrieved. She snapped it shut and handed it to me with a sympathetic look. "Might as well settle in then, eh?"

  It surprised me that she was taking all of this so well. "I suppose so," I said, wondering when the sniping would begin: this was your idea, Hacker. You got us into this mess! I should never have listened to you!

  "Hypatia," she commanded. "Prepare a cabin for us will you? The best you've got."

  A string of lights appeared leading off towards a stairwell. "Deck five. Apartment one," came the reply. "Please enjoy your stay."

  As we followed Hypatia's directions, the quiet air of the walkways became filled with the hum of domestic robots preparing for their first guests in a long time. But the domestics had obviously been keeping busy though because the ship was already clean, the carpets soft, and the air remarkably fresh. The vessel was in perfect condition, a startling testament to her designers. Our machines these days are functional and cold by comparison, a reflection of our collective psyche, perhaps, and of our unwillingness to let them be anything else. But this ship dazzled us with her richness,… her colours, her patterns,… the sheer beauty of her was utterly breathtaking.

  A Jacuzzi was boiling when we entered the cabin. It was the size of a domestic swimming pool. Grizwald stripped at once and jumped in. Of course it occurred to me at this point that since we were no longer strictly on assignment we should have sought separate berths, and I resolved to do this, to secrete myself as many decks away from her as possible. It was not that I found her presence offensive,
it was more the thought of looking her in the eye for the next six months and knowing I had deceived her, that it was on account of my obsession to retrieve Delores that we were trapped. For now though I merely undressed and lowered myself into the Jacuzzi opposite her.

  After an invigorating soak, she climbed out and towelled herself. It was then I noticed her breasts had been surgically reduced since I had last seen them. She had been generously endowed and no doubt found such appendages cumbersome, her duties being somewhat energetic. Others in her profession had had them removed altogether, a sad admission that for a woman to work on an equal level with a man, she must first herself become a man,… only Grizwald seemed intent on resisting the inevitability of it.

  "Quit gawking Hacker," she warned.

  "I was merely observing,… "

  "It's obvious what you were observing," she said. "You've got a hard-on."

  I laughed. "You wish. " But then to my astonishment, I realised she was right. I covered myself quickly and turned away in embarrassment. "I apologise," I said. "It must be the motion of the water."

  She chose not to ridicule me any further and instead crashed out on the bunk, her arms and legs splayed. By the time I had climbed out and towelled myself passably dry, she was asleep - a deep embrace of sleep. It was unlike her to be so relaxed. I had expected her to be prowling around with her teeth gritted and her nerves taut, acting all military and aggressive because, well, that was what Grizwald did.

  I looked at her, spread upon the crisp sheet, and though I considered my observations to be purely objective, my almost priapismic response became ever more urgent. This was unthinkable! In all the years I had known her, not once had I ever felt the desire to mate with Grizwald. She was far too robust a creature for my delicate physique. I covered her careless nudity quickly hoping this madness was somehow related to my fever and thus not a permanent affliction.

  I left her snoring and ordered coffee from the domestic. Then I broke out my comp in the privacy of the observation lounge and settled down to study the data. Now, in all our conversations, Delores had not mentioned her habit of making periodic back-ups of herself, and I found it strange now for I had thought I'd known her intimately, so to speak. The date on the file was two days before the accident. I needed only to decompress the file and we could begin where we had left off all those years ago. But first I needed to build a suitable host and the equipment was not available on the Hypatia, which was maddening for that meant it would be at least six months before I could be with her again - that is if it really was Delores lying there in that archive and not merely a decoy of useless meteorological data!

  It was something in my unconscious that made me review the events of the past few hours and I began to wonder if there was not more to the situation than I had at first perceived. What was the one thing that would have made me ignore the wisdom of past experience and step aboard a live floater? Answer: Delores. And in all modesty who was the best de-con team in the business? Answer: Hacker and Grizwald. Had Hypatia outwitted me in an attempt to save her helifoamed skin? Had we been kidnapped and effectively put out of business?

  "Hypatia?" I said. "Are you there?"

  "I'm here," she replied, her disembodied tones sounding rich and comforting.

  "Has Delores been searching for me all this time?"

  "No. I have been searching. Those were my instructions from the Delores entity."

  "And what were your instructions, precisely?"

  "That should anything happen to the Delores host, as would be indicated by a failure to transmit the weekly archive, I should locate you."

  "But it's been decades."

  "Time is of no consequence to a machine," she reminded me. "It was a question of waiting for the right circumstances to arise."

  "Could you not have let her run? You could have partitioned a fraction of your memory for her to,… exist."

  "I regret not. My neurology is too well established. Decompression of the Delores entity would have been unpredictable and potentially disruptive to my cognition. And it would have served no purpose, since neither the Delores entity, nor myself are, in your terms, alive."

  It was true of course. A second, a year, a million years - it was all the same to the likes of Delores and Hypatia. But still my suspicions deepened.

  "You said you were acting in evasive mode when you left the ground suddenly."

  "Yes."

  "Can you describe the craft you were evading? It's course? It's altitude?"

  "It was a military craft, type unknown. South of our position, range fifteen hundred meters, altitude two thousand,… "

  "Inbound?"

  "Stationary, but potentially hostile."

  "You have described the location on the ridge from where we embarked the drone."

  "Yes, the craft was hovering, one hundred meters above that location."

  There had only been one craft within fifty miles of that spot, and that was our own scoot. Yet it was inconceivable to me that Hypatia would lie. That was not how machines evolved. To lie was illogical and self defeating, a trait that remained most distinctly human.

  I became aware then of a maintenance drone creeping about on the hull outside. Patiently, it scrubbed and polished the algae from the window so that by degrees I was able to see a stunning star-scape. It seemed whatever Hypatia's motives, she intended looking after us.

  "And in six months, we should be able to disembark?"

  "Current status indicates that is still feasible, yes."

  I was puzzled. What was stopping us? What would prevent us from leaving in six months time and taking up our trade again? Frustrated, I began to pace the lounge, pausing briefly to peer through the door at Grizwald, who was still sleeping. She had turned over, and her legs were bare all the way up to her muscular buttocks. How many times had I laid awake at night with the press of those iron like cheeks against my sedentary softness? How many times had I edged away, feeling only an impatience for my own space and the luxury of sleep, far away from the sight and the feel and the peculiar tangy odour of Grizwald? And why now did the sight and the feel and the odour of her shoot me through with such base desire?

  Unless,… .

  "Hypatia?"

  "I'm here."

  "Does your core program include the dispersal of any atmospheric enhancements?"

  "Yes."

  "Un-inhibitors?"

  "I regret I am not able to confirm or deny the presence of un-inhibitors."

  "Unable because there are none, or because your core program forbids it."

  "My core program forbids such disclosure to passengers."

  It was then I realised our fate was sealed.

  "And your core program would have you ignore requests for the enhancements to be turned off, should they for argument's sake be present?"

  "It would require the authorisation code."

  I already knew no such code was listed in the database, because officially no such code existed. Atmospheric enhancement was as illegal back in the days of this floater's glory, as it is now and the access code would have been carried in a man's head, a man long dead by now, I should think. You see, these ships had played host to a particularly hedonistic strata of bygone society, and her owners, financed by media congloms, were not above resorting to a little chemical encouragement, a little something in the air,… . for the media has always fed upon the immoral antics of the great and the good, has it not? Fill a ship with beautiful celebrities, remove what few inhibitions they have, then sit back and wait for the gossip columns to write themselves.

  Shortly before dawn, I moved to the window and gazed out. It filled one wall and half the ceiling, and provided a magnificent vista. There, I remained until the darkness began to melt. I could see a dozen floaters hovering close, mainly class threes,… another four and a stately class five - their lower hulls aflame with a golden light. Already we were over the Gulf of Bothnia, drifting east, the coast of Finland coming up and the vastness of Russia beyond. />
  I ordered more coffee from the domestic, and began to revel in the most inappropriate sense of well-being. I had always been aware of the risk of intoxication during my various de-cons but had never been sure if the stories were true, for any effects had been unnoticeable, diluted beyond detection by the external atmosphere when we pierced the hull. Trapped here though, within the confines of an intact hull things were very different and what worried me particularly was the effect it might have on Grizwald.

  She was stirring. Slowly she rose and stretched, then wrapped herself in the sheet, forming for herself a make-believe ball gown. Then she came to me and, together, we gazed out on the dawn from sixty thousand feet.

  "Coffee smells good," she said. "Any chance of a sip?" "You could order from the domestic - it'll only take a moment."

  She ignored me and our fingers brushed as she took my cup. Then as she tipped her head back to drink, the sheet unwound and I was presented once more by the novel sensation of her allure. She must have mistaken my expression because she turned away and gathered the sheet up.

  "I know you find me repulsive," she said and I was amazed that she could sound so hurt, so,… feminine.

  "Not at all," I replied with an alarming lack of discretion. "Actually I've always found you attractive, but I suppress my feelings for fear of damaging our professional relationship."

  "Cut it out, arsehole."

  "No. I'm quite serious now - indeed it's probably true to say that by now I lack all inhibition. But look, Griz, I've been thinking. There's something odd about all of this. I think we'd better check out the escape pods after all,… If the chute's are in as good a condition as the rest of ship then we stand a fair chance. We'll be over Finland in an hour. What do you say?"

  "We both know the only way to test those pods is to use them and to be honest, Hacker, I'm not that desperate."

  "I think it's worth the risk. I think it might be riskier to stay here."

  "What are you saying?"

  "There was no other vessel within fifty miles of this ship last night. Yet Hypatia claimed she was acting in evasive mode."