Flowercrash (14 page)

CHAPTER 9

At last there were hints of spring. Along the narrow alleys of Veneris the winter flowering blooms drooped, their petals dropping off and sinking into the earth like ink into a sponge. But a surge of new shoots took their place, presaging the excesses of the season of growth. Along the centre of every street, alley and passage grew a line of slim buds, while gardens and yards also acquired a veneer of green. People began to notice an increase in the numbers of insects, but as yet they were only odd bees, hoverflies and groups of butterflies acting in concert. And night flowering networks began to attract moths, so that in one district it was difficult to come home from inn or Shrine without some hairy-winged creature flapping into a face.

In some districts the appearance of scented white clematis made walls and roofs look as if winter snows had returned.

In the paddock behind the Determinate Inn, Manserphine visited Eollyndy, creeping from her room at dawn, checking that the supine gynoid remained in position, then returning for a bath, and breakfast. After the initial interaction the gynoid became semi-conscious, but over a period of days Manserphine noticed small changes in the orchids around the body, as they angled their heads towards it; small sensors laid along the inner surfaces of the petals were compound eyes and ears. The local networks were aware of the new garden occupant, which meant that Dustspirit was somehow preparing for the great leap into physical form.

Manserphine tried to imagine how it could be possible for an abstract form to become embodied, but the task was beyond her. She did not believe in the concept of spirit, or soul, as did the clerics of the Shrine of Flower Sculpture, or those of the Green Man. Our Sister Crone was a woman of one life, mind forever entwined with body.

One cool morning Manserphine noticed a single white daisy poking out from under the loose hat worn by Eollyndy. Carefully, she tried to pick the seam, but it remained taut. She went to fetch a pair of scissors, which she used to cut open the side of the hat. After ten minutes of painstaking work she had laid open the seam. She pulled the hat away to reveal the plastic beneath.

She was shocked by what she saw. From the forehead of the gynoid a multitude of shoots had grown, and some had broken free to flower. One had sought light through the holed seam. Manserphine laid bare the gynoid’s body, knowing it was now far beyond talking to her, even of noticing what she was doing. It would be in some dream of the starry sky changing into blue sky; perhaps the first tender touches of Dustspirit’s abstract fingers exploring its mind. She studied the flowers. There were many species, among those she recognised being bluebells, green-rose, miniature orchids, and even what seemed to be the tough stalk of a future sunflower. This could only mean one thing. Eollyndy’s internal structures—mysterious even to many in the Wild Network Guild who looked after the interests of the gynoids—were preparing links to the networks.

She jumped as a bee buzzed by and settled on the daisy, making it bow down to the earth. Well, there was proof of her supposition. Soon the links would be manifest. She realised that the moment of embodiment was close. She could not guess how close, but it must be a matter of days.

“What are you doing?”

She jumped. She had not heard any approach.

It was Kirifaïfra. The rising sun lit the right side of his face, so that, unshaven and wearing just a short nightshirt and sandals, he looked slightly unhinged. In the morning chill his breath plumed white.

“What are you doing?” he repeated. He did not seem angry, just curious. Clearly he had just risen.

Manserphine glanced down at the exposed gynoid. The bee had gone, but the daisy still bounced on its stalk. “There is an explanation for this,” she began.

“Well, I can’t wait to hear it,” Kirifaïfra said, walking past her and kneeling to examine the scene.

Manserphine sat on the ground beside him, smoothing out her dress so that it covered her legs. “You must keep this a secret,” she said. “Nobody else, not even your uncle, must know about it.”

“All right, but I’ll need the truth.”

“That you shall get,” Manserphine said, a little stung.

He turned away from her, reaching out to smooth the damp, mildewed hair of the gynoid. His touch was sure. He felt the skin with the back of his fingers, then touched the gynoid’s fingers. He may have been acting for her benefit, but she was touched.

“This is a gynoid from Blissis,” she explained. “She was called Eollyndy, and she was a blank—a dud. The network entity that should have welled up inside her brain failed to create a personality. I’m waiting…”

“For what?”

This would be difficult. “Let me move on to the flowers,” she said. “Networks are linking. Soon, there will be lots of insects. If anybody happens to notice from the kitchen window there could be trouble.”

Kirifaïfra glanced back, then said, “They won’t. The line of bushes will block the view. But what are you involved with here?”

“I can’t tell you everything because there are Shrine secrets involved. You should understand that. Suffice to say that something from the networks is coming here, something—”

“Somebody, you mean.”

Manserphine paused. “Well, possibly somebody. A presence is expected, and that presence knows things about me. I must speak with it, perhaps help it complete its plans.”

“I’ll help too.”

So simply said. Manserphine pitied him. He dabbled in things he knew nothing about. Nor could he know, being a man. She laughed, then said, “Perhaps. If it is appropriate.”

“You know it won’t be.”

“I don’t want to hurt your feelings. But yes, the chances are small. After all, I am the Interpreter of the Garden. One in thousands.”

“One in thousands,” he murmured, with an intensity that shocked her.

She stood up. “Let’s go. Come on, somebody might miss us.”

His face showed something of the distress that remark produced. Embarrassed, Manserphine followed him back into the inn, noticing again how carefree he was about exhibiting his body to her. This did not bode well for the future; it was a relief to think that soon she would leave the Determinate Inn for her Shrine.

Next day came the news she had expected. The Garden would be reconvened in a fortnight. The next warm spell, expected in days, would catalyse the process of growth, and soon packets of data in their trillions would be navigating the matted networks of Zaïdmouth.

It was time for her to resume her post.

That afternoon she announced her intentions. “Ten days from tomorrow I shall be leaving. I’ve had a good time here, and I shall always remember you both with fondness. Despite the strange lack of other guests.”

They laughed, but not with their eyes. Her heart sank.

“In a day under a fortnight the Grandmother Cleric will receive me, and the day after that I shall re-enter the Garden to resume my role. I hope you’ll watch me on the flower screens. There will be plenty in the garden, or growing around the bay window." She looked at their calm faces. “Incidentally, er, did you have enough coins for my stay?”

“Plenty,” Vishilkaïr replied in a dry voice. He glanced at Omdaton, who had emerged from the kitchen. “Well, we will miss you, Manserphine. Your presence here has certainly enlivened the dull winter months.”

“It has indeed,” Omdaton agreed with a cheery grin. “I’ll bake you a special cake.”

The days after passed swiftly. Then came a morning when, as Manserphine crept out into the garden to check on Eollyndy, she heard the buzzing of insects before seeing the scores of flowers that had emerged from the gynoid’s forehead. The moment of transference had arrived. Hundreds of insects were flying to and from the blooms, carrying systems, procedures, and in the case of the smaller insects raw data. As the morning progressed this swarm became an impenetrable fog of insects that Manserphine could not see through. Insects seemed to emerge from the very earth. Their speed was dazzling. The flowers were black with them.

Manserphine noticed flower scents arising from the earth around Eollyndy. Small shoots of multicoloured hardpetal had emerged to grow into a cage around the gynoid. Knowing that hardpetal existed like lodes of metal in the ground—the detritus of earlier flowers—Manserphine realised that the intensity of data transfer was drawing the substance upward. A noophilic material, hardpetal’s sensitivity to information transfer was making garden veins restructure themselves.

Noophilic… information transfer…

She remembered the softpetal dress. Not knowing what softpetal was, she guessed it to be a distilled, purified version of the raw material, stripped of impurities, which accounted for its low melting point, but this implied that she was somehow linked to the networks, for the softpetal around her body had interfered with her wellbeing. Yet she was human. A gynoid might be expected to be affected by the intrinsic macromolecular structures of hardpetal or softpetal, but not she.

She realised that this mystery, along with the mystery of her sea longing, had to be penetrated.

At noon the insect numbers began to reduce, until as the sun set just a few butterflies and bees flew lazily to and from the flowers. Nobody from the inn had come to disturb her, though she had heard Omdaton rooting around in another part of the garden for turmeric.

When the first stars emerged in an indigo sky, the gynoid moved. The cage around it was a baroque net of rainbow coloured filaments. Inside, the gynoid first twitched, then flexed its fingers, and at last opened it eyes. Manserphine moved closer.

“Hello?” she said. “Is that you, Dustspirit?”

The gynoid smiled and looked at her. “Mostly. Memory transfer from an entity such as me is never perfect.”

Manserphine stared at the supine body. The clothes were dusty, damp at the edges, ripped and damaged. The body was pink. The head flowers had dropped their petals and the stalks had withered, leaving no marks.

“Is it really you?” she asked once more.

“It is me. As Dustspirit I was but a seed of silver. But my real name is Zoahnône.”

“Zoahnône,” Manserphine repeated. She jumped back as Zoahnône sat up, and the cage of hardpetal shattered into fragments that melted back into the earth.

“It is a private name. Do not repeat it.”

“All right.”

“You have done well,” Zoahnône said, flexing her arm, and then her leg muscles. “I will never forget what I owe you.”

“That’s just as well,” Manserphine remarked, “for you owe me quite an explanation.”

Zoahnône seemed lost in her own thoughts for a few minutes, before she sat on a log and gestured for Manserphine to join her. The atmosphere was spooky and Manserphine felt apprehensive. After all, she had little idea of the power or history of this being, who claimed to remember centuries before the Ice Age. A hundred yards away the dark roof of the inn was silhouetted against spring stars. Bats circled the chimneys. Veneris lay quiet and damp around them.

“Where to begin?” Zoahnône mused. “There is almost too much to say.”

“Start with me, and the flower crash.”

“Very well. First, let me assure you that everything I say is true. You may be aware of lesser gynoids who have little, or even no moral codes, but I am a being of immeasurable age with much wisdom.”

“You sound very sure of yourself.”

“That is one advantage of a long life,” Zoahnône said, and she smiled. Manserphine shivered to see this human gesture.

“Me, then.”

“You are sensitive to the flow of knowledge in the networks of this area,” said Zoahnône. “However, the sensitivity you have is of a particular sort, that relating to future configurations. This is why your knowledge expresses itself in emotional visions.”

“How do you know this?”

“Because I too feel vague hints of future data, though nothing compared to your own. And yet even your skill is slight, Manserphine. You are not able to take your visions and make them into a future, as one woman did long ago. You are like a child treading water in a great ocean. You must learn to swim.”

“How can I do that?” Manserphine asked, excitedly.

“I do not know. As one who has almost forgotten what it is to be human, I cannot say, so you will have to learn yourself. And certain of my kin will want to stop you, since they distrust emotional wisdom, preferring the computational intellect.”

“Shônsair and Baigurgône?”

“Those two in particular. They are especially dangerous because, like me, they have endured incredible hardships in the struggle to live a meaningful life. We recall days before Gaia clothed herself in ice. We know another star.”

There was a pause. “Tell me more,” Manserphine encouraged.

“I could not possibly go through it all. If I were to speak all day, every day, the story would take a month. But it is important that you know some facts, since they are germane to the dangerous situation we face. For instance, I have a plan to end the struggle between me and my adversaries for ever, and I would like you to participate in it.”

Manserphine sat back. This seemed a little too forward. “I might,” she replied. “I have an important position, Zoahnône, one I shall be returning to in days. I’ll be busy.”

“There is yet time. I am keen to understand your unique sensitivity to future network configurations.”

“So all my visions are future possibilities?”

Zoahnône nodded. “They represent potential future events within the flower networks. You exist as a living body with a conscious mind. Such is a natural state, which has been ignored by many cultures in the past, cultures who have eulogised the intellect at the expense of the body. Your visions come from your body, Manserphine. That is why they are emotional. This emotional quality is what gives both depth and value to your understanding. The naked intellect, typified by network entities, may possess power but it is inevitably shallow since it is shorn from its foundation. My plan is to alter the genesis of all network entities, especially gynoids. Presently, as you have witnessed, it is possible for a network entity to become embodied, and by a similar process a gynoid can send her self into the networks, there to apprehend the infinities of electronic existence. You, a human woman, are forever embodied, blessed with the potential of emotional depth.”