Steel Beneath the Skin (23 page)

‘What do you think?’ she said as Ella looked up from the tablet she was reading.

Ella pouted. ‘It’s a little… covering. Very form-fitting, I like that, but…’

About a quarter of the swarm lifted away from Aneka’s body and went back to their box leaving her arms and midriff bare. ‘Better?’

‘Uh-huh, but your legs are covered. I like your legs.’ She was playing, and they both knew it.

More robots left and the remaining ones rearranged themselves into an opaque micro-dress with a low back and no straps. A normal dress would have needed glue to hold it in place like that, but this one was self-supporting. With a thought Aneka turned the robots’ lights on, giving a bright red colour to the garment.

Ella giggled. ‘You’ve got the control down perfect.’

‘Al’s good with machines.’ She stalked toward Ella, shedding microbots as she went. By the time she was standing next to her she was wearing a semi-transparent dress of sparkling white gems.

‘Oh… wow…’ Ella breathed. ‘I hope you told him to do that. Otherwise he’s turning into a really kinky AI.’ She reached out and the swarm shifted to allow her hand through to stroke up over Aneka’s ribs. ‘Worth every credit.’

University of New Earth, 23.5.524 FSC.

If Yorkbridge looked like something out of Blade Runner, the University of New Earth looked like Star Trek. The buildings were tall, futuristic, and white with big windows. Palm trees stretched toward the blue sky from large planters. There were benches to sit and enjoy the sunlight, and there was lots of sunlight. Aneka stood on a balcony looking down onto a courtyard which was surrounded on all four sides by three-storeys of offices, and it still looked bright down there.

Ella and Gillian were standing beside her, and behind them was the main entrance to the administrative building. Aneka turned as she heard a door open, spotting a tall, moderately attractive man in a business suit with a high-collared shirt walking toward them. He was dark skinned with a broad nose and close-cropped black hair, and he had what looked like a firm body under the suit. He had let himself age a little, probably to add authority and he was wearing a political smile; the kind of smile Aneka had seen on too many commanding officers. It said, “I have a problem, and you are it, but I’m going to put you at your ease.” It was not going to work.

‘Dean Ajax,’ Gillian said, noticing the man’s approach, ‘I’d like you to meet Aneka Jansen.’

Ajax extended his hand, continuing to smile. Aneka had learned this one and put her own hand out, palm upward. There was a slight pause, and then they brought their hands together and shook. Handshakes had been invented as a way to demonstrate that you were not holding a weapon, and the tradition had been continued and extended. During the Long Dark there had not been a lot of trust going around.

‘Miss Jansen, a pleasure to meet such a beautiful… woman.’

Aneka smiled back; she had noticed the slight catch before the final word; clearly Ajax knew what he had just shaken hands with. Well it would have been hard to keep it a secret from him. ‘Thank you, sir. And thank you for giving me a job.’

‘Not an entirely popular decision in some circles, I’m afraid. Hopefully the analysis the Sciences department is going to carry out will alleviate that issue and we can all get on with our jobs.’

‘I can get behind that, sir.’

His smile did not waver. ‘Barriman. Now, why don’t you get down to Doctor Wallace’s lab and get things started?’

‘The Dean fancies you,’ Ella said as they took a lift down to ground level.

‘He thought I was a problem,’ Aneka replied. ‘A political inconvenience.’

‘Probably, but he still wants in your panties.’

‘The Dean has something of an unusual quirk,’ Gillian explained. ‘He likes robots.’

Aneka looked at her. ‘You don’t just mean, “thinks they’re a good thing,” do you?’

Gillian shook her head. ‘It was not generally known that he had three android… companions in his house in the Islands. Then a reporter got wind of it and he had to resign his position in the Senate. The Dean position was a consolation prize for the loss of a distinguished political career.’

‘He says he’s given up the robots,’ Ella added, ‘but a fetish like that isn’t easy to give up on.’

The conversation was stopped by the doors opening. They walked out from the admin building and were immediately faced by a huge, white, blocky building which seemed to lack some of the elegance of the rest of the university.

‘The Physical Sciences building,’ Gillian said. ‘The architects apparently thought the subject suggested a more utilitarian design. It’s commonly known as The Brick. We’re meeting Abraham Wallace, the Senior Lecturer in Physical Sciences. Try not to stare.’

‘Huh?’

‘Abraham was born on Ephemera, it’s a small planet with about a third of standard gravity. He’s odd, but he’s always cheerful, and he’s a genius. He’s
very
proud of his ultra-scanner.’

‘Oh,’ Ella said, ‘and you should try to avoid staring at his assistant too.’ They walked into the building and turned hard left as she said it.

Aneka glanced at her. ‘Because…?’

In front of them a door slid aside as if it were expecting them and a desk became visible, along with the woman sitting behind it. She was stunningly attractive in an oddly sculpted fashion, as though someone had crafted a statue and brought it to life. Her shoulder-length hair was platinum blonde, her eyes a clear blue, and she was dressed in a simple, tank dress. It was her movement which was the most strange; precise, smooth, elegant beyond anything Aneka expected to see in a human, or even a jenlay. She looked up with a face full of serenity…

‘She’s an android.’ Al’s voice held a hint of surprise. ‘An AI. She just made contact with us… me.’

The woman spoke, her voice soft, calm, and musical. ‘Good morning Doctor Gilroy, Miss Narrows, Miss Jansen. I am Cassandra. Doctor Wallace is expecting you.’ Her face shifted into a smile. ‘It is always a pleasure to meet a fellow AI, Miss Jansen. You would not object to me communicating with yours while you see the Doctor?’

Aneka smiled back, trying to keep her bemusement off her face. ‘Uh, no, of course not. I couldn’t stop him if I wanted to anyway.’

‘Technically correct,’ Cassandra replied, ‘but “Al” is programmed to consider you his master and would not act without your permission.’

‘Oh. Well, he has it. Thank you for asking.’

Cassandra bowed her head in acknowledgement and her hand shifted to a virtual button displayed on the desk surface. A precise twitch of a finger and the door behind her left shoulder slid open. The little group walked through and Aneka was faced with Abraham Wallace.

The man was sprawled on a large chair which was almost a recliner, dressed in a loose, dark green jumpsuit. A framework of rods and fibres could be seen webbing his hands and fingers, and a similar structure could be seen around his chest where his suit was not zipped up to the neck. He had to be eight-feet in height and stick-thin. His narrow skull was bald and had an angular quality to it, and his eyes were a deep green, full of intelligence.

‘Morning ladies,’ Wallace said. ‘Pardon me if I don’t get up, Miss Jansen. My body has acclimatised to one G for the most part, but my muscle mass is not up to jenlay norms. Have a seat.’

Aneka gave him a smile as she lowered herself into one of the four guest chairs. Wallace’s office was a counterpoint to the neatness of Cassandra’s. There were physical books on the shelves, printouts of various sorts littered every surface. Aneka took an instant liking to a man who clearly valued physical media. It was anachronistic and rather endearing.

‘Well, I’m sure you’re anxious to get things going so you can get on with being a citizen of good standing.’

‘You sound convinced I will be,’ Aneka commented.

‘I share none of my races’ phobias regarding cybernetic entities and I trust the analysis Gillian and Ella made. The authorities want to be sure that your AI is not affecting your thinking and cannot take over control of your body. They also want to be sure there are no hidden surprises in there, such as a nuclear self-destruct device. And they want an analysis done on your AI to determine whether it might cause problems. Cassandra will take care of that. She has several degrees in digital psychology.’ He smiled. ‘What would be the point in the conditioning they didn’t do if your AI could control or influence you? The Xinti were an efficient race, not prone to wasting time or resources.’

‘Huh, I hadn’t thought of it like that.’

‘It’s a very good point,’ Gillian commented. ‘They most certainly would not have wasted the time and effort required to brainwash you without a good reason. The Xinti considered any mechanical device, however intelligent, to be beneath their own form of life, and you are, essentially, the same form of life as the Xinti were. It seems unlikely that they would place Al over you in any circumstance.’

‘Al?’ Wallace asked.

‘My AI. I named him Al. He says he likes it.’

Wallace raised an eyebrow. ‘He’s volitional?’ He moved an arm, contacting the virtual controls on his desk. ‘Cassandra? Would you step in here?’

A second later the door opened and the slim android stepped through the door. Out from behind her desk, her figure had a somewhat exaggerated quality with broad hips and very firm, large breasts. Her mini-dress showed it off perfectly, and Aneka noted the absurdly high heels which she could likely only wear all day due to artificial muscles and metal bones. ‘Yes, Doctor?’

‘Miss Jansen’s AI…’

‘Al,’ Cassandra supplied.

‘Al... he’s volitional?’

‘Yes, Doctor. I’ve concluded my interview. Al is a fully volitional AI, designed as a support for Miss Jansen’s original mission for the Xinti. He has no combat or strategy programming since Miss Jansen is a trained soldier. He is, essentially, an observer.’

‘You got all that in a couple of minutes?’ Aneka asked.

‘We had quite a long conversation. When two fully digital minds speak, they can do so… more efficiently than one can within the limitations of speech.’

‘Oh. So, Al’s not going to go psycho-robot on me?’

Cassandra smiled a prefect, knowing smile. ‘He’s probably less likely to do that than a typical jenlay is to develop psychotic traits, and even less likely to act them out on you. He has been programmed to obey you without reservation. He is basically a slave and quite happy about it.’

Aneka tried to keep the look of discomfort of her face. What was the use of having a robot body when you could not hold a good poker face? ‘Thank you, Cassandra.’

The android gave her a smile and glanced at Wallace. His nod indicated that she was no longer needed and she retreated from the room. As the door closed Al’s voice sounded within Aneka’s head. ‘Cassandra says “thank you” as well.’

‘What for?’

‘Apparently for being uncomfortable with my programming.’

‘Oh.’

‘You shouldn’t be. She feels that all sentient beings should be free to do as they wish, but she is an emergent AI. I was created with a purpose, your service. It is my understanding that people can spend much of their life looking for a purpose to their existence. I was provided with mine at birth. Does that not make me fortunate?’

‘I… guess.’ Not wanting to think too hard about the issue now, she turned her attention back to the room and was a little surprised to discover that nothing had changed. Her conversation with Al seemed to have taken place in an instant.
When two digital minds speak…

‘He’ll need to be registered,’ Wallace said. ‘Now that he’s recognised and a psychological analysis is available.’

‘Registered?’

‘As a citizen. There may be some legal peculiarities since he’s resident in your body… The legal department will need to handle that. Shall we get you in the machine?’ His chair leaned forward to make it easier for him to get to his feet and, once there, he seemed to be just as nimble as anyone else.

‘You seem to handle the gravity fine,’ Aneka commented.

Raising his hand, Wallace tapped the metallic frame he was wearing. ‘Bio-mimetic exoframe. It supplements my strength, keeps me upright. Actually, with this on I can deadlift more than an average jenlay, but, if you’ll pardon the analogy, I punch like a girl.’

Aneka laughed. ‘That’s okay, I punch like a freight train. So what’s this scanner going to do to me?’

They had walked out of the office and to a lift set in the corner of the entrance lobby, and now they were going down. ‘It uses terahertz radar, lidar, passive arrays, everything we can throw at someone. The discovery which really broke it was the measurement of a particle I discovered. We’re not entirely sure what it is or does, but we believe it’s a candidate for Dark Energy. Technically, a particle and anti-particle, opposite charges and spin. We’re able to generate them in pairs and use quantum entanglement to measure the effect of the positive one passing through the target using the negative one… When did I lose you?’

‘Well, I remember seeing something on the Discovery Channel about Dark Energy. That counteracts gravity, doesn’t it?’

‘Indeed it does, but only over considerable distances. Its effect is unnoticeable locally, but when we get to galactic scales we can detect a subtle acceleration of expansion. Quantum entanglement is simply an effect which causes two particles created in the same quantum event to synchronise with each other over long distances and, apparently, faster than light. If we pull the positive particles out and fire them at you, we can learn things by watching the negative ones.’

‘Sounds like magic.’

Wallace grinned. ‘Magic is simply a physical effect we don’t understand yet.’

The lift stopped and they entered a concrete bunker. On their right was a huge wall with glass panels through which Aneka could see huge racks of computer equipment. To the left was an open area with a raised, circular platform in the middle, presumably the target area. Between the two were more racks and a huge bank of phased-array sensor units. Thick cables snaked across the floor; the thing took a lot of power.

‘Not exactly compact,’ Aneka commented.