“What happened?”
“Wait a minute.” Gabe was struggling with it. “This place doesn’t look as if it’s been hit by any kind of major war. The cities and towns look untouched.”
We pulled off to the side of the street.
“I hope not. And who exactly are you?”
“Okay, Ark. And when that happens, when the bipeds are gone, won’t that also mean the eventual end of you guys? Of the AIs?”
“Agorian?”
The car stopped, only a few steps from the lander.
“But if the biologicals die,” Gabe continued, “doesn’t that mean you can’t survive either? In the long term?”
“Do you have space vehicles?”
He went silent for a time. Then:
Gabe and I exchanged glances. We weren’t sure we wanted any more surprises. “What?” asked Gabe.
It was Belle.
“Belle,” I said. “We weren’t sure we’d ever hear your voice again.”
said Ark. And we understood where his command of the language had come from.
Gabe leaned forward. The voices were coming from the dashboard. “Ark, what is it you need us for?”
“And you want us to take you somewhere?”
“And that’s going to leave you without power?” said Gabe. “I don’t see how we would be able to do anything about that.”
“Why was that?”
“Ark,” I said, “this control unit you mention: Is it part of the solar array?”
“You mean it’s orbiting the sun?”
“How close would we be going?”
Belle broke in:
“Hold on,” said Gabe. “We’re going to be putting the ship at risk to pick up a piece of hardware?”
not alive said Ark.
Gabe nodded. “So she’s an AI, right? As you are.”
“She has radio contact with you?”
“Is she in imminent danger?”
“What happens,” Gabe said, “if we decline?”
“You’re not threatening us?”
Gabe looked at me. I let him see I was okay with it. “All right, Ark,” he said. “We’ll do what we can.”
Belle said,
Gabe slipped back into his seat and folded his arms. “If you’re so anxious to be a friend, why did you seize our lander without saying anything? We had an unsettling few hours trying to figure out what happened.”