‘A message?’ Blegg wondered.
Al Hourne continued, ‘Shayden’s skin cells bonded to the surface of the crystal, were read at the molecular level, her DNA copied in virtual format, and in the same format possible variations processed. It was these that fed back through the optic interface she connected. That piece of crystal then began rapidly to degrade.’
‘This could happen to the entire artefact?’ Blegg watched one of the Golem reach up to pull aside his shirt, then a flap of syntheflesh underneath that to insert an optic plug. Directly controlling something—perhaps one of the telefactors.
‘It is possible. I believe this one protective measure will ensure the contained information does not fall into the hands, tentacles or claws of alien lifeforms.’
Blegg grinned. He liked this AI—it possessed a dry sense of humour.
‘You’re keeping it clean, then.’
‘Yes, now, but even though this object came from an environment in which DNA could not remain intact, just by bringing it aboard this station, it must have come in contact with complete DNA strands. That it has not self-destructed suggests different rules apply to the whole. I suspect those fragments that broke away then cued themselves to disintegrate. This would prevent any hostiles from cutting the artefact apart to obtain its secrets.’
‘So what is happening through the main interfaces with it?’
‘It absorbed the data I transmitted into it, but returned nothing until I sent in a search program. That program came back with three-dimensional measurements for the human eye.’
‘I see. We are not just dealing with data storage here, are we?’
‘The semi-AI program I later sent in returned with a hologram of the human anus—in full colour.’
Blegg laughed out loud. ‘So what does it want?’ he finally asked.
‘From having read human DNA it has constructed virtual representations of human beings. It can read molecules by touch. Scanning indicates nanoscale sensory apparatus imbedded in the surface. I am presently transmitting language files into it with five-level data back-up.’
‘Five level?’
‘Apple, for example, is represented by that word in every current human language, also a hologram, genetic coding and variations, context links to human biology, mythology, semantics—’
‘Okay, I get the picture. Let’s hope whatever is inside there gets it too.’
‘I believe it already has. Observe.’
Blegg turned to see a hologram of a naked woman rise out of the carpet. She wore a fig leaf and, while he watched, took a large bite out of a juicy apple she held.
‘How coincidental that we were just discussing that.’
The hologram shattered—like glass.
‘I am compromised,’ announced the AI.
Just then the station lights all grew very bright. Blegg turned back to the viewing window to see the various telefactors floating around, jerking as if in the throes of silicon epilepsy. To one side a heavy-duty power feed advanced on its rams to the edge of the alien artefact. Glancing around the control room, he saw the plugged-in Golem begin shaking, one of the haimans drop out of his seat and fall flat on his back on the floor. Others not similarly connected pushed themselves back from their consoles or other equipment and began calling out to each other.
‘Subverted power feed controls…’
‘I lost everything…’
‘Telefactors frozen out…’
To the rear of the room, two of the VR booths sprung open and their occupants staggered out of them.
‘What can we do?’
‘Subversion protocol, we have to—’
‘No,’ decided Blegg, loudly and clearly.
Some of the chatter settled down as many eyes turned towards him.
‘You have primacy,’ agreed one of the Golem. ‘What do you require of us?’
‘Do nothing,’ said Blegg.
He turned back to the viewing window. The power feed was now nearly in place. He saw the crystal near its point of contact, darkening as something formed there. Then the s-con heads made contact, and the lights dimmed. A webwork of glowing lines spread through the crystal like a million cracks, then they faded to a general glow throughout it. The lights came back on again.
‘Use one of the VR booths,’ said Hourne.
People in the room glanced suspiciously up at the camcom points set in the ceiling, then turned to Blegg to see what he would do.
‘Are you truly Hourne?’ he asked.
‘Yes, and no,’ replied the AI.
Blegg nodded, turned, and walked across the room to step into a VR booth. He fully expected this to be an interesting experience.
Logan passed him a joint. He placed it between the last two fingers of his right hand, cupped both of his hands over his mouth, and drew in the aerated smoke. Tracking the physical reaction through his body always gave his new face an introspective and shocked appearance, so that others always thought him more stoned than he actually was. The ache of rearranging facial muscles had receded to a dim memory—the art almost instinctive now since his time in Korea where displaying a Caucasian face gave him the time to step aside into that other space to avoid American bullets. Skin hue was a whole different problem for his cellular inner vision, but directing his immune system against the melanoma that appeared five years after Hiroshima, while he explored the Australian outback, had granted him the required know-how. Now though, it felt strange to be wearing a Japanese face again.
Studying the young stoned Americans all around him in the firelight, all debating civil rights and cursing their government’s obstinacy in the face of the inevitable triumph of Marxism, Harris—formerly Herman, Hing Cho, Harold and Hiroshi—realized it was time to move on yet again. Though he looked as young as the rest of the group, he was a good twenty years older, but he felt mentally removed from them by a century.
‘Man, you mount your placards on two-by-twos,’ Logan was saying, ‘and maybe nail ‘em to the wood with four inch nails.’
General laughter greeted this. Harris assessed this man with his long hair and his beard with plaits in. ‘Peace’ he often proclaimed. ‘End the wars—disarm.’ But he carried a flick-knife tucked into his sock, and a.45 in the kitbag beside him, along with his delicate boxed scales, a bag of heroin secreted in a sugar box and a cellophane-wrapped block of cannabis resin. The money belt underneath his tatty coat just kept getting fatter and fatter. One of his previous customers lay in the morgue right now; another one, who ended up owing just too much, Logan had carved up with the knife. The boy managed to make it to the hospital before collapsing from blood loss. They sewed his cheek back into place but could do nothing about the ear, which he had left in the car lot where Logan caught up with him.
Logan turned as Harris passed the joint on to Miranda, who looked pale and was staring at Logan intently, avidly. Miranda was short of funds now her parents had cut her off, but she found other ways to pay.
‘Hey, Harris man, you should be handy. I betcha know all about that hiyah shit?’ Logan made a chopping motion with his hand.
‘I know some,’ Harris replied. After being beaten half to death in a Paris back alley—it had all happened too fast for him to even summon the concentration to step away—he had gone home to learn shotokan karate, jujitsu, aikido. Now he only fought when he wanted to. He found that the focus such training gave him also provided more than ample time to step into U-space. In this situation, however, he began to feel like he wanted to fight—that there was something he needed to do before moving on. The conversation drifted on to other matters—something about rednecks fighting for the country and not understanding how they fought to keep the country in a political Stone Age.