Tomalon nodded and his eyes went opaque again. The drone turned in midair and led Cormac out. Tomalon was leading him, or the AI, or likely an amalgam of the two.
Was I like that? It had been years since Cormac had been gridlinked, and then he had been variously linked with a series of different AIs. Still, it had dehumanized him, hadn't it?
With the gas giant in its position — at this time of year — of leading the sun by only one quarter-day, Eldene knew, when Calypse disappeared behind the far horizon, that darkness was only a few hours away. When workers headed down the rows of grape trees, carrying the backpack sprays they had been working with all day, Fethan changed course to take the two of them away from any encounter. The sky changed from lavender to deep purple then starlit black, and one of the giant's moons hurtled across above wisps of cloud as if late for an appointment with its Jovian father. Shortly they reached another of the tool sheds they had earlier seen, and Fethan broke into it.
"Don't move from here unless you really have to," Fethan instructed her, handing over Volus's stinger. "I'm going to find some supplies." Fethan winked and slipped out of the door.
Eldene was too tired to protest and, pulling the tarpaulin from a dilapidated electric tractor, found the darkest corner, wrapped herself in the material and bedded down. But all her discomforts conspired to keep her awake: the strange lightness she felt without her scole, the sensitivity of her nipples from where, unsupported by the creature, they had been rubbing against her shirt, the itching pain in her chest where its feeding tubules had penetrated, and the discomfort of having to use a breather unit. Instead of sleeping, she lay back and replayed the long question-and-answer session of that day.
Unlike the tutors at the orphanage, Fethan answered her every question succinctly and never lost patience. Eldene now visualized such wonders as runcibles, Polity battleships, wondrous Earth and the heavily populated Sol system, strange environments adapted for human use, and humans adapted to live in strange environments. She contemplated the idea of godlike AI minds wiser and more intelligent than anything she could have possibly imagined before, of medical technologies that seemed capable of extending people's lives indefinitely… the strange creatures and stranger technologies and constructs… No, sleep just did not seem possible with all these golden visions playing across her retina. Then the next thing she knew she couldn't breathe, and was scrabbling in the darkness of midnight to find the spare oxygen bottle.
"All right, girl," said Fethan from beside her, with swift precision changing the bottle for her.
"Thank you," she said, as soon as her breathing was back to normal.
"You go back to sleep."
She was about to say something else to him, but with seemingly no transition, Fethan was shaking her by the shoulder and light was beaming in through cracks in the grapewood walls of the tool shed.
Eldene lay there for a moment longer, as she felt so warm and comfortable in the tarpaulin, but then habit beaten into her at the orphanage, and further reinforced by the proctors in the work sheds, had her struggling from the tarpaulin and to her feet.
"Were you gone long… in the night?" she asked, hinging her mask down in irritation.
"Few hours," Fethan replied, squatting down to open a large pack resting against the wheel of the electric tractor. From this he held up another oxygen bottle and showed it to Eldene before placing it on the floor.
After taking another quick breath from the mask Eldene asked, "Did you get any sleep?", then could have kicked herself for her stupidity, and was grateful when Fethan offered no patronizing reply.
What came out of the pack next, Eldene smelt before Fethan revealed it to her, and, with her mouth watering, she approached almost involuntarily.
"Sausage," she said reverently as Fethan handed her the huge tube of meat, then shortly removed a loaf followed by a four-pack of wine bottles.
"Remember, this has gotta last you four days," said Fethan.
Eldene heard him, but was too busy relishing her first mouthful of meat in something like four months. She followed this with bread, then with a swallow of wine — something she had tasted a couple of times back at the orphanage. Eating was a rather vexing process with the mask, and Eldene could see why the thing was disposable — no doubt it very quickly became quite filthy.
"Where did you get this?" she asked, finally pausing to take the water bottle Fethan handed her.
"There's a lot of Voluses in the world, though this morning there's one less," Fethan replied.
Eldene stared at him in the dim light of the tool shed as she tried to adjust to the casual killing of yet another proctor for oxygen, food and drink. It came as no surprise to her that such adjustment did not require much effort. She took another bite of sausage, another swallow of wine.
Once Eldene had eaten, and recorked the bottle of wine, having only drunk a quarter of it — she well understood how drinking too much would affect her, having never acquired any tolerance of alcohol, and having experienced the effects of Fethan's lethal brew back at the work sheds — they set out into the new day. Calypse was high in the sky, so they were an hour or more beyond the customary starting time for workers, but none were in sight nor came in sight before the pair reached the fringe of the orchards.
"Why did you brew alcohol if you never needed it?" Eldene asked, as heading through flute grass they skirted a wide area of square ponds where workers were scattered like pawns.
"I brewed it because I could, and it gave some of the team there some comfort," Fethan replied.
"They'd have more comfort not still being there."
"Yes, but how many breather masks do you think I could obtain for them?"
Chastened, Eldene now saved her breath for walking. The new growths of grass, like spikes of green metal tipped with blood, were now a hand's length high and it was walking through these that became difficult. The tall growths of last year were becoming increasingly brittle, however, and disintegrated almost at a touch.
By mid-morning, with both the sun and Calypse well up in the sky, they rested upon a huge tricone shell that was buoyed up by the flute grass rhizomes. This monster shell was three metres long and wide enough at its widest end for Eldene to sit on it without her feet touching the ground. Here she sat drinking water and eating a piece of bread while Fethan walked slowly around the shell itself studying the ancient graffiti carved into its nacreous surface.
"I never knew they got to be this big," said Eldene, around a mouthful of bread.
"Neither did I, but then I wouldn't, as the only ecological survey recorded on the AI net is about three hundred years old and was not produced by the most reliable of sources." Fethan paused with arms akimbo and transferred his gaze up to the sky. Then suddenly, moving very fast, he caught Eldene by the arm, half carrying and half shoving her off the end of the shell. "Get inside! Right now!"
Eldene caught a glimpse of things glinting in the sky as she hurriedly obeyed, Fethan diving into the cone next to her. Once safely inside, she tilted her head to the drone of turbines and immediately recognized the source: a military transport was passing right over them. She risked peeking her head out for a look. The transport was just a huge flat rectangular box with windows down each side, one thruster mounted on a rear tail fin, two air rudders depending below the front two corners, and underneath, the two huge turbines that kept it in the air. The blast from these engines raised a wake of fragments from the dead flute grass below, and the noise was deafening. Accompanying this massive vehicle was a veritable swarm of aerofans. She glanced aside to see Fethan watching the sky as well.