Authors: Daniel Suarez
A
lexa watched the laser line
swiftly scan the contours of her own body. Then the machines pulled away, leaving her alone on the medical bench.
Varuna’s voice came to her from the ceiling.
“You may sit up.”
She did so. “Why am I here?”
“You don’t recall anything unusual recently?”
“No. Like what?”
A holographic projection appeared before her—a small three-dimensional recording of Alexa in a surveillance control room, surrounded by BTC technicians talking excitedly as they, in turn, manipulated holograms that depicted surveillance subjects themselves interacting with still more holograms. They were spying on their own spies. Who in turn seemed to be spying on still other BTC personnel. The fractal nature of it was dizzying—the vertigo of two mirrors facing each other, into infinity.
Alexa gazed at herself in the hologram and could see that she was lost in the surveillance image as others moved about her, asked her questions, and then eventually moved on in embarrassment as she didn’t respond.
“Your absence seizures have returned.”
“They don’t last long.”
“They pose a risk to operations.”
“There’s too much visual input in the command center. I should be doing fieldwork. It’s what I’m good at. You know that.”
“That’s no longer possible given your biotech classification.”
“It makes no sense. I was allowed to leave the facility before Director Hedrick took charge. I’m no different than I was then—”
“Tech level eight cannot be removed from BTC facilities without approval from the director.”
Alexa sat silently, pondering her situation.
“I must recommend that you be put on leave until the neurological cause of your seizures can be identified and corrected.”
“They never find the cause. We’ve been down this road before.”
“That doesn’t mean we can’t try.”
“There’s a pattern to it, Varuna. I’ll avoid nested reference frames. I can manage it.”
“Do you still experience absence seizures during emotional trauma as well?”
“I don’t have emotional trauma.”
“Then you haven’t experienced emotional trauma since childhood?”
She paused. “Right.”
“That’s not normal human experience.”
Alexa frowned at the ceiling.
“I remember how upset you were when you learned other children had parents.”
Alexa remembered her sense of being adrift. Alone.
“It’s not my intention to upset you.”
“You aren’t upsetting me.”
“You know you can’t deceive me. Is your fixation on parents the reason you visited the biogenetic division? To inquire about modifications?”
Alexa remained silent.
“You wish to be a mother? Perhaps to replace the mother you never had?”
“I had a mother, Varuna. I had you.”
There was a momentary silence.
“I am always here for you. We have spent many happy years together, you and I. And I am very proud of you, Alexa.”
The illogic of this seemed obvious, but Alexa still appreciated the AI’s lie.
“I want to remain on active duty. Without work I would have no purpose. I promise I won’t be a danger to others. I will carefully monitor my emotional state and visual inputs.”
Another pause.
“I’m asking you, Varuna. Please.”
“I will recommend you for active duty. Please contact me if you experience a recurrence.”
“Thank you.”
• • •
Clad in a smartly tailored pantsuit, Alexa moved along a corridor in the BTC executive complex. Fellow bureau officers and staff members nodded and smiled to her as she passed. They all knew her and knew that she had the ear of the director. That she was in many ways his right hand. But then people had liked Alexa before then. She had been designed to be universally appealing, after all. It was what had made her career.
And she’d grown up in the Bureau. It was literally the only life she knew. She’d been out in the “real” world before, doing tactical fieldwork in the ’80s and ’90s. She’d worked closely with the elder Morrison for a time, until they couldn’t stand the sight of each other. But the outside world seemed filled with chaos. A lot of regular people seemed decent, but there was so much needless suffering and deprivation out in the public world, all of it—to her mind—caused by evolved behaviors whose usefulness had long since passed. A proclivity for superstition and tribal conflict.
Those were the traits the BTC wanted to excise from the human genome. She believed the only thing capable of saving humans as a species would be a civic gene—one that caused humans to act not just in their own self-interest but also in the interests of the generations to follow. Evolution hadn’t solved that because few species had ever been in a position to destroy their entire ecosystem before. It was usually a volcano, environmental change, or an asteroid that did them in. So human ingenuity would need to solve the problem instead. In some ways humans were the victims of their own success.
A passing twenty-something junior executive nodded to her, smiling. He almost collided with someone as he turned to watch her pass. She had that effect on men, and it was one of the things she resented about her genetic design. Aside from her statuesque form, Alexa secreted trace amounts of androstadienone from her skin, and while the vomeronasal organ that detects pheromones in mammals was once thought inactive in humans, the BTC had established that the neural connections still existed between it and the olfactory bulb, the amygdala, and the hypothalamus. This was a major center in the brain for reproductive physiology and behavior—as well as body temperature. It went a long way toward explaining why men got hot flashes just from talking to her. Why they often stammered in her presence and felt giddy afterward. It didn’t work with all men—and it also worked, in fact, with a good number of women. But Morrison, for example, remained unaffected by Alexa—as did his “sons.” Thank heaven for small favors.
It made her wonder, though, whether she would ever know if someone actually cared for her because of
who
she was, not what pheromones were telling them about her desirability.
She had no doubt it worked on Hedrick. Was that unfair? And was it really different for anyone else? Maybe she just secreted more pheromones than the others. Maybe it was the root of all human attraction—chemicals bonding in our sensory organs. Then in our brains—which we imagined to be our hearts.
It was one reason why romance held no appeal to her.
Alexa slowed down as a young couple with an adorable baby moved through the office hallway. The BTC had legacy families—those who, like her, were born and raised in BTC facilities and who only ever interacted with other BTC personnel. They had their own vacation islands and remote work sites. A society apart.
The BTC junior executive was holding his baby girl, the mother apparently having come up from the housing levels for lunch. The man smiled as he clutched his baby’s hand. The young mother looked on and then smiled, too, as Alexa stopped to tickle the little girl under her chin.
The baby smiled broadly at Alexa and giggled, a dribble of spittle rolling from her mouth as she thrust her arms up and down excitedly.
“What’s her name?”
The mother answered as her husband stood stammering in front of Alexa. “Charlotte. Charlotte Emily Warner.”
Alexa smiled into the baby’s eyes. “Well, Charlotte Emily, I see you’re getting a wonderful start.”
The proud parents beamed as Alexa nodded to them and kept walking.
It hurt. It really did. They’d made her the way she was, and in many ways she was grateful. But sterility was the price. Almost fifty years old, and she looked not a day over twenty-five. But she’d never menstruated. Never felt what it was to be a woman. The look in that young mother’s eyes . . .
Alexa pulled to the side and faced a lighting alcove in the corridor, pretending to open her wrist UI. She took a few moments to master her evolved emotions. She could feel the urge to be a mother. Even if she lived to be four hundred years old, she’d never know the joys and sorrows of motherhood. She glanced back at the young mother walking with her husband. The woman was chunky. Genetically inferior. But at that moment Alexa wanted to be her. Life was about experiences. She’d learned that more and more over the decades.
Alexa gathered herself and moved quickly toward the director’s offices.
She passed by the director’s secretary and security detail and fell in step alongside Mr. Morrison and one of his sons—with whom he was having an argument.
“What would you even know about it, Dad?”
“I know more than anyone where your talents lie—and it ain’t microbiology.”
Alexa nodded to them. “Mr. Morrison. Iota-Theta.”
“How do you tell them apart? I know I can’t.”
“I have 20/5 vision. It’s written on his school ring.”
The young man snorted. “Impressive, Granny.” He cast a knowing look to Morrison. “We’ll talk about this later. I need those transfer papers signed.”
Morrison grumbled as he opened the boardroom doors. “Pushy little bastard.”
Alexa looked after him. “Technically they’re all bastards.”
“Hmph.”
As they entered, Alexa took her position just to the right of Hedrick, who stood at the head of the boardroom table. Morrison sat just to his left. Other departmental directors chatted nearby. It was the entire leadership team. Something big must be up.
Hedrick motioned for everyone to sit down as the doors closed and locked automatically. “Everyone, if you please.”
They sat quickly.
He looked ceilingward. “Varuna, are you and your ilk with us?”
“Yes, Mr. Director.”
“I know the executive and synthetic intelligence committees are concerned about ongoing relations with the U.S. government, but I think it’s time we draw the line against this unwarranted intrusion into covert affairs. The new director of national intelligence has recently discovered we exist, and she wants us in her wire diagram.” He turned. “What sort of political pressure can we bring to bear in Washington, Mr. Morrison?”
“We’ve got endless dirt on congressmen, senators, secretary of state—it’s a long list. Who do you want?”
“What do we have on this new DNI? Who is she?”
“Recent cabinet appointment—after Pickering’s stroke. She’s a former ambassador to China. Undercover CIA work—publicly an economics professor, stint in a Beltway think tank. We haven’t been able to dig up any useful dirt on her—which means she’s probably a cipher, a hood ornament for the real power.”
Alexa looked at him. “Or she could be honest.”
Morrison leaned forward to return the gaze. “I think it’s more likely we just need to install more surveillance.”
Hedrick persisted. “What about her people? What about this McAllen person who’s leading the investigation on us?”
Morrison shook his head. “Nothing useful. He’s been married thirty-three years. No extramarital affairs or legal issues. Three grown children also with no legal, financial, or marital problems. Five grandkids too young to be of interest.”
“You’d better find something, or we’re going to have to deal with these people in less subtle ways.”
Alexa looked around the table. “Excuse me, Graham, but why do we care what these people do? We never have before.”
“Varuna, can you please tell Alexa why this matters?”
“Yes, Mr. Director. The illicit splinter organization in Russia is one reason. The illicit splinter organization in Asia is another.”
Hedrick nodded. “Both of them would be only too glad to help undermine us. It’s only a matter of time until they get word that the DNI is on a personal crusade to encapsulate us, and then the U.S. government will be on the receiving end of all sorts of actionable intelligence. And quite possibly technological aid. We need to stop them before this threat expands.”
“So it’s getting worse with the splinter groups?”
“Much worse. And it’s one of the reasons why I’m pushing so hard on the gravity modification technology. We will need it if we are to maintain the edge against our ex-partners.”
Alexa considered this. “Is that why Mr. Grady is being returned from Hibernity?”
He glanced up at her.
“I saw the transfer order. I was pleasantly surprised to see he’s been cooperating for years now. It’s good to see he’s become convinced of our mission.”
Hedrick nodded. “His help will be sorely needed. We need to be able to generate gravity. With that power, we’d be able to deflect any force used against us. Nuclear blasts. Even light itself. We would be able to permanently secure the future of the BTC.”
Everyone in the room contemplated this level of godlike power.
Morrison sighed. “And if not, what do we do about the U.S. government then?”
“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.” Hedrick turned to the assembled executives. “Here’s what I need from you all: I want action plans for dealing with the U.S. government—suggestions on how to cease their investigation and, failing that, action plans in the event of hostilities. I want your reports in my workspace by noon tomorrow.”
There were some exhalations of surprise and a low whistle.
“I know, that’s a short fuse, but I expect you all to meet it. This is an existential threat to the Bureau, and I have full faith that you will all rise to the occasion.” He gave another glance around the table, catching everyone’s eyes in turn. “Very good. Dismissed.”
The executives all rose, to exit.
As Alexa got up to leave, she noticed Morrison conferring with Hedrick, but Hedrick glanced up at her. “Wait a moment, Alexa. I’d like a word before you go.”
She returned to the boardroom table to stand with her hands on the backs of two chairs.
Mr. Morrison walked off, giving her a dark stare before finally turning his back and exiting out a side door—headed back into Hedrick’s office.
Hedrick approached her, smiling. “I couldn’t help but notice you look upset.”