Lacuna: The Sands of Karathi (10 page)

The robot, seemingly almost giddy with relief, clacked his claws together eagerly. “Oh, that will be wonderful, simply wonderful! Thank you! Thank you
so
much!”

Liao nodded, a strange smile spreading across her face as she regarded the spider-like creature. “No problem,
Ben
.”

Everyone stared at her, including the creature itself, who glanced around at the others as though to see if it had heard what she said correctly.

“You know. Ben. The guy who gets marooned in
Treasure Island
.” More silence as everyone stared at her in confusion. “The classic pirate story? Long John Silver and all that?”

Summer shook her head. “What?”

Liao threw her hands in the air. “It’s a classic! Don’t you read anything
that doesn’t have lasers or magic spells in it?”

Rowe grinned widely. “Nope. It’s sci-fi, fantasy, and porn for me.”

Liao rolled her eyes, and the little robot clapped its claws together with glee. “
Ben
! Ben, I like it. I like it. Very simple, easy to spell.”

Liao raised an eyebrow. “We
tend
to put more thought into our names than spelling, but…” she smiled. “I’m glad you like it. It was that or Ogilvy, the forgotten astronomer from
The War of the Worlds
. I think Ben suits you better.”

“
War of the Worlds
?” Summer laughed, reaching up and patting Liao on the shoulder. “Well, what do you know. I’m proud of you, Cappy-Cap. You finally made a science-fiction reference.” Rowe gestured to the others. “Taught her everything she knows.”

Liao forced a smile, but there was a lack of mirth in her eyes.
The War of the Worlds
was one of James’s favourite stories, and he’d encouraged her to read it—twice, in fact. Once when they were in Australia inspecting all the new technology that would later be a part of the
Beijing
, and then again right as he vanished.

While she had lain in the hospital, her shoulder bandaged and her mind trying to come to terms with the small life growing inside her, one of the nurses had come around with a crate full of books. Right on the very top, as though calling to her, was a copy of H.G. Wells’s
War of the Worlds
.

She had wanted to read it with him, but he had disappeared before she found a chance, so she settled on reading it aloud to the fetus inside her in quiet moments alone in her quarters.

“Yes, I finally read it.”

Act II

Chapter V

“
The Howling Wind”

Engineering Bay Two

TFR Beijing

It took them four days to do so, but finally Ben’s computer core was cut from the rusted hulk of the
Giralan
and placed within the
Beijing
’
s engineering bay. Liao finally understood why the Toralii rescue party had complained that the datacore was too heavy to move; it weighed in at almost eleven hundred kilograms, putting the
Beijing
perilously close to the two hundred thousand tonne limit where the jump drive–seemingly arbitrarily–failed to work. Summer had once tried to explain to Liao exactly why that was, but she didn’t understand.

Ben seemed very happy. Summer and a few of the other engineers had spent some time brushing the rust from the datacore, then they had given him a thick coat of paint to stop any further deterioration. They spent some time rebuilding his broken legs and replaced the burned out articulators in the maintenance drone’s joints, so all six limbs were now functional. To reduce the weight, they only brought the one drone they had found, which was the most functional, although they kept various parts of four others to use for repairs.

It was good to have allies, and once they’d brought him on board, Ben was more than happy to tell them anything they wanted to know. Liao had a team lead by Lieutenant Yu following the little scuttling drone around, listening to Ben prattle on. He mostly spouted information they already knew, such as the differences between the Telvan and the Toralii Alliance, but some was quite valuable, even if only in an academic sense: fragments of Toralii history, data on Karathi, speculation regarding troop and ship movements. Liao authorised Summer to dedicate a whole reactor to powering Ben’s datacore, which was a relief for him because he had been without a reliable source of power for so long.

Liao waited for Ben to return. He had settled in well and her crew had shown him every hospitality. She had questions for him.

It wasn’t long before the click-clattering of Ben’s claws became audible, followed by his thin, metallic, synthetic voice.

“… and then, forevermore, possession of the black blade was a sign of the rules of the three kingdoms. Whoever held that blade held with them the throne, and—Captain Liao!”

Ben, his metal carapace freshly painted a hospital white and claws clicking in excitement, scuttled over to where Liao was standing. “It’s great to see you, Captain! Thank you so much!”

Liao smiled broadly, reaching up and giving the drone a playful pat on the head. “It’s good to see you too, Ben. How are you settling into life on the
Beijing
?”

“Settling in just fine, Captain. This is wonderful! I mean, it’s not nearly as advanced as the
Giralan
, but it’s a wonderful ship! Very sturdy and. lots of power. So much power, mmm. Rowe fabricated a converter for me. Oh, how nice it is to have to reliable, clean energy. And eight reactors! Redundancy–that’s the ticket. Much better than the sole emergency reactor I had left.”

“I’m glad you’re happy. Just be aware we need those reactors for the rest of the ship, so one for you, seven for us.”

“Of course, Captain, of course. I’m just jolly glad to be
away
from that damn rock, I have to say. I really owe you, big time. I think I was going to go off my rocker if I was stuck there any more.”

Liao smiled. “Don’t worry about it,” she remarked. “We’re just glad to help.” She stood, gently easing herself into the fold-out chair she’d brought for exactly this purpose. She gestured to the flat piece of cloth she’d set out for Ben to ‘sit’ on, not that she was entirely sure he needed it or how he could even use it. “Now that you’re settled in, I was hoping we could have a little chat about a few things.”

“Right, right, right. I guess you’ll be wanting answers to your many questions, then, right? Eh?” Ben’s British accent, coming from the thin slit that functioned as his mouth, seemed comically out of place.

Liao nodded. “We, as a species, are a new people to the spacefaring community. There’s so much we just don’t understand, or even know about, that we need explained. We’ve had Saara in the past, and she’s been a great help, but in terms of raw information, your brain contains so much more that we could know, even if it is many years out of date.”

“Of course! Your wish is my command, good Captain. Ask away!”

“You were communicating with Sheng, yes? Were you talking to anyone else?”

“Oh, well, yes and no—it depends. In the beginning, I was sending out as many signals as I could–I talked to the Alliance, the Kel-Voran, the Telvan.” He clicked his claws together in annoyance. “For all the good talking to the
Telvan
did to me. Bunch of arrogant, evil psychopaths. But by the end, it was just Sheng.”

Liao shifted uncomfortably, looking down at the drone. “I see. Well, you should be aware… Saara, one of my crew
members and a civilian, is a former member of the Telvan. She’s the only non-Human aboard, though, so don't be alarmed when you see her about.”

Perhaps it was her imagination, but Liao swore she could see a flash of rage cross over the robot’s remarkably expressive features.

He drew his claws up against his body, clacking them together.

“Of course. I’ll try not to be
alarmed
, no.”

Liao crossed her hands over her chest, frowning. “Saara has proven herself to be a very capable member of my crew, and she is very welcome here, as are you. I know the Telvan left you behind on that planet, and I know that must be somewhat vexing to you, but on my ship, under my command, we recognize you as a sentient creature and won’t do the same to you.”

“Oh, no, no, no. That’s not what I worry about at all…” Ben waved his claws in front of him. “I don’t mean you’ll do
that
.” His tone became nervous. “At least, I hope not. A-a-anyway, the point is, it’s just…”

As Ben spoke, the nervousness faded and his speech took on a sinister, grim edge. “Her people left me, alone and with no prospects for rescue, on a deserted planet—just
left
me to rust. But of course, not before taking anything of worth, including vital parts of my systems, primary power generators, and practically all the spare parts. The only thing they left me with was an emergency generator because they couldn’t be bothered cutting it out of the hull, and the long-range communications array, which just happened
to be communicating with the Forerunner network.”

“When I discovered that, I sent out every signal I could, and it took over fifty years to be rescued. Fifty
years
, Captain, just sitting there with nothing to do but watch as the ship, my ‘body’ I guess you could say, rusted away into nothing. Every day was spent pacing back and forth over places I knew, sending out signals that were not answered, and glancing to a sky that was always empty. I have a photographic memory, Captain.
There are only so many times you can walk down a corridor before you could just replay the experience in your mind and not bother.”

The robot slumped on the cloth, shaking his head. “If you hadn’t come along, I don’t know how much longer I could have held out.”

Slowly digesting the robot’s story, Liao nodded. “I understand that you would be angry about such a thing–I know I would have been as well–but Saara is an individual in her own right, and she is no longer serving in the Telvan military. She is a part of
my
crew, and she will adhere to my ethical standards. She’ll treat you as you should be treated.”

She could swear that Ben was resentful–angry, even–and somewhere in that digital brain of his, the huge datacore working away next to them, she suspected that he was trying to find a way to logically refute her statement.

“Very well, Captain Liao. You have my word. I'll treat her the same way she treats me.”

Liao nodded. “Good.”

A creak from the opening entrance hatchway caused her to twist in her seat. As though right on cue, Saara stepped through the hatchway, giving a nod towards Liao.

Nothing like that for Ben, though, and Liao could see he noticed.

The Toralii woman stepped up to Liao, handing over a clipboard with paper attached. [“Captain, the salvage results. Aside from the datacore, which is in poor condition and corroded in some places, there is precious little aside from scrap metal we could realistically salvage from the
Giralan
. My apologies.”]

Ben turned to her, his tone acidic. “Salvage, hmm? What about survivors?”

Saara, looking confused, glanced at him. [“Of course not.”]

“Well,
I’m
here and I am not
salvage,” Ben hissed, his thin, metallic voice cracking slightly as his fairly simplistic modulator struggled to adequately express the tonal range he was pushing through. “I’m a survivor.”

Saara turned her body towards him, tail flicking slowly behind her, her face screwed up in confusion. [“I suppose that you are. I don’t know, it just seems so strange and awkward to be saying that.”] She tilted her head towards Liao. [“I mean, look, I’m sure you’re enjoying being mystified by this piece of advanced technology, but I feel as though it’s your, well, your
ignorance
,
that’s really causing that reaction. Humans are a young species in the interstellar community. Advanced devices like this construct are found everywhere, and they are all the same; they are not
alive
.”]

Ben’s claws clicked and clattered, and for a moment Liao thought he was going to spring up and clamp hold of Saara’s neck. “I am
alive!
I am! I am! I’m sentient, I think, I’m not just a machine—”

[“With all due respect, Captain, the construct isn’t really sentient. Yes, it speaks, but it’s no more alive than your radio. Voices and speech come from that, too, but you don’t consider such devices alive, do you?”]

Liao gritted her teeth and stood, glancing between the two of them. “I can understand your argument, Saara, but Ben is far more advanced than any artificial intelligence Humans could create, and there is still considerable debate about the ethics surrounding the subject on Earth. However, for the moment, Ben has demonstrated an ability to learn, a desire to grow and change, and he suffers. To me, that’s enough to be considered alive.”

[“I understand how he
appears
, Captain, but any animal can be taught tricks. That’s all they are—complex machines. There is no sentience in there, no more than there is in a trained beast.”]

“That is your people’s opinion, Saara, but I am surprised to hear that it is yours, too.” Liao folded her hands in front of her. “I understand that you don’t see Ben as a sentient life, but it’s important to me that you acknowledge that
I
do.”

Saara hesitated, and Liao’s tone softened somewhat. “Humanity can be brutal, Saara, but it can be caring, too. I would have thought that you, more than anyone, would have understood that by now.”

[“I understand,”] Saara said, glancing towards the still furious-looking robot, [“but to me it seems foolish to show kindness to something that does not truly understand the concept and is merely repeating what its programming told it. This ‘Ben,’ as you call it, is not capable of sentient thought and merely understands commands and composes verbal replies based upon complex heuristics. It is a machine. A complicated and intelligent machine, yes, but not a living thing.”]

Ben scuttled forward, his claws clicking angrily. “You and your arrogance! You Telvan bastards left me on that planet to rust, and now you don’t even have the moral fortitude to acknowledge you did anything wrong at all!”