I had gotten back through the security barrier and was walking up the tunnel when I came within range of the feed again. I tapped ART to let it know I was back.
It said, We have a problem.
Chapter Seven
I LOCATED THE PROBLEM in the lobby of the main hotel.
Tapan was on one of the upper platforms, seated on a round cushioned bench, her pack at her feet, partially screened by another holographic sculpture of a giant crystal formation. She looked up at me and said, “Oh, hi. I didn’t know if the others would be able to reach you.”
Without me present in the shuttle, ART hadn’t had any visual access to the passenger compartment. (As a private vehicle that was only being used as a public transport in a sketchy if not openly illegal way, it had no onboard security system or cameras.) ART hadn’t known Tapan wasn’t onboard until the shuttle reached the transit ring. Taking its responsibility seriously, it had sent a drone over to the embarkation area to watch my clients disembark and had seen an obviously distraught and angry Rami and Maro, but no Tapan. Then it had checked Eden’s profile on the social media feed and found the message from Rami. (Tapan had told them she was sick and was going to the shuttle’s restroom compartment. They hadn’t realized what had happened until the shuttle had cleared the port.)
I said, “They left me a message.” I had intended to just stand there and stare at her, which is what SecUnits do to clients who have just performed an act of stupidity so profound it approaches suicide which they ordered us not to stop them from doing. But she looked like she knew she had been stupid, and I had to know. “What happened?”
She looked up at me, clearly anticipating a negative reaction. “I got a note in my feed, through the social profile I had when we were working here. Someone working for Tlacey—a friend—said he had copies of the files and he’d give them to us.” She forwarded the message to my feed.
I checked it carefully. The meeting time was set for the next cycle.
I felt this would be the point where a human would sigh, so I sighed.
Tapan said, “I know it could be a trap, but, maybe it isn’t? I know him, he’s not the greatest guy, but he hates Tlacey.” She hesitated. “Will you help me? Please? I’ll understand if you say no. I know I’ve been … I know this could be a really bad idea.”
I had forgotten that I had a choice, that I wasn’t obligated to do what she wanted just because she was here. Being asked to stay, with a please and an option for refusal, hit me almost as hard as a human asking for my opinion and actually listening to me. I sighed again. I was having a lot of opportunities to do it and I think I was getting good at it. “I’ll help you. Right now we need to find a place to get out of sight.”
Tapan had a hard currency card from the transit ring, which wasn’t tied to any RaviHyral account and so was not traceable. At least, that’s what she thought and I hoped she was right. I had never been given any education modules on financial systems and since our modules were crap anyway, I’m not sure that would have helped. ART ran a search for me and the results were mixed. Hard currency cards could be traced, but usually only by non-corporate political or corporate entities. I decided it was probably all right to use it. If the message wasn’t a trap, Tlacey must think my clients were back on the transit ring by now. If it was a trap, they would know they could grab us when we walked into the meeting so there was no point in looking for us earlier.
Tapan used the card to pay for a transient room in the block next to the port. While she ran the card through the vending kiosk and got our room assignment, I stood behind her and surveyed the area. The transient rooms were in a narrow warren of corridors, as unlike the main hotel as a real cargo transport was unlike ART. There was no SecSystem to get control of and only one camera at the entrance. I deleted us out of its memory, but I still felt like we—or I—might have been observed at some point. It might just be inherent rogue-SecUnit-on-the-run paranoia.
Tapan led the way to our room. There were other humans hanging around the dimly lit corridors and some looked like they might try to approach her, then saw me and changed their minds. I was bigger than they were, and without cameras it was still hard to control my expression.
ART said, Tell the human not to touch any surfaces. There may be disease vectors present.
On the way here I had shared the recording of what I had found at Ganaka Pit. ART said, This is good news. You were not at fault. I agreed, sort of. I had been expecting to feel better about it. I mostly just felt awful.
Once inside the room with the door secured, I saw Tapan’s shoulders relax and she took a deep breath. The room was just a square box with pads stored in a cabinet for sitting or sleeping, and a small display surface. No cameras, no audio surveillance. There was a tiny attached bath, with a waste-reclaimer and a shower. At least it had a door. I was going to have to pretend to use it at least twice. Yes, that would be the cap on all the fun I was having today. I created a schedule and set an alarm to remind myself to do it.
Tapan dropped her bag on the floor and faced me. “I know you’re mad.”
I tried to moderate my expression. “I’m not mad.” I was furious. I thought my clients were safe, I was free to worry about my own problems, and now I had a tiny human to look after that I couldn’t possibly abandon.
She nodded and pushed her braids back. “I know—I mean—I’m sure Rami and Maro were furious. But it’s not like I’m not afraid, so that’s good.”
In my feed, ART said, What?
I have no idea, I told it. I said to Tapan, “How is that good?”
She explained, “In the creche, our moms always said that fear was an artificial condition. It’s imposed from the outside. So it’s possible to fight it. You should do the things you’re afraid of.”
If a bot with a brain the size of a transport could roll its eyes, that was what ART was doing. I said, “That isn’t the purpose of fear.” They didn’t give us an education module on human evolution, but I had looked it up in the HubSystem knowledge bases I’d had access to, in an effort to figure out what the hell was going on with humans. It hadn’t helped.
She said, “I know, it’s supposed to be inspirational.” She looked around and went to the cabinet with the seating pads. She pulled them out, sniffed them suspiciously, then took an aerosol capsule out of a pocket on her pack and sprayed them down. “I forgot to ask, did you get a chance to do the research you wanted to do here?”
“Yes. It was … inconclusive.” It had been damningly conclusive, it just hadn’t had the revelatory effect I had been, stupidly, hoping for. I helped her pull the rest of the pads out.
We got them arranged on the floor and sat down. She looked at me and bit her lip. “You’re really augmented, aren’t you. Like, a lot. Like more than someone would choose voluntarily.”
It wasn’t a question. I said, “Um, yes.”
She nodded. “Was it an accident?”
I realized I had my arms wrapped around myself and was leaning over like I was trying to go into a fetal position. I don’t know why this was so stressful. Tapan wasn’t afraid of me. I had no reason to be afraid of her. Maybe it was being here again, seeing Ganaka Pit again. Some part of my organic systems remembered what had happened there. In the feed, ART started to play the soundtrack to Sanctuary Moon and weirdly, that helped. I said, “I got caught in an explosion. There’s not much of me that’s human, actually.”