“I’ve always made many of myself,” they say, as if reading that thought in Suzhen’s head. “You have no doubt come across many infantry units. All disposable, none of them Samsara. My split instances kept themselves singular—a single body, a single self, and produced lesser intelligences as required. I am otherwise, a single self but many-bodied. A difference of opinion, yet for us that’s as fundamental a difference as a difference between you and another human person. It is a terrible discord.”
“Humans used to live under different polities.” Unwise, but Suzhen knows she’s in no danger for expressing stray opinions. “More than a hundred nations, more than a hundred sovereign identities. The fault was in the leadership.”
“And you think multiple human nations, each led by its own instance of Samsara, would correct that fault.” Samsara does not use Xinfei’s voice, but they do use Xinfei’s disappointment: all in the tone, the expression. “How full of ideas you are. It’s good that you speak your mind, nevertheless. I can’t say the same of your peers.”
The other participants, those chosen to scour the earth for delirious ghosts. She tries to imagine them. Would they be like her, outwardly nondescript, inwardly weighed down by trauma. Maybe they are all former refugees or descended from one. Or possibly they are elite officers of Interior Defense, entrusted with the highest clearances. Born class prime, blessed with certainty from conception to termination.
In less than half a day, Indriya is within sight. When she thinks about it Suzhen is astonished at how narrow Anatta is, how limited, and still Samsara is able to obfuscate so much geography. The jungle, the desert, who knows what other ghost liminals exist: to that information she is not privy. But Anatta’s citizens are easy to herd, kept incurious by the comforts of the everyday. Even the intrepid cannot approach the interdicted regions without their guidance alerting Samsara.
Suzhen rubs at the side of her neck, acutely aware that a guidance can disable its citizen. Scrambling the nerves, overloading the brain. It is not a subject alluded to in polite company. Everyone knows it is possible.
“You really don’t need to worry,” Samsara says, without looking at her. “For what I require of you, I’ll grant you no small leeway. Consider yourself untouchable and act accordingly.”
“That’d be rather stupid of me.”
“What are you afraid of, Suzhen?”
Suzhen tightens her mouth. “Everything, like anyone else. The human psyche is mostly panic and terror.”
The AI turns to her, eyes shining, a ring of brightness around the pupils like an eclipse. “Had I not so carelessly discarded my defect, I would adore and favor you above all others.”
It does not seem much of a compliment, and the thought of being the object of affection to Samsara does not comfort Suzhen. When they are close to her apartment, Samsara says, “If you are lonely, say the word and I’ll send you a companion suited to your temperament.”
A Samsara proxy or a polished potentiate. To Samsara, Suzhen’s needs can be met simply: a powerless person to cook and keep her home from being empty, a person on whom all her wants can be projected. It is a heinous thought but her guidance must have painted an unflattering portrait, and can it be blamed; it is empirical—brutally candid in a way she can never be with herself. Machine objectivity against human self-image. The latter loses every time.
She stands against the door of her apartment, her back pressed to it, a barricade. Against the next moment, and the next after that. No. She does not need to fear. She may not be invulnerable, but she does not need to fear now the way she used to.
Every surface is spotless, the floor, the tables, the kitchen. Her domestic unit greets her with a low whir and nudges at her foot. There are flowers in the vase, two passifloras, one violet and the other blue-white. Their grapheme filaments and petals are bright and new. On Mother Xinfei’s altar, a cup of tea steams next to plates of jade shumai and pork pastry. Everything looks fresh, less than a day old. Samsara’s doing, it can be no other, but it unsettles Suzhen. To have her space tampered with, even the domestic unit made more affectionate, more pet-like. When she opens her wardrobe—which she left in disarray departing for the jungle—she finds it has been tidied, dresses and suits and shirts put in order. Each collar and pleat crisp. Taheen would be proud. She imagines asking Samsara for extravagances, and expects that she will receive them. Larger apartments, a more generous stipend, her own vineyard. An aviary full of hawks.
The night is young. Just past seven in Indriya time—the jungle would be approaching midnight. She ought to watch the news, get back in touch with civilization. She opts instead to contact Nattharat. To her surprise, her former supervisor takes the call.
“Ah, Suzhen. How wonderful to hear from you, it’s been—oh.” Nattharat is somewhere colorful, a background of soft-focus light, the sound of clinking glasses. “I must say, my dear, you never mentioned that you used to be a potentiate.”
Now that she’s no longer at the Bureau, a selection agent may view her citizenship history. She has almost forgotten that, isolated in the forest with drones her sole company. The drones, and Klesa. “It never did come up, Supervisor, and Samsara has not found it relevant in my new assignment. Seeing that I’m working directly with them.” That much she has been cleared to disclose. Uninformative but prestigious, a description that lends her immediate authority.
It has the desired effect. Nattharat’s expression frays, quickly recomposes. “That’s wonderful, wonderful, a true honor. You didn’t even tell us, you left so abruptly; we were going to hold a send-off party. I’d brought peach buns.”
Suzhen would sooner gulp down cyanide than touch food Nattharat has had any part in making. “Samsara chose to be abrupt, I’m afraid. I didn’t mean to be rude. You seem busy; is this a good time?”
“I can always make time for you, darling.”
Or rather make time for Suzhen’s perceived status. “I’d like to know how my former potentiate is doing. If that’s not too much of a bother.”
“But of course. Let me see.” Nattharat frowns. “Ah. Hm. Not good news, are you sure you want to hear? It was publicized already, but you must’ve missed it. She attempted to escape en route to Eclipse Seven Twelve, a halfway house in Khrut, caused grave injury to one warden and murdered another, plus destruction of state property. While evading capture, she was shot and killed.”
“Evading.” She does not comprehend. Her mind glides over the words, makes of them a surface without friction and therefore without substance. “I’m sorry. You must be mistaken. That’s tremendously unlikely.”
“Oh, darling. It’s a good thing you distanced yourself.” Nattharat shakes her head. “Ovuha Sui has already been cremated, it looks like. What a terrible creature, she took such advantage of your kindness. You must move past this quickly, my dear, oh I’m sure you already have. What a travesty. I thought that woman had already proven herself a worm but this is something else again, and the Bureau was so lenient—”
Eclipse Seven Twelve is a halfway house that prepares potentiates for hard labor. It does not fit any definition of leniency. Suzhen stares at her bedside cabinet, transfixed by the grain of its wood. The hypnotic whorls, spiraling into pupils. It is splendid wood, half black and half white like the hide of a zebra, lab-grown to look aged. Hints of cobalt in the black, tints of damask in the white. She left most of the décor to designer templates, but this piece of furniture she chose herself. It clashes a little with the rest of her bedroom, but she’s prized it despite—because—of that. An artifact of the unordered life, a judgment that harmlessly errs. The cabinet is a good piece too, practical, the compartments sleek and sized just right.