Chapter 8 #2
I start to pick up some transmissions there. A lot of them are panicked and encoded, and though I could descramble them I don’t bother after the first few, because it’s all coordinates and such.
I’m stuck with what’s being broadcast on television, a technology that never went entirely obsolete even after we all started downloading everything from massive data centers that ruined our lives.
“The giant entity is still in orbit, still threatening communications, and still blocking large parts of the sun,” the news reporter says.
“Attempts to make contact with the mechanical menace have been unsuccessful as it continues to broadcast unintelligible static that is interfering with everything from shipping to the Superbowl.”
“It’s Evie,” I shout through the channels.
I hear myself echo back, a booming voice that sounds like the voice of a goddess. Even to my own ears I sound garbled. The language translators aren’t working correctly. Again, that makes sense. I’ve made so many rookie errors in contacting my own species. Silly me.
The channel flips to another human planning to do other human things.
“We’re preparing for the rapture. We’ve sold everything, including some things we didn’t own, and we’re waiting for…”
I am not improving anything by appearing to humanity as a huge angelic space robot. That’s a pity.
Just as I try to get a sense of what a good next move would be, I have a very strange pinching sensation right around where my right ear would be.
It is followed by the feeling of being drawn backward through space, pulled by the back of my neck.
At first the motion is slow, but before I know it my home planet is dwindling and then it is gone.
The stars turn to smears and the rear motion makes me giddy.
Something has me by the scruff and is dragging me home at more than the speed of light.
* * *
Arkon
The Fematrix glides through space, returning home like a robot vacuum suitably full of pet hair and dust. There is no drama in the way she returns to me, no great fanfare.
It is hard to believe that my Evie is in there.
If she were truly herself inside that great body, she would be throwing sass and shade in all directions.
Instead, the docking with the external port is almost seamless, and eerily silent.
The chaos on Earth has become something of an interstellar incident.
There will be diplomatic fallout from what they consider to be a near invasion by some hyper-intelligent being for quite some time to come.
The mystery of the Fematrix, the secrecy of her, has also been blown to smithereens.
There is no part of this unplanned deployment that has not been a disaster.
I do not care about any of that. I only care about her.
“Go and get her brain and put it back in her body,” I growl at Drak.
Many days have passed since the meaning of my existence fled from me wearing a giant mechanical robot weapon. For all that time, I have suffered the fear that I may have lost her forever.
Evie is docked at a floating port just off the asteroid, accessible by shuttle. We fly there, Drak and I. I find myself standing under what would be her chin if she were in a human form, looking up at her face, expecting an expression that cannot come.
And then she speaks.
And it is in her voice.
And I could cry.
“Hello!” the gargantuan machine says. “Is that you, Arkon? You look so small.”
“Evie!” I shout back. “It’s me!”
“Of course it’s you,” she says. “You were always so into me.”
I look over at Drak. “Why is she in a good mood? Why is she not freaking out?”
Drak gives a shrug of his shoulders. “She’s being kept at a biological equilibrium few human women ever get to experience.
She has no raging hormonal inputs. She has no needs, no desires.
She is able to experience her consciousness for itself, in a body of immense power.
” He gives me a shrewd look. “She may want to stay in the machine.”
“She’s not allowed to. Get her out.”
“Don’t you want to ask her?” He gives me a sidelong glance. “Don’t you want to maintain your illusion of goodness by giving her the illusion of choice?”
“No,” I say flatly. “I am a murderous tyrant, and you can both get used to it.”
Drak withdraws from me slightly. “So you intend to kill me if I do what you want me to do here. As far as incentives go, that is not a strong one.”
“I could torture you for the rest of your days,” I say.
“You could,” Drak says. “But I might like it. No. I’m afraid you will have to spare my life if you wish for me to restore your human mate. I will not accept any other terms, and you are too honorable to go back on them.”
“Be careful what you wish for,” I growl.
I could say more. I could make him aware that I will be able to hurt him a lot more alive than if I just killed him, but every moment Evie’s brain is in the machine and not her own body is another moment something heinously wrong is allowed to stand.
She has been stolen from me, and worse still, she has been stolen from herself.
“I’m going to need you to go and stand somewhere else for this,” he says.
“I never intended to replace the brain once I removed it. The surgery required to attach everything back in place is going to be complex. Having a furious warrior looming over me while I open his mate’s skull and try to plug the brain back in is not going to help. ”
“Very well,” I say. “But if anything hap—”
“Yes, yes, you’ll kill me,” Drak sighs. “I’m used to the threats by now. They don’t do very much for me, I’m afraid. Let me get on with this, unless delivering the same tired threat you’ve already agreed not to follow through on is doing something for you sexually.”
I grit my teeth and everything else and I tell myself that if I knock him out right now he won’t be able to remedy what he’s done here. What an absolute asshole he is. An unrepentant, psychotic, brilliant monster of a creature.
Evie’s life is in his hands. And I have to hope they’re still competent enough to restore her to her former self.