Hostile Takeover: A Space Opera Adventure (Luminous Void Book 3), page 8
“Shopping,” Salome said.
Before she could add anything else, the safety gate closed and the people-mover nosedived. Onboard gravity kept the maneuver from sending Salome’s stomach out through her mouth, but Baku let out a squeak of surprise and Sweetums a yodel of glee.
They flashed past other sleds, twisting and dodging with a dexterity not even Sweetums could have matched. Salome closed her eyes so she wouldn’t have to see the near-misses, but a sudden swerve startled them open again. Not seeing was actually worse.
They plunged past stately barges decorated with wreaths and garlands and packed with celebrants waving whirligigs and colored streamers. The passengers sang along with the festival music coming from the speakers and occasionally leaped fearlessly from one barge to another.
Salome’s stomach was feeling distinctly delicate by the time they arrived at their destination and a concierge bot announced, “Pedestrians only beyond this point.”
Salome followed Lurayne and Baku out of the vehicle. Carnivalia carols tinkled and jingled from the overhead sound system, and most of the people around them wore costumes.
“Where do you want to start? Mwassaa asked. “I have a schematic of the mall. I can direct you anywhere you want to go.”
“Food,” Lurayne said. “I’m not shopping on an empty stomach, and the big guys are always willing to eat, aren’t you?” she added over her shoulder.
Demi and Tano looked mildly interested.
“There are twenty different cuisines within five-minutes walk,” Mwassaa said.
They passed two dozen restaurants, cafés, bars, and kiosks, and every one offered sample nibbles. If Salome had stopped to try everything that caught her eye—or her nose—she’d have eaten herself sick in the first hundred meters.
Lurayne pointed ahead to a kiosk. “That place over there looks good, and the sign says it’s human-compatible.” A holographic display in front of the little kiosk showed images of the entrées offered by the establishment scrolling up the holofield. A short line of mixed species stood at the service counter.
They joined the line behind a Vilk couple. The male wore an enormous broad-brimmed hat adorned with brightly colored plumes, and the female had on a full-length skirt of jingling metallic discs. The four-armed insectoids buzzed and pointed at the scrolling holodisplay in front of the stand. They leaned toward a floating head-sized box with a grill in the front, sampling the smells from the olfactory atomizer, and their twittering giggles suggested they felt vastly daring to be trying alien food.
The Vilk made a selection and moved ahead. Salome and her party stepped up to the holographic menu, and the display altered to exclude any foods that would be likely to make a human sick. Salome didn’t recognize anything on the display, so she sniffed the atomizer until she found something that smelled as if it had been deep-fried. “I think I’ll have that,” she said. The image on the menu—something lumpy covered in a greenish kind of sauce—brightened for a moment.
Salome turned to the boys. “What would you like, darlings? Just look at the menu and maybe have a little sniff.”
Demi and Tano shrugged and glanced at the menu. Two items immediately flashed as bio-sign readers detected microscopic eye movement, pulse rate, and pupillary dilation to determine which entrée they had selected.
“There we are.” Salome stepped aside so Lurayne and Baku could make their choices.
“Move out of my way.” A short, dumpy person colored bright pink from top to bottom pushed her way toward the front of the line, bumping hard into Baku.
Baku, who had been leaning toward the sniffer, staggered sideways and bumped into Lurayne.
A second person, taller than the pink individual, hurried in their direction, waving limber, boneless arms. “Oops oops oops. Sorry, sorry, sorry. Excuse us. So sorry.”
She reached the side of the pink person. “No, Prucilla, that’s not appropriate.”
The pink person turned to the newcomer. “O’Brien, they didn’t move aside when I arrived.”
O’Brien—Salome wasn’t familiar with her species—had an exaggerated hourglass figure sheathed in something that was arguably a dress composed of beads, bows, ruffles, and glitter. She wore her hair in a tower of three yellow poofs one atop the other, all ornamented with Carnivalia beads and flowers and topped with a pinwheel that spat sparks and somehow didn’t set her hair alight.
She would have looked at least approximately human, except that her arms appeared to have no bones and her features were shallow and indistinct except for her eyes, which were three times the size of a human’s.
Prucilla made her companion look positively unremarkable. She had two legs like posts and three arms—two corresponding approximately to a humanoid arrangement with three-fingered hands. The third arm, set lower on her left side, was much thicker, ending in a powerful-looking pincer. Her bright pink flesh seemed to be stretched over a semi-exposed carbon skeleton with joints like gears.
“They’re mechanoids,” Mwassaa said in Salome’s earpiece. “Kind of like cyborgs, but machine brains rather than organic. I can hear them linked into the station communication network.”
O’Brien said to the pink mechanoid, “When organics have to wait in turn, each individual as they arrive goes to the end of the line.”
“But I’m hungry, and these obstructed me.” Prucilla raised her powerful third arm to give Baku another push.
Fran let out an outraged squeal. Demi snapped out a hand faster than a human could move, grabbed Prucilla by the arm, and lifted her off her feet.
O’Brien waved her rubbery arms. “No, Prucilla, no. All of these organics are hungry. Hunger is an intrinsic organic state.”
“But they’re obstructing me,” Prucilla repeated.
At that moment, a quartet of hulking black bots, each taller than Demi and Tano, rumbled up to them on heavy trends. In unison, they said, “Interpersonal aggression is prohibited. Desist or you will be banned from the station premises.”
Prucilla glared at them, the lenses of her visual receptors flashing yellow. “These organics have aggressed against me.”
Salome stiffened, prepared to give the unpleasant mechanoid the sharpest edge of her tongue, but O’Brien waved her arms. “Security units, my trainee initiated aggression. These others responded with sufficient counter-aggression to prevent injury to themselves without further escalation.”
In unison again, the security bots said, “The incident has been observed and recorded. The individual known as Prucilla has received a reprimand and station demerits and is hereby alerted that future aggression may result in permanent eviction from the station.”
Prucilla’s receptors flashed faster. “I am not at fault.”
“Station central processing has delivered its judgment,” the security bots said. “The conclusion is not subject to appeal. Acknowledge recognition of the verdict.”
Prucilla had stopped kicking and now dangled limply, staring at the security bots with what appeared to be incredulity.
O’Brien said, “The correct procedure under these circumstances is to apologize and promise not to do it again.”
Prucilla’s eyes flashed for several seconds as she apparently processed her options. Finally, she muttered, “I acknowledge the verdict.”
Salome gritted her teeth. The mechanical hadn’t only assaulted a member of Salome’s crew, she had gone straight for Baku, the smallest and least imposing of their group. “I don’t think that sounded like an apology. Lurayne, did that sound like an apology to you?”
“You see, Prucilla,” O’Brien said, “organic social protocols demand that you experience discomfort. Please express appropriate regret for your antisocial behavior.”
Prucilla dangled in sullen silence for a few seconds. Finally, she said, “I regret my error and will modify my programming.”
O’Brien turned to Baku. “Is that sufficient? I’m sure she can do better if necessary.”
Baku shrugged. “It’s fine.”
Salome patted Demi’s arm. “You can let her down now. Nicely,” she added, but Demi had already set Prucilla on her feet as gently as if she were a Yueltan child.
The security bots said in unison, “Situation resolved,” and rumbled away with no more comment.
The Vilk couple ahead of them paid for their food and scuttled off to one of the nearby dining tables to await its delivery.
Salome and her party turned their backs on the two mechanoids and moved forward to the service counter. Salome was about to pay when O’Brien made a throat-clearing sound.
“As my trainee has caused you discomfort and inconvenience, we would like to offer to pay for your meals, and possibly you would allow us to join you. Prucilla would benefit from observing organic protocols, and I myself am highly skilled in organic social behavior. We would consider it a great favor.”
Salome wasn’t inclined to do the obnoxious Prucilla any favors. Lurayne, however, grinned maniacally. “We would love nothing more.”
Salome scowled at her, but the engineer folded her hands in a pleading gesture and widened her eyes like a child begging for a trip to the candy dispensary. Apparently, Prucilla and O’Brien had aroused her sense of humor—which Salome did not consider to be Lurayne’s best feature.
Salome turned to Baku. “How do you feel?”
Baku shrugged. “Okay by me.”
Salome wasn’t sure the young woman was being strictly truthful. Baku was too self-effacing. Salome would really have to do something about that someday. Since no one else seemed to actually object to the intrusion, Salome consented with a nod.
“Then I will pay for all of these,” O’Brien informed the service bot.
In the dining area, four round tables skidded themselves together and merged into a single table. A chair performed an elaborate folding procedure and converted itself into a stool for Sweetums. Another arranged itself into a scaffold for Fran to perch on, and a third became a stanchion mount for Mwassaa’s independent audvid unit.
They seated themselves just as plates of food swooped from the back of the kiosk, descended in a flock, and set themselves on the table.
Salome looked at the double-sized platter that landed in front of Sweetums. “You didn’t order all that did you, putty-tat?”
Sweetums flattened his ears and grabbed the side of his plate with one long-fingered hand. “Mine.”
Lurayne was grinning so broadly Salome was afraid the top of her head might fall off. “We can always send the leftovers back to the ship.”
“That’s what I want.” Sweetums said.
Salome sighed. “Just don’t give yourself a tummy ache.”
Another plate had set itself in front of Fran. It contained cubes of carbon, bits of glassine tubing, a string of Carnivalia beads, and a rosette of artificial flowers made from many-colored communication and data crystals.
Fran poised a manipulator arm over the plate, wavered as if she were choosing the tastiest morsel to try first, then picked up a little cube of carbon and dropped it in her storage compartment.
Across the table, O’Brien pressed one hand, with its long, wiggly fingers, to her exaggerated bosom. “I have neglected to make formal introductions. I am O’Brien. I am a Mechanical/Organic Interface Facilitator, and Prucilla here is my trainee. You, I believe, are mostly humans.”
“That’s Salome,” Lurayne said, “captain of Dismal Endeavor. I’m Lurayne, the engineer.” She finished introducing the rest of the party.
O’Brien addressed Sweetums. “I’m not familiar with your species.”
“I’m a cat.” Sweetums had already sampled several morsels from his plate and licked his fingers.
“And is that a technologically advanced species?” O’Brien asked.
“I’m a pet. This is my mommy.” He bumped the top of his head against Salome’s arm.
O’Brien turned to Prucilla. “A pet is an associate species that occupies a privileged legal and social status. Injury to a pet typically provokes extreme aggression on the part of its associate—its ‘mommy,’ as such an associate is called.”
Baku chuckled. Lurayne grinned even more madly.
O’Brien hadn’t finished instructing her trainee. “Another unusual feature of this social grouping is the inclusion of a pilot. Humans typically experience social difficulty in interactions with pilots similar to that between mechanicals and organics on….” she made a clattering noise like a heap of tools falling on a metal floor.
Lurayne leaned her elbows on the table and waggled her fork. “So, you two are from Machineworld?”
O’Brien pressed a hand to her bosom. “That is correct.”
Salome was tired of the conversation going on above her head. “What is Machineworld?”
Lurayne looked over at her. “It’s a little like Waysend Station. It’s run by machines, but organics there are considered inferior to mechanicals.”
“That is correct,” O’Brien said. “Consequently, mechanoids such as Prucilla and myself are forced to conceal our true natures or flee to places where we can adopt organic bodies.”
“But doesn’t that just mean…” Baku took a deep breath and plunged, “… that you’re mechanicals?”
Prucilla’s fork clanked on her plate. “I am not a mechanical.” Her visual receptors flashed. “That is typical organic prejudice.”
“No, Prucilla, that is a logical question for an organic.” O’Brien turned to Baku. “Both Priscilla and I were incepted as mechanicals. However, we were unable to live comfortably in that state.”
“But isn’t that just… just a programming error?”
“What?” Prucilla raised her voice in a mechanical squeal. “How dare you?”
Fran let out a squawk, followed by a long squeal. She waved two of her manipulator arms at Prucilla very much the way O’Brien had done. Apparently, Prucilla just had that effect on people.
“You see, Prucilla,” O’Brien said, “Baku is very respectful of people’s programming and does not reprogram them by violence.”
Salome wondered what exactly Fran had said.
“There’s nothing wrong with my programming,” Prucilla grumbled.
“No, Prucilla,” O’Brien said. “No one here is implying you have faulty programming.”
Salome wasn’t sure she agreed. She didn’t care whether Prucilla was mechanical or organic, but it wouldn’t do her any harm to download some manners.
CHAPTER 8
MWASSAA
Salome and Lurayne had taken Baku and Demi and Tano out for lunch and shopping. Mwassaa was following along, watching and listening from an audvid unit mounted on Demi’s chest. At the moment, she was “sitting” in a virtual reconstruction of a restaurant with Salome and the others, eating panocopika, her favorite Carnivalia dish. The restaurant had given her temporary access to the recipe file. She could “taste” it as if it were real. It was a very good version, but it couldn’t give her the sense of being at home with her family. She supposed nothing could. Maybe it was better not to try.
While one part of her attention sat and “ate” with the girls, she was also tracking Ramadi through the ship. He was running routine system checks that probably didn’t need to be done. Lurayne and Baku were good at their jobs, but Ramadi considered it his responsibility to double- and triple-check. It was a holdover from the old days when Salome’s uncle, Captain Mix, had owned Luminous Void and the old crew had been worse than useless.
Mwassaa herself had nothing important to do. The pilot’s job was to pinch the ship. That was all. She could use the communications system and see and hear through the ship’s internal and external sensors, but she couldn’t actually do anything.
The majority of pilots went into the program in search of eternal life and, eventually, fabulous wealth as their invested income accrued interest. You had to be a particular kind of person to not care that everyone and everything you knew would die or disappear long before you got out of pinch-space. And that wasn’t the sort of person anyone would want to trust with control of any part of their ship’s systems.
Mwassaa, on the other hand, had joined the Pilots’ Guild to stall the progression of an infectious parasite. She only had to stay in pinch-space long enough to save up enough money to pay for the treatment. She was sure Ramadi would have no hesitation authorizing Lurayne to give Mwassaa access to at least a few of the isolated systems, but it would require a major overhaul, and they couldn’t afford to take any of their essential systems offline long enough to make the transition.
Keeping half her attention on Salome and her party, she turned another fragment of herself to the message she’d found in her mail drop.
A few weeks ago, Mwassaa had sent a message to her sister Nyssaa on Ouroborus. In the weeks since then, LV and her crew had been hiding out on Shangri-La, and their arrival at Waysend Station was the first chance she’d had to check her mail. She’d found Nyssaa’s reply waiting.
She braced herself and opened the message.
Nyssaa stood before her in the back garden of the family farmhouse. She had an odd face with a prominent brow and jaw that was somehow arrestingly beautiful, a reflection of Mwassaa’s own before the parasite had begun to deform her features.
“Thank you for your last letter,” Nyssaa was saying. “I love you so much. We both do.”
Her younger sister was getting ready to marry the man Mwassaa had planned to marry herself before her illness. It had been crushingly difficult for Mwassaa to give Nyssaa her blessing.
“I wish you had told me more about your new captain,” Nyssaa said, “and what you’ve been doing, but maybe it’s not very interesting.” There was a static blip in the recording. An equipment error, maybe. Or something had gotten corrupted as the message was passed through the pinch network.
The scene changed to Nyssaa standing at the rail of one of the fuzzybustard pens. The chicks, brown-striped bundles of fluff, scurried around, flapping stubby wings and lashing their little snakelike tails. Carmella, the big pink hen, watched her surroundings with a suspicious eye.
