dropped it there and then awkwardly began to climb the trunk.
“Ah. It’s going to make another bush to help with the harvest,” said Frances, who had been apparently ignoring the exchange between the two humans. “Clever things, these venumbs.”
“Actually, it’s not a venumb,” Peter Onethirteen said, going over to join her. “It’s more a symbiote,” he continued. “A bit like the way that lichen is a symbiosis between fungus and algae. The tree itself is a genetically modified rose bush. The VNM seems to find the thorny wood of the tree provides the best building material. Watch…”
Smooth brown twigs were falling to the ground, sharp red thorns glowing in the pale light. A rasping, clicking noise came from the branches above, where the spider bush worked unseen. The noise ceased and the spider bush then dropped to the ground in a tangled heap. There was a moment’s stillness and then it began to twitch, its silver joints flashing, and the bush gradually regained control of its legs. It raised itself up and then began collecting the twigs it had just harvested into a pile.
Peter Onethirteen was smiling as he watched the spider bush tearing off pieces of silver foil and placing them amongst the twigs. He moved forward to crouch down by the bush and beckoned Judy closer. She stood at his shoulder, her robes flapping gently in the wind.
“To be honest, I don’t quite understand how the next bit works,” he said. “I don’t think it uses nanotechs, but there is no way those twig fingers could form the metal foil into hinges and motors. It’s a beautiful principle, though. In a region of scarce resources, both VNM and plant make use of their respective strengths. The VNM gains access to building material, while the tree gets armor and stealth protection.”
“Did they evolve naturally? Or do they have a creator?” Peter looked towards her. Her body remained still, but there was a note of interest in her voice.
“I don’t know. They were found in the Russian Free States over a hundred years ago. Nobody will admit how long they’d been around before they were discovered.”
Still crouching, he waved his hand to take in the area around them. “This area was established as common ground after the Transition. It’s littered with symbiotes like these.” He paused. Frances had moved up beside him, bringing the push buttons between her legs level with his face. He appeared to notice them for the first time.
“There’s something about these bushes,” he said, looking rather disconcerted. He turned to Judy. “A suggestion that there are forms of evolution other than the path chosen for us by the EA. I spent time in the Enemy Domain, you know. It gives you a different…perspective.”
Judy’s hand was moving from her sleeve to her mouth, a tiny blue dot on her finger.
“Ouch!”
“What’s the matter?” asked Peter.
“I don’t know.” Judy frowned. “I thought I felt…Never mind.” She regained her composure and placed a little pill on her tongue.
The second spider bush was completed. After a moment’s apparent thought, it began to scuttle after the first, back towards the beach.
“Going to harvest more foil,” Peter said. “If the tree they’re stealing it from doesn’t get its stealth routines updated fast, all the local symbiotes will find it and strip it clean of metal.”
Judy gazed at him, the little blue pill dissolving on her tongue.
“You’re not like your digital counterpart,” she observed. “I’ve got my sister’s report.”
“People change.” Peter shrugged. “My digital counterpart was created years ago. We’ve grown differently.”
Judy’s gaze was cool. “There’s more to it than that. You said you spent time in the Enemy Domain. Tell me about that.”
Peter gave an involuntary shiver. “I was marooned there for three months,” he said. “That was
Judy tilted her head to listen to her console. “Oh, I see,” she said in some surprise. “Three months marooned on a clone world. How could that be allowed to happen?”
“It does sound far-fetched, doesn’t it?” Peter’s voice was soft. “Isn’t that a modern fantasy, to be out from under the gaze of the Watcher?” He noted Judy’s reaction. “Oh yes, I
Frances was intrigued. “How is it possible to be marooned? Surely the EA were monitoring you at all times. They would have noticed that you were missing.”
“You’d think so, wouldn’t you?” Peter straightened up, brushing his hands together. “Look, why don’t we go to my apartment? If nothing else I can get something for Judy to put on her feet.”
The tree flickered from sight as they walked away from its stealth region. Judy had the impression that other things were hidden away in the windblown land around them.
“You know about the origins of the Enemy Domain, of course,” said Peter. “An AI was charged with overseeing the colonization of a planet. It got paranoid and ended up creating an expanding volume of self- replicating machines. It sought to challenge the Earth sphere of expansion.”
“It tried to make colonists,” Frances interrupted. “It left something like three trillion half-grown clones scattered through the region.”
“I know,” Peter said. “The EA employed people like me to go into the former Enemy Domain to help clean up the mess.”
“A lot of people from Social Care went there,” Judy said.
“Yes,” he said patiently. “I met some of them. Anyway, I flew into the Enemy Domain alone. I had a set of library codes to build anything up to and including type six VNMs and a set of teaching resources so I could train the clone population in the use of self-replicating technology. My ship was a limited Von Neumann Machine: the copies it made of itself would not contain warp drives. I think the EA is
Frances seemed fascinated by Peter, and Judy noticed how her walk mimicked his. She was clearly adopting his mannerisms. The robot leaned forward and tilted her head slightly.
“And what happened to you, Peter?”
“I was picked up by a remnant of the Enemy Domain’s security net. A very efficient net: completely isolated and self-sufficient. I hear there are still lots of regions in the ED like that. Regions that don’t know they have been defeated by the Watcher and the Earth AIs, security systems that are still fighting battles in a war that was over long ago. My ship was disabled as it flew into one of them, but an image of my ship carried on, following my original course. That security net was good: the apparent ship mimicked the emanations from my own ship exactly. It was three months before the Earth AIs realized that I wasn’t where they thought I was.”
“And what happened during that time?” Judy asked.
“I was interrogated.” Peter walked in silence for a while. “The details are all available from the EA, if you want to know. They…healed me afterwards.”
Judy slowed, listening to her console. Frances walked on beside Peter. They passed through another insubstantial barrier of lavender lights, leaving the region of common ground behind. Antique low-rise buildings made of concrete and glass were scattered in a grid pattern before them, the air above them being kept clear for some reason. Skyscrapers could be seen in the distance beyond.
“I have a subterranean apartment in one of the closer buildings,” Peter said. “They built low here, to retain the look of the area. I think that bleak concrete-and-glass look suits this countryside, don’t you?” They stopped outside the entrance to his apartment block. “Do you see that cannon over there?” He indicated a vicious black spike that stood on the top of a nearby building, pointing up into the grey sky.
“I see it,” Frances said.
“The AIs have calculated that, next week, a section of the Shawl will hit the ground just about where we’re now standing. That cannon is designed to destroy the last few fragments before they can do any damage. The AIs have set the burn at about a hundred meters up; it promises to be quite a display.”
Judy walked quickly to keep up with them, white robes flapping plum and pink.
“You live on the Shawl, don’t you, Judy?” Peter said. “I checked up on you when my digital self said that you might be calling.”
“I do,” she said. “Frances, could I have a word, please?”
