way up to her throat…
—Don’t lose it, warned Jesse.
She gulped hot vomit back down inside her. The skin of the meniscus was close to her face; she resisted the urge to reach out and touch it, frightened that it might burst and leave her exposed to the hard vacuum beyond. They passed through a curl of shifting segments, part of the surrounding material of the Free Enterprise. A nest of clear plastic spheres, each containing a jelly-black dot drifted by, then an array of hexagonal containers of all different sizes. And then the probe changed direction and she lost sight of the waiting ships, and Fraxinus all green and friendly below, and she plunged into an open box. The lid snapped shut.
“Hello, Judy.”
Judy was laced to a bench by red and yellow and green and gold strands. She could see them curled around her fingers and wrists and arms, stretched out before her. She could feel them digging into her feet and calves and thighs; they rubbed against her naked back. She was lying facedown on a bench in the middle of a pale green room, straining to hear the electronic movement that was taking place behind her. She wanted to turn her head to see what lay there.
“I know you can hear me, Judy.”
“Where’s Jesse? Why can’t I hear Jesse?”
“We’ve had to suspend certain mechanisms within your body while we complete your development. Why were you left half finished, Judy?”
“I don’t know what you are talking about. Why have you kept me here? Why haven’t you let me go with the other passengers?”
“We’re not sure that we understand why you wished to go with the other passengers, Judy. Why didn’t you make yourself known to us as soon as we took you on board? We could have assisted you.”
“What? Assisted me with what?”
“This is a DIANA ship, and you are an asset of DIANA…”
“Bullshit. I am…I was a Social Care operative.”
“This may be true, yet you remain property of DIANA. Your genetic code contains sequences copyrighted to DIANA, your thought patterns are constructed on a recognized DIANA AI seed algorithm.”
For a moment, Judy was speechless. She fought against her rising indignation, coldly calming herself.
“This is ridiculous. My thoughts are my own. Even if, and I do not believe this to be true for a moment, even if my thoughts were the result of a DIANA AI seed algorithm, then they would still be my own. You cannot copyright a mind.”
“That may be true of the Earth Domain, but not of DIANA’s sphere of influence.”
Judy was thinking fast. At these moments it was helpful to speak to Jesse, but he was gone. Gone? What had the Free Enterprise said, that certain mechanisms had been suspended while it completed her development? What did that mean?
Her hands suddenly flexed, without her meaning them to, the right hand fluttering pitifully, trapped within the colored threads that bound it. What were they doing to her?
“Is this some sort of game?” she shouted. “I think you are being deliberately misled. I have had dealings in the past with DIANA in my work as an SC operative. Did Kevin put you up to this?
Have you heard of him? Maybe he tagged me, some sort of revenge…”
“No, Judy. This goes to the very core of your being. It is in your bones, you might say. You are a DIANA asset. I cannot believe that you did not know this. Surely you know what your purpose is?”
“I don’t know what you are talking about.” Something touched her back and the flesh there went suddenly numb. She strained at the brightly colored laces, saw them digging into her arms and hands, tried to turn her head to see what was happening.
