Ishmael sounded impatient:
< When you’re finished with memory lane.
> Go fuck a whale.
< We got places to go.
Kara sighed. It had been a mistake to give her AI a name. Its predecessor could be bloody-minded but was definitely AI. Ishmael was sounding more human by the day. She looked round the Wild’s SUT control room and sighed again. All sleek, curving surfaces and control panels arranged around a central group of three ergonomic chairs. She had no idea how anything worked.
< That’s what I’m for. Me and the SUT’s AI. Team Kara.
> Kara needs to know. Data dump.
She steeled herself for the sudden rush of information.
< Er, no need. It’s already there. Happened at the simulity training.
What else was hiding inside her mind?
> What happens to data that’s never accessed?
< It has a shelf life. One moment waiting to be useful. The next, phhhtt! Gone in an instant. Sad.
> It’s not AI.
< It’s mathematics. Programming. Information. It has an awareness. Even quadratic equations got needs. No, not really. But you ask any seriously good mathematician, they’ll tell you maths are somehow alive. How could they not be? Ishmael was warming up. < They’re the basis, they express the pattern of all life. It’s just most humans define life in their own image. It sounded contemptuous. < Used to do the same with their gods, too. Except they’re still arguing over what life really is. Can’t agree about mind, either. Especially since us AIs showed up.
> So what exactly are you? The question she’d long wanted to ask, but had been nervous about the answer. Kara sat down on the centre chair and called up the SUT’s AI, told it to go Up, even as her fingers flickered over the control panel that had appeared on the chair’s right arm. A large vid screen flashed into life opposite. Ishmael was right. She did know how to operate the SUT – but was now content to let the SUT’s AI do it. The screen showed two tiny figures on the ground. Kara ordered maximum enlargement and saw Greenaway and Cleo, both staring up at her.
< I’m you.
> What?
< I am your mind writ large. It’s what the tech does: captures your mind, copies and increases its potential. I can do nothing that one day humans will not do themselves unaided. Assuming you live so long, as a race.
> Crap. There’s more. Tell me.
< I do extend into other dimensions. It helps communicate with other AIs. Like a shortcut.
> But if alien tech can capture my mind...
< It’s just tech, Kara. Essentially, a vast memory bank existing in six dimensions that, for reasons no one seems to understand, means that the memory operates way faster than light... which is anyway an arbitrary measurement. My house might be alien – although these days they’re manufactured in several places in the Wild – but I’m as human as you. With differences. Like no body. There again, yours is more than enough for two.
> But you’re not me! You have your own... personality. You’re male.
< I can be either sex. I am both sexes and everything in between. It’s just that you get on better with men. Overall prefer sex with men, too.
> My sex life is not for discussion. Not with a fucking chip.
< No more no less than what you’ve told yourself.
Kara stood up. You can’t actually walk away from your AI. But the symbolism was important. What else did the damn thing know? Her emotions regarding Marc and Greenaway? And if Ishmael did – Kara was now thinking very loudly – would he have enough sense to shut the fuck up?
< Where are we going?
> To check on Marc.
< I knew that. I mean we. In the universe. That sort of going.
> Can you and the SUT AI get us to where Tatia left with the pre-cogs?
< Yup. Three days. Earth days.
> Then go there. Do I need to put markers on the n-space drive?
< Yesterday’s technology. Gliese have been selling you short for years. This star drive is the size of a football, tucked away under the front display screen and fully automated.
Kara felt strangely calm. Greenaway had said the Wild drives were different.
> Still get the light show?
< Always. For the full immersive n-space experience, the hull can become transparent. Some Wilders try to achieve enlightenment a millisecond before n-space drives them insane. Others believe limited access to n-space enhances the sexual experience.
> I wouldn’t know.
< So we’re ignoring the climax in the engine room, are we? However, this SUT’s AI only allows minimal exposure. It wants to be introduced, by the way.
> That thing with Henk was full n-space exposure?
She recreated the scene in her mind: incredible, pulsating colours from the huge globe that was apparently an antique star drive... while Henk’s eyes had flickered with the same colours, her own orgasm almost scarily overwhelming. For a moment she’d known every human emotion imaginable, and several that could only be alien.
< Partial. Marc experienced the full one.
And what the hell had it done to him?
> That Henk, such a busy little bastard.
< I suspect his true role was to have sex with Marc and yourself.
> You’re fucking joking!
< It was necessary for your development. A quicker way to link both of you permanently with n-space. This SUT’s AI? Saying hello?
> Bloody Greenaway!
< Actually, that would have been Tse. I hate to gossip, but it seems that Greenaway is quite protective of you. Please, Kara. Let me introduce you. Wilders can be very formal. I think it’s a reaction against so much raw nature.
> Do it.
< May I present Salome, Integral AI to the Wild SUT named Merry Christmas. Salome, this is Kara Jones, Sniper/Assassin First Class, Plenipotentiary Extraordinary
