Proteus Unbound (19 page)

"It's impossibly complicated already."

"I agree. But it simplifies. Watch." Bey entered a new command. The whole screen lit up with a tracery of moving yellow lines. They each began at a form-change tank and branched and zigzagged across the display. Thirty seconds later the screen steadied. Leo Manx shook his head. Lines were everywhere, a tangled mass of knotted interconnections, convoluted and horribly interwoven.

"I hope you don't expect me to read anything useful out of that."

"With a little help you will." Bey was busy again at the terminal. "I agree it still looks like a gigantic mess. So I wrote another program to help sort it out. I asked for a statistical analysis of the places where each branching set
ended.
That would tell me how often the form changes were using a particular data storage bank, or a particular computer. If one storage area or computer was receiving unusually heavy use, that would be a good place to do some troubleshooting. Take a look at what I found. The program flags every terminating node that occurs more than two sigma away from the mean for all nodes."

A couple of dozen points on the screen began to blink. Leo Manx stared at them blankly. "Very interesting," he said after a few seconds.

"You're wrong. It is interesting—once you look at those nodes more closely." Bey stood up and went to the wall display. "Some end at computer elements; some end at data banks. Very reasonable. But what about this one?" He was pointing at a flashing purple point on the screen.

"What about it?"

"Leo, remember the color code. Purple. That means it's a
sensor
—a place that collects data for the computer system."

"That's not surprising. There are sensors on each form-change tank."

"True. Not surprising—
if
this were a sensor associated with a form-change tank. It would be collecting physical readings from the tank and using them in the programs. But this sensor should have nothing to do with a form-change process. And
every
form-change anomaly has a branch that ends there. That sensor was involved
every single time
we had a form-change problem."

Manx had stood up and was craning to see the blinking point next to Bey's finger. "I don't know which sensor that is. Are you sure it's not a form-change monitor?"

"I checked it a dozen times. It's not. So I decided that it had to be a signal coming from
outside
the harvester, maybe something we were picking up on beamed data from an external antenna. It's not that, either."

"Don't keep telling me what it
isn't
." Leo Manx was losing his usual courtly politeness. "We have to check this directly. Which sensor is it?"

"I'll tell you, but you're not going to like the answer." Bey tapped the display. "That sensor is inside the harvester, but it's in the hardest place of all to check. It monitors the radiation level from the harvester's kernel, and that means it's sitting where we can't get at it.
Inside
the kernel shields."

Leo was shaking his head. "You're suggesting that somebody put a computer and a data storage unit in there? It couldn't happen. Nothing but hardened sensors can operate inside the shields—even the remote-handling machines that manipulate the kernels don't have programs."

"I know. But I'm convinced there's
something
there, inside the shield. Some information source, some chaos generator for the form-change process. It's the 'negentropic' influence again—spurious information that's the source of disruption for the whole system."

"But the other problems we've had were nothing to do with form-change!"

"We've gone past form-change now, Leo. Form-change just happens to be highly sensitive to signal control sequences. Problems show up there first. But what I've found takes us into kernel control theory, and that's a different game. I don't know enough about Kerr-Newman black holes to decide what's going on. That's why I've been waiting for Aybee to get back from the Sagdeyev space farm."

"Then you might have to wait a long time. He's not there."

"But he's on the way back, isn't he?"

"I'm afraid not." Leo Manx retreated to a cleared area of the floor and sat down cross-legged. "Before I came here I was with Cinnabar Baker. She'd just had a report from a repair and maintenance crew who had reached the farm. Apparently it's totally deserted. No farmers, no Aybee."

"More mechanical trouble?"

"No signs of that. The bubble was halfway repaired, reasonably habitable. But deserted. It was just as though everyone had decided to down tools at the same time and leave. We have no idea why they went or where they went. Or even
how
they went. Baker says that no transit vessel was missing. All they took with them were their suits. There was no sign of new violence."

"So it could be worse. Aybee's probably safe. And he's a survival type." Bey left the screen and flopped down untidily on a pile of output listings. He was almost at home in his new body, but the odd center of mass offered occasional surprises. "But it's very bad for me. I don't know who else to ask."

"We have other experts on the kernels."

"Not like Aybee. I need somebody who thinks around corners." Suddenly Wolf's labors were catching up with him. He was exhausted.

"And so do I." For the first time, Leo Manx held up his own blue folder. "That's why I came to you. You've got your problems, I've got mine. Aybee got me started on this before we left the farm. I need him as much as you do. But he told me to talk to you if he wasn't there—I don't know if you cherish the notion, but Aybee suggests that you and he think about things the same way."

"He's wrong." Bey made no attempt to take the proffered folder. He was still staring moodily at the display screen. "Aybee's smarter than I am, but he makes me feel a thousand years old. I don't have his childlike faith. If I can't solve my own problems, I'm sure I can't solve anybody else's."

It was a dismissive comment; at that point Leo Manx was supposed to stand up and leave. Instead he inched forward along the floor and placed the folder open on Bey's knees.

"The Negentropic Man," he said. Bey looked down at him, then shook his head.

"Where he came from," Manx went on. "What he means. Aybee listed four ways of thinking about entropy: thermodynamic entropy, statistical mechanics entropy, information theory entropy, and kernel entropy. But he couldn't suggest which meaning was appropriate."

"Nor can I."

"That's all right. I don't want to ask you about that." Manx lifted one sheet from the folder. "Aybee suggested that if we want to make progress we ought to examine the exact time when your hallucinations occurred. I've made a list of everything that you told me when we were in transit from the Inner System. Now I'd like to make sure it's complete."

Bey stared gloomily at the list. He knew what Leo was doing: exactly what he would have done himself with a reluctant partner. Bait him with something he was interested in, reel him in slowly, and hope that after a few minutes he could be dragged far enough to be useful.

Well, what the hell. It was a game two could play, and Bey had gone as far as he could in the form-change tracking without allowing time for his ideas to sort themselves out.

"You only want to hear about my seeing the Negentropic Man? You know that Sylvia is sure he's Black Ransome?"

"I know. We have only her word for it. Isn't the Negentropic Man the only person you saw in your hallucinations?"

"He was, until a few days ago." Wolf did not look up. He was not sure he wanted to tell anyone at all about Mary's strange visit. It felt remote and improbable. Even the day after it happened, he had become half-convinced that he had dreamed the whole episode. "I saw Mary Walton," he said at last. "After I came out of the change tank."

"You mean—saw her in person?"

"No. A recorded message, left in my sleeping quarters."

"And you didn't tell Sylvia or Cinnabar Baker?"

"No." Bey hesitated for a moment, evaluating the risk. He decided that he had to trust
somebody
—they could not all be spies. "Leo, I had a reason why I didn't talk about this. We have an information leak here. We arrived from the space farm just a few weeks ago. No one knew we were coming; no one even knew we had survived the 'accident' there. No messages were sent out from here
after
we arrived, saying we were here. I know, because I checked the message center myself. And yet, as soon as I went to my sleeping quarters, a planted recorded message from Mary Walton was waiting for me. Leo, until I was taken to those quarters, I didn't know
myself
where I would be sleeping."

"So that's why you didn't talk about it to me, or Sylvia Fernald, or Cinnabar Baker?" Manx was full of unfocused energy that made his arms and legs jerk like a puppet's. "Bey, I know you're not used to Outer System ways, and I know where you're heading. But it's crazy. Those are terribly serious charges that you're making, and it's just as well you told this only to me. I can absolutely assure you that Sylvia and Cinnabar are not providing information leaks."

"Not
intentional
ones, maybe. But think back, Leo. Somebody seemed to know we were going to the farm almost before we set out. Somebody knew we were here the moment we arrived."

"Then it must be somebody on the harvester staff."

"On two different harvesters? We left the Opik Harvester; we came back here to the Marsden Harvester. Are you suggesting that there are
two
leaks, both close to Cinnabar Baker, one on each harvester?"

"Then who? I hope you don't think that
I
—"

"There's an old Earth saying: 'Everyone's suspect but me and thee; and I'm none too sure of thee.' I thought about you. But I don't see how it could be. When we arrived here you were in pretty bad shape, and you went straight to the tank for remedial form-change work. You weren't conscious until after this happened."

"Your faith in me is touching. I wonder why you're telling me now."

The bait was taken. Time to reel in the line. Slowly. "Because I need your help, Leo. And I want your word that you won't pass this on to anyone, unless we've discussed it first. And I mean
anyone
."

"Not Sylvia? Not even Baker?"

"
Especially
not Baker. Can't you see that if we're logical, her office is the only place where the leaks can start? Don't tell her anything, unless it's at a meeting that I've arranged, in a place I arrange. I think we should talk to Sylvia and see how she responds to the idea of a spy in our group. Will you come with me, right now, and do it?"

"Under one condition." Manx took back his blue folder and looked at it in a puzzled way. Somehow the whole conversation had headed off in an unintended direction.

"Anything reasonable."

"Then you take a shower first. I don't want Sylvia or anyone else we meet to think that smell is coming from me."

"Is this the Leo Manx who dragged me out of Old City? All right. If you insist. Let's go."

Later, Bey would describe the shower as a wasted effort. As soon as he was scrubbed clean and dressed in clean clothing to Leo Manx's satisfaction, they headed for Sylvia's quarters.

But she was not there. No one knew where she was or when she would be back. Twelve hours earlier, Sylvia Fernald had requisitioned a high-g transit ship. She had headed inward, toward the edge of the Halo, traveling fast and traveling alone. She had told no one her mission, and no one on the harvester seemed to know her destination.

CHAPTER 19

"Stone walls do not a prison make,
Nor iron bars a cage."
—Richard Lovelace

"But empty space does a pretty good job of it."
—Apollo Belvedere "Aybee" Smith

The training schedule was rigorous but reasonable. Four hours of theory in the morning, a food break at which all the trainees were expected to eat together and discuss what they had learned, four hours of practical work in the afternoon, and then the evening free, but with enough reading, interactive education sessions, and quizzes to fill at least another six hours before sleeping.

The program was scheduled to continue for seven weeks. Aybee kept his head down for the first couple of days, watched what the others were doing, and tried to fall nicely in the middle of the group when it came to tests and answering questions. That was not so easy. The rest of the trainees were a miserable, mismatched set who had apparently been dragged in from random sources. In Aybee's not so humble opinion, none of them had the least idea of any kind of science, and a couple of them acted positively half-witted. They offered bizarre answers to the simplest mathematical questions—Aybee could not figure out how they came up with such odd replies.

On the third day he made his first request. He was not used to eating food with other people; it would be a lot less of a strain if he were allowed to take the midday break alone. Could he get permission?

Gudrun looked doubtful, but she agreed. There were twenty-four trainees, and Aybee's absence would not make much difference to the discussions. "Remember, Karl," she added. "If you hurt your progress because you can't talk to others while what you've learned is fresh in your mind, you'll have no one but yourself to blame. If the reason you're doing this is that you find the work difficult and you're embarrassed to talk with the others, come and see me. I'll arrange personal coaching for you."

Aybee/Karl nodded politely. He had gained an hour. The morning classes so far had covered routine general relativity material three centuries old, and he did not need to discuss that with anyone. More than that, he did not want to. The big danger was that he would reveal how much he knew about the subject.

The evening work was a joke. He did not need to do the reading, and he could handle all the rest of the assignments in the middle of the day. His next request to Gudrun was a little more risky. He handed in a perfect test, which he was usually careful to avoid doing, and went to see Gudrun that afternoon.

She beamed as he came in the door. "Well! Smart Karl. You don't seem to be harmed by missing the midday sessions."