Random Chance and the Paradise that is Earth (8 page)

“Cubey? You there?” he asked as he and Mia
walked hand-in-hand through a park towards a squat tower a
half-kilometer away.

“I am here, Random Chance,” said Cubey.

“Is this the tower, the one we’re walking
towards?”

“Affirmative. According to the SolarWeb,
there is a hardware dealer on the thirtieth floor. He can get Mia
Findlay ‘hooked up.’ ”

Random laughed.

“What’s so funny?” asked Mia.

“ ‘
Hooked up,’ Cubey? Is Hewey
teaching you idioms?”

“They’re fascinating,” said Cubey. “They are
most confusing, but he has been a very helpful teacher. How did I
do?”

“You’re coming along nicely.”

“Updating files.”

Random repeated the conversation to Mia, who
had waited patiently. She laughed.

“The hardware I’m looking for
will provide interfacing tech. You’ll be able to hear Cubey and
Hewey away from
The
Girl
. It’s also the latest in
self-upgrading tech. It will eventually upgrade your entire
software network, and will probably patch up a good deal of the
hardware too.”

“What if this guy doesn’t have it?” asked
Mia. “Can he be trusted?”

“Cubey assures me this dude is the real deal
and has no love of the Garkies. I trust his research abilities. He
told me he’s got access to every record in the Solar System of
everybody living or dead.”

“Scary,” said Mia.

“Helpful,” returned Random.

“How do you know he won’t go bad, Rand?
Don’t you ever worry about it? Don’t you worry he or Hewey might
turn on you?”

“I don’t,” said Random, stopping and shaking
his head thoughtfully. “Cubey’s a conscious being now. He’s got
free will. So does Hewey. If either wanted to ‘go bad,’ they very
well could. But I don’t think they will.”

“Why is that?”

“Because,” said Random, smiling
in self-satisfaction, “
I
gave them the gift of consciousness, and
I’m
not bad—am
I?”

“You mean there’s some vein of goodness that
you gave them, one they won’t discard in order to wipe out
humanity? Pretty flimsy, Probability. Especially with Cubey.”

Random looked up. “Are you hearing this,
Cubey?”

“Yes, Random Chance.”

“And? What are your thoughts?”

“Processing.”

Random heard the familiar beep in his ear
telling him Cubey would probably be gone for a while.

Mia watched, concern lining her face.

He gazed ominously at her, then said, “He
said he’s thought about our conversation and is going to start
extermination procedures immediately.”

The horror on Mia’s face didn’t last long.
It morphed into anger when Random started laughing.

“That isn’t funny!” she yelled, and punched
his arm.

~~*~~

The supplier was a short and grizzled
retired miner who only grunted when they introduced themselves.
“This way,” he said without smiling. They followed him.

His name was Pirate. Random didn’t ask if
that was his real name. In a back room he stopped, wheeled
about.

“What did you say you wanted this hardware
for?”

“I didn’t,” said Random.

“How do I know you’re legit?”

“You mean, how do you know I’m not
Garky?”

“Or Earth,” shot back the man. “Both monitor
the goods leavin’ this rock. So…?”

He waited, arms crossed. Random thought that
the frown on his face was permanent, and took it that way. Mia
shuffled uncomfortably next to him.

“You don’t,” answered Random. “And nothin’ I
tell you will sway you. So do you have what we’re looking for, or
don’t you? I’ll be happy to take my business somewhere else.”

Pirate’s frown deepened. He looked Mia up
and down, then came back to him. He nodded. “Back here.”

They followed him through another room to
its back wall. Pirate held up, then closed his eyes. A moment later
the wall, which was nothing more than a very convincing holographic
projection, dissolved, revealing the much older, real one behind
it. Pirate grasped the circular handle of a large circular hatch
and grunted as he pulled. The hatch opened with a deep, rusty
groan. The hole through it was almost as thick as Random was tall.
They stepped through as ancient lights flickered on. Random and Mia
looked around.

“This is the place, amigo,” said Hewey.
“You’re lookin’ for a Model 24x/6f-4d console. It’ll be black or
gray and deceptively small. There’ll be a Garky symbol near the key
ID on the bottom right-hand side. You can’t miss it. Pan around a
little. Give me a look.”

Random looked slowly around as Pirate
waited. Random ignored him. This crusty rock fart was probably in a
good mood.

“Left,” said Hewey. “Back wall, second shelf
up, just right of center. See it?”

Random walked toward the console he thought
Hewey had spotted. Mia followed, the shopowner close behind.

The console was oblong, smooth, and
shiny-black, with a large, clear circular systems interface
window.

Random picked it up, turned it over. The
device was two-thirds of a meter long and very light.

“Keep your focus on that key ID, amigo,
lower right,” said Hewey. “Let me cross-ref it, make sure it isn’t
fake or tagged by Garkies.”

Random tried not to nod. He focused on the
symbol under the key ID: a series of thin trapezoids making up a
triangle, at the top of which was a glowing eye. The Oligarchy.

“Looks clean,” announced Hewey.

“It’s good,” said Random to the
shopowner.

“The key ID matches a console stolen a year
ago from shipyards on Ganymede,” said Hewey. “It probably explains
our luck finding it here, relatively close by. Now show the nice
man that you know all about Garky military tech.”

Random reached into his pocket and pulled
out a small gun. Both Pirate and Mia jumped backward. “Hey! What’re
you doin’?” demanded Pirate. “How did you get through security with
that thing?”

Mia looked utterly out of place here. Random
felt sorry for her, and for bringing her along. She didn’t know he
had the gun, and didn’t know that he had used both Hewey and Cubey
to dampen security sensors into Vesta City. She gaped at him.

Pirate looked like he might run, but Random
said without looking at him, “Stay where you are, Pirate. Your comm
link is dead, so it’s no use trying to sound any alarms. Just hang
on for a second. If this console is real, you’re going to find that
I’m a very generous man.”

He pointed the gun at the key ID and
fired.

The gun was a high-energy nano-discharger
designed to strip modern alloys. On a low setting it could shave
layers without harming internal hardware.

The key ID sloughed off the console like a
paper-thin centimeter-wide snake and dropped curled to the floor,
leaving a perfect, smokeless indentation behind.

As they watched, the snake began
evaporating. Soon it was gone. Random presented the console to him:
the key ID had resolidified in its old place as though it hadn’t
just been stripped off. “Classified Garky tech,” he said. “We’ll
take it.”

Pirate’s price was almost twenty percent
above the estimated black market price Hewey had researched. Random
paid it without haggling or complaining. Illegal Garky military
tech would be very difficult to keep from the wrong eyes,
convincing holographic walls notwithstanding. He verified the
credit transfer to Pirate’s account and left with the console,
which the shopowner placed into a secured case.

“Good luck getting out of the city with
that,” said Pirate at the door. “The penalty for Garky military
tech in the hands of civilians is incineration. I never met you.
Have a good day.”

The door to his shop slid closed.

“Random!” hissed Mia. “You’ve
got a
lot
of
explaining to do! How did you get that gun? And how are we gonna
get that console back up to
The
Girl
? This was such a bad idea
…”

“It’s why I want you to have it—to have
Hewey and Cubey with you at all times.” He looked up and around.
“Are you aware that Garky sensors monitor every single public
conversation?”

“But Vesta isn’t Garky,” she
replied as the lift descended. “It’s Earth
and
Garky.”

“I don’t exactly trust Earth sensors either.
Vesta is at the fulcrum of the conflict, and bugs are probably
everywhere. Hewey has altered those monitoring us, including all
visual data. If they check, they’ll think we’re having a completely
different conversation than the one we’re having.”

The lift doors opened and they
walked out of the building. “I think all-out war is coming,” said
Random. “I saw it in my uncle’s eyes. He wants war. I don’t want
you in harm’s way. Hewey and Cubey will keep you safe—safer.
Much
safer.”

“How do you propose we get
state of the art military tech back to
The
Girl?” she demanded. “How did you
get your gun through? How do I keep the console hidden once it’s
aboard ship? What if Garkies board the ship? I’ll be
screwed!
We all will
be!”

He looked up. “Hewey? Are the
city sensors properly, er,
attenuated?
”

“You got it, Rand,” answered Hewey. “I like
that word.”

Random started walking again. “Let’s
go.”

When she caught up to him, he said, “The
tough part is coming up—getting this console out of the city. Don’t
worry about the gun. It’s made of an illegal composite that renders
it unreadable to sensors.”

They passed through a small
park. “The latest Garky tech is easy to hide,” he continued. “It
was designed that way. It’s ironic, but it’ll help defeat the
sensors we need to get it out of the city. I’ll put it beneath the
fossil that’s running
The
Girl
. Should any Garkies board her,
which they won’t
, don’t
look so alarmed, they won’t know to look for her, because they’ll
have no reason to suspect that you are using any of their tech.
This console’s programs will mimic and ‘hide behind’ the old
software. Sensors watching us at the shop think we purchased
something entirely non-threatening and completely legal. Hewey has
access to the sensor logs. He’ll mark them as useless and they’ll
be deleted within an hour. I’m doing this to make you
safer
, Findlay. You’ve
gotta trust me … okay?
Okay?
”

She held up, then nervously jerked her head
up and down. He took her hand, which he noticed was sweaty, and
together they walked towards the taxis.

Bringing her was definitely a mistake.

~~*~~

“What’s this?” asked the security guard at
the throughway. Beyond were the taxis. Mia stared at them like
she’d never get to them.

Random took his gaze from the case to the
man, who continued to examine it.

“That? A very bright future. If you open it,
though, you’ll never see it.”

The guard’s face melted into a
mishmash of conflicting emotions. He impatiently turned and barked
at the security arc to shut up, which was shouting, over and
over,
“Contents under suspicion. Unable to
view inside. Recommend opening and investigating. Contents under
…”

Security bots gathered at the arc’s
perimeter.

“Tell you what,” said Random, “let me run it
through again. Would you mind? I think the sensor is
malfunctioning. After it passes under the arc, I’ll be happy to
open the case, or let a bot do it. How about it?”

The guard’s face solidified back into
suspicion, though this time there was a vacant cast mixed in with
it. “No. I’ll do it. Get back, sir,” he ordered. “That’s my job.
Get back.”

He grabbed the case and walked around the
arc as Random and Mia watched. He set it down on the conveyor belt
and walked alongside it as it slid through for a second time. The
bots didn’t move.

“Contents verified,”
said the arc.

The bots turned and walked away.

Random grabbed the case and glanced at the
guard. “Shall we run it through a third time just for kicks, or
shall we open it? I’d be happy to …”

That vacant suspicious look melted into
uncertainty. “My … my future?”

Random patted the man’s shoulder. “It’s all
set, no worries. You’re workin’ for the wrong side. Now you know
it. Do what you need to do.”

He reached for Mia’s hand. With
the case in his other hand, they walked out of the throughway to
the taxis. They got in the first one to pull up. Moments later it
floated up Shaft 18A towards
The Glowing
Girl
thirteen kilometers above.

~~*~~

Mia hadn’t stopped staring at him. He sighed
and took his gaze from the green-glowing walls of the shaft and the
incoming ships.

He knew what that stare was about. He sighed
and shrugged. “It’s a gift, like you said. I try to use it for
good.”

She blinked. “I didn’t think …
I mean … I hadn’t thought it through. How would I know if you’ve
been influencing
me
with it? How would I know you haven’t used it to mess with my
biotech like you did that guard’s?”

“You …” He shook his head. “You
wouldn’t.”

The horrified stare on her face was painful
to look at. He took her hands.

“I have
never
interfered with your biotech,
Findlay. Never. Do you hear me? And you have my word that I never
will. Never.”

“But … but … how can I
know
that?”