Gudsriki (29 page)

“Whatever. You asked.”

Nel had asked about Vibeke's childhood. For reasons she couldn't qualify, hearing Vibeke speak was pleasing to her. She thought at first it was because Vibeke spoke only of misery, and she enjoyed Vibeke's misery, but in truth she didn't care what Vibeke said, so long as she was speaking. Nel decided it must have been a defense mechanism against the boredom of walking across the ice.

Vibeke could qualify her appreciation of Nel speaking more easily: she sounded like Violet. Her voice, if not its exact cadence. She had the same vocal cords; the memories had granted her the same accent. Vibeke could almost forget sometimes that it wasn't the real thing.

“So what was Violet's like?” asked Vibeke, “from your perspective?”

“Frustrating. She knew she could do so much more than anyone ever let her do.”

“I felt the same way sometimes.”

Nel wanted to prod her. “That's neat, Vibeke. You two would have been perfect for each other.”

“Fuck you, Nelson.”

Nel laughed. “You're so easy.”

“Easy?”

“This brain I've got, I think I've got the hang of it, but it's tricky. It's hard to get it to think what I want it to think. Sometimes it throws a memory at me for no reason, or I mean to say something, and it says something different. But you, your brain works on algorithms. You're easy to program. I just have to select an input and let you loose and there you go. You're like a robot or something.”

Vibeke was pissed off but amused at how little Nel thought of her. “You think I'm that easy to manipulate, make me do something.”

“What should I make you do?”

“I don't know, make me laugh.”

“I'd just tell a joke.”

“So tell it. You think I work on punch cards, put in the laugh card.”

“Okay, so three guys were talking. The first said, ‘My wife read
A Tale of Two Cities
when she was pregnant and—'”

“Ali Baba. Oldest joke ever.”

“Oh. I got you wrong. This feels….”

“Yeah? Fucked up your first joke? How
does
it feel, Nel?”

“Like drowning puppies.”

Vibeke laughed.

“See? Punch cards.”

“That wasn't the joke.”

“That was the joke exactly as planned.”

“Bullshit.”

“You told me to make you laugh; I made you laugh.”

“Whatever, you got lucky.”

“Give me another one.”

Vibeke thought. “Fine…. Make me stand still in awe.”

Nel pointed to the horizon. The great snowy dome of Valhalla loomed ahead, white under the dim gray sky. Vibeke stopped and looked at it, their destination after what seemed like a month and a half.

“Still in awe, check.”

Vibeke just looked at her briefly, then walked on toward the dome.

Through the drill Nel and Vibeke cautiously made their way into the storage room, then down the walkway. Vibeke hoped that in the quiet, dank ravine Mishka might sleep carelessly. But then again, the idea of killing her in her sleep was somehow lacking.

Valhalla had been burned since last they saw it. Vibeke wondered if the Geki had come to kill Veikko and set things right. And if they hadn't, why didn't they?

At the base of the walkway, they found Veikko, away from his hole in the ground. Vibeke got a better look at him than she had before, and he seemed more assembled than the last time. He recognized them.

“Mishka's gone,” he choked out, “and I thought you were dead.”

He headed back for his pit.

“It's not Violet. It's a gynoid with her memories.”

“Wow, Vibs. I wonder what inspired you to do that….”

“Desperate times.”

“So what do we call you, not-Violet?”

“Nel.”

“Short for Nelson. The AI is Violet's Tikari.”

“A Tikari with a human brain and body?”

“Yeah, Niide assembled her. Speaking of Tikaris with brains, I swatted yours.”

Veikko seemed genuinely hurt, though it was hard to tell sans face. He crawled back into his pit and expanded his legs to hold up the ravine.

“Wow, thanks, Vibs. I had some hope I could fly free of this hole but instead you killed off the only part of me that had a chance.”

“Sal killed Violet.”

“He wouldn't—”

“He did. He hooked into the silo's neural net and turned into a malevolent little shit just like you. He killed her.”

“So you plugged Violet's into a neural net too? Smart.” He turned to Nel. “Why don't you get lost for a while so I can talk to Vibs?”

“She stays, Veikko.”

“Fine. Mishka left weeks ago. Said she had work to do.”

“What kind of work?”

“Evangelical.”

“Lovely.”

“Yeah. How did you get Niide to make that thing? Didn't he try his wife and get someone killed?”

“I convinced him.”

“Let me guess, you killed nurses until he cooperated?”

“This from the man who killed Balder.”

“I killed Wulfgar,” said Nel.

“
Violet
should have killed Wulfgar.”

“Well,” said Vibs, “Violet's dead thanks to you.”

“Fine, one point for me, how many do you have, Vibs? Oh yeah—
six billion.
”

“It's more like fourteen. Did Varg cut off your fucking decency gland, Veikko?”

“Hey, I'm not the one who grew a murderous vibrator.”

“No, you're the one who—”

“I don't vibrate.”

“Did you come here to argue, Vibs? Because it's boring down here but given the company I'd prefer to be alone.”

“Why don't you leave?”

“Skadi secured me holding up the ravine while the rampart's in place. I can leave it for a few minutes, but then the ravine starts shaking. If the Sigyn system activates while I'm out of the hole the ravine will collapse. Ares hits the ocean.”

“Skadi had a good sense of poetic justice.”

“You know I'm really sick of all the women, and fake robot women, in my life. Skadi, Mishka, you, and your cuntbot. If I could get my hands working I'd wring your damn necks.”

“I swear to fucking God, Veikko, if killing you wouldn't end the world, I'd have done it already.”

“So do it. I'm thirsty. You get thirsty when your mouth is gone.”

“Poor fucking you. I can't believe you fucking hacked us.”

“I can't believe you grew a damn gynoid. It's an embarrassment.”

“Oh no, I'd hate to ‘lose face.'”

“No, you lost your girlfriend instead.”

“At least my girlfriend died on a mission instead of killing herself because of me. How is Skadi? Has she rotted away yet or did Orson eat her?”

“At least my girlfriend knew how to read.”

“At least my robot could assemble itself, you chewed-up heap.”

“Chewed up? What's eating you? Oh yeah, a fucking
robot
.”

“It's not about sex; we're friends at best. You know, friends? Those things you'll never have again?”

“Like you had any friends that your dad didn't rape.”

Vibeke punched him in the lack of face. He punched back with a half-assembled arm and struck Vibeke on her left shoulder, which broke, the bones shattering from the extreme force. With her right arm, she pulled her microwave, remembering only an instant before firing what would happen if she did. Veikko laughed a disgusting mouthless chortle.

Nel ran to Vibeke and cut into her arm with a blade inside her index finger. Each of her fingers split into four finer surgical manipulation tools. She acted with the speed and precision of Dr. Niide's old medical robotics. Vibeke's arm was repaired in seconds.

“Well, if she can do that with her fingers I don't know why you
aren't
fucking her.”

“I swear I'll shove a stump under the ravine and kill you myself.”

“You don't think I've tried?”

“With that useless body?”

“There's nothing strong enough to replace me here. You'd need the Cetacean Corp of Engineers.”

“That can be arranged.”

“Yeah, have fun trying.”

“I'll bring the Valkohai.”

“No such thing.”

“Then I'll go down there and build one. The world is over, Veikko, and we're still here. All I have to live for is revenge. And if I can't find Mishka, you're the lucky boy.”

“I think you hurt your pal with that. If you don't live for it, why not leave it here for me? I always wanted to give Violet a go. I think I've got a penis somewhere in this mess.”

“You're disgusting, in every possible way.”

“Seriously, I'm not the one who grew a fake fucking Violet, you pervert.”

“You just wait here, like you have a choice, and I'll have the Cetaceans make you their personal doomsday device. And you can live for eons listening to 'em bicker like you were home again. And when I come back—”

“When you come back, I'm gonna kill that abomination while you watch.”

The Sigyn system activated. The ravine shook slightly.

Drops of the Ares began to fall upward from the ring. And then Veikko began to scream. Drops from inside his mechanisms and face began prying their way out of him and up the mass of rotting gore around the power plant.

Veikko clawed at his half eyes in pain with broken fingers that stuck out from his tangled arms and hands. It was a grotesque spectacle. Vibeke shouted over it as it slowed and halted.

“She's the improved system, dumbass. You, but better. Violet always was.”

“Violet was a retarded bitch who slowed the team down on every single fucking mission. And you fucking grew a new one! I can't think of anything more pathetic.”

“Then I'll find you a mirror.”

“Get out of my ravine. I can kill you, but you can't kill me. And this is the last tactical retreat you're gonna get.”

Vibeke stood still, seemingly ready to move out. Nel, however, walked up to Veikko and crouched in front of him.

“You think Violet was stupid? You think her love for Vibeke made her inefficient? You're right. But I'm not Violet. I'm not stupid. I'm not in love with Vibeke. And I have no care or love for this world. If you and I ever meet again, I will kill you.”

Veikko watched her with his half eyes. She stood and returned to Vibeke's side, and they walked for the spiral ramp out.

“Where are you going?” he called.

“Undersea to find you some friends. Next time you see me the whole school's gonna be here.”

Veikko's un-face flexed, like a cringe. Or could it have been a smile?

“Hey, Vibs!”

She didn't stop. She and Nel walked for the spiral out.

“Vibs! You never asked what I hacked you into doing!”

“The nuclear silo, we know.”

“Yeah, that's what I hacked you and Violet into doing after I escaped the Geki. You never asked what I hacked you into before then.”

Vibeke stopped.

“You hacked me before?”

“Couple times; who hasn't?”

She turned and walked back. “What did you do?”

“Couple things. Like that time you joined in my prank on L team with the fireplaces.”

“You're a dick, Veikko.” She moved to turn again.

“And that time you fell for Violet.”

Vibeke froze.

“Strange,” said Veikko, “how you fell for her so suddenly right after she practically raped you.”

“You weren't even there, liar.”

“I had you on time delay. The hack was on project Serenade after I got sick of Violet's overtures and you ignoring them. I only had to program in some memories, some milestones. Like kissing her after she nuked not-the-Ares. Didn't have to push you very hard, guess you're a real slut at heart.”

“I loved her long before Serenade.”

“You didn't. You just remember you did. Think about it, and you'll see through it. Did you ever act with the slightest romantic affection for her before Serenade? No. Did you catch yourself flirting back at her for the first time right after? Yes. Did you kiss her the first time after a big victory? Bit out of your character. Did you suddenly want to fuck her a day after your first big argument? I didn't think she'd try to fuck you against your will, but that should make it all the more obvious.”

Vibeke stood still, thinking.

“You'd never have touched her after she did that. Not without me. Did it come on quick? Suddenly? I know it did. One second you were pissed at her and the next you had to, what did I have you do? Pin her and grab her hair and reach in her suit?”

It was too specific. She ran her old Valhalla hack detectors on her memories of Violet, of the way she touched her, and—nothing showed up.

“There's no hack around those events; you're lying.”

“No, I'm that good. I spread the hack like butter on your ego. Subtly over your entire cortex so our software could never pinpoint it. Scan for the nuke base hack. You'll never find it either. My hacks are flawless, undetectable.”

“What are you getting at?”

“Other people are sloppy, their hacks are so focused in a single cortical column you can spot 'em with Valhalla software, remove 'em with a DBI. But making you fuck Violet? That's spread over half your frontal lobe. Just like you spread your—”

“You could've just found out, you spied on us. You had spy nodes everywhere.”

“Didn't need to spy on you to know you had sex. How do you think I knew the second I saw you?”

Vibeke felt cold. She had no idea if it were true. She had no way of learning.

“You could have guessed.”

“You don't believe that anymore.” The remains of the muscles that would've made him smile flexed. “You figured it out. And you, a Valkyrie, thought you couldn't live without her. So much you made a new one. I guess someone overshot it. Come on, Vibs, hacking minds is a way of life for us. A way of war. You should thank me I used it to make you two happy. And when in your life have you
ever
been happy? You must believe it now.”