Fred Saberhagen Berserker 11 Berserker Kill

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intelligence in omissions or contradictions concerning details. Nick, when
he chose to do so, could weave a seamless cloak of deception regarding such
matters, and do it all in a moment.
Presently Dirac seemed to realize this fact. He charged Nick with the
responsibility of spying on Havot in the future, and soon after that dismissed
him.
Nick's immediate reward from the lady, the last thing he saw as he vanished
from the holostage, was a look of desperate gratitude.
As he resumed his regular chores, Nick pondered his new assignment.
He was quite willing to create trouble for Havot, but not at the price of
causing the lady any embarrassment.
Perhaps, he thought, his wisest course would be to warn Havot to stay away
from her. Hoping to accomplish this indirectly, Nick sought out Commodore
Prinsep.
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Prinsep appeared to take little notice of Nick's indirect attempts to pass
along a warning. The commodore had other things in mind. He tried to
question Nick about the yacht's defective drive and other matters.
Nick thought he could be somewhat helpful in the matter of the drive. He
remembered perfectly that three hundred years ago the yacht's drive had been
damaged in the fighting when Dirac's little squadron of ships had caught
up with the berserker and its captured station.
"Are you sure, Nick?"
"I have an excellent memory, Commodore," Hawksmoor
ironically reminded the organic man. But then Nick paused, vaguely
wondering. The memory of how that damage had occurred was quite cool
and unemotional, like something learned from a history tape.
"What's wrong, Nick?"
Nick tried to explain.
"Like something you learned from a tape, hey? Or, maybe, like something that
never really happened, that was only programmed in?"
"What do you mean?"
"I don't know much about your programming, Nick. But I do know that the
yacht's drive shows no physical evidence of damage. Take a look for
yourself next time you're over there."
Nick went over to the
Eidolon
, and looked at the undamaged hardware, wondering. He no longer knew which
fleshly people deserved his loyalty-if any of them did. But he was determined
to do everything he could for Jenny.
Brooding about the yacht's drive, and about why he had been programmed with
erroneous information, led Hawksmoor into fantasizing about finding a
quick and easy way of restoring the machinery to full function, and then
taking off in that vessel-with only himself and the Lady Genevieve aboard.
Nick in general disapproved of fantasies. He supposed he was
3
subject to them only as a result of some stubborn defect in his
programming. Experimenting with your will only in the privacy of your own
mind was like fanning the air, shadowboxing. It accomplished nothing
and proved nothing.
Nick had already spent-wasted, as he saw the matter now-a great deal
of time wondering how he had been able to manage the seemingly profound
betrayals that, as the facts and his memory assured him, he had already
accomplished.
By now Nick had deduced that the long process of his betrayal
3
of the Premier must have started when he-or rather his predecessor
Nick -had flown to the damaged courier to try to
1
help the Lady Genevieve. Up to that point he had still been running
firmly, or so he seemed to remember now, on the tracks of his programmed
loyalty. His only objective in boarding the doomed vessel had been to
save his employer's lady any way he could.
But no, any betrayal that had really happened must have started
later. Because in fact his saving the lady, and his recording her
mind and personality, had in the end been a benefit to Dirac. Suppose he
had not interfered. Now Jenny would be really dead, just as her husband
had long believed she was. How would the Premier have gained by that?
He'd have lost her permanently. And the stretch of time she'd spent in
optelectronic mode hadn't caused Dirac any suffering-at least not until he had
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found out about it.
Prinsep, following his talk with Nick, picked up Lieutenant
Tongres and Ensign Dinant and went with Dr. Hoveler into a region of
the laboratory they had not seen before, to inspect the site of the
experiments and bioengineering projects Dirac had been and evidently
still was conducting.
Hoveler had been involved only intermittently in that work, and only
reluctantly admitted his participation, because he had serious
reservations about the morality of using the zygotes to grow new
bodies in which to house old personalities. He served as a good if sometimes
reluctant guide.
Dirac, as Hoveler explained, had always felt himself perfectly justified in
trying to recover his lost bride by whatever means were necessary. And
other experiments had grown out of that.
Hoveler introduced the new arrivals to Freya , and explained to
2
them how and why she had been created by Nick .
1
Freya appeared to her visitors on a holostage in the lab, using an image Nick
had once suggested to her, that of the head of a handsome woman, her age
indeterminate, long silvery-blond hair in motion as if some breeze were
blowing through the optelectronic world in which Freya dwelt.
After a brief exchange of pleasantries, Prinsep got down to business.
"Freya, can you tell me what is commonly done with dead organic bodies,
here on the station or on the yacht?"
The imaged woman seemed serenely immune to surprise.
"Ordinarily, Commodore, there are no dead bodies of any organic species. Such
food products as meat and eggs are synthesized directly by the
life-support machinery."
"I am thinking of the Solarian human species in particular.
There must be experimental failures here in the laboratory. And lately there
have also been dead adult human males."
"I store all such material for future use in genetic work. So far, the storage
space available is more than adequate."
"Ah. And may we see what specimens you now have in storage? I am [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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