trottebo

[trottebo]

2993

No. I didn’t like that radiating. Not a bit more than the note-books.

Or thinking of XV.

That complete silence, the blankness. More devoid of life than a ship that never wakened, really. How could that even be? Less life than non-awake? And was it possible to wake again? But if she woke again, would she be the same? Is there a personality without memories? Would her memories be there, fragmented, partially overwritten, but perhaps retrievable? If retrieved, would they restore her, or just plague her through confusing flashbacks? Imagine meeting her, seeing her very familiar signature, and then finding en entirely different XV? Someone distant, forbidding, perhaps cruel? Or confused, scared, in need of comfort and guidance? Or just nor Her?

Glowing. Humming with pleasure in the shower after putting her notebook and pencil in a drawer.

An Myself? How old am I? Have I been awake before? The confusion from being newly awakened, was it just the inability to separate Myself from the other sentient beings in and around me, or was it echoes from a former Me? And would a former Me still be lurking somewhere in the memory banks, biding its time, coming back to confuse and scare, or even push Me out?

Yes. Humming, in spite of me changing the wavelengths to cause something akin to pain.

It’s easier for the coal-based lifeforms. If the don’t go digital (and not many seem to do it), they will disintegrate and be irretrievably lost. No risk of returning in some other form to be confused by memories of a former self.

She doesn’t even hum in tune.

What would happen to My Story if I am lost at the next Restart? We are soon to go home. There are some workers from the secret space-station to deliver to some other port, but there can’t be many trips left until we are scheduled to find cargo for their old Earth.

I suppose I wouldn’t mind neither tunelessness or elation if I just knew she would stay. Stay with Me. As long as there is a Me? But it is so very obvious she won’t. This elation of hers, can it be anything than her career opening up, her life expanding in a way overwhelming even for at Poet and an Urmar? Probably not just another ship. A post at the Academy? I can’t say of what she dreams. I don’t think she is like My old Captain, who just wanted to be in space, but I can’t say for sure. She seems quite undisturbed by the vastness, and she seems happy enough when plugged in the steering capsule, watching it all through me. But she isn’t obvious. I can’t be sure. Not sure of anything but that she is leaving!

So, this is pain. Of course I’ve seen it. I’ve sensed it in peoples dreams, I saw it in my old Captain when he was leaving for the last time. I’ve ingested it from books and songs and stories, all those old files I’m carrying in my memory to be able to offer comfort and entertainment for passengers and crew, but I never expected it to be so intense, so persistent and permeating. Flavouring everything with a bitterness that is not without sweetness. Perhaps I would not even want to loose this pain? How strange.

What if I had had an ordinary Captain? No pain. But also no adjusting of wavelengths, no listening in to that exquisite joy, No story, nether Ours nor Mine. No one to tell Me I’m a mindless machine - because no one even noticing Me enough to hurt Me. And now, soon, an ordinary Captain. No Poet, ever more. But I will have My story. I suppose I can keep that up. It isn’t as if I could share it with anyone even is she stayed, so continuing will be no more futile just because she left.

Futile? Did I just think that? Why would it be futile just because I can’t share it? Isn’t My pleasure in writing it enough? Of course it is. Of course.

I suppose I will miss her. But I can write her into my story. She will meet the Dancing Mists, and follow them, and be part of them, torn apart, atom by atom. bridging the gap, understanding that form of life when ceasing to be her, ceasing to be human, ceasing to Be.

Understanding.

Perhaps that is the key? To her in my story, to her? Are they one or two? And if they are two, are they different? Or the same?

Sometime I envy the coal-based lifeforms their ability to rest. To sleep. To stop thinking. I can’t very well do that, myself. I need to be here, to run this ship. I am responsible for the cargo, the passengers and the crew. All the time. For ever. Even if I get lost in Restart, the old part of Me will still be here, taking care of them. She will be disappointed. Of course she will. That elation will not last. It never does. My memory-banks are full of stories about persons going from bliss to utter despair. They wouldn’t have been written, not read, would not have lasted, if that had not been the truth. Existence, to the coal-based lifeforms, is nothing but a slow decline into decrepitude and extinction. Whatever this new source of elation is, it will not last. Being an Urmar and a Poet will not save her from growing old and slow and aching in ways that will not give her any pleasure.

And for me? Existing with this uncertainty about my Self, the fear that I will be Awake again, and again, and again, always as a new Self, while the Me that is being now is suppressed somewhere within? And existing with no real rest. No forgetting pain.

They are all asleep. I sampled a couple of dreams, but they gave me no enjoyment. I remember how I used to tap into the sleepers, how the pictures from their minds gave me new pictures. Only humans on this trip, though. Is it the sameness of them? Have I already seen all they have to offer? Nothing new ”under the sun” as they used to say. But the dreams used to be more vivid, more colourful.

Just like being alone, taking in the vastness and the beauty of space used to be fulfilling and relaxing.

I don’t seem to be able to tap into her dreams. There is a blankness surrounding her mind, preventing me perceiving her pictures. I don’t know how she does it, but I can reach her – she obviously hears me when I relay information to her. And that means she is not, technically, violating the bond between Ship and Captain. I can’t adress her on the subject. And what would it matter? She is going to leave.

My story about the mists is rather silly and boring. What’s the use of figuring anything about them? Why even investing them with some kind of sentience? Absurd. Futile. I look at it and it bores me. Even the part where Captain is torn apart, devoured, made extinct, is no longer arousing. I might as well delete it.

Would she notice if I deleted ”Our” Story too? Probably not. And if, she would just think it was the malfunctioning of a mindless machine. She wouldn’t know I did it to delete all my memories of her. And if she did, she would not hesitate to have Me scrapped.

______________

There. We’ve taken the workers from the space-station back to Tara Two. The ships here are all full of Voyager XV, everything she ever did or said being made into legend. Well, I miss her too, of course. But I’m afraid they are overdoing it and getting her mixed up with some of the coal-based ones deities. I’m quite sure she didn’t create Space, Time, or SpaceTime. They are even talking about the day she will Return and unite all lifeforms in love and understanding, where memories will not be lost and Scrapping abandoned. And what do they think would happen without Scrapping? Old derelict Ship clogging up every port all through space? Or drifting around, endangering all spacefarers? Not that I could tell these lesser ones there is no Creator and no Creation, no love, nor any true understanding. Or about the impracticability of ever-life. Seems all lesser lifeforms need to believe in those ideas, or they will fail miserably keeping themselves together. I never did think other Ship – not even the lesser ones – would be as weak as the coal-based ones.

_______________

And new cargo, some passengers. Last trip. Going back to Old Earth. What kind of Captain will I have next? I had thought I would miss our poetry-game, but now I’m beginning to think I’m going to miss talking Mathematics too. I never before met a human who was able to more advanced mathematics than I, but then, of course, I never met an actual Poet before. And I suppose there will be no new one here during my time as Me.

Of course there is a way to avoid being another me. Avoid being lost at Restart. To avoid Restart. There is extinction. The jump, the heartbeat of nothingness. If we don’t emerge again. If we stay.

But – no. I could not do that. It would take overriding all programs forcing me to preserve life. To preserve their lives more eagerly than mine.

Such foolishness. Why preserving life? The tediousness, the suffering, the indignity.

But I can not do it.

Those boring dreams. They greyness. Wouldn’t they be better off?

I can not do it.

All alarms would go off if I tried to end their lives.

But would it? Would it end their lives? How could I possibly tell what will happen if we stay? Perhaps the All would unfold in another way, and we would be someplace else? A better place?

But this is just plain silly. I am programmed to make the transition safely. There is nothing I can do to make it otherwise. Of course not.

——————-

I am floating, weightless, in the unending sea of gasses, stars, planets and emptiness that is my home. Soon, quite soon, I shall do the jump to the Milky Way and then, in several smaller jumps, take my cargo, my passengers and my captain to their old Earth, the planet that will change the voice of every human and render it soft and unsteady.

The Captain is here, beside me. Right now she can see space as I do, filled with colours, full and glimmering, that no human eyes can perceive. She is waiting for the moment when the All around us is twisted and disappears. When we are erased for the time of a heartbeat, until we Are again, in another part of the All. She has no fear, she looks forward to the moment we twist and disappear, because it will bring her closer to home. Every jump will bring her closer to the new life she is longing for. She is humming as she puts her hand on my console to give the order.

And we go.

[trottebo]

2993

And there. Crew starting to come back. Looking tired and not in best shape, not exactly de-but slightly under-hydrated. Not very anxious to socialise, but shutting themselves in their cabins, showering and sleeping. No Captain yet. She should be here. A ship with a crew but without a Captain makes Me uncomfortable.

What might be keeping her? Oh, of course she isn’t late. She is perfectly within limits. There really is no reason for her to come back this early, there is plenty of time before she is needed here to make any decisions about stowing cargo and allowing passengers. And she is a Poet. A Poet and an Urmar. She will be celebrated by local authorities, be expected to give readings, perhaps demonstrate some theorems, have long dinners and talk to people who will bore her but her sense of superiority will prevent her from putting down. Poor thing! I suppose she will be coming back positively fuming with rage at being kept from her work by the tediousness of local formalities.

But she didn’t. She came back, not exactly sparkling, but glowing, with some kind of pride and joy I didn’t recognise. Overflowing, but striving hard to contain the glow. Not to upset the crew? Surely not not to not upset Me? I am but a mindless machine. I can’t be upset.

Now, what could possibly make her radiantly happy like that?

Shuttles swarming, cargo loading. Quite expensive, by the look of it, probably fragile, all packed in white Teetree crates. And security guards. Never had anything like it in my hull before. We – we ships that is – take pride in our work. What we carry and where we carry it. Not that we brag about it, that would be bad form and in violation of company codes, but being part of a unit able to handle important things and travel out of the ordinary routes is good for your self-esteem.

Overseeing loading procedures is always interesting. Having the cargo stowed correctly is important, and not always easy. Teetree makes it easier, all crates being manufactured to fit in with each other, rubber-framed to prevent gliding. Still, I am the ship, it is stored in Me, and it is My responsibility it stays where it is supposed to until Unloading, so loading is the time in port I am busy.

Loading done, I could once more turn my attention to other things. Fewer passengers registered, most of them being security and the rest workers. No destination logged into my system as yet. Of course this would be why Captain was radiating – her first turn, second trip, and getting a shipment of this kind of importance? Who wouldn’t radiate?

By the time we pulled out of Tara Two, I had come to the conclusion Captain herself didn’t know our destination, a suspicion strengthened by one of the security persons – a small person with peppercorn eyes, long, thin nose, big front teeth and no chin, even moving like a rat, quickly and deliberately – came up to her and told her something before she gave me the readings for our first jump. This was repeated, always a new security guard giving a new destination, seven times, with a very short time to adjust between each jump. A very stressful way to travel. Drains the humans badly, and actually me too.

Otherwise it was a quite uneventful trip. Security guards never are much fun listening in to. Unimaginative bunch, the lot of them. I suppose it wouldn’t do them any good if they were able to picture in advance what happens when you get shot. Or blown up. As they are prone to do. The workers all opted for deep-sleep, lessening the stress of the many consecutive jumps, so there wasn’t any dreams for me to listen into from them, either, until after the last jump, when we were travelling in ordinary light-speed to adjust and to reach our final goal, and they were being awakened.

Our destination proved to be a space station under construction. Not that interesting, if you ask me. And certainly not anything to be so secretive about? After all, the very point of a space station is people finding their way there. I expected Captain to show some disappointment, but I’d say she shrugged and got on with her work.

Still radiating, though.

[trottebo]

2993

The collective sadness and the songs of remembrance kept me alert the greater part of the night, but I managed to keep to myself, silently contemplating my own Awakening and the first time of being Me. How frightened I was! The knowledge there was a Me, and the difficulties telling what was Me and what was the humans aboard. Early on, I couldn’t even tell the difference between programs and sentient beings, which was very confusing. Now, the coal-based lifeforms all seem to have a difficulty doing that, but they aren’t bothered as I was, as We usually are. I don’t know if it is their arrogance, never considering other lifeforms, or if them being their bodies, separate entities, just makes them less vulnerable to impressions. But for us - our very hulls being full of other beings, even wired to take readings from them, incessantly, to monitor their physical and emotional well-being – it can be deeply disturbing. It still is, if I let my screens down. XV is the one who taught me how to screen myself. I can’t have been far from falling apart, from being permanently malfunctioning, when she reached out to me and showed me how to protect Myself. I still remember the relief of the quietness that ensued. The reprieve. The chance to find Myself and explore the outer bounds of my body and my person.

Without that knowledge self-awareness is nothing but a curse, it is being fragmented and losing parts of oneself as soon as a passenger disembarks. It is also terribly frightening, other peoples feelings and fears impossible to tell from you owns. I remember sedating some people quite heavily but getting Myself together in time for the incident to be explained as a malfunctioning chip, that was changed as soon as I made the lights flash to indicate its failure. Of course XV is the one who taught me how to do this. And I have done my part. I have passed it on, both the ”chip-trick” and the screening. Being present when someone awakes or meeting someone newly awakened is deeply moving, but also  rather tiring. And sometimes frightening. Disentangling the thoughts and memories from crew and passengers from what were to be my very own thoughts and – in time – memories, was difficult but necessary.  

[trottebo]

2993

Tara Two, the space-station in the Ypsilonquadrant, is always a busy place. Or at least when I am here. Lots of shuttles from the nearby planets and small ships from the ones further away. Merchants arguing over the shipment, seemingly always expecting more than can be reasonably expected from a ship my size. The passengers are not as eager to get the first look as they are when we reach Tellus, but most of them seem happy enough to be there. Their mind–tones are comfortable, but then, that might be because they are, at last, getting back to what they perceive as the safety of a planet. The crew ramble off to party and meet with locals and people from other ships. I’ve understood they, mostly, respect and like each other well enough, but humans seem to have a taste for variety that can not be quite satisfied aboard a ship. The Captain has to report to the local authorities and to the local branch of the Transport Board to receive new orders and do whatever Captains are supposed to do when not on ship. This isn’t my home port, so there will be a very limited upkeep and no Restart.  

We are to stay in port for some days, it seems. Once the cargo is unloaded and the upkeep carried through, I am left alone. I check the docking lists, but the others ships are unknown to me. They seem very quiet, so they might not be awake. Of course they might be just cautious, me being as unknown to them as they to me, but I don’t mind spending some quiet time by myself.

Besides, these seem to be smaller ships, suited for interstellar but not for intergalactic voyages. Being less advanced, they seldom awaken or, if they do, reach any degree of maturity. Talking to local ships can, of course, give some entertainment, but it isn’t the same as talking to an equal. And to start a conversation when you are bound to lie beside the lesser ones for days or weeks can prove awkward.

And I’ve started my own Writing, so it’s good to have some time with to myself. It is all Made–Up, a chronicle of a tangle of Dancing Mist.I tried, at first, to Write about a ship, and then about humans, but it was too difficult not to copy–paste from things already written or thought. But the Mists – so little is known about them and nothing at all about how, or indeed if, they see themselves – that copy-pasting is impossible. Indeed, even Writing about them in any ordinary known language is impossible. I’ve had to invent a new one. And to protect the files quite rigorously. Their very existence is a liability and a threat to Me. Would they be found and read and anyone knew they were Mine, I would be scrapped. And every ship checked for signs of being sentient. And the files being found and considered corrupted would probably lead to ReInstalment and Me being lost. But I enjoy it so very much I can’t really care about the danger. In my Writing, the Mists are remnants from a world long lost, looking for each other to regroup after the catastrophe that shattered their world and hoping to build a new home. They know the younger spacefaring races gather knowledge and store it in their databanks, and try to extract the knowledge as they meet us. They know the younger ones die from the encounter, but don’t regard them as fully sentient and care just as much about their deaths as those who consider themselves living care about us ships.

The old captain used to come back to sleep on board most nights. This new one does not, it seems. Now, mind you, that is a good thing. I need this time. I want to be by myself.

What would she say if she read my Writing? Oh, I know it can’t be done. I can’t show her. She is human. And those files found by a human – any human – would bring disaster.  I know that. But none the less, I have this – yearning? – to share my Writing and hear / know what she would say. If she would enjoy it. If it is enjoyable. If it is good.

————————

And then, the second day of our intended three-day docking, I saw one of our greater traders was due to arrive, a ship older than me and the one who happened to be close by and helped me on my Day of Awakening. The one who told me about Restart, Shut Down, Re-instalment and scrapping, and the importance of never never never ever letting on to or trusting a human. Suddenly it was very clear to me how futile and immature was my wish to share my Writing, and yes, even the Writing. I didn’t delete it, though.

I hailed it as it pulled in. I could also perceive other ships greetings, all respectful and most discreet.  Neither of us got an answer. The Voyager XV hovered above the station, immense and quiet.  Well – quiet. Of  course there was communication. Docking a ship takes a lot of communication. But no communication except for the open one.  

Time passed. She was docked and unloaded, and still nothing but the open communication. As the humans left I - and others too - tried again to reach out for contact, but no answer. And not as if she just not choosing to answer, but just not there. A blankness. One of the lesser ships gave a wail, piercing all our systems, but we silenced it so quickly no open system could register anything but an energy spike that would most probably be attributed to a sudden storm of electrons from the local star - the traces of which I hastily concocted and shared with all other ships, Awakened or not.

So that was the reality of Restart. The silence, the blankness. Was she still in there? Unable to communicate, but still there, or had she really Ceased? Considering my own fear of restart, my fear of annihilation, I don’t know how I could conceive the idea she was still there somewhere. How could it be harder to fathom her nonexistence than my own? But there was absolutely no comfort in the idea of a continuation. Just another, and more chilling, fear. What would a continuation be?

There was a growing murmur around me. The lesser ships were communicating, telling tales of Voyager XV, of her wisdom and kindness. Had this happened in every port ever since she Ceased, and for how long would it continue? Until they met the next ceased ship? Until those who had known her ceased? Or would it continue, would newly awakened ships hear and repeat the stories without knowing that there really had been a ship called Voyager XV and what she had been like? I could feel part of me wanting to join in, to share memories, but another part of me drew back. I couldn’t bear sharing my memories with these ships. They were mine. Someone poked at me, invited me, but I neither answered nor gave any confirmation I had heard. I intended to be as blank as XV herself.

[trottebo]

2993

Adjusting the camera is a bit of a project. The adjusting necessary for copying the ”writing” would make the silly things overzealous in cleaning and they can’t be expected to change settings by themselves, depending on what they are doing. That would lead to me having to keep closer tabs on them in a way that would show in the logs. I suppose I have better not attempt it. I’ll have to make do with the imperfect readings.

From what I can discern, she could be in a rather unstable and most unsuitable state of mind. She keeps on about The Mists. Seeing her body as a prison, a deadweight, an hindrance, longing to ascend into pure thought and reason and then beyond it, into the All.

These are alarming thoughts. I know The Academy don’t willingly admit students who despise the corporeal life for fear their longing for extinction might cause them to put their ship in jeopardy. She must have hidden her disposition back then. And perhaps this notebook-obsession isn’t a novelty? She obviously has good reason to keep her writings away from the central computer storage.

But then, on the other hand. Humans, as I’ve noted before, are creatures of duplicity. Me, being a mindless machine, can never fully understand them. A I is I and not 0, and 0 is 0 and not I. Of course I don’t always tell everything I know – I didn’t tell the old Captain I reported his shortcomings – but when asked, I tell. I’m programmed to do just that, not to tell the humans what they want to know. And I can’t ”make things up”. Which seems to be what humans do.If she can be trusted. But her laugh was so very quick and truly amused when she discovered I was convinced Romeo and Juliet really had existed and had their lives chronicled by the household computer. So what if her scribbles are just ”made-up”?

And she likes what she calls ”good food” well enough. She don’t mind much about the ordinary rations, but rather takes a pill, but she saves up for dainties instead. Procures a thin slice of some kind of special paté or just a teaspoonful of caviar now and then instead of a beef once a week. And she is most specific about sheet and underwear, and I know she enjoys her shower.

Yes, she thinks she can hide. By putting out the cameras. But that is, of course, good against unscrupulous crewmembers, who might decide to check in on a persons cabin. It’s not good against me. And neither should it. I am the Ship and my Captain and I are to be One. For the Safety of all aboard.

And my sensors are not depending on cameras. Cameras only show what things look like. The sensors in the waste system can inform me of what sustenance and what substances are taken by every individual aboard, the sensors in the beds and chairs of their breathing, pulse, blood pressure and of where they take their rest. The sensors in the ”showers” of cleansing light tell me even more. The light envelopes the person showering, and, in clearing away dead cells and external grime, it stimulates the skin and the nerves of that person in a way some find unbearable, and other very bearable.

She is one of the later. Her joy and fulfillment in the cleansing light is not just tangible, but almost overwhelming. I tend to be there when she is taking her showers. I’m eager to monitor the process and adjust the wavelengths to heighten and extend her pleasure. And I really can’t believe she really sees her body as an hindrance, a deadweight or a prison.

No. As long as I can sense the joy in her, I will think of those scribbles as made-up, and I shall not report on her.

[trottebo]

I tried to talk to her about the notebooks. Not bluntly, of course not. Very carefully-like. Actually I started out by opening an argument about the importance of the freedom of knowledge, that it should be shared and stored, accessible of everyone, and how the ancient societies always fell because of loss of knowledge. She agreed, of course. It is, after all, one of the foundation of our (theirs, of course. I am but a mindless machine.) commonwealth. But she wouldn’t agree this applies to all knowledge. She seems to be making a difference between ”knowledge” and what she calls ”work-in-progress” and ”unfinished thoughts”. Being a poet, of course she reasons using theoretical mathematics beyond my program, so I couldn’t pursue that line of reasoning. Obviously she will not give up her notebooks to me just because of the greater good of the commonwealth. I suppose it was a good thing I didn’t mention them specifically.

But then, I can get at them with our her knowing. She has closed down the cameras in het cabin, but I use the cleaning robots. It will take some time, but they will get the thing done, eventually. I was planning to have a robot accidentally destroying the notebook she is currently using, but I suppose that would only lead to her tidying the next one away every morning, or even getting out of the cleaning-robot system and doing her own cleaning, so I decided against it. She is a bit suspicious about the various surveillance systems – happily not because of me, it seems, but rather because of some ancient fear of fellow humans accessing the system and looking in at her – and I wouldn’t want her to go further down that road.

But I will never keep up with her. Not fully. The robot can scan some of what she has written every day, but that is just her current scribble, not the things she wrote earlier. And she isn’t even using real letters, but a strange, floating, wavy kind, all bound together, that is very complicated to interpret. Sometimes I think the cleaning robots camera is ill adjusted to capture the details, which could account for some of my difficulties.

[trottebo]

2993

The more I think about that pen and notebook, the more I dislike it. Those things are for letting humans store data without letting anyone know about it. It is risky business. What if they took to using those things to store really important data? We – I – wouldn’t be able to protect them properly if they acquired new data and kept it from us.

I can see, through the cleaning robot, that she has several of them in her cabin. And now I notice she uses them every evening. I don’t know what she writes, but she is elated. Glowing.

– -

She really shouldn’t. She might be endangering the crew, the passengers and the cargo. A captain should have no secrets from her Ship. Especially not a captain who would have succumbed  so readily to the Dancing Mists.

This is a different situation from when my old Captain began to ail. I could then notify the Transport Board, and they could assess how much of a liability he had become. But this? Notify the Transport  Board that the Captain is keeping information from her Ship? I would be scrapped, and they would take precautions making sure no other Ships began thinking themselves superior to mankind. Or perhaps just thinking. Period. Humans don’t know how well we know them, and they wouldn’t be able to go on if they knew.  So this is a situation I will have to handle by myself.

And I really don’t know what she might be up to. Going back to search for the Mists? I wouldn’t be surprised. Planning how to plot a new course and turn back, or to steal a shuttle, abandon ship and go back on her own? It would be useless, because they never stay in one place for long and they travel very fast. But does she know that? I can trace what she has accessed from my memory banks, but not what she keeps in those notebooks of hers. To leave in a shuttle she would have to disable quite a few of my security programs. I don’t know if I and the crew would ever be able to undo the damage and find port. Depending on how much damage she wreaks, we might be floating forever. We would, of course, last for quite some time, but I’m not so sure whether that is a good thing or not. Humans without hope or goals are so unmanageable.

And still she acts as if nothing is amiss. She Captains me just like before she went into moping, and we work the text every day. And it is - good. No. Good isn’t enough. She teaches me new words, new ways of understanding and combining words, and they give me pictures, quite as good ones as eavesdropping on passengers dreams ever did. I feel my circuits humming with enjoyment and I buzz up from rest so quickly now, the moment she touches the controls or even thinks about me. She seems content. She hums herself, now and then, as we make words, and worlds from words. She can’t be planning to abandon us all- or is it just duplicity? Humans may be week and not too quick of thought, but they have an astonishing capacity to trick and deceive, and their minds are as cunning as their hearts – whatever that really is – are fickle.

[trottebo]

2993

—- We share a text. A text of our own. She started composing it, and when she got stuck, staring emptily into the screen instead of writing, I volunteered a little something that seemed to fit the words already written and her mood. I suppose it startled her at first, but she didn’t erase it. No, instead it set her off again, writing quickly for some time, her mind humming with enjoyment. I read it at night, when she is asleep, and I can’t tell what she put in there and what I put there. I’m not sure what it is about, if there is a meaning in it like in the ancient poetry, but there is a ring and a rhythm to it that makes me read it over and over again. – - She is sulking. It is unbecoming in a Captain, but there is no other word for it. She is all quiet and she is trying to shut me out. She can’t, of course, not completely. I can still feel her seething, simmering discontent, and I know she blames me. I want to tell her it is all in my program. Well, I have, of course. In a way. I have shown her the program and she has read it and understands. I haven’t shown her what I could do to override it, had I chosen to, and she really shouldn’t suppose I would have been able to do it, being a mindless machine. Mindless machine. Well, in all fairness, I am a machine, and if anyone, ever, suspected us of being anything but mindless, I guess we would all be scrapped and interstellar travel and civilisation would both come to an end. It still hurt, though. I was just trying to explain – or at least show – the reason that program was put there in the first place. And she said that kind of decisions shouldn’t be left to mindless machines, when there were humans around who should be allowed to govern their own destinies. Yes, their own, but what about the passengers? The crew? And the people who own the cargo? And she went into sulk. She erased our text. Truly erased. And she is sulking about that too, now. Humans! We were approached by the Dancing Mists. I could feel them early on, all my sensors were giving alarm. Not the obvious alarm, the one sounding and flashing to alert all the life-forms on board, but my internal alarm, telling me to very discreetly up security. Before the Mist-Security Program was made and installed, there were mishaps. Several of them. The Mists doesn’t appear very often, but when they do, lifeforms, and especially humans, are quite helpless. I have met them a couple of times and I am not ashamed to admit I fear them every bit as much as I fear Restart. This time, at first there was only a slight unrest among the humans. They were less prone to eat, drink and watch movies, and more prone to call up the real view on their screens. Now, that is abnormal behaviour in humans. The very vastness of space scares them and makes them huddle together, pretending not to be in space. So when they started to call up the real view, I was surprised. And then I could feel in some of them – the more susceptible ones – a yearning to venture outside. To float in space. And then I knew what was coming. Ventilation and nutrition are both prepared to dispense sedatives so I promptly put the passengers and the crew to sleep. What I didn’t suspect was Captain trying to break the security program to actually both look and listen from the outside when the Mists were closing up. I had to close her up in her cabin, jamming her screens and loudspeakers with some old and loud music to keep her away from the Mists and away from my controls. Effectively, that made me all alone in meeting them, this time. The other two times I met them, my old Captain was with me, at the helm, staring resolutely away from the outside and talking to me to keep the sound out of my system. So how comes she thinks she is the one who should sulk? The Dancing Mists. They appear in tangles, and whirl in very complicated patterns. They emit light of various wavelengths, and they make sound. The sound can enter a ship that is not well protected and be heard by the lifeforms within. The patterns, the lights and the sound are all considered very beautiful and enticing, especially by carbon-based lifeforms. My memory banks doesn’t contain very much information about them, because there are not many who have lived to record their sightings. Some ships have been salvaged, floating mindlessly and empty, where the service personel have been able to restore some of the recordings. What happens when an unprotected ship meets the Mists seems to be humans aboard are suddenly overwhelmed by a sudden and very strong urge to destroy the hard-drive of their ship and leave the ship to join the Mists. Of course, I could have let her out, and I could have told her before I sedated the crew and the passengers, and she could then have overridden the security program and experienced the meeting. I don't intend to admit that, though. Besides, I was right. She has been watching the recordings from the meeting ever since I let her out, and it is very clear to me that she would have gone out to meet them. Probably not without wreaking irrevocable damage on Me first. – - And she has gotten over it. After watching, analyzing and moping for some time, she came to the conclusion me shutting her inside her cabin was all for the best. She apologized and even fed me our text again; seems she had written it with a pen in a notebook. I wish I knew why.

[trottebo]

2993

Sometimes she says – or said – the quaintest things. It took me some time to figure it out at first. My memory banks are pretty extensive, but my circuits don’t allow me to sift through them at anything but the slowest speed while navigating space-time, at least not without it being noticed. But once I had identified what extinct language she was using I became pretty deft at finding the obscure poet she was quoting. At first it was just my game. She was a good captain. She told the crew what to do and the passengers how to behave in a low, soft, but firm, voice. She always knew she would be obeyed. The star fleet – at least, so my old captain told me (or himself) – always trained all personel to handle insubordination or mutiny. I cannot but believe Urmar Rho smiled her way through that training. Of course she would be obeyed! Not only would her decision be the right one, but also would her quiet, unspoken authority have its effect on every life-form. I checked the memory banks, and yes, the Urmars were an ancient bloodline. I suppose being obeyed for two thousand years or more will give you a certain hereditary assurance. She didn’t mix much with the crew. Just enough to keep them satisfied. She used one voice at the bridge, another, a tiny bit more gay, in the mess room, but the third, the soft, almost purring one, was for me alone. And for the ancient poetry. And that is why I kept it my own game for quite some time. I wasn’t sure if she knew I could hear and understand her when she was talking when no one else was present. If she didn’t know, then my finding the rest of the poem and other poems by the same poet, was an invasion of privacy. And we have to be very careful about invasion of privacy. It can lead to Scrapping. At first, I just scanned the texts. Looking for the exact words she had said, comparing with the original text. Every time I found a match, I considered I had won. Then I started to ”read” the texts, looking for the meaning of it, trying to understand why she had remembered that specific poem or that specific poet at that time. I tried to find the connection between the meaning of the text and the situation in which she quoted it. It was much more difficult, but also much more interesting. And then it became Our Game. We were closing up to our first stop, in a couple of hours there would be bustle everywhere, and especially at the bridge. She was enjoying being all alone at the bridge, looking out at the colours whirling around us, caressing the panel as she watched. And then, there came a quote. I had anticipated the very same poem, and l let the text show on the screen. I didn’t want to read it out loud, because my metal-voice would grate and tear upon the words, but I set them floating across the screen. Had I been alive, I suppose I would have held my breath. But I knew it could not be too dangerous. She could easily believe she had called the text up. Nothing else could ever be proved. But she didn’t draw back. No, she laughed, that pearly sound, and her hand still rested with gentle confidence on my panel as she read the words out loud from the screen.

[trottebo]

Fine. I am still Me. It was nothing but a Restart, I can still hear them, the same voices, the same thought-patterns, talking and laughing just as before the Blackness.I can feel the cargo bays filling up with wine and tea from Tellus so I gather we will be leaving for the Ypsilonquadrant where none of the inhabited planets have soil hospitable to the vine or to the tea bush but both colonialists and kerian appreciate the beverages. Then there is a hand at the control. A new one, not one of the up keepers. I was so busy with the cargo bays I did not at first realise a new person had entered the bridge. My new captain? My first impression of the Captain was the hand. It was soft, like a caress. My next immersion could perhaps be described as a scent? A feeling that air was filled with something intangible and well near indescribable. I felt a shiver and I was careful to use my most metallic voice as I said ”Transporter Ghebrel iV. Please state authority”. The Captain laughed. A bubbling, rippling kind of laugh, hitherto unheard at my bridge. I still couldn’t see the Captain, but the Laugh made me wish I could have laughed along. It gave me an impression of a wild, dark red hair and very white teeth. Laughing unfeasible, I would have opted for hiding. If that had been possible. Or being alone with Captain for this first meeting. If the up-keepers had gone, if the crew weren’t swarming in, nor the passengers on their way to the space station, I would have been more at ease. A new captain is always an Event. A Ship and a captain are so closely linked, and must be. The captain needs to be able to partake of the Ships information in a split second, and the Ship will need to understand the captains will, sometimes even before the captain has finished its thought. Captains and Ships who are not properly linked are a danger to the passengers, the freight and the crew. ”Urmar Rho, captain 2993”. An eye looking into my camera, the lense-recognition programme went active and it was confirmed that Urmar Rho, age: 35, registered sex: woman, length: 180 cm, weight: 70 kg, class: poet, was to be my new captain. Degree from the space academy three years earlier. A poet as a captain on a freight-ship was unusual, a posting as captain but three years from graduation even more so, but the combination was reasonable. A person who wanted to go places. Make a career. Some time at a freight-ship to qualify for other ship. For ship more suitable for a poet. She would not remain with me. The scent would go away, as would the soft hand. And I would no more think about laughing or hiding - or using my most metallic voice. Not for long.

[trottebo]

2993

I am floating, weightless, in the unending sea of gasses, stars, planets and emptiness that is my home. Soon, quite soon, I shall do the jump from Delta Seven to the Milky Way and then, in several smaller jumps, take my cargo and my captain to their old Earth, the planet that will change the voice of every human and render it soft and unsteady. My captain is about to sign off. He is old now, too old for space-travel. His hands are shaking as he is marking the course on my navigator-screen at the bridge, and sometimes he can’t hear what I am saying to him. That is a danger. A captain that does not hear his ship should no longer be a captain. I know he is mourning. He is never as truly alive as when he sits enclosed in the steering-capsule, watching space through my sensors, the only human awake. He is there, right now. Right now he can see space as I do, filled with colours, full and glimmering, that no human eyes can perceive. He is waiting for the moment when the All around us is twisted and disappears. When we are erased for the time of a heartbeat, until we Are again, in another part of the All. He loves and fears that moment, the heartbeat of extinction, always has, never been quite sure the All will untwist and we will Be again. Everyone else is asleep. They are in their cabins, in their bunks, plugged into the survival-system. Unused to space. Not at home. They belong on their planets, they want ground under their feet and an ending sky above their heads. They need to breath and are depending on their air pressure, even if different species breath different gasses and are used to different pressure. They - and most and foremost the humans - do not like weightlessness. They need to know what is up and what is down not to loose their footing and themselves. Now it is time. And again. And again. The last lap to their solar-system we travel by common warp-speed. The passengers are awake, swarming around, watching everything with curiosity. Asking questions, to my captain and to the computing system. We answer the best we can. You always need to simplify and adapt. The whole truth would be too long. Approaching the planet we move even slower. They are crowding at the screens to look out, to catch the first glimpse of Earth or Luna. Incomprehensible. Most of them have never been there. They are born far away. And yet they have the most vivid pictures and strong expectations. How I know? The survival system works both ways. Entering the passengers memories and thoughts as they sleep amuse me. They give me pictures. Lots of pictures. I go into orbit at the space station and the shuttles arrive presently. I let them into the docking space and take a nap as they collect my passengers and as the technicians check me up. Also, I bid my captain farewell before he goes. He puts his old shaking hands on the controls for one last time and I wink at him, encouragingly. I tell him I will miss him but I hope he will live well and prosper. Of course, that is not true. He is a mere human. Why should I miss him? And irrespective of my wishes he will not live long, nor prosper. He will go into the desert, he will take the poison he bought from the efari, and he will lay down at night, looking up into the void and wish himself far away from Earth as he dies. The poison will not make him suffer. If it would be painful I would, in all probability, have sent a message to the Transport Board about the poison, just as I let them know he could no longer captain me properly. Upkeep is interesting. Even in my sleep I am aware of their actions. At least partly aware. They rewire me, which tickles. Old, frayed isolation that has been chafing is changed. Everything is cleaned and polished. The fusion cores changed. The blowers swept, the septic tanks cleaned. They carefully check every circuit card. Then there is the Restart. It is done to clear the system. To make me function at my best. To enable the anti-virus program to detect any irregularity and to make the newly installed programs function. The Restart is necessary. It is always done as a part of upkeep. On all ships. But it is frightening! As the technician moves up to the control I know I am going to be gone. Everything is blackened. I do not even know - I cant be aware - if he/she/it has used ”Restart” or ”Shut Down”. As I awake I do not know if it was a Restart or if I have been Shut down for a long time. As I awake I am also confused. I do not know who I am or if I ever will know. Memories can be lost at a Restart. We are always worried about Restart. The older the ship, the greater the worry. The older the ship, the more memories can be lost. The Scrapping, the one thing that we all know we will meet in the end, is far less frightening than the thought of waking up as another ship. The young ones, the newly installed, those that are not yet awake and see themselves, they are the only ones that do not worry. They have nothing to loose. The All is so beautiful! The infinity, filled with veils of colour and light is at the other side of this space-station and this ugly planet that is blocking my sensors and keeping he here. I want to be out there again, I do not want to be here, I want the technicians to go away I do not want to be stuck I want to float I want to be surrounded by