Part 33 (1/2)
Charles' face went cold and hard. ”You do not need to know the answer to that question. Now come along.”
Annie turned back to James, and he inclined his head slightly, indicating that she should go with Charles. She blew him a kiss and followed Charles out of the building.
”I don't like this at all,” she said to Gar a few minutes later. They were seated alone, under a tent-like shelter one of the humanoids had set up'”as protection for your fragile human skin,” Charles had said with contempt. Humanoids occasionally pa.s.sed by the shelter, but unlike the humanoids in the holo-image, their gazes were not in the least friendly. They quickly glanced away, with revolted expressions that suggested they had just seen a scorpion or a dung beetle. Evidently humans were not popular here.
”What's wrong, Annie'”
”Charles told me the Bureau refused to let the humanoids go until their minds were wiped of something, and now they're trying to get the information back by downloading it from James. I don't know what it is that they want to know, but I'm afraid it's something that could hurt the humans in the cylinder cities.”
”I don't know why you're so certain of that,” Gar said. ”It could just be farming skills, or knowledge of mining, or something practical along those lines. Something they need to know outside.”
”But why would the Bureau have wiped their brains of that' No. It has to be something important.” Annie got to her feet and began to pace in the narrow band of shade. ”You know the humanoids better than I do, Gar. What did they know that might be dangerous to humans'”
”To the Bureau in my reality, their most dangerous trait was their desire for freedom.”
”Well, they've got that already in this reality, so that can't be it. What else'”
Gar compressed his lips. ”They had knowledge of the layout of the cities,” he said at last. ”I suppose that could be dangerous, if they wanted to attack the humans. The cylinder cities are practical in many ways, but a closed ventilation system is extremely vulnerable to terrorist-type attack. The water supply is susceptible to sabotage as well.”
Annie continued to stalk back and forth. ”But how many of the humanoids really knew the layout of the cylinder cities' I know each living area was pretty much cut off from the rest, wasn't it' I mean, except for the elevator shafts, which you and James claim haven't been used for travel in a long time. It's not like the humanoids visited each other or anything, right'”
”Most visiting, among both humans and humanoids, was done via holovideo. But if the humanoids visited each other, they did it via the Gates.”
”The spatial distortion thingies. Right. So they weren't really familiar with the ' the actual geography of the cities. Isn't that right'”
”I suppose that is true. But James may be more familiar with the geography than most. He led us a merry chase through several cities.”
Annie shook her head. ”But we don't even know if the cities of this reality are the same as the cities of your reality.”
”The Bureau and my mother's dwelling appeared the same.”
”Not much of a statistical sample, Gar. The humanoids can't know if it's the same, either, so that information would be pretty worthless.” She shook her head. ”I don't think that's it. What could James know that they'd want'”
”Very little,” Gar admitted. ”James was only a domestic servant. His knowledge was extremely limited.”
Annie frowned, and a thought niggled at the back of her mind. Struggling to focus her sleepy brain, she realized that in at least one area his knowledge was unusually extensive. In her mind she heard an echo of James' voice.
I helped my mistress and master with the TDM for years.
”The time machine!”
Gar stared at her blankly. ”You mean the temporal displacement module' What would the humanoids want with that'”
”The same thing everyone else wants, I suppose. They want to go back and change reality.”
”But none of them would have known anything about it besides James. Their minds wouldn't have been wiped of that, because there was very little there to wipe. They might have heard of it, but they didn't have any technical information.”
”So they're lying about their reason for downloading information from James,” Annie said impatiently. ”Big surprise. They're as capable of being devious as humans, Gar. They're carefully downloading every piece of information in his brain so that he can't figure out what they're doing. They're obviously playing a deep game here, doing something they don't want either James or us to guess at.”
She paused, then went on thoughtfully, ”And there's something really weird about the way they're downloading it, too. How come they have to take apart his chest and abdomen to download the information' Wouldn't you think he would have been designed with a ' a port somewhere'”
”His chest and abdomen'” Gar repeated.
”Yeah, they had to strip his skin and muscles off. Seems like an awful lot of trouble. Do you have to do that to a humanoid just to download information'”
”I'm not sure, Annie. I'm not an expert on humanoids, not at all. But that does seem odd. His brain is in his skull, just like ours. I'm not sure why it would be necessary to expose his abdomen.”
Annie growled with frustration and sat down on the tarp that served as a floor, aware of the sweat trickling down the back of her neck. The sun was barely up, but it was already as hot as h.e.l.l on the fourth of July. ”Something is going on here, Gar. I wish I knew what the humanoids were up to. But the way I see it, we've got two options. We can either get out of the way and let them do what they want, or try to stop them.”
Gar's square jaw tensed. ”I can't let them do anything to the past, Annie. G.o.d only knows what they might try to do to humans. G.o.d only knows what they might do to reality this time.”
”Then we don't have much choice, do we'” she said softly. ”We'll have to try to stop them.”
An hour and ten minutes later, James walked into the primitively constructed tent, ducking his head under the overhang. He appeared to be all in one piece. Even the gash in his arm had been repaired.
”James!” Annie exclaimed, flinging her arms around his neck. His warm, solid arms wrapped around her, leaving her with no doubt'this James was no holo-image.
”It is all right, Annie,” he said against her hair. ”I am fine.”
”I was worried about you,” she said, her voice m.u.f.fled by his shoulder.
”So was I,” Gar said from behind her. ”Annie told me what they did to you, James. Are you all right'”
James nodded seriously as he released Annie. ”My skin has been resealed. It is now impossible to tell I
was ever'” He slid a look at Annie. ”Opened.”
Annie gave a wry smile. ”You're lucky, James. It takes us a lot longer to recover from something like that.” James blinked at her, giving her the impression he was shocked by her deliberately light tone. At last he said, awkwardly, ”Annie ' you saw my internal workings. Were you ' repelled'” She lifted her chin and looked him straight in the eye. ”Why would I be repelled, James'” ”You saw my ' machinery.” ”Yeah, I did. But you know what, James' You look a lot better with your skin off than I would.”
His jaw dropped, and she grinned, amused at his reaction. Seeing the gleam of wors.h.i.+p in his eyes again, she decided to change the subject. She really didn't like it when he looked at her as if she were an angel from Heaven, because she knew all too well she wasn't. G.o.d knew she'd had her share of troubles accepting him as a person. But she no longer did. He was a person, no matter what his inner workings looked like.
”So now that Charles has what he needs,” she asked, ”is he going to let us go back to the cylinder city'”
James nodded. ”But we must rest first.”
”Rest'” Annie echoed with some dismay. She didn't want to spend any more time among the humanoids
than she had to. Charles' att.i.tude of revulsion bothered her. She supposed it helped her understand how