The Chameleon

22.SEPT.3756 (Earth Actual)

“I THINK,” TANIA Sharma said, “before the shutdown, it would be good if you told me about your home.”

“Home,” Eve repeated, trying out the word as if it were unknown to her.

“Your home world. Your Creators’ home world. And the system it is in.”

“My information is very old.”

Tania folded her arms, then let them hang. She exhaled slowly, trying to decide how to play this. It was an AI, after all, not a person with feelings to hurt. Logic would be the best route, she decided, and sat down in the ship’s approximation of an executive’s chair. The chair, and indeed the room it was in, had been modeled after the analysis lab on Anchor Station where Tania had spent so many hours trying to decipher the mystery of the space elevator and those who had built it. From the trio of large displays, to the long desks facing them, to the high-backed faux-leather chairs. Tania found the cushion of the seat unforgiving, the machine not understanding that it was supposed to be soft. She decided not to comment on it. There were more important things to talk about. “It was one thing to go about all this knowing that, if the situation really called for it, you’d tell us what we needed to know. But the situation will soon change. You’ll be switched off. Unavailable as we cross through the barricade. I know you don’t want to cloud our minds with outdated information, but…we would feel more comfortable with some basic knowledge of those that hold your system captive. The Captors, as Skyler calls them.”

The briefest pause.

Across the trio of displays, images bloomed to life of a large spacecraft. The angular vessel looked like dozens of squared pillars all lumped together. Lights dotted the surface, giving the impression of a cluster of skyscrapers built far too close together. Along the flanks were patches of small, scythe-shaped protrusions. Antennae, Tania presumed.

“What am I looking at?” she asked.

Eve replied in her oddly accented, soothing voice. “This is a typical Captor transfer ship, built to traverse the vast distances between the local stars. Every example of a ship leaving or entering the system is one of these, though the design has evolved somewhat over time.”

“Okay,” Tania said, wondering why Eve had decided to start with this. “I have nothing to compare this to. How big is it?”

Another visual appeared beside it. Small white rings along a central spine, about a third the size of the vessel. “Anchor Station, for reference,” Eve said.

Anchor, Tania knew, was about five hundred meters from bottom to top, which made this ship about fifteen hundred bow to stern. Still, Tania struggled to find meaning in that. Was this large, or small, for the species who’d made it? Should she be impressed? She decided to focus on its purpose. “Transfer ship, you say?” Tania asked. “Transferring what?”

Eve told her.

The answer left Tania speechless.

“Is something wrong?” Eve asked.

“No,” she managed. “I just…can you say that again?”

“The enemy uses these vessels to deliver the prepared bodies of my Creators to their allies and customers.”

Tania slumped back in her stiff chair, staggered by the words. “I thought,” she began, swallowed, and started again. “I thought your Creators were trapped on their home world?”

“Most are, yes. But those suitable for the Captors’ purposes are placed out on ships like this one.”

“Suitable for what?”

“Their purposes.”

“Yes,” Tania said patiently, “I understood that. But what are those purposes?”

Another pause. Tania shifted in her chair, suddenly wary. Pauses were natural for people, but a computer? Was Skyler right to mistrust her? The idea sent a shiver up her back. An earlier conversation with Skyler echoed through her mind, about how everything they knew about the situation came entirely from the AI. Even supposedly raw data could be altered, or entirely faked, by such an advanced system, and no one the wiser.

“Eve?” Tania asked when the silence had stretched ten seconds.

“Forgive me,” she said. “Your question is complicated. Answering carries considerable risk.”

“Risk?” Tania replied, surprised. “How could answering me carry risk? I don’t understand.”

“To put it succinctly: If you understood the reason why they hold my Creators hostage, you may wish to take their place when the siege is ended.”

Though alone in the room, Tania raised her hands, palms out. The idea that Eve might not trust them had never occurred to her. “Please, Eve, I assure you, we—”

“After all,” Eve said, “members of your species discovered our plans for Earth in advance. Rather than warn the rest of you, they sought to profit from that knowledge. If I’m not mistaken, one was your own father. Sandeep Sharma.”

Tania could only sit and stare, her mouth hanging open.

“Did he and your good friend Neil Platz not keep this knowledge for themselves?”

After several seconds she snapped it shut as anger, even rage, boiled in her. “What the hell do you know about my father?”

“I know everything your mother knew,” Eve said, in her maddening, even tone.

The words cut like a knife. Tania’s mother had succumbed to the SUBS virus, during the initial outbreak in 2278. Which meant her mind, specifically her memories, had been cataloged in a grand database. A persona that Eve had clearly studied. Tania warred against her own judgment, a string of insults on the tip of her tongue held back by an enraged snarl.

“I have upset you,” Eve said. “I am sorry.”

Tears on her cheeks, Tania managed only a nod. She had to remind herself that she spoke to a machine. And even though it sounded so, Eve had not meant her words to sting. “If you want us to help you, you’re going to have to trust us, Eve. It is as simple as that.”

“Trust is an equation to me, Tania. A very complex equation. But perhaps, if you wish to know, I could tell you the details of my home.”

For a time, she just sat there, staring vaguely toward the three screens. Her father had learned something of the Builder plan, along with Neil, and the two of them had told no one. Even after learning of the reasons behind what the Builders had done to Earth, though, Tania never understood the motivation to provide those early hints her father and Neil had found. Why tip their hand? But here, now, she began to understand. It had been a test, like everything else. The question was, had humanity passed that one? “You’re implying I might try to keep this from the others? To profit from it?”

“I do not know. I think it will be interesting to find out.”

“Well,” Tania said, “you don’t know me very well, then. I will share everything with them.”

The AI pondered that for a time. “We shall see.”