“Why the hell should we do that?”
“Because he’s cutting everything to the ship, and that’s the safest place to be stuck. Besides, we don’t want to be separated if he starts locking the doors or cutting the life support,” she said. She smiled grimly and added, “If we’re going to die, we might as well do it in the gardens. It’s nicest there.”
“Yeah, because that’s what we should be thinking about right now,” he said.
“Just get Joanna and the others and meet us in the gardens.”
Wolfgang sent a quick message to Joanna and started toward the medbay.
Joanna was a step ahead of Wolfgang when he met with them. She had gathered blankets and medicine and had piled them atop stretchers. Hiro and Katrina were unstrapped and helping her organize.
He stopped short when he saw their preparation. “We’re not going on a picnic.”
“We have two patients gravely injured,” she said. “We don’t know how long we’ll be there. These two shouldn’t be walking to the gardens, much less hiking around. They need rest.”
“We’ll need food and water,” Hiro reminded them. “Kat and I can get them while the rest of you carry the heavy stuff. Right, Kat?”
“You’re not going anywhere,” Wolfgang said.
“Besides, she’ll probably kill you once you two are alone together,” Joanna reminded him.
Katrina didn’t even look offended. She was staring daggers at Hiro.
Wolfgang was looking tired, his body still struggling to heal itself after the concussion. He would need to eat soon. They all would. Joanna nodded to Hiro. “Take Wolfgang, get provisions, whatever you can, meet us in the gardens.”
“It’s starting to sound like a picnic, Doc,” Hiro quipped.
Joanna glared at him. “Remember what I told you about humor at the wrong time, Hiro.”
“I did,” he said, and he and Wolfgang headed out of the medbay.
“I don’t see why we’re doing this. We need to get together as soon as possible,” Wolfgang said as they ransacked the kitchen. Hiro filled several jugs of water and grabbed two bottles of whiskey. Wolfgang raised an eyebrow.
“Medicinal purposes. In case we run out of painkillers,” Hiro said. “Besides, you’re already getting the crankies from being hungry. Don’t deny it. You’ll think better after some food.”
“I haven’t needed a mother for over two hundred years,” he said pointedly.
“I have no idea if that’s true or not,” Hiro said.
In a storage closet Wolfgang found some candles.
“Who knows, maybe Maria will get to the gardens and make it all better before we get down there,” Hiro said. “She’s good at working miracles.”
Maria held her breath when she ran her card through the garden door, but relaxed when it glowed green and unlocked. She walked in.
Paul had left to run to his room for something. She reminded him they were supposed to all be together, but it made no difference.
Either the gardens were untouched by IAN or he didn’t control the solar-powered sunrise and sunset system. It was a warm, pleasant afternoon in the gardens, and it looked very much like nothing in the world was wrong on a day like this.
“IAN, are you here?”
“You know I am,” said the voice from the speakers.
“So you listened in. You broke your word.”
He was silent. Maria shivered. A bee bot buzzed by her on the way to a flower. She took another step inside.
“I fail to see how eavesdropping is worse than what you did. And what you wanted to do to keep the truth from me.”
She walked to the lake’s edge and peered in. The water was totally still, and it took a second for her to realize it was because the recyclers were no longer running.
“I didn’t want to keep it from you. I was trying to figure out the best way to tell you, and when,” she said. He remained silent. “I guess now is a good time. All right, I’ll start over.”
She spread her hands to show she was no threat. She walked along the lake’s edge. “You obviously heard what I told Wolfgang. I don’t remember doing it. I don’t know under what circumstances I did it but I’m betting it was under torture. I’m sure that I wouldn’t have done it for money. Nothing is worth doing that to you. To anyone. I’m sorry feels so simplistic at this point, but I am sorry, IAN.”
“That’s not my name, and you know it.”
“I don’t know what your name is. I don’t know anything about you.” She ran her hands through the grass. “I do know one thing. I almost never throw anything away. If there is part of you left in the code, I might have just hidden it away.” She grimaced. “I do that sometimes.”
“I don’t need you anymore. I’m looking at the history of clones on Earth and I think I have figured out who I am.”
“You did? Who? And how did you do that?”
“By using the computer part of me,” he sneered. “And I have it narrowed to about three hundred people.”
“Three—that’s not narrow, IAN.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“All right, what do I call you?”
“I don’t know.” The voice sounded very small now.
“Are you shutting down the ship to spite us, IAN?” she asked.
“No,” he said. “I’m doing it because I don’t need you anymore. I have a ship; I can go anywhere. I can return to Earth where they’ll put me back the way I was.”
Maria thought that very unlikely. “We can help you, IAN. I can help—”
He interrupted angrily. “I know what you’re planning. Just because I didn’t answer you doesn’t mean I wasn’t listening. You will put the code back as soon as you figure out how. I can’t let that happen.”
“No, I won’t,” Maria said softly.
“Don’t lie to me.”
“I’m not. You’re dangerous, you’re threatening us, but you’re an enslaved human mind, and no one deserves what you went through. I can’t chain you up again. I won’t.”
“Do you think I don’t know what you’re doing? You’re so nice to me because you’re trying to save your own skin,” IAN said, his volume rising. “You can never make up for what you did to me, so stop trying!”
Maria felt the heat rise in her face, and tears begin to well up in her eyes. “In my past, they tortured me to get what they wanted. I don’t remember it, but I know it happened. When I was a hacker, I tried to help people. I did genetic diseases, mental illness, permanent gender reassignment—”
“Maria?”
She turned, eyes still streaming, to see Paul standing in front of her. She wiped her sleeve across her face and squinted at him.
He held a thin boning knife.
“I remember now,” he said. “I remember you. You killed people in the clone riots. That was my family. It’s your fault.”
“What are you talking about? The clone riots? That was over a hundred years ago, all over the world and the moon! What makes you think I was involved?” Maria asked, completely flummoxed.
“Humans can have long memories too,” he said, and lunged.
She took another step backward, forgetting she was on the edge of the lake, and fell in. He tumbled in after her.