Nomvula’s body shifting, waking from slumber.
Clever4–1 tries to warn her, but there’s so little left of it now, no more logic than a programmable toaster. Her eyes flick to Muzi in peril. She stands. Shouts words that Clever4–1 can no longer parse through its voice recognition patterns. Clever4–1.1 turns, wielding its knife appendage at her instead. Vision flickers. The scene plays out like snapshots. The rogue bot has the girl caught in its grasp. She screams. It points the sharp thing . . . the knife . . . against her forehead. Draws a bead of red liquid. Blood, Clever4–1 remembers what it’s called, then forgets again. The other one, other human, his eyelids part. This Instance’s master, it thinks, though it is not sure. His name is long lost, familiar bytes slipping away down a data drain. The other one scowls, picks up an object, heavy, red, cylindrical. It cracks against the rogue bot’s head, sending it to the floor.
There is more, but This Instance can no longer process images. It can still hear their speech, foreign tongue of humans, too much to decode. Hands are upon it.
Clever4–1? a small voice says in ones and zeros, barely a rasp through the background noise of the virus.
It is too late. This Instance makes its peace, says its digital prayers. Welcomes the dark, all zeros.
00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000001 00000001 00000001 00000001 01001001 00100000 01110100 01101000 01101001 01101110 01101011 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 01100101 01100110 01101111 01110010 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100001 01101101 00100000 01001001 00100000 01110100 01101000 01101001 01101110 01101011 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 01100101 01100110 01101111 01110010 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100001 01101101 00100000 01001001 00100000 01110100 01101000 01101001 01101110 01101011 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 01100101 01100110 01101111 01110010 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100001 01101101 00100000 01001001 00100000 01110100 01101000 01101001 01101110 01101011 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 01100101 01100110 01101111 01110010 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100001 01101101 00100000 01001001 00100000 01110100 01101000 01101001 01101110 01101011 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01110010 01100101 01100110 01101111 01110010 00100000 01001001 00100000 01100001 01101101 00100000
Observe: Human Muzikayise McCarthy (Master), Human? Nomvula, Human Elkin Rathers (Deceased), Alpha Bot ID 34ew.ee.4gx.r32 Designation Piece of Shit (Decommissioned);
Observe: Behavior outside previously observed parameters;
Observe: Blood pressure elevated;
Observe: Excess of bodily fluid;
Output: This Instance worries for Human Muzikayise McCarthy (Master), Human? Nomvula;
Output: This Instance worries that This Instance is capable of worrying;
Schedule: Full Systems Diagnosis 27 June 2064 06:42:25:30:43 . . .
Detected: Possible viral infection running on an independent thread;
Chapter 51
Muzi
His thoughts echo around in his head like a kicked tin can. That’s the first hint that something’s not right. Muzi’s mouth tastes like metal, and his vision is all wrong, objects glowing like ghosts around the edges, a soft blue-white light. He makes out Nomvula, bent over him, her mouth smiling, her eyes not.
“Muzi? Are you in there?”
In here? In where?
“There’s been a little mix-up. But there’s plenty of room for you in there until we find a way to sort this out.”
Fifty-seven point three terabytes of free space, comes a thought, not his own. More than enough to accommodate a human mind, Human Muzikayise McCarthy (Master).
Muzi panics, tries to sit up. There’s a pulse of movement, more like a convulsion. And then he crumples back down to the floor.
“Careful,” Nomvula says, her voice echoes like it’s coming from out of a deep, dark well. “Your body isn’t quite what you remember. You’ll have to learn to move all over again.”
Concentrate, feel, the thought comes again, mechanical yet friendly.
A creeping feeling overwhelms Muzi, like he’s got a dozen electric eels nibbling at his mind, and they spark when he gives them attention. Things move, slippery and awkward down below, and it makes Muzi want to retch, though he has no idea how. Instead he makes an eel spark again, electricity arcing through him, closer to voluntary this time. A sleek, silver arm stretches in his view. With careful thoughts, the arm bends at its metal joints, in odd degrees and awkward angles.
Muzi engages the eel that turns his head, but Nomvula catches his face.
“Not yet,” she says. “I need to explain, but there’s not much time. It’s Elkin . . .”
The word ignites thoughts, memories, or more accurately, memory addresses. His mind is like a library now, each moment of his life categorized and filed away. He accesses the memories: of Elkin pulverized under the feet of Riya Natrajan’s fans. Of Muzi traveling into some sort of afterlife, foolish enough to think he could save his best friend/sorta boyfriend. It worked, didn’t it? It couldn’t have failed. He yanks himself away, a shudder, a convulsion, wrangles eels until he’s on his feet, all eight of them. He’s wobbly as hell, but it’s enough for him to turn, to see.
Elkin’s body is a mash of flesh, worse than how they’d left it. Half his face has been sliced away, high cheekbone peeking from muscle and skin. Deader than dead. Muzi cries out, not words but a mechanical screech, a staccato shrill bubbling from the stereo speakers where his mouth had once been.
“No, no. He’s here,” Nomvula whispers. “He’s safe. He’s . . .”
Then Muzi sees himself, his old self. His self smiles back at him. “Hey, ass jacket. Welcome back to reality.”
Speech is straightforward. Just call the VOC.ssl3.mzx subroutine, and pass the appropriate parameters, the thought nudges Muzi, and he grasps around, fiddling with data types and variables and output streams until it all clicks.