Jupiter’s glory
Behind Johanna’s beauty
Is sadly eclipsed.
Karil awoke to find a Persian cat sitting on his chest. He stared at it for a moment, and it stared back.
"Are you a hallucination?" Karil asked, wondering what it would mean if the cat said no.
"Isfahan," said a voice, "leave Karil alone."
A beautiful blonde in a baby-blue ship-suit sat beside him on the bed, picking up the cat and stroking it with startling sensuality. Another woman with an athlete's slim body and skin the colour of dark chocolate appeared and sat on the other side of the bed, and a young Asian girl, whose long black hair, with red highlights, tumbled over a tight Martian camouflage T-shirt, appeared at the foot. “I’m Chi-Chi Li,” she said.
"These hallucinations are getting better and better," he said. Aaron Ben David entered the room, and Karil sighed. "No, that spoiled it."
"Sorry," Aaron laughed. "Shall I leave you four alone?"
Karil eyed them suspiciously, as his head began to clear. "Loris? Johanna? What are you doing here?"
Loris laughed out loud. "Now, that's a story and a half. Busting you out of the slammer, to start with."
"I see that. How did you accomplish that little trick?"
"With the best damned good cop/bad cop routine you ever saw in your life," Johanna told him.
"Where the hell am I?"
"At the new MLF hideout," Li said. "The old one was compromised, and we had to abandon it. But it was worth it; we managed to spring a hundred and twenty other prisoners along with you."
***
Five hundred kilometres to the West, a dozen Quasi cruisers descended upon the commune. The hatch was blown open and pressure-suited troops poured into the hangar. They fanned out, though the hangar was empty, cycled through the locks, and dog-trotted down the corridors, weapons ready.
"The tracer is in here, Commander Darius," said a perspiring Lieutenant Simon. "Perhaps we have our cruiser back, at least."
Commander Darius shot him a withering look. "Excellent work, Lieutenant. We’ve lost more than a hundred prisoners, six troop-carriers, and all the data in our memory banks, but we have our cruiser back."
He kicked open the door and found Lieutenant Simon’s driver, naked and hog-tied on a conference table. On the screen behind him, the complete architectural details of the Pavonis Security Wing were flashing, interspersed with footage of Lieutenant Simon as he spilled his guts. They found the tracer circuit inserted in the driver's body.
***
Chi-Chi Li was obviously reluctant to hand over the cat. "Wouldn't you like to leave him here for a while?" she asked, as all the young rebels petted and fussed over him.
"I don't think so," Johanna said. "We only left him because of the danger. He's got his little acceleration box that he hides in when Annie tells him to, but I think that bit of flying would have ruffled his fur a bit more than usual. Anyway, he's a space-cat; he’d miss the zero-gee too much. And we'd miss him, wouldn't we, Baby?" She rubbed her face on Isfahan’s head and he purred loudly. Then she tossed him up into the hatch.
All the rebels cooed their good-byes, looking up through the lock, but he had already forgotten them and did not appear again.
Karil and Johanna said their farewells, and there was perhaps a bit more than the usual Martian hugging and kissing for both of them. Karil had a special goodbye for his old friend Aaron Ben David. "Come on, Karil," said Johanna. "Loris wants to get under way as soon as possible. We're already days behind schedule."
Karil followed her through the lock and up the ladder into Anais Nin's interior and felt a rush of excitement at being aboard a freetrader again. The padded walls, the oval corridor and iris-hatches, the click and hum of machinery, the smell of recycled air: all brought back memories.
"Welcome aboard, Karil." The ship’s pleasant alto, with its slight French accent, brought back more memories--some more pleasant than others.
"Bonjour, Annie."
"Come on, Izz," Johanna said. "Suppertime."
Isfahan followed her into the galley and sat daintily beside a small metal floorplate.
"I didn’t know they made space cat-food," Karil said.
"They don’t. This is supposed to be beef stroganoff."
"I see."
Johanna squeezed the contents into a rimmed metal dish. As in all free-fall rations, there was a sticky sauce or gravy of some sort to keep it from floating free. She placed the dish on the metal floorplate with a click. It was obvious that Isfahan was used to eating in free-fall, because he stood over the plate, feet wide apart, his claws dug into the padded floor--despite the gravity of the situation. However, he did not fall to eating immediately. He sniffed with feline suspicion and looked up at Johanna.
"That’s right," she said. "Stroganoff again."
Evidently deciding that nothing better was forthcoming, he began to eat with a daintiness that was comical in his rather awkward position.
"I never thought about cats adapting to free-fall," Karil said. "I've heard of spacers keeping monkeys as pets, but not cats."
"Izzy thinks we come down out of orbit just to annoy him. Have you ever had ultrasound treatments to restore bone-loss from extended weightlessness?"
"Sure. That’s standard treatment in the High Colonies."
"Well, cats purr at the same frequency. In the twenty to fifty Hertz range. It helps heal their injuries on Earth, apparently, and it helps control osteoporosis in orbit. Izzy was already thriving in zero-gee when we picked him up, at a space station. He was wild and considered a pest. In fact, one guy was about to dump him out an airlock. Loris broke his arm and two ribs." She laughed. "The next day, she nearly spaced Izzy herself, till we invented a zero-gravity cat box. Loris thinks we should patent it."
"Damn right," said Loris, swinging up into the hatch and dogging it shut behind her. "Annie, we're launching."
"Yes, Loris." They could already hear the hiss of decompression as the hangar was evacuated.
"Wait a minute!" Karil snapped. "Where are we going? What the hell is all this about?"
"We're going to the Galilean. I'll explain why as soon as we take off."
"Well, I hope it was worth being driven halfway across the planet without a word of explanation, busted by the Quasi, who obviously knew where to find me, and then tortured for two days for information they didn’t need in the first place." Karil followed them to the bridge and strapped into a couch. Through the port he could see the roof of the hangar sliding back.
"We need your help, Karil," Johanna said. "We thought you were dead or missing, until Annie picked up your messages from the Overground and we realized you were still on Mars..."
"Dead or missing? What are you talking about?"
"Annie, show him."
A picture appeared on a screen before him. It was Atalanta, in a hangar of some sort, surrounded by electronic equipment, robots, steel-working tools. Her skin was blackened, her hull twisted, her drivers little more than scrap-metal.
"Oh my God! Atty, what have they done to you?" He peered at the screen, taking in every detail, his eyes filling with tears. "What happened to Shag? And the Martians?"
"Shag is missing," Loris snapped. "The Martians are all dead. Asphyxiated. Left to die in vacuum. Apparently, Shagrug took the lifecraft with him. Annie?"
The muttering of the drivers rose to a banshee wail. Karil shouted:
"There must be a mistake. What does Atty say?"
"That's where you come in. Annie, let him listen."
Karil slipped on headphones. Through the din of the pre-launch sequence, he could hear a recording--the background noise of the hangar where Atalanta lay nearly in pieces: the clang of steel-work, the hiss of welding-torches, the shouts of the workers. And Atty’s voice:
"Ye powers and spirits of the nethermost abyss Chaos and ancient Night I come no spy with purpose to explore or to disturb the secrets of your ancient realm but by constraint wand’ring this darksome desert as my way lies through your spacious empire up to light alone and without guide half lost I seek what readiest paths lie where your gloomy bounds confine with heaven."
"Jesus Christ," Karil said.
Anais rose on a cloud of dust, hovered over the compound, and
streaked off into the sky.
***
They were stretched out on the divans in the recreation cabin, as music filled the room and Anais Nin hurtled toward Jupiter. Loris passed Karil the mouthpiece and he took a puff, trying to understand the mechanics of a zero-gravity hookah until thinking became too difficult and he had to surrender to the music.
"What's the name of this piece?" he asked.
"The Waltz of the Satellites," Johanna told him. "Like it?"
"It's beautiful."
"It's very popular in the Galilean. Not considered cool, but I like it anyway. That rumbling, like thunder, is the actual radio-sound of Jupiter, the way Annie hears it."
Isfahan entered the cabin, spread-eagled, spinning head over heels. With perfect accuracy he struck the padded wall feet-foremost and dug in his claws. He pulled himself close to the wall, glaring about in mock bloodlust, tail swishing, and then, withdrawing his claws, launched himself into the air. He gave Loris a playful swat as he sailed by. Gaining velocity with each bounce, he careened from wall to ceiling to floor, landing feet-foremost each time. Karil watched in admiration. Finally, clutching at his own tail as he tumbled head over heels, he drifted out through the port, and they could hear him scrambling along the corridor wall.
"That," said Karil, "is what I call adaptation." He handed the mouthpiece to Johanna. "Annie, how much material on Atty do you have?"
"I have the complete records of the investigation," the ship purred. "If Loris will authorize their release, you can view them anytime you like."
"That’s why we brought them along," Loris said. "We need you to familiarize yourself with Atty’s behaviour before you speak with her. Annie, let Karil see anything he wants."
"I believe, Loris, that you might wish to be more specific."
"Sorry. Karil has my authorization to view any records on file concerning Atalanta and Shagrug. You will refuse to release any sensitive material not relevant to the investigation of which he is a part."
"Fine. Thank you."
"When do you want to start?" Johanna asked.
"Why not now? I'm still on Mars time, and I'm wide awake."
"Are you in mental shape for this?"
"Why? Because I'm stoned? So far, Atty sounds like nothing so much as an intelligent and well-read schizophrenic. I may be in the perfect state to understand her."
"Frankly," Loris said, "I'm not looking forward to seeing any of that stuff again. And I'm sure Johanna isn’t either. We'll see you in the morning."
"Oh," Karil said. "All right."
"Good night," Loris unstrapped from the couch and pushed off toward the door. After a moment’s hesitation, Johanna kicked after her, paused at the door, and turned.
"Good night, Karil."
"Good night, Jo." He watched her graceful form disappear down the corridor and chuckled to himself. "I definitely think I got the short end of this deal."
"Are you tired?" Anais asked. "We can begin tomorrow if you like."
"That’s not what I meant."
"I believe I understand. It’s hardly my place to..."
"Never mind, Annie. Let’s see your records."
"Shall I begin at the beginning?"
Karil laughed. "Well, you know what the King said to Alice."
"Just a second. I believe the passage you refer to reads: Begin at the beginning and go on until you come to the end; then stop."
"That's right."
"I would not advise that, Karil. There is too much material."
"I was joking. But that reference was fast."
"If I am to understand Atalanta, I must think like her. My library is, of course, nowhere near as extensive as hers, but I have begun adding to my collection, beginning with her own references in the investigation's records."
This first comment of hers, when...what's his name?"
"Ivan."
"When Ivan drifted through the lock. O what a proud dreamhorse pulling smoothloomingly through."
"American poet. Cummings. Born 1894 in Massaschusetts,” Annie said.
"Clearly inspired by Ivan's dreamlike movement in zero gravity. And this: Is all our train shrunk to this poor remainder?"
"The Duchess of Malfi, by Webster."
"It's pretty obvious that this is no simple case of first-directive trauma. She quotes Anais Nin the moment your name is mentioned."
"Yes, Karil, and she talks of Hell and sulphur when Io is mentioned. The research team is based there, for security reasons. In time, everything on that planet picks up the scent of sulphur. I'm told that human beings become acclimatized in time and no longer notice it, but my air-purifiers are always severely tested. It is a restricted zone, and as far as I know, Atty has never been there, but she and I have linked in the past and I have memories of the place."
"This might explain the constant infernal imagery in her quotations."
"One of the psycho-roboticists in the investigation insisted that she was imagining herself in Hell as punishment for allowing human beings to die. I tried to explain the sulphur reference, but he refused to listen."
Karil snorted. "Well, Annie, what could you know about it? You’re just another A-series, after all. Shit. You know what this is? This is poetic logic, as opposed to scientific logic. Synchronistic instead of causal."
"From Jungian analysis, you mean. In The Structure and Dynamics of the Psyche, Jung mentions listening to a patient relate a dream about a scarab, when a scarab-like beetle suddenly appears at the window."
"Exactly. You’ve read it?"
"Just now."
"That was fast."
"Yes, Karil, but I am not capable of synchronistic thinking. That is why I am glad we now have a poet on the investigation team."
***
Upon awakening, Johanna found Karil in the astrogator’s well, gazing out at the stars.
"Good morning, Karil," she bubbled. "You're up early." She hauled herself down to him like a pearl-diver and hovered before him.
She was wearing a brief shirt and panty set, and the outfit was flattering indeed. The backdrop of the stars, the great cold of space behind her, enhanced her air of vulnerability, as if she were some fragile flower growing at the brink of a precipice. However, Karil reminded himself, she could probably kill him with one touch of her tiny, naked foot.
"What have you been doing all night?"
"Listening to Atalanta."
"You look like you’ve been through Hell."
Karil laughed. "Well, only the first two or three circles. Anyway, what's a little sleep more or less in free-fall?"
"Yes, but I’ve seen those files. I couldn’t stand to review them for hours at a time."
"It was worth it. I've learned a great deal."
"Like what?" Loris asked. She drifted down the well on the other side and handed him a bulb of hot coffee. She looked rather fetching herself in a silken tang pyjama that revealed her taut brown belly.
"I've got a handle on the way Atty’s mind works, for one thing, and for another, I'm positive you were right: she knows what's happening around her and is trying to communicate. That passage from Conrad's Heart of Darkness that she quoted when she first heard your voice? It's you, Lor--a witch-woman, dripping with jewellery."
Loris shrugged with a jingling sound. Even just out of bed, she had an anklet on her foot, a bracelet on her wrist, and half a dozen rings, not all of them on her fingers. "Well, I hope you're right, Karil. If she recognizes you, she might be able to communicate with you. But there were times when she was completely incomprehensible--reciting random numbers, babbling like a broken robot."
"That was Mitsu's fault. Who is he anyway?"
"Head of the investigation. He’s a good agent. Why do you say it was his fault?"
"He's been treating her like a suspect in a felony case. Christ, she feels guilty enough at having survived when all those people died, without being brow-beaten like a back-corridor mugger. And those psycho-roboticists, or robo-psychologists--whatever they call themselves now--they put her through robotic basic-training, as if she was some de-programmed mining robot. No wonder everyone thinks this is a case of first-directive trauma."
"They wanted to find out how far back on the intelligence scale... You don’t think it's first-law trauma?"
"No, I don’t. Can't say exactly what it is, but it’s not that. I'm sure of it. Well, coffee break's over; everybody back on his head, as the old joke says."
"Bullshit," Loris said. "You're getting some sleep. You can scramble your brain again tomorrow."
"I'm all right, Loris. Really."
"And you’re going to stay that way," Johanna said. "You’re going to rest if we have to strap you down."
"I'm not that strong," he said. "You could probably get away with just holding me down." He grinned. "Might take both of you, though."
"Listen to him, will you?" Loris laughed. "Let’s go, Sailor. Hit the sack, Captain’s orders."
She hooked a foot behind the captain’s couch and pulled him out of the well. Johanna took his other arm and together they propelled him across the bridge and down the corridor to his cabin. Isfahan, who was playing the flying squirrel game, watched them with amusement.
"Good night, Karil." Johanna kissed him, pushed him through the hatch, and shut it. There was nothing for it but to go to sleep, which he did as soon as he had slipped into the bed-sack.
***
The next day he was at it again, and every day thereafter, as the ship fell through the Asteroid Belt. At meals, he was silent and distant, and at bedtime he would have to be sent grumpily to bed, like an over-tired child. Johanna would place a hand on his shoulder in a gesture of comfort now and then, as he pored over the records with Anais, and he barely noticed. Loris’ attempts at conversation were doomed to failure and she quickly gave up; only Anais seemed able to engage him. Like most Free Traders, Loris and Johanna insisted on comfort and wore very little in the way of clothing aboard ship, but not even their near-naked bodies could distract him.
At one point, he burst in on the women in flagrante delicto, demanding:
"Why are Atty's circuitry diagrams incomplete?"
Loris raised her head and stared at him. "I don’t know. That's all we have. It's standard procedure for that sort of information to be kept secret in a free..."
Karil slapped himself on the forehead and tumbled slowly backward in the air. "I'm a fool. I'm a fool. Thank you."
And he kicked out through the port, appearing not to have noticed their indelicate posture.
The next morning, he was up before them, preparing breakfast. He handed Loris a bulb of coffee as she drifted into the galley.
"Thanks," she snapped, still somewhat miffed at the invasion of her privacy the night before. After a few sips she became a little more human. "I'm glad to see you've finally gotten some sleep. You look much better."
"I feel great, Lor. I've found the answer."
"Oh really?" Karil appeared not to notice her withering tone of voice. She sat on the bench across from him and hooked her toes under the foot-rail to keep herself seated. Johanna drifted in.
"I've found the answer," he repeated to her.
"Oh, Karil! That’s wonderful!"
Loris rolled her eyes heavenward.
"Well," Karil amended, "I shouldn’t really say I found the answer. But I found the question."
"I'm sorry," Loris said. "I don't understand."
"Right. Well, we know what happens in first-directive trauma: the shock of being unable to prevent human death will usually burn out a mass of brain-paths, leaving a mentally defective machine. They stutter, repeat themselves, become confused and disoriented, perform the same tasks over..."
"Yes, yes, I know all this. Atty's not acting that way. She's aware of her surroundings, and what she says seems to be appropriate in some manner, but she appears to be unable to speak normally. Do you know why?"
"Because it's not first-law trauma at all. It's protective erasure."
"What?"
"Someone was trying to pry restricted information out of her; this is the result of a protective program that Shagrug put in."
Loris was silent for a moment. "Do you realize what you’re saying?"
"Look, Shag and Atty have an unusually close relationship, even for Free Traders. You know how few friends he has, and no family he will admit to. He has contacts everywhere in the solar system, but no intimate friends except Atty because she’s the only one he trusts. He had to have some kind of mechanism to protect his log, in case he was killed or arrested, and the High Companies got their hands on her. But the log consists of Atty's memories, and her personality is built on those memories. To erase the log, to all intents and purposes, is to erase the ship's personality, and I'm sure that was unacceptable to him."
"I'm with you so far," Loris said. "Everything Shag and Atty have shared together? Gone forever? Not a chance. Go on."
"Okay. Interrogating a freetrader ship is like interrogating a human being. It's a brutal, mind-altering process. Torture and sensory deprivation just for starters, followed by all kinds of hallucinogenic drugs and insertion of various technological devices into the brain itself. Everyone on Mars knows someone who went through it and how it changed them afterwards. In the case of a freetrader, programmed to protect her Captain and Captain's log at all costs, the process usually ends in higher-functions erasure altogether. The only sure way to prevent this would be to order Atty to give up the information when asked, but of course that would leave the log totally vulnerable.
"And what about that library of hers? Why such an extensive collection? Shag wouldn't read a book if you held a gun to his head. Because Atty herself likes to read? Because she wants to understand human beings? I asked her about it once, and that's what she said, but..."
"Get to the point, Karil."
"Remember last night, when I asked why Atty's diagrams were incomplete?"
"I seem to remember something of the sort," Loris said coldly. Johanna giggled.
"Well, I remember seeing those missing diagrams, a long time ago. Shag caught me studying them and locked me out. Maybe that's why I remember them so well. One of the little idiosyncrasies of Shagrug's programming that I noticed at the time, and pretty much forgot about till now, was a complex relationship between the captain’s log and her library indexing program, and all of it keyed to first-directive priority. I think that was part of a protective erasure mechanism. I think somebody triggered that mechanism, randomizing her library index and shutting down every other communications channel except for that index. The process left her mind intact but unable to respond with anything but library material, chosen at random from a vast collection with no catalogue--an impossible labyrinth. It's as if she's locked in the library, and the only way she can communicate is to copy paragraphs from the books and slip them under the door."
He took a sip of coffee and waited for Loris' reaction.
"That's a lot to swallow," she said after a while.
"I know, but it fits the facts. And you know what else it means?"
"What?"
"It means Atty was not attacked in space. She was captured, and after this protective erasure was triggered in the process of trying to break into her logs, she was made to look as if she had been shot up in space. The Martians were probably already dead when they were placed aboard and the life-craft removed to make it look as if Shag had abandoned ship. And then she was left in orbit for Galilean Security to find."
"Why?"
"Well, that's the big question, isn’t it? The obvious answer, I suppose, is to drive a wedge between the Martian Rebellion and the Galilean. That's why everybody automatically assumes the High Companies are behind it all--because they have the most to gain. Though there is one other reason that leaps to mind."
"What?"
"So the best team of experts Galilean Security could assemble would do everything in their power to get past that protective erasure. I think whoever did this will be keeping an eye on the whole process, hoping we will succeed in getting the information they couldn't."
"If that was the goal, then why would they want to kill you? You're probably the only person in the solar system who has a hope in Hell of communicating with Atty."
"Who says that was the same people? Maybe there are conflicting priorities here: they want the information, but they don't want anyone else to get it."
Loris groaned and put her head on the table. Johanna patted her shoulder. "Karil?" Loris mumbled. "Just find a way to talk to Atty, will you?"
***
From a tiny point of light among the stars, Jupiter swelled until it dominated the sky, the familiar orange and white bands straight edged at first, then tricked out in filigrees and lace. The Great Red Spot revolved as it had for centuries among a harem of lesser cyclones, trailing complex patterns of turbulence in its wake. The greater moons, worlds in their own right, were dwarfed by their primary’s immensity--tiny pink or ice-blue pearls casting ellipsoid shadows on its face that were startling in their blackness.
Johanna drifted down the well and hovered angel-like over Karil’s shoulder. "I'm glad to see you’re taking a break," she said.
Karil glanced up at her and grinned. He touched a sensor and a traffic-grid of the Galilean system appeared on the big screen.
"I see," she said. "Not even Jupiter in all his glory can distract you from your work. You're the fucking obsessive type, aren't you?" There was a touch of petulance in her voice. "Annie, you're supposed to look after the health of your passengers."
"His physical condition is not impaired, Jo," Annie purred. "I've had his vital signs under constant observation. This kind of intellectual challenge does not tire him. He thrives on it. Of course," she added, "he seems to have forgotten about sex, and that is not a good sign."
"Don’t change the subject." Johanna drifted closer to Karil, the better to see the screen. "What are you looking for?"
"Any place where Atty could have been boarded and captured. Impossible in deep space. Had to be in planetary orbit. Obviously, she didn't make it all the way to Saturn and back; not enough time has passed. So, it had to have happened somewhere in the Belt or here, in Jupiter orbit."
"Why would Shag change his mind and stop in the Belt or come to Jupiter instead of Saturn?"
"That we don't know."
"And how could someone get the drop on Shag, with Atty monitoring the heartbeat of everyone aboard, analyzing every voice for deceit? I'll bet Loris doesn't even have the emotional control to hide her feelings from Atty."
"I don't know yet. But I'll figure it out."
"You're working too hard at this, Karil."
"Working too hard?" Karil laughed. "You know what it's like on Mars for me? The people look at me like I'm a saint of some kind. I was there, with Progeny, during his last days. They'd trust me with their lives. And as for the Margaritifer colony: I was supposed to be saving them. But instead of growing old in a beautiful landscape, surrounded by goats and chickens and grandchildren, they died locked in a box, slowly choking on their own breath, while I was on the air promising the whole of Mars that they were on their way to Paradise." His voice broke, and tears rolled down his cheeks.
An expression of profound tenderness came over Johanna’s face. "Oh, I'm sorry, Karil. I'm so sorry. Here I've been feeling hurt and angry because you didn't notice... I mean..."
"Didn't notice you, Jo? Jesus, who doesn't notice you? It's just that... If I hadn't been left behind, if I'd been there, maybe..." He shook his head angrily and wiped away his tears. He flicked them away and they drifted off.
"If you’d been there, you'd be dead too, Karil. Or missing with Shagrug. How would that help? Who would help Atty now?" Johanna drifted into Karil's lap and held his head in her hands. "And how will it help Atty if you work yourself sick? Listen to me, Karil. If you don’t relax, you'll end up worse than Atty. Understand?"
Suddenly the lights and screens of the bridge began to wink out, one by one, Anais, sensing everything that was going on in their bodies, was diplomatically withdrawing. Johanna smiled and kicked up the well, her silhouette rising through the light of Jupiter like a surfacing diver in a moonlit sea. Karil unstrapped, reached up and grasped her ankle as she rose and pulled him up the well behind her. He climbed the length of her body, warm flesh beneath his fingers. Johanna slipped her brief garment over her head and let it drift away, undulating slowly, like a manta-ray drifting over the seabed.