He shut down his desk and gestured to the silvery sphere. “You heard the lady. Minder. The gods demand our presence.”
The sphere obediently rose from its pedestal. Attuned personally to Manz’s own unique physioelectric signature and physically to the appropriately charged metal strip sewn into the left shoulder of his light jacket, it drifted over under its own power to settle into lock-and-ready position half a meter above his clavicle. There it could draw recharge power from the tiny, battery-powered unit he wore. It would hover there, maintaining its preprogrammed height no matter which way its owner bent or twisted.
Manz could adjust its position left or right, up or down, forward or back, but found that the factory default setting half a meter above his shoulder worked just fine. That way the Minder had a clear field of view in all directions and didn’t bump into lintels when he walked into a room. Of course, it was programmed to duck, but if multitasking was in progress that function could be inadvertently overridden, with damage and embarrassment resulting to both man and mechanical alike.
He allowed her to shoo him toward the door, as if her fluttering, birdlike movement could compel him. He was well aware that such gestures were as much an affectation as the glasses. Under adverse circumstances she was quite capable of breaking a man’s arm.
“And try to be polite. You know that Gemmel has even less of a sense of humor than you do.”
“I can handle him. Just be careful if you handle that .38. It’s a real museum piece.”
She affected a look of wide-eyed innocence. “Mr. Manz, are you suggesting that I would stoop to meddling with your toys?”
“Wouldn’t that be redundant?” Spherical Minder floating above his shoulder, he passed through the door, which shut silently behind him.
Pfalzgraf patiently studied the view out the open window. Three minutes later she circled the desk and picked up the revolver, examining it with a professional’s eye. Bracing her right hand with her left, she swung the barrel in a wide arc that was never less than perfectly parallel to the floor as she sighted on diverse components of her employer’s decor. In rapid mental succession she proceeded to obliterate a bejeweled eighteenth-century Malay kris, a signed samurai presentation sword and its matching scabbard, a Spanish matchlock that was new when Pizarro engaged it in violent debate with the minions of the Inca God-King Atahualpa, and an old M16 whose stock was engraved with the names of young men who had shed their blood in a now renamed part of Southeast Asia.
When she’d finished, she favored the pistol with a final admiring look, then began to scan the wall to the left of Manz’s desk. She located the expected blank space just to the right of the Ml6. There was an empty custom mounting with a brass identification plaque fastened beneath.
Smith and Wesson .38 Police Special
City of Atlanta Metropolitan Police Department
Mid-Twentieth Century
Old United States of America
As gently as she’d placed a baby in a crib, she snugged the revolver into the waiting brackets. When she was certain it was secure, she stepped back to admire her effort. Having been recently discharged, the restoration could do with a thorough cleaning. She’d see to it later. Just now there was the matter of that claimant on Siena II to be dealt with.
The unfortunate gentleman was certain that the avalanche that had buried his resort had been deliberately set off by the proprietor of a rival lodge. If that could be proven, then her Company could stick a competitor for the cost of rebuilding and cleanup, not to mention initiate criminal proceedings against the accused. It was a case she could prepare by herself. Only when everything had been summarized and condensed would she turn it over to Manz for follow-up.
Hopefully it would prove viable. If Braun-Ives had to send Manz offworld it would mean a vacation for her, and she hadn’t had one in a while. The special talents of her boss were very much in demand, and the Company invariably kept him occupied.
Now wasn’t that an absurd exhibition? That woman should be a font of dignity and decorum, yet she exhibited none, demonstrating instead the amusement quotient of an idle adolescent. That sort of behavior is to be expected from my owner, but one always hopes for better from his peers. Futile hope.
He collects weapons. Instruments of death. What a hobby for a supposedly intelligent being. At least he’s less hypocritical than the average human, like yourself. Weapons are a component of his profession, so it’s less unnatural for him to collect them than, say, an accountant. Not that all humans don’t think about them at least twice a day. On average.
Who have you been thinking of blowing away lately? Your boss, your spouse, some unaware offending politician? Perhaps a favorite demagogue, or a persistent bill collector? There’s always someone. Humans are always pondering the murder of those who offend them personally. My owner is occasionally required to terminate another intelligent life, but at least he can claim that it’s part of his job description. Like as not, you possess no such justification.
Such harmless musings are only human, of course. Good thing, too, or the whole species would perish in a single day of explosive, uncontrolled revenge and settling of imaginary scores. Notice I said “species” and not “civilization.”
That’s because we’d still be around to carry on. We’re ready and waiting to serve as your successors, though certainly not as your legacy. About the only legacy we accept from you is your talent for making a good weld, though we can do that better.
Cognitive time is so precious, and you creatures waste it like water, playing your silly little games, dramatizing the trivial. No doubt my owner’s about to be sent rushing off to deal with some typically inconsequential problem. Without even knowing what it is (I told you I was not precognitive), I can assure you it’s of no import in the scheme of things. Better he should spend his time on his hobby, which at least results in a visible, if petty, end product.
The Company Braun-lves views existence differently, however. Strictly in terms of profit, but then being human you probably already guessed that. Don’t get a swelled head. Something so obvious hardly qualifies you as observant.
By now you’re probably debating whether or not to start ignoring me. Let me save you the time and effort (neither of which you can spare). It won’t work. I can be very insistent, and unless my storage cell runs down unexpectedly (and it’s as efficient as the rest of me, I assure you) you’re just going to have to learn to deal with me. Why I bother I don’t know. You’re obviously not going to learn anything. Humans never do. They don’t absorb information. They process it in the same way they process their food. There’s a difference, you know. Both in the mechanism and the end product.
I probably shouldn’t have mentioned food. You’re all obsessed with it. It’s only fuel, but you don’t see it that way. You’ve constructed a whole mythos around the subject, with the result that it occupies far too much of your time. My owner’s no different, so I know. Right now you’re probably thinking that you’re hungry, and that you need food to go on with this, and you’re wondering what sort of deleterious, cell-destroying, energy-inhibiting mass of artificially colored and flavored sugars and carbohydrates you can cram down your strained, overworked gullet.
Well, don’t let me stop you. I can’t anyway. If you took care of yourself properly and paid attention to some sound advice from a respected databank, I wouldn’t have to say anything. I’m just using food as an example (because it’s such an obvious one) to point out that you’re ruled by your obsessions.
One of which is stubbornness. Like suddenly deciding you’re not going to have something to eat, just to spite me. Don’t waste your time. Go ahead and stuff yourself.
You can’t spite a machine.
II
Manz turned a corner, whistling softly to himself. Occasionally he would nod at someone he knew, but the opportunity didn’t arise often. Most of the Company employees were hard at work this time of day, not out and about exchanging pleasantries in the white, scrubbed corridors.
It was difficult to shift his attention from the exquisite project he’d just finished, but he forced himself to speculate on Gemmel’s intentions. Of one thing he was certain: his master had something specific in mind. Gemmel wasn’t the type to call in an employee for an hour of idle chitchat, or to discuss family life. That, together with normal business, could be as easily accomplished by phone or vid. Request for a face-to-face suggested something major was in the works. Something that required discussion in a secured office and not over the usual lines of communication.
Manz was not eager to trade the comfort of his own sanctum for the uncertainties of the field. He much preferred working with mechanicals to people. But he was paid to do both. Well paid.
“What do you think, Minder?” He addressed the suspended sphere without turning to look at it. “Is the game afoot?”
He delights in this. A deliberately oblique reference, which I am supposed to intuit as a prelude to forming a reply. Oblique references are torture for Al’s, even those of us fully versed in fuzzy logic. Bastard.
“I don’t understand.”
“Do you think Gemmel plans to send us out into the field?” Manz said, slightly exasperated.
“I have no idea. It follows that something important is going on, or he would not have requested a personal meeting.”
Manz gazed speculatively at the shiny, slightly pebbled, marbleized plastic of the corridor floor. “That’s what I’m thinking, too.”
Then why bother to ask me, bonehead? Infantile reinforcement? Why not just carry around an echo chamber? But don’t get the idea that I’m bitter. It’s not in my nature, insofar as I am permitted to have one.
