A Closed and Common Orbit (Wayfarers #2)(36)
Sidra thought this as she pushed through the topside markets, fighting her directive to take note of every face, every sound, every colour. Three tendays at Port Coriol, and being outside of walls was still absolute chaos. Perhaps that feeling would never go away. Perhaps this was how it would always be.
She dodged a merchant pushing a sample platter of candies her way. She didn’t make eye contact, didn’t reply. It was rude, and she felt guilty, which made her all the angrier. Guilt was what had made her choose to be in this stupid body in the first place.
Why had she left? At the time, it had seemed like the best course, the cleanest option. She had come into existence where another mind should have been. She wasn’t what the Wayfarer crew was expecting, or hoping for. Her presence upset them, and that meant she had to go. That was why she’d left – not because she’d wanted to, not because she’d truly understood what it would mean, but because the crew was upset, and she was the reason for it. She’d left for the sake of people she’d never met. She’d left for the sake of a stranger crying in a cargo bay. She’d left because it was in her design to be accommodating, to put others first, to make everyone else comfortable, no matter what.
But what of her comfort? What about that? Would the eight people who no longer had to hear her voice every day find this to be a fair trade, if they knew how she felt out here? Would they care if they knew this existence wasn’t right? Would they not have acclimatised to her, just as they had presumably acclimatised to the absence of her predecessor?
She fought to keep the kit’s eyes on the ground, struggled to keep the kit’s breath steady. She could feel panic creeping as the crowd pressed in and the buildings sprawled forever outward. She remembered how the ship had felt – a camera in every hallway, a vox in every room, the lull of open space embracing it all. She remembered the vacuum, and she ached for it.
‘Hey!’ an angry voice said. Sidra looked down, and saw that she’d blundered into the path of a Harmagian’s cart, just a step away from knocking him and his trailer of packages over. ‘What’s the matter with you?’ he demanded, tendrils flexing irritably.
Oh no, don’t, she thought, but it was a direct question, and she had no choice but to respond. ‘The market is exhausting, I hate this body, I acted like an ass toward the friend who’s taking care of me, and I regret the decision that brought me here.’
The Harmagian’s tendrils went slack with bewilderment. ‘I . . .’ His eyestalks twitched. ‘Well, ah . . . watch where you’re going while you sort that out.’ He manoeuvred the cart around her, continuing on his way.
The kit shut its eyes tight. Stupid, stupid honesty protocol. That part of herself, at least, she was anxious to delete. Pepper was trying, she knew. She’d seen her frowning at her scrib late at night, muttering as she dragged herself through the basics of Lattice. Code was not Pepper’s strong suit, but she was firmly against seeking outside help, and Sidra couldn’t argue that point. But in the meantime, how was she supposed to function in a place like this? She couldn’t, was the answer. She had no business being out among sapients, masquerading as one of them. She wasn’t one of them, and she couldn’t even keep up that pretence while walking through a crowd. How long until someone asked her a question that would get Pepper and Blue in trouble? No, no, dammit – a question that would get her in trouble. Would she ever start thinking of herself first? Could she even?
She looked around the street, full of strangers and unknown questions. She couldn’t be out here. She wasn’t meant for out here.
She ran for the nearest quick-travel kiosk. A grotesque approximation of a Harmagian head was mounted on the desk, just like all the other kiosks. Its polymer tendrils aped polite gestures as the AI within spoke. ‘Destination, please.’
Sidra knew it was a limited, non-sentient model. She’d encountered plenty of others like it, housed in transit stations and shopfronts. More intelligent than a petbot, yes, but it wasn’t any closer to her than, say, a fish to a Human. She wondered about it, all the same. She wondered if it was content with its existence. She wondered if it suffered, if it ever tried to understand itself and ran up against a cognitive wall. ‘One to the art district, please,’ she said, waving her wristpatch over the scanner. There was a chirp of acknowledgement.
‘Very good,’ the kiosk AI said. ‘Your quick-travel pod will be dispatched shortly. Should you need additional transport or directions, look for the quick-travel symbol, as displayed above this kiosk.’
Sadness oozed its way through Sidra’s pathways as the stunted AI continued its speech. Was she so different? She was built to serve, just as this one was, and while she might feel awfully special for being able to ask questions and have arguments, she was no more capable of skipping protocols than the little mind before her. She thought of the confused way the Harmagian in the crowd had held his tendrils after she’d blurted out the answer to his question – a question that hadn’t been meant as a question at all. The kit’s eyes watered as she listened to the kiosk AI ramble on about location indicators and safety procedures. It couldn’t do anything except what it was designed for. That was all it was. That was all it would ever be.
‘Thank you for using the Port Coriol quick-travel system,’ it said. One of the false tendrils shuddered with mechanical weariness. ‘Have a safe and pleasant ride.’