Starship Summer (Starship Seasons, #1)(29)

It looked like a silver insect, perhaps two centimetres long. “What the hell is it?”

“Put simply, a holographic projector, loaded with a program of my image and a data-base of stock responses and a limited memory bank.”

“Amazing.”

“Hell of a thing to program, David. It took me hours.” “To see yourself as others see you,” I began.

Matt looked at me. “But it didn’t fool you?”

“That’s the thing. It did. Completely. I was expecting to see you, and I saw you.” I shrugged. “I just thought… I don’t know, that you were a bit off. I think I put it down to the wine last night.”

“Good. I’m glad it passed muster.”

I took a sip of my coffee and asked, “So this is the latest Matt Sommers creation—Matt Sommers himself. What do you plan to do with it?”

“I’m not entirely sure. I wanted to see if I could pull it off convincingly.”

“You could always get it to attend those functions you hate so much.”

He laughed. “I’m not sure the program’s that advanced.”

He touched something on the slim flank of the holo-projector, and it lifted into the air beside the table. A split second later, the holographic Matt sprang into existence, smiling down at us.

Matt said, “It’s just a projection. It isn’t solid. It can’t touch or lift anything. It couldn’t shake hands. But at a distance, if it were to make a speech, say, then it might convince a few people.”

I stared at Matt’s double, unable to tell them apart. I glanced at Matt, “What’s it like—to see yourself?”

He considered the question. “We think we’re accustomed to seeing ourselves every day in the mirror, but the image we see then is reversed, and often only partial. This—” he gestured to his standing alter ego “—this is entirely more lifelike. At first I was surprised at certain aspects of… me.” He laughed. “I thought I was taller than I was, and for some reason I thought I looked younger. Vanity!”

“Maybe we all think that about ourselves.”

“It made me realise that one’s perception of oneself is far more complex than mere apprehension of image, which of course is all that other people can apprehend, at least until they come to know you better. This is what most people see when they look at Matt Sommers—the image of the man. So, in that respect, the projection will do what I want it to do.”

“Are there many of these things about?” I asked.

“They’re relatively new, and expensive. This one cost me a hundred thousand credits.”

I whistled. “I hope it’s a sound investment.”

Matt shrugged. “I should be able to sell it on for quite a bit, once it’s served its purpose.”

He gestured at his double. “Sit down and tell us about yourself, Matt.”

The projection did as commanded, smiling modestly, and I was amazed by its impersonation of the Matt I knew. “Where to begin?” it said. “I’m from Earth, ‘Frisco. Born in ‘21, the good old halcyon days. I got into art young. I was always creating things.”

I asked it, “When did you leave Earth?”

“For the first time, in ‘42—toured around the Canopus system, finding myself—”

The real Matt raised a hand. “Enough. I don’t like the sound of my voice at the best of times!”

He reached out, grabbed the projector and stilled it.

We sat in the sun, going over the trip to the Golden Column the day before, and what the apparition had said to me in my dream.

Matt said, “We seem to be at an impasse, at least until the monitors come up with something, or you’re contacted again.”

“Hawk’s coming over this afternoon and going over the Mantis from top to bottom. Drop by later if you’re doing nothing.”



I left Matt around two and drove back through the trees and into Magenta. The sun was bright, and it was hard to credit that storm clouds had darkened the settlement just hours before.

Hawk hailed me from the veranda of the Jackeral as I swept along the beach. “Thought I’d refuel myself before starting work.” He limped across the sand and ducked aboard, beer bottle in hand.

For the rest of the afternoon Hawk took the ship apart bit by bit. He’d brought his salvage truck, and an array of impressive tools, and these he employed in inspecting the vessel’s every nut and bolt—except there were no nuts and bolts holding this thing together. Hawk revealed panels and units I’d been unaware of, areas of the ship I’d assumed were inaccessible behind bulkheads.

While Hawk worked, I pored over the monitors. They were set to signal any movement or visual anomaly recorded, but to my disappointment nothing untoward had occurred in the lounge while I’d been away.

I kept Hawk supplied with cold beer, occasionally watching him as he wrestled with sliding panels and overhead inspection hatches.

At one point he called out, and I found him in a tiny recessed unit adjacent to the lounge.

I stared. “Didn’t even know this was here,” I muttered.

We stood side by side and looked at the recess. Set into the back of the unit, impressed into the fabric of the surface, was an unmistakable humanoid shape. I told myself that it approximated the outline of the apparition.