Betrayals: twentythree

That night they made love in his en-suite hut in the tourist compound. Something was not quite right about it; Vema seemed to be distracted or disinterested in some way, so he was not particularly enthusiastic either. But his body seemed to find the gravity of the old world familiar and right during this ancient act, which was interesting in itself.

 After a trip to Ankor Wat the next day, a temple complex now surrounded by windy desert, their short visit to the Mother planet was over; it seemed a long, slow, mournful trip back up the beanstalk into orbit. Vema was quiet and standoffish in the glass elevator capsule, and did not seem to acknowledge their recent intimacy in any way. Gus shrugged and put it down to the rich, unfathomable tapestry of life and the contrariness of women. He was glad to be reunited with his symaiote vec at the top of the tower, and they spent many happy hours disparaging human nature together.

 On the way back to the wormhole they were diverted via the gas giant world Saturn; Gus had seen this planet in a million images, as it was truly an iconic planet in so many cultures. Representative of a common type of medium large ringed giant worlds, misty and pale cream in colour with little of the blue-green methane tint common in the coldest giants, Saturn had become the definitive planet in graphics and artworks of all kinds. The symbolic image of this ringed world was even used in several written alphabets and pictographic systems, and in logos and insignia throughout the civilised galaxy. Gus picked a particularly stylised version for his tattoo wallpaper background as they crept closer to the famous world.

 But the rings were entirely altered from the images in his internal database; the broad brilliant rings were gone, replaced by a thin, broken, uneven smear as if a moon had recently broken up. Spirals of material were reaching inward to the planet, creating a strange woven effect as they crossed each other. It looked as if someone was trying to replace the old rings with new material; but the job was far from completed by the looks of it. 

  ~What the? Saturn is all wrong.   he sent to Max .

  ~Hmm. The rings. Not quite what I expected either; but a little datamining should turn up the answer; ----
Aha! Yes, here is something. –

klik-

`The beautiful rings of Saturn were famous throughout the colonised
galaxy, but were also a valuable resource for the Solsys miners of
the first and second millennia. The dusty rock in the rings was in
some ways the most valuable, as it was used as ballast to generate
energy from the Saturnian magnetic field using electromagnetic
tethers. Unfortunately this process de-orbited the solid material
from the rings, and it was lost forever into the giant planet.
Meanwhile the deuterium and helium isotopes were being extracted for
fuel, and the depleted water ice was used for propellant and life
support throughout the outer system. By the time of the Version War
the rings were mostly gone.
As an attempt to recreate their former glory (and to facilitate
energy generation and ice extraction) a number of icy satellites
have been moved within their Roche limit over the last few millennia
with varying degrees of success.'

~Do you want the reference tag for that, Gus?

~ I'll skip that, thank you very much. 

Somewhere out around the orbit of Neptune Gus had a short sleep, only an hour or so, attempting to recharge his biological batteries...

--------------------------

...but he woke with a start, bright daylight in his eyes instead of cabin lighting. He was in a tight, confined cot, lined with shimmering but inactive utility fog instead of cool cotton. Clambering out onto the floor he staggered under the relatively familiar pull of Novan gravity; he had somehow missed the rest of the journey back to Tau Ceti, unless…
Oh, no, it couldn't be.
 

A neatly folded pair of shorts and a transparent shirt were on the bedside table; he dressed, and opened the door of the room into a richly decorated corridor. Gus recognised a couple of Alrami statues, which stirred slightly and watched him as he passed. With trepidation he opened the large doors at the end of the corridor; inside were a small relaxed crowd of Arkab Prior expatriates, including … Vema, who had not noticed him yet, Max (holding forth in a crowd of fluorescent robots of various types), and Lorca Alrami, the son of the famous sculptor. 

  ~Max? he sent, but Alrami greeted him first.

  "Ah. The sleeper awakes. It is exceptionally good, isn't it?"
  "I'm sorry?" But Gus was beginning to catch on.

  "The simulation. Earth. You might have experienced realistic virches before, but that one really is convincing. Ha,  I expect you are still trying to figure out if it was real or not."

  "I am gradually readjusting my sense of reality. Whoo. There were no virtual indicators or anything. Max? What happened to our sym-link? You could have tipped me off when I woke up…"

  "Sorry, Gus; I was just chatting to these interesting robots here. We went to the same Tachydidaction college back in the Necklace, I think you have already met Ike and Natasha; this is Hans. I agree, however; that SimEarth  program is extremely convincing.  I certainly enjoyed it. Even though the sim doesn't let robots down onto Earth itself."

Vema was standing behind Alrami, only vaguely interested. Somehow she suddenly seemed a lot more real than before; a living, bored human, rather than a simulation. Now that was different, and interesting.

  “Did you like the simulation, Vema? You said it was your first time to Earth. Was that true?”

  “I said that? I’m sorry, but I haven’t had time to download the sim yet- I sent an avatar into the simulation. I’ll have to merge memories with her as soon as I get the time. So you recommend it, then, mister--?”

  “What? Oh. My name. Of course. You haven’t met me yet. My name is Auguste Gienah. But, you can call me –that is, your avatar already called me – Gus.”

  “Rii-ght. Thanks, Gus.”

Lorca Alrami was vastly amused.
  “I think he got on quite well with your proxy, my dear.”
  “Oh did he? Oh dear- I’ll have to get her adjusted. She really is much more promiscuous than I am.” Vema laughed.
 

Gus tried not to look quite as crestfallen as he felt, and studied his naked feet for a bit. Which were covered in blue designs. Another surprise.
  “Hello- that’s a new pattern; where in all of Space did I get that from?” His skin was midnight blue, sprinkled with three-dimensional stars, planets, habitats and spacecraft, all in hypnotic detail.

  “Ah yes; I took the liberty of loading that pattern into your skin for free while you were in virch.” Lorca said. “It is entirely new; think of it as souvenir of the Earth Simulation. I can personally vouch for its functionality; I helped to design it myself, here on Nova.” 

  “Well, it is beautiful. Thank you, Zar Alrami; I have never seen tattoos quite like these. A souvenir, you say?”

In the back of his mind alarm bells were sounding. Something not quite right. It was always risky to accept unsolicited programs; but Gus felt obliged to keep them, at least until he got offplanet. And it seemed difficult to concentrate on the idea of erasing the program- why should he... it would be alright... what was he thinking about again? Oh yes.

  “The… simulation…” Gus mumbled, trying to remember what he was thinking about that was so important. “How- how accurate was it? Is Earth really like that?”

Lorca was amused again. 

  “Probably;” he said, dismissively. “I expect it is something like that; it was made a few years ago. I have absolutely no idea. Never been there myself.”

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