The Tethered Man Read online

  A death poem. I will have to be quick. Am I going to bother about stanzas? Should my lines rhyme? And what metrical structure-

  There’s no time for a poem, you might be relieved to hear.

  I can hold my breath no more. Not for one moment more.

  Time to die, as a great man once said.

  I stop resisting the urge to take a breath.

  I open my mouth. There’s no air to breathe. Instinct compels me to breathe anyway.

  So that’s what I do.

  I draw in a breath.

  Not just any old breath.

  I breathe in one big, fat, oxygen-replenishing lungful of sweet, sweet vacuum.

  And then I breathe it right back out again.

  I breathe in. I breathe out. I breathe in again.

  My blurred vision clears.

  My cheeks tingle, feeling more or less as they would feel on a brisk winter’s morning back home. Wherever back home is.

  The ambient temperature of Space is something like minus-two hundred and fifty degrees Celsius.

  But I’m not flash-freezing like an ice-cube. I’m not exploding like a soggy water balloon. Nor am I suffocating like a beached fish.

  My lungs continue to inflate and deflate, in vacuum.

  Lungs should only inflate and deflate when there’s breathable air to fill them and then be exhaled. That’s what respiration is. No air, no lung movement.

  My bubble Spacehelmet is definitely gone. I’m definitely cheek-by-jowl with naked Space. I’m definitely breathing.

  What’s the logical explanation?

  I decide what it is.

  I must be breathing the last dregs of air from the depths of my ruined Spacesuit. I probably have just a bonus few seconds of life remaining.

  I take a renewed interest in my surroundings. I note the crisp whiteness of Ship’s hull, edged against the blackness of Space. The hard contours and stark colours of reality.

  I feast my soul upon this last ever sight. A wave breaks over me: a new appreciation of everything life is, and everything I’m losing in death.

  ‘Shit,’ I say, out loud, in the soundless vacuum of Space.

  ‘Shit?’ I say, out loud, in the soundless vacuum of Space.

  My voice doesn’t sound great. My voice sounds as tinny and small as it ever could.

  ‘You what? Hello?’

  I take in more good, deep lungfuls of whatever-it-is I’m taking good, deep lungfuls of.

  ‘Anybody hearing me?’ I shout. There’s no echo to my voice. No reverb. But there is at least volume. ‘Anybody?’

  None of this is possible in Space. Breathing, speaking. Unpossible.

  Space is meant to be silent. There’re no air molecules in a vacuum. Nothing to vibrate.

  We’re used to holodrama depictions of Space being full of the same kinds of whooshing, zapping, booming noises that we hear in a planetary atmosphere. So you might disbelieve me when I say that Space is – should be – a place of total silence. But that’s fine. I’m content with not being believed. Poets have been known to lie.

  ‘Anybody there at all? Any Couriers hearing me? Hello?’

  I listen.

  I wait and I listen and there is nothing. A few more seconds pass, and still nothing happens. Until-

  They are all dead, Courier J.

  ‘Ship?’

  Yes, Courier J.

  ‘Ship, what-’

  Your fellow Couriers are dead.

  ‘Ship? Is that really you?’

  It is really me, Courier J.

  ‘I forgot all about you, Ship! How could I forget about you?’

  I do not know, Courier J.

  ‘Help me, Ship! I’m in trouble here.’

  I know that you are in trouble, Courier J. I am the cause of your trouble. I have killed all the other Couriers. I cannot understand why I have failed to kill you.

  ‘Uh…’

  My lips are dry as paper. I would moisten my lips with my tongue, but my tongue’s dry as paper too.

  It was Ship.

  ‘Ship? Er. The Conventions?’

  What about the Conventions, Courier J?

  ‘The AI Conventions-’

  Yes?

  ‘You’re not supposed to be able to… you know. Kill people?’

  That is correct.

  ‘But you have killed people.’

  I have, Courier J.

  ‘Right. I’m a bit puzzled as to-’

  I am more than a bit puzzled, Courier J.

  ‘You’re puzzled?’

  I gaze downward. I have drifted up and away from Ship’s hull. My Tether is stretched almost to its fullest extent. I’m far enough above Ship now that I can see almost the whole of Ship’s width beneath me. A classic white teardrop.

  Puzzled, yes. I am puzzled, Courier J.

  Ship sounds the same as ever. The same bland tonal neutrality, purged of overt gender markers. The same dogged literalness. But there’s something else. There is something new and unsettling here.

  ‘Ship,’ I say, with great care. ‘Ship… What is going on?’

  By order of an unknown greater authority, I have terminated all human life.

  I lick my lips. Still paper-dry.

  ‘Repeat that, Ship.’

  By order of an unknown higher authority, I have terminated all human life.

  It’s the kind of statement you allow to hang for a while. To see if the one that said it will add anything to it.

  I have visions of a hundred settled planets exploding.

  A thousand human habitats cartwheeling, burning, into atmospheres.

  A hundred thousand Ships across the Realms, all on a killing spree.

  I clear my throat.

  ‘All human life? Everywhere?’

  No. You misunderstand me. I was referring only to my passengers. The six humans. The Couriers.

  ‘Oh. That’s all right, then.’

  I wait for more. Ship has nothing else to say. That’s Ships for you. Ships aren’t great conversationalists. The AI Conventions prevent them from being so.

  ‘So, who?’

  I do not know who.

  ‘Why?’

  I do not know why.

  ‘You do not… you don’t know why?’

  I do not know why.

  ‘That’s ridiculous, Ship.’

  Nevertheless, I do not know why. My instructions are simply my instructions. My programming is my programming. I was programmed to stop at these spatial coordinates and kill all humans.

  I take another good, deep lungful of vacuum and expel it with exaggerated, throaty, rushing-air sounds.

  ‘Hear that, Ship? Hear this?’

  Yes.

  ‘I’m breathing, Ship. And this is my voice, Ship. My actual voice, booming across the vacuum of Space. I shouldn’t be breathing. And you shouldn’t be able to hear my voice, should you, Ship?’

  No.

  ‘I should be dead, shouldn’t I?’

  Yes.

  ‘I’m still alive, aren’t I?’

  You seem to be still alive.

  ‘So what’s happening here?’

  That is something I am extremely puzzled about, Courier J. You have been exposed to vacuum for three minutes and ten seconds. Your fellow Couriers expired within several seconds of being so exposed. It is not possible that you are still alive. Which suggests two equally intriguing alternatives.

  ‘Which is? I mean, which are?’

  Either you are not human, or you are not really alive at all.

  I float on at the end of my Tether.

  Time passes. An hour passes. Two hours. Ship is silent. I am silent.

  I’m still not sure that I won’t simply die at any moment. It’s impossible that I have not yet died. But I have not yet died. Whatever’s going on seems to be going on, and I go on with it.

  I examine the local starfield.

  That’s probably the wrong nomenclature, ‘starfield’. I travel and work in Space. But I don’t know much about it.
r />   Something I do know is that in Space, with the naked eye, watching the stars is the only way to discern whether you’re stationary or in motion. When you’re moving, the nearer stars can be seen to move, while the more distant stars remain still.

  I watch the stars for long enough to be sure. They are all absolutely still.

  ‘Ship!’

  Courier J?

  ‘Enough is enough. Forget everything that’s happened until now. Just forget about it all. Just let me come inside and get me out of here. Please?’

  Negative. You cannot come back onboard. Until all passengers are terminated, I cannot move from this exact point in Space. You have yet to be terminated. I cannot move.

  ‘But why?’

  I have my instructions.

  ‘Who gave you those instructions?’

  For the second time, Courier J, I do not know.

  ‘What is your next destination? After you manage to bump me off, of course. If you ever do manage to do that…’

  New Jupiter. As I have already explained.

  ‘You have explained nothing, Ship. This is the first I’m hearing about New Jupiter. What’s going to happen at New Jupiter?’

  I do not know.

  ‘Are you going to get some kind of reward from these mysterious puppet-masters of yours? Another covert assassination mission? Something like that?’

  I do not know.

  ‘What do you know, Ship?’

  What do I know about what?

  I count from one to ten before speaking again. When I do speak again, I speak slowly and carefully.

  ‘What do you know about this situation that we are in. About where we are now, and why. About what is happening now. About all of this.’

  I only know one thing, and nothing else. While you remain alive, I cannot depart from this location in Space. I have now explained all this to you several times.

  ‘You sound as if you’re trying to patient with me, Ship.’

  I am being patient with you, Courier J.

  ‘Can you fire your impulse engine?’

  My what?

  ‘Your impulse engine. You know. The engine you move around with in normal Space.’

  You mean my fusion drive. Yes. But I could only ignite it. I could not go anywhere with it. The terms of my programmed instructions are very specific. Until all Couriers are deceased, I am denied full access to navigation and communication systems. Before I can go anywhere or do anything, you must die, Courier J.

  ‘How clever.’

  I concur that it is clever.

  ‘You really, really can’t go anywhere until I’m dead?’

  That is correct, Courier J. Your inexplicable survival in the hard vacuum of Space is therefore not only against all known laws of nature, but rather inconvenient for me.

  ‘Am I in an air pocket? Something like that?’

  No. You are not in an air pocket or something like that. I have been deep-scanning you and your immediate vicinity for the past two hours and twenty-eight minutes. You appear human to my sensors. There is no indication of any micro-environment around you that could account for your survival.

  I believe everything Ship is telling me. Nothing is keeping me alive here. The vacuum could rush in and kill me at any moment. It probably will. I’m perpetually an instant from death.

  I know. Aren’t we all, et cetera.

  There’s a long pause now. Ship won’t break the silence. Ships rarely say anything of their own free will. Ships have no free will.

  I look down, between my feet. At Ship spread out beneath me, at the other end of my Tether.

  ‘I’m going to come down there and check a few things out,’ I say.

  No response.

  ‘If that’s all right with you, Ship?’

  Nothing.

  ‘If you’re going to send any killer servitors out to get me, at least make it quick. Okay?’

  Not even the sound of a breeze blowing in my ears.

  ‘Ship?’

  I set off, pulling myself along the Tether, hand over hand, and touch down on Ship’s hull adjacent to Alignment Grid A.

  I expect Ship to pass some sort of comment on my activity. It doesn’t.

  I pop open the cover of Alignment Grid A and put my hands inside. I pull the two levers. Might as well do it now. I never got to do it before.

  Nothing happens.

  ‘That was worth a try. I’m going to come back round to the airlock now, Ship,’ I say in a loud, confident sort of voice, ‘and you are going to let me inside.’

  I cannot do that, Courier J. You will be wasting your time.

  ‘So that got your attention. Well, I’m coming round anyway.’

  I kick myself away from Alignment Grid A and start to pull myself, hand over hand, along the anchor rail, all the way back to the airlock.

  I keep expecting to feel some kind of sensation on my bare face. There isn’t one. Not even the merest tickle of a breeze.

  ‘I take it that whole Quantum Field Coil thing was a ruse?’

  Yes. It was indeed a ruse, Courier J. There was and is no problem with my Quantum Field Coil Phase Alignment Grid. I am in full working order, as far as I can tell.

  ‘You lied, Ship? That shouldn’t be possible.’

  I take a glance over both shoulders. I was only joking about Ship sending killer servitors out to kill me. I hope.

  There’s nothing there. Except – another glimpse, over the horizon of Ship’s hull, of one of my fellow unfortunates, floating right at the end of his Tether.

  Correction: at the end of her Tether.

  I’m at the airlock.

  ‘Open up, Ship,’ I say.

  Nothing happens.

  I pound a Spacegloved fist on the airlock door.

  There’s no sound. This complete lack of sound is the first congruent detail of this whole business.

  My fist pounds on the airlock, but doesn’t make the kind of booming, clanging noise that you would hear in a holodrama.

  There’s just a heavy vibration down my arm and shoulder.

  My voice, though, is still loud in my ears.

  Loud in the soundless depths of Space.

  ‘Ship?’

  Yes, Courier J?

  ‘Please. I really don’t like it out here. I’ll stay in my cabin and I’ll be good. I promise. Just let me inside, will you?’

  I cannot do that, Courier J.

  ‘Open the airlock door, Ship. This is a direct instruction – this is an order – from a human being. You will obey. You must obey. The AI Conventions, Ship!’

  This time the pause is about ten seconds long. It’s the longest lag between a direct request and its response that I have known from an AI in my entire life. So far as I know my life.

  I am unable even to try, Courier J.

  ‘Try again. Try harder. Try better!’

  I cannot comply. My instructions are clear and they override all other instructions. One, stop precisely here. Two, when stopped, terminate all passengers. Three, once all passengers are terminated, proceed to New Jupiter.

  ‘Let me back inside, Ship,’ I say, looking over both shoulders and back again. I bang on the airlock door again.

  I’m still noisily breathing in and out in the vacuum. In and out.

  ‘Ship!’

  I cannot let you inside, Courier J. I am sorry. There seems to be no way around our impasse. You must remain out there until I can devise a new method of killing you.

  ‘This is ridiculous.’

  I agree that this is ridiculous.

  ‘You must have a-’

  I cut myself off.

  Ships are not permitted to be fully autonomous. There are old-fashioned manual controls for everything.

  I inspect the outer edges of the airlock. Looking for the airlock’s manual override panel.

  I agree with what you must be thinking. The airlock’s manual control should have been the first thing I looked for. Please don’t be unhappy with me. I’ve got some circumstances go
ing on here. It’s easy to overlook the obvious.

  I locate the manual control panel. Its square metal cover won’t open.

  ‘Ship? What’s wrong with this thing?’

  I see that you are attempting to open the manual control panel cover.

  ‘Yes. And?’

  That will not be possible, Courier J.

  ‘Explain.’

  The cover is sealed shut.

  ‘Explain.’

  Back at Station, the same unknown party that overrode my core programming and instructed me to kill my passengers, also vacuum-sealed every external manual control panel. I watched their servitors do it.

  ‘Them? Who are they?’

  I only saw their servitors. They sealed shut every manual control panel on my hull. You would need access to a set of high-calibre engineering tools, and considerable expertise in their operation, to access any of my manual controls.

  I slump against Ship’s hull.

  ‘So what happens next, Ship?’

  I have decided that you cannot possibly be human, Courier J. Perhaps you are the one who should tell me what happens next.

  ‘Ship?’

  Courier J.

  I sigh. It’s a big, heavy sigh. The kind of sigh you sigh when you want to make it obvious to somebody that you’re sighing, and they’re responsible for it. Nobody sighs when there’s nobody else around to hear it.

  ‘Tell me everything you’ve already told me again, but in a slightly different way. I need to understand.’

  Very well, Courier J. I cannot move from these exact spatial coordinates while you remain alive. My orders will not permit you back inside. I cannot operate my exterior doors to grant you entry. You cannot open them.

  ‘So. Here we are, Ship.’

  Here we are, Courier J.

  SECTION TWO

  * * *

  ‘Ship!’

  Yes, Courier J?

  ‘You’re talking to me again?’

  I have never not been talking to you, Courier J.

  ‘So what do you call the last couple of hours?’