Read Online Polity 4 - The Technician by Asher Neal - Free Book Online
Authors: Asher Neal
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lungs
in her chest, the blood in her veins and her muscle matter were substantially
different after her three-week sojourn in a somnolence tank, being taken apart
and put back together again by the AI surgeon. Alveoli density in her lungs was
now three times what it had been, and the extra formed of a semi-organic film much
more efficient than the remaining original – a film that actually cracked CO2. Her haemoglobin levels were double what
they were before, complemented by oxygen-gathering nanomachines that operated
from the artificial portions of her lungs and that also collected excess carbon
for excretion through her kidneys. Her muscles burned oxygen more efficiently
than before – much of the dross created by parasitic DNA had been removed.
‘And
that tale is?’ enquired the drone.
Of
course this creature had no need of air, just water, which it processed through
its internal fusion reactor. And, since this creature was a battle spec drone,
it probably also had methods of generating power from every other source
available. It probably could breath oxygen, just didn’t need to.
‘He can
walk – all that part of him is functional – he just won’t
walk.’ Sanders paused to gaze up towards the sanatorium perched at the top of
the slope ahead. The Theocracy had used it as an interrogation camp, and though
the internees had been moved to City Hospital before she arrived, she shuddered
on remembering some of the equipment she had found there when setting the place
up as a hospital for badly injured survivors of the Brotherhood. Of course,
they were all gone now; cured of their ills and coming under the Polity
Intervention Amnesty. Only Jeremiah Tombs remained.
‘Won’t
walk?’
‘I’ve
tried everything,’ she said. ‘It’s why I had him put in a wheelchair rather
than an exoskeletal suit – I want his imagined debility to inconvenience him more,
in the hope it will drive him to lose it. But that doesn’t seem to be working.’
Understatement of the hour, since Tombs had remained in that chair for fourteen
years. She glanced at the drone, but there was no point trying to read an
expression there. ‘The problem lies inside his skull – that area I was
specifically ordered to avoid. If I’d been allowed just a little more freedom
to act I could have replaced that damned head prosthetic of his – regrown all
those burnt-out nerves and filled in all those little holes bored through the
bone.’
‘It is
necessary,’ said the drone. ‘However, it’s interesting that he has retained the
use of everything above his waist. Does he do anything with his hands?’
‘Like
what?’
‘Like,
perhaps, make sculptures?’
‘He draws,’
she replied.
Once it
became apparent just three years ago that Jem wanted to draw, when he started
scribing pictures on the floor of his special bathroom with his own excrement,
she provided him with the required materials. Fortunately he took to them well
and stopped his experiments with the previous medium.
‘What
does he draw?’
‘Molluscs,’
she replied.
It had
taken her some time to figure out what his drawings depicted – all those
geometric shapes in intricate and specific patterns that he laboured over for
so long, before enclosing them in a circle and then consigning them to the
floor. Only one day when she was walking out here and had seen penny molluscs
clinging to the shady side of a boulder did she realize what he was drawing.
Perhaps the time it had taken her to realize this, despite her studies of
island biology, was a good indicator of how far she had disappeared into her
own head.
‘Interesting,’
said the drone, but that was all.
‘When are we going to put his mind back together?’ Sanders asked.
It
pleased Jem that the terrace was so wide, but he wished it was wider, so he
could get further away from that thing. Why it came
here to conduct these nonsensical conversations with Sanders he didn’t know. He
just wished it would go away and
in her chest, the blood in her veins and her muscle matter were substantially
different after her three-week sojourn in a somnolence tank, being taken apart
and put back together again by the AI surgeon. Alveoli density in her lungs was
now three times what it had been, and the extra formed of a semi-organic film much
more efficient than the remaining original – a film that actually cracked CO2. Her haemoglobin levels were double what
they were before, complemented by oxygen-gathering nanomachines that operated
from the artificial portions of her lungs and that also collected excess carbon
for excretion through her kidneys. Her muscles burned oxygen more efficiently
than before – much of the dross created by parasitic DNA had been removed.
‘And
that tale is?’ enquired the drone.
Of
course this creature had no need of air, just water, which it processed through
its internal fusion reactor. And, since this creature was a battle spec drone,
it probably also had methods of generating power from every other source
available. It probably could breath oxygen, just didn’t need to.
‘He can
walk – all that part of him is functional – he just won’t
walk.’ Sanders paused to gaze up towards the sanatorium perched at the top of
the slope ahead. The Theocracy had used it as an interrogation camp, and though
the internees had been moved to City Hospital before she arrived, she shuddered
on remembering some of the equipment she had found there when setting the place
up as a hospital for badly injured survivors of the Brotherhood. Of course,
they were all gone now; cured of their ills and coming under the Polity
Intervention Amnesty. Only Jeremiah Tombs remained.
‘Won’t
walk?’
‘I’ve
tried everything,’ she said. ‘It’s why I had him put in a wheelchair rather
than an exoskeletal suit – I want his imagined debility to inconvenience him more,
in the hope it will drive him to lose it. But that doesn’t seem to be working.’
Understatement of the hour, since Tombs had remained in that chair for fourteen
years. She glanced at the drone, but there was no point trying to read an
expression there. ‘The problem lies inside his skull – that area I was
specifically ordered to avoid. If I’d been allowed just a little more freedom
to act I could have replaced that damned head prosthetic of his – regrown all
those burnt-out nerves and filled in all those little holes bored through the
bone.’
‘It is
necessary,’ said the drone. ‘However, it’s interesting that he has retained the
use of everything above his waist. Does he do anything with his hands?’
‘Like
what?’
‘Like,
perhaps, make sculptures?’
‘He draws,’
she replied.
Once it
became apparent just three years ago that Jem wanted to draw, when he started
scribing pictures on the floor of his special bathroom with his own excrement,
she provided him with the required materials. Fortunately he took to them well
and stopped his experiments with the previous medium.
‘What
does he draw?’
‘Molluscs,’
she replied.
It had
taken her some time to figure out what his drawings depicted – all those
geometric shapes in intricate and specific patterns that he laboured over for
so long, before enclosing them in a circle and then consigning them to the
floor. Only one day when she was walking out here and had seen penny molluscs
clinging to the shady side of a boulder did she realize what he was drawing.
Perhaps the time it had taken her to realize this, despite her studies of
island biology, was a good indicator of how far she had disappeared into her
own head.
‘Interesting,’
said the drone, but that was all.
‘When are we going to put his mind back together?’ Sanders asked.
It
pleased Jem that the terrace was so wide, but he wished it was wider, so he
could get further away from that thing. Why it came
here to conduct these nonsensical conversations with Sanders he didn’t know. He
just wished it would go away and
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