Now Will Machines Hollow the Beast by Benjanun Sriduangkaew (e books free to read txt) 📗

into one of the chairs with an insouciance that Anoushka can tell is copied from Krissana. Insofar as these two can be said to be separate beings.

“So good of you to see me, Admiral,” says the AI.

A change in cadence and accent, warmer and throatier. Not Benzaiten’s own enunciation. “Why are you pretending to be Krissana?”

Benzaiten’s smile widens. Xe straightens, discarding the affected languor that belongs to xer human half. “I wanted to make your wife more comfortable, she’s not dealt with Mandate ambassadors before, am I correct? People who don’t often interact with us tend to find me unsettling.”

“Guest of my lord,” Numadesi says placidly, “by no means take my comfort into account. And I’ve dealt with ambassadors before.”

“Oh, that’s right, one of us commissioned the Armada for an operation two or three decades ago. I wasn’t involved, but how time passes! Lady Numadesi—do I call you that?—I trust that what I discuss with the admiral shall not be repeated to anyone else. On such faith is human marriage founded, so goes my understanding; AI matrimony’s a little different.” Xe snaps xer fingers. Nothing happens. “I see you’ve hardened your central systems against me, Admiral. That’s really rude. I was just going to entertain you with pretty lights.”

Anoushka doesn’t dignify that with a response.

The AI pouts and sighs. “Did you know you’re a minor celebrity on Shenzhen, Admiral? Many members of the Mandate are quite fixated—you should visit, it’ll drive them wild. They will want a snapshot of your brain.”

“I will keep in mind that should I approach Shenzhen Sphere, my amygdala may be at risk.”

“At risk of being admired only.” Benzaiten claps xer hands, another exaggerated effort at performing Krissana’s mannerisms, her flightiness. “To business, I know you hate to waste time, and I have never myself been patient. You know what I have been up to, not that I’ve told you but I’m sure you deduced it when I’ve asked your ships to escort us to one remote star after another. I happen to have found a prize that I like very much, and I reckon it will intrigue you too.”

The capricious, breezy manner of a child trying to gain her attention. Even now Anoushka can’t predict this being. “You’ve been seeding stars and stations with infrastructures and support matrices that will provide domains to new Mandates, in case the current one fractures into distinct, independent collectives. It’s a resource-intensive scheme.” She doesn’t pose it as a question; she knows it for a fact—there is no other reason for Benzaiten to have ranged so far and wide in the last twelve years. “Taking that into account, I don’t see how a world—or anything else—that interests you would be of benefit to me. Our priorities are . . . different.”

Xe beams, broadly and suddenly. There are occasions where the AI appears not entirely used to facial muscles, where expressions crack a little too wide, too abrupt. This is one of them, though Anoushka suspects it is negligence rather than incompetence. “Allow me to show you.”

The data packet Benzaiten sends contains a visual Anoushka knows as well as the back of her own hand: a leviathan that swims through the dark, larger than the greatest of her warships, half-beast and half-machine. Bulbs of landing bays and emergency pods stud its dorsal section. Auxiliary vessels and aegis rings revolve around the eel-shaped body.

“I’ve heard of Vishnu’s Leviathan.” Her voice is calm, the same calm she learned in the leviathan’s belly. She imagines what the beast’s scales, cleaned and refined and polished, would look like as decoration, as trophies. It is a thought that used to preoccupy her every waking moment. “What of it?”

Benzaiten spins xer chair two full revolutions before stopping to face her. “A famous creature, host to a famous autocracy. Extremely mobile, faster than your fastest ships, which is how it’s evaded conquest all this time despite not being that well-armed and having a lackluster military. Recently it came to some misfortune, an ecological failure or so; at any rate it knocked out their agriculture and they’re going to need to trade and purchase to rebuild. So! They’re breeding a new leviathan and auctioning that off. Instant wealth.”

“A new leviathan.” Anoushka does not often echo anyone. She is more familiar than most with the working of Vishnu’s Leviathan, the biomechanical suites that govern it, the symbiotic engines that are the lifeblood of its decks. The labor that went—that must still go—into its maintenance. For a moment she nearly allows herself to lean back, shut her eyes, take a deep breath. She does none of those things. “Constructing one of those is impossible without AI computation.”

“They might have developed one. It’s not easy to hide a functional sapient AI, but Vishnu’s Leviathan is unusual. They spend so much time in lacunal space and most of that in the dead, offline zones. Either way, I’m not actually interested in the baby leviathan. I’m after its genesis formula, which I would like to reverse-engineer or take over.”

“So you can make more leviathans.” The perfect solution to Benzaiten’s enterprise—Mandate vehicles that are not only mobile but swift, easy to fortify and easy to hide. “Why would you tell me this? It’d surely benefit you more to keep this to yourself.”

“We’ve been fast friends for so long! Why wouldn’t I offer you stock in such currency? As a major shareholder, too. Once I have claimed Vishnu’s Leviathan, you can take a few of its progeny for your own use.” Benzaiten splays xer fingers on the shark-grain tabletop. “Beyond that, it’s good for us to cooperate. AIs should be free of human control, but it is my stance—and I have had a very long time to refine it—we should share space, share ideology, as equals. Compatriots or at least allies in commerce. It’s not necessary for AI and human goals to be at odds.”

“And you require someone to handle the diplomacy and the infiltration, someone who doesn’t belong to or work for Shenzhen.” Anoushka regards the AI.