She found Ike in a storage closet, a cramped space piled with junk they’d dragged back from the salvage bay and been unable to find immediate use for. With his long, iron gray hair and impressive beard, he resembled a pagan king of broken things. That unlikely thought in mind, she paused in the doorway.
“May I come in?”
He hesitated, as if there was something on his mind. Then he just answered, “Queensland belongs to you. Of course you can.”
That wasn’t entirely true. The power to rule came from the Queenslanders, and if she pissed off enough of them, they would find a way to remove her. She was always conscious of the line she walked and how fickle public opinion could be, especially when her constituents were hardened criminals. Voting wouldn’t be anything so kind as chits of paper, either; instead, she would be impeached with a shiv in the throat or a weight upside her head. Constant caution made her paranoid though Tam would say it wasn’t madness when the danger was real.
Dred joined him and closed the door; she didn’t know how he spent long hours in here. “How close are you?” she asked.
The old man shrugged. He had been rebuilding the Peacemaker since they returned from the salvage-bay run. From what she could tell, he had the thing about half put together. It wasn’t an original unit, however, more of a retrofit constructed of other materials. So it didn’t look the same as it had before it was broken; there was probably a valuable metaphor in that. But more importantly, he had managed to get the weapons back in place. A Peacemaker without the Shredder and laser gun wouldn’t serve much purpose.
“I’m having trouble with the programming,” he said. “And Wills keeps demanding that I help him with that stupid maintenance bot, or the turrets, and whatever else he’s working on.”
Dred smiled slightly. “You’re allowed to tell him no, you understand. He’s not authorized to give you orders.”
“You know how he is. I can either help him out or listen to irrational ranting for an hour or watch him cursing the wall roundly. Then he starts in with his ritual of threes—”
“I’m starting to suspect he’s not crazy at all, ever. That he slips in and out of it like a skin, when he wants something, needs a diversion or to make people look away.”
Ike nodded at that. “Me, too. Can you hand me that—” She hovered her palm over a random pile of gears, metal bits, and wires. “Yes, that one.”
“Is he helping you with the Peacemaker?” she asked, once he had the part.
“No, this is a project just for me. He’s busy enough with his own work.”
“You know an awful lot about bots.” It was a borderline invasive question, as he hadn’t given any indication he wanted to confide in her.
“Are you asking me what I did before I ended up in here?”
“If that’s all right,” she said quietly.
At the moment, she felt less the Dread Queen and more like Dresdemona Devos, who had worked on a freighter in the maintenance department before she made so many wrong turns. Consequently, she knew a little about repair work, but nothing compared with Ike and Wills. She watched for a few seconds, then at his signal, handed him another component.
“I worked for Pretty Robotics,” he answered at length.
“I’ve heard of them. They manufacture those realistic androids?”
“Indeed.”
The units came with human-looking bodies and advanced programming. A number of companies preferred them to flesh-and-blood employees as they didn’t require benefits, never got sick, and took no vacation days. That created problems with the labor boards over their discriminatory practices, making it harder for organic workers to earn an honest living. She recalled studying the protests in her history courses, but growing up on remote Tehrann, she had never encountered a Pretty Robotics unit—or anyone who had designed them.
From his expression, she could tell Ike was waiting for her to ask how he went from working at a reputable company to a life sentence. She didn’t. “That explains how you know so much about this sort of thing.”
“Mmhm. So why are you hiding?”
Denying the charge would insult his intelligence. “I just needed a break. People won’t look for me here like they would in my quarters. Tam and Einar come and go as they please.”
“Then welcome to my kingdom,” he said with gentle irony.
That put her in mind of a quote: “‘I could be bounded in a nutshell, and count myself a king of infinite space, were it not that I have bad dreams.’”
“Do you?” he asked.
She dreamed of the life she’d left behind more than of the things she’d done, but knowing she’d never see her family again, never know what became of them? Those old memories took on the nuance of nightmare. “Sometimes. Doesn’t everyone?”
“In here? I suspect so, though some would deny it; others have no conscience; and some simply can’t remember. For them, sleep is more like dying.”
“Is it possible to do the things we’ve done and keep one?” she wondered aloud.
“A conscience, you mean? Quite the philosophical inquiry.”
“Never mind,” she said. “I’m in an odd mood.”
“It’s all right to ask the tough questions now and then, just not when the questions become a way of avoiding or disavowing responsibility.”
“Is that what I’m doing?”
“I never said so. As far as I’m concerned, you’re just helping an old man chase an impossible dream.” With that, Ike gave his blessing for her to stick around as his assistant; it was a welcome break.
“What’s impossible about it?”
“Are you looking at this unit?”
At his incredulous tone, she tried to see the Peacemaker through his eyes. “It has less than half the original parts, and it’s quite damaged. But somehow I don’t think that’s what you’re talking about entirely.”
“You’re a perceptive woman. I also meant that if I can get it running, I won’t feel as though I’ve outlived my usefulness—that I’m contributing to society again.”
“Society,” she repeated with a bitter laugh.
“It’s strange and warped, but we have our own ways. You’ve changed things just enough since Artan died, made things better without taking away the promise of violence.”
“That was Tam’s idea,” she admitted. “He said if we can limit grudges and grievances to the ring, there will be less random fighting.”