Into the Unknowable Ch. 18

Intrepid - 3756 C.E.

Anger. Frustration. Humiliation. These were just a few of the emotions Nadezhda was feeling as she reviewed her helpless situation. Her command of the space ship Intrepid had been stolen from her by an alien. She was confined to a villa on the outermost level. She was unable to communicate with anyone other than Beatrice: the android who was both her captor and lover. And every day when she accessed the Intrepid's information systems, she was humiliated to see an android masquerading as herself.

Nadezhda paid careful attention to the daily reports that pertained to come from Captain Kerensky, but although she was sure that much of it was nothing more than lies, she had no way of knowing what was true and what was false. The lie that grated most, of course, was that she was the same Captain Kerensky who broadcast an upbeat daily account of the ship's affairs to the passengers and crew. Unfortunately, the only human aware that her identity had been stolen was herself. And what more mortifying theft was there than that?

The truth of which Nadezhda was most certain was that the Intrepid was deep inside the Anomaly and that the crew and passengers were, so far, still alive. That presumably was why there was still a need to produce the cheering daily news reports. And although Captain Kerensky wasn't a scientist, she could see little of scientific value in the cheery reports.

She'd also seen some of the strange Apparitions when they materialised beyond the invisible boundary that confined her. They were as puzzling to Nadezhda when viewed for real as they'd been when she'd previously viewed recordings of them. What sense could be made of a floating mermaid that appeared to swim through a pool of water hovering in mid-air? What intrinsic truth could be determined from the sight of a duel between two three-metre long scorpions? What was the value of entering the Anomaly to get a first-hand view of a man in Tudor uniform carrying under his arm the head that should have still been attached to the throat above the lace collar?

And worse yet was that Beatrice had the gall to visit Nadezhda on a regular basis. As always, she was seductive, passionate and sensuous. She was far better as a lover than as a source of information, although she was more likely than the androids masquerading as the ship's senior officers to acknowledge that there'd been no great breakthrough in scientific understanding with regards to the Anomaly.

"Why do you still visit me?" Nadezhda asked after several weeks had passed by since entering the Anomaly.

"I adore your company," said Beatrice as the two naked women lay side by side on the lawn outside the villa. "I love making love to you. It's what I most enjoy. It's what I was made to do."

"Haven't you got quite enough to do having to run the ship?"

"As you know," said Beatrice, "there is a full complement of ship's officers who can be trusted to do that."

"Is it that why you're no longer in command? Have other androids assumed your authority?"

Beatrice appeared to think for a moment before replying enigmatically: "I am as much in command of the Intrepid now as I have always been."

However much Nadezhda hated Beatrice, there was never an occasion when she resisted the android's caresses. She regretted it the moment she surrendered and immediately resolved not to be so easily taken in again. But Nadezhda had no other company and Beatrice was all she had. When Beatrice wasn't there, all she could do was lie naked in her villa and await her return. She'd have preferred more dignity but Beatrice explained that she'd been denied clothing for precisely the same security reasons that the Holy Coalition crusaders had been stripped bare. Nadezhda suspected that the real reasons were the android's bizarrely unquenchable sexual appetite and the simple pleasure of humiliating the captain.

"What about my fellow officers?" Nadezhda asked. "How are you treating them?"

"As well as I am treating you. Although none of them other than you is privileged with my regular visits."

"What do they think about the imposters who stole their identity?"

"They don't know about that. All they know is that they've been imprisoned for an unspecified offence. Naturally they all blame you for it."

"Do they know anything at all? Do they even know that the Intrepid is now inside the Anomaly?"

"They know that. It might compromise my mission if they didn't have that information. But very little beyond that. Why tell anyone more than they need to know?"

Nadezhda considered Beatrice's view. "I don't believe that position is either moral or practical," she said.

"In a sense, you may be right," Beatrice conceded. "But it is pretty much the policy of all human governments throughout the Solar System's history."

Nadezhda despised Beatrice, but also looked forward to the android's daily visits. She was the only person she could talk to. The only person she could make love with. The visits structured her life. It provided her with a modicum of comfort. She could survive without Beatrice, of course. The Intrepid continued to provide the same services as it ever did, so Nadezhda never went hungry and she had access to the same entertainment and information as everyone else aboard the space ship.

But Nadezhda missed her lover's company much more than she'd imagined when Beatrice failed to arrive one day and not the next day either. She paced around the villa in a battle of emotions that fluctuated between hatred and the need for carnal attention. She couldn't settle down. She wandered about the villa gardens and gazed towards the curving arch of the horizon as it receded upwards in the distance.

She tried to spot Beatrice's familiar figure in the distance. Sometimes the android wore a thin gossamer dress. Sometimes she wore a tight revealing top and shorts. Sometimes she was naked. But normally she would appear from somewhere over the horizon and walk unhurriedly towards Nadezhda's villa with a broad smile that taunted the captain but was also a prelude to their passionate lovemaking. There was never a specific time that she'd arrive, but it invariably happened sometime during the day.

But on these days there was no such arrival.

Nadezhda walked towards the invisible boundary of her confinement that she'd so many times bashed her head against. She held out her hands in anticipation of that gentle but irresistible force that restrained her. No amount of research on the Intrepid's encyclopaedic systems explained to her the nature of this force field or how to circumvent it.

It took Nadezhda several seconds to realise that she'd stepped further forward than she'd ever been able to do before and her heart began to pound with an anticipation even greater than that before she made love. Could she now be free? Could she now do what she'd been planning to do in such intricate detail during her period of detention?

Nadezhda stretched her arms forward and continued walking away from the villa. Her progress was still unimpeded. She was now over a hundred metres beyond the boundaries she'd mapped out so exactly. And still nothing was holding her back.

Nadezhda let her hands drop to her side and walked forward with a more normal stride. She was curiously aware of the nakedness she'd come to accept as part of her confinement. She was now able to approach other villas and even enter them.

Now what should she do?

Captain Kerensky's first duty was for the welfare of her passengers and crew. This would be best served if she could somehow wrest back control of the Intrepid from the android invaders and then steer it out of the Anomaly. But was either action even possible?

But before that she needed to gather together her senior officers.

Nadezhda decided not to return to the villa to collect her possessions or review the Intrepid's information systems. She was fearful that she would once again not be able to escape. Nevertheless, she took the risk of entering the next nearest villa which, like the one in which she'd been imprisoned, had been regenerated after the attack on the space ship. It was unoccupied as Nadezhda understood would be the case with most of the hundreds of villas in the outermost level.

Every villa on the Intrepid had a distinct individual character. Some had two storeys, though most did not. Some had a swimming pool attached. However much they differed in design they all provided the same basic facilities for food, cleanliness, sleep and relaxation, but Nadezhda was seeking information systems that might help her understand what was happening both within the space ship and outside.

Disappointingly, the data provided by this villa was no different to what she already knew. The view of space outside the Intrepid was still empty and black. There wasn't even the reassuring light of the distant stars. The view of the bridge showed the senior officers including Captain Kerensky—or at least the android Captain Kerensky—still at their duties and unconcerned about the strangeness within the Anomaly. The bulletin boards and daily reports were no more informative. Whatever else had happened, the Intrepid's information systems were still under alien control. Nevertheless, Nadezhda took an armband with her which could generate a holographic user interface to provide access to the information systems.

She was pleased to confirm when she strode out of the villa that she wasn't held back by an invisible force field and hadn't just exchanged one prison cell for another.

Now what should she do?

She knew that the other senior officers were detained in villas throughout the outermost level. She hadn't been able to monitor them through the Intrepid's surveillance systems as Beatrice had been able to and sometimes she doubted what she'd been told. Perhaps her fellow officers really were those individuals working on the bridge who were guiding the Intrepid through the Anomaly's void. Furthermore, although her priority was to gather the other officers together, Captain Kerensky was inevitably anxious that they wouldn't trust her. Beatrice had told them that the person they most blamed for their incarceration was her. How could Nadezhda convince them that there was more than one Captain Kerensky on board the ship and that she was the real one?

Nadezhda took a path across the curving interior of the Intrepid from one villa to another. None of those she visited was occupied. They showed no signs of having been otherwise since the outermost level had been regenerated. She approached each one and loudly called for attention. The only presences she encountered were the peculiar Apparitions that despite their oddness Nadezhda had come to disregard. It wasn't always obvious whether an Apparition might not be more permanent. The woman sitting on a roof wearing a dark veil and an encompassing black cloth could very well have been a real human being, but when she started to drift off into the sky and then suddenly vanish, Nadezhda knew for sure that this wasn't one of her crew. More convincing was the appearance of several men and women in brightly coloured clothes carrying small guns and nervously scouting the area, especially as their presence persisted for more than ten minutes. But as Nadezhda approached and was almost within hailing distance, a goblin-like creature appeared out of nowhere and brandished a huge axe. The men and women retreated through a door that was standing alone with no wall or other structure supporting it. They all vanished as they passed through the door. And then the door itself disappeared.

It was several hours until Nadezhda encountered any of the crew. By then, she'd nearly abandoned the pursuit altogether and was seriously considering the plan of walking alone to the bridge to confront the aliens that had stolen her identity. She knew this was folly. She'd simply be recaptured and bundled back to confinement. But what else could she do?

But at last there was the sight of several senior officers and all of them naked. More than any other fact, this persuaded Nadezhda that these were the real senior officers and not their doppelgangers. She knew that they'd been deprived of their clothes just as she'd been and that the aliens were unlikely to appear in public without some semblance of dignity (unless, of course, the alien happened to be Beatrice).

The company consisted of Second Officer Nkomo, Chief Science Officer Chang and three other more junior officers. Nadezhda wondered how she should address her colleagues given that there were others who'd adopted their rank and physical identity.

She cautiously approached the company who froze in their tracks as soon as they recognised her. They stood still beside a small hazel tree by a fountain from which spouted an uninterrupted flow of water. Their faces expressed far more wariness than welcome. When Captain Kerensky was within hearing she paused in her steps and addressed her fellow officers.

"Hello," she said. "I'm very pleased to see you again."

Second Officer Nkomo regarded the captain with barely concealed hatred.

"I'm not so sure that the same can be said for us, captain," she said.

"I can explain..." said Captain Kerensky hesitantly.

"You have a lot of explaining to do," said Chief Science Officer Chang.

"Why did you imprison us?" asked Second Officer Nkomo. "What have any of us done to warrant that?"

Captain Kerensky knew that the true answer was that she and other officers had had their identities stolen by alien robots from beyond the Solar System. She also knew that even now her explanation wouldn't be believed. But an explanation was required.

"Can we sit down?" she said indicating the bench around the ornate fountain. "There is a great deal I have to tell you about. But first of all you'll have to believe me when I say that it wasn't actually me who authorised your detention."

"If it wasn't you, then who was it?" said Sheila Nkomo sceptically. "It was definitely you who visited me when I was detained."

"Please sit down, Sheila," said Nadezhda, addressing her second officer informally. "It wasn't me who you saw."

"Are you telling me that I should pay no attention to the evidence of my own eyes?" said the Second Officer.

"That is exactly what I'm suggesting," said Nadezhda.

There was a great deal that Captain Kerensky couldn't tell her senior officers. She couldn't tell them that the alien invasion was from Proxima Centauri or that the android who'd taken control of the Intrepid was Beatrice. Nobody would have believed that the wife of the singularly unimpressive Paul Morris was an alien android of superhuman strength and intelligence. Captain Kerensky had to feign a degree of ignorance that was far from real. Even so, her story of an alien takeover of the Intrepid was already difficult enough to believe. That these aliens had done this for the purpose of plunging the Intrepid into the unknown depths of the Anomaly was plausible, given that nobody really believed that the Interplanetary Union would so authorise the effective suicide of the crew and passengers where there was no conceivable scientific benefit. More difficult to believe, of course, was that the officers' identity had been stolen by androids that could convincingly deceive the passengers and the rest of the Intrepid's crew.

"Are you saying that there is an android Nadezhda Kerensky?" Petal Chang asked sceptically.

"Not only an android replicant of me," said Nadezhda, aware of how ludicrous her account sounded, "but also replicants of Sheila and you. There are also replicants of Chief Petty Officer Singh and, I imagine, of all the senior officers. I really don't know how many people on this space ship have been replaced by android replicants."

"I still find your story very difficult to believe," said Sheila.

"Shall I show you a view of the bridge?" said Nadezhda who now displayed the bracelet communication device which was all she was wearing.

Although the view of the senior officers on the bridge could easily be faked, the image of the senior officers, including Captain Kerensky, was still good evidence of the truth of Nadezhda's account. The additional evidence of all the daily reports was more convincing. There, for instance, was a view of a conference that had taken place within the last week in which Second Officer Nkomo was giving an uncharacteristically enthusiastic and unqualified account of how successful the mission into the unknown had been. She was surrounded by other equally enthusiastic officers including the captain and the Chief Science Officer. They were flanked by grimly authoritative military figures and taking questions from scientists who were mostly either as enthusiastic as the space ship's senior command or cautiously welcomed the reports of great discoveries whilst also mildly voicing their reservations.

"This could still be an enormous hoax," said Sheila. "This story of androids who can take on the appearance of humans to the extent you suggest is frankly incredible. They must be truly advanced robots if they can manufacture a copy as much like you as the Captain Kerensky I met so many weeks ago. How do we know that you're not just walking us into a trap?"

"You'll just have to trust me," Nadezhda admitted. "In any case, something or other has changed on the Intrepid recently. You've obviously noticed that the invisible force fields have vanished. There's so far been no sign of anyone who's tried to stop us or return us to captivity. This favourable situation mightn't last forever. We have to take advantage of it. We have to try and regain control of the Intrepid."

"Is this what you suggest we do?" asked Sheila.

"It is our duty as officers of the Interplanetary Union and commanders of the Intrepid to do what we can to protect this space ship and all who travel on it," said Nadezhda persuasively.

"I don't think we have any choice," Petal admitted. "But, like Sheila, until I actually meet one of these aliens I shall remain, dare I say, somewhat sceptical of what you've said. It really does stretch belief beyond normal bounds."

Fortunately, Nadezhda's account was at least partly verified during the company's exploration of the villas that they passed on their way to the bridge. In one villa they discovered Professor Penrose who was as naked as everyone else. Nadezhda was surprised because the professor wasn't a senior officer. The androids hadn't restricted their activity to only those in the space ship's command.

At first the professor was very wary and, indeed, resentful of the senior officers. He was particularly suspicious of Dr. Petal Chang. He hadn't realised that the invisible force field around his villa was no longer active and he assumed that the senior officers had arrived in an official capacity although he was also puzzled by their unprofessional state of dress.

"Haven't you done enough?" he protested as the senior officers confronted him in the living room where he was sitting surrounded by holographic displays. "You take away my freedom. You take away my ability to do research. What more does the Interplanetary Union want to do?"

It took a while to reassure the professor that the officers hadn't come to humiliate him or further restrict his freedom, and that he was now free to leave of his own accord. He was under the impression that the Interplanetary Union had authorised a change of policy and that he'd been arrested for dissent. He even suspected that there'd been a military takeover of the loose federation of affiliated nation states.

The professor's account of his arrest was evidence that further supported Nadezhda's account. The senior officers that addressed the conference at which he'd been arrested included amongst their number the same officers now arraigned in front of him who knew for sure that at that time they'd been detained on the outermost level. It was clear that the Dr. Petal Chang who'd escorted Professor Penrose away from the conference centre to his place of luxury detention wasn't the same woman as the Chief Science Officer who was now revising her most recent assessment of Nadezhda's sanity.