The Forever Quest (The Forever Series Book 4) Read online

“What about your quest to find the other you, the one you mentioned back in my office?”

  I scratched the back of my head. “That one. Yeah, sort of put it on hold. Everybody told me I was nuts, suicidal, or both to try and find someone very dangerous who didn’t want to be found.”

  “They’re all wrong. They’re forgetting one thing. You.”

  “You’re as unclear as a fortune cookie. What’s that mean?”

  “They’re all forgetting just how low you can sink and how impossible it is for you to ever kick your legs to try and reach the surface.”

  “Okay, now you’re up to two fortune cookies of huh.”

  She set her fork down, set her elbows on the table, and clasped her hands. “Look, Jon. Literally look at yourself. Take a moment.” She checked her watch. “I have time. I’ll need to be back in a couple hours. But, come to think of it, I’ll need time to stop by a hospital and have my stomach pumped, so do speed it up.”

  “I’m done. I took a long, hard, informed, and critical look—”

  “I said take five minutes. I expect you to take five minutes. I deserve five minutes’ worth of your otherwise pointless day.”

  “You got four left. Sorry.”

  “Here’s the short and sweet of it. You, Jon Ryan, lost one loved one, a handful acquaintances, and a bunch of buildings. That put you in an epic tailspin the likes of which I’ve never personally witnessed. I don’t see you pulling out of this dive, seriously. Short of having you committed to a psych hospital in perpetuity, I don’t know what to do. But,” she stabbed her fork at me angrily, “I’ll remind you of this. That other Jon Ryan, if he’s really out there, lost a hell of a lot more than you did. He lost everything. He lost his people, planet, his roots, and any sense of purpose he could ever have. He probably watched as nine billion lives were blown to pieces, and he could do nothing to save them. Ever think about that, Jon Ryan? Hmm?” She slammed her fork to the table, and it clanged to the floor. “If your sad pint-sized loss did this to you,” she pointed at me with four fingers, “just try and imagine though your fog of self-pity and self-loathing what that would do to him.”

  She pulled in a few ragged breaths and pushed back from the table. “There. I said what I came to say. I’m outta here. You’re free to be flippant, funny, or drop deader than the Christmas goose. Thanks for the indigestion and the lousy conversation.” She stormed out so fast I swear I saw a smoke trail behind her.

  Peg came over uninvited. “I think I misjudged that gal. I kind of like her.” She slapped a mighty hip against my shoulder, nearly pushing me out of my chair. “I think she kind of likes you too. Oh, and she’s right. You do look like shit, and you are acting like a pathetic wuss.”

  “It’s not polite to eavesdrop on private conversations.”

  “I don’t have a polite bone in my body.” As she walked away, Peg turned and asked, “Oh, and if you’re not going to call her, give me her number.”

  “Do you even know who that was?”

  “Yeah. The girl one of us should be sleeping with tonight.”

  TWO

  I walked slowly into Kymee’s cluttered work area. Over the last few years, the two of us had become the unlikeliest of friends, but we were good friends. Kymee’s multi-million-year life dwarfed my two-century lifespan. I actually still thought of myself as human. Kymee was Deavoriath, an ancient and mysterious race that I wanted to learn more about. Kymee and his people wanted to be left alone, tiring long ago of outside contact. But kindred spirits tended to find one another, and we two certainly had.

  “Jon,” Kymee said as he rose to greet him, “I’m surprised to see you again so soon.” In place of the human tradition of shaking hands, we exchanged the Deavoriath version. We grabbed the each other’s right elbow and bumped shoulders. “But it’s always nice to see you. Please,” he gestured to a chair, “sit.”

  “So soon?” I responded. “It’s been, what, almost six months.”

  “For you, six months means little.” He slapped his chest, “For me, it means considerably less than nothing. The space between heartbeats.”

  “What, you guys have hearts? Huh! Never would have thought it.”

  “That’s because you know Yibitriander. Even his own people think he’s a sourpuss.”

  We shared a cordial laugh.

  “So, my young friend. What brings you to this stale, old planet?”

  What did? Why had I come? I took a second, but I realized why. “Because I missed you, y’old curmudgeon.”

  Kymee reflected a moment. “Curmudgeon? I’m accessing the files I downloaded from you when you first arrived. I see the word, but I don’t think we have that concept. Curious. A crusty, ill-tempered old man. Me? I think I’ve just been insulted by an inferior species.”

  “Species, nothing. I’m a robot, remember? We don’t get a biologic classification.”

  He aimed a bony finger at me. “You’re as human as they come, boy. You can’t hide it.”

  “Wait, now I’m insulted.”

  “It’s good to see you too,” Kymee said with genuine warmth. “I’d forgotten how good it is to see an old friend.” He shook his head so his long, white hair whipped against his cheeks. “We’ve been isolated for so long, externally and internally.”

  “Then come with me,” I said. “I could use a good mechanic on a long voyage. You might actually become useful in your retirement.”

  “Me, join your adventure? Hardly.” He sat back down and fumbled with the items on the bench. “I’m well past the age and inclination of vacationing, let alone questing.”

  “Oh, so now my mercy mission is a quest? Maybe I should change my uniform, add some armor, and wear a funny-looking hat?”

  “Call it what you will. A crusade, a pilgrimage, or a night on the town. I see it for what it is.”

  “I know what you advised. Let’s not go there again.”

  “Then why, I ask again, have you come?”

  I remained silent a long spell.

  “And please, sit down. At least provide me the illusion that I’m not passing the day talking to some oversized children’s toy.”

  I sat, folded my hands, and proceeded to twiddle my thumbs. Finally, I spoke. “I don’t have too many people I can talk to, Kymee. Not anymore. Sapale’s dead, the kids are, well, they’re my kids. Aside from Toño, I’m not close to any of the androids left. I guess I need an immortal with a kind ear to bounce off my sorry excuses for ideas.”

  “Thank you. That’s the best compliment I believe I’ve ever been paid.” Shifting his tone, Kymee asked, “That brings up a point I’m curious about. It’s about the android program you mentioned. Many civilizations have developed similar technology, us included. Some used android extensively while others stopped producing them almost as soon as they were invented. You humans invented them out of necessity. I get that. But it seems to me the human fleet is not making much use of them lately. Why is that? Androids are phenomenal tools.”

  “I’ve been called that by the ladies on more than one occasion.”

  “I’m asking seriously, which is always risky business with you.”

  “Sorry,” I said, almost meaning it. “Reflexes are hard to tame. You’re right. Uploads to androids seem to be a thing of the past. After the initial astronauts were produced and shipped out, the US was the only one to make many more. Stuart Marshall mostly did the creating. He wanted them as part of his plan to rule forever, the sick SOB. Maybe that’s what did the program in? He acted about as badly as a person could. People probably figured one group of deluded, self-serving robots was enough.

  “Plus, the worldfleet is doing very well. I keep half an eye on them, and I’m impressed. There is a school of thought that androids will be needed to keep key skills alive: doctors, scientists, those sorts of occupations. But kids are learning the old ways, and education is booming, so no one thinks androids will be needed to fill in gaps. They even found people to do the dirty work—sewers and that kind of stuff. Can you imagine
being immortal and cleaning out waste-water systems?”

  “I’d switch myself off,” replied Kymee. He then looked at me sternly. “So, are you here to tell me you’re going on your ill-advised quest, or are you here to try and trick me into helping you again?”

  I winked at him. “Maybe both.”

  He rolled his eyes.

  “As to my quest, I have to go. A good friend convinced me of that. I know you helping me is a touchy subject, but yes, I’d like to pick your brain about it.”

  “What a ghastly idiom.”

  I guess it was kind of gross. Never thought about it. Yuck. “You’ve traveled the stars. I don’t know what I’m even looking for. I was hoping you could at least tell me where not to look.”

  “In what sense?”

  “Places a human android wouldn’t go. Areas void of life, too hostile, that sort of thing. Maybe give me a few insights as to where he might have gone, if you have any.”

  “Fair enough. I’ll send Wrath a such a file. I’m not sure it’ll be of much help, but I see no problem providing you that type of information.”

  “I guess that’s it.” It wasn’t. “I do wonder about Wrath.”

  “He can be a challenge.”

  “He’s nuts. He has his own agenda that he’s very sneaky about, and all he really wants to do is kill, kill, kill.”

  “That would be Wrath.”

  “Is that how you programmed him?”

  Kymee was quiet again for a spell. “I don’t think you can understand what Wrath is. I don’t mean that as an insult. I think it’s simply the truth. Yes, I oversaw his…fabrication. But he is not a machine. No one programmed him. He did what you and I, what everybody, does. He developed into who he is via whatever mysterious process forms us all.”

  “You telling me he’s alive? A sentient being?”

  “No, but yes. Suffice it to say, he’s complicated. But he can be reasoned with, and believe it or not, he wants to be led.”

  “I still say he’s loco.”

  “Yibitriander used to tell me the same thing all the time.”

  “And is he like you guys? Will he live forever?”

  Kymee twisted his lips, thinking. “Possibly. He may just outlive us all.”

  “That brings up another thing I’m curious about. How long do the Deavoriath live? Have any of you died?”

  “As far as I can tell, and I’m the most likely to know, we’ll stumble on forever.” He thought a moment. “Only one man has died since we returned to Oowaoa, and that was a very long time ago.”

  “What happened to him? An accident?”

  He took a while to respond. “It was no accident. His death was intentional, and it was at my hand.” He was clearly disturbed to recall the event.

  “Was he, what, a criminal?” Didn’t seem likely.

  “No, Farthdoran was the very opposite of a criminal.”

  What was the opposite of a criminal? A police officer? I hadn’t seen signs of a constabulary on any of my visits. “Should I drop it?” I asked.

  He sat mute a second, then snapped back to reality. “No. I’m just being a silly old man and losing myself in the past. Farthdoran was what you might call a priest, a religious thinker. We were never big on religion, as you might imagine. It would have interfered with all our killing and enslaving. Couldn’t have that.”

  He was quiet again. “Farthdoran returned with us and lived among us here at Oowaoa for a long time, but he was never happy. The longer we all contemplated our collective navels, the sadder he became. We, he maintained, served no useful, let alone greater, purpose. We were becoming, he was overly fond of saying, fungus on the bark of a dead tree.”

  “So he was sentenced to death for possessing an unflattering opinion? You guys are tough.”

  “No,” he said sadly, “the sentence was his. His alone.” Kymee was still for a while again. “He came to me and asked me to terminate his life. I laughed at him. Can you imagine that? I laughed at a man who begged me to end his suffering. That’s the kind of tough we were, Jon Ryan. The worst kind I can conceive.”

  “What suffering? Was he, like, terminally ill?”

  “By then, such a thing was no longer even possible. No, he couldn’t take what he felt was a futile existence any longer. He lost his interest and will to live.”

  “So…”

  “So, we did the Deavoriath thing. We conferred amongst ourselves, agreed upon his murder, and then patted ourselves on the collective backs for all of our new kindness and wisdom.” He shook his head slowly. “What a sorry lot we are, Jon. What a terrible sorry bunch of outmoded, irrelevant beings.”

  “It’s not like you need me to help you out morally, but dude, the man wanted to die. Helping him actually might have been a kindness. If you hadn’t helped, what were his options? Lighting himself on fire? Putting a laser hole in his head? Not tidy and definitely not without suffering.”

  “We could have listened to him. We could have tried to understand him and his position. But, no. The most enlightened race in the universe smugly euthanized him and promptly forgot all about his inconvenient proposition and imposition.”

  “Sorry,” was all I could think to say.

  “You asked. There you have it.”

  “Kymee, you guys have spent a million years trying to reinvent yourselves as better people.”

  He shrugged. “And?”

  “And how are you going to get anywhere if you don’t stop hating yourselves? You guys need to move on.”

  I could see I’d hit him hard with that one, maybe below the belt. He started to tear up. Yeah, lots of species cried It was a universal habit, it would seem.

  “How can one so young be so wise?” he asked as he lost it.

  I let him be until he was done. It took him a while. I got the impression he hadn’t allowed himself direct contact with his feeling for a very long time.

  “You okay?” I asked, patting the back of his hand.

  “No. Far from it, but I am better. Thank you.” After a while, he said, “I’m going to take your advice about trying not to hate ourselves to the One That Is All next time we’re all gathered. Maybe we can make some progress. Probably not, but who knows?”

  “I’ll send y’all a bill. Heads up: counseling immortals ain’t cheap. Be generous when the hat is passed.”

  “How does your species put up with you, Jon Ryan?”

  “They loaded me into a tin can and blasted me into endless space, that’s how.”

  “A judicious and crafty species, it would seem.”

  THREE

  So, where do you look for someone who doesn’t want to be found? I had very few clues. I knew Uto had been on Proxima Centauri two hundred years before and maybe above Azsuram more recently. Two points define a straight line. Not much help. I’d been a few places on my Ark voyage. I wasn’t looking for him then, but I’d seen and heard nothing to suggest he was anywhere I’d been. Kaljax was off the list. I knew just about all there was to know about that planet. No ancient, surly androids hid there. But crossing off a few worlds wasn’t very useful. The list Kymee sent me contained thousands of civilized planets.

  From what I’d observed, Uto wasn’t able to fold space. That meant he wasn’t anywhere extremely far away. Even with the FTL speeds possible with warp drives, he’d still be local, more or less. He could, unfortunately, be sailing to somewhere a thousand parsecs away. He, like me, had all the time in the world. I pulled up Kymee’s list and filtered it for planets within ten light-years. There were a few hits, but not many. I tried twenty-five light-years. Hmm. Dalque. It orbited Xi Boötis, around twenty light-years away. I had to chuckle at Kymee’s footnote concerning the planet. Good place for the damned. Well, in the mood I was in and the mood Uto was always in, that sounded like as good a place as any to start. I made my request to Wrath. No reason to rekindle our old squabble over the concept of me being his boss.

  From a hundred kilometers, Dalque looked okay enough. The oceans were kind of smal
l, it had no polar ice caps, and the air wasn’t exactly crystal clear. But, hey, I didn’t need to breath the crap, so what did I care? I’d managed to attach Shearwater, my bitchin’ old ship, to Wrath. I used it to descend to the surface. The less I was associated with the Deavoriath, the easier life was. Appearing out of nowhere in a cube was pretty much a guaranteed way to instantly become public enemy number one.

  There were several continents and multiple cities, much like old Earth. Having no way to decide which place might be better than the next, I elected to land at a city right below Wrath’s orbit. The closer I was, the more I got the damned aspect Kymee mentioned. Smoke billowed up everywhere. Some came from totally inefficient factories horrifically polluting the air, but most came from randomly scattered fires. Buildings, open fields, you name it, it was smoldering. Al was with me on Shearwater. He was trustworthy, if not sociable. I asked him to find the least wrecked place. We landed in a flat part of a city called Grelf, in sort of a downtown-looking section.

  Up close, the best part of Grelf was pretty bad. The streets were pockmarked with holes that looked like explosive craters. Many windows were broken, and the ever-present smoke wafted out of many openings. Cross this hellhole off your bucket list. I walked down the sidewalk, or what was left of it, debris and rubble crunching under my boots. I entered the most logical place. A bar. Yeah, they’re kind of a universal first stop in Crap City. In two hundred years, I’ve been in some really nasty bars. This one, named the I You Dare, was far and away the worst. Litter on the floors, on the bar, and on the tables. It reeked of old smoke, cheap booze, and filthy patrons. I turned down my olfactory sensors to twenty percent and was still nauseated.

  I stepped up to the bar and waved a finger at the barkeep. It, because I had no idea if its species had sexes, rotated its head toward me but defiantly didn’t budge. I came to learn it was a Landaquin. The name rolls off the tongue real nice, but that’s the only non-revolting thing about the beasties. They were squat and furry with a bunch of arms and legs. Think cube-shaped spiders with fuzz and bad breath. Finally, I decided to go to it, since it wasn’t coming to me.