Immortal Coil - Jeffrey Lang [79]
She carried him through a doorway and into a wide hallway where she paused to adjust her hold. Data’s field of vision was limited because he could not lift his head, but whenever Rhea paused to shift his weight, he got momentary glimpses of his surroundings. The floors were pink marble inlaid with veins of silver and gold. Delicate crystal chandeliers hung from the ceilings and the walls were festooned with paintings, charcoals and pencil studies that—if he had the opportunity—Data would have wanted to study for hours, even days. Data knew then that his cataloging system was damaged because he kept seeing pieces by acknowledged masters—drawings by Rembrandt, watercolors by van Gogh, sculptures by T’Chan and baskets woven by Senese—that he could not find in his database.
For several hundred paces, the only sound he heard was the clack of Rhea’s heels against the marble floor and the hiss of her breath. Then suddenly, he heard a door open behind them. Rhea turned and readjusted her grip so that Data was now cradled in her arms. His head flopped to the side and there before him stood Emil Vaslovik. Data was not terribly surprised to see him, but he was startled to see two exocomps hovering just above his shoulders. Like Odin’s ravens, Data thought, and congratulated himself on the analogy.
The last Data had heard, the exocomps—the small servomechanisms he had helped to identify as sentient beings several years earlier—had elected to remain with Dr. Farallon and assist in the research. Data wondered if Vaslovik had stolen these as he had stolen Rhea, but then realized, no, if the exocomps had been stolen, he would have heard about it. Another thought occurred to him: the designs for the construction of exocomps had been widely disseminated before Data had discovered their sentience. It was entirely possible someone else had constructed some—perhaps someone with fewer ethical constraints than Farallon—and Vaslovik had liberated them.
But all such thoughts were thrust aside as soon as Vaslovik spoke, or, rather, shouted, his voice reverberating off the marble floors. “Rhea! Are you insane? Do you realize the risk you’re running? What if you were followed?”
Rhea spun on her heel and continued down the long hallway. “I don’t have time to discuss this.” She called to the exocomps. “Winken, Blinken—go get a stretcher. Tell Nod to get the lab ready. Hurry! My arms are getting tired.”
The two exocomps spun on their axes and regarded Vaslovik, but before he could say anything, Rhea shouted, “Go!” They sped off down the hall and disappeared into the shadows. Vaslovik ran to catch up to them, but Rhea cut him off before he could say a word. “He saved my life,” she said, “and now he’s dying. I couldn’t take him back to the Enterprise and there was nowhere else to turn. What would you have had me do? Leave him to die?” She didn’t wait for Vaslovik to respond, but laid Data gently on the antigravity gurney Winken and Blinken had brought. “So,” she said, “are you going to help me?”
But Data never heard Vaslovik’s response. He saw the man’s mouth open and close, once, then twice, but he seemed to be speaking slowly, so very slowly. When it opened the third time, Vaslovik’s mouth seemed to stretch wide, like a serpent dislocating its jaw to swallow its prey, and Data had the peculiar sensation that he was falling, tumbling headlong into a pit. The world grayed out, stuttered and stammered. Sound fluttered back in and Data heard Rhea’s frantic shouts.
“I can’t stop it! Hurry! Help me stabilize him. Winken! Get me that phase adjuster!”
Data’s vision snapped back into focus and his ability to synthesize information returned. He had been moved—he could see that much—because the paintings and portraits on the walls were different.