Agent to the Stars, John Scalzi [paper ebook reader .TXT] 📗

that a Yherajk other than Joshua connect to Michelle’s mind, and acting as a conduit, send the memory into the brain of a human. This would allow us to see more perfectly what Michelle was thinking in those last moments.

“Without this information, this opportunity for our peoples could be gone forever. And, as importantly for me, my friend, who I did not value as I should have in life, will be gone as well.”

I bowed my head, and put my hand over my eyes. I didn’t mean to choke myself up as much as I did. But saying how much someone means to you jackhammers into your head the fact of whether you mean it or not. I had meant it. I didn’t realize how much.

“That was a very noble speech,” Gwedif said, after a minute. “But we must hurry. Are you ready to answer questions?”

“Yes,” I said, clearing my throat. “I’m ready.”

“Very well. The ientcio will speak for the officers, and I of course will speak for him.”

“All right.”

“The ientcio wants to know what you think happened in those last minutes of your friend’s life.”

“If the ientcio will allow it,” I said, “I’d rather hold off on that question, for reasons that I’ll get into in just a minute. But I can say that, being a human, I suspect that the situation was not as clear-cut as Joshua saw it. Joshua was looking at Michelle’s actions, but perhaps not her state of mind.”

“What gives you the right to make this decision for your friend?”

“She gave me the right, if she were incapacitated such as she is, to make medical decisions for her. I believe this qualifies me to take this action.”

“What will you do if we refuse your request, or if the results are such that Joshua is not able to inhabit your friend’s body?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t really have a backup plan.”

“That’s not very wise,” Gwedif said.

“No, it’s not,” I agreed. “But giving her a chance here is better than her having no chance back on Earth.”

“You realize that if Joshua inhabits your friend’s body, your friend will still be dead.”

“I understand that. At the same time, Joshua has told me that he has retained the memories and some of the personality traits of Ralph, the dog whose body he inhabited, and those traits are still with him even now. My hope would be that some of who Michelle was might still remain after Joshua inhabits her body. However, even if doesn’t work out that way, from the practical purposes of having Joshua inhabit Michelle’s body, it won’t matter.”

“It occurs to the ientcio that you might be proposing having Joshua inhabit your friend’s body merely out of convenience.”

I blinked. “I’m not sure I follow that,” I said.

“You said that this course of action may be the best way to introduce the Yherajk to humanity.”

“Right,” I said.

“What are some other courses of action?”

“I didn’t come up with any others that were as good as this one, I’m afraid,” I said.

“That’s what the ientcio means,” Gwedif said. “This is, you’ll admit, a rather extreme course, and your pressing for it may simply be a way to keep you from admitting that you couldn’t figure out a more conventional or at least sane way of introducing the Yherajk to your people. How is the memory of your friend served well by what might be your instinct to save your own skin?”

I flushed. “I wouldn’t deny that having Joshua in Michelle’s body would keep me from having to admit total defeat,” I said. “But with all due respect to the ientcio, if he or the rest of you had wanted to do this conventionally, you should have just dropped a cube down on the steps of the White House and gone in for the tour. This is an extreme course, yes. But it will give a Yherajk a chance to live as a human, to be a human. Joshua has human memories, but that’s not enough. It’s like watching a documentary of a war. You can watch it a thousand times, but you still can’t say you’ve fought. If you want to understand humans, you have to be one. Here’s a chance.”

“Wouldn’t her family know that your friend has changed?”

“She has no family,” I said. “The only person who would have been close enough to note the change would have been me. And maybe her hairdresser. I don’t know.”

“You say that a Yherajk could send the memory to another human being, so they might see it. Which Yherajk? Which human?”

“The Yherajk would be Gwedif,” I said. “He’s worked with humans before, and he’s the only Yherajk on the ship who didn’t parent Joshua, so that makes him more impartial than any other Yherajk might be. As for the human, I had originally thought I could do it, but I’m biased towards my argument. So it would have to have been Miranda. Miranda is morally opposed to the idea of Joshua inhabiting Michelle’s body, but I trust her not to let her own opinion color what she would experience in the memory. But now, as it turns out, we’ve happened to pick up someone who is totally unbiased, since he doesn’t know the specifics of Michelle’s event. So the human who sees the memory should be Jim Van Doren.”

“What?” Van Doren said.

“You’re the man,” I said, “Who gets to read Michelle Beck’s mind.”

“How do I do that?” Van Doren said.

“I’m going to stick tendrils into your skull,” Gwedif said.

“Is it going to hurt?”

“Not if you’re nice to me from now on,” Gwedif said, sweetly.

“Tom, you never told me that I was going to get probed,” Van Doren said.

“It’s not really a probe,” I said. “Come on, Jim. You wanted to get the story straight, anyway.”

“Is this seriously necessary?” Van Doren said.

“Yes, it is,” I said. “Honestly. What you experience now could change the course of the world.”

“It sounds so hackneyed when you put it that way,” Van Doren said.

“It’s hackneyed, but it’s true,” I said.

Van Doren turned to Gwedif. “Promise me my brain isn’t going to end up in a jar,” he said.

“It will stay safe and snug in your chubby little skull,” Gwedif said. “I promise. You’ll be fine.”

“God, what have I gotten myself into,” Van Doren said. “All right. Fine. Whatever.”

“The ientcio has a question for Jim Van Doren,” Gwedif said.

“Okay,” Van Doren said. “What?”

“Tom feels it would be appropriate for Joshua to inhabit Michelle Beck’s body. Miranda does not. The ientcio wishes to know what you think about Joshua inhabiting this human body.”

“Well, it would take her off my list of people to date,” Van Doren said. “Other than that, I don’t know.”

“The senior officers will now debate the issue and render a decision,” Gwedif said. “You may notice the room getting smellier for a few minutes.”

It did. By the time they were finished, my eyes were watering. Miranda had to sit down. Van Doren was standing his ground, but just barely.

“The senior officers have decided to allow me to probe Michelle and transmit the memories to Jim Van Doren,” Gwedif said.

“Good,” I said. “Another minute of discussion and my sinus cavities would have imploded.”

“It was not a unanimous vote,” Gwedif said. “There was a lot of shouting.”

“What do I do now?” Van Doren wanted to know.

Gwedif had him sit next to the stretcher and explained Van Doren’s options — Gwedif could go through his nose, which was the most efficient way, but the most uncomfortable, or through the ears, which was less efficient but least uncomfortable. Van Doren chose the ears.

“What am I going to be looking at?” Van Doren asked me, as Gwedif was preparing Michelle.

“You’re going to be looking at the last moments of her life,” I said. “The ones just before she goes into the coma.”

“What am I looking for?”

“Don’t look for anything,” I said. “That’s the whole point of you doing this: you don’t know what to look for. Just let us know what you’re experiencing.”

“Will I be able to tell you as it happens?”

“How should I know?” I said. “I’ve never done this before, either.”

“Man, your alien dog was right,” Van Doren said. “This is the weirdest night of my life.”

Gwedif slopped onto his ears before he could say another word.

*****

“What are you seeing?” I asked Van Doren.

“I’m seeing your ugly face, Tom,” Van Doren said.

“Try closing your eyes,” I suggested.

Van Doren did. “This is so very odd,” he said, finally. “I’m seeing some woman pouring goop over my face. I’m feeling the goop. What is this stuff?”

“Try sensing it for yourself,” Gwedif suggested. “Just like you would your own memory.”

Silence for a moment.

“It’s latex,” Van Doren said. “I’m getting a latex mask done for this stupid movie I’m doing. The woman who’s putting the mask on me is a real bitch. A minute ago she tried to make Miranda leave. Miranda stood up to her, and she’s talking to her now about something else.”

Silence for another moment.

“Now the woman is sticking straws up my nose,” Van Doren said. “It hurts, the way she’s doing it, but I don’t say anything because I just want to get this over with. I’m more depressed than I’ve ever been in my life. Hmmm. That’s odd.”

“What’s odd?” I say.

“The way Michelle is experiencing that,” Van Doren said. “She is depressed. Really, really depressed. But she’s trying to make herself more depressed than she is.”

“Why?” I ask.

“I don’t know…..” Van Doren trailed off for a minute. Then he said, “I think it’s because she feels stupid. The audition earlier in the day went incredibly badly because she had prepared the wrong scene and because she fainted because of her treatment, whatever that means. She knows these things are her fault, and they were stupid little things. I think she’d rather be depressed than feel stupid. Yes, that’s exactly what it is.”

Silence again.

“My face is completely covered now. Miranda is telling me she has to go. I don’t want her to go, because I don’t want to be left alone. But I can hear the pain in her voice. I think she ate a bad burrito. I feel sorry for her; my lunch was fine. I let her go.

“Now I’m just lying here, thinking, trying to make myself more depressed. But it’s not working. I’m replaying the earlier audition in my head and I’m looking stupider each time I replay the memory. And now, to top it all off, I’m sitting in Pomona with straws sticking out of my nose, for a part that I got because someone wanted to fuck me a couple years back. I’m disgusted with myself. I yank out the straws, and fling them away. I’ll just sit here and die with goo on my face.”

There it was.

I looked at Joshua, who was sitting there, a sad doggie look on his face. He was right. He wasn’t happy about it, but he was. I bit the inside of my cheek until it bled. I was in a jumble of emotions. Sad for Michelle, who chose a stupid, stupid way to end her life. Angry at myself for believing that Michelle couldn’t, wouldn’t try to kill herself, and for taking her body so far away from where it should be. Fearful, because now I didn’t know what I was going to about Michelle. Or myself. Where could I take her to die? To finally die?

Miranda was sobbing quietly next to me. I reached over to her and held her. All she