‘I just don’t see it,’ the man was saying. ‘She had everything: power, status, family, friends . . . She could easily re-engineer her personality if she was having problems. She almost certainly ran regular sanity-check programs.’
‘Madness by choice, then,’ the ant suggested. ‘Those who achieve and obtain so much often feel they have lost something indefinable along the way.’
Behind the man, but invisible, the Legate extended its forefinger into a narrow needle, primed with a particular narcotic. It pressed this into the man’s neck, injected, then withdrew it just as the man reached up to scratch the sudden itch.
‘That’s bullshit and you know it,’ the man continued. ‘If you’re haiman, you’re about as pragmatic as it gets. Every organic feeling is quantified and analysed, and if it doesn’t fit underlying drives it’s discarded. All haimans know it’s just neurochemicals.’ The man stumbled briefly. ‘Just. . .’
The Legate stepped in again and pressed a hand to the back of the man’s neck, injecting fibres through the numbed skin, seeking out and connecting to his auditory nerves. The drug dulled him just enough to edge him into fugue, his state slightly mesmerized.
Precisely mimicking the ant drone’s voice the Legate asked the man directly through his auditory nerve, ‘Where is the evidence being kept?’
‘The old oxygen store, level eight sector three,’ the man replied out loud—not even wondering why the forensic AI would ask him about something it had organized itself.
‘What’s that?’ the genuine ant asked, turning to look up at him, antennae waving.
‘Um?’ The man halted as the Legate withdrew. He rubbed his face. ‘Shit, I’m tired. Unless you’ve got some critical use for me, I’m going to sack out.’
‘I wouldn’t use you in a critical situation if you were tired,’ the ant observed.
The man waved a hand and moved on. The ant remained behind, its antennae still waving. It turned its head slowly, beginning to make probing scans of its surroundings. The Legate quickly retreated. Its chameleonware was the best, but no such ‘ware was perfect.