PeterWatts_Blindsight

Peter Watts 90 Blindsight
deterministic as any other kind."
"That doesn't mean you can even predict them, let along set them
up like that." Luminous intel reflected off the major's bald head.
"You'd have to know the starting conditions of a million different
variables to ten decimal places. Literally."
"Yup."
"Vampires can't even do that. Quanticle computers can't do
that."
Szpindel shrugged like a marionette.
All the while the Gang had been slipping in and out of character,
dancing with some unseen partner that—despite their best efforts
— told us little beyond endless permutations of You really
wouldn't like it here. Any interrogative it answered with another—
yet somehow it always left the sense of questions answered.
"Did you send the Fireflies?" Sascha asked.
"We send many things many places," Rorschach replied. "What
do their specs show?"
"We do not know their specifications. The Fireflies burned up
over Earth."
"Then shouldn't you be looking there? When our kids fly, they're
on their own."
Sascha muted the channel. "You know who we're talking to?
Jesus of fucking Nazareth, that's who."
Szpindel looked at Bates. Bates shrugged, palms up.
"You didn't get it?" Sascha shook her head. "That last exchange
was the informational equivalent of Should we render taxes unto
Caesar. Beat for beat."
"Thanks for casting us as the Pharisees," Szpindel grumbled.
"Hey, if the Jew fits..."
Szpindel rolled his eyes.
That was when I first noticed it: a tiny imperfection on Sascha's
topology, a flyspeck of doubt marring one of her facets. "We're not
getting anywhere," she said. "Let's try a side door." She winked
out: Michelle reopened the outgoing line. "Theseus to Rorschach.
Open to requests for information."
"Cultural exchange," Rorschach said. "That works for me."
Bates's brow furrowed. "Is that wise?"