Children of Time by Adrian Tchaikovsky

subtly tugging with insubstantial ghost fingers, the first touch of the world below.
    ‘All signs suggest stable orbit for now,’ Lain reported tensely. There followed a slow-motion comedy as deceleration ceased and then rotation began, gravity creeping across the floor to make a new home against the wall, and the
Gilgamesh
’s consoles and fittings shudderingly adjusting. For a minute there was no point of reference; a room full of weightless people trying to remember their long-ago training, hauling on each other to get to the right surface before they could be slammed into it. In the commotion, awkwardness, and a series of minor medical calls, the whole business of their imminent destruction was almost forgotten.
    ‘New transmission,’ Holsten alerted them, as the signal came in. In his ear those same female tones sounded, but the intonation, the rhythm of the speech was quite different, and stripped free of that tortured backing.
    I am Doctor Avrana Kern, chief scientist and administrator of the Second Brin Exaltation Project
, was his translation. Even through the filter of archaic Imperial C, the voice was stern and proud.
What are you? What is your provenance?
    ‘That doesn’t sound like a computer,’ Lain murmured.
    ‘Of course it’s a computer,’ Vitas snapped. ‘It’s simply a more sophisticated approximation of—’
    ‘Enough.’ Guyen cut through the argument. ‘Mason?’
    We are an ark ship from Earth,
Holsten sent,
seeking permission to establish a colony on Kern’s World.
If the thing he was talking to was in any way human, he guessed that a little flattery couldn’t harm.
    Whose Earth, though? Sering’s Earth or my Earth?
came the swift reply. Now that they were in orbit, there was barely any delay: it was almost like a real conversation.
    Real conversation with a faceless machine mind
, Holsten reminded himself. He sent his translation round the room, looking for help, but nobody had any suggestion as to what the satellite meant. Before he could give any kind of answer, a new transmission came in.
    I do not recognize you. You are not human. You are not from Earth. You have no business here. Eliza shows me all that she sees of you and there is nothing of Earth in you but why can I not see you for myself why can I not open my eyes where are my eyes where are my eyes where are my eyes.
And then an abrupt cessation of the message, leaving Holsten shaken because that was it: a segue straight into the voice of madness, without a moment’s warning.
    ‘I don’t think it’s a computer,’ he said, but soft enough that only Lain heard him. She was reading over his shoulder still, and nodded soberly.
    Our vessel is the ark ship
Gilgamesh
from Earth. This ship was built after your time
, he prepared and sent, with a bitter awareness of the sheer understatement implicit in that. He was dreading what they might receive back.
     
Good evening, I am Eliza Kern, composite expert system of the of the of the am instructed to require you to return to your point of origin.
 
Send them away I don’t want them if they say they came from Earth they can go back go back go back I don’t won’t can’t no no no no no
     
    ‘It’s completely deranged,’ Karst stated flatly, and that with the benefit of only half of what was being said. ‘Can we keep the planet between us, or something?’
    ‘Not and retain stable orbit,’ one of Guyen’s team reported. ‘Seriously, remember how big the
Gil
is. We can’t just flit him about like your drones.’
    Holsten was already sending, because Guyen had stopped dictating and it now seemed to be down to him.
Return to Earth is not possible. Please may we speak to your sister again, Eliza?
, pleading for the life of humanity in a dead language – having to make the call between artificial intransigence and what he was increasingly sure was real human crazy.
    That other voice again, delivering a rant that he got down as:
Why can’t you just go back where you came