Mind Over Ship by David Marusek

unmistakable whine of small-arms fire. The security guards at the private cars all perked up, and the media bees raced off in the direction of the commotion.
    “Please, Fred,” Mary said, trying to pull him into the Starke car, “I don’t have many more tricks left to play here. Why don’t we just drive into Provo and rent our own car there? How does that sound?”
    But Fred had made up his mind. He removed his visor cap, threw back his shoulders, and marched in the direction of the public platforms. He didn’t get far before a media bee discovered him and projected a small frame in his path with a talking head who said, “Is it true, Myr Londenstane, your release from prison was purchased by unknown benefactors?”
    Fred had been wondering that himself, but he never slowed down. “Get out of my way,” he growled. When the bee persisted in blocking him, he said, “Desist!” and the mech complied, closing its frame and flying outside his privacy zone.
    But ten more talking heads replaced it and peppered him with questions: Did Applied People collude with you in infiltrating the clinic? Have you talked to officer Dell since you strangled him? Where did you acquire the black market identikit? Is it true you were on the Starke payroll during the twenty-first century?
    “Desist! Desist!” Fred shouted and tried to bat the mechs out of the air with his duffel. They retreated from his privacy zone, but the main body of bees had returned, and everywhere Fred turned, they blocked his way and roared questions at him. A miniature diorama opened at his feet displaying a clearing in a wooded area where two men struggled in desperate combat. One of the figures was a pike wearing a Roosevelt Clinic uniform and the other was a russ. The ground around them was littered with blasted splinters of tree branches. The russ knocked the pike down and straddled him, grabbing up a sharp stick and jamming it into his ear. The pike screamed and stopped struggling, but the russ only shoved the stick in deeper. He rocked back and forth against the fallen man, his crotch bulging with excitement.
    “No!” Fred shouted over the din. “That’s a lie! It wasn’t like that at all!”He covered his head with his arms, but the bees pressed closer, and a new picture opened. In it Fred was beating a fallen russ with a baton. Again and again he struck him, though his brother made no effort to defend himself. Fred pummeled his head, his back, his ribs, until he swung so hard the carbon fiber club splintered, something impossible in real life. “Stop that!” Fred cried. “Stop!”
    “Desist!” Mary shouted. She was at Fred’s side. “Desist, desist, desist!” she kept shouting until she had cleared a little bubble of free space around them. Then she took Fred’s hand and led him through the melee back to the limo. “Desist! Desist!” But when they reached the car, a veil of bees hung between them and the door and stubbornly and illegally ignored her demand to move.
    Suddenly the tiny mechs began to drop from the air like pebbles. They fell in waves all around the hapless couple and beat their wings spastically against the concrete floor. When the way was clear, the limo door gulled open, and Mary urged Fred inside. The jewel-like fallen mechs crunched under their feet with every step. At first Mary was appalled—the cost!—but she remembered who she was, Mary Skarland, the evangeline, and she giddily ground a fortune of hardware under her elevated heels.
    More mechs were arriving when Fred and Mary entered the limo, and Mary ordered the door to shut. It lowered but did not shut completely until a bluish blur flew inside. It was a solitary bee, larger than most; it alighted on Mary’s shoulder and crawled under the lapel of her suit.
    Fred said nothing, only looked around the interior of the limo: five pods, each a safe harbor for two people, each seat an overstuffed lap of luxury. He fell into the nearest one and allowed the harness to