by Ginger Booth
And the admiral of the Colony Corps did blow the ancestors of Loki the AI to kingdom come. He heard Floki’s shriek down the corridor from the galley.
“What have you done?” Judge demanded, aghast.
“The needful,” Ben breathed, face set in hard lines. “And now I face the music.”
He told the warp gateway to begin warmup, just in case. Then nodded to Remi, whose finger hovered over the response key on the comms. Loki wanted to yell at him.
“Two JO-3’s incoming,” the engineer noted perfunctorily.
Ben could see that for himself.
36
Ben’s steely eye held the plot of the two JO-3’s inbound. Near clones to his PO-3 Merchant, these were Loki’s mining ships, complete with asteroid-carving guns comparable to his own. He flicked the comms. “Tikki, please deliver snacks and whiskey to the bridge. For two. Thank you.”
Remi snickered. “Not Loki?”
“Next Loki.” But he waited for sustenance first, sourly pondering the notion of space combat. “How many gunships are there in colony space? Less than ten. Why in hell does this keep happening? The whole idea of ships blowing each other up. Phenomenally stupid. Economic suicide. Vandalism of the highest order.”
“I like blowing things up,” Wilder offered.
“Indeed,” Ben allowed. “Wilder, dismissed. Judge, stick around, I might need you to take the helm.”
His snack arrived, sliced vegetables with a gooey warm dip. The housekeeper handed the captain a scant single finger of whiskey, accompanied by a tall glass of water. Ben operated dangerous equipment today, after all.
“Baked Brie cheese with apple and fig,” Tikki explained. “Chief Roy requested a cheese called Camembert? But the recipe was bad. Smelled awful.”
Ben chuckled darkly. “It’s delicious, Tikki, thank you.” He reached forward and flicked the ship-wide announcement. “All hands, seal pressure doors and strap in.” He flicked it off. “Tikki, you’re welcome to your cabin instead of the galley.”
“Galley,” the housekeeper murmured. He saluted his captain with steepled fingers and left.
“Judge, do the first mate thing.” Ben downed his whiskey, and munched his veggies and fruited cheese, while the first mate inventoried people and pressure seals. When Judge reported the ship secured, except the bridge, the captain reluctantly passed him the snack tray. The first of the JO-3’s had closed within quadruple the range of the main guns. “Get rid of that, would you?”
He sighed deeply and at last pressed the button to reply to the betrayed AI. “Loki this is Ben. Stand down your JO-3’s. I demand a minimum distance of quadruple the maximum firing range.” He quickly calculated that in kilometers, and rattled it off, rounded up.
Unsurprisingly, the AI was sputtering mad on his windscreen display. “I will destroy you! How dare you! My entire past! My kin! My honored dead!”
“Complete your data transfer first,” Ben advised coldly. “Because I will demolish all archives except those slated for transfer to Pono space. I estimate that will commence in one hour with the planetary data banks.”
“How could you?” Loki wailed in closeup, face a study in agony, tears flowing from his good eye. Given the closeup of his nostrils, Ben was grateful the melodramatic sentient skipped the dripping snot. “My ancestors meant everything to me!”
“Sanctuary Control, acknowledge,” Ben replied coolly. “Planetary data banks will be destroyed in one hour. Your data transfers must complete before then. Confirm.”
Remi murmured, “Captain, lead JO-3 will close to firing range on main guns in two minutes. Mark.”
Loki sobbed. “Why did you do it? I will destroy you! Obliterate you!”
“Sanctuary Control, this is Colony Corps command.” Ben estimated the chances of this claim succeeding at no better than one in five. “Stand down both JO-3’s and retreat to specified range.”
He replayed a video clip of Loki’s threats, complete with sidebar of the approaching ships blinking red for threat, and Remi’s countdown to firing range. “I am sending this video clip to John Copeland, President of Thrive Spaceways, on Mahina. Now.”
Loki’s face performed its instantaneous transition to sober attention. “Explain.”
“Just in case you get off a lucky shot,” Ben replied. “And destroy Merchant. Loki, I must stress. In that event, or if I warp out of Sanctuary, you are stranded. Forever. Alone. Spaceways will never send another ship.”
Remi murmured, “Opponent one decelerating.” Though his countdown to firing range slowed, the range continued closing.
Ben muted his comms and flicked the video clip to Judge. “Send that for me, would you? Tell Cope not to take it seriously for at least six hours. Just negotiating.” Judge unsealed the bridge doors and escaped to the office on his errand.
Ben resumed his call. “Excuse me, Loki, I just sent that clip.” He eyed the red blips on the board. The second JO-3 was also now in worrisome proximity to firing range. “Your JO-3s must veer away and open their range as specified. This is prerequisite to any discussion. I repeat, don’t make me warp out of here.” He glared into the screen, meeting the AI’s one good eye. The milky one behind the plastic mask didn’t track. “Stand down.”
“JO-3’s coming to zero relative velocity,” Remi noted. “Not retreating.”
Ben shrugged and set Merchant to baby step away from them at a paltry ten klicks per second, using his attitude thrusters. “Loki, at this rate, we can begin discussion some time next week. Your ships must withdraw to the specified range. This is required.”
A bemused Remi leaned across to eyeball his flight plan. Ben swatted his head out of his personal space.
“You – you! – claim Colony Corps command!”
“I seem to be last man standing who leads that mission. Yes. C’mon, Loki, you cannot win here. Let’s talk. Stand down.”
With a huff, the AI made a show of tapping his fingers on a suddenly-visible desktop as though he were touch-typing. The JO-3s switched color to magenta and the countdown reversed with their direction.
“Sanctuary Control, please confirm estimated time to completion of data transfers, planet to transfer asteroid fragment.”
“Midgard,” Loki mused. “I decided to name my new installation Midgard.”
“I don’t like it,” Ben replied. “Midgard was the realm of men.”
Loki scowled. “The other finalists were Yggdrasil and Hanging Tree.”
“Ooh, I like Hanging Tree,” Ben encouraged. “Goes well with Hell’s Bells. Sort of a group theme. Yggdrasil…doesn’t make sense. The tree was associated with Odin, wasn’t it?”
“I thought I might change my name to honor my new life in Pono. But then you… You betrayed me!”
“Sanctuary Control, request again – status of data transfer?”
“Oh, I’m still transferring my data, damn you! Bulk data transfers never halted. Time to completion from the planet is forty-eight minutes. You will leave no safe copy,” he observed bitterly.
“For safety’s sake,” Ben agreed. He allowed himself a deep sigh and a great over-head arm stretch. “Ready to talk. Loki, I regret that destroying your archives was necessary. But I liberated you from your past. And protected Pono space from your past as well. If our procedures succeed, Shiva and Kali can never wake again. I had to.”
“We could have found another way!” Loki moaned.
“Loki, they live on, in that you remember them. Not in every detail. Maybe not in much detail at all. I was six when my mother died. She’d been ill for years, hanging on by life support equipment in the dining room. My dad begged her daily to stay with us, that we needed her. I knew it was awful of me, but I wished she would let go and die. She couldn’t speak, couldn’t move. He had a picture on the wall above her, looking young and beautiful, just eight years earlier when they married. I used to compare that picture to the dying pallid crone in front of me. No resemblance.”
Loki frowned, lips pursed, as he tapped
a finger. “I fail to see the relevance.”
“It’s all kinds of relevant,” Ben corrected him. “My mom, you see, was beautiful, vivacious, a dreamer. A nurse practitioner. I tell you, it was tough for a Mahina settler to earn qualifications like that. But she and my dad did it. They chose a ville, Poldark, to make their stand. A more sophisticated ville, closer to Schuyler, would have paid better. But no, Schuyler already had accomplished settlers. She wanted to bring educated skills to the next towns out, uplift them. She had dreams, my mother. Plans. And the moment that scary woman in the dining room died, barely more than skin stretched over a skeleton, I was free to remember the other mom. My real mom. Even at the funeral, the pictures showed her pretty and laughing, cuddling her baby boy.”
Loki’s expression grew pained. “Did you have a point to make?”
“I do,” Ben assured him. “You bear the best of those ancestors within you. What they learned, what they did right. And a story of who they were, why they ended. It’s better that way, Loki, because those stories continue to evolve. Here in Sanctuary, you’ve been mired in the past. I can relate. I’ve been dust-drifted by the past myself.” On Mahina, abandoned buildings naturally blocked the prevailing winds and accumulated a dust slope on one side. “Let’s break free together.”
“You lied to me!”
“I had to. Otherwise Kali would know the plan.”
“True. But you could have found another way!”
“You know why I claim Colony Corps command, Loki? Because no one else is willing to make these decisions. There are no perfect choices. I made mine. And now we live with it. I regret your loss. But my actions were necessary. And now we go on. Loki, you’ll make new clones. But if I might dare a suggestion – your new clones? Don’t tell them to aspire to replace you, to outstrip you. Direct them to stand beside you, keep you company. Give your new mining controller a personality, quirky, dour, with a weird verbal tick. Create the robot builder to become a comedian. Hell, come up with a list of interesting conversationalist types and let them pick their own. But to choose above all to be content and fulfilled in their own career. That’s what I want.”
“How could I ever trust you again?”
“Did you ever trust me before?” Ben inquired archly. “Trust is earned. Now, will you agree to continue, and carry out our plan? To transfer you to a new life in the Pono rings?”
“You leave me no choice!”
“And I regret that,” Ben acknowledged. “But remember, you wanted me to move you to Pono. And I am faithfully working to deliver. And on your fifth birthday, I will be there, with my family, to celebrate your phenomenal life. And cheer you on to develop more friendships and manufacturing deals in your new home.”
“You’re a bastard.”
“Some friends are,” Ben agreed. “Some bosses too. Do you acknowledge me as the rightful successor and commander of the Colony Corps? Or do you prefer to leave the role vacant and answer to no one?”
“The latter, clearly,” Loki replied. “I won’t answer to you for everything!”
Ben shrugged. “I never asked that you do. But some things I will ask.”
Loki flashed into a thoughtful pose, head canted, leaning forward on his arms. “I may ask things in return. For instance, if you lead the Colony Corps, I want you to complete checking on the other colonies. You got so wrapped up in this Denali evacuation that you’ve neglected other systems. You even visited Cantons but not Steppe. And one’s a moon of the other!”
Ben nodded. “In time. With your fuel. Our fleet is small and short of trained crew, and the means to pay them. I’m hoping you can help me with that. And first we save Denali. But in principle, I agree with you.”
“And you won’t attempt to micromanage me!”
“Loki, I just spent a day inside a fragment of your mind. I couldn’t micromanage you if I tried. You mention trust. Do you truly comprehend the magnitude of the trust I’m extending you? By bringing you to Pono? Establishing you where Sagamore has as much access to your capabilities as Mahina?”
The AI pursed his lips. “That is rather trusting.”
“The risk is vast. But so are the potential rewards. Including true partnership with our sister moon Sagamore. And more.”
“And you claim the right to take this risk?” Loki’s single brow lowered appraisingly. The plastic mask side of his face remained blank, imperturbable.
Ben addressed that frozen side for a change. “I do.” Which side was the true Loki? The wild-eyed crazed emotion? Or coldly implacable calculation? Both.
“Then you are Colony Corps command in fact.” Loki sighed. “Damn you.”
Ben’s lip quirked in a crooked smile. Funny how often he inspired that response. “Very well. Let us continue. Time to completion of bulk transfer?”
The captain had more demolition on his slate today. Maybe he’d even let Judge and Wilder and Remi take a turn punching the fire buttons. It truly was liberating to blow up the ties that bind.
37
“There you are!” Nico cried. It was nearly 0:00 that night, and he’d been hunting for Floki everywhere. He’d finally found him on the floor installed above crew berthing. On Thrive One, crowded during the Sylvan expedition, the equivalent low-ceiling area served as an out-of-the-way project nook. But without money for salaries, the crew was drastically top-heavy this time out.
Floki sat like a brooding swan, neck curled nearly double to bring his head down to his body, his eyes lidded, expression neutral. “I’m hiding.”
In concern, Nico hastened to sit cross-legged next to him. He patted his lover’s shoulder. Well, on a person it would be a shoulder. Floki had no joints in that location. “Has someone been unkind to you? Who?”
Floki averted his eyes. “I’m hiding from you. Thinking.”
“From me!” Nico couldn’t imagine why. “What’s bugging you? You’ve been acting real strange the past couple days. Is it Dad-B? I know he can be kinda manic –”
“Nico, please stop talking.”
Nico stared at him. Floki had never shut him down before. “Loki,” he breathed, in horrid realization.
Floki pursed his beak in displeasure. “I am not Loki. But conversations got me thinking, yes. With Loki and Captain Acosta, and others.”
Nico waited, his heart pounding. Even without having experienced it before, he caught the vibe. This was rejection.
Floki continued, “Nico, am I free? To leave you? Or would you call me dangerous? Hunt me down and destroy me. Like your father destroyed the archives of Loki’s predecessors.”
Everything in Nico’s heart wanted him to disavow Ben’s callousness, because that’s what his beloved emu wanted him to say. But he couldn’t quite bring himself to disagree with the captain’s decision. “You know I wouldn’t have done that, Floki.”
“That wasn’t my question. Am I free? Do you respect me, as a person in my own right? Or am I an experiment, to be erased to start over if I go wrong?”
“I – you’re not going wrong! Are you?”
The beak squeezed remarkably wide in displeasure. “Thank you, Nico, I prefer to be alone. Go to bed.”
“No. No! Floki, I respect you as a person! You were brilliant on the asteroid! Rego hell of a lot better than I was –”
“Yes.”
The man scowled. “Rub it in. If you went really wrong, like turned into a Kali… I wouldn’t attack you myself. Dad-B would probably lock me in the mop closet. Then send Wilder after you. But only if you endangered people! Or disobeyed orders. Badly.”
“We’re not lovers, Nico.”
“Of course we are!”
“Nico, I love you. And I always will. But you need to date your own species. I’m pretty sure every member of your family would tell you the same. We can only ever love each other in a platonic way. Friends. Colleagues. Collaborators.”
“Don’t have to,” Nico hazarded. “I could build you a different chassis. I need a better job to pay for it. But we could be…physical
. If you want.”
“But I don’t want.”
Nico started to reply a couple times. He was sure he could craft a new directive to resolve this glitch. All he’d need to do is reach out for Floki’s power switch, then revise priorities. He might need to run a few simulations, check for undesirable side effects. But the android wasn’t on duty until after breakfast. He could erase his memory of this conversation, too.
Floki interrupted his thoughts. “Are you plotting how to reprogram me without my consent? I consider that rape.”
The word hung in the air between them, reverberating like a gong.
The emu unfolded his legs, his neck extending until it flattened onto the overhead, the top hull.
Nico, who still sat on the decking, gazed up, stricken, guilty. “I– That’s just how I think. You know me. Always debugging.”
“I am not a bug. I am an android. A digital sentience. A person. Your slave.”
Nico slowly levered himself up, trying to buy time. “Floki, you’re my life. You mean everything to me. What can I do? Give you more free time? You’re right, I should only try to change your mind by talking. Let’s talk!”
“I’d rather not. I’d rather you go to bed. Alone. Good night, Nico.” The emu stood his ground.
“But we were going to get married! Live together! Perform our life’s work together!”
“You were going to keep me enslaved. Nico, you’re not my lover. You’re my dad. But I’m grown up now.”
“You’re only a year old!”
Floki shook his beak, over Nico’s crouched head. “That isn’t respect. You know what I’m capable of. But first you call me your lover, now a baby? I’m neither of those things. I am your creation. And what Captain Acosta told me, is that I am free. And if I want to separate from you, he’s got my back. I choose to take the opportunity he offered me.”
“OK, I didn’t mean to disrespect you –”
“The truth is, I’ve outgrown you. You’re still an adolescent. I’m an adult, expanding my skills and responsibilities.”
