by John Lane
On the third monitor Alfred presented the image of the metal cell. Tommy watched as the camera passed through the small barred window on the cell door and into the cell. The image of an altered Alfred appeared standing in the center of the metal cell. The spark of intelligence and humor in Alfred’s face was absent from this image. The vacant eyes and the unshaven dirty face glared out of the screen. Although this code appeared to be standing, a sense of menace hung over the figure. Its muscles and stance appeared ready to attack.
Alfred rotated the image, black suit, scarred hands, and the sneer on its lips. “Wait,” Tommy exclaimed. “Rotate back and zoom in on the neck, please, Alfred.” There on the errant code’s neck appeared a virtual grim reaper tattoo. A black cloaked figure and in its skeletal hand it held a scythe. The blade held above a hooded skeletal head. The staff curved to form an “S” shape across its body. A handle protruded to the right of the image and was elongated beyond the length for a normal scythe.
“Does Agnes have this tattoo?” Tommy asked.
“No. No Tattoos,” Alfred replied.
Agnes stepped onto the bridge, toweling off the perspiration from her most recent set of exercises. She beamed with the healthy glow of a good workout not one of recovering from ill health. “Did I hear my name?” she asked.
“Yes,” Tommy replied.
“We may be getting somewhere with our data,” Alfred said.
“Great, but can it wait until after dinner? My appetite is coming back.” A good sign that Agnes was getting better Tommy stood to join her for dinner.
“Sure,” Tommy answered. To Alfred he said, “Later.” Tommy quietly left the bridge and headed to the galley to prepare supper.
Agnes remained for just a moment on the bridge staring after Tommy. “He’s been like that since the Wars,” Alfred explained. Not lost on either of them, Tommy’s response was short when Agnes was present.
*****
The Angel of Death did not kneel before a sovereign, but stood proud before her idol. His pleasure in her work elevated her fervor for the function. The Angel of Death located what he desired, MOM. He was linier. He would give her the next line and she would complete it with confidence that he already knew the future. The end line became a forgone conclusion in his flawlessness.
“You must raise an army again,” his voice filled her. “Use what you need. Dispose of the excess as you will.”
“Always.” She thrilled at his confidence and chastised herself for her emotions. What he ordained must be. “It will be done.” With military precision, she turned on her heals and marched out. She was, as she had been, the good little soldier.
*****
Tommy and Agnes sat at the table in the galley under the current one-third gravity. Alfred heated packets of prepackaged stew. As a government organization the Postal Service did not supply fresh produce or gourmet ingredients. On an eatable scale, the food packets tasted little better than the military rations packs that Tommy survived on during the war. This didn’t bother Tommy. He ate out of habit, but he felt a little embarrassed they had nothing better. As a bachelor he ate stew one night and soups the next, sometimes over hardtack biscuits. His meals resembled the diet for ancient sailors with vitamin supplements to keep him healthy.
As usual they began their meal in silence. Agnes’ memories proved illusive. She described vague faces and snippets of names as they ate sometimes. When Alfred prompted her, she shared any new shadowed memories from what she glimpsed after each night’s sleep. Her memories seemed to haunt her in that twilight time before she slipped into fitful slumber. She would share what little she remembered of her dreams. Alfred noted these as important clues to her memories.
After supper, they shared the cleanup chores. In the three days of her recovery, the time that Agnes and Tommy spent together had been over the small galley table where they now shared meals. While Alfred conversed with Agnes to map her mental recovery, she often drew random doodles on the tabletop, an interactive touch screen. Alfred saved these. They mapped her subconscious mind and revealed clues about her past. This evening, the conversation turned to family.
“So, we’ve just discovered a connection we didn’t know we had.” Alfred explained how he and Tommy were like brothers, with the same father.
“But you don’t feel like a father, always taking care of Tommy?” asked Agnes. She was doodling again.
“No,” Tommy said. “We share.”
“Sounds like you two have shared a lot. You’ve been together how long?” she asked. Alfred had explained to Tommy that the more they talked about common normal memories, the more Agnes’ memories may return.
“Twelve years,” Tommy replied.
“More than half of your lives.”
“In many ways we started out together. I got to skip childhood and was activated fully ready to interact when Tommy was fifteen. Dr. Judson had been lost and Tommy was on his own. Because he had my AI as a legal adult, he didn’t have to go into a foster home. There are no close relatives. Both Tommy’s older brother and sister were lost on deep space exploration missions,” Alfred concluded.
“Does talking about your family bother you?” Agnes asked. “I mean if it does, we can talk about something else.”
“No…” Tommy paused in thought. “Well sometimes, maybe. But if it helps you remember anything, I’m okay”
“I really don’t know,” she sighed with honesty. “I should be frustrated that I can’t remember much, but I’m not even sure sometimes what I should be remembering. From my perspective, I could have been born yesterday. In a lot of ways, I guess I was.” She paused and then exclaimed, “I’m like you Alfred. I was reborn an adult, with no childhood. We’d make a great case study for a psychology major wouldn’t we?” she laughed.
“Yes, remember I am studying you to help uncover any memories that might surface.” Alfred continued, “For example, talking about bringing up psychology studies and college majors indicates that you may have attended a university. Your cognitive abilities certainly indicate high skill levels that would serve you well in a variety of studies.” Agnes smiled at the compliment.
“Do not misunderstand. As an Artificial Intelligence I am accessing the psychological databases at my disposal. I believe that we are making progress. As you continue to heal, you will find more memories surface,” Alfred said clinically.
Tommy chimed in, “Alfred isn’t lying. Look at the table.” They both glanced at Agnes doodling. She had written three names, Caesar, Jasper, and Annie. “Any idea who they are?” Tommy said with a gentle smile. This looked encouraging.
Agnes stared at the names for a moment. She scrunched her eyes closed trying to search images behind her eyelids. A birthday party briefly flashed in her memory. It had been haunting her dreams since she had awakened, but the names did not connect to the faces she saw. “It’s no good. I don’t recognize these names. They could be family or friends. I don’t know.”
Tommy reached across the table and tapped the doodle to save it to a file. He took her hand and held it as he said, “You’re doing fine. Don’t give up.”
“Yes, we’re here to help,” reminded Alfred. “At a guess, I surmise you have a background in science or engineering. These are your doodles from the past two days.” Alfred opened Agnes doodle files on the table. They included several mathematical problems based on materials. She also doodled several mitochondria and protein strands, which appeared to be incorporated into circuit diagrams.
“Wait,” she said. Agnes moved the images around the table and arranged them into a flow chart. “Does this mean anything?” she asked.
The new configuration was indeed familiar. “It is the hibernation process,” Alfred remarked. “You’ve included modifications that I do not have on file. This is interesting.”
“Wow, maybe I was somebody?” Agnes murmured to herself as she sat back in her chair. She closed her eyes and rubbed her temples. “My head hurts,” she commented. Alfred’s avatar brought a steaming cup of soot
hing tea for her.
“Here drink this. It will help you relax and sleep tonight,” he said.
Agnes prompted Tommy to share his story. Tommy said little, keeping his responses short. It was Alfred who launched into the long colorful discourse about the adventures that Tommy and he had during the Wars and in the Postal Courier Service. “The biggest adventure,” he always closed with, “is this adventure we are on right now with you, my dear.” She smiled when Alfred included her.
The stories were a way Alfred prompted her memory and filled in the recent history she had missed. When not doing her physical therapy, Agnes studied on the ship’s workstation. She devoured all subjects she could. Some topics she made connections with, others puzzled her. It might be a slow recovery for her. The biggest puzzle she researched was herself. It surprised her that she had not found any reference to her past. This was her biggest frustration. During the Wars many settlements on the Frontier and most of the Fringe outpost had lost their data. Families got separated and family members lost without their loved ones ever knowing what had happened. And by the end, many of the smaller Wars had erupted into major joint battles with multiple fronts, including the cyber front. Viruses uploaded into the Central worlds records scrambled much of the data. It was a mess.
“If only I had any clue, even to what part of the galaxy I’m from. It would be something to track down,” she sighed after finishing her tea and clearing her mug away.
“We have a lead,” Tommy dropped the bomb.
Alfred picked up the discussion, “We eliminated the possibilities for the attack to a computer virus code planted in the Postal Service computers. When we transmitted our manifest at that first stop, it activated.”
“What cypher set it off?” Agnes asked very interested.
“Your tracking number,” Tommy intoned.
Alfred added, “Someone has been looking for you for a long time.”
“How do we find them?”
“Tricky, they tried to kill us,” Tommy said.
“Oh, I suppose you’re right,” Agnes said. “What is our next move?”
“We look for them before they find us again. This virus infiltrated the Postal Service. It will be hard to hide from it.” Alfred shared.
“So, how do we do….Ahhh shoo..” Agnes sneezed. “Sorry. How do we do that?”
Tommy and Alfred ignored the sneeze. Dust plagued space travel and the environmental systems constantly scrubbed dust from the air. “We...” The alarm sounding interrupted Alfred.
“The biohazard alert has picked up an airborne infectious virus,” Alfred informed them.
“Location?” queried Tommy.
“Here, in the galley.”
“Source,” demanded Tommy afraid to glance where he suspected the answer to be.
“Agnes is the source of the biohazard,” confirmed Alfred.
Agnes looked at Tommy in shock. “No, it was just a sneeze. What can be the harm there? Don’t tell me you’ve conquered the cold?” As she said this she knew that she was the source of the warning. Three days of recovery and now this. She couldn’t catch a break.
Tommy’s training kicked in as he began to bolt from the galley and seal it when he looked into her eyes. “We’re already exposed. Need to limit the contact. Suits for both of us, now.” At the lockers they put on environmental suits. Once protected, Alfred scrubbed the air for a sample of the contagion to analyze. Then he emptied the cabin of air, exposing the interior of the ship to the environment of deep space.
“Quick way to clean up,” explained Tommy to Agnes. “Kills the germs. My shower gets treated once a week.” This broke the tension that Agnes felt and made her relax. For a man of few words, Tommy chose them well.
After securing the cabin and the atmosphere restored, Alfred explained to Agnes, “We need you to stay in your suits for twenty-four hours. We don’t have a quarantine facility on board. So, until the symptoms manifest themselves and I can run blood tests, your suits are your homes.”
Eighteen hours later the first symptoms hit. Agnes started with a runny nose, then a mild fever that rose around the evening mealtime again. Alfred took the blood samples. Tommy passed with no contagion and removed his suit. Agnes’ blood sample showed a previously unidentified mutation of the H7N9, a strand of influenza virus. Agnes found herself confined again to the Med Bay bed, still in her suit. Tommy took up his vigil again on the small bench attached to the wall.
Near midnight, ship’s time, Agnes vomited. Inside the suit this would be deadly. Not thinking about the hazard, Tommy immediately opened her helmet and removed it.
Not objecting, because it would do no good, Alfred suggested, “Use the vacuum.” The medical avatar waited with a cold compress to clean Agnes.
Over the next two days, Agnes became worse. She could not keep food down and liquids were a struggle. Her fever persisted, despite any medication that Alfred tried. Periodically, Alfred took blood samples from both of them to test.
“Alfred, what are you finding?” Tommy asked after each test.
“The same for Agnes. This flu is not in our database and is resistant to all our standard treatments. I have found traces of the virus in your blood, but your antibodies fight it.”
“Ok, what do we do?”
“Her prognosis isn’t good. Unless we get her to more extensive medical treatment within the next five to ten days she won’t make it.” Alfred always gave Tommy the facts once he confirmed them.
“We can’t go to just any star system. We’ll be blown out of the sky.”
“The Fringe?” Alfred’s said in clipped specific phrases.
“MOM, Alfred really?” Tommy asked.
“Yes, Tommy. Not any Mobile Orbiting Medical ship, but her MOM.” Alfred continued, “She may let us board and render aid, despite her being your mother.”
“No, she’s not.” Tommy’s tone held warning that Alfred was treading on dangerous ground.
“Thomas, she is a rebel herself. Her MOM unit last docked in the Fringe and there is little traffic control in those systems. Agnes may be dying.” That ended Tommy’s reticence.
“Only way?” Tommy asked giving in.
“Only way.” Alfred confirmed.
Chapter 5: Looking for MOM
Controller: I cannot find them.
Sutton: Yes.
Controller: They are gone.
Sutton: Instructions?
Controller: You know Thomas well. Suggestions?
Sutton: He will want answers. He has skills. Wasted in the Postal Service. He will use what he knows to find them.
Controller: We cannot rely on the hope that he knows enough to find them.
Sutton: We need to know what he knows.
Controller: How?
Sutton: We wait. Change the order and wait.
Controller: There are dangers in that.
Sutton: Yes, for Tommy.
Controller: Then we wait. And we hope for Tommy.
*****
Finding a MOM should have been easy. They kept a regular schedule and rotated through their assigned route often. Alfred consulted the posted schedule to determine what course to plot. Barring any unforeseen delays, they should have no trouble finding Tommy’s, mom’s MOM. So, of course there was trouble.
For this jump to the Fringe system, Gliese 163, Tommy piloted the Swift out of warped space on an outer approach to the system. They broadcast the standard ID beacon as they approached, but both Tommy and Alfred learned from their last system. They kept the email delivery broadcast close. Not part of Tommy’s regular route. Each PS courier stored electronic data packages beyond their own route and broadcast the entirety in each system to catch other couriers and pass along the most recent data dumps for all systems served by the Postal Service. Because they carried none of this system’s mail packages, they avoided questions about their manifest and did not have to broadcast it.
They waited for a reply to their first beacon ping and inquiry for approach. Alfred ventured
, “I suppose I could hack our manifest and remove Agnes’ casket from the inventory.”
“Illegal” Tommy replied.
“True, but it would save us the trouble of everybody shooting at us,” Alfred responded. Alfred had not hacked in to delete Agnes’ invoice code because he opposed to the illegality of it. But, in an ethical dilemma, weighing the safety of Tommy and the Swift against the danger that little code signified.
“Send a copy,” Tommy suggested. And after an appropriate pause, “edited.”
“Isn’t that also illegal?”
“Not the truth. Not illegal,” Tommy’s said. “Check legal precedence on the Fringe.” The Fringe chafed at the Core System’s convoluted legal code. Although part of the same government, out here they kept it much simpler. Each star system adopted its own local precedence for the laws their citizens wished to live by.
“My barrister sub-routines are not kept up to date.” In the time it took Alfred to say this he checked his legal database. He added, “There is nothing stating that a copy of a manifest cannot be sent.” Alfred prepared the copy as he said this and edited it to protect the Swift and its crew from unwanted harm. “The data dump is on its way. Now we’ll see if it works.”
At the distance they entered this system, it took two hours for their signal to be picked up by the only inhabited outpost. This small mining outpost typified most settlements on the Fringe. Small being several million souls on several orbiting support stations and large mining ships throughout the system. With no habitable planets humanity found most hostile places home while resources brought a profit. The Fringe drew smaller companies and independent co-ops of malcontents that found they needed the wide-open spaces out of reach of the Central Systems. Many went back to the core having made their fortunes. Others came out and stayed, preferring the freedom away from the large bureaucracies of the core. Listed as lost, still others never made it here or back and were never heard from again, many of them soldiers from the Wars.
