"Damn," Jason said, shutting down the drive and securing the ship from flight mode as the hangar doors swung closed.
"Don't act so surprised," Cas said. "Remember that much of my operational matrix was developed while residing in your implant. It's inevitable I will have learned to anticipate your actions and reactions."
"Maybe we can plug you into the Phoenix when I get her back." Jason climbed out of the seat and smacked the drone with a friendly slap, spinning it about. "It'd be nice to have a copilot I didn't have to argue with constantly."
"If you gave me Kage's job, I have a feeling he would accelerate his plans to kill me."
"He's not going to kill you. He's just going to piss and moan about how you're redundant, and that we should sell you to someone on Colton Hub. I wouldn't worry too much about it."
By the time Jason had finished securing the ship to the deck, the Devil's Fortune was already accelerating away from the planet and pushing for her mesh-out point with Doc at the helm. The hired troops were all busy preparing their gear in the two cargo bays on the ship that weren't stuffed with either the computer farm Voq lived in or supplies needed to run the ship. So far, there hadn't been any trouble between the two groups, and Jason hoped to keep it that way. On the flight out to the routing station, they would begin training for the mission and running drills. If there was any friction, he hoped to work it out there and not once they were doing it live.
"I saw your little friend go flitting by," Kage said as Jason approached the hatchway to exit the hangar bay.
"So?"
"It looked like it was up to something. I don't trust it."
"Again…so? I don’t trust you, and we've worked together for years."
"You can be hurtful for no reason sometimes," Kage said. "After all I've sacrificed for this crew."
"You've become insanely wealthy from the contacts and opportunities that have come up from working on this crew," Jason pointed out.
"That does help soothe the pain from your words, but that's not the point."
"Look, Kage…Cas is helpful without demanding something in return, good at its job, and works hard without giving me a ton of shit about it the whole time. In fact, it's the only one around here that does that now that Lucky has bounced. It's not going anywhere unless it wants to."
"Whatever." Kage waved him off with his two smaller hands. "I also wanted to ask you whether you were going to need me or not on the assault team."
"That's a good question," Jason said. "If I take you, that leaves Doc and Twingo on the Devil alone to take on that cruiser, and I'm not sure I like those odds. But if I run into something on the platform unexpected—"
"I could help through the remote link, but that's not the same as actually being there," Kage said. "Could one of the battlesynths stay behind and help manage this ship?"
"Not the best use of their talent, but yeah, I'm sure they could manage it," Jason said, nodding down the corridor for Kage to follow him. "Besides that, I think I prefer not leaving any heavily armed warriors behind on this ship."
"You don't trust them?"
"I don't trust anyone who isn't us," Jason corrected. "Their reputations as units are impeccable, but individuals can be coerced, even battlesynths. You just have to know how to apply the pressure and appeal to their sense of honor and morality."
"Interesting. How do you—"
"Captain, you have a slip-com channel request originating from a United Earth Navy ship. It's marked as urgent," Doc's voice came over the local intercom.
"On my way," Jason said, secretly relieved to leave Kage behind before he could work the conversation around to trying to get what he wanted.
"Any word on Jacob?" Jason asked without preamble or greeting.
"Unfortunately, no," Marcus Webb said. "I'm actually getting in contact because of an odd thing I've just gone through. Do you know a Senior Councilman Scleesz?"
"Maybe."
"He hinted he knows you quite well."
"Is this call in an official captain in the Navy capacity?" Jason asked.
"No. This is personal. I'm trying to wrap my head around what's going on before I get hung out to dry," Webb said. "Scleesz showed up, asked to talk to me personally, and then fled the system once they were—"
"Wait, Scleesz was in the solar system? With a ConFed delegation?" Jason sat up straighter, now paying close attention.
"He was. And then, when the Cridal sent a taskforce to make their presence felt, the ConFed just left. Now, the brass and the politicians think I'm in on some ConFed plot against Earth."
"Are you?"
"Fuck if I know." Webb shrugged helplessly. "He showed up asking about those ruins you told us about on Mars. Wait, that's not true. He showed up asking about how Earth made so much progress so quickly in technology and ships. I told him about the ruins on Mars and the Traveler ship you left in the Potomac."
"He bought that?" Jason asked.
"Seemed to," Webb said, "but I get the feeling he knew I was lying and was almost relieved I had something to offer him as a red herring. I never mentioned the Ark, but I feel like the powers that be here on Earth won't see it that way."
"Yeah, about that," Jason said. "Has there been any…odd…behavior from the Ark?"
"I couldn't tell you," Webb said. "That system is so highly classified I have no idea where they might even be keeping it, or what it even looks like now. Word was that it quickly outgrew the laptop you put it on and that it ended up developing its own computer system to reside in. After that, the whole thing went very quiet." Jason just groaned and let his head fall to the desk.
"I don't think it was just a cool searchable resource of knowledge like I thought," Jason said. "There's a good chance it's actually another of the Ancient AIs like the one that's taken over the ConFed."
"Why would you give us that?!"
"I didn't know that's what it was," Jason protested. "I actually still don't. But the nature of these things is a lot more complex than we first believed. Is there any way you could pass that up the chain to someone who might be in a position to investigate?"
"I don't think they'd believe me given my current status as under suspicion," Webb said.
"Shit," Jason muttered. "I could question the thing I used to create it in the first place, but I'm beginning to have my suspicions there, too."
"What thing?"
Jason quickly filled him in on what the Legacy/Archive really was, what it told them about the issues with the Machine, and the plan they'd cooked up to neutralize the threat of it. He explained why the Machine was looking for all the available scraps of Ancient tech and scouring old outposts for data. He even told him about the superweapon being built at the edge of ConFed space and why it was so crucial the project be destroyed. During all of this, Webb's expression went from incredulous to genuinely horrified.
"So, to stop one malevolent, hyper-intelligent AI, you're going to unleash a second one…one you've already determined might not be completely trustworthy."
"When you say it like that it sounds stupid," Jason said.
"So, how does it sound to you?"
"Desperate," Jason grumbled. "Because we are. It's an enemy of my enemy type of situation, and we're hoping the Archive can do what it promised while also not harboring any secret desires to replace the Machine as the uncontested overlord of this region of space. What we do know is that the Machine has already toppled one empire and is currently building the weapon to come after the rest without needing to risk ships or troops."
"This is so screwed up," Webb said. "What if you're wrong? What if this other AI is even worse than the one that's already loose?"
"I'd say it's a little late to stuff that genie back into the bottle," Jason said. "At this point, we're committed. I'm just giving you a heads up so you can get your people clear and maybe warn Earth to hunker down for a bit."
"Given how spectacularly you've fucked this up, can we call it even for me getting your son into a forward recon
unit?"
"No. I'm still going to kick your ass for that, but I'll consider a ceasefire until we can at least find him and my damn ship."
"Fair enough," Webb said. "Good luck."
"You too."
Jason signed off and leaned back in his chair. "I guess you heard all of that?"
"I did," Voq's voice came over the intercom speakers. "You are right to harbor such concerns. The Noxu were ultimately made extinct by the very errant program we are attempting to subdue."
"You know I wasn't just talking about the Machine. You're also probably aware I'm not real fond of eavesdroppers. Half my crew are a bunch of sneaks, and it pisses me off."
"You gave me access to the ship's intercom system to facilitate our mission planning," Voq said. "You did not specify any limitations to its use."
"So, of course, you just decided to listen in on every intercom panel, all the time," Jason snorted. "I notice you still haven't answered my implied question."
"Yes, the interface your people call the Ark was built from an existing AI that I have in my memory core," Voq said. "I constructed the binding protocols based on what I inferred you were trying to do. The program I chose is quite benign. It was an engineering lab assistant when it was first designed, I left its core characteristics alone and added security measures to make sure it could only be used by the people you designated."
"I guess I'll burn that bridge down when I get to it," Jason said. "How long until we reach our first course change?"
"I am not privy to navigational data and have no way of—"
"Just seeing if I could get you to slip," Jason cut it off. "We're starting drills tomorrow morning. Stop spying on people and make sure you're ready."
24
"Report."
"Holding position, Admiral. The last ship arrived while you were sleeping."
Kellea nodded and walked past the operator stations to look out through the forward windows. The primary star of their target system was so far away it wasn't even the brightest object in her field of view. The ship was running dark, no light emissions of any kind to give away their presence. Without the exterior flood lights on illuminating the hull, the brilliance of the night sky made itself apparent. With the bridge lights dimmed, the effect was breathtaking. It was as if she stood on a platform in the middle of the universe. It should have given her a sense of calm and wonder, but she was too tense to give it the attention it deserved.
Her taskforce had meshed-in a single ship at a time, well outside the detection zone of the system the largest of the construction projects was in. She wasn't on the bridge of her mighty battlecruiser, Defiant. Instead, she was running her battle from the bridge of a frigate-class ship that had been built to resemble one of the ubiquitous bulk freighters that swarmed through populated star systems. It was the perfect camouflage to hide in plain sight. The five ships in her force each carried two of the special missiles Mok had manufactured based on specs provided by Jason Burke. If they performed as he claimed, they would be more than enough to destroy the cradles and the hull sections.
"Signal the other ships to prep their missiles for launch," she said, turning from the window. "According to our insider in ConFed Intelligence, there's a fleet defense force somewhere out there waiting for us to strike, so everybody stay sharp."
An agent named Tulden had passed on information that orders had come from Miressa Prime to mobilize a sizable taskforce. That wasn't so unusual since the fleet was always in motion, but the move orders had been classified at the top level, and there were references to some project called Omateo, which was a Miressan word that roughly translated to war hammer in Jenovian Standard. The obvious implication was that the Machine knew they were planning to hit the weapon it was building and was moving forces into position to stop them.
"All ships signaling in via laser that they're preparing their munitions, Admiral."
"Excellent," Kellea said. "Sound the general alert, get the crew to their stations, First Officer. We're going to execute this in three stages. Operations! How are we looking on the passive scans?"
"Passive sensors have been tracking arriving and departing slip-drive signatures, as well as the gravimetric signatures of the ships in-system, but nothing that matches our warships in the database, Admiral."
Kellea frowned at that. The ConFed taskforce should have easily beat them to the target. They were leaving from a much closer location, and they could fly directly into the system at maximum slip-velocity. It's possible they were sitting dark with their drives shut down to hide from passive scans, but that strategy would only work if they knew exactly where the attack was coming from. She had a moment of doubt and contemplated calling off the attack. Mok had told her their resources were limited, and if she couldn't hit the target cleanly, withdraw and live to try again later.
"Admiral?" her acting First Officer asked. "Is something wrong?"
"I'd just feel better knowing where the expected resistance is going to come from," Kellea said. "Summon the captain to the bridge and then we will start the operation. Once we begin, this will be over quickly, so everybody be at peak performance, understood?"
"Understood, Admiral!"
The captain of the ship slunk onto the bridge, an unpleasant individual if Kellea had ever met one. It was obvious he resented her presence here and resented having his ship included on such a dangerous mission. She made a mental note to speak with Mok about the quality of the officers he was getting for his private military. The captain ignored her and walked to one of the auxiliary stations and began checking statuses, turning his back to everyone else on the bridge. The first officer caught her eye and made a gesture that looked half-embarrassed, half-apologetic.
"Captain?" Kellea asked, letting her irritation creep into her voice. The captain was obnoxious, but he wasn't stupid. He wasn't about to cross someone Saditava Mok had handpicked to lead the mission. That was the sort of thing that was bad for your life expectancy.
"Admiral," he said crisply. "We are fully prepared to execute on your command."
"Indeed," Kellea deadpanned. She'd been the one pulling double bridge watches while the captain had entertained himself below and was thus well aware of their current status. She walked over and slid into the elevated command chair, her stomach fluttering a bit. "Very well, Captain…execute."
"Executing," the captain said, nodding to his operations officer. The officer activated the laser signal that automatically synced the other four ships to the lead ship's mission clock. It began counting back from fifty, the slip-drive charging automatically when it crossed the thirty-two second threshold.
They'd planned the mission so that once the master go signal was given, the ships would automatically execute the operations at precise intervals, relinquishing control to the crews once the missiles were away. The only part Kellea didn't like was the first step, something called a dead jump. Normally, when a ship meshed-out, it would carry some relative forward velocity to help along the transition from real-space to slip-space. It wasn't strictly necessary, but it made things a lot less bumpy. A dead jump was a mesh-out while the ship was sitting at a full relative stop. Even with the newer drives it was…unpleasant. It was disorienting enough that Kellea had decided to let the ships handle targeting and fire control in case the crews were incapacitated.
The captain had fought her tooth and nail against doing the maneuver, but she couldn't risk being underway and having the defending fleet detect them and anticipate their attack vector.
"Stand by! Dead jump in three seconds!"
Three seconds later, Kellea felt waves of vertigo and tidal pressure on her body as the slip-drive was slammed to full power and the emitters struggled to stabilize the fields around the ship. The effect seemed to last forever, so she wasn't even really sure when she regained full awareness. There were some people moaning, but no alarms, and they were all still in one piece.
"Jump complete," the operations officer croaked. "Missiles targeting…firing in
six seconds."
"Go full active sensors when they're away," Kellea said, struggling to sit straight in her seat. She looked over and saw the captain slumped over but apparently still alive.
"Missiles tracking…missiles away!"
Two hard thumps sounded through the ship as the large missiles spit out of the two forward launch tubes, shoved out by a charge of compressed nitrogen before their plasma engines ignited and sent them streaking away. The operations officer brought up the active sensors without being prompted so Kellea could see the missiles from the other ships had also all fired. She could also now see their target and sucked in a breath. It was enormous.
It was also completed.
Their most recent intel showed that the hull sections were sitting in construction cradles, nowhere near being ready to join together. But what she saw on the sensors was a mammoth spherical construct and no sign of the construction equipment used to create it.
"What is going on?" she murmured to herself. "This is wrong."
"Missiles going active!"
The missiles had decided they liked the large spherical target anyway, even though it didn't exactly match their targeting package. They picked out the part they wanted to hit, seeming to recognize the sections they were assigned within the whole, and activated their slip-drives. All ten missiles reappeared on the sensors, each within a few klicks of the target, covering the distance in the blink of an eye. Kellea held her breath as they fired their plasma engines again and slammed into the target.
She wasn't sure what she expected from the new warheads, but what she saw on the optical sensors was eerie. There was no massive explosion or expenditure of destructive energy. There was some wavering light in the UV range that escaped the effective area, but for the most part, it just looked like space swallowed the sphere. A split second later, they began getting sensor returns on refined metals and larger pieces of structure that could only have come from the massive weapon.
"That's…impossible," the captain said.
"Apparently not," Kellea remarked. "Did the construct exhibit any sort of defensive behavior? Shields? Point defense weapons?"
The Pandora Paradox Page 19
