The Star Wizard: Starship Fairfax Book 4 - The Kuiper Chronicles

by Benjamin Douglas

  “Great, team up on me here,” Lucas mumbled. He cleared his throat. “What if we change the rules of the game entirely? Give it a new set of experiences, a new package of rules, or laws?”

  Ada raised an eyebrow. Caspar cocked her head. “Can you be a little more specific, Sir?”

  “I mean, what if we were able to get our hands on Hive’s programming and tweak it to our advantage?”

  Ada’s eyes narrowed. “That sounds incredibly nuanced and challenging.”

  “Good thing we have onboard someone with experience tweaking AI programming, isn’t it?”

  Caspar and Ada both looked at him as if he were crazy. Then, as one, they began voicing their objections.

  “Do you have any idea how long it takes to learn an AI’s internal logic?”

  “Just how do you propose we get our hands on the programming to begin with, Sir?”

  “Technically Moses isn’t an AI! Or at least, he wasn’t to begin with, so—”

  “And then what? Are you suggesting a complete systems reboot? A manual overwrite? Will we have to actually get our hands on these things to implement the new rules?”

  Lucas shook his head, raising his hands. “You’re both asking me all the questions I want to be asking you. I don’t have the answers. I have an idea. Ada, talk to Moses. Troubleshoot the problem. What was his impression of the construction of Hive’s AI? I want you to work with Lieutenant Caspar to begin to simulate it. Use the ship’s computer; Moses can help as much as you need. Once you’ve got something he recognizes as similar, we can start to hack the rewriting problem.”

  They fell silent, mouths agape. They were still looking at him like he was crazy.

  “Well? C’mon! Get to work!”

  They glanced at each other—not exactly a look of comradery, but perhaps one of commiseration—and left him alone at the table.

  Lucas smiled and took a mug of coffee from the dispenser.

  ---

  He was sitting in the command chair on the bridge again when Darren reappeared, having apparently aided security in removing the mutineers to the brig. He approached the chair, an unusual gesture. Most of the time he lurked along the back wall, but Mulligan’s station.

  “We should turn around,” he said.

  Lucas stared at him. Whatever would cause the man to say that? Surely not fear. True, they were hurling themselves as quickly as they could after the deadliest AI weapon in the history of the system, but he had never known Darren to act from fear.

  “You know we can’t,” he said, his words measured. “Pluto must be warned.”

  “We’ll be too late,” Darren replied. “And as much of a threat you think the drones pose ahead, there’s a greater one behind. One we might actually be able to do something about.”

  Lucas raised an eyebrow. “You have my attention.”

  “I have reason to believe that Rome Inc. has acquired a superweapon that could threaten the entire system.”

  Lucas scoffed. “You’re a few days behind, Darren. They had acquired it, and then we acquired it, and now we’re running after it.”

  Darren shook his head. “Not the drones. Not an AI. This is something more important.”

  “And where did you gather this new information?” He had an idea.

  “Several of the mutineers were in the intelligence trade on Ceres. They came to us well-informed.”

  Lucas’ jaw fell slack. “Seriously, Darren? We’re running hell-for-metal to try to get to one of the capitol bastions of humanity to save not just lives, but civilization as we know it, and you want us to turn around to check out another secret weapon, based on the word of some of those—those—”

  The words soured in his mouth. It didn’t feel right to deride the refugees for having come from Ceres, not just days after Ceres had been gutted by Rome. But everyone knew the place had been a den of thieves. “Look, I know you called it home, too. Once. But you’ve obviously moved on past that place. You must understand that the people in the brig right now, they’re not the most trustworthy in the system.”

  Darren’s brow darkened.

  “I’m sorry,” Lucas said. “But you’re going to have to make a much more compelling case if you really want to try to convince me to listen to anything any of them have to say.” Part of him hated himself as he doubled down on the anti-Ceres rhetoric, but there was no point pivoting now. He was saying what he meant. If Darren couldn’t take it, he could go sulk somewhere other than on Lucas’ bridge.

  Darren inclined his head gently, as if in assent, and turned and left.

  Lucas frowned, watching him go. He didn’t like the man, he didn’t trust the man, he didn’t know the man. But for all the terrifying one-man-army mystery that surrounded Darren, nothing about it had made Lucas feel as uneasy as this conversation.

  Chapter 5

  “Rylea, it’s ok,” Erick said. “It’s alright! It’s me, Erick. I’m here!”

  She did not open her eyes, but kept pinching her face in concentration. The deck beneath their feet continued to quake. Erick banged on the plastiglass of her cell wall. “Rylea!”

  She opened her eyes, startled, and met his. Her concentration was broken. In that moment, the ship bucked violently, and all three of them—Rylea, Erick, and Cyclops, fell to the deck.

  “Rylea, stop!” Erick shouted.

  Her eyes were wide with terror. She shook her head and closed them, screwing up her face again. The deck stopped spinning.

  “She isn’t causing it,” Cyclops muttered. “She’s trying to stop it. Rylea, is that true?”

  She didn’t answer, but continued to concentrate. When the deck quaked again, she seemed to pour all of her strength into trying to stabilize it. Erick shook his head in disbelief. Cyclops was right.

  Erick turned to tell him as much, and caught sight of him running back out into the corrider.

  “Cyclops!” he yelled, but the man didn’t stop. Erick dashed to the wall console and swiped at the control, hoping to let Rylea out of her cell, but he was locked out. Cursing, he glanced her way. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. Then he turned and left, chasing after Cyclops.

  “Come back and let her out!” he hollered. He followed him down another level to a hangar deck. To a bay. Cyclops came to a console and opened the hatch, then started running for a shuttle.

  “Cyclops!”

  He stopped and turned, just for a moment.

  “You can’t leave her!”

  “She’ll be alright,” the man said. “The ship won’t be, though. You want to survive a little longer, Erick? Get on this shuttle.”

  Erick shook his head. “You coward! You can’t go and leave her in that cell. At least give me the power to set her free!”

  Cyclops grinned strangely. “No one can give her that power, Erick. It already rests within herself. Not coming, then? Good luck!” And with that, he boarded the shuttle and was gone.

  Erick was blindsided. If nothing else had been making sense anymore, he had relied on Cyclops’ desire to keep Rylea alive and close. Now it seemed even that had ended. And whatever was happening to the Rome conscript ship, the two of them were stuck onboard.

  Erick?

  “Rylea!” He whipped around, looking for her, but she wasn’t in sight. He was alone on the hangar deck.

  Erick, you’re ok!

  Am I? he thought. He wasn’t sure that hearing voices qualified him for good health.

  Stay where you are, the voice that was Rylea and wasn’t Rylea said. I’m opening another bay for you.

  He frowned. Another bay? Just then, the hatch beside the one through which Cyclops had passed hissed open, revealing another shuttle. It hummed to life, the outer hatch opening.

  There, Rylea’s voice said. See it? That’s for you!

  He looked around, feeling his chest and stomach with his hands. He seemed whole. Am I dead? he wondered, half-jokingly.

  Not yet, but you will be soon if you don’t get on that shuttle. Hurry up!

  Um…
He turned in a full circle, confirming one more time that he was alone. No offense, Rylea’s voice, but, ah, I think I might be losing my mind. I’m not convinced I should do anything right now. Is there even a shuttle there? Am I hallucinating all of this?

  “Get in the shuttle!” Rylea yelled. Erick spun and saw her running toward him from the opposite end of the hangar deck. He started toward her, but another ship-wide tremor threw him from his feet. By the time he was back on them, she had almost reached him.

  “What is going on?” he yelled.

  “No time,” she panted. “C’mon!”

  They ran through the hatch and lifted the shuttle out as quickly as they could. Behind them they watched as the ship quivered and quaked, looking like it would begin to tear itself apart any moment.

  “Erick,” Rylea said, “you have to knock me out. Just for a few minutes.”

  “What??”

  “There’s no time to argue! If I’m awake, he’ll sense me and he’ll kill us both. Knock me out. Do it, now!”

  His muscles tensed. Knock her out? She was just a kid. What was he supposed to do—ram her head against the hull?

  “Are you sure?”

  YES! She shouted in his mind.

  “Ok, but we need to talk about that when you wake up, because that is really freaking me out.” His eyes darted around the cockpit. Ah, there. That would do. He pulled down the little med-kit from the wall and opened it, spotting a heavy sedative and a needle. Sorry about the needle, he thought.

  Better than getting punched in the face, I guess, she replied in his mind.

  He shook his head, still not believing what he was hearing, then loaded up the syringe. “Alright,” he said. “Here we go.”

  She nodded and closed her eyes.

  ---

  Erick watched in horror as the Rome-conscript ship disintegrated into space. How many souls on board, he wondered? Had they any idea what had happened? Had more of them managed to escape? His stomach felt weak. He had seen enough senseless death.

  With Rylea asleep, time passed slowly. Erick didn’t know what was going on, but his instincts told him to lay low, so he kept power at minimum—just enough to run life-support—and let the shuttle drift among the scattering debris. Who was the “he” she had been talking about? Cyclops? He didn’t understand how her being unconscious would prevent them being found. If anyone came close enough with a decent scanning system, they would pick up their heat signatures, at least. But he had chosen to trust her, so he made do with his choice.

  Scanners on the shuttle were powered down, but he kept a watchful eye on the viewscreen. He thought at one point he saw a ship passing by on the opposite side of the debris field, but it was difficult to say for sure. He opened the view menu to zoom in, then realized that doing so would activate another level of systems and make it more likely they would be detected. He paused. Would that be such a bad thing? Wouldn’t they need to be picked up by someone eventually? They couldn’t drift through open space in a short-range shuttle indefinitely. But a hunch told him to keep trusting Rylea and keep the shuttle quiet. Maybe it was because of how amazingly rotten their luck had been with hospitality on other ships ever since losing the Spacegull.

  Time ticked on. Erick dozed a little in the seat, waking from time to time with an elevated pulse. The events of the past few weeks had shaken him deeply. He hoped someday he would be able to sleep soundly again.

  It was after one of these wakings that he heard her again.

  Erick? Is everything alright?

  He sat in silence. I’m not sure anything is alright anymore, he thought. But we’re still alive, if that’s what you mean.

  She sat up, rubbing the sleep from her eyes. “How long was I out?”

  He shrugged. “Hours, I think. I haven’t kept track. Nothing’s really happened since you went down.”

  She nodded.

  “Are you feeling ok?” he asked.

  I don’t think anything’s really ok anymore, either, but yeah. I’m alive.

  “Ok, what is that?”

  She smiled. “Apparently I can talk to you in your head now.”

  “Yeah, I gathered. And I can talk back?”

  “Well, it’s more like I can listen in.”

  “You hear my thoughts?”

  She shrugged. “Sorry about it. If it’s any consolation, it hasn’t been a lot of fun, hearing everyone’s thoughts, especially back on that prison ship. That was a nightmare. I couldn’t tune any of them out at first.”

  “Rylea, what happened? I don’t remember any of this coming up when you were with us on the Spacegull.”

  “No,” she sighed. “That’s because they had brought me to the edge, but hadn’t pushed me over. That didn’t really happen until after we lost the ship. After… after Wally died.”

  A look of pain passed over her face, and Erick grimaced. Things had been so crazy ever since the loss of the ship, they hadn’t had time to so much as talk about her brother’s death. He wondered how she was handling it.

  “I’m ok,” she said with a sad smile. “Or I will be, anyway. Don’t worry about that.”

  He squinted at her. “You’re reading my thoughts.”

  She winced. “Sorry! It’s not always on purpose, still. I’m working on my fine-tuning.”

  He shook his head. “This is nuts.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “Who are we hiding from? Cyclops?”

  She snorted. “Him? He can’t hurt me anymore. Don’t worry about him. He’s pretty close by, by the way. Drifting in his shuttle, same as us.”

  Erick glanced at the viewscreen, but didn’t see anything new. “Can you read his thoughts?”

  She closed her eyes and concentrated. “It’s difficult… we’re just a little too far, I think. I’m getting something from him, but it’s more vague. Like feelings, or colors, or something.”

  Erick was silently thankful he was unable to enter Cyclops’ mind.

  “Are there more sedatives?” she asked.

  He checked and showed her. Three more doses sat unused in the med-pack.

  “Keep those. And the syringe.”

  “Alright. Mind telling me why?”

  She sighed and sat beside him. “I’m not the only one with… powers. Or whatever.”

  “They did this to more of you?”

  She nodded. “Yeah, but that’s not all. We were the experiments. The lab-rats. Now that they’ve seen it in action, one of them has taken it himself.”

  The hair on Erick’s arms stood up. “You mean to say that one of the men who experimented on you has taken a massive overdose of Prophet, voluntarily, and he’s out there right now? Geez—is that what happened to the ship?” His eyes widened. He had seen how much it had taken out of Rylea to destroy that tiny fighter squadron. How much power would someone have to wield to have torn the conscripted ship apart with their mind?

  “He’s looking for me. If he gets close enough to feel me again, you have to knock me out. He can’t track me when I’m out. At least, I think he can’t.”

  “Ok.” He dropped the doses into his breast pocket. He found himself agreeing without understanding a lot.

  She closed her eyes again for a moment. “I don’t sense him anywhere nearby,” she said. “I think he’s done.”

  Erick nodded, then fired up secondary systems. The shuttle started a scan.

  “I suppose we should check for survivors,” he muttered.

  “There are none,” she said. Her voice was coldly matter-of-fact. It chilled him to the bone. “Except for Cyclops. Oh! He’s coming this way.”

  Erick glanced at the tactical screen. Sure enough, a tiny red dot was moving in their direction.

  “Great.”

  Chapter 6

  “Here’s what we know,” Kepple said. He was at the head of a conference table. Gavin sat there, along with a young man and woman—agents, Kepple had explained—sipping some of the worst ship’s coffee he’d ever tasted. They had shuttled him ba
ck to their main ship, a gatling-class. Medium battleship, not the heaviest of the heavies, but a lot more firepower than a fighter.

  “A weapons developer contracted by the Council was running a field test of a new class of battle-drone, when something went wrong and the drones developed a mind of their own. They refused commands, and instead went on their merry way. The developer tried, in vain, to locate the drones before contacting the Council. As a result, they were long gone by the time the Council sent agents to search for them. Lost, gone, all but forgotten. Until a month ago.”

  The young agents were frowning.

  “Yes?” he asked.

  The woman cleared her throat. “Sir, what do you mean, the drones developed a mind of their own? That a euphemism of some kind?”

  “Glad you asked, Agent Van. No, I meant just what I said. The reason the drones were a secret was their operating system, a highly advanced learning-capable AI. When I use the word superweapon here, it’s an understatement.” He smiled tightly with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. The young agents seemed to take it in stride. Nevermind the fact that true AIs were illegal system-wide in order to prevent just this sort of incident.

  Kepple passed around a thin dossier. On top was an image of a woman—middle-aged, attractive, a smile on the lips but a look in the eye that said she was all business. “Meet Madame Umbrador, owner/operator of Rador Solutions, a shipping company.”

  The young man suppressed a snort.

  “Yes,” Kepple said. “Shipping being a thinly veiled synonym for piracy, smuggling, and possession and distribution of various illicit compounds and illegal items. Umbrador operated out of Geta-4, in orbit around Ceres. Among her more interesting connections were her sister, Carmen, the notorious head of Carmen’s Crews, and an enormous, but, we believe, shady operation known as Rome Inc.”

  “What happened to her?” Gavin asked. He couldn’t help but notice Kepple had been speaking of her in the past tense.