Defending the Galaxy: The Sentinels of the Galaxy

by Maria V. Snyder

  Beau and I search for worm holes, but it doesn’t take us long to realize that Jarren and his super wormers are skilled enough to not leave holes or cause any ripples. Yet that doesn’t sit right with me. There has to be at least some fingerprints. Unless they found a way to access DES legitimately—a scary thought. Once a person has the proper clearance, then they can use those established clusters.

  A sudden worry occurs to me. Beau, has Radcliff considered that there may be someone in DES working with the looters?

  It’s always a possibility. They do security background checks and have safeguards on the information, but you know nothing is ever completely secure.

  True. And this place is too clean. After searching for a long while, I finally find an unauthorized breach. Q, can you highlight it and find the rest, please?

  Beau curses as splotches of red light up DES’s network. Can you warn me when you’re going to do that?

  Sorry.

  A huff. What does it mean?

  They’re all the places where a wormer has gained illegal access to DES.

  There’s a million of them! He pauses. Are they over the course of the Q-net’s lifetime?

  Please show the age of each one, I ask the Q-net “aloud” so Beau can hear.

  The red shifts into various shades from a super bright red to a pale pink. A guide flashes—the most recent are the eye-aching red color.

  Can the Q-net fix those gaps in security? Beau asks.

  YES.

  Did you hear that? I ask Beau, hoping maybe now Q will allow him to hear it.

  Hear what?

  Great. You know that’s not helping, right Q? But I say to Beau, Yes, the Q-net can fix those because we fixed dozens of them before.

  Then why didn’t it do it before? If it’s…aware… then why not protect DES?

  CANNOT INTERFERE.

  Huh? But you’re interfering now?

  NO. YOU ARE.

  Because I’m asking?

  YES.

  But what about hiding me from Jarren? When you removed my image from the camera feeds?

  YOU ASKED FOR PROTECTION.

  Talk about a loophole.

  Ara? Beau asks. I can only hear one side of your conversation.

  The Q-net won’t interfere on its own, I say, and then I explain that I need to ask Q.

  Then ask it to plug those holes!

  I do.

  IT WILL TAKE TIME.

  Okay. Q is going to be busy for a while, I say to Beau. What do you want to do in the meantime?

  I think we can follow these neon-red lines back to the looters and figure out where they’re hiding, but not today. For today, maybe we can discover who in DES might be communicating with them.

  That’s a great idea. Q, please keep the lines in place even after you fix the holes.

  WILL DO.

  Before we can sort through the red lines, Radcliff’s voice sounds behind us. “Conference room. Now,” he orders.

  From the icy tone of his voice, I know the meeting isn’t going to go well for me.

  Not at all.

  Three

  2522:248

  Beau and I disentangle. This time Beau waits for me. He pauses with his hand on the doorknob. “How much do you want to bet your parents will be there?”

  “I’d bet my entire life savings that they will be there. The million-credit question is, will there be an ambush?”

  “What kind of an ambush?”

  “Dr. Edwards and his medical staff. Radcliff probably asked them to bring a confinement jumpsuit for my own protection.”

  “I think you’re being overly dramatic,” Beau says.

  I wait.

  He gives me a slanted grin. “They’re not going to wrestle you into a suit. Edwards is probably packing a hypodermic full of La-La juice.”

  “La-La juice?”

  “Yeah, stuff to make you go to La-La land.”

  “La-La land?”

  “You know…” He twirls his hand in the air. “A floaty place where everything is calm and peaceful and magic is real.”

  “And you said I was being dramatic. This isn’t helping my nerves.”

  Beau opens the door. “Relax, it won’t be that bad.”

  Not for him. But he’s being nice. I squint at him in suspicion. “I thought you were mad at me.”

  “I was, but I’ve had time to think about it.”

  “And?”

  “And if I want you to trust me and be able to tell me anything, then I shouldn’t jump down your throat when you do. Besides, truth or not, we accomplished three days of work in one afternoon and I can’t deny that.”

  We head toward the conference room. To avoid thinking about my upcoming doom, I ask him, “La-La Land? Where do you find these words anyway?”

  He mock-bristles. “I’m more than a pretty face.”

  “You’ve been in the colloquialisms cluster again, haven’t you?”

  His handsome face brightens. “There are so many forgotten words and phrases that just need an advocate to get them back into our vernacular.”

  “Like skedaddle?”

  “Exactly! I heard a tech use skedaddle the other day. I almost whooped with joy.”

  I pause at the doors, trying to guess the mood of the room from the murmur of voices.

  Beau’s hand touches my shoulder. “It’ll be fine. How many crazy theories have you presented us with so far?” He doesn’t wait for an answer. Instead, he counts on his fingers. “Invisible aliens, Warrior ghosts, alternate dimensions, Warrior hearts, portals in the pits, and now a sentient Q-net. We haven’t locked you up yet.”

  Yet is the key word. “Still not helping. But since you’re so confident, you can go first and Edwards can stab you with his hypodermic.”

  “Fine.”

  He enters. When he isn’t attacked, I follow him. All the usual suspects are there: my parents, Radcliff and Morgan. Much to my relief, Dr. Edwards doesn’t tackle me, and he’s alone. Bonus. Niall’s attendance is a surprise. He’s wearing civilian clothes and gives me a questioning look. I shake my head sadly. Sorry, I mouth to him. Because he’s bound to be upset at me, too. I settle next to Beau. From his earlier comments, he might be my only advocate.

  “Lawrence, please explain to everyone what you told me earlier,” Radcliff orders.

  The please is a nice touch. I draw in a breath and release it, considering how to put the best spin on it. But there’s really no way to say this without sounding insane. “The Q-net is sentient.”

  Morgan is the only one who doesn’t react. Everyone else’s reaction are almost comical; I mark when confusion turns into astonishment and then into worry followed by alarm. I half expect Dr. Edwards to pat the pockets of his lab coat for a syringe full of La-La juice. It doesn’t take long for my mother to demand clarification.

  I oblige, repeating everything I told Beau and Radcliff earlier. I end with, “I know it’s impossible to believe, but so were the HoLFs, and the Warrior ghosts, and the Warrior hearts.” I don’t add the others because they haven’t been proven. Yet. “And all those things ended up being true.” I glance at Beau, now understanding why he pointed these out to me earlier. Thanks, partner.

  He gives me an and-you-thought-I-was-being-a-jerk look before he says, “I don’t know if I believe the Q-net is an alien consciousness that encompasses the entire Milky Way Galaxy, but I do know that Ara’s ability and ease with working in the Q-net has leaped many orders of magnitude since Jarren invaded. She thinks it and the Q-net does it. That fast. It’s another weapon in our arsenal. Whether or not she’s right, I don’t see any harm in continuing with our work in the Q-net.”

  Radcliff grunts. “Say Ara’s right and the Q-net is sentient. It does what she says, so what happens if she gets mad and it decides to lash out at whoever she’s upset with?”

  “It doesn’t work like that,” I say. “Its directive is to protect us.”

  “And how do we know it’s not lying?” he counters.

 
“Why would it lie? If the Q-net wanted to harm us, don’t you think it would have done it by now? And if it decides to in the future, we can’t do anything to stop it. It’s integrated into all our lives.” Another thought propels me to my feet. “And before you accuse me of using this special link with the Q-net to my advantage, let me remind you of all the times that I’ve risked my life for this team and the base. I should have earned your trust by now, and if I—”

  “That’s enough, Lawrence,” Morgan says. “Sit down. Officer Radcliff’s just playing devil’s advocate.”

  Oh. I sit on the edge of my seat.

  “From her glower,” Morgan says mildly, “I’d say if the Q-net was going to lash out at anyone for making her upset, it would have been you, Radcliff. Any ill effects?”

  “You made your point,” he says. “Take us through it again, Lawrence. Why did it choose you?”

  I suppress a sigh, but realize that this time he’s paying attention versus reacting to the news. “I gained its notice when I protected the Warrior hearts from the looters. The Q-net reached out to me because it could no longer protect us from the HoLFs. Today I learned that the Q-net can’t directly interfere on its own, but if I request something, like information or help to reveal a hidden program, it will assist.”

  “And you asked it to heal Niall?” Radcliff asks.

  “Not quite. I didn’t know about its sentience then. I was trying to figure out how to help him. That’s when the Q-net showed me Niall’s brain—or what looked like a graph of his neutral pathways. I asked Q to send the diagram to Dr. Edwards, but instead there was an impressive light show and then nothing. I never considered that Q healed him until yesterday when it told me.”

  “But you didn’t prove to the Q-net that you could heal him.”

  Huh. “No, I don’t think I did.” Perhaps another loophole?

  “Think?”

  I bit back a growl of frustration. “I was very emotional at the time so I’ve no idea of my exact words.”

  Radcliff glances at Dr. Edwards. “What are your thoughts?”

  Startled, Edwards asks, “About what?”

  “About Niall’s recovery. Could it be due to the Q-net?”

  The poor man blinks at Radcliff as if he just asked him to flap his arms and fly. “I…Niall’s…” Edwards snaps his mouth shut. He visibly pulls it together. “With the amount of blood loss Niall experienced, his brain was affected, but the amount and degree of the damage is unknown. His electrical brain activity was below normal but not by much. However, the longer he remained unconscious, the more I worried that the damage was extensive. Brains do regenerate, but not that fast. It takes years for a full recovery. I tested Niall after he woke and, cognitively, he’s fine with no outward signs of any damage. It’s possible that the coma was due to other issues. It’s so difficult to tell the direct cause when dealing with brain trauma.”

  “What about his sensors? Do they normally stop working after a trauma?” Radcliff asks.

  “Those sensors don’t malfunction. Ever. The problem is always with the brain. Some people can’t handle the interface.” Edwards looks at Niall. “I suspect the reason he can’t use the sensors is because there is some brain damage. I hope with time, he’ll heal and be able to use them again.”

  “In other words, there is no way to prove the Q-net healed him?”

  Out of all the stuff I said about the Q-net, Radcliff really seems determined to disprove this one.

  “I can pull up his brain-wave chart during the time Ara said she requested help. That might show unusual activity. It might take me some time to find it.”

  Radcliff gestures to the terminal. Edwards inserts his tangs and sits in front of the screen. The desire to ask the Q-net to give the information to the doctor pulses. It would do it in a fraction of the time. I decide not to scare the good doctor.

  “Are you in the Q-net now?” Mom asks me.

  How to explain without upsetting her? “Not exactly.”

  “That’s not an answer.”

  “I’m not in the Q-net right now. However, I just need to…reach out, and I can fly with Q.” I hold up a hand, stopping the questions. “Flying is different than worming or just using the Q-net. It’s like the structure is gone. There’s no clusters or barriers or restrictions. I can go anywhere. But when I need to unravel a program or work with data, I have to entangle, and that requires more effort.”

  “Is the Q-net reading your mind all the time?” My mother sounds horrified.

  “No. When I’m entangled, it does pick up on my intentions, but, when I’m not, it’s more like Q is in another room and if I want to communicate, I have to raise my voice and call out to it. Otherwise Q doesn’t invade my privacy.” Or, at least, I don’t think so, but I’m smart enough not to mention that. Is it strange that it doesn’t freak me out to think the Q-net is privy to my deepest thoughts and emotions? Probably.

  “At least it has the same goals as us,” Dad says. “We need to keep the HoLFs out of our dimension.”

  “We don’t know if—”

  “I’ve been reading through Lan’s file,” Dad says, interrupting Mom. “I know there’s no evidence that there are multiple dimensions, but her translations indicate that the aliens who left the Warriors behind believed that the HoLFs are from another one.”

  “Q confirmed that the Warriors, when they’re intact and have hearts, are protecting us from the HoLFs, ,” I say.

  My dad focuses on me. “Did it say what the HoLFs are or where they come from exactly?”

  It almost sounds as if my father believes me. A bit of hope warms my insides. “When I asked about the nature of the HoLFs, Q sent me Lan’s research.”

  “Can you request more information?”

  “I can, but so far Q can only supply what’s already been discovered by us. It doesn’t have its own…files, but will pull information together for me into a file.”

  “Ara, what day and time was the light show?” Edwards asks. A graph is on the screen above the terminal. Various colored lines zigzag across the graph.

  I think back. “Day two-forty-three.” Struggling to recall the time, I remember it’d been dark and quiet. “I think it was after midnight.”

  OH-TWO-SIXTEEN.

  I jump in my seat and almost slip off the edge. “Oh-two-sixteen.”

  Radcliff turns to me. “That’s rather precise.”

  “Here it is,” Edwards says, saving me from replying. He hums to himself as he studies the graph.

  We all wait in silence. Niall is watching Edwards with a slightly pained expression. I’ve been avoiding his gaze since the big revelation, and I suspect I’ll have to apologize later for not telling him about Q. Although, in my defense, I still wasn’t certain about Q when we last spoke.

  “There was definitely a great deal of activity starting at that time. See this?” Edwards points a finger at the graph where the lines aren’t as jagged. “This is a standard pattern for a sleeping brain, but at oh-two-sixteen, something happened.” The new spot has as many zigs and zags as if it was a seismograph recording of an earthquake. “Lots of activity for two minutes before the lines smooth. Except they don’t quite go back to a deep sleep. In fact, his readings improved steadily until he woke.” Edwards swivels around to face us. “It was so subtle, I didn’t notice at the time.” He peers at me. “Ara, did you talk to Niall at this time?”

  “I talked to him before I fell asleep.” I don’t mention that I also bawled like a baby. “Then I had a nightmare where Jarren told me Niall was in a vegetative state, and that’s why I was in the Q-net frantically trying to find a fix for him.”

  “Hmmm.” Edwards turns back to the screen. The lines and graph flow backward then stop before he has it scroll forward. He points to a yellow line that’s more spiky than the rest. “You can see where Ara talked to him for about four hours. Even unconscious, patients recognize voices, which is why we tell family members to talk or read to them.”

  I glance at Niall.
He meets my gaze and there’s a softness in his expression. Maybe I’m not in as much trouble with him as I’d thought.

  “While this is very interesting, is there any evidence that the Q-net was responsible for those crazy squiggles from oh-two-sixteen to oh-two-eighteen?” Morgan asks.

  Edwards slowly rotates back. “No. Sorry, Ara.”

  Then we just wasted a bunch of time. “Does it matter if there’s proof?” I ask everyone. “You don’t have to believe me. It’s not like the Q-net will attack and kill people like the HoLFs. Q has been nothing but super helpful. Officer Dorey and I are able to get much more done. Nothing is going to change. Well…not for us right now. Maybe in the future. Unless, once we stop the HoLFs, Q goes back to being…silent.”

  “That’s true,” Mom says. “But we’re concerned about you and why you’re so convinced. Could the voice you’re hearing be from another super wormer?”

  Wow. That didn’t occur to me. Huh. I consider her question and am shocked by the answer. “It’s possible. But the person’s skills would have to be tremendous. Like beyond genius level. I’m getting a response to my requests in a fraction of a second.”

  “And you weren’t verbalizing them until I grumped at you,” Beau says.

  “But why would they help me if they’re another wormer that was working with Jarren?” I ask.

  “To gain your trust in order to learn what we’re doing and planning,” Radcliff says.

  He has a point. Yet. “That level of skill would be frankly terrifying,” I say.

  “More than the Q-net being sentient?” Radcliff asks.

  “Yes.” The truth. “Sure I was freaked when Q started communicating with me, but now, it makes perfect sense. It explains why I don’t need tangs or a terminal. I was able to send messages when I was clinging to Jarren’s shuttle high in the air and well away from the base.” I shudder at the memory, rubbing my arms. “There’s no other explanation about why I can do that. Not even a mutant super wormer could do that to me. I still believe Q is sentient.”

  No one comments. Edwards exchanges a glance with my parents. Uh oh. Here we go.