Ghost Station (The Wandering Engineer)

by Hechtl, Chris

  There is another cyber war while the admiral was off on the Kiev. Irons became aware of it as it wrapped up. The next morning Sprite briefed him on it. It was a short brief; none of the cybers involved were talking. She did know that Fu had contained the problem but there had been extensive damage to the station net again. The organic crew wasn't happy about that.

  Memory and processors have been burnt out. Software corrupted, and some sections of the station net were damaged. The AI and software techs were trying to get a handle on the situation. There was some concern that the three AI who had been insane but had hidden in the net were responsible. Unfortunately that's not provable and the cybers aren't talking.

  When Irons and Sprite pressed for details they were silently rebuffed by Fu and the others. Even the Berkhearts were noncommittal; they sadly ignore the requests for information and leave the communications area.

  Sprite picked through the damage with the muse AI when the admiral returned to the station. Clio and Mnemosyne aren't happy about the damage either. They tell her bits and pieces of the story as they right the damage. Apparently some of the attorneys had thrown a tantrum over the activities on the station and the contracts that the admiral had agreed to without consulting the council. The council had finally come to an agreement over it but they were short on details on that. Apparently there was an nondisclosure agreement in place covering the meeting and all parties were adhering to it. It served as a sort of peace treaty for all parties.

  She reported it all to the admiral who silently listened as he tapped his lips with a finger. He rocked in his chair, uncertain and surprised by his involvement in the mess. Why hadn't they told him? Why hadn't they talked with him about the problem?

  ñChapter 28

  When they arrived at the Lagrange point the council declared a holiday to celebrate the achievement. The mayors of Antigua agreed and in an act of brotherhood also declared a planetary holiday. It is the first such holiday in living memory.

  The media went wild covering the prep for the holiday. Toni Chambers took on a freelancing reporter job, filming the occasion and the prep work for all parties. The coverage of the prep work builds up interest and excitement over the holiday.

  Getting into the spirit the mayors try to outdo each other with various displays of banners and planned events in their towns and cities. Each mayor is posturing and ribbing the others. It's all in good fun but there is a serious undercurrent of something more there.

  Essential services still needed to be run of course. Many could be overseen with a skeleton crew. Riff and Gwen took watch in engineering with Irons. Much to Sprite's ire Irons avoided the celebrations ongoing through the station and both ships. She made certain to be there on the podium for the speeches, a subtle reminder of who really made this achievement possible.

  People joined in impromptu tour groups to visit the station and see the sights. That sparked interest in various sights they found, including the parks and recreational facilities like the casino's, hotels, water parks, and theme parks. A petition is immediately started to get one or more of those places back online.

  The surviving augments were tired and old. They needed help to run the station network, most really didn't have the skills or interest at all. It's obvious, only a handful were actually interested in the drudgery of actually running the station. Averies, Ribber, Gwen, the Stewards, and the Berkhearts were the primary ones doing the day to day station chores. The new augments lacked the necessary skills. The Stewards were unhappy about the deception when it came to light. Discussions on what to do about the situation became a bit heated before eventually pattering out. It wasn't like they could just cut them off now.

  Averies tried to help as much as possible but he was constantly pulled off in one direction or another. Myers did a bit, but he was so absent minded it was useless to involve him. He frequently forgot his commitments when something else came up. He was intently focused on the station's science now over anything else.

  The Gashg Ribber was a hard worker; he worked along with Ron and Rachael Steward to maintain the ever growing life support system and to keep his beloved gardens healthy. But he had resigned from the council, preferring to attend to his garden over dealing with the day to day meetings and seemingly endless wrangling over petty subjects. The admiral felt a pang of envy over the Gashg; he wished he could join the old coot.

  Doctor Megan Trask was so busy running medical she rarely attended the meetings anymore. She had signed over her proxy to the Berkhearts. That hadn't gone over well with some of the others.

  The rest were all attorneys and minor bureaucrats, all uninterested in actually managing the station. Oh they were, but not the hands on. No, they couldn't sully themselves with such details. Let the peons handle that while they stuck to the quote unquote big picture.

  Of course they didn't quite come out and say that. If they had the admiral was fairly certain Riff or Gwen would yank their cords in a heartbeat. They were furious over the last cyber war. Gwen had been seriously pissed over a planned virtual golf tournament that had sucked up memory and processors yesterday. When she had found out what was going on she'd shut down entire banks that had been tasked. Of course the cybers just shifted their game to other processors, preempting them from whatever task they had been performing. That had caused some major headaches for the station crew.

  After mulling the situation over Irons broke down and decided to have another talk with the Warners about the subject. Something had to be done for them and for the council's long term coordination of the station. They couldn't afford another cyber war. He also needed some help, some friends in the right places so to speak.

  He made his way to the hospital ward during visiting hours. He was fairly sure the ensign would be there as well. She rarely left her husband's side now that his situation was deteriorating rapidly.

  The doctors had said they were delaying the procedure because of the holiday and because of how fast he was deteriorating. They didn't want to hook him up until he was stable.

  “How are you doing?” he asked, knocking on the open door when he arrived at Taylor Warner's room.

  Warner looked up and smiled politely. “Come to pay your last respects admiral?”

  “Actually... I well, I wanted to know if you rethought that idea that the doctors presented to you earlier.”

  “Oh?” Warner looked at his wife. He'd thought about it but nothing else had been said so he had just assumed that it was no longer possible.

  The admiral came into the room and stood uncomfortably, clenching and unclenching his hands. He hated this. He knew from experience how it felt to be there in that bed. Being here, feeling so damn helpless... it sucked. It sucked the life right out of you.

  "The station needs help to maintain itself. We can't well..." he frowned, not sure about how to ask what he didn't want to ask.

  "You need volunteers," Warner asked. Most of the volunteers from the planet were next to useless in the net. He'd seen them fumble about and try to do tasks they were assigned to do. None of them had any sort of experience with the job. Some blew off the tasks in favor of consulting or discussing other things. All of them tended to lead but very few of them knew how to get something to work. It was a case of too many chiefs and not enough Indians.

  The admiral was asking a lot. He was asking them to sacrifice their physical selves. Not that he had much choice. His condition was terminal. They could save his brain and brain stem but the tumors were already proliferating through his body. He'd come to accept it, but he didn't like it.

  He looked down at his body. Too much radiation and a timed genetic disorder. That's what the doctors were saying. Nanites were clearing some of the tumors but not all. Too many were cropping up all over. Thousands all over his body. They grew in frightening speed, sucking away resources his body needed to function and stay alive. In order to get them all they'd have to rewrite his DNA and replace every cell. That was possible of course, humans replaced their cells
every seven years, but inducing the repair and mitosis was a long shot at best. One that they didn't have the time to complete. The doctors were focused on his neurology but the rest of his body was rotting away before their eyes.

  According to doctor Kraft and that T'clock geneticist he couldn't get the name right they could in theory clone his body and transplant his brain and brain stem to the new one. But first they had to find a fix for the genetic disorder, one that stuck. The last two repair attempts had failed miserably.

  They had tried to convince him to go into stasis but he had vehemently denied it. No more little death of sleep. No. He was done with that. Live or die he would do it in the real world among friends.

  He didn't mind the surroundings; they had him in a nice hospital bedroom. A green colored suite complete with a credenza of white flowers and a simulated window. It was a nice place to visit but he was heartily tired of being here.

  “It's a big thing. I can't well...” Irons twisted his hands clearly torn. “I... A station of this size needs dedicated personnel. It's designed to be run by cybers, people jacked in permanently. People who know what they are doing.”

  “I know what cybers are admiral,” Warner said. “We have discussed this already with doctor's Trask, Kraft, and Numiria last month. I don't have a lot of time left and I'm willing to take the risk.”

  "I'm in too," his wife said with a smile. She rubbed his hand. “Though I will miss this,” she murmured.

  He looked at her, eyes glowing. His wife still had little to say but what she did say had enormous impact with him. After a moment of searching he nodded too, smiling a little. "We do need to make room for the next generation don't we?" he asked softly.

  "That's good. But not the real problem. The problem is..."

  "The problem is the core of the station uses both AI and cybers."

  "AI?" Warner knew this but he wasn't sure where the admiral was going with it.

  “There were a lot of AI. Most crashed and went senile a long long time ago,” Irons replied softly. “You know about Draco.” They nodded. “There are a couple of dumb AI and one smart AI left in the system. There are also three dumb AI who are supposed to be borderline insane somewhere hiding. They... all the AI are... well eccentric.” He shrugged uncomfortably.

  "I can whip something up in time with the help of the others. I've patched them the best I can. But in the meantime we need engineering Cybers. People linked in full time to manage the power plants and needs of the station. People who know what they are doing," Sprite said. “We're at a standstill and this latest cyber war has really torn a hole in the manning tables. Admiral Irons and I are each standing watched as well.”

  “Cybers?” Quinna asked. She'd just come in and was wrestling with the topic.

  The Warners looked her way and nodded for her to come in. “Full time augments. They would be put in a pod and their bodies would be kept on life support. Their brains would be permanently hooked to the station's computer net. In effect they would be the computer. Or at least the one's running it.”

  "Um..."

  “It's not for the faint of heart. It takes a level of commitment most people can't understand. We're talking about... well...” he shrugged helplessly.

  “I take it the ones in the station right now...”

  “Are old. Most died over time. A few like we saw went insane over time. It apparently varied, some went delusional and retreated to their own virtual world, and others went psychotic like we saw. Some cut off their own life support and died thinking their bodies would wake up.”

  Taylor flinched. “But they can live...”

  “A long long time. Millennia at least. With the right medical support indefinitely,” Irons said.

  “We could keep an eye on the kids. The grand kids I mean. Always be there for them,” Taylor Warner said looking at his wife. He smiled. Of course first their son had to get off his first mate stick and find someone.

  He realized that what Irons really wanted and needed was an ally or in their case allies plural. Allies on the council to watch his back. He resented that a little, but understood it. Besides, what choice did he have? None really.

  “My brother was an augment, a cyber I mean,” Mrs. Warner said softly. “He was injured in an accident. His body was torn apart in the crash. They said it was the only way to save him short of a full body clone job which was illegal. He... he was okay. Weird but okay.” She grimaced. “It took some getting used to though.”

  "It's something to think about. We'll have to have volunteers for that as well," Irons said with a grimace. "Sprite can't handle a class seven bottle. It takes an AI and dedicated staff to manage one. We've got four we can run and well, we'll need two staff to get the station up and running at minimum."

  "Ouch," Warner said wincing. He looked at his wife, hands on hers. "We'll think about it," he said after a moment.

  "I'm not... I wasn't... hell," Irons said slumping a little as they looked at him with knowing eyes. "I didn't want this. I don't know what to say," he said, struggling with his own emotions.

  "We'll talk about it admiral," she said softly, eyes searching her husband’s. He stroked her hair gently.

  In a rare move the medical team decided to do both surgeries at the same time. They had a second and a third team trained in the basic procedures. Since both the Warners had extensive implants already it would be much easier to perform their surgeries.

  Of course the admiral and his AI had to be on hand for both surgeries. That annoyed some of the medical staff but when he gently explained that they had to have his implants and Defender's overrides or the Warner's military implants would suicide they understood.

  Doctor Light Touch had excelled in the surgical training program, using her own implants she was now on her way to becoming the premier telepresence surgeon of the station. Another doctor opened each patient up and did the initial work, and then passed it on to her. She had a fine grasp of the micro manipulations needed for the task. Doctor Trask and Doctor Kraft directed the work. They also used their fine control of the medical nanites to plate over all the connections and test everything.

  A second team did the basic biological connections, rerouting their biology to graft in the catheters and other equipment. Fortunately Mr. Warner had most of that already done when he had been admitted to the hospital. All they had to do was extend the services, using nanites to meld man and machine. They also removed extensive parts of his body to limit the tumors. His torso and head were all that remained when they were finished, all treated to prevent further tumor growth.

  When it came time to work on Mrs. Warner the teams were encouraged but a little tired. They missed a pulmonary embolism at first. When the alarms began to shriek a few of the nurses flinched, one knocked over a tray of sterile surgical tools in her surprise.

  Fortunately Light Touch had an iron grasp of the situation. She released nanites into the woman's heart to combat the blockage as the basic team swung into action. As she cleared the blockage they scanned for additional blockage as well as other blood clots and repaired the damage.

  “I thought we'd have that problem with Taylor since he's been sedentary for some time. It goes to show you, expect the unexpected,” Light Touch murmured. Irons agreed with a nod.

  Doctor Trask took control when the patient was stable. She used Light Touch's robots to find and repair the neurological damage to the woman's speech centers and then handed the controls over to Doctor Kraft for the final fitting.

  Both Warners awoke two days later to a changed existence. They were now virtual, feeling and seeing and hearing through the net. Since they had experience with jacking in they brushed off helpful hands politely, orienting themselves quickly.

  Sid Berkheart was amused that Kenny was so put out by their easy almost casual acceptance of their changed reality.

  “Well, what do you expect?” Sid asked when Kenny had lamented their lack of tutoring. “They are from our time. They know how to jack in; they've bee
n doing it since they were kids! Of course they know how to do it!”

  “Oh.” Kennet looked a little put out still.

  “Forgot that?” Sid asked amused. He watched Sprite hovering protectively behind the Warners.

  “Yeah, sort of.”

  “It's like riding a bike Ken, it just takes a little practice to get back on and get back into it.”

  “If you say so,” Kenny said dubiously. He had been looking forward to adding allies to their faction. Now he wasn't sure if they were allies or not.

  Sid shook his virtual head. Kenny didn't know what the Warners were all about. Sid did. They were friends of the admiral sure, but they were also doers like him. People who did more than they said, they got things done while Kenny was still arguing about who should do it. Life was about to get interesting.

  Sometimes he missed Diego, Manny, and the others. They had been doers, people who lived life and worked hard.

  “I still think they should take it easy. Maybe let us show them around a bit,” Kenny groused. He didn't like it that the admiral's AI was sticking near the Warners.

  “They'll do fine,” Sid said, watching the Warners orient themselves and nod politely to the other's congratulations and acceptance into their group.

  Sprite has another icy incident when Irons mentioned creating more AI after the Warners had awoken. They were with a programmer and a psychologist recently arrived from the planet at the time he inserted his foot into his mouth over the subject. When Sprite left he talked with them. Hesitantly the psychologist talked to him. She wasn't happy about the divided loyalties but the situation is rather unique.

  She frowned. “I... hesitate to bring this up but your AI...”

  “Yes doctor?”

  “She's showing classic symptoms of trauma.”

  The admiral scowled briefly before deciding to talk to her about it. Perhaps she could help a little, or at least shed some light on the situation. Sprite had become touchy again, moody. The emotional swings were a dangerous sign of rampancy, one he was concerned about. “I... know. We had an incident.” He related the Draco incident to the psychologist. She didn't say anything, didn't ask any questions, and just listened. When he was finished the psychologist was sitting back looking thoughtful. “Any ideas?” He finally asked.