Pathfinder

by Laura E. Reeve

  “The standard commands are marked, but they’re too limited. The bot’s situation has changed and it may now interpret an aggregate command. I sliced up the standard commands and ran a random aggregation routine to see if anything useful appeared.” The AI sounded smug and, just like a pet, it hoped for feedback.

  “This is great, Muse. We can query ‘friend or foe,’ and ask for general cooperation, assuming the bot considers itself the interface for the buoy.” Matt got excited, scrolling through the lexicon. He opened view ports for the other two functions Muse 3 had provided, discovering a routine for attempting response interpretation directly, and one for breaking a response apart into original primitives.

  “I suspect the bot has become responsible for providing an interface. Your original video makes its intent fairly clear.” Muse 3 used a satisfied tone.

  Matt remembered Muse’s interest, or obsession, with the video he took with his EVA suit on that day. He’d nearly lost his life, because the bot was slicing his suit apart while he pigheadedly told Ari he didn’t need rescue. But he did, and he didn’t realize his dire circumstances until the bot had cut his communications with Ari and the ship. Lucky for him, Ari didn’t always obey orders and she was on top of the situation.

  “How did you get this done so fast?” Matt asked, then wished he could take it back.

  “I have had no other duties for six days,” Muse 3 said reproachfully.

  “Sorry, Muse. Life can be boring sometimes, when you have synapses that run near the speed of light.” According to Ari, however, human synapses were necessary for piloting N-space and human heads contained quantum devices, blah, blah, blah. Matt didn’t want to discuss any of these subjects with Muse 3. “Now stay quiet while I go through this undocking checklist.”

  Everything was prepared and requisitioned by the time David Ray and Dr. Lowry stepped through the passenger airlock. Aether’s Touch could support a two-person crew for a real-space voyage of sixty days. Matt didn’t consider it risky to take three people on a little jaunt within an hour of rescue from Beta Priamos Station and the Laomedon mining operations.

  Lowry had effusive praise for the bot command testing routines; her face became animated and cheerful, making her seem positively friendly.

  “How did you have the time to do something like this?” She scrolled through the interactive tests, almost chirping when she saw an interesting command.

  “Oh, I ran a random aggregation routine to see if anything useful appeared,” Matt said modestly.

  David Ray, standing on the other side of Lowry and a little behind her, rolled his eyes. Matt hoped Nestor hadn’t programmed Muse 3 with pride of ownership. Was it possible to offend an AI by taking credit for its work?

  Matt didn’t wait to find out. “Everybody get webbed into their seat.” He shooed David Ray toward the jump seat, and pointed Lowry at the other control deck chair. David Ray gave him an annoyed look, but started webbing into the seat.

  After doing his system checks and ensuring his S-DATS display was working, Matt got clamp disconnection verification and departure approval from Command Post. He boosted away from the station efficiently. Even though Ari had more real-space hours and gave him gas about his piloting experience, he was a safe real-space pilot.

  They spent at least an hour on transit, including boost and braking time. During that time, David Ray and Lowry chatted about the Minoans and their substance, background, and technology. The Minoans were one of David Ray’s favorite subjects and one he’d studied extensively. Matt had heard plenty of David Ray’s opinions and theories, so he stayed quiet. He also noticed David Ray was trying to draw Lowry out of her prickly shell and elicit her opinions.

  “The Minoans build and sell us N-space buoys—but did they do the same with the Builders?” David Ray gestured at the pictures Lowry displayed above the console. “That buoy looks like it might have been manufactured by the Builders.”

  “The shape is similar to ours—the ones we pay the Minoans to build, that is. The physical differences may be superficial. It’s the functional difference, the fact it only goes to one place, that intrigues me.” Lowry zoomed in and displayed the baffling text that translated to “Biological Temple.”

  “You think the Builders designed their own time buoys?”

  “An aggressive, xenophobic species wouldn’t leave their buoy manufacturing to aliens,” Lowry said. “We just happen to be okay with having them build our buoys for us.”

  “So you’re not happy with the status quo.”

  “Do you think the Minoans are inherently benevolent?” Lowry asked David Ray.

  “Absolutely not. On the other hand, I don’t assume they’re opportunistic and greedy, just because I don’t understand their agenda.”

  “And they do have an agenda. I just wish I knew what it was,” Lowry grumbled. “What bothers me is that humans are taking all the risks in this venture.”

  “All the physical risks, but not the financial ones.” Matt finally piped up.

  “But they’re still pretty careful with their money.” She looked thoughtful. “That matches with their unwillingness to provide us with a new buoy.”

  “You asked them for one?” David Ray raised his eyebrows. “Only the generational ship lines are allowed to transport buoys.”

  “It made sense. Why not do the same job as a generational ship?” She blew out her breath in annoyance. “But they hid behind the contractual issue you mentioned—only generational ship lines have the necessary neutrality, et cetera, et cetera.”

  “We’re coming up on the buoy,” Matt said. He brought up an external cam-eye view of his exploration bot, sitting serenely on top of the long cylindrical buoy.

  “Now we’ll see if your bot can communicate for us. Is it possible to get a copy of your routines and commands?” Lowry asked Matt. She waved her slate, prepared to copy immediately.

  “I’ll have to make sure they don’t contain proprietary code from the ship,” Matt said. “If not, I can get you copies.”

  Lowry seemed too excited to notice his reluctance. While he started a careful approach, Lowry started scrolling through commands. “First we establish ourselves as a friend, not a foe,” she muttered. “Let’s begin by . . .”

  “You’re cutting it close, Ms. Kedros.” Ensign Walker, as representative of the court, was starting to panic.

  “What’s the matter? We’ve got four minutes.” Since they both knew the drill, she was ready in two.

  Before Walker took his place beside her, he hesitated. “We haven’t told Dr. Lee yet, but we found tiny channels from the leads inserted near the base of her head. Someone used a neural probe on her.”

  “Will she be okay?”

  “Maybe. The brain doesn’t like having its memory changed, dealing with the conflicts, so to speak. And whoever did this was a pro; they left hardly any physical trace. If we’d waited longer to scan her, we wouldn’t have found anything.”

  She nodded. “Thank you, Ensign.”

  “They’ve finished crew selection for the Pytheas.” He still stood. “I expect you’ll be delaying the expedition?”

  “We can’t. The Minoans won’t wait.” Until the words were out of her mouth, she hadn’t realized she’d made her decision.

  “Ridiculous! You’ve got someone loose on this station, someone who has a neural probe and isn’t afraid to use it. Even on nice old lady doctors.”

  “But we weren’t supposed to find out about that—we’re just supposed to continue on with the mission. That’s what’ll draw out this lowlife.” This felt right. She hadn’t played the part of bait, in so many of Owen’s plans, without learning a thing or two.

  Walker gaped. “You’re putting the crew and ship in danger.”

  “Everyone on this habitat will be in danger until we find who did this. If we delay the mission, the perpetrator could get bolder or more desperate. Either possibility is perilous.”

  “But—we need to check if other people have had memory l
apses, or have mysteriously passed out.”

  Good point. She gave the Ensign credit for thinking around the angles. “You should do that. And you’re going to help me go through the backgrounds of everyone who will be on the Pytheas, as well as everyone who applied for crew positions.”

  “I’ll have to clear that with Leukos Industries, as well as SP—crap!” He whirled to tap a command on the tabletop. “You’ve got video-play appearance in front of the ICT in five, four, three . . .”

  Symbols lit in the air before her. Ensign Walker and the Beta Priamos security office faded from her sight. She logged in and the Pilgrimage amphitheater appeared, with three grim members of the Tribunal sitting above her.

  CHAPTER 19

  While waiting for the ICT to complete their closed sessions, net-think has spawned a Voice of Concern regarding the sentencing. The accused may be remanded to Terran League courts, which have the death penalty. Interested activists should visit “Isolationist Advocates,” at virtual address . . .

  —Interstellarsystem Events Feed, 2106.061.09.03 UT, indexed by Heraclitus 14 under Conflict Imperative

  If Joyce had anything to say about his future, and he usually did, he was never getting this damaged again. When the medics first helped him walk up and down the corridors, saying it was good for him to get up and about, he’d joked with them. But, as each day went by, he didn’t seem to be getting better. When he tried to use his walker, the whole side of his torso felt like it was on fire. If he saw one of those medics now, he’d snarl, Up and about, my ass. Speaking of which, I can barely drag it along.

  He’d hauled his pain-racked carcass out again today to sit beside Captain Floros on their favorite bench. The advantage of this bench was that it had a line of sight to the Bright Crescent’s dock area, through the central docking ring. It was early second shift, when almost fifty percent of the Pilgrimage came off shift, and the busy foot traffic was good cover for Joyce and Floros.

  “There he is,” Floros said.

  Myron, dressed in his dapper designer suit, stood out from the crowd as he nodded to the dock perimeter guard. Before Myron crossed or turned onto the docking ring, he stopped in front of a kiosk panel and called up a cam-eye view of himself, turning and evaluating the fit of the suit. He fiddled with the suit’s color, finally choosing a dark gold thread mixture that blended well with the Pilgrimage mono-chromatically yellow crew overalls and ship decorations.

  Frowning, Joyce could only guess Myron was considering evasion or disguise. As someone who either put on the same uniform every day, or wore bland civilian attire, Joyce could only label Myron’s behavior as narciss—narcissis—the man is obsessed with his appearance, okay? Joyce’s sole amount of preening was shaving and keeping his mustache clipped within AFCAW regulations.

  Myron was finally satisfied with his appearance and turned off the kiosk “mirror” view. He strolled onto the docking ring and to their surprise, turned right.

  “He’s not using the same drop.” Floros eyed Joyce’s walker as she stood up. “I’ll follow him while you call for Xena, the wonder hound.”

  And a wonder Xena was, after smelling the sample of specialized scent. While Floros followed Myron, Joyce started Xena back at the Bright Crescent airlock and ramp to see whether they could trail the contaminated discs. Xena snuffled at the railing of the ramp, and “went ballistic,” according to her handler. He let Xena off her lead, making Joyce nervous. But he quickly got over his worry, after laughing at crèche-get hugging bulkheads to get out of the dog’s way.

  Xena led them to the kiosk where Myron had brought up his image and adjusted his suit color. When the handler looked at Joyce inquiringly, he said, “Yup, he was touching that.”

  “Good girl, Xena!” exclaimed the handler, and the dog barked twice in excitement or pleasure. “Now, go get him!” She bounded into the ring corridor, following Myron’s trail.

  Joyce paused at the sound of her bark. Before this, he’d heard her make semi-articulate sounds from her throat, and she’d snuffled, panted, whined, but she hadn’t barked. His aunt’s dog could find a piece of cheese blindfolded, but its bark had been bred out. That’d been a disservice to the breed, because the bark was such an honest exuberant sound. At that point, Joyce decided he wanted a dog in his household, provided he could convince his wife it’d be worth the expense. For the kids, of course.

  This was also the point he lost sight of Xena and her growing entourage. A loose furry mammal on four legs was hardly ever seen on generational ships, where crews “raised” yeast mashes, fungi, and fish for their protein and generally eschewed transporting life-forms other than humans. Xena attracted attention from visitors and crew alike, although the crèche-get gawked in horrified, wide-eyed, space-wreck-watching fashion. Joyce could follow Xena’s paw-steps by homing in on the furor.

  He was panting with pain by the time he regrouped with Benjamin, Xena, and her handler. They were outside one of the package drop centers. Benjamin called Floros, who still shadowed Myron, and checked against his notes.

  “Yes, we got that. V-play equipment at station eight in rec room four. Then she homed in on locker 223; pawed at it. I agree.” Benjamin broke off his call and started speaking to Joyce. “Amazing. Xena picked up on every one of Myron’s stops. He had crossed his path once and she got the stops out of order, but I’m still impressed.”

  “What do we do now?” Joyce knew what he’d do, but this was sovereign Pilgrimage territory, and Benjamin wasn’t doing this because classified Bright Crescent data was at stake. Benjamin had been swayed by Captain Floros’s argument that Myron’s secret maneuvers, besides flouting Pilgrimage line neutrality, were ultimately endangering the Interstellar Criminal Tribunal proceedings. It was now a Pilgrimage op, so to speak.

  “We wait.” Benjamin gestured toward a bench against the wall of the crowded public area. Joyce gratefully eased over and seated himself. Xena and her handler, however, set up as a sort of carnival exhibit near the door of the package drop lockers. As people slowed to watch, her handler started putting her through some tricks.

  “Do you think that’s a good idea?” Joyce pointed at Xena, who had crooned a short bar of a song from her throat, and garnered applause. “Will that scare our suspect off?”

  “Smith knows what he’s doing.” Benjamin referred to the handler, who was casually steering everyone who entered and exited the package drop lockers past his wonder dog. “After all, these animals are so rare outside the Sol system now . . .”

  Benjamin had become a dog lover and Joyce actually listened to his impassioned speech on the many fine qualities of canines, storing away wife-convincing facts for later use. Due to selective breeding, dogs now lived longer and healthier lives. They didn’t provoke as many allergic reactions in humans and their longer lives helped improve their intelligence. Wasn’t it amazing that today’s dog had three times the vocabulary of its ancestors? Joyce rolled his eyes, but Benjamin continued without pause. The dog’s scent processing was superb and trainable; they could even diagnose human health problems. Of course, when used for finding explosives—

  “Have you taken the other dog through the station for explosives yet?” Joyce interrupted Benjamin’s info dump.

  “The dog triggered on your old clinic room and the bot storage bay. It’s a big ship, so we’re just getting to—”

  “Visitor quarters?”

  “They’re next. Sammy will be taken through in an hour or so.” Benjamin checked the time on his sleeve.

  “There she is.” Joyce focused on a passing Terran woman. Her closely cropped blond hair had a reddish tint. She wore a TSF lieutenant’s uniform with intelligence insignia, but had no nametag, as was often the case with Terran military uniforms. The Terran Space Force rank structure derived from old Earth naval organizations, meaning this lieutenant was equivalent to an AFCAW captain such as Floros. Joyce immediately raised his estimate of the woman’s age and experience.

  Like several other “grav- huggers”
who were more comfortable around animals, the lieutenant stopped and exclaimed over Xena. Benjamin and Joyce watched as she talked to Smith, bent down, and stroked the dog’s head.

  “Why, thank you, Lieutenant,” Joyce drawled. “For giving us a perfect before and after comparison.”

  Looking up at the lieutenant with large brown eyes, Xena patiently accepted the admiration as her due. Then the lieutenant disappeared into the package drop and locker area. Benjamin stood up and Joyce followed suit, although it took him much longer. The lieutenant appeared and Xena became excited, with her hindquarters trembling, her neck elongated, and her nose stretched outward with her ears forward. Smith looked over at Benjamin, who gave him a nod. Xena moved in front of the lieutenant, impeding her, and tried to paw at an area near the lieutenant’s hip.

  “What the—?” The lieutenant spun, trying to avoid Xena, and backed into Benjamin.

  “Will you empty your pockets, Lieutenant?” Benjamin asked politely, having reached the group.

  Her blue eyes cooled as they flickered from Benjamin over to the approaching Joyce, whom she had to know, because of recent events. She had the regular bland features that all Terrans had, but the light freckling across her nose and cheekbones gave her an engaging, wholesome look that most Terran women lacked.

  “I have diplomatic immunity. You have no right to search me,” she said.

  “Nice try, Lieutenant . . . ?” Benjamin matched cool for cool.

  “Lieutenant Tyler, of the Terran Space Forces, escorting State Prince Duval.”

  “Claiming diplomatic immunity doesn’t work in our ship’s public areas, particularly when we’re investigating crimes such as theft, murder, bombings, or the interference of interstellar justice.” Benjamin tapped the small badge on his upper right chest. “This badge, plus probable cause, allows me to search your pockets.”