At the Helm: A Sci-Fi Bridge Anthology (Volume 1)

by Rhett C. Bruno

  Would it be tonight then? she wondered. Would this be the night she lost someone?

  “I advise you to retreat.”

  “Can’t do it, Delphi.”

  It was the expected answer, but she’d had to try.

  Nervous tension reduced her to repeating the basics. “Expect them to underestimate how fast you can move and maneuver in your exoskeleton. You can take advantage of that.”

  The shooting subsided. In the respite, audio pickups caught and enhanced the sound of a tense argument taking place at the distant farmhouse. Then a revving engine overrode the voices.

  Karin said, “The other truck, with the machine gun, it’s on the move.”

  “I see it.”

  A check of his setup confirmed he had the feed from the surveillance drone posted on the periphery of his visor display.

  He used gen-com to speak to his squad. “It’s now. Don’t let me get killed, okay?”

  They answered, their voices tense, intermingled: “We got you…watch over you…”

  Valdez’s window-set centered, cutting off their replies. “Delphi, you there?”

  Her voice was calm, so Karin said, “Stand by,” and swiped her window-set aside.

  “…kick ass, L. T.”

  Shelley’s window-set was still fanned, with the live feed from the surveillance drone on one end of the array. Motion in that window caught Karin’s eye, even before the battle AI highlighted it. “Shelley, the machine-gun truck is coming around the north side of the ruins. Everybody on those walls is going to be looking at it.”

  “Got it. I’m going.”

  “Negative! Hold your position. On my mark…” She identified the soldier positioned a hundred-fifty meters away on Shelley’s west flank. Overriding protocol, she opened a link to him, and popped a still image of the truck onto the periphery of his visor. “Hammer it as soon as you have it in sight.” The truck fishtailed around the brick walls and Karin told Shelley, “Now.”

  He took off in giant strides powered by his exoskeleton, zigzagging across the bare ground. There was a shout from the truck, just as the requested assault rifle opened up. The truck’s windshield shattered. More covering fire came from the northwest. From the farmhouse voices cried out in fury and alarm. Karin held her breath while Shelley covered another twenty meters and then she told him, “Drop and target!”

  He accepted her judgment and slammed to the ground, taking the impact on the arm struts of his exoskeleton as the racing pickup braked in a cloud of dust. Shelley didn’t turn to look. The feed from his helmet cams remained fixed on the truck parked between the ruined walls as he set up his shot. The battle AI calculated the angle, and when his weapon was properly aligned, the AI pulled the trigger.

  A grenade launched on a low trajectory, transiting the open ground and disappearing under the truck, where it exploded with a deep whump!, enfolding the vehicle in a fireball that initiated a thunderous roar of secondary explosions as the rocket propellant ignited. The farmhouse became an incandescent inferno. Nightvision switched off on all devices as white light washed across the open ground.

  Karin shifted screens. The feed from the surveillance drone showed a figure still moving in the bed of the surviving truck. An enemy soldier—wounded maybe—but still determined, clawing his way up to the mounted machine gun. “Target to the northwest,” she said.

  The audio in Shelley’s helmet enhanced her voice so that he heard her even over the roar of burning munitions. He rolled and fired. The figure in the truck went over backward, hitting the dusty ground with an ugly bounce.

  Karin scanned the squad map. “No indication of surviving enemy, but shrapnel from those rockets—”

  “Fall back!” Shelley ordered on gen-com. Powered by his exoskeleton, he sprang to his feet and took off. “Fall back! All speed!”

  Karin watched until he put a hundred meters behind him; then she switched to Holder, confirmed his ambush had gone off as planned; switched to Deng who was driving an ATV, racing to cut off her own insurgent incursion; switched to Valdez, who had finally joined up with another squad to quell a street battle in an ancient desert city.

  • • •

  “Delphi, you there?” Shelley asked.

  “I’m here.” Her voice hoarse, worn by use.

  Dawn had come. All along the northern border the surviving enemy were in retreat, stopping their exodus only when hunting gunships passed nearby. Then they would huddle out of sight beneath camouflage blankets until the threat moved on. The incursion had gained no territory, but the insurgents had won all the same by instilling fear among the villages and the towns.

  Karin had already seen Valdez and Holder and Deng back to their shelters. Now Shelley’s squad was finally returning to their little fort.

  “Is Hawkeye done?” he asked her.

  She sighed, too tired to really think about it. “I don’t know. Maybe.”

  “I never liked him much.”

  Karin didn’t answer. It wasn’t appropriate to discuss another handler.

  “You still there?”

  “I’m here.”

  “You want to tell me if this was a one-night-stand? Or are you going to be back tonight?”

  Exhaustion clawed at her and she wanted to tell him no. No, I will not be back. There wasn’t enough money in the world to make this a good way to spend her life.

  Then she wondered: when had it ceased to be about the money?

  The war was five thousand miles away, but it was inside her head too; it was inside her dreams and her nightmares.

  “Delphi?”

  “I’m here.”

  In her worst nightmares, she lost voice contact. That’s when she could see the enemy waiting in ambush, when she knew his position, his weaponry, his range…when she knew her clients were in trouble, but she couldn’t warn them.

  “You want me to put in a formal request for your services?” Shelley pressed. “I can do that, if you need me to.”

  It wasn’t money that kept Karin at her control station. As the nightmare of the war played on before her eyes, it was knowing that the advice and the warnings that she spoke could save her soldiers’ lives.

  “It’s best if you make a formal request,” Karin agreed. “But don’t worry—I’ll be here.”

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Linda Nagata Linda Nagata is a Nebula and Locus-award-winning writer, best known for her high-tech science fiction, including The Red trilogy, a series of near-future military thrillers. The first book in the trilogy, The Red: First Light, was a Nebula and John W. Campbell Memorial-award finalist, and named as a Publishers Weekly Best Book of 2015. Her newest novel is the very near-future thriller, The Last Good Man.

  She’s a science fiction and fantasy writer from Hawaii, with thirteen published novels and numerous short stories. Her science fiction novels are considered high-tech, “hard” science fiction, with an emphasis on character and story.

  You can find out more about her work at http://www.mythicisland.com/. She invites you to sign up for her occasional newsletter. It’s the best way to stay in touch and you’ll get word of new publications, deals, and other writing news.

  Subscribe here: Newsletter

  PATCHWORKER 2.0

  BY M. PAX

  Eyelids twitching, drooling like a simpleton, Carl lay on a gurney. I came to replace him, hoping not so exactly, and hugged my navy trench coat tighter. The October chill piped into the habidome, as if people still lived with the world, nipped deeper into my veins.

  Carl and I had flirted with love back in the academy, before becoming fully licensed in PO, Patchworkers Order. PO forbade our affair, threatening to send us back from where we came. No way would I return to craptacular Sludge Bay. Carl vowed he’d take a stroll outside rather than live in Solder Park again, which was located on the edge of the landfill. He swore the stink followed him. Sludge didn’t smell any better. We put our blooming passions on hold and had planned to revisit them when we retired. Now that’d never h
appen.

  The medtechs strapped up Carl’s stocky arms so they’d quit flopping around and tucked away his disturbing empty state as readily as the city dome concealed the raging storms and scalding ultraviolet rays. Before they wheeled Carl toward the ambulance, I straightened the lapels of his trench coat and committed to memory a face so dear.

  Most wouldn’t call Carl beautiful. His cheeks mooned out with bulbous outcrops, a boulder-like nose and pronounced brow ridge. His fleshy lips, once brimming with pink verve and promises, matched his strong jowls and double chin.

  Sighing, I scanned him. Interfaces—thin micro-patches of circuitry—covered my skin and Carl’s like most people wore clothes. I should have sensed him before the rail car stopped to let me out. His thoughts should have mingled with mine during the twelve block walk from the station. I should have perceived him beyond what my fingertips could touch. Frowning, I lifted his sleeve and pressed the black-lined circuit inked on my wrist to the same on his.

  “Carl, what happened?”

  Seizures weren’t uncommon for patchworkers, but none of those prone to them ever made it into PO. I detected no pain echoing through his tattoos and nothing of what made Carl the man he was.

  PO let me tap into reports it had archived on this AI, artificial intelligence. Carl hadn’t been the first patchworker put on the job. He had replaced Gaati and Kawana. They had also ended up like this.

  Crap. Three patchworkers down. Now only one hundred ninety-seven people on the planet had the ability to patch into AI and manipulate the minds of machines. Our elite group could resist getting lost in the knotted streams of code when the things went haywire. We were the few that could distinguish biological and mechanical electrical pulses, the few that could make sense of them, the few who could create necessary patches.

  I pressed my wrist to Carl’s once more. All my interfaces strained to boost the signals, searching the data he had collected on this client. Into his main processors I hacked, swaying for a moment when I stared up at myself — tall and big boned, square-jawed, the telltale silver irises of a patchworker, and red ringlets flowing down past my shoulders. My curls fluttered in the gentle wind, which was piped through the dome’s vents. The breeze had a curdled smell to it, some days worse than others. Today it reeked.

  Carl’s job logs ended the moment he arrived, as if erased. I found the same exclusions in Gaati’s and Kawana’s records. I didn’t believe in coincidence. PO heard my doubt and sent an instant avowal that it hadn’t deleted anything from the logs. Had the AI?

  The repeated omissions gave me pause, and my second thoughts darted over the nearby gray door that had no signs or windows. It appeared so harmless. No advisories alerted my interfaces. Yet what lay beyond those doors had rendered Carl into a sack of bio matter ready for recycling. His skill level rose to a mere half notch below mine. Would I fare any better?

  PO demanded I go meet the client, nudging my childhood memories until the fetid aroma of sludge filled my mouth. I needed no other incentive and ducked into the entrance.

  Red diagonal stripes on the floor gave the briefest warning. Beyond them, a squadron of six Marines leveled assault weapons. Six red dots sprouted on my chest. None quivered.

  Their aim gave me no choice other than to hold out my hands like a common hacker. “Patchworker Evalyn Shore. I’m expected.”

  The Marines didn’t jostle, so I didn’t see the suit taking cover behind them. I heard him, though. His voice, more shrill than the sirens outside, grated over my jitters like corroded code. “Patchworker Shore, you were scheduled to arrive twenty minutes ago.”

  The words flitted in my ears as a question rather than a demand. Peering around the burly soldiers, whom I matched in breadth and height, I sized up the peon sent to fetch me. A lack of authority sloughed off his cheeks like the dirty rain on the dome. I could smell his nerves, which added a sour note to the hard-used air.

  “My orders are to answer only to Director Beatty. Where is he?” I brushed my red ringlets behind my ears and discreetly tapped my booster interface. The peon remained as unreadable as Carl.

  “I’m Assistant Director Randall. ” He held out his moist hand. It trembled.

  Lots of people contracted a case of the fidgets when meeting a patchworker. As I said, we were a rare breed, but this stooge had already met Carl, Gaati, and Kawana. He had to know the rule against touching patchworkers. If PO wouldn’t reestablish my residence in Sludge Bay for bailing, I’d march back to the rail car right now.

  Sweeping past Randall, I strode into the corridor leading to the AI. “Let’s get ticking, bub. You now have me twenty-six minutes behind. I’ve a reputation and all. Run, run.”

  Despite my brisk pace, he fell into step beside me. The odd spongy texture of the ruddy brown tiles deadened any echo.

  “Director Beatty and I are pleased you could come on such short notice,” he said. “You were born in Sludge Bay, weren’t you? What an inspiring rise in status.”

  Since he didn’t matter to anything more than a defunct subroutine, I didn’t bother to answer, and I was relieved he didn’t continue to jabber. It was of no consequence which district a person had been born in if she or he had the ability to become a patchworker and a damned good one.

  Perhaps this assistant director boy wanted to get me riled, riled enough not to notice the absolute void. Neither my interfaces nor my senses picked up anything other than lemon-scented cleanser and heavily insulated walls. Everything pinged back as a dead end. The minty-hued corridors zigged and zagged. The cushion of the ruddy tiles grew deeper, stumbling my steps. I found it harder to swallow.

  A set of doors appeared on the left. Randall stopped in front of them. Silently he summoned them open using tech I couldn’t detect. That had never happened. Warnings shivered down my spine. Randall shoved me inside.

  Lined with blinking lights and hardware, the dim room buzzed and twinkled. The man standing in the middle of it all had to be Director Beatty. He stared blankly into space, unshaven, tie and jacket askew, fingers twitching. His tongue flickered at his dry lips.

  In stilted steps, he pivoted, staring into my face. As if a circuit switching on, thoughts lunged at me, screaming, sniveling. The onslaught after total nothing shocked me. My knees buckled.

  Beatty reached out to catch me. I veered sharply the other way to avoid his touch. A good number of interfaces could be lost by innocent contact, and his void expression creeped me out. It reminded me too much of Carl.

  Boosting my sensors, I worked harder to scan him. Beneath the overwhelming chatter of AI in the room, I could make out Beatty’s mind — overwrought, lost, fearful. I knew that much only because it had been allowed. By him or the machine?

  “Ah, Mayflower has introduced itself.” A ring of hair fringed his round head like a wire-rimmed screw hole on a circuit board. The top of his pink skull puckered with his words, emphasizing his nerves in the oddest way.

  I amplified my connection to PO, checking to make sure my ability to communicate remained unobstructed. “We’re here,” PO whispered. Good.

  I greeted the AI. It cooed so eagerly, inundating my conscious and unconscious thoughts, replacing my emotions with its own. Powering on the tattoos at my temples, I muted Mayflower’s babble. A machine should mind its place.

  “Tell me the problem. Leave out no detail,” I said to Beatty. His opinion and analysis mattered most. The human caretaker’s assessments trumped all in extreme cases. This job definitely fell into the extreme category.

  “My digital colleague is in need of something I can’t provide. It knows you can.”

  A knot formed in my forehead, narrowing my vision. “How can you know what I can provide? And what happened to Carl? Gaati? Kawana? Any of them should have been able to fix your problem. They’re as PO certified as I am.”

  “Only the best will do.” His lips clamped tight together, and he gestured at the jack-up chamber — a soundproof room with jacks, interfaces, speakers, and monitors where I’d v
isit with Mayflower. The AI could manifest as a hologram in there if it wanted.

  The AI gave me a mental push. I walled it off by setting the tattoos at my temples to maximum strength. The connection had to happen on my terms, and I communicated to Mayflower that I wouldn’t budge until it demonstrated some courtesy.

  It dialed down the aggression, giving me the space I demanded. Good.

  To prepare for merging, I silenced communications from any source other than the AI and PO. Then I thanked Mayflower and accepted its invitation. Inside the chamber, I lay down, getting comfortable.

  Before settling into a union with the machine, I set my anchors — boosting my connection to PO, isolating my personal processing chip, setting it to beep every three minutes, fixating on the cool draft blowing over my right hand chilling my fingers to ice. Join with me, Mayflower.

  I need. I hurt.

  The emotion in those simple words overpowered my defenses. Beatty, Randall, the weird facility, Carl, everyone and everything faded away. Mentally I embraced the AI, calling it friend. Let me help you. Who named you Mayflower?

  Dr. Navin. She created me.

  Where is she now? Sometimes all it took was an understanding of who had authored the routines and subroutines. Few could resist imbibing their personalities into their AI.

  My PO interface accessed the global library and fed me data on Dr. Navin. Her work involved evolution. Her biography didn’t mention any programming credentials, and Mayflower didn’t appear on her list of achievements.

  Aboard.

  For a moment I blanked, my thoughts sputtering. You’re a ship? To where? Why hadn’t PO given me this information?

  PO claimed not to have known. It scanned the library files for a list of possibilities. Mayflower stopped the search when PO pinged over ERC 14, Earth Reboot Candidate 14.

  I heard myself gasp. Are you there now? Or is that the issue? You’ve run into a travel snag?