All Systems Red

by Martha Wells

  Green said, “It’s lying.”

  A trace of panic in his voice, Yellow said, “We can’t chance it.”

  Blue Leader turned to him. “It’s possible, then?”

  Yellow hesitated. “I don’t know. The company systems are all proprietary, but if they have an augmented human who can hack into it—”

  “We have to go there now,” Blue Leader said. She turned to me. “SecUnit, tell your client to get out of the hopper and come here. Tell her we’ve come to an arrangement.”

  All right, wow. That was not in the plan. They were supposed to leave without us.

  (Last night Gurathin had said this was a weak point, that this was where the plan would fall apart. It was irritating that he was right.)

  I couldn’t open my comm channel to the hopper or the hopper’s feed without GrayCris knowing. And we still needed to get them and their SecUnits away from their habitat. I said, “She knows you mean to kill her. She won’t come.” Then I had another brilliant idea and added, “She’s a planetary admin for a system noncorporate political entity, she’s not stupid.”

  “What?” Green demanded. “What political entity?”

  I said, “Why do you think the team is called ‘Preservation’?”

  This time they didn’t bother to close their channel. Yellow said, “We can’t kill her. The investigation—”

  Green added, “He’s right. We can hold her and release her after the settlement agreement.”

  Blue Leader snapped, “That won’t work. If she’s missing, the investigation would be even more thorough. We need to stop that beacon launch, then we can discuss what to do.” She told me, “Go get her. Get her out of the hopper and then bring her here.” She cut the comm off again. Then one of the DeltFall SecUnits started forward. She came back on to say, “This Unit will help you.”

  I waited for it to reach me, then turned and walked beside it down the slope of rock into the trees.

  What I did next was predicated on the assumption that she had told the DeltFall SecUnit to kill me. If I was wrong, we were screwed, and Mensah and I would both die, and the plan to save the rest of the group would fail and PreservationAux would be back to where it started, except minus their leader, their SecUnit, and their little hopper.

  As we left the rocky slope and turned into the trees, the brush and branches screening us from the edge of the plateau, I slung an arm around the other Unit’s neck, deployed my arm weapon, and fired into the side of its helmet where its comm channel was. It went down on one knee, swinging its projectile weapon toward me, energy weapons unfolding out of its armor.

  With the combat override module in place, its feed was cut off, and with its comm down it couldn’t yell for help. Also, depending on how strictly they had limited its voluntary actions, it might not be able to call for help unless the GrayCris humans told it to. Maybe that was the case, because all it did was try to kill me. We rolled over rock and brush until I wrenched its weapon away. After that it was easy to finish it off. Physically easy.

  I know I said SecUnits aren’t sentimental about each other, but I wished it wasn’t one of the DeltFall units. It was in there somewhere, trapped in its own head, maybe aware, maybe not. Not that it matters. None of us had a choice.

  I stood up just as Mensah slammed through the brush, carrying the mining tool. I told her, “It’s gone wrong. You have to pretend to be my prisoner.”

  She looked at me, then looked at the DeltFall unit. “How are you going to explain that?”

  I started shedding armor, every piece that had a PreservationAux logo on it, and leaned over the DeltFall unit as the pieces dropped away. “I’m going to be it and it’s going to be me.”

  Mensah dropped the mining tool and bent down to help me. We didn’t have time to switch all the armor. Moving fast, we replaced the arm and shoulder pieces on both sides, the leg pieces that had the armor’s inventory code, the chest and back piece with the logos. Mensah smeared my remaining armor pieces with dirt and blood and fluid from the dead unit, so if we had missed anything distinctive GrayCris might not notice. SecUnits are identical in height and build, the way we moved. This might work. I don’t know. If we ran away now the plan would fail, we had to get them off this plateau. As I resealed the helmet, I told Mensah, “We have to go—”

  She nodded, breathing hard, more from nerves than exertion. “I’m ready.”

  I took her arm, and pretended to drag her back toward the GrayCris group. She yelled and struggled convincingly the whole way.

  When we reached the plateau, a GrayCris hopper was already landing.

  As I pulled her toward Blue Leader, Mensah got in the first word. She said, “So this is the arrangement you offered?”

  Blue Leader said, “You’re the planetary admin of Preservation?”

  Mensah didn’t look at me. If they tried to hurt her, I’d try to stop them and everything would go horribly wrong. But Green was already getting into the hopper. Two other humans were in the pilot’s and copilot’s seats. Mensah said, “Yes.”

  Yellow came toward me and touched the side of my helmet. It took a tremendous effort for me not to rip his arm off, and I’d like that noted for the record, please. He said, “Its comm is down.”

  To Mensah, Blue Leader said, “We know one of your people is trying to manually trigger our beacon. If you come with us, we won’t harm him, and we can discuss our situation. This doesn’t have to go badly for either of us.” She was very convincing. She had probably been the one to talk to DeltFall on the comm, asking to be let into their habitat.

  Mensah hesitated, and I knew she didn’t want it to look like she was giving in too quickly, but we had to get them out of there now. She said, “Very well.”

  * * *

  I hadn’t ridden in the cargo container for a while. It would have been comforting and homey, except it wasn’t my cargo container.

  But this hopper was still a company product and I was able to access its feed. I had to stay very quiet, to keep them from noticing me, but all those hours of surreptitiously consuming media came in handy.

  Their SecSystem was still recording. They must mean to delete all that before the pick-up transport showed up. Client groups had tried that before, to hide data from the company so it couldn’t be sold out from under them, and the company systems analysts would be on the alert for it, but I don’t know if these people realized that. The company might catch them even if we didn’t survive. That wasn’t a very comforting thought.

  As I accessed the ongoing recording, I heard Mensah saying, “—know about the remnants in the unmapped areas. They were strong enough to confuse our mapping functions. Is that how you found them?”

  Bharadwaj had figured that out last night. The unmapped sections weren’t an intentional hack, they were an error, caused by the remnants that were buried under the dirt and rock. This planet had been inhabited at some point in its past, which meant it would be placed under interdict, open only to archeological surveys. Even the company would abide by that.

  You could make big, illegal money off of excavating and mining those remnants, and that was obviously what GrayCris wanted.

  “That isn’t the conversation we should be having,” Blue Leader said. “I want to know what arrangement we can come to.”

  “To keep you from killing us like you did DeltFall,” Mensah said, keeping her voice even. “Once we’re in contact with our home again, we can arrange for a transfer of funds. But how can we trust you to leave us alive?”

  There was a little silence. Oh great, they don’t know either. Then Blue Leader said, “You have no option except to trust us.”

  We were slowing down already, coming in for a landing. There had been no alerts on the feed and I was cautiously optimistic. We had cleared the field for Pin-Lee and Gurathin as much as we could. They had had to hack the perimeter without that one last SecUnit noticing and get close enough to access the GrayCris HubSystem feed. (Hopefully it was the last SecUnit, hopefully there weren’t
a dozen more somehow in the GrayCris habitat.) Gurathin had figured out how to use the hack from their HubSystem into our HubSystem to get access, but he needed to be close to their habitat to actually trigger their beacon. That was why we had to get the other SecUnits out of there. That was the idea, anyway. Possibly it would have worked without putting Mensah in danger but it was a little late to second-guess everything.

  It was a relief when we thumped down into a landing that must have made the humans’ teeth rattle. I deployed out of the pod with the other units.

  We were a few kilos from their habitat, on a big rock above a thick forest, lots of avians and other fauna screaming down in the trees, disturbed by the hopper’s hard landing. Clouds had come in, threatening rain, and obscuring the view of the ring. The beacon’s vehicle was in a launch tripod about ten meters away and, uh-oh, that is way too close.

  I joined the three other SecUnits as we made a standard security formation. An array of drones launched from the craft to create a perimeter. I didn’t look at the humans as they walked down the ramp. I really wanted to look at Mensah for instructions. If I was alone, I could have sprinted for the end of the plateau, but I had to get her out of there.

  Blue Leader stepped forward with Green; the others gathered in a loose circle behind her, like they were afraid to get in front. One, who must have been getting reports from their SecUnits and drones, said, “No sign of anybody.” Blue Leader didn’t answer but the two GrayCris SecUnits jogged toward the beacon.

  Okay, the problem is, I’ve mentioned this before, the company is cheap. When it comes to something like a beacon that just has to launch once if there’s an emergency, send a transmission through the wormhole, and then never gets retrieved, they’re very cheap. Beacons don’t have safety features, and use the cheapest possible launch vehicles. There’s a reason you put them a few kilos from your habitat and trigger them from a distance. Mensah and I were supposed to distract GrayCris and their SecUnits while this was going on, get them away from the habitat, not end up as toast in the beacon launch.

  With the delay caused by Blue Leader deciding to grab Mensah, time was getting close. The two SecUnits were circling the beacon’s tripod, looking for signs of tampering, and I couldn’t take it anymore. I started to walk toward Mensah.

  Yellow noticed me. He must have said something to Blue Leader on their feed because she turned to look at me.

  When the remaining DeltFall SecUnit whipped toward me and opened fire, I knew the light had dawned. I dove and rolled, coming up with my projectile weapon. I was taking hits all over my armor but scoring hits on the other SecUnit. Mensah ducked around the other side of the hopper and I felt a thump rattle through the plateau. That was the beacon’s primary drive, dropping out of its casing to the bottom of the tripod, getting ready to ignite. The other two SecUnits had stopped, Blue Leader’s surprise freezing them in place.

  I bolted, took a hit in a weak armor joint that went through to my thigh, and powered through it. I made it around the hopper and saw Mensah. I tackled her off the edge of the rock, turning to land on my back, curling an arm over her suit helmet to protect her head from impact. We bounced off rocks and crashed through trees, then fire washed over the plateau and knocked out my—

  UNIT OFFLINE

  Oh, that hurt. I was lying in a ravine, rocks and trees overhanging it. Mensah was sitting next to me, cradling an arm that looked like it didn’t work anymore and her suit was covered with tears and stains.

  She was whispering to someone on the comm. “Careful, if they pick you up on their scanner—”

  UNIT OFFLINE

  “That’s why we need to hurry,” Gurathin said, who was suddenly standing over us. I realized I had lost some time again.

  Gurathin and Pin-Lee had been on foot, making their way toward the GrayCris habitat through the cover of the forest. We had meant to go pick them up in the little hopper if everything didn’t go to shit. Which it did, but only partly, so yay for that.

  Pin-Lee leaned over me and I said, “This unit is at minimal functionality and it is recommended that you discard it.” It’s an automatic reaction triggered by catastrophic malfunction. Also, I really didn’t want them to try to move me because it hurt bad enough the way it was. “Your contract allows—”

  “Shut up,” Mensah snapped. “You shut the fuck up. We’re not leaving you.”

  My visual cut out again. I was sort of still there, but I could tell I was hovering on the edge of a systems failure. I had flashes off and on. The inside of the little hopper, my humans talking, Arada holding my hand.

  Then being in the big hopper, as it was lifting up. I could tell from the drive noise, the flashes of the feed, that the pick-up transport was bringing it onboard.

  That was a relief. It meant they were all safe, and I let go.

  Chapter Eight

  I CAME BACK TO awareness in a cubicle, the familiar acrid odor and hum of the systems as it put me back together. Then I realized it wasn’t the cubicle at the habitat. It was an older model, a permanent installation.

  I was back at the company station.

  And humans knew about my governor module.

  I poked tentatively at it. Still nonfunctional. My media storage was still intact, too. Huh.

  When the cubicle opened, Ratthi was standing there. He was wearing regular civilian station clothes, but with the soft gray jacket with the PreservationAux survey logo. He looked happy, and a lot cleaner than the last time I had seen him. He said, “Good news! Dr. Mensah has permanently bought your contract! You’re coming home with us!”

  That was a surprise.

  * * *

  I went to finish processing, still reeling. It seemed like the kind of thing that would happen in a show, so I kept running diagnostics and checking the various available feeds to make sure I wasn’t still in the cubicle, hallucinating. There was a report running on the local station news about DeltFall and GrayCris and the investigation. If I was hallucinating, I think the company wouldn’t have managed to come out of the whole mess as the heroic rescuers of PreservationAux.

  I expected a suit skin and armor, but the station units that helped us out of processing when we had catastrophic injuries gave me the gray PreservationAux survey uniform instead. I put it on, feeling weird, while the station units stood around and watched me. We’re not buddies or anything, but usually they pass along the news, what happened while you were offline, what the upcoming contracts were. I wondered if they felt as weird as I did. Sometimes SecUnits got bought in groups, complete with cubicles, by other companies. Nobody had ever come back from a survey and decided they wanted to keep their unit.

  When I came out Ratthi was still there. He grabbed my arm and tugged me past a couple of human techs and out through two levels of secure doors and into the display area. This was where the rentals were arranged and it was nicer than the rest of the deployment center, with carpets and couches. Pin-Lee stood in the middle of it, dressed in sharp business attire. She looked like somebody from one of the shows I liked. The tough yet compassionate solicitor coming to rescue us from unfair prosecution. Two humans in company gear were standing around like they wanted to argue with her but she was ignoring them, tossing a data chip casually in one hand.

  One saw me and Ratthi and said, “Again, this is irregular. Purging the unit’s memory before it changes hands isn’t just a policy, it’s best for the—”

  “Again, I have a court order,” Pin-Lee said, grabbed my other arm, and they walked me out.

  * * *

  I had never seen the human parts of the station before. We went down the big multilevel center ring, past office blocks and shopping centers, crowded with every kind of people, every kind of bot, flash data displays darting around, a hundred different public feeds brushing my awareness. It was just like a place from the entertainment feed but bigger and brighter and noisier. It smelled good, too.

  The thing that surprised me is that nobody stared at us. Nobody even gave us a second lo
ok. The uniform, the pants, the long-sleeved T-shirt and jacket, covered all my inorganic parts. If they noticed the dataport in the back of my neck they must have thought I was an augmented human. We were just three more people making our way down the ring. It hit me that I was just as anonymous in a crowd of humans who didn’t know each other as I was in my armor, in a group of other SecUnits.

  As we turned into a hotel block I brushed a public feed offering station info. I saved a map and a set of shift schedules as we passed through the doors into the lobby.

  There were potted trees twisting up into a hanging glass sculpture fountain, real, not a holo. Looking at it I almost didn’t see the reporters until they were right up on us. They were augmented humans, with a couple of drone cams. One tried to stop Pin-Lee, and instinct took over and I shouldered him off her.

  He looked startled but I’d been gentle so he didn’t fall down. Pin-Lee said, “We’re not taking questions now,” shoved Ratthi into the hotel’s transport pod, then grabbed my arm and pulled me in after her.

  It whooshed us around and let us out in the foyer of a big suite. I followed Pin-Lee in, Ratthi behind us talking to someone on his comm. It was just as fancy as the ones on the media, with carpets and furniture and big windows looking down on the garden and sculptures in the main lobby. Except the rooms were smaller. I guess the ones in the shows are bigger, to give them better angles for the drone cams.

  My clients—ex-clients? New owners?—were here, only everybody looked different in their normal clothes.

  Dr. Mensah stepped close, looking up at me. “Are you all right?”

  “Yes.” I had clear pictures from my field camera of her being hurt, but all her damage had been repaired, too. She looked different, in business clothes like Pin-Lee’s. “I don’t understand what’s happening.” It was stressful. I could feel the entertainment feed out there, the same one I could access from the unit processing zone, and it was hard not to sink into it.

  She said, “I’ve purchased your contract. You’re coming back to Preservation with us. You’ll be a free agent there.”