Lyssa's Dream - A Hard Science Fiction AI Adventure (The Sentience Wars - Origins Book 1)
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Andy shrugged and blew out a breath. “I guess so. How long is this going to take?”
“The surgery? Not long. Not long at all. Maybe an hour. The auto-surgeon is a specialized model, with proprietary software I wrote.” He didn’t try to hide the pride in his voice. “The recovery will be harder. You’ll need time to—adjust. We’ll take you back to the apartment where your children are sleeping.”
He paused and Andy wondered why he’d bother to mention that detail.
“They’ll wake up with you there,” Jickson continued, speeding up his words. He seemed to be waking up, coming out of whatever stupor that had slowed his thoughts. He rubbed his hands together, nodding. His eyes were rimmed by bright, sickly pink. “This is good timing, really. Very good. Two days recovery and the ship will be—it will almost be ready. You’ll have full control of yourself when it’s time to leave.”
“Back on the ship you called this symbiosis,” Andy said, the realization hitting him that what he had hoped to put off was happening. He hadn’t had time to prepare the kids. He hadn’t had time to even absorb the information himself. “So, this isn’t just a bio-drop. Am I actually going to be able to communicate with it? I’m going to have another consciousness in my head? Isn’t that really illegal?”
“By whose laws?” Starl said, grinning again.
“At least three major legal bodies that I can think of.” Andy looked at Jickson. “Can you make it just a bio-drop? Why do I need to talk to the thing?”
“It’s not a thing,” Jickson spat. “She’s a person just like you. She was born. She lives. She can’t remain bottled in a storage medium and hope to survive. I’ve risked too much even now. I don’t know how the transit may have affected her.”
Andy looked from Starl to Jickson. It was bad enough that he had Brit’s voice in his head all the time. “How is this going to work, then? Am I going to be able to talk to her?”
Jickson waved a hand. “Like talking to someone over the Link. That’s all.”
“The Link. Is it going to be able to access the Link separate of me? Will it try to talk to the ship?”
“She won’t do anything you don’t invite her to do,” Jickson said, irritation high in his voice. “She’s not a monster.” He sounded nearly parental.
“How do you know?” Andy asked.
“Gentlemen,” Starl interjected. “There is an element of risk here.” He looked at Andy. “You acknowledged that when you accepted the deal. Like anything, there are dangers. But the AI won’t be a danger to you, Captain Sykes. I promise you.”
“You keep calling it she,” Andy said, looking at Jickson. “What’s her name?”
“Lyssa,” Jickson said quickly. “Her name is Lyssa and she’s been asleep for nearly four months now. She’s going to be as disoriented as you when she wakes. You’re not the one with something to fear.”
Andy pursed his lips, looking from Starl to Jickson, and then at Petral and Karcher who appeared quite entertained by the exchange. “What do you know about this?” he asked Karcher.
The guard held up his hands. “Only that I didn’t have the brain capacity to handle the package, otherwise one of us would be the carrier pigeon.”
Andy frowned. “That makes it seem like you’ve been targeting me from the start. You said there were other ships with your cargo and I was the only one to get through. You said this had nothing to do with me personally.”
Starl’s grin never wavered. He didn’t even look at Karcher. “It’s got everything to do with you personally, Captain Sykes. You’re the one that made it.” He clapped his hands. “Now, we’re talking in circles. We’ve already explained how this is going to work. It’s time to jump in and learn to swim. I don’t want to push Fran any more than we have to, so I need to get you started on your part in the project.” He motioned toward another room off the command deck.
“The shuttle’s this way,” Starl said. “We’re going back over to Sunny Skies.” He gave Andy a wink. “Don’t get upset if you find she’s naked. Fran uncoupled her from the dry dock and she’s tied to an older section of the ring, just like any piece of scrap. Hasn’t stopped Fran from her work, though.”
Andy was too tired and irritated to answer. He felt manipulated and he hated it—like he often had at the end of a long argument with Brit, after she had turned his own words against him several times and he couldn’t remember whether he admitted to what she accused him of or just surrendered, wanting the disagreement to be done, wanting everything to be all right. He wanted the kids to be safe. He wanted the ship fixed. He wanted off Cruithne.
He sat with his head against the cold bulkhead on the short ride from the dock to Sunny Skies. He closed his eyes for a second and then time skipped forward and they were docking. The shuttle’s airlock stood open to a familiar corridor.
Fran stood in the doorway in a close-fitting EV suit and harness hung with tools. She flipped her faceplate up. A few of her blonde curls floated around her face.
Andy half-nodded. It didn’t matter if the ship had a new official name. She’d always be Sunny Skies to him and the kids. As he maneuvered down the corridor, grabbing handholds, he was surprised to find the air on his face was warm.
She shrugged.
Andy looked down at himself, remembering the new suit. He was surprised to find it covered in dust. He’d lost the green pocket square somewhere.
Andy sighed.
Fran shot him a smile as she pulled herself forward.
He caught glimpses of new cabling in various sections, as well as a few replaced bulkhead panels. One section had been the middle of one of Cara’s drawings, the new blank tan was surrounded by faded scribbles.
In the cargo bay, Jickson pushed ahead of them and went immediately to the opened surgery with its silver-gray bed, and knelt to manipulate the lock of a dull green crate that Andy didn’t remember seeing before. The doctor opened its lid and pulled out an orange canister about the length of his forearm. A single blinking display on one end indicated it was more than a random replacement part of the ship.
Jickson held the canister carefully between two hands, rotating it to check for any damage. He floated sideways to the surgery and placed the canister in a receptacle above its control section. The canister’s display flashed yellow then green.
The doctor turned to Andy. He looked better than he had in the control room back on the station. He was still sweating, but a calm had come into his eyes that Andy recognized as professional control.
Andy took a deep breath. He wasn’t going to refuse but he didn’t want to comply right away. He wanted to stretch out this last moment. He wished the kids were here, at least. He hadn’t felt this alone in a long time.
He pushed himself lightly so he floated into the surgery’s utilitarian
couch and maneuvered himself into a reclined position. As he relaxed against the cushion, the material automatically pulled him in closer, cradling the sides of his arms and legs until he couldn’t float free. Without warning, two needles slipped into the tops of his hands, finding veins.
“You’re going to get sleepy,” Jickson said aloud. “The process will only take about sixty minutes, like I said. You’ll be disoriented at first. If she’s not there when you wake, don’t worry. It may take her a while to communicate with you.”
Again, the strange quality in Jickson’s voice. Love? Worry? Jealousy? Words floated through Andy’s mind as he stared at the dark overhead, automatically following the dents and scratches from years of loose cargo. For a second, Petral’s face floated above his, followed by Fran and then Ngoba Starl’s white teeth grinning like the Cheshire Cat. The gangster nodded slowly.
“I told you I believed in you, Captain Sykes,” he said, his deep voice vibrating in Andy’s chest. “You’re Lowspin all the way, my friend. All the way.”
Andy didn’t know what that was supposed to mean. He couldn’t stop thinking of Lowspin as some kind of washing system for clothes, not something a crime syndicate would call itself, not something meant to strike fear into anyone. Or maybe that was the point? The Lowspin was always there, always had been, tumbling through space like a lost sock.
He tried to think of Cara and Tim. And then sleep took him.
PART 3: CRUITHNE ON FIRE
Chapter Nineteen
STELLAR DATE: 09.16.2958 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: TSF Officer Candidate School, Fort Salem
REGION: High Terra, Earth, Terran Hegemony
Twenty-Three Years Earlier
Andy and Brit were in the same platoon, different squads. While they shared a barracks bay, she was at the far end and he only saw her when they were waiting in line for meals or allowed to mill around during breaks.
The Academy didn’t like breaks but had been required by law at some point in the past to offer them. Breaks involved the cadets filing out of the classrooms, spurred on by barking instructors who would keep them walking in circles in the gymnasium down the hall. The only times they sat still were in class with an open book, or during chow—where they were expected to shovel food into their mouths until the tray was empty and immediately get up and leave.
There wasn’t time for a plebe to do anything. They were running, shouting, singing, doing push-ups, pull-ups, sit-ups, climbing ropes and walls, staring at instructors, or jamming food in their mouths for sixteen hours a day. When the instructors weren’t controlling their time, upper-class cadets took over during the evenings and mornings with renewed vitriol and fresh ideas for torture or their own amusement.
One of Andy’s dad’s friends had told him not to worry about any of it. “Think of it as standing on your head, kid. Sure, it’s tough, but every minute that goes by is one you don’t have to do over again, right? Keep your head down, do your work and you’ll be fine.”
Andy tried to avoid notice but a few people still singled him out. The instructors loved to ask him questions then ridicule him even if he was correct, but hadn’t phrased the answers the way they’d wanted. His fellow cadets were constantly looking for ways to tease him or steal his gear if he left it out.
They recognized immediately that he was slow with his Link and found ways to ridicule him for that. But he also realized this abuse wasn’t specific to him. Everyone did it to each other. It was the natural outcome of an insular group of people in a high-stress situation with no other outlet than to turn on each other. The TSF called it Esprit de Corps.
As soon as the platoon was formed and squads assigned, the cadets found further ways to establish the pecking order.
While Andy wasn’t exactly at the bottom, he quickly realized that, while cleaner than the stairwells of Summerville, the Academy was really no different. He had joined a gang. It was a gang with history and resources and much greater reach than a neighborhood one, but their methods were the same. He would assimilate or be ground up like hamburger and sent to the enlisted ranks. Or worse, sent back home with nothing.
Brit was one of the first cadets to get in a fight. Anyone who tried to call her Brittney and stayed within reach found themselves in an arm bar with their face digging into the floor and Brit’s boot between their shoulders. She was thin and fast, with a hard face and bright blue eyes, appearing almost robotic at times.
She hit with words before she used her hands but both attacks were devastating. If someone made a comment about her mother, which seemed to be her eject button, it was inevitable the two would soon be locked in a boxing match in the middle of the barracks, whooping cadets hanging from bunks on either side of them.
In one of the first fights, the attacker, a solid kid named Triston, held his fists high in the kick-boxing style, while Brit didn’t seem to adhere to any particular training. When he followed a feinting punch with a jab-kick aimed at her head, she caught his leg and moved in close to deliver a series of hard body blows. He stumbled back, giving her the opening to hit him square in the jaw and he collapsed, eyes rolling up in his head.
“Ashford!” somebody yelled, followed by everyone else in the bay. The cheering continued until one of the upper-class cadets arrived to bark for lights out.
While it had seemed like a victory, Brit was small and others continued to look for an opportunity to break her down. Beating her was a shortcut to the top of the pecking order.
Andy had his share of fights as well. It felt like every other day, but looking back it was probably once a week. Usually Fridays when everyone was worn out from the week’s training and needed to blow off steam. Something small would set someone off. His first fight happened in the chow hall when the kid across from him at the table blew his nose heavily into his napkin, then looked up and muttered, “God, I can’t stop blowing out this shit from my nose.”
Without thinking, Andy said, “I guess that means you’re full of shit then, right?”
He’d expected a laugh but those around him kept their heads in their trays and the other kid glared at him. Later that night, the kid sucker-punched him as he was coming out of the latrine, and in a heartbeat Andy was rolling with him on the floor. Neither of them were very good fighters, which made for a great show when the circle formed. They’d choked each other, made ineffective strikes on ribs, shoulders and arms, wrestling more than fighting, until they were finally too exhausted to continue and the cheers around them turned into disgusted boos.
Sitting on his bunk with head hanging, Andy wondered why his dad had never taught him to fight. It occurred to him that his dad probably viewed a fight as having lost the battle of words that really mattered. You couldn’t get to a deal if you were fighting and it was certain no one was going to make any money unless they were betting on the fight. But that rarely helped the people doing the actual fighting.
“You fight like a teddy bear,” someone said from in front of him.
Andy lifted his head to find Brit Ashford looking down at him with a hand on one hip. She was wearing her fitness shorts and light shirt that clung to her muscled shoulders.
“What?” he asked.
“You’re all hugs and squeezes. You can’t squeeze the fight out of somebody. Not at your size, anyway.”
“I’m not a boxer. I’ve never had any martial arts training besides what we’ve had here.”
She nodded, her blue eyes flicking up and down his body. “Stand up,” she said.
“Why?”
“Stand up. I want to get a look at you.”
He stood slowly, sore in places he hadn’t noticed before. Squaring his shoulders, he bore the brunt of her inspecting gaze.
“You’re fit enough. You’ve got the structure to fight. I can see you’re hungry. You just don’t know how.” She met his eyes. “I can help you.”
“Why would you do that?”
Brit shrugged. “Boredom. Maybe if I can get people to pay more atte
ntion to you, they’ll lay off me.”
“Wow, thanks.”
“You’re going to get in more fights now, you realize that, right? They all saw that you can’t fight, so anyone who thinks they can beat you is going to try.”
He knew she was right. He had shown weakness and now the pack would try to tear him apart. He was doing well in the rest of his training. He wasn’t going to let other cadets be the stumbling block that failed him out.
“All right,” he said.
Brit was a street fighter, and with each move she taught him, she showed him how to follow it with a boxing move that could hurt without maiming someone. Over the course of the weekend, she taught him enough basics that when the next attack came on Monday, he was able to fend the kid off and even land some real blows.
“If you break an arm or leg, that’s going to get the command involved and nobody wants that,” she’d said. “But you can still surprise with a good knee in the gut or an elbow to the face, or a head-butt.”
“How’s a head-butt going to hurt anybody?” Andy had asked.
When she’d demonstrated, jumping up to bring the top of her head down on his skull, hard and fast just above his hairline, he felt like the ceiling had hammered him. A moment later, he realized he was sitting on the floor, blinking in a daze.
“What was that?” he asked finally.
“Maybe head-butt isn’t the right term.” She shrugged. “It’s hitting hard and quick with the top part of your head, just past your forehead.” She pulled her black hair back and pointed to her pale skin. “You see?”
Andy nodded, feeling so dazed he thought he might puke. “I think I have a concussion,” he moaned.
“You don’t,” Brit said, slapping him on the shoulder. “At least, I don’t think you do.”
He’d gone another week without a fight but when the next one came, he won. Or it seemed like he won. The tall kid who thought he could grab him and throw him into the wall got two elbow jabs in the abdomen and an uppercut when Andy was able to turn and face him. The kid fell back against the concrete wall and put his hands up, trying to make a joke out of the whole thing.