Lyssa's Dream - A Hard Science Fiction AI Adventure (The Sentience Wars - Origins Book 1)

by James S. Aaron

  “I’m going to have to learn how to turn that off,” he muttered, trying to get comfortable in the window seat. He figured he should try to sleep as well. The baby guides all said newborns were nocturnal at first.

  Before he closed his eyes, he sent his commander, Colonel Ryth, an update on Cara’s birth and submitted his official request for paternity leave.

  Ryth replied.

 

 

 

 

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  STELLAR DATE: 08.27.2981 (Adjusted Years)

  LOCATION: Sunny Skies

  REGION: Near Cruithne Station, Terran Hegemony

  Sunny Skies was caught in a maelstrom of missiles, lasers and cannon fire, everything slicing through the too-close distances around the Benevolent Hand. Too often, ships that should have been friendly fired on a location where an enemy had been and now Sunny Skies had just arrived.

  This sort of combat in a ship the size of Sunny Skies was something Andy would usually consider suicide. Since the option of breaking out of the swarm meant facing the Benevolent Hand and its drones alone, he figured the odds were slightly better here.

  They had only been in the swarm for ten minutes—in the midst of executing the third of Andy’s ninety-degree turns—when the first suicide ship collided with the Heartbridge cruiser. Everyone on the Lowspin battle net went silent in the overhead speakers, waiting for the explosion.

  The nuke failed to detonate. A new swarm of drone fighters poured from the cruiser’s flanks.

  “We don’t have many more where that came from,” Fran said.

  “How many do we have?”

  “Maybe just one,” she said.

  A proximity alert went off in Airlock One. Andy pulled up the hull security monitor and cursed out loud.

  “Daddy!” Cara shouted.

  “Sorry,” he muttered, keeping his gaze on the screen. He jerked his head at Fran. “We’ve got boarders.”

  “What?” she demanded. “How the hell did anyone get close enough?”

  “I don’t know. That’s the only alarm going off. They must have come in slow to get past the shields, matching our velocity.” He shook his head. “That was a hell of a pilot.” He tapped a series of commands into the console.

  “We’re in autopilot,” he said. “Call me if it looks like we’ll need to override.”

  “How am I supposed to have time to call you? It’s a mess out there.”

  “I count five at the airlock. It’s going to be a mess in here.”

  “Do you have a visual on them?” Fran said.

  Andy pulled up the camera feed off the airlock and showed her.

  Fran peered at the grainy picture, which looked down on five people in EV suits, projectile rifles slung across their backs. She pointed at the screen. “That’s Riggs Zanda,” she said.

  Andy squinted. He barely remembered seeing the other gangster in Starl’s club. The only thing he recognized about the man in the EV suit under Fran’s finger was his muscled build.

  “This is great,” Andy said. “I guess I should be glad there are only five of them.”

  “I don’t remember if your drone had defensive capability,” Fran said.

  Andy shook his head. “Alice has spot and arc welders but that’s it. I guess we could use it as a battering ram.” He looked over at Cara. “Sweetheart, power up Alice and have it meet me at the habitat airlock.”

  “Alice is a she,” Cara said.

  “Yes, dear,” he said, not wanting to argue. “Run a systems check and make sure the welders are functional.”

  “Do you have any heavy weapons?” Fran asked.

  “Yeah. Look, you can lock down the habitat from the command deck if you need to. The kids can show you the safe room off the hydroponics chambers.”

  “I didn’t see a safe room in there. I saw a lot of other little cubby holes.”

  “It’s shielded by a water tank. Once you’re in, though, you’re not getting out until the ship is clear. There’s a maintenance chute that runs alongside the hab airlock but it’s in vacuum. If you need to get to your shuttle, that’s going to be the best way. There are three EV suits in the safe room and a pulse pistol.”

  “You’re acting like we’re not getting out of this,” Fran said.

  “I’m planning ahead. It’s what I do.”

  He gave her a tight smile and crossed the command deck to hug the kids. “Love you guys,” he said, squeezing them both. Tim clung to him longer than Cara.

  “Are you going to go fight, Dad?” he asked.

  “I hope not, buddy.”

  Leaving the command deck, he strode down the main corridor to the habitat airlock, pulling on his EV suit as he waited for the passage to cycle open. In the tube, he pulled himself grimly forward along the access ladder, anticipating the stomach flip as he lost gravity.

  Reaching the ship’s main spire and zero-g, he floated out and used handholds to pull toward the cabinet where he’d hidden the crate of TSF weapons.

  “I don’t know where you came from,” he said, “but thank you.”

  Activating his mag boots, he knelt in front of the open cabinet and lifted the lid on the crate. The multi-mode rifle with its grenade launcher was still there, along with a complement of variable grenades, and three pistols. Two were projectile handguns, and one was a plasma weapon. He checked the cartridge and saw that it had enough gas and charge for two, maybe three shots. Andy hated plasma weapons. They were indiscriminate and crazy-dangerous in low-g. However, without body armor, he wouldn’t last long against any determined attack. A stream of plasma might make Zanda’s team think twice.

  he said over the Link.

 

 

 

 

 

  As he closed the cabinet doors, Alice came floating up the corridor toward him, both forward lights glowing like yellow eyes.

  “Hello, there,” he said. “I promised I wouldn’t pretend I like you, but I’m sure glad you’re operational right now.”

  Alice floated up and down in a way that almost made it seem like the drone was nodding. Andy patted its side and pushed past it into the corridor.

  “Cara,” he said over the intercom. “Transfer control of Alice to my EV suit.”

  “Done,” she answered, obviously waiting for him to call. “Can you see them yet?”

  “No. But I’m not near the airlock yet. I’m going there now.”

  Holding the rifle in one hand with the sling wrapped around his forearm, Andy kicked off down the corridor. It was roughly twenty meters to the airlock. For once, he wished it was farther.

  he said.

 

  Andy said.

  Fran said. Andy found himself in darkness. He turned off his helmet lamp and waited before moving forward again. He knew the ship well enough that he didn’t need the lights.

  he said. < How long do you think it will take to bring the temp up to a hundred degrees?>

 

 

>  

  Nearing the airlock, Andy caught a spark leaping from the interior doors, as bright as a sun in the complete darkness.

  he said.

  He sent Alice up to the edge of the door, killing her forward lights as well, and parked her out of sight of the airlock. Floating back to a ribbed section in the bulkhead, he slipped behind the support and activated his mag boots. The support provided him about half a meter of cover but he would have to stick his head out to fire down the corridor. He waited, watching the external temperature rise.

  Andy opened Alice’s onboard camera in his helmet display and watched the shower of sparks from the cutting torch slice through his newly repaired airlock. The camera made Alice seem too close, so he pulled it back another five meters and activated the plasma welder. It didn’t give him anything to throw at the boarding party but it might make them think twice.

  After another minute, the torch stopped and the sparks died out. A screeching noise filled the corridor as a section of the airlock door floated free into the corridor. Four lamp beams pierced the dark.

  Andy controlled his breathing as he watched a helmet poke through the hole in the airlock door, decide it was clear, then step through. Four more suits came through. Using Alice’s camera, Andy’s helmet assigned target icons. He only had seconds before whatever other short-range scanners they had found him and locked-on.

  Switching on Alice’s flood lights, he sent her forward with the plasma torch at full power. Soundlessly, the drone surged forward. Andy heard surprised yells through his helmet, sounding like people underwater.

  Leaning out from behind the bulkhead, he lobbed five grenades after the drone.

  “Sorry, Alice,” he breathed.

  The explosions flashed in the dark. Alice’s camera caught surprised gray faces behind visors then cut out.

  Andy counted five blasts, then held the rifle away from his chest so it cleared the bulkhead support and squeezed the trigger, filling the corridor with automatic fire. He waited for a response, expecting a grenade to float down the hallway. When nothing came, he checked his helmet’s targeting display and found only one active icon remaining from someone who had fallen back inside the airlock.

  Slowly, Andy eased out from behind the support and kept his magboots activated, clicking on and off the floor as he approached the airlock. Four bodies were plainly visible on the floor.

  Switching on his external speaker, he shouted, “Who’s in there? Answer me or I’m tossing in another grenade.”

  A Link request on a standard channel hit his helmet. Andy let it beep for a second before accepting.

  a man said slowly, voice wet with pain.

  Andy recognized Zanda’s gravelly voice from the attack on the cargo bay. He was much quieter this time.

  Zanda said.

  Andy said.

 

 

 

 

 

 

  Zanda coughed.

  Andy waited, thinking. The people Zanda had come in with were definitely dead. He leaned against the bulkhead but didn’t lower his rifle. Andy said.

 

  Sending a new connection request, Andy waited as Zanda accepted. On another channel, he told Fran,

  she nearly shouted.

 

 

 

  Fran said.

  Andy wondered for a second if there was actual caring in her voice. He shelved the thought and switched back to the channel with Zanda.

  Zanda said.

  Andy said.

 

 

  Zanda laughed and started coughing, sounding very much like Starl just hours earlier.

  Andy said.

 

  Andy said.

  Zanda said, his breathing growing labored.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  STELLAR DATE: 08.27.2981 (Adjusted Years)

  LOCATION: Sunny Skies

  REGION: Near Cruithne Station, Terran Hegemony

  Andy demanded. He kept himself from rushing into the airlock to jam the plasma pistol under Zanda’s chin.

 

 

 

  Andy said.

  Zanda coughed.

 

  he said, voice trailing off.

  Andy said sharply, wondering if he had died.

  He laughed wetly.

  Zanda, like Starl, apparently liked the sound of his own voice.

  Andy said.

 

 

 

  Zanda laughed.

  Andy eased toward the edge of the smashed airlock, stepping over the cold body of one of Zanda’s people
. The grenades had torn one body apart while the others looked dead from concussion wounds. One helmet faced upward with its faceplate shattered.

  Zanda said.

  Andy wasn’t going to tell him to toss out any weapons. It was a no win situation. If he got too close, Zanda might easily send a grenade floating through the door, or a spinning rifle locked on automatic.

  he said.

 

  Andy connected to the camera and saw a man in an EV suit floating above the floor of the airlock, globes of blood drifting around him from a jagged wound across his right thigh. One gloved hand was wrapped around a wall-handle. He didn’t see any weapons but that didn’t mean there weren’t any present.

  Andy told Zanda.

 

  The camera showed Zanda waving a pistol above his faceplate.

  Andy said.

 

 

  He took a wheezing breath.