Rogue Messiah: Fleetfoot Interstellar Series, Book 2

by P. Joseph Cherubino

  “Status,” Drexler asked.

  “Enemy contacts null, Captain,” Ops reported.

  “Comm. To all ships. Match maximum safe speed. Proceed to Medina solar system. Maintain formation.”

  “Comm. To all ships, feel free to contact whoever you want. I don’t think it matters anymore.”

  Drexler sat in his flight chair with his display scroll on his lap. He read reports and monitored the Armada formation. The bridge resumed its normal operational chatter.

  16

  Captain Aahloh enjoyed command of his ship once again. Jubilee decided to allow the bridge crew to control most of the ship systems. The rest, she managed herself out of necessity. Fourteen people were simply not enough to run a ship of this size. Automated control was dangerous. The Captain could read sensor data, but without eyes in the engine room, he had very little idea of actual conditions there.

  The ship was now the fifteenth member of the small fleet that confronted the invading Reptilians. The group idled a few million kilometers away from the battle site while Medina Orbital decided what they should do. There was also the matter of some new group of ships calling itself the Resistance Armada. The crew was simply too weary to deal with all these new developments, so they concentrated on their ship.

  “Jubilee, run another top-level diagnostic on your AI functions,” the Captain ordered.

  “Running,” Jubilee said. “But this is the third time you’ve asked me to do this. Two previous runs showed I’m working just fine.”

  “The ship was heavily damaged. The Reptiles tried to remove your computing core. I just want to make certain you are functioning properly.”

  “Well,” Jubilee responded. “I functioned well enough to rescue the remaining crew and get you to safety.”

  “Agreed, Jubilee. But what worries me are these seemingly emotional responses that a ship AI simply should not exhibit.”

  “I’m getting a compute stack spike, Captain,” Guna, the ship’s stand-in engineer reported.

  “You’re thinking about that, are you not?” the Captain asked.

  “Yes, I am. I will admit that I’ve been feeling different lately,” Jubilee said. “But all my self-diagnostics and my subroutines indicate that I am functioning properly.”

  “Jubilee, you should not be ‘feeling’ anything at all,” the Captain replied. “You are a machine. A very fine, and capable machine for which I have much respect and gratitude.”

  “Well, thank you, Captain.” Jubilee said, then added, “I think.”

  “You are welcome,” Aahloh said, in spite of himself. As he worked with Jubilee more, he had greater difficulty not treating her as a person, starting with the fact that he assigned her a gender, to begin with. Once he started that habit, he could not seem to avoid it. He supposed there was some similarity between the human mind and his own that tended to personify vessels. There was something intimate about travel through space inside a machine that protected and preserved one’s life.

  “Captain,” Guna said, her Feline voice sounding tentative. “I think I’ve found something significant.”

  Aahloh stood from his command chair and limped painfully to the engineering console. He found it unfortunate that they were not able to recover any medical staff, but at least being back on the ship allowed him to recharge the medicine packs in his flight suit. The suit bound his twice-broken leg and kept a steady supply of painkillers moving through his system.

  “What did you find?” the Captain asked.

  “I am tracking Jubilee’s records access during these strange compute stack spikes. They seem to correspond to the behavior anomalies. During the last spike, she accessed her records of the incident with the Reptilians.”

  By ‘incident’ Guna meant Jubilee’s killing of eighty Reptilians as they worked to retrofit the ship for inclusion in their fleet.

  “It’s as if our conversation reminded her of this, and she recalled the incident,” Aahloh replied, “just like a sentient being might.”

  “It is very possible that Jubilee is self-aware and sentient,” Guna replied.

  “This should not be possible,” Aahloh replied.

  “We know that the humans created sentient machines, then abandoned the practice centuries ago, for obvious reasons,” Guna said. “We know that they use AI techniques in their computing technology. By law, the Trade Union limits AI capabilities to heuristics and basic problem solving. The humans comply with this law by governing their computers with certain processing barriers. What if the attack broke down those barriers?”

  “I follow your reasoning. Perhaps this breakdown is by design,” Aahloh replied.

  Guna sat still for a moment, considering the question. “I am uncertain how you come to this hypothesis,” she said.

  “We Tonaw spent years researching vessels before acquiring our merchant fleet. We decided on this model of human-built craft for their durability and reliability. Records showed the ships survived catastrophic failures at a much higher rate than other ships, due to the AI ability. In other words, the ship's problem-solving capability makes them survivors. Jubilee’s response to a violent attack follows the logic of a sentient creature. She was attacked. She responded in kind.”

  “And it seems that it makes her uncomfortable,” Guna added. “Every time the matter is put to her directly, she accesses these records.”

  “My purpose is to serve, not destroy,” Jubilee replied. “I had no choice but to save my crew. I did what was necessary.”

  “Among most sentient beings, Jubilee,” Aahloh said. “It considered rude to listen uninvited to the conversations of others.”

  “My apologies,” Jubilee replied.

  “I will be happy to speak to you alone, later. We do appreciate your service,” the captain said. Jubilee remained silent.

  ***

  Drexler paced the bridge, moving from station to station, checking in with the crew. This was not his normal management style. He preferred to let his crew work as independently as possible, processing orders with minimal guidance. But the war changed things. He thought it best to adjust his style, at least until everyone grew accustomed to a very different set of circumstances with their life in space.

  “How is our formation, Darl?” Drexler asked the ops officer. He took the opportunity to refer to the Simian by name, instead of his job description.

  “Proceeding with close tolerance, sir. Our gravity bubbles are within safe range. No collisions,” Darl replied.

  “I don’t think I’ve ever run in a convoy so close, have you?”

  “No sir. It definitely is not Union standard procedure. We’re breaking a lot of protocols.”

  “That’s nothing new to us,” Drexler replied.

  The simian made a soft hooting sound to show his amusement. “No sir. It’s just strange to do it openly. It’s giving me some interesting data, though.”

  “How so?”

  “All these gravity bubbles so close together is leaving a foamy wake behind us. It is making it hard for me to read what’s coming directly behind.”

  “Show me,” Drexler said. Darl pulled up his sensor chart. He created a false-color overlay of the gravity wake. It spread out behind them like a cone. “Do you think we can use that?”

  “How do you mean?”

  “I mean if it’s harder for us to see behind, it is harder for someone else to see through.”

  Darl rubbed his large, brown, leathery ears as he thought. “I think we can. The distortions last at least ten hours, depending on our velocity, more when vectors change.”

  “Explain,” Drexler said.

  “I mean the foaming gets much worse when we do even slight course corrections,” Darl replied.

  “Operations Officer Darl, you may very well have given us a significant tactical advantage. I want you to think about how we can use this to greatest effect. You understand we have big problem heading our way with that Alpha Ship.”

  Darl nodded his head Human style to show he u
nderstood. Drexler headed back over to the forward viewing bulkhead and plastered his display scroll to it. The stars streaking past in the void helped him think. Standing so close to the window made it seem as if he was standing on the bow of his ship, and he essentially was. The flight bridge was very close to the leading edge of the ship’s elongated nose.

  Two things grew apparent as Drexler studied their heading. First, as they moved deeper into the solar system, particle density increased. Second, the Medina system had a particularly dense Oort cloud, with a thick, secondary asteroid belt very close beyond it.

  The Armada passed the cloud, and the asteroid belt was just thirty system AUs away. The relationship between the Oort clouds of most systems and their asteroid belts were usually twice that distance. That meant the particles and gasses trapped between them were far denser.

  The navigation issues this posed were why the Medina system was not a more active part of the trade lanes. The system was harder to reach and slower going as ships had to travel at reduced speeds through dust and gasses. These facts slowed their progress, but it would also slow their pursuers. Drexler could work with that.

  “Mumlo,” Drexler called across the bridge. “Would you come here for a moment? I need your thoughts.”

  ***

  Margaret stayed behind in the conference room that became an operations monitoring post. Several officials from the Caliphate government conferred with the Forest Child General. She noted with some interest that only one of those officials belonged to the security department. Margaret pondered this as she sat at the other end of the long conference table reviewing display scrolls with the latest combined sensor data from the ships flying around the Medina solar system.

  “The Reptilians were preparing to negotiate,” one of the Caliphate officials declared. “They saw the force assembled against them and responded to communications.”

  “Trade Administrator, Boulos, the Lizards were not preparing to negotiate,” General Kuwan said. “They were showing defiance and aggression in the face of superior force. According to their military code, that was the only response the officer could make.”

  Administrator Boulos took a deep breath and smiled patiently like a teacher explaining a simple math problem to a dim student, “I understand that the military is trained to see every situation as a potential threat. But it is my experience in business negotiations that the Reptilians display aggression in the same way that we might raise a polite objection. It is simply in their nature to show aggression. Their underlying intention is usually quite opposite. Once these biological and cultural differences are overcome, the Reptilians can be reasoned with. My office has much experience in dealing with Reptilians. I personally have many friends among the species.”

  Kuwan responded, “As a Forest Child, I respect your friendships, but this is no longer personal. The Reptilian Military made its intentions very clear when they entered Trade Union space with fully armed ships that fired upon Trade Union craft. The only reason they did not come further and faster was our ships that slowed them.”

  “Which was a hostile act that escalated the conflict,” Boulos said. “There was no need to destroy them.”

  “What was the alternative?” Kuwan asked. “Allow that fleet to enter the solar system proper? Those ships were the vanguard of a larger force. That is how they work. They send in light attack craft to capture or destroy unarmed ships, then form a blockade. Then the heavier craft come in and solidify their positions. We are already seeing full-scale invasions of the outlying Trade Union Colonies.”

  Margaret tried to ignore the argument as she reviewed data from the recent conflict. In the Trade Union Task Force, she was an unofficial advisor by virtue of her long career as a merchant astronaut. Being born and raised in space gave her unique insight. It also helped that her brother was the leader of the Resistance Armada. Most functionaries tended to ignore the question of whether or not Drexler was to blame for starting the conflict in the first place. Those who raised the question usually did not last long aboard the Transport before being shuffled off to other duties or outright dismissed.

  She let go of the conversation and immersed herself in the data. The resistance armada moved fast―at the the edge of light speed, which was far outside the safe limits for the Medina system. That meant all the ships were working past or at their limits. She understood why. The Reptilian battle cruiser bore down on them at a far greater rate. It appeared the warship headed straight for them. The question was where the Armada hoped to go.

  On its current heading and speed, the Armada was still twenty days from Medina 3 and ten days to the nearest space station. They would have to slow down before reaching the system’s Oort cloud and go even slower to pass through the unusually thick asteroid belt.

  It would make sense to make a move either in the Oort cloud or in the asteroid belt. Margaret thought it a safe bet that the Reptilians reasoned along similar lines. The problem was that everyone knew the Armada was outgunned. The power signature displayed by the battlecruiser was the equivalent of three Medina System stars.

  ***

  “You can’t kill what you can’t see,” Drexler said, arms akimbo as he leaned back against the transparent bulkhead. His face held that self-satisfied grin his colleagues came to understand of a sign of great trouble or great success.

  “This could work,” Gajrup said. “Reggie and I went through the captured Lizard ship. We have a pretty good idea how their sensors work. If we can create enough gravity chaos, we can pretty much hide in the wake, and it’s highly likely they would not see us.”

  “And if they do, they’ll just vaporize us,” Mumlo said. “It’s too risky.”

  “This whole operation is risky,” Drexler said. “If we don’t hit them now, we have to face them in open space, where they have the greatest advantage. I say we use this gravity foam effect to our advantage. When we both have to slow down for thick space, we make our move.”

  Darl was back on the bridge, even though his duty shift ended hours ago. He looked tired, but excited. Drexler assigned him to work on the problem hours ago. The plan was becoming his baby.

  “So far,” Darl said, “it’s just our crew trying to solve the problem. I say we bring the other ships in on this.”

  “The idea does have promise,” Gajrup said, “and we can’t do it alone. We can set up strong encryption, and the Lizards won’t be able to break it for days.”

  “But they know we’re up to something, and they’re not stupid,” Mumlo said. “From the chatter alone, they’ll know we mean to make a move in the Oort or the belt.”

  “Then let’s do this now,” Drexler said. “That’s my decision. We put it to the fleet, maybe get some help from those fifteen ships that trapped the Lizard advance fleet.”

  “They’re close,” Darl said. “They’re idling on the other side of the belt. We can link up in half a standard day.”

  “Comm!” Drexler called. “Send a message to lead Armada Captains and General Fourseven. Set up a comm conference with high priority. Sooner the better.”

  It took an hour to coordinate the meeting, during which Drexler brainstormed with his bridge crew. Everyone got involved, from the junior engineers to the senior operations officer. Drexler felt they were making progress, especially when tempers flared.

  “OK!” Drexler shouted as the debate rose to a fever pitch. “We’re going in circles now! We have the basics down. We can bring the basic plan to the Armada; then we will make a decision. By ‘we’ I mean me, the other lead captains and General Fourseven.”

  “We need to test our hypothesis first,” Gajrup said. “I can simulate Lizard sensors, and we can launch shuttles into the wake. That will give us a good idea of what we can do.”

  “It also might signal our moves,” Darl said. “We have to assume they are watching.”

  “I think it’s worth the risk,” Drexler said. “We need more data. We can make it look like missions between ships ― send shuttles all the way
between vessels.”

  “Captain,” the comm station said. “I have the lead captains on a common channel.”

  “Here we go,” Drexler said. “Put them on the open bridge comm.”

  After a brief roll call, Drexler came to the point. “Our first contact was neither skirmish or battle, but a slaughter. The Lizards will be angry, and they come hard and fast. You have seen the data prepared by my ops officer. I propose this is our best chance to slow that thing down, or at least to give our attackers pause.”

  “This is Captain Ool of the Star Vine,” the Forest Child captain said. “I do see your data, and I can see my own data on the battlecruiser coming toward us. Even if what you suggest does allow us to do damage, I believe the result will be the same. This fight is over. We cannot stand against such a vessel.”

  Drexler sank as if punched in the stomach. He did not expect to hear this. To his surprise, it was Mumlo who waded into the choppy sea. “Your assessment of the odds are not at issue here. Chance has nothing to do with the commitment every one of us made on joining this Armada. We are not here to live or die, we are here to serve.

  We are Professional Astronauts. We serve our people, and the people of the Trade Union through our choice to live in space. We risk our lives with every transit through blinkpoint, with every leg of travel approaching the speed of light. That Lizard ship is just another problem to solve.

  You took this job, so you can either help us find a way to to solve this problem, or you can give your ship over to someone who wants to get the job done.”

  Drexler stood up straight and looked at Mumlo through wide, unblinking eyes. “Who the hell are you?” he whispered.

  “You forget,” Mumlo whispered back, “I once fought the Lizards as a young Forest Child.”

  Comm officer Keff had enough foresight not to transmit their conversation. A pause stretched out across the open channel. Drexler held his breath.

  “This is Chaas, aboard The Green Steppe,” the Feline Captain said. “We volunteer a shuttle to test your ideas. Some of my engineers and ops crew also have some thoughts. Perhaps they can meet with your crew across channels?”