Archaea 3: Red (11 page)

The captain took a slow sip.
“I like the sound of that. Is this the sort of vehicle I can fly?”

“Certainly sir, as you wish. It will be
an ambulatory dropship.”

“Like a rideable?”

“Yes sir. However, I would like it to be large enough for cargo and a compliment of six.”

The captain
laughed out loud. “Janis, that's a pretty tall order. Do we have enough raw materials for that?”

“
Indeed we do, sir. Additionally, we have removed a significant number of very serviceable parts for replacement that I would like to reclaim for the project. Gene has purchased far more raw materials than I will need.”

“Well Janis, this is pretty interesting stuff. What sort of time frame are we looking at for completion?”

“I will need Gene's assistance to begin, sir. It should not require more than a shift of his time for assembly of the intial components. From that point, I will complete fabrication and perform field trials in 13 standard days. I am afraid it will not be truly operational for 19 days.”

“Janis, one moment please
… Gene?” he called back on comms.

“What's up Dak?”
he groused.

“Gene, do you want Ja
nis to have control over the machine shop?”

“Damn straight, Dak. That's why I bought those
tools.”

“Well, that's good to hear. So what are your thoughts on
having another AI as a crew member?”

“Is Pauli working on another AI?”

“No… not Pauli.”

“Janis?” he
asked softly. I gave up trying to pretend to work, and rotated to watch the captain.

“You get a gold star, Gene. Bottom line, Pauli and I
both think she can do it, and do it well. She’s going to need to wait until we can install some extra cores – if you recall, Pauli bought ten of the very latest model.”

“
Well, that won't take much time, they rack easily enough…” he trailed off for a moment. “Sir, I won't lie to you, I don't much like the idea of Janis getting into the business of coding AI.”

“Well,
Gene, I can understand that”, the captain replied softly.

There was a
nother short pause. “Dak, you know me. It's your ship, you're the Captain. I trust you, sir. Listen though, about the machine shop. Who's going to fabricate all this stuff she's going to build?”

“He's got a good point”, Captain Smith said across the bridge
to me. “Gene, that's definitely an important thing to consider.”

“Well, i
t's not that big of a deal, really – there’s a pretty easy solution. She just needs to build her own support network. I can help her get it off the ground, but she's going to need to make some sort of machine to help her fabricate additional components. I can’t possibly keep up with her, Captain.”

“Gene, she mentioned that she
will need a shift from you to help her. It sounds to me like you’re both talking the same language, would you please explain to Janis what she's going to need? You know what to say.”

“Well…
I can sure try, though I am not a programmer. Pauli, please jump in and help if I do something dumb, ok?”

“Sure thing Gene
”, I said into comms, though I didn’t really have any major concerns. She was definitely cognizant enough to identify null program at this point. He wasn’t going to break her.

“Okay, thanks.” He paused for a moment,
and then continued on comms. “Janis, Captain Smith has informed me that you wanted to use his shop. I think that's a fantastic idea, and I want you to build anything that you anticipate we may need.”

“I shall do so Gene, and thank you.
Has the Captain discussed the other projects I will be developing?”

“Well, that's the thing, Janis. We need
to make sure you don't kill old Gene with a workout. I can't possibly haul parts fast enough keep up.”

The captain
chuckled. He and I both knew it would probably be Yak doing any heavy lifting, while Gene scowled as appropriate.

“
I completely understand, Gene. My plan is to enlist your assistance only briefly, so that we can build some highly functional fabrication platforms. I anticipate a very brief build time, and will machine all necessary parts.”

“
Well Janis, that sounds like a fun project, but that's just part of what I am talking about here.”

“Gene, o
nce I have fabricators, I will use those to build assemblers. With assemblers, I will develop maintenance systems. As I proceed, I plan to build additional reclamation systems to recover raw materials from failed components.”

Captain Smith flew an eyebrow at regulation height, and tossed me a chuckle
as Gene replied on comms. “Janis, that sounds perfect. I really don't have a lot to add to that, it sounds like you have it covered.”

“Thank you Gene, I know your time is extremely valuable to the operation of this vessel, and my goal will be to minimize any impact this work
may have on your busy schedule.”

T
he captain barked out a laugh, and rolled his eyes almost hard enough to make the Archaea tumble.

Janis continued, “Additionally, p
lease be advised, I have just completed four mounting plates for the klystron upgrade you are currently involved in. They are milled out of regenerative plate, and will need to be energized.”

“Captain, is there anything
she can't do?” Gene asked.

“Well,
the only thing she doesn’t seem to know how to do is nap; see that you don’t teach her that one by example, mister.” He paused to yawn, and started to unclip. “Speaking of which, I need more coffee. Gene, Pauli can bring you up to speed on the rest.”

He hooked my coffee cup and then looked right at Yak
, adding “Does anyone else on the bridge want a cup of my best coffee?”

“Yes sir”, Yak said. “I'll just have a cup out of Pauli's share.”

I laughed, and keyed comms. “Gene, the new AI is named Emwan. She was the AI Janis subdued and harvested out of the capital ship we sent to the surface of Solis.”

“The one that attacked us?” he exclaimed.

“That's correct, Gene. When their AI attacked us through the orbital network, Janis allowed it to pour through her defenses, and then she coded them off into a dead block of code for analysis. Now that her analysis is complete, she wants to build a new, improved variant from the code.

“Damn Pauli. That's a lot to think about.”

“I agree, Gene.”

“Gene,” the captain came on comms from the galley. “Janis will not fail
.”

“Well, that's for sure.
It seems to me that if anyone is qualified to make an AI, it’d be her...” he said quietly.

“
Pauli and I were just saying the same thing, Gene. I think it's going to be just fine. Her initial systems access will be through Janis, so she can monitor her progress and fine-tune as necessary. It’s important to understand that will almost certainly mean full systems access to, well, all systems. Where Janis is, Emwan will almost certainly be as well.”

“
Is she continuing to spread through networks… on her own?”

I paused to consider my words carefully.
“You really don't want to know, Gene, but yes. You could say she is on just about all of them at this point.”

A very
long, interminable moment of silence filled the bridge.

“Dak...”

“Yes Gene?”

“Are you concerned about this?”

“Nah… not really, Gene – Janis knows what she's doing, it’s not like any of us are even qualified to second-guess her. It is what it is, as they say. What can we do about it even if we wanted?”

I broke in. “Sir, we
could ask Janis to vacate the Unet and all external systems, and she would do it.”

Another long moment of silence
spun on an on, probably while the captain sat there in the galley and drank our cups of coffee.

“Well, that's good to know, I suppose”, he said thoughtfully. “
For now, she is doing her job, and she is doing just fine.”

“Sir,
for what it’s worth, I agree”, I said.

“Same here, Dak”, Gene added.

“So what kind of guns will Janis be making for our new walker?” Shorty cut in on comms. Yak and I laughed; I could only imagine what was coming next. Gene handled the news well, but Shorty... she was a lot less predictable.

“We haven't gotten that far Shorty. What do y
ou suggest?” the captain asked casually on comms.

She wasn’t about to be out-cooled.
“Well, sir, with the new glasser we have, she can form parts in just about any shape. I’ll bet she could build a mighty nice gun. Janis, are you going to put weaponry on our new dropship?”

“I did want to provide offensive and defensive capabilities, Jane. Do you have any suggestions?”

“Well, we have the old ammo ovens, I’d think we could add a heavy railer. You could make some pretty hot magnetics out of glassed ferrite.”

“
Wouldn’t an alloy of titanium and zirconium be more durable rail material, Jane?”

“
I suppose, but you would still need to make some sort of magnetic inserts, right?”

“No
t necessarily, Jane. I would like to use pseudomass for propulsion. I believe I can greatly increase the speed with a higher durability rail and a focused mass driver.”

Yak whistled appreciatively.

“Pseudomass? Hey Gene, do you think our generator would be fine-grain enough to power railshot?”

“No way
, Shorty, that would require an incredibly tight beam. Our gear has the mass, but you would need way more focus than our set can handle.”

“Tha
t’s what I was thinking as well, Gene. Janis, how are you going to generate the pseudomass? We don’t think you’ll be able to get the focus you’d need from our current gear.”

“
I might be able to incorporate that gear for propulsion and lifters, Jane. For the rail assembly, I will be fabricating the components for new, small-format generators and armatures. I will use gallium arsenide for the stator rings, and liquid helium for the float, in a compensated ninety-degree break so it will function planet-side.”

I looked over at Yak, who answered me with a shrug. Neither of us had the chops to keep up with this conversation.

“Janis, a lot of what you are planning is a bit over my head. To the best of my knowledge, I don’t think psuedomass have ever been weaponized for a railer. I know there have been experiments with large-format rock throwers, mass drivers, essentially… but nothing of the form factor you’re thinking of.”

“Jane, I am merely minaturizing the process
through careful application of the technology, and making it more focused than has been done to date – but I am really only refining current technology.”

“
It’s a novel approach, nonetheless”, Gene replied. “What I want to know, is what will this rideable use for power?”

“Gene,
I am glad you asked. I am currently fabricating parts for a small-form tokamak. I would really appreciate it if you could help me check my math.”

“I
would be honored, my dear.” he said reverentially.

The captain floated back in with refills for Y
ak and I, and I realized I have chatted completely through my two-off, and it was time to come back on shift.

Good thing I had a fresh cup of sleep-replacer
.

Chapter 3

Dak found me napping. I don't know how, but he's finally caught me at it, and I w
ill never hear the end of it.

I was doing so well, but I had been working so hard. These tired old bones needed rest, and I had made so much progress. I found a nice, comfortable spot to hook my feet, loosened the belt just enough to let me
float a bit off the couch and shut my eyes – but only for a moment!

Unfortunately…
that moment stretched on a little longer than I planned.

“Gene, rise and shine, sleepy-head.” a voice
called, drifting down the halls. I was inexplicably holding a small stuffed animal, and wandering down a hallway lined with doors that kept getting smaller and smaller.

“Gene…” the voice said louder, taking on a more strident urgency that pulled me forward against my will. I raced toward the exit, and crawled through the opening, but behind that was another door I had to slither through like a snake. I had to get my shoulders sideways for the next door, but it was constricting as I slid through it, breathing hard and racing for escape. I pulled desperately, but my hips wouldn't fit, and I could tell my head wouldn’t fit through the next.

I was trapped.

“CAPTAIN ON DECK!” the captain bellowed, in his best parade voice.

He has a very
commanding parade voice.

I snapped awake in a moment and would have been halfway to Ma
rs if I wasn't wearing my belt. My dream faded into the shadows, as I blinked myself awake.

“Sorry Captain...” I started
to say, and then trailed off sheepishly as the realization of what had just happened started to sink in.

“Napping, eh?” he said with a severe face.

I didn't say anything. I was mortified. I couldn't believe what a mess this was. He was going to use this, for the rest of my natural life. I will never get a moment of rest from this.

“Mister, are you aware that sleeping on shift
is rank dereliction of duty?” he asked in a level voice I am not sure I’ve ever heard.

“Sir, I know. I just--”

“Closed your eyes?” he offered, with a half-smile.

“Yes.
I am sorry Captain.”

“
Gene, I can’t believe I have to do this. It pains me to be put in this position, but the sad truth here, is you need this. It's unacceptable for you to fall asleep while you are on shift. You need to learn from this experience, and you need to learn from this lesson. As the Captain of this vessel, I am hereby commanding you that, you are never, ever, allowed to let your caffeine level drop to dangerous levels like that again.” He passed over a full cup of coffee – his own personal cup, and completely full of coffee.

If I wasn’t belted in, I might have fallen out of my chair. I would have expected anything, but for him to actually
give me his cup of coffee? I considered the possibility, albeit briefly, that this may have still been a dream.

“I mean it, mister”, he continued with a giga-parsec stare leveled at me from beneath bristling brows, “Heed this warning well. F
alling asleep is what you do when you’re not on shift, when you have the luxury to dream, and get real rest. You sleep on shift and you’re going to just hurt your efficiency.” He winced slightly as I took a deep sip from his cup.

“Dak I know… I
am sorry. It won’t happen again.” I punctuated it with another deep pull off his cup, then handed it back. He looked at it like it was a victim of a disaster, needing a hug and a warm blanket. 

“
Gene. I know you nap. Heck, we all nap. You know, one time on a patrol in Regulan, I took a nap?”

“Just
once?” I asked politely.

“Don't you start with me
, mister… I might just have you weld us up a nice keel so I can have a place to haul you out-system.”

As much as I wanted to laugh, I didn’t. You never know with Dak. He might actually have me do it.
“I am just beat, Dak. I've been really pouring it on the past few days. Janis is sure making it easy to do this sort of work, but it's still a lot of climbing, crawling, lifting… I’m not a young man anymore.”

The captain smirked.
“Gene, we're in null-g. How much lifting are you doing, really?” he chided with a wink. He knows full well how hard it is to move mass in null-g, so I just sniffed politely through a scowl.

“
In any case, I meant to come back earlier and see what sort of progress you were making back here. From the look of our cargo bay, you and Shorty must have bought just about everything Tranquility had.”

I laughed. “Well
, we were under strict orders, as you recall.”

“
Be that as it may, I am still impressed at how much you both managed to spend, to be honest. I didn't think you were going to be able to dent our balance.”

“Well, I probably wouldn't have except for the new drives. Shorty's gear
though, that was some spendy stuff. That girl knows how to burn a budget. Not even my tools came close. Pauli though… he just about spent as much as both of us put together on those cores. I am sure glad I had one of those handy when we refit the Archaea – we might have worked our entire career and not have been able to afford one.”

“
You know… might and maybe are words I don’t really use these days, not after having met Janis.” He took a sip, and then continued. “As much as I appreciate the effort, while you may have put a nice little dent in our bankroll, that’s about all you did, mister. Next time I am going to request it be spent more lavishly. Some of these parts here,” he looked around at the still piled crates and packing materials, “can’t you mill any of these out of gold, and then chrome plate it or something? We need to get the rest of those crates out of our bay.”

“Well, I suppose I could redo a lot of our electricals with it, now that you mention it.” I offered. Gold wasn’t really a good replacement for a part made out of titanium, but as
a conductor it was first rate.

“Well,
that won’t do much. I suppose we could make some deck plates out of it and paint them or something… If there’s any left after I restock our coffee, which reminds me, one moment.” He looked up from his cup. “Janis dear, please place an order with Montana Coffee Traders for 100 kilos of their best beans, a full assortment - fresh roasted and vacuum packed.”

“I have placed the order sir”, she replied
less than a second after he had finished talking. “It will be ready for pickup when we will be able to take delivery.”

“But Janis, we’re headed out-system, pretty far off into the fringe, in fact. Do you know when we’re going to be back?”

“Of course I do, sir.”

“So we
do make it back from this adventure?”

“
I believe that will be your intention, sir.”

He flashed me a wink.

“Your confidence is pretty infective my dear, very well. On the subject of coffee, do we have enough on hand to make it to that point in time?”

“
Unfortunately we do not.” She said, sadly. Right as the captain started to work his jaw to try and order engines full reverse, she added, “At least, not without significant rationing, sir”, she said with a low chuckle.

Dak
looked sternly at his cup for a moment, and then smiled. “Well, at least I won’t run out…”

I groaned.

“In any case Gene, I am sorry I interrupted your little nap, but we are just about to our halfway point, and I believe you said that you needed to drop power to the tokamak to do some work?”

“
That’s correct, but it should be minimal, Dak, just the work of a few moments. The new plasma pumps are all set up and ready to install, I just need to scram, cool her off, and drop them in. It’s a pretty simple process.

I hesitated a moment, then added, “
I am a little more concerned about the work we need to do on the sensor package, to be honest.”

I was not very keen on having
Janis blind. We were in a very busy area of Sol system, and probably moving right along, if I know the captain.

“
Well, we need those online sooner than later, Gene. That's the other reason I am keeping you awake.” I sighed as a tiny part of me died inside. This was one joke that was simply never going to end.

“
Dak, we are facing a pretty significant engineering challenge with the sensors. Before we need to even think about installation, I need to complete the process of merging the prototype gravimetrics with the new sensor array package.

“Is that a hard process?” he asked.

“Well, it’s a hardware issue, really.” I said, as I unclipped and kicked towards the starboard bulkhead racks where I had a work area set up. “The prototype isn’t really standard; they hadn’t really gotten around to tooling this up for a specific sensor package. This is pretty much what I have to do – we’re essentially completing their prototype.”

He floated down for a closer inspection of the sensor mounts.
“Well, if anyone could, you’re the man for it. I am a little confused though… I thought you said these things were all modular?”

“Well, normally they are, but Janis wanted a specific one, sir, one that happened to be a prototype, test model, not a finished product from the catalog.
By the time they took this baby to market, they’d have adapted it to snap right in. This is a hardware interface sort of process, really. I just need to figure out how to fit tab A, into slot B.” It was a little more complex than that, of course.

“Well, that doesn’t sound too hard
, but worth your best effort all the same.” He pulled himself around the sensor array, looking at the various components I was re-routing to make room for the new gravimetric sensor. “What sort of time frame are we looking at for getting this ready to install?”

“Maybe another da
y, Skipper”, I said, running through the list in my mind and immediately doubting myself. “It might take me a little longer, but not much.”

“
Well, as long as you can stay awake.” He said with a fear-inducing eyebrow tuned precisely for maximum shock value, and looked me in the eye for another moment.

“Very well, Gene.
As your Captain, and until this current crisis is over, I am hereby ordering you on double-rations of coffee.” He smiled, adding “Because I am your friend, however, I will take pity on you and drink half of your ration. As much as I need you alert, I don’t want you to become too 'jittery', whatever that means.”

Janis broke
in before I was able to respond, saving him from a withering scowl of such ferocious magnitude, I might have pulled muscles.

“Gene, please be
advised that I have completed the remaining components to complete the sensor array. Would you like me to deliver them?”

With a little more time to work up, I fired off my ultimate scowl towards Dak, only to have it deftly fenced by an
adroit eyebrow.

“Captain, do you know what she is talking about?”

“Not precisely Gene, though I have my guesses. Janis, please proceed to deliver those components to engineering.”

“I shall do so Captain.”

We didn't have long to wait. The engineering lock opened, and a… machine floated in that looked like an overgrown ant that moved like an octopus. It moved with unparalleled precision through the null-g environment, smoothly transitioning between grabbers with highly articulated limbs terminated in four opposable appendages.

The limbs moved very gracefully,
with a full range of motion – they seemed to be able to function as 'hands' or 'feet' as needed. The limbs were attached to a smooth, almost featureless carapace that appeared to have compartments, strong-points, and retractable clamps.

I made these observations as if I was floating somewhere far away from where I was. As strange as it seemed, I forced myself to reconsider that this
could all be a very strange dream, and that it would be a pretty good idea to wake up before Dak caught me napping. I didn’t wake up, sadly, and had to come to grips with the fact that I was looking at something real.

The
machine moved nearly silently, making a low hum you could hardly hear over the background noise, and it’s pretty quiet back here when we’re not burning the drives or ramping up the tokamak.

It was flawlessly engineered, and looked to be
formed rather than built, like liquid alloy. As we stood by in shock, it glided across the room and placed a crate full of parts and components near the sensor array.

“Gene, would it be okay with you if I began assembly?”
Janis asked, sweetly.

“
That would be great, Janis.” I tried to say, though the sound I actually made was a rough croak and a cough as I inhaled some extra drool. She seemed to get the message, and started working.

I was captivated by the lithe motion of the machine as it started pulling parts out of the crate, and almost
completely overwhelmed by a wave of unexpected admiration.