Atlantis Rising (17 page)

Jon reached out, took Carex’s
proffered hand, and shook it, “Nice to meet you. You can just call me Jon we’re
pretty informal around here.”

“Thank you, nice to finally meet
you. Sorry about the councilor, he’s always been a thorn in our side. No one
really likes the petty little man,” Carex said.

“Ghost, restore the
Titan
to Captain Gilas’ control,” Jon said.

“Yes, Sir. However, there is the
small matter of the outstanding bill ...” Ghost said.

Jon moaned and Gilas chuckled.

“Just joking, Sir. I just
returned
Titan
to Captain Gilas and his crew. All command codes have
been transferred,” Ghost said.

“Everyone’s a comedian,” Jon
said.

This started a new round of
laughter.

An hour later, Jon sat at the
head a large table. Seated around him in no particular order were Gilas, Carex,
and his command crew. There were a few things he needed to go over, and
everyone needed to provide input.

“I called this meeting, mainly to
introduce you to Gilas and his second in command, Lieutenant Carex,” Jon said.
He then introduced his staff to them and started the meeting.

“While the
Titan
is being
repaired I have offered them access to the station for rest and relaxation.
Marc, Gilas will be giving you thirty marines to supplement your security
forces and will include some of their powered armor and Polaron rifles. The
duty sergeant from Gilas’ crew will instruct you on the use of them. You will
be in command. While on the station all personnel will fall under your
jurisdiction,” Jon said.

“Yes, Sir,” Marc said. “When
should I expect them?”

“They should be on their way,
now. I gave them orders to follow the duty sergeant of the station until you
get out of the meeting,” Gilas said.

“Brad and Mike, you’re working
with their techs already, right?” Jon asked.

“Yep,” Brad said as he stood up.
“Let me show you what we have planned since you are both here. You can
authorize the changes or shoot them down.”

“Go for it,” Jon said.

A hologram of the
Titan
and
Atlantis
popped up above the table. Brad pointed to a few spots on
both ships.

“We want to install a second main
reactor in the
Atlantis
and
Titan
. It would allow us to give more
power to the shields and weapons. It would also serve as a backup in case
either one failed for any reason. These compartments here,” Brad said,
motioning to the spots that lit up on the hologram. “Are perfect for what we
are thinking. This compartment is an unused additional storage bay connected to
the Engineering section. The
Titan
will get an additional secondary
reactor installed; where it’s supposed to go?”

“Where are you going to get the
reactors?” Gilas asked.

“Well, I’m updating our main
reactor programs now. It seems the only difference between your reactor and
ours is that your reactor is a bit more efficient. The extra reactor for the
Titan
you already have onboard. With the supplies on Ghost Station, we have
the
Atlantis
’ spiders building the extra one for
Atlantis
.
They’re actually building it in place onboard the
Atlantis
. It will take
about three days before it is complete and ready to be programmed and
connected,” Mike said.

“Nice stuff, I don’t have a
problem with this change for the
Atlantis
,” Jon said.

“Same here, you have my
permission to go ahead and do the modifications,” Gilas said. He looked over at
Carex who just nodded his acceptance.

“That brings us to our next
point,” Brad said.

He removed the
Atlantis
from the picture and zoomed in on the
Titan
. Several different areas
flashed on her.

“These spots are spider bays.
However, they’re all offline or disconnected from the main routines that control
them for the ship.”

“Yes, they’re seen as a waste of
energy and resources by the higher ups,” Carex said.

Brad scoffed, “They can save your
lives and even your ship.”

“Yes, we know,” Gilas said. “We
don’t have any control over that, though. They were locked out by the engineers
a long time ago, by order of the King.”

Brad glanced over at Mike who
nodded. “Well, what if I told you we could turn them back on and activate them
again. Mike and I have the master codes that will allow us access to override anything
built by the Eutharan Empire,” Brad said.

“Those codes have been lost for
ages. They still work? I mean you’re sure they work?” Gilas asked.

Mike nodded as he spoke, “Yup, I
have already tried them out on the
Titan
, because we were also curious
if they would work. It seems that your builders haven’t changed the base code
that much. There is a catch though.”

“What catch?” Gilas asked.

“For the spiders to work, we
would have to turn on your ship’s AI,” Mike said.

“The
Titan
doesn’t have an
AI,” Carex said.

Brad and Mike exchanged glances
as Mike continued, “Yes, it does. She is there, though no one activated her.
You see, the AI routines are so ingrained into the base code for Eutharan
ships, that it has to have one, active or not.”

“I don’t know about that,” Gilas
said.

“She is a clean slate. If that is
what you’re worried about. She would just wake up and never know she had been a
sleep,” Mike said.

“What would be the benefits of
having her active?” Gilas said.

“There are too many benefits to
explain completely. I’ll tell you some of the main benefits though,” Mike said.

“Okay,” Gilas said.

“She controls the spiders that
would help repair the ship in case of damage. The AI would be able to react if
something rendered the crew unconscious, possibly saving many lives. She would
help with monitoring the subsystems of your vessel. In doing that, alone, she
will make your ship run smoother. This list actually goes on from there, but
those are the main points,” Mike said.

“You keep saying ‘she,’” Carex
said. “What if the AI is a ‘he’?”

“Nope, the Eutharans didn’t build
any male AI units, as far as I can tell. This one is a ‘she’ I have already had
her hologram online,” Mike said.

“You turned her on?” Gilas said
in shock.

Jon glared at Mike as though he
wanted to strangle him. He didn’t want to force anything on their new friends.

“No, no. I turned on the part of
her program that projected her hologram, not her consciousness,” Mike said.

“Oh,” Gilas said as Jon relaxed a
bit.

“I was checking to see if the
code base had changed between her and
Atlantis
in the past thousand
years. I got curious about what she would look like so I took a peek,” Mike
said. “Currently, I’m rebuilding Ghost’s holographic program as her old one has
severely degraded from not being used.”

“It did?” Jon said.

“Yeah. Really, it’s almost all
gone,” Mike said.

“Then why did
Atlantis
’
program not do the same?” Jon asked.

“Well, Atlantis and Atlanta
shared that part of the program. Atlantis just has a few more parameters to
make her look different. The
Titan’s
AI hasn’t degraded either because
it has never been brought online,” Mike said.

“Honestly, Gilas, I think it
would be a good idea to bring her online. I can’t see how it would be
detrimental to your ship,” Jon said.

“I’ve read the AI wars. I know
what they’re capable of,” Gilas said.

“Then you also know the Eutharan
AI units were the only ones to not go rogue,” Atlantis said as she appeared
next to Jon.

Everyone blinked in surprise, as
Mike grinned.

“Did I mention that I enabled the
routines that allow the AI unit of any ship docked to move around the base?”
Mike said.

“Uh, no, you didn’t,” Jon said.
“Welcome to the meeting, Atlantis. This is Captain Gilas and this is Lieutenant
Carex.”

“Captain Gilas, the choice is
yours and yours alone to make. However, I think you should wake the
Titan’s
AI. It will only benefit you and your ship,” Atlantis said.

“I agree with Atlantis,” Ghost
said.

“Okay, wake her up when you’re
ready,” Gilas said. “But, I want to be able to turn her off, if I need to for
any reason.”

“That is built into their
programming,” Mike said. “All, it takes is the command codes from any of the
command staff.”

“All right, I’m sold. You have my
authorization to do everything you think needs done to the
Titan
, as
long as my own Engineering Chief agrees,” Gilas said.

“All right, onto the next order
of business,” Jon said. “Terri, I’m promoting you to Flight Chief. Atlantis has
informed me you’re not far from your fighter pilot’s badge. I want you to hand
pick a squadron from our available crew and start getting them trained. Gilas
is sending over some of their fighters, and ours are being off loaded as we
speak. Once ours have been checked out and upgraded, we will start setting up
our own patrols.”

Terri’s face brightened as she shouted,
“Woo Hoo!”

Several people chuckled around
the room.

“Easy, Sis. I want you to be
careful and listen to everything Gilas’ flight instructor tells you. He’s in
command until you get your wings and he has final say over getting your wings,”
Jon said.

“Okay,” Terri bubbled.

“Bill, what is the situation on
the atria?” Jon asked.

“The one atrium on
Atlantis
is starting to grow plants. It’s going to be a while before we get a harvest
from the garden though. Kelly, Andie, and I are working on the atrium here on
the station. Let me tell you, it’s huge, Central Park huge. The good news is
there are still some viable plants there. Bad news is we do not know anything
about the plants,” Bill said.

“We have a botanist on board the
Titan
. I’m sure he would be more than willing to help you catalog the
plants there. He would probably even help you get it in order. If I’m not
mistaken he always carries extra seeds, too,” Gilas said.

“That would be a huge help,
thanks,” Bill said.

“Thanks,” Jon said to Gilas.

“No problem,” Gilas said.

“What about Command?” Jon asked
Bill.

“We’re about as staffed as we can
get, right now. People are settling in well and Ghost has been very helpful in
getting us up to speed on the systems,” Bill said. “I have a small crew out
right now checking the mining bases. Another small Engineering crew is
currently checking all weapon platforms and performing maintenance as needed.
We dispatched another crew to the foundries to check them out. As you can see
we’re pretty thin personnel wise.”

“Yeah, I know. Gilas and his crew
are going to be helping fill in while they’re here, getting their repairs done.
Kind of a payment plan I guess,” Jon said as he winked at Gilas.

Gilas coughed as the liquid from
the glass he had just sipped from went down the wrong tube. Carex slapped him
on the back, and started laughing.

“As far as food supplies go,” Jon
said. “Gilas is going to donate some of his food stores to us. They should last
until we get the gardens up and running. I might bribe him to make a delivery
every so often though. Say ten percent off all future repairs.”

Jon had waited for Gilas to sip
from his glass as he said the last.

Gilas choked again, “Damn it,
Jon, stop doing that to me.”

Everyone laughed as Gilas tried
to regain his composure.

“Gilas, I think I’m liking you
more and more,” Brad said.

Terri groaned, “Well, you like
anyone who will wave food in front of your face. Just do us all a favor, and
don’t start humping his leg, okay?”

Gilas coughed and sputtered as he
tried to take another sip.

“Damn it. I give up.”

Gilas set the glass down and
pushed it away.

“Yeah, well …” Brad said.

He was trying to formulate a
comeback but nothing came to mind.

“What was that?” Terri said.

“Nothing …” Brad muttered.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought,”
Terri said triumphantly.

After everyone stopped laughing,
Jon continued the meeting.

“Andie, how is your department
doing?” Jon asked.

Andie smiled as she spoke, “Well,
I have to say the Medical Ward on the station is a bit better equipped than the
one on the ship. Everyone seems to be adjusting pretty well, and everyone
injured in the attack has made a full recovery. We’re just kind of sitting
around and learning what we can while we have some peace and quiet. We get a
few scrapes and sprains daily, but nothing serious.”