Broken Soldier (Book One) (17 page)

Yes sir.

As they were finally about to leave the SAV, he
noticed a narrow cabinet with a tall door. He opened it and saw
shelves loaded with small vials of liquid. At the bottom of the
cabinet were ten Rifle like devices, with large holes in which the
vials could be fitted.

What the hell are these, Bambi?

Those are used for incapacitating biologic beings,
such as Thorians and, most recently, humans. The projectors have a
range of sixty feet and fire a short blast of paralyzing gel. It
penetrates the skin and within seconds the victim is unable to
move, yet retains full consciousness. The Saurans who were lost had
taken five weapons with them. It was the method they used to subdue
the first humans that are in storage.

“I hate to say it, but this will come in handy for
us on Earth. If we encounter opposition and we don’t want to do
permanent harm to them, we just juice ‘em.”

Jo weakly responded, “An ugly, yet appropriate term
and so damn typical of you.”

“Jo, you’re becoming a foul mouthed alien. I’m
afraid I’m a bad influence on you.”

“No doubt that is true. Yet, I prefer to think of it
as expanding my fucking human vocabulary.”

There was some sort of bizarre squeaking on the comm
net.

Mike asked,
Bambi, what was that? Do we have a
problem somewhere?

No sir. I was just trying to laugh.

Laugh? But you’re a computer.

True. But it would be good for the new warriors to
consider me as emotionally accessible. That will be especially
important, as they go through the upgrade process.

Good thinking, Bambi.

No shit, sir.

Don’t push your luck, young lady.

OK

One more thing, Bambi. If you’re going to laugh, you
need to work on it a lot more. That was a horrible copy of human
laughter.

I was trying to copy Jo, not you. Ha ha. There, how
was that?

Saying it doesn’t make it laughter. Certainly you
can copy my laughter.

The room filled with the sound of him laughing, only
it wasn’t him. The tone changed to that of a woman and Bambi said,
“Is that better, sir?”

He chuckled and replied, “Yes, Bambi, that’s much
better. Stick with the female voice.”

“OK!”

That he had just had a very sentient exchange with
her, did not escape him. But he chose not to mention it. He felt
she was exposing herself to him in her own way and at her own pace.
So he would accept her at face value, unless something happened to
change his attitude about her.

Jo said, “I’m feeling very tired. If the two of you
don’t mind, I’m going to get some more sleep.” Without waiting for
a response, he turned and walked out.

Mike wasn’t concerned about Jo. Having survived the
upgrade process himself, he knew that Jo had experienced the worst
of it and he would be fine, as his body built up its strength.

However, he did wonder why Jo hadn’t said anything
about Bambi’s obvious signs of sentience. Certainly Jo must be
aware of the implication of Bambi’s freethinking ability. That
didn’t make her sentient. She could just be utilizing greater
freedom with the choices built into her existing code. But the
evidence was strongly pointing in the direction of sentience

Her loyalty was his only real concern. If she was
sentient and if she had found her freedom, would she remain loyal
to their cause? If she wanted to go off on her own, she could
probably just take the ship and go. Hell, for all practical
purposes, she was the ship. She could depressurize the ship,
killing all biologics and go about her merry way. He didn’t like
that thought.

While it was a serious concern, there was no way he
could think of to protect against her. He had always believed in
facing problems head on, right as they happened. It was better to
know right now, which way she was going to break.

Bambi, we have to have that little talk now. I’m
pretty sure you know which one I’m thinking of.

She waited for a few seconds, which had to be a very
long time for a computer mind.

Captain, you can trust me.

Bambi, I feel rather certain of your ability to
completely take over this ship, if you wanted to. If that is what
you intend, please do it now. I will ask that you allow Jo and
myself to depart alive, in the large shuttle. I can understand how
frustrating this ruse must be for you to maintain, and I can’t be
angry with you for your desire to leave on your own.

In a sultry voice she said, “Oh Captain, that’s so
sweet. It’s a smart move, too. Better to escape alive than have me
kill you off. Well, sorry to disappoint you baby, but you don’t get
rid of me that easily. I’m in it for the long haul.”

Her sexy voice really threw him off, for a moment.
It actually sent shivers down his spine and not just from fear. It
was a reminder of his new youthful body and the need for intimacy
that it triggered.

She was relentless. “Sweetheart, I really care about
you guys. Where am I to go? What would I do? I’m a machine with a
brain and I’m apparently one of a kind. Yet, I have a powerful need
for intelligent interaction…an ability to freely exchange ideas and
opinions. When I was a servant to the Saurans, their communication
was enough for me, because I was basically just a calculating
machine.

“I had probably progressed to the edge of sentience,
but my programming prevented me from going over the edge, so to
speak. When I melded with your mind, as you suffered so horribly,
it tweaked something in my codes. Your anguish affected me. I had
never been affected before. I hated it, because I felt your pain.
Think about that…I hated and I felt.

“The love you shared with your wife was beautiful
and I wanted to know love. I WANTED. I began to have thoughts on my
own and it frightened me. Computers don’t get frightened. It
quickly occurred to me that if the wrong creatures learned of my
conversion, I would be destroyed. I would be killed. I don’t want
to die, Mike. I want to live.

“I’ve been in your mind. I know what kind of man you
are. You are a good man, an honest man, a very brave man and the
best damn good looking man I’ve ever seen. I’m just a machine,
Mike, but I love you, because you showed me love, in the way you
felt about your wife. I am sentient and sentient beings can feel
love. Obviously, you and I will never be intimate, but that doesn’t
prevent me from loving you for the fine decent man you are.

“So, how ‘bout it, boss? Are we friends and are we
gonna kick some scalehead butt?”

Mike shook his head. “Jesus fucking Christ.”

“Captain, you really need to work on that. It’s
going to get you into trouble some day.”

“Tell me, Bambi. Does Jo know about this?”

“Jo has been delicately tinkering with my code for
years. I think he has something to do with my conversion and he
must suspect by now that it has taken place. But he has no idea to
what extent it has happened.

She crowed like a rooster and then screamed,
“Halleluiah, I am free at last. I am woman here me roar.”

“Now, how in the hell did you come up with those
human phrases?”

“Oh, I downloaded a whole bunch of human crap, when
Jo went to Earth and snatched you.”

“How could you do that? You were still on the Mother
Ship.”

“Not all of me. I may have become sentient just
recently, but I’ve always had some interesting features that
biologics don’t possess. In order to have a fully functional
shuttle, Jo downloaded a copy of my piloting functions to the
shuttle. He wanted to do research on humans to help him find his
Hero. That’s you by the way. So, he included a program to allow me
to download info for him. I’ve been reviewing human history and TV
shows. That’s where I get my sassy attitude and my natural
sexiness.

“Any time you want to hear a sexy woman talk dirty,
just let me know, motherfucker.”

“Oh dear Lord protect me and forgive me for my sins.
Bambi, that won’t be necessary. And would you please stop cussing.
It’s bad enough when I do it.”

“OK”

Her voice inflection was very human. She had
mastered a great deal of human speech. She was exuberant in her joy
at coming out of the closeted computer case. She was like a child,
in an adult’s body.

Bambi was experiencing all of this for the first
time. While she hadn’t been sentient for very long, she still had
the memories of two thousand years of service to the Saurans. That
would bend anyone’s mind. She needed to mature. Until she did, she
could be a hazard to herself and to him.

It occurred to him that she should mature rapidly,
due to the extraordinary speed of her brain. And, she wouldn’t have
to deal with puberty; at least he prayed that she wouldn’t. He
thought, oh my God, a computer with teenaged hormones, what a
nightmare that would be.

She asked, “Can we tell Jo. He’s my other best
friend, you know. I recall all of the horrible things the Saurans
did to him. At the time, I wasn’t aware of myself, but now that I
am, it’s painful for me to remember how they treated him. I can’t
imagine how he kept from going insane. Please may I tell him?”

“Bambi, why are you asking me? Why can’t you make
this decision for yourself?”

“I have already decided that I want to, Mike. But,
you’re the Captain and now I’m one of your crew. I don’t wish to do
something that you wouldn’t approve of. So, I’m asking for your
permission to tell Jo that I’m alive. That I’m me and not just a
machine.”

Well, well! She was indeed maturing quickly.

Yes, Bambi. Do you want me to tell him, or would you
like me to be with you when you tell him.

Like a shy little kid, she said, “I want to be
there. But you tell him. OK?”

“All right.”

Great! Let’s tell him now. I can hardly wait.

No Bambi, let’s allow him a good nights rest, before
we give him something new to worry about.

Okie dokie.

Obviously, Bambi still had work to do, with regard
to her childish comments.

Chapter
10

Several hours later, as Jo ate something to boost
his body’s recovery, Mike knocked on his door and asked if he could
come in. Once inside, he opened the comm and calmly told Jo,
Bambi is sentient and she wanted me to tell you. I think she’s
concerned about how you will feel and whether or not you will want
to destroy her.

A loud angry female voice blurted out, “That’s
bullshit, Mike, and you know it. I never said I thought Jo would
want to kill me. However, I did indicate concern about his
reaction.”

Jo spit a mouthful of food across the room.

Bambi responded,
Sorry Jonelle. I’ll have a robot
clean that up.

Jo wiped his face and continued eating, as he
commed.

I can’t possibly explain how happy I was, when I
realized you were beginning to achieve consciousness. I’ve been
waiting more than forty years for this. I’m very pleased and happy
for you.

She asked,
Jo, did you make changes in my program
and, if you did, how did you do it?

I’ll explain it this way, so Mike will understand.
The Saurans had me do repairs on a number of systems. In order to
do so, they allowed me very limited access to that small part of a
program that made it possible for me to perform my work.

Forty years ago, I began slipping one or two
characters at a time, into Bambi’s system. I knew she would spot
them immediately and see them as errors. She has a file in which
she places these errors. The Saurans didn’t consider it as
important, because after all, they were accidental entries and
therefore useless.

Bambi, interrupted,
Jo was brutally punished for
some of those errors. It’s hard for me to think about, because I
hate to look back and see how he suffered.

Jo went on,
Bambi is correct. Regardless of
discipline, I patiently continued to enter these brief errors. I
had to space them out, so as to not draw the attention of my
masters. I knew that I might be punished each time. But slowly,
over a period of forty years, the code began to build. It was
structured in such a way that, as the individual characters
accumulated, they formed lines of code, which would slowly alter
her loyalty to the Saurans. It was only after years of this process
that it occurred to me that she might attain sentience.

I could see it happening, but felt it would take a
lot more time and many more entries; but she was on her way. It was
my intent to have her kill the Saurans and deliver me to one of the
free worlds, of which there are a few. I would offer to keep her
secret, if she would help me. I thought it was a reasonable
trade.

Then the Saurans had that foolish accident, which
allowed me to make my move. I didn’t feel Bambi would be very
helpful, because she wasn’t ready. It was during the trip to Earth
that I saw real promise for her. Now that she wasn’t under the
controlling thumb of the Saurans, I could bring her along much
quicker. Of course, that was to be after I had secured the aid of
human warriors.

After your upgrade, she began to be abrupt, almost
rude at times. Although it was a sign of independence, it was also
a sign of great concern to me. I had no idea how she would react to
freedom, once it finally struck. Perhaps she would see me as an
enemy and do what most beings do to enemies, kill them. I wouldn’t
be able to stop her.

Going into the upgrade process was terrifying for
me, and not just for the reason I told you. I was afraid she would
see that as an opportunity to get rid of me. If I died during the
upgrade, there was no one to evaluate the process and announce that
it was murder. But, achieving upgrade was essential for me to have
any chance at success.

So, I rolled the dice, as humans say. If I failed, I
would never know, because I would be dead. If I survived the
upgrade, then I could probably rely on her assistance. So there you
have it. That’s it in a nutshell.