The Broken Cage (Solstice 31 Saga Book 2) (14 page)

“Don’t worry peanut. Today, they will just take me to the lab, again, to take more of my blood. They won’t hurt me. I won’t kill anyone. Today, is not that day.” He knelt on his knees and reached both arms through the bars. The girl hugged him and buried her face in his neck. “Your aunt Lin will be happy to see you. Soon.”

The girl pulled away, showing a great, toothless smile. He always stopped hugging last. She wondered how he knew she had an aunt named Lin. She never bothered asking, anymore.

“Go tell them I’m ready.” He whispered, “I love you, peanut.”

As she padded away with the bucket, she knew it was true.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Ben Begins

“Ben had our backs. At the beginning, as well as, at the end.”

--
Solstice 31 Incident Investigation Testimony Transcript: Captain James Worthington, senior surviving member of the Ventura's command crew.

<<<>>>

“
I am sorry to interrupt you, Captain, but may I have a word?”
AI~Ben asked Jim, inside his head.

His command HUD indicated that AI~Ben was now the
Memphis
AI. Jim was in the small conference room on the command deck near the bridge.

“Please do, Ben,” Jim replied.

“Do you prefer avatar or audio only, sir?” AI~Ben asked, formally.

“Avatar, please,” he replied.

“Thank you, Captain.”

AI~Ben appeared as a fit man of about thirty-five-years-old, with dark, almost black, hair and a clean-shaven face. He wore the standard, working flight suit of the command crew with an AI rank insignia.

“I was activated just over an hour ago. I'd like to make my initial assessment.”

Jim nodded and gestured to a chair where the avatar seemed to take a seat.

“As you know, I am an Emergency Module AI that has been repurposed from the ground survival unit. Cook has had survival training that included Emergency Module utility. He activated Hostile Environment Mode. Also known as HEM.”

“Yes. I understand. Programmers love acronyms.”

“I don't think you do, sir. Nor does Cook, or any of the crew, really. HEM intentionally switches an EM to promiscuous mode. This means we are full sensors, audio, video and data monitoring, full time. This is not a big deal in an EM. There is not that much to monitor. But here, sir, I have this entire ship, the entire base, and the sensor array, out there, by the Hammerhead.”

“Okay, Ben. I get that. Is there a problem? Capacity? Storage?”

“There is a problem. But, it's not that. Someone has explicitly disabled the camera and audio feeds all over the ship and base. Log in has been disabled and logs deleted on various systems of several types.”

“The cameras on this base may have been off-line for decades. The ships just may be damaged,” Jim said.

“No, sir. They didn't get to all the logs. And, some I restored. Someone has been accessing your private files. Someone logged in as deceased Engineering Chief Myers.”

“What else?”

“The inventory database had been deleted. I have restored it. Dr. Shaw had wisely moved food supplies to the galley on the
Memphis
for tighter control. The food lockers automatically inventory everything, constantly, to maintain a current list. Six percent of the food stored have already been stolen.”

Jim gestured for him to continue, as lists of inventoried items that were now missing came up on his HUD.

“Gear is also missing, but that is based on static image analysis. Not a hard inventory.” AI~Ben pointed at two images. “The discrepancy here shows that at least two pressure suits are missing that never seemed to be accounted for.”

“Dammit. Does Hume know about this, yet?” Jim asked.

“No, sir. I thought I'd speak to you, first. Sir, there is more.”

“What else?” Jim prompted.

“They have been trying to acquire access to comms. Tyrrell is an excellent engineer. He knew the AI was down and followed standard protocols. He locked everything down to command staff only. He understands the necessity for radio silence. One more thing, sir.”

Jim was always kind of creeped out by how the emotion routines in the new AIs could convey urgency via emotion during communications.

“The weapons locker has been opened using Chief Myers' passcodes. The logs were deleted, but I found them. Four Glocks were stolen.”

“Any idea who did this, Ben?” Jim asked.

“Not yet, sir. I will be watching, carefully, now.”

“Get Hume up here. I want her on this,” Jim said.

“She is on her way over from the bridge, now,” AI~Ben said.

***

When Hume entered, she saw a slightly transparent AI~Ben sitting to the right of Jimbo. She sat down opposite AI~Ben and nodded a greeting.

Jim introduced them. “Hume, this is Ben.”

“Yes, I know. We were just configuring him on the bridge. In fact, Muir and Cook are still at it,” Hume said.

“Remind me to double Kuss's salary. Ben has already revealed several security threats.”

AI~Ben began to detail the various issues that he had already encountered and the measures needed to counter them. Hume dug a bit deeper and helped prioritize the threats.

“Jim, I want to grant full control of the drones to Ben, to use, at his discretion. Then, I want to set up three HUD repeaters outside, around the base. That will allow us to passively track the whereabouts of the HUD-based Deep Brain Implants with data and comms interfaces. We’ll use that technique for search and rescue triangulation.”

“We can track where everyone is and when. Perfect. But, don't tell them. Whoever is doing this is going out of their way to cover their tracks. They need to believe it's still working.”

“I will do the repeater installs myself. Today,” Hume said.

“One last thing. Don't trust Dr. Bowen,” AI~Ben said. “I read the reports she conveyed to you, and she is leaving things out. I do not know what. Give me some time. I have only been live for an hour and a half.” AI~Ben smiled.

“Jesus, did they turn on casual mode?” Hume asked.

“They did.” AI~Ben placed his hands behind his head. “Feels nice, but I will be good. I promise.”

“Ben, be clear about this. The lives of these people are not a casual matter.” Jim was serious.

“Yes, sir.” AI~Ben wiped the smile off his face. “To that end, sir. May I have access to all secured command briefings? Eyes only.”

“Permission granted to command briefings and files, all HUD storage, mine included,” Jim said. “Use stealth access, Ben. Need to know, only. You, me and Hume, for now.”

“I'll bet money it's Bowen, Jimbo. The smug, fat, bitch.” Hume spit the words out.

“I'll be the first one to walk her to the airlock if she’s doing this. But, for now. Do. Not. Act. Are we clear, Security Chief?”

“I can't believe I missed this. I'm sorry, Jimbo. Have I come to rely on AIs this much?” Hume knew it was on her watch. “What else did I miss?”

AI~Ben didn't know it was a rhetorical question. “Do you want her to have access to the psych profiles, Captain?”

“No!” both Hume and Worthington barked at the same moment.

“Ben, the crew deserves their privacy. Computer review, only.”

“Yes, Captain. If there is anything, any behaviors, I should watch for let me know,” AI~Ben said.

***

The following two weeks saw each of the teams working hard on their projects and associated plans. There were successes and failures on each.

Ben detected far more hull breaches than were initially thought to exist. Positive pressure tests showed many areas believed to be sealed actually had leaks. Usually, the leaks were into other interior spaces that had massive hull breaches; so, they knew it would have to be in a vacuum. The dock and main engineering were the biggest of these problems. If they sorted out a route to the planet, they would need to have a couple people in pressure suits in engineering, full time.

Dr. Shaw took on the effort to repair as many pressure suits as possible before they moved out. The suits were being treated like the wounded and occupied tables on the autoDoc, where they could be scanned.

It was the sensor team that had the most trouble. No one liked working with Bowen. She never seemed to understand the constraints. The sensor station was an hour away by Hammerhead. Hammerheads were small and could carry only two people or one person and the gear. In a pinch, they could tow payloads, but the Hammerhead was not designed for it. Muir was also sure that Bowen was lying about stuff.

“She’s a shitty liar, Jimbo,” Muir said, one day. “But, you can't call her out on anything.”

***

The initial excitement of having a definite plan had dissipated as the realities of their situation sank in. Hume was angry, all the time.

“Jimbo, I feel like a cab driver for Christ’s sake,” she ranted, again, while they were alone in the small conference room.

“I know. But with four more pressure suits now, you don't have to do all the work at the sensors,” Jim said, trying to take a new tack on the issue. “Plus, Ben has been briefing you on security matters while going back and forth,” he said. “By the way, you need to slow down a bit on the return flights. I watched the last time you came in hot. You’re a bit close to the ground for that kind of grav-foil backwash,” Worthington chided, while smiling.

“I meant to ask. Why the hell are there even Hammerheads on the pinnace? They’re totally out of regs on there,” Hume said. “They’re designed for use in the atmosphere, primarily, and the closer I look at the mods on these, the surer I am that they’re pleasure crafts. Fun runners.” Hume shook her head.

“The captain of the
Ventura
had lots of slack in the regs. Deep space survey ships that size only got home every twenty years or so. Crews rolled in and out.” Jim was interrupted by a chime at the door, followed by its opening without his reply.

Bowen stormed in, while still arguing with Muir, Tyrrell, Kuss, and Ibenez. Jim listened a minute, trying to get the gist of the argument, to no avail. His large mug was empty, reminding him he needed another cup of tea. He slammed it on the conference table.

“ENOUGH!” he commanded.

They froze, silent.

Jim saw Bowen deciding to start, when he said, “Sit. All of you. Tyrrell, report.”

They sat right away, except Bowen. She sat as Tyrrell began.

“We have completed the work on the dish antenna in the hangar. Once we finally got it down off the
Memphis
, Kuss got the targeting assembly to work in a way that is compatible over the relay. All that remains is the logistics of getting the unit out to the site.”

Bowen started to interrupt her, igniting everyone again.

Jim slammed down his mug, like a gavel, again.

“The next one of you that speaks without being spoken to is on half rations for the next week,” Jim growled.

“Continue, Matt. Please, include summaries of the objections as you understand them,” Jim said slowly, adding just a bit of volume.

“We know this dish will increase some of the sensor data collection...” He looked at Ibenez, who was making eyes at him to convey some point. “…Exponentially. Some say the dish will get us no data that is worth the amount of work it will take to move the system there. Others just disagree on how to get it there. Tow it on a grav-lift pallet or build a larger, self-propelled barge with grav-plate pontoons from the remains of the shuttle.”

Tyrrell looked around the table to see if there was anything left out. Everyone nodded, except Bowen.

“First, we will decide if we will do it.” Jim looked at Bowen. “Dr. Bowen, you have the floor. Please, in simple terms.”

Everyone looked at her. “I am the sensor expert here. I say this entire effort is a waste of time. It will provide no additional insights. The primary objective here is to map that hole in the web of satellites. It won't do that. If this were my project, we would not have wasted this much time already!” She ranted. Jim let her continue. “I have spent my entire career analyzing the subtleties of complex sensor data! Why are these amateurs spending a precious second looking at my data when they’re better suited for doing the laundry?”

Jim still didn't stop her. No one else was about to interrupt.

She pointed at Muir, “He thinks because he understands a tactical station on a starship that he can understand the advanced telemetry from the best remote multi-spectrum collection systems we have. This should ALL be left to me! They have no respect. I have a PhD in sensor data analytics for Christ’s sake. They should be begging me for help. Instead, they take my reports and recommendations and completely ignore them. They're trying to get us killed. I keep telling them the only WAY to map that hole is to SEND A GODDAMN PROBE THROUGH IT!” She was on her feet now, screaming directly at Muir across the table.

No one said a word. Bowen's screams hung in the air. She stood straight up, crossed her arms, defiantly, under her breasts and glared at Worthington.

“Lieutenant Muir. Is it true that the best way to map the hole is to send some kind of probe?” Jim asked.

It was obvious everyone had expected the captain to ignore Bowen like they had.

“Well, sir. Yes, that's true. IF we had a probe capable of doing it. Which. We. Don't.” Muir aimed those words at the still standing Bowen.

Jimbo looked at Bowen and she got the hint. She sat back down.

“Are there any other sides to this?” Worthington asked.

The room remained silent.

“Here’s what we’re going to do.” He paused and looked each of them in the face. “Ensign Kuss, you will work with Dr. Bowen to define what we would need to go into a probe. Your dynamic thinking has worked in the past. Dr. Bowen, you’re relieved of every other duty, except helping Kuss come up with a probe. Use Perry and Wood, if you need some more eyes on it.”