25.
Si never felt as free as when he had his ladies released into the openness of space. Despite his physical body being trapped in the tight confines of a crash-vat, his mind was flying around space, dancing in the dappled light of the sun.
Si never felt as free as when he had his ladies released into the openness of space. Despite his physical body being trapped in the tight confines of a crash-vat, his mind was flying around space, dancing in the dappled light of the sun.
Aunt Lorn was
always in the vanguard, spitting fire at the other ship's drones as she banked
around them, rocket engines burning bright. This feast of light and energy gave
Great granny Rose and Irene the opportunity to break off and enter a
counter-rotating orbit of Europa, seeking to get behind the enemy ship.
Alice and
Little Mia followed in Aunt Lorn's wake, but with a little more subtlety. They
contained Si's best electronic equipment, the top of the range hardware he'd
assembled himself. Deep within the crash-vat he smiled as Mia delicately peeled
open the electronic defences of the drone closest to his intervention ship,
then Aunt Lorn smashed it apart with a volley of plasma weaponry.
Si was good.
He knew it and even his most outspoken critics (ie most people he met) knew it
too. He'd always been talented, right from back in his school days. Si’s
universal grade point average was a regional best 97.8. And this despite the
fact he rarely attended his automated learning centre. Instead, he'd spent the
latter part of his school days developing a sophisticated infiltration
programme targeting the central educational AI. On exam results day he'd successfully
launched it, even going as far as giving his mum a copy of the e-certificate to
put on the wall.
It took the
education AI 7.6 seconds to realise that it had been hacked. This was an all Asia
record at the time; the AI was very interested in this occurence. It took
another 31.3 seconds to trace the hack back to Si (another record) and an
arrest warrant was issued, security drones released. However, at the same time
a "person of technical interest" tender was issued to the congloms.
The recruitment AI of the congloms quickly appraised the files presented, then
launched competitive bids to purchase Si's imminent incarceration. Lanark
Horishmo was the top bidder and so the security drones deposited a confused Si
at their corporate headquarters within two hours of his hack going live.
Mia and Alice
combined their electronic attack on the next enemy drone, disorientating its
navigation software and sending it hurtling down towards Europa. If anything,
Si was finding this too easy. The
initial attack and AI failure had caught him off guard, but since then he had
been steadily gaining the electronic upper hand. Whoever he was up against had an
impressive electronic arsenal at their disposal, but just didn't seem capable
of using it imaginatively. That made it easier and easier for Si to anticipate
their attacks; to subvert or misdirect them. Now with his ladies in the field,
the tide was turning even quicker. Another enemy drone disintegrated under
assault from Aunt Lorn as Little Mia and Alice danced around another, intrusion
scripts running hot as they pulled it apart from the inside.
Great granny
Rose and Irene had just about completed their orbit when Si powered down their
engines. The other ship loomed in the distance, but was stationary. By cutting
off the engines and letting the two ladies drift the remainder of the orbit he
could suppress their heat and electronic signatures. Now any drone controller
worth a damn would still spot the suspicious objects orbiting on a similar
trajectory to his or her own ship and let the ship AI begin evasive manoeuvres.
But Si suspected that if their lacklustre control of the drones was anything to
go by, Great granny and Irene might just get within range without the ship
noticing.
He was
right.
Shifting Mia,
Alice and Aunt Lorn onto a more automated set of scripts - they could more than
look after themselves - he was able to concentrate on the two ladies
approaching the enemy ship. He gradually powered up their electronic warfare
systems, keeping half an eye on the enemy ship at all times to see if it showed
any signs of reacting to this threat. It didn't. Si began with a few basic scans,
try and see what he was up against. It was an intervention ship similar to
their own, but of a design not in any of his technical handbooks. Probably
something new out of the shipyards he figured. It lacked any transponder or
digital signature, so he didn't have a name for it. However, this wasn't all
that unusual as if it was a rival conglom trying to make a move on LH holdings,
then running without identification it would make it easier to deny in the the
corporate courts back on Earth.
He'd have to
make his move soon as the drifting orbit of Great granny Rose and Irene was
taking them ever closer to the enemy intervention ship. He couldn't work his
way into the central AI core, that was too well defended and had multiple
redundancies. Instead he started an attempt to break into the low-level life support
systems. This was something of a speciality of his, he had some scripts purely
for this purpose. Never mind "flipping" an enemy drone, there was no
bragging rights better than backing up the enemy crew's toilets in zero g.
Given that these shits had tried to kill him, never mind messing with the
toilets, he felt like breaking the o2 systems. However, it would probably make
more sense to disable them rather than kill them all. Try and get some answers
over why the hell they had attacked his ship.
Si went to
work, aiming to break their lighting systems and set the o2 alarms off, if not
actually mess with the air supply. Get them panicking, then push for surrender.
However, after just a couple of seconds he stopped. He couldn't locate the life
support systems on this particular ship. Those systems normally weren't
actively hidden that deep in the AI systems, but even if it was, Si was the guy
to root it out. It just wasn't there, did this crew not need to crap or
something? There wasn't enough time for introspection though, Rose and Irene
were with a thousand clicks now; close range.
Time to
switch his attention. Si went into the enemy engine systems. This caught their
attention; it was difficult to attack engines without it setting an alarm off
somewhere. He watched via the readings from Great granny Rose and Irene as the
enemy ship powered up its manoeuvring thrusters to try and escape his
electronic tentacles. Too late; he was in.
It was
impressive, the enemy had the latest ion drive, able to reach 0.89 the speed of
light. Made his ship look like a bit of a sloth in response. Taking these guys
down would be a significant feather in his cap. They might even try to recruit
him for this fancy-pants ship, give him a well deserved promotion. Whoever the
drone controller was on this ship, he or she was no great shakes, but Si could
whip it into shape.
The enemy
ship exploded.
The feeds
from Rose and Irene blanked out, radar trace showing them tumbling off into
space under the force of the explosion. Meanwhile, the two drones that Aunt
Lorn, Mia and Alice hadn't got round to tearing apart yet shut down. Electronic
readings showing that their AI had been wiped; they were now just lifeless
husks, floating space junk.
Si
frantically went through the last few seconds of his readings, trying to work
out if it was anything he had done to trigger the explosion. He'd been in their
ship thrust control, getting ready to start shutting it down. There wasn't in
there anything that could trigger an explosion, he knew his way round an ion
drive. So why the explosion? He instructed Lorn and Alice to go recover Rose
and Irene, he wanted to check the readings they'd taken just before this ship
blew. Meanwhile, Mia was tasked with salvaging one of the enemy drones, see
what he could dig out of that.
After a while of fruitless cross checking, Si gave up
and opened the crash-vat. His ladies were nearly back with their hauls, so he
could go see if that shed any light on the case of the mysterious exploding
ship. The come down from the crash-vat was a horrific task. The occupant had to
get the oxygenated ooze out of their stomach and lungs. There were little
sinks, attached to which were suction masks for zero g operations. Si hooked a
mask over his face and began to vomit, wretch and cough up the ooze, which
gurgled away down the hose. After it was over, Si drifted to the bank of
showers on the opposite wall, try to wash the worst of the gunk from his flight
suit (oddly named given that it never actually flew, but was a hangover from
air forces past). Zero g showers were unsatisfying rather than unpleasant, the
water not pulled down by gravity made it an awkward process. What was more
awkward was when the showers refused to work. Fucking AI Si cursed, before heading out of the room, leaving a
trail of slime behind him like a grumpy slug.
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