by J. N. Chaney
Accidents happened, he knew, but he decided to go check on the man anyway. Without some kind of central computer system to keep him informed of details, he had to find out for himself.
Warren arrived at the infirmary after getting direction. The injured man was covered in blood and lying on a table. The mangled wreck of his right arm was being worked on by a robot with thin, spidery appendages. It rode around on a wheeled base, buzzing and clicking happily.
The rest of the room was occupied by five other beds, several small cabinets, and a high-security door at the back.
“How’s the patient?” Warren asked a severe, pale-skinned woman watching the robot do its thing.
“He’ll live,” she said, clearly not happy to be working on him. “Though he may wish he’d died when he realizes how much medicine this is going to cost us. We only have a limited supply, and I know we’re going to need it all for the upcoming battles. Unless we steal more from our enemies, we’ll run out.”
Her rant finished, she consulted a small tablet, tapped a few commands, and watched the surgery with a keen eye.
The robot withdrew an arm that was tipped with a hooked scalpel and extended three others. These ended in narrow clamps, which it used to grab the skin around the man’s compound fracture and pull it away.
“He’s going to take a long time to recover,” the woman said, shaking her head. “No way I’m going to waste anything on him that will speed up the process. I have plenty of painkillers, though. It’s all he’s getting. One arm will be a little shorter than the other, and the scar will be severe. I hope it reminds him to be careful in the future.”
The dark-skinned man looked to be in his thirties, and he was sound asleep. Warren was glad he wasn’t awake to hear the doctor’s verbal abuse.
“How many of these robots do you have?” Warren asked, nodding toward the one performing the surgery. “
“I have another four in storage in my back room,” she said, not looking up from what she was doing. “Another eight in the main warehouse. They can all run at the same time, but their computers are unsecure. That’s why you don’t see any others out. I heard what happened with the printer. Can you imagine if one of them were hacked? You’d have to destroy it, and my services would be even less effective.”
“Understood,” Warren said, suddenly feeling like he wasn’t welcome. Rather than challenging her, though, he decided she was handling things just fine and backed out of the room.
“Thirty seconds until the ship’s in range of the guns,” Cooper said. Warren noticed Curet was in the conversation.
“What’s the ship doing?” Warren asked, again wishing he could bring up the data himself.
“Well, it’s making itself a big target,” Curet said. “We’ll be capable of shooting it down without a problem, but I don’t think it can return fire.”
“What do you mean?” Warren asked as a memory tickled the edge of his mind.
“I mean, it’s like they’re begging us to shoot them,” Curet said. “It looks like they know we have guns and they want to get shot.”
“In range in ten seconds,” Cooper reported. “Want me to give them their wish?”
“Hold your fire!” Warren ordered. A memory was coming together. If the pilot was good enough to bring the ship in that way, he or she was good enough to know it made them a target. It was the most non-threatening thing a ship could do.
“What?” Curet asked. “Why? Neither the Grand Republic nor the Commonwealth would hold their fire for one of us.”
“Lame duck!” Warren said with a snap of his fingers as the term came to him. “They’re performing lame duck maneuvers. The damage. They can’t transmit. They’re showing us they aren’t a threat. And furthermore, we’re not the Republic or the Commonwealth. It’s the whole reason we’re doing this. We’re better than either side.”
“The pilot wants to surrender,” Curet realized first. “They’re headed for the hangar. There’s nowhere else to land in the vicinity, unless they fly over the mountain. That would be suicide, so they must be doing what Warren said.”
Cooper spoke up, sounding less than pleased. “Are you sure?”
“If I’m wrong, Curet will vaporize them,” Warren told him.
“Yes,” Curet agreed. “Yes, I will. Holding fire.”
“Then let them in,” Warren said before adding his head of security to the channel. “Lukov, get to the hangar. The ship is going to come in. Secure the vessel, it’s pilot, and its crew. When you have the personnel isolated, find their leader and bring them to the warehouse. I want to have a little talk with them.”
20
Warren studied the mid-sized ship sitting in the hangar. It was a damn miracle it made it this far. Pieces were falling off and the vessel didn’t look like it would be taking off again anytime soon. No one had exited yet, but his HUD had detected movement.
“Lukov, where’s the survivor from the spy room?” he asked.
“I’m interrogating her now,” he said. “So far—nothing. She is Commonwealth, but that is all I know.”
Warren didn’t want to think about how the cyborg might be interrogating his prisoner but was sure he’d get something out of it.
“I’ve got one exiting the craft,” Cooper said. “Male, and the gear looks Republic. Walking out hands raised.”
That may have been the case, but Warren wasn’t going to take chances. “I’m going to head him off. Let’s scan the pilot and ship,” he instructed.
“For what?”
“Biological weapons, bombs, things like that?”
Cooper didn’t answer right away, presumably attempting the scan. “I don’t think these scanners work that way. Compared to some of the stuff we have, this tech is like a high-speed periscope.”
Warren bit back a curse. “Fine. I’m going to check the pilot out personally before they let him any further.”
The pilot stood rooted in place as Warren approached with his rifle raised.
“I think they followed me,” the man said. He didn’t look well and swayed as though he would fall to the ground at any moment. His face was covered in a sheen of sweat and looked to be a sickly shade of gray.
“That’s far enough,” Warren commanded, coming to a halt. “Who followed you?”
“The machines. They’ll kill us all!” The pilot’s eyes went wide and pleading. He let out a groan and staggered forward.
Warren didn’t think it was a ploy and lowered the rifle a fraction. As the man went down on his knees, a quickly growing dark patch at his side caught Warren’s eye. He was injured.
“Get me a medic,” Warren called out over the public comm as the pilot slumped forward.
“I have new information,” Lukov reported as a team of medicals took the man away on a stretcher. “The spy speaks freely now. She provided the frequencies used for speaking with her partner in the colony. Have monitored network, but it has gone dark and secret.”
“Keep at it,” Warren said. “But make sure no civilians see what you’re up to. They’re nervous enough as it is.”
Lukov laughed. “Because Lukov is Spetsnaz I must doing some terrible thing? Come, look, see for yourself.”
He began transmitting what he was looking at to Warren, who braced himself for what he was about to see. There was a woman sitting in a chair in front of Lukov. She’d been crying—ugly crying—but there was no blood. Her face was red, and her thick black hair was sticking to her face, but there were no obvious signs of harm.
“Yeah, well,” Warren started.
“Have been trained to interrogate prisoners to make them do the speaking and talking. It is professional—no killing, no bamboo under nails, no electrodes clamped to the sensitive things. Trust me. Torture is not so good for gain reliable information. Person say whatever you tell to say for to make it stop. No, she will tell the truth. Also, I can tell when person tells lie. Our cyborg touch is very sensitive. I touch her wrist, can detect heart rate, sweating, and temperature. Can s
ee respiration rate. She is afraid because she think I can read mind, maybe magic or sorcery.”
Warren laughed, drawing the attention of several civilians standing nearby. He sent his response as a text message.
CARRY ON
The minor mistake was a reminder for Warren that he didn’t know nearly as much as he thought he did. Then again, he didn’t know what had been lost over the last few hundred years.
A new realization hit him. He’d been so busy he hadn’t even thought about it in a while. He still hadn’t backed himself up. He switched to the all-cyborg channel and transmitted. “I need Saul Hendrose to me.”
A moment later, another cyborg replied. “He’s on his way. He was on the other side of the hangar.”
Sure enough, one figure broke from a group and started across the hanger toward Warren. He arrived thirty seconds later, then he placed his hands on his knees and tried to catch his breath.
“Got here... fast as I could,” he gasped.
“I need to be backed up,” Warren said. “How long does it take?”
Hendrose gave him a confused expression. “Something wrong?”
“Only that if I don’t get backed up now, I won’t remember any of this when I’m restored. That’s a pretty serious problem, I’d say. There’s no way I’d believe any of this if my memory got wiped due to sabotage or battle. So I’ll ask again: how long does it take?”
“About ten minutes,” he replied. “Has to be done on the ship. We don’t have anything like that out here.”
“Can a copy of my memories be made on one of those data cubes?”
“Yeah, we have some onboard. You want an off-site backup, just in case?”
“Yeah,” Warren said. He didn’t want to have to tiptoe around because he was afraid of losing his memories.
“We can do it now, if you like.”
“Craig,” Warren said over a private channel. “Hendrose and I are coming aboard. I’m going to back up my memories, just in case. You want in on this?”
The line was silent long enough that Warren thought about repeating the question.
“Yeah,” Craig said, finally. “If something happens, I’d like to come right back here. This is nice.”
Neither the words nor tone sounded right for Craig. He sounded dreamy—not himself. Maybe it’s a good thing? No, he couldn’t convince himself of it. Something was definitely wrong.
Warren and Hendrose took the cargo shuttle up. They got into the elevator without incident. Hendrose babbled on about something, but Warren ignored him. He was thinking about war. Countless wars. Unending war.
People had been fighting since the dawn of time. When the first human picked up a stick or a rock and smacked another with it, retaliation was inevitable. From there, the family—most likely—of either side joined the fight. Whether it was retribution, a warning against future attacks, or what, war became the final result.
When the doors opened. Craig was waiting a meter down the hallway. “You remember doing this last time?” he asked.
“No,” Warren said, joining him in the hallway. “There are a lot of things I don’t remember.”
Craig nodded and removed his helmet. He was smiling. Warren removed his helmet as well and plastered on a serene expression.
“Lead the way,” he said.
Hendrose stepped out in front, glanced at both of them with a quizzical eye, and said, “This way.”
Craig waited for Warren to pass before he started following. Warren focused on the sounds around him. He listened for any sign of betrayal. A weapon powering up. A knife being drawn from its sheath. Rapid movement of Craig’s feet.
They got to the infirmary without incident.
“Who wants to go first?” Hendrose asked. “It doesn’t matter to the backup unit, so it’s up to you two, but I can only do it one at a time.”
“Craig, you go first,” Warren said. “Let’s catch you in your happy place.”
The other cyborg nodded and stepped into a man-sized hemispherical alcove on the wall. Hendrose brought a tablet close, tapped a few commands, and watched as Craig’s eyes closed like he was falling asleep.
“Setting parallel synchronization,” Hendrose mumbled to himself as a low thrumming sound started to fill the room. “Aligning... aligning... ah, there it is. Initiating copy.” With a final stab of his finger, he turned to Warren.
“Easy as that,” he said with a smile. “Right now, the computer’s examining his brain to make sure everything looks right. Then it’ll take a snapshot—just a quick picture of what the brain looks like for future reference and identification.
“You see, no two people’s brains are the same. However, no matter what a person’s been through, his brain stays, more or less, the same. By identifying the person, based on their brain structure and knowledge, the computer can ensure the correct person’s backup makes it to the correct file. It’s all basic stuff these days.
“Does that have anything to do with why there aren’t two Craigs or two of me?” Warren asked.
“Yes!” Hendrose said, obviously excited by the prospect of teaching someone something he knew a lot about. “War computers—this isn’t a war computer, it’s a completely separate system—but war computers send signals based on the person, not some kind of code or something. Codes can be hacked. Could you imagine what would happen if someone was able to convince a war computer that every single one of the cyborgs it was managing were the same one?”
“Fill me in,” Warren said. “What happens if there are two Warrens on the battlefield, or if the computer thinks there are?”
“Bedlam, death, destruction, all the above,” Hendrose said. “You don’t remember this part, either?”
“Would it surprise you to know I don’t?”
Hendrose was quiet for a moment. “Sorry,” he said. “I forget sometimes. Not like you, but you know, I forget. Your situation is kind of unique. So, yeah, it would be bad. The computer tracks each cyborg by interfacing with its compulsion chip, which in turn is marked with a unique identifier.”
“The cyborg’s memories?”
“Exactly!” Hendrose said with a snap of his fingers. “So, if the war computer can’t tell which one is right because the memories have been loaded into two biologicals, it’s got to try to send signals to both. Each compulsion chip would try to do what the war computer said. But if you’ve got two cyborgs, one facing West, the other East, is there any simple command both could receive to move to a specific location?”
“Could the war computer just say to move from here to there?” Warren asked.
“Not after the compulsion chip has taken control. Every step—every movement—is controlled. Lift arm. Turn twenty-degrees to the left. Look at that thing. Squeeze trigger. All of it—things you and I do every day—has to be controlled. That’s why the Republic still uses biologicals. Nothing compares to the human brain. Nothing.”
“Damn,” Warren whispered.
“Yeah, it’s too bad,” Hendrose said. “Imagine if we could have a couple hundred of you.”
“Why can’t we?” Warren asked.
“We could, if you’re willing to kiss the war computer goodbye. But that means no more backups, instant communications—nothing that would actually help us. Sure, you’d still be a badass, but you’d be a badass with an expiration date. Plus, there’s the problem of divergence. You are you only because you experience what you experience. Eventually, one of your copies would decide he didn’t like the others. Then you’re fighting you. Can’t be good for the psyche.”
“So, if we turned our war computer against another corps, we could disable them?”
“No, but I like your thinking,” the tech replied. “Their war computer would need to be destroyed for ours to take over. If that happened, we could control them all, force them to surrender, things like that.”
“Or make them all commit suicide.”
“Lucky for them, we’re neither the Republic nor the Commonwealth, right? We’ve g
ot standards. It’s the only thing that sets us apart.”
“And by setting us apart, it makes us attractive,” Warren concluded.
Hendrose stepped a little closer and stared intently into the cyborg’s eyes. “It’s also what makes you more human than most of the Republic’s leadership. Don’t forget that.”
“Oh, he’s almost done,” Hendrose added, lifting a finger to his lips.
“Ahhh,” Craig uttered. “That’s the closest thing to a nap any of us ever get. Trust me, you’ll love it.”
Warren couldn’t help but smile at the man’s frankness and happy demeanor. “I guess we’ll see.” He stepped into the alcove as Hendrose tapped commands into his tablet.
“Just relax,” the tech said.
Warren was about to ask what he needed to relax for when the world, the universe, and everything in it disappeared.
Warren found himself standing in a field of pixels. They were unevenly spaced, green, and still a flat plane against the black backdrop of eternity.
He reached out to touch one. It moved a little, then slowly floated back into place.
This is me, he realized. Everything I know, remember, and have ever learned.
IMAGE PROCESSING: 2%
He thought about the last time he’d been connected to a computer. He’d seen his old memories. Sort of. They were stored somewhere just out of reach. He’d wanted to know what they contained. Maybe some of his 400-year missing history, or notes he’d left for himself—clues to things he’d discovered during the testing he volunteered for. It could be anything.
IMAGE PROCESSING: 28%
He studied his environment. This was him, but his memories were being stored within the war computer. Where was the connection? He studied the pixels, trying to make sense of what he was seeing.
RELAX YOU ARE SLOWING THE PROCESS
It was Hendrose. Apparently, Warren’s stress was causing some trouble. He formed a thought and sent it to the tech.