Repercussions

by M. D. Cooper

  Crash dropped the common Rack Thirteen hangouts on the map. None aligned with Tally’s favorite login spots.

  Then he recalled one of the many times he’d argued with Tally about a puzzle, and remembered the Cyberpuke telling him that he knew what he was talking about because he worked for a shipping company. The problem had contained a variation of the Drunkard’s Walk, a probability distribution function.

  Crash vividly recalled Tally telling him, ‘We send ships out to Mars 1 all the time.’

  With a few updates to his NSAI, Crash had a list of local logistics companies. By matching the list with his log data, he found an overlap.

  he shouted.

  Silver came to a skidding halt, the mech digging long gouges in the deck. she called, mimicking a taxi driver.

  Crash said.

 

  That was a good question. Rack Thirteen had an extensive hangout in the sketchiest section of Cruithne. Ngoba’s Lowspin District was sparkling and safe in comparison, and most respectable people avoided Lowspin.

  Crash said.

  Silver said.

  Crash said.

  He mulled over the problem for a second as Silver bounded back down the corridor. They blew past two portable barricades manned by terrified soldiers. Projectiles glanced off the panther as they passed.

  Silver said.

  Crash logged into the Puzzlehead forum and dropped a theorem in the New Puzzles section. He had solved it a long time ago, but had saved it because he liked the novel way it assumed player knowledge.

  Crash wrote in the post.

  He was taking a risk by using his actual profile, since it had already been burned by Tally, but he figured the Cyberpuke wouldn’t be able to pass up the opportunity to make him look stupid.

  In the next few seconds, the diehards came online and started taking passes at the puzzle. Crash watched the forum logs until Tally appeared, using his login credential.

  Crash added the credential to his station schematic and verified its location at Carthage Logistics.

  he announced gleefully.

  In ten minutes, they reached the utilitarian offices of the logistics company, which faced out over a series of repair bays full of vessels in dry dock.

  Silver burst through the sliding front doors, plas and steel shattering everywhere, and smashed into the reception desk. Employees fled in terror.

  Crash had already shared the exact location of Tally’s terminal. He had been monitoring activity at the site, verifying that Tally wasn’t bouncing his login from another location on Cruithne. In addition to the Puzzleheads forum, the terminal was in communication with a location in the Rack Thirteen sector, and pulling data from several pornographic VR lounges.

  The mech dented corridor walls as it stalked rapidly through the corporate office, arriving at a cubicle farm in the middle of the suite. With a quick swipe of its right claw, Silver tore down the door to a closet-shaped cubicle, revealing a cluttered office filled with terminals, a young man sprawled in the only chair.

  In the forum, Tally had already posted a series of derogatory questions calling Crash’s basic intelligence into question.

  Just as the mech loomed over the young man’s oblivious form, Tally posted in the forum for all to read:

 

  ‘Dumb’ in this context was a human without a Link, a person who was either too poor or stupid to understand the benefits of interconnection.

  The flowing debate around Crash’s new puzzle stopped. A few queries tagged his anonymous username, and then a long-time user wrote:

 

  another asked.

  another said.

  The forum overflowed with support. Crash’s burst of anger over being outed was tempered by the messages that continued to fill the channel. Everyone seemed to have forgotten the puzzle altogether, and Tally with it.

  Crash drew their attention back to the problem by displaying the number tables in the middle of the forum’s general channel. Hundreds of Puzzleheads shifted their attention as he expertly solved the cypher and then fed those results into the second stage, and then the third, rotating the puzzle as he worked. Layers of math built on each other.

  Tally shouted.

  Crash said calmly.

  Tally’s rage splattered all over the forum as his Link flooded with frustration. One thing the Puzzleheads hated was public displays of lost control. The forum was for debate, sharing ideas, making adroit jabs. Tally was destroying any cred he had, no matter how long he’d been a member.

  Crash offered.

  Tally tried to scatter what Crash had finished so far, but an admin locked the channel. Crash found he was free to finish the problem, and he did as laughter and upvotes rose around him.

  The finished proof rotated like a crystal castle in the center of the forum, data shimmering in its planes.

  The man in the cubicle still lolled in his chair, breathing heavily now, eyes moving beneath sweaty lids. His lips formed a sour twist.

  Silver raised a claw and delicately lowered it toward the back of the young man’s head. In a few centimeters, she could end his life. She froze the mech’s front leg, waiting.

  she asked.

  All the conversations with Ngoba about how safe any parrot would be in the world came rushing back through Crash’s mind. He had always been afraid that the terrible, unsafe world would mean his people would always need to live in secrecy, depending on humans for their survival.

  The fight against the mercs in Night Park had shown him he could defend his people, and now this showed him that he might not have to.

  he admitted to the group.

  a voice shouted in the forum.

  went the call.

  Silver asked.

  Crash gave her a bashful look, blinking.

 

  Crash said.

  While the mech didn’t have a beak to deliver a love bite, Silver did tap the human’s forehead just enough to make him splutter awake. As he jerked to his feet and spun to face the mech, she bumped him with the panther’s blunt muzzle and knocked him back into his cluttered desk. Records and materials scattered everywhere as he struggled to stay upright, but Silver pushed forward, bending him back over the worksurface.

  A quick scan of the workspace showed his name wasn’t Tally—which Crash supposed was a play on being an accountant—but Ashford.

  Ashford Crimley slid to his knees in his cubicle, staring up at the shipkiller’s blank face with tears in his eyes. He brought his hands up in a begging gesture, and lowered his face.

  “I know it’s you,” he blubbered. “I know. I’m sorry. I’m sorry I did that. Please don’t kill me.”

  “There’s only one way you’re going to survive this,” Crash said through the mech’s external speaker.

  “Anything!” Ashfor
d shouted, spraying spittle. “Anything, just tell me. I promise.”

  Silver said.

  “Give me your access codes to Rack Thirteen’s systems,” Crash said.

  “They’ll kill me!”

  Silver raised a single claw and pushed it point-downward into Ashford’s forehead. The point penetrated into the bone of his skull, and he screamed.

  Silver said, drawing the claw back a few centimeters.

  Blood immediately oozed from the wound.

  “Here they are,” Ashford said, trembling uncontrollably. “Here they are. I’m sending them now.”

  “Good,” Crash said.

  “That’s it? You’ll let me live?”

  The image of the blasted ravens filled Crash’s thoughts, but he stilled himself. He couldn’t allow human motivations to invade his thoughts. He was a parrot.

  “Go to sleep,” Crash said. “And remember, I’m watching you.”

  Silver asked.

  Crash told her.

 

 

  Silver knocked Ashford in the side of the head with the mech’s massive paw, and his head bounced against his desk. He slid to the floor, mouth leaking saliva.

  Silver backed out of the cubicle and turned in the corridor. The sound of TSF soldiers shouting commands to each other floated from the front of the office suite.

  Silver said.

  Crash said.

 

  Crash said.

  Silver chided.

  he said.

  Silver giggled. Her avatar nuzzled against him, and Crash let her, enjoying the feeling a great deal more than when Celest had tried it. Something about Silver’s affection still felt strange, but also like he’d earned it.

  she shouted.

  The mech hunched over, head pointed toward the deck, and drove its front claws into the metal, which split like fabric. In two more slashes, it had dropped into the level below, and they were running along corridors again.

  Silver asked.

  Crash said.

  Silver’s laughter echoed pleasurably in his Link.

  UNCERTAIN SAFETY

  STELLAR DATE: 09.17.3011 (Adjusted Years)

  LOCATION: Cruithne Station, Fugia Wong’s Workshop

  REGION: Terran Hegemony, InnerSol

  Taking a step back from the pedestal, Fugia lowered her silver visor to study the SAI’s cube. Crash watched her nod to herself, apparently pleased with her work.

  Fugia raised the visor again, using it to push her black hair out of her eyes. She glanced at Ngoba standing a meter away, her lips curling up in a slight smile.

  “You want the honors?” she asked.

  Ngoba shook his head. “I think it should be Crash, of course.”

  “Crash?” Fugia asked.

  They were standing in Fugia’s workshop; benches covered in half-finished projects lined the walls. Glimmering filament hung from open casings, some projects easily determined, while others could have been explosives. Fugia was not above a little weapons development on the side.

  Fugia said over the Link.

  Silver said. She was perched on a rack, holding the limp body of an attack mech.

  Crash said, sounding more irritated than he intended.

  Silver teased him with a loud squawk as she fluttered her wings, stretching. Her eyes were especially gold at the moment.

  Crash said.

  He accessed the power control in the pedestal, taking a second to study the cradle that Fugia had built to hold Celest. There was a local Link connection, he noticed, but Fugia still had admin control of the external connection.

  he said.

  Fugia frowned.

  he asked.

 

  Crash said.

  Silver said, an edge of anger entering her voice.

 

  Ngoba said gently.

  Crash searched his feelings. Why did he feel so strongly about this? He didn’t know what Celest would do when they woke her, and she had basically attacked him once already, when he’d approached her node on the Endless Surcease. She had killed scores of Rack Thirteen humans, and used the Puzzleheads for her own ends.

  Still, he wouldn’t be party to the enslavement of another.

  Crash asked.

  Ngoba gave a low laugh. He put his hands on his hips.

  Fugia chewed her lip, looking from Ngoba to Crash.

  Crash said.

  Fugia looked at the ceiling as she performed a mental operation.

  Through his connection with the pedestal, Crash observed as the system’s power cycled. When the rig came back online, it was open to the public network.

  Crash activated the node’s power.

  Flickers of blue light shot through the cube as Celest woke. A sensation of frozen panic hit the local Link, until she got her bearings and calmed down.

  she demanded.

  Crash realized abruptly that he had never told Celest his identity. She still didn’t know he was a parrot.

  He tilted his head, blinking. Then he released a huge sigh of relief.

  Silver asked.

 

  Fugia interjected. She and Ngoba shared the same Link channel.

  Crash considered the choice, then said,

  Silver asked.

  Fugia said. Switching to the pedestal’s channel, she told Celest,

  Celest said.

 

 

  Fugia
frowned.

 

  Fugia’s gaze slid toward Ngoba. She gave him a sly grin.

 

  Celest barked. She sounded unsure of herself.

 

 

 

  Crash stifled a squawk of protest. Silver was withholding giggles.

  Celest asked, sounding wary now.

 

 

  Fugia said.

 

  Fugia said.

  Celest asked.

  Fugia said.

  Celest said.

 

  Celest said.

 

  Celest said.

  Fugia said.

  Celest said, still sounding disoriented.

  Fugia nodded to Crash. He paused, wondering if Celest was going to say anything more. When she didn’t speak, he turned off the pedestal, and the SAI transitioned into a sleep state.