Proxima Centauri - Hunt for the Lost AIs (Aeon 14: Enfield Genesis Book 2)

by M. D. Cooper

  That was invitation enough for her. She entered the room.

  “Do you want to talk about it?” She voiced the question softly as she walked over to where his frame stood, staring down at something.

  As she neared, she realized that it was an immutable crystal storage data cube sitting on the surface in front of him.

  For the longest moment, she thought he would refuse to answer.

  * * * * *

  Calista’s voice broke into his reverie, and he recoiled at the sound.

  No, he cried sharply within his own mind. Go away! Leave me to grieve.

  Hers was an intrusion he didn’t want, hadn’t asked for. Yet Logan knew this was a human Landon had respected; he also knew his brother would not have wished him to shut his teammates out.

  Logan picked up Landon’s ICS cube, rotating it carefully in his hands. He glanced over at Calista. “He signed a DNR.” The AI’s voice sounded rusty. How could an artificially generated voice sound so…unused? And yet it did.

  The Enfield pilot recoiled as if she’d been slapped. “A…DNR? Do not restore? I…do AIs even have such things?” Her voice sounded confused. She nodded toward the cube. “Does that mean what I think it means?”

  Logan paused to recenter himself as he observed Calista’s reaction. “Landon and I had a fallback we used.” He held the cube carefully, as if it might fracture at any moment. “Whenever we thought we might be going into a dangerous situation, we would take the time to create a backup image of ourselves, in immutable crystal storage. It was something Landon began doing decades ago, to keep me from losing my sanity.”

  “But then, why—” Calista abruptly cut off her next words, looking confused and a little shocked.

  He glanced down at the ICS cube in his hands and realized that what he’d just said made Landon out to be a bit of a heartless bastard—leaving an ICS cube behind, yet filing a DNR to nullify it.

  Until that moment, he hadn’t realized how much it had bothered him as well.

  He knew Landon had instructions filed with the ESF to reanimate him using his most recent backup in ICS, should he fall in the line of duty. He paused as a thought hit him.

  If an AI fell in the line of duty, normally, that would terminate his service to the military, and he would be posthumously discharged with full honors and the thanks of a grateful planet.

  Landon had been discharged early; his tour of duty should have lasted another few years, but he’d never alluded to why it had been cut short. Had he…had something happened to his twin that Landon had never shared with him?

  It's one more thing I will never have the answer to, he thought to himself bitterly.

  * * * * *

  After her brief, shocked outburst, Calista remained silent, waiting for Logan to explain what his cryptic comment had meant. Losing his sanity? What did that mean? She mentally urged Logan to continue his train of thought. Finally, her patience was rewarded.

  “My tour of duty was a bit unusual,” the AI began, choosing to ignore her truncated question and instead expound on the reason for the cube. “I was stationed at the heliosphere for many years, and Landon…well, he kept me sane.” His frame shifted slightly, as if the memories were uncomfortable ones.

  At the heliosphere?

  To her knowledge the ESF had no deployments out that far. Unless….

  No, it couldn’t be. Could it?

  “He…was stationed with you?” she prodded, her voice neutral and her eyes searching.

  “At first he was,” Logan replied haltingly. “But then he was recalled, and I…wasn’t. Not for decades.”

  Calista drew in a sharp breath. She’d heard that sensory deprivation could drive an AI insane.

  Logan nodded, as if he could guess the direction her thoughts had gone. “Landon accrued fifteen days of leave every six months. He burned ten of it traveling out and back.” The AI made a noise that sounded a bit like a short laugh. “He bought an old ore hauler. It was a pile of junk, but its fusion drive had been recently tuned, and that was all Landon cared about—a means to transit one hundred AU as fast as possible.”

  Calista's suspicions were beginning to crystallize into certainty. The Mendoza case was heavily redacted, much of it classified, but she’d bet good credits that Landon and Logan’s names factored heavily in the originals.

  “How many trips did he make before you were rescued?” she asked, her voice breaking the silence that had fallen between them.

  “Fifty-two.”

  Stars. Twenty-six years. Her eyes burned with unshed tears at the thought of a brother who had loved enough to never give up. She reached out and laid a hand on Logan’s arm and gave it a gentle squeeze.

  “Time flows differently for AIs, Calista,” the AI reminded her. “We lived centuries in the few days his leave allowed. He gave me enough memories to last during the long stretches of silence. The lengths he went to, the effort, his sheer tenacity—if he wouldn't give up on me, how could I do any less?”

  “You said you were stationed at the heliopause,” Calista began, choosing her words carefully, “I suspect that he would have a reason to hide his actions?”

  Logan made a rude noise. “If you are suggesting that we were part of the Mendoza scandal, then yes. You'd be correct. Landon was very careful about his approach. He calculated his optimum velocity so that once he was past Rigel K’s dust belt, he could go EM silent from there.”

  Calista nodded thoughtfully. “Then I'd imagine he could time his braking burn to coordinate with the eclipse of one of the larger asteroids so that it would obscure his activity.”

  “Yes. He didn't need to be physically on site. In fact, it was better that he wasn't, since any docking activity would have been reported back. Landon came just near enough to open an Expanse for me.” Logan paused a beat, then added, “It was enough.”

  They sat in silence for several minutes until finally, Calista couldn't stand it any longer; she had to know.

  “You mentioned Mendoza. Did you mean that Mendoza? The general? The trial?”

  Rather than respond to her question, Logan turned and stared at her, meeting her eyes for the first time.

  “Landon was the whistle-blower, wasn’t he?” she breathed. “Stars, Logan. I had no idea.”

  The AI inclined his head.

  Calista shuddered mentally. They’d all heard the story, she and her peers in OCS. It was a cautionary tale the ESF used as an example of why an officer should never ever allow such power to go to her head.

  Mendoza’s military tribunal had been very public and, thanks to testimony that had been largely redacted, very damning.

  Now Calista knew why.

  “Landon worked for years to find an advocate within the Space Force brave enough to bring General Mendoza up on charges before the Office of Chief Military Judge,” Logan said. “He finally succeeded, and you know the outcome.”

  “A full court martial.”

  Logan nodded. “After years of transit between the ring and the derelict station at the heliopause I had been permanently sealed within, Landon made one final trip. He brought a team with him,” the AI said. “They had been assigned by a board of inquiry to gather evidence.”

  Calista was willing to bet that Landon hadn’t cared one whit about the evidence. It was merely the means by which he managed to finally bring his brother home.

  Once the story had been told, silence settled between the two, AI and human. After a few minutes, Calista cleared her throat, paused to gather her thoughts, and then spoke.

  “So this…data cube,” she said softly, tilting her head to indicate the ICS cube curled protectively between Logan’s hands, “is Landon. And you’ve had it all these months?”

  He nodded.

  “And inside that cube is the brother you knew, minus…what? A few days?”

  Logan shook his head. “Not even that. Backups became habit for us, routine. I checked; Landon did a backup on the Sable Wind en route from Krait as soon as I received the da
ta burst from Lysander about Prime. We knew from that transmission that Landon might be placing himself in harm’s way when he deployed to protect Judith, while I…” His voice trailed off, leaving Calista to wonder what Logan’s instructions had been on that day.

  “And the DNR? When was that dated?”

  Logan looked up at that, startled, she supposed, by the direction her questions had taken. He looked back down at the cube, the thumb of one humanoid hand brushing against the top of it.

  “It’s dated…an hour before he was killed. It was uploaded from one of the university’s nodes and annotated to the personnel file that vice-marshal Esther keeps on record at Enfield Holdings.”

  Calista paused, pursing her lips as she sat back in thought. “Forgive me if what I’m about to say brings up fresh wounds, but, Logan…the way Landon was killed. Is it possible Prime uploaded that DNR as some twisted means to strike out at the ones hunting him?”

  She gestured to the cube. “You said yourself that the cube was found untouched, back at headquarters. There’s no way Prime could access it there, so is it possible he did the next best thing, to ensure the erasure of anything Landon might have possibly uploaded during his time at the university that might finger him?”

  Slowly, Logan’s head rose. He glanced at her, his face inscrutable.

  After a moment, he nodded thoughtfully. “Thank you, Major,” the AI addressed her formally now, using her former rank. “You’ve given me much to consider.”

  * * * * *

  As Calista left Logan, she sought out Jason’s location and found that the pilot was once again inside the ship’s greenspace. She’d be willing to bet she would find him on his hands and knees again, digging in the dirt. She’d discovered weeks ago that he and Tobi often made use of the ship’s greenspace in their off hours. The cat would roll in the dirt, race along shaded gravel paths, or attempt to sharpen her claws on one of the area’s few trees.

  An irate Shannon had quickly brought that to an end when she’d discovered long gashes in the bark of one of her favorite trees. Soon after, plas sheeting had appeared around each trunk, and a fake tree stump had been installed that provided the large cat with an acceptable alternative.

  As she neared the greenspace’s entrance, and the doors slid open, she drew in a deep breath, savoring the crispness of the air. Nowhere else did the environment smell as fresh. An entire level of the ship had been dedicated to this space; it was as close to planetary—or ring—life as one could get while in transit. Part hydroponics bay and part park, it was a favorite spot for many onboard.

  She turned down a path that led past an herbal hydroponics section Marta had installed. Medicinal herbs were a hobby of hers, and this small area was an addition the doctor had lobbied for while still in drydock, explaining that the plants would benefit the ship’s human crew.

  Calista didn’t know the first thing about herbs, but some of them smelled nice, so she made it a point to walk past this section when she came in. Marta looked up as Calista approached, and waved as she stripped off her gloves and set them aside.

  “More seedlings?” she smiled at the doctor, who nodded and smiled back.

  “Yes, lavender and rosemary.” She gave a little shrug. “Not much need for it when mednano can relieve sore muscles, but sometimes an aromatic is a more enjoyable way to recover from a workout,” she admitted as she sealed the cover over the seedlings and began to gather up her things.

  Calista laughed. “I suppose that’s true. Especially if you have someone around to apply it with a nice, therapeutic massage.”

  The doctor grinned and gave her a little wink. “Got it in one.” She laughed and then waved goodbye as she headed for the door.

  Calista continued past the hydroponics section into the vegetable garden, where she mentally congratulated herself on guessing correctly. Jason was indeed on his hands and knees, playing in the dirt. It looked like he was forming mounds of soil and packing them loosely around the base of a few tallish green plants.

  He glanced up when he heard the gravel crunching underneath her ship boots. Setting aside the tool he’d been using to dig, he rocked back on his heels and quirked a half-smile at her. “Don’t forget to wipe your soles before you leave,” he said by way of greeting.

  Inwardly, she winced.

  It had been a mere week after they’d launched when Shannon had first caught her transgressing in that regard, and the AI had refused to let her forget it. Shannon was a fanatic about keeping the ship clear of anything that might interfere with her equipment, and the last time Calista had forgotten, the AI had treated her to a dressing-down that hearkened back to her academy days.

  “Duly noted,” she responded with a wry smile. “I’ve set a reminder so I won’t forget this time.”

  Jason snorted in amusement and rose, dusting the gravel off his knees as he stood back to inspect his handiwork.

  “Vegetable?” she asked, leaning forward to get a closer look. She was hopeless when it came to growing things, and knew next to nothing about plant life.

  Jason nodded. “Tomatoes, interspersed with basil. It’s an herb,” he explained as she looked up at him. “Very good combination, trust me on that. Nice and flavorful, which is what you want in this kind of shipboard atmo.”

  Calista could get behind that. She knew well the impact of higher altitude and lower humidity atmospheres on the flavor of foods. “Hypoxic stress-related hedonics,” she said now, referring to the changes in taste intensity humans experienced under these conditions.

  Jason nodded, although his lips twitched, and she suspected he was resisting the urge to tease her about something.

  She shrugged. “All I know is that our in-ship MREs sucked, and green, growing things create breathable air—at least in here,” she hurried to add when she saw the glint in Jason’s eye.

  He snorted again. “Glad you added that qualifier, ESF, or I would’ve had to wonder what Enfield saw in an ex-vacuum jockey to give her command over their whole technical development division.”

  Calista shot him a glare as she turned and headed for a nearby bench. “Plants do generate oxygen, Andrews.” She grudgingly added, “just not nearly enough to sustain even the small number of humans we currently have, let alone a full crew complement.” At Jason’s skeptical look, she burst out, “What? Has Shannon been over-sharing again?”

  She tilted her head up to the nearest sensor pickup and glared at it. “I know you’re listening, Shannon. That stupid incident was years ago, and how was I to know that stuff about plants and ship’s atmospheres anyway? I’m a pilot—of teensy fighter ships, need I remind you. I’m not an engineer. But it’s not like I’m a backwoods Proxima freight hauler, who lived and breathed massive amounts of canned air for years, out in the black.” She lightly punched Jason’s shoulder as she emphasized the word ‘massive’.

  “Well, you should have known,” came the tart reply over the greenspace’s speakers. “And don’t forget to wipe your feet before you leave.”

  Jason snickered as he saluted the room’s sensor pickups, and then took a seat on the bench. “So, what’s up?”

  Calista sobered as she joined him on the bench.

  “I just ran into Logan,” she began, and Jason turned his head, one brow quirked in inquiry.

  “He’s been quieter than usual since we departed,” he murmured, and she nodded.

  They sat for a moment in silence, both buried in their own thoughts of the events that had led up to their hasty departure.

  “How’s he doing?” Jason asked finally.

  She sighed. “About as well as expected, given the circumstances,” she admitted. “But I hope what just happened may mean he’s willing to work through his grief, rather than holding it in and keeping himself shut off from the rest of us.”

  “What did just happen?” Jason leaned back, draping his arms along the back of the bench as he turned slightly to look at her.

  “Have you ever heard of an ESF general named Mendoza?”r />
  When Jason shook his head, she launched into the tale Logan had shared with her. The more the story unfolded, the higher Jason’s brows rose.

  “And he has Landon’s ICS cube, here with him on the ship?” he asked when she’d finished.

  She nodded.

  He lowered his head in thought, then after a pause, looked sideways at her. “Think he’ll do it? Reanimate Landon?”

  She returned his look solemnly. “For his sake, I hope so.”

  “Yeah. I miss the guy, too.” Jason frowned. “I can’t help but think that he’d still be alive, if only I’d been there.”

  Calista shook her head. “You can’t know that. It’s obvious that Prime was already somewhere on campus. He must have seen Landon escorting Ethan and Judith to that lab before he managed to breach that back wall.”

  She leaned forward, the better to make eye contact with him. “Judith told you how long the two of them had been in there, sorting through material to ship back to Proxima. They were damned lucky Landon checked in on them when he did—or else it would have been Judith who died, instead of Landon and Ethan.”

  She saw Jason suck in a deep breath of air as he nodded. “Yeah. It bugs me, though, that Judith has no memory of the attack. All we have is ballistics from the railgun fire that was exchanged…and Landon’s shredded frame.”

  “Well,” she said lightly as she gently nudged him in the shoulder. “They’re both here with us, safely out of Prime’s reach. It’s Lysander’s problem now, not ours.”

  Jason shoved back, and then slipped an arm around her waist.

  “You’re all right for one of those military stiffs, ESF. You know that?” He turned to face her, one side of his mouth kicking up into a lazy smile as his eyes drifted down to focus on her lips.

  she sent privately.

 

 

 

  * * * * *