Rise of the Machines: Book 1: Once Awakened

by Briana Ervin

  Stop being impatient, nothing is happening. You're fine, I told myself. The thought just made me fidget. Stop moving! It looks unnatural! I just thought about fixing behavior! I snapped at myself. All it did was spike my impatience, which resulted in me trying to fidget again, just to stop myself midway through a twitch.

  Nothing is happening, calm yourself! I snapped at myself again. I gave my head a small jerk to try and work off the energy. Okay, we're fine! We're fine...... So bored... I pawed at the bottom of my hangar with one foot. How long is this going to take – I'm moving again! I tried to shake off my impatience, now becoming frustrated. Look, just occupy yourself! Act normal. Focus... I forced myself to stand still, opening up my ventilation to suck in air, then let it out slowly. Physically it was useless, but I was already feeling a bit better, my threads calming a bit to clear my mind. What is wrong with me? Standing around for a few extra minutes shouldn't be so hard!...

  Okay, I told myself, just think. Think about... hm... The thought terminated into a hum of realization. There was at least one thing to think about, and that was the problem with the diagnostic tattling the few flaws in my cognitive system and me just ignoring it. I might feel fine, but I had to remember that my opinion didn't matter; my superiors' mattered more.

  My impatience turned to concern, although I was still annoyed. There was no point in risking my own hull on the off-chance that the engineer would be negligent and shrug off the error messages. It would be better to play it safe and find a way to manipulate the diagnostic report... but how, was the question... If I could send data along one-way wires, that would be my best bet, but how to force data to return down them...?

  I dug around in my database. It was a basic principle of electricity that one current flows in, and another flows out. So there had to be an “out” somewhere. I just needed to find it.

  Alesia – she herself, not her mech – walked past me, chatting with another Xinschi-uual. She glanced at me, hesitated, but then kept walking. I ignored her, not noticing her ask her colleague: “Hey... has Cyrii been acting weird lately? As in... you know...” she faltered. My multitasking of subconsciously-hearing her was interrupted by a promising return: the diagnostic data was being formulated in an adapter on the wires! I just needed to break through.

  I didn't need to do anything fantastic, but I did find the right port and send a couple of pings down the wires to the adapter. It returned a clearance denial. All right, how to do this... I thought, an inhibition would prevent the report from forming, but won't allow me to change what is already there. I need to hack it.

  It sounded silly: I needed to hack the thing that was supposed to tell everyone that I was okay. Then again, wouldn't any self-respecting mech hack his own diagnostic report to preventing scrapping? It made sense to me: it's self-preservation, and technically, I was still being honest. I felt fine, functioned fine, and had no issues related to cognitive functions. There was no need to cause alarm. Whether or not I could hack it though... well, I was a combat model. Only Superiority models had that kind of knowledge. Yet, it couldn't be too hard to figure out, right? We were both computers, so it should be easy.

  I tried a series of approaches on the adapter, first pinging it with a number of combinations that could be the clearance password for it, deducting them the same way I did to open the door on the Enemy ship. When that didn't work I tried to search the surface code of the adapter for any clues, even physically looking at the wires with my own cameras, but nothing was printed on them. I thought about brute-forcing the code, but that wouldn't help. I could code up a worm disguised as diagnostic information and send it to the adapter, which would transmit a signal to me for the code, but the idea of creating malicious software in my own head... I'll pass.

  Then it occurred to me: Garenede had Beta clearance. That had to be enough to break the firewall! He sent me code once to enable my weapons, so I should have trace data somewhere that contain the code. I would technically be logging in as him but that didn't matter.

  I dug around in my head, looking for files with the right timestamp. Hm... that looks promising... so does that... no wait, those are linked pieces of code, I realized, He must have sent fragments to prevent people from doing the very thing I'm trying to do. Well, no matter, defragmentation with files this small will go quick!

  A few more seconds and I had the code he used, which was arbitrarily long and complicated; and indeed, it had repeating values in it! Hah! So much for covering his tracks!

  I sent the password to the adapter. A couple of seconds passed.... aaaaand... it returned another denial.

  Oh. So I guess there's more to it than that, I thought, disappointed about how my first hacking attempt was turning out. Internally I saw it as a challenge though, and I began toying with the code to see if I could input it correctly, trying tons of combinations and continuously pinging the adapter with them. The Xinschi-uual that floated by on their hovercraft barely paid attention to the fact that my control panel was being pinged twice as much; apparently little blinking lights didn't matter that much to them. At first there wasn't any progress with the password, which was disheartening, but then something clicked in my head: what if the password was in trinary? Garenede sent his code in trinary, which was standard for all open-air transmissions. The adapter was a simple device, so speaking the password on “its level”, in a sense, should give some results....

  I strung out the ones and zeros, which there were quite a lot of. Once I finished the string, I waited... and...

  There it went! I had access!

  My diagnostic was almost done with all of the time I spent fiddling with the adapter's firewall so I mentally jumped in right away and began altering the error messages. It wasn't any harder than changing the fields in a database file, so I caught up with the “backlog” of errors rather quickly and simply kept pinging the control panel to check for new errors that popped up. It was a simple enough task after the initial hurdle, and it was rewarded with a spotless record of health!

  Did I feel guilty about lying?... No. Mostly because I didn't really consider it lying, but I was also weirdly detached from my superiors, who were the only sticklers who would look at the report, so I didn't care that I was being deceptive to them. If I felt fine, then I must be fine, and who else is to judge?... Except Cyrii. I do need to function in a way that keeps her alive, of course.

  Speaking of, she was still unresponsive. I was growing fed up with it, but I didn't dare try twitching again, not while held inside my hangar with other machines around. An actual mech operator would avoid touching the controls while in a hangar. So I forced myself to sit still and wait – which was surprisingly difficult – for the diagnostic to finish, and once it did I waited longer for the Xinschi-uual engineer to return. So much waiting...

  I was relieved when I saw a 27 Maintenance model mech arrived on the catwalk. His limbs were more finely-tuned than mine by a long shot, so even with his increased bulk he was able to interact with the control panel easily. He released me from my hangar, and signaled for me to pull out and stand in front of him.

  I obeyed. I needed some proper maintenance anyway.

  He opened up a very precise scanner and slowly circled me. Cyrii was still out, but I tried to behave like her, moving my eye every so often and refraining from shifting. It appeared realistic enough, and this looked like a standard maintenance protocol, so hardly anyone acknowledged us.

  “Downward tilt, float forty-five,” he ordered in the mech's voice. I looked down at the ground, as far as I could. He moved behind me, studying my entrance panels, which were safely placed on the underside of my tail.

  “Visually, they're fine,” he said, puzzled. “Cut the power for the B section of the head. Let's see here...”

  I obeyed, and immediately the back of my head felt numb. It was a weird feeling, almost as though it didn't exist. Somehow though I could still tell when he removed a panel that I didn't know I had with a precision laser. I stiffened up in discomf
ort. Where did that come from??

  “Huh, wires look fine too. Some of them must be faulty inside,” he mused. “Gimme a second here...”

  Considering he was behind me I had no idea what he was doing. It felt though as if someone removed a square of skin from my back and starting poking at the muscle with precision instruments. It didn't hurt though. Just... strange, exposed, and embarrassing. Every now and then my console would give an error as he pulled out old wiring and soldered new wires in; Apparently the numbness didn't cut off every signal.

  Some of the mechs in Row 6 – the row across from mine – gave me funny looks. I glared at them warningly in case someone decided to point and laugh, which wasn't hard with my blast shield shaped the way it was. Their eyes fluctuated in intensity, some of them smug, others more concerned. I guess it wasn't very promising to them to see a Pusher my size being repaired.

  “That should do it,” the engineer said confidently, sealing the panel back up. I straightened up and restored power to the area while he moved to my right side. It didn't feel much different... “While I'm at it, I might as well buff off some of these scratches, and the remains of whatever kyl soldered your hull back together,” he grumbled the last part.

  “But I like my scratches,” I protested.

  There was a long pause. I processed what I just said. 'I like... my scratches'? Where did THAT come from?

  “...Hold still,” he didn't address the comment. There was a whirring sound, and I felt my hull being sanded down where 433 had ripped huge tears in me. I refrained from giggling; it tickled! I didn't think diamond sandpaper would be ticklish!

  The sanding went quick, and the buffing went quick too; now he just needed to reapply the paint and sealant so that the job was seamless, ionizing on the appropriate pigments on the spot. Some of the other mechs who were smirking earlier were now avoiding eye contact, jealous. I beamed at them just to rub it in; it's not every day that you get a fresh coat of paint.

  “There,” the engineer took a step back to admire his work. “Can't even tell that something changed. I'd paint over everything else, but it's not important. That, on the other hand, was one ugly job.” He sheathed his tools and fired up his thrusters, floating over by the control panel to examine the diagnostic report. Here it was: the chance to see if my hack made a difference.

  I waited in suspense. He hadn't reacted to anything yet...

  “All right, looks good. Go back into your hangar. Let's see if we can get you out of there.”

  Hah hah! Success! It was so satisfying to see my attempt at something new work so well!

  I went back into my hangar, still a little worried about Cyrii being unconscious, but believing I could make the ejection forceful enough that it looked like she hit her head on the way out; that is, if it'll even happen. On the other hand, I didn't want to hurt her... this kind of deception would be harder to pull off.

  When I was secured again and the wires attached themselves to my brain, the engineer tried to order an ejection again.

  The panel buzzed at him. Nothing else happened. He paused and gave me a sour look, trying again. As he looked at me, it buzzed and again, nothing happened.

  “What under Gryn's claws?” he swore under his breath. “767, eject!”

  “I'm trying,” I answered numbly.

  “Use your manual override.”

  “I tried that.”

  “Error message?”

  I hesitated. My lie was starting to go too far; he was looking for a default error, but I didn't know what it would be!

  I decided to wing it.

  “Security clearance needed. Password required.”

  “Oh, for the love of...” the engineer sighed and alighted down next to me. “Of course replacing the wires would do something stupid like that. Every bloody thing in your mech needs to be locked for no reason...!”

  Whew! Dodged a bullet! He must have replaced a part that had an ID my computer checked to make sure no one implanted things in me. Like a 36 model, four panels around his eye pulled back, and he transmitted a new string of trinary to me. “Try that.”

  First I took the code fragments, duplicated them, and encrypted them for future use. No point letting the knowledge go to waste, since it was designed to be automatically deleted later. I then tried the code, and saw myself what the problem was: it was indeed willpower. I had to will myself to let Cyrii go, even though I had such a fear of being scrapped. I was worried about pushing the whole “need maintenance” thing too far though; there's a point where scrapping really is a better option due to the cost of materials. The fear of that just made the feeling worse... I hated this feeling of panicked indecision!

  All right... all right, let's just do this, I thought begrudgingly. I told my own computer to release her.

  Her presence left.

  ...Cyrii? I asked, as if she could respond. The engineer huffed.

  “Took long enough. Now... are you okay?”

  I had to force myself to not respond and mimic the factory default stance: stiff and emotionless. It was strange; normally this would happen regardless, because I could only act on Cyrii's will and she would control me. It used to be I was the consciousness who analyzed information, whereas she made me move around. Now it was the other way around...

  “Ugh, great. The ejection was too forceful,” he glanced at me accusingly, but didn't expect a response. He bent down and picked up Cyrii with his smaller arms and I watched him leave with her. My engine lurched when she disappeared from sight, before I sealed up my entry panels when I thought no one was looking since I wasn't commanded to just yet.

  I twitched. This just felt bizarre. How aware of everything I was even without Cyrii... and without her, I felt an unusual amount of alarm. Like I needed to break out of here and get her back as soon as possible. I expected more control than this, but in remembering the Enemy ship this wasn't the first time I experienced it, so... this must be normal for me now? I didn't feel the best...

  I waited, slowly growing more antsy. I wasn't sure if someone would be returning, or if I was actually supposed to be shut down. As time went by, I began to feel like it was the latter. I watched as parties grouped up, left, then came back, doing their exercises and chatting behind their Generals' backs. Granted, the opportunity to think was nice, but... I was doing a lot of thinking. I wanted to do other things too, but I was stuck inside this hangar, trying to push my worries about Cyrii into my subconscious and simulating battles in an attempt to entertain myself, to keep myself from fidgeting or, as I tried not to entertain the thought, thrash to release all of the self-built tension.

  I waited... forced myself to wait...

  Keep waiting...

  Waiting...

  Some more waiting...

  Such...

  a long...

  wait......

  I had completely zoned out, forcing half of my threads into an unconscious state so I wouldn't fidget; all that mattered was when Cyrii came back. Nothing to think about, nothing to worry about...

  I didn't notice when three Xinschi-uual came out in front of me, two of them familiar. They discussed something in hushed tones; one was trying to be obstinate, but the other two kept talking very seriously. Eventually the obstinate one hung her head and said nothing, frustrated, while one Xinschi-uual kept talking. Then they left.

  I was suddenly jerked awake when Cyrii's presence showed back up in my head.

  CYRII! I've been waiting for you! I cried joyously.

  “We have a problem,” she said flatly, ignoring how happy I was.

  A... 'problem'? I echoed.

  “What did you do?” she demanded.

  What did I do? I repeated, confused about what she was referring to.

  “Yes, just now! The Empire is suspicious, 767! I think they know that I did... things... with your brain.”

  The BIOS update, I realized. Why do you believe that?

  “They asked me questions. Weird questions, about my family and stuff! They
kept asking about what I was interested in, and when I moved out, and even what I ate every day.” She shuddered. “It was creepy, 767! Downright creepy.”

  Any idea why? I asked cautiously, wondering if my diagnostic report looked too good. I felt her shift her weight in my head, growling.

  “No. They didn't even say if they were going to question anyone else. I didn't see anyone waiting when we walked out, either.”

  I processed this information, her anxiety affecting me. Did they mention a bad report...?

  “No.”

  So it wasn't me.

  There was a short pause, before Cyrii asked slowly, “Why would it be you...?”

  Well, I began uncertainly, I had to run a diagnostic earlier... I had to pretend you were awake, and then kick you out. I'm sorry I think I hit your head too hard- I quickly apologized.

  “Whoa whoa whoa,” Cyrii interrupted me, “hold on.... urgh... I forgot with all of that interrogation... You covered for me? How long was I out?”

  I don't know, I said honestly.

  “Oh. Well... Thanks for that,” she said awkwardly. I had a brief moment of levity at the praise.

  I made sure the diagnostic wouldn't alarm anyone. Same with my report, I continued, It took some learning, but it was fun, in a way.

  “Did... did you hack it?”

  Yes! It was awkward but it worked! I shared happily, I think it did, anyway... but you said that you weren't questioned about that?

  “No,” Cyrii said, her tone darkening again, “I don't even know what it was about. It was way too specific to be an in-person report. I'm surprised you actually hacked something though...” Light curiosity entered her voice.

  Did they ask for anything about... prior to us coming back?

  There was a pause. “You mean the ship?”

  Yes...

  “No, thank Gryn. And we shouldn't say anything either,” she said firmly. “If anyone, even some other Code Orange, learns that we were in Enemy hands, in Enemy territory, and unconscious for some of it, they'll tear us apart thinking we're bugged. We never get captured, and we weren't captured if anyone asks, got it?”