Spinward Fringe Broadcast 0: Origins

by Randolph Lalonde

At the mere thought of being asked a question, trading information for relief, hope sprang forth. I could answer anything he put forward without a single regret, Freeground Fleet Command couldn’t have foreseen us getting captured by an enemy like this so soon, I was sure, and revealing our mission wouldn't make anything worse for them. Triad already knew where I was, that there was a ship just out of their reach. “Ask.” I managed to croak.

  “Where is your ship?”

  That was the one thing I couldn't tell him. He could have asked anything else, and despite my pain I managed to roll my eyes. “Don't know,” I slurred.

  “Well, if your own pain doesn't motivate you towards having an open dialogue, perhaps we could start on Elise. At this very moment she is in the care of our best physicians, being treated to a gentle rehabilitation. A recovery that your people started, in fact. Is she frightened? A little. She knows that she's in the wrong hands, but they're caring, gentle hands regardless.”

  “Please, innocent,” I managed.

  “Ah, there it is, the real nerve. Should I have her brought in? I can arrange it! Where is your ship?”

  “Don't know. Would tell if I did,” I wailed as loudly as I could.

  He put one hand on my head and pressed down, my head felt like it was in a tightening vice. “How can you not know? You're not trying to tell me that they just left you behind? Do they have a cloaking device? Is it hiding in some chasm or cleft in a nearby moon?”

  “Don't know!”

  “You must have a retrieval code! A way to use a communicator as a beacon! A channel you can call them on that would be traceable! What is it?”

  I knew that if I were to try and contact the ship, Ayan would take it as a sign that we were too deep in custody to be rescued. Her training would tell her not to accept any communications from us, and to go deeper into hiding, run further away. “Won't work!” I managed to scream.

  He looked up to a hidden window and yelled. “Bring the girl here, it's time to show the Captain how serious we really are.”

  “Don't!”

  “Are you going to tell me how to summon your ship?”

  “Won't work! Will run!”

  The thin, bony man stopped pushing down, grabbed my hair and pulled my head back. I shouted in his face. The agony was so intense I was seeing white spots and kicking my feet. “I am getting tired of hearing; ‘I don't know!’ or ‘it won't work!’ from you and your crew! They have told us who you are, where you come from, about this misguided mission to find new technology, and still they won't tell us where your ship is! Now this girl you set out to help is about to suffer. We will reverse all the healing you have done, make her condition more painful and debilitating than ever! I swear she'll be a twisted mass of writhing flesh by the time we return her to her father and it will be your fault!”

  As he shouted in my face I had a moment of perfect clarity, a thought occurred to me; the captive had broken the jailer by doing nothing but sitting and suffering in silence. This man was too complicated to entertain the thought that none of us knew where the First Light and the rest of the crew were. There was nothing I could do about Elise, nothing I could do for my crew. I was helpless, powerless to fix anything. I was beside myself with pain, but by some freak reflex, I started to laugh. It hurt, oh hell it hurt, but I couldn't help but laugh.

  "Why are you laughing?” He screamed in my face.

  Without thinking I hopped, just an inch, just enough to get his nose between my teeth. As I squeezed my jaws together, grinding as I went, the world around me disappeared. I don't remember being knocked out, or what my interrogator's reaction was beyond his cursing and wailing.

  * * *

  The nightmare was over. At least, the part where my head felt like it was about to explode and the thin man with angular features who talked too much and was asking me what I didn't know was over. All the pain was gone except for a little tingle in the back of my neck. When I opened my eyes they confirmed what my face already knew; my head was resting on a small white pillow. I was still strapped into the chair, and my head was on the table, but there was a little pillow. That little comfort felt like the greatest luxury, and I took a moment to enjoy it.

  “Good morning Jonas,” a much deeper voice greeted. “Feeling better?”

  I realized that I felt like I had slept for a week and I did actually feel much better. There was also a little drool, so I wiped my mouth on the pillow as best as I could before sitting up. The new interrogator had a grey beard and wore a slick light blue lab coat. “Much better, thank you.” I looked down and saw there were blood stains on my jumpsuit.

  “We took care of your injuries, but we couldn't clean you up properly. I apologize. The mess you made of Major Hampon will take a bit longer to clean up.”

  “So that wasn't a dream,” I said, knowing very well it wasn't. I had trouble believing what I had done and found it more repulsive than satisfying.

  “No, it wasn't. You are a very dangerous man, but then again, when you torment any creature while it's in that much pain you can only expect the worst. Sadly, the Major did more damage to our cause than you did to his nose. His well laid plans included broadcasting your interrogation to your crew through their cell walls and it backfired. As they witnessed you bite off a substantial portion of their interrogator's nose and fight through all that pain until we could inject you with a sedative, their morale rose up. Most of them actually cheered.”

  “I've heard I can have that effect on people,” I looked at my new interrogator more carefully. He was a tall fellow, and seemed very confident; controlled but with an easy manner. If I had met him anywhere else, I got the impression that we would become fast friends. Their interrogation technique was so well put together, they used all the classic tricks and I was becoming very aware of what phase of the mind game I was being ushered into.

  “Well, as I supervised our dear Major's interrogation, which was almost flawless, by the way, I got to know your crew and their opinion of you. I have to say, I'm impressed.”

  “How is Elise?”

  "She's fine. Sleeping soundly actually. Her recovery is going very well. I just checked on her.” He brought up a holographic image between us of her sleeping comfortably in a hospital bed with high railings. “The work Major Hampon did made it quite clear that you and your crew have been left behind. There was no point in going through with his threat,” he turned off the projection.

  “How do I know that projection was real?”

  “What point would there be in harming her? What information could I gather from you that wouldn't be offered freely without harming anyone more than we already have?”

  “None.”

  “I believe you. Your crew have been very forthcoming, on your order I assume. So I couldn't see why you would withhold.”

  I sighed and nodded. “Well, in that case, what can I do for you?”

  “I just want to do a little more fact finding and get some clarification on a few things, if you don't mind. Then we can move on to other matters. From what your crew tells me, you're a very intelligent, good hearted man, so this should be quick.”

  I tried to scratch an itch on my nose by rubbing it on my shoulder, and nonchalantly replied, “I hope. And thanks, I think.” I knew I looked just a bit silly since I couldn't quite reach it, but I was trying to make a new impression.

  My new interrogator laughed and crossed the room to stand a meter away from me. “You know you can't escape. Even if you somehow managed to relieve yourself of your restraints, overpower me, there's no way out of this room. You're being watched by at least one or two of my staff from a gallery with a one way wall and the door is armoured. Even if you made it outside and past the guards, you'd only be hunted down somewhere in the hundreds of kilometres of corridors.”

  “I know, just get this itch, willya?”

  “Like night and day. You are a fascinating fellow Captain,” he said as he scratched my nose gently with two fingers. “Take away what ails you and a dif
ferent man emerges from under all that anger.”

  “Just don't start calling me Valentine. Thanks.”

  He walked to the other side of the table and sat back down. “My pleasure. I believe that you're still absolutely livid at the imprisonment and treatment of crew members, but it's good to see that anger under control. To see that while you're thinking on your feet you make even the smallest of efforts to convince me that you are just a harmless captive.”

  “No, really, thank you. My nose was really itching like crazy. I don't know what you make those pillows out of, but I'd look into possible allergens.”

  “You're welcome,” he knitted his fingers and rested his hands on the table. “My name is Marshal, and if you don't mind, I have a few questions for you.”

  “Sure, I'll tell you pretty much anything. Just don't expect me to go into great detail about middle school, that was a pretty awkward time for me.”

  “Isn't it always. Now, to start, we confiscated this from you when we brought you aboard.” He pulled my command and control console out of his coat pocket and put it between us on the table. “I'm assuming it was used as some kind of data storage and retrieval unit.”

  “Actually, it had pretty much all the information I needed to command and control the ship and a predictive file serving system that would get everything I needed ready right before I actually needed it. You should look into getting one, or you could take mine. I can get another one made once I'm back on board my ship.”

  “I think I'll pass, thank you. I find it interesting, however, that it's completely blank. We can't retrieve so much as a serial number.”

  “Data's funny that way, erase it and overwrite it with nonsense a few billion times and it's gone forever.”

  “We picked up a burst transmission between it and a nearby interceptor right before your shuttle docked. You wouldn't happen to know anything about that, would you?”

  “Actually, the predictive program was just trying to store itself somewhere else before deletion. Standard procedure.”

  Marshal watched me for a moment and smiled. “You're actually telling the truth,” he shook his head in disbelief. “So everything we need to know is actually in our own computers.”

  “Whatever do you mean?”

  “I mean the details on your ship, the rest of your crew, enough information about Freeground to learn why Triad wants it so badly.”

  “The predictive program doesn't take much data with it. Just enough to know how to get back home if it's called.”

  “That's not how the artificial intelligence we've detected is behaving. A data sorting, filing or even a predictive database reader will collect information, make copies of itself, not leave false trails and move along. What is this artificial intelligence programmed to do?”

  “It sorts the most important data pertinent to a situation to the front and presents it when necessary. It was very useful to me, maybe it's just sorting your system out.”

  “And maybe I'm just here to hold your hand. You're telling me the truth, sir, but not all of it. This artificial intelligence is leaving messages for us. It's interfering with non-essential systems when it can, and it's moving deeper into our systems. Our computer security programs are preventing it from seeing where it's going, blocking off anything essential and hunting it down, so it will only be a matter of time before we put a stop to whatever it's programmed to do. You may as well tell us all about it and save yourself some trouble.”

  I looked at him for a moment and smiled. “What message is it leaving you?”

  “It's nothing of consequence.”

  “Then why don't you tell me?”

  “You know, I will hold you and your crew accountable for anything your artificial intelligence does. It would help everyone for me to know what it's here to do.”

  Just like that, I had some control over the situation. There was only one card left to play, and I didn't know if I'd get another chance, “You're starting to sound a bit like your predecessor. Are you going to force the answers out of me? Harm the helpless to get me talking? Even if I told you what this artificial intelligence was for, it wouldn't change anything.”

  “I have a luxury you don't, Captain. Time. I can take as much time to question you as I like.”

  “What happens when you take everything away from someone? All their control over a situation, their accountability. I know full well that I'm not in control of my situation, that whatever you do to me or my crew -- even Elise -- is not my fault. You're the ones who do the damage. Harm my crew and my charge, they won't blame me in the end. My liability is gone and so is my motivation. I'm sure your superiors are happy with how things are going. They're watching right now, aren't they? I'm sure there are holorecorders scanning this entire room, our interview is being replayed life size in some boardroom and your efficiency is being graded. You've probably been groomed half your life for this kind of work, had less control over your own destiny than I have over mine now.”

  “If you plan on trying to play on my baser instincts, get some kind of irrational rise out of me, then you'll be sorely disappointed.”

  It was too late, he had already given away the general direction of the hidden main recorders. When I mentioned recording, grading, he glanced at them. He couldn't help it. That was all I needed to ensure that Alice would know that I was trying to speak directly to her. “I wonder, how much is your company willing to spend on me? What kind of return do you think you'll get even if you manage to track down my ship? Eight billion seems like a pretty low figure for a company like Vindyne to slow down for.”

  “I'll be honest with you then. We want to enter into more extended talks with the Triad Corporation. Presenting your ship, loaded with all the latest technology from Freeground, to them would be a fantastic opening to such negotiations. If you cooperate I can promise we'll speak on your crew's behalf and ask for leniency when you are presented to their court system.”

  I started leisurely looking around as though I was getting bored. “You don't have that kind of power, let's not make promises that are impossible to keep.” I looked straight at where I was sure he had glanced a few times, where I was certain the main holorecorder for the room was. “To them you may as well be daddy's little girl.” There. The trigger phrase was out, and what Alice would do with all the safeties and restrictions deleted from her programming was a mystery, but I was sure that one directive would be well served. She would try anything to get us out of this. Up until now she had only been tinkering, testing security and learning about their ship. “They just pat you on the head for doing a good job and send you on your way, or give you a good sound spanking if you don't perform as well as they need you to.”

  Marshal seemed amused and surprised at the same time. “Is that what you really think of me?” I could tell my answer wouldn't matter to him.

  “Nope, just trying to push your buttons.”

  “Well, I have something to show you, since we're talking about pushing buttons, but not today. I think we've made a lot of progress for one session, Jonas. I'm learning a great deal about you, your ship, your crew and even more about this artificial intelligence that's running around somewhere in the ship. I have a feeling that finding that program will be key to discovering the location of your vessel.”

  “They can't communicate with each other. Like I said, the program just isn't that intelligent.”

  Marshal smiled at me. “Now, now you're lying. Thank you Jonas, thank you very much. That's all I needed.” He left the room first, and then I was led back to my cell.

  Chapter 7

  Incarcerated Life

  The cell had gotten worse. Somehow when I was feeling the after effects of their energy rifles the cell looked bigger. Maybe it was just my blurred vision at the time, but as I became more accustomed to my surroundings my sensitivity grew. They turned up the intensity of the energy field that sealed off the front wall of my cell and it started emitting a hum. A low, undulating hum that I could just barely
hear.

  After another day I noticed that after every few minutes, the lights would become dimmer for just a split second, like clockwork. For a few hours I observed it while I laid still trying to think of some way to escape.

  Intermittently, by no schedule I could discern, people were led past my cell. Sometimes the energy barrier was smooth enough so I could see them. Other times it made them look like shimmering shadows. They would walk them out ten or twenty at a time but I never saw any return.

  At least two days passed and finally they turned the lights out. The barrier's hum subsided and I was allowed to sleep soundly. I don't know how long my slumber was, but the lights came on way too soon. The barrier was still almost completely transparent and quiet. I just laid back and closed my eyes, hoping I could go back to sleep even though I could see light through my eyelids.

  Not long after I heard people approaching and sat up to see who it was. I couldn't help but grin as Oz came into view, all healed up and as fit as ever. He smiled and winked at me, stopping suddenly. One guard bumped into him. The sentries were standing too close, and I started to motion to Oz not to do anything but it was too late.

  He spun and grabbed the closer guards' rifle away from him then shot him point blank. The energy spread across the sentry’s armour without penetrating. The guard tried to take the rifle back. The other soldier was trying to get around the first for a clean shot.

  Oz ripped the rifle free of the soldier who was desperately trying to get it back and rammed the butt into his throat as hard as he could. The guard dropped as Oz's foot came up, and then down, on the other soldier's hip. The second guard reeled backwards into the field keeping Jason in. The energy field repelled him with at least six times the force, sending him across the hall into my field. Somehow he just stopped instead of being bounced again. The guard slumped to the ground limply. “So, that's what happens when you touch the field,” Oz said to himself as he glanced to the two guards to verify that they weren’t moving.