The bubble dissolved, releasing a familiar-looking woman. Maybe Ron was right. His mother is a witch. Standing, she was several inches taller than Lexi with the heels on her open-toed Louis Vuitton pumps accentuating the difference. “I’m Geena, the good witch, of course.” She looked back toward where a few remaining monkeys were messily feeding on hapless shoppers. “Interesting metaphor, that,” she remarked, turning back to Lexi.
“Right, Mom, of course you are.” Lexi said. Maybe Ron was right about witchcraft being involved with her young appearance, too. Lions and tigers and bears, my ass. “What metaphor?”
“The Kreesh swarm is coming, darling, and they eat people.” She glanced briefly back at the bloodbath in the atrium. “Sure looks like a metaphor to me. Is that adorable young man my grandson?” She leaned forward to pick up the baby only to be warned off by a growl from Shyamalan.
“What’s going on, Geena?” Lexi asked. “I’m starting to think I don’t belong here.”
Giving Shyamalan a dirty look as she straightened, Geena nevertheless responded in a sweet tone of voice. “No, darling, you’re quite right, of course. It’s time for you to return home. And it’s so easy to get back. You simply click your heels together three times while repeating ‘There's no place like home.’" As she spoke, her gaze dropped to the bloody mess she was standing in, causing her to shriek, “Oh, no, I’ve ruined my shoes!”
“You’ve got to be freakin’ kidding me,” Lexi exclaimed.
“No, look at them! Absolutely destroyed! The blood will never come out.” Then, shaking her head and stoically ignoring her gore-saturated footwear, Geena laughed merrily. “Would you be happier if I told you we’ve built trans-dimensional transport actuation modules into the soles of your ruby-red Nikes?” Geena asked.
As Lexi gave her a hard look, Geena continued, “The fact is, darling, all of this is happening in your head. None of it is real. I’m not real. In all of this, only you are real. And you’re dreaming. Ron’s death never happened. You dreamed it. You’ve been dreaming for a long time, darling. Think it through. You’ve given yourself plenty of clues.”
She gave Lexi a moment, watching as Lexi looked again at the center court carnage, then at her son, who was nodding sagely. The damn dog was nodding at her too. It shook her when Shyamalan said, “Listen to her. She knows what she’s talking about.”
When her attention returned to Geena, Geena continued, “You’re Lexi Stevens. You lead the best damn team of insurance investigators the space-threading civilization of the Accord has ever known. You just fought and destroyed the evil computer intelligence you named ‘Meat.’ And now, darling, we need you to come back to stop the Kreesh. You need to take control, wake up and get on with your life.”
Chapter 27
Lexi has Fallen in the Well
In the real-world, nanoseconds after Lexi plunged into battle with the warped computer intelligence she named “Meat,” Urania was herself again — the sentient command computer of Vankovian-built starship WA32198389-18-32405. Her transition from the computer-generated human body she occupied in Meat’s simulated reality was instant. She immediately triggered the alarms that signaled her crew, while announcing, “Battle stations. Grab hold of something fast!”
She was operating at far too great a speed to explain anything. She discarded the fire patterns programmed in by Ron and Geena while both she and Lexi were trapped as avatars in Meat’s simulated playground. Finding herself far too close to Meat to hit her multiple targets, she used the technique she used previously to position herself in Meat’s vicinity before all of this started, pulsing her hyperdrive at minimum power, positioning herself a mile closer to the front of the ship and almost two miles farther from the hull. Then she fired on the Wraixain derelict, targeting only the two specific areas as instructed by Lexi while they were in the simulation. All of us, in a crisis, always assume Lexi knows what she’s doing. She smiled mentally. So far that’s been working well for us.
Urania’s primaries, focused to pencil-thin diameter, tore at the incredibly tough hull for three seconds before cutting through and into the much softer, inner sections of the ship. The first blast speared through the ship until it found command-comp, the hull-metal-fortified master computer core. Lexi believed that was where the ship’s malevolent intelligence dwelled. Or perhaps more accurately, had dwelt. The odds were good that Lexi already killed him from within the simulation. As with the outer hull itself, the metal stubbornly resisted her weapon fire. It took a full second before the metal gave up, the beam converting the core inside to a cloud of quarks.
Her second target was the power feed to the single active hyper-field generator holding the massive ship adrift, locked in hyperspace these last nine centuries and potentially forever. Urania immediately cut out her generator, following the derelict as it popped back into n-space. The derelict had multiple redundant back-ups, of course, and was still fully hyper-capable. That one generator, sabotaged by the ship’s former, long-deceased crew, held the derelict locked in hyper since shortly after command-comp took control. “I’m keeping primaries focused on it, but I don’t think we’re in any danger at this point,” she announced. Killing the hyper-generator is going to be exceptionally stupid, and dangerous, if Lexi or I didn’t kill command-comp. The last thing we need is this monster loose in normal-space, ravaging the Accord.
Geena arrived on the bridge at a run while Urania was punching holes in the alien ship. With relief in her voice, she said, “Welcome back, Urania, darling.”
Ron, who had been on watch, was looking at Lexi, still strapped into the chair in front of the panel that held the educator hardware and still unmoving. “Why isn’t Lexi waking up?” he snapped.
Sharing the same concern, Urania said, “I don’t know. It’s not the educator. There are no energy flows in either direction on the circuit. I need better scans. I don’t understand what the cabin sensors are showing me. Would you remove the cap, Ron, and carry her to the medical bed. I have to update you on what Lexi and I have been experiencing for the last six hours. You also need to know about the experiment we were doing with the educator.”
“We knew you guys were fiddling with it,” Ron said.
Urania grunted. “There were unexpected side effects. It may be what saved all of our lives.”
On the bed, after a complete scan, although Ron and Geena stood anxiously over her, each holding one of Lexi’s hands, their attention was on the three-dimensional brain scan Urania projected to the monitor. “This is what the neurological activity in Lexi’s brain looked like at the time of her last scan. I’ve done a lot of research on this in the datanets of the planets we’ve stopped at because it has never been exactly what medical science claims is normal. Her brain always shows heightened activity in these areas compared to other people,” she said while highlighting sections of the display.
She paused so they could take in the display. “Of course, we still don’t know if this is normal for Earth-born humans.” I really need to scan some of those people, she thought. Well, we all want to meet Lexi’s father. We’ll be heading there at some point. “Brace yourselves. This is real-time.”
The image on the screen looked like a fireball. Streaks of energy rushed across the surface and plunged deep inside. Others clearly originated from deep within and spread across the surface like an eruption of lava. The areas associated with telepathy and the Barossa Channel were brighter than they had ever seen them. And clearly superimposed over the whole unbelievable display was the pattern they had all come to recognize as that associated with the Ackalon Rose of Light.
Geena, after staring dumbfounded for an entire minute, stated, “If the Rose is involved and it certainly looks like it is, then we need Jis. Urania, I think you should plot us a course to Ackalon. I think we should hurry.”
Urania said, “Agreed. I’ll send our message drone ahead so that she knows to expect us.”
“No, wait,” Ron insisted. “We need to do something about the d
erelict.”
“You’re right,” Geena acknowledged. “What will it take to destroy a ship that large, Urania? Can we even manage it?”
“No, Mom, not that either,” Ron interrupted. “You’re thinking like a mother, not like a partner in Aeolus Investigations. We need to make sure we can find it again. We need to make sure that no one else can find it even if they freakin’ crash into it. Maybe build something that makes it look like an asteroid to sensors. Nothing like that monster exists in the Accord. Damn, it even makes the Vankovian dreadnought look tiny. You know how Lexi is about technology. When she wakes up, she is going to want that ship. You know she will, and she will be very upset with all of us if we vaporize it, assuming we even can. Which I kind of doubt. I was watching the tactical display when Urania was drilling it. Hopefully, Lexi won’t give us a hard time about not repairing it while she’s asleep.”
He paused, thinking. “We should check out the other two derelicts while we’re here too. There’s a good chance that one of them is the pirate we were tracking and may still have the stolen biologics on board. Geena, if you can put on an EVA suit and check on that, I’ll see what I can cobble together to disguise all three ships. And Mom,” he added, “be careful out there.”
“Ron, honey, Lexi may be gone,” Urania said, her voice soft and gentle, her own grief held tightly in check. “People who overdose on the educator wind up brain-dead. They never wake up. Lexi was under the helmet for six hours. She’s usually in and out in minutes.”
Ron pointed to the display of a brain that was clearly anything but dead and very calmly said, “I bet their scans don’t look like that either.”
Chapter 28
Salvage
Urania took them back into hyper so that she could take over the command computers on the two smaller ships. As she gained control of each, she shut off the hyper-generators, dropping them to join Meat in normal-space. After that, although Urania remotely flew the smaller ships, it took three days to tractor the giant ship into proximity to an asteroid belt around a nearby planetary system.
Ron, who despite the “She’s with stupid” t-shirt he still wore from time to time when he was with Lexi, actually understood a good deal of the technology Lexi developed. Over a year and a half ago now, they learned how Unity pirates adapted shield technology to cloak their ships from other ships’ sensors. Lexi was the one who figured out how it worked, of course, but Ron asked her to walk him through it.
They all noticed he was becoming as much of a science nerd as Lexi. Now he built self-powered shield nodes derived from the cloaking technology that should, both visually and to the casual scan, register all three ships as no more than worthless chunks of rock. He was forced to strip, and then modify, all of the shield nodes from Urania’s hull in order to get the coverage he needed for the large green ship. It didn’t matter. With the new shielding technology Lexi built into the dampeners when they were rescuing Ostrieachia, the old nodes were redundant at this point anyway. He worked in Lexi’s lab, using the interactive wallboards, discussing what he was doing with Urania. He had to smile. This was how Lexi worked. Despite his continual concern for Lexi, it was fun.
During those first three days, other than subtle shifts in energy currents, the scan of Lexi’s brain remained unchanged.
Of the two smaller ships, one was no more than an old personal yacht named Witchy Bitchy Woman. Geena cautiously entered through the airlock but found nothing to be concerned about. What she did find was the mummified remains of six women. Based on log entries, she determined the ship had been purchased by Imeline Hars, a young woman, recently come into sufficient credit to support her dream of traveling to places unknown. Based on the date of the last entry, Imeline and her friends died close to seven hundred years ago. Despite the ship’s age, it should still have enough salvage value to justify towing it. Technology evolved slowly in the Accord, or at least it had until Lexi stowed away on her starship and changed everything. Ron was right that Lexi would want the massive alien ship. Geena couldn’t even imagine what Lexi would be able to do with it.
The second ship bore the incongruous name Save Me. Geena found the name incongruous because it did indeed prove to be the pirate her team was tracking. This one, she entered with even more caution, if that was possible. The crew, unable to mount a defense of any kind, was taken by the being Urania was calling Meat. While she didn’t expect any booby-traps and knew there were no living pirates on board, it was always best to err on the side of caution in a situation like this. Automated defenses were always a possibility. She had nightmares for months after she and her late husband were attacked one time years ago by a robotic guard dog on an abandoned outpost.
As on the yacht, the nine bodies on board bore no outward signs indicating how they died other than expressions of horror and agony on their faces. She was sure that had not Lexi and Urania taken care of Meat, she and Ron would now have similar expressions on their own dead features.
The prize was the sealed biological stasis chamber bearing the crest of the Vankovian imperial family stored in the ship’s small cargo area. Checking the readouts on the chamber, Geena noted that its contents remained viable. The so-called “biological samples” they had chased for weeks from Sandlin were, in fact, eight Vankovian embryos. Well, I guess that somewhat confirmed the rumor that the current emperor was having difficulty producing heirs. She smiled wryly, looking at the next generation of Vankovian Imperials. She wondered what politics must be involved for the Emperor to have this done off-planet.
Geena grimly examined the single body strapped to a cot in the hold. Unlike the other bodies on the ship, this one was both unclothed and female, even in death her body showed signs of recent abuses. She guessed that the poor woman had been the Grebal Laboratories med-tech accompanying the stasis chamber to Vankovia. She hadn’t been spared any of the horrors visited by Meat on the crew members of this ship. Based on Urania’s story, she could guess the end of the poor woman’s tragic story.
Geena transferred the chamber to Urania’s hold before sealing the ship. As Ron noted concerning the warship, Lexi would want this one as well, even if only for its logs. Damn it, I want the logs too, Geena realized. She had to smile inwardly, albeit grimly, as she realized that Lexi’s attitudes were now influencing her own.
For the thirty-plus years she had been an insurance investigator, her attitude about piracy had simply been to avoid pirates at all costs. Recent events forced her to reevaluate that attitude to the point where now her inclination was to exterminate them. Seeing the young woman’s abused body did nothing to soften her stance. The poor thing was in hell even before Meat got hold of her.
Chapter 29
Urania’s Story
Whenever they weren’t working, both Ron and Geena spent all of their awake time in the small medical bay with Lexi. They even ate their meals there. Urania, of course, was always present, always awake, and always alert. Urania filled in some of the time by recounting the pseudo-reality she and Lexi experienced while they were part of the simulation in which Meat lived. They both enjoyed hearing about how Lexi tried to kill the monster with movies. It seemed so, well, so Lexi, somehow.
“I know it must have been difficult for the both of you,” Urania began, “with Lexi unconscious in the educator and me responding as a computer with no hint of consciousness. I’m sorry about that. As you know, I was attempting to hack the derelict’s command computer. Unfortunately, it turned out to be as fully sentient as I am. We estimate it has been locked in hyper for eight hundred to a thousand years.”
“I thought we were convinced it was usage of the Wraixain educator that sparked machine sentience,” Ron said.
“Even if we’re right about that,” Geena pointed out, “it doesn’t mean that’s the only way to achieve computer sentience.”
Her voice grim, Urania said, “We still are, Ron. That ship is a Wraixain warship.” She paused to let that sink in, and continued, “He realized what I was doing and count
erattacked. I don’t know whether it’s because he’s older, or meaner, or dirtier, or simply that his sentience took me completely by surprise, but he won the contest. He pulled me into a simulation as what he terms an avatar and was in the process of killing me when Lexi stepped in and drove him off.”
“She put on the educator headset, stating she was ‘going in after you,’” Geena related. “She was unconscious before we had a chance to question her about what she meant by that. It seemed like a very odd thing to say, even coming from her.”
“I suppose it did. That’s exactly what she did, though,” Urania confirmed. “You both know that we’ve been experimenting off and on with the educator, trying to better understand the technology. The latest modification gave us a wide-open, two-way channel between the user’s mind and my own. Based on comments Lexi made in the sim, I believe she was more than a little surprised at the result of our first use of the modified tech. I know I was.” Urania paused. “Our avatars were in the simulation for three days while only six hours passed for you guys in the real world.”
Aeolus Investigations Set 2: Too Cool To Lose: The Continuing Evolution of Lexi Stevens Page 31