by M. R. Forbes
It was an outcome that baffled him then, and continued to baffle him now, and that was only one example out of thousands.
There was no reason why his daughter should be laying in a bed dying of a brain tumor. Not when medi-bots had been in service for nearly a century. Not when medicine should have gone so far. The idea of an inoperable malady was inexplicable to him. It was inconceivable, and yet it was the truth of their reality.
It was infuriating.
He had questioned. Of course, he had questioned. His mind was built to put everything to task, to seek answers everywhere. Time and time again he had come up short. Every thread led to a dead end. Every path stopped at a black hole. He hadn't understood it.
At least, not until he had taken the job with Hirokasa Corporation. It was his first job out of college, a placement in the research and development wing of the largest robotics company in the galaxy. Hirokasa was so big they had a special dispensation from the Federation government proclaiming them trade neutral. They could sell to any planet in any nation with no repercussions and without being forced to add tracking and monitoring equipment. It gave Hirokasa power that few others could rival, and a worth in the many trillions. All because they made simple machines that could think simple thoughts for themselves. Machines that made the lives of humans easier.
It had taken him three years to come up with the first iteration of his neural network. All the while, he had wondered why no one had done it before him. The algorithms had been obvious, and almost painfully elementary. He had shared it with Pulin, who joked that Hirokasa was run by "monkeys with hamsters instead of brains."
Pulin convinced Tio to get him a job in his lab. Tio had agreed, hoping that between the two of them they could prove what, exactly? Tio knew the answer, but even today it was hard to admit it. They wanted to prove how smart they were, and how dumb everyone else was.
Except it hadn't worked out that way.
Tio had proven to himself how dumb he really was, because even though he knew about the singularity, had studied it and wondered why it had never happened, he had never really gotten it. Not until Pulin, for whatever reason, maybe as a joke, had introduced him to Isaac Asimov.
It was almost stupid that his eyes had been opened by words penned all those centuries ago as nothing more than entertainment. Stupid and effective. It was the moment he discovered that he hadn't taken his research far enough. He had focused on one line of history instead of branching out past it and collecting all of the facts. When he did, it all began to make sense.
First, every line of technological advancement in every field ended with autonomy and artificial intelligence. There was a limit to how far the human mind could take any idea. There was a limit to how complex and abstractly a human mind could think. Only a logic based, machine mind could get them to the next level.
Second, while efforts to make these advancements came and went in waves, there was some hidden force shutting them down before they came to fruition, much like his own efforts in university.
Was it an organized force? Or did the other machine scientists like him always come to their senses in the end?
Did they always destroy their own work, the way he did only a week after reading the bulk of Asimov's science fiction?
He doubted Pulin had ever planned for him to enter the lab early one morning and erase the last three years of their work. If he had, he might have made a copy.
Of course, the action had cost him his job, and his brother. No amount of logic could sway the impulsive Pulin from his ideas, all of which were founded on pushing the galaxy past the point of no return and towards the true singularity. No amount of pleading, begging, or bribery could keep him from joining the Federation military in order to join their research team and get access to resources they had both only dreamed of.
It had also put him out of Tio's reach. In the years immediately after their falling out, Tio had never considered killing his own brother. In the years beyond that, he had wished every day that he had.
Instead, he did his best to curtail the storm he knew would come. The growth of AI, the prevalence of thinking machines in every aspect of human life. He poured his life into taking whatever precautions were needed to slow what he began to see as inevitable. Even if Pulin wasn't the one, someone else would come along sooner or later.
He smiled when he thought back to those early days. His plans needed capital, and he had turned to fraud to raise it. There weren't enough smart criminals in the galaxy, he had realized. It had been all too easy to find loopholes and insecurities in systems across all three spacefaring nations. He funneled money, diverted cargo, arranged complex schemes and more while at the same time removing any record of his existence from the universe. In time, he converted himself from Liun Tio, scientist, to the Knife, warlord and secret lobbyist against the advancement of AI. It had taken years.
And it had changed him. In ways both good and bad. In his efforts to save humanity from itself, he had lost his compassion for it. In his single-mindedness, he had lost the purpose of his efforts. In his rogue state, he had lost the ability to trust.
He had become a caricature of himself. A joke. He hadn't realized it until now. He hadn't seen it because he had never been confronted by it. Not even when he had first been confronted by a note from an anonymous man known only as M warning him of what was to come. Not when Liberty had fallen, enslaved by an unidentified force. Not even when Mitchell had saved his life, brought him to the Goliath, and explained that all of his fears had come to pass in a way he had never quite imagined.
Not until he had been confronted about his past. Not until he had been questioned by his oldest friend and had seen the deep-rooted disappointment in Teal's eyes. It had stung him worse than any other setback ever had, and at the same time, he could still see the caricature within himself, a distorted mirror image that couldn't simply be banished away. It had become a part of him, a wounded appendage that fought with all it had to protect itself. He didn't have the ability to turn if off or reject it completely. While some of what he had done was wrong, there was still a measure of rightness to it that he couldn't disregard.
His goals had been correct, even if the Tetron proved he had ultimately failed.
Had there ever been a way to succeed?
Was there now?
The data was there. It had to be. The secrets of the past that he had yet to discover because he hadn't known precisely where to look. A clue that would answer the questions that gnawed at the edge of his thoughts.
And Pulin. He had to find Pulin. He knew his brother had a hand in the Tetron's origins, even if he had downplayed it to Mitchell and his crew. He hadn't told them anywhere close to everything about himself or his brother and he never would.
He would solve the riddles. He would lead them to Pulin and force his brother to reveal what he had done. Together, they would find a way to fix it all.
Then he would be the hero. Him. The Knife. Not some uninspired, unintelligent Marine jock who didn't seem to be able to accomplish anything on his own on purpose.
Tio reached the end of the corridor. He stood in front of the door to operations for a moment, collecting himself. The engineer, Watson, was smart enough to be tolerable. The other one, the Admiral? Every word out of her mouth grated on him and he had to resist the urge to hack her bionic hand and force her to choke herself with it. He was sorry that he had killed her mother. As sorry as he could be, considering he would repeat the action. She was the type who couldn't see the bigger picture past her familial ties and simple emotions, and that angered him beyond reason.
He forced himself to be calm and cordial. He had to play the part for their sakes. He needed them as much as they needed him. In the end, he would make sure that if they failed history would blame Colonel Mitchell Williams and the Riggers.
If they succeeded, humankind would celebrate the Knife.
29
Tio smiled as he approached Watson and Millie, reaching up to straig
hten his jacket. "Admiral. Corporal."
"Is your daughter well?" Millie asked.
Tio's smile faded. He doubted the woman cared about Min. "I assume so though I didn't excuse myself to go and visit her. In truth, one of my men reported that Colonel Williams took him at knifepoint. He was forced to lead the Colonel and one of his men, I think his name was Cormac, to the communications array so they could send a message to Goliath."
He waited for her reaction. Her face was flat. Expressionless. He was impressed.
"And?" she asked.
"And, Admiral?"
"Don't play coy, Tio. You know I put him up to it. So, are we about to be arrested, imprisoned, executed..." She trailed off.
"Fortunately for you, none of the above. I've realized I may have been hasty in forbidding you to communicate with Origin. It comes from years of having to keep one eye on my back."
"I imagine there are a number of people who'd like to knife the Knife," Millie said.
"Indeed. I'm certain I can count you in with that number. Your Colonel sees the world for what it is, and I respect that."
"Mr. Tio, I'd like to get started as soon as possible," Watson said, interjecting before the comments could become more toxic. "You mentioned your assistant?"
"Bethany, yes." Tio wandered over to the nearest control station and lifted a small, wired disc to his face. He spoke into it before returning. "She's on her way."
"It must be difficult, doing everything like that," Millie said, pointing at the wired device.
"It isn't as hard as you would think. It's even easier once you consider the consequences. I prefer to remain in control of my own body."
"The ARR is perfectly secure with the correct encryption algorithms," Watson said.
"Is it?" Tio countered. "What about EMP? When you become dependent on the augmentation, you lose the ability to fend for yourself."
"Mitchell did okay."
"Mitchell is a survivor. He also got very lucky. In any case, we've managed to adapt our lifestyle and protocols around the so-called limitations of wires. Our mechs have won a number of conflicts against both Alliance and Federation forces, and our starfighters have claimed a number of victories, in part because we don't judge a man's worth by subconscious neural processing speeds."
"I wouldn't tout your battle prowess if I were you," Millie said. "The reports are clear that you fight dirty and have broken a number of conventions."
Tio couldn't hold back his distaste this time. His eyes snapped to her. "Don't forget that I've read Project Black's reports, Admiral. Don't you ever, ever dare question my methods. They're spotless compared to the actions of the Riggers."
Millie stared at him, bionic hand clenched into a quivering fist. Somehow she managed to remain quiet. Tio was satisfied that he had gotten under her skin.
"Enough of this back and forth over the past," he said, waving the subject away with his hand. "We have a lot of work to be done, and our time is limited."
"So Mitchell was able to send his message to Origin?" Millie asked.
"Yes. From what I understand, you are using the Tetron's communication technology to transmit a message to Mitchell's brother, the Admiral. A warning of the coming invasion. Let us hope it reaches its intended target."
"At least we can agree on one thing," Millie said.
"You called for me, sir?"
Tio turned to face his Chief Data Engineer. Bethany was almost as old as he was, one of the first followers he had enlisted after he had been removed from Hirokasa. They had been lovers for a time all of those years ago, before he had met and fallen for Min's mother. She was still an attractive woman, fit and strong, though the years had left her hair mostly gray and her skin more wrinkled and sagged.
"Yes. Bethany, I'd like you to meet Admiral Mildred Narayan and Corporal Erubiel Watson. They came over from the Goliath to help us improve our data compression algorithms."
"Improve the algorithms? We have plenty of storage remaining in the data stack."
"Yes, I know, but we have a sudden and imperative need to make the archives portable."
Her eyes widened. "Portable? Are we leaving Asimov?"
Tio glanced around at the other people working in the operations center. They didn't need to know about their predicament just yet. He leaned in close and spoke softly.
"Our position has been compromised, and we have reason to believe an enemy force is on its way as we speak."
"How long?" Bethany asked. She wasn't afraid. It was one of the qualities that had made him love her so long ago.
"We're targeting six days. It could be more. Hopefully, it won't be less."
"Six?" She grimaced before turning to Millie and Watson. "I hope you're good at math."
"I'm quite good at math," Watson said. "I once extrapolated the-"
"Good. Sorry, but we don't have a lot of time for idle chat. Let me show you what we have and I'll be warm and fuzzy once we start copying data."
That drew a smile from Millie. Watson's face flushed, and his eyes fell to Bethany's feet. Tio couldn't believe anyone with Watson's intellect could be so uncertain and anxious.
Bethany pointed at the terminal. "Let me grab another seat and we can go over it."
"I'll have it brought," Tio said. "Every second counts."
"Yes, sir."
Bethany led Watson over to the terminal. Tio and Millie followed behind them. She touched the screen, letting it capture her credentials, and then navigated to the code. She paused and turned back to Tio. "How much should I show him?"
"Everything," Tio said. "This isn't the time for secrecy."
She nodded, returning her attention to the screen and navigating deeper into the system. She began giving Watson a rundown of their current capacity and processes, as well as explaining what resources they could use to make the archives portable. Tio knew it was going to be a challenge, as they would have to fit what was currently stored on a room-sized stack onto something that could be carried. He hoped the Rigger's engineer was as up to the task as he had claimed to be.
"Bethany, when you're done for the day please see Corporal Watson back to his quarters. I've prepared a room near yours. I have some other business to attend to, but I will help you with this process tomorrow."
Bethany didn't look up from the screen. "Okay, Tio."
"Admiral," Tio said, getting Millie's attention. "That other business. I would like you to assist me if you're up for it."
"Anything is better than standing here and watching this," Millie replied. "What did you have in mind?"
30
"We need to send the message out to my forces to begin gathering at the rendezvous point," Tio said as he guided Millie towards the docks. "I thought you would be interested in joining me."
"So you can take me somewhere quiet and get rid of me?" Millie asked.
The thought had crossed Tio's mind, but he knew the Admiral and Mitchell were close, and his own personal dislike wasn't a good enough reason to put the war effort in jeopardy.
"I think we've established that we don't like one another. We don't need to continue with the venom." He enjoyed watching her face crinkle up as she struggled to maintain her outward calm. "I don't allow wireless communications from Asimov, which means we have to make a quick trip further out to pass the baton. I have a dozen transmitters positioned randomly within a nine hour jump radius. Since we're having trust issues, I thought taking you with me so you can be part of the communications would help ease them somewhat."
"You'll have to do more than that to get me to trust you."
"But it would be a start, no?" He did a better job holding his own anger in check. "I could send someone else, but it would be better if my people hear they're going to war from me directly."
"You aren't worried about the Tetron catching up to us?"
"No. It's impossible that they've discovered the transmitters. They're well placed. We'll jump to a transmitter, send the message, and jump back."
"What if
the Tetron intercept the message? You'll be revealing our rendezvous coordinates."
"Yes. I'm open to other ideas on how to get nearly three hundred ships to meet at the same place without using a wireless communication. Sadly, it will take at least three weeks to get the signal to them, and likely another two for them to arrive."
"Did you say three hundred?" Millie asked, surprised.
"Yes, but don't get too excited. Most of them are converted miners, trawlers, and that sort of thing. We can't go around looking too much like an organized military. They have some tricks up their sleeves though, and when Mitchell returns they'll be that much easier to underestimate."
She seemed to relax slightly when he used the word "when" instead of "if." He had chosen the word for that exact purpose. The Admiral would be easy to manipulate when the time came. All of the Riggers would.
Tio led her to the bottom-left docking arm where his ship was waiting. It was a small ship, an orbital transport that had been torn apart and rebuilt with pieces of a number of other ships. The result was a sleek but motley construction that was well-enough shielded and armed to get through a scrape, and deceptively able to carry hyperspace engines.
"The Lanning," Tio said as they approached the airlock. "I designed it myself."
"Beautiful," Millie said. Tio knew she was being sarcastic. The Lanning wasn't much to look at, but she had it where it counted.
"I'm sorry to say there isn't much by way of amenities. There's a pisspot on board if you need to go, but nowhere to go privately."
There were so many quips he could have added in response to her earlier comment about the state of the Goliath. He kept a few of them running in his head though he didn't speak any out loud. He could tell by Millie's reaction that she knew he had held back for the sake of their alliance.
"Modesty is for civilians," she replied, following him through the airlock.
They boarded the Lanning, an open design with four total seats up front and a mattress in the rear. The engines took up ninety percent of the ship's length.