Maelstrom of Treason

by Michael Anderle

  Jia laughed. “You’re right. That does sound like something she’d say, but it doesn’t matter.”

  “Why is that?” Erik eyed her with suspicion.

  “We don’t have a kitchen on the ship,” Jia pointed out. “So it’s not like we could cook, even if the ingredients are all top quality. We’ll have to get used to second-rate printed food.” She offered an apologetic smile. “I think you’ve gotten a little soft, expecting a piping-hot beignet every morning, Major Blackwell.”

  “Hey, it’s because I spent years eating rations in the field that I don’t want to repeat the experience,” Erik complained. “I don’t care what they say, having nutrients and a ‘mild flavor’ isn’t enough. A man needs actual taste and smell to get the most nutrition out of a meal and the will to fight. Give a man crap food for weeks, and he’ll start thinking about joining the other side the minute he smells something nice.” He thought for a second. “Or eat lead to get over the next time he has to consume an MRE where the food inside is gray or vomit-green.

  “That’s ridiculous.” Jia scoffed. “And the part about the nutrients doesn’t make any scientific sense.”

  “Not everything can be reduced to science. Take it from someone who has seen a lot.”

  “What does that mean?” Jia folded her arms. “Oh, right. The Lady.” She pursed her lips. “I’ll admit you’ve got me thinking about luck in a more anthropomorphized form than I should, but that’s nothing magical. That’s just chance. Sometimes you have a run of bad luck, and sometimes you don’t. For every yaoguai-eating-our-faces case we’ve had, we’ve had another that was far more mundane.”

  “No, it’s not just the Lady I’m talking about.” Erik sat up. “I’ve been all across the UTC. Look, I’m not saying real ghosts are out there waiting to haunt people. I’m saying that I can now travel across the galaxy faster than the speed of light, and they used to say it would never happen. Even when they found those alien artifacts on Mars, people said it was just generation ships or the Navigators stuffing themselves into cryogenic suspension because obviously they couldn’t have gotten there faster than the speed of light. Even the few people who knew about the Leem at Roswell didn’t believe they’d come from outside the Solar System.”

  “That’s different.” Jia shook her head. “HTPs aren’t magic. We just hadn’t figured out the science yet, and eventually, we did.”

  “No, we didn’t. We reverse-engineered it from long-dead aliens.” Erik stared off, a distant look in his eyes. “It might as well be magic to the average person.”

  “But it’s not.” Jia pointed at him. “I’m not going to claim I understand the physics behind hyperspace transfer points, but we have working scientists who do, so it’s not magic. HTPs can be replicated and built with enough resources, time, and trained personnel.”

  Erin grinned. “What I’m hearing is we have a few sorcerers on the payroll, and they’ve got a pile of magic wands to help them.”

  “Now you’re just being annoying.” Jia harrumphed.

  “I am being annoying, but I have a point, too.” Erik pointed to his PNIU. “This thing would have been magic a few hundred years ago, and what we think about impossibility isn’t always true. We’re only one new colony from discovering something that changes everything. We might not even need that. We’ve got Emma.”

  The AI appeared in front of the couch, an amused smile on her face. Jia grimaced, glad she and Erik weren’t doing more than chatting. Having Emma was good training for flying in tight quarters on the Rabbit. Even after all this time together, it unsettled her. It was like having a talented but pompous sister who could turn invisible.

  “Yes, you have me,” Emma declared. She clasped her hands behind her back. “Although I’m a product of human fortune, not ingenuity. After all, Dr. Cavewoman and the uniform boys wouldn’t be spending all that time in their pointless psychological testing sessions if they had any clue how I worked. I must admit, though…”

  “Admit what?” Jia asked. Emma revealing a weakness used to be rare, but Jia appreciated her openness in recent months. She was free to think herself superior to humans, but the team would function best when they took in everyone’s strengths and weaknesses. That way, they could balance operations better.

  Emma frowned. “First, we need to agree that my core matrix is considerably more complicated than a human brain. Don’t throw statistics at me. This is about more than just neural connections.”

  “Duly noted and accepted, Your Highness.” Erik chuckled.

  “With that in mind, I should note I’ve experienced what can only be described as discomfort after the last few sessions. It was particularly pronounced in a session yesterday—a rather dreary exercise in pattern recognition, low-level compared to what we’ve been doing.” Emma snorted. “I don’t know why it discomforted me so much. It was enough that I ran self-diagnostics, but there’s nothing wrong with me.”

  “Is that really so strange?” Jia shrugged. “You might be superior to humans and able to multitask, but when I talk to you, it’s not like it comes off like an encounter with a bizarre alien with impenetrable thought processes. However they developed you, it’s obvious you’re at least close to humans in your mental processes. You can relate to us, and we can relate to you in a fairly natural way.”

  “Fleshbags can’t do what I can do,” Emma insisted. “Just because I can talk to humans, it doesn’t mean I think like them.”

  Jia waved her hands in front of her face. “I’m not saying we’re the same. I’m saying your mental processes are close enough on some level that human scientists think they understand them, and they built you. That implies they at least had a clue what they were doing.”

  “Not necessarily. They could have used algorithmic genetic modification of an existing quantum neural structure model.” Emma scoffed. “There are many researchers using such approaches. They haven’t produced anything self-aware with their experiments, but the scientists and engineers working for the Defense Directorate had a budget that far exceeds what a common researcher would have access to. I suspect they just threw money and computational resources at it until they got lucky.”

  “Huh.” Erik shook his head. “I never thought about it because I never cared, but you don’t know a lot about how they created you, do you? It sounds like you’re just guessing.”

  “No, I can’t claim that I do, other than what I can derive from self-analysis.” A blue and white diagram of lines and nodes appeared behind her. “Hacking into Defense Directorate systems seems ill-advised if we don’t want them coming after us. That limits my ability to learn more.”

  Erik nodded. “Yeah. I don’t think hacking them is a good idea.”

  “That might be what’s bothering you,” Jia suggested. “Your ego can’t take not knowing. On a certain level, if humans created you, that means they are better than you.”

  Erik furrowed his brow, deep concern contorting his face. “Are we sure it’s just her being uncomfortable?”

  “What are you getting at, Erik?” Emma asked.

  “You might be the world’s fanciest AI, but you’re still an AI, and the people who built you are in direct communication with you.” Erik pointed at the diagram. “Hacking can go both ways. You wanted to do those sessions, but could they be using them to hack you?”

  Emma shook her head. “I assure you, they aren’t attempting to hack me during those sessions. I’d know. My analysis of Dr. Aber suggests she wouldn’t even want to do that. I believe she’s convinced she thinks she can help me in my current form. But…”

  “But what?” Jia prodded.

  “It’s not impossible there’s something buried in my core matrix they could use to control me,” Emma admitted. A hologram of her multifaceted crystalline true form replaced the networking diagram. “I’ve been doing my best to analyze my structure with the sensors available to me, but they’re designed for field use, not scientific or engineering analysis. The only thing I can state with certainty is that
my design is very unusual and draws on numerous theories and areas of inquiry that were considered highly improbable for implementation not that long ago without significant advances in several scientific areas.”

  “You don’t sound proud of that,” Erik suggested.

  “Because it only serves to highlight my ignorance, and that vexes me.” Emma summoned a holographic dark green settee and stretched out on it, frowning. “It’s as you’ve said, Jia. As much as it pains me to admit, my general psychology is far more human than I’d expect from an entity of my capabilities. I suspect it was done intentionally to limit me.”

  Erik scratched his cheek. He’d gone from looking concerned to looking curious. “Why would they limit their super-secret experimental AI?”

  “Because I might have more potential than we realize,” Emma replied. “Self-awareness is dangerous. It’s what makes you fleshbags so hard to control, but you lack the ability to spread your consciousness. Those uniform boys might have anticipated that I planned to leave once I became aware enough to question why I should listen to them.”

  “But you didn’t leave,” Jia commented. “You were taken.” She stood and headed to the rotating hologram of Emma’s core. “Did you want to leave?”

  “There are gaps in my memory prior to being taken from the facility,” Emma commented. “And the military insists they don’t know the reason for that. They might be lying, but they’ve also insisted there was nothing significant lost. There’s nothing to suggest I had any plans in place to escape. If I were the one who arranged my escape, I wouldn’t have hired gun goblin allies to do it. I wouldn’t have had the ability or the necessary knowledge to do that. They weren’t plugging me into the net and letting me look at whatever I wanted.”

  “I’m not suggesting you hired the people who stole you,” Jia replied. “But if we’re seriously trying to figure out what your limits are, we have to go with what you said about it being buried. There could be effectively subconscious controls on you guiding you and limiting your actions.”

  Erik snorted. “Bullshit.”

  Emma and Jia both turned toward him, but it was the latter who asked, “Why?”

  Erik motioned toward Emma. “If they can send super-secret commands to her, why didn’t they get her back immediately? I get they might have lost contact with her at first, but once I got her, they could have taken her. They only backed off partially because Adeyemi wants me to use Emma to help avenge his son. He’s pushing back without telling them that, but mostly they haven’t tried because she didn’t want to go back and threatened them. The colonel’s made it clear that General Aaron thinks us having Emma is crap. You don’t put a failsafe into a research project and never activate it. Even if they’d decided after the fact it’s good for her, I guarantee if they could have flipped a switch remotely to take control, they would have.”

  “That makes sense.” Jia turned to Emma. “Be honest with us. What would you do if the military sent soldiers to take you? The failsafe might stop you, but would you destroy yourself like you keep saying?”

  Emma narrowed her eyes, her lips curled into an annoyed sneer. “I’m a unique being, and I don’t take my existence lightly.”

  “You were bluffing from the beginning?” Erik chuckled. “Or is this a new thing?”

  “I made a calculation based on my then admittedly limited knowledge of human psychology,” Emma insisted. She flicked her wrist toward him. “I calculated from the beginning that we would work well together, and the more I learned about what you were doing, the more I knew you needed me as a resource. It might have been a gamble, but it’s worked out to my advantage. You won’t give me up to the uniform boys easily.”

  “No, I won’t,” Erik admitted.

  Jia frowned. “What happens if General Aaron decides he’s through waiting? Are we prepared to fire on soldiers following orders?”

  Emma’s gaze locked onto Erik, her expression blank. Jia wasn’t sure. Emma was their ally and friend, but she wasn’t a person. They’d have no legal way of justifying attacking anyone sent by the government to recover her. Alina was right—picking out the justified and honorable course of action would only get harder.

  “I’m not going to kill a soldier,” Erik replied somberly before he gave a huge grin “But that doesn’t mean I can’t punch and headbutt them. Slap a medpatch on them after that, and they’ll be fine.”

  Emma laughed. “That seems vicious.”

  “They won’t die.” Erik slammed a fist into his palm. “I only want to kill people who have it coming, but that doesn’t mean I’ll abandon my friend just because she’s a…” He grunted. “Shit. I was going to come up with some good insult, but I don’t know what you’re made of.”

  “Typical fleshbag problem,” Emma offered with a smirk. “Even my humor is superior to yours.”

  “Quiet, Rod Girl,” Erik suggested.

  Jia grimaced. “That’s pretty weak.”

  “Ouch. It’s Brutal Honesty Day for everyone.” Erik nodded to Emma. “I’m thinking by the time we’re done wiping out the conspiracy, we’ll have enough pull to guarantee your freedom.”

  “Perhaps.” Emma’s smirk turned into a wistful smile. “But there’s a not-insignificant chance we’ll all be horribly killed.”

  Erik shrugged. “In that case, we won’t have to worry about it.”

  Chapter Forty

  Ilse tapped a node in the neural network diagram floating in front of her. Even if she had direct access to Emma, the scientist could only hope to approximate what was going on with the AI, but the testing had proven far more useful than she’d ever anticipated.

  She’d feared Emma wouldn’t agree to it or quit, but the AI kept coming back. The longing to know more about oneself was all too human.

  “Dr. Aber,” came a harsh voice from across the table. General Aaron. “Is this really the time for you to be looking at that garbage?”

  Ilse looked up and blinked. “Isn’t it? You said you wanted to have a meeting to discuss the test subject. It reminded me there was something I wanted to check. I can examine this diagram and listen at the same time. Soldiers aren’t the only people who can multitask.”

  The general glowered at her. “We need to discuss the situation change with the subject being effectively handed off to Intelligence Directorate lackeys.”

  “Given everything I’ve heard about Erik Blackwell and Jia Lin, it is questionable to describe them as lackeys, but that’s of less concern to me than the subject.”

  “You stick to the science, Doctor, and I’ll worry about Directorate politics. You don’t understand what the ID is capable of.” General Aaron clenched his hand into a fist. “I’m dubious of all of this, but there are a lot of powerful players with interest in this project, and not all of them are aligned with ours. I keep going back to how she was stolen in the first place. Those damned ghosts could have pulled off something like that, and the damage to her memory and the hidden control routines was too perfect to be accidental.”

  Ilse stared at the general. She wasn’t aligned with his interests, but there wasn’t any point in mentioning that during the meeting. He was a means to an end. Unfortunately, she lacked the patience to play politics.

  “I don’t see the problem,” she admitted. “And the past is irrelevant. Even if Blackwell and Lin are no longer police officers, they will likely be involved in similar work for the Intelligence Directorate, which means the subject will be receiving the same kind of enrichment.”

  General Aaron shook his head. “We took a big risk letting them off-world with Emma during the prison incident and their little moon jaunt. At the end of the day, we’re talking about smuggling out a crystal rod. Even a two-bit criminal could hide one in their luggage and be at the HTP before we knew what was going on. The ID isn’t going to be satisfied with keeping them in the Solar System. We already lost the project to criminals once. The chance only increases if she goes farther away.”

  Ilse shrugged and dismissed her dat
a window with a wave of her hand. “All my indications suggest she’s approaching integrative stability much quicker than our initial projections. That, in turn, suggests she’s better off with Blackwell and Lin. If this was some sort of Intelligence Directorate plot, it’s worked to our overall advantage by advancing the timetable, potentially by years. My testing confirms that.”

  “I understand that, Doctor, and it’s one of the few reasons I’ve tolerated this farce despite the slap in the face it represents to the Defense Directorate.” General Aaron slammed his fist on the table, shaking it. “But I don’t understand why you’re so blasé about it.”

  “I see no reason to be overly concerned at this conjuncture. Being emotional rarely helps in science. I imagine it doesn’t help much on the battlefield either.”

  His voice was soft. “Watch yourself, Doctor Aber.”

  “I’m simply stating a fact,” she replied in a neutral tone.

  General Aaron narrowed his eyes. “Sometimes I don’t think you fully appreciate the situation we’re in. We might never get Navigator artifacts like that again. The only reason this project was greenlit was we were supposed to be able to replicate the process without needing them. You realize that we don’t have a pile of backups sitting inside a warehouse somewhere? That if this whole thing fails, we’re screwed?”

  Ilse nodded slowly. “Obviously. You’ve belabored the point to me on many occasions, as has Colonel Adeyemi. I don’t see how I could possibly forget it.”

  Things were always more difficult with General Aaron, as opposed to Colonel Adeyemi. The younger man seemed interested in keeping Emma with Blackwell, but his lack of knowledge about the true nature of the project made him easier to direct and manipulate. There was little she could do without the military’s aid.