Lyssa's Call_A Hard Science Fiction AI Adventure
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How had Jirl chosen not to focus on the details of the Weapon Born program? Was it the way Arla liked to say that tools like the Weapon Born would ensure peace between Mars, Terra and the Jovian Combine? Abstractions like tools and peace ignored all the steps in-between.
But now these tools were answering the call of a multi-nodal AI named Alexander. They wanted to be free. Just as the virus of their creation had spread between human scientists across a hundred secret clinics, now the promise of freedom might unleash thousands of Weapon Born on Sol. What would happen then?
Had Hari Jickson known what he was starting?
She had to protect the millions of children who would die in a war. She had to protect her son Bry.
Heartbridge had already delivered hundreds of Weapon Born drones for the contracts with Mars and Terra, despite the loss of several of their largest production facilities. She could help stop the rest.
Britney Sykes had Kraft because he knew where the clinics were located, and he knew which were the most dangerous. Britney Sykes had been hunting Heartbridge for years and now she had her guide. Kraft had always been the plausible deniability for Arla and her boardroom blather. Kraft had the details.
As the realization settled over her, so did a calm she hadn’t felt in weeks. She knew what she had to do.
She was going to help Britney Sykes. With Kraft’s information, she could dispatch security teams to destroy the remaining sites, stop the production of Weapon Born.
Yarnes had told her about Alexander. Yarnes knew the sentient AI were in the slow process of a revolt. Whether he was following some deep TSF directive or operating on his own initiative, she decided to trust him, at least until he helped her find Kraft.
Jirl took a deep breath and stood from the chair just as a woman in a grey suit came into the office.
“Can I help you?” she asked in surprise.
“I’m fine,” Jirl said. “Thank you.”
She walked out the open door, through the office suite and back into the main corridor, swinging her arms a little. She felt lighter than she had when she’d gone in. She tried to imagine Brit Sykes from the TSF documents she’d studied. A gaunt woman with raven-black hair and piercing eyes.
Jirl barely remembered the remainder of her walk to the board room ante chamber. Several of the other assistants glanced at her and then went back to their Links. Jirl ignored them and went to the tall windows where Raleigh spread out below them, the spire’s height making the curve of the ring noticeable. She’d never been off High Terra. The idea of travelling to Cruithne, a station known for its wildness, its pirates and smugglers, filled her with unexpected excitement. And Bry? She would send Bry to see her sister on the Mars 1 Ring. They had talked about the trip for years.
In five minutes, Arla flung the boardroom doors open and strode into the hall, enacting one of her favorite scenes. Behind her, the other board members sprawled in their chairs or stood at the sideboard pouring drinks. They all looked exhausted in comparison to Arla’s feral calm.
Jirl fell in beside her boss and they took the corridor for the maglev terminal.
Arla didn’t speak until they were seated in the car and speeding away from the Heartbridge spire. Jirl sat with her back straight, feeling the car’s acceleration in her shoulders. The light feeling had remained, even as she watched Arla frown at the distance.
They were halfway across Raleigh when Arla finally said, “Katherine Carthage is going to buy a controlling share in the company.”
Jirl blinked, rolling the sentence around in her mind. “I haven’t seen one word about that in the news feeds.”
“She hasn’t said it publicly. Her ban on AI imaging research has nearly reached the Assembly floor on Terra. If that goes through, it will devalue the stock and open the door for her to make her move.”
“You think that’s why she wants to stop the research? Not her son’s death?”
“Why not both?” Arla said, raising an eyebrow. “She’s not stupid. If she can get what she wants and get rich in the process, why not?”
“A seat on the board doesn’t mean she can change much of anything.”
“Maybe not,” Arla said. She sighed and leaned back in her seat. “There might be an advantage in having her close.”
“Arla,” Jirl said. “I need to make a request.”
“Oh? Why do you sound so serious?”
“I want leave to go to Cruithne in a week.”
Arla frowned. “Cruithne? Why there of all places? If you want time off, we’ll get you a week at a spa down-ring. You’ll love it.”
“Cal Kraft surfaced on the Cho. He survived the Resolute Charity attack and he’s apparently in TSF custody.” She waited to see if Arla’s expression would change. It didn’t, so she added, “There was an attempt on his life.”
Arla’s disinterested expression didn’t change. “So what? It’s the Cho? Isn’t it worse than Cruithne?”
“There are a hundred billion people on the Cho.”
“And a million Heartbridge clinics. I know. It doesn’t mean I have to go there. Why are you worried about Kraft? Isn’t he a liability at this point?”
“He has information about our Weapon Born research operations. He could attempt to sell that information.”
“And the TSF has him now.”
“Yes.”
“For Heaven’s sake, Jirl. You don’t need to get him from Cruithne. We’ll send a security team. They can finish the job someone else started.”
Jirl watched Arla closely, trying to determine how much was her typical sociopathy and how much might be carefully composed.
Arla picked her fingernails, then held her hand out for inspection. Jirl pursed her lips, frustrated that she couldn’t tell.
“I’d like to go,” she said. “I’ve never been off High Terra. It would be nice to do something—more.”
“Something more. I’m in the midst of an attack from Katherine Carthage and my Jirl wants to leave me.” Arla caught Jirl’s gaze and smiled, flashing her straight white teeth. “Who’s your TSF contact?”
“Yarnes,” Jirl said.
Arla let out a powerful laugh. “There it is. Jirl needs her pipes cleaned.” She pointed an accusing finger as she held her chest, laughing. “This is wonderful. Yes, you can go. Expense all of it. Come back rested and focused. You’ll need it.”
Jirl smiled in thanks, still sitting with her back straight. For a second, she thought she heard a tremor in Arla’s voice, an uncharacteristic uncertainty. Arla didn’t like the idea of her spending time with Yarnes. She’d heard it.
Shifting her gaze to the window and the passing city, Jirl began assembling the facts around Arla’s possible exit from Heartbridge, wondering how likely it was that she would burn the company to the ground on her way out.
And if Arla didn’t plan it, how likely it was that Jirl could destroy Heartbridge in her name.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
STELLAR DATE: 11.01.2981 (Adjusted Years)
LOCATION: Lowspin Private Clinic
REGION: Cruithne Station, Terran Hegemony
Reading through Cal Kraft’s updated med report, Brit let out a low whistle. “You were right,” she said, looking across the corridor to Petral. “It was poison.”
They were standing outside a reinforced window that looked into a private med clinic, where Cal Kraft lay on a bed in the middle of the room, surrounded by displays. He was still unconscious, kept in the artificial coma under orders fr
om a new doctor who had apparently identified the poison.
Further down the hall, two muscled men in suits and bowties stood near the door, staring fastidiously at the middle distance.
“So what does that information give us?” Petral asked, tapping her fingers on her thighs. She kicked away from the bulkhead to pace a few meters up and down the hallway. The guards didn’t look at her.
“Heartbridge wanted to cut him loose,” Brit offered.
“They could be afraid he might share what he knows. They might want to punish him for massive failure. He might have already tried to sell what he knows in the short time he was on the Cho.”
“I don’t think he had time for that,” Brit said. “He was barely out of the escape shuttle when I tracked him to the club.”
Petral tugged at her chin absently. “He was in an escape pod, though, which means it had a transponder.”
Neither woman spoke for a moment, both wondering what Kraft’s real plan could have been.
“Does it say what kind of poison?” Petral asked.
Brit handed her the report and Petral stopped pacing to read the data terminal. Her brow knit as she read.
“Mercury inhalation,” Petral asked. “Really? Is that correct?”
“I’m not sure if I trust it, either. Apparently, the dosage was low enough that he could have been attacked days ago. It could have been before we boarded the Resolute Charity.”
“So Heartbridge might have been done with him due to Clinic 46.”
Petral handed the terminal back and shook her head. She started pacing again. “I hate that Kraft being poisoned saps my desire to torture him. I want to nurse him back to health, seduce him and then chain him to a bed and flay him. I don’t want to feel sorry for him.”
“Why should this make you feel sorry for him? The good news is that it didn’t kill him. It still means we need to decide how to play this with the TSF. The question I’ve been weighing is whether we should wake him before Yarnes arrives or hand him over as he is.”
“Yarnes has no obligation to share information with us.”
“No, he doesn’t.”
“I’ve been thinking about a different plan, though,” Petral said. “What if I implanted a monitoring device in Kraft’s body cavity? We could track whatever he told Yarnes.”
“You just want to cut him open,” Brit said. “And that plan depends on Yarnes interrogating him, which means Yarnes is on our side.”
“But if Yarnes wasn’t on our side, we could track Kraft to wherever Yarnes delivers him. Then we’ll know who at Heartbridge he’s working for.”
Brit raised her eyebrows. “That seems like a good way to hedge our bets. Can you get something that can’t be seen by an autodoc? You know they’re going to scan him again.”
Petral nodded. “There are biological systems. I can plant something on one of his organs. It looks like a benign tumor on any scan, if they pick it up at all. It’s too bad he’s not fatter.”
Brit checked the time. “Yarnes is going to be here in two hours. Does that give you enough time?”
“I could stop to get a drink and still have enough time.”
Brit stepped closer to the window to stare at Kraft, who looked too peaceful in his unconscious state.
“Don’t waste too much time,” she said. “I wouldn’t be surprised if Yarnes tries to show up early.”
Petral chuckled. “I like the earnest types. Easier to get them all twisted up inside.”
For a second, Brit thought Petral was going to add something about Andy, but the tall woman only waved goodbye and turned to walk quickly down the hall, face already blank with a Link connection.
In forty minutes, Petral was back with a small kit that consisted of a fat syringe-like device with a fleshy blob in its clear plas canister. Brit followed her into the med room as she walked around the bed, studying Kraft’s bare abdomen.
“Pull back the sheet there,” Petral said, pointing to a spot just below the edge of Kraft’s rib cage.
Once Brit had pulled the sheet down, Petral raised the thick-needled syringe with two hands, holding it perfectly vertical over Kraft’s abdomen. She steadied her breathing, glanced at Brit with a half-smirk, then focused on the syringe and drove it hard into Kraft’s body.
The needle made a popping sound as it slid into Kraft’s skin. Petral pushed it in until the drum of the syringe pressed against the skin, then eased the plunger at the top of the tool down with both her thumbs. The fleshy globule in the clear tank danced as its surrounding liquid decreased, until it disappeared as a single mass.
Appearing satisfied she had emptied the syringe, Petral withdrew it straight upward, then placed it back in its packaging.
“There it is,” she said. “It takes about an hour to implant properly. Once its dug its way into his nervous system, I’ll be able to pick up the tracking signal on a specific channel.”
“What’s the range?” Brit asked.
“Not as far as I would like, but there are tricks to amplify the range. You can also run automated searches for the local signal using public networks. These things aren’t all that popular, so the signal stands out if you know what you’re looking for.
“You mean everybody doesn’t want their own bio-tracker?”
“It’s a parasite. If he hadn’t already been poisoned, this thing would still kill him eventually—in a very painful way. I’ve heard its similar to syphilis.”
Brit pressed her lips together but didn’t offer criticism. Hadn’t Andy said to make Kraft suffer? Didn’t she want that, too?
Maybe she was just exhausted. She wanted Kraft’s information. Then she would think about how to get justice for Tim. The information was going to be Tim’s justice.
“You better get rid of that thing,” Brit said.
Petral carried the box over to the bio-waste receptacle, which would carry it down to a reclamation tank. With the insertion device gone, the only evidence of the tracker was a small red dot between his belly button and his last rib, now swelling slightly. It might have been a flea bite.
She glanced at Petral, who had taken on a grim look. “You ready?”
Petral nodded. “Let’s go find out if this Colonel Yarnes is in bed with Heartbridge.”
*
Near the entrance of the private hospital was a small room for grieving families. A fountain stood in one corner with bubbling water. Shelves lined the walls on either side, bearing various religious icons. In the middle of the room, facing chairs had been set close together, Brit assumed, to make grief counseling easier.
When she and Petral walked into the room, Yarnes—and a woman Brit didn’t know—were sitting in the two chairs facing the couch. The colonel was wearing a duty uniform and boots with a black pistol hanging from his hip. He stood as they entered.
“Major Sykes,” he said, extending his hand.
Brit looked from Yarnes, who was shorter than he had seemed in the video, to the woman standing next to him.
“Who’s your friend?” Brit asked.
“My name is Jirl Gallagher,” the woman said as she stood, holding her head up as she replied. She was civilian, thin with finely shaped blond hair, wearing a conservative business suit that made her look like she’d just walked out of a Heartbridge board meeting.
Petral closed the chapel door and moved to stand beside Brit. When Brit didn’t take Yarnes’ offered hand, Petral shook it instead. She leaned toward him and smiled, turning on all her charm. Yarnes responded with a tight nod.
“Why are you here, Jirl?” Brit asked, looking back at the colonel. “I thought this was a conversation with the TSF.”
Yarnes cleared his throat. “Why don’t we all have a seat? We have a lot to talk about.”
“I hope so,” Brit said.
She sat across from Jirl Gallagher and studied the woman, who appeared calm and composed, as if she was used to waiting for events to play out before she made a decision or spoke.
Petral clapped her hands together as she sat. “So we asked to talk with the colonel and he brings friends. To what do we owe the pleasure of your acquaintance, Ms. Gallagher?”
Jirl gave her a thin smile. “I work for Heartbridge,” she said. “Until recently, I was Cal Kraft’s primary contact.”
Brit’s heartrate jumped. She stared at the woman. “Until recently?” Brit asked. “You’re aware he’s still alive, right? Although it certainly looks like someone tried to poison him.”
Jirl’s gaze didn’t falter. “I’m aware of that.”
“What’s your relationship to the Weapon Born program?” Brit asked, heat rising in her voice. “Are you responsible for what that man has been doing?”
Brit was surprised when Petral put her hand lightly on her arm.
Jirl glanced at Yarnes. “I understand that you’re angry. I have the status recordings from Clinic 46. I know what he did to your son.”
“What he did to my son…” Brit said, struggling to maintain her composure. The image of Tim helpless on the imaging bed rose in her mind. “That man is a monster, and you set him loose on my family.”
“His charge was to protect the research programs and the resulting Weapon Born seeds,” Jirl said. “We are responsible for them until their care passes to someone else.”
“Where are the other four seeds that were made from Tim?” Brit demanded, pushing Petral’s hand away. She was losing control of her anger.
“Four seeds? I don’t know. I don’t have that information.”
“You don’t know? So much for responsibility then. How can you not know what’s going on at your own research station? How can you not know what your company has been doing to my family?”
“I’m here to try and fix this,” Jirl said quietly.
Brit stared at the woman, whose shoulders remained set, as though she was carrying an immense weight.