She pursed her lips. “That is a bit cumbersome for a person.”
[I am an AI, not a person.]
“No,” she disagreed firmly. “You are an AI, yes, but you are a person. You’re not an organic one, you’re synthetic. But you are still a person.”
The AI pondered this further. [I understand. And thank you, Tamara.]
“You’re welcome, my dear. I think if we are introducing you formally to someone, we will call you Grania Estelle. Would you mind if otherwise we called you Stella? It’s a nickname.”
[I would like that very much. I am the Grania Estelle… but my friends call me Stella.]
Tamara laughed joyously. “You have been paying attention!”
Ka’Xarian was exhausted. He’d just gotten off a twelve hour shift, working to get engine four operational. With all the other building and repairs that had been done, the ship’s main propulsion had remained untouched. They were still operating on three of the ship’s six engines, though he was confident that after another shift, number four would be online and operating. He nodded to himself, antennae twitching in pleasure.
They were really doing it. The ship, which had been their home and their lives for so long had been dying. He and Quesh and the Captain had been doing everything they could to keep Grania Estelle alive for years, but it had been a losing battle. For those same years, they had presided over the downward spiral of their home. Then that fateful day came when they picked up an escape pod with an unlikely passenger. She had given them the codes to the replicators, she had given them some skills that they needed and ideas to solve problems. More importantly, she had given them hope. And now that hope, and an awful lot of sweat and hard work, was breathing new life and new youth into the ship, into their home.
But, that new life was exhausting. He clacked his mandibles in a zheen chuckle. A cleaning in the sonic shower and a long sleep would do wonders. He could eat, he probably should eat, he knew, but he was simply too tired. He placed his hand on the door control to his quarters to open it when his communicator beeped. His antennae flared in annoyance.
“I need to sleep!” he hissed. Pulling the communicator from his belt, he flipped it open. “This is Ka’Xarian.”
“Xar, it’s Tamara. I know you just got off shift. Would you mind stopping by my quarters? I have something to show you.”
He sighed. “Tamara, it’s been a very long day. Can this wait until tomorrow? I really need rest.”
“I know you’re tired. But I have snacks!” she said in a wheedling voice.
He stood there, thinking, or rather, trying to get his sleep-addled brain to think. “All right. But whatever this is had better be good and it can’t take long.”
“Thanks, Xar. I’ll have the ku-resh waiting for you.”
“Oh, you have ku-resh?” Candied pill bugs, which were a considered a zheen sweet treat. “You know its bad form to bribe an officer of the ship.”
She laughed. “See you in a few.” The call ended.
He was in her quarters a few minutes later. They sat and chatted for a few minutes, he ate a few bites of ku-resh, which was succulent, while she had a small plate of cookies and sipped a glass of fruit juice.
After finishing a particularly tasty bite, he finally addressed the reason he was here. “All right, Tamara. Spill it. Not that I don’t appreciate the snacks – they’re delicious, by the way – but why did you call me here?”
Tamara set down her glass. “You know I’ve been working on a special project for the last few months.”
“Yes.” He set down the bowl and sat up straighter on the chair. “The AI.”
She nodded. “Yes. And she’s finally ready to be shown off. But I’m going to be doing this slowly. I don’t want anyone freaking out over this.”
“She?” he asked.
“Yes, she. She’s a person, Xar, not just a computer construct.”
He cocked his head to one side briefly. “We’ll see about that.”
Picking up her datapad, she pressed a command. The holo projector on the tiny table in the middle of the room, separating the two of them activated and an image appeared. It was a pretty young human woman, a teenager, dressed in a ship suit. She had dark hair which was pulled back in a ponytail. Her rather serious façade was marred by slashes of color across her cheekbones, a dash of purple. Also, upon further inspection, Ka’Xarian noted that her dark hair, which was a dark shade of brown, was highlighted with a trio of purple stripes starting at her forehead and going back to the end of the pony tail.
“And this is the AI?” he asked incredulously.
“Yes, I am, Assistant Chief Engineer Ka’Xarian,” the projection of the woman replied. “I am Grania Estelle, but my friends call me Stella.”
He was taken aback. Looking at Tamara, “Did you program it to respond that way?”
Tamara chuckled. “I programmed her, yes, but you can talk to her directly. Don’t be rude.”
He looked back to the AI. “Forgive me… Stella. May I call you Stella?”
She considered him for a moment. “You were a bit rude just then, Assistant Chief. But I can tell you are excited about seeing me.”
“The Captain is the only one you need to address by rank, Grania Estelle,” Xar replied, shaking his head. “Everyone else, you just call by name. Except for the Chief Engineer. Most people call him Chief. My friends call me Xar. I’d like it if we were friends.”
She smiled. “I would like that too, Xar. Call me Stella.”
“Hello, Stella.” He looked over to Tamara. “We have got to get the computer core rebuilt for her.” The zheen was really excited now.
Both of the women laughed. “Yes, I think we do,” Tamara replied. “Though I think perhaps Stella would need to meet the Captain and Chief Trrgoth first.” Her face darkened. “Not sure the Chief will like her.”
Stella looked concerned. “He is a tough male and is in charge of his department. Having me in the computer core and running a great deal of the autonomous functions could only ease his workload and make the ship run more smoothly. Why wouldn’t he like that?”
“He’s not entirely thrilled with me as a person,” Tamara admitted. “We can work together, but he isn’t always enthusiastic about my ideas. Or more correctly, our personalities clash.”
Xar nodded. “I’ll speak with him. Stella, you’re too good of an opportunity to waste. A real AI! I have never seen one before, but I’ve heard about them. Read about them. This is so exciting!” He stopped and thought for a moment. “We should tell them.”
“What tonight?” Tamara frowned. She checked her watch. “I know I dragged you in here just off your shift, but it’s late. You think they’re going to want to get called in this late?”
Xar’s antennae were swirling in excitement. “For this? To meet Stella?” he gestured. “I think so.”
“All right.” She frowned. “Stella, are you ready to meet them?”
“Of course! I’m excited. Let’s do it!”
Tamara laughed. “All right. But I think we should move to the wardroom instead of my quarters here. There is simply much more room. I think you should meet them where you can be celebrated.”
The Captain was lying on his bunk, just pulling his blankets up over him. The sheets were cool and just starting to be warmed by this own body heat. It had been a long shift, hell, a long month here in orbit. Long, but it was incredibly satisfying. His ship was coming back together, better, in fact, than it had ever been in his lifetime. The crew was larger than ever. His holds were full of goods. This was a good time.
The comm panel next to his bed beeped. He sighed in frustration. Leaning over, he pressed the button. “Yes?”
“Captain, its Moxie. I didn’t wake you did I?”
He took a deep breath and let it out. “No, you didn’t, though I was just about to get to sleep. Is there some problem?”
“I have something that you need to see, Captain, but no, it isn’t an emergency. Can you meet me in the wardroo
m?”
He sighed again, looking at the chrono on the bulkhead. It read 02:14. “I’ll be there in five minutes. And all I have to say, Moxie, is that this had better be good.”
The wardroom was far less empty than the Captain expected when he arrived. Moxie was there, of course, seated at the far end of the table from his seat, though not at the actual end of the table. Seated at his standard seat was Ka’Xarian, who had a happy glow about him, his exoskeleton flushed a pale lavender. Also in attendance were Quesh who was downing a cup of coffee and, to his surprise, Turan. The Guura had a glass of water (half full), a shot glass of Sherbaak brandy (full) and the accompanying bottle (two thirds full) in front of him.
Moxie looked up as his entrance. “Ah, Captain, good you’re here. Coffee?” Without waiting, she stood and walked over, handing him a cup.
“I thought this was going to be a one-on-one session, Moxie,” he said irritably. “I didn’t realize we were having a staff meeting.”
She shrugged. “Sorry, Captain, but I thought this was something that we’d only want to do once. After that, of course, you’ll be able to decide how to proceed.”
He eyed her. “All right. I’m both concerned and intrigued.” He gestured with the coffee mug. “Carry on then.” He took his standard seat at the head of the table.
“Aye, Captain.” She went back to her own seat at the far end of the table. “Gentlemen, I present to you, Grania Estelle.” Without pressing anything, the holo projector on the table activated and the image of the young female AI appeared.
“Good evening, Captain. Good evening, Chief. Good evening, Doctor,” she said, nodding to each in acknowledgement. “I am Grania Estelle. When the computer core is upgraded, I am programmed to become the ship’s AI.”
Everyone stopped what they were doing and stared. Drinks sat forgotten on the table as they stared at what looked like a human girl. “Moxie, what is this?”
“This is Grania Estelle, Captain,” she replied. “Just as I said. She’s a class two smart AI, though she is very young. I built her to help out on the ship.”
“For which I am grateful,” Stella replied with a smile and a bow to Tamara. The woman saluted her with her coffee mug, smiling herself.
“An AI?” Turan gasped. “That’s amazing! Where did you get her from?”
“My mind and my fingertips,” she told him. “I did all the coding myself.”
“But I’m self-sustaining now,” Stella put in. “Tamara did an excellent job getting things started and set up, but I don’t need additions to my coding or core matrix anymore. I can learn on my own, just as any organic would.”
“This is incredible, Tamara,” the doctor gushed. “I haven’t seen an AI since I was on the mining station, but the ones there were little more than helpers. She’s a real person!”
Stella beamed and Tamara nodded. “Yes, she is.”
“What do you mean by help out?” the Captain finally managed to say. He was bowled over by this. He too had heard about AI’s ever since he’d been old enough to listen to spacers talk. Ever since the war between the Federation and the Republic, very few AI’s could be found out here in independent space. In his life, the Captain had seen only one AI and that was aboard a Republic cruiser that had passed through the Volantis system while the Grania Estelle was in for repairs and refueling, some thirty years ago. The cruiser had been in orbit, negotiating with the locals for a replenishment order and the AI had contacted the big freighter to contract them to carry a load of machine parts to another system. While the Captain had been only a quarter-share crewman then, he had never forgotten the artificial person who had worked out the deal with the then-Captain of the ship.
“She will work to keep the ship operating at its most basic level,” Tamara explained. “She will maintain the fusion reactor and help to run the ship’s autonomic functions.”
“I see.” And he did. “That will free up crewmen for other jobs.”
“Exactly. She can’t do everything, and Stella, please forgive me for speaking around you,” she apologized. The AI just smiled and nodded. “But she’s a synthetic, not an organic like us. She can perform millions of calculations a second and has a much higher response rate than any of us do. So, she’s an excellent troubleshooter and fixer.”
“Will you be a hindrance to operations?” the Captain asked. He didn’t want to ask, but he needed to know, especially if he was going to consider adding her to the ship’s company.
“I’ll try not to be, Captain,” Stella replied, unfazed by the question.
“No she won’t, Captain,” Tamara agreed. “In fact, she’ll help smooth things out. She’s a crewmember like any other, though she will be confined to the ship. She’ll be the ship, for all intents and purposes.”
“But you are the Captain, sir,” Stella pointed out. “You are the boss.”
He laughed. “Well, she clearly learned that from someone other than you, Moxie.”
Tamara smiled, her cheeks coloring slightly. “Nice, Captain.”
“Well, I’m sold,” he said. “How long to rebuild the computer core to accommodate this young lady?”
“A few days,” the Parkani rumbled for the first time.
“No objections, Chief?” the Captain asked.
He looked surprised and held up all four hands, palms up. “To an AI? Are you kidding, Captain? No way. I’ve always wanted to work with one. To have one in our ship? I think this is one of the best things that Samair has done.” He lowered his hands, save one, which he used to shield his mouth from her. He spoke in a very loud and conspiratorial whisper. “Don’t let her know that, Captain. It might make her head swell.”
The entire assemblage laughed, even Stella. Tamara roared the loudest of them all.
“Can we have the core ready by the time we reach the hyper limit?”
Quesh shook his head, a smirk on his lips. “No. We’ll have engine four up by tomorrow, which will let us get to the hyper limit about eleven hours sooner. But I’d say unless we slow down, we’ll be about six hours in hyper before we have it set up.”
“Then we’ll delay the jump,” the Captain decided. “I know that we can’t really interrupt the computer systems while we’re in hyperspace. Get the core up and running, install our friend here,” he indicated Stella, “and then we’ll jump.”
The Parkani nodded. “Aye, aye, Captain.”
“Aye, aye, Captain,” she echoed. “My first jump.”
“Our first jump,” the Captain corrected. “With an AI, anyway.” He checked his watch. “Well everyone, this is certainly an exciting meeting. It gives me hope for the future. We will inform the crew once the core is built, but until then, I’m sorry… Stella… you’re going to be kept under wraps.”
“I understand, Captain.”
“Good. Now, I bid you all good night.” He stood and they followed suit.
The actual building and installation of the computer core didn’t take as long as Quesh had projected. Uploading Stella’s core matrix into the system didn’t take all that long either. They were actually still a day out from the hyper limit when it was completed, much to the Captain’s delight. He made the announcement to the crew about Stella’s existence and installation as the ship’s AI and as a crewmember. The ship was abuzz with conversation about this. They were generally excited about the idea, though a few were concerned that she might be spying on them during private or intimate moments.
Stella chuckled when the topic was raised. “I’m no spy,” she replied. “I don’t have any designs on becoming one. I’m not interested in the workings of your digestion or what you might do in the comfort of your staterooms. If you decide to… go at it in the corridor or the cargo bays or some other inappropriate place, I will be reporting you to the Captain. But other than that, honestly…” She paused at the looks coming her way. “I don’t care what you’re doing. So long as you’re not endangering the ship or breaking the ship’s rules, have at it.” At this point, Stella gave them a con
spiratorial wink and her holo disappeared.
An hour before they ship was ready to jump into hyperspace, the Captain called Tamara to the wardroom. She wasn’t nervous this time. Stella was a great hit and seemed to be integrating herself well into the workings of the ship and with the crew. The ship was operating better than it ever had before. And while the sell prices of all the cargoes they had brought on board were speculative and basically unknown until they reached their destination, the likelihood was that the crew shares and profit would be much higher than anyone had yet seen aboard this vessel. To her knowledge, she hadn’t done anything to invoke his ire in the last few days.
“Moxie, good. Come in, have a seat,” the Captain said as she entered the wardroom.
She did so. “I have to say I’ve come to dread these meetings here, Captain.”
He laughed. “Understandable, but I’m actually not here to yell at you this time.”
She raised an eyebrow. “That’s a change.”
His face got more serious. “Change is actually the reason I called you in here. I want to discuss the future.”
“Okay.”
“Our original agreement was that you get to keep the starfighter and you pay off the work by fixing up my ship.”
“That’s right.” Her tone was wary. Was he going to go back on the deal?
“You’re more than held up your end, Moxie. And with the addition of Stella to my crew, I think that our original contract is complete.”
Tamara’s HUD popped up in her vision and Stella stuck her face into the left hand bottom corner. Clearly, she was going to have a witness to this conversation. Tamara wondered if the Captain was aware this was going on. She kept her face clear of expressions.
“You’re throwing me off the ship, Captain?” she asked, curious.
He blinked. “Are you kidding me? After all the work you’ve done? All the potential profit? Unless you want to go, I’m not getting rid of you.” He hesitated, his confident demeanor slipping just for a moment. “You don’t want to go, do you?”
“Well…” she said, drawing it out. Then she gave him a wicked smile. “No, Captain, I don’t. I like it here and there’s still plenty of work to get done. Besides, I think I’ve made a difference here and could do more.”
Pursue the Past: Samair in Argos: Book 1 Page 30