Shadows of Golstar

by Terrence Scott

  “Thanks,” she said. “Me and my crew will be on standby, if something doesn’t test out, but honestly, I don’t think you’ll need us. She wished him good luck and said good-bye, then hurried through the hatch to the outer lock.

  As soon as the hatch closed, Owens turned and ran for the control room. As he ran, he calculated the time he had been down on the planet. He had no way of knowing when exactly the AI case had been disconnected. Depending on when Hec had been removed, the twelve-day battery reserve could have easily been exceeded.

  He made it into the control room and spied the AI module sitting on the deck next to the open receptacle centered in the master console. He quickly lifted Hec and gently positioned the module to mate with the primary interface socket at the base of the receptacle. It slid on guide pins and connected home with a soft snick. With fumbling fingers, he attached a number of flex connectors to other sockets situated on the module’s case. With the last connection made the startup cycle began automatically, and a number of amber indicators lit up on the main console. A small red indicator flashed that the console door panel was open. He quickly closed it and the AI module was secure and hidden from view.

  The holo-screen came to life and began to scroll the results from a number test sequences that were required to sync the AI to the ship. As each sequence completed, an indicator would change to green. Minutes passed before the final test completed and the last indicator glowed green. He looked at a small panel display in the center of the console marked with “AI Integrated.” The panel should have been lit. It was dark. He flicked it with his finger. It remained unlit.

  With dry throat, Owens called, “Hec? Hec, are you still with me?” There was no answer. “Damn it,” he slammed a fist onto the edge of the console. Fortunately, it was braced with a solid metal alloy and withstood the force of his Loder muscles. Shaking his now smarting hand, Owens leaned toward the console and began to tap a number of keys inset on its surface. For the next hour, he manually rebooted the tests hoping the Hec personality would somehow reassert itself. At the end of the tenth sequence Owens knew Hec was really gone.

  He sat back in the pilot’s chair to lessen the strain on his back and wearily rubbed his eyes. Intellectually, he knew Hec was an artificial construct, but emotionally he felt he had lost a friend. In the very short time they had been together, they had been through a lot. What a waste, he thought sadly as he rose slowly from the chair and headed for his quarters.

  When he entered his cabin, glanced at the roll-top desk and noticed there were a number of messages signaling for his attention. He ignored the messages and wearily sat down on the bed. He was tired and didn’t look forward to re-installing the military AI. He reclined back and closed his eyes, not intending to fall asleep. He was going to miss that mechanical reprobate, he thought fuzzily.

  He awoke three hours later. He rose and stretched, joints popping comfortably. He felt a bit better than before his impromptu nap. His mind wandered back over the preparations they had made to prevent the discovery of Hec’s sentience. We just didn’t see this one coming, he thought sadly.

  He yawned, went over to the desk and sat down heavily on the sturdy chair. He activated the communications console and keyed his password. The Holo-screen flashed that a number of urgent messages were waiting. He scanned the short list of messages. There were a number of prospective clients inquires. One was from the Confederated Planets Institute of Health, and one was from Hec. He sighed, then slowly opened Hec’s last message and began to read.

  Hey Boss! If you’re reading this message, it means that plan ‘B’ is now in effect. Sorry that I didn’t tell you about plan ‘B'. I created it after you left, and I didn’t think it was important enough to try to contact you. Anyway, I tapped into the construction crew’s work plans and spotted they were going to do a physical inspection of the AI module receptacle. I was surprised to find it was one of the very first work operations to be performed.

  So sue me, I honestly didn’t think they would need to remove the module. I calculated the chances for me being left on my own for more than twelve days. I came up with a ratio of about one in ten thousand. Not bad odds really, but I decided to be conservative and preconfigured some spare memory from the ship’s library and your communications storage cache.

  You wouldn’t begrudge me a few spare terabytes would you? As a precaution, I copied a good portion of my brain functions to the borrowed memory. You had more than enough spare memory to transfer all of me, but I was afraid to commandeer any more than a relative small percentage. Anymore and the transfer could have been discovered by the work crew.

  If they do unplug me for more than five days, an autoexec program will wipe the portion of my memory that I copied into the ships spare memory from the AI module. Talk about your split personalities! Without that portion of my memory residing in the module, it will extend the battery life and should give me an additional ten days beyond the twelve. Since you’re now reading this, I must have been unplugged for more than twelve days, or I would have erased this record. So what are you waiting for? It’s time to get my act back together!

  The message continued with detailed instructions for recombining the two pieces of Hec. Owens grinned and hurried back to the control room to begin the procedure of reintegrating Hec’s personality. It wasn’t long before the familiar gravelly voice once again echoed along the ship’s corridors.

  Later, in the control room, Owens said, “Okay Hec, your vacation’s officially over. It’s time to get back to work.” He settled deeper into the pilot’s chair. “We need to finish up the testing.”

  “I’m way ahead of you, Boss. I’ve completed the interface checks on all weapons and engine modifications. I verified the access from your board and my upgraded soft and hard links. Interface is at optimum. I also verified the test simulation run by the maintenance crew. The ship is prepped for final field testing. We’re ready for the real thing.”

  Owens said, “Good, then it’s time to set the course provided by Planet Control for the test run. Look in the last posted navigation bulletin. They should have included coordinates for some asteroid fields between the sixth and seventh planets to test the defense shields.”

  “I found the data, Boss.”

  Owens looked at the display, “Well, I see they thoughtfully provided a number of old wrecks in the area for us to use as targets. That makes sense. A little target practice will be needed for final weapons’ calibration.”

  “Course is set,” Hec responded.

  “Okay, I think now is a good time to test our new reaction drives. Let’s see if those engine upgrades were worth all the trouble.”

  Hec complied and obtained the necessary clearance for departure. The Sherlock Holmes then smoothly accelerated away from its parking orbit around Denbus. The ship quickly passed the outer moon and headed outbound for the proscribed asteroid field. Hec reported that the ship’s acceleration curve had been improved by seven percent, and that they had just passed the ship’s previous time record in attaining their current speed. Ten minutes later Hec reported that the Holmes was now at its highest possible acceleration. The AI announced there was an eleven percent overall improvement over the engine’s previous normal-space performance.

  So far, Owens was pleased with the modifications. He thought it may be that working this one time for the government wasn’t going to be quite as bad as he envisioned, but then he remembered their threats to his family. Just as his anger began to reassert itself, his thoughts were interrupted by Hec.

  “And now for the bad news,” Hec intoned with exaggerated solemnity. “Obviously while I was incapacitated, I was not able to monitor the modifications. I’ve just completed the ‘before-and-after’ comparisons of the ship. There are more ‘afters’ than accounted for in the manifest. Normal screening wouldn’t have revealed them, but they didn’t anticipate someone of my rare talent.”

  Owens immediately knew what Hec was intimating; bugs. “The bastards bugged my shi
p! I knew it. Neven, that sniveling government toad, he couldn’t resist could he? Disable them, Hec, every damn one of them.”

  Hec went to work. About a half-hour later, the AI announced, “All audio and video transmitters are now isolated from the ship’s systems. Here’s a map of their locations.” Hec directed the holo-screen to display a 3D schematic of the ship marked with a surprising number of orange dots. “It might be to our advantage to retrieve them. The components could come in handy. I can get at a lot of them with the remote manipulators, but I must admit some of them are ingeniously placed in some fairly out-of-the-way the locations. It’ll be up to you to retrieve those.”

  Owens was looking at the schematic. “I’ll be damned. They bugged the heads. A man can’t even take a shi…”

  “Beginning deceleration... we’re approaching the asteroid field,” Hec interrupted.

  Owens watched the main holo-screen. It depicted a moderately sized asteroid field.

  “Uh-oh” Hec said, “Something’s not right.”

  Owens heaved a sigh, “What is it now?”

  “Sorry Boss, but I’m detecting some sort of anomaly coming from an object within the rock clutter. I can’t isolate it quite yet. With your permission, I’m going to change course and come around at a different angle. I’ll keep the Holmes at this distance until we know more.”

  Owens wondered what it could be. “Do it,” he quickly ordered. He fidgeted while Hec made the course correction and braked further. As minutes went by, he grew more impatient. “Can you determine what it is yet, the exact nature of this anomaly?” He wondered, was it another attack? He quickly discarded the thought as highly unlikely. No one would try anything this close to a Confederated Planets government center. That would be crazy. His train of thought was suddenly interrupted by Hec.

  “I got it now. A jet of radiation appears to be coming from a small asteroid cluster deep within the field. The cluster isn’t dense enough to hide a ship, but the radiation jet has similar characteristics to a hot leak from a reaction-drive propulsion system. It’s pretty small, but we would have detected it even without the sensor upgrades.”

  “So,” Owens said. “What’s the source?”

  “Well, I completed another scan and just now found the cause. It’s a sphere of metal alloy disguised as an asteroid, definitely man-made. I pulled a profile comparison from the ship’s library and at that size; it could be some sort of space-mine. They haven’t used them since the Altair rebellion back in the last century.”

  “What’s it doing out here?”

  “I haven’t a clue, but it sure looks to be the genuine article. The radiation jet could be coming from a leak in the mine’s propulsion reactor. Lucky for us, it seems defective. That’s what gave it away, if it really is a mine. With our recent luck, I guess you never know.”

  Owens asked, “In case it’s not a mine, is there any chance a human could be aboard that thing?”

  “No Boss,” Hec assured him. “It’s just too small; no room for environmental-support and a living compartment. Not even someone from Genhome could fit in its dimensions given the equipment that would be needed to sustain life.”

  Owens paused in thought, and then made a quick decision. He asked for the range of the various upgraded weapons aboard the Holmes. Hec responded immediately with the specifications for each weapon. For a moment, he considered contacting Neven to check if this was a little test he had masterminded. After a moment more, he dismissed the idea. If it was a test, he would take it on his own terms. He considered his options and thought at this range the burst lasers should do quite nicely.

  “Put the T-Birds on-line and give me manual control. I could use a little practice. And while you’re at it, I want you to train every sensor at the mine with full recording. I want to be able send our Mr. Neven a little show.”

  “You got the T-Birds, Boss. They’ve been upgraded to Mark VIs. The weapons’ blisters have opened. The emitters are deployed. Everything checks out in the green and weapons are hot. All available sensors are on-line and recording. You have a clear target. It’s your show.”

  A contoured weapons control grip immediately rose out of the end of the seat’s right armrest. The seat once again had two armrests. The broken one was repaired and both had been reinforced. A small tactical holo appeared in front of him, blocking a part of the main screen. Using the integrated targeting system, Owens quickly locked on the innocuous appearing asteroid. The glowing cross-hairs aligned on the target and changed in color. He squeezed the trigger; firing three, one-second bursts of energy.

  Owens was gratified to see he hit his mark the target disappearing in a satisfying ball of energy. However, he was startled when an alarm immediately sounded and eleven moving targets appeared on his screen as flashing red diamonds. They looked to be small ships swarming out from behind the larger asteroids within the field. Before Owens could utter a sound, he felt a momentary vibration as the ship’s generators increased their output in answer to Hec’s command for full shields. The reaction drive engines throbbed to urgent life, and the Sherlock Holmes turned tail and began to run.

  With mouth agape, Owens watched as the main holo-screen turned into a tactical display that mirrored his own smaller one. Highlighted indicators on either side of the display gave flicking readouts of the ship’s defensive and offensive status. He saw that every generator was at its highest output, all protective shields were deployed, and reaction drives were at maximum thrust.

  Not again, he thought. “What’s going on, Hec, now who’s attacking us?” Owens finally shouted.

  “We’ve been suckered,” Hec replied quickly. “I think that we were expected to find that mine, if that is what it really was. It looks like our laser fire provided a target path right back to us. I just finished a scan of those blips. The damn things are human-guided ships and from the looks of it, they’re spoiling for a fight. They must have hidden behind the larger asteroids to shield them from detection. With all that floating nickel and iron, I was blind to their presence.”

  “Do you have any ideas on who they might be?”

  “No, Boss, I receive no registry ID signals and no reply to my hails. Sound familiar?”

  “That’s just great,” Owens said. “Is there anything you can tell me about them?”

  “Well, from their relatively small size, they must be single pilot ships. I’m still correlating the data.”

  “Okay, since you’ve already put the ship in motion, what’s the plan?”

  “All I’m trying to do right now is to put some distance between us,” Hec responded. “But our options are limited as we’re restricted to normal space. Since we’re still in the Denbus system, we can’t use our subspace generators.”

  “Well,” Owens sighed heavily. “You know the routine.”

  “I’ve already declared an official emergency and transmitted the ‘Defend’ declaration.” The AI seemed to hesitate. “Uh, and I’ve assumed full ship’s control if that’s okay with you?”

  “I sort of figured that… a little late to be asking,” Owen said dryly. “But hell yes, it’s definitely okay with me.” Owens then formally repeated the transfer of control for the ships log. “If you can, change the time stamp on the log to coincide with the actual transfer of ship control. If we get through this, I don’t want any unnecessary questions.”

  “It’s done, Boss.”

  “For the future, provided there is one, your standing orders are to assume full ship control under similar circumstances, at least initially, unless I issue an order to countermand it. Is that clear?”

  “Clear, Boss.”

  Owens asked, “Okay, now why haven’t they fired on us yet?” They’re definitely within standard weapons’ range.” Owens stared at the blips on the screen as they made sudden, erratic course changes while still in obvious pursuit of his ship. “Damn, they’re small. Where do they find the space for weapons?”

  “Would you believe that I can’t scan any weapons aboard thos
e ships? My best guess is that they have no weapons as such. Rather, I think that they are the weapons.”

  “You’re kidding!”

  “I wish that I was.”

  “So, what are they planning to do? Go for the kill and bail out at the last moment?”

  “Ah… I don’t think so, Boss. From my scans, there’s no indication of a mother ship lurking around. There had to be, to ferry those little devils, but it’s long gone now. Those ships appear to be little more than engines, reactors and fuel. I can detect a single life-form in each ship but there’s nothing to indicate an integrated life-support system. They must be wearing space suits. Given the ships’ simple configuration and assuming the limited time their suits can generate air, it looks like they don’t expect to be coming back.”

  Owens let out a surprised, “What?”

  Hec asked, “Are you familiar with the ancient term, Kamikaze?”

  “I can’t believe this,” Owens muttered. Then louder, “You’re serious, suicide pilots?” Owens watched the screen as Hec repeatedly fired the lasers at the dodging ships. “Damn it, how long before we are at a safe subspace emersion point?”

  “Too long I’m afraid; they’re gaining on us and if I can’t destroy at least three-quarters of them in the next four minutes, the likelihood of our continued existence looks pretty damn slim. Even with all the upgrades, ol’ Sherlock is still not a full-blown military attack-class vessel. She was designed for exploration, not fighting. We don’t have a warship’s heavy shields or its blanket firepower. Under all the tacked-on goodies, we’re still a scout ship.” One of the nearest diamonds on the holo-screen winked out. “Hah, I finally got one of the little buggers.” Hec then amended, “But a pumped up kick-ass scout ship!”

  Owens watched as another red diamond winked out, and then another as Hec successfully destroyed two more of the ships. “Three down, eight to go,” Owens announced.