by Isaac Asimov
But Masid choked off the speculation welling up. None of that mattered right now. The immediate task was to find a way to be effective.
One question required an answer: What was he doing here?
The ship carrying Chassik back to Solaria — in disgrace, Masid thought — had been attacked. Everyone now believed Chassik dead, along with all the other passengers.
Why?
Masid worked through the logic tenuously. Chassik had been recalled from Earth, which suggested that Solaria’s involvement with him was aboveboard. They considered him an ambassador and nothing more. Perhaps a few Solarians knew who he was and had arranged the attack as cover for diverting Chassik from a hearing which could prove embarrassing.
But Nova Levis was a Solarian property. If Chassik — Parapoyos — ran it, then more than a few Solarians knew and understood. Solaria’s reluctance to get involved in this debacle now acquired a more sinister aspect.
The moneyed interests with a stake in Parapoyos and his various enterprises numbered in the hundreds, touching nearly every Settler world and doubtless a good number of Spacer Worlds. Such a coalition of diverse interests might welcome a single resource, one place where illicit trade could be conducted with impunity.
It might also suit them to have Parapoyos himself on one planet where everyone knew he could be watched.
Then why am I here?
Obviously, not everyone was privy to this situation.
Parapoyos — somehow, now that he knew, the change of names came easily — moved through the gathering, talking to people. Masid stiffened as the arms dealer approached him.
“I don’t know you,” Parapoyos said.
“My name’s Masid. I’m with Filoo.”
“Ah, Noresk. Worked for him long?”
“Just started, really. I was independent for a long while.”
“And Filoo trusts you. Impressive. Welcome.”
“Thank you.”
Parapoyos searched for Filoo and smiled, nodding. “Time to move the festivities, I think.” He turned toward his bodyguards. “Get the transports now. I want to see the lab.”
As Parapoyos moved away, Masid thought of the weapon in his jacket hem, and felt utterly helpless. He had always wondered what kind of situation might render him ineffective and yet leave him in harm’s way.
Now you know...
The gathering shifted to make room for two more aircars, one of which was quite large. Masid boarded that one and found a place by a window.
They lifted off and flew in a staggered line to the northwest.
From above, Masid studied the lab when it hove into view. The compound had clearly been added to over time, new sections coiling outward from a central form that looked vaguely familiar.
As they descended, he stared at the shape. The centerpiece was a bulbous structure, connected by a long, enclosed arcade to an oblate, fan-like section that formed part of the northwest wall. Against this the rest of the lab huddled, diverse shapes and sizes...
That one structure, though... the more he stared, the more he thought he knew what it was.
They dropped down onto a platform just in front of the central bulb. He emerged along with the others and stared up at the curved building. In the wall, a door slid aside —
It’s a ship, Masid thought instantly, recognizing the external airlock hatch. Nova Levis laboratory is a ship...
Parapoyos turned at the hatch and raised his arms.
“We’ve been working toward a day when we can come out of the shadows of illicit trade and black marketeering,” he said, his voice amplified. “The tool upon which our ambitions have depended is this place, right here. Within this lab, we have developed the future. A small thing, really, but with tremendous impact. You have all been field testing the various scenarios over the last few years. My arrival here is premature, but not so much so that the schedule is in any way threatened. I’ll simply be among you to see the first export of our new product.
“It somehow seems inappropriate to talk about the future in terms of the trivial, but, in fact, all history has been made by two factors: the impact of the unnoticed, and the advantage taken by those who understand change when it comes. This differs only in the first instance. People will definitely notice. They cannot help but notice. Every time they settle a new world, what we have created here will be waiting for them. Every time they set foot where no one has before, what we have sown will take root in their very beings. And they will have to come to us to live.”
He laughed. “What every businessman wants! A ready-made market and no competition.”
The gathering laughed.
“So,” Parapoyos went on, “let’s go in now and see how our future is doing.”
In single file, they followed him through the airlock.
“Arrests are being made throughout the capital,” Penj informed Derec and Ariel as he entered the security operations room. “Byris is wasting no time for a change. I doubt most of the people he’s detaining are directly involved in any of this, but a few are bound to be part of it.”
Derec did not take his eyes from the array of screens before him, and listened with only part of his attention. The shapes filling three displays shifted through geometric and polymetric configurations. He knew this, had seen it before, though not with this complexity. The Resident Intelligence on Earth had been corrupted for less than a year, but what he saw here revealed the effects of decades of invasive counter-programming and viral restructure. He wished he had Rana with him — she possessed a gift for breaking down unusual numeric structures.
The other screens showed the actual numbers. These, too, were familiar. Most of it conformed to what he had developed from the analysis of the Union Station D. C. brain, but...
“Ariel,” he called, “take a look. What do you think?”
Ariel came over and sat down beside him. She studied the screens. “Set point topology... interface iterations... this resembles the cyborg brain.”
“Mm-hmm. More than just misdirection was going on here.” He tapped commands into the console and waited. “Ah-ha. Look. Those points, here and here, are one cell of the Three Law programming.”
“Shit,” Ariel hissed. “If it’s not broken...”
“Then it’s severely impaired. It’s possible this RI was actually cooperating.”
“Not sanely.”
Derec shrugged. “Does that really matter? They found a way to co-opt it and corrupt the Three Laws.”
Ariel glanced at Bogard, standing nearby, watching the room. “If I had to choose, I’d accept your approach at once.”
Derec did not reply. He was tempted to ask her if she really understood the difference, which would be insulting. Of course she did — Bogard’s makeup, even with its flexibility, still adhered to the Three Laws, while what they saw here in this RI seemed severed from those laws. Still, he doubted Ariel would ever fully accept Bogard, but as long as she allowed that he could be depended upon, even within limits, Derec was content.
The room contained several Aurorans now, most of them security people, but quite a few from the Council. First Advisor Maliq had been shamefacedly explaining the situation to his associates since Pon Byris had brought them here. It had quickly become apparent that he had not known what Lea Talas had been doing, that she had manipulated him along with many others. Still, he was chagrined at having been gulled. But he was not allowed to see what Derec and Ariel were doing.
Derec was shutting down the corrupted RI, piece by piece. Like any Resident Intelligence, it had multiple responsibilities. Arrangements had to be made to transfer those duties to other RIs. But before anything, he had closed off its communications links — again, one by one.
Dr. Penj sat with them now and studied the screens.
“What is that?” he asked, pointing at a stable form amid the fluctuating fractalscape on one screen.
“That is a V. R. environment,” Derec said. “We have no idea what it contains — it’s encased by
a very sophisticated security shell. If we just open it up we might destroy whatever’s within. Almost everything we’ve been able to identify as an illegal dataline feeds ultimately into it, so it must be very important.”
“What do you have attacking it?” Penj asked.
“I’m using my RI, Thales, to apply a sequence of algorithmic keys. Even at that speed, it could take days. Thales?”
“Still working, Derec. No progress. However, I have found something else of interest.”
“Show me.”
A new screen winked on. Numerical coordinates appeared in the left-hand corner. In the center, a routing tree scrolled up, showing a series of cross-connected links.
“Among the masked hyperwave connections we have discovered,” Thales said, “this one I thought unique. It has been operating continuously for nearly a year, and except for one short period of data exchange, one direction only with no responding traffic of any kind.”
“So something has been receiving constantly,” Ariel said, “and sending nothing back?”
“With the exception I mentioned, that is correct. The nature of that exception appears to be in the form of remote programming algorithms. I traced the signal. It has been difficult because of the complex routing. There are at least sixteen connections which switch constantly, according to an algorithm I was able to break without too much difficulty. I discovered that its endpoint is within the Nova Levis blockade.”
“To whom?” Penj demanded.
“No, sir,” Thales said. “To what. It is in continual communication with an AI system on board part of the perimeter.”
“Doing what?” Derec asked.
“It is operating a location and identification system which seems to be the main trunk feed for the entire blockade. It is, in fact, masking incoming and outgoing ships. Compromised in this way, the blockade has little way of detecting, identifying, and locating ships coming through these coordinates.”
New numbers spread across the bottom of the screen.
“That’s nearly thirty degrees of arc,” Ariel said.
“Of course, this would not affect independent sensors,” Thales continued. “A single ship would not be prevented from detecting traffic in this segment. However, there are strict protocols in place determining which ships patrol which areas.”
“Who has this area?” Penj asked.
“Earth.”
“So what would happen,” Derec asked, “if you disconnected that line?”
“I cannot say with certainty, but if my understanding of the specific AI system is correct, then the masking will simply end. Any ships in that section will become quite visible to the entire blockade.”
Derec glanced at Ariel, who turned to survey the others in the room. No one seemed to be paying much attention to them. Penj was the Calvin liaison to this operation — by his own insistence — and security was preoccupied with what was becoming a purge. Ariel gave Derec a small smile.
“Do it,” Derec said.
Mia moved to the next console.
“What’s happening?” Kru demanded. “We have to move.”
Mia shook her head. “No,” she said. “This part of the ship has been closed down. No one has been in here in years. There’s a firewall between these systems and the rest of the complex. I don’t know who built it, but it’s designed to prevent meddling from outside. We have not been detected by any systems outside these because that link could be used to get back in here. Paranoid programming. Anyway, the result is, we can do what we want here.”
“But there’s nothing here!” Kru shouted.
Mia looked at her. “What was there supposed to be?”
“This is Nova Levis. This is where they make all the sickness. This is where the reanimés came from.”
Mia nodded. From what she had seen at the first cyborg village, added to what she was learning here, the reanimés were failures, examples grown wrong. Somewhere along the lab wall was another access out of which these failures were tossed. Mia supposed they were expected to die of exposure. Many no doubt had. The lake probably contained the rotting corpses of hundreds of them, rotting and releasing who knew what kind of biophage into the ecology — exotic viruses, bionans, synthetic constructs.
But some had survived and had learned to rescue those who came after. The consequences of that process were problematic since, evidently, all the reanimés were sterile. If no more were made here, no new ones would be born.
Unless the environment itself were reworking the colonists.
Mia shook her head. Too big for the moment, too much to consider.
She activated the hyperwave console.
“You want to stop the lab?” Mia asked, studying the readouts. “Give me time and I’ll see if we can just move it.”
One of the cyborgs made a sound. Kru danced across the deck to look at another board that had lit up.
“Someone’s coming,” she said.
Mia, frowning, joined Kru. The board showed the grid of the internal communications system. Piece by piece, it was coming back on-line.
“They are, aren’t they?” Mia asked sarcastically, and returned to the hyperwave console.
Where’s the emergency broadband signal...?
There. She tested the circuit, then opened a link to whatever planetary satellite array might still exist. She found nothing local except the transponders of the blockade fleet.
That will have to do, she thought, and adjusted the frequency to match.
She touched a contact.
“Attention. This is Lt. Commander Mia Daventri, Internal Security Terran Expeditionary Task Force. Attention. This is Lt. Commander Mia Daventri, Internal Security Terran Expeditionary Task Force. Please respond.”
She repeated the phrase four more times before she received a reply.
“Watch Officer Grenn of the E. F. S. Suttermill. Please verify identity.”
Mia felt herself grin as she read off her I. D. code and security clearance.
“You are listed as missing, Lt. Commander.”
“I’m back. Please lock on these coordinates. We have a situation. I need to speak to Fleet Admiral Bhek. Pass this —”
“Hold, please.” Silence. Then: “What the —”
“Watch Officer Grenn, please respond.”
“I’m patching you through to Commander Starls, Lt. Commander. We now have a situation.”
Mia waited nearly a minute before a different voice came on the line.
“This is Commander Starls. Please identify yourself.”
Mia ran through the litany of codes again.
“You’ve been missing, Lt. Commander Daventri. Do you have an explanation?”
“I was assaulted and sent to the surface of Nova Levis. Please note the link I am using. I’m sending the automatic transponder code to you now.”
A few seconds later, Commander Starls said, “That is a Solarian ship, decommissioned twenty-eight years ago. Where did you find it?”
“It has become an on-ground research facility. I believe this is the cause of all the trouble.”
“That’s a bold claim. Can you back it up?”
“The ship needs to be examined, but I think it contains everything we need to —”
“The seals are being opened,” Kru shouted.
“Commander, I’m about to be discovered. What I want to do is lift this ship off.”
“It’s functional?”
“I can’t tell, I’m not a pilot. But my guess is, yes. It’s been kept ready. If I give you the codes for all the controls, can you operate it remotely?”
“Of course.”
Mia tapped quickly. “Then I am sending it all to you... now.”
Masid watched Parapoyos laboriously enter a long string of access codes into several consoles. The lower sections of the ship were open and a good part of the starboard upper section, but all the control areas had been sealed. Certainly the doors could have been blasted through, but who knew what that might bring about? At the
very least, Parapoyos would have installed an auto-destruct, set to go off at any unauthorized breach.
Masid became aware of Filoo watching him. The man looked nervous now. Masid surveyed the rest and found a few others who showed the same edginess.
The big access doors lurched on their tracks noisily, and dragged themselves open. Beyond spread the bridge, all the consoles coming quickly to life after long sleep.
Parapoyos entered with obvious pride. “It was always intended that operations should be mobile. In the event, this ship was prepared to be used as our headquarters. I would have preferred to wait till a more politically unstable time, but things are pretty bad in general, so it may not be terribly premature.”
Filoo ran a hand over his mouth, looking around.
Masid drifted casually over to a hulking display board. Watching the room, he slipped the weapon from its pouch and pressed the charge stud, then held it behind his back, close to the casement.
“We can manage things here,” Parapoyos continued, “until a better location can be found, and —”
An alarm sounded, filling the bridge with a raw vibration. Masid clenched the weapon, his chest seizing. Parapoyos went to a console and worked for a time.
The alarm died. In the abrupt silence, someone coughed.
“Well, well,” Parapoyos said. “We may be leaving much sooner than I thought.” He turned and glared at the assembly. “Our supply corridor has been unmasked. Blockade ships are moving in to intercept. Now, how could that happen?”
Masid gauged the distance at about ten meters. He would have one shot. He doubted now he could close the gap without being grabbed. He looked down at the box in his hand — the firing stud glowed a bright green now, indicating a full charge — and swallowed.
He began to bring the weapon to bear.
A deafening groan filled the air and the deck tilted. People sprawled across the floor, grabbing each other or consoles. Parapoyos fell back against aboard and held on. Masid barely kept his feet.