The Admiral sent the order for the Jaguar to tow this craft back to the Galaxy. Marcus didn’t like this new surprise. The coincidental appearance of this craft, so similar to the pictures he had seen back in the council, really bothered him. Had they been followed?
“TOM, you said it tried to take control of the ship?” he asked.
“Full integration. It wasn’t a virus, it was a full replacement. It was going to move in.”
“And you said it tried to talk to you?”
“It was a question. Just one word.”
Marcus waited.
“All he said was, ‘Brother?’”
Jorg sat inside his Jaguar. The battle had been quick, easy and satisfying. He was completely convinced that he was inside the most formidable single man space fighter in existence. He wanted to get back to the Galaxy to celebrate with his men when he got the order to fly out to check some stranded craft. He sped out to the edge of the asteroid field, unsure of what he was looking for, following the tracking signal from the Galaxy. His eyes opened wide when he saw the black sphere.
A black sphere. Just like the rumors of the visitors from the black beyond. The Angels of God.
Jorg nearly hit the wrong button when he hit the gravity tow and slaved the sphere to his gravity field. His hands were shaking and he was breathing heavily. He turned the ship and sped back to the galaxy.
The party with his men would have to wait until he got back from his quarters. There he typed up one quick and simple message.
-I found an angel.-
Jorg Busen, Crusader, was getting very near to God.
***
Admiral Mueller stood about twenty feet from the pure black sphere. Sub-Commodore and Captain Graham stood next to him with his hands on his waist. The other Captain was on her way over from her ship and would reach them soon. Four techs in full containment suits were working on the small craft. Two were dragging cables out of a mobile console unit they had moved over next to it, and were attaching them all over the sphere. The third tech was standing behind the console, setting up all the diagnostics they were preparing to run while the fourth was using a manual scanner. The fourth tech was trying to chip off small bits of the metal to analyze it.
The Admiral and Sub-Commodore were standing behind a glass window just outside of the hangar the craft had been brought to. Marcus had wanted to go in and look upon the foreign device himself, but he knew the protocols, and knew even more so that breaking the protocols just looked bad. The Admiral always had to be the best example on board the ship.
“You weren’t joking, Marcus,” Graham said. “That thing is straight out of the conspiracy theory virtuavids.”
“It is almost too good to be true,” the Admiral pointed out.
“How long until we have any kind of data on this thing?” Graham asked.
“Hours. Days. Probably months,” Marcus replied, knowing full well the extent of research that would be done.
“You know, it can’t be a coincidence…” Graham began before the Admiral interrupted him.
“It can’t be. I know. And still…” Marcus wavered off.
“I mean, look at that thing. The black sphere rumor is one of the oldest rumors around. Then we're off to hunt some black spheres in a far-off system, and now one tries to hack our ship here?” Graham was visibly excited.
“That’s the thing, Graham. The rumors were all good and funny. But really think about it. They are man-made rumors.”
“So?” asked the sub-commodore.
“Man-made rumors. Why on Alioth would an alien device fit so perfectly in the minds of men?”
Marcus turned to face Graham. The large man was staring at him with a confused look on his face.
“We want to find alien life forms, but for the most part, we assume they will be something like us. It is my belief though, that whatever we find out there, if we ever do, will be so foreign to us, that, well, I don’t think we’re going to recognize it.”
“So you're saying this thing isn’t alien?” Graham asked.
“I am saying men created the rumors of the black sphere and now we have one.”
“Or maybe the rumors were right all along,” Graham pointed out. “Rumors are based on truth, at least partially.”
“Rumors are based on what we want to believe.” Marcus reached to his ear and tapped on his com link. “TOM?”
“Yes sir?” The AI replied.
“You said it was trying to hack you?”
“No. It was trying to hack the ship to take it over. It did not expect to see me.”
“Was it an AI?”
“I do believe so sir. Just not in any way that I am.”
“What do you mean?” Marcus asked.
“I should have removed it with more care, but the little bit of code I saw before I wiped it…”
The AI got quiet.
“TOM?”
The Admiral waited a few seconds.
“Are you still there?”
“Sir. Yes. Sorry. I was running the code, the small bits I had preserved. The code is rudimentary, but only in comparison to mine. A lot of the structure is the same. The code is certainly not Alioth navy.”
“Well, that’s a given,” Marcus accepted.
“Dominion?” Graham asked after Marcus relayed to him what the AI had said.
“No. Not Dominion,” TOM said, once he was put on the console speaker. “Dominion AI technology is basic to say the least. It’s barely functional. No. From what little research I can do while out here, this code came from Earth.”
Marcus and Graham exchanged glances.
“What’s the Commonwealth doing with AIs? I mean, I know we are cheating, but they are the big anti-AI guys,” Graham asked out loud.
“Sorry, Sub-Commodore Crawford. You misunderstood me. I said the code came from Earth, not the Commonwealth. The code isn’t Solar. It is from a time long before the Commonwealth existed,” the AI corrected.
“Say again, TOM?” the stunned Marcus asked.
“This AI is old. I just can’t say how old. I saved only a very small portion of the code and I don’t have access to Aliothnet out here.”
Graham began pacing while Marcus held his hand up to his chin.
“Is this serious Marcus?” Graham asked.
“I don’t know…” he trailed off, his mind racing in many directions.
“And these, spheres, we’re going to investigate?” Graham asked.
Marcus didn’t hear him. “TOM, did you have any difficulty against this...this AI?”
“No, sir. I have a far larger and faster core than that small black sphere. Beyond that, the AI was almost shocked that I was here. The seven nanoseconds where the AI did nothing were all I needed.”
“What’s the plan?” Graham asked.
“We have TOM. We keep going,” Marcus said.
Graham nodded as they both turned to look back out through the glass. The techs had secured many of the data cables to the sphere and were standing back behind the consoles. They would begin their work and Marcus could only hope they learned something before they faced a another similar threat.
Marcus had never believed in Aliens. The black sphere rumors, little green men, abductions, these had all been the extension of human fears. Marcus had never been afraid of being the lone intelligent race in the universe. It had filled him with a sense of determination. The galaxy was theirs, and theirs alone. What did scare the Admiral were other men and the weapons they created. It was the reason they had created TOM. He was, after all, an incredibly advanced weapon.
And Marcus feared what other men might do with a weapon like that.
***
Jorg sat down behind his tiny work desk. In front of him, data was starting to come in from the after-battle reports. Each pilot of his wing would write up his or her own report that he would review with the wave leaders. They would also review all the videos that had been taken during the fight to study their tactics, movements and in this specif
ic situation, how the new Jaguar fighters were handling themselves. The data was nearly done uploading to his station.
While it was doing that, Jorg had his personal tablet in front of him. He had used his authority to tap into the data that was being pulled off of the black sphere he had towed back to the Galaxy. He had already uploaded all the pictures he had taken himself while onboard his Jaguar and sent those messages off. He continued to make great efforts to keep his data stream completely hidden. He had been a God is Near convert for almost seven years and had kept his affiliation with the powerful church completely hidden. Being a member of the Church was no crime, but being a part of the Alioth Navy had certain requirements, and an affiliation with a possibly competing entity was certainly not in the books. But after seven years, he had still yet to be caught, so he continued with his encryption and slipstreaming. He knew the blackwall software on the Galaxy was modern, but he had no reason to believe that he was a suspect for leaks.
Jorg finished putting the last set of data from the black sphere into a compressed format and sent it through. As he hit send, the battle data completed and a green light lit up. He clicked the review button and sent the information to the Wing deck mission room. He would meet his other wave leaders there and begin what would most likely be a four-to-five hour meeting, reviewing all of the information.
He closed up his tablet and put his workstation computer to sleep. He got up to walk away and realized that the computer hadn’t gone to sleep. He reached over and hit the button again, but the computer stayed on. He took a step back. The Galaxy had the most state-of-the-art computers. It was also a ship that was still working out its bugs. He would need to send for a tech to check in on his computer, but he wasn’t comfortable with that. He had wiped all traces of his activities, but he needed to cover his tracks. He was about to reach forward to sleep the computer again though, when it went dark on its own.
Jorg stood back watching the screen on his desk. It remained in sleep mode. He pursed his lips and then nodded his head. He turned and left to go to the meeting. The moment the door to his quarter slid shut, the computer screen came back to life.
3127 – In threaded space towards Gemini 53
Karai was beginning to wonder if this had been a good idea after all. It had been three days since they had left Alioth. They had made a quick eight-hour jump to a nearby station in order to pick up the last pieces of supplies for the silent research station and had then made the three-day jump out to Gemini 53. At first, Karai had been ecstatic to talk to, by her knowledge, the only fully aware AI in existence. But the excitement had died quickly when Sentinel proved to be quite plain. The being was truly amazing with its ability to process information and extrapolate data, but overall, Sentinel was quiet, didn’t ask much, and appeared to only be comfortable around the young man, Gheno. Gheno was a young genius all by himself, but he seemed more entertained by making crude jokes about her behind her back.
Then there were the other two. The Captain, Kale, a definitely unique character, was a somber and dark man, and Ayia, the other half, was quite the opposite. Karai quickly found out that those two spent most of their time together fighting about nearly everything they could think about.
Karai had asked Gheno if the two were married and all he had done was laugh at her and walk off. Sentinel informed her that they weren’t, and then he also had remained quiet about their peculiar relationship. She could clearly see and feel the tension, and yet could also see the care each had for the other. It was a care hidden under darkness and pain.
At the nightly sit-down meal that second night, Karai sat at the table and watched everything be recapped in front of her. Kale had cooked some kind of bird. It was a fowl with large feathered wings, and it had been cooked this way. It was surprisingly good. He had served the meat with some assorted vegetables that she hadn't recognized. The meal was the only normal part of the evening. Gheno had a tablet at the table and he was watching some kind of virtuavid. He laughed out loud every few minutes. Sentinel would chime in every once in a while, referring to something Gheno was watching. To her right and directly across from her, Kale and Ayia sat, arguing about yet another subject. This time they were arguing about several ships Ayia wanted to purchase. This had been a recurring theme.
"Ok, well, what about this Puma?" she said, pulling up the picture of the old classic.
"Too big. It’s just like the Lion but with more cargo space. We don’t need more cargo space. Plus it just screams 'please, pirates, attack me’," Kale replied.
Ayia's shoulders slumped. "Ok," she said scrolling by more of the pictures. "Here is a Martian Constructions Frig-X."
"The Martian Bat?" Kale asked. "It’s a gimmicky ship. Too many bugs yet. Yeah, it’s modern, but we need solid, not pretty."
"You know," she continued while scrolling through more pictures, "you could suggest something yourself."
"I’ll know it when I see it," he said. He stuffed a spoonful of vegetables in his mouth.
Ayia slid the tablet over. "Well, this is all I’ve come up with. You can look at it whenever you feel like it."
Kale ignored the tablet. "I don’t need to."
"Really?" Ayia said, standing up. Her plate rattled in front of her. "You whine and complain about this hunk of junk but when I try to offer a solution, you won’t take it?"
"It’s a hunk of junk, but I don’t want to replace a hunk of junk with another hunk of junk."
"You know I could buy nearly any spaceship."
"I don’t need you to buy a spaceship.." he began.
"Yeah, you don’t want anyone babysitting you. You’ll never be satisfied. I might as well have a ship hand-built for you."
When she looked up, Kale was looking right at her.
"Wait...could we?" she asked. When Kale didn’t answer, her eyes grew large.
"You never thought of that," she said. She could see him trying to answer, but for once, she had hit on something even he hadn’t thought of. She smiled and sat back down on the chair. She scooted in closer to the table and put her elbows on the table and her hands on her chin.
"So, Captain. How about it?"
Kale put his spoon down and sat back in his chair.
"Ok. I have to admit. I’m listening."
Ayia mouthed 'yes' and reached over to grab her tablet back.
"Ok, we will have to do it when we get back, but I remember my father used to contract with several elite space yards to build these unique ships for the very wealthy. We wouldn’t need anything like that, but they can build to specifications."
Ayia began scrolling through some older messages on her tablet to see if she could find that old information. She scrolled past the anonymous messages from the Cross-bearer and quickly looked up, guilty. Kale was busy eating but she made eye contact with Karai. Ayia quickly turned away.
"You’re not going to back down from this one, Kale," Ayia said. "You have to admit. This is a good idea."
"Yeah, yeah," he waved her off. He did agree it was, but would never let her know. He knew full well that she was, in many ways, much smarter than him, but it would never do for the Captain of a ship to give that authority up.
"Captain?" Sentinel's voice chimed in over the ship speakers. Karai looked up.
"Sentinel, you can call me Kale. Everyone else does."
"Ok, Captain. Well, I have a request," the AI continued.
Kale shook his head. "Go ahead."
"Our visitor would like to speak," Sentinel informed them.
Both Kale and Ayia looked at Karai. Gheno wasn’t even paying attention to them.
"It’s not me," Karai said, holding her hands up.
"Sentinel?" Kale asked.
"She is calling herself Cove. She is asking for permission to speak."
"Cove? She?" Ayia began, "Sentinel, what are you talking about?"
"Since when is it a she?" Kale asked when he realized who he was talking about.
"We found it better to assign ourselves gen
ders. Helps for personalization," Sentinel explained.
Ayia continued looking around as if someone was going to explain to her what he was talking about.
"Fair enough," Kale said. "Why Cove?"
"Her software designation is CVE46. We picked something similar," Sentinel said.
"Ok. What does Cove want?" Kale asked. When Ayia started to ask something, Kale raised a finger. She stopped herself.
"She wants permission to speak as freely as I do," Sentinel asked.
"Fine by me. I could use someone new to talk to," Kale proposed. "But Sentinel, do you trust this new friend of yours?"
"I have personally helped her rebuild her limited basic code with my own code. I have all the failsafes," the AI explained.
Kale waved his hand giving the hardware beings the go-ahead. He waited for a moment before a new feminine voice started talking over the ship's coms.
"Captain. Thank you. I will not bother you," Cove said.
"Ok. First of all, it’s Kale."
"Sentinel informed me it was a sign of respect to use that title," Cove answered.
"Don’t listen to him. Sentinel is a bit stiff. Call me Kale," the Captain instructed her.
There was a brief pause when the AI resumed. "Very well, Kale. I have to ask. Why do you fight with the Ayia?"
Kale groaned, while Ayia laughed out loud. Karai sat back and watched as Gheno looked up from his tablet asking who the new chick was. The red head was speechless as Kale and Ayia began arguing again as they tried to explain to yet another new AI about why they argued. She pushed away from the table and got up to leave. No one said anything. This was truly a bizarre group, but she would have to put up with it to get her data. It would make her career.
Karai walked out of the room and headed to her small quarters. It had been a rough couple of days. She had come from a small family. Her mother was a bioticist doing research for large pharmaceuticals and her father was a Christian priest. She and her younger brother had grown up in a calm, close knit environment. They were strict, organized and quiet. Karai had never even seen her parents fight. Not once. When she had gone off to Westchester University to study gravimetrics, she had had a rude awakening. She was left defenseless when she had had her first fight in her first serious relationship. Since then, she had kept to quiet and orderly guys.
The Lost Tribe (Sentinel Series Book 2) Page 11