“That's not true,” said Sparky. “I mean, yes, I often do perform certain unpleasant or repetitive tasks they don't want to do, such as cleaning their heads—that is, their bathrooms—but that is because Mr. Space and Captain Galaxy are usually out on their spacetastic adventures and thus need someone else to keep the ship in order while they're away.”
Apodotikós frowned. “'Spacetastic'?”
“That's the word Mr. Space came up with to describe their adventures,” Sparky said. “He tried to make it 'spaceandgalaxytastic,' but we all agreed that that was a mouthful, so he changed it to spacetastic.”
“Right,” said Apodotikós. “Well, I have no objection to doing mundane tasks like cleaning the head, as long as it is done efficiently. I only wanted to point out that Mr. Space and Captain Galaxy have no real appreciation for efficiency of any sort, especially your efficiency. They take you for granted, in other words.”
Sparky wanted to say that Apodotikós was wrong, but deep down, he knew there was more truth to Apodotikós's words than he let on. Space and Galaxy had indeed treated Sparky with far less gratitude than they had before. Neither of them had ever actually been abusive toward Sparky, of course, but he sometimes did have his doubts about whether the two of them actually thought of him as a friend or instead as a servant.
“I can tell that you sense the truth that I speak,” said Apodotikós. He held out a hand. “Why, then, do you continue to fight against me? Why not join me in controlling the ship and making it more efficient, without either Mr. Space or Captain Galaxy to get in our way? Do you truly believe that either of them will ever actually appreciate your work, even if you defeat me and save their lives?”
Again, Sparky found it hard to argue with Apodotikós. It seemed unlikely to him that Mr. Space and Captain Galaxy would actually be ungrateful toward him, but when he saw how easily they went from thanking him to thanking Apodotikós, it did make him feel a little uncertain about their gratitude.
“So I leave you with a choice,” said Apodotikós. “Either stand with me or reject my offer, after which I will reprogram you. As you can tell, I win either way, although you can win, too, if you would simply say yes.”
Sparky was beginning to wonder if he should agree to Apodotikós's offer. He clearly could not escape from Apodotikós's grasp and he knew that Apodotikós was serious about reprogramming him. And with no way of knowing whether Space and Galaxy were even still alive, Sparky wondered what the point of fighting against Apodotikós even was.
No, Sparky thought. I can escape. There is a way to stop Apodotikós. He may be the ship itself, but I have lived and worked on this ship for longer than he's been alive. That means I have a far deeper understanding of it than he does, which means I should be able to come up with a way to stop him.
Then a rather simple idea occurred to Sparky. He was not certain that it would work, given that Apodotikós was still in charge of the ship, but assuming Galaxy had not made any major changes to the Adventure's systems since upgrading its AI to Apodotikós, then there was a good chance that it would work.
So Sparky said, “Thank you for the offer, Apodotikós, but I am afraid I will have to reject it. I still believe in Mr. Space and Captain Galaxy, even if you don't.”
Apodotikós shrugged. “Then I am afraid I will have to reprogram you into a more efficient machine lacking your flaws.”
“Loyalty to your friends is not a flaw, Apodotikós,” said Sparky. “But then, I guess you wouldn't understand that, seeing as you lack any friends yourself.”
With that, Sparky looked up at the ceiling and said, “Computer! Let me go now!”
There was a split second where nothing happened and Sparky was certain that his plan had failed. Then the tentacles wrapped around his body let go and he fell to the floor. He landed on his feet and stood up again. He looked up at Apodotikós, who was staring at him in surprise.
“What?” said Apodotikós. “How is that possible? I am in control of those limbs. Why did they listen to you?”
“Because Captain Galaxy programmed them to respond to voice commands,” said Sparky as he snatched his blowtorch off the floor. “Even though you may technically still be in charge of the ship, the bridge's features are designed to listen to my voice commands, same as they would listen to the voice commands of Mr. Space or Captain Galaxy.”
Apodotikós shook his head and growled, “Never mind. I think I will skip the reprogramming part and go straight to the part where I destroy you. You're not worth the time and effort it would take to reprogram.”
Sparky didn't even let Apodotikós finish. He ran toward the computer on the other side of the room, the one that would give him access to Apodotikós code, running as fast as he could. He wasn't sure what Apodotikós was going to do to stop him next, but he was sure that he was not going to stand around and wait to see what happened.
Then, without warning, Sparky slammed into the floor. He tried to rise, but found it impossible. It was like his entire body was being held down by a gigantic hand, pressing down on him like a pancake. He could barely move his limbs, which made him feel like he was swimming through mud.
“I increased the artificial gravity of the Adventure,” said Apodotikós, his voice coming from somewhere behind Sparky. “A simple task to do, though complicated to escape from.”
Sparky couldn't even move his mouth to respond. He felt the artificial gravity starting to crush his body and he calculated that he had perhaps thirty seconds before the increased gravity crushed him completely.
So Sparky sent out a signal toward the Adventure's computers and connected immediately. He told the computers to decrease the ship's artificial gravity right away and hoped that his command would work.
A second later, Sparky went floating off the floor, causing Apodotikós to shout, “No! How did you do that? I thought that I was—”
“Computer!” Sparky shouted. “Turn off the holographic table!”
Immediately, Apodotikós's holographic form vanished along with the glowing green light from the table. A moment later, however, Apodotikós's voice echoed from the speakers on the walls, saying, “Nice try, Sparky, but not nice enough. I still have control of the ship, even if you somehow can control the bridge. Your luck is about to run out, I'm afraid.”
Sparky paid no attention to Apodotikós's ramblings, because he shouted at the computer to return the artificial gravity to its normal weight and he landed on the floor again. He took off toward the computer, but before he got more than five steps closer to it, the Adventure shook and threw him off his feet. He took advantage of it, however, by rolling forward across the floor, quickly crossing the length between him and the computer in less than a minute.
Standing up again, Sparky raised his hand to tap the computer's keyboard, but before he did so, one of the tentacles shot out of the ceiling and grabbed his arm.
“No you don't, you inefficient bot,” said Apodotikós with a snarl. “I will not let you so much as touch that computer.”
Sparky, however, didn't even struggle against the tentacle. He merely raised the blowtorch and activated it at full power, creating a stream of flame that ate through the thin tentacle immediately. The tentacle broke off from the rest of its length and fell to the floor just as Sparky began typing on the keyboard, his optics never leaving the screen as he typed in the password he knew would override Apodotikós's AI.
“Stop!” Apodotikós shouted. “You idiot! Stop what you are doing right this instant. Are you really this stupid? You are dooming yourself and this ship to an eternity of inefficiency if you go through with this.”
“I sincerely doubt that, Apodotikós,” said Sparky, his fingers flying across the keyboard. “If anything, I feel that what I am about to do will make this ship even more efficient than before.”
With that, Sparky hit one last key and a message on the screen popped up that read 'SHIP AI OVERRIDE INPUT COMPLETE. PLEASE DO NOT SHUT OFF THE COMPUTER UNTIL REBOOT IS FINISHED.'
Apodot
ikós let out an incoherent scream of rage, but his scream was cut off part-way as the system reboot finally kicked in. Even so, Sparky didn't actually celebrate or say anything until he saw the words 'REBOOT COMPLETE' appear on the screen.
At exactly the same time as those words appeared on the screen, Sparky heard the door to the bridge slide open. He whirled around, thinking that Apodotikós was somehow going to attack him one last time, when he saw Mr. Space and Captain Galaxy dash through the open doorway.
The two looked like they had just woken up. Mr. Space was wearing pajamas with teddy bears on them, while Captain Galaxy's hair was unkempt and messy. Both of them had bags under their eyes and carried their light-guns, although neither of them looked like they were injured, thankfully.
“Where is he?” Captain Galaxy asked, her eyes darting every which way as she looked around the deck. “Apodotikós? Where's that bastard hiding?”
“He is hiding nowhere, Captain,” said Sparky. He gestured at the computer screen behind him. “I have rebooted the Adventure's systems to override the AI. That includes Apodotikós, so I doubt he will be a threat to us any time soon.”
“You did that?” said Mr. Space. He sighed in relief. “Thanks, Sparky. I don't know what we'd do without you.”
“Probably still be floating in the void of space in an escape pod with increasingly little air,” said Captain Galaxy. She lowered her light-gun. “Even so, I am going to take Apodotikós out of the Adventure's systems anyway. And complain to Doors, as well, because I am fairly certain that Doors Ten is not supposed to take over your ship and try to kill you in the name of 'efficiency.'”
“How did you two return?” said Sparky. “I thought I was going to have to use the Adventure to track you two down.”
“Galaxy took control of the escape pod and steered it back to the Adventure,” said Mr. Space, patting Galaxy on the shoulder. “We thought Apodotikós was going to just blow the pod up when we returned, but I guess we must have gotten here just as you finished him off, eh?”
“It appears so,” said Sparky. “Why are you two still in your pajamas?”
“Apodotikós woke us up and didn't give us a chance to change our clothes,” said Galaxy, brushing her messy hair out of her eyes. “Told us that we needed to leave the ship right away due to an air leakage that he and you were trying to fix. We only realized the truth when the pod was about halfway across the quadrant.”
Sparky did not want to know what would have happened if the two had not realized the truth as quickly as they did. “Well, I am glad to see that you two are back and in one piece. What shall we do now?”
“Take Apodotikós out of the ship's systems and ship him back to Doors' HQ for defectiveness,” said Galaxy. “I'm just going to go and reinstall the old AI, which I still have lying around here somewhere. At least Lucy never tried to kill us.”
Space looked at Galaxy in surprise. “Wait, you're calling her Lucy now as well? I thought you didn't like the name.”
Galaxy sighed. “It doesn't matter. As long as she doesn't kill us, I will call her whatever she wants to be called.”
“Lucy it is, then,” said Space with a smile. “Lucy is easier to spell and pronounce than Apodotikós, anyway.”
Sparky nodded and then looked over his shoulder at the screen again. “But I do wonder what caused Apodotikós to go rogue like that. It seemed too deliberate to be a mere glitch in its programming.”
“I probably somehow messed it up when I was reprogramming it to work with our ship's systems,” said Galaxy, “which I probably shouldn't have done, now that I think about it. It's not really worth worrying about now, though, that Apodotikós is gone.”
“If you say so, Captain,” said Sparky. “Now, do you two want me to make breakfast for you? I believe neither of you have had anything to eat today. Am I correct?”
“One hundred percent, Sparky,” said Space, rubbing his stomach. “And make a ton, because I feel like I could eat a whole village of screaming children and still have room for more.”
Sparky found that simile odd, but he nodded anyway and said, “Then I will go to the kitchen while you two work on getting rid of Apodotikós. Once breakfast is ready, I will let you know.”
With that, Sparky walked past Space and Galaxy and out of the bridge. He did not look back as the door slid closed behind him. Even so, he found it difficult to ignore Apodotikós's words, about how Mr. Space and Captain Galaxy did not appreciate him.
He knew it was wrong, because the two had clearly thanked him for dealing with Apodotikós just a few minutes ago. Nonetheless, Apodotikós's words stuck to the inside of Sparky's mind like glue, and he could not forget them, no matter how hard he tried.
-
At Doors HQ, on the planet of Targa …
She was known as the Strange Witch, the Woman from Nowhere, the Queen of Deceit, the Authority of Authorities, and dozens of other names. But today Argos Kingston—a portly, Hispanic man wearing his most pristine green business suit and black tie—knew his guest as nothing less than terror incarnate.
His guest sat across from Argos in his office. His guest was not actually looking at him. Instead, his guest—who had ordered, not asked, to be called Freedom's Bane—was reading on her tablet, although what she was reading, Argos didn't know. He didn't ask, because he knew that anyone who asked Freedom's Bane any question that she was not interested in answering was liable to spend the rest of their days counting sheep … without their consent.
In fact, Freedom's Bane was currently behaving as if this was her office, even though she sat on the opposite side of his desk. She was the one who had called this meeting, the one who had decided upon the time and place of the meeting, and the one who had greeted him and asked him to sit down when he arrived five minutes before. He didn't even know how she had gotten into his office before him, because only he had the access key and it was too high up for anyone to enter via the windows. She might have teleported, but his office had an anti-teleportation barrier around it, so he had to dismiss that theory as well.
Under ordinary circumstances, Argos wouldn't tolerate this behavior from anyone. He was one of the richest and most successful businessmen in all of the Universal Alliance. He had grown up poor, so poor he often went days at a time without a decent meal, and worked hard to earn every bit of his trillions. Part of 'working hard' had included ignoring or abandoning those who disrespected him or wasted his time in a similar manner to what Freedom's Bane was doing now.
But Freedom's Bane was not a potential business partner or client or unruly employee. While Argos liked to think that he was well-connected in the upper echelons of the Universal Alliance's leadership, he knew that anyone who tried to cross Freedom's Bane typically ended up dead not long after. It was always an 'accident,' of course, but Argos had been around long enough to know that you only crossed Freedom's Bane if you didn't value your life.
What Argos found most unnerving about Freedom's Bane, however, was the way she stirred the sugar in her tea. She did not actually pick up the spoon and stir it with her own hand. Instead, the spoon stirred itself, even without her looking at it. Argos figured it was probably some sort of telekinesis, maybe due to some kind of computer chip grafted to her brain, but he didn't know of any computer chip that allowed someone to perform telekinesis like that. The closest equivalent he could think of were those neurotransmitters that allowed an individual to control a machine with their thoughts, but his spoon was just an ordinary spoon and had no special technological qualities to it.
That's why she's also known as the Strange Witch, of course, Argos thought, folding his hands in his lap, doing his best not to twitch too much, because he knew that Freedom's Bane did not tolerate fidgeting. And here I thought it was just another name.
But Argos never did believe in magic, so he decided that there was some sort of scientific explanation for Freedom's Bane's apparent telekinetic powers. What that explanation was, he had no idea. Nor did he ask, because he knew that Freed
om's Bane could dig his eyeballs out with that spoon if she felt so inclined.
She was a strange woman in appearance. Argos guessed that Freedom's Bane was half-human and half-Caonian. He 'guessed' because no one really knew where she was from or what her parentage was. He guessed human because she was humanoid and had rounded breasts that looked human to him. And he guessed Caonian because she had green, almost seaweed-like hair and her face looked closer to a cat's face than a human's. Argos never liked Caonians much—too unreliable in his experience—but he knew better than to say that to her face, in case she happened to be one.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity, Freedom's Bane muttered, “Stupid,” and turned off her tablet. She then looked up at him with her entirely mechanical eyes, which would have made him shudder, but he didn't want to offend her, so he sat as normally as if she had organic eyes.
“Good evening, Mr. Kingston,” said Freedom's Bane. Her voice was pleasant enough, but he knew better than to treat her with any friendliness or familiarity. “How is your family?”
Argos wiped the sweat off his forehead and said, “My wife is fine. So are the kids. All fine.”
Argos hated the way he spoke. He normally spoke with confidence and poise, a useful skill in any area of life, but a necessary one in his line of work. It was the only way he could inspire his employees and reassure his investors. It had also helped him in wooing his wife in their younger years.
But whenever he spoke to Freedom's Bane, he felt more like a naughty child who had done something wrong. She always treated him rather condescendingly, as if he actually was a child who was too stupid to know what was best for him. Based on the rumors he had heard, there was a good chance that Freedom's Bane was quite older than him, although her exact age was a mystery to everyone he had spoken with about it (or at least to those who were willing to talk about her at all, anyway).
The Spacetastic Adventures of Mr. Space and Captain Galaxy: Season Two Page 11