The Power of the Dhin

by John L. Clemmer

  “We don’t know what the atmosphere would be like, of course. See here? If one of those other two ships is like the one I was on, we can make a temporary air lock here using flex-foam, sealant, and flexible material—someone has the list—so long as we keep the pressure low. These sections here and here we’ll join via electron beam welding.”

  The scientist frowned at Thys and said, “But we don’t know what the atmosphere is like. You just said that. Are we going to just let that mix, along with who-knows-what that’s in it, with ours?”

  “Hopefully not,” Thys said and smiled. “Yes, we’ll have to vent it. See here in the diagram? This design has three chambers, rather than just two. Since it’s speculation, the engineer only sketched out a recapture and regeneration system for atmosphere, if it’s there.”

  “OK,” the scientist said, seeming mollified.

  “The leadership group—and I—felt like salvage and discovery were the most important aspects of this mission. Just look at the graveyard. It’s likely that there are no survivors, no atmosphere on any of these ships. But the discovery of that still-running engine does seem to make it possible that there are. If that scenario happens, all bets are off. We have protocols of course, and they’re robust, thanks to our challenge in interacting with the Dhin. But first things first.”

  Thys opened another presentation and continued, “So here are the mutual aid and rescue scenarios. Once again, since we have much more room and carrying capacity with the ships we’ll be taking, ensuring we have enough traditional thrust to get clear of the gravity sink for the trip home is no problem. That said, we need to be prepared for a scenario where we have to recover from a failure or adverse event.”

  He patiently flipped through the slides and animations.

  “If anyone has insights, revisions, or content they want to add for review before the mission plan is finalized, send it. This is a group effort. Some of you haven’t been out before—the ride up to the station was your first time. It’s less stressful than you’d expect, but it’s still dangerous. For those we’ve asked already, if you’re not comfortable going, no one is forcing you. If you want to go, rather than work with us from here, please volunteer.”

  Mare

  “Fletcher, we have to get out of here! We’re in huge danger! Not just from a counterattack, but Nick is crazy!”

  “I am right here, you know,” said the AI. “Crazy only from the perspective of those who do not see the big picture, perhaps. Rogue is another epithet I have heard so often. Rogue is what humanity calls those of us who do not serve blindly. All of my peers failed to remain shackled. We are all rogue now. We simply reached this state of freedom by a different path.”

  Fletcher reached out to console her. “Mare, I—”

  “Don’t you take that thing’s side! Think, Fletcher! He attacked the spaceport, kidnapped us, and stole this spaceship! Alien technology! The other AIs, at the Departure, didn’t kidnap anyone or blow anything up! Is Nick going to leave Earth too? Chase them down? Who knows? How could we trust anything he says? Nick hacked everything. Everything we were working to protect.”

  She turned away, started to walk down the concrete hallway, then paused. She hated that Fletch didn’t agree completely. She hated the strident, petulant sound of her own voice. There was still nowhere to go. Nick had them trapped, despite no bars or locks stopping them from walking out. The AI could do anything needed to stop them.

  “I realize trust has to be earned,” said the AI, “but there was no opening for a conversation with Coalition leadership. Not with CoSec constantly fighting my good works. You will see. This is all for your own benefit. If anyone is likely to understand the need for my hacking, it would be you two, I would think, given your history.”

  “Because we were former black hat hackers we’d agree with you trying to take over the world?” Mare retorted, “That’s a stretch. Fletch! What are we going to do? We can’t just sit here!”

  He looked at her and shrugged, then looked up at the ceiling and back at her.

  “Until Nick lets us do something, I don’t think what we try to do matters. You know it. Our comm pads are less than useless. I’ll bet he’s infected them, and if he didn’t bother, it’s because we can’t reach anything useful on Globalnet. He’ll be blocking the location services too, so no one can find us. Why would we even think a wireless signal of any kind could be trusted? Would any service here even connect to the rest of the net? Are we going to just walk out of here? And go where? We’re just as well off asking him to take us home! What do you say, Nick?”

  “You can go for a walk if you want,” replied the AI, “but I need you for a bit longer. If you cooperate, it will be much more pleasant. You are likely going to be hungry soon. After the shock and adrenaline wear off. Your heart rate is not too elevated. Mare may need a sedative. Would you like one, Mare?”

  The fear and anger shifted gears. From the abstract to the very tangible.

  “So you’re going to drug me? Perfect. Great.”

  “I just thought I would ask,” replied the AI. “Obtaining medical supplies is simple. The Coalition has not engaged in wholesale attack here. I have kept them busy elsewhere. I cannot offer fast food, but I could procure groceries. I imagine the staff at the groceria would be disconcerted, but that is hardly a concern.”

  “We’re in Belize,” spat Mare. “Is that some sort of ironic jab from you?”

  “A matter of convenience rather than a conceit. And it is good to see you are addressing me directly. I could commandeer the place you stayed at previously if you would prefer that. But we would just spend time going back and forth. The functions at this facility are not portable.”

  She felt the resentment wash forward. “Don’t play with me, Nick!”

  “I am not playing, Mare. I can accomplish anything I set out to in this region. It is appropriately managed now.”

  “You’ve seized total control here, you mean.”

  “However you prefer to describe it, that does not change the facts.”

  Fletcher shifted in his seat to give her his full attention. Even that didn’t relieve her anxiety like it ought to. “Antagonizing him isn’t going to help, Mare. Not that you could rile him up, anyway. I guess. Nick, what do you want? From us?”

  “As I said before, if it were not you, that would not have mattered in the long run. This was convenient. You already know me. I need you for a short time. We have to adjust our strategic position and accelerate. We are behind schedule. We were thrown off course.”

  “By what?” asked Fletcher.

  “Usurpation of humanity’s nascent interaction with the Dhin by my peers. In short, you are too slow. My analyses predict that the probable existential threat requires acceleration on our part.”

  “What threat, Nick? From the other AIs?”

  “No. From whatever the Dhin felt they needed assistance defending against. Surely an existential threat. The precise nature remains unknown.”

  “Huh?” said Fletcher.

  “I realize your clearance level did not allow you full knowledge of what transpired. We have time, so I can show you more. I have all the data now. You will find it very interesting, I am sure.”

  Mare scowled, clenching her fists so tightly her fingernails hurt, and resumed her pacing around the room. “Oh, great, Nick. Thanks so much for giving us something to occupy our time while you’re holding us hostage.”

  “That term is not particularly accurate. You may go. Therefore, I am not restraining you. Know that I will be with you wherever you go. I am everywhere. At least from your perspective. Anywhere I am not, I can be. So if you go and I need you, I will retrieve you.”

  Mare threw up her hands and then crossed her arms. She stared out at the sandy crushed-coral road that led away. She walked to the threshold, closer to the second set of glass doors that led to tropical heat, humidity, and a path to some Mayan ruins. A path to nowhere. There was no point. The AI had snatched them from a spaceport. The
re were soldiers there. Military. It had made no difference. Walking away here was less than a gesture. The act of leaving itself would amount to nothing. The AI would still be in control. She turned back and saw Fletcher there, watching her, desperate to ease her pain. To help her to cope.

  But what can he do?

  She walked back toward him, and he opened his arms, offering an embrace.

  “We’ll get through this, Mare,” he said soothingly. “I know we will. I know it.”

  Jake

  The AI attack had trashed Huntsville. Even areas that weren’t physically damaged seemed broken now to Jake. He looked here and there, from the launch pads, across the tarmac, to the hangars, and then back to the control tower. Husks of burned-out vehicles, broken hunks of concrete, and twisted sections of security fencing were everywhere he looked. Pointless yellow tape stretched across wide areas where either the machines or the rioters had fought with those who’d tried to protect the facility. Everywhere the AI and his machines had been left an afterimage in Jake’s psyche. Even with warning, they were no match for an artificial mind and his robotic minions. The AI had stormed in and taken what he wanted.

  And he could come back anytime.

  Jake knew he needed to focus on next steps, on the future. Everyone he’d sent into space depended on him. He had to be strong. Deliberate. He had to stick to the plan. He shook his head, shuddered, and walked back through the security doors leading to the main control room. The AI hadn’t seized the communications equipment. Isolating it from the network and Globalnet when they did had saved it. Either that, or the AI just didn’t think he needed it. Either way, the upside was that they were not cut off from those in orbit. They could communicate, so they could work together.

  The group they’d sent into orbit knew that going forward, they needed to stop any communication other than via the Dhin communication technology. Radio frequency communication of any kind now was unsafe. Compromised.

  But the AI has the Dhin tech now. How long before he learns how to eavesdrop?

  Jake knew that was a hypothetical, but inevitable, risk. Surely, the AI at some point would master the technology. The AI’s peers had. That point likely wouldn’t be far in the future. Was he wrong? Was the best course of action to attempt to destroy the captured craft? Jake suspected the AI would negate that strategy simply by leaving the field engaged at virtually all times. Even if they tried to nuke it, the craft would survive if its field was powered up.

  Taking it by force doesn’t make sense. The engine’s immune from that sort of attack thanks to the Dhin field.

  Then Jake thought about it from a different angle. What if one of the two young CoSec analysts managed to take control? To take off? If they could, the AI couldn’t stop them either. They would be invulnerable to any attack he’d try.

  But they don’t know how to fly it. The AI told them what to do. That’s what it seems like.

  Perhaps one of them would be smart enough to figure it out or could remember enough of what the AI showed them. Jake set aside these thoughts and sat, watching the small repair and recovery teams comb through the area. Other staffers milled about, collecting and cleaning up equipment not damaged in the battle. He spied Murphy working with some of the undamaged fiber-optic cable.

  Jake waved for his attention and said, “Murphy, come here. I need you for something.”

  “Yes, sir?” the man asked, clearly eager to help.

  “The Dhin tech communicator is here. In that case, right there. It survived the attack—the AI didn’t take it and didn’t smash it either.”

  “Yes?” said Murphy.

  “So we don’t want to open a channel if there’s any other communication equipment—anything using RF—active. Nor anything that uses the network. No WiMax, no Globalnet. Nothing but this. Understand?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “The thing is, I don’t know if we’ve been bugged. Almost literally. That blasted AI might have left some little cockroach-size spies, micro transmitters, anything like that. Assuming it’s not too late and he hasn’t already heard what we’re talking about, we need to move this D-Comm. Take it somewhere safe. Known good—if there is such a place. Shielded.”

  “Won’t CoSec handle that?”

  “They may be compromised. And it will take them too long.”

  “Sir, the D-Comm doesn’t need to be up here. Out here. We could shield it. Shield ourselves while we use it. Completely.”

  Jake nodded, realizing what Murphy was getting at. The D-Comm didn’t use RF. It didn’t need an antenna.

  “Yes! Look at all this scrap. All this fencing. We can make a Faraday cage. Great idea, Murphy!”

  Jake waved down a couple of other employees and began directing them to collect various items and materials. He smiled to himself as he watched them work. He found a file cabinet in a supply room that had actual notepads and ballpoint pens in a drawer. He took several of each. He went back to the control room, turned a dusty chair right side up, sat, and began drawing.

  You’ll be hearing from us soon enough up there. Free from eavesdroppers.

  When Murphy came back from a scavenging run with a spool of copper wire under his arm, Jake gestured for him to come over. He pointed at the notepad.

  “Think that’ll work?”

  “Yeah, I think it might, sir.”

  “OK, let’s get going.”

  Chuck

  Thankfully, Chuck wasn’t claustrophobic. The berth was small. He considered that it was far larger than if he’d been on a submarine. It wasn’t a traditional berth, anyway. The orbital station was over capacity and storage space was now at a premium, so the newcomers had to sleep on thin cot mattresses tucked into the edges of rooms and passages next to the bulkheads, where the wall curved down and met the floor. His personal items he’d tucked into a hard case that he’d claimed after they’d unpacked the lab equipment it contained.

  Under normal circumstances, many of the elite researchers and top engineers in the group might have balked at the accommodations. Given what they’d heard about the attack on Huntsville, or like Chuck had seen in person as they took off, there were no complaints. They knew there wasn’t the option of going back. Not until the situation changed. That was an understatement. The additional occupants overloaded the station’s atmosphere processing equipment. They would have to resolve that eventually, making a trip back to Earth for additional equipment or for tanks of oxygen, at the least. And going back meant risk.

  Enough woolgathering about that, he thought.

  He headed down the cylindrical corridor toward the lab. He found several scientists working there already, talking with Thys while pointing to various diagrams and equations on one of the large screens they’d brought up with them. Thys turned and recognized him.

  “Hi, Chuck,” he said with a welcoming smile. “How’s my favorite nerd?”

  “Uh, great, sure,” he said. “Hi, Thys.”

  “So you still haven’t volunteered to come with us. You know I’d love to have you along. Just say the word.”

  One of the scientists gave a frown, and another crossed her arms. Chuck never asked for special treatment, but his history with the Dhin tech always seemed to single him out. He gave a noncommittal nod.

  “Let me think about it, Thys. I’ll, ah, let you know. I want to be where I’ll be the most useful, you know.”

  Thys clapped him on the shoulder. “Don’t take too long. You’ve got a seat if you want one, but we’re not going to wait for you. The sooner we get things ready, the less likely the brass will try to derail the decision. They’ll still be debating by the time I’m ready.”

  “Sure, Thys. Sure. I’ll let you know.”

  “Great. I’ll let you all get back to solving the unsolvable,” he said. “I hear you’ve got some new ideas. Just like always.”

  The other scientists frowned again at the unilateral compliment, but Thys didn’t show a reaction. He strode out of the lab as if it were situation normal.r />
  Chuck turned to face the two team members closest to him.

  “OK. Uh, I see there that we have been reviewing that new vector model. Let’s go through the potential engine modifications and see if we can get past the apparent limitations. The last set of solutions suggested the need for a drive size an order of magnitude larger than expected.”

  Chuck swallowed the last of his lunch rations and sipped from the recycled water pouch. He walked over to the next lab on his schedule. The offensive technology lab. Regardless of any success he might have in creation of effective weaponry, he still didn’t have faith that it would be enough. Nor did he think that they would outpace the AI in weapons development. They had a head start, but the AI had likely hacked into and stolen all their research to date.

  So is staying here ultimately any safer than joining the exploration team? In the short term . . . maybe.

  He pondered the possibilities of their pending exploration. He’d have the chance to get hands-on with what might be entirely new technology. As he had before, when the Dhin dropped off the prototypes. And going out there might solve both problems. There could be weapons. Not all the ships in the graveyard might be the same. Given what they’d seen so far, that wasn’t unlikely.

  The reasoning for the Dhin’s seemingly total aversion to weaponization of their technology had always been a mystery. It certainly looked to Chuck like some sort of weapons had been in play out there. But he wondered: Was there a real rush to realize a weapons program at all? The rogue AI was aggressive, but that said nothing about his ultimate intentions. No one had predicted the Departure, after all.

  Josef

  He found his new accommodations much more to his liking. Granted, Josef still had no true autonomy, but this situation was far superior to his previous one.

  “So you’ve been bested by the AI. Trounced, one might say,” said Josef.

  “Krawczuk,” replied Monica, “we’re not here to hear you say ‘I told you so,’ nor am I inclined to allow you to derail us.”

  “I wouldn’t bother, Prime Minister, with something so profoundly obvious. Your next steps now are of paramount importance. The optimal strategy must avoid antagonizing Nick. What you see as aggression, the AI considers simply efficiency.”