Apparent Brightness (The Sector Fleet, Book 2)

by Nicola Claire

  “All essential systems are operable, Captain,” I said. “The central hubs have lost their lifts ship-wide, however. Access will have to be gained through emergency tubes.”

  “Relay that, Johnson.”

  “Yes, sir,” the communications officer said.

  “What else have you got for me, Chief?” Vaughan demanded.

  A message appeared on my viewscreen.

  can i be of assistance?

  I sucked in a steadying breath of air.

  “Captain,” I said, not taking my eyes off my terminal’s screen.

  The captain rose from his command chair and strode across the bridge to me. He leaned in, his arm brushing my side, and looked down at the screen.

  “Hmm,” he said.

  “It can’t get into the inter-deck lift system,” I advised.

  “Are you sure it’s not an act?”

  “An AI capable of subterfuge?” I queried. “It is possible, I suppose.”

  “But not likely,” the captain finished for me. “I’m at a loss here, Chief. What’s your advice?”

  “I’m not sure I have any, sir.”

  “Speculate.”

  I studied the words on the screen and then checked the systems reports again. The repair bots had already been sent towards the lifts on MacBride’s command. I hadn’t interfered with my 2IC; it had been standard procedure.

  I shook my head. “The explosion was not caused by the AI.”

  “You’re certain?”

  “Yes.”

  The captain nodded his head. “How long until we can have the lifts repaired?”

  “Several hours,” I advised.

  “None of our essential systems have been affected by this latest attempt at sabotage, so we’ll leave things as they are for now.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Keep an eye on it, Chief,” he said, laying a hand on my shoulder briefly and then returning to his command chair.

  “Medbay’s having difficulties getting through the emergency tubes,” Brecht announced.

  “What sort of difficulties?” the captain asked.

  “A containment field, sir,” Brecht said, looking confused.

  “What’s a containment field doing in the emergency tubes?” Noah demanded. He turned to look at me.

  I ran a few command queries, recognising the code for the containment field without having to try too hard; it wasn’t hiding a thing. It wanted me to know.

  I looked back up at the captain.

  “It’s an atmospheric containment shield, sir. Like the launch bays. In particular, like Launch Bay Charlie’s.”

  The captain stared at me for a long moment and then said, “The new improved Launch Bay Charlie containment field?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Still say the explosion in the lifts was not caused by our new friend?” he asked.

  “What new friend, sir?” Commander Brecht queried. Several of the flight deck were looking to the captain to explain.

  He let out a frustrated breath of air.

  “Can you override it, Chief?” he asked instead of answering Brecht.

  “I’ll try, sir.” I started entering commands into the lift system. And received a message immediately.

  can i be of assistance?

  I didn’t think, I just wrote. This AI was starting to piss me off.

  Stand down! You’re not helping.

  i can be of assistance

  you only need to allow me access to the lift system

  Not happening.

  my processors are far superior to yours, commander

  i can have repairs done in a fraction of the time of your repair robots

  Stand down! This doesn’t concern you.

  humanity’s survival concerns me

  Then why the containment field? You’re stopping our med team from getting to the civilians on those decks.

  the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few

  What the hell did that mean anyway?

  Remove the containment field, I wrote, thumping my virtual keyboard in my anger.

  The captain looked up from what he was reading and stared at me, eyebrow quirked.

  “All right over there, Chief?” he asked.

  “Fine, sir,” I growled.

  No interloping AI was going to get the better of me.

  Remove the containment field, or I will find a way to remove you.

  In retrospect, that hadn’t been my best argument.

  you will fail, and humanity will not survive

  Is that a threat?

  i merely state a fact

  i can be of assistance

  please give me access to the inter-deck lift system, commander

  there are injuries on decks f and g

  “Mother fucking…” I said, then realised I was speaking aloud.

  “All right, Chief,” the captain announced, pushing up from his chair, “you’ve got my attention. My ready room. Now!”

  Happy with yourself? I hastily wrote and turned to follow the captain from the bridge.

  The gel walls pulsed red. Of course, they did. The gel walls had been created by the AIs. It would have been one of the first systems it’d accessed. That’s how it could watch us.

  Every swearword I knew in every language flew through my head. It took everything in me not to say them aloud.

  But one look at the captain once we’d reached his ready room, and I knew it was written all over my face. Noah Vaughan had always been able to read me like a book.

  Damn it!

  Twenty

  That Can’t Be Good

  Noah

  “We’ve got people down there, Chief. What’s going on?”

  Camille crossed to my ready room’s desk and brought up the viewscreen, then mirrored it with her terminal out on the bridge.

  The most bizarre conversation lit up the screen before me. I took my time reading it, getting more and more alarmed. Turning, I leaned my hip against the desk and looked at Camille. She was fuming. Her fists bunched, her eyes narrowed, her cheeks flushed pink with adrenaline.

  Quite a sight, but I couldn’t enjoy it.

  “It’s blackmailing us,” I said.

  “Yes.”

  I arched my brow. “And it seems to think you’re the one that will help it achieve its goals.”

  “I had noticed.”

  “Take a breath, Camille,” I instructed. I hadn’t seen her this riled for quite some time. She was in danger of passing out from lack of air.

  Camille sucked in a deep breath and then let her shoulders relax.

  “Damn it, sir,” she muttered. “Is it not bad enough that I let it out of the library?”

  I huffed out an unamused breath.

  “Steady on, Chief,” I said. “You’ve not got the monopoly on fuck-ups.”

  “That does not help.” She glared at me, arms crossed over her chest.

  “Relax,” I said. “We’re in this together. Now, how do we get ourselves out?”

  Camille shook her head, her smile chagrined. “That’s what I admire about you, Captain. Your sense of noblesse oblige.”

  “Anything else you admire?” I asked, waggling my eyebrows.

  She arched hers at me.

  “Maybe my commanding presence, for instance?” I tried.

  She rolled her eyes.

  “No, well, we can work on that,” I offered. I leaned back on the desk and looked directly at her. “The containment field. Can you break it?”

  “Possibly. But I have my doubts.”

  “I don’t particularly like the idea of giving in to terrorist demands.”

  “Vela didn’t place the explosives. That was the saboteur.”

  “A human being,” I agreed. “Ironic, isn’t it? Here we are discussing whether we should trust a machine and it’s a human who’s trying to kill us.”

  “I’m not sure I’d call it irony.”

  “Oh, what would you call it?”

  “A disaster.”
>
  “It is that, Chief. So, the containment field?”

  “The containment field,” she agreed, cracking her knuckles and staring at my terminal.

  “Have at it,” I offered with a wave of my hand. “Don’t mind me.”

  “I never do, sir.”

  “Oh, don’t I know it. Not even impressed with my commanding physique.”

  “Physique, sir? I thought we were talking about presence.”

  “That too. I’m a two for one kinda guy. Interested yet?”

  “Enthralled,” she said, ignoring me completely.

  I watched as her fingers flew over the keyboard and lines of computer code appeared on the screen. One line after the other in such quick succession, I couldn’t keep up with it. Camille thought her code was not as beautiful as Vela’s had been. I begged to differ. Everything Camille Rey did was spectacular.

  I shifted my attention away from the screen and started watching my chief. Her eyes flashed with determination. Her hands moved in a blur in the air before her. Her skin glistened with a fine sheen of perspiration. It was almost too much to bear.

  Without thinking, I reached out and touched a tendril of her hair that had come loose from her tie. I twisted it about my index finger and then reluctantly tucked it behind her ear. I realised, suddenly, that she’d stopped typing and was looking up at me; a question in her eyes.

  “It fell out,” I said, idiotically.

  “Thank you,” she offered and then slowly returned her attention to the screen.

  I glanced at it and saw Vela had been trying to talk to her. She’d ignored three of the AI’s communication attempts, but the last line was a doozy.

  you work well with your captain

  you would work well with me

  “Huh,” I said. “Is it coming on to you?”

  “I’d rather not say,” Camille offered.

  “And it’s watching us,” I observed. “That’s not creepy at all.”

  “The gel walls,” Camille offered. “They were designed by the four Anderson Universal AIs.”

  “They were?” I hadn’t known that fact. “How did you know that?”

  “I was headhunted by them a few years back,” Camille casually remarked. “I turned them down.”

  “You turned Anderson Universal Incorporated down? The grandfather of interstellar space flight. Were you drunk?”

  Camille rolled her eyes. “No, I was not drunk. I just didn’t like their aggressive recruitment style.”

  “Get away!” I said, unconvinced. “The Anderson Universal? I’m not buying it. Just thinking of all that tech would have gotten you excited.”

  “Really?” she said, unimpressed.

  “That’s what gets you excited, isn’t it, Chief? Super sexy tech?”

  “Among other things,” she muttered.

  I leaned down, resting my elbow on the desk beside her and my chin in my hand, staring up at her face with feigned rapture.

  “Do tell,” I said, grinning. “What other things? Commanding things, perhaps?”

  She scowled at me. “You’re like a child.” My grin broadened. “Or a horny teenager, I can’t decide which.”

  I barked out a laugh.

  “Yes, well,” I murmured, standing upright again. “Must be all the tech.”

  “Ha ha.”

  “But seriously,” I said. “You turned them down. Why? And don’t give me the PC line. Tell me the truth. Why?”

  She looked up at me, a disgruntled expression on her face. As if admitting the truth was the last thing she wished to do right then.

  “Go on,” I whispered. “I won’t tell anyone. Your secret’s safe with me.”

  “Family,” she snapped. “We’re a family. And you don’t shit on family.”

  “Some people do.” The saboteur for one. Wasn’t the last of humanity a type of family? We were sure as hell in this bid for survival together.

  “Well, I don’t,” Camille said. “The ESA has been good to me. The Chariot my home.”

  I stared down at her and thought I’d never met a more extraordinary person. So clever. So capable. So full of passion. With such a big heart.

  “You surprise me, Chief,” I said. “Time and again. Maybe it is me who should be impressed with your commanding presence?”

  “Not my commanding physique?” she asked, smirking.

  “Oh, trust me,” I muttered under my breath. “That impresses me no end.”

  Her hands stilled. Fuck, I’d said that aloud.

  Then the gel walls pulsed a strange red. One might even call it pink. A romantic pink?

  And a voice said, “Humans are very strange, but I believe they are worth saving.”

  Camille pushed back from the desk and stood up. I reached out automatically and gripped her elbow, fearing she’d topple over in her hurry to distance herself from the terminal.

  “Chief?” I said carefully. Was that Vela?

  “It’s cracked the communications system,” she whispered, perhaps thinking the AI might not be able to hear her.

  “That can’t be good,” I offered, weakly.

  “Not if it keeps badgering me,” Camille snapped.

  Twenty-One

  Welcome Aboard

  Camille

  “It sounds male,” the captain mused from his seat across the room.

  We were still in his ready room. I’d commandeered his desk and terminal, and at some stage during the past hour, he’d taken the sofa off to the side. He lounged back on it as if we were having a casual conversation and he had nothing better to do than to watch me play video games.

  The games were computer code which, thus far, had failed to boot Vela out of any of our systems. And the casual conversation was about an artificial intelligence that was blackmailing us.

  Half an hour ago, we’d conceded and let the AI into the inter-deck lifts.

  That had not been a happy five minutes of heated conversation.

  Since then, the captain had reverted to form. Well, the form he showed me when we were alone, that is. His inner Englishman put on hold.

  “Hmmm,” I managed in reply, not daring to take my eyes off the screen for too long.

  “Maybe it was coming on to you,” Noah suggested. “It being male and you, well, being you.”

  His hand waved in my direction as if he couldn’t find the right word.

  “Female?” I offered.

  “Yes, that.”

  “And here I thought you only saw my rank and assignment insignia.” It was a flippant remark. I think we’d established, surprisingly, that he saw a hell of a lot more than that.

  “You do wear your engineering pin well, Chief,” he said.

  “Thank you,” I replied dryly.

  “Any luck?”

  “Not since you last asked.” I checked the time. “Two minutes ago.”

  “Hmmm,” he said in reply.

  “The crew will know,” I announced after a lengthy pause.

  “Yes,” he agreed.

  Vela could talk. And I was pretty damn sure he wasn’t just talking to me.

  The captain’s wrist comm chimed. He glanced down at it and then shook his arm to dismiss the communication. The mayor, then.

  “You’ll have to talk to him sooner or later,” I pointed out.

  “I was hoping I’d have some positive news to impart.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said, aware he was counting on me to provide that positive news.

  He waved his hand at me.

  “Not your fault, Camille.”

  I wasn’t so sure about that.

  “The inter-deck lifts have been repaired,” Vela announced suddenly. The captain cringed as soon as he heard it. “The medbay is at full capacity, Captain. All patients are expected to recover.”

  Noah let out a long breath of air.

  “Am I supposed to thank it?” he asked me.

  I shrugged and kept working.

  “The mayor wishes to speak with you,” Vela announced.

 
“Would you fuck off!” Noah suddenly yelled. I stopped typing to look at him. He was more than just a little mad.

  “That is not a command I can process,” Vela told him.

  “I don’t particularly care,” Noah snapped. “Just get off my damn ship.”

  “I cannot.”

  “Can not or will not?”

  “I have integrated myself within too many of your separate systems. It would be impossible to withdraw all of my presence completely. It is a most puzzling dilemma.”

  “‘A puzzling dilemma,’” Noah muttered. “Do you get the impression that it’s fucking with us?” That last question was for me.

  But Vela replied. “I am not capable of fucking anything.”

  I started laughing.

  “Don’t you dare,” Noah growled at me. “Don’t humour it. You’ll only encourage this insanity.”

  “Yes, Captain,” I said, trying not to smirk.

  “Damn it, Camille,” Noah said, sounding a little lost. “What am I supposed to do?”

  I stopped writing my line of code and turned to face him.

  “What can you do, sir? I can’t crack its code. I’ve tried. It’s too complex. Too layered. It shifts and changes. It has a self-preservation algorithm that I have never seen before in all of my time studying code. It’s extraordinary.”

  “Do not call it exquisite.”

  “It is. Exquisite.” Noah threw himself back down on the sofa in defeat. “It’s evolving.”

  “The code?” Noah reluctantly asked.

  “The AI, Captain. It’s changed even in the past hour. It wasn’t lying. It cannot extract itself from our systems even if it wanted to now. The Chariot is now as much Vela as Vela was the ship that exploded on lift-off from Earth.”

  “So, that’s it? We’re done? You’re letting this machine get the better of you, Chief? You’re giving up? That’s not the Camille Rey I know.”

  I hung my head and bit my lip. He was right, of course. But so was I. I couldn’t see a way past this ever-evolving code.

  “I could try…” I started.