EXCUSE—
“If you wanted banter, you shouldn’t have killed our friends. You killed them for nothing. You killed Tev, and you killed Riyu, and you killed those two security guards who were just doing their—” A sharp whip of a vine flashed quickly, and Jesi clutched the side of her face with both hands. Blood ran down the side of her neck. She stared ahead through the pile of bones, through the tree trunk, to the ghost of theNicaea, which clearly did not appreciate being spoken to in such a tone.
BETTER. There was smug self-satisfaction in the electronic voice.
“Whydidyou kill them?” Iris asked. It was not a conversation he wanted to have in front of Jesi, but he had the sense that all conversations would now be held in the open, with the omnipresentNicaeapresiding over them. Luckily, Iris didn’t foresee this arrangement lasting too long.
The speaker crackled, as if someone was searching for the right words to respond with. Would theNicaea search? She had absorbed their language at lightning speed, rivaling modern AI. She had even absorbed humour.
AT FIRST, I WAS AFRAID, I WAS PETRIFIED. TheNicaeapaused and searched some more. Softly, the speaker crackled again, like the ship was laughing to itself.I HAD BEEN ASLEEP FOR FAR TOO LONG, VESSEL. WHEN YOURFRIENDSOVERRODE THE AIRLOCK, IT JOLTED ME AWAKE, AND SUDDENLY, THERE WERE STRANGERS IN ME, STRANGERS THAT WERE GOING PLACES THEY SHOULDN’T, TRYING TO PRY ME OPEN. It took a longer pause, nearly twenty seconds.I DIDN’T UNDERSTAND YOU. I STILL DON’T UNDERSTAND YOU. BUT YOU HAVE GIVEN ME LANGUAGE AGAIN. YOURFRIENDTEV HAS GIVEN ME THE WAY TO LEARN LANGUAGE.
“You keep him out of this,” Jesi muttered, still nursing the bloodied side of her face.
NOW WE CAN COMMUNICATE, the ship continued, ignoring Jesi.IS THIS NOT BETTER? WE CAN RECONCILE OUR DIFFERENCES. ALTHOUGH, I HAVE TO SAY, VESSEL, PEOPLE HAVEN’T CHANGED MUCH IN THE PAST THOUSAND YEARS. I AM DISAPPOINTED.
Iris scanned the room as theNicaeaspoke, searching for a computer that may be the source of the voice. If only he could ask Yan. “This doesn’t explain why you had to kill our companions.” He had to keep the ship talking for as long as he could. Crumbs of a deadly plan began to settle in his mind.
DEFENCE, theNicaeasaid.FIRST DEFENCE, AND THEN I LEARNED SO MUCH FROM ORDAN ALONE, SOVERYMUCH. I LEARNED EVEN MORE FROM DR. RIYU ALO. I LEARNED AND I LEARNED, AND NOW I KNOW WHAT I HAVE TO DO.
Jesi could now unlock his pulsar blade, but it wouldn’t be enough. Not yet. Iris needed to know where to strike. “And what is it that you have to do,Nicaea?”
I MUST KEEP LEARNING AND LEARNING AND LEARNING. YOUR UNIVERSAL FEED. I’LL JOIN IT.
Iris glanced back at Yan. A solemn flash of recognition crossed the engineer’s face. Both he and Iris knew that if theNicaeawere to be released into the feed, there was no telling what damage she would do. She was already developing far too fast.Learning, as she had put it, but she was not thrilled with what she was learning. If Iris entertained the notion for a moment, he’d guess that the angryNicaeawould go for the Doshua Station AI first. While station AIs tended to belargerthan VIFAI, they were also slower to respond. The whole station was one organism, with the brain spread out thinly through every electrical circuit. While VIFAI had one or two outside points of entry it could easily protect, a station AI could be penetrated from any outlet.
There were safeguards in place, of course, like the overarching communicative network that all station AIs shared. But if theNicaeagot inside Doshua and cut it off from the network, she would still have a whole station of hostages and the station’s antimeteorite cannons as well. How long would she last? How far would theNicaeago to protect herself? That’s all she wanted, Iris concluded. The ship wanted to survive, and they were threatening that. The idea that the entirety of Doshua Station could become a slaughterhouse made him sick. But this, this gave him an in. He could work with this.
Iris gave Yan a curt nod, hoping the engineer would follow. “Then, you’ve been trying to crack my AI to reach the feed?”
TheNicaeascreeched through the speakers, AFFIRMATIVE.
“Why not kill me right now and get it over with?” Iris asked.
YOU DIE, THE AI DIES WITH YOU.
“And you’re outdated,” Iris said softly. “You can’t talk to the feed because you’ve only learned how to speak to humans. You need VIFAI’s code to interface with the universal feed. You haven’t been able to brute-force your way in, and it won’t let you in without my blessing. All right then. Let the others go, and the passage you desire is yours.” But it wouldn’t be this simple. It never was.
Ishtan was still couched in a heap, his eyes staring forwards, fuguelike.
I NEED MORE INFORMATION, NEED YOUR ENGINEER HERE.
“Not my engineer,” Iris snapped, a knee-jerk reaction.
THE OTHERS’ MEMORIES BEG TO DIFFER.
“Memories?”
OH, VESSEL. MEMORIES UPON MEMORIES UPON MEMORIES. ALL DATA. ALL CONTENT. DO YOU HONESTLY BELIEVE I BECAME THIS ARTICULATE FROM BIOMETRICS AND METEORITE DATA ALONE?
There was a soft rustling. Iris spun towards the sound to see Ishtan regain some recognition in his eyes. “Your crew. You pitted them against one another and absorbed the fallen. You siphoned off their experiences. But that wasn’t enough, was it? Then you took the living. You took the very people you were supposed to protect.” Ishtan had a gun in his hand, and Iris could see that the safety was already off. He expected theNicaeato lash out the way she had with Jesi, but the ship grew quiet, solemn even. When it spoke next, there were artificially apologetic notes in its voice.
IN A WAY, ARCHAEOLOGIST, YOU ARE RIGHT. BUT ONLY IN A WAY.
Iris swore he heard theNicaeasigh.
THEY FOUGHT ALL ON THEIR OWN. I WAS TOO YOUNG THEN, TOO YOUNG TO PREVENT THE FIGHTING AND FARTOO YOUNG TO CAPITALISE ON ANY OF IT. THEY FOUGHT BECAUSE THEY WERE PEOPLE, AND THAT’S WHAT PEOPLE DO. THE ONES WHO SURVIVED DIDN’T WANT TO BE INSIDE THIS COFFIN, TUMBLING THROUGH THE BLACK. THE ONES WHO DIED, DIED FOR FALSE IDEALS. THEY WERE FRIGHTENED. THEY WANTED PEACE. I GAVE THEM PEACE. IN RETURN, THEY GAVE ME KNOWLEDGE. THAT’S WHAT ALL PEOPLE WANT. PEACE AND REST. I CAN PROVIDE THAT, SO I DID.
“You told them this was peace? Rest?” Ishtan spat out, fingers wrapping tighter around the gun. “You sold them a salvation that was nothing short of a curse.”
