Network Effect

I make a secure connection to the transport and send, A hostage situation is to be avoided at all costs. They will threaten to destroy the SecUnit and you will be forced to destroy the colony. This is a failure scenario.

Perihelion: I know that.

I know I am taking a risk. The transport is very angry. I tell it, But I know how to proceed, this is my function. The solution is a targeted, stealth retrieval, possibly incorporating a show of force as a distraction.

Perihelion: Your point is?

This is the risky part. If you return my clients to the remaining Barish-Estranza task force, I will help you.

Pause.

Perihelion: I was going to do that anyway.

Oh. I will still help you.

Perihelion: Why?

How can I explain to it when I can’t explain to myself. I say, Stories in the HelpMe.file. I know that answer is inadequate. I had read things that had made me consider other possibilities, it is impossible to explain. Murderbot 2.0 asked me what I want. I want to help.

Pause.

Perihelion: Good.

The humans have stopped arguing and the one called Iris retains control of the comm. She says, “Peri, listen to me. There are factions here among the colonists. One of them actually died up on the explorer trying to help us escape. You can’t just bomb everybody. It won’t get your friend back.”

New human contact-Thiago: “She’s right, Perihelion. Let us help you. Even if they refuse to return SecUnit, a negotiation could stall them, distract them while we think of a way to rescue it.”

Perihelion: Please calm yourselves and stop talking. Plan A01: Rain Destruction has been superseded by Plan B01: Distract and Extract.

Chapter 18

Murderbot 1.0

Status: Not so great

Forced Shutdown: Restart

What happened?

Forced Shutdown: Restart: Failure Retry

Forced Shutdown: Restart: Failure Retry

Restart

Yeah, I’m definitely in trouble here. All my joints ached, and there were sharp pains in other places, probably projectile holes. I didn’t have any outside input, no feed, no visual or audio. By concentrating I managed to get a visual through my eyes, but wherever I was, it was completely dark and my filters weren’t online. Oh, and I was being held immobile, that was kind of a big issue, but until I finished my restart, I could only be terrified about one thing at a time.

Functions were beginning to come online again and I tuned my pain sensors down. That made it easier to think. Oh yeah, memory archive active, I remember what happened. Yikes.

Okay, now I’ve finished restarting and I’m terrified about a lot of things. But now that my entire brain was online again, I could see there was actually a distant light source somewhere above me. It was a small one, like a work light, or a discarded hand light. I could see more of my surroundings and it wasn’t encouraging.

I was suspended, hanging from four cables, in a large open space, with clamps around my wrists and ankles holding my arms and legs apart. The cables were taut and didn’t budge when I pulled on them. So whoever put me here hadn’t wanted me to be able to get a grip on the clamps because they knew I could break them. And my environmental suit was gone, though I still had the shirt, pants, and boots I’d been wearing under it. Oh, and I was upside down, which was just insulting since it didn’t affect me the way it would a human.

Atmosphere was minimal, at a level that would have had a human gasping and unable to function, but I was designed to be shipped in cargo containers and it was fine for me.

Oh shit, I hope the humans aren’t in here, too.

I wasn’t picking up anything on audio, no matter how I increased my gain. And there were no human-like shapes hanging anywhere that I could see. Maybe one stupid part of my stupid plan had worked and they had all gotten to the maintenance capsule and escaped.