Network Effect

I was going to tell it I didn’t need one. And I really didn’t. But I knew what I did need. I shifted everything over to our shared workspace and pulled up the first episode of Timestream Defenders Orion. I asked ART, Do you want World Hoppers or something new?

ART considered, poking thoughtfully at the tag data for the new show. It said, New, as long as it’s not realistic.

I’d downloaded Timestream Defenders Orion off the Preservation media archives because it was pretty much the opposite of the whole concept of realistic. I started the first episode.

We watched it while ART finished our code, occasionally sending sections to me to check over. (Possibly it was humoring me. ART might still have memory archive gaps, but there was nothing wrong with its other functions.)

Twenty-six minutes to the end of the designated rest period, ART said, Using the data from the shuttle, I’ve located one of the Barish-Estranza vessels. My engine repairs are complete and I am moving to intercept.

HelpMe.file Excerpt 3

(Section from interview Bharadwaj-108257394.)

“It’s normal to feel conflict. You were part of something for a long time. You hate it, and it was a terrible thing. But it created you, and you were part of it.”

:session redacted:

(File detached from main narrative.)

I was sitting on top of Hostile Two to make sure he was dead. He had been apparently dead at least twice, so this wasn’t misplaced caution. Tifany was on her knees beside me, her weapon pointed at his head. “You’re too close,” I told her.

She looked at me, the skin around her eyes so swollen and puffy I’m not sure how well she could see. Then she edged back out of potential arm’s reach.

Behind me, in the one stupid security camera, I saw the human second response team and their medical assistance bots belatedly crash through the door. I checked the time and wow, scratch that “belatedly.” This had been a fast incident, even by SecUnit standards of fast.

The Preservation council meeting room was a big oval with a long table in the middle, the walls lined with tall narrow windows, two entrances/exits on either end of the room. The one the second response team had come through led to the foyers and station government’s public offices where humans came to take care of things that couldn’t be taken care of on the feed, I guess, I actually had no idea. The other door led into the private offices where the occupants of the council room had managed to evacuate to when the incident occurred.

Senior Officer Indah circled around the table and knelt down where I could see her. She said, “Is that person dead?”

“Probably but there’s a seventeen percent chance he might revive,” I said.

Tifany, her voice a strained rasp, said, “He came back twice. We need a containment unit.”

Indah’s brow furrowed. “On the way.” She reached over to Tifany and carefully coaxed the weapon out of her hands. “You’re off duty now, officer.”

Tifany said, “Yes, senior,” and folded over onto the floor.

“She’s had a hard day,” I told Indah.

“I inferred that.” Indah tapped her feed and a spidery-legged medical bot picked its way past me to crouch beside Tifany. Making comforting noises, it scanned her and immediately injected her with something. Indah said, “You need medical assistance, too.”

I had a stab wound so large you could see the metal of my interior structure, but Senior Indah was too polite to mention it. The medical bot extended a delicate sensor limb toward me. On the feed I told it anything it touched me with would get torn off and thrown across the room. It pulled the limb back and used it to check Hostile Two instead.

“Is there any hope for the subject?” Indah jerked her chin toward Hostile Two.

I didn’t think there had been a person inside Hostile Two since before the first time we killed him. “Probably not.”

I stayed in position until containment arrived to take care of our mostly dead Hostile Two and the hopefully all the way dead Hostile One. Tifany and the rest of the first response team had already been carried off to Station Medical. I went the other direction, further into the council/admin offices because I needed to see her.

I found her only three unsecured doors away, but at least it was an office without a balcony or windows onto the admin mezzanine. I walked past Station Security and admin personnel. They should have tried to stop me but (a) it wasn’t like they didn’t know who I was and (b) it was a good thing they didn’t try to stop me.