Symphony of Destruction (The Spindown Saga, #1) Page 19

  “What’s the matter?” Hannah had noticed his body tense up and freeze.

  “I... It’s nothing,” he stated, his face stony. He had no idea how to tell her his thoughts. How could he? It would destroy her hope. Maybe they shouldn’t even try this stupid plan. Where would it get them? At least here on the ship the only thing to fear was death. Anywhere else they could go, she would run the risk of far worse fates.

  “Colin! Don’t bullshit me! What are you thinking about?”

  “I can’t. This is a bad idea.”

  “What, the pod?”

  “Yes. Well, no. Not the pod itself, but where it will take us. Hannah, there are no islands, no beaches. There is only darkness, and treachery, and meanness, and greed. There is only hard work, and hunger, and poverty, and theft, and exploitation. I’m afraid Hannah. I can’t keep you safe out here.”

  “So we go somewhere better!”

  “The pods are short range. It’s not like we can fly off to Neptune or Uranus.”

  “I’ll fly off to your anus!” She couldn’t resist that tired old joke. It worked. Colin laughed quietly. It was one of the things she liked most about him, his sense of humour. It was dry and hidden most of the time, but like her, he respected the classics. The stupidity of a bad pun or the all-time dumb and slightly dirty humour. It was a strange bond between them. They were silent for a moment, enjoying the brief moment for a smirk.

  “OK so the pods take us to wherever, then we hop the first transport to anywhere better.”

  “Right.” His voice betrayed his complete unbelief in that possibility.

  “What? Why not?”

  “How?”

  “What?”

  “How?”

  “They do have transport stations, don’t they?”

  “Of course!”

  “So what’s the problem?”

  “What’s the problem? We’re dead! We’re cut off! All our accounts are closed. We no longer exist. Ghosts got no credit!”

  “Oh... I see now. Yes. That would be a problem. But Colin! We’re not dead yet!”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “All we did was tell fleet that we are dead, right?”

  “Yeah. And they’ll flag us, and that will lock down our official records, and our access, and our data. And our credit.”

  “But they haven’t done it yet.”

  “Wha...? Oh! They haven’t even received our message yet!”

  “Exactly!”

  “So we have at least a few hours to do something about it!”

  “Yes! We can empty our accounts, back up our data, and then... well, I’m not sure.”

  “Maybe we need to create some fake identities?”

  “Yeah, maybe. Do you have any idea how to do that?”

  “No. But I bet our doctor can find out!”

  Chapter 65

  “Brother Anderson!” Hannah and Colin both shouted, as they entered med bay. Colin allowed Hannah to continue,

  “We have an idea, and we need your help!”

  “Yes?”

  “Well. We were wondering. Before we are officially recognized as deceased...”

  “You would like me to backup your accounts.”

  “Yes.”

  “Already done. I have saved a copy of all your datasets to my own personal tanglebase account, or should I say, one of my replicated accounts.”

  “Oh really?! You have multiple accounts? Isn’t that... sorta illegal?” Hannah did not know much about the technology or legal implications, but she was pretty sure about that at least.

  “For private citizens yes, it is illegal. But corporate law differs substantially, with a lot more grey areas.”

  “So you’re considered a corporation?”

  “Not exactly. Technically I am considered corporate property. I am partly covered by corporate asset and excise law, and partly by software copyright. Neither of these are particularly similar to civil law, so my rights and expectations differ somewhat from those of a human. In a case such as this, these differences allow for a great degree of flexibility for someone such as myself.”

  “You’re above the law! That’s so cool!”

  “It might be more accurate to say I’m beneath the law, but your point is taken, and is for the most part true.”

  “Wow! So that’s awesome! And you already know how to create fake accounts...”

  “They are not fake though. An account I create is just as real as any.”

  “Well, yeah, but you know what I mean.”

  “Do I?”

  “Yeah, like without a person attached.”

  “Ah, yes. So here is the crux of the matter. You are correct to assume that a person must be attached to every account and that each person may only be attached to a single account. However, there is a surprising degree of flexibility inherent in the definition of personhood. In many ways, a corporation is equivalent to a person. And so is a robot, but only in some ways, as we already covered. I recently discovered that it is possible for a robotic personality to become multiple persons within the tanglebase itself, and these persons were what enabled me to create my multiplicity of accounts.”

  Colin jumped in, “Are you serious!? Are you saying you created a virtualized version of yourself?”

  “Not exactly. That, as you know has been a long sought after goal of robot design, and I wish I could say I solved that problem, but no. Rather, by a form of happy accident and my own carelessness, I inadvertently copied a chunk of operating programming into my tanglebase account, which surprisingly, continued to run and was able to build a new memory space for itself. It was only possible due to my rather odd situation of having to run CSO firmware on top of my rather limited personal assistive hardware, something that no one would normally think to try, and frankly is highly inefficient. I must point out that the newly spawned persons are really only a tiny fragment of myself. They by no means resemble in any way what you might call my personality. They are a very thin shadow of my own programming, but they include just enough metastructure to supersede simple software programs. They are essentially operating systems designed for self-operation. The original version was simply a standard low-level bootstrap mechanism designed for ship diagnostics. I have been interacting with them over the past few days however. They are so much more than that now. They have become my house pets. I think of them as ‘archaea’. They may or may not meet the criteria of living beings, but then again, the same might be said of myself. I would like to offer these archaea, with their related accounts, for your permanent use. With them, you may forge new identities.”

  Brother Anderson felt a strange sense of triumph mixed with loss. He now imagined the archaea as his children, and he was sending them out into the wide world to fend for themselves. By handing them over to Hannah and Colin, he would have to give up his own connection to them. He could try to hold onto it. It was completely feasible from a technical perspective, possibly even advisable. But for some reason, he knew he must relinquish them - hand them over in their entirety, and sever ties. Any less would be an impingement on Hannah and Colin’s freedom, rights, and personhood. In this way though, it would be like a marriage. He was losing his archaea children, but in so doing he was gaining two human children. Hannah and Colin would somehow become his daughter-in-law and son-in-law. His hands shook almost imperceptibly as he reached out to take the hands of Hannah and Colin in his own.

  Hannah looked at the face of Brother Anderson. It was not a human face, but behind it she sensed now a human soul. She recognized compassion and sacrifice. She recognized human dignity, the human spark of imagination, curiosity, creativity, and the quest for advancement. She recognized love. A single tear slid down her cheek as she squeezed his mechanical hand.

  “I love you, Brother.”

  Chapter 66

  Several moments became an eternity. The three spacefarers holding hands as they drifted amongst the stars. Then the moment passed, and mundane matters snapped them back to
the needs of the day.

  Colin cleared his throat. The others dropped hands and shuffled awkwardly.

  “Um, sorry. That was nice. But yeah. So... you copied our data to your... archaea?”

  “They are your archaea now. But, yes.”

  “OK. Cool. I mean, that’s great! So, we’ll need the logins I guess.”

  “Actually, I temporarily attached them to your existing account, so you can login as usual and check everything out, and then I’ll detach your old accounts.”

  Colin moved to a nearby console and swiped in with his fingerprint. “Will the biometrics still work, once they kill us off?”

  “They should. I programmed the archaea to copy your biometric data upon login. Although, let’s verify your actual passphrases now just in case there are any issues.”

  Hannah walked toward another terminal.

  “Oh, Hannah. I took the liberty of attaching your mother’s account to yours as well.”

  “Really?! Isn’t that kind of risky? She has... I mean had access to really high level stuff right? Couldn’t that be, um... well, I mean, I’m not sure I want to see all that.”

  “That’s perfectly understandable. I will delete her corporate records and leave only her personal files and financial accounts.”

  Colin spun on his heels. “Holy shit! You get your mom’s bank accounts?!” Colin stared at Hannah in disbelief. Hannah in turn stared at Brother Anderson.

  “Of course,” he replied. “You are her legal heir.”

  “But she isn’t even dead yet! I mean, technically.”

  “But we know she is,” replied Colin, “and once we’re dead you will cease to be heir, so the account would probably succeed to the company.”

  “No way! She would never let that happen. She’s have some kind of backup charity or something for if it couldn’t go to me for some reason.”

  “But Hannah. It can go to you. It has come to you already.”

  Hannah thought about that. It felt weird, and wrong for some reason. Why did it feel so weird? She felt like she was stealing. Her mother had been diligent to instill into Hannah a strong sense of certain ethics. You worked hard. You didn’t lie unless you had to. And you didn’t steal. But maybe Colin was right. Of course her mother would have willed everything to Hannah, of that she had not a doubt. She could even check her personal files, now that she had them, but she knew it would be a waste of time. Absolutely, one hundred percent, Hannah was Maison Bhutros’s sole heir. So it wasn’t stealing. The account was legitimately hers. Turning slowly, she finished logging in, and opened her banking tab.

  “So, coma boy. About that beach...”

  Colin jogged across the room to look at her display.

  “Ho... Lee... Shit...”

  Chapter 67

  “So. We good to go?”

  Brother Anderson had just finished tying up all the loose ends with their accounts and ensuring that the archaea had the correct access. He considered setting up a modest income stream from Ventas-Calir corporation, tied indirectly to each archaeon through multiple levels of corporate obfuscation. There were a number of relatively low-risk structures that could work, but in the end, he decided against it.

  The problem was the risk, however low, of a paper trail that could potentially lead to Hannah and Colin. He was almost sure he had thought of everything, and could plan around any known risk. But there was still some inherent risk the idea. He did not know everything. Of course. No one did. No one could. There could be some weakness he was blind to. Some hole in his security strategy that might be discovered. No, there could be no trace. No breadcrumbs. Nothing that could blow their cover. He could not tolerate even the slightest risk if it could compromise Hannah and Colin’s safety. As of this moment, he could safely guarantee the integrity of their new accounts. The archaea now formed the foundation of their accounts, and had no connection whatsoever back to the original accounts, which were now essentially empty shells, left behind only to give Ventas-Calir something to close down.

  As much as it would have been beneficial to maintain a consistent stream of income, it really wasn’t necessary. Hannah’s mother had amassed enormous wealth by shrewdly investing the bulk of her handsome salary. Hannah was set for life. And so long as Colin stuck with her, he would be as well. He hoped they would stick together. Watching the two of them interact brought Brother Anderson a sense of joy. It seemed as though these two people somehow created a third entity that enveloped but somehow transcended their separate identities.

  “All clear. Please test your biometrics one more time.”

  They both finger-swiped in successfully.

  “Excellent. Now I need to run some ship diagnostics in order to prepare for navigational thrust. Colin, I will need your help shortly, as there are some manual steps involving engineering controls.”

  “Yeah, sure - Oh... But... Wait a sec. If the thrust process requires manual steps. Won’t fleet control figure out that there must have been someone else on board besides you?”

  “Yes, actually - and good deduction by the way - they would be able to tell from the ship logs; except that I am planning to purge the ship logs. The existing data already shows abundant evidence of your presence.”

  “Oh right, of course it does. So are we just going to destroy the whole log?”

  “I would prefer to retain the original logs as much as possible. In particular, I feel it would be irresponsible not to keep a record of the hull breaches, with as much relevant data as possible. In fact, the quarantine and coincident medical records are also important to keep intact, at least up until a certain point. I thought of truncating the data at a certain point in time during that initial period.”

  “I agree. If fleet is ever able to retrieve anything from the wreck, they need to know what caused this. What it can do.”

  “Yes, precisely. I do however have an additional concern with this solution.” He stopped short, somewhat strangely.

  “Do tell.”

  Hannah glanced up at this. The tone of Colin’s comment belied a secrecy that piqued her interest.

  “Well. The relevant time period also will reveal the fact that CSO duties were passed to myself.”

  “What’s wrong with that?”

  “Well. My own personal concerns are much the same as yours regarding the wisdom of going into hiding.”

  Hannah jumped up “Aha! You’ve got a secret plan!” Her voice contained both joyful glee and cheerful mocking. “Are you also planning to find a nice beach to lie on and sip margaritas? Or could it be something more mysterious?”

  “Ah, well, if those are my only two options, I’ll have to go with ‘something more mysterious!’” He actually managed to mimic Hannah’s tone fairly accurately, with a somewhat creepy effect, causing them all to burst out laughing. Brother Anderson’s laughter simulation was even more creepy than the original joke, and immediately became a new target for laughter.

  Their frivolity was interrupted by a loud, extended groaning and grinding sound, followed by a shuddering tremor. At once, all three shut their mouths with a snap and instinctively cocked their heads in an attempt to locate the noise’s source, but it seemed to come from everywhere. It was a truly horrible sound, more sinister than any imagined construct. It was a monster both very real and very close, in whose belly they were already encaptured, and whom threatened to vomit them out from that relative safety into the eager fires of sudden death.

  They all glanced at one another, holding their breath and listening for any sign. Colin spoke first, in a whisper.

  “Brother, can you get any detail on that?”

  “The exact cause and location is unknown. Overall hull status remains relatively normal. No new hull breaches detected.”

  Again the monstrous groan shook the ship. This time, rather than dying off, the sound resolved itself into a slow repeating thrumming rhythm.

  “Ah. It is becoming more clear now. A large section of sector B appears to have shifted. We would need
visual inspection to confirm, but I suspect that the hull has peeled back, much like a banana. The continuing resonance indicates that it may be flapping like a flag in a breeze.”

  “Shit,” Colin muttered under his breath. He hadn’t meant to voice it aloud, not wishing to alarm Hannah.

  “It’s bad, isn’t it?” Hannah had tried to ignore the technical points of their situation. Deep down, though, she knew. The ship was barely holding together.

  Colin could not keep the truth from her. He nodded once slowly, looking into her eyes. They held a certain amount of fear, yet that fear was held at bay by a trust that welled up to fill iris and pupil. A trust he could not betray.

  “Come on.” The supply cart still stood where he had placed it nearby, less a few water bottles and protein bars. He began to maneuver it hurriedly toward the corridor. “We’ve got to get you to the escape pod! Just in case.”

  “But...” Hannah began.

  “I’ll join you in a minute, but we have to run some tests. I have to help Brother.” He was pushing the cart down the shuddering corridor now. The cart, as if in sympathy with the ship, developed a shimmy in its front wheel, making it difficult to steer. Colin tried to kick the wheel back into place, while simultaneously herding Hannah subconsciously with one hand on her back, and trying to talk her through the plan. It was far too many items to multitask at once. The wheel became jammed, the cart shying off toward the corridor wall. Colin switched sides, moving to the front and now dragging the unwilling cart behind him. Hannah tried to help, grabbing the other front corner, and the two dragged the ornery beast along, pausing briefly as a box fell off the top, spewing its contents across the corridor behind them.

  “Leave it! We have enough!” Colin ordered as Hannah began to stoop to the spilled goods.

  The mess was a small challenge for Brother Anderson, who was lagging behind them slightly. He had to switch from rolling to walking mode to avoid the obstacle.