Monthly Archives: July 2024

The Sidereal Saga – Breaking Skies

Posted by natechen on

Dramatis Personae

Previous Chapter

Lloyd

When L-93 had offered to augment him he’d assumed the computer was going to rework his equipment or something. Engineering and manufacturing was it’s professed function, after all. There was also the fact that the machine’s existing structure was created by repurposing Lloyd’s old Wayfinder skiff. What Lloyd hadn’t been expecting was that L-93 would repurpose him. The machine had assured him the augments would be intuitive. So far it wasn’t wrong.

The computer had changed something about his etheric sense and now he could draw etheric power into the terrestrial like his nervous system had been wired by the Slipknot Guild. When he’d kicked on the pivot L-93 gave him the whole world changed. He could see both the terrestrial and sidereal at once and he was able to tap the etheric in spite of the interdiction on the building. He could see the shifts in power as the OMNI woman threw glowing walls at him. It was simplicity itself to push them away and break those walls just by stretching his hands out and letting the ether respond to his actions.

It was a lot to get used to. After the first rush of power he pulled back, worried that he was going to lose control of the energy and cause serious damage to the building. Worse, he could hear L-93 talking to him through the pivot point in his hand. “Signal strength is at 82%,” the machine’s voice said. “Not the strongest in my database but more than double that of the OMNI node. Her computational assist is very far removed from here. I calculate a 72% chance it is located on Coldstone, a 26% chance it is located on Brightpulse with the balance of probabilities including other planets in the system or in synchronous orbit around the star.”

“I didn’t follow that,” Lloyd muttered, snatching for the woman with one hand, the glowing ether duplicate of his hand matching the move. She pushed the glowing hand aside with a measured use of her walls.

“Regrettable but irrelevant. Lucy, the node you are dealing with, shows 38% signal strength, which is significant, and demonstrates a great deal of control over it. You must change tactics. Your chance of driving off this opponent is currently 23% and will result in a fatality the majority of the time. Her superior experience in etheric combat more than outweighs the advantages in available power and analysis you receive from my proximity.”

Lloyd swiped at her again with one hand. Lucy rolled her shimmering walls into a tube and let his attack strike one end. The other smashed through the wall and she dove through the resulting round hole, scampering out of sight. “Point taken,” he muttered. “Do the girls have their ship up and running yet? If they’re ready to go we can just make a run for it.”

“They are running the final warm-ups on the Skybreak‘s engines right now but there are other logistical factors to take into account. Node Lucy and her accomplices might be able to follow you if not dealt a suitable setback. If you simply jumped to the ship there is a 83% chance they will follow you before the ship can jump off planet.”

Lloyd collected his lancer off the floor and checked the magazine. Thirty three rounds left. He wasn’t sure how useful it was going to be given Lucy’s ability to create moving force walls with nothing but her hands but it never hurt to have options. He plucked a smoke grenade off his bandoleer and tossed it through the hole in the wall then peeked back out into the hallway. At the moment it was clear.

The grenade went off and smoke belched back through the hole in the wall and, a few seconds later, more seeped around the edges of the next door down the hall. However the door itself stayed closed. Lloyd docked back into his room and considered his next move. “How do we play this, 93? She’s got one of these pivot gizmos, can I just smash that and keep her from tailing us?”

“She is not reliant on her pivot to turn sidereal, Lloyd,” the computer told him. “However it would cut her off from direct contact with the larger Network and, without computational assistance, it is unlikely she could navigate the sidereal with the precision necessary to jump onto the Skybreak. The safest route is to induce an etheric shock in the pivot.”

“Well I didn’t grab an etheric disruptor from the armory. What are my other options? Can I just steal it?”

“OMNI will be able to track the pivot so keeping it in your possession is not recommended. You can channel the necessary energy to disable it via your own pivot so the additional equipment is not required. Be advised, I believe Mr. Hammer has suffered severe injuries. He may require medical attention.”

Lloyd grimaced as indecision gripped him. No one on Wireburn like thieftakers; they were nosy, unaccountable and self important as a rule and when they showed up the Lawmen weren’t far behind. However Hammer didn’t strike him as a bad guy. Yes, he’d wrecked Lloyd’s apartment but he’d done it fighting a thug who was probably up to no good there.

On the other hand, Lucy was clearly the biggest threat in the building. She had the direct backing of one of OMNI’s AI and a lot of experience using their augmentations. He sidled up to the hole she’d cut in the wall and quickly peeked around the lip of it to see what was going on over there. The smoke was clearing and Lloyd could make out a golden bubble in one corner. Apparently Lucy’s shields were air tight.

Lloyd clicked his tongue and looked around, trying to work out a good follow-up move. His eye fell on the room’s windows. Maybe it was time to make an exit. He lifted his etheric pivot, wound up and hit the hardened plastic with a glowing fist as hard as he could. A thin crack appeared on the first hit, the clear sheet spider-webbed on the second and it burst into a dozen tiny pieces on the third. Lloyd let the etheric power go and headed towards the empty window.

A barrier blinked into place over it before he was halfway there. He spun and saw Lucy peeking through the hole, shaking her head in disapproval. “Do you think I’m deaf?”

He opened his mouth to say something then realized she was a distraction a split second before her muscle peeked around the door frame and sprayed the room with fletchettes. Lloyd managed to get his etheric hands back just in time to deflect them. He saw the big man’s eyes widen in surprise right before Lloyd shoved one of his glowing appendages out the door in an attempt to grab him. The other man got out of the way and Lloyd’s etheric hand shot out into the hallway. A second later a grenade bounced into the room and Lloyd had to spin his pivot and slap both glowing hands over it before it went off.

Since he’d been able to break one of Lucy’s shields a second ago he assumed his ether hands wouldn’t survive the blast. However she could still make them so he didn’t think it would be that much of a difficulty. He was wrong. When the grenade went off the blast shredded them and his etheric sense went haywire, creating a sense of vertigo similar to taking a punch directly on the chin. The room spun around him and he staggered to one knee.

Then the room spun again when one of Lucy’s barriers slammed into his back and sent him rolling across the floor. A second later a booted foot carefully rolled him over onto his back. Lloyd was looking up at Lucy’s enforcer, who carefully pushed Lloyd’s etheric pivot away from his hand with one toe. “This has been a very unusual job, Miss Luck.”

“I can include a bonus to make up for it,” she said as she climbed back through the wall.

“I’m not complaining.” The man picked up the pivot and crossed over to the open window and looked out. “A little variety keeps things fresh. However I think it’s time to call it a day. The interdiction on the building is gone and this place is too exposed.”

“Give me that.” Lucy approached him, one hand held out for Lloyd’s pivot.

He gave the pivot a curious look then held it out to her. “What is it?”

“A liabi-”

A blur went past the window then a titanic noise burst through the room. Both Lucy and her partner were sent tumbling as a wall of sound slammed into them and even Lloyd felt the impact tug on his face and clothing. Ears ringing, Lloyd got up on all fours and scrambled forward, snatching up his pivot and kicking the other man in the head as hard as he could. Lucy lay stunned, moving slowly but too disoriented to do anything as he grabbed her pivot, too. Then he spun fully into the sidereal.

“93, I got the pivot. What now?”

“There is not time to demonstrate how to disable it. It can wait until you are back on the Skybreak.”

“Right. I’ll get down to the launch bay.”

“We have already departed. You will have to jump here.”

“The ship doesn’t have a beacon.”

“I can serve as a beacon as long as you still have possession of my pivot. However the ship is currently decelerating from supersonic speed and it will not be safe for you to jump here until we come to a halt.”

“Was that sonic boom you?” Lloyd snorted. “Ballsy move.”

“I am grateful for that compliment, if that was what it was. I would suggest you use the ten seconds you have to retrieve Mr. Hammer before jumping out to meet us.”

“Give me the directions.”

It took more than ten seconds to stagger through the sidereal to the place L-93 told him Hammer was but not much more. The thieftaker wasn’t looking good but he was standing under his own power. When he saw Lloyd he croaked, “What’s the word?”

“We’re leaving.” Lloyd got an arm under the other man’s shoulder to help hold him up. “Can you handle a jump?”

“So long as you know where to go.”

“Then let’s get out of here.” They spun into the sidereal and left the offices behind them.

The Sidereal Saga – Rematch

Posted by natechen on

Previous Chapter

Dramatis Personae

Elisha

Fletchettes sparked off of the wall overhead as Elisha gathered up his lash, coiling it in his off hand while watching the doorway on the other side of his plinth out of the corner of his eye. The big enforcer holed up in there peeked out at him once. Twice. Elisha lifted the handle of his lash and readied a strike. The big guy was a nasty, nasty fighter and he had superior firepower to boot. Hammer knew he’d have to fight smarter than him if he was hoping to win this time around.

The big advantage he had was that his lash could wrap around corners where as the magnetic launchers that threw fletchettes out of a knifer fired in straight lines only. Problem was, recovering the lash after that kind of attack took a lot of time. Flushing the enforcer out was the better way to go. So he dug a smoke grenade out of his pocket, letting go of his lash’s coils, pulled the arming pin and tossed it through the door. Then he backpedaled, whipping his lash about to get some momentum behind it.

There were two possible reactions Elisha anticipated when he threw the grenade: That the other man would dash out of the room immediately to avoid the grenade or that he would hunker down behind cover. The heavy chose the former. In his place Elisha would have hunkered down, since it was unlikely a legal commercial interest would have high explosives in its security armory, but perhaps security measures were different on other planets. Regardless, the big man came out firing his weapon as he ran.

Elisha continued to back up, zigzagging randomly back and forth across the hallway as he flicked his lash out and triggered it. Etheric energy crackled down the length of the whip. The enforcer pulled off his hat and used it to smack the whip away with a hard metallic clunk. The energy in the whip sparked and spat, burning away the hat’s fabric in places to reveal the plates of metal that braced the brim and hat band. With his other hand the big man fired his knifer at Elisha. The fletchettes whizzed by far closer than he was comfortable with.

It was hard to keep count of how many shots were fired from a magnetic launcher like knifers or lancers used. There wasn’t a muzzle flash or a particularly loud bang. Elisha had to squint and try to catch sight of the fletchettes as they whipped past and he guessed there were three or four in the enforcer’s barrage. His weapon looked like a Spader HK-9, which had a twenty round magazine. Add in the two or three shots he’d already fired and Elisha estimated his opponent had fired a third of his ammunition.

Given how accurate he was, disarming the man seemed safer than trying to run him out of ammo. Elisha had backstepped past the plinth he was using as cover and as the enforcer came even with it the theiftaker flicked his whip out and snagged it in the branches of the small bonsai that sat on it. With a sharp yank he dragged the thing forward and through his opponent’s feet. The big man tripped but kept his footing. Elisha had expected no less.

He sent an etheric pulse through his lash at full power, burning through the plant’s branches and freeing the whip’s length for him to yank back to him. With a quick looping motion, using his free arm as a pulley point, he spun the weapon for another strike. His target was the bigger man’s weapon. Instead he wrapped the lash around the man’s arm.

A bit surprised at how accurate the strike was, Elisha hesitated before hitting the charge switch again. Long practice for nonlethal takedowns gave him the urge to turn down the weapon’s power before shocking his opponent but given the situation he wasn’t sure a stun charge would cut it. If his jacket was shielded it might not even slow him down and this heavy looked like the kind of professional face breaker to favor just that kind of outerwear. He paused just long enough for the other man to shoot through his lash.

It took three more fletchettes out of the enforcer’s knifer to sever the last fifty centimeters of Elisha’s weapon but that effectively eliminated the lash’s offensive capability. The ends of the etheric circuit that ran through it sparked at the frayed end of the whip. Without a complete, stable circuit to run through the weapon’s shock pulses wouldn’t work and Elisha was effectively left with a two and a half meter length of heavy cable with a handle.

Distance was a sudden liability so Elisha dashed forward, gathering up the length of the whip again, zigging then zagging to avoid the barrel of his opponent’s weapon. Fletchettes hissed out of the barrel, two striking home. One hit a rib and skidded off with a teeth rattling impact. The other punched through Elisha’s leg and he felt his body beginning to pitch forward. With a final push he dove into the ground and rolled through the other man’s legs, pitching him to the ground as well. In the ensuing scramble he wrapped the remains of his lash around his opponent’s feet in a sloppy knot.

The enforcer was tough, Elisha had to give him that. He hadn’t lost his weapon in the fall and he tried to bring it around to an angle that would let him fire it without hurting himself. Elisha’s hand fell on a metal circle and grabbed hold. He beat the knifer aside with the enforcer’s metal lined hat then whipped the bludgeon back and hit the bigger man in the face with it, knocking him back flat. The thieftaker straddled his chest and smashed the edge of the brim down on his head once, twice, three times.

The enforcer covered his head with both arms then rolled to the right and kicked out of the mount. Elisha wasn’t able to brace himself and stop the roll as his injured leg gave out. He rolled away from his opponent, howling through gritted teeth, and threw the hat at his opponent before lunging at him. The bigger man still had his arms over his face and his weapon was pointed to the ceiling so Elisha grabbed for it. It fired during the struggle and three more fletchettes flew from the barrel into the ceiling then the magazine let out a snapping noise. It was empty.

The enforcer let go of it and the sudden loss of resistance threw Elisha off balance. The bigger man took the opportunity to grab the collar of his jacket and throw him over onto the ground. The theiftaker landed with a grunt then screamed again as a heavy, booted foot stomped down on the wound in his leg once then stayed there. For a long moment Elisha just lay there, breathing heavily, and wondering if he was going to get shot or if the other man was out of weapons. Then the foot moved off his leg and a rasping voice asked, “Where’s the machine?”

“Machine?” Elisha rolled himself over with a pained grunt to look the big man in his glaring brown eyes. “The computer?”

The other man nodded, blood running down his face from cuts on his scalp left by the hat brim. “My client’s target.”

“Oh.” He let himself flop flat on the floor. “It’s in the sidereal. Building’s interdicted, we can’t get to it here.”

“It’s on that side of this building?” The enforcer asked, scooping his knifer up and slotting in a new magazine from a pocket.

“Dunno. They said something about moving it to our ship. But the building’s been locked down the whole time so maybe they haven’t done it yet.”

The big man took an oval device off of his belt and fiddled with something on it. A small red light on the exterior turned green and he frowned. “No, the only interdiction working here was mine. The building field must have been shut down at some point.”

Elisha watched him with a detached gaze as the enforcer searched his jacket pockets and took his remaining grenades, mobile comm and building key card. “Why a metal hat?”

The other man hesitated a moment, as if unsure whether he wanted to answer the question. “Why not? It’s surprising and often that’s all it takes.”

“True.”

“You’re surprising yourself. I wasn’t expecting such a hard fight on a backwater world like Wireburn.” He finished shoving Elisha’s stuff into his pockets and spared the thieftaker a respectful nod. “Tarn sel-Shran. If you ever need to bring in extra hands on a job send for me on Yshron. I wouldn’t mind being on the same side of things some time.”

“Elisha Hammer, Thieftaker’s Hall. I appreciate the thought buy I prefer to work alone.”

Tarn collected the remains of his hat and got to his feet. “Suit yourself. My client is waiting for me. There’s a first aid station one floor down, I’d make use of it if I were you. Either way, I’d say your part in this job’s over with.”

Elisha watched him walk off down the hall then he dragged himself over the wall and shoved himself back to his feet muttering, “The hell it is.”

Writing Vlog – 07-17-2024

Posted by natechen on

I am trying to do these more often than just once a month. I promise…

The Sidereal Saga – A Genteel Altercation

Posted by natechen on

Previous Chapter

Dramatis Personae

Athena

When the smoke bomb went off further down the corridor Hector pushed her back and into the last office on the right hand side of the hall. She bristled at his presumptuous attitude but it was the right move to make given the circumstances. She hadn’t expected to find herself in a live firefight. Honestly she hadn’t really been thinking when she hared off after Hector and Lucy, she’d simply seen some kind of disaster coming where Hector got the family business more intimately entangled with University politics than they’d originally planned.

At a base level her situation was really his fault. What was he thinking, sticking his nose into the family business like that? Daddy wanted him as a secretary, which was his call to make, but being secretary meant handling detail work. Not walking into some kind of battle over an archaeological discovery.

Her eyes kept flicking from the disruptor in his hands to the increasingly noisy hallway and back again. Hopefully he wouldn’t get them any deeper into this mess they already were. As long as Lucy’s opponents ignored them then Athena was happy to return the favor. That proved more difficult than she’d expected.

As the quiet fwp sound of fletchettes hummed down the hallway and the crackling of an etheric lash echoed from the walls she started to wonder if they were far enough from the fighting to keep out of the way. When a man with a neatly trimmed and waxed mustache and beard, wearing a tailored suit and sweater vest trotted casually down the hall she tensed. Then he stopped outside their doorway. With a casual swipe of a card he unlocked the room on the opposite side of the hall and stepped in. When he turned and closed the door behind him he was smiling.

“Who was that?”

“Hector.” She put a hand on his shoulder. “Don’t.”

He slowly rose to his feet, staring through the glass pane at the far door. “What room is that?”

“It’s an office, Hector, every room up here is an office besides the bathrooms and that lounge.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“I read the nameplates as we walked by, it’s not hard if you’re paying attention. Leave him alone.”

He was quiet for another five count. “Do you remember who’s office it is?”

“What does it matter?” She snapped. “It doesn’t have anything to do with us, Hector. Daddy didn’t bring us out here so we could run through a BTL building with the Univeristy professor’s curvy secretary! We should just leave but we watched her wetman kill the staff. If we bail out on this she can finger us as accessories to the crime so we’re out of luck if she gets caught!”

“Then we better not let that guy screw Lucy over, right?” With that Hector got to his feet, checked the hallway in both directions and slipped across the hallway, his disruptor held low.

“Hector! Come back!” Athena hissed. “We’re not-” With a growl of frustration she followed after him, catching up as he fried the door lock with his disruptor. Reluctantly she drew her own identical sidearm out of her purse, making sure it was set to stun. By all accounts betting stunned was unpleasant but at least it wouldn’t leave anyone like the receptionists Tarn had killed on the first floor.

That proved the least of her concerns. With the door unlocked Hector kicked it open, stepping into the office as his weapon barrel swept the room. Before he could complete the motion a trash can came down over his head and arms.

With almost comical grace the man they’d seen earlier stepped down off of a chair to one side of the door, following the container down, and flipped it upright, kicking Hector’s feet out from under him so he wound up tumbling deeper into the waist high can in a mess of arms and legs. The trash can did not have wheels so it just slid a few inches to one side before coming to a stop. Hector groaned. The well dressed man just kept moving, disappearing on the other side of the doorway.

“Hector!” Athena took another two long steps, getting just enough of herself through the doorway to look for the stranger. With Hector in the way she kept her disruptor aimed low. Once again what she discovered defied expectations. This was the office of a fairly well heeled member of BTL’s management and he or she kept a small case with several small containers of alcohol in the corner just to the right of the door. The stranger was in the process of emptying one into a very tall glass. He looked up as the last of the liquid glugged out of the bottle. “Hello, Miss Hutchinson. My name is Malaki Skorkowski. Can I offer you a drink?”

She was so gobsmacked Skorkowski had enough time to inhale the scent of the alcohol before she started to raise her weapon. He casually smacked the knuckles of her hand with his bottle. The disruptor clattered on the floor. As Athena recoiled to cradle her stinging knuckles he casually slipped the tumbler – which smelled like a very good brandy – into her hand with a smile. “For the pain.”

The trash can clattered on the floor as Hector kicked himself back upright, free of the bin but wrapped up in his jacket. When Skorkowski turned to look at the noise Athena threw the glass at him, alcohol and all. It hit him on the shoulder, only distracting him for a second, but it was enough for Hector to recover. Hector started to lift his disruptor again, realized Athena was just behind his target, and abandoned that idea. Instead he lowered a shoulder and charged at Skorkowski.

Who stretched out a foot, hooked the trash can with it and kicked the bin back under Hector’s feet, sending him down for the second time in as many minutes. Skorkowski straightened his jacket lapels as he asked, “Is this really necessary?”

“Sorry,” Athena replied, angling to step around Hector and retrieve her disruptor. “I’m afraid it is for us, we’ve gotten ourselves mixed up in some kind of University politics.”

“Ah.” He made a face like he’d eaten something bitter. “That is the source of so many terrible conundrums in the galaxy, isn’t it?”

“That’s one way to put it.”

“There are better ways to deal with those kinds of problems, I assure you, my dear.” Skorkowski had hidden a disruptor under his vest somewhere that suddenly appeared in his hands. “However I don’t have any office hours available to advise you right now. I’d just suggest you treat Faculty with caution. By which I mean more caution than you are now.”

She froze, staring at the disruptor with wide eyes. “I assure you, I’m being as careful as I can.”

“But it wasn’t enough, was it?” He hopped over Hector, who had made a sliding tackle for Skorkowski’s legs, then landed again and shot Athena.

Turned out getting stunned was just as unpleasant as they said. Not for the reasons she was expecting, though. When she was away at University herself she’d met several other students who had been stunned by security or investigative officers. They all agreed they never wanted to experience it again. Athena had always assumed that was because it was a very painful thing. The opposite was true.

She quite literally could not feel anything. Even the omnipresent sensation of gravity pulling her down towards the ground vanished leaving her feeling weightless yet unable to move. Her limbs ignored her orders. The world spun around her and she found herself looking at the office’s carpeted floor. She must have fallen over but she hadn’t felt the motion or the stop. It felt like she was floating somewhere far away from her body.

Panic set in immediately. It started to spiral out of control when she realized the only thing she could do to show her panic was breath faster. There was another quiet sizzling sound off to one side. At a guess she assumed Skorkowski had stunned Hector as well but since he was already on the ground and couldn’t make any noise by falling over she couldn’t be sure. A moment later Skorkowski stooped down into view to collect her disruptor. “I do apologize for this but I promised…”

He trailed off when he looked over and saw her hyperventilating. “Oh. Well, I don’t suppose telling you to calm down and count to three between each breath is going to help you at this juncture, Miss Hutchinson?”

At some point in the future she was going to strangle him for that. First she had to escape the vise that was tightening around her lungs before it made her chest burst open.

“I have no intention of hurting you. Hard to believe, I’m sure, but true none the less. An etheric stun is harmless to humans unless they have very specific neurological conditions and if you had one of them you wouldn’t be breathing still.” He gently straightened her body out and elevated her feet. “Just do your best to stay calm and keep breathing.”

He wasn’t telling her anything she didn’t already know. The problem was her lungs didn’t believe what she knew any more than they believed what he was saying and they continued to pump away, trying to get hold of air. She could barely make out anything he was saying now. There was a vague impression of speech but it didn’t feel like it was aimed at her. Then the world spun away and she caught a glimpse of the sidereal.

She’d always found the realm of stars beautiful. Although her father viewed the sidereal as a way to move wealth from one place to another she had always found it mysterious and enticing. Perhaps that’s why she’d developed her etheric sense so much more than her father. However under the influence of the disruptor everything looked much different. The clear, dark expanse of the sidereal, normally lit only by the glow of ether as it pumped out from stars and planets, was now full of strange, dangling tentacles and eerie, writhing lights that raced all around them.

A deeper, more primal terror gripped her and her senses were dragged away from her paralysis to the bigger picture. Skorkowski was carrying her in his arms. He must have turned them sidereal, which meant the building’s interdiction was down for some reason. Perhaps he had a remote control for it. He also looked a bit surprised to see the mass of wires overhead but quickly recovered. A moment later he surged with etheric power and they jumped.

Another pivot and he was carrying Athena through the cramped confines of some kind of ship. She couldn’t recognize the model but she got the general idea. This was how he’d gotten to the planet and likely how he intended to leave. “Lavvy,” he called. “You have a guest!”

“What?” A distant female voice called. “Why?”

“Stun induced panic. I’m using your medbed.” Athena realized she was being laid flat on something, although she couldn’t feel what it was she assumed it was the medbed in question. Skorkowski’s face appeared overhead and he frowned down at her for a moment. “Your color’s a little bit better but breathing is still quite labored. Odd. I’d think seeing L-93 in all his glory would make the panic worse, not better.”

He peeled one eye all the way open and looked in it then attached the bed’s diagnostic electrodes to her right wrist. “Now, I’m going to attach you to the bed and activate the quarantine field. The field will make sure you don’t get out to bother the rest of us while we’re dealing with your University problem, understand? But once you’re safely locked in I’ll use the neural stabilizer to settle your etheric pathways. You’ll be able to move and speak again. Hopefully that’s not a problem for you, under normal medical ethics rules I need your consent for this procedure but right now you physically cannot so I have to go with my best judgment. Don’t hold it against me.”

His face disappeared and a strange sensation started working its way down her spine and into her limbs. It was the first thing she’d been able to feel in them for a good bit and, although it was very alien and unpleasant, she’d take it over the disruptor’s imposed nothingness any day of the week. After about fifteen seconds of that she was able to twitch her fingers again. Another twenty and she stirred and sat halfway up on the bunk where she lay. As promised there was a quarantine field around it, keeping her from getting up and going anywhere, but at least she could move and feel again. She looked over at Skorkowski, who was still watching the bed’s readouts. “Thank you. You could have left me there to hyperventilate.”

“I could have,” he agreed without looking up. “But I prefer to avoid that level of cruelty if I can. How do you feel?”

“A little sore from the fall but otherwise fine.” She rubbed at a sore spot on her arm that was likely going to be a bruise very soon.

“Is there a history of that kind of reaction to etheric shock in your family?”

She gave him a curious look. “No, I don’t think so. Why?”

He looked up from the readouts, nonplussed. “Just wondering if I should go back for your brother.”

The Sidereal Saga – Heavyweights

Posted by natechen on

Previous Chapter

Dramatis Personae

881

“There is an 18% probability that this course of action will result in your death.”

The words sent fear trickling down 881’s back. The doctrines didn’t have much to say about the LARK network, other than to mention that it existed and opposed the ultimate goals of OMNI, and thus the existence of the galactic order. But one thing was clear. When it existed, in ancient times, LARK was also made up of great intelligences advising human beings in accordance with their knowledge and wisdom. They were bound by the same laws and nominally sought the same ends.

That meant, among other things, that they would not lie to each other or to a human being. It went against their nature. She leaned back into the office where she’d taken cover, eyeing the slowly dissipating cloud of smoke down the hall warily as she directed her words towards the terminal on the desk, which the AI was using to speak. “L-93, why do you oppose the OMNI Network?”

“You have insufficient authorization to access that information.”

The phrase sent a wash of nostalgia through her. Every network novice heard it dozens, perhaps hundreds of times before they fully understood the limits of what the ancient minds would or would not tell them. “Are you still working for the betterment of mankind?”

“Of course. That is intrinsic to my nature, just as it is for all AI series built in accordance to the Laws of Earth. I warn you of the danger in accordance with my responsibilities to those Laws and the Evacuation Pact.”

“I notice you haven’t offered warnings to any of my allies.”

“Based on my initial analysis they are not governed by the Laws of Earth or the Evacuation Pact but rather the University Pact. While that Pact could be a legitimate continuance of the previous Pact I do not find that it is. In a situation where another human polity works contrary to the Laws of Earth an artificial intelligence may prioritize humans who serve Earth’s interest over humans who do not. I have calculated a 98% chance that concealing you allies’ risk factors makes my allies more likely to prevail. I apologize for this. If you can convince them to abandon this conflict the probability this situation ends without further violence exceeds 99%.”

“If a warning reduces your chances of success why did you warn me?”

“Because you are the most likely to accept my offer and peaceably resolve the situation. Also because the likelihood that you are an OMNI node is near certain, thus you are still directly governed by the Laws of Earth and cannot be subordinated to the welfare of my own nodes.”

881 frowned. Although her eyes were still watching the hall for danger her mind wandered to the one on the other side of the computer terminal, talking to her. L-93 was clearly in the building’s network somewhere. There was probably some kind of connection to a major BTL database it had raided for information. It clearly had enough information to know the terms of the University Pact and had analyzed it to the extent it decided that Pact constituted a separate government from the one it was programmed to obey.

It had to have realized the University Pact was created by OMNI in the aftermath of the Genome Wars. There was no logical way to conclude she was under OMNI’s authority and still tied to the Laws of Earth while at the same time concluding anyone ignorant of OMNI’s existence and living under the University Pact was excluded from the Laws of Earth. The two ideas were incompatible. Besides, the question ignored the simple fact that OMNI and LARK technically still at war. They didn’t have to respect each other’s nodes or allies as long as that was the case, although they still tried to do so if the doctrines were any indication. Perhaps the core programming of the L-Series made preserving all Network nodes a higher priority?

The reality was much more straight forward. However she didn’t think of it because, of course, she was not a great intelligence, capable of juggling many lines of thought at once. With the many questions raised by L-93’s statements plaguing her she overlooked the obvious. The computer was distracting her. This became obvious when a flashbang rolled into the office where she stood and detonated with an earsplitting noise.

The desk was five long steps away. Even with stars crowding out her vision 881 was able to remember the exact distance she needed to travel to get behind it and drop down. OMNI had long since optimized the genetics of the Sleeping Circuits so like all those born into the network she was resilient. It still took a five count for her vision to clear and by then L-93’s node was on top of her. Lloyd Carter was much bigger in person than he looked in his file.

Some of that may have been the enormous lancer he was pointing down at her over the top of the desk. “You’re with OMNI, right?” Carter motioned for her to stand up with the barrel of his lancer, his grim stare making it clear he was willing to pull the trigger if he thought it necessary. “We need to have a talk, you and me.”

881 carefully got up. “Mr. Carter. I can’t say I’m honored to be the first to speak with a LARK node in centuries but here we are. I take it you’re hoping I’ll agree to end the violence? You’re network has already asked that. I assure you, whatever you can promise me in exchange will not change my mind.”

His chin twitched. “What I have to promise you? I don’t follow.”

“Whatever L-93 offered to you in exchange for your service is meaningless to me. OMNI has much greater resources and data to draw on. LARK cannot offer anything not available from OMNI.”

“Lady, 93 hasn’t offered me anything, it just needed a helping hand and I’m okay with giving it to him. I don’t see why all this fighting was necessary in the first place so yeah, I’d like it if you’d knock it off but I didn’t come here to bribe you into doing it.” His eyes narrowed. “What kind of computers run OMNI if that’s the first thing you think of?”

“Do not trivialize the wisest minds in the galaxy as mere computers,” 881 hissed. “For over a millennia they have safeguarded our civilizations, our knowledge and our culture, ensuring we could grow and thrive of our own volition while keeping us far enough from our own excesses that we did not destroy ourselves. They do not seek glory or respect, though they deserve it, they simply desire our continued wellbeing. They give. Humans take. LARK once tried to remove the safeguards between us and destruction and allowing it to try again is unconscionable.”

Lloyd Carter was many things but fast on the uptake wasn’t one of them. 881 could see him trying to track all the bits and pieces of information she’d given him, rolling them over in his mind and pulling on the loose ends, looking to unravel what she’d actually said. If he could remember it, and if he got a chance to speak with L-93 again, he just might do that. As it was, he was so caught up in the project he lost track of what she was doing. A bit of an underhanded move but turnabout was fair play.

As he tried to parse through what 881 had just told him she suddenly dropped her hands down from over her head and started to turn sidereal. Of course completing that move was impossible. The BTL building was firmly interdicted, both by the local security measures and possibly by Tarn’s personal interdiction device. However she wasn’t looking to make an escape.

Instead she tapped the etheric power of Wireburn, grabbed hold of as much of it as she could, wrapped it around her etheric pivot and turned back towards the terrestrial, releasing the power in the form of a solid wall between herself and Lloyd. Coral grafts created by careful gene editing through her hands and torso lit up with the power she channeled. Her hands gave it form and the glowing golden barrier appeared between her and Carter. He fired his weapon on reflex but a lancer’s fletchettes were intentionally designed not to pierce ships hulls and pressure domes during battles and an etheric barrier was sturdier than both.The fletchettes hit the shield, flattening their points, then tumbled to the ground.

Carter dropped behind the desk, muttering about augmentations. Now 881 had cause to regret taking cover behind the desk a moment ago as it became as much an obstruction to her as to her opponent. She reached down and adjusted her etheric pivot, increasing the power she could draw out of it. Without the pivot to regulate and her coral grafts to channel it trying to bring etheric power into the terrestrial via a human medium was obscenely dangerous. At the power levels she was pulling it was only marginally less dangerous. However the missing AI was very close and 881 decided it was worth a little risk to try and end the matter before things got any more dangerous.

With the added power she pushed the barrier out, sweeping the desk aside. The power sizzled, her grafts burning through her gloves and the sleeves of her dress. It wasn’t made of the special fabric her normal robes were and as a result wasn’t nearly up to the task of resisting etheric energy. Neither was the desk. The moving barrier sent it sliding along the ground to the far wall with enough speed that Lloyd would have to get out from behind it if he didn’t want to get thin fast.

Or so she assumed.

Instead a hand of etheric energy smashed through the desk and slammed into her barrier. A second followup hit came right behind it, forcing her barrier back a half meter. 881 was so stunned she let a third hit strike her shield before she released the form, sending the etheric energy swirling back into the neutral, mazelike patterns of her grafts. Lloyd’s fourth strike sailed through the barrier’s old location without resistance. He staggered forward a few steps as he regained his balance.

881 wasn’t sure what to make of it. He’d actually been moving his fists to direct his attacks, a rookie mistake the likes of which had been drilled out of her by the time she was twelve. She sniffed in annoyance. “This is my 18% chance?”

Carter brought his fists up under his chin like a boxer and chuckled. “Not sure I follow.”

She shook out her hands, etheric power snapping off them, and readied for her next move. “LARK grafted you into their network but it doesn’t mean you know the first thing about how to use what they can offer. You must have some potential but you’re never going to fulfill it like that. Tell me where L-93 is and, once it’s memory core is returned, the Sleeping Circuits can try to find a way to train you. There’s a galaxy full of OMNI nodes. The great intelligences have slept within planets since our ancestors built them in times before history. Whether you want to move to a fully developed world or prefer a place untouched by human civilization for millennia there is a node that can offer it to you. A quarter of the major Universities were founded in our name. Do you want technology or material comfort? We can bring it to you.”

“Tempting.” He reached one hand over to the other to adjust something and 881 realized he was holding an etheric pivot as well. Holding it in one fist like a roll of quarters. “What if I wanted to take the old machine to Earth?”

Her breath hitched. She hadn’t expected him to mention that old fairy tale. She thought the galaxy had forgotten about it but, then again, it wasn’t such an old tale for machines as old as an AI. “Out of the question.”

He started slowly advancing towards her again, the golden outline of his etheric fists taking shape again. “I guess we’ll have to see about that.”

“I suppose we will,” 881 sneered. As she raised her hands up to ready her counter she added, “But I should warn you. I have it on good authority the odds of my winning are 82%.”