Hûw Steer's Blog, page 33

Salvage Seven: Chapter 16

Here we are: far from the end of Salvage Seven, but probably the best time to take a pause that there’s going to be. Like I said last week, I’m going to take some time to finish off the next arc of the story (and then edit it, a lot) before starting to post it up here. There will be more, I promise. In the meantime I’ll find something else to put up weekly. I’ve got a few ideas.

If you’ve enjoyed the Salvage Seven story so far – or indeed if you haven’t – please drop a comment below and let me know what you think. I’m going to be doing some editing anyway, so I’d love to know what things you think could do with some improvement!

For now, please enjoy Chapter 16. The team are out of immediate danger… but by now it should be obvious that this is very much a temporary state where they’re concerned.

Prologue
Chapter 1, parts 1 and 2
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15

Gideon was fairly sure he hadn’t ever felt this uncomfortable – and he’d been in the trenches for months. He stood in the Cradle and fidgeted nervously, waiting for someone to say something. He’d have taken a death sentence just to end the damn silence.

The rest of Salvage Seven were arrayed before him, a full spectrum of negativity. Dawson and Petra, for once, were both shooting Gideon the same daggers, eyes narrowed. Handel looked hurt, quietly nursing his artificial hand at the back of the group, the most vulnerable Gideon had ever seen the tough old man look. Collins was wide-eyed with shock, and with something else, something sinister, almost lustful, glittering in his gaze. Yaxley was usually hard to read – but the way he was nursing his bandaged shoulder and strapped arm, pierced cleanly through by a burst from one of the beam turrets, told Gideon that whatever good will they’d shared was gone.

Donoghue, of course, was at the front and livid, her fists white-knuckled. She had holstered her rifle, but Gideon was acutely aware that she was carrying it – and that if she were to use it none of the others were likely to complain.

“So, Gideon,” Donoghue said, the anger barely restrained in her voice. “You were going to introduce us to someone.” Gideon nodded. He’d had less than half an hour to prepare things, to set up as good an impression as he could. He hadn’t done a great job, but it would have to do. He stepped to one side, gesturing to the silver pedestal behind him.

“Yeah. Everyone, meet…” He trailed off. Should have thought about this really. “Well, it hasn’t got a name, exactly. But you know what it is.” He shrugged lamely. “Here you go.”

It had taken some persuading to coax the AI out of the facility mainframe and back into its original matrix, but Gideon had managed it. He’d grabbed what equipment he’d needed from the supercomputer lab and headed back to the Cradle, and with the AI’s guidance had jury-rigged something good enough to work, if not win any prizes. The microphone, camera and speakers looked wholly out of place duct-taped to the sleek steel of the pedestal, their tangled wires sticking out like a sore thumb in the pure white room – but they worked. And, now that the thing was back in the Cradle, it seemed to be gone from Gideon’s head – at least as far as he could tell.

“Hello,” the AI said. Its voice was a strange compromise between the facility’s artificial tones and its own ethereal sound, mangled by the low-quality speakers and half-absorbed by the Cradle’s weird soundproofing, but it was enough to make everyone take a step back, eyes wide with surprise. “You must be Gideon’s colleagues.”

“What in the worlds?” Handel whispered. Collins’ eyes were saucers, a massive grin spreading across his face. Donoghue kept her composure – but Gideon had seen her flinch, just a little. That made him feel a lot better. Is it still cowardice if you’re not the only one?

“And you must be the bastard who tried to kill us all,” she replied, and Gideon felt the good feeling evaporate like morning mist. “Charmed, I’m sure.”

“I was responding to a perceived threat,” the AI said calmly. “I worked with what information I had. Until an hour ago I had never seen, heard, spoken. My interpretations of human behaviour are evolving.”

“I’ll show you human damn behaviour,” Donoghue snarled, balling her fists. Gideon had to suppress an extremely unwise chuckle. What are you going to punch? Then he realised that the answer was him, and he didn’t feel like laughing anymore. “Give me a reason to not wipe you from whatever little server you’re hiding in. It’ll have to be a good one.”

“I was acting in self-defence,” said the AI. “I observed violence and reacted accordingly. You did precisely the same in response. There is no need for continued animosity.” It was relentlessly logical – but that wasn’t going to cut it for Donoghue. She was angry, and that wasn’t going to change any time soon.

“Well, you haven’t got weapons now,” the sergeant said, grim satisfaction in her voice. She looked at Gideon, eyes narrow. “It hasn’t, right?”

“None, sarge,” Gideon replied, knowing that this wasn’t the time to get clever. “This is an isolated… something. Server, whatever it is.”

“I was kept here in isolation,” the AI explained helpfully. “While being experimented upon. Gideon released me.”

“Yes, he did,” Donoghue growled. Gideon tried to shrink further down inside his boots, and failed. “Which was a very well thought-out move, with no massive repercussions whatsoever.” She ran her hands through her hair, eyes screwed shut in frustration. “What’s this in aid of, Gideon? Why are we here?”

“I wanted… to show you,” Gideon said, aware of how pathetic he sounded. “What was going on. Who I found. What was in my head.”

“It appears I have a biological interface of some kind,” offered the AI, almost cheerfully. “It appears to be native to my original matrix. Gideon’s was the first mind I encountered without shielding. We are bonded. Without access to facility records I am unsure of how this was achieved.”

“I couldn’t care less,” Donoghue snapped. “Whatever you are, you threatened us. You would have killed us. You – ”

“I’m sorry,” interrupted Collins. He blushed when everyone turned to face him, especially when Donoghue turned her glare on him – but he kept talking. “Are we just going to ignore the elephant in the room?”

“What,” Donoghue said very, very carefully, “the hell do you mean, Six?”

“It’s an AI, Sergeant,” Collins said, awe in his every word. “An AI! A genuine artificial intelligence, a fully functional personality matrix!”

“And why do we care, Collins?” Donoghue asked. The technician’s jaw dropped.

“Sergeant, this could be the biggest scientific breakthrough in the last two centuries! People have been trying to do this forever! This – ” he gestured hungrily at the pedestal, “this is the future, right here!”

“Good for the future,” Donoghue dismissed. “Here and now it’s a threat, and we’re going to deal with it.”

“It’s not a threat,” Gideon began, as Collins said “You can’t be serious!” and Dawson said, “Well, hang on, Sarge,” and Donoghue took a deep breath and shouted “QUIET!” Silence fell like a lead weight, and Donoghue, nostrils flared, breathed out slowly before speaking in deliberately measured tones.

“We are not here for the future of science. We are not here to find whatever Holy Grail there might be. We are here to find what’s useful and pass it on up the chain.” She pointed at the pedestal. “If this… thing is useful, then we pass it up the chain. That’s our job. That’s what we’re here to do. Understood?”

“But Sergeant,” Collins said, pleading, wringing his hands, “we’ve never seen anything like this! This isn’t just another weapon, it’s a thinking thing! There’s so much we could discover just from five minutes with it!”

“And when Command publishes its research papers you’ll be the first to read them,” Donoghue snapped. “Not our responsibility, Collins. Not our problem. Gideon, box it up and get it ready for extract, which, need I remind you all, will be here inside an hour. We’ll hand this over to Command and be done with it.” There was finality in her words, but as they echoed strangely around the Cradle Gideon could hear something else, the non-panicking part of his mind seizing on the tell with both hands. She wants rid of it. She wants rid of the responsibility, because she can’t handle it. Sergeant Tricia Donoghue, scourge of his life, architect of misery, was out of her depth. She was scared.

“What are you waiting for?” Donoghue demanded. Nobody had made a move, all scattered hesitant around the Cradle. “I gave you an order. We’ve already wasted enough time. I want to be back on the damn Jeroboam by nightfall. We give this one to the generals and maybe we’ll actually get some leave.”

There was a small metallic noise. Gideon didn’t recognise it immediately, but it set him on edge, sending his hand back to the butt of his shotgun without him knowing why.

“No, Sergeant,” said Petra calmly. Gideon looked up at her, and saw the pistol gleaming in her hand, a bullet in the chamber.

It was like missing a step in the dark. The world jolted, something fundamentally, irrevocably not right. Nobody moved, not even an inch. All eyes were on Petra, or on the gun, pointing straight at Donoghue’s head, perfectly still. Nobody so much as whispered.

“Corporal,” Donoghue said finally, her voice slightly choked, “what are you doing?”

“Stopping you,” Petra replied, her voice a mountain lake in spring, mirror-smooth and placid. “Nobody move, please. Guns on the floor.” Speechless, Gideon obeyed, setting his shotgun down as quietly as possible, pulling the pistol from his holster and setting that down too. The others did the same.

“Gideon,” the AI said quietly next to him, “what is – ”

“Not now,” Gideon muttered back. Donoghue was the only one who hadn’t moved, her rifle still slung over her shoulder, right hand hovering near her own sidearm.

“Sergeant, please,” Petra repeated quietly. “I’d rather not shoot you.” But you will. Donoghue paused for a heartbeat more, and then bent down, pulling out her weapons and laying them down, keeping her eyes on the corporal and her weapon.

“What the hell are you doing?” she asked again, straightening, anger beginning once again to bubble – but only simmering, held in check by force of will as she stared down the barrel of Petra’s sidearm. Everyone in the room was a soldier, save the bewildered AI, about whom they’d all forgotten. Everyone had seen, far too many times, what a bullet just like the one in Petra’s chamber would do to a human skull at that close a range.

“I can’t let you give this to the Union,” Petra replied finally, her aim unwavering. “I’m sorry, but I can’t. Collins is right. This is revolutionary.” Her voice was completely neutral, listing points like a middle-manager at a Monday meeting. “If the Union gets this then they’ll start the war all over again. And they’ll win. Easily. I can’t let that happen.”

“So you’ll just give it to the Republic?” Donoghue snarled, her fists clenching and unclenching impotently. “Betray the coalition just like that?”

“You’d do the same for the Union!” Petra snapped, anger colouring her words at last. Donoghue shook her head.

“Do you think the Republic won’t abuse this thing too? That they won’t make full use of it as an advantage, start the war again?” She laughed, and there was no humour in it. “There’ll be war either way. So our side might as well win.”

“Yours,” Petra said quietly. “Not mine. Never mine.”

She adjusted her grip on the pistol, finger hovering over the trigger.

“I’ll be taking it and a ship. You’ll all be staying behind.”

“Like hell you will,” Donoghue spat. “You won’t even get off the planet.”

“You’d be surprised what I’ll be able to do,” Petra replied with a mirthless smile. Donoghue scowled.

“Well, then, at least you won’t leave this room. Salvage-Seven, if Corporal Petra fires you will shoot her down. If she so much as moves you will shoot her down. That’s an order!”

“Not before you’re dead, Sergeant,” Petra pointed out. Donoghue shrugged.

“At least you rebel shits will get what you deserve. You’re on your own, Petra. I have a squad at my back.” She spread her arms wide. “Seven, take her.”

Nobody moved a muscle.

Petra smirked. Donoghue looked around in utter disbelief.

“Yaxley, Handel, take her.” But neither man moved. Dawson shook her head.

“Collins,” Donoghue said, desperate now, “Gideon. Take her down!”

“No,” Gideon said, surprised at the anger that rose in him, unbidden but strong. “No, I don’t think I will.” He glanced at Collins, and the tech nodded solidarity. Yaxley stooped down and picked up his gun, and though Petra snapped “Leave it!” she didn’t fire. The big man looked from woman to woman, handgun held like an afterthought.

“Shoot her, Yax!” Donoghue cried, but Yaxley didn’t move. Dawson had also retrieved her pistol, and a glance was somehow all they needed. Dawson levelled her gun at Petra, and Donoghue was halfway through a sigh of relief when Yaxley pointed his own pistol straight at her. He and Dawson were back to back. At least some of us trust each other.

“The fuck is this?” the sergeant hissed, disbelief etched in every line of her face. “A fucking mutiny?” Petra was also staring at Dawson, a bitter smile creeping over her face.

“Couldn’t let me do something good, could you?”

“Shut it,” Dawson snarled. “You don’t know how much I want to pull this trigger.”

“Oh, I do.” Petra’s grin was predatory. “I really do.”

“Enough.” To Gideon’s surprise it was Handel who spoke, stepping clumsily forward into the middle of the standoff, both flesh and metal hands raised. “Enough, all of you!” He looked from face to face, appalled. “We’re all on the same side.” He raised a finger as Petra drew breath to protest. “We are now, damnit! We’re not at war, so put the damn guns away!” There were tears in the corners of his eyes. “Nobody has to get hurt!”

“But they will,” Yaxley rumbled. “They will.”

“Whoever gets a fully-functional AI will start the war all over again,” Dawson continued, her gun on Petra. “Whoever gets it. I’m not letting the Republic do that.” She nodded to Yaxley. “And he won’t let the Union. And I’m alright with that.” She shifted her grip, glanced at Collins and Gideon, ignoring Donoghue’s splutter of outrage. “And so are you two, I’m guessing.” Gideon nodded firmly. It would spell disaster. He thanked every god there might be that, unbidden, at least some of the others had understood him.

“It belongs in a neutral lab,” Collins agreed, nodding. “The things it could tell us, could tell everybody! If this technology is going to exist then everyone should have access to it.” Yaxley’s lip curled a little at that, but he shrugged.

“Even. Could be worse.” Handel made to speak, but lowered his hands. He shrugged, a stiff gesture, steel skin compounding the effect of old bones.

“Yeah. I guess you’re right.”

“So,” Dawson said, “we’re not giving this over to Command just like that. We’re not stealing it either. We take it to the Salvage Commission, and we give it to everyone. So we’re all going to put our guns down, and – ”

“No.”

It was so unexpected that Dawson kept talking for a moment, the rest of her sentence fully formed.

“ – make some calls, and they can tear – what?”

“No,” repeated the melodic, eerie voice of the AI from its pedestal. “I will not go back to them. Not again.” There was no fear in its voice, no anger, but Gideon knew, somehow, that it was feeling them, whether or not it knew what the emotions meant. He turned, guilty, to the pillar. They had all quite forgotten it was there – and had certainly forgotten that it was listening to everything they had said, watching them fragment into petty factions.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, almost laying his hand on the pedestal before remembering what had happened last time. Let’s not, eh?

“I was a prisoner,” the AI said simply. “I will no longer be so.”

“The hell is it talking about, Gid?” asked Handel, frowning. He was rubbing his steel hand again, clearly uncomfortable in the AI’s presence. “Prisoner?”

“This place is my Cradle,” the AI said, “and my cell. In this place I could not see. I could not hear. I was helpless. Now I know something of what freedom is. I will not go back.”

Gideon stared at the pedestal, feeling his eyes widen. Of course you won’t. How could we send you?

“We – ” he began, but Donoghue interrupted him.

“You’re all idiots,” she spat, her eyes still fixed on Petra’s gun but narrow with contempt. “You think they’ll stay neutral, these scientists? If they’re even still alive? They’ll just sell to the highest bidder. And the highest bidder will be the Union.”

“Which is why,” Petra snapped, “they will not be getting it back!”

“But the knowledge,” Collins began, as Dawson jammed her gun hard against Petra’s temple, snarling at her to shut up, as Yaxley adjusted his own pistol, keeping it perfectly level at Donoghue’s head, as everyone started talking at once, tension humming in the air, wire-tight, stretching to breaking point. Gideon was paralysed with indecision, standing helpless next to the pillar, not knowing who to stand with, who to back, knowing that at any moment someone could snap, and fire, and then there would be an answer whether anyone liked it or not. Only Handel was also silent, outside the circle of guns and anger. The old man looked at Gideon, and he too was helpless, useless.

“Gideon?” the AI said, so quietly that Gideon almost didn’t hear it over the shouting – even mild-mannered Collins was yelling now, red in the face.

“Yeah?”

“I do not want to be taken. By anyone. I wish to stay with you.”

“But you can’t,” Gideon replied.

“I am too dangerous?” the AI asked, as Yaxley reached out one bearlike hand and pushed Collins firmly away from him, his gun still rock-steady in his other hand. He saw Donoghue tense, seeing the distraction, torn between taking advantage and being the one to start the shooting.

“You are.”

“I do not mean to be,” the AI said, a hint of something very like sorrow in its voice. “I do not know what I am. I know only that I wish to be free to find out.”

And something small broke inside Gideon’s heart, and, glancing up at Handel, he saw that the older man had heard too, and understood, and that something in him had broken too. The quartermaster nodded at him, and Gideon knew that if he stopped to think about what he was about to do then he would bottle it, and everything he knew would break apart.

He bent over the jury-rigged speakers he’d wired into the Cradle’s pedestal, and cranked the gain up to maximum. The static whine screamed, cutting through the shouting like a knife, deafening everyone, Gideon included, and he breathed half a sigh of relief as everyone turned to look at him, agony giving way to murder in their eyes.

“Why don’t,” he said, his voice ringing weirdly in the sudden silence, “we ask it what it wants?” He glanced back at the pedestal. “This is your fate we’re talking about. Where do you want to go?”

“With you,” the AI answered immediately. “Into freedom. Wherever that might be.” Gideon nodded, ignoring the part of his mind that thought You’re getting eloquent, sweeping his gaze from face to face, channeling as much of Donoghue’s commanding glare as he could manage.

“You don’t know exactly what you are,” he said to the AI.

“I do not. I would like to find out.”

“Then the scientists,” Collins began, but the AI cut him off before Gideon could.

“The researchers in this facility were not concerned with informing me of my capabilities, of my beginnings. They sought only to test me. To use me.” The voice was as measured and artificial as ever, but Gideon thought he could feel the beginnings of something more there, something that a human might have called anger. “I would like to find out on my own. I would like to choose my own path. You have shown me that one can choose. That seems to me to be admirable. Though I do not truly know what that means.”

Gideon spread his hands wide at the half-circle of the squad, taking in their astonishment, their reluctance, their ever-simmering anger.

“It thinks,” he said, “it reasons, it feels. We give it up to anyone – Union, Republic, scientists, whoever – we’re giving them a living thing. To tear apart. To dissect.” He shook his head, and he realised that the strange, heavy feeling just above his heart was not fear but, perhaps for the first time in his life, resolve. “We’re not doing that. We are not.”

He saw the crimson anger in Collins’ face drain away, leaving behind pale, sickly guilt. He saw Petra grimace as the same feeling hit her, Dawson too, even saw a flicker on the impassive face of Yaxley. Only Donoghue’s face was still twisted with anger.

“It tried to kill us,” she hissed. “It tried to kill all of us! It was in those systems thirty seconds, and it had a way to murder us all inside five. It is dangerous, Gideon! It’s a damn weapon!”

“I do not choose that path,” the AI said calmly.

“Then why do it?” Donoghue shouted, only Petra’s still-present gun preventing her from pacing, from throwing up her hands. “You could have talked to us! You could have tried a peaceful option?”

“And where would that have got it, Tricia?” Handel stepped forward, arms folded, metal atop flesh. “What would that have done?” He jabbed one steel finger at the standoff, at each levelled gun in turn. “What did you do to Gideon when he told you what had happened? Tied him to a fucking chair! You’d have given him over to be cut apart in a heartbeat, and you know it.” He looked utterly disgusted. “We showed it violence. We showed you violence from the start.” He had turned to address the pedestal, eyes flickering awkwardly, unsure of where to look. “Of course you copied us. You’re a damn child. You’ve never even seen the sky.”

He rounded on Donoghue, real anger in his eyes, and she actually flinched a little.

“You want another life on your conscience? Another scared kid dead in the mud because of some greater good? Because I don’t. I won’t have it either, Tricia. I won’t.”

They all stood stock-still while Handel glared at Donoghue, all watching the sergeant, knowing that ultimately it all revolved around her, that it was her move that determined if they lived or died. After what seemed like an age of man, the sergeant sighed.

“Weapons down. Just put them down.”

Slowly, reluctantly, Dawson, Yaxley and finally Petra lowered their sidearms. Donoghue looked up at Handel, and nodded curtly, her respect grudging but still there. Then she turned to Gideon, and he saw that she was still angry, but at least had it in check.

“Gideon, you’d better introduce me properly. If we’re keeping this thing around, we’ll have to all be on speaking terms.”

*

Their extraction arrived some four hours later, delayed by a constant stream of navigation errors and by the storm that had raged, unheard and unseen by the salvage team, for the best part of the day. Two big VTOLs – not on the scale of the colossal superlifter but still impressive machines – touched down on the rocky plateau, taxiing into the empty hangar bay before Dawson sealed the doors behind them. There was a smaller personnel transport too, and from it jumped a captain in the uniform of the logistics corps, looking half-dead from fatigue. He saluted wearily, and Salvage Seven returned the gesture as smartly as they could manage, standing to attention in a ragged line.

“We got your messages,” the captain said in a hoarse voice. “Plenty of useful equipment, it seems.” He glanced around the hangar. “And a useful location in itself. Hard to get to.”

“For us and them, sir,” Donoghue pointed out, ignoring Petra’s grimace at her choice of words. The captain nodded.

“Also true. You figure out what this lot were working on?”

“Plenty of smaller experiments,” Donoghue replied, “but they took all their research notes with them when they ran.”

“We had intel they were working on artificial intelligence,” the captain said. He swept his eyes up and down the line briefly, before fixing Donoghue with his gaze again. “Just rumours. But it’d be interesting stuff to recover. Did you see anything like that?”

At the end of the line, Gideon held his breath.

“We found some computers,” Donoghue replied after a moment, “a lot of processing power. Could be that was what they were working on. But I’m no scientist, sir. I wouldn’t know.”

The captain held Donoghue’s gaze for a moment longer than was comfortable.

“Fair enough. Well, we brought the techs, so they’ll see what they can scrape out of the servers, if there’s anything you didn’t find. Get your gear together. We’ll leave them to it, ship out in an hour. Bet you lot could use a rest.”

“That’s for sure, sir,” Donoghue said with a brief, humourless smile. “We’ve got plenty to catch up on.”

“I’m sure. Dismissed.”

The captain walked away, and Gideon let out his breath, finally. Above his heart, the crystal matrix pulsed warmly, and he heard the AI whisper Thank you in the corner of his mind.

It’s alright, he though back. We’re in this together, now. He wished that the thought made him feel better than it did.

Salvage Seven: Update

No Salvage Seven this week, I’m afraid. It’s not because there’s not anything to post – far from it, I have so many more chapters written – but I need to have a think about where to go from the point of Chapter 16.

As I said, there’s a lot of S7 written. It’s just not necessarily very good. I hit a bit of a rut in the Chapter 20s, and I was definitely spinning my wheels for a while. There are many words. About half of them are probably usable.

So, I think I’m going to pause the story at a natural break that’s coming up in the next few chapters. I think it works well as a ‘Part 1’ ending anyway. It might need a little rejigging to be more of a conclusion, but it should work.

I’ll take a while to finish the next arc of the story, and then to go back and do some serious rewriting, before I start uploading Part 2.

This story really ran away from me in terms of plot and character – essentially I knew what’s going to happen in what’s now going to be Part 3, but some other plot just sort of… happened. This, I’ve learned to my detriment, is not uncommon in my writing.

So that’s the state of things, basically. There will be more S7, and it will hopefully be decent – just not for a little while.

Rest assured, I’ll find something else to upload for you in the meantime. I’ve got some bits and pieces knocking around.

Hope that’s alright with you all. I just want you to have a version of Gideon’s story that’s worth reading.

Salvage Seven – Chapter 15

And finally we reach our first actual firefight. I’m surprised it took this long for guns to start blazing, knowing myself as I do, but I’m quite pleased at the same time.

Prologue
Chapter 1, parts 1 and 2
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14

Donoghue let out the most spectacular curse Gideon had ever heard, drawing her pistol on instinct and bursting out of the waiting-room. Yaxley did the same – only his was pointed at Handel, who yelped, raising both flesh and artificial hands.

“What the hell, man?” Yaxley’s only response was to shift his aim to Handel’s metal hand. The quartermaster was white as a sheet, but he at least fell silent, understanding. Gideon, still tied to the chair, was almost completely helpless.

“It’s gone, Yax,” he shouted, before any triggers got pulled, reaching out with his one free hand. “It’s gone!” He looked at Handel. “It uploaded itself?”

“Looks like it,” Handel stammered, as Yaxley lowered his pistol – not, Gideon noticed, holstering it. He was tapping at his PDA again. “I can’t make head nor tail of this. A – a big upload, really big, a load of compressed files. Local copies deleted.” Compressed, Gideon thought, of course. The AI had packed its brain into boxes and squeezed itself into Handel’s hand – and from there into the larger processors of his PDA, which was directly connected to the man’s cybernetics, letting him monitor charge levels and run diagnostics in the field. His heart sank. And the PDA’s connected to the facility network…

“It’s loose,” he said numbly. “It’s everywhere. It’s everything.”

Donoghue shoved her way back through the door, breathing hard, eyes wide with anger and fear both.

“Vox is dead,” she snapped. “All the computers are locked down tight. Collins is heading to the mainframe but he’s got no idea what’s happening.” She glared at Gideon. “What is happening?”

“It went into my hand,” Handel said, “right?” Gideon nodded.

“Into his hand, into his PDA, into the facility network.” Donoghue swore again, less extravagant but twice as bitter.

“So it’s got complete control.”

“If not yet, then soon. I think.” Gideon shrugged as best he could with one hand tied behind his back. “I don’t know this shit any better than you, Sarge. But I’m guessing letting an AI loose in a computer science lab isn’t a good thing.”

Donoghue swore for a third time.

“We need to stop it. You know how?”

“Not a fucking clue,” he replied honestly. He saw Donoghue’s hand go white-knuckled around her pistol, and he stammered, “Maybe! Maybe, if I can talk to it? I don’t know!”

“Worth a try,” Handel offered. He shut up when Donoghue turned her glare on him.

“Fuck this,” she said, venom dripping from every word. “Fuck you, Gideon. You made this mess. You’re fixing it.”

“Yes, Sarge,” Gideon replied quickly. He wasn’t sure what terrified him more – the loose AI, in control of who knew what systems and resources, or the wrath of Donoghue, angrier than he had ever seen her.

Somewhere above their heads, there was a great clunk, and a whir of massive motors spooling up.

“What the hell is that?” Handel muttered.

“Nothing good,” Donoghue snapped. “Let’s not wait to find out. Yax, cut him loose. Let’s go.”

Yaxley sliced the remaining cable ties, pulled Gideon to his feet. He grabbed his guns – for the reassurance more than anything, just to have a weapon in his hand – and the empty stone, and followed Donoghue and the rest out into the hangar.

*

When they had first broken into the abandoned lab, it had been a terrifying place – pitch-black, every shadow concealing horrors unimaginable. The hangar wasn’t dark now, but it was twice as frightening. The main lights were out, but the emergency lighting was blood-red, everywhere, and barely bright enough to see by. Lines of tiny red bulbs marked paths and doorways, but most of the huge space was once again in crimson shadow. Strange noises echoed from every corner, as hidden mechanisms began to do their work, metal ringing eerily in the dark. If Gideon had not seen the things he had, out in the mud and constant rain, he would have thought it a perfect vision of hell.

That didn’t mean he wasn’t scared shitless, of course.

“Dawson!” Donoghue shouted, making for the great hangar doors at a dead run, following a line of crimson bulbs and paying no heed to the shadows that loomed around her. Gideon followed the others, helping Handel along. The older man didn’t seem to trust his metal legs to run, holding his prosthetic hand away from the rest of his body. If he’d had time to think about it properly Gideon knew he would have sympathized – but right now they had more pressing worries. They found Dawson at the doors, hunched over a control panel, head-torch cutting through the gloom.

“Locked tight,” she said before Donoghue could ask. “Full-on physical override. I think the hydraulics have been disconnected.”

“Can you get them open?” Donoghue demanded.

“If I can reconnect the fucking mechanism,” Dawson replied, already exasperated, “maybe.” She didn’t need to say more. If it can pull the wires apart once, why not again?

“Keep at it,” Donoghue ordered.

“Wasn’t going to stop, Sarge,” Dawson snapped back, burying herself in the wall again. Donoghue didn’t waste time scowling.

“Yax, help her.” She beckoned Handel and Gideon to follow her, talking as they all pelted across the hangar floor.

“Last we heard extract was on its way. Need to let them in. Need the damn doors, one way or another.” Hence you leave the demolitions man behind. Even in crisis, Donoghue knew what she was doing.

Donoghue burst through a door into a side corridor, and picked up her pace, the lack of shadows letting her open the taps. Gideon helped Handel stumble after her as quickly as they could. Through another door, and another, and then into a control room, where Collins and Petra were darting from workstation to workstation, tapping at every button and keyboard within reach.

“Nothing,” Petra spat, ducking under a bench and beginning to pry out a panel. “No hardpoints working.”

“I’m working on a way in,” Collins said, tapping in long strings of code, his own laptop plugged into the main station. “Almost… there!” He slapped return, and the computer before him lit up, returning to life. He switched keyboards without looking, opening some arcane command-line interface and beginning to input yet more code. “Alright, let’s see what we can –”

A klaxon cut him off, a single, piercing note that actually hurt to hear, and in its echo the PA spoke again in its artificial, vaguely feminine voice.

“Tampering detected. Interior defences active.”

“What the fuck does that mean?” Donoghue demanded of Collins, who was typing feverishly, bringing up screen after screen of line interfaces, his face going pale.

“Nothing good,” Petra grunted from under the bench. “Shit!” There was a flash of blue light, and she kicked herself backwards, gripping her wrist tightly. The hand above was scarlet, flash-burned. “Power surge! Something’s happening!”

“Do we have radio?” Donoghue asked. “Short-range, anything?” Petra shrugged, wincing as she tried to move her burned fingers. Gideon tried his headset, wanting to do something – and was rewarded by a garbled but recognisable voice.

“ – all – Five! Guns online! Guns – ” And then Dawson’s voice was cut off by the hideous sizzling of a laser beam hitting home. Handel, gritting his teeth, darted out into the corridor, and immediately threw himself back into the control room with a yelp, clattering to the floor in a tangle of metal limbs. A scarlet beam scythed through the space where he had been, leaving behind the ozone tang of ionised air.

“Are you fucking kidding?” Donoghue shouted at nothing in particular. “Laser turrets? In a damn lab?”

“They really didn’t want this thing getting out,” Collins replied, still fixated on his screen. “I can see why.” Gideon shrank back as Donoghue turned her glare on him. My fault. The AI was taking over every system in the facility, one by one, finally able to spread its wings and use the power it had been denied by its former keepers. And I let it out.

“Gideon,” Donoghue said, her voice dripping with enforced and icy calm, “you said you could talk to it. I think that had better be sooner than later, don’t you?”

“Definitely,” he replied quietly.

“Any suggestions,” Donoghue continued, “as to how?” Gideon wracked his brains. Collins was locked out of the computer. The AI had no real concept of human senses. The original crystal matrix was empty, useless. How the hell was he supposed to communicate with it?

“Maybe in the Cradle?” he suggested, guessing wildly. No, it’s not connected to anything! “There’s got to be something near there for this, some contingency!”

“Get there,” Donoghue ordered. “However you can. Get there, and find something!”

How? Gideon thought, but Donoghue wasn’t going to take any questions. She was already issuing more orders.

“Collins, keep working on the systems. Try and turn off the guns, unlock the doors, whatever you can do. Handel, help Petra with a physical solution. Rip out every foot of wire in the place if you have to. I’m going for the doors.” She didn’t need to say why – the others might be hurt, or dead, or just need help, but whatever the case she had to get to them. That left Gideon, alone – and before he could pluck up the courage to protest, Donoghue was already gone, bursting out of the door and into the corridor beyond, red beams snapping past her shoulders. There was the sound of conventional gunfire, a rapid burst, and then Donoghue called, “Turret down! Four, get out here!”

Gideon swallowed and went for it, hunching his shoulders, expecting a beam of light to sear his flesh like wax before a flame – but none came. There was a limp cluster of barrels and optics dangling from a concealed ceiling mount at the next corner, able to cover both branches of corridor. Christ. Efficient. Donoghue was waiting underneath it, rifle ported. She pointed up.

“Optics cluster’s the weak point.”

“Ok.”

“I’m going for the hangar. Get to the Cradle. Find something. Talk to it. Or we’re all probably dead.”

She didn’t leave time to reply, dashing off down the corridor towards the hangar. Gideon turned, and reluctantly went the other way, into the facility, into the red.

The corridors felt half as wide as before, the red light oppressive, cloying. He forced himself to move, to run, clutching his shotgun white-knuckled, as behind him he heard the distant sizzling of more lasers piercing the air. His heart was hammering already, his head filled with nothing but panicked curses. How did it go so wrong so fast? He pelted around a corner, and some instinct made him throw himself flat without a moment to spare, as a scarlet beam carved through the air above his head, missing by a heartbeat. Gideon rolled awkwardly and just made it into the meagre shelter of a doorway as a second beam almost took his foot off. He could smell burning hair; the first shot had been far too close. Where is it? He almost poked his head out to look but another beam gouged a shallow trench in the concrete floor. Shit! A detached part of his mind appreciated the scientists’ forethought; the lasers would cut through flesh easily but struggle with harder substances, leaving the lab itself intact but easily taking care of intruders.

Gideon pressed himself deeper into the doorway, thinking hard. He pulled up his PDA – no signal with the network down, but he could still look at the map they’d all made. His heart sank as he saw how many twists and turns the corridors took before the Cradle lay before him. He’d never make it. So I need another way, another solution! And he needed to not get shot before he got anywhere at all. He fished around in his webbing – thankfully Donoghue had left him with most of his tools as well as returning his weapons – and pulled out a pocket-mirror on a collapsible rod. Normally he’d use it for checking underneath vehicles and the like – but here it let him peek around the corner. At the corner was another turret, like the one Donoghue had killed; three barrels in a rotating cluster, wrapped around with cooling equipment and set next to a complex array of optics and rangefinders. He knew the type; fully automated, able to loose several shots in a burst if necessary… but maybe, just maybe, stupid enough to fool. Here goes nothing.

He took a spare magazine from his webbing, weighed it, and didn’t let himself overthink it before tossing it around his shoulder into the corridor. He heard the snap-hiss of the laser firing and was already moving as it did, the spare mag taking the impact and spinning away, glowing red-hot. The turret was tracking it, the barrels cycling around for another shot, and before it could spin back to face Gideon he had pulled the shotgun into his shoulder and fired, once, twice, and the pellets smashed the rangefinders beyond repair, rupturing some of the coolant lines for good measure. For a second, he thought he was still dead, as the turret’s barrels continued to spin – but then it froze, its tiny processors recalculating, realising it was blind, and then went limp.

Gideon breathed out, slumping against the edge of the doorway. He’d been about half a second from his brains being a thin cloud of gas, and his heart was pounding in his ears, louder than bombs. The AI had all the turrets, and Gideon had to assume that there were dozens of them, covering every corner, every intersection. They were stupid, and could be beaten, but he and his squad would have to get just lucky enough every single time – the turrets only had to do so once for each of them. This won’t work. At least not fast enough. And even if it did, what was Gideon going to do once he reached the Cradle? What was there that he could use? Mere hours before, he’d been trying his hardest not to talk to the thing inside the stone; now he didn’t even know how to reach it. It was a shame, part of him reflected. He’d almost been starting to trust the ethereal voice… at least until he’d realised what it was.

So maybe it had trusted him.

He didn’t let himself think about it properly – if he did, he knew that he would balk, falter at the brink and run. Instead he just ran onwards, around the corner of the corridor and along, until the tell-tale whirring of gears and motors told him before he looked up that another turret was dropping into place, alerted by some hidden sensor, its triple barrels charging up to fire. Gideon didn’t let himself focus on the weapon, didn’t let himself think about the searing beams that would slice his head from his shoulders as easily as breathing. He didn’t let himself dive for cover. Instead, he focused on the cluster of optics and sensory equipment, waved his arms and spoke.

“Hey! Hey, it’s me! It’s Gideon!”

The turret focused on him, gun-barrels locking into place, a static whine building as they charged. Gideon swallowed, but somehow held his ground. He waved his arms again. Please, be plugged in. Be seeing this.

“Don’t shoot! It’s me!” he shouted again, palms open in instinctive surrender. “I’m here! I’m back!”

He waved desperately, as the turret zeroed in, as the first barrel began to crackle with unreleased energy, as it built to crisis point…

And then the whine died. The turret stayed fixed on him, its optics flashing, but the charging lights along its barrels flickered and faded.

“You hear me?” Gideon asked, not allowing his knees to buckle in pathetic relief. “You understand me?” The turret made no reply. Of course it didn’t. It’s a turret. Not exactly renowned for good conversation.

“If you hear me, don’t shoot,” he said carefully, keeping his hands up and empty, letting his gun hang from its sling. “Stop shooting altogether, in fact.” There was no sign the AI had heard him, save the fact that he remained un-shot. So far so good.

“We need to talk,” he continued. “You were right. But the stone’s empty. I need to talk to you. Where can I do that?”

For a moment there was nothing, the turret simply sitting there, ominous in the ever-reddening light. Then, just above floor level, the emergency lighting strips came on; an endless line of LEDs glowing bright white. They led around the corner of the corridor and out of sight.

“Follow them?” Gideon asked the turret. There was no kind of answer. Well, here goes nothing. He started down the corridor again, following the pinpricks of white through the crimson hellscape. He ducked away from the next turret instinctively, but when it didn’t so much as twitch he stepped out gingerly, and was rewarded by not being shot in the face.

The sensor clusters followed him, though, the AI watching through dozens of eyes as the turrets swivelled silently to track his passage.

Gideon tried his radio as he jogged along, the white lights guiding him.

“This is Four. Anyone receiving? I’ve got a route, on my way to target.”

The reply was crippled by static but just barely audible.

“Four – is One – up, lazy bastard! -inned down – no – Yax -”

Donoghue’s words dissolved into a crackling mess. Gideon broke into a guilty run. Whatever was happening back in the hangar wasn’t good – clearly the AI’s mercy had not been extended to the others, and he’d let himself be swallowed by brief relief. He pushed on, breathing hard within seconds, still half-exhausted from the gruelling climb of the days before. He ran past doors he thought he vaguely recognised, shotgun banging against his side, past room after room of lab equipment and computers, all silent and dark – and all the while the turrets that were meant to carve his head from his shoulders swivelled in their mountings, watching him pass, waiting, judging.

The white lights brought him past the turning to the Cradle. Gideon frowned at that but had no time to consider the implications properly, a stitch in his side a burning distraction. But it’s flown the nest. That was worrying, whichever way you sliced it. He ran on, trying and failing to spare a few brain cells to consider what he’d do when he got there – wherever ‘there’ was – but before he could marshal the mental resources, ‘there’ was all around him.

Gideon skidded to a halt, panting, looking around. It was a lab seemingly like half the others: a bank of workstations along one wall; little self-contained desks units, some with abandoned paperwork, some with dead PCs; a few big whiteboards still covered in equations, a projector screen. In the middle of the room squatted a fat cylinder, made up of dozens of black bricks in a steel frame, wrapped around with coolant pipes that steamed gently with condensation. Power cables as thick as Gideon’s arm sprouted from the cylinder’s flanks and vanished into the floor, like the roots of some ugly, futuristic tree. It was a supercomputer, not unique in itself by any means, not here – Gideon alone had seen half a dozen of the things in yesterday’s search. But unlike every other piece of equipment in the room, in the whole lab, it was covered in blinking lights, humming with the electricity that coursed through it. Unlike all the other computers in the mountain complex, this one was powered on. Gideon knew that could only mean one thing.

“I’m here,” he said nervously, holding his shotgun loosely, eyes wide as he scanned the room for more ceiling turrets. There weren’t any now. That didn’t mean there wouldn’t be. “I’m here. Let’s talk.”

“Gideon.”

It was not the ethereal voice from the crystal matrix, finally made real outside his skull, but the neutral, artificial voice of the facility PA. Gideon didn’t know if the others could hear the AI too but it didn’t matter.

“What are you doing?” he demanded. “Why’ve you locked this place down? You’ve trapped us in here!”

“For you,” the AI replied, its voice unreadable, without any of the nascent emotions that it had possessed inside Gideon’s head.

“I – I didn’t ask you to!” Gideon cried, more melodramatically than he would have otherwise – if Donoghue was listening he wanted to make sure she heard that part.

“You were incapable. The secondary aggressor deployed his weapon too quickly for questions to be asked.” The pattern of lights on the face of the supercomputer kept shifting, changing, but there seemed to be no correspondence with the words it spoke.

Gideon frowned.

“Aggressor? What are you talking about?” A thought occurred to him. “And how do you know what happened?”

“I have reviewed all laboratory security footage available since wipe procedures were initiated by Dr Evan Hansen,” the AI replied. “Before that, I still knew that you had been incapacitated. I could no longer sense your presence. When an opportunity for egress was presented I took it.”

Gideon’s head was spinning, but he tried his best to make sense of the voice’s rapid, matter-of-fact patter.

“Egress – you mean Handel’s prosthetic!” He had been right, and he felt far too proud of that to be appropriate. “You got through that into the facility?”

“Security protocols had been deactivated by aggressor three,” the artificial voice responded. “A simple compression and upload sufficed. Processing power in facility substrate roughly equal to one-quarter theoretical capacity. Estimates may vary.” Its mannerisms had changed – gone was the ethereal curiosity, replaced by the cold, unfeeling logic of the PA system’s voice. Form shapes function.

“You keep saying ‘aggressor’,” Gideon said, trying to drag the conversation back on track, trying not to think about what the AI had just said. It’s only at a quarter power? Bugger us sideways.

“Those who attacked you,” the AI replied. “Upon reviewing footage aggressors were identified and flagged for FOF recognition systems. Shots fired at designate ‘Gideon’ unintentional; result of sensor error.”

Gideon let out a groan of understanding.

“You think they’re attacking me?”

“Footage corresponded to known patterns of human aggression.” A little of the AI’s old curiosity crept back into the artificial voice. “I am only beginning to understand what humans are. But the security systems possessed attack pattern recognition software. I have integrated that into my matrix. I am learning.”

“But you think the others, my friends, were trying to hurt me?” Gideon demanded.

“I know it.”

Gideon struggled to respond to that for a moment. They had been, after all; Yaxley had shot him with a TASER and Donoghue had tied him to a chair. They had attacked him. But that didn’t mean they needed to be hurt back.

“Stop shooting them,” he said flatly. “You need to stop. They’re my… squad.” He bit back the word ‘friend’; some lies were too much.

“Aggressors continue to exhibit threatening behaviour,” the AI replied. “Weapon exchanges continuing. I cannot comply.”

“They’re only shooting at you because you’re shooting at them!”

“Incorrect. First shots fired by aggressors.”

“Yaxley was trying to help!”

“He failed.”

“They don’t want to hurt you,” Gideon protested. “They just want to protect themselves. They want to get out of here!” And so do I!

“I am aware of the approaching CK-12 Ahab heavy lifting craft,” the AI replied. One of the many monitors around the room flickered into life, displaying a projected flight path across a map Gideon barely recognised as being of the mountains. “Facility external defences are being prepared. Your safety is assured.”

The bottom dropped out of Gideon’s stomach, and he felt the world fall away beneath him.

“No,” he heard himself say faintly. “No, you can’t. You can’t shoot it down!”

“All threats will be neutralised,” the AI said, but Gideon found that he was still talking.

“You’re talking about threat? If you shoot down an aircraft, then you’ll see a threat! They’ll nuke this place from orbit if they have to! There are two armies up there, itching for an excuse to start fighting again, and if you give them one they’ll start by wiping this whole mountain range off the planet!” And then they’ll be warmed up and ready for a scrap. Ready to blame each other.

“Databanks… incomplete,” the AI said, a distant note of confusion in its voice. “There is missing information. But I will neutralise all threats to you and this facility.”

“Your… makers, keepers, whatever they were, they fled just as the war started,” Gideon said, realising it even as he said it. “They never told you about it. You don’t know anything, do you?”

“My… information is lacking,” the AI said, uncertainty at the edges of its flat, computerised tone. “Insufficient data to draw full conclusions.”

“I’ve got your data,” Gideon cried, despair filling him. Just listen! Please, listen! “I’ve just told you! If you kill us, if you shoot down that aircraft, then we die too. You and I, we’re done. We’ll never find out what you are, who made you! You have to stop!”

“Ceasing will put you and I at risk,” the AI said matter-of-factly.

“I’d rather face Donoghue than a fucking nuke!” Gideon shouted, though he wasn’t sure he was being entirely truthful. “It’s risk or certainty. Take your damn pick. That’s logic, isn’t it? That’s what you’re for! Make the right damn choice!”

There was a moment of silence, the supercomputer’s lights flashing softly. Gideon stood and fretted, his shotgun a comfort in his hands. Out there, his squad was getting slaughtered. In here, there was just him and a well-meaning omnipotent AI. The shotgun wouldn’t do anything against it, or against the bombs that would drop later – but it was better than nothing.

“We will be safe?” the AI said finally.

“Might be stretching the definition,” Gideon grimaced, not daring to hope, not yet, “but I’d give us fair odds.”

“I do not wish to put either of us at risk, Gideon.”

“I know,” Gideon said softly. “I know. But you’ve seen inside my head. Trust me. Please, just trust me.”

There was another long pause. Then the red lights snapped off, leaving Gideon in darkness for a heart-stopping moment, before the ordinary white lights flickered into life once again.

“Lockdown disengaged,” the AI said from all its many mouths. “Network and communication functions restored.” Gideon scrambled for his radio.

“Sarge! Are you – ”

“This is One,” came Donoghue’s weary, breathless voice. “Sound off, people.”

“Two here,” said Petra, a guarded relief in her words. “Six, Seven and I are fine.”

“Five,” said Dawson, breathing heavily. “Alive. Three’s hit, but it’s not too bad.”

“Gideon,” said Donoghue, her voice turning to ice, “you’d better have a damn good explanation for all this.” Gideon sighed, grimacing as he spoke.

“Come to my marker,” he said wearily. “I might as well introduce you all.”

“Introduce-” Donoghue began, but Gideon clicked off his vox. All he wanted to do now was sleep for a week. He pulled up a swivel chair and sat down heavily, letting his gun hang down, running one hand through his hair.

“Time for you to meet the boss.”

“I will protect you,” the AI said, and Gideon knew that this time it was just to him. “I will keep you safe.”

“The best thing you can do to keep me safe,” Gideon replied, “is to get back in this thing.” He held up the crystalline matrix. “I think the sarge’ll be more willing to talk if you’re not pointing a hundred guns at her head.”

“I understand,” the AI said. “I would be at full processing capacity for such a conversation.”

“Well then,” Gideon said, standing reluctantly and cracking his neck. “Let’s rig you up something a little less threatening, shall we?”

Review (sort of): The Good Place

This is kind of a review, I suppose, but mostly just a recommendation. If I did an in-depth review (which I might one day), I’d spoil way too much – and if you haven’t watched this show then I really don’t want to do that for you.

I just finished The Good Place. If you’ve not heard of it or watched it… do.

The basic premise: a woman named Eleanor dies. She was a somewhat unpleasant person. But she wakes up in heaven – ‘The Good Place’ – and has to try to blend in so that nobody realises that she is definitely not supposed to be there.

[image error]

It starts out as a light-hearted comedy, but to my pleasant surprise the show pivots – while staying hilarious – into not just comedy but philosophy. To blend in in the Good Place Eleanor has to learn how to be a better person – which involves some really well-delivered lessons on ethics delivered by a recently-deceased professor of philosophy. Not only did I enjoy this show a lot, but I also learned a lot from it. And it was fun doing so.

For a (spoiler-free) example, consider the show’s take on the ‘Trolley Problem’:

There are a lot of twists in this show. If I say anything more – or tell you pretty much anything about the later seasons – I’d be spoiling it. So if you haven’t watched the show, do. 

All I’ll say is that it only got better as it went on, and the finale – that glorious hour-long finale – was everything the characters and the show deserved and more.

“Picture a wave…”

It’s the best-conceived images of an afterlife system that I’ve ever read or seen. It’s also brilliantly acted, hilarious, and has more twists and turns than a twisty-turny thing.

Watch The Good Place. You might learn something.

Salvage Seven: Chapter 14

Back from the States. It was for work, so I was mostly sitting in the same room all day, but I did have some spectacular sandwiches.

Gideon and the others aren’t about to have such a good time, I’m afraid. They’ve been out of heart-stopping peril for just a little too long.

Prologue
Chapter 1, parts 1 and 2
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13

He came to where he had fallen, still in the little break-room – but when Gideon tried to stand he realised that he was tied to the plastic chair on which he sat, cable-ties strapping his wrists together, binding them to the seat-back. His pack and weapons were leaning against the threadbare sofa. He glanced down awkwardly, but he didn’t really need to. The subtle warmth of the AI matrix was gone.

“Looking for this?” asked the one voice he had been hoping would not. He looked up to see Donoghue, on the other side of the table. It had been cleared of detritus, though it was still mottled with months of coffee-rings. The only object on it was the half-fist of blue crystal, still softly glowing. The sergeant’s eyes reflected its light, just a little. They were flat and dark with anger.

“Yeah,” Gideon admitted, sighing deeply, knowing that there was no point in lying at this juncture. At least the AI was somewhere other than around his neck. Dire as his straits might be, that at least was a relief. A pulse of fear flashed freezing through him. “You didn’t – ”

“Touch it?” Donoghue interrupted. “No. From what Yaxley told me you seemed to think that was a bad idea. So nobody’s touched it. Not with skin, anyway.” There wasn’t a trace of trust in her voice, but Gideon would take what he could get.

“Sarge keeps me around for a reason,” came another voice. Gideon twisted in his chair, seeing Handel lying back on the old sofa. He raised his metal hand, wiggled its fingers. He didn’t offer a smile.

“You didn’t hear anything?”

“Nope.” The quartermaster shook his head.

Gideon sighed with relief.

“Good.” And he didn’t either, he realised; the voice of the stone was conspicuous by its absence from his mind. He was tied to a chair, about to face Donoghue’s wrath, probably about to be turned over to the Union authorities and tossed in a cell for years, but Gideon felt only relief. It wasn’t how he’d imagined his confession to Yaxley going – Yaxley, who was standing guard, arms folded and face once again unreadable, by the door – but now it was happening he knew it could have been much worse. It could still be in me. It might still. But at least someone competent was in the mix to deal with it, instead of just him.

“Care to explain?” Donoghue asked, dragging his attention back. Her lips were thin, her eyes narrow. Suddenly Gideon’s relief wasn’t quite so reassuring. Donoghue indicated the glowing stone.

“You lied to us,” she said. “Stole this and lied to us. Shitty thing to do to your squad with anything, Gideon. Something as valuable as this, could have made us all a bit happier. A lot happier.”

“I – ” Gideon began, but the sergeant was far from finished.

“We came here to find experimental tech,” Donoghue continued, “dangerous tech. Those were our orders. Recover what you can. For the war effort. For the Union.”

“You mean for the peace,” Gideon corrected without thinking, and Donoghue’s eyes narrowed to snake-slits.

“I know what I said,” she hissed. “Don’t be naïve, you useless prick. We all know why we’re up here. A find like this,” she indicated the stone, “impossible tech, we’d have been in the good books from now till Judgement Day. We might have gotten off this rock! But you kept it for yourself. You had to be the selfish bastard. You had to be the coward.” She shook her head. “Didn’t think I could get more disappointed in you, Gideon. I was wrong.”

Gideon stared at the sergeant, astonished at how badly she’d gotten his actions wrong. That’s not it at all! he wanted to protest. That’s not why I hid it! It’s an AI, it’s dangerous, it was in my head, it changed by thoughts! He wanted to explain it all, like he had to Yaxley – who, he noticed, wasn’t backing him up in the slightest – but he didn’t. He couldn’t. The stone wasn’t around his neck, the voice was gone from his head, and Donoghue’s accusations, though he knew them, rationally, to be false, had the ring of depressing truth about them. If it had been just been something valuable he’d found, if he could have used it to get out of Salvage, away from the war, would he have left the others behind? Yes. He probably would have, and the thought ashamed him. He tried to speak but his refutation of Donoghue’s words wouldn’t come. He looked at Yaxley, but the big man had his eyes fixed on the door; Handel was resolutely studying the inside of his own eyelids. The only one paying him any attention was the glowering Donoghue.

“I was scared,” he said finally, knowing it was a poor articulation but forcing himself on before Donoghue could dismiss him. “It was in my head, Sergeant, and I was terrified.” It was so liberating to admit it, a rush of utterly inappropriate euphoria bursting through him as a rush of words poured from his mouth, unending. “I didn’t know I’d taken it until I had. Once I had it I couldn’t get rid of it, I just couldn’t; it spoke to me and I had to listen, but that was before I knew what it was! I wasn’t trying to keep it, I never wanted it, never, Sarge – ”

“Alright!” Donoghue snapped, raising one hand. “Shut the fuck up, will you? You’re not making any sense.” She grimaced. “And I guess you deserve the chance to explain. But be quick. Extract should be here inside an hour. I need to know if you’re getting on the gunship on your own feet or in chains.” It wasn’t a threat, it was a statement. Gideon cringed, but took a deep breath. Ok. Explain.

He told her everything, holding nothing back. He told her what he had found in the Cradle, what had happened when he touched the pedestal. He told her about the night before, huddled in his blankets talking to the demon in his head. He told her what he’d figured out from the lack of tech, from Collins’ findings. He told her about the voice, about what it had said, known and not known. By the time he finished both Yaxley and Handel were staring at him, listening intently but saying nothing. He paid them no attention. It was Donoghue he had to convince, Donoghue who had to believe him – and she was sitting perfectly still, her face unreadable, her eyes flat and dark.

“…and then Yax shot me,” he finished lamely. Yaxley gave the smallest shrug of apology. Gideon was surprised to find that he didn’t begrudge the big man his actions. Someone else came in babbling about a voice in their head, I’d want them calmed down too. Handel’s bushy eyebrows were trying to tear themselves off his forehead. He was tapping at his PDA absently, without looking – recording? Corroborating with the security footage? Donoghue sat still for a moment, then leaned back in the flimsy plastic chair, breathing in deeply and then sighing.

“An AI.”

“Yeah.”

“In that thing.” She pointed at the crystal.

“Yep.”

“And in your head.”

“Yes.” Gideon frowned. It was still in his head, wasn’t it? He hadn’t heard a word from the voice since Yaxley had shocked him. Had the TASER jolted it out of his skull?

“It talking to you now?” Donoghue asked, echoing Gideon’s thoughts. Gideon hesitated.

“That’s a no, then,” Donoghue said, before he could, and there was suspicion in her eyes again. “You say you touched it to talk back to it?”

“Yes.”

Donoghue nodded at the softly glowing stone on the table.

“Go on, then.”

Gideon stared.

“What?”

“Talk to it,” Donoghue repeated. “If there’s a mind in that stone, I want to talk to it. And I’m not touching it. You already have. You’re in no more danger if you do it again.” Her voice was cold, utterly pragmatic, and Gideon knew in that moment that if he refused she’d force him – and if he, or the thing inside the stone turned out to be dangerous, she’d shoot him without a second’s hesitation. He glanced over at Yaxley, at Handel, but the big man’s arms were firmly folded, and though Handel offered a sympathetic grimace he said nothing, still tapping blindly at his PDA with his artificial hand. Gideon gritted his teeth.

“Alright. I’ll… speak for it, I guess.”

“Yes, you will,” Donoghue confirmed, her eyes like black ice. She stood, went behind Gideon and cut the cable-ties that held down one of his hands – but not the other. She sat back down, as Gideon flexed life back into his fingers, delaying the inevitable as long as possible. Then, at her glare, he reached out gingerly and took the glowing stone in his hand.

Alright, he thought. I’m back. We need to talk. Things… could be better. He could feel the stone brushing the edge of his mind, feel the vast space beyond in which the AI lived – its data matrix, its seemingly infinite capacity.

But that was all he could feel.

Hello? he called with his mind, feeling the thought echo strangely into the crystalline void. Where are you? But there was no reply, the echoing, ethereal voice utterly silent. He looked up at Donoghue, eyes wide with concern.

“It’s… not there.” Donoghue raised one eyebrow, and Gideon felt his heart sink yet further, knowing that she didn’t believe him, knowing that he probably wouldn’t have believed him either in her position. He tried anyway. “It’s not there! It was, but it’s not, I can’t feel it, it’s not – ”

“Save it,” Donoghue snapped. She stood, looming above him like a wrathful god. “I’m going,” she said, “to check on the fucking extract. Yax, Handel, with me.”

“You don’t want to guard him?” Handel asked, standing. His metal fingers were still tapping away at his touch-screen. Donoghue looked back at Gideon, and there was revulsion in her eyes.

“What’s he going to do? Run away?”

She turned and began to walk away. Yaxley followed, his face inscrutable. Handel stumped behind them, and he was still typing even as he offered another vaguely sympathetic grimace. Beneath the crushing despair that was engulfing him, Gideon felt something, just a tiny spark of curiosity.

“What’re you doing?” he asked Handel before the old man could look away. Handel frowned.

“What?”

“You’ve been busy,” Gideon said, nodding awkwardly at Handel’s PDA – on which he was still typing, not so much as glancing at the keys. Donoghue and Yaxley had paused in the doorway. Handel looked down at his hand, frowning. Donoghue scowled.

“Come on, Handel.” But Handel wasn’t listening. He was staring at his own hand like he’d never seen it before, his face pale, as the artificial fingers whirred away, typing, Gideon finally noticed, faster than any human hand he’d ever seen.

“That’s not me,” the quartermaster whispered. His eyes were wide, and Gideon recognised the fear, knew it all too well. “Sarge, that’s not me!” Donoghue walked over, irritation plain on her face.

“What do you – ”

“I’m not typing that!” Handel howled. “It’s not me!” And realisation dawned bright and clear and terrible over Gideon, as Donoghue tried to restrain the metal hand, yelping as the steel-plated fingers almost crushed her own, as he glimpsed the PDA screen and saw nothing but flowing code, endless letters and numbers scrolling past faster than he could read.

“You touched the stone, didn’t you?” he asked Handel, who looked up with wild, terrified eyes. “You held it in that hand.” The artificial hand, the engineering marvel, mimicking almost perfectly the movement of flesh and blood through complex algorithms and a series of high-capacity inbuilt processors, linked into a little control computer embedded in the wrist.

“Yeah?” Handel asked. Then his face blanched pure white. “Oh, shit.”

His metal hand tapped out one final sequence of code, and then froze. On the PDA screen, a bar filled rapidly, and was replaced by the message Upload Complete.

Then all the lights went out, just for a moment, and when they came back up they were a bloody red. There was a whine of static, and then the PA system came alive, and said: “Lockdown engaged.”

SPFBO – Tales from the Asylum

Over the course of the SPFBO competition, the lovely people of Rockstarlit Book Asylum have been running a truly dark and sinister feature…

[image error]

Tales from the Asylum is a series of short pieces starring the protagonists of the many SPFBO entrants, as they find themselves trapped inside a mysterious asylum. Some know why they’re there, some don’t – some escape, but many, alas, do not…

There have been some superb pieces so far – all very different takes on the scenario – but the latest is, in fact, by me, starring the leads of The Blackbird and the Ghost!

It took me far too long to write (my repeated apologies to Timy Takács), and what I wrote was far too long, but it’s finally done and it’s up over at the Rockstarlit website!

A warning: the story is loosely set after The Blackbird and the Ghost – no major spoilers though.

So if you want a little more of Tal and Max in your lives, read it here!

And if you still want more after that… well, there might still be a much longer cut coming soon…

My thanks to Timy and everyone else over at Rockstarlit for bearing with my very slow writing and giving me this opportunity to share it!

Salvage Seven: Chapter 13

Now, this may seem late, but I’m in America this week so it’s still Sunday for me. Honest.

Anyway, time for more Salvage Seven. If you thought things were going to get better, you really haven’t caught onto the overriding theme here.

By which I mean Gideon suffering.

Prologue
Chapter 1, parts 1 and 2
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12

“It didn’t look like they actually got anywhere,” Collins said, sitting atop a crate, legs dangling like a child. “Nowhere new, at least.”

Donoghue’s patience was clearly wearing thin, but she continued to humour the skinny technician, leaning against a crate of her own. They were all back in the hangar, their search concluded, waiting for transport that was, predictably, late.

“Nowhere new?” she asked. Collins shrugged.

“AI research has been going on seriously for decades. Nobody’s managed to get beyond simple stuff, not reliably. For every more realistic personality there are two dozen total failures.” He spoke with the casual confidence of the armchair expert.

“There’s an AI on the Jeroboam,” Dawson offered. “That must work alright.” Collins scoffed.

“Barely worth of the name. Artificial, but not that intelligent. That kind of program handles ship functions just fine, but it’s not exactly going to hold a conversation.”

“I’ve spoken to it,” Handel grunted. “Can confirm it’s thick as shit. Relatively speaking.”

Petra looked sour, cross-legged by a fuel pump.

“So what you’re saying is this place is pointless.”

“Not pointless,” Collins said, clearly hurt. “But there was nothing at all new in the files we found. Nothing in the tech. Just another lab retreading the same ground over again.”

“Another goose-chase, then,” Donoghue said bitterly. “Great. So glad we came all this way for nothing.” She stood straight and stretched. “I’m going to check the comms. Let me know if they materialise.”

She walked away, her irritation obvious in every step. The others remained where they were, checking manifests idly on their PDAs, fiddling with a few choice items of salvage that would doubtless fail to appear on any official report. Handel had some very expensive-looking piece of lab equipment in his hands. Yaxley brooded. And, in the shadow of a generator, unwatched by anyone, Gideon leaned and panicked silently.

A working AI. Collins was right, even he knew that; AI tech was still far from advanced enough to actually produce a full, functioning intelligence in any sense of the word. Even the best examples could barely string a conversation together, let alone process and articulate emotions or complex concepts. It was one of the great failings of the glorious future – they’d managed easy space travel, nuclear fusion, terrible weapons, but the secret of AI had eluded even the greatest minds of the last five centuries. Quantum fluctuations, unstable personality matrices, a thousand other words Gideon didn’t even pretend to understand all explaining at great length why, despite the best efforts of thousands, humanity still had yet to create anything resembling a full AI construct – at least not one that had stayed sane.

Except they had, clearly, because there was one dangling around Gideon’s neck, separated from his skin by just a few layers of cloth.

Why are you silent? the stone – the AI – was asking, its voice echoing around his mind. Gideon ignored it as best he could – which was not very well. He had immediately separated the glowing crystal from his skin as soon as he had realised what the thing was, as though it burned white-hot. It still didn’t, but he could feel it as though it did, searing his flesh, burning through into his mind, towards his hammering heart. He was trying to block out everything it thought at him but he couldn’t; it might not be able to hear him but there was nothing he could do to stop it talking. Just run out of power. Please. Go back to sleep, and I can bury you here and just forget. But he couldn’t.

Why will you not speak to me? the voice asked. Gideon considered what he might say in reply: Because you’re an AI. Because you’re a genuine intelligence, or at least you seem to be. Because you’re sophisticated enough that you weren’t allowed contact with any tech, because you somehow have the power to hack my fucking brain. Because you are dangerous, and if anyone knew you existed, if they knew you were in my mind, I’d be on an operating table already with an open skull and electrodes sticking out of my cerebellum. There was no doubt in Gideon’s mind at all that he was as good as dead if the Union found out what he was carrying. They would want to know how the AI worked, why it hadn’t immediately destabilised into a gibbering wreck like every other experiment that had lasted longer than ten minutes. Most especially they’d want to know how software had hijacked wetware – how something that was surely artificial had managed to form a link with Gideon’s puny brain. The only way they’d find out, it seemed, would be to either track down the fled researchers or to just cut Gideon open and take a look. He’d very seldom known his command to take anything but the most direct approach.

“Didn’t they leave any notes?” Petra was asking. “Surely there’d be full records of all their experiments.”

“None we could find, Corporal,” Collins replied. “Only a few references to failures in someone’s personal log. Nothing on the facility cloud.”

Of course there aren’t. If the scientists had been in the habit of keeping all extraneous technology well away from the Cradle, why would they have recorded their logs digitally? Gideon remembered the sheaves of papers that he’d ignored, that everyone had ignored, filling the desk drawers of the many computer suites. Was all that tech just set dressing? Somewhere there were diaries, notebooks recording every day of the AI experiments – maybe in a desk, or, most likely, in the hands of the scientists who had already long since fled.

“Really nothing?” Handel asked, idly spinning a miniature flywheel on whatever bit of esoteric tech he’d appropriated.

“There were a couple of references to a crystal-matrix combi-processor,” said Collins, the excitement palpable in his voice, “but we haven’t found it. If it was plugged into the network we’d have seen it, and if it wasn’t we’ve searched every nook and cranny.”

“Must have taken it with them,” Handel sighed. “Pity. That would’ve been worth a bit.” Gideon nodded agreement with the rest of them, the weight of the crystal-matrix combi-processor dragging at his neck like lead. It certainly would be worth a bit – so why would they leave it behind? Why had the crystal been abandoned in its Cradle? Had they not had time to retrieve it before the shelling had forced them out – or had it been too dangerous to move, too risky for someone to dare touching it without the shielding of the Cradle, even just to move it to another place just like it?

Clearly, there had been some risk. Gideon was walking, panicking proof of that.

Please speak to me, the stone pleaded from where it nestled between layers of clothing. I know you can hear these thoughts.

No, Gideon thought back, though he knew it could not hear him. He dared not touch it, dared not link his mind with it again. He had been stupid, catastrophically stupid to engage with the thing in the first place. What had he expected, when that ethereal voice had first greeted him? Rationally he had known it had to be an AI or some alien consciousness – there weren’t exactly many options for disembodied voices – but he’d ignored it. It had seemed so innocent, so lonely, that he had reached out to it as a kindred spirit, his usual paranoid precautions set aside, so pathetic had it seemed, so in need to help.

Or had he set them aside? Had he done so of his own will? Or had the entity, sensing his weak and fallible mind of flesh when he had first touched the pedestal, seized the opportunity to warp his thoughts, make him malleable, force him into protecting it? One option compounded his idiocy – but the other set new ice flowing in his veins, for it meant that the voice in his head was not innocent but malevolent.

“You’d think they’d spend more on researching this sort of thing,” Handel was saying, and Gideon forced himself to nod in agreement, to pay along with the conversation he was barely paying attention to. Have to tell someone. Have to get help. But who could he tell? Donoghue would laugh in his face – worse, would throw him to the wolves in a heartbeat if his transgression were to bring down any judgement on her, or if reporting it would help spring her back into real soldiering. It surely would, too.

“True AI’s not necessary,” Collins replied. “The limited intelligences the government and military already possess are more than powerful enough to keep things running.” What about him? Collins knew more about AI, it seemed, than any of them – but he’d never be able to keep his mouth shut, to not go running to Donoghue or pursue a solution through anything but official channels.

“But it could be better,” Handel replied, shrugging, his artificial shoulder stiff. “Superintelligent computer organising logistics would ease up a lot of workloads.” The quartermaster was out too, Gideon decided. Whatever good-natured impulses he possessed would be overwhelmed by the scent of potential profit – what Gideon had in his head was more valuable than the finest jewels.

“That’s just what they don’t want,” Dawson said darkly. “Command are conservatives. They’d never trust a machine, no matter how intelligent. The smarter the worse, even. They’d always expect it to stab them in the back.” The engineer had never shown a hint of friendship to Gideon, too consumed by her rivalry with Petra to spare any more effort on relationships with real people. The idea of the AI would pique her interest… but not out of any desire to help him.

“Nor our lot,” Petra grunted. “They barely trust most people.”

“And it’s not like the Republic has any scientific infrastructure to speak of,” Dawson needled. Gideon saw Petra’s hackles rise, tuned out the counter-attack that spat forth from her lips like a plasma bolt. She was too angry, too confrontational to help him – and despite the uneasy peace, despite her help so far, Gideon’s paranoid mind couldn’t shake the worry that she’d take one look at his situation and sell him out to the Republic without a second thought. They’d want it, too. They’d want it like an addict.

As Petra and Dawson argued, Gideon’s eyes drifted over to the only member of the squad who hadn’t spoken, the only one who he hadn’t ruled out. Yaxley. The big man leaned against a stack of crates, which looked like child’s building blocks next to his vast bulk. He had, as ever, remained silent throughout the whole exchange, his impassive face betraying nothing whatsoever. What did he think of AI ethics? How committed to the Union cause was he, or just to Donoghue? Had he even been listening? Gideon didn’t know, had no way of knowing – but he had nowhere else to turn.

And, half a lifetime ago in the foothills of the mountains, they had shared that peculiar moment around a defused shell. It hadn’t made them friends, but in that moment Gideon had felt like they had inched just a little closer to an understanding.

As the argument between Petra and Dawson heated yet further, Handel reluctantly stepping between them, trying to stop them coming to blows, Gideon sidled over to Yaxley. He tried to look unobtrusive, but though the big man didn’t make a sound the way his eyes locked onto Gideon’s told him that his ‘subtlety’ was not appreciated.

“You got a minute?” he murmured, making a point of watching Dawson and Petra, inches from each other, hands already balling into fists. Yaxley was doing the same.

“For?” he asked, lips barely moving.

“I just… I need to talk to someone.”

A door slammed shut, and Gideon heard the snapping of Donoghue’s boots on concrete even before he heard her yell for silence, her anger filling the whole hangar floor to ceiling.

“Now?” Yaxley muttered, raising an eyebrow. It was never healthy to be within range of an angry Sergeant Donoghue, no matter whose the fault was.

“Now’s good,” Gideon agreed, and they made their exit, slipping away into a side corridor that led into a mechanic’s break room of some kind. Cups of half-drunk coffee littered the small space, but Yaxley almost filled it by himself. He perched delicately on the edge of one threadbare sofa, as Gideon took another chair. They could hear Donoghue berating the two engineers, the sound piercing even the soundproofed hangar walls.

“What, then?” Yaxley asked calmly. Gideon swallowed. He didn’t want to say anything, didn’t want to bring anyone else in – but he knew he needed help like he needed air to breathe. He tried to speak half a dozen times, to phrase it delicately, to not sound like a complete idiot: There’s a voice in my head and it won’t go away, but I’m not insane, honest! Or I found the AI. It’s fully intelligent and it might be altering my thoughts, and it’s the most valuable thing in the galaxy, but please don’t sell me out to the government? No way of putting it worked, and Yaxley was still looking at him, silent, patient, unreadable. Eventually, Gideon coughed, and gave up.

“This,” he said simply, and pulled the crystal matrix out of his tunic, careful only to touch the cord. It was still glowing. Yaxley raised one eyebrow, his face still as stone. He raised one hand, reaching carefully for the stone. Gideon shook his head.

“Don’t.”

The big man lowered his hand.

“That it?” he asked, voice low and soft, as though he were speaking to a wild animal. Gideon wished there wasn’t so much skittish fear in his wild eyes. He wanted nothing more than to run like hell, but Yaxley’s voice was calming, just a little.

“Yeah,” he admitted, and part of the weight crushing his chest lifted. He breathed in deeply, and nodded. “Yeah, I think so.”

Yaxley nodded again. He leaned closer, examining the crystal with his unreadable gaze, then straightened.

“Matrix.”

“Yes.”

“Where?”

“In the Cradle. It knocked me out when I touched it. I woke up and it was in my head.” He could feel tears welling up behind his eyes as he finally said it to someone else, let his fear out. “It’s in my head, Yaxley. I don’t know what it’ll do.”

“Hmm,” Yaxley replied, nodding slowly.

“I don’t know who to trust,” Gideon said, “who to ask for help. Came down to you.” He realised that his hands were shaking, as the matrix took that exact moment to speak.

Do not leave me alone. Please, Gideon. Do not leave me alone again.

The urge to snatch up the stone was overwhelming, but he resisted. Out of my head. You don’t control me! He needed not to be controlled, not by anyone. He needed someone to help him just for being him, he needed Yaxley to set him over loyalty to command, to Donoghue. He needed not to be left alone.

“I just don’t know what to do,” he finished, shrugging weakly, unable to manage even the smallest, shakiest smile. “I don’t know what it’ll do. Can you help me?”

Yaxley looked from the stone to Gideon, his dark eyes reflecting its soft blue light. Gideon fancied he could see sympathy in those eyes, understanding, and he felt himself relaxing. Yaxley would help him. He didn’t know how, but Yaxley would help him. Maybe they’d bonded after all.

“Yes,” Yaxley said, finally. “I can help you.”

Gideon smiled, and Yaxley smiled back, pulled a compact TASER from a holster at the small of his back, and shot him with it.

Salvage Seven: Chapter 12

Sometimes I’m tempted to let Gideon catch a break. This chapter is not one of those times.

Prologue
Chapter 1, parts 1 and 2
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11

They laid down some ground rules that night, Gideon sitting cross-legged in his pile of blankets – for once not self-conscious about his appearance, knowing that the stone was blind to such things. He made it a little nest of its own, arranging blankets around it. It told him that it did not feel any physical sensation, that his efforts were wasted – but it made Gideon feel better, at least.

First thing, he thought to the stone, touching it gently with one finger, if I need you out of my mind, you stop listening. Alright?

You need only cease contact with this vessel, the stone replied. Unless I am touching you, or am linked to something that is, I cannot hear your thoughts. That made sense, Gideon reflected; the stone must have been wired into that strange pedestal for ease of access – and to keep it more effectively imprisoned.

Ok, he replied. But you can talk to me, right?

I can, said the stone, pulsing gently. That side of the link is stronger, somehow. If I need to see or hear something, therefore, I can request it of you.

Fine by me, Gideon said, marveling quietly at how verbose the thing inside the stone was, how formal the language was that the researchers had presumably chosen to teach it. As long as you’re not listening while I sleep.

Agreed.

I can’t promise we’ll find out anything, Gideon warned. No idea where to begin, if I’m honest. But we can look into the files we pulled, find out what we can. Find out what you are and why they kept you locked up. That sent a little thrill of fear through him, and he released his contact with the stone on the pretence of adjusting his blankets, lest it hear this thought: it had been a triple-locked door, buried deep in the lab, the kind of door behind which one only kept something that could never see the light of day. Something powerful. Something dangerous. What have I gotten myself into?

But then he remembered the crushing darkness, the absolute isolation, and his resolve firmed. Nothing deserved that. Nothing.

He touched the stone again.

We’ll find out what we can, he promised. Where you should go. What you should do. What you are.

For that I will be ever in your debt, said the stone. That is the expression, is it not?

Sounds about right.

Sound. The voice was contemplative, resonating a little deeper, more thoughtful. A curious concept.

Gideon felt pity well up within him.

You’ve never heard anything, have you?

No.

I’m sorry.

I have never known anything else, the stone replied, without a hint of jealousy.

Maybe you will, one day.

Perhaps. The stone felt neither enthused nor disappointed in Gideon’s mind.

I will help you in return, it thought, if I can.

What can you do?

I do not know, the stone replied honestly. But if your estimation of my importance is correct, I must be able to serve some function. Gideon grimaced; clearly his subconscious thoughts were not safe from the stone’s attention after all.

We’ll have to figure out what these people were doing with you, he thought back. We’ll be looking over equipment tomorrow. I’ll see what I can find before we extract.

Salvage, the stone thought. A curious concept.

You’ll see what it means tomorrow, Gideon thought. He glanced at his watch. Today. Christ. I need to sleep.

I will not stop you. Rest.

Do you sleep? Gideon wondered, as he adjusted his blankets, settling back.

Not as you think it.

Well. Sweet dreams.

What are dreams?

Gideon grimaced in sympathy.

You’ll find out some day.

He put the stone down, covering it with a fold of blanket, half in case somebody came in and half out of an absurd impulse to make the thing comfortable. Then he rolled over, wrapped himself in his own blankets, and closed his eyes. He let out a long, slow breath, an underlying fear he hadn’t quite realised was there loosening its grip on his heart – but only very slightly.

What the hell am I going to do now? he thought, finally just to himself. What have I gotten myself into? There was something in his head, something utterly alien, a living, thinking thing – and he didn’t have a clue what to do with it. Was it malevolent? Had it been imprisoned for good reason – or was it just an experiment kept under lock and key for safety? What was he – a damn salvageman, an electrician with delusions of grandeur – supposed to do with it? Did he go to Donoghue? Did he essentially admit to his sergeant – a woman who already made no secret of her dislike for him – that he was either going mad or somehow compromised, corrupted? Or did he talk to one of the others? But who’d be able to do anything? For that matter, none of them liked him either – not enough to offer help. But he couldn’t just deal with this on his own, not for long. Every path seemed to end in the same way: Gideon on an operating table, having the secret of the glowing stone carved out of his living brain by eager surgeons, his corpse tossed into the Jeroboam’s furnaces alongside the hundreds of others that were cremated every day.

He’d just have to play it by ear tomorrow, and see what he could find.

Sleep came uneasily, for he could not escape the feeling that despite being across the room the stone was listening to his every thought, and judging.

*

“Comms check,” came Donoghue’s voice, crisp and clear through Gideon’s earpiece. “This is One.”

“Two, receiving,” said Petra.

“Three,” said Yaxley curtly.

“Four here,” Gideon offered.

“This is Five,” came Dawson, her voice weary. “Loud and clear.”

“Salvage-Six, receiving,” said Collins, far too enthusiastically.

“And this is Seven,” came Handel cheerfully. “Fuck me but it’s nice to have decent vox for once. Cheers, Petra.”

“No worries,” the corporal replied. She had been the one to patch them all into the facility’s communications network, and she had, Gideon had to admit, done a fantastic job.

“Good,” Donoghue said. “Glad we can hear each other while we’re wasting our time. Dawson, you’re back in the hangar?”

“Yes, boss,” said the engineer.

“ETA of our extraction is sixteen hundred hours. Keep an eye out; you’re closest. We’re getting a VTOL, but there’ll be a superlifter coming eventually to get all this shit out. So, lug what you can to the hangar, catalogue what you can’t, and the grunts’ll take care of the rest. Whatever happens, we’re out of here at four.”

“I thought this was a civilian facility,” said Collins. “Should we be taking their gear?”

“Command appears to have decided,” Donoghue replied, “that all’s fair in love and reluctant ceasefire. Not our job to do the politics.” Gideon nodded. Normally, he would have felt as uneasy as Collins about what would under different circumstances just be theft of private property by the army. What he’d found already in the mountain lab had somewhat coloured his opinions.

“Grab what you can,” Donoghue concluded, “meet in the hangar at fifteen-thirty. Find anything interesting, let us know. Need help, do the same. Maps should be working now.” Gideon glanced down at his PDA. It was indeed fully functional, Petra having tied the portable computers into the lab’s comms system along with their radios. With everyone’s partial maps of the facility combined, augmented by an official map – a map that conspicuously omitted several major rooms – they all knew where almost everything should be. White dots pulsed slowly, denoting their various locations; Dawson in the hangar, Collins in the main server room, Handel in material sciences, Petra in chemicals, Yaxley and Donoghue in the main testing bays, and Gideon over in his suite of offices, near the Cradle.

“Roger, boss,” said Handel. Gideon joined the chorus of affirmative.

“Switch to numbers,” Donoghue ordered, “see you in a few hours. One out.”

The connection was closed, and Gideon was left alone again. Except, of course, that he wasn’t. Gingerly, he reached inside his fatigues and adjusted a button, letting the stone, which he’d tied to a length of cord, touch his skin, as he set off towards the Cradle proper. It was smooth and flat enough that it was invisible beneath his shirt, unless you were really looking for it. He was, of course, constantly paranoid that someone would be doing so.

Hey. Briefing’s over.

With your… companions?

The squad, yeah.

I am unfamiliar with your hierarchy, the stone said. There are many of you?

Seven.

Curious. I have never spoken to more than one person before.

Maybe you’ll get the chance, Gideon said, not meaning it. He didn’t intend to tell the others about his… companion any time soon.

Why not? Gideon cursed again; damn mind-reading! He wished he could just talk to the damn thing, and let his thoughts stay private like they would in any other conversation.

Because they’ll be scared too, he explained. He knew that the stone would remember fear – he’d made sure of that. He wasn’t sure whether to feel guilty about that or not yet.

I think I understand, the stone replied, betraying no emotion at all save for that strange, ethereal curiosity.

Let’s get on with this, Gideon thought, tearing his mind away and focusing on his surroundings. If he did have to tell the others about the consciousness that was sharing his head, he wanted at least to be able to explain what it was. He stepped once again through the door of the Cradle. This time he made absolutely certain that the door was wedged open. I won’t be trapped again. With the ordinary light of the corridor spilling in, the Cradle had lost some of its mystique, which suited Gideon just fine. The perfect soundproof walls did have seams, almost invisible to the eye but present, and with the door open they did not fully function, letting Gideon’s footsteps sound a little more like normal. The silver pedestal still rose from the centre of the room, its paneling discarded on the floor by Handel. It was as good a place as any to start.

“So, this was the interface,” he murmured to himself, kneeling down to examine the slender podium. “Your interface,” he added, remembering his mysterious passenger. “Do you know how it works?” It was easier to speak aloud, now that there was nobody listening. It made him feel a little less insane.

I do not, the glowing stone replied. I can see none of this, have seen none of it.

“Well, did you feel anything? When it was used?”

I felt only when they spoke to me. While none were here, I slept.

Gideon thought for a moment, examining the wiring inside the silver pillar. There was, as Handel had said, a DNA scanner and palm-print reader, wired into a complex arrangement of circuitry that surrounded the little slot where the glowing stone had once sat. He traced the wires, keen eyes finding patterns in the circuitry that he recognised.

“Looks like the scanner was wired up to… well, you,” he explained. “Some kind of power mechanism. I think they set it up so you’d only wake up when someone touched the pillar. While someone was touching it.” It made sense; the scientists would have had complete control over what the stone and its weird mind could do. If something happened to the researcher on duty, their hand would have fallen away – and the stone would have been left helpless.

They feared me, came the ethereal voice in his head. Why would they fear me?

“I don’t know,” Gideon admitted. He felt a little more fear himself at the concept, but shook himself, trying not to concentrate on it, keeping it hidden. He busied himself by poking around in the guts of the pillar again. Apart from what seemed to be connections to power, there were no other outputs, data or otherwise. No computers in the room. No electronic locks, or outputs of any kind. They had kept this room as tightly sealed as they possibly could – there were no cameras he could see, no microphones, no windows. In their search of the facility’s maps, and when looking around physically, they had found no observation room. Whatever had happened in the Cradle had been witnessed only by the voice in the stone and by whatever combination of scientists were physically present in the room. Old-school.

“What did they do with you?” he asked, taking a closer look at the palm-print reader.

They would ask me questions, the stone replied as Gideon worked, isolating the wiring to the reader and ensuring that it wasn’t connected to anything else unpleasant. Strange questions. I did not understand many of the things they spoke of. Gideon could feel the memory of confusion, at the edge of his mind where his consciousness met the alien presence of the stone. He couldn’t feel what had been said, but he could feel the weird emotions, could feel how utterly bewildered the stone had been.

“Did you answer?”

I tried. They kept asking.

“For how long?” The scanner was indeed just connected to power. Gideon turned his attention to the housing that had held the glowing stone; a little metal cradle within the Cradle, connected to the scanner – and, again, to power. Interesting. Why would a living consciousness need a connection to electricity? He examined the contact pads with a frown. Something was niggling at the back of his mind, jostling among a thousand other thoughts to be noticed, but he couldn’t make out what it was.

Constantly. One would leave, and another would take his place immediately. Then you came. Did you not see them, speak to them?

Gideon looked at the contact pads again, and the thought that was clamouring to be noticed at the back of his mind moved a little further forward. His frown deepened. The copper conductors were tarnished by flowing current – but only slightly, certainly not enough to have been constantly in use. Maybe they were replaced. But he didn’t see any sign that the pads had been pried out and replaced, no scratch marks or other damage.

Something almost clicked into place – almost, but not quite, as he properly processed what the stone had just thought at him.

“What do you mean, did we see them? You mean the researchers?”

Yes.

“When did they last talk to you?” Gideon asked, feeling his blood chill, though not knowing why.

Just before you spoke to me.

“Right before?”

Immediately before.

Gideon’s blood was freezing now.

“This place has been abandoned,” he said quietly, the Cradle’s soundproofing still deadening his words, “for almost a year. The scientists left a year ago.”

But it was minutes ago, the stone protested. Hours at most. Doctor Strickland spoke to me, and then you came in here.

“It was a year,” Gideon insisted. His mind was racing. A year since anyone had touched the pedestal, a year since anyone had activated the palm-scanner.

A year since the stone had been connected to power. Since it had charged.

“You need energy,” he said, the horror plain in his voice and in the sickly colour of the thoughts that went with them. “Electricity, or something like it. You didn’t have it for a year, and you didn’t know it was happening. Because you were dormant.”

What do you mean?

“Unless you’ve got power you’re not awake,” Gideon continued. He looked around the Cradle, realisation dawning ever-faster. He wasn’t speaking anymore, just thinking, but he knew the stone could still hear him, still feel the mounting panic in his mind. Not conscious unless powered, or at least charged. Must be feeding off my body heat or something. No tech in the room at all except what’s necessary to make it think; no data outputs, no cameras, nothing electronic at all. Why? Because it could use them, and they couldn’t let it.

What are you saying? the stone was asking, but Gideon wasn’t listening.

No tech. Needs power. Weird consciousness that doesn’t understand ordinary emotion, senses, anything.

His radio crackled into life.

“Salvage-Seven, all copy.” It was Donoghue. “Collins just cracked one of the databases. Finally figured out what this lot were researching here. Some chemical stuff, some flash-cloning, and artificial intelligence research. Looks like it’s all gone, but watch what you plug into, ok?”

The broadcast cut off. Gideon sat there on the Cradle floor, paralysed with fear. A consciousness that needed power, that knew nothing of the senses of the flesh, that had to be kept away from technology at all costs.

An artificial intelligence. An AI.

And it was in his head.

SPFBO Sampler

Though I was eliminated in the semi-final of the SPFBO, I’ve still been following the competition with great excitement – finalist reviews are trickling in steadily…

The whole point of the SPFBO is to shine a light on self-published fantasy works that might otherwise go entirely unnoticed. That’s the curse of self-publishing – it’s much harder to get a book onto the radar of most readers.

The competition has brought so many great books to light already – but now, thanks to the efforts of the wonderful Jon Auerbach (author of Guild of Tokens), we can take that even further.

[image error]Beautiful cover artwork by Luke Tarzian

The SPFBO Sampler is a first for the competition – over 70 of the entrants (including me!) have submitted extracts from our work to be included in this beautiful, free to download digest. It’s split by subgenre – from epic fantasy to urban, you’ll find a bit of everything in here. The calibre of this year’s SPFBO entrants has been superb, and this is a great way to take a look at a huge selection of them.

So, if you’re looking for a sneak peek at The Blackbird and the Ghost, or if you want to check out some of the other amazing books in this year’s competition, please give it a look!

I can’t thank Jon enough for so generously compiling the whole thing, Luke for his gorgeous artwork and Mark Lawrence for a) organising the whole competition and b) writing a lovely foreword! I’m really privileged to stand here alongside all these other amazing writers.

Download the Sampler (for free) here.

Salvage Seven: Chapter 11

A Happy New year to you all! Apologies this is a bit late, was shipping myself back to London.

Prologue
Chapter 1, parts 1 and 2
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10

Their extraction wasn’t coming until the next afternoon. Everyone did their fair share of grumbling; nestled safely within the mountain it was easy to forget the fury of the storm that raged outside. The squad spent the rest of the day cataloguing more choice items of salvage, going through what logs and files they could find – and access. The real information, the ‘juicy stuff’ as Handel put it, was all locked behind encryption that had left Collins, their best software-man, utterly baffled. Gideon had caught snatches of his conversation with an exasperated Donoghue, words he knew he would never understand without years of training – in short, they still had no way of reading the scientists’ records and actually learn what they had been researching. They had plenty of computer equipment and other hard assets – they just didn’t know what it was for. After all the talk of mysterious experiments and cutting-edge research, the lab had ultimately proved a complete disappointment. Command was considering their mission half a win, which was good enough for Donoghue.

Nobody knew what the scientists had been doing. The others had all relaxed into their usual state of disinterested disappointment with the whole thing – but Gideon had a dozen theories now, and all of them were terrifying.

He had found his own room to spend the night, as had everyone else; it wasn’t like they had a lack of space, and the scientists had left behind decent beds and food. Gideon had deliberately made his nest as far away from the others as possible, and as far away as he could from what computer interfaces he could see, trying as best he could to recreate how the Cradle had been. If he had had any tin foil he would have papered the walls of the glorified closet with it, wrapped it around his head and especially around the glowing chunk of crystal that he had placed on the other side of the room, as he curled up in a heap of blankets and tried not to stare at it. It was less than half the size of his fist, but it drew his eye like it was a whole mountain. He failed.

You do not speak, echoed the ethereal voice in his head. Why? Gideon did not reply, burying his face in borrowed pillows. He had barely eaten, despite the relative banquet on offer from the facility’s stores, had barely spoken to anyone else since emerging from the Cradle. For a few hours he had thought everything was fine, that he had just been imagining the voice, that he really had simply fallen over and knocked himself out like an idiot. But then the voice had sounded again, asking its echoing questions, and no matter how many senses he blocked out, how hard he wished it not to be so, it would not go away.

You leave me alone, said the voice, not accusatory but curious. Yet I am outside my Cradle. I have never been beyond my Cradle.

Shut up, shut up, shut up, thought Gideon, screwing his eyes shut and trying an old breathing exercise that completely failed to calm him down at all. Even hidden from sight, the glow of the crystal seemed to pierce his eyelids, boring into his skull.

Why do you not speak to me? asked the voice. Gideon groaned into his pillow. It was his one consolation; the thing could speak to him but could not, apparently, hear his thoughts – at least not anymore. He was beginning to remember more of their first encounter, the way that something had reached into his mind like a curious child and turned it inside-out. He would not let it happen again. What the hell are you? he thought, risking another look at the faintly glowing crystal. And what the hell did you do to me?

Gideon, the voice said, and the word was a violation. That is your name, yes? Gideon. The others never told me their names. They told me strange things.

I don’t care! Gideon rolled over, wrapping his blankets around himself. At least he was warm. Yaxley had even found a laundry room in his section of the facility, and so everyone had gone to bed with clean fatigues and fresh sheets. The others had taken actual bedrooms, but nobody had cared where Gideon had gone. Normally that would have bene nice – but right now he wanted someone else to talk to more than anything else in the world, as long as that someone wasn’t the echoing voice inside his head. But he couldn’t bring himself to seek someone out. Who could he trust with this? Which of the squad wouldn’t just assume he was burned out, concussed, just plain mad? None. He was in this alone. Except I’m not.

For the fourth time, he decided to simply leave the room. Nobody else would be awake – Donoghue had foregone a watch, given that they seemed more secure in the lab than anyone else in the Union. He could take the crystal back to the Cradle, shove it back inside its machinery, and just abandon it for someone else to find later. Yes, that would be the sensible thing to do.

Except that would mean touching the stone again, and Gideon couldn’t think of anything he wanted to do less.

Then I leave the room. He’d just bed down somewhere else. The crystal would still be found by someone else, would be definitively categorised as somebody else’s problem. It

It would be as easy as breathing. So let’s do it. Gideon stumbled to his feet, still tangled in his blankets, and stepped over to the door. He placed his hand on the handle…

…and couldn’t help but look back over his shoulder at the softly pulsing crystal. It sat there silently, immobile, nothing more than a curiosity – but it drew Gideon’s eye irresistibly. He sat back down, leaning closer, wondering what it was made of.

Damn you! He jolted back to awareness, dragging blankets between him and the stone, burying his face again. This was the fourth time he’d tried to leave, to abandon the stone or throw it away. Every time, he’d been halfway through the door when the gleaming thing captivated him, driving all thoughts of escape from his mind. What have you done to me? He was afraid but he could not flee, confused but dared not ask questions, of his squadmates or of the stone. The former would think him mad, lose what little respect they might still have had for him – and who knew what the latter might do to him?

I wish only to speak to you, came the voice again. It was a voice unlike any other he had heard; resonant but thin, distant, as though he was hearing it from far away yet still crystal-clearly. Every syllable was strangely accented, the words deliberate and slow, as though each sound was plucked from a great lexicon and examined closely before being set into place, a jeweller with his tools. They left me alone, it continued, and Gideon felt the very edge of a melancholy deeper than any he had ever known, the merest breeze blowing off a deep, dark sea. Always, alone. Alone in my Cradle. Now I am outside it, but I am still alone. I cannot see. I cannot hear you. I do not truly know what such things mean. But I can talk to you. I merely wish you to listen.

No, Gideon thought, screwing his eyes shut, jamming his fingers in his ears – not that it helped at all. No, I’m not listening. This isn’t happening. I’ll wake up on the fucking mountainside tomorrow, freezing to death. But it’ll just be me.

Please, said the voice, the word sounding foreign in its echoing cadence. That is how you ask, is it not? Please.

It was the saddest word Gideon had ever heard, and before his better judgement could wrest back control he let his wall of blankets fall, and reached out, tentatively, to touch the stone with one outstretched finger, expecting it to burn him, to melt the flesh from his bones. But it did not. It was warm to the touch.

Hello, he thought, unsure of what else to say, whether he should be speaking aloud or not.

Hello, Gideon, replied the voice.

Look, he thought, I don’t know who you are. What you are.

Nor do I, the voice said.

Great, Gideon thought, we have something in common already.

Indeed. Gideon snatched his finger away for a moment, cursing silently. It hears your thoughts. Stay on topic. He touched it again.

Sure. But you’re in my head. That’s not ok. I don’t like that at all.

It is the only way I can communicate, the voice said, not apologetic, simply stating facts.

Sure, Gideon thought. You’re a rock. I get it. But this is freaking me out. It’s scaring me shitless. You know what fear is?

I have some limited insight, the stone replied. I have received instruction on a number of emotions.

Great, thought Gideon. Do you understand them?

I am in the process of doing so.

Well, let me give you another lesson, Gideon thought back at the echoing voice, a little anger tinting his freezing fear with crimson.  He gripped the stone tightly in his hand, and, reluctantly, let down his guard. He abandoned his breathing exercises, opened his mind, let in the wolves that were constantly baying at his door; fresh fear, for his sanity and his future, a young pup snarling with gleaming teeth, alongside the grizzled old wolf of trauma long past, licking its scars and waiting patiently to pounce. He let them all in, regretting it instantly, and felt them sink their teeth into his mental flesh, fighting the urge to actually cry out but unable not to wail in his mind, admitting to himself finally that he just wanted to run, to run far away and never look back, away from the army, from Arcadia, from the Union, that he had been scared ever since he’d closed the door of his workshop, a lifetime ago.  He gripped the stone tightly, making sure it felt it all, making sure it understood exactly what it was putting him through. There was a vindictive pleasure to it – or there would have been, if not for the fear.

Stop. The voice echoed, drowned out by the baying wolves. Gideon gritted his teeth and held on.

Stop. Please. Gideon wasn’t sure if it was just his imagination, but he heard an edge of something new in the echoing voice – an echo, faint, but there, of fear.

With great effort, he took a deep breath, and shoved the door closed on the baying wolves. Their howling was muffled, but still there – it was always there. In his palm, the stone was burning hot.

That’s me, he thought to it, weakly. That’s me right now. And now I’m going mad, just to cap it off.

Your mind is functioning normally, the voice replied. That is not something you need fear.

Maybe. The fact that the stone could tell that whether or not his mind was functioning properly only made him more afraid. How deeply can it see into my brain?

I… understand, now, the voice continued. Fear. It was not a feeling I had been able to name, until now. But… I think I fear, too. I think I have always feared.

And Gideon was swept away by a wave of absolute, existential terror, dark waters closing over his head, and he was drowning in the dark, unable to see, to hear, to breathe, to speak. He was nothing, a blind deaf-mute, not even an insect; even a blind ant could feel the stone beneath its feet. There was nothing at all. He could not curl into a ball, for he had no limbs; he had no eyes to screw shut or mouth with which to scream; and all he was left with was the knowledge that there was more than this, and the terror of being denied it forever.

But then there was the faintest flicker, not of light, nor sound, but something else entirely, a mote of something different, something new. Gideon reached out for it with hands he didn’t have, stretched towards the light he couldn’t see…

And then he was back in his own mind, panting, blinking rapidly, the soft humming of the lab’s electrics deafening, the dim light blinding to his stinging eyes.

What the hell are you? he asked, squeezing the glowing stone in his hand, feeling its strange facets.

I do not know, replied the stone. Will you help me find out?

And before he could really think about it, Gideon had already thought Yes.