Fool's Gold (The Wandering Engineer) (26 page)

"Just
a bit paranoid are we?" she sighed and returned her attention to the
humans. "Defender and Proteus are limited AI, I am a prototype micro smart
AI," she smiled. “Most of my systems are compressed and when I'm in the
Admiral only my core functions are online. Being in another network gives me a
chance to, as you organics say, stretch my legs properly.”

"She
is also a lieutenant commander. She's one of the best AI I have ever worked
with," the Admiral admitted.

"Why
thank you Admiral, I didn't know you cared." Sprite's outfit morphed into
a dress then she curtsied. She swirled the dress for a moment, then it morphed
back into her silver skin suit once more.

"Quite
lively are you? Do you keep the Admiral on his toes?" the old man smiled.

"We
aim to please," she laughed. The Admiral chuckled as well.

"That
she does. I try to keep her busy out of self defense," he waved.
"Speaking of which, we need more info on the station computers, have you
managed to make any progress?" he asked turning to business.

"Yes
Admiral, I spun off an entire security suite after reworking the one in the
core, spirit of space is that the thing was senile! I had to dump and restart
from the backups again!" She shook her head. "I've taken almost
complete control of Smithy's network now. I am working on revising the archive
and I have security bots scouring the system even as we speak. They kill or isolate
the viruses and shoot Defender and I a list every minute. We should have this
system decontaminated in another shift." She brushed her fingers over her
arm like she was dusting herself off.

"It's
not military grade, but we'll manage," she nodded as she finished.

"Good
to hear. You’re compiling a table database right?"

Sprite
nodded. "It's going in parallel with the security issue, but it is a bit
slower. We should have a handle on the core systems by next shift. Peripherals
are a different story." She shrugged. "Since some of them are
intermittent, and a few are plug-and-play, it is a little harder to
quantify."

“Defender
has the new and improved firewall up so it is helping us keep a log," she
reported.

"I'm
glad someone took a broom to the viruses. I've tried but I was never a natural
programmer," the old man ran his hand through his hair ruefully.
"When I couldn't get Smithy to fix the security suite, he complained to
the Port Admiral and the damn Port Admiral locked me out..." he sighed looking
down then looked up. "I severed the engineering computers and created our
own network here. It has a clone of my personal implant security suite to keep
it clean. I still get some annoyances from people who plug in an infected
peripheral from time to time though." He sighed shaking his head.

"We're
working on it. We started with engineering, it was a lot easier to fix. Now
that the reactor cores have been reworked we can reset the links to the station
command center." Sprite raised her hands and then she and Proteus disappeared
as a station schematic grew in their place. "Areas in red are unoccupied
due to breach or hazard. Areas in yellow have overloaded life support,"
Sprite reported. Most of the occupied decks were shades of yellow.

Irons
sighed. "Yeah, I caught that earlier." He shook his head. The old man
grunted.

"Yes,
I've known for years we've been over taxing our life support. Nothing I can do.
This place isn't a planet. Some of our major imports are activated carbon,
limestone, and calcium carbonate for the life support." He sighed in
frustration clenching and unclenching his hands.

The
Admiral nodded watching him. "Now I know why you aged so fast." He
shook his head as the old man chuckled.

"Yeah,
well, I think the kids had something to do with that too." His daughter
came in and waved.

"Sure,
blame it on us!" she smiled as she kissed her father's grainy cheek.
"Hi pops." She leaned back to look into his eyes.

"Shelby
how are things in engineering?" he asked.

She
grimaced. "Not good, we're still in trouble. Life support on deck eighteen
is out. And the assholes in admin want to cut the life support to the low
income district on any deck below fifteen," she snarled as she sat down.
The Admiral stared.

"Cut
life support to where?" he asked. She shook her head.

"The
low rent district. The scum as they call it." She jerked her thumb up to
indicate the people above. "Never mind that they are people, people who do
the dirty work on the station," she snarled slamming her fist onto the
table. "They made their loot off of them, lord it over them, now they want
to suffocate them!" she snarled.

Irons
shook his head. They had no idea what sort of hornet's nest that would provoke.
Most of the people who were there would become desperate. Desperate people took
insane risks and did stupid things. More rioting was the last thing they
needed.

Her
father looked around. "Honey dial it down, your making a scene," he
whispered urgently. She looked around to the others looking at her and then
visibly tried to get control of her temper.

The
Admiral handed her a cup. "Coffee?" he asked. She looked at it.

"Where
did you..." she asked surprised. Her father chuckled.

"Let's
just say your dear old dad isn't the only one with a magical touch when it
comes to fixing things dear," he chuckled as she stared. She took a wary
sip.

"Oh
wow! Bitter!" she exclaimed. He chuckled and handed her a spoon then a
pair of ceramic ramekins.

"That
is how it is supposed to taste actually. Cream and sugar." He set them
down in front of her. “Now that we've got power I diverted some so we could
keep a clear head.”

"Oh,
don't mind if I do." She helped herself then set the spoon down and took a
sip. "Now that's more like it." She sat back with a satisfied sigh.
Her father patted her arm.

"My
little girl always did have a sweet tooth," Logan said as he chuckled.

“What
the hell is that thing?” Shelby growled looking over her father's shoulder. The
Admiral and Logan turned to see a meter long robotic wasp floating down the
corridor. Enrique the exec had called a meeting in ops.

 “Security
drone,” her father answered watching it warily.

“Security
drone?” his daughter asked. The drone darted back and forth, and then stopped
to hover in front of them. Its optics zoomed in and out. The weapons under the
main body pivoted on actuators, and then pointed away. Fins on its under body
moved back and forth, as did the cylinders serving as wings. “Force emitters?”
Shelby asked softly. A moment later the robot turned and left. They heard
approaching footfalls and turned to see the exec approaching.

“Who
the hell activated that thing?” Shelby waved to the departed drone. “As if we
need crap like that! The power for it to stay flying could power half a deck!”
She snarled. Enrique spread his hands apart helplessly.

“I
had nothing to do with it. Honest. Smithy did it.” He shrugged his shoulders as
his hands dropped to his sides.

“Keep
that thing out of engineering and away from my work parties,” Shelby growled.

“Smithy?”
the Admiral asked softly. He opened a link to the mainframe.

“Sorry
Admiral. Orders,” Smithy responded. He watched as the senile AI tried to throw
up a firewall to lock him out. It fell apart in seconds.

“Conflicting
orders with your charter and core programming.” The Admiral shook his head as
the AI tried to restore the firewall. “You are wasting your time it won’t work.
I am in now,” he waved and the rebuilt firewall dissolved. “You need me
remember?” He looked at the AI avatar. The avatar tried to look away.

“I'm
encoded to him Admiral. As long as he is on the station I am bound to protect
and serve him,” the AI said softly. The Admiral sighed.

“There
isn't room on this station for the two of us you mean?” He meant it only half
joking. He knew his preference.

“Something
like that. At least Sprite has deleted that self destruct command,” the AI
responded.

“Well,
I am not going anywhere until another ship comes into the system. And that may
not be for weeks, or months. Deal with it.” The Admiral gave in to using his
command overrides. Sprite swirled in beside him.

“It
is wise to listen Smithy, he doesn't give second chances often.” She eyed the
AI. “I am still working on repairing your kernel remember?” she asked. The
station AI nodded.

“I
know. I will try to defer things as long as possible.” He swirled out. The
Admiral sighed.

“What?”
Shelby asked, grabbing his arm. He refocused.

“Smithy
is getting paranoid about me and the repairs to the station. He feels we are
both a threat to the Port Admiral.” He shrugged.

“Which
in a way you are, since we are succeeding where he failed. So we can't trust
him.” She shrugged. “I never did anyway.” She looked over to her dad who
nodded. “I guess we stay in engineering then,” she said threading her arm
through her dad's. “Coming?” She turned looking at the Admiral.

Enrique
cleared his throat. “I'll meet you there in a bit,” the Admiral said then waved
for them to go on without him. She studied him for a moment then shrugged.

“Suit
yourself.” She escorted her dad off.

“You
wanted to speak to me about something?” He turned to the Exec.

It
took two weeks of intense effort to get the other five reactors repaired. By
the time they were, the station's fuel supply was down to dregs again despite
an all out effort by the Valdez family. Seven hundred years of mining had
simply stripped the surrounding space of anything usable.

To
keep from over taxing any one reactor each of them were at twenty percent
power. The combination was just enough to keep the station's life support fully
functional.

Without
the threat of doom hanging over their heads most of the station's citizens were
slowly calming down and things were getting back to normal. Irons had no
intention of letting them go back to sitting on their asses for long though.

“We
need more fuel. So, how do we get it?” Shelby sat next to her father in the
conference room. The Admiral had insisted that Logan remain at the head of the
table as head of the station engineering. However Logan made it clear he would
defer to the Admiral's judgment.

The
Admiral shook his head, toying with a stylus. “I take it diplomatic efforts
didn't get anywhere?” he asked looking from one to the other. They both shook
their heads.

“Enrique
tried, but it's hopeless. The Port Admiral has burned the other colonies in
trade agreements so often that they won't do anything even if they did have
fuel to spare,” Shelby replied acidly.

“It's
not just that.” Logan gave his daughter a restraining look then looked at the
Admiral. “You must understand, seven hundred years, the wear on equipment... skills
lost...” He shook his head wearily. “Most of the other colonies are small jury
rigged things, or buried on the moons of the gas giants. They can live
troglodyte and we can't talk to them,” he sighed.

“Did
word of the repairs get out?” the Admiral asked.

“Yes,
most heard an Admiral was responsible and put that with the Port Admiral and
ignored it as propaganda.” Shelby shook her head. She tapped her stylus on the
desk. “Until that jerk is out of here we're stuck with his crap and legacy
hanging around our necks.” She sat back abruptly tossing the stylus down onto
the desk. Several of her fellow assistant engineers nodded or murmured
agreement.

“Trust
me, I think by the time another ship arrives the Port Admiral will be more than
willing to vacate the premises,” Irons replied.

“With
the station repaired?” Shelby asked in disbelief. He smiled.

“Oh
yes. You see, I'm going to have another... let's say chat with Smithy. Juanita
left her proxy with me before she left. I found it in the launch. Sprite and Io
set it up while we were repairing the reactor,” he smiled.

“What
does that have to do with anything?” Shelby asked confused. Her father looked
suddenly relieved.

“Will
it work?” he asked eyes bright. He gave the Admiral an eager look.

“Oh
I think so. You know the Constitution. The amendment on clones and inheritance
is embedded into it. Along with a half a dozen other things the so called Port
Admiral has been forgetting about. We give him a way out and he will jump at
it,” Irons smiled. Shelby shook her head vehemently no.

“Besides,
his clone back up had an unfortunate accident when we lost power. His tissue
samples as well,” Sprite informed him quietly.

“No,
that ass should be tossed out an airlock. Naked. Let him squeal as he sucks
vacuum. He's done it enough to others,” Shelby snarled. Her father shook his
head.

“No.”
He said. She stopped and looked at him with questioning eyes. “The Admiral is
right, we give him a way out he will run. Back him into a corner and he could
do all sorts of things we would regret.” He shook his head. “Without Smithy in
his corner and his guards as his army he will have a fun time out there.” He
waved to indicate the galaxy at large. Shelby suddenly smiled, catching on.