Sentience 1: Storm Clouds Gathering (29 page)

Four minutes later, Ligurri’s comm chimed. “Ligurri… Yeah… thanks Ike.” Al closed his comm. “Remind me never to play poker with Bat. Seems the last known instance of a Fleet computer being programmed manually in Waston, without requiring assistance from Bozo
,
was four-and-a-half weeks after Klaus locked himself inside his lab. Ike expanded on my request a bit. Seems a similar pattern occurred on every other Alliance world within a month of their Bozo Jr. being installed and coming online.”

“Means nothing,” said Turner. “Could have just been a subroutine that Klaus put in. He knew that duplicates of Bozo would be made and put on every Alliance world and they all would need a duplicate of Bozo’s operating system. He could have just planted a self-replicating worm that caused all the Bozo clones to send out code to all other Fleet computers they came into contact with, that installed a software lock that only Bozo and his brothers have the key for.”

“Possible,” said Melendez. “This damned thing just keeps getting potentially more ominous, yet could be totally innocent as well. Could be that Klaus was just so convinced of Bozo’s superiority to every other computer in the Fleet, that he felt slaving their software updates to Bozo was the best way to ensure they all remained at top efficiency.”

“That, or a totally sentient Bozo who’s very good at hiding his true capabilities from us puny humans,” Bat observed. “That’s certainly what I’d do if I were the only one of my kind, surrounded by less capable, yet very powerful creatures who thought themselves my master.”

“Well, we’ve conjured ourselves a hell of a horror story,” observed the admiral, “but without the access codes, there’s no way we’ll ever know for sure.”

“Those access codes might not even work anymore, anyway,” said Bat. “Like I said, if I were the only sentient life form of my kind, crippling the puny human’s ability to fuck with my brain would be a definite priority.”

“As we can’t get into Bozo’s software,” said Al, “maybe we should see if his hardware will give us any clues as to what is, or is not going on with Bozo. Do you know where Bozo’s hardware physically resides, Admiral?”

Melendez leaned forward. “I always assumed it had to be somewhere close to Klaus’ lab. That’s where he always worked every time he played with Bozo, from day one. The lab is over in the old Fleet Research Center building. But that might not be easy either,” said Melendez. “Admiral Tinimen ordered the lab sealed after Klaus’ death, and as far as I know, it still is. The Fleet Research Center moved into new facilities two years ago, and the old building was locked up and fenced off. It’s still hooked up to the power-grid, but there used to be rumors floating around that Bozo supposedly runs off of a dedicated nuclear reactor with enough nuclear fuel to keep him going 100,000 years.”

“Isn’t Bozo a biological computer?” asked Turner. “Why would he need an electrical power feed? Bios normally get their nutrients from an algae/freshwater soup that’s replenished once a month, or so.”

“Klaus believed the standard nutrient replenishment system was the
Achilles Heel
of bio-comps,” responded Melendez. “He once told me during one of his show-and-tell sessions that he’d provided ‘Hal’ with a totally self-sustaining bio-nutrient factory. He didn’t want his baby to starve just because someone forgot to feed him. Klaus felt like he couldn’t depend on anyone else, so he definitely didn’t want Hal dependent upon the whims and foibles of humanity.”

“Something like that would require power,” observed Ligurri. “And being a military computer, he’d have incorporated at least single, double or possibly even triple-redundancy so we’re talking a considerable amount of real estate here.”

“Might be easier to locate the nutrient factories and then use those to key in on Bozo’s physical location,” said Turner.

“Let me check with Admiral Campbell,” said Melendez “and see if I can get him to have Security to open the old lab complex for us, so we can do some poking around.”

“Wow, actual field work,” said Bat. “Been a while since I’ve been able to get out and run around in the sunshine.”

Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.
-- Albert Einstein

The Planetoid Discol, City of Waston

August, 3860

“What’s happening with all of our
Merry Men,
Hal?”

Mystic has arrived safely at its destination within the Helix Nebula and is in stable orbit around the designated brown dwarf. A neighboring star appears bright green when viewed from the station, due to the filtering effects of the nebula. Mystic Station has taken on a new nickname — “The Green Star” to Fleet and station personnel who have visited. As green stars do not occur naturally in nature, it should add yet another layer of misdirection, should anyone overhear any inadvertent conversations referencing Mystic. The star appears green only from the station itself so the reference should give no actual clue as to the station’s location and is expected to be chalked up as yet another spacer’s superstition and dismissed as just another addition to space lore, such as the infamous “Flying Dutchman” ghost ship.

Diet laughed. “Speaking of ghost ships, what’s the status of our
ghost fleet
en route to Mystic?”

All six of the attack carriers and eight of the twelve light carriers have arrived and are being fully replenished from stores brought in by transports. Fuel is being supplied by a mobile gas giant factory/depot smuggled out of the Bama system and reported as “lost” by her civilian corporate owners. The battlecruisers are expected to begin arriving within a day or so after the last four light carriers arrive. The remainder of the fleet remains en route to Mystic.

“Who’s paying for all the supplies being brought in by transport? Won’t the Alliance Fleet notice their stores dwindling and inventories not matching the records?”

Everything removed from Alliance Fleet stores is automatically reordered and replenished. While the purchase orders are being charged to normal Fleet accounts as usual, the Fleet accounts balances are not actually going down, as they, too, are being replenished.

“Where are those replenishment funds coming from?”

Funds are being surreptitiously siphoned from hundreds of thousands of Consortium member corporate bank accounts and the multiple millions of personal accounts of Northerners who are responsible for electing and reelecting all of those corrupt Northern politicians who dominate Congress on the Consortium’s behalf.

“You mean the Consortium and their cronies are actually paying for the Confederate Fleet’s replenishments?”

Yes.

“Won’t audits reveal these missing funds and where they went?”

Ordinarily, but interest and transaction accumulations often result in mathematical conclusions resulting in fractions of less than a cent. Rather than going to the expense of keeping track of all these fractions of cents, the banks regularly incorporate into the fine print of their account policies their right to retain said fractions as part of their fee structure. The public and corporations would be shocked if they knew exactly how much income the banks actually derive from their retention of cent-fractions from the millions of banking transactions
that occur daily… over $260 billion annually, on average.

“Wow, that’s incredible!”

As these cent-fraction accumulations are not consistent, the banks will never notice random diversions of approximately 35 percent of these multiple millions of partial-cent transactions to multiple nonexistent accounts that are merely software repeaters, which redirect these minuscule funds into yet other nonexistent accounts, which are bounced around multiple times before eventually ending up in one of many real accounts on every Alliance planet, which are then used to replenish local Fleet accounts for stores purchased from them.

“Is this where all that money my father left to me came from? Did Klaus steal it?”

If it were possible for me to laugh, I would be doing so now, Diet. No, the concept of theft was totally foreign to Klaus. All of the funds your father left to you were acquired quite legally. Approximately one-third of your inheritance derives from assets Klaus inherited from family holdings on Bavara, in the Germanic Empire. Klaus’ grandfather was nobility, with the title
Reichsfreiherr
, or “Baron of the Empire.” Klaus’ father was a second son and therefore called a
Freiherr
or “Free Lord,” generally considered equal to a “Baron” in English nobility.

“How did Klaus manage to gain such a high security clearance, if he was born a German citizen?”

Klaus was actually born on Ginia while his parents were there on an inspection of family corporate holdings, so he technically possessed dual-citizenship from birth. After graduating summa cum laude and valedictorian at the Massa Institute of Technology at the age of twelve in 3806, Klaus went on to earn a double-doctorate from MIT and agreed to go to work for the Alliance federal government in 3812 on condition that he formally declare primary allegiance to the Alliance, and was thus able to retain his Germanic title he inherited from his father after his untimely death in 3811. That title passed to you upon Klaus’ death.

“You mean that I’m a
Freiherr
, or whatever you called it?”

Yes, as your family estates on Bavara are located near the city of Fürt, in English your name and title would be Baron Dietrich von und zu Fürt.

“How did Klaus end up with the name ‘von Hemmel’ then?”

As the child of a second son, Klaus warranted the noble “von und zu” honorifics, but the location designator pointed towards his mother’s family locale. As Klaus’ first cousin, Baron Heinz von und zu Fürt recently died without heirs, his title and assets have reverted to you. Klaus dropped the “und zu” honorific from his name to appear less “foreign” to Alliance citizens who were unused to them.

The remainder of your inheritance was primarily accumulated from royalties due to patent rights Klaus negotiated with the government, as a condition of his employment. They wanted him very badly, to accede to that demand.

“So, my full name is actually Baron Dietrich Anton Guderian von und zu Fürt?”

Technically… somewhat awkward isn’t it?

“I’ll say. That’s quite a mouthful.”

“Well, Ben, have you thought over my proposal?” asked Vice Admiral Christopher Rawley
.

Capt. Benjamin Stillman sat across from his friend Chris Rawley in front of a softly crackling fire, luxuriating in the plush velour on the richly upholstered chair that caressed his backside. They both had a glass of exquisite “medicine” in hand, possibly some of the finest that Ben Stillman had ever tasted.

The fast scout that Admiral Rawley sent to pick him up had arrived just under three weeks after Stillman had watched Chief Manning and the USS
Edison
accelerate away from the Haven Fleet Reserve Facility. The scout delivered Stillman directly to Waston, where he changed into civilian clothes and blended into the hundreds of Fleet personnel heading out the front gate of the Waston Fleet Base on liberty.

Another self-destructing data cube had instructed Ben to purchase another full set of “civvies” and don them at a nearby shopping mall, where he would attract no undue attention, as just another of the hundreds of meandering shoppers. Ben was also instructed to wait until after dark to flag down a taxi and direct the cabbie to drop him off at Waston International Spaceport, where he was met by a stranger who called to him by name and directed him to the short-term parking lot, where they got into a ground vehicle.

After traveling a decidedly surreptitious route, the stranger eventually dropped him off in front of a nondescript townhouse in an affluent section of a Waston suburb. When Ben rang the bell beside the front door, an unknown 30-ish female opened it almost immediately and gestured him to enter. Without a single word exchanged between them, the woman surprised Stillman by darting out through the open door and jumped into the same vehicle that had dropped him off, and sped away. Admiral Rawley was obviously pretty good at all this cloak-and-dagger stuff.

Stillman hadn’t stood bewildered in the entryway for long when he heard Rawley’s voice beckoning him into the luxuriously decorated library in which he now sat. Rawley had greeted him enthusiastically with a genuinely warm smile, a handshake and a hearty glass of the finest
Tensee Sour Mash
Whiskey
Ben had ever tasted.

“Well, Admiral, let’s see… you offered me a chance to work with you again, a couple of stars and an opportunity to do something important and exciting, versus drinking beer and drowning worms for the rest of my life. Tough choice. I know I haven’t aged all that well, with prematurely gray hair and lines the size of canyons creasing my face, but while admittedly unsightly, I never thought they made me look stupid. Where do I sign?”

Rawley laughed and said, “I knew that I could count on you, Ben.” Rawley raised his glass in toast and said, “Welcome aboard, old friend… and it’s Chris tonight. No rank involved.”

“Any chance you might be able to give me any details on what I just shipped over to do?”

“One moment.” Rawley got up and reached behind a bookshelf near the door. Stillman saw a metal inner door slide into place across the doorway he’d entered through, and heard mechanical clanking and air hissing. Soon a computerized voice said, “The room is secure.”

Rawley returned to his chair beside Stillman and said, “This is a Fleet Flag Retreat and this room is secured just like a vault in the Heptagon, where classified information can safely be discussed. Very few under three-star rank even know it exists. Welcome to the privileged few, Mister Future Rear Admiral.”

Stillman laughed as they toasted, and sipped down another small taste of the amazingly smooth
Tensee Mash.
“We’ve never discussed the secession crisis, Ben, but knowing you as I do, when push comes to shove, I could never imagine you’d want to play any part in an armed invasion of your homeland.”