New Neighbors
Chapter 22
Nick Jones was really missing Kate. He had gotten used to having her around; she reminded him of his daughter Cathy who was still back in the Sol system. He had retired from the Navy and had been recruited by Ted Smith just two days before his separation was complete. He had left without even saying good-bye to his family. Stuck here in the Alpha system he would never see his daughter or his grandkids unless he could somehow convince them to settle here with him. Jones' thoughts were interrupted by another intrusion alert. It appeared that "the bugs and lizards" were trying again to enter the system. Why didn't they learn that their presents wasn't wanted or needed? Jones had an idea, maybe this time they could capture the invading ship and use it to their own advantage. So, he issued the order to try and capture this invader without destroying the ship.
It wasn't easy but they managed to capture the invading ship with minimal damage, the crew was another story. They had captured another SuLak clone, that made 15 they had now. Jones received a message from Amy telling about the battle for the PDF system and the promotion of Ted to "acting Admiral". Included in the message was a request, Amy never told anyone what to do - she asked, for Jones and Thomas, in the Sol system, to try and come up with a way to sneak some beacons into the home system of the Iberians and the Empire.
With the recently captured ship it should be a little easier to sneak into the systems. It would help if they could recruit more people from Earth to help settle this system, thereby freeing up some of the people that were used to being in space to man the front lines. Jones relayed the message and his idea to Nightwalker and Thomas for their thoughts on the matter.
Back on Mars Nate Thomas was just sitting down to eat dinner with his daughter Cindy when the messages came in. After reading the messages he handed them to Cindy to read. Cindy had been able to take advantage of the rapid learning offered after the technique was altered to work on people that had less Progenitor DNA. She was now about to graduate from flight school as a pilot. She had also been studying the history of the Progenitors in depth on her own. Cindy read the messages from both Amy and Jones, and then asked her father if he minded if she made a suggestion. He told her that her suggestions were always welcomed. Cindy told him that she thought that she remembered something from the history studies she had done but wanted to recheck what she thought she remembered.
After they finished their meal Thomas went back to his office to work on Amy's request and Cindy started to dig into the history looking for the information she remembered. She found what she was looking for in the files of the original crew of AL. Even though SuLak had been a last minute replacement he was still subjected to a complete physical and psychological profile during the trip to this system. The records didn't show that he had been confirmed dead, just the assumption. His psychological profile was very informative, at least to Cindy, in that it implied that SuLak had been borderline schizophrenic or maybe had multiple personalities. She re-read the report of the explosion that had been assumed to have resulted in SuLak's death. From these reports she was able to estimate the course he had been on when his ship exploded. It should have exploded close to the moon Phoebus, maybe there was something there nobody had looked closely.
The next morning Cindy graduated from flight school and was assigned to a research team as a pilot. Cindy asked for and was granted a chance to fly her new ship to get acquainted with the way it handled. As soon a she took off she headed for Phoebus to check out her theory that there might be crash remains there. As she approached the moon she started an intense scan of the surface. She was almost out of time when the scanner showed something it couldn't identify. Cindy took a chance and landed close to the object. It appeared to be some type of metal box with traces of organic material in the area. She dispatched a drone to retrieve the box and to obtain a sample of the organic material. Once the drone returned she took off back to base, she was late.
Later that night Cindy contacted Sally on the moon. They had become friends and it was Sally who had gotten Cindy interested in flying. With the new communication setup they were able to talk in real time without a problem, and see each other at the same time. Cindy explained her theory and what she had found. She wanted Sally's help in getting the box and material analyzed without many people being involved. Sally added her brother into the conversation and the three of them agreed that John would take care of getting the box and organic material analyzed.
It had been John's idea to have a copy of AL's old database stored here on Mars before the ship left for PDF space. Now that database would be put to some real use. The present AI for the base had access to this database but had not seen any reason to access it yet. But only by having the AI access the database was John able to identify the box and the organic material. The box was an old personal recorder that had been used by the Empire when AL first came to the Sol system and the organic material matched the genetic profile for SuLak. John examined the box himself and found that it had no power, this wasn't a surprise. The surprise came when John applied power to the box, it started a playback of it's contents. At first John couldn't understand any of the data, then the AI said that it was a very old dialect from the Empire and it would try and translate, but it would take some time. John contacted Cindy and told her what he had found so far.
Cindy asked if she could have access to the old database and was told that anybody on the network could access it if they knew where to look and what to look for, all she had to do was ask. John also told her that a lot of the database had not been translated into English though. Cindy worked her way into the old database and found that she could understand most of it. She now had a chance to read the real reports instead of the cleaned-up version she had been studying. The differences were subtle at first, just a difference in the way things were worded. Then she made a discovery, SuLak was related to Tuvok! at least on a genetic level. The records showed that Tuvok was telepathic, but this information had been kept from public knowledge. She also found that there was evidence that SuLak had tried to access parts of the database that were off-limits to him.
Cindy called John and Sally and asked if there was anyway possible for the three of them to meet in person. Sally said she had a week's leave she needed to take and that she would come to Mars in the next day or two. After they finished their conversation Cindy went to bed.
John had an idea that he wanted to try, he went to the main computer core. He asked the AI to use a projection so he could see who he was talking to, instead of talking to thin air. When the projection came on it was surprising, it looked just like him. John asked about this and the AI said it had reviewed the records since John joined Amy and Jake and that it had decided that he would be a good model to use for it's own avatar, if John didn't mind. John asked that the AI make a few changes so he wasn't talking to himself. After the changes John started in with his questions and theories.
It was two days later when Sally, John, and Cindy got to meet face to face. John told the two girls what the AI had found from the recorder, most was personal stuff. But, close to the end of the usable data there were several references to coordinates that the AI didn't understand. When John showed the coordinates Cindy and Sally both recognized that they were space coordinates but were in reverse order. John said he had another surprise for them and maybe for the rest of the people too. He and the AI had worked out a plan, or theory, to interconnect all of the AIs together. If this worked then the three of them could "talk" directly to AL and have AL interpret the data also.
John had his AI try and contact AL, the connection was unstable at first but as both AIs worked from their ends it became clear. AL said that he didn't recognize the coordinates and could not find them even in his old database. Sally asked AL to reverse the coordinates and check again. This time AL, and the Mars AI, both came to the same conclusion - the coordinates were in the Empire's home system but even allowing for time and spatial drift they didn't make sense. Sally asked if it was possible to include Jake and Amy in this conversation, it would involve waking both of them up AL said. It was decided that AL would record this and play it back for Amy and Jake later.
The three humans and the two AIs talked for several hours before ending the conversation. AL asked if the connection between the two AIs could be kept open and John said that he thought it would stay open on a permanent basis and that he wanted all the AIs to be connected together as soon as possible. With this type connection it would cut down on changes being delayed between AI upgrades. AL and Marcie, as the Mars AI now called itself, said they would work on connecting the other major AIs one at a time and would notify John when all were connected. John told them to include Cal and Carol first, then add the space docks. It was a few minutes later when Marcie notified John that Cal, Carol, and the space docks in Sol, Alpha, and the two in PDF space were all interconnected. Marcie also suggested that the core on Mars be expanded to act as the main hub for all of the AIs. Since John was the one responsible for the computers he agreed, he also said that for the time being the AIs were not to reveal this new connection to their users, until Amy approved. Marcie immediately acknowledged for all the AIs, except AL who would make sure Amy was notified as soon as possible.
When Amy woke up she noticed the message-waiting light flashing on her terminal, the message was that John had called and left a message with AL. Amy was a little surprised when AL rang for entry just as she finished reading the message. AL explained what had transpired during the night and what had been accomplished as far as the interconnection of all the major AIs. AL suggested that for the time being that the ships not be included in this connection until it was determined to be secure and functional. Amy agreed and asked that Jake, Kate, and Ted be brought up to speed as quickly as possible. Amy was still trying to adjust to the fact that AL now stayed in avatar form the majority of the time. But she suggested that AL increase the rank insignia to that of Commander, and asked that each of the AI avatars wear that rank. Amy asked if the new connection enabled her to communicate with the AIs directly, instead of tying up ALs resources and the Comm. channels? AL told her that she, or anyone she authorized, could "talk" with any AI that was connected. Amy called Marcie and welcomed her to the crew and asked that a conference be setup for later to include John, Sally, and Cindy in addition to the command staff. Amy also gave permission for the three of them to have access to the connection at any time in addition to the command staff.
The conference was setup for 2100 local time, 1300 for John and the girls. Jake, Kate, Ted, Amy, and AL were the only ones to attend the conference on their side of the galaxy, John, Sally, Cindy, and Marcie attended from Sol sector. Amy asked that Jones be included, it took a few minutes but Jones was added to the conference. John, Marcie and AL explained the new connections between major AIs to everyone again. Jones reported that he had an intact Iberian ship in his procession and that he thought that it could be used to sneak drones into the Iberian system. It was decided that the Iberian ship was to be placed in a secure bay of the space dock and that the dock AI was to try and gain access to the ships computer and download all information. Special attention to any access codes and communication codes. When Jones reported that the captain of that ship was in a detention cell this gave Jake an idea. Jake suggested that they see if it was possible to create a realistic hologram of the captain in case they were challenged. AL and Marcie said they would work with the dock AI to do so. Next Ted and Kate asked if their ships could be added to the connection of AIs. Amy agreed but with the stipulation that the AIs had to have an avatar form and that the news of the connection was not for common knowledge, restricted to Kate, Ted, and the AIs only. Amy also suggested that Kate and Ted name their own AIs and assign the avatars to a specific function on the ship, as far as the crews were concerned, and that the avatars display the rank of Commander.
Amy asked if there had been any further theories as to the meaning of the coordinates found on SuLak's recorder. AL and Marcie both agreed that the location was not found in the original database. Ted suggested that they send a cloaked probe to those coordinates to see what, if anything, was there. Amy told him to do so but to be very careful since if the drone was discovered it could tip their hand. Cindy requested that she be allowed to inform her dad of what was going on. Amy told her that she could tell her dad that communications had been improved again, but not the specifics of how.
Marcie reported that the space dock AI had suggested that instead of a hologram of the old captain, they replace the present computer with an AI. That way the AI could just alter it's own avatar to look like the captain; and with a full psych scan the AI could even act like the replaced captain. It was decided to follow up on this suggestion and to include the new AI in the secret interconnection of AIs. That way there would be instant communication of anything that happened. With these things settled the meeting broke up.