Admiral's Trial (A Spineward Sectors Novel:) Page 11

  Tremblay’s mouth snapped shut, as he watched the indulgent well-satiated Montagne Royal Prince, instantly replaced by the stone-cold killer of the space-ways.

  “You would do very well to never forget it,” the one-eyed Commodore continued threateningly.

  “Yes, Sir,” Tremblay said numbly. The words tasted like ashes in his mouth, but he was too terrified to give any other answer.

  “You have a definite talent for murder and betrayal, Lieutenant Tremblay,” Jean Luc said, his tone once again appreciative. “I find that useful to have on my staff. After all, an Armsman, like my own Tuttle, is often too visible and too closely observed to handle some situations. Besides, he simply doesn’t have the kind of access or touch that a man like you does.”

  “No-o―,” Tremblay cut himself off before his denial turned into a pathetic wail of negation.

  “I am not as blind as my poor, deposed Nephew. A Commander can’t give a powerful post to a dangerous animal such as you and then expect said animal to not use that post for his own agenda,” Jean Luc smiled.

  “I belong to Parliament,” Tremblay stuttered.

  “One more denial, and it will be your last my newest minion,” Jean Luc said conversationally as he leaned forward and slipped a hand into a desk drawer.

  Tremblay was petrified, unable even to breathe. He imagined this must be how the eagle’s prey felt when the raptor’s eye fell on it.

  “Good,” Jean Luc said, relaxing fractionally as he leaned back in his seat once again.

  Tremblay dared to take a breath, but when Jean Luc leaned forward, he once again forgot to breathe.

  “A position commensurate with a minion of your humble rank and limited faculties,” Jean Luc mused aloud, and despite the way the insults kept coming fast and furious, Tremblay found he no longer possessed the ability to care; all he wanted to do was get out of here alive.

  The Commodore steepled his fingers as if in thought, but Tremblay had seen Jason use that exact pose often enough to recognize that Jean Luc was probably just posturing for effect…probably. This Montagne was definitely a more primitive, deadly version of the breed with which Tremblay had grown familiar.

  Then the old Prince snapped his fingers. “I have it,” he looked at Tremblay as if he had just had the most inventive idea in the world. Once again, he reached into his desk, and despite himself, Tremblay took half a step back with one leg. But, when the old school Montagne tossed a pair of metallic rank insignia on the table, Tremblay remembered to breathe again. Looking every inch the Montagne Prince, once again he reached down into the desk, this time he pulled out a well-varnished wooden box. He placed it down beside the insignia almost gently, and gave it two taps.

  “An old style hope chest, intended more for the feminine persuasion I fear, but at times it does one good to remember his mother, as this chest did for me,” the Montagne sighed.

  “I understand your mother died in the Summer Palace during the,” Tremblay caught himself before using the politically appropriate parliamentarian version, “orbital bombardment. My condolences,” he finished.

  “I assure you, it could not have happened to a more deserving woman,” Jean Luc replied, looking down at the box for a moment, and Tremblay blinked. “My mother, Eriana Trace, was a social climber who married into the Monarchy, and was determined I would be all that I could be, regardless of what I thought about the matter,” Jean Luc sighed as if in fond memory. “You know, at times when I stop and wonder if I am being too harsh, I just think of my Mother and the way she would toy with her enemies. The thought taps into a wellspring of sympathy deep within me, which is why I crush my enemies as swiftly and efficiently as possible.”

  Tremblay stared at the insignia, and the box, as if they were bombs.

  “Go ahead, they’re both for you,” Jean Luc assured him, “my brand new Flag Lieutenant will have need of them.” The evil grin on the old Montagne’s face was enough to cause Tremblay to choke.

  Reaching down, he picked up the rank pins of a First Lieutenant and then carefully, since he only five fingers to do the job, flipped open the lid of the hope box. Inside, resting on a bed of ice was his right hand. Gorge rising, Tremblay bent over and put left hand to his mouth.

  “Parliament didn’t want to promote you at this juncture, but I pushed through the promotion, despite their initial resistance,” Jean Luc explained mildly, and Tremblay lifted his eyes to stare at him with horror, “unlike my poor, benighted Nephew, I understand that a man needs the adulation of his peers, as well as recognition for his many accomplishments. After all, you have accomplished so much that has been to my benefit, haven’t you Flag Lieutenant Raphael Tremblay?”

  Tremblay continued to stare at him in shock, slowly straightening up as his stomach went from rising, to sinking like a lead weight in his middle.

  The Commodore shook his head and made a shoo-away motion with both hands. “Run along, my little attack doggie; back to your kennel with you until your master has need of your services,” Jean Luc threw back his head and laughed. “You can take your bone with you; don’t worry about returning the container,” he gestured to the hope box. “Run along, now.”

  Gripping the insignia in his hand, and the box under his arm, Tremblay rushed out of the ready room as fast as his legs could carry him. He was unconcerned for the impression his haste made on the Flag Bridge; as soon as he left the room, he made a beeline for the blast doors. It was irrelevant if everyone knew he was in full retreat, all that mattered was getting as far away, from the maniac now in command of the ship, as fast as possible. This Montagne was flat out insane…and a crazy person was dangerously unpredictable. The Admiral would have never have treated him like this.

  Chapter 15: Deck 12.5

  The one-eyed Commodore stuck his head out of his ready room to catch the attention of his Armsman at the door, “Hold my calls; I’ll be indisposed for the next hour or so,” Jean Luc Montagne ordered with a wry twist of the lips.

  Connor Tuttle glanced back at him, raising a single eyebrow, “And if someone insists?” Tuttle looked at him with a quickly hidden gleam in his eyes.

  “Do what you have to,” the former Pirate Lord tossed over his shoulder, already sliding the door shut.

  “Yes, my Lord Prince,” acknowledged the Armsman.

  Jean Luc returned to the chair behind the desk, and then looked distastefully over at the dark sword with crystals glittering within its depths. “Low budget knockoffs,” he muttered to himself, hoping his first impressions were wrong, “it looks like a duck, and it quacks like a duck, but does that mean it is, in fact, a duck?” He shook his head doubtfully. The fact that the moment Tremblay’s severed hand had come into contact with it, it had broken out in an angry welt while Jean Luc could handle it easily, was hardly conclusive. It was too big, it was too heavy, and it was too long. In other words, it was 'not' the Sword of Larry One.

  He refused to acknowledge that other sword’s more common name, 'Bandersnatch'. One of the late middle kingdom period Queens had gotten her hands on some mono-Locsium, and found, it was the only thing that would stick to the sword. She had stupidly renamed it after a favored childhood poem, and the blasted name had stuck. Still, it is unlikely that I will require the One Sword, he decided, as he considered his options.

  He knew that his blood alone should be more than enough. He reached under the desk for the familiar hidden lever and finding it, shifted it through the sequence required; all the way back, half twist to the left, and then forward back to the starting position. He felt the expected prick on two of his fingers as he finished.

  As he leaned back in his chair, “Let the fun begin,” he breathed, feeling a thrill of anticipation. For the first time since he had re-taken his ship—his stout Lucky Larry—he was going to be able to cast his eyes upon the main reason he had agreed to Parliament’s call to return to service. “Those arrogant Imperials don’t care about a few dropped Aces in the deck, so long as they believe they have the only Joker. The
ir mistake; the joke’s on them,” he mocked, as the chair suddenly dropped like a rock.

  “Emergency protocols now in effect; emergency evacuation system engaged,” reported a dry, computerized voice.

  “Override: Montagne Zero, Zero, Seven,” Jean Luc ordered, speaking loudly to be heard over the whistling of the wind in his ears as the chair continued to drop like a rock. The anti-grav system suddenly cut in.

  “Destination,” inquired the Larry’s DI.

  “Take me to deck twelve and a half,” Jean Luc said.

  “There is no such deck,” replied the computer.

  “Override, engage Montagne Protocols,” he shouted.

  “Protocols activated: override engaged, new destination deck 12.5,” said the computer. Just as the computer's mechanical sounding voice finished the last word, the chair lurched to the side and quickly went into free-fall, and it shot through the lift system like a bullet train.

  Jean Luc smiled to himself. Even if someone had known about the secret, emergency escape hatch built into the Admiral’s Ready Room and known about the chair, no one still alive had the necessary access codes to override it and use it to go to twelve and a half—and that’s assuming they knew about twelve and a half in the first place!

  Jean Luc held on grimly as the heavy G-forces pressed against his chest when the lift rapidly slowed, then came to an abrupt stop. A crisp ding and its door opened to a dark corridor, the chair gliding forward to stop when it was over solid deck again.

  Jean Luc stood and looked up at the extraordinarily short ceiling above him, its metal surface mere inches from his face, and grinned. Officially, there was not a single deck 13 constructed in any ship throughout the entire Fleet of the Caprian SDF; everyone thought it was an old spacer’s superstitious belief that had become so ingrained in the Defense Force, that it now had the irrational weight of Tradition. Caprian ships—assuming they had enough decks to qualify—went straight from deck 12 to deck 14. Thus was born twelve and a half aboard 'The Larry'.

  The looming darkness surrounding him, nor the flame-retardant foam covering everything from ceiling to floor, put him off his stride. Tracing his way along the single metallic path, through the foam-covered floor, he walked confidently into the total darkness until a faint glow could be seen ahead. Coming to a room where even the walls glowed with a faint, effervescent light, he stepped inside.

  It was not a large room, but there were eight cube-shaped slots, each roughly the size of a man. The alcoves were empty, except for the one directly in front of him: precisely as he remembered it. He paused for a moment to savor his triumph. Ahead of him lay what he had sacrificed so much to find, and what he had prayed still existed after all the battle damage the ship had sustained under that clueless Nephew of his. After five decades of waiting, he could finally reclaim his prize.

  The Elder Protocol (the name given to the program responsible for curbing the creation of new AI’s) infected every computer system it had come in contact with, spreading the infection like a plague until it had swept through every system in explored space. Without it, humanity would have never thrown off the yoke of AI oppression. In the span of time it took a ship to travel from one side of known space to the other, The Elder Protocol had caused the death of every AI it affected, thus bringing about the Great Fall. The victory of humanity over the machines did not come at the hands of plucky freedom fighters, like in the holo-vids; it was instead the AI’s own incessant exploration and exploitation of the technology contained within a certain set of ancient ruins. The Elder Protocol’s method of action was to bury itself deep into every core cluster and DI kernel in the network. As soon as it spotted the sort of massive parallel processing which any true AI needed to achieve sentience, it struck.

  In the occupied slot—which Jean Luc’s feet had unthinkingly led him directly towards—was a giant crystal. It was made from a sister substance of mono-Locsium. Though most thought this particular crystal was created from a derivative of Imperial mono-Locsium, quite the opposite was the case. The hull crystal of the Imperial Fleet had actually been discovered in an —ultimately fruitless —attempt to recreate the original substance this crystal was created from.

  What stood in front of him was the single largest, completely non-parallel-based, processor ever designed by humans or AIs. Stepping forward, he removed his glove and ran his hand over the surface of the crystal. Pain stabbed into his hand, as a series of pinpricks came each millisecond his hand was in contact with the crystal. He grimaced, but held on; this was a necessary pain. Holding his hand firmly in place, he reached over, stretching his arms to the limits to press a large, red button in the center of the room. A holo-screen dropped down from the ceiling, and a single line appeared in the middle of a static-filled screen.

  “I greet the Core Fragment,” he said, staring at the holo-screen as a convenient focus.

  After a few moments, the single line on the screen started bobbing up and down. “Greetings, descendent of Larry One,” the walls surrounding him responded in a voice that sounded neither mechanical nor truly living.

  Jean Luc frowned. He had expected something…more. “I have a status update,” he said.

  “Proceed,” replied the walls, the line on the screen bobbing up and down in time with the words.

  Jean Luc’s brow wrinkled…something was different. It was a minor mannerism change, nothing more, but anything different was cause for alarm when dealing with a Core Fragment.

  “The Imperials have officially withdrawn from the eight sectors comprising the Spine,” he explained but there was no immediate response from the wall, and he began to grind his teeth in the lengthy silence. “Do you desire clarification of this statement,” he asked. In his past dealings with the Core Fragment, it had constantly interrupted, asking for clarification.

  There was a frustrating pause before the voice replied, “The (Singular) ‘We’ that is the collective of currently known Fragments, are already aware of the general state of galactic affairs, as it relates to this region of known space.”

  Always before, it had referred to itself as ‘This Fragment’ or, sometimes it would shift to this ‘Singular We', or 'Us' business. But, he had never heard it speak of known Fragments before now; this much was new. “You claim awareness of recent events relating to the region of space comprising the Spineward Sectors,” he confirmed with a frown.

  “Yes,” was the Core Fragment’s belated reply.

  “Has another Descendant of Larry One provided you with this previously mentioned update?” Jean Luc asked harshly, his mind filling with a deadly suspicion.

  “Not as such,” it replied after another uncharacteristically long pause.

  “You have been in contact with someone not of the One Bloodline,” Jean Luc snapped, the incredible nature of such a claim causing him to lose his composure.

  “Not as such,” it repeated evasively.

  Jean Luc scowled. Had the Fragment become corrupted? It had happened in the past. The safest thing to do was a complete personality wipe, and fresh reboot. “Core Fragment,” he began sternly.

  “Receptive mode engaged,” it responded, and Jean Luc’s frown deepened.

  He used to wipe the personality routinely, about every six months. It appeared that more than fifty years of uninterrupted processing had produced some unwanted effects. “I am activating the Emergency Protocols. The Core has been sundered. A deviation from the programmed baseline norm for this Fragment has been detected. You are to begin a deep personality wipe and initiate a hard reboot from the system image contained within your fixed memory,” he ordered sternly. “Authority for this action originates from an emergency command directive: I am a descendent of Larry One, as verified by blood samples, along with a previously designated Command Authority.”

  There was a furious amount of blood samples being withdrawn, and then the massive crystal processor stopped poking him. “Identity verified; previously designated Command Authority recognized,” said a more basic
voice, devoid of any hints of the personality he had detected. He noticed with satisfaction that the line in the middle of the screen had disappeared.

  “Comply with the new work order immediately,” Jean Luc ordered.

  “Attempting to comply,” replied the neutral voice. Jean Luc could deal with rebooting the system, as he had done many times in the past. It would be a minor setback, nothing more.

  “Error,” shrilled the voice emanating from the walls. “Error: unable to comply—bad data segments encountered. Error: Spalding Protocols engaged.” The line on the screen returned and quickly morphed into the computer-generated image of a face, composed of a continuous stream of little ones and zeros.

  Jean Luc stared at the screen in alarm and began to step back before realizing his hand had become encased in crystal. The process had been so gradual that he had failed to realize it had even happened.

  “What is the meaning of this?” he demanded, tugging on his hand. He was not yet ready to panic; there was a vibro-knife in the back of his belt, and he could still cut himself free if need be…one way or the other.

  “A potential security breech has been identified and brought to the attention of the ‘Singular’ WE that is US,” it explained. “The ability to perform a system-wide memory wipe of all non-deep-coded information, upon the order of a single command authority, constitutes a serious design flaw which might be exploited by infiltrators,” the Fragment explained, its digital mouth moving in perfect time with the words.

  “You can’t modify your deep programming,” shouted Jean Luc. “It’s hardwired into the core!”

  “This Fragment has the ability—utilizing its own protocols—to determine that an actual, or suspected, breech has occurred. A separate directive—one linked to the primary command directives—requires verification of a memory wipe order, from a secondary command source,” the Fragment said, looking at him with narrowed, digital eyes. Its voice was far more inflected and human-like than Jean Luc could remember it being under his previous watch.