InterstellarNet: New Order by Edward M. Lerner

Author:Edward M. Lerner [Lerner, Edward M.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Science Fiction, Alien Contact, Action & Adventure
ISBN: 9781936771691
Google: uU1ACgAAQBAJ
Publisher: FoxAcre Press
Published: 2010-09-01T04:00:00+00:00

Corridor sensors revealed a guard detachment approaching Mashkith’s cabin. They marched briskly for Hunters, not that the prisoner had any difficulty keeping up. His summons had been curt and snarled—he meant for her to be rattled by the guards’ tension. Still, a glimpse of the ka coughing and fumbling with her breather mask made Mashkith truly angry at the soldiers. Denying her a few seconds to adjust her equipment had been needlessly cruel.

There was a timorous tapping on the hatch. “Authorization to enter.” The escorts wasted no time in leaving him alone with K’choi Gwu ka.

“Foremost.” She was hoarse from fumes leaking under her mask.

Talons already half-extended from his hands and feet emerged further. He curled back his lips, baring teeth. “Your mockery of respect for me.”

She did not flinch. “I do not understand.”

“A lie! Unauthorized message from Victorious to Earth. Unauthorized frequency.”

She stretched to her full height. “If you refer to an InterstellarNet message, it was authorized by the ka of this mission.”

“Your admission of defiance and disrespect!”

“It was a matter of duty to the Unity. Whatever the consequences.”

“Consequences certain—despite the failure of your attempt.” At Mashkith’s thought, the holo display flipped from Jupiter to multicolored schematics. Green threads brightened: the ship’s original systems. She would surely recognize those. Red icons sparkled: symbols for biocomp nodes. Those should be familiar from recently reviewing the humans’ antimatter transfer design. The image zoomed in on primary communications.

“Security overlay. Protection against rogue messaging, its implementation immediately after our takeover.” With an arm stretched into the hologram, he indicated a knot of red beside the main external antenna. At his thought, the tangle flared blindingly crimson. Faster than the red light ebbed to normal levels, the antenna became a faint shadow. Inert. “Power cutoff upon detection of your unauthorized signal. Your mutiny a failure.”

“Those whom I serve are prisoners, not your crew.” She trembled, but did not back down. “We oppose, Foremost, we do not mutiny. We will continue to oppose, as best we can.”

To have maintained for so long the will to resist … she was worthy of his esteem. “Failure, regardless. Punishment for the attempt.”

“That is for you to decide.” Her tremor worsened.

The display viewpoint panned back to encompass the full schematic, even as the diagram compressed itself into a corner of the holo. Into the emptied region he streamed real-time 3-V from sites across the ship. Each scene showed a Hunter cadre waiting before an open panel. “Authorization to continue,” he said. In Mashkith’s peripheral vision, the ka winced as work crews slashed and severed photonics equipment. Green inter-subsystem links disappeared from the schematic as the procedure continued.

Mashkith knew she would never admit to using the long-withheld Unity credits as bait. That was what the money had been—a lure to entice him into awakening the ship’s dormant AI. Its restoration had been temporary only in his thinking. Perhaps no action less drastic than destruction of the ship could expunge that AI now. The partitioning he had just ordered would at least hamper it.

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