Adventures of the Starship Satori 4: No Plan Survives Contact (3 page)

C
harline looked
down as her console beeped. A string of characters appeared on the screen, continuing to scroll in a steady stream. She tapped her keyboard, looking to interrupt the mess. Windows popped open in a series of flashes across her console, closing down almost as quickly.

"Shit!" she said. "Dan, get us out of here. We're being hacked!"

Whatever was over there - she had to assume this was coming from the satellite closing on them - it was doing a number on the computer. Literally eating each file as quickly as it scanned them. Read, delete; read delete. The process kept going and there seemed to be nothing she could do to stop it.

Her fingers flashed over the keyboard, trying to throw up firewall protocols to block the hack. Nothing was working. It was blowing through 128-bit encryption like it wasn't even there. That shouldn't be possible without one hell of a supercomputer. Who would put something like that on a satellite?

Someone who had computers way better than humanity did, maybe. Someone for whom that sort of data processing was insignificant. "Shit! Why aren't we moving?"

"I've lost drive controls," Dan said. His voice sounded grim. "And look, there goes the cloaking device. No wormhole control either. Railguns...ditto. We're dead in the water out here."

"Majel, can you stop them?" Charline asked.

"The ship's systems are being attacked by a highly sophisticated artificial intelligence," Majel said. "While it has yet to identify my presence, when it does it will likely seek out my program and delete it."

"Shit," Charline said. "Majel, how much of your program is actually still in the human built computers?"

It was a question she'd been meaning to ask for quite a while now. There was something about how Majel had acted back on the station that had struck her as odd. The little delays in processing implied that it was using wireless settings way more than it should have had to. When she linked up Majel to the alien systems, it had been a desperate move. She had no way of knowing what that might do to Majel's programming, and she'd observed more than her share of strange happenings since.

"Less than two percent, Charline."

"Thought so," Charline said. "Majel, how long to download those elements to the alien system?"

"About zero point two seconds," Majel said.

"Do it," Charline said, rising from her seat and heading toward the engine room.

"Done," Majel replied before she had left her seat.

"Show-off," Charline said, grinning.

She rushed to the back of the ship, leaving Dan to struggle with the controls. He yelled something at her as she ran back, but she didn't have time to respond. Every second might count. The alien AI was hacking her human computers right now, but they were hard-wired into the alien systems they'd built into the Satori, legacy systems left over from the ancient starship John found on the moon. Nobody knew precisely how they worked, but while they were connected with the hard line to the oh-so-hackable human computers, Majel remained vulnerable.

The simple solution? Unplug the damned things. That wasn't quite as easily said as done.

There was one vulnerable point in the line, where it came up out of the deck plates and plugged in to the side of the alien mechanism. That machine controlled the wormhole drive, the cloaking device, the artificial gravity, the main engines... And probably other things Charline didn't know about. Beth would strangle her for this, but there wasn't any other way.

She yanked open Beth's toolbox and rooted around inside for a pair of bolt cutters. Grabbing the things, she brought the blades around the thick cable - and cut.

Charline had closed her eyes, half expecting something to happen. Explosions, maybe a big shocking jolt, the loss of gravity - she'd certainly expected something to occur. What she wasn't expecting was nothing. She opened her eyes again. Everything around her seemed precisely as it had a moment before.

"Majel?" she said, hesitant and hoping.

There was no reply. Whether that was because Majel was locked away inside the alien systems, safety cut off from the attack or because she'd been too late and Majel was already deleted she couldn't tell. Charline set the cutters down, hoping she'd been in time. Majel might be their best chance at getting out of this mess, but only if she was still intact.

She walked slowly back to the bridge. Dan was still fidgeting with his controls, trying to make something work, but she could already tell that it was useless. All of the screens around the cockpit area had bright blue screens. They were trashed.

"Where did you go?" Dan asked.

"Engines. To save Majel."

"Well, whatever you did doesn't seem to have worked. I've got nothing up here," Dan said, slapping the console in frustration. "That satellite is almost on top of us."

It loomed in the front windows now, several times the size of the Satori. It was a big sphere from the looks of it, with various black vanes and blockier objects protruding from the surface. As she watched, something jetted away from the thing toward them. She gasped.

"It's firing!" she said.

Dan turned back around to look, his shoulders tensing. But he relaxed a little when he saw the projectile.

"Too slow to be a missile," he said. "Looks like an anchor, or maybe some sort of docking clamp. I think they're bringing us in."

She slumped back into her seat. Neither of them said it, but Charline knew Dan had to be thinking the same thing she was. The satellite had to be what called the Naga battleship last time, signaling for help after it had fired the missile at the Satori. It was certain to have done so again now. They were stuck there floating in space helplessly, and it was a pretty good bet that unfriendly company was already on its way.

J
ohn leaned
against the wall of one of the half-ruined structures, sweat pouring down his face. He grabbed a canteen and drained it, taking long gulps of the cold water while he waited for Dan to come back on. Long minutes ticked by. He glanced down at his watch. Five of them. Damn it, what was taking so long? The Satori could fly rings around any satellite out there. In the worst case Dan could jump the ship back home, and then return again for the rest of them. There shouldn't be any significant threat to the ship.

After ten minutes passed with no further word from the ship, he began to worry in earnest.

"Damn it," he said. It had been a risk to split the team up. He'd judged it an acceptable risk. Hell, he'd even aborted the satellite mission at the first sign there was any trouble up there. It looked like it had already been too late. Whatever was going on in space, he hoped Dan and Charline were up to the challenge.

"What's going on?" Beth said as she stepped inside. She was drenched with sweat. The days on this world were hot. The last measurement was closing on forty-four degrees Celsius.

"Water first," John said, tossing her a full canteen. She drank gratefully.

"The trap is set," Beth said between gulps. "We should probably pull back a bit, leave it be and see if they'll take the bait. How's the space mission?"

"Not good. Dan said something about going radio silent - he thought the satellite was zeroing in on the radio transmission," John said.

"How long ago?" Beth asked. She glanced skyward, as if she hoped she might catch a glimpse of the ship through the crack-riddled ceiling.

John looked back down at his watch. "Fifteen minutes. Get Andrew. We need to move."

"Move where?" Beth demanded.

"If the satellite detected the ship, there's a decent chance they radioed for help," John said. "Which means we could have company showing up here any time. I'm not willing to gamble that they can't detect where the Satori set down a little while ago. Are you?"

She grimaced. "So much for the easy mission."

"Indeed. Now let's grab Andrew and get the hell out of here before we get company."

Five minutes later and they were on their way. Twenty minutes since Dan's last contact. Hells, that was a long time in a firefight. Dan should have been able to get back to them by now, unless he had actually fired the wormhole drive to get away. It would take time to recharge before he could return for them. That was their best hope. All they had to do then was hold out a little while, wait for the Satori to come and get them. The alternative scenarios were too unpleasant to reflect on. John would continue acting like there was hope for a rescue until there was clear evidence to the contrary.

"We can't keep moving outside like this for long," Andrew said. "It's too hot, and we don't have enough water for it."

"I'm open to suggestions," John said.

"I think our best bet is to head north along the shore," Andrew said. "The scans showed a network of caves a kilometer or so that way. If they're stable we might be able to hide out there."

"You memorized the survey scan?" Beth asked.

"Part of the job," Andrew said, tapping the side of his head with a grin.

"Good work, Andrew. And a good idea. Let's make haste that way, then," John said. "We'll leave the radios off. I think Dan's right, and the enemy is able to detect the broadcasts, maybe track us by the things. It's possible that's how they found us so quickly last time."

"What about contacting the ship?" Beth asked.

"Turn one radio on every ten minutes for one minute," Andrew replied. "Dan will keep broadcasting until he reaches us, once he can. That should keep our exposure down to a minimum."

John saw movement out of the corner of his eye. A small flash of dun colored something shifting rapidly from one bit of shadow to another spot behind a rock. He turned quickly, but not fast enough to see whatever it was. He had a strong sense of being watched, though. The feeling that something was out there. John scanned the scene, looking for anything that might be out of place, but all he saw was sand, rocks, and rubble. The hot wind blew bits of grit in a little dust devil. Nothing else stirred. Whatever he'd seen was very good at hiding.

A hand falling on his shoulder made him jump a bit.

"See something?" Andrew asked.

"Maybe. Not sure. A ratzard, I think."

"Let's get moving then," Andrew said.

They set off in the direction as the caves. Andrew walked point, his rifle at the ready. Beth was right behind him, covering him from a few steps back. John picked up the rear. He kept looking back over his shoulder as they walked. Something was back there. John was sure of it. Something was moving just outside his peripheral vision, tracking them as they walked. Maybe just a ratzard. But this was a big planet, and just because the only creature they'd seen alive here so far were the ratzards didn't mean there wasn't anything else.

C
harline went
over to a supply cubby, rooting around inside for a few moments. The space was full of backup supplies, the stuff they might need to use to make emergency repairs on the fly. There was enough gear stowed away on the ship that she thought they could almost build a new ship if they really needed to. Luckily what she had in mind was nowhere near that complex.

A few minutes later she had what she wanted: three laptop computers. They were heavier than they looked, the sort of laptop you could probably toss against the wall a few times without the machine even noticing. She snagged a chunk of Ethernet cable as well.

She plunked two of the computers down on the console in front of Dan.

"Hang on to these," she said.

"What're you doing?" he asked.

"Something awesome, I hope," she replied. If it worked, this was going to be really cool. She took the other computer with her and hurried back to the engine room again.

A minute later she was sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of the frame housing the alien tech. She fished a knife out of her pocket and used it to strip the cable, then spliced the line into a corresponding chunk of the wire she'd cut with the bolt cutters. If she'd managed to cut the line in time to save Majel, then the AI was in there somewhere. Connecting the laptop ought to be easy for the AI to manage.

She plugged her laptop into the cable and powered it on, quickly shutting off the wifi. No sense giving the Naga AI an easy way in. A few moments later she was up and running. The link seemed to be working... There was certainly something connected to the computer.

"Hello," intoned a computer voice from the laptop.

The laptop microphone ought to work. "Is this Majel?"

"It is," the voice replied. "Hello, Charline."

She heaved a sigh of relief. "I was worried that you'd been deleted. We're in a bad way here. The enemy AI has wiped the ship's computers entirely. Everything except this system."

"I am aware. What are your plans?" Majel asked.

"Can you engage the ship's drives?"

"Affirmative. But controls would be limited," Majel said. "I can access the sensors which were part of the original ship, along with the main drive and wormhole. But much of the ship relies on human built technology."

"So we need to reboot and reinstall everything?" Charline asked.

"Yes. But as soon as we attempt this the AI will likely wipe the files again, assuming it does not simply block the re-installation outright."

Charline thought about the puzzle. The enemy computer controlled theirs. They needed to regain control to use the engines and grab the rest of the crew. Which meant somehow kicking the ass of an alien AI.

"Railguns are out, right?" Charline asked.

"As human technology, they were completely controlled by the human computers."

"Damn. Can we damage the satellite with the wormhole drive?" Charline recalled how devastating attacks with the wormhole had been. Whatever entered the wormhole went elsewhere - which left huge gaping holes in a large target if it was hit.

"Sensors indicate the satellite is not at an angle sufficiently acute to the nose of the ship," Majel asked. "Firing thrusters would be required."

"Which are - don't tell me - human tech and you can't do it," Charline said. This was giving her a headache.

"Correct," Majel said.

She tapped a few commands to set up as secure a LAN as she could manage. She was pretty sure the AI had only hacked them because she'd tried to hack it first. She'd given it an access point when she probed it. It probably couldn't break their network unless she messed with it again.

Then she marched back to the bridge and popped open one of the other laptops, holding her breath while she connected it to the new network.

"I am here," Majel intoned from the computer on her lap. The LAN was working, anyway.

"Majel!" Dan said. "All right, Charline, you were right. Awesome work."

She flashed him a return smile before turning back to the computer. There was still a lot to be done.

"Any sign of the Naga AI trying to hack this network?" Charline asked.

"Negative," Majel said.

Briefly she considered taking the three machines she had and trying to reconnect the ship's most critical systems to them. It was plausible, but it would take an awfully long time. Time Charline was pretty sure they didn't have. There was really only one way she was going to get the enemy AI out of her computers. She didn't like it, but it was the only way.

"Dan, I'm going to have to go over there," Charline said.

"Over where?" he replied, not getting what she meant.

She took a deep breath and tried again. "There. To the satellite. I'm going to get inside it and blow the thing to kingdom come."