Martha Wells: All Systems Red

I felt like I should say something to her, and didn’t know what, and just stared at her awkwardly for a few seconds. Then I sealed up my helmet and got out of the hopper as fast as I could.

I went through the trees, listening for that fifth SecUnit just in case it was hiding somewhere waiting for me, but there was no sound of movement in the undergrowth. I came out of cover and climbed the rocky slope to the plateau, then walked toward the other group, listening to the crackle on my comm. They were going to let me get close, which was a relief. I’d hate to be wrong about this. It would make me feel pretty stupid.

I stopped several meters away, opened the channel and said, “This is the SecUnit assigned to the PreservationAux Survey Team. I was sent to speak to you about an arrangement.”

I felt the pulse then, a signal bundle, designed to take over my governor module and freeze it, and freeze me. The idea was obviously to immobilize me, then insert the combat override module into my dataport again.

That was why they had had to arrange the meeting so close to their hub. They had needed the equipment there to be able to do this, it wasn’t something they could send through the feed.

So it’s a good thing my governor module wasn’t working and all I felt was a mild tickle.

One of them started toward me. I said, “I assume you’re about to try to install another combat override module and send me back to kill them.” I opened my gun ports and expanded the weapons in my arms, then folded them back in. “I don’t recommend that course of action.”

The SecUnits went into alert mode. The human who had started forward froze, then backed away. The body language of the others was flustered, startled. I could tell from the faint comm static that they were talking to each other on their own system. I said, “Anyone want to comment on that?”

That got their attention. There was no reply. Not a surprise. The only people I’ve run into who actually want to get into conversations with SecUnits are my weird humans. I said, “I have an alternate solution to both our problems.”

The one in the blue enviro suit said, “You have a solution?” The voice was the same one who had made the offer in our hub. It was also very skeptical, which you can imagine. To them, talking to me was like talking to a hopper or a piece of mining equipment.

I said, “You weren’t the first to hack PreservationAux’s HubSystem.”

She had opened their comm channel to talk to me, and I heard one of the others whisper, “It’s a trick. One of the surveyors is telling it what to say.”

I said, “Your scans should show I’ve cut my comm.” This was the point where I had to say it. It was still hard, even though I knew I didn’t have a choice, even though it was part of my own stupid plan. “I don’t have a working governor module.” That over, I was glad to get back to the lying part. “They don’t know that. I’m amenable to a compromise that benefits you as well as me.”

The blue leader said, “Are they telling the truth about knowing why we’re here?”

That was still annoying, even though I knew we had allowed plenty of time for this part. “You used combat override modules to make the DeltFall SecUnits behave like rogues. If you think a real rogue SecUnit still has to answer your questions, the next few minutes are going to be an education for you.”

The blue leader shut me out of their comm channel. There was a long silence while they talked it over. Then she came back on, and said, “What compromise?”

“I can give you information you desperately need. In exchange, you take me onto the pick-up ship with you but list me as destroyed inventory.” That would mean nobody from the company would be expecting me back, and I could slip off in the confusion when the transport docked at the transit station. Theoretically.

There was another hesitation. Because they had to pretend to think it over, I guess. Then the blue leader said, “We agree. If you’re lying, then we’ll destroy you.”

It was perfunctory. They intended to insert a combat override module into me before they left the planet.

She continued, “What is the information?”

I said, “First remove me from the inventory. I know you still have a connection to our Hub.”

Blue Leader made an impatient gesture at Yellow. He said, “We’ll have to restart their HubSystem. That will take some time.”

I said, “Initiate the restart, queue the command, and then show me on your feed. Then I’ll give you the information.”

Blue Leader closed me out of the comm channel and spoke to Yellow again. There was a three-minute wait, then the channel opened again and I got a limited access to their feed. The command was in a queue, though of course they would have time to delete it later. The important points were that our HubSystem had been reactivated, and that I could convincingly pretend to believe them. I had been watching the time, and we were now in the target window, so there was no more reason to stall. I said, “Since you destroyed my clients’ beacon, they’ve sent a group to your beacon to manually trigger it.”

Even with limited access to their feed, I could see that got them. Body language all over the place from confusion to fear. The yellow one moved uncertainly, the green one looked at Blue Leader. In that flat accent, she said, “That’s impossible.”

I said, “One of them is an augmented human, a systems engineer. He can make it launch. Check the data you got from our HubSystem. It’s Surveyor Dr. Gurathin.”

Blue Leader was showing tension from her shoulders all down her body. She really didn’t want anybody coming to this planet, not until they had taken care of their witness problem.

Green said, “It’s lying.”

A trace of panic in his voice, Yellow said, “We can’t chance it.”

Blue Leader turned to him. “It’s possible, then?”

Yellow hesitated. “I don’t know. The company systems are all proprietary, but if they have an augmented human who can hack into it—”

“We have to go there now,” Blue Leader said. She turned to me. “SecUnit, tell your client to get out of the hopper and come here. Tell her we’ve come to an arrangement.”

All right, wow. That was not in the plan. They were supposed to leave without us.

(Last night Gurathin had said this was a weak point, that this was where the plan would fall apart. It was irritating that he was right.)

I couldn’t open my comm channel to the hopper or the hopper’s feed without GrayCris knowing. And we still needed to get them and their SecUnits away from their habitat. I said, “She knows you mean to kill her. She won’t come.” Then I had another brilliant idea and added, “She’s a planetary admin for a system noncorporate political entity, she’s not stupid.”

“What?” Green demanded. “What political entity?”

I said, “Why do you think the team is called ‘Preservation’?”

This time they didn’t bother to close their channel. Yellow said, “We can’t kill her. The investigation—”

Green added, “He’s right. We can hold her and release her after the settlement agreement.”

Blue Leader snapped, “That won’t work. If she’s missing, the investigation would be even more thorough. We need to stop that beacon launch, then we can discuss what to do.” She told me, “Go get her. Get her out of the hopper and then bring her here.” She cut the comm off again. Then one of the DeltFall SecUnits started forward. She came back on to say, “This Unit will help you.”

I waited for it to reach me, then turned and walked beside it down the slope of rock into the trees.

What I did next was predicated on the assumption that she had told the DeltFall SecUnit to kill me. If I was wrong, we were screwed, and Mensah and I would both die, and the plan to save the rest of the group would fail and PreservationAux would be back to where it started, except minus their leader, their SecUnit, and their little hopper.