Марта Уэллс - Network Effect

“Don’t answer it,” I told ART. “That’s probably how you got into this situation in the first place.”

Ratthi waved his drink bottle in what he thought was ART’s direction. “Yes, please be careful. There was a terrible virus on a company ship and we all nearly died and SecUnit’s brain was compromised.”

SecUnit’s brain is always compromised, ART said. And I was not breached via the comm. My comm system is filtered to prevent viral attacks and I have engaged extra protections.

“That’s probably what you said right before it happened,” I told it. But ART insulting my intelligence was a good sign. It sounded almost normal again.

Amena sighed and wiped crumbs off her mouth. “Hey, you two, it’s too early for fighting.”

Arada was doing her mouth-twisted expression again. She said, “ Perihelion, if you think it’s safe, can you allow contact?”

Overse hastily swallowed her food. “Babe, is that a good idea?”

Arada made an open-handed shrug gesture. “I don’t know how else to figure out what’s going on here, babe. If we can get a visual and they’re all gray people wearing alien remnants on their heads, then at least we’ll know they probably won’t want to help us.” She added, “And if we’re a lot more lucky than we usually are, they’ll have some idea where the explorer with Perihelion ’s people is.”

That wasn’t unreasonable. My threat assessment module didn’t like it, but if we could get intel this way it might mean we could find ART’s humans sooner.

Thiago pressed his steepled fingers to his mouth, then said, “I agree. We know the explorer is compromised. If it attacked them, or if there’s another ship we haven’t encountered yet, we need to know.”

Ratthi shrugged agreement. Overse didn’t look happy, but she didn’t argue. Amena was still eating, eyes wide.

ART said, Accepting contact .

A new display appeared above the scan results on the control deck. The static swirled artistically into an image of a human or augmented human wearing the same red and brown uniform as Eletra and Ras. With impatience, the human said, “Unidentified transport, are you receiving this?”

ART pulled feed information from the transmission and ran it across the display. Name: Supervisor Leonide, augmented, Barish-Estranza Exploration Services ID, gender: female, femme-neutral.

I wasn’t surprised she was a supervisor. (I had worked with a lot of human corporate supervisors and after a while they were fairly easy to identify.) Her skin was one of the mid browns that was common to a large percentage of humans but it had an artificially smooth even tone that indicated cosmetic enhancement. (My skin was less even than hers and it gets completely regenerated on a regular basis due to me being shot in the face.) Her dark hair was wrapped around the top of her head and she had small metallics and gemstones set in the rim of one exposed ear. I thought there was a 49 percent chance that she was a much more important supervisor than the feed signature indicated.

Arada sat up and squared her shoulders. The drone snatched the empty food packet from the console beside her and retreated out of camera range. She ran her fingers through her short hair and said, “Right. When you’re ready, Perihelion .”

Of course . ART put up another display showing Arada. It had changed the color of her jacket from Preservation Survey gray to the blue of its crew uniform, edited out the water bottle on the console beside her, and artistically adjusted the lighting. Arada planted a serious expression on her face as ART said, I’ve sent my identifier and a Corporation Rim feed indicator stating that you are Dr. Arada of the Pansystem University of Mihira and New Tideland .

Arada said, “Supervisor Leonide, we see your transport is in distress.”

“We are, and would appreciate any assistance.” Leonide’s expression was opaque but vaguely critical. “But this system is under claim by Barish-Estranza, so I wonder why you’re here.”

Amena made the huffy noise indicating disbelief and/or incredulity. For the love of light, Ratthi said on the feed, disgusted. Are they really worried about that now?

ART was in Arada’s feed supplying an answer, and Arada repeated, “We have a contract for sustainability evaluation and mapping with the Pan-Rim Licensing Agency and this system was listed as a priority. I assure you, the University is not a terraforming entity, and we have no intention of violating your claim.” Arada’s serious expression was a little too fixed, but it got more natural when she added, “I see you’ve taken damage—were you attacked by raiders?” The next hesitation wasn’t calculated at all. “We’ve been in this system only a short time, and encountered some… strange activity.”

On a side display in the galley, ART was breaking down Leonide’s opaque expression for us with a feed-superimposed analysis. She was experiencing everything from irritation to reluctant resignation. She said, “There are raiders here. As we’ve discovered.”

Arada pressed her lips together and looked thoughtful. I had a bad feeling she was about to call Leonide a liar—which we all knew Leonide was lying but even I knew that wouldn’t make this interaction any easier. Then Arada said on the feed, I’m going to tell her we have Eletra.

But you just told Leonide we’re Perihelion’s crew, Overse objected. Eletra knows we’re from Preservation.

She knows Amena is from Preservation, I sent.

Yes, ART told me to tell Eletra you all were part of its crew, Amena confirmed.

I was doing a rapid search of my recording of all the conversations in Eletra’s hearing since the others had come aboard, particularly when Thiago had spoken to her. None of the rest of you told her you were from Preservation. And some of you are wearing ART’s crew clothing .

Overse looked down at the T-shirt she was wearing. Oh, you’re right.

ART had thrown in some static to give Arada time to think. Now she said to Leonide, “I don’t think they’re ordinary raiders. We have one of your crew on board, a young person named Eletra. She was captured in a shuttle by some very divergent raiders, who also attacked our ship. She was with another crew member called Ras, but he was injured when he was captured by the raiders and died before our medical facility could help him.”

Leonide’s expression went through some rapid calculations. “How did they get aboard your ship, then?”

(In the feed, Amena was worried. But Eletra’s really confused, she said. She’s not going to be able to tell them much about what happened. Will they believe her? They won’t accuse her of helping the Targets or something, will they? Or do something terrible to her?

She needs more help than we can give her, Thiago told her, and she wants to go home to her family. This may be her only chance.

Much as Amena might want to forcibly adopt Eletra and drag her off to Preservation, Thiago was right.)

Arada was saying, “They were brought aboard by the raiders who tried to take us prisoner. I can let you speak to Eletra if you’d like. She’s physically well, but we know they used some sort of mind-altering tech—”

You’re talking too much, ART told her on the feed, right as I was about to say it. Overse must have thought so, too, because she made a faint noise of agreement. Arada stopped and ART added a little artistic static to give her a chance to regroup and to show her that its analysis of Leonide’s expression revealed a spike of extreme interest at the words “mind-altering tech.” Arada cleared her throat and said, “So, maybe you could be more forthcoming. We’re ready to render assistance if you need it.”