Марта Уэллс: Rogue Protocol

In some entertainment media I had seen, they were used to portray the evil rogue SecUnits who menaced the main characters. Not that I was annoyed by that or anything. It was actually good, because then humans who had never worked with SecUnits expected us to look like human-form bots, and not what we actually looked like. I wasn’t annoyed at all. Not one bit.

I had to run back the drone’s camera feed to catch up, I had been so busy conquering that burst of non-annoyance. The first new human said, “I’m Don Abene.” She gestured to the other new human. “This is my colleague Hirune, and our assistant Miki.” She hesitated. “Did the employment agent have time to brief you?”

“They said it was a bodyguard job.” Wilken flicked a glance at the bot, which was apparently called Miki. It stood there with its head cocked, staring at her with big globe-like eyes. It was unusual for a human to introduce a bot, and that’s putting it mildly. Gerth looked like she was struggling to keep her expression professionally blank. Wilken continued, “You’re going down to the terraforming facility to make an initial assessment and your contract with GoodNightLander Independent requires a security team.”

Abene nodded. “I’m hoping we won’t actually need you. But the company that abandoned the facility didn’t maintain the satellite monitoring, and no one has been inside since they left. We assume it’s deserted, but there’s no way to make sure.”

“The agent said that was a potential problem,” Gerth said. “The terraforming shield is preventing any off-site scanning?”

Hirune answered, “Yes. We know it’s stable, because of the tractor array GI put into place, but that’s all. The station’s been monitoring the facility, but as you can see, there are no patrol vessels here.”

She meant there was a possibility that raiders had moved into the facility. Except if they did that, they couldn’t have been very good raiders, because they had ignored this station. Also, raiders tend to hit and run, and not hang around to live on a deteriorating terraforming facility.

Actually, with my experience in security, anybody who wanted to hang around and live on a deteriorating terraforming facility worried me a lot more than raiders.

Gerth and Wilken exchanged a look. Maybe the same thought had occurred to them. Wilken asked, “Is there a possibility there were active organisms in the facility when it was abandoned?”

“The biological matrices would have been sealed, and probably destroyed, before the staff left,” Hirune said. She made a gesture, like flicking something away. “Even if they hadn’t, there’s very little chance that they could create any dangerous airborne contamination.”

Wilken’s expression remained professionally cool, but she persisted, “I meant something other than bacteria. Any organisms large enough to be a physical danger?”

Right, so even I knew more about terraforming than these two.

Hirune’s face now had the blank, lip-biting expression I associated with humans trying not to show their feelings, especially the feeling that someone had said something unintentionally hilarious. (This is why it had been a struggle for me to give up armor; concealing facial expressions was hard, even for humans.)

Don Abene’s eyes crinkled, but she made it seem more like she and Wilken were sharing a joke. “The matrix wouldn’t be working with any organisms larger than bacteria. And there wouldn’t really be any reason to bring any larger organisms up from the surface to the facility. Of course, we don’t know that they didn’t. So it’s proper to exercise caution.”

Wilken seemed to accept that, or at least didn’t ask any more questions. It sort of made sense. It was a security consultant’s job to be skeptical of their clients’ assurances that everything was fine. (SecUnit clients, at least, only assured each other that everything was fine while you stared at the wall and waited for everything to go horribly wrong.)

Abene and Hirune walked the security consultants into the Port Authority now, where they had quarters with the skeleton station team. They were talking about a full briefing, team prep, and a departure time sixteen hours from now. Miki the human-form bot followed, then stopped. It turned, and looked up at the drone I was riding. Its head cocked and I could tell it was focusing in on the camera.

I let the drone go, its memory of the temporary takeover blanked. It sent a confused reorientation request to the PA’s system, then wandered off back to its patrol route.

Miki didn’t move, still staring into the dark with the opaque surface of its eyes. The feed was clear, it couldn’t know I was here.

Then Miki sent a directionless ping. Just a call into the dark, checking to see if there was anyone out there who wanted to reply.

I checked myself for signal leakage, tightened my walls, and reminded myself to be careful. Just because the station feed was silent didn’t mean no one was listening. The GI expedition would be running their feed off the systems equipment they brought with them, but someone on the station staff was giving the lifter bots orders and maybe still checking the security reports.

This place was so quiet, maybe Miki had picked up the marker ad I’d tripped. Maybe it had heard a whisper in the otherwise empty feed, and that was creepy enough it even bothered me. Finally, it turned and followed its owner into the PA complex.

I slipped out of the cubby and went down the dark hall to find a better hiding place.

I worked my way around through the maintenance passages and loading corridors, into an empty commercial slot not far from the Port Authority. After some careful work, I managed to get a view from the two security cameras inside the PA offices. Yes, two. It was weird to be around humans who didn’t monitor everything everybody did constantly via Sec- or HubSystems or drones, and who relied on human supervisors. And one camera was in the central hub for the port traffic control and the other in a jury-rigged hub that was now acting as station control—the two places where if something went wrong, you needed to know right away; in other words, not the mess, restrooms, or private quarters. It was almost like nobody here cared what anybody said or did as long as they weren’t trying to blow up the station or crash the lifter-bots. (After thousands of hours spent analyzing and deleting video of humans eating, having sex, performing hygiene, and eliminating excess bodily fluids, it was a relief, but still.)

Fortunately the GI expedition and the station staff seemed to be pretty casual with each other and I was able to catch enough conversation to hear that the first assessment would be a short one, just twelve hours on the facility for an initial estimate of its condition, then they would return to the station to analyze their findings, take a rest period, then head back. That sounded perfect. Twelve hours should be plenty of time for me to find what I needed.

I also heard what docking slot their ship was leaving from and when they were loading supplies aboard. I still needed help getting onto the expedition ship. But with none to few active systems to work through, I didn’t have much choice.

I was going to have to make friends with the stupid pet robot.

Hi, Miki.

It answered immediately, Hi! Who are you?

I was using the address in the ping Miki had sent to establish a secure connection. Abene and the others had finished their prep and were taking a rest period before leaving for the terraforming facility. It gave me about three hours to seduce the robot. I didn’t expect it to take that long.

I said, I’m a security consultant. GoodNightLander Independent contracted with my security company to make sure your team completes their mission safely. It tried to message Abene over the feed, and I blocked it. You can’t tell anyone I’m here. I expected it to ask me how I had managed to take over its feed, how I had gotten onto the station. I thought I’d managed to anticipate most of the questions and had my answers ready.