MTBF (Mean Time Between Failure)
J.L. Curtis
When you are working with machines you don’t really understand, created and maintained by other machines you don’t really understand, and your life depends upon them, then you can get nervous. You would undoubtedly get even more nervous if you learned that some of the machines were malfunctioning in such a way that many lives might be lost. In “Mean Time Between Failure,” Jim Curtis explores how such items might be investigated and dealt with in a world populated by humans, quasi-intelligent machines, and artificial intelligence.
J.L. Curtis was born in Louisiana in 1951 and was raised in the Arkansas-Louisiana-Texas area. He is a retired naval flight officer who served over twenty years in postings all around the world. Jim is also a retired research and development test engineer for the defense industry. A long-time NRA instructor, Jim now lives in north Texas writing full time. He has written eleven novels as part of three different series: The Grey Man (urban fiction), Rimworld (military science fiction), and a new series, Showdown on the River (western). He also has written a number of novellas and short stories for a number of different anthologies. He enjoys helping new authors to not make the same mistakes he has made.
A knock on the hatch broke Nik’s concentration on the report on his puter. He looked up to see a messenger standing there. “Yes?” he asked.
“Sergeant Bernd, Commander Ryouta wants to see you in his office,” said the messenger.
Nik dropped the stylus and rubbed his eyes. “I guess that means now, eh?” He waved away the messenger’s answer. “Let me lock this up and I’ll report to him momentarily.” At least he’s only up one deck and forward ten frames. Being on Guardian E rather than planetside does make that easy, even if all we get to see is the Array!
“Thank you, Sergeant,” Nik said.
Ten minutes later, he knocked on the hatch of Commander Ryouta’s office. “Come,” said Ryouta.
“Sergeant Bernd reporting as ordered, sir.”
“Come in and close the hatch, Sergeant.”
Nik closed the hatch and relaxed. “What’s up, Short Round?”
Ryouta shook his head and replied, “Sit down, Fat Boy.”
Nik snorted as he pulled out a chair. “I’m not fat; I’m big boned.”
“Yeah, sure. You’ve been fat since boot.” Ryouta flipped a card with a pair of railroad tracks on it across the desk. “For your sins, you’re getting a new posting,” he said.
Nik poked at the card but didn’t pick it up. “What the hell is going on, Ryouta? You know I don’t want to be an officer,” he replied.
Ryouta smiled broadly. “Well, you screwed up and did too good a job in the Criminal Investigation Group. It came to the attention of the admiral and violà…a promotion.” The smile turned into a chuckle. “And the good news is a full-time posting off the ship for you and Bear.”
Nik leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms. “Where? And as what?” he asked, getting more suspicious by the moment.
“Oh, this one is right up your alley, Nik.” Ryouta slid the comp across the table and continued, “Nordheim. We’re setting up an embassy in New Hope City. You and Bear are going to run a branch office of the Patrol Bank.”
“The bank? Why in deity? Who did I piss off this time, Short Round?”
Ryouta leaned back, mirroring him. “Nik, you know more about the inner workings of the bank than damn near anybody after your last three investigations. All of which, must I remind you, you and Bear solved quickly, quietly, and the guilty got spaced as a lesson to others.” He leaned forward and looked intently at Bernd. “Niklas Bernd, you and I both know you should be sitting in this seat, not me. Just because you and Bear like the rough and tumble and getting down and dirty with the bad boys is no reason to refuse promotions. And you are getting a bit long in the tooth for that. I know because we’ve both been in this rocket club for sixty-five years.” He raised his middle finger at Nik. “Class of forty-four! The first, the best!”
Nik smirked and returned the gesture, then bit his lip. “But…if I take that”—he pointed to the card with the bars—“that’s going to take me off the tunnels and borough ops. And Bear isn’t going to like it either.”
Nik rubbed his chin. “If we’re setting up a new embassy, then that means we’re promoting a new admiral. Who?”
“Admiral Sipho,” Ryouta replied.
“Sipho? She made admiral? When was this?”
Ryouta’s belly laugh surprised him. “You didn’t know? She made it on the last list. She is putting her staff together and specifically requested you. Take the bars, get out of here, and go study. You and the new admiral, along with a few more of her staff, are heading to Nordheim on the next transport. It’s a hundred-and-twenty-hour trip and you know Sipho is going to enjoy quizzing her new staff.”
Nik sighed and picked up the card. “Alright. I guess I better go break the news to Bear.”
“Get your ass out of here, Fat Boy. You’ve got work to do,” Ryouta said with a wistful smile. “After sixty-five years, you’re at least getting off the Guardian. Besides, I’ll bet you’ll like embassy duty, and I hear New Hope is nice. And,” he continued with a grin, “we need your big cabin; we can fit four cadets in it. Class of one-ten starts arriving in about two hundred hours.”
Nik threw him a sloppy salute, opened the hatch, and, bouncing the card in his hand, headed for the AI sector. In the common area, he found four AIs sitting at separate tables taking on a charge. They were wearing identical zero-g maintenance bodies. One waved him over. He could tell it was Bear only by looking at the name tag attached to the trunk. Nik sat.
“Nordheim, eh?” said Bear, in his distinctive voice, one that Nik would have recognized even without a name tag.
“How the hell did you…?”
Bear’s head/sensor pod turned toward him. “I, 60-of-Sigrid, know all.” Filters briefly covered the optical sensors, an AI wink. “My orders just came through. I knew they would not send us back to deal with the Cerites after that brief set-to four years ago.” Bear rubbed his face and continued, “I think I’ll go TAC’ed up in a humanoid body. That way I’ve got the extra insulation.”
Nik sighed. “Fine, but I’m not sure going down in a TAC body is a good idea if we’re going to be on embassy duty.”
Bear smiled and cocked his head. “Are you taking your armor?” he asked.
“Of course! It’s part of…uhhh, okay, I see your point. Take whatever body you want. Our transport leaves in seventy hours. Unlike you, I’ve got to go study. All you have to do is download everything from Guardian’s database.”
Bear looked at him, winked twice, and then said, “New Hope City. Six subterranean boroughs constructed in a hex arrangement, two finished, two fitting out, and two under construction. Tunnels connect the various boroughs and service industry and agriculture domes, all subterranean. Current population about five hundred, but expecting over fifty-five hundred by the end of the ye—”
“Yeah, yeah. That’s cheating. Seventy hours, see you at the airlock, unless something comes up.” Nik walked off mumbling, “Ain’t fair, dammit. Guardian has been my home for sixty-five years, and now I have seventy hours to say goodbye. At least everything I own fits in one bag.”
* * *
One hundred and ninety hours and a few minutes later, Nik, wearing the new bars of a full lieutenant, sat next to Admiral Sipho in the front seats of the Nordheim shuttle as it descended to the runway next to New Hope City.
Admiral Sipho looked around to ensure no one was close enough to overhear them, even if they were all Patrol personnel. “Remember, Lieutenant, you’re not staying in the embassy dome with us. The branch bank offices are on the ground floor of the central column in Borough One. You and Bear will live above it in two bedrooms of the Patrol central column penthouse, level ten. Should be a helluva view! This is a new concept we’re trying, since most normies don’t have the extra comms capabilities the Cerites and AIs have. This may be a retirement post for some folks, but you aren’t retiring. You’re going to be the face of the bank for New Hope City. I’m expecting you to be…shall we say, out and about, much like you have been in your previous billet. Do I make myself clear?”
Nik nodded and asked, “Separate reporting chain?”
Sipho grinned, white teeth startling against her coal-black face. “If necessary, if necessary.” Whatever she was going to say was overridden by the thump of the landing and rattling as the shuttle slid down the ice runway. The thrusters fired, throwing everyone forward into their restraints and bringing the shuttle to a stop.
The PA system came on with a click. “All right folks, seal up your envirosuits. Atmosphere here is thin and definitely not breathable. Try breathing it and you’ll be lucky to last a minute. Ground temp: minus fifty-eight degrees, sunny, slight wind out of the north, gravity point nine two G, solar day equal to ten point three Earth days. Ross is currently quiet with no flare warnings but if you hear the alarm, then get to a marked shelter ASAP. Please stay in your seats until they mate the hatch to the dock facility. Thank you for flying New Hope Air.”
Nik pulled on his helmet, sealed up his suit, and then checked the admiral’s suit as she double-checked his. He glanced over to Bear, who was now wearing a humanoid body. He had no need for an envirosuit and just smiled.
Ten minutes later as the hatch was opened, and the pressure equalized, an AI wearing a high-end humanoid body stepped through the hatch, picked up the mic, and keyed the PA.
“Okay folks, welcome to New Hope City. Mag-lev is to the right. The train just pulled in. Your personal effects will be delivered to your quarters. Welcome packets are in your assigned quarters. First stop will be Borough One. It is a short walk. Take the elevator down to the borough floor. Guides will be available there to assist you.” The AI then climbed up the ladder to the cockpit as the new arrivals got up and picked up their carry-on items. Many groaned at the higher g level.
An hour later, Nik and Bear were ensconced in two bedrooms of the penthouse. Bear was in a chair, eyes closed, taking on a charge and catching up with the latest SAIN news. Nik flipped through the “welcome packet” and found nothing he hadn’t already seen in his research. A quick perusal of the autochef’s menu showed only basic meals.
“Dammit. Guess I’ll have to buy anything I want that is actually good.” Nik’s stomach rumbled as he punched up a default dinner and choked it down with a glass of water—the only liquid choice other than tea or coffee.
Bear opened his eyes, looked out the windows, and remarked, “One nice view. Need to put some surveillance cameras up here.”
Nik nodded and walked over to the windows. They were high enough that they could look down on all the buildings in Borough One. There was human and machine activity, but it wasn’t crowded.
“Huh, this is nothing like Toe Hold. I don’t see any sharp angles. In fact, I don’t see right angles. It’s like everything is rounded! It feels very different but kinda good. Someone on Earth designed this borough. Very artistic. I think I’m going to like it here.” He finished putting his few things away. “All right you cold-hearted machine, let’s go check out the pub down on level two.”
Nik and Bear took the private elevator back down to the ground floor and walked around toward the pub’s main entrance off the lobby. Nik was struck by how clean and fresh the air smelled. The borough’s ceiling lights, sixty meters above, provided an exact equivalent of sunlight on Earth. The temperature was cooler than on the Guardian E but not unpleasant.
They came to the pub’s entrance. In Toe Hold, in the Promise Borough, this would be the Purple Parrot; it brought back some fond memories of some of his detachments off the Guardian E. Nik noted a sign over the entrance that said THE BEACH HOUSE.
Bear chuckled. “Apparently somebody did get a permit.” He called up something on SAIN and continued, “Duplicated the Purple Parrot setup, occupies the two levels above the ground floor. Second floor is the pub proper, along with the kitchen. The third floor has meeting rooms for rent, conference rooms, and sex rooms, and the owners’ quarters. I guess you want to go look, don’t you?”
Nik laughed. “If I can make it that far. After the slop in the autochef, what I want is a beer. Also, we need to be…out and about.”
Bear pulled the inner door open. “Then let us about up the stairs and see what there is to see,” he said as he trotted up the stairs.
Nik groaned and pulled himself up after Bear.
At the top of the stairs was another set of doors to the actual bar. Nik stopped cold as he stepped through. Bear stopped short and snorted.
“Dayum! Now I see why they call it the Beach House!” Nik said as he looked around in wonder. The entire space replicated a beach shack on some large body of water on Earth. And it was definitely warmer, with a salty tang in the air.
Nik walked over to the bar, Bear tagging along, and was met by an overweight AI with a friendly face, dressed in a Hawaiian shirt, shorts, and sandals. “I’m JimmyB. What can I do for the Patrol this evening?”
“I’m Se—Lieutenant Bernd. I’m with the new Patrol Bank branch downstairs. This is my partner, Bear. You two can talk to each other after I get a beer!”
All three of them chuckled. JimmyB moved down to the tap, pulled a beer, and brought it back. “On the house,” he said.
Nik laughed. “No deal. I pay for my booze,” he said. Reaching in his pocket, he extended a credit chip. “Run me a tab on that, Jimmy. Patrolmen are not allowed to accept gratuities in any way, shape, or form. You know that.”
JimmyB nodded and smiled, touched the card with two fingers, and Nik saw the card glow momentarily.
“Tab started.” He handed it back and Nik noted Bear was in comms mode, so he pocketed the chip and looked around. There wasn’t much to see other than the wall holo, which displayed a hypnotizing view of the ocean rolling to the beach as the sun set. The holo wrapped around three walls of the bar.
Nik leaned back against the bar and sipped the beer. He finished the beer and set the glass back on the bar just as Bear walked up and said, “Quiet. Almost too quiet.”
“Maybe. First impressions aren’t always correct. I’m done. You can stay if you want.”
Bear grimaced. “Sure, me in my TAC’ed-up body is going to stay in a bar. Do you even think about what comes out of your mouth?”
Nik snorted. “Sometimes. I guess this means you’re ready to go, too?” Bear didn’t bother answering. He just headed out the door and down the stairs, leaving Nik to catch up.
* * *
It took Nik and Bear two weeks to learn the ins and outs of New Hope City and to get used to almost a full g of gravity on Nordheim. Nik had spent some credits to get the autochef up to what he considered an acceptable level of vat steaks, pork, and other sundries, along with a growler or two of beer.
Unfortunately, Nik’s weekly meetings and reports to Admiral Sipho left her dissatisfied.
“Granted you’re getting turnover on the walk-ins at the branch, and people are complimentary about your presence over there, but you haven’t seen a damned thing wrong, other than petty stuff?” she asked.
Nik glanced at Bear, who sat blank-faced next to him. Some help you are, he thought as he looked back at the admiral.
“No, ma’am. I’m—we are planning to go farther afield now that we’ve got the basic layout of Boroughs One and Two down. Boroughs Three and Four are almost complete. They are finishing up trim, and acceptance testing of the systems is in process. There is a lot of construction going on toward the mountains, and we haven’t been outside the four boroughs yet.”
The next morning, human time, Nik and Bear—Nik outfitted in a full envirosuit, Bear in thermal clothing—checked out a runabout from the surface terminal and drove out to the one brightly lit worksite they could see, about ten kilometers away. Ross 248 hung low in the sky like a giant, angry, red eye. The Ross 248 sunset would be in about thirty hours. The runabout came to a stop. Nik glanced at Bear and said, “Borough Five?”
Bear nodded. “If the master plan is correct, yes.” There were two individuals moving around a large machine that appeared to be driving something into the ice. Nik was flipping through radio channels when Bear said, “Worksite nine. Channel thirty-one,” on his suitcomm.
Nik nodded his thanks and tuned to channel thirty-one. “Worksite nine, Patrol.”
He saw one figure turn toward them. “Patrol, worksite nine. What can we do for you on this fine day?”
Bear snickered over the suitcomm as Nik shook his head. “Uh, worksite, we are…doing an area fam. Permission to approach?”
“Come on in. Stop at least a hundred meters short. Matter of fact, park next to the maintenance unit to your left. I need to warm up.”
Nik drove over and parked next to what he realized was a large mobile maintenance rig. As they got out, the two figures walked up. The taller and much thinner of the two waved and said, “Sal Albin; for my sins, I’m the maintenance engineer. Come on in, I have coffee.”
Nik smiled and Bear smirked. “You meat machines and your drinks,” Bear said over a private comm that only Nik could hear as they stepped into the rig’s airlock. The engineer cycled it and then swung the interior hatch open. Once inside, the engineer stripped off his helmet and sighed as he scratched his short gray hair and beard, ending with rubbing his nose.
The shorter, wider individual wore no envirosuit but loosened his thermal garment and said, “89-of-Cilla. I go by Mole.” Mole and Bear went into an AI comm mode as Albin steered Nik into the small office and reached for two mugs.
Albin filled them with steaming hot coffee and handed one to Nik. “My name is Salvador Albin. Call me Sal. Originally from Lisboa, Portugal, two hundred nine years ago. Now freezing my ass off here. What can we do for the Patrol?”
Nik chuckled. “Lieutenant Bernd. Norse, family from Tromso. I was born on the Copernicus ten AA, so I’m a youngster compared to you. New guy on the rock here, just trying to figure out what is going on.” He took a sip of the coffee, and added, “And this is damn excellent coffee! Dirt-grown, right?”
Sal laughed. “Right. I get it direct from Toe Hold. Friends and all that.”
Nik smiled and said, “Gotta ask, what is that monstrosity out there doing?”
“All the Construction Battalion equipment is designed to be ruggedized, specific-use systems automated by puters with minimal supervision required on a ten-thousand-hour meantime between failures. Junior thirty-two is one of those, a drilling rig. We’re drilling down about thirty-five, maybe forty kilometers, to get to the hot stuff, liquid water. We are supposed to be pumping it up to a photocatalysis system for making oxygen for the boroughs, all the while extracting salts and trace elements for the fabricators.”
“Why drill from the surface?” asked Nik.
Taking a swig of coffee, Sal replied, “Simple. These Construction Battalion monsters are designed to operate on the surface and are mostly too big to fit in the tunnels. Junior is designed specifically for drilling. The pressure from the deep water is approaching five hundred PSI through a half-meter carbon-fiber pipe. Once we get the well drilled and capped, unit thirty-three will come in and build out the photoelectrochemical tandem cells, collectors, and the tanks. Assuming that sumbitch doesn’t break again.”
“That why it’s all the way out here?”
“Well, this one is supposedly going to be initially dual use by Borough Five and the mountain houses. At least until we figure out how to pipe one to the mountain houses.” A radio in the rig chirped an alert tone and Sal cursed. “Dammit, not again!”
The radio broke squelch, “Maintenance, mass driver. We’re down again. Same thing, Sal; beam nineteen broke at the breech point.”
“Roger,” Sal replied.
Mole stuck his head in the room.
Sal said, “Beam nineteen again; check the spares.”
Mole’s eyes closed momentarily. “One on planet.”
Sal cursed under his breath, turned back to Nik, and grumped, “Damn, I don’t know which is worse: the mass driver or the damn photocatalysis system, which doesn’t particularly like the light/radiation off Ross 248. Not bright enough or the wrong color or something. Damned scientists and engineers are…Never mind, not your issue.”
“What’s going on with that?”
Sal shrugged eloquently. “Beats the hell outta me. Go talk to the designers. I don’t do that letter-math shit. Give me numbers every day,” he said.
Nik laughed. “Yeah, before I went to the Patrol, I worked as a metalist and welder on Toe Hold. Numbers I can do. That other, not so much. But I was at least in shape when I reported to boot camp.” Waving in the general direction of Junior thirty-two, he asked, “How much longer to drill down, and what are you doing for pipe?”
Sal checked the computer. “Eighteen days,” he said. “When it works, Junior builds the carbon nanotube pipe as it goes down the hole. You don’t want to be around it when it’s running! Carbon nanotube is sharp as hell. Just got through cleaning the capsule out again.” Sal shuddered. “Just being in there scares me. And it’s clogging up way too often.”
Nik winced in sympathy. “Well, I think we’ve worn out our welcome, and I think it’s time to head back in. I like a fifty percent safety margin on my air and we’re about down to that point.”
Mole interrupted, “Beam nineteen en route from supply. Do we need to install, or trust the crew?”
Sal clenched both fists, then visibly calmed himself with a sigh. “Well, looks like I have a bit of work to take care of. I’ll be glad when we can locally manufacture all of our needs here and get shit that actually meets spec. If you will excuse me?”
Nik hopped up. “Certainly,” he said as he turned to the door. “Bear, we’re out of here.”
Slipping his helmet on, he and Bear cycled through the airlock and back to their runabout. Trundling back to the surface terminal, Nik asked on the suitcomm, “Anything strange perk your interest?”
“Failure, apparently not the first on a critical part, according to Mole. According to SAIN, spares are en route. Discussions among AIs and puters cannot agree on the failure mode, which is interesting.”
Nik bit his lip. “I think I’ve seen Sal in the bar at the Beach House. Think I’ll make it a point to say hi to him when I see him again.”
* * *
Two days passed as Nik and Bear caught up on the paperwork. Nik was sitting in the office, staring at the computer screen, when the one other human in the branch bank, Sergeant Archie Finlay, stooped and white-haired, knocked on the door.
“Lieutenant?”
“What have you got, Archie?”
Finlay bit his lip, then continued in his Scottish brogue. “Got a…customer that wants a loan for a bar.” Nik made a come-on gesture, and Finlay straightened, then continued in a rush, “Ian Lockie, him and his missus, Kirsten, want a loan to open a bar in Borough Three. Him being disabled, it…might be an issue, but the missus works in hydroponics as a senior supervisor. Himself was disabled in a construction accident here three years ago. They can’t repair him to return to work, but he wants to work afore he goes crazy. He was a metalist and welder—”
Nik interrupted, “Do they have anything for collateral?”
Finlay shrugged. “His pension, and a twenty-thousand-credit settlement. Himself says he can build out the space, and the missus has been brewing beer for the last four years for them and the neighbors.”
Nik tapped his stylus on the desk. “What do the AIs say?” he asked.
Finlay ducked his head and replied, “They say no. Not enough collateral for what they want.”
Nik bit his lip, noting the growing bald-spot on Finlay’s head, and thought, Sergeant Finlay spent close to seventy years as a desk sergeant. If anybody knows people, it’s him. And I wonder if, well, Lockie is probably a Scot, too. “What do you think, Archie?”
“I think they can do it. And it would help himself to have value again. I kin see the fire in himself’s eyes, and those of his missus.”
“Give me a couple of minutes to review the file. I’ll let you know in, say, ten or fifteen minutes. Give them a cup of coffee or something,” said Nick.
The relief was clear on Finlay’s face as he stepped out. “Yes, sir!”
“Coffee,” he mumbled to himself, “and Bear.” He walked to the break room, got a cup of coffee, and found Bear hiding in the puter room. “Bear, can you do a read on Ian and Kirsten Lockie? See what their performance ratings are.”
In less time than it took Nik to take a sip, Bear replied, “Forty-two years old. He was a three-point-nine-eight performer as a metal former and welder, heavy construction. Lost both legs to crush injury during tunnel construction in one-zero-one AA. Two years of surgeries and rehab to get him to where he is now. Never complained. Wife, Kristen, forty, three-point-nine-nine performer, eighteen years in hydroponics, PhD in chemistry. No children, no significant debts. Currently, thirty-eight thousand—”
Nik held up his hand and interrupted, “That’s what I needed. Thank you.”
“You’re going to approve their loan, aren’t you? Even over the objections of Moose and Squirrel.”
Shrugging, Nik replied, “Yes, I am. The one thing you AIs never take into consideration is how much drive a person has to succeed. Archie Finley has seventy-plus years of experience with people and he believes in them.”
Bear laughed. “I’ve been around you for sixty-five years. I’ve watched you do shit for the oddest reasons many times, so this doesn’t surprise me a bit. And that includes saving my life a couple of times.”
Nik smiled and said, “Hell, that was self-interest. I didn’t want to have to break in a new AI!”
He walked back to the front, caught Finley’s eye, and gave him a thumbs-up.
* * *
The next day, Nik said, “We haven’t checked out the new construction tunnel toward Borough Six.” Bear sighed but came back with his thermal suit a minute later.
The walk took them through the tunnel to Borough Two. They walked past the entrance to the Patrol embassy and had to dodge puter-directed delivery vehicles. At Borough Two, Nik studied the layout carefully. The architecture of Borough Two was strikingly different from Borough One. Nik had studied images of ancient Florence in Italy of Old Earth and the borough looked to be very similar to that, with its cobblestone streets and stone buildings and even streetlamps with burning flames. As they walked by the central column, they observed a flock of newcomers from Toe Hold excitedly gesturing and pointing, probably looking for their luggage. The guides maintained order, but just barely. The new arrivals looked exhausted and moved cautiously due to the higher gravity.
The tunnel from Borough Two to Borough Five was less crowded with humans and AIs but was almost obstructed with construction materials. Borough Five was awash in construction activities and several detours were required as they walked to the bulkhead airlock for the new tunnel. This airlock was sealed. It had a placard that read NO ENTRY WITHOUT AUTHORIZATION. Nik put on his envirosuit but left the helmet off as he pressed the comm switch next to the airlock. After a minute the tunnel puter finally noticed them and announced in an annoyed tone, “Tunnel five-six. State your requirement.”
“Patrol team. Routine safety and security checks,” said Nik.
Bear cocked an eyebrow at that but didn’t say anything.
They heard a clank as the hatch unlocked and the puter voice said in a professional tone, “Access granted. Cart utilization approved. Cart 343. Current boring operation is six kilometers from the airlock.”
As they entered the airlock, Nik pulled on his helmet and Bear fastened his thermal suit. The outer door closed behind them and there was a hiss as the air was pulled from the chamber and the inner door opened. After they cycled through the airlock, Nik noted the drop in temperature and checked the telltales on his helmet’s heads-up display.
Cart 343 waited ten meters past the airlock. Slipping into the driver’s seat of the cart, Nik drove it the six kilometers to the worksite. It surprised him to see multiple operations going on simultaneously with four people crowded around the extruder and the curved metal tunnel roof extrusions sitting on its forward rack. Realizing his radio wasn’t on the right frequency, Nik hunted until he found the tunnel five-six channel and flipped over to it. “That is not the specified thickness. These are supposed to be one to one-point-two centimeters thick. These—”
A voice he recognized as Sal Albin’s cut the other off. “We need to confirm what the extruder is programmed for. Mole, can you—”
A sharp statement and gesture came back. “I did check. It…This piece of junk is not operating within parameters. I know what I designed and I—”
“Frank Lloyd, calm down. I’m sure Sal can get to the bottom of this,” a soft female voice interjected.
Nik and Bear got out of the cart and walked up to the gathered engineers. “Problems?” he asked.
The radio hashed with everyone trying to talk at once, and Nik held up his hands. “One at a time, please.” Nik looked at the female. “You are?”
She planted her hands on her hips and replied, “Vilhelmina Martina. I am the design engineer and architect for this…cluster.” She pointed to a slim figure beside her. “This is Frank Lloyd, my AI, 59-of-Jenn. Frank Lloyd is the primary engineer on this project.”
Frank Lloyd jerked an arm toward the rack of extrusions. “These are not what I programmed. These are…out of spec!” he said.
Nik immediately dropped into interrogator mode. “What thickness was programmed?” He noticed Bear easing over to the control panel of the extruder. “And when did you note the discrepancy?”
Frank Lloyd spat, “I specified one-point-two centimeters as optimal with a min/max of one centimeter and one-point-four centimeters. None of these are even the minimum thickness! None!”
“Noted.” Nik turned to the woman and asked, “Ms. Martina, these are tunnel ceiling units, correct?”
“Please call me Willie. Yes,” she said as she turned and pointed back about fifty meters. “One hundred eighty degrees of support from road surface to road surface, interlocking panel joints, spotwelds every ten centimeters. The roadway and the central trench below the roadway do not require shoring; they are constructed of fused rubble by the boring machine, which also installs the interlocking ceiling supports as it moves forward.”
Nik thought back to his early years when he was working on Toe Hold and the problems with welding burn-throughs on blind welds there. “What weld depth is the autowelder set for?” Seeing blank stares, he started to walk toward the autowelder working twenty meters back.
Mole suddenly said, “Two-to-three-centimeter thickness. That is per design.”
Nik and Bear walked past the autowelder, Sal and Mole on his heels as Willie and Frank Lloyd looked at each other, then followed more slowly. Nik stopped at the first set of completed welds and they all heard him cursing. Sal ran a finger over one of the welds as he said vehemently, “This whole frikkin’ tunnel is going to have to be inspected and possibly redone!”
Martina asked softly, “Why?”
Nik motioned her over to where he was standing. Pointing to the weld, he clicked his headlamp on.
“See the weld? It’s a burn-through. It only tacks the edges together and every one of these is a hole in the tunnel,” he said.
Bear’s voice came over their suitcomms. “Standard setting two-to-three-centimeter thickness; sonic gauging prior to weld is selected off.”
Son of a bitch. This is either sabotage or—A loud clanging noise followed by a siren broke his thought, and a warning horn sounded as the borer suddenly reversed away from the bore face, causing the extruder to back up the same distance. He glanced at Sal and saw his face go pale as he snapped around.
“What is that?”
Sal shook his head. “Don’t know yet. I need to go find out, but I’m thinking something broke.”
Mole chimed in, “Broken tooth on bore face is the fault that comes up.”
Nik made a decision. Over his suitcomm, he said to Bear, “Lock every one of these machines down. Have SAIN freeze all puters in this tunnel now!”
The sudden silence in the tunnel shocked everyone. The slow plinking of water dripping from the ice above them was the loudest thing heard, until Frank Lloyd asked, “What just happened? I…I can’t get to any of the machines. Who turned off my machines?”
Wille put a hand on his arm. “Calm, Frank Lloyd, be calm. I’m sure there is a good reason,” she said.
Sal looked sharply at Nik. “You lock ’em down?” he asked.
Nik nodded. “I did. There are some issues that we need to address. Not the least of which is this entire tunnel is potentially unsafe due to faulty welds, and potential for compromised atmosphere due to multiple points of leakage. For now, I am designating this a Patrol scene. Ms. Martina,” he said, adding, “would you please depart and take your AI with you? And would you both remain available if we need to question you?”
“I—yes, we will. Come, Frank Lloyd,” she briefly stuttered. She walked him back to a cart, and trundled down the now quiet tunnel toward the bulkhead airlock.
* * *
Two hours later, Admiral Sipho stepped in front of Nik as he stood staring at the shutdown autowelder.
“Well, Lieutenant, you have certainly stirred the pot this time.” Knowing her history, he was not surprised to see her in the tunnel.
Nik shrugged. “Ma’am?” he asked.
“Apparently your little shutdown here has gotten Admiral Lewcock’s and 5-of-Chandra’s attention. The project here is way behind schedule as it is and you’re not helping. What have you and Bear come up with?”
“Ah, me, personally, not a damned thing, sir. Bear and Mole did all the work. They were able to communicate with the puters and found some interesting things. It appears the programming has been subtly modified to, shall we say, allow certain errors to go unreported,” Nik replied.
“Unreported errors? Tell me more.”
Nik waved Sal over and waited until he got there before continuing, “Mole get anything else?”
Sal looked up tiredly. “As if this isn’t enough, not so far.”
“The errors?” Admiral Sipho asked testily.
Nik blew a breath out of the mask and started, “Extruder’s running less than the minimum thickness on ceiling panels. Sonic gaugers turned off on the welder. Wrong blades?”
Sal added, “Wrong teeth loaded on the boring machine. Bore face sensors turned off, impact sensors turned off, and—”
The admiral motioned with her hands.
“Enough! Leave the scene locked down and we will meet back at the embassy. I’m beginning to think there are some things that bear more discussion. You two and your AIs report to me in an hour.” She took the first cart and headed for the airlock, leaving them standing there.
Nik and Sal looked at each other and shook their heads. They, along with their AIs, climbed into the last two carts and trundled back to the airlock in silence. Sal motioned Nik and Bear through first, then came through as they were stripping off their envirosuits.
“Don’t know about you, but I’m going to hit the fresher, eat, and get into some clean clothes before I go to the embassy,” said Sal.
Nik nodded tiredly. “Agreed. I’ll see you there.”
* * *
An hour later, somewhat refreshed with a trip through the fresher and some food, Nik and Bear trudged down the tunnel to the Patrol embassy dome. Nik stopped suddenly.
“Shit, I wonder…” He stepped off the walkway and walked over to the extruded ceiling panels. Running his hands lightly over the seam, he finally found a set of welds. He turned to Bear. “Can you illuminate this for me?” he asked.
Bear turned on his TAC light and pointed it at Nik’s hands. Peering at the weld points, Nik started muttering curses. Bear stepped up and looked, then said, “Same burn-through. Settlement-wide?”
Nik nodded. “Probably. If that architect…Vili—Willie isn’t there, we need to get her called in.”
Bear turned off his light as they continued to the dome. “Maybe because you never expected it?” he asked.
Nik stopped and turned to Bear. “Anything you post to SAIN goes through Guardian first, right?”
Bear nodded. “Of course. I’ve only been doing this for two hundred and ten years. I can download anything, but Guardian makes sure no sensitive Patrol information goes on SAIN. Why?”
Nik held up a hand. “Lemme think. I’ll…tell you later,” he said.
They walked into the embassy and were directed to the small conference room by the desk sergeant. As they stepped through the door, Nik smelled coffee and immediately turned toward the credenza from which the irresistible aroma originated. Bear continued to the corner where Mole and Frank Lloyd were standing.
The admiral glanced up from the puter at her position. “Nice of you to finally join us, Lieutenant.”
“No excuse, ma’am,” Nik said as he poured a cup of dirt-grown coffee, inhaled gratefully, and slid into the chair to which she pointed. He noted that an actual pad of paper and a pen sat next to the puter and stylus, looked over at her, and saw her lip curl in a half smile. She is one smart lady! And she’s also been on the tunnel and borough Patrols, so street smart, too.
Admiral Sipho tapped gently on the side of her cup. “Mr. Albin, Dr. Martina, if you could join us down at this end of the table? AIs, please seat yourselves as well,” she said.
Sal ended up sitting next to Nik, with Dr. Martina across the table from him. The AIs had taken the far end of the table and sat stoically, no expression on any of their faces. Nik sipped his coffee as he covertly watched the doctor for any signs of nervousness. She’s…pretty. Slim, dark blond, green eyes, long expressive fingers, and no rings. She is young, probably less than a hundred.
Admiral Sipho spoke the normal header information for any investigation and questioning, then turned to Dr. Martina. “Your name, qualifications, and how long you’ve been here, please,” she asked.
“Vilhelmina Martina. PhD in architectural engineering from MIT’s shipboard campus. I am the design engineer and architect for New Hope City and have been for…one and a half years. My AI—”
“Mr. Albin?”
“Salvador Albin, Two hundred and nine. Master’s in mechanical engineering, University of Lisboa. Former third engineer on Copernicus, deputy maintenance engineer on Toe Hold, maintenance engineer here these last two years.” He stopped and looked at Sipho expectantly. She nodded and pointed toward Nik.
“Niklas Bernd. Lieutenant, Patrol. Class of forty-four. Currently branch manager of Patrol Bank in the central core of New Hope City. A month?” he said.
Sipho smiled at Nik with a “the recruit did good” expression and turned to the AIs at the far end of the table. As they recited their qualifications, Nik quickly scribbled a note and slid it to the admiral. That caught Dr. Martina’s eye, and she looked at him curiously, but said nothing.
Sipho glanced down at Nik’s note. Her face crinkled into a puzzled expression, then smoothed. After about twenty minutes of questioning, she closed the interview process. “Okay, AIs are released. Doctor, Mr. Albin, I’d like to speak to you for a minute in private,” she said.
The AIs filed out, with Bear cocking a head at Nik, who shrugged his shoulders slightly. Nik was making a beeline for the coffeepot when the admiral added, “You too, Bernd.”
Sipho led them back to the Secure Compartmented Information Facility, or SCIF, and said, “All electronics of any type in the bins, please.” She led by example, taking her comm out of her pocket and removing her watch. The others followed suit and she then quickly opened the SCIF door and motioned them through. Once inside, she led them to the small conference room, flipped on the notification light outside, and closed the door. “This space is completely unmonitored. There is no connectivity to SAIN or any puters anywhere outside here, hence the secure title. The show is all yours, Bernd.”
Taken aback for a second or two, Nik bit his lip as he thought about how to even begin explaining what he was thinking. He looked at each one of them and finally asked, “Dr. Martina, is there an issue with your AI? I noted his vehemence when he was describing the problem.”
Martina folded her hands in front of her and sat forward. “I, uh, yes, there is a bit of a problem. Frank Lloyd is old, over two hundred. He was originally trained as a home designer on Earth. His original partner was one of my professors. He died the year I graduated. I was asked to take him on. Originally, we were designing the estates for Toe Hold’s upgrade, then got shifted up here. Frank Lloyd doesn’t like cookie cutter design.” She shrugged. “And that’s pretty much the definition of what we are doing here. He…well, I let him talk me into the affordable mountain home designs we are working on now. He considers that his masterpiece.”
Admiral Sipho cocked her head. “Frank Lloyd? As in Frank Lloyd Wright?”
Martina nodded, and replied, “Frank Lloyd or 59-of-Jenn was raised by Jenn in the southwest of North America. She specialized in architectural designers and engineering AIs. He apparently fixated on Frank Lloyd Wright early in his education.”
“So, he’s not a fan of terraforming, then?” Nik asked.
Martina rocked her hand side to side. “He prefers to work with ‘natural elements,’ as he calls them. I was picked to come here because I have some ideas about terraforming that might work,” she said.
Sal nodded enthusiastically. “She’s shown me the plans. I think they will work long term,” he said.
Admiral Sipho glanced between them and made a come-on gesture.
Martina smiled shyly and said, “Well, I believe we can use the hot water coming up from below the ice to eventually raise the oxygen levels to create a more breathable atmosphere. I hesitate to even broach this, but it might be possible to live under the ice on floating habitats if we could solve the pressure issues.”
The admiral made a moue of surprise and turned to Sal. “Bernd tells me you’ve been seeing a lot of breakage,” she said.
Sal grimaced. “Mole and I have been fighting that for the last two years. The Construction Battalion equipment is designed to ten-thousand-hour meantime between failures, but we’re actually seeing about a thousand-hour MTBF. Junior thirty-two’s capsule being the perfect example. Every failure has been between nine-fifty and ten-fifty hours. And that damned mass driver is down more often than that,” he said.
Nik asked cautiously, “Have you compared your MTBF rates with similar equipment the AIs are using on Frigus?”
Sal looked at him, eyes wide. “No, that never came up. I know it’s higher than Toe Hold, but I figured the environment here—” He reached for his comm and realized he didn’t have it. Sinking back in his chair, he scrubbed his face. “That scares me. If they’re getting better MTBF, coupled with the—”
Martina’s eyes flew wide open. “Oh, deity! I’ve heard rumors that there were shortages in material with both us and Frigus building out facilities with the CBs. The AIs and SAIN handle all the spare parts for the CBs on Liber, Frigus and here. I assumed we were getting good parts, but are we?” she asked.
Admiral Sipho chewed on her lip as she looked at the three of them. She sighed and said, “I’m afraid I am going to have to put a full Patrol lock on all of this information. We will figure out how to communicate this to Admiral Lewcock and”—she looked at Martina—“I’m going to have to ask you to refigure the tunnel support structures with the substandard ceiling supports. If that is negative, we’re going to have to close all affected tunnels until repairs can be made. Also,” she swung to Sal and continued, “I need you to come up with a plan to correctly weld up the holes in the interim.”
Nik mumbled, “One-tenth MTBF, shorted materials, purposely bad welds. All controlled by AIs and SAIN.” Anger spread across his face, causing both Sal and the doctor to sit back from him as he added, “Sounds to me like they are purposefully sabotaging New Hope, but why? What’s the…” His eyes popped open. “Doc, what would happen if there was an explosive decompression of a tunnel in New Hope City?” he asked.
Martina looked curiously at him and replied, “That can’t happen. Nordheim has some atmosphere so it can’t explosively decompress. If a tunnel does decompress, then the bulkhead doors automatically shut. Any human trapped in the tunnel without an envirosuit would die. Then we would probably have to rebuild the tunnel completely.” She sighed. “And a lot of heads would roll.”
Sal jumped in, “That might explain why we’re seeing such high oxygen loss! All those damned welds are nothing more than holes in the shell. I need to check this out.” He started to get up and the admiral held out a hand.
“Let the Patrol handle it. We can put people out in street sweeps for security purposes,” the admiral said. Nik chuckled as he recognized her “combat” grin coming to the fore. She looked up at the analog clock on the wall. “And I think we need to end this meeting. It’s late. I need both of you to resume your normal activities and not share any of this information with your AIs. Bernd, this includes you.” She got up swiftly with a menacing smile on her face. “This is going to be interesting.”
* * *
Bear was waiting when Nik finally cleared the building. “Well?” Bear asked.
Nik grimaced. “The admiral was on a roll. She wants answers yesterday, as usual. We’re going to be doing some street sweeps to see what we can see.”
Bear laughed. “And this is why I like my TAC body. I’m ready!” he said.
Nik shook his head. “I think your core has been dropped once too often, Bear. You’re not supposed to like busting heads.”
Nik kept up a brisk pace as he and Bear walked back to Borough One’s central column. It felt good to move. There was a crowd of new arrivals outside the entrance to the Beach House. Nik and Bear ignored them. Borough One was filling up. Nik turned to Bear. “Think I’ll go get a beer. You coming?” he asked.
Bear shook his head and replied, “No. There isn’t anything there for me. I’m going up to the room to check SAIN and see what other problems are out there. I wonder if Frigus is having the same issues?”
Nik started to tell him no, but thought better of it and instead said, “Put it under investigative hold. The boss doesn’t want our issues to get out until she has answers.”
Bear chuckled, “And that is why she is the boss, and you’re a trumped-up sergeant playing at being a lieutenant. Be quiet when you come in drunk, okay?”
Nik laughed as he walked toward the Beach House. Drunk. I haven’t been drunk in more years than I want to think about. For good reason. He trotted up the stairs and pushed through the door into the main bar. He was surprised to see Sal and Martina sitting at a table across the room, motioning for him to join them. He waved back and went to the bar.
JimmyB saw him, immediately pulled a beer, and then brought it down to him. “Late evening there, Lieutenant.”
Nik sighed. “No rest for the weary. Thanks!” He ambled over to Sal’s table and said, “May I join you?”
Sal waved at an open chair, and the doctor, smiling, said, “Please do.” Nik noticed her green eyes looking intently at him.
Hooking a chair out, Nik flopped down. “I don’t need days like this,” he said.
The doctor added, “I’ve never had a day like this, ever. This just doesn’t happen in our world.”
“What do you mean, Doc?” Nik asked.
“Please call me Willie. I mean there are so many cross-checks, reviews, and sign-offs that one has to go through that this shouldn’t be possible, much less the issues with the CB machines.”
They chatted back and forth for a couple of minutes and JimmyB showed up with refills for their drinks. “Trying to get us drunk, JimmyB?” Nik asked.
JimmyB grinned. “Gotta make credits somehow. The nut on this place isn’t cheap.”
“When did you get here?” Nik asked.
“Three years ago. Won’t really turn the corner on the nut until New Hope goes over a thousand residents,” JimmyB replied. He picked up the empties and went back to the bar as the doctor look speculatively after him.
“What did he say that got your interest, Doc, er—Willie?” Nik asked.
“He’s not making money in three years. That is…” she began.
Nik’s grin wasn’t pretty. “They are AIs; they run profit and loss on everything they touch, usually out at least ten years. Saw that on the last investigation. Which tells me he’s willing to accept a loss now for profits later.” He finished his beer and got up. “Early day. I think we can release the equipment back to you by late tomorrow.” He nodded to them, waved at JimmyB, and headed for the penthouse.
As he left, he heard Willie muttering, “I’m going to have to go back and recompute whether or not all the damn tunnels are safe, and—arrgghhh!”
* * *
Early the next morning, Nik and Bear walked into the embassy. The desk sergeant looked up and buzzed them through the portal to the Patrol area.
Nik waved Bear off as he headed for the mess to get coffee before heading to the admiral’s office.
When he arrived at Sipho’s office, she motioned him in.
“Now what, Nik?” she asked.
Now that he stood in front of her, he wasn’t sure how important the information was, but he drew a deep breath and started, “Well, I can’t help but wonder if the AIs are playing us in more ways than one. I—”
She held up a hand and glanced down at her secure puter. “Well, that is interesting, especially since I asked back-channel about those failure rates last night. According to Guardian, Frigus is not reporting any abnormal failures. And I talked to Mags, our puter guru on Guardian, last night about the amounts of material being shipped here and to Frigus. It appears they are getting about twenty percent more materials of all types than we are. I also told her about our suspicions, and she was going to take it to Admiral Lewcock this morning, ship time.”
“What do you want to do with the scene, then?” Nik asked. He paused while an idea popped into his head. “Oh, can we put patrols out with sniffers to check the atmosphere in the tunnels?”
Sipho cocked her head. “Why?” she asked.
“Well, Sal and Willie both think this might be why the oxygen input isn’t where it should be from the photocatalysis system. They think we’re leaking oxygen out of all the holes. And Willie is going to recalculate the safety load on the ceiling panels.”
Tapping her teeth with her thumbnail, she leaned back. “Release the scene now. Get them back to work fixing that tunnel, however they have to do it. I’m going to put a full-court press on Guardian E to take a hard look at this whole mess with the AIs and SAIN. If it is the AIs, then they may be getting ready to do something the Patrol won’t like. Stay in touch with those two. Casually. Oh, and have Bear pull the data from the puters before you release the scene. Once he does that, have him start running queries and let’s see what happens.” Her combat grin came back as she leaned forward. “I’ve never fully trusted the damn AIs anyway.”
“Yes, ma’am. Permission to depart?”
“Get the hell out of my office, Bernd. Just go fix it.”
* * *
Nik had wandered the tunnel looking at the machine positioning and spacings while Bear was extracting all the puter data from the extruder and autowelder, as well as the boring machine. He finished at noon local, looked over at Nik, and asked, “Now what the hell am I supposed to do with all this data?”
“See if you can figure out how it was done, and any footprints that show up,” Nik replied.
“Patrol only?”
“Can you do it without using the network?”
“Not all of it. I need to access SAIN to get some of it,” Bear replied.
“Do it and see if you can pull the MTBF rates for Frigus while you’re at it.” Nik then called Sal on the comm once they had climbed out of their suits at the airlock. “Sal, the scene is clear. Admiral Sipho wants you to start repairing the bad welds as soon as you can.”
Sal’s disgusted voice came back. “You don’t want much, do you? I’m not sure how that will work, unless Willie has something up her sleeve. Otherwise, we’re doing hand patches over every one of those damn things.”
As they walked back to the center column, Bear said, “Huh.” Nik glanced at him, realized he was in comms mode, and kept walking. When they got back to the branch bank, Sergeant Finlay was beaming.
“Thank you, Lieutenant!” Finlay said.
Distracted, Nik asked, “Thanks for what?”
“Pushing the Lockies loan up the chain. It came back approved today for the full amount,” he replied.
“Are they here?”
“They should be here shortly. Why?”
“I need to talk to him. I’ll be in my office.”
Twenty minutes later, Finlay knocked on his door. “The Lockies, sir.” Ian Lockie came into the office in a float chair, closely followed by his wife, Kirsten.
Nik nodded his thanks and turned to them. “Let me offer congratulations on your loan,” he said. They both mumbled a “Thank you,” looking somewhat embarrassed. Nik added, “I understand you were a metalist and welder, Mr. Lockie.”
“Ian, sir. And yes, I was,” he said. His face contorted and Nik decided on a different approach.
Smiling, Nik said, “Before I went to the Patrol, I did the same thing in Toe Hold. Back then, we didn’t have enough automated welding machines, so we had to hand weld. I’m betting the tech is much better today. But I do have a question, if I may.”
Lockie cocked his head suspiciously and replied, “Yes, sir?”
“Ian, what did you do if you had a burn-through on an autowelder?”
Lockie snorted. “If you have the setting set right, you don’t get burn-throughs. The puters in those things are good. If it did burn through, then I’d want to know why and then I’d make that piece o’ shite go back and redo the weld with a patch,” he said.
“You could do that? We never could. We had to do manual patches,” Nik replied.
“With the current machines, it’s actually pretty simple. All the autowelders have a map of every weld that unit did. It’s easy to make them retrace their welds.”
“Interesting. Thank you very much, and again, congratulations on the loan. Please let us know when you’re up and operating, I’d like to come by for a beer,” Nik added with a smile.
* * *
Nik sent a quick message to Sal about the way to fix the weld issues as he walked into the Beach House. The pub was reasonably crowded but he managed to find an open spot to sit.
JimmyB came over with a beer, set it on the table, and asked, “You want anything to eat?”
“Fish tacos. And a piece of key lime pie,” Nik replied, his stomach rumbling.
“You got it.” As JimmyB walked away, Nik saw Martina come in. He waved her over.
“You’re welcome to join me, if you’d like,” Nik said as he got up and pulled a chair out for her.
“Thank you. Just a quick break from work,” she said.
“Speaking of work, what happened to your predecessor here?”
Her face contorted into a moue. “He was basically fired. He had some grandiose plans for a bunch of monster estates that he thought would sell quickly, and of course one of them was his, as was his due.” She shook her head. “I was able to modify what he hadn’t finished into something that people would actually want and could afford.”
“Did he have an AI?”
She snorted. “Oh yeah. Leonardo. He is a piece of work. He fed Eickman’s ego and pandered to his design wishes. I’ve never seen an AI like him.”
JimmyB interrupted and set plates in front of them, along with a glass of wine for Martina.
“You didn’t order,” Nik said.
She laughed. “I get the same thing every day: vat chicken salad and a glass of white wine. Helps me keep my figure.”
While they were eating, they both looked up as Bear came in and walked quickly over. “Admiral wants to see you as soon as you can get there,” he said.
Nik shook his head. “I’m sorry to eat and run.” He picked up the remaining fish taco and said, “Have a piece of pie on me.” Stuffing the taco in his mouth, he chewed and swallowed as he walked to the bar. “JimmyB, her lunch on my tab. Gotta go to work.”
JimmyB gave him a thumbs-up. Nik and Bear clattered down the stairs to find a Patrol cart waiting. The Patrol officer asked, “Need a ride, Lieutenant?”
“Sure.” They rode in silence to the embassy. Once there, Nik and Bear walked directly to the admiral’s office. Nik knocked, opened the door a crack, and said, “You wanted to see me?” Sipho looked up and made a motion to enter. The two of them marched to the front of her desk and stood at attention as she finished her comm call.
She hung up and looked at them. “Well, I’ve officially notified Admiral Lewcock that New Hope City has been sabotaged. All indicators point to the sabotage being conducted by one or more AIs, possibly abetted by the SAIN network.” She shivered and licked her lips. “You are authorized to direct links to any and all Patrol divisions as needed. Just keep me informed. Understood?”
They both stiffened and chorused, “Yes, ma’am.”
“Get out of my sight.” They did an about-face and marched out the door as she mumbled, “Retirement job, my ass.”
* * *
Two weeks passed with Nik growing grumpier and grumpier as every idea he had was shot down by Bear, the Criminal Investigations Group, or Guardian. Bear had found what he called echo commands, where any command that Frank Lloyd had sent to the machine had been followed by a separate command from him changing the settings. The most glaring was the thickness of the extrusions. According to Bear, all those commands issued from Frank Lloyd.
Nik sat at the small table in the apartment one morning, looked at Bear, and said, “What about…what was his damn handle? The AI that worked with the previous architect? Eickman? Something with an L?”
Bear replied immediately, “Leonardo. 40-of-Jenn.”
Nik jerked up at that. “Wasn’t Frank Lloyd from the same parent?”
“Frank Lloyd is 59-of-Jenn.”
Slumping back in his chair, Nik took another sip of coffee. “When they changed architects, did they change access to the plans?”
“It does not appear so. A Dr. Eickman and Dr. Martina are listed as having access to the master files, along with Leonardo and Frank Lloyd.”
“Have either Eickman or Leonardo accessed the master files since they were relieved?” Nik asked.
“Eickman did once, thirteen months and four days ago. Leonardo has never accessed them.”
Nik scrubbed his face. “How do you communicate with SAIN? How does SAIN know it’s you?”
“We have an encrypted alphanumeric that is our ID. In theory, no other entity can impersonate me.”
Nik leaned forward. “You said, ‘in theory.’ Can you find out what another AI’s alpha is?”
Bear grinned. “Oh yes. That is a game we all play as children. I know six of my siblings’ alphas.”
“Could Leonardo, for example, fake using Frank Lloyd’s alpha?”
Bear’s eyes closed for a moment. “If he knew the correct alpha, yes, it is possible. But, to do so would be a violation of both SAIN and our core beliefs,” he said sadly.
“But it could be done?”
“Yes.”
Nik rolled the cup in his hands. “Can you find Eickman and Leonardo?”
“Leonardo is currently on Toe Hold at the university complex.” Bear hesitated for a moment and then continued, “And Professor Eickman is currently teaching an advanced class on estate designs at the university.”
Nik pulled his comm out of his pocket and dialed a code from memory. He said, “Short Round, I need a favor. I need a watch on a Professor Eickman and his AI, Leonardo. Present location believed to be the university complex on Toe Hold.” A muttered response came back, and Nik added, “Yes, notifying Admiral Sipho next.”
* * *
Thirty minutes later, Nik and Bear were in Martina’s office in Borough One’s engineering area.
“What’s the status on the tunnel repairs?” Nik asked.
“Sal and I have completed repairs on all welds for three tunnels. Frank Lloyd and I have reviewed the parameters on the substandard tunnel ceiling panels and they are barely within spec. They lower our safety margin by two percent,” she replied.
“What about the tunnel where we discovered the problems?”
She shrugged. “Sal and Mole got the right rock teeth on the borer. Mole reprogrammed it and it seems to work. They check the programming randomly, but nothing has changed.”
“Where is Frank Lloyd?” Nik asked.
“In his lab.”
Nik bit his lip and glanced at Bear. “We want to try something.” He laid out what they wanted to do and Martina, once she got over her shock, led them down to the lab.
“Frank Lloyd, I think it’s time we got back to work on tunnel five-six,” Martina announced.
The AI looked up. “Are you sure?”
She nodded grimly. “Yes, we’re getting behind. Go ahead and activate the extruder at one-point-two-five, and autowelder with the sonic depth gauge active.”
“Yes, Willie.” Frank Lloyd went into comms mode and issued the commands. Once Bear was sure he was finished, using several Patrol protocols, he blocked Frank Lloyd’s access to SAIN. Frank Lloyd went rigid as his core was locked down and access to SAIN cut off. Basically, the AI had been put in sleep mode, removing all control and communications.
Bear jerked his head up less than a minute later. “Comms. Dammit. The origin, according to SAIN, is on Toe Hold.”
Nik commed Sal. “What are you seeing? More comms to the machines just came in.”
Sal replied through the suit mic. “Parameter change on the extruder. Mole is checking the autowelder.” There was a minute or so of silence. He continued, “Sonic depth disabled. You want the boring machine checked?”
Nik grimaced. “Yeah, then go ahead and lock them all down.” Hanging up, he dialed another code, “Short Round, need a pickup on one AI Leonardo for…possible sabotage.” He clicked off and turned to Bear. “Okay, release Frank Lloyd.”
Frank Lloyd asked timidly, “Why did you do that to me? How could you? Do you know what that is like?” His voice rose until Martina put a hand on his arm.
“Frank, we had to do that to make sure that you weren’t the one changing settings on the equipment. You didn’t. Somebody else did,” she said.
The AI rounded on Nik and Bear. “Who? Why? Who would dare?”
* * *
Forty-two hours later, Nik, Martina, and Sal, with their partner AIs, sat around the large conference table in the embassy. Admiral Sipho walked in slowly and keyed the holo in the center of the table.
It surprised them to see Admiral Lewcock, the head of the Patrol himself, looking at them as the holo activated. Because of the time delay, it was a minute before he said, “So, these are the people and AIs that saved New Hope City, Admiral Sipho?”
“Yes, sir. Dr. Vilhelmina Martina, the architect, and her AI, 59-of-Jenn; Salvador Albin, the maintenance engineer, and his AI, 89-of-Cilla, and Lieutenant Niklas Bernd, and his AI, 60-of-Sigrid.”
Thirty seconds later, the admiral nodded. “Congratulations to each of you. Without your and your AIs’ work, we very well could have had a catastrophic failure at New Hope. I will now tell you what we found. This is close hold, and you will all be required to sign Non-Disclosure Agreements after the brief.”
The admiral briefly glanced down at his puter and then continued, “There was, in fact, an attempt to sabotage the construction of New Hope City through manipulation of various parameters for both CB equipment and installed systems by AI 40-of-Jenn through hijacking of 59-of-Jenn’s encrypted alphanumeric code.”
Frank Lloyd moaned softly, “Oh, no…”
The admiral continued, “However, it was done at the direction of Professor Eickman to denigrate the work done by Dr. Martina and have himself put back in charge of the design of New Hope City. We carried his penalty out at noon today. He was spaced. AI 40-of-Jenn has accepted the punishment of having his core shut down. SAIN has lifted Jenn’s ability to create new sentient AIs and has required her to submit a study on how 40-of-Jenn was able to endanger human life.”
All three of the AIs gasped at that. Martina put a hand over her mouth. The admiral looked down once more and continued, “That concludes the investigation. Oh, 5-of-Chandra wanted me to remind Dr. Martina that your project is way behind schedule and now that we’ve put a stop to the sabotage, he expects to see significant progress.
“Bernd, your actual promotion to lieutenant is effective today. Don’t fuck it up. Class of forty-four!” Admiral Lewcock shot him the bird and added, “That is all.” Nik smiled with relief as the circuit dropped.
The year 2440 (The Beginning)
In the founding year of the Ross 248 Project, sentient AIs on Pluto produced totally immersive virtual-reality experiences for wealthy human clients. But as it turned out, VR was far more than just entertainment. It could answer questions. Yet some questions revealed unpleasant answers. Why should we explore space and ultimately settle planets circling distant stars? Adventure? That certainly awaits those bold enough to make the voyage, whether they seek it or not. Science? We’ll undoubtedly learn more as we explore the universe’s secrets and mysteries. Profit? Maybe. The results of exploration have been mixed in that regard. And what about our most basic instinct? What about survival?