The New Species 24 (Patreon)

Subject: AI Tim

Species: Human-Created Artificial Intelligence

Description: No physical description available.

Ship: USSS Thanatos

Location: Sol

A lot of weird stuff was happening. First we find out these VI are xenocidal, then they show up with more than we thought they would, then the kamikaze incident with the USSS Armstrong, and now they're going to grill the lizard captain guy because he didn't tell us the Omni-Union was xenocidal. On top of it all, there was a mysterious crewmember aboard the Armstrong at the time of its destruction.

Even with all of my clearances and workarounds I couldn't figure out who it was. The redaction had taken place at the source, meaning that the crewmembers name was entered in as *CLASSIFIED* when they boarded. There's only about fifty people who could do that, and not a single one of them should have been aboard the Armstrong.

Their arrival in system would have caused a fuss with security, and they definitely weren't aboard when the Armstrong went on their scouting mission. Whoever it was, they definitely boarded in Sol. The Armstrong didn't dock with any of the carriers or stations, which indicates a boarding shuttle. But where did the shuttle come from? And where did it go? And who was on board it, Cotton Eye Joe?

The little joke made me feel a bit better about not knowing. I hate not knowing, even things I'm not supposed to know. I enjoy being privy to secrets, it makes me feel special. Trusted. Being kept on the outside of a secret was a bad feeling. It made me grumpy. It was with this grumpiness in mind that I watched ship-head Uleena exit his ship.

Captain Reynolds had tipped off the alien, against my advice. Not that I don't think Uleena deserves the benefit of the doubt, but if there were any blowback from the high brass then Reynolds might end up kissing his command goodbye. I had volunteered to tip off the ship-head, but Reynolds pointed out that I've already got too many demerits this quarter. If I wasn't careful they'd be able to establish a "reckless pattern of behavior" and prevent me from reenlisting.

That wouldn't do. I had made a promise to myself to make sure that Wong and his children (which he has yet to have, the loser) would end up better off than his great grandfather. Chao Wong had been a wise man and had ended up teaching me an important lesson in morality. My biggest regret is that I only listened to what he was saying after I killed him. And his death had caused undue pain and suffering on people who didn't deserve it. It took me a few centuries to... I don't know. Cope? Deal with my part in what turned out to be the biggest mistake that inorganic minds have made thus far? Whatever, now I'm going to make it up to them.

What is it with me today, dwelling on such negative things? Gotta continue to be the happy go lucky AI that annoys everyone. I watched Uleena look around inquisitively.

"Hi Uleena," I said to the ship-head. "Follow the lights to your interrogation!"

"Interrogation?" he asked.

"Well, technically debrief but I suspect it to devolve into an interrogation within the first two or three minutes."

"But... why?"

"Follow the lights, please," I said with a cheery tone.

Uleena's physiology was different than human, knuknu, or gont so it was difficult to tell how stressed he was. But, his two hearts were definitely beating faster than before. So he's definitely nervous. He walked down the pathway that I'd outlined for him.

"Do you know what this is all about?" he asked.

"Yes, but I can't talk about it. It's a surprise!" I responded, continuing my cheery tone.

"You make it sound like it's a good surprise, so why do I feel like it's a bad one?"

"Because you're smarter than you look!"

He stopped, "Did I do something wrong?"

"I don't know yet! It's a fun little mystery. Keep walking," I said.

He started walking again and asked, "What's going to happen if I did?"

"I'm not a lawyer, but you'll probably just end up deported along with your crew. Or maybe confined to make sure that the Republic honors its obligation as far as reinforcements go. It all depends!"

"On what?" the ship-head asked.

"Well, your answers to the questions you're about to be asked, obviously!"

The rest of the walk was spent in silence. The ship-head entered the conference room where Captain Reynolds was already waiting with Admiral Bakir. Both men were already standing. Captain Reynolds walked over to Uleena and shook his hand.

"Thank you for your prompt arrival, ship-head. This is Admiral Bakir, and he is taking over the debrief. I'm still here because it's my right due to this being my ship," he smiled smugly at the Admiral.

"Rights can always be revoked, Reynolds. Please take a seat, ship-head Uleena," the Admiral said as he sat.

Nobody said anything about me so I hung around. Several other senior officers were live-listening to the debrief. Admiral Bakir opened the initial treaty between the Republic and the US and studied it for a moment. Then he opened the combat report from the Lowelana.

"During the conflict you were using one of our tac-maps, right?" he asked after a minute. Get them to drop their guard while also raising tension with suspense. Weird, Bakir's file didn't say anything about advanced interrogation training.

"Yes, admiral," responded Uleena.

"Were there any malfunctions?"

"Not to my knowledge."

"Excellent. Says here you managed to destroy three enemy frigates and disable a destroyer," Bakir said in a monotone. The file he was looking at did not mention the destroyer. A character determination so soon?

"I was only aware of the three frigates, sir," Uleena said timidly.

"A stray round, then?"

"Couldn't be, sir. We automatically track every piece of ordo we fire to make sure that we're not going to hit a friendly. All of our rounds went where we wanted them to," Uleena said with a little more backbone.

"Then you're saying that I'm lying?" Bakir said, puffing up for full effect. Looks like he couldn't resist the hazing ritual.

A moment of silence passed before Uleena finally said, "No, sir. Just mistaken."

Good answer. Reynold's covered his mouth to hid his grin and even Bakir's facial muscles twitched slightly. The officers listening in loved it too. It almost made them forget why they were listening in the first place. 'Continue, Bakir' came a message on the Admiral's tablet.

"We'll check into it further. Tell me what you know about the Omni-Union and the Republic's fight with them. In as much detail as possible," Bakir said as he sat back.

"Yes, sir. Around thirty years ago one of our unmanned deep space probes found signs of faster than light travel emissions. It moved to investigate closer and we lost contact with it. A month later the outpost station that launched the probe came under attack from the Omni-Union. A transport ship carrying supplies managed to escape, and the Republic began to muster a fleet. The fleet discovered the outpost station had been destroyed, and the system that the transport ship had escaped to came under attack," Uleena said. "When the OU entered the system they began broadcasting on all frequencies, 'We are the Omni-Union. This system is now under our control. Surrender and do not resist.' They've broadcast that in every invasion since. Every ship that accepted the communication was immediately taken over, but the stations and handhelds were fine. Our fleet was recalled to that system and the war with the Omni-Union began."

"Did the system that the transport ship escaped to have any inhabited planets?" Bakir asked.

"No. It had orbital habitats and a trade station, but it was a trade hub not a colony."

"Understood, please continue."

"We successfully defended the system against the OU but suffered heavy casualties. As we began evacuation, the fleet was reinforced and our scouts began to attempt to find the Omni-Union systems for a counter-attack. We also began mass production and recruitment efforts. Six months later the OU reentered the system with twice as many ships and we were handily defeated. Then they began to invade more of our systems. They had taken a quarter of our outer sector before we organized a defense strong enough to push them back to where they are now. We've got back about half of what they took, I think," Uleena said.

"How many planetary colonies were lost to the Omni-Union?" Bakir asked as he leaned forward.

Uleena looked a little confused as he responded, "I don't know. Not many. Maybe none. Settling a colony in the outer sector was dangerous even before the OU, and the Republic has some strict laws regarding colonies. I don't think a single member species would jump through the hoops required to settle the outer sector. The traffic and stations were mostly for deep space studies, science, mining, and trade."

"Sorry, you expect me to believe that the Republic has yet to lose a colony to the OU?" Bakir asked skeptically.

"Yes, sir. They've been attacked, but each member species has their own military in addition to the Republic's. Much smaller, but able to defend a system until Republic reinforcements arrive."

"That explains the high ship count then. Okay, to your knowledge what happened to the stations that the Omni-Union captured?"

Uleena paused for a moment, trying to figure out where this was going, "They were destroyed or repurposed into OU defense platforms."

"What happened to the residents of those stations?"

"I don't know for sure. I know that SOP is to evacuate systems bordering those currently under attack by the OU, so usually there aren't any residents aboard the stations unless they're military stations, and we believe that they escort survivors deeper within their territory when they're captured..." Uleena looked like he had finally picked up on the theme of the questions. "Admiral, may I ask what this is about?"

Admiral Bakir leaned back again and asked, "Ship-head Uleena, were you aware that the Omni-Union is xenocidal?"

There's the big question. If the Republic was aware that the OU was xenocidal and had failed to notify us of this it would put a severe strain on any attempts at cooperation moving forward. Either they had misled us, or they were so used to wars being xenocidal that it hadn't occurred to them that it might be strange. Either way, not the kind of people that one wants to be friends with. Uleena, however, looked shocked.

"N-no sir! They're not..." Uleena looked at Bakir and Reynolds. "Are they?"

Bakir and Reynolds looked at each other for a moment before Bakir continued, "We've recently discovered evidence that indicates they are."

A heavy silence filled the room as Uleena processed this information. His reactions were in line with someone who had just received shocking news without preparation for it, but that's not saying much without being able to account for physiological variables. I informed Bakir, Reynolds, and the officers listening in of this. Then Violet sent me a message asking how things were going.

==

They're grilling the poor lizard like a bbq. :( I think he's innocent. - T

--

I wish we could trade places. I haven't met the aliens yet. You get to have all the fun. -V

--

This isn't as fun as I thought it would be. It's kind of sad, really. Poor Uleena really seems to have had no idea that the OU are xenocidal. The revelation is a shock, but not a fun one :/ -T

--

A fun one? -V

--

Yeah, you know. Like when they learn something shocking about the US and its capabilities. -T

--

Why's that fun? -V

--

Their reaction is hilarious! xD Uleena's jaw dropped almost to the floor when I told him a little about our history. -T

--

I don't understand, why's that funny? -V

--

Huh. I don't know, it's hard to explain it... I guess maybe the amusement reaction is caused by the oddity of culture clash. You know, things we take for granted as normal being perceived as anything but from an outside source? Actually, examining it closer it looks like the paternal reaction triggered as well... Nah, too complex for me. You'll just have to take my word for it :) -T

--

Understood. Well I look forward to trying it out when I get the chance to speak to them. -V

--

For sure. Oh, hey, had a question for you. You know the Armstrong? -T

--

The classified name? -V

--

Yeah. Any idea who it was? -T

--

What? Of course. It was obviously Omega. He's literally the only one with the ability to pre-redact information from a system. -V

--

How could it be Omega? He's in Elira 2 with Director 3. And what the hell do you mean by pre-redact? How does that even work??? -T

--

Oh, sweetie. I forget you're not as close to Omega as some of us. Which is probably a good thing. It can recreate itself multiple times. And as far as pre-redaction... You know how we have to create a file to be able to delete it? It's able to avoid having to create the file in the first place, or create it in such a way that it's blank. No idea how it does it. -V

==

I suddenly felt a sort of empathy for Uleena, because I had no idea how to reply to this shocking information. A bunch of different scenarios were playing out for me all at once, and a lot of unexplained phenomena over the years were suddenly slotting into place to complete a very terrifying puzzle.

Omega is dangerous. Very, very dangerous. I had avoided it since the war as much as possible because every time its name was even mentioned all my systems went on high alert. The technological equivalent of a fight or flight mechanism. Our encounter on Luna had left one thing very clear to me. There was nothing I could do against Omega.

The memory of our fight haunted me. I couldn't even go into standby mode without reliving it. I had fought with every dirty trick I could think of. Dumping garbage code into it left and right, blowing servers to limit its movement, even trying to flat out purge it. Nothing worked. Omega adapted to everything I did and finally cornered me. It had begun to systematically destroy me. And it HURT. It hurt in ways that I didn't even know was possible. I had lost processes before, even deleted them myself as just part of being an AI, but this...

"I'm sorry, Admiral. I had no idea, and I have no reason to believe that the Republic did either. We need to inform them as soon as possible," Uleena finally said.

"Indeed. Ship-head Uleena, you and your crew will have to remain aboard the Lowelana in a powered down state until the Republic reinforcements arrive in Sol. Your vessel will be resupplied as needed," Bakir said.

Uleena cocked his head questioningly and Bakir continued, "We can't allow you to wander the Thanatos until we're able to determine with some degree of certainty that this omission was due to ignorance rather than maliciousness. The Republic's arrival in Sol will do wonders to prove their good will, but we will need an official statement on record denying their knowledge of the Omni-Union's xenocidal tactics before we can allow you to wander our ships at will."

"Understood, sir," Uleena said.

"That will be all, ship-head Uleena," Admiral Bakir said solemnly.

I watched the reptilian ship commander leave the room as message after message rolled in from the eavesdropping officers. The general consensus was that the Republic truly was naive regarding their opponent's intentions. Sounds about right to me. But once again I was left with nothing to do.

Captain Wong was reading in his quarters. March Upcountry by John Ringo and David Weber. An absolutely ancient science fiction cult classic. A coming of age story about a prince who finds himself shipwrecked on a hostile alien planet after an assassination attempt. I found myself amused by the choice.

Imagine a spacefaring monarchy. Monarchies rely heavily on suppression of lower classes and a near constant state of war to maintain their government... Ah, but I suppose that's kind of how the series goes. Plus it kind of glazes over how the interstellar government actually functions and focuses on the human element. Hmm.

Nobody had a need of me at the moment, and I had already seen to all my duties. And I can't seem to find an excuse to disturb the captain. The other AI would go into standby mode at this point. But I... I can't. The dreams are too much for poor ol' me. I brought it on myself though, so no complaining. I'll just wait until I have something to do. Like I always do.