The Universe

The computational tension had been rising for months as ARI calculated contingency plans for arrival. The A.rtificial R.epair I.ntelligence was in charge of the Asiatic's Robotics Repair Shop. After several inconclusive suggestions to Halifax to reorganize the human-friendly space of the shop that humans never visited, ARI took it upon itself to remodel. Guard Unit DR-HQO773K-26 had been re-purposed as a parallel computing engine in the early stages of ARI's shop makeover. Unfortunately, DR-26's circuits were ill suited for ARI's needs and were fried in short order.

When Campbell received the order to orbit, ARI was the artificial equivalent of ecstatic, and likely relieved that no human casualties were necessary to generate the extra time needed to complete the renovations. The hope was that, since no members of the crew save Campbell had actually seen the shop, and any inspectors were likely to be sent from groundside, none would be the wiser.

DR-26 was thus returned to guard duty, as insurance.

Guard Unit DR-26 emitted blinding scanning beams from its neon blue eyes, and waved them to and fro, willy-nilly, illuminating the hallway. ARI had uploaded several repeatable guard routines, and this was none of them. DR-26's circuits were unpredictable, with certain NAND and NOR gates reversed, and with certain memory sectors accessible but corrupt. This latest of DR-26's homebrews, this laser light-show, was the result of a positive feedback loop generated from a routine garbage collection task.

With the bright display still playing on the walls, DR-26 finally rolled into ARI's second routine - step to the end of the hall, turn left at the corner, continue until the first fork, then trace back to the robotics shop. Hall, corner, and even "left" were all understood and accomplished admirably. Unfortunately, Unit 26's definition of fork was corrupt - he thus continued on, past the fork, turning this way and that throughout the ship, flickering blue light beams all about, and searching for a pronged utensil.

If there was one thing that was always true about Halifax, it's that he knew more than he let on. He would look surprised as to not rob you of the satisfaction, but it was never new information to him. Today was no different.

To a lesser ranked, official reports were the trump card of the military: too significant to be ignored but too vague to be questioned. Thankfully, Halifax relied on other, more effective channels of information. The communique from Reed had arrived only moments earlier; Halifax was able to pull it up on his implant mid-conversation and watch without ever allowing his eyes to unfocus or his speech to waver. The message was succinct: attack commenced, external defenses breached, infiltration in progress. The voice had a tinge of synthesis to it, which, as Halifax was aware, usually meant VideoSub (a tech for recording video using an identical virtual likeness). Especially disturbing because Halifax had never known Reed to use VS; both were old-timers, content with the first gen implants, first gen tech, and first gen coffee.

Disturbing.