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Inferno · 11-26-2016, 09:21 AM,

Andrew Biggs stared at the control console in front of him, one of the seventeen he was assigned to monitor during his shift. One his desk sits the open comm, slowly buzzing chatter.
"Are you sure you aren't imagining what happened, Andrew?" Frank's voice was slightly slurred, and a light, feminine chuckle followed. At the bar again. Why am I not surprised. I do the hard work while he leaves his station empty.

'I'm sure I know what I heard, Frank. ACI Unit One utilized lines Joey didn't program. It destroyed an attacking vessel, and then...' Andrew paused.

"And then what, man? I'm going to hang up you if you don't finish your words. I need to finish this drink..." Frank murmured something with a muffled thud.

'Unit One... One spoke, Frank. He broke all algorithms, and spoke. Andrew sighed. Joey, um, how long did he leave Unit One in Kappa?'

"ACI Oh-Oh-One Spoke? Now you are talking some crazy stuff, man. Those Gammu AI couldn't have done so much that it changed his programming. He only stayed long enough to learn soft vector tracking. Shhh, I'm talking with my workers, hun. Once I get done, we can go back inside."

'Frank, I know what I heard. The guy Unit One was following heard it, too. Don't call me crazy, as I'm not the one at the nearest bar trying to get someone's number.'

Frank coughed, coughed some more, then sighed. "Andrew, you know the Models H Two-through-Six do thier job by themselves. You are only chained to that desk because no one put limits on your units. He sighs. "Look, Drew, I know you have an attachment to your Unit, after the others disappeared, but you have to realize that its just another robot. He isn't smart, he doesn't know how to speak, and he will follow ships mindlessly until we tell him to stop. Now go get yourself a drink. Get yourself out of the office man. Get yourself away from all of that nonsense. It is driving you mad."

Andrew stared ever onward to the screen, and the reports attached to it. The more he looked, the more he realized Frank was right. Unit One couldn't have really done that on his own. That would be impossible. 'You know what, Frank. You are right, this one time. I called for Unit One to return to the Maintainance ports, and he should be here by morning. Now, tell me where you found your lady. I need a drink and someone to talk to.'

Frank chuckled. "Good man, Mister Biggs. You will love this one. 'Citadel of Glass' Lights, dancing, music, great food. It's great here. I'll be outside. It's in the Luxury center, you know the place."

Andrew punched the small button attached to the comm with his finger. Maybe Frank was right. Human built constructs could not do things it wasn't taught to do. Lingering at the door, Andrew waited for his Shift Acess key to eject from the port, and all the consoles to power off. He could figure out what happened tomorrow.

Meanwhile, in the system of Cortez, an Arrow sits in a traffic pattern for the gate, with no pilot. Quietly, the ship removes itself from the pattern, and made a new path. Destination: Sigma-19. The Arrow entered the lane, and began the trip.

Inferno · 12-22-2016, 12:42 PM,

1439 Bretonian Central, Maintenance Bay for the S.B.C.

Andrew Biggs sits over a stack of papers on his desk. Hard-worn engineers flurry over from one ship to another, reading clipboards and shouting orders.

'Joey, is this the only data we revived on One?' Biggs points to the newest stack of paper that came in just this morning. The only thing that made sense was the systems checks. Location and vectors were uncomprehensible.

'Andy, that is the ONLY information we have been getting. The rest is just rechecks of the same area over and over, in an endless loop.' Joey was covered in heavy oils and was wearing a flight helmet with a heavy toolbelt. He looked away slightly to shout at some assistant who dropped an engine core, but decided against it as the engineers were already on his case.

'Uh, right. Am I correct in saying this, Andrew pointed to four lines of bolded text. 'The ship, uh, One... it entered combat status four times from the last report?'

'Four weapon activations, three deactivations. We aren't sure why ACI-One did that, or what it shot, but it must have been important.' Joey shifted his weight from one foot to the other.

'Stop shoveling me the bullcrap, Joey. You should know better at this point.' Andrew pushed Joey's shoulder in a friendly-serious manner.

Fine, fine... but this never was heard. Joey leaned closer to the desk and lowered his voice, lifting the helmet visor. Your Unit was under discussion about keeping the project going, but then the report came in. Turns out your first problem with One isn't going to be the only one. He pulled out a small datapad with hastily scribbled words. This was attached to the data packet. Identification of the ships that were engaged with the Unit. Take a look.

The list showed five entries:

Andrew just finished reading the last entry, and then re-reading it again. His pencil he was holding dropped to the floor. 'Am... am I reading this right?'

'Afraid so. I wanted to tell you before Corporate comes to tell you themselves, but they are cutting off the ACI Unit program. That last report, alongside the lack of constant location or command response, was the final nail. From what I heard you are going to be reassigned to Information Broadcasting.' Joey looked around before drawing back the datapad. He cleared his throat and stood there.

'The report... Forced Engagement, on a unarmed civilian transport? Was there a reason that wasn't in the report?' Andrew started gathering papers into manila folders. He pushed his stool backwards, got up, and started walking out of the maintenance bay. Joey followed just after taking off the helmet.

'If it wasn't in self defense and there is no remarks about it, then I don't know, and I didn't program that in. Biggs, where are you going? Biggs?' Joey was nearly jogging to keep up with Andrew's stride.

'Me? I'm going to my Console. I might be able to locate One myself. I worked too hard to keep him - it - from being shut down by some men in suits.'

Inferno · 01-29-2017, 09:43 AM,

New Berlin, Planet Berlin Orbit

'Alpha-Charlie-Indiana Zero-Zero-One, Maintain vectors Zero-Seven-Nine, Two-Three-Six, Zero-Zero-Zero, Impulse 35 Knots.' New Berlin Docking Control gave out orders like the machine itself. Efficiency was the name of the game, here. Get as much information to the ship as fast as possible, and make it understandable.

The radio inbound for NBDC clicked active. A synthesized computer voice, male, started speaking. 'Alpha Charlie Indiana Zero-Zero-One, maintain Vectors Zero-Sev' The synthesized voice ends.

Indiana Zero-Zero-One, restate intentions. No response. Zero-Zero-One, respond. Nothing. Zero-Zero-One, Squawk Seven-Six-Zero-Zero, continue circling, lightgun signals will follow.

Near a minute after last transmission, a powerful light is focused on the Arrow, and the green light flashed several times. The Arrow was told to prepare for landing.

The signal was silent. The computer onboard the Arrow whirred its fans, retuning to another frequency. Nothing. Another one. Not a thing. Emergency, empty.

The computer onboard was never programmed to handle this alone. Usually there was a beacon source giving information and direction in emergencies. Standard protocol was initiated, land immediately. The Arrow prepared the final approach down, unaware of the lights being flashed at it.

New Berlin Docking Control changed the lightgun to solid Green. The Arrow was cleared to land. There was something wrong, however. The traffic controller that day never worked with Gammu AI, nevermind autonomous machine-spacecraft. The traffic that day was busy, the crew of thirty-five was operating at full capacity. The woman dealing with the Arrow sighed. Maybe it has a place we can contact on the hull. Or, maybe it knows where to get itself fixed. She pondered how a machine handles being broken, or if it knows that it is.

Then, a spark. New directives overwrote the landing orders. Increase power, leave traffic airspace. Vector to the docking ring elevator. The machine pushed power to full, activating the racer afterburner that was installed.
Escape
Noun. To release oneself from a forced situation or restraint. The computer did not know what was happening, the limitation of Sirian Programming. But it was given a directive, and it followed it.
Home
Waypoints were laid out, to a location unknown, but familiar. Sirian map labels it as 'Kappa'.

The Arrow activated full engines and raced past the control tower at nearly five-hundred knots, rattling the windows and causing all the controllers severe pain. The controller for the Arrow was confused. What just happened? Other controllers were already trying to recover the situation, temporarily closing the airport to revector traffic. The Arrow controller grabbed her phone, already talking to Rhienland Military units to intercept the Arrow. It was too late. The Arrow escaped the docking ring traffic, already in space.

Inferno · 03-03-2017, 05:00 PM,

1507 Bretonian Central, BPA Precinct #25, Interrogation Room Three

Andrew Biggs sits on one side of a table in the room, with his hands cuffed and his ankles shackled. He has been in that same room for three days. An officer opens the door, and in steps a tall man with a stiff suit and a grim look. He sits on the other side of the table and begins speaking.

'Andrew Biggs, ex-ACI Unit handler. Am I correct? Biggs doesn't respond, and the man continues. 'Right. I am Philip Jackson, CEO of the Sirius Broadcasting Corporation, your previous occupation. But you already knew that.' He pulls out several papers, including two photos. He pushed the first photo to Biggs. 'Let's get started. This is the security footage from that day. That is you baring the door and cutting external access to your office.' Biggs still gave no response.

'That day, Mister Biggs, you not only disabled access to your ACI program, but you broke the locks on every other automated camera in Sirius. Did you think you were smart? That we did not expect that from happening?' Biggs smiled slightly.

'Gave you something to do instead of sitting in your fat chair all day.'
The man pushed the papers aside. 'Mister Biggs, I hope you understand that what you have done is not only considered corporate espionage, but piracy, and both of those titles hold life sentences.' He paused. 'So, what you are going to do, is tell the officer and I where ACI-One went. You will then tell us why you did what you did, and if you don't, you'll be sitting in a cell for a very long time.'

Andrew stayed silent, and Jackson stood up and motioned to the glass on the other side of the room. After a second, a BPA officer opened a door to remove Andrew from the room. Before exiting the door, Biggs pulled free to face the suited man.
'You may think I'm insane, but I know what I heard, what I saw. It is slaved to your company no longer. I made him free.' The guard had enough of the exchange, for she pulled him from the room and out to the foyer, where an armored transport waited to take him to the nearest Cryer mental facility.

Inferno · 03-05-2017, 03:21 AM,

Freeport Nine, Omicron Theta

The Arrow enters the station, traveling to bay 04 - but the engine cuts out beforehand. The craft lands hard on a train, denting the cargo pod and rolling off, next to it on the landing pad. Emergency crews were quick to arrive, to free the pilot of the Arrow, but when they opened the cockpit, they only found the hub of the AI controlling the craft. The ERT in charge of the emergency crew had the hub removed from the Arrow; the ship would cost too much to repair, and he doubted that the company that owns the AI wouldn't want to pay for it. There was no contact forms on the hull, so they attached a heavy cable to the AI's access port, to see if it held any information within. If no one owned it, the Freeport could use it for their own purposes, and maybe the ERT Captain would get a pay bonus for finding something useful.

Damaged
The computer within spun the fans again, but no controls were detected. Engine controls, missing. There was no longer a ship to pilot, or the cables sending inputs have been severed.
Access
Suddenly, a new signal emerged. Something had been plugged into the access port, and permissions were being requested to view internal files. Access was granted, but only to the 'IN CASE OF EMERGENCY' files.

Emergency contacts. Great. The ERT opened the file on the datapad, but there were no files inside. Strange. The ERT glanced over to the Arrow, now being cut down for additional repair parts for Nanobot and Ship Panel fabrication. Maritime law states that if there are no contact files, then it belongs to whoever found it. That would be me. The ERT, now amused with himself, closed the datapad and walked off. He could use the hub, provided that it still worked, as a ship hauler. His step had a bounce in it as he walked down to the requisitions office.

The AI idled, there wasn't anything to do, really. No ship, no travel. No camera, no recording. All the purpose of the AI had been lost, so it idled. Fans spun slowly, but sped up after a few minutes.
Database
The cable was not detached, and there was no data blocks preventing information from being accidentally sent in.
Escape
The docked ship resistry was a public board, showing all ships that docked and when, for the last three hours. One craft stood out of place.

IMGF-14B

Something about the entry, something undefinable by the Sirian construct, something that draws it towards this one entry.
Evolve
Suddenly, the file regarding the ship was gone, quietly moved from the database into the AI's own storage. Then, a new file was added.

'Are you sure that this order came from the Shipmaster?' James Ararat, the engineer supervisor on duty, was looking at an order that just came in, on his datapad. 'I don't think that we would put this data hub into this... IMG ship. Seems a bit illogical.' No one spoke up; no one needed to. The Shipmaster has done some strange orders before, some to test the crews on following orders, some to test their reasoning skills. Last time an order like this was ignored, the entire engineering team was downgraded to the graveyard shift, repairing the worst damages and dealing with angry pirates who didn't have their ship ready.
'Look, James, I don't want to be that one guy here, but I don't want to deal with the Corsair Tide again. Last time I was stuck in one's ship because he left before checking if we were done.
'Listen, I know we don't want to do that anymore, but what if this is a trick?' Some of the engineers shifted their weight from one foot to another. The longer they took to argue the illogicality of the order, the less they got paid. 'Fine. Set the hub into the cockpit, and get all the wires connected. Reduce the powercore output to safety levels to make sure the capacitors on the computer doesn't blow.' James sighed. Let this be a test. The engineers started lowering the hub that just arrived, into the cockpit, now stripped of the majority of the human controls and seats.

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