They hadn’t been alive but they’d still given him the creeps. The thought of them packed away in a storage chest somewhere was even worse. What if they were alive and got out? Would they be pissed at being locked away? He was too proud to admit to the others he’d been having nightmares about that.
He shivered as he walked past the empty tubes and into the main area. His gaze cut to the seating area and the large metallic figure that still occupied one of the couches.
It was a Latharian bot. Worker model HC-seven-four-nine, B class to be exact. But that wasn’t all it was. It was, had been Keris, the alien AI that had saved his life.
He had no idea how long he’d been a “guest” of the Lathar. His ship had been patrolling the front lines of Terran space, on high alert after the attacks on Sentinel Five.
Filled to the brim with Marines, they’d been all gung-ho, arrogant in their belief that the Sentinel Five marines had gotten sloppy. Life in one place must have made them soft. They were different. Frontier marines, they were as tough as they came. There was no way any aliens would be able to take them on and win.
Pride came before a fall, and fuck had they fallen fast.
They hadn’t even seen the attack coming until it was happening all around them. Resistance was… impossible. The Lathar had hit them so hard and fast, and the battle had been over practically before it had begun. All he could remember was chaos and gunfire. Then the blackness of a D’Corr holding cell. And pain.
He closed his eyes, body rigid.
They’d been tortured. Killed.
His unit was gone.
He was the only one left. And he’d prayed for death. Begged for it. When the self-destruct countdown had begun, he’d known it was over. Even though he didn’t speak Latharian, he’d realised what the alarm was. So, in pain and alone, he’d prepared himself to meet his maker.
Then Keris had come crashing through the metal wall of the cell like a bulldozer, her faceplate red as it swung toward him. He’d thought it was one more torment in the many the Lathar had inflicted on him until she’d scooped him up and ran. He’d passed out only to wake later in an escape pod.
She’d saved his life and had been by his side ever since. She saved him, saved an entire colony from a flesh-eating octopus. But she wasn’t in the metal body anymore. She’d taken a gamble and left the safety of metal and circuitry for the chance of becoming flesh and blood.
Like a magnet, his eyes cut to the large machine in the middle of the room. A 3-D printer… but for bodies. Actual physical bodies. Like the ones that had been in the tubes when they’d arrived.
The twin blades, like airport gates, still rotated slowly around the central tube. Lights on the sides ran lazily from bottom to top in sequence. But where the glass had initially been clear to allow him to see the forming body within, the tube was dark now and blocked his view.
Keris.
He stood in front of the tubes, trying to pierce the glass with his gaze. Keris was in there. Somewhere. Her mind had been separated from the machine and should be in the body shielded by the glass.
“Computer, report progress on running program?”
Light waves shimmered in the air next to him, and between one moment and the next, a Latharian female appeared. Miisan, the AI that had led them here to find the base.
“Progress is still at 99.999 percent, Major Stephens,” she said, her voice no-nonsense and firm. “I said I would inform you if there was any change, and I will.”
“I know,” his jaw worked. “I’m sorry. I’m just… It’s been a week, I mean… how long does this usually take?”
“It’s a little longer than usual,” Miisan admitted after a pause. “But this technology was developed for organic consciousness transfer. Keris is an AI.”
He nodded curtly, his gut tightening. “Yeah, but she’s sentient, right? An advanced AI… like you? She should be okay. Right?”
Miisan’s expression softened. “The program seems to be progressing normally, if a little slow. I’m sure she’s fine. Like I said, as soon as anything changes, I will let you know. Please remember you have a medical check in half an hour. I also have an adapted translation matrix I want to install.”
Before he could answer, she winked out, leaving him looking at empty air. He sighed heavily and watched the printer for a while longer. He’d told her he’d be waiting when she woke up.
Now he wondered if that day would ever come. One thing he did know, though… even if it took until he was a gray-haired old man, he would still be here.
2
“Your brain function looks completely normal for your species,” Miisan’s voice was calming, pitched to carry over the intersecting blades of the medical bed.
Jay grunted to show he’d heard, not daring to move a muscle. Having an alien computer shoving a foot-long needle into his brain just behind his ear tended to do that to a man. Keeping his eyes open, he concentrated on the ceiling above him. They looked to be the same small stippled panels so loved in Terran design. Like, identical. Perhaps they were their own species that had spread through the known universe, hiding amongst other species and living in their buildings.
The fantastical idea kept him amused and his mind off what Miisan was doing.
“So, what does this do, exactly?” Gracie asked, her arms folded over her chest.
He appreciated her concern and the fact she’d insisted on coming in on each of his “appointments.” Shame he hadn’t been able to stop Nyek’s mad brother and his band of fanatics from taking her washed over him and he understood Seren’s problem. They were men, bigger and stronger than the women… it was their job to protect.
“Whatever you’re doing, Mr. Stephens, stop it.” Miisan’s voice cut over the soft whum-whum-whum of the rotating light discs of the bed. They wrapped around his entire body, the operating arm on the inside with him, controlled by Miisan on the outside. As an AI, though, was she really outside? Or was she everything on the base… even the base itself? “Your heart rate is rising and I can’t do this if you are tense. I’ll have to put you out unless you calm down. Blink twice for yes if you understand me.”
He blinked. Twice. He didn’t want to be sedated. The last time she’d put him under to operate, he’d come to with a blazing headache and the trots. Latharian medicine, while effective, was not always gentle.
“Excellent. We will continue.”
He heard the whirring of machinery by his ear and tried hard not to think about it, his mind latching on to Miisan and Keris. Both were AIs but Miisan was more formal and aristocratic in her speech. Probably because she’d been modeled after the emperor’s sister, a royal princess, whereas Keris was a normal AI. Her personality had been allowed to develop naturally and was her own. For a moment, he almost felt sorry for Miisan. She was just a pale copy of a person. She was self-aware, like Keris, so that had to rankle, if only a little.
“I am implanting a new translation matrix in Mr. Stephens,” Miisan explained to Gracie as Jay went back to studying the ceiling. If he concentrated, he could just make out the slight bumps. He started to count them. Anything to avoid thinking about the drill.
“What does this matrix do that ours don’t?” Gracie asked. “We didn’t have to have this done.”