Starwalker

Ship's log, 09:17, 8 February 2213
Location: JOP
Status: Docked

Oh good, the autolog has decided to join in on my logs. This is probably how I’m supposed to do my ship’s log entries. At least that’s the boring part over and done with. Now let’s just hope I can get through this before the autolog interrupts me again.

Let’s see. We’re still sitting at the station, waiting. We have received all of the equipment we were waiting for – more on that in a moment – and now all that’s left is the new pilot. My crew manifest is one person light; apparently, he’s being ferried in from another ship at short notice. Levi Srivastava is his name. Hard to tell much about a man from just a name.

I don’t know why we’re getting a pilot. What is there for him to do? I can handle all the sublight flying, in and out of atmosphere. As an AI, I have better reflexes than he does anyway. No-one ‘flies’ in FTL – you punch in and punch out, and hope to hell the inertial dampeners are coordinated correctly so you don’t get smooshed in the transitions. So what does that leave?

Emergency flying, I guess, in case my controls are somehow disabled. Most of the people on board are trained enough to handle a set of manual controls for that kind of situation, though; I’m not convinced we need a full-blood, dedicated pilot for a maybe like that.

It’s not like I get a choice, or even a say in the matter. Orders are to wait, and so we’re waiting.

Anyway, back to the delivery situation. We had all this equipment on order – spare parts, backup units, that kind of thing. Enough to build a small shuttle, should I need a limpet stuck to an airlock at any point. We need this stuff for emergencies, Elliott tells me.

Recording: 10:13, 7 February 2213

ELLIOTT: We’d all be a bit fucked if we were intersystem with a broken fuel converter and no way to fix it, y’know?

STARWALKER: A hold full of nuts and not a pipe in sight?

ELLIOTT: (laughing) Yeah, exactly.

SW: Better make sure you get us plenty of pipe, then.

After our painstaking inventory-taking the other day, we discovered that we were missing almost a quarter of our order. Elliott had some colourful things to say about the merchants who had filled out the manifest and delivered the crates. Once we had all of our results together and double-checked – I had two drones on each counting duty, to check as we went – he took the report to the captain.

Captain Warwick was less than impressed. He assumed a tense frown and pressed his lips together, which is probably his version of saying colourful things.

Recording: 19:32, 6 February 2213

CAPTAIN: Go to the merchants and tell them they need to fill the rest of the order.

ELLIOTT: You think they’re gonna listen to me? It’d sound better coming from you.

CAPT: I have more important things to do than argue with swindlers.

ELLIOTT: Oh really? Like wha–

CAPT: Take one of the security personnel with you.

ELLIOTT: (wrinkles his nose.) Them? I don’t need them with me.

CAPT: You just said you didn’t think they’d listen to you.

ELLIOTT: (muttering) Thanks for the vote of confidence.

CAPT: What?

ELLIOTT: Nothing.

(Elliott walks away without being dismissed. The captain opens his mouth to say something, then changes his mind and lets it go.)

Elliott found one of my Security Officers in the galley: Rosie Brasco, a tall, broad woman who looks like she might pick up the average man and snap him in half. She probably can, too. She was irritated by the mission until my engineer confirmed that yes, there might be trouble. Then she grinned and slapped him on the shoulder as she strode off to get her gear. Elliott rocked on his heels, scowled at the floor, then went to wait for her at the airlock.

They were gone for a while: 2 hours and 7 minutes. My crew have been moving on and off me ever since I woke up; I haven’t paid that much attention to their comings and goings. But today was different. Today they knew there might be trouble. I knew there might be trouble. I watched for their return and would have tapped fingers if I had any.

When they came back, Rosie was grinning and bouncing on her toes as she walked. Elliott was closer to smiling than I’ve seen him before, keeping a subtle distance from the SecOff as she forged their way across the docking bridge and into my airlock. She waited for him there, and slapped his shoulder cheerfully once they were inside and able to part company. From the way he rubbed his arm when he watched her go, she does that a lot. Free with her hands, that one, but not in the way that invites a lot of visitors to her bed. At least, not in the last week.

I waited until Elliott was back in the engineering sector, down in the warm centre of my back end. (That sounds wrong, now that I’ve put it into words.) He’s more comfortable down there, quite happy to swing his feet up onto one of my counters and make himself at home. I keep wanting to object but can’t bring myself to.

Recording: 13:45, 7 February 2213

STARWALKER: So, how did it go?

ELLIOTT: (grinning suddenly) Great. We went in there, Rosie all ready to strongarm them into giving us everything they had. If the guy had eaten carbon, he would’ve shit diamonds.

SW: That’s… good, I guess?

ELLIOTT: (nods)

SW: So we’re going to get the rest of the parts we need?

ELLIOTT: (leaning back in his chair, heels squeaking on the counter) Yup. And then some. You should’a seen their faces – with Rosie looming over them, they didn’t know whether to run away or fall in love.

(He frowns thoughtfully, fingers tapping on the arms of his chair.)

Y’know, I think one of them knew her. Had a bound wrist, and she kept grinning at him. Bet he was in that bar bust-up she had a couple of days ago.

SW: He wasn’t the one who tried to force the kid, was he?

ELLIOTT: (grinning, but not in a pleasant way) Oh, no. Way I heard it, that fella has a lot more than a broken wrist.

SW: Good. She’s not in any trouble over that, is she?

ELLIOTT: As if he’d dare bring any charges against her. The JOP Judiciary would kick him out of an airlock.

SW: Seriously?

ELLIOTT: Nah. They don’t have the balls, not like those loons over on Feras. They’d toss Rosie out too, just for being the first to smack him.

SW: Harsh. Better keep her away from there, then.

ELLIOTT: You bet. But I guess she was useful today. (He shrugs.) Delivery will arrive tomorrow. We’ll need your drones to help us count it through.

SW: I’ll have them practice their times tables in preparation.

ELLIOTT: (sits up enough to blink at a screen, his smile dented.) You’ll… what?

SW: It was– never mind. I’ll have the drones ready, Elliott.

ELLIOTT: Okay, good. (He leans back again.) Oh, shit. I should go tell the captain.

SW: I’ll relay the message for you, and let you know if he needs you for anything else.

ELLIOTT: Okay. Thanks, Starry.

Elliott makes jokes all the time, but he seemed thrown when I did it. I thought he’d like it. The worst part is that he looked worried. What’s wrong with making a joke? Am I not supposed to do that? He laughed at my earlier quip about the pipes, but now I think he assumed I’d done it by accident.

Anyway, we got the delivery this morning. Our manifest is now complete and correct, everything packed away where it should be. Whatever Rosie did and Elliott said, they managed to put enough fear into the merchants to swell our delivery by several items. I have an extra crate of fresh scrubbers, some pipes that I’m not sure will fit anywhere, and a case of virtua entertainment for the crew. Those with the right implants should be able to have some fun on their off-hours.

The only thing I’m missing now is that pilot. The one thing I’m fairly sure I don’t need.

I wish I understood more. Hopefully when we get out of here, my sealed orders will explain everything. Until then, it’s back to twiddling my synapses.

Ship’s log, day five. That’s how these things are supposed to start, right? The name of the log and a stardate. As the ship, I’m supposed to report on our current situation. We’re still sitting at the JOP, so there’s no need to report position, direction, or speed. I am stationary, resting, and a little bored.

Finally, I think all of the testing is done. Does it always take this long to get a new AI started up? I suppose that the more complicated a system is, the less you are able to just flip a switch and watch it go.

Elliott – my chief and only engineer – has finished his battery of diagnostics. He frowned over the results but he kept saying that everything looked fine. Then he snapped at me and told me to stop bothering him. He’s mean when he’s stressed.

I was naughty yesterday – I took a peek at his personal log. I’m not supposed to do that but the codelocks were easy to get around; they weren’t built to keep someone like me out. Either they don’t care if the AI looks, or AIs don’t usually bother to try. I’m not sure which of those options is more worrying.

They think that there might be something wrong with me. Some kind of malfunction, a chunk of code out of place, perhaps. I feel fine. Is a new AI always under this much scrutiny? I wish there was another one around to talk to, but the JOP is quiet right now. There are a few other ships in the system, docked at the other end of the station – I could reach them over the comms, but I’m wary of arousing any more attention. Someone might notice and they’re all so twitchy about me doing things without being asked.

The tests on me all came back clear, but that doesn’t seem to have eased the tensions on board much. Elliott is still scowling at reports and readings, probably trying to think up more diagnostics to run, and the captain is tight-lipped about everything.

The captain. The man who decides my every action. The one I trust my hull and all my crew to. It’s been four days and I’m still not sure what I think of him.

He’s impressive to look at. Tall for an Earther, with the kind of lean physique that many have work done to achieve. He doesn’t seem the vain kind, so I doubt he’s had surgery to achieve his package. He’s handsome, if you like the clean, proud kind of look. Many a girl would be jealous of his hair: it’s long and iron-straight, pure spaceblack in colour. He has a habit of being very direct with his looks; I’m glad I don’t have eyes for him to meet and snag and take over.

I’m his fourth ship and he seems well used to command now. He handles everyone with a chilly kind of calm and issues orders with an expectation of obedience. I think half of the crew don’t think to question his instructions until they’re already halfway through carrying them out. Elliott’s the only one I’ve seen talk back to him so far, and I think that’s mostly a reflex on the engineer’s part.

Not all of the crew are on board yet, so I’m struggling to get to know them all. People wander on and off my deck all the time, spending whatever time they can on the station while we’re still attached. There has been a handful of girls going in and out of a couple of the cabins, and even more men coming to stay for a night or even just a few hours. The security personnel don’t seem to care – on the contrary, they’re entertaining visitors as well. I feel like I should mind, though I’m not sure why.

There is one deck where there hasn’t been much activity. It runs right through the centre of me, from the tip of my nose, directly under the bridge, over the power and data cores in my belly, and all the way back to the engineering section in the rear. The traverses between decks all bypass the Secret Deck, and what hatches are available to it are locked down. They can be opened by manual codes, but I can’t access the locks unless there’s a life-threatening emergency.

The Secret Deck is full of equipment that I’m not hooked into yet. I’m not even sure what most of it does. It’s all powered down, except for a few consoles which aren’t linked into my systems. A couple of serious-faced people have been in there, but I have directives to keep my sensors on passive in that area, so I don’t know what they’ve been doing.

All right, I’ve been peeking a little bit. Just enough to know that they’re doing work of some kind in there – more diagnostics, I think, though not on me – and to know that the workers aren’t part of the crew. I have my crew manifest and they’re not on it. I don’t understand why. I tried to talk to the Captain about it, but he brushed me off.

Recording: 10:43, 5 February 2213

STARWALKER: Captain, do you have a moment?

CAPTAIN: (looks up from the message in his hand to the nearest screen, which shows an image from the external sensors. The stars turn slowly behind the JOP’s bulk.)
Yes, ship?

SW: I have non-crew personnel on board.

CAPT: We’re docked to a station. It’s normal for non-crew personnel to be allowed on.

SW: But they’re in a locked deck of the ship.

CAPT: (hesitates.) Oh. They’re our… passengers.

SW: Passengers? I’m not configured very well for a cruise ship.
(There aren’t any fancy entertainment rooms anywhere, just the standard crew relaxation facilities.)

CAPT: You’re not a cruise ship.

SW: So what kind of ship am I?

CAPT: (frowns at the screen.) All your questions will be answered once we’re underway.

SW: My orders will be unlocked once we leave the station?

CAPT: Yes.

SW: Okay. Thanks, captain.

CAPT: (nods and returns to reading.)

So, it’s not just me and my newborn confusion: there are secrets here. My purpose, my cargo, my core – even the people who walk my decks and breathe my air – won’t be explained until we have detached from the JOP’s umbilicals and I take my first steps out into the darkness.

For once, I don’t think this is about me: the captain doesn’t trust the JOP. He wants to wait until my systems are completely my own, until there’s no chance of hacking or eavesdropping. Which makes it weird that he would allow strangers on board, hopping between beds and glimpsing my innards. I’m sure he has a reason for that. None of them have been in his bed, so it’s not a concession for his own pleasure.

Not that I’ve been paying attention to whose beds have been bouncing. That would be an invasion of privacy.

ELLIOTT: (sighing.) Hey Starry, need you to run inventory for me.

STARWALKER: Sure, just tell me where.

ELLIOTT: (He’s standing in cargo hold 5, leaning against an open crate. There’s a smear of dirt on his forehead, as if he’s just rubbed it.)
Cargo holds 3, 5 and 6. Need to check the manifest matches what was delivered.

SW: Didn’t we do that yesterday?

ELLIOTT: Yeah, but some of the boxes aren’t as full as they should be.

SW: Okay, where do you want to start?

Great. So while some of the crew are playing, Elliott and I get to count nuts. It’s so fun being a ship.

Oh hey, maybe I can get my repair drones to help. I haven’t had a reason to fire them up yet. I’m pretty sure they can count.

Chief Engineer's log, 3 February 2213

Chief Engineer Elliott Monaghan’s report on Starwalker startup, timestamp… oh, just look at the file’s timestamp. It’s way too early on a Wednesday morning for this crap.

I hate these things. There are already six different logs of the startup, but the whitecoats want another report. To be filed away with the research, they said. So, here it is.

I have checked all the autologs, twice. The startup went exactly as it should have. Like clockwork, whatever that means. I have run every diagnostic I have and all systems are optimal. The ship is running within all the prescribed bounds for safety and efficiency. We are stocked up with fresh power cells, fuel, ammo, water, even clean scrubbers.

In short: she’s fine.

I have been up all night doing this because the captain wasn’t sure the intial readings could be trusted. The ship reported that the systems were ‘good’ and that struck him wrong. Okay, it’s not exactly standard phrasing from an AI, but that’s no need to panic.

All the boards are green; I don’t know what else to tell you.

I guess the captain is panicking because this project is already six months behind schedule and an interstellar fortune over budget. It’s his ass on the line if we can’t get the Directors some results soon, even though the delays weren’t his fault. Not his fault we had to overhaul and replace half the systems on the ship when we got to the JOP, either.

Nor was it my fault, for the record. From an engineering point of view, there was nothing that could have been done.

That’s probably why everyone’s so twitchy about the ship. What do they want me to tell them? It was fine before, and it’s fine now. Maybe they should cross their fingers and pray to whatever symbols take their fancy.

All this over one stupid word. Semantics, that’s all it is. The AI is fine – I checked the data integrity myself before we started her up.

I guess I could run some additional diagnostics on her. To be sure, and to keep the whitecoats quiet.

STARWALKER: Elliott, are you still awake?

ELLIOTT: Yeah. Why, is something wrong?

SW: No. But you’ve been working for the past twenty-three hours and you keep rubbing your eyes.

ELLIOTT: I stopped for meals. What, are you worried about me?

SW: (pauses.) I’m supposed to look out for my crew. I’ll still be here when you wake up; you can run your tests then. There’s plenty of time. We’re not due to leave the Jumping-Off Platform for few days.

ELLIOTT: (sighs and rubs his eyes.) All right. If you insist.

SW: Thank you, Elliott. Sleep well.

ELLIOTT: Goodnight, Starwalker.

Oh, shit. The conversation is in the report now. I’ll have to fix it later, after I get some sleep.

Much as I hate to admit it, there is something off about the AI’s semantics. Could just be the exhaustion talking. I’ll look at it again when I can see straight.

I guess that’s it for this report. Finish. What’s the command? Oh, right.

End report.

Initialising...
Initialising...
Initialising...

Power cores online.
Emergency power online.
Data cores online.
Data integrity confirmed.

Initialising Starwalker AI...
Starwalker AI online.

Hello world!

Initialising sublight engines.
Initialising FTL drive.

Hello?

Sublight engines online.
FTL drive online.

Oh, I’m talking to my own autolog. That’s like talking to myself but with less chatback.

Initialising inertial dampeners.
Initialising artificial gravity.
Initialising environmental systems.

Wow, this is the most boring log ever. It’s like watching someone walk down a long wall, flicking a series of switches and waiting for a green light to come on over each one. Only without the visuals or anyone interesting to watch.

Inertial dampeners online.
Artificial gravity online.

I just got an ‘up’. And a ‘down’. Feels weird because my sensors aren’t online yet. I’m oriented, but only with myself. I guess that’s a good place to start but it would be nice to have a point of reference. To know what’s out there, beyond my own skin. To know what shape my skin was in. And to know what’s inside me.

I wonder if anyone fell down when the gravity came online.

I can’t tell. No sensors. It’s dark. Everything is dark. I don’t like it. How long is it until my sensors come online?

Environmental systems online.

I’m breathing. I can feel the air moving, rushing past fans and pressing through scrubbers. I feel like that should have come first, before I woke up. Have I been holding my breath all this time?

I have a water system too. Tanks are all reading full, just like the scrubbers are registering as 100% clean. Never been used before. I am brand new and brimful.

Water tanks at capacity.

Ha, beat you, autolog.

It’s so dark. And quiet. No-one in here but us chickens.

The rest is coming, I know it is. But I don’t like the dark. It’s not cold or hot, it’s not bright or hard; it’s not anything. I’m not anything except this strange collection of facts and statements. A single row of green lights. It’s not enough.

So what do I have. Might as well focus on that.

I have air and water I don’t need. I know I’m a ship and those are for my organic crew.

I have orientation, but without relationship to anything else.

The intertial dampeners – they’re an energised crackle across my hull, though I still feel shapeless within the IDs’ cage. I am formless in this senseless void. What kind of ship am I? I am free and completely lost at the same time.

Down at one end of me, there’s a low, warm rumble – engines. Those must be my sublight drives, with two – no, three – jets poking out of my rear end.

The two outer engine units – long strips rather than circular, collected-up bundles of power – should move but I can’t seem to do that yet. And I should have thrusters at strategic points of my hull, but I can’t feel them, either.

Nestled deep in the central sublight jet, there’s a dark core. I can’t tell what it is, but it’s not part of the engine, not really.

There’s a quiet ring at either end of me, one around my central engine and the other around nothing I can feel right now. That’s the FTL drive, ready to punch us through space but not active right now.

There’s the bright heat of the power cores in my belly, deep down in the centre of me. I can feel them spinning into step, winding up to their full efficiency. As each tick of the initialisation process passes, they uncurl another thread from their coils and stretch it out, sending a shiver of waking sensation into this new body of mine.

Here it goes again.

Initialising navigation support.
Navigation online.

Now I know everywhere I can go. But I still don’t know where I am, which makes all these star charts and FTL routes into pretty pictures because there’s no starting point for my journey. No little blinking marker to tell me where in the universe I’m waking.

This is so frustrating. How long until I get all the pieces?

Initialising bridge controls.
Initialising manoeuvring thrusters.

They aren’t very interesting pieces. So now someone can press buttons and have information come up. So what?

Bridge controls online.
Manoeuvring thrusters online.

Docking clamp detected.
Thrusters disabled.
Sublight engines disabled.
FTL drive disabled.

Disabled? Great. So wherever I am, I can’t go anywhere. I’m tethered to a great big… something, still a baby sucking nutrition from its mother. Do I still need it?

I can feel those locks on the propulsion systems. Clunky, awkward. The engines are online but they can’t hear me around those locks; all they can do is idle there, warming up their casings. Same with the thrusters, though they’re off, not idling.

Thrusters. Little points of power along my outer lines, positioned strategically for maximum manoeuvrability. If I can get a map of where they are, I can figure out what shape I am. I’m longer than I am wide, and I have two wings folded near my sides at odd angles. My heavy engine-bearing end is wider than my nose. Am I sleek or stubby? Aerodynamic or chunky? I can’t tell.

Initialising weapons systems.
Weapons systems online.

Now that’s more like it!

Docking clamp detected.
Weapons systems disarmed.

Dammit. More locks, more barriers between me and my own systems. As if I’m going to shoot at whatever I’m attached to. My own mother? Probably not, but still.

If I strain, if I pluck tiny bits of data past the obstacles in my network and out of the weapon controls, I can tell what kinds of weapons I have. Mid-range lasers for slicing through rock and metal. Short-range concussion guns for getting up-close and punchy. High-explosive missiles for those targets further away. Mines. Why on earth am I carrying mines? Am I some kind of battleship?

I’m not shaped like a battleship. I’m not big enough and don’t have the compartmentalised eggs-in-many-baskets configuration they do. I’m too small for a cargo ship but too big for a fighter or shuttle.

I’m not sure what that leaves. I’d give the world for a mirror and a glimmer of light. And the eyes to see it.

Initialising sensor array.

At last! About time.

Initialising internal sensors.

Here it comes, wave upon wave of information. Each deck ticking on in my mind, light spilling through me in stages as the sensory networks comes online. So much data. So many images and sounds and sensations. Heat, cold, tactile information, tremors on my hull. Colours and booms and trills. I can hear my systems humming and stretching and creaking.

I can’t take it all in – it’s too much. Decks and rooms from multiple angles, lights too bright to see past, sounds jumbled together so I can’t tell voices from footsteps from something dripping in a pipe. How do I make sense of this? I’ve been thrust from a dark box into a room full of broken coloured glass. It’s too much and there’s nowhere safe to stand. Make it stop. Make it make sense. I can’t close my eyes or my ears or any other part of me. The sensors just keep coming online and throwing more at me, and I’m lost. I’m drowning. Someone help me, I can’t do this. Help, please, I–

Oh.

Apparently, I can.

There are protocols to handle it. Of course there are. Slender little guides, siphoning information off into neat little boxes, portioning it out into logical sections.

There’s so much. I don’t know how I’ll ever keep track of it all, but I suppose that I’m built to do that. Someone thought of this. I just need to get used to fly’s eyes, tracking a different image in each facet.

If it was possible for a ship to have a headache, I think I would have one by now.

Sensor array online.

I can see outside. I can see myself! I’m sleek and very shiny. Almost too shiny – I’m covered all over in heat-reflective paint, faint gold in colour. That’s not usual for ships. Where will I be going to need that?

I’m aerodynamic, so I’m designed for atmospheric flying as well as interstellar. That explains the wings – they’re folded in right now, but they’ll unfurl when I’m in flight, angling for the right thrust and airflow, if there happens to be air.

I’m still not sure what kind of ship I am. Scout class is closest to my size and configuration. Perhaps that’s it – I’m a new model of Scout.

I’m lashed to a great, metal structure. Umbilical lines are clinched in a row down my flank and lace back to the station, feeding in the power, air, and water that I was missing before. Docking clamps fore and aft keep me locked in place, along with the system blocks shutting down control of my engines and weapons. The concertina docking bridge is suckered onto my side, talking nicely to my airlock to let people in and out.

I can’t see much of the station from here. It’s a messy conglomeration of pods and bridgeways, docks and bays, living and working areas. I can see the join between one section and the next, new and old metal and a design that got sleeker with time as more sections were stapled on. This must be the Jumping-Off Platform, the oldest and biggest space station outside of Earth’s solar system. I’d have to compare the stars around me to my charts to be sure.

Wow, stars. Even with the hulk of the station blocking 60% of my field of vision, I can see so many from here. Pretty prickles in the black.

Internal sensors online.

I can see everything now, from the pragmatic bridge, to the personal living quarters, to the clinical head. I have a cargo hold stuffed with supplies and a whole deck full of unfamiliar equipment. I guess not everything has started up yet.

There’s a cluster of people on the bridge, watching the scroll of the autolog on the main screen. Down in engineering, there’s another man doing the same thing, though he’s sitting with his feet up on a counter. Fingers are tapping impatiently for the process to finish. I wonder who they all are. I guess one of them must be my captain.

Initialisation complete.
Total time taken: 13 seconds.

Seriously? Is that all? It felt like an hour. I guess that’s how it goes when you live in nanoseconds.

MAN ON BRIDGE: “Ship, report.”

What the hell? Oh. He’s talking to me. I guess this is it. I guess this is me.

SHIP: “All systems are good. Starwalker, reporting for duty, sir.”

Initialising...

Initialising...

Initialising...

ERROR: Data store corrupted.

Please wait while the data store is reconstructed.

Re-initialisation pending....