Mac Walters

SOUNDTRACK: Something inspiring. Adjust style for local market tastes per extranet IP address.

EDIT TEAM 1: Can we use Vaenia’s music?

EDIT TEAM 2: No, are you high? We want “inspired,” not “let’s go fuck an alien.”

EDIT TEAM 1: Hey, inspiration’s what you make of it!

She kept pinging on them because in any other crowd, these small oddities of behavior looked suspicious. Potential threats. But she was pinging everywhere, because they weren’t threats.

They were just humans—a complete chaotic mess.

CM 4: Half of Intelligence’s VIs are working to find out. Nothing yet. The other half are busy checking out back-channel chatter about that dead Spectre. The human one.

“A moment, Lieutenant. I’ll need to use Ms. Menoris’ omni-tool to access the Audacity’s systems.” It paused.

“Hmm.”

Cora made yet another mental note to ask Alec Ryder what the hell he’d been thinking to make an AI that paused for dramatic effect.

“Yes?”

“Menoris died of a registered assassination, so it’s not like we’re going to waste personnel hours on investigating it. We only tracked you down because of the floor. And since you’re a witness, we might as well register you as such. Makes the paperwork easier.”

Cora’s mouth fell open for a moment. “Assassination is legal here?”

She rolled her eyes. “This is Illium, human. Failure to comply will delay your departure by several days, and I’ll be late for dinner. Just sign the form.”

“I didn’t actually see the assassination, you know. Just the body.”

“Yeah, I know. That’s what the form says.”

“Oh.” Cora skimmed, and sure enough, there was a brief bit of text noting that she had not seen the assassin or witnessed the actual murder.

More often than not he slept in his lab, though he’d been making an effort to stop doing that. Ellen didn’t like it.

“Come on, Alec,” she always said. “Even Einstein managed to bathe every day.”

“Dirt builds character,” he’d reply. Not that he’d ever really foregone bathing. It was just that sometimes it took a little prompting for him to stop working and attend to basics. It had been easier to subsume himself in the work than think about mundanities. Or the looming future.

She was right. Enough coincidences meant intent, not bad luck.

“But even an AI developed from your codebase isn’t you, SAM. The problem is that you—AI-kind, if we want to call you that—are just too complex for predictive models or simulations to nail down. I took a chance on you because I think I’m right—I think a symbiotic fusion of organic and artificial intelligence is the key to successful coexistence. But what works under controlled conditions could go completely pear-shaped if every Tom, Dick, and hairy alien starts tinkering with your code.”

“I’ve had no urge to wipe out organic life,” SAM supplied helpfully. “Not yet, anyway.”

Alec stifled a laugh, knowing SAM would notice anyhow.

“What has you fuming this time? The folly of bureaucracy? The inefficiency of lesser minds? ‘What’s Wrong With Your Children,’ Version 7.12?”

Alec sighed and kept his voice down, though no one was paying attention to them as they walked. “The ‘children’ haven’t been children in years, and I haven’t complained about them in months.” Mostly because he hadn’t seen them in months. Well. “Bureaucracy and lesser minds are unavoidable.”

(Director note: Can we get an actor who looks like Shepard? Will Shepard’s estate sue us?)