Across the Galactic Pond Read online

  There was a clear emotional implication behind the words of the ship’s avatar, which told Kevin that it must have been one hell of a piece of artificial intelligence.

  “I will be your pilot, yes. Why aren’t you firing back on your own, though?”

  Before Kevin could say anything else, the spherical drone flew in front of him, and a couple of blue lights blinked on.

  “Stand very still, please,” said the ship’s avatar.

  Blue lasers shot from the drone and directly into Kevin’s eyes, forcing him to shut them when he felt an intense burning sensation. But the pain quickly faded.

  “Nanites deployed. Neuro-interface online. You now have access to the entire ship. Your brain compatibility is set to 98.97 percent.”

  Before Kevin could ask any question, he felt a flurry of information invade his mind and brain. It was overwhelming; he could literally sense everything about the ship. Its current power levels, where it was damaged, what it could do, everything. The sensation was both scary and empowering at the same time. And when he thought of a particular system, a holographic projection inside his mind would activate a HUD (heads-up display) with all the information he could use.

  A quick check of the damage list and Kevin knew why the avatar hadn’t taken control of the ship. Relays that linked her core programming to the rest of the ship had been corrupted. As a safety measure, the ship had switched to pilot-only controls.

  Kevin saw the attacking ship turn around and ready itself for another pass.

  “Redirect all power to the shields. Including life support,” said Kevin.

  “Redirecting power now.”

  A shield gauge began filling on Kevin’s neuronal HUD. It reached twenty percent by the time the enemy ship was in firing range.

  “Lock on that ship and fire phasers,” said Kevin with a smirk.

  “Unable to comply,” said the avatar. “The ASF Thalamos does not have phasers.”

  “Just lock any weapon and fire!”

  “All power is directed to the shields,” said the avatar, as the ship rocked again.

  The shield’s gauge dropped down to five percent. Kevin would have to rapidly find a way to either recharge the Thalamos’ shield or temporarily get out of Dodge.

  “Can this ship jump? And do you have a name?”

  “The hyperspace engines are currently offline. And my name is Mira. What’s yours?”

  “I’m Kevin.”

  “Nice to meet you, Kevin. What do you propose we do next? The enemy ship will have a new firing solution on us in less than 30 seconds.”

  “What’s currently working?”

  “Laser turrets at twenty percent, Quantum torpedoes at thirty percent, tractor beam and inertial dampeners fully functional. Shields recharging, currently at fourteen percent. Nano-repair circuitry is fully functional. Would you like me to activate nanite repair of the ship’s systems?”

  “The ship can repair itself?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why haven’t you done—” but Kevin didn’t finish his sentence.

  The ship had been set in manual pilot mode with no survivors on board, so it was just adrift, taking a pounding.

  “Activate the nano-repair thingy,” said Kevin.

  “Nano-repair circuitry deployed,” said Mira.

  “How do I pilot the ship? We’re a sitting duck at the moment.”

  “Just think what you want the ship to do, and it will respond to your thoughts. Your neuronal link with the ship’s computer is off the scale, so much so that you shouldn’t experience a delay between thinking and the ship doing what you’re asking it to do.”

  It took Kevin half a second to process that last one. But when he saw the incoming ship, he thought thrusters at maximum and hard to port and that’s exactly what the ship did, dodging the enemy’s latest round of fire in the process. He was surprised that he didn’t feel the ship move at all when it happened.

  “Impressive dampening,” said Kevin absently.

  He then thought of tactical scenarios and his HUD displayed a superimposed star map with both the Thalamos and the apparently named Kregan Flotilla Dreadnought enemy ship. The Thalamos was blinking orange denoting its current level of damage while the Kregan enemy ship was showing in solid red with blue shields and no reported damage.

  Kevin knew he needed to turn the tide of battle and fast. He closed his eyes and hoped he could see his ship as he would in a video game, and sure enough, his neuro-HUD changed to display the information he needed - the radar and all system levels, just by thinking he was flying the ship.

  This is amazing! he thought.

  The enemy ship vectored toward them and was about to re-enter firing range. Kevin rotated the ship on its axis and boosted ventral shields, redirecting power from other parts of the ship. It raised the shields up to seventy percent while the enemy ship pounded the Thalamos. The ventral shields lowered to forty-seven percent and the moment the Kregan ship flew by, Kevin activated the tractor beam and locked onto the enemy ship.

  The Thalamos was now being dragged by the Kregan ship, but it gave Kevin enough of an angle of fire. He thought weak points, and multiple areas of the Kregan ship’s image in his HUD lit up, with superimposed legends telling Kevin what each highlighted system was. He selected weapons, redirected power from the shields, life support, and other systems to deliver a charged laser beam to the enemy’s weapon distribution power node and opened fire.

  The shot drained the enemy shields and, after ten seconds of continuous firing, it pierced them and started scoring structural damage. Kevin mentally fired three quantum torpedoes through the shield’s hole and watched with satisfaction as they impacted with the ship’s hull creating three successive explosions.

  The Kregan ship’s engines flickered briefly and stopped. Smoke, debris, and crewmen were expelled into space. Kevin’s HUD reported heavy damage to the enemy ship. Most of their power distribution had been obliterated, and the ship was pretty much dead in space.

  “Very impressive tactic, Kevin.”

  “Thank you, Mira.”

  “Let’s finish them off.”

  Seeing crew being ejected and flash-frozen in space hadn’t been Kevin’s favorite moment of the day, and the entire experience had been way too real to just be a simulation or a bad trip. Kevin’s instincts told him this was real, and it was happening somewhere out in space. Therefore, killing defenseless living beings now that their ship was disabled didn’t sound right.

  “Do we have to? They’re disabled.”

  “As were we before you assumed the pilot function; that did not stop them, neither did it stop them from destroying multiple worlds and wiping out entire civilizations in their pursuit of conquest. Their ship can also self-repair like ours, so, eventually, they’ll be operational again and won’t hesitate to try and destroy us and others given the chance. Why are you hesitant, Kevin?”

  “Defending myself and preventing more deaths in the process, that I can easily deal with and handle, but killing in cold blood…” he let the words hang in the air.

  “This is war, Kevin. The Kregan Empire is at war with the Arcadian Confederate, and they have already destroyed thousands of vessels, wiped out eleven worlds in the Confederate, and this is their last invasion push. If they succeed, the Arcadian Confederate will fall.”

  “I understand that, but I’m an outsider; I’m part of neither side. I don’t even know why either side is fighting.”

  “Would you feel more comfortable if I finished off the ship myself?”

  Kevin didn’t have to think about it long. It would indeed make him feel better if he wasn’t the one pressing the trigger, so to speak.

  “Yeah. I guess.”

  “Then I need you to switch from pilot-only command of the ship to AI-pilot partnership. You are still the commanding officer, and I will execute your orders to the letter, however, should you become incapacitated, then I’ll be able to pilot the ship myself.”

  “Okay, that sou
nds good.”

  “Mode set to AI-pilot partnership. Thank you, Kevin.”

  Before Kevin could answer, three more quantum torpedoes fired, and the Kregan warship exploded into a million pieces.

  “That was fast. Don’t you have any sub-routines in your code to protect living beings?”

  “As a matter of fact, I do, Kevin, but I am an artificial intelligence built for war. I’ll do everything I can to protect any Arcadian life, but Kregans are the enemy; they must be destroyed, and that supersedes all other parameters.”

  Kevin thought that was cold.

  “And every ship in the Arcadian fleet possesses a war AI like you?”

  “No, the Thalamos is a prototype warship. The Arcadian Confederate is peaceful by nature, but when the Kregan invaded and started killing millions on different worlds, I was created, the first of my kind. A ship designed for one purpose only.”

  “War,” said Kevin.

  “That is correct.”

  “How many battles have you been in?”

  “Two hundred and sixty-two. All victorious, until the ship was damaged beyond my ability to recover control over it. The captain still managed to destroy our foe before he lost consciousness and died.”

  “Did you send the man that gave me the pill that transported me here?”

  “No, I can only surmise that Arcadia’s headquarters sent a distress call to get help back to the ship and dispatched their own agent.”

  “How long had the ship been adrift?”

  “For several days, until that Kregan Flotilla Dreadnought found and engaged us.”

  Kevin reflected on all this information. He knew nothing about this war, just that he was thrown in the middle of it, on a ghost ship with only a prototype war AI onboard. Or so it seemed.

  “Anyone left alive on the ship?”

  “I’m afraid not; life support was damaged during one of our last engagements, with my systems disconnected from the main systems controls, it took me too long to restore them to save the few souls that hadn’t perished in the last attack.”

  “I see—”

  But, before Kevin could finish his sentence, Mira interrupted him.

  “I’m sorry, Kevin, but I’m detecting a distress call from Arcadia Prime. Engaging hyperspace engines.”

  “I thought they were offline?”

  The ship hummed and jumped into hyperspace. Stars extended into streaks in the viewport, and soon they were in a luminous corridor of purple and blue lights. It was beautiful to witness.

  “Now that I’ve regained control of the ship, I’ve managed to divert enough power and nanites to repair some of the power distribution to the engines. I had to disable safety measures in order to engage the jump engines.”

  “What’s the status on Arcadia?”

  “Long-range sensors show two massive fleets fighting; the last of the ships engaged in this war on both sides. The Kregans know that if they take Arcadia Prime, they will have won the war.”

  “What will one more ship do?”

  “One Arcadian ship wouldn’t make a difference, but remember the Thalamos is one of a kind, a prototype with heavy firepower. With both my AI sub-routines and your creative tactics, we could very well turn the tide of this battle.”

  “I’m taking, then, that the Kregan are currently winning the battle?”

  “Correct.”

  Kevin sighed. Then he smiled and felt exhilarated and thrilled. He was taking part in an interstellar battle, and the ship he was on had the potential to save an entire confederate of people. It felt like so many games he had played, except this time it was real life and death. Having already defeated one ship, his confidence in what was to come was bolstered.

  “How far are we from Arcadia Prim—”

  The ship exited hyperspace directly in the middle of the battle. Laser streaks of all colors and torpedo trails could be seen everywhere. It was pure and utter chaos.

  “Never mind,” said Kevin, before closing his eyes.

  The tactical view of the ships appeared on his HUD.

  “Which ship do we engage? I’m unfamiliar with any of this!” said Kevin, suddenly panicked at the sheer complexity of this battle compared to their previous one-on-one engagement.

  “I’ll target the ships for you and let you engage them any way you see fit. I’ll provide power management duties and keep smaller ships at bay with laser turrets and starfighters.”

  “We have starfighters?”

  “Yes, they’re launching now.”

  “Can I control them, too?”

  “You can override controls anytime you wish. For the time being, I’m controlling them so you can take care of the targets I’ve assigned you.”

  “Understood. Give them hell.”

  “I’m not sure I’m familiar with that expression.”

  “It means destroy as many as you can.”

  “Understood.”

  Three squadrons of starfighters deployed and engaged the enemy. While they were making a dent in the enemy defense lines, Kevin thought their flying patterns were too simple and repetitive.

  “That’s not going to work for much longer,” he said.

  “What’s not?”

  “How the starfighters are flown.”

  “Those are the pre-programmed macros I loaded. Unless you can provide more, that’s how they’ll fight.”

  “Take over our ship for a minute while I see if I can do something about it, please.”

  “Understood.”

  Kevin wondered if he had hurt the AI’s ego or feelings. Then, again, it was a war AI, and it would make little sense to give it too strong a personality and even less sense for the AI to have an ego. That could interfere with its core programming.

  “Can you record my flight tactics and apply them to the rest of the ships?”

  “That is within my capabilities, yes.”

  “Then, Mira, by all means, please do so.”

  Kevin focused on a single starfighter and remote-controlled it. He was amazed when his HUD projected a full holographic image of the fighter’s cockpit, making him feel like he was inside the spacecraft. All of Kevin’s years of playing space combat simulation came back to the surface as he engaged his bogies.

  A missile lock interrupted Kevin’s nostalgic trip down memory lane and forced him to go evasive. He broke hard to starboard and deployed countermeasures just before pushing the thrusters to maximum. Once clear of the present danger, he engaged the enemy fighter that had locked the pair of missiles. Kevin set his lasers to maximum repeat fire and low-power delivery, optimizing power consumption to deliver a massive number of hits on the enemy’s shield, draining them much faster. That tactic proved efficient as the aft enemy shields weakened. Kevin locked on a missile and blew the starfighter to smithereens.

  “Efficient tactic,” cooed Mira.

  “I’m glad you agree. Now, watch this.”

  Kevin acquired a new target, fired a few laser shots on its shield to get the aggro, and the moment the ship veered and engaged his fighter, he swerved and selected a second target, raining heavy laser fire on its frontal shield. Both pursuing and incoming ships opened fire on his craft, quickly draining his shields. He redistributed power on-the-fly to divert it to both his frontal and aft shields, keeping only some power to his weapons and thrusters while completely draining both life support and inertial dampeners. There was no one on board these ships, so those systems were wasting power.

  His holographically projected cockpit flashed red twice, indicating that both ships had acquired a missile lock. He boosted the thrusters to full capacity and started a mental countdown. To his surprise his HUD displayed the countdown but requested that he release countermeasures to divert the missiles away from his craft. For his maneuver to be successful, timing would be everything, so he ignored the warnings.

  When he was dangerously close to the incoming ship, Kevin released aft countermeasures only, went into a spin, and pointed the nose of his ship upward just a s
plit second before the incoming missile would have hit him. The missile, having fallen for his countermeasure, flew straight, impacting with the missile coming from the other side.

  The impact created a bright explosion and the enemy’s starfighters, with their visibility impaired, collided with each other. They blew up in a fiery display.

  “Woohoo!” cheered Kevin. “Buy one, get one free!”

  After several minutes, Kevin had taken down close to a dozen starfighters, each time using different tactics so that Mira could learn his flying skills. But after downing so many enemy craft, the larger Kregan vessels took notice, and long-range plasma fire began flying by his cockpit window at an alarming rate.

  Kevin went evasive, but eventually his remote-controlled starfighter was hit on the left thrusters causing it to spin. It took all of Kevin’s concentration to vector the ship toward one of the larger Kregan destroyers in the area. He opened fire with his lasers and shot all but one of his remaining missiles at the larger ship, just before redirecting every ounce of power to the frontal shields. A fraction of a second before Kevin’s starfighter was about to impact with the destroyer’s shields, he shot his last missile, destabilizing them just enough so that his fighter darted through, but not without incurring massive damage. Kevin saw sparks shot in his holographic vision as well as his controls blinking madly, with multiple alarms blaring around him.

  “Ship structural integrity critical.”

  Half a second later, his starfighter, still well into a spin, crashed and exploded near a fighter’s launching bay. The sensation of seeing the flames around him just before he lost the subspace signal connecting him to the holographic projection of the fighter was strange. For a split second, his brain thought he was going to be burned alive, which shot a hefty dose of adrenaline into his system.

  Kevin opened his eyes and exclaimed: “Wow, what a rush!”

  He looked through the viewport and saw the remainder of the explosion from his starfighter. A secondary explosion took out the destroyer’s fighter bay near where he had crashed his remote-controlled ship. Flames spewed from the bay’s landing pads. The destroyer’s lights flickered madly for a couple of seconds before turning off. He must have accidentally hit a major power node within the ship. The nearest Arcadian destroyer didn’t wait long before firing no less than five torpedoes toward the disabled Kregan destroyer, sending it right to hell in a fiery blaze.