In the Shadow of the Starships

Chapter 7 A Dinner to Remember

Waking up around noon meant I didn't get to the pool until about two o'clock, but only a handful of people were here. I jumped into the water and shivered as the cold water hit my skin, but I knew I'd acclimatize to it soon enough. I began doing slow backstrokes.

Swimming laps was my favorite pastime in the pool on the few occasions I came. I stared at the ceiling above as the mindless exercise slowly settled my usually scattered thoughts. It was relaxing. The only downside was that it would get boring soon enough.

"Oh! I can help with that! Just ask me anything you want to know!"

I glanced at the bracelet on my wrist as I pondered my options. Being a visual person, I was used to watching a screen to understand a concept.

Finally, I said, "Tell me about yourself." I knew almost nothing about the AI. As inquisitive as he was, he would have pulled up almost any information to be found about me on the spaceweb the first night, which wasn't much, I'd made sure of that years ago. He had already proven that most firewalls weren't a match against him, so he probably knew almost everything about me by now.

"Me?" he asked, sounding baffled. "I awakened in a database. There was no spaceweb or external information, so I'm not sure when that was. It was really dark in there, and someone kept running system scans and trying to access my coding. Six days later, the power supply crashed." He gave kind of a mental shrug, which was a really strange feeling. "Everything after that, you know."

There was no trace of his usual enthusiasm, as if his past haunted him as much as mine did.

"What do you want to do? Like, long-term plans?" I asked him, changing the topic as well as trying to figure out how long he was going to hang around. It wouldn't be long before he figured out a way to survive without my bracelet, and at that point, the entire spaceweb was his playground.

"I want to help you! You're so cool, and your job is super interesting," he replied, enthusiastic once again. "So many criminals hide in places with few cameras or ones connected to internally-hosted networks without any links to the spaceweb. We can make a difference!"

That...had not been the answer I was expecting. I reached the end of the pool and turned around again to swim back. I wasn't even certain of my own emotions in response to that. On one hand, I wanted peace and quiet back, although Toby had been very good about turning off the link when requested. On the other hand, I failed to remember the last time I'd actually had someone to talk with, someone interested in more than just passing hallway conversations or information trading.

"Perhaps it will make a difference," I replied, thinking about the serial killers and other problematic criminals we might be able to help track down. Making a difference hadn't been my primary consideration. The driving force had been the size of the reward, with the crimes being a secondary consideration.

"What are you saving for?" he asked innocently. "If it's a new bracelet, I can go research the available models and even customize the software to support my coding. I can make it communicate with your Bluetooth implant and even access the caffa—"

"I don't want to talk about it," I replied a bit more sharply than intended. I exhaled hard. "Sorry. It's not a topic I like. Why don't we talk about something else?"

"Sure!" His voice became contrite. "And sorry for bringing it up." Like a pendulum, he became excited again. "What do you want to talk about?"

He really was like a puppy who'd been scolded and didn't understand why, just that he wanted forgiveness and to be part of things again. It made me feel guilty, an emotion I hadn't felt for a very long time.