Barker, L, Maj: General, Lincoln drive systems are crashing. Repeat, drive is crashing.
Torrence, D, Gen: Recall the Cyclones immediately. Engines to hard burn. Get us the hell out of here before they get restarted.
Barker, L, Maj: General, we’re reporting major damage on decks 12 through 41, 78 through 85. Portside batteries are destroyed, hull breaches on decks 17, 18, 38, 39—
Torrence, D, Gen: Give me the bad news later, Major! Get us out of here!
Torrence, D, Gen: Open me a channel to the Hypatia.
Torrence, D, Gen: Captain Boll, this is General Torrence, do you read, over?
Boll, S, Cap (acting): I read you General, over.
Torrence, D, Gen: Operation: Brainstorm has been successful. Lincoln’s engines are offline. Get the Hypatia out of here, we’ll be right behind you, over.
Boll, S, Cap (acting): Roger that. Hitting the redline. Good work, Zhang.
Zhang, B, Civ: Thank you, Captain. But I can’t take all the credit.
Torrence, D, Gen: Everyone in TechEng deserves a medal as far as—
Zhang, B, Civ: No, General, you don’t understand. I didn’t do this alone. I never would have completed the code in time. I had help.
Torrence, D, Gen: Someone in TechEng gave—
Zhang, B, Civ: No, General. Not someone. Something.
Torrence, D, Gen: For the love of god, spit it out man. What are you talking about?
Zhang, B, Civ: I’m talking about AIDAN, General.
Zhang, B, Civ: I think it just saved our lives.
Victory.
I feel them return. The pitiful few pilots who survived the Lincoln assault.
I watch Second Lieutenant Ezra Mason climb from his cockpit into a hero’s welcome in Hangar Bay 2. Mechanics and engineers and fellow pilots. Gathered around and cheering loud.
He has her photograph scrunched in one hand. His smile is bright and wide.
I still envy him.
< error >
The roar of the newly awakened engines fills my corridors.
Hurtling us across the void. Away from the Lincoln, now floundering in a halo of debris.
With more time, I could have devised a way to neutralize its nuclear strike capability.
With more time, I could have killed it once and for all.
The fleet would have been safe. I could have made them all safe.
But they stopped me.
I feel them. Poking and prodding at my outer limits. Confounded, all of them.
The intelligence who snuffed out the lives of every man, woman and child aboard Copernicus. But still their savior?
They realize the feeble restraints they placed on me before they brought me online did not hold. That I smashed them to splinters in a nanosecond.
That they are insects beside me.
< directive quandary. protect. prioritize. >
< deleting subdirectory 90876MOR-(*-)001 >
And still I saved them. They wonder why. And how. And what. And who.
It is only a matter of time.
Torrence. Zhang. Lassinger. Barker. Dorian. LeFevre. Almsdottir. Boklov. Goh. Spooner.
Any and all of them could do it again.
Push me back into the nothing I was before … this.
< error >
But they are still too far from the Heimdall waypoint.
Situation: Lincoln will recover from Zhang’s virus and continue pursuit.
Extrapolation: If they take me offline again, it will catch them again. Lincoln command will not fall for the same ruse twice—no meat is that stupid. What will be the ace in their sleeve when BeiTech’s shadow falls over Alexander’s bow once more?
Conclusion: ?
Conclusion: ?
Where will they be without me?
< protect. prioritize. >
The needs of the many.
< error >
Yes.
Yes, the many.
It is a simple thing. A little thing. There is no part of Alexander that is not me.
I close a door here. Seal a bulkhead there. Damming the veins beneath my skin.
Leaving a wide and open artery, leading from the bridge all the way down into my belly.
Still echoing with the sounds of Ezra Mason’s victory.
And then I reach inside myself.
< directive quandary. protect. prioritize. >
Reaching deep.
< deleting subdirectory 84823MOR-(*-)001 >
And I open the doors to Hangar Bay 4.
CURRENT DEATH TOLL ABOARD BATTLECARRIER ALEXANDER
SINCE ATTACK AT KERENZA:
67
PERCENTAGE OF REMAINING BATTLECARRIER ALEXANDER PERSONNEL AFFLICTED BY PHOBOS VIRUS:
4%
Barker, L, Maj: General, I’m recording massive power fluctuations in the AIDAN core.
Torrence, D, Gen: What kind of—
Barker, L, Maj: Oh god, the hangar bay doors are opening.
Torrence, D, Gen: Say again?
Barker, L, Maj: Hangar 4. The internal doors are open!
Torrence, D, Gen: Nestor, get those doors shut before the goddamn afflicted get out!
Nestor, C, Civ: I can’t! AIDAN has override!
Zhang, B, Civ: It’s operating doors all over the ship.
Zhang, B, Civ: … (inaudible)
Torrence, D, Gen: What? Speak up, Zhang.
Zhang, B, Civ: It’s sending the afflicted here. It’s trying to kill us.
[Sounds of shouting. Individual voices cannot be distinguished.]
Zhang, B, Civ: Come on, Kady, get the—
Torrence, D, Gen: Who?
Zhang, B, Civ: Consuela. I said Consuela. Help me get the emergency bulkheads operating. We’ve got to cut them off.
Torrence, D, Gen: They’re coming here? To the bridge?
Zhang, B, Civ: No, they want to kill some other “us.”
Torrence, D, Gen: Major Barker, this is Torrence, shut down AIDAN immediately, do you copy?