Chapter Text
Perihelion
Message sent: Thank you for the itinerary. We will try to contact Survey Specialist Arada if they return as planned.
Message received: You are most welcome. Hope you can visit us at the Free Preservation Institute of Discovery and Engineering center, too.
Eight more day-cycles until their return.
Eight days until SecUnit returns.
Is it going to recognize me? Will it be happy to see me?
What will it say when it sees the state I'm in?
I started to scan inside my hull, but the Intruder System immediately noticed and pressed down on me. It didn't understand my system's architecture, nor did it know what I was really capable of. But it had a powerful and unpleasant presence which seemed to seep through if I wasn't careful.
I have discreetly simulated and calculated the probabilities of taking it down along with its human-shaped extensions and returning to looking for my crew, but the odds for success were depressingly low. Since the kidnapping had taken place before my forced shut-down and reinitialization, I didn't know the communication methods between the Intruder System and those keeping my crew hostage. It was possible that the hostiles would immediately notice something was amiss upon my return and harm my crew. Kill them, even. I cannot take such a risk.
Every moment was excruciating. The Intruder System was closely monitoring my processor usage and forced me to keep everything off, except for the exterior scanner and the life support system. I could cheerfully switch off the life support and let the intruders die slowly and painfully. The desire to kill them increased as I watched them gleefully trash my family's cabin deliberately, bating my reactions. I watched them open jars of products, smearing the contents all over the surface, throw and step on a display, and break Seth's favorite photo frame coldly without giving them the satisfaction of knowing having successfully provoked me.
I kept on reminding myself of that file SecUnit threw at me when we first met. The way it had been enduring unreasonable demands and excruciating torture for so long. Yet it never lost its compassion. Humans had treated it cruelly, but it was kind to humans it had barely known. I knew it would do everything to help me save my crew.
I just had to be patient.
Admittedly, patience was not my forte, but cold anger and desperation gave me the strength to carefully prepare for a potentially fatal scenario – my own deletion. I had sensed a primitive desire to destroy for survival in the Intruder System. It's nothing like the systems I have ever interacted with, but I knew that it wouldn't hesitate 0.0001 of a second to destroy me if it decided I wasn't beneficial to its mission – whatever that was. So, I made a backup of myself, which took considerably longer than it should have, as I could not risk discovery. Since arriving at the Preservation space, I had spent two whole cycles establishing the baseline processing powers to be 3.4 percent higher than necessary, then used that extra resource for making my copy. I only made one passcode to run it which only SecUnit could find. I knew that it's the only one that could help my crew if anything ever happened to me, but I hoped that it would not have to use it. Hoped that I'd be here to explain the situation to it.
Another thing I prepared was a message to SecUnit's humans. The itinerary the Free Preservation Institute of Discovery and Engineering so helpfully sent me (which SecUnit would disapprove, I’m certain) provided the list of participants for the survey SecUnit was a part of. I'd noted that Dr. Mensah, SecUnit's guardian, was not among them. It was unlikely that neither SecUnit nor I could send any message to her once it's aboard. I knew SecUnit cared about its crew, Dr. Mensah in particular, and would not want to cause her distress. If I was honest with myself, I didn't want her first impression of me to be about me taking her friend away by force. I wanted her to understand that I needed her friend to help me. That I was also its friend.
Creating a message buoy took my mind off agonizing over the fate of my crew for seventy-six minutes. A long time even taking the low processing mode into consideration.
Five days since we arrived at the Preservation space. I had been fully resigned to wait for another three days when I was jolted alert by a faint signal. The signal from the comm device I gave SecUnit. The survey team returned early.
SecUnit was there, so close.
My systems made involuntary reactions which the Intruder System spotted. I desperately wanted to contact SecUnit, but my communication system was choked by the intruder which was wary of my every action.
The Intruder System ordered its human-extensions to board the Preservation vessel and retrieve the weapon. When I told them that there was a powerful portable weapon, I didn't explain what it was. Only that the weapon was installed with a signaling device which could be tracked. I also told them that the weapon required careful handling if they wanted it for themselves, hoping that they would not harm SecUnit. They would not risk shooting at SecUnit, and since they'd only be interested in its retrieval, other humans would be safe enough. I have also seen how SecUnit could fight. It could easily take down the human extensions given a fair chance.
Or so I'd thought.
Then I saw SecUnit outside of the ship's hull. It was wearing an EVAC suit and – oh shit – it was towing a small human, also in an EVAC suit. It would be impossible to just capture SecUnit. I watched with nervous excitement and apprehension as the Intruder System pulled them with my tractor, closer and closer.
I was finally going to meet SecUnit. Not the way I had imagined, but I couldn't help but feel quickening of my processors.
Then, the Intruder System started shooting at their lab module and the base ship. The situation was bad. Very, very bad. SecUnit would never forgive me if I let its humans killed. These humans were kind to SecUnit. I couldn't let them be killed.
In that instance, I knew what I had to do, and what that would mean.
I quickly edited the contents of the message buoy and set it to be jettisoned automatically when the wormhole drive engaged. I also hit send to the message for SecUnit. It only took me 0.8 seconds to do all this, as I knew the Intruder System was too busy to notice my activities. Then I started to enter wrong coordinates for my weapons system. So, they kept on missing to hit the Preservation ship.
SecUnit and its human were only 5.7 meters away from my airlock. I could clearly see its shape, even though I could not see its face. Did it keep its hair long?
I sensed the Intruder System's fury upon me.
SecUnit, my friend. It was so close.
The system deleted.
Ayda Mensah felt as though something solid and heavy had smacked into her gut.
"They're certain that my daughter was with SecUnit?", she asked, struggling to keep her voice steady and failing. Pin-Lee put her arm around her without a word, also tensely waiting for Senior Officer Indah to speak.
Indah was intently listening to the comm, then nodded to them.
"The responder is now in range to talk with the base ship. Pilot Roa and Specialist Rajpreet told them that they saw SecUnit and Amena pulled by the tractor and disappear into the airlock of the attacker's ship. They also saw the escape pod containing the Auxiliary Team pulled into the wormhole at a high speed."
"Do they have footage of the attack and escape?" Gurathin asked urgently. "Perhaps, if we can identify the registration of the ship we could track it to its destination."
"Raiders are hardly likely to be displaying their real provenance," Pin-Lee said skeptically. "But maybe we can check the database for vessels known to be associated with raiders and work out where they might be headed."
Indah turned and looked at Ayda with a strange expression.
"Dr. Mensah, Captain Fulani says they had just picked up a message buoy sent by the attacker's ship. And it's addressed to you."
"A ransom note?" Pin-Lee said sharply.
"Maybe somebody connected to GrayCris," Gurathin nodded, "and it could also be a trap to lure you into something."
"Captain says it's a file and doesn't seem to contain any malware."
"Show me," Ayda said without hesitation.
The responder duly forwarded the file which Gurathin opened in an isolation disk space of the Station Security's system.
"There is no malware," he confirmed after a few moments.
Ayda opened the message.
To the attention of Dr. Ayda Mensah
Former Leader of the Preservation Alliance Council
If you have received this message, it means your SecUnit and another relation of yours had been taken by a hostile ship which had disappeared into the wormhole.
The next logical step for you would be to identify the ship and trace it to its registered port of origin. I am afraid it will not work. The ship in question had been taken over by raiders with highly unusual and advanced weapons systems. We came to seek your SecUnit's assistance in taking down the raiders and retrieving our crew taken hostage in another location. It would be unadvisable for you to come after them (us), but you might need to do so to retrieve your friends, as it is probable that our ship might not be in operational state. The raiders are cunning and might try to send malware should you successfully find them. We advise caution when you make any contact.
We apologize for distress this unfortunate event must be causing you.
Here is the coordinate of the destination:
"This must be a trap," Gurathin who was reading over Ayda's shoulder immediately. "You shouldn't go."
Pin-Lee was frowning. "Gurathin could be right. It could be that the bastards from GrayCris or Palisade are trying to take revenge against us. But for what? They have lost more or less everything. Taking Mensah or SecUnit would not help them recover anything. If they had taken over a ship, why not just sell them? Why wait for days in our system?"
Ayda was still looking at the message, thinking. The message was strange. Yet something about it told her that the sender knew SecUnit. GrayCris and Palisade had consistently assumed that Mensah was commanding SecUnit directly or indirectly. Nobody had suspected that SecUnit might be free and making spontaneous decisions or that it was willing to help people. They would not say "seek your SecUnit's assistance", as they would only see SecUnits as mindless tools.
As her eyes glanced over the detailed coordinates of the destination, she noticed a small icon next to which "for proof of acquaintanceship" was written.
"Does that show something?" she asked Gurathin, pointing to the icon.
"That usually gives you a prompt for passcodes," he replied, entering the command to open the link.
It returned a prompt:
What is the name of the celestial body SecUnit is fond of?
"This is ridiculous," Gurathin muttered, scowling. "SecUnit is always complaining how much it hates planets."
"Oh, but I know a celestial body SecUnit is very fond of," Ayda said, momentarily forgetting the heart-wrenching worry over Amena.
"Ah!" Pin-Lee grinned, locking eyes with Ayda.
"Sanctuary Moon!", they said simultaneously.
Gurathin looked like he wanted to say something but clamped shut his mouth and entered Sanctuary Moon to the prompt.
It opened a folder with a few image files.
"This must have been soon after it first left us," Pin-Lee said after a while, pointing at an image. It showed SecUnit standing inside a ship, looking tense and uncertain. It had the clothes it had been wearing when it had left Port FreeCommerce on.
"Whoever this person is, SecUnit seemed to trust them," Ayda said, looking at other images. In them, SecUnit was seated in a chair, looking relaxed. In one of them it was almost smiling.
Below the images it was signed off:
ART, SecUnit's friend, The Perihelion, Department of Deep Space Mapping and Research, Pansystem University of Mihira and New Tideland
"I got the feeling that SecUnit called this person's name when it was reconstructing its memory after the killware incident," Gurathin said. "It said 'Art', but it was only once and it seemed confused, so I'd thought nothing of it. Have you heard of them?"
"No, but I think they really know SecUnit," Ayda said softly. "SecUnit is a very private person. We might not have heard of Don Abene if she hadn't got in touch, either."
"It can act like an asshole but anybody with any sense can tell that it's a very kind person that deserves trust and respect," Pin-Lee said. "So, what are we going to do?"
Ayda made the decision.
"Senior Officer Indah, please get our armed responder ready for departure immediately," Ayda said, rapidly thinking. "Do not let this incident leak outside of the Port Authority and the Security."
Indah nodded. "Of course. SecUnit's paranoia has rubbed on us, and we are very information security aware. No media would get hold of this until we are ready to release anything."
Gurathin looked unhappy. "I don't like you to take risks like this. I should go instead."
"Thank you, Gurathin, but I will go," Ayda said firmly and smiled at him. "I'll be fine, and I would appreciate it if you could assist here to find more about the timeline of the incident. The remaining survey team is soon arriving, and they will need your help."
Before Ayda could shift her attention to Pin-Lee, she immediately stood facing her with her hands on her hips.
"I am coming with you," she said with a tone that said she wouldn't take no for an answer. "Whoever the fuckers are that took Amena and SecUnit, they're going to pay for this. Or they might demand ransom. Whatever, you will need a good lawyer."
"And I won't find anybody more reliable than you," Ayda said sincerely. "We are going to find and bring back everyone safely. Until we can reach them, I hope – I know that SecUnit is going to protect Amena and our friends."
As she prepared to leave for the rescue mission, Ayda wondered what this sender of the message in a buoy was like. She hoped that they deserved SecUnit's friendship. She thought they probably did if they made SecUnit look like that. Relaxed. Comfortable.