The Ship of the Unforgotten

Chapter 28

Chapter 28

Main Computer Lab

UTS Rose Dawn

Jun. X, 2565 A.C.E.

Sometime later the passage beyond the hatch was littered with floating disabled hulks. Jackson had gone through several racks worth of the altered phones and was waiting on yet more when suddenly the behavior of the oncoming bots changed. Several were making their way toward their position when, without warning, they stopped, turned, and started toward the forward end of the ship—the bridge, where Dann and Rose were clambering about the hull.

Jackson tapped her phone’s activation sequence. “Chambers? Rose? Whatever you did, thanks,” Jackson said, relief on her face. “They’re pulling away! What did you do?”

“I think we pulled them off of you and onto us,” the reply came. “Let’s just hope it takes them a while to get to us.” Chambers’ voice was stressed, but it didn’t sound serious. She was about to reply when Pixton poked her head out through the door. “Jackson, I’ve got more for you here—oh! W-what are they doing now?” she said, eyes wide.

“Rose and Chambers,” Jackson said. “They did something, pulled their attention. I don’t know if we’re going to need those,” she gestured at the phones, “but let’s keep ‘em out here just in case they decide to come back.

<>

Dann stripped off the suit with shaking hands, barely resisting the urge to hug the enclosing bulkheads that surrounded them once again. “I am so glad to be back inside,” he said fervently.

“You did fine, Dann. In fact, you did much better than fine. Do you know you’re now in the top 1% of known human space walkers, measured by duration?”

“That’s because nobody in their right mind would want to make a habit of that,” he said. “I know I sure don’t plan to.”

He’d just stowed away the last of his suit when Pixton burst into the room, followed by a steadier Jackson. “D-do you have it? Where is it? Is that—is that it?” she asked, eyeing the large device floating beside Rose within easy gripping range.

“That’s it, at least when it’s got power,” Dann nodded wearily. He’d been out on the hull for almost 10 hours; to say he was run down was a serious understatement. “It won’t be causing us any more trouble.”

“Good,” Jackson said, “because we have more trouble.”

Dann’s heart sank. “What is it now? We didn’t lose any more people did we?”

“No, nothing like that,” Jenny said, eyes still locked on the device. She looked like she was about to attack the thing, though whether she wanted to tear it apart out of anger or a simple desire to figure out how it worked, he couldn’t say.

“While you were outside,” the computer tech continued, eyes never leaving the AI’s housing, “and Jackson was taking care of the maintenance bots, I was working on a few different things.” She pushed and pulled against the handholds on the bulkhead, looking ready to launch toward the AI at any moment. She seemed to realize what she was doing as well, and stilled herself with a visible effort. “One of those things was that city we saw.”

“We don’t know for sure that that’s a city,” Dann started to object.

“We do know,” Jenny said. “At least we do now. After you left, I got Rose Dawn’s sensor suites up and running again. The AI caught on eventually and shut them down again, and they were useless after that, but while they were on I picked up a lot of very interesting stuff. The colony down there has been filling the air with all kinds of broadcasts. Not nearly as much as Earth was producing, but way more than I need to say, yeah, they’re definitely human, and they’ve been here a while.”

“That’s crazy,” he said. “How can that be possible? How long have they been here?”

“I can’t tell from the broadcast contents, but there’s enough development on the surface that I’d say years, or even c-centuries. Without knowing the population they had to start out with or any knowledge of their living conditions, it’s hard to tell for sure. They’ve built quite a bit and have 3 major population centers that I was able to make out on this side of the world.”

“Three doesn’t sound like that many for half a world,” Dann noted.

“Not for Earth, no, of course not, but it took time to build a lot of huge cities on Earth, too, back in prehistoric times, and they were in an environment that was ideally suited to them. Colonists on another world, like us? We’d have to focus our efforts on the best available spots, wherever they might be on the surface, and prioritize that above concerns like being close to the neighbors, right? I-I’d say they’ve done pretty well to have three cities so fast.”

Dann found himself wishing for gravity so that he could rest his head in his hands easily. If it was true that the planet had already been colonized by humanity, they had to have left after the Rose Dawn had, and obviously they had traveled a lot faster to arrive so much earlier.

Since there was no gravity, he couldn’t even properly wilt despite the growing tide of exhaustion stealing over him. Rose glanced at him and frowned. “Dann is exhausted, and the rest of you don’t look much better. We should get to a housing station and continue this in the morning.”

“Are you sure the housing stations are safe?” Jackson added, stifling a yawn.

“With the AI disabled, certainly,” Rose said.

“How is Rose Dawn now?” Dann asked, realizing that the main computer hadn’t spoken with them yet since their return from the ship’s hull.

“She is occupied, but should be okay shortly.”

Jenny looked up sharply. “Did something happen? Shouldn’t she have been fine as soon as you disabled the AI?”

“She’s running systems checks to ensure all traces of it are purged from the system. Wouldn’t want to leave any hidden code laying around that could cause trouble in the future.”

Jenny nodded. “Is there anything I can do to help with that?”

“Actually, your assistance would be welcome, but not tonight. Tomorrow.”

They filed out through the offices, stopping briefly only to collect the phones that were still attached to the large collection of maintenance bots that hadn’t drifted off down the main corridor. The bots seemed to wake up shortly afterward, moving off to take care of various maintenance tasks around the ship. They got back in the tram cars and made their way to a safe place to sleep.