E-mail Matt Jarpe at m.jarpe@comcast.net
Web design & programming by David Louis Edelman.
By Matthew Jarpe
Originally published August 2004 by Asimov's Science Fiction. Copyright © 2004 by Matthew Jarpe.
“Not as bad as I thought,” Randy said as he shucked off his suit. He had been out for three hours and the sweat stains under his arms reached right around his chest to shake hands with one another. “I think I can put together one good main thruster with a couple of week’s work. I can redistribute the lats after a bit of CAD work to get the balance right. My cargo is intact.”
Breitman was at the command chair. It looked like she had been plunking around the control panel, uninvited. Randy hovered over her shoulder, trying to see what she’d been accessing. She wasn’t trying to hide what she’d been doing, so it probably wasn’t anything personal, but still, it would have been nice if she’d asked.
“Now your ride, on the other hand, is screwed,” he said. “I’ve never seen the kind of damage a . . . what did you call it? Gauss grenade? Sure hope they don’t throw another one of those at us.”
“You inspected my ship?” It was the first thing she’d said since he’d returned. “That’s classified equipment.”
“Hey, I’ve got to crawl over the damned thing just to get back to my engines, the way you parked it. And as far as it being classified, what I saw isn’t any great shakes. Leftover military gear. Nothing I haven’t seen before in declassified reports.”
“The Massacre is the most advanced Damager out here.”
“But you still don’t have cloaking devices,” Randy pointed out. “Any ideas what the hell that’s all about?”
Breitman turned to the computer. “I’ve been replaying the recordings of the attack. I thought maybe one of our ships might have seen the thing at some wavelength before it started shooting. No luck. It appears here just after the missiles come up your ass. It brakes, fights it out with the Massacre for a while, then runs away and disappears. It’s invisible at every wavelength.”
Randy leaned over the panel and replayed the files himself. Breitman pulled back out of his way, avoiding physical contact. “Not a glimmer,” he mumbled. “It’s not there, then it’s there. It stayed visible through the fight, when it would have been easier to blink out. So I’m guessing that it can’t fight while invisible. Every frigging wavelength. How the hell do you disappear in every wavelength?”
“It’s possible they’re bending light around themselves so perfectly as to leave no trace.”
Randy shook his head. “I don’t buy that. Too cumbersome.” He pushed off from the panel and bounced around the small habitat. “No, if I were going to go invisible, I’d send out a signal to trick the other ship into not seeing me. Yeah, that’s the plan. I’m not really invisible, I just make the computer think that I am.”
“But that doesn’t do anything for direct visual contact.”
“It sure doesn’t, but hey, I wasn’t looking.” He gestured around the room. “I don’t have any windows. I’ll bet your Damager doesn’t have any either. You don’t even have a clear visor on your suit. Everything we see comes to us through electronics. There’s just too much to see out here to rely on our eyes. We need cameras to take in everything we need and computers and imaging software to interpret it for our eyes. And these guys have taken advantage of that. Clever bastards.”
Breitman shook her head. “How can you fool computers with different operating systems? I have an AI on my ship. You can’t just trick them with some bogus data.”
“What operating system are you running? Not the interface, I mean the core system?”
“N-space, version 2.6.”
Randy jerked a thumb at his computer console. “Version 3.0. Everybody runs N-space. It’s the only thing that works. You don’t have to fool the AI on your ship, you just have to fool the operating system. These guys have found a back door.”
“How did you get Version 3.0?”
“I know a guy. I’m beta-testing. Sort of. Listen, though, it doesn’t matter. What we’ve got to do is find that back door and close it up before these jerks come back and finish us off.”
“Well, technical support on Titan is about a two-hour time lag. . . .” She stopped and stared as Randy doubled over with laughter.
“Technical support! Hello, technical support? We’ve got an invisible pirate chasing us, and, um, I was wondering if you had any bugs in your software that would like, you know, make a pirate invisible or something?”
“That’s enough,” Breitman snapped. “What’s your big idea?”
“I told you, I know a guy. Turn off your law-enforcement ears, now. He’s cracked this code wide open. If there’s a back door, he’ll know about it.”
The guy was on the moon, which meant only a nine-minute time-lag. That still meant almost an hour of exchanged pleasantries. Ms. Breitman became visibly more agitated with each unproductive message.
“Hey, Jimmy. Randy. You ever get over that hangover I left you with?”
Eighteen minute wait.
“Hey, Randall. I think we found your pants in the ventilation duct.”
“I was wondering what happened to those. That was some sendoff.”
Another eighteen minutes.
“Well, six months locked up in that shit can you call a spaceship, we had to do something that would hold you until you got to Mars.”
“I’ll take this shit can over staring at code all day.”
Eighteen more minutes.
“Yeah, staring at code all day and staring at pussy all night. Sorry, didn’t mean to make you jealous. I forgot all you got on that tub of yours to keep you company is your right hand.”
Breitman slapped her hand on the communications console before Randy could answer. “How much more time are you going to waste? Need I remind you that that pirate could be back any minute?”
“Relax,” Randy told her. “We’re using some heavy cripto here. It takes a while for everything to get into synch. Jimmy won’t talk to me on an unsecured line. If he knew there was a Damager here, he wouldn’t talk at all.” He activated the pickup. “Listen, Jimmy, I got a little job for you. I hope my credit is still good. I’m running that software you loaned me for beta-testing. You know which one. Only I’ve found a bug. Seems somebody figured out how to make my ship think his ship isn’t there. That’s messing with my head. You think I can close up that backdoor?”
Randy leaned back to wait for the reply. “I hope we don’t have to get any more explicit than that. He probably knows exactly what I’m talking about.” He pushed off from the com station to the kitchen and started rooting around in the cold storage. “You want some lunch? Looks like I’m going to have to thaw out another block of rations pretty soon. With the extra mouth to feed, we’re going to run out before we get to Mars. We’re going to have to start eating the cargo eventually.” He pulled out cheese and bread and pinned them under the net covering the cutting board.
“What is your cargo, by the way? All the manifest said was PVP.” Breitman filled squeeze bulbs with lemonade and stuck them to the wall.
“Powdered vat protein, breakfast of champions,” Randy said. “Just mix it with water, and you got, what do you call it? Bouillon. Broth. Throw in some veggies, and you’ve got soup. Throw in some kind of goopy stuff I got around here somewhere and you can chew it, like meat.”
“How do they make it?”
Randy waved his sandwich at her. “You don’t ask that question. You don’t want to know. Just remember that it’s highly purified from the starting material and it doesn’t matter what the starting material is.”
“It sounds awful. What does it taste like?”
“Hmph,” Randy finished his bite of sandwich. “Tastes like chicken, goes without saying.”
Breitman looked down at her sandwich. “I suppose you’re going to tell me I’m eating it right now.”
“Oh, hell no. I ain’t gonna eat that shit until we’re starving. Looks like Jimmy’s got an answer for us.”
“Hey, Randy,” the message said. “I don’t got the slightest idea what you’re talking about. Never heard of a bug like that. I’m afraid I can’t help you. Listen, I gotta get going, so, hey, enjoy the rest of your trip. I’ll catch you when you get back.”
“So much for your guy,” Breitman said. “He must not be as good as you say he is.”
Randy frowned. “He got back too soon.”
“Eighteen minutes. What do you mean?”
“If he really didn’t know what I was talking about, he’d have checked for himself. Run some sims, cracked open the code and looked for the back door. He just came right back and said he didn’t know.” He shook his finger at the com panel. “He knows. He’s the one who showed these pirates the back door.”
“That’s a little farfetched,” Breitman said. “There must be thousands of hackers who could have done this.”
“No, not really. Jimmy’s the guy. If he didn’t do it, he knows who did. If he’s not telling me, its because he was paid not to. That’s the only way you get Jimmy to do anything.”
After five days in inactivity, Randy was about to give up on the pirate. “Chickenshit. He gets a little taste of Rattle and Hum and runs home to Mommy.”
“You talk like it was your ship that chased him off. The Massacre did all the work.”
“Excuse me. I believe the Massacre would have been a sitting duck if the Rattle and Hum hadn’t kept rolling over to keep the line of fire open. I did that. Not some tactical AI. Me. In any case, we schooled him, and he ain’t comin’ round here no more.”
“I wouldn’t speak too soon,” Breitman said.
“I don’t believe in that tempting fate nonsense,” Randy told her. “That’s just superstitious crap. Did I ever tell you about the time . . .”
“No, I mean he’s back. He just fired a pair of rockets but the Massacre’s countermeasures are jamming them. They’re going to miss. He’s trying to keep your cargo hold between him and the Massacre.”
Randy jumped over to the main console. “He’s going after my atts. But I’m not totally defenseless. Watch this.” He activated the particle beam generator and took careful aim. He fired and a phosphorescent spot appeared on the hull of the pirate ship. The glow spread out, dispersed, and faded to nothing in a few seconds. “What the hell?”
Breitman chortled. “That’s the most pathetic weapon I’ve ever seen! Try to roll again and let my ship at him.”
Randy fired his attitudinal thrusters, but the enemy had come in too close. However he twisted and turned, the other ship stayed out of the way of the Damager’s guns. “He ain’t buying what I’m selling,” Randy said. “Any more bright ideas?”
“I’m going to cut my ship loose,” Breitman said, pulling out her remote control. “My lateral rockets are probably way off-center because of that gauss grenade. They’ll work as attitudinal thrusters so I can chase him around.”
“No way,” Randy said. “You’ll never be able to control it like that. You’ll be bumbling around all over the place. Probably run right into us.”
“He’s going to start shooting any minute. I have to do something.”
“Okay, try this.” Randy did something with his controls and turned back to Breitman. “Now, cut loose and kick on your main thrusters, quick burst and then off again.” She did as he asked, and he sat back to continue the dance he had been sharing with the pirate.
“That’s right, a little to the left, now. Up, up, up. You’ve got it now, kid. Now slide around the corner and . . . oops. Did I leave a Damager lying there? So sorry.” He grinned as the Massacre’s tactical AI took over savaging the pirate ship. The Damager was unable to maneuver, but it had the element of surprise, as well as the advantage of being unoccupied. The AI was able to take chances that it’s programming would not allow had Breitman been aboard. Whatever the pirate was using for tactical guidance, it wasn’t able to dish it out or take it like the Damager. After a few minutes of exchanging heavy fire, the pirate fled once again. It ran for several minutes, firing back along its vector to cover its escape, then vanished without a trace.
“Badda bing!” Randy shouted, slapping Breitman on the shoulder. She flinched away from the contact, but shared his excitement.
“Nice trick, Marsgalen. We got him.”
“Well, nice shooting to your AI. Did you see how fast he lit out of here?”
Breitman frowned down at her remote control. “We didn’t get out of this without a scratch, though.”
“Ah, I wasn’t expecting too,” Randy said. “What’s the bill?”
“We lost the tactical AI. Big power surge, probably. Particle beam hit the main grid. I probably have nothing left of any of my computers.”
“Ouch. That can’t be good if he decides to come back!”
Breitman nodded. “We’re completely defenseless.”
“Eight kilometers,” Randy said.
“What’s eight kilometers?” Breitman was just up from her sleep shift. They had established the watch rotation for two reasons. Someone needed to stay awake in case the pirate decided to return, and there was only one comfortable place to sleep on the Rattle and Hum.
Breitman had set up an elaborate curtain wall to maintain the privacy of both the bedroom and the sanitary facilities. She entered and emerged fully clothed, and Randy did the same. She had to wear mostly his clothes, since hers had been destroyed by the gauss grenade. She looked a lot younger swimming in baggy, rolled-up pants and tied-up T-shirts.
Randy occasionally let his mind entertain sexual thoughts about her. It was one of his boilerplate fantasies, being forced into a long space voyage with a young woman. But those fantasies didn’t survive his companion’s physical presence. In person, she was the least sexually attractive person he’d ever known. It wasn’t how she looked. She looked just fine, and he’d have to be some kind of hypocrite to criticize someone else on that score anyway. It was that she was frightened of him, and he really hated that.
“When our pirate runs away, he always gets eight kilometers before he vanishes.”
“No,” Breitman said. “The first time he got twelve kilometers and then disappeared.”
Randy frowned and shook his head. “I’ve got eight. Here, I’ll show you the recording.”
“I’m getting my number from my ship’s analysis,” Breitman said. “It’s all wiped out now.” They had retrieved the Texas Chainsaw Massacre with some fancy maneuvering and had strapped it back onto the cargo hauler. They were taking turns going extravehicular and pulling off the weapons. So far, they had only managed to get the particle-beam generator mounted to the Rattle and Hum. It was orders of magnitude more powerful than the one Randy had, but it was still a paltry weapon compared to the energy the pirate ship had thrown around. And the cargo ship had no tactical AI to guide it. It was run by a dumb software program with a simple targeting device. The pirate could sneak up on them and be well within range of its more powerful weapons before they could target it and fire.
“Weapons range,” Randy said, snapping his fingers. “That’s the ticket. What’s the greatest weapons range of the Massacre?”
“We don’t have any range now,” Breitman said. “But when it was working, well . . . the rockets are self guided and they’re limited by fuel. But the ballistic and energy weapons go by the targeting radar, and that’s twelve kilometers. I suppose your targeting radar has a range of eight.”
“You got that right.”
“So he appears once he gets within range. . . .”
“Oh, no,” Randy said. “That’s where my little theory falls to pieces. If that were true, we’d have him every time. But he appears much closer in.”
“When he fires,” Breitman ran the replay of the first attack, then the second. “We see him as soon as he fires a weapon, then he disappears as soon as he’s out of range.”
Randy pushed off from his command sling and floated around the room, slapping his forehead. “I got it. I’m an idiot. I can’t believe I missed this! Tactical subroutine. You don’t use N-space to run your tactical operations, do you?”
“Hell no,” Breitman said. “N-space is terrible at tac ops. I’ve got FireDancer 8.9. Best you can get. I take it you don’t use N-space either.”
“Naw, I got some home-brewed thing. Beta-testing, you know.”
“Jimmy?”
“Yeah, Jimmy again. I hope he didn’t sell out this program, too. But it’s been seeing the pirate so far. As soon as N-space detects hostile intent, it turns control over to the tactical operations subroutine and the pirate becomes visible. We’ve got him.”
Breitman smiled, then her smile disappeared. “You can’t just turn the ship over to tactical operations full time.”
“Can’t I?”
“What about your flight plan? Without navigational software, you’re a ballistic problem, not a space ship. You’re a hazard to everyone around you.”
“I’m already a ballistic problem,” Randy said. “I’ve got no frigging engines! I’m turning it over right now.” He hit a few keys on his keyboard. “As of right now, this ship is no longer running N-space. I can’t alter course, but guess what? I couldn’t do that anyway. Now we can spot him as soon as he’s anywhere within range of my navigational radar, which is about a hundred klicks.”
“But that doesn’t help us,” Breitman said. “We still can’t shoot until he’s within weapons range. He still outguns us. He still has working thrusters and we don’t.”
As she spoke, Randy slumped as much as one can slump in zero gravity. “You really know how to take the thrust out of a guy’s engines, don’t you?”
“It’s not entirely hopeless,” Breitman said. “We still have the element of surprise.”
Randy threw up his hands and grinned maniacally. “Surprise! We’re helpless!”