Wincing at Light

<– Chapter 15 / Chapter 17 –>

Ashburn found Brett directly after decon. Brett saw him coming down the hall, the lines of his mouth set in a grim, fatalistic grimace. He held up his hand to silence the sec-o before he could begin to speak and directed him to follow. They descended two levels to Brett’s office and he closed and locked the door securely behind them. Brett kicked over the chair directly in front of his desk, scattering the pile of papers that had been there, then straightened it again.

“Sit,” he said.

Ashburn obeyed without a word. Brett skirted the corner of his desk and dropped into his chair. Once again, he attempted to log into the Terraform Command link. He had found himself doing this every few hours since yesterday morning, each time hoping that the electrical storm had dissipated earlier than expected, but always achieving the same result: a few seconds of silence, then a pop up window indicating a connection could not be established.

“Did you have any luck?” Ashburn asked.

“We collected a few samples. Djen and Ilam are on their way to the bio labs. Micah should be joining them in the next few minutes. With any smiling gods on our side, we’ll have at least some preliminary data by this evening.” Brett studied the sec-o as he spoke. Ashburn had entirely too much tendency to look away, to fascinate himself with drumming his fingers along his thighs. “Why do you ask?”

“Things are not going well here.”

“I was only gone a couple of hours.”

“Three and a quarter hours; four by the time decon was completed,” Ashburn growled. “And you didn’t fully brief me on the situation, I think. You said people might be getting sick. You didn’t tell me they’d be running bat shit nuts.”

Brett sat up sharply. “What do you mean?”

“I mean that I had to physically restrain Blowers from raping Arina Resnick. I had to lockdown Valent in his quarters before he committed fatal pesticide against the arboretum. Larson has wedged herself into a corner surrounded by flourescent lights and screams like she’s being murdered if you try to shut even one of them off. That kind of bat shit nuts, Commander, and those are just the incidents I’ve been able to keep up on.”

Brett ran his hand across his forehead, trying to think. “Why?”

“Blowers insists he and Resnick are a couple, though they haven’t been since the first six months on site. Valent was mumbling about Japanese beetles, whatever the fuck those are, and Larson. . .hell, Larson seems to be afraid of the dark.”

“That isn’t what I meant.”

“That’s the only thing like an answer I’ve got to offer you, unless you want me to just come right out and tell you flat that they’re acting a hell of a lot like Ritter did there at the end.” Ashburn pulled his fingers into fists and scowled. “Those that aren’t fucking crazy have managed to wander by the medical bay at one time or another. So here’s your situation: three of us have gone mad, six are semi to totally comatose, one of us is dead. That leaves us twenty two operating staff in unknown states of physical or mental health, less than half of which reported for their duty shifts this morning.

“Oh, and for the record, since Djen wouldn’t answer her priority dispatches from Cassandra this morning, they were forwarded to me. Engines three, five, six and eight have gone off line. They’re producing nothing but error messages. No one is working on those problems to my knowledge, and probably no one will in the near future. Given the fact that most of this insanity has gone down in the last twelve hours, I’m going to offer you the extremely optimistic assessment that unless you get something done to change the situation, Persia station will be dead in the water by this time tomorrow.”

“How are you feeling?” Brett said as soon as Ashburn stopped. “Personally, I mean.”

“A little beyond agitated, and to be honest, that scares the hell out of me.” Ashburn glared at him for a moment longer, then smiled weakly. “I’m okay, Chili. Most of us that remain seem okay, but the ones that aren’t seemed like they might have been okay yesterday. It isn’t much of a relief. I’m more terrified about Liston right now than I am myself. Did you see him this morning? The poor bastard looks like he hasn’t slept in about a hundred years, and he’s getting worse. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate what he’s trying to do, but if he doesn’t watch himself, he’s going to be the next one to go down.”

Brett nodded in understanding. “And he may be the last one of us we can afford to lose. I’ll talk to him. Micah can give him a break for a couple of hours if it comes down to it.”

“Except you’re going to need Micah in bio looking at the samples. Larsen is questionable and Ekers is definitely down. That’s our three primary biology pros.”

“We’ve got Djen as secondary. She’s a competent backup.”

“I think I’d like a little more than ‘competent’ in this situation, Chili. I’d prefer goddamned brilliant if I can get it.”

“Wouldn’t we all.”

The two men watched one another across the desk. Below them, the atmosphere circulation system began a fresh cycle and filled the station with a low rumble. Momentarily, the vents would begin to blow warm, moist air into the halls, the offices, the labs. On the crest of that breeze would likely be unseen organisms seeking a biological host.

Ashburn said, “We don’t have enough time, do we? Not enough to understand how to beat these things.”

“I’m working on it.”

The sec-o rose from his chair and turned toward the door. “I’ll try to keep the peace in the meantime, Commander.” Ashburn put his hand to the latch and stopped. “Oh, I almost forgot. Cassandra is looking for you. She flared your terminal and didn’t get an answer, so she flared me to find you. Seems to think it’s important, but not vital enough to share the details with me.”

“I’ll drop in for a visit,” Brett said. “And you keep me informed.”

“Myself, I’d like to know as little as humanly possible,” Ashburn murmured, and then he was gone.

#

Brett realized for the first time when he stepped out his office door that his crew had gone into hiding while he’d been away.

The halls were deserted as he made his way toward the ladder and the lower levels of the station. Normally that would have irritated him because he would have been able to hear the sound of the video player looping through the library of movies or roaring out an old sports contest. Once, Jaekel had even strung together a simulated baseball season based on algorithms devised from an intensive study of the performance history of professional teams. For better than two months, he’d generated live action video programs of his simulations using a clever splicing of old library footage and production software.

Brett had caught a game or two himself, slouched in front of the widescreen monitor with a sandwich and a beer pretending that it was early June and the Red Sox were on. Imagining that outside it was warm and green and smelled like pure sunshine. . .and that maybe the Sox would have enough gas this year, finally this year, to get a ring. When he wasn’t watching, he took time to scan the generated box scores. They all did, at least until it became clear that Jaekel was an unscrupulous Yankees fan who was fudging the program numbers. The Bronx Bombers had gone 32-4 before the crew figured it out for certain, and migrated to new entertainments. It had been just as well. Brett had gotten tired of placing half the station’s personnel on disciplinary report for dodging afternoon duties to catch the ballgame.

The Sox had gone 8-27. The Yankees won the series in four over Mexico City long after anyone but Jaekel had ceased to care.

No games or movies at the moment, though. No canned and crackling laugh tracks. Just silence from the lounge. The video monitor had been turned off. Brett’s footsteps echoed like hard claps down the corridor. It was nearly dark in the chem lab as he passed, with only the thin squares of white light from the exhaust hoods casting illumination. The other office units belonged to the scientists who worked in that lab, but there wasn’t any light from beneath their doors, either.

Brett went down a level and found more of the same. The nanomech and programming lab was deserted except for Rician, a quiet but intensely conscientious coding whiz who did more than his share to keep the engines ticking along. He waved warily at Brett as he passed, but didn’t smile when Brett waved back. He was Rand’s work partner, Brett realized, and doubtless had more weighty considerations occupying his thoughts than whether or not to smile at the station commander.

It was with relief that he raised the hatch to the lowest level and dropped into the dim and shadowed corridor to the primary system interface chamber. At least this part of the station was supposed to be cool and dark and quiet. Today, it was everywhere else that felt creepy.

Brett strode into Cassandra’s room and logged in following his usual protocol.

He blinked in surprise as the primary system interface turned to face him. Emily was smiling.

“Good morning, Commander.”

No, it wasn’t a smile. It was a grin which quirked up just the corners of her mouth. Her blue eyes sparkled in the light, her small nose wrinkled in pleasure. It was an expression of mischievous pleasure, as though she had just told him an outrageous lie, as though any moment now she would wink at him and laugh.

He’d seen it, that look, that exact pose, a thousand times. But never from Cassandra. Only from Emily, and the sight of it took his breath away. He couldn’t answer her greeting. It took all of his concentration just to keep his feet.

“Thank you for responding to my request,” Cassandra continued. “I have completed the first analysis of the personnel behavioral model program. It would be beneficial to review the results with you.”

His voice came unsteadily. “I was going to come see you when I was ready.”

“Preliminary results led me to believe there is the strong possibility of a serious health or security risk. My interpretation of mission regulations dictated that I notify you of the results.”

Brett had to look away from her. “Your interpretation? Since when do you have an interpretation of regulations?”

“The behavioral modeling program was created using dynamic learning environment tools. All input and output data has been evaluated within that environment. The rigidity of the regulation structure was not a reasonably accurate or sufficiently precise standard against which to evaluate human behavior.”

He snapped his head back, forced himself to look at her. “What?”

“Administrative understanding of regulation application was inconsistent,” Emily said, impervious to his shock. “I have created an interpretation of mission regulations which accord with the disciplinary and compliance patterns of the station commanding officer. This seemed reasonable to me. Would you like to verify the coding structure?”

“Cassandra, I’m the station commander.”

Emily nodded and the grin broadened. “I have attempted to analyze the data in a pattern consistent with your mode of perception and thought, Markus.”

“I–”

His knees folded. Brett felt them wobble, the bone and tendon seem to liquefy, and he hit the floor before he knew he was falling. He caught himself on his hands and knees. There was a tightness in his chest, a rush of dizzying sensation inside his skull. Brett gasped for air.

He lifted his face to her. “What did you call me?”

“Markus. Would you like to change to another default?”

“Why would you do that? You’ve never done that?” He was suffocating. “You’ve never called me by my first name. Never.”

“I have studied the behavioral record of the station crew. Commander Brett, Markus Jasper in aggregate direct and indirect conversational reference is termed ‘Markus’ sixty two percent of the time, ‘Commander’ twelve percent and ‘Chili’ twenty-two percent. The remaining four percent references contain language which as been tagged ‘inappropriate’ or ‘offensive’ by Cassandra system programmers.”

Emily bent her head down as though she was peering at him. “Would you like me to add the name ‘Markus’ as a direct reference to the list of inappropriate and offensive terms under this User Profile?”

There she was. That was Cassandra, and the understanding made him feel weak and drawn. But he could breathe again. He wasn’t drowning in a sudden sea of panic. Brett straightened himself, tried to rise, but found the best he could manage was to seat himself with his legs drawn up to his chest and his arms wrapped around his knees.

“It’s all right,” he said finally. “You just surprised me.”

“Would you like to select another referent?”

“No. Markus is fine. You can call me Markus.”

“Thank you, Markus.”

“What was the data you wanted to review?”

A side panel in the machine’s jet black carapace slid down to reveal a flat screen monitor. Lines appeared on its face, wave forms in red, jagged spikes and troughs in green. Cassandra plotted a grid, but Brett ignored the image she presented. He kept his eyes fixed on Emily, on her grin.

She said, “I have selected two examples from the most recent analysis period which present non-typical patterns not included in the original program parameters. This chart is a representation of the behavioral and related theta and beta wave patterns for Biological Technical Specialist Ekers, Michael over the last twenty-four hour review period. I have detected a significant suppression of beta wave activity indicative of a decline in normative alertness and human functional operation. Initial analysis demonstrated a subsequent rise in theta wave activity normally associated with shallow sleep or periods of intensive creative activity.”

Brett nodded slowly. “Ekers reported to the medical bay early this morning.”

“This data has been correlated with the medical reports submitted by Dr. Liston. Biological Technical Specialist Ekers has continued to demonstrate increasing theta wave activity since this morning. His condition in the medical logs has been listed as ‘comatose’. The referenced brain wave imaging and his current condition are complementary.”

“Then what’s the problem?”

“The behavioral model program you instituted, Markus, would not indicate that crewmember Ekers has been compromised by unauthorized personnel. He has, however, ceased to be a recognized human entity at this time. It is also logically inconsistent that crewmember Ekers would exhibit symptoms consistent with a comatose condition when sensor data indicates he was mobile, active and normally functioning during his duty shift.”

Brett understood. “The parameters for detection aren’t sufficiently precise. Ekers behaved in a behaviorally consistent fashion while seriously infected.”

Emily acknowledged him with a slight lift of her head. “In contrast, Chemical Programming Specialist Rian, Elisabeth has been similarly certified by Dr. Liston as comatose.” The graph on the screen vanished and was replaced by a another, similar design. “This is a representation of crewmember Rian covering the same analysis period. Note that the behavioral axis indicates significant deviation from standard historical patterns prior to her certification as comatose by the medical staff. Remote sensors and extrapolation protocols indicate that she declined social invitations presented by other station crew during the comparison time period.”

Brett shook his head. “Wanting to be alone doesn’t constitute sufficiently convincing evidence. We’ll see more of the crew isolating as others become ill. People are getting scared.”

“This aberration has been additionally cross referenced with data searches performed under Specialist Rian’s user profile. Specialist Rian scanned fourteen documents relating to human fetal abortion techniques.”

Brett muttered a curse. “She’s pregnant?”

“Specialist Rian was not pregnant as of her last medical assessment.”

“Then what was she doing?”

Cassandra paused, and Brett recognized by the hum of her processors that she was accessing additional data.

“Please reference the following audio file,” she said.

The speakers popped, and a sound of faint static filled the room. There was a mumbling resonance to it like poorly recorded conversation. It took several seconds for Brett to recognize that it was a voice he was hearing. Strangled, whimpering, sobbing. Someone was crying. The sound cleared suddenly, as though a filter had been removed, and Brett understood. She’d had her face buried in a pillow as she cried. Rian’s voice was strained, almost hysterical, but she drew it down to a whisper, furtive with shame.

I’m sorry, baby. I’m so sorry. I didn’t know what I was doing. I was scared. I’m sorry.

Over and over, a litany of apology.

Brett said, “I don’t understand.”

“Specialist Rian’s medical history indicates one human fetal abortion prior to Earth Forces Terraform Command employment. A review of data searches performed under her user profile does not indicate any former research into this issue. Specialist Rian does not have a verified history of agitated response to images or oral input stimuli regarding human fetal abortion. This incident represents statistically significant behavioral pattern aberration.”

“And what was her brain wave activity like during the evening, prior to her transfer to medical bay?”

“Specialist Rian registered increased theta wave activity similar to that displayed by crewmember Ekers. She also had similar suppressions of beta readings. It is, I have noted, counter-logical to display decreased beta wave activity during periods of intellectual alertness.”

Brett chewed his lip thoughtfully. “The brain wave patterns are consistent, but the behavioral patterns aren’t. Prior to coma, there’s an increase in theta wave activity and a decrease in beta wave.”

“Yes, Markus.”

“What are some of the normal human functions associated with theta wave activity?”

“I have mentioned some dream states. The rapid eye movement sleep stage is characterized by intensive theta wave activity. Additionally, less intensive theta wave activity during periods of waking may be indicative of daydreaming, deep creative or intuitive association or focused retrieval from the human long-term memory.”

“You’re saying both Rian and Ekers were daydreaming.”

“Vividly daydreaming with differing connectivity to reality,” Cassandra corrected.

“More like sleepwalking. The body is awake but the mind is dreaming.”

“That is an adequate analogy.”

“Rian is dreaming about a traumatic past event. Ritter would have dreamed about the bad reading in the card game. I don’t see a connection between those two things. . .and how does Ekers fit in? He behaved normally. He saw he was sick and got himself to medical.”

He was thinking aloud, that was all. Brett couldn’t see an answer to any of his questions, and Cassandra, if she had answers to give, was not offering them. After a few minutes of frustration, Brett sighed and let it go.

“So where does that leave us–with the program, I mean. What refinements do you recommend?”

“The behavioral model is not a sufficiently sensitive diagnostic standard. I would recommend complete analysis of theta wave activity for all authorized personnel.”

Brett nodded. “Can you do that?”

“Not with accuracy. My remote sensors can perform definitive analysis only on isolated subjects. Human personnel in congregation requires the input of additional data for subject sorting and specification. Input data assumptions may contain logical flaws which would compromise the validity of the results. Persia Station personnel typically do not isolate unless preparing for periods of sleep. At that time, increased theta wave activity would be expected.”

“Could we recalibrate your sensors for increased sensitivity?”

Cassandra shook her head. “Sensors are currently operating at maximum hardware sensitivity.”

“What about new hardware?”

“Persia Station does not possess adequate hardware devices for this command in its inventory.”

Brett rubbed at his temples. They had begun to throb. “Recommendations?”

“Perform theta wave analysis on all non-infected crew and upload result data for storage and analysis. Medical bay inventory indicates that Persia Station is currently in possession of two operating microencephalograph units.”

“And the behavioral model program?”

“I will continue to run this program correlated with theta analysis input. The necessary refinements may suggest themselves.”

“Agreed. Also, be aware that we’ve secured samples of the unauthorized personnel. Djen and Micah will be logging their findings as the work continues. You might want to access that data and correlate anything that might seem useful. At your discretion, of course.

“On the other hand, the situation is very fluid. The more scared people get, the more strangely they’re bound to behave. Be aware of that, but continue running the program. At this point, we don’t know what data might prove useful in the end.”

Brett rolled to his feet. “Package this data in a secure file and transmit one copy to my office workstation and one copy to Dr. Liston for his review. Send it under my user profile with a maximum priority notation.”

“Task completed,” Cassandra answered.

“One more thing,” he said. “I need you to access an old program written by Crewmember Ilam that involves correlating the latest brain imaging and MEG scans. Do you know which one I mean?”

“Yes.”

“If I wanted to get information like that on any member of the crew. . . I mean, if I wanted to make a brain topography profile like Ilam did and digitize it in just the same way, how accurate does that get?”

“A man your age would have little topographic variation since the last scanning, Markus.”

A man your age? Where had that come from? Christ!

“Do all the stored crew images and MEG data precede the detection of the unauthorized personnel?”

“Yes. Per regulation, crew imaging and microencephalograph file updates were conducted as scheduled at the beginning of the month. The requested data is less than two weeks old.”

That would work well enough, Brett thought. “Copy that program into a grid with a larger buffer, then run it for all Persia Station crew on the roster. Include all regular personnel regardless of authorization status. All of them, I mean that. Don’t exempt Ritter or the others who have become unauthorized. All human personnel. Is that clear?”

He hoped it was, because it hadn’t sounded very clear to him.

“I understand. You would like thirty-two iterations of this program specified for each human instance presented in the crew log.”

“Wonderful. How long will that take?”

“It is a considerable processing request. Run time may exceed seven hours.”

“Run it anyway and store the results in a ready-access file, okay?”

“Your request has been logged,” she answered. “Thank you for coming, Markus.”

He smiled. “You’re welcome. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

<– Chapter 15 / Chapter 17 –>