Oh God. Actually producing story
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7735-Z1Z "Rise and Fall"
7736-Z1Z "Rage and Grace"
On electronic paper, they now existed. The message on her monitor screen confirmed it. Mackie gave them their names, winning the toss. Great Justice accepted their existance as prototypes, giving them the Z1Z designation of an electronic warfare spacecraft. Apparently that originated amongst the Supers. After a few clarifications to the CAD files, they'd been accepted for manufacture. Machines were already cutting and forming battlesteel to make the base spaceframe. Primary computer systems were on order. Delivery in a month's time, scheduled to the hour, with three days set aside for acceptance trials.
If those went well - and they probably would - both were then sent to GJ for evalutation. If they came back as meeting specification, Anika got paid. If not, things got expensive. Musing at it in her cockpit, she longed for that to be her biggest worry again.
"Switch to scan mode B please, Anika."
Ustinyavna's voice tickled in her ear, the same abrupt Russian accent as Lun, twinged with the fangy lisp shared by all catgirls.
"Done," she answered
The electronic humm coming from behind her deepened. Warning lights on her console advised that the hanger power supply was getting close to overload. Hangar lights dimmed as auto-systems switched priority to compensate for the load. Life-support systems struggled to cope with the heat being radiated up from the wings. Cooling pumps whined, pumping refrigerant throughout the Hi Streamer's systems. Any human in the hangar would've been sweating. Anika was beginning to feel the effects of the heat, slowing her mind. Most of the catgirls had stripped to bare fur and shorts.
Only Nina Ustinyavna kept her labcoat on.
"Recording now,"
Anika mindlessly tapped through the test sequence, following the test proceedure specification on her thigh. She'd used the torn cover from the spec as a plate for a lunch of cheesecake and brownies, crumbs covering the comm panel. At least she was back in her normal clothes, that kept things from getting too uncomfortable.
"Ow! Ow! Ow! Ow!" One barefoot catgirl found the radiator panels on the wings the hard way, tap-dancing across the wings before vaulting herself onto the floor and continuing her dance across the steel floor.
"Anika?" It took Anika a moment to recognise the synthetic voice as Cortana's "I'm detecting unusual radiation emissions coming from your engine cores."
"Oh...."
Every single autonerve in her body sparked in unison. If she'd been human, she might've described the sensation as feeling eery little hair on her body stand on end.
"They don't match my records for an idle engine of the Roughriders type?"
"Um...." The difference between lying, and hacking were like night and day.
"Mackie made some modifications to the cores. They're use a fusion reaction to boost the output."
"That still wouldn't explain this signature. The Gamma signature's all wrong."The AI's tone remained mild. Curious, not accusing. "Much higher emissivity and activity."
"Um, Mackie knows more about that than I do...."
I was the first thing to come to mind, the first answer. Pass it off to someone else and let them worry
"I'll ask him."
Now she had to rely on Mackie not dropping the ball. "Oh Gods" she thought.
"Problem, Anika?" Nina Called up
"Ah... No." A nervous giggle rose up her throat.
"Long range Scan Mode A, then we'll switch to single-cell diagnostic mode."
Hardware in the Loop testing could bore a hole through a rock. It kept her mind from falling back into the shadow of the mushroom cloud, for a short whole at least.
------
The map on her headset guided her back through exocomp-filled corridors. The walls hummed with Science, her skin prickling with discomfort at the idea. It struck her that, sometime between her leaving for the lab, and coming back, the whole facility had been re-arranged.
The door hummed open. Mackie looked like he hadn't moved from where he'd been left.
"So," she said.
"What?," he answered.
"Did she talk to you?"
"Relax, Anika." he swatted it away with a sweep of his hand. "I told her that it was just Plutonium created by the fusion process." He smiled at her, stretching himself. "I told her they were old cores that'd been run on testbenches for a bit so they'd built up a lot of it and the shielding was acting as a filter for any of the normal Uranium emissions."
Anika blinked. "And she believed that?"
Mackie Shrugged. "We weren't asked to leave and nobody seems to be screaming for Great Justice, so I'd say it was a win." He grinned
"Big AI's aren't that easily fooled."
"And if she isn't, we've got a legitimate reason and explanation for having it there. And for lying. Relax."
She breathed, taking a moment to compose her thoughts.
"Mackie. The basic hacker ethic is that, information wants to be free. And it doesn't mean like it's okay to steal secrets and stuff. It means that, once somebody knows something, it's almost impossible to destroy it. You can't un-discover something." She waited a moment, watching for his reaction. He seemed to be listening, to be thinking about it. "I mean, what's the joke? Three men keep a secret when two are dead? But only up until someone asks why those two died and starts digging. Everything you do to cover it up makes people curious."
He looked away for a moment, at whatever he'd drawn in wireframe on his computer screen. She thought she'd gotten to him.
"Anika, please, I don't want my name and Nuclear Weapons to appear in the same sentence. I don't think I could live my life with that sort of scrutiny. You know how fucked up all those checks are?"
"You know something that can harm people. Think about telling them."
"And someone makes a bomb and I'm responsible," he said, his expression almost pained."But if I do nothing and they discover it on their own, it's not my fault."
"It is, for not warning people." They'd been over this, hadn't they?
"That's a Catch 22. I'm not responsible for what other people do. Peter Parker is an idiot." He snorted. "And if I do tell all, then I hurt a friend's business and cause a massive scandal. I mean, there're hundreds of engine cores out there that'd have to be recalled. Even if we tried to keep it quiet, such a big recall would probably tip someone off."
"But if you tell someone, they can work out a plan!"
"That's why I want to tell Kohran."
Anika Glared. "I think that's the easy way out."
"How?" He demanded.
"Because you know she'll tell you to keep it quiet. Because that's what she did."
"Because maybe that's not the wrong thing!"
His voice rang off the walls.
"And if somebody else works it out then? The laws of physics are the same for everyone." She stepped towards him.
"I'd be surprised if somebody hasn't. But since nobody's talkin, that's probably working." He stood is ground, glaring at her.
Anika could feel herself vibrating, her body starting to burn with anger
"This isn't going anywhere."
They both said it in unison. Mackie slumped down into his chair. Anika dropped down onto her bed, sighing as she stared up at the ceiling.
"Anika. Are you going to tell someone?" Mackie asked, his voice soft.
She honestly didn't know.
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"Anika?"
It took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the night-light. Cortana Again, on the monitor beside her.
"What is it?"
"I've checked the radiation signatures of the drive. Mackie claims they are old engines. It still doesn't match."
"It's not illegal. It's just a prototype." A nervous quiver shook her voice.
"So why the deception?"
"It's a new prototype. A secret design."
"We would not steal such a thing." The AI sounded almost offended.
"You can't be too paranoid." Anika found herself forcing a smile.
There was a pause.
"I see."
--------
________________________________
--m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig?
-----
-------------------------------------------
7735-Z1Z "Rise and Fall"
7736-Z1Z "Rage and Grace"
On electronic paper, they now existed. The message on her monitor screen confirmed it. Mackie gave them their names, winning the toss. Great Justice accepted their existance as prototypes, giving them the Z1Z designation of an electronic warfare spacecraft. Apparently that originated amongst the Supers. After a few clarifications to the CAD files, they'd been accepted for manufacture. Machines were already cutting and forming battlesteel to make the base spaceframe. Primary computer systems were on order. Delivery in a month's time, scheduled to the hour, with three days set aside for acceptance trials.
If those went well - and they probably would - both were then sent to GJ for evalutation. If they came back as meeting specification, Anika got paid. If not, things got expensive. Musing at it in her cockpit, she longed for that to be her biggest worry again.
"Switch to scan mode B please, Anika."
Ustinyavna's voice tickled in her ear, the same abrupt Russian accent as Lun, twinged with the fangy lisp shared by all catgirls.
"Done," she answered
The electronic humm coming from behind her deepened. Warning lights on her console advised that the hanger power supply was getting close to overload. Hangar lights dimmed as auto-systems switched priority to compensate for the load. Life-support systems struggled to cope with the heat being radiated up from the wings. Cooling pumps whined, pumping refrigerant throughout the Hi Streamer's systems. Any human in the hangar would've been sweating. Anika was beginning to feel the effects of the heat, slowing her mind. Most of the catgirls had stripped to bare fur and shorts.
Only Nina Ustinyavna kept her labcoat on.
"Recording now,"
Anika mindlessly tapped through the test sequence, following the test proceedure specification on her thigh. She'd used the torn cover from the spec as a plate for a lunch of cheesecake and brownies, crumbs covering the comm panel. At least she was back in her normal clothes, that kept things from getting too uncomfortable.
"Ow! Ow! Ow! Ow!" One barefoot catgirl found the radiator panels on the wings the hard way, tap-dancing across the wings before vaulting herself onto the floor and continuing her dance across the steel floor.
"Anika?" It took Anika a moment to recognise the synthetic voice as Cortana's "I'm detecting unusual radiation emissions coming from your engine cores."
"Oh...."
Every single autonerve in her body sparked in unison. If she'd been human, she might've described the sensation as feeling eery little hair on her body stand on end.
"They don't match my records for an idle engine of the Roughriders type?"
"Um...." The difference between lying, and hacking were like night and day.
"Mackie made some modifications to the cores. They're use a fusion reaction to boost the output."
"That still wouldn't explain this signature. The Gamma signature's all wrong."The AI's tone remained mild. Curious, not accusing. "Much higher emissivity and activity."
"Um, Mackie knows more about that than I do...."
I was the first thing to come to mind, the first answer. Pass it off to someone else and let them worry
"I'll ask him."
Now she had to rely on Mackie not dropping the ball. "Oh Gods" she thought.
"Problem, Anika?" Nina Called up
"Ah... No." A nervous giggle rose up her throat.
"Long range Scan Mode A, then we'll switch to single-cell diagnostic mode."
Hardware in the Loop testing could bore a hole through a rock. It kept her mind from falling back into the shadow of the mushroom cloud, for a short whole at least.
------
The map on her headset guided her back through exocomp-filled corridors. The walls hummed with Science, her skin prickling with discomfort at the idea. It struck her that, sometime between her leaving for the lab, and coming back, the whole facility had been re-arranged.
The door hummed open. Mackie looked like he hadn't moved from where he'd been left.
"So," she said.
"What?," he answered.
"Did she talk to you?"
"Relax, Anika." he swatted it away with a sweep of his hand. "I told her that it was just Plutonium created by the fusion process." He smiled at her, stretching himself. "I told her they were old cores that'd been run on testbenches for a bit so they'd built up a lot of it and the shielding was acting as a filter for any of the normal Uranium emissions."
Anika blinked. "And she believed that?"
Mackie Shrugged. "We weren't asked to leave and nobody seems to be screaming for Great Justice, so I'd say it was a win." He grinned
"Big AI's aren't that easily fooled."
"And if she isn't, we've got a legitimate reason and explanation for having it there. And for lying. Relax."
She breathed, taking a moment to compose her thoughts.
"Mackie. The basic hacker ethic is that, information wants to be free. And it doesn't mean like it's okay to steal secrets and stuff. It means that, once somebody knows something, it's almost impossible to destroy it. You can't un-discover something." She waited a moment, watching for his reaction. He seemed to be listening, to be thinking about it. "I mean, what's the joke? Three men keep a secret when two are dead? But only up until someone asks why those two died and starts digging. Everything you do to cover it up makes people curious."
He looked away for a moment, at whatever he'd drawn in wireframe on his computer screen. She thought she'd gotten to him.
"Anika, please, I don't want my name and Nuclear Weapons to appear in the same sentence. I don't think I could live my life with that sort of scrutiny. You know how fucked up all those checks are?"
"You know something that can harm people. Think about telling them."
"And someone makes a bomb and I'm responsible," he said, his expression almost pained."But if I do nothing and they discover it on their own, it's not my fault."
"It is, for not warning people." They'd been over this, hadn't they?
"That's a Catch 22. I'm not responsible for what other people do. Peter Parker is an idiot." He snorted. "And if I do tell all, then I hurt a friend's business and cause a massive scandal. I mean, there're hundreds of engine cores out there that'd have to be recalled. Even if we tried to keep it quiet, such a big recall would probably tip someone off."
"But if you tell someone, they can work out a plan!"
"That's why I want to tell Kohran."
Anika Glared. "I think that's the easy way out."
"How?" He demanded.
"Because you know she'll tell you to keep it quiet. Because that's what she did."
"Because maybe that's not the wrong thing!"
His voice rang off the walls.
"And if somebody else works it out then? The laws of physics are the same for everyone." She stepped towards him.
"I'd be surprised if somebody hasn't. But since nobody's talkin, that's probably working." He stood is ground, glaring at her.
Anika could feel herself vibrating, her body starting to burn with anger
"This isn't going anywhere."
They both said it in unison. Mackie slumped down into his chair. Anika dropped down onto her bed, sighing as she stared up at the ceiling.
"Anika. Are you going to tell someone?" Mackie asked, his voice soft.
She honestly didn't know.
------------
"Anika?"
It took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the night-light. Cortana Again, on the monitor beside her.
"What is it?"
"I've checked the radiation signatures of the drive. Mackie claims they are old engines. It still doesn't match."
"It's not illegal. It's just a prototype." A nervous quiver shook her voice.
"So why the deception?"
"It's a new prototype. A secret design."
"We would not steal such a thing." The AI sounded almost offended.
"You can't be too paranoid." Anika found herself forcing a smile.
There was a pause.
"I see."
--------
________________________________
--m(^0^)m-- Wot, no sig?