Chapter 11 - Collateral Questions

  Darius leaned against the rusty metal wall of the abandoned building they were hiding in, trying to catch his breath. His heart was still racing from their mad dash through the industrial sector’s back alleys and side streets.

  He glanced at the others - Corin was keeping watch at one of the filthy windows overlooking the street while Tarek and Lena sorted through the supplies they’d managed to grab before abandoning the transport. Harlan stood a short distance away, speaking in hushed tones into a communicator.

  The adrenaline was fading now, leaving him feeling drained and empty. Had that really just happened? Had he really just been involved in a running gunfight through the streets?

  In the moment, everything had felt so exciting, his heart pounding as bullets pinged off the walls around him, and the thrill of victory as his shots had disabled one of the vehicles. Now that it had passed… the doubts were starting to set in. He realised for the first time that he had been shooting at people. Imperial guards, maybe, but just because he didn’t like the Empire didn’t mean that everyone in it was rotten.

  The people driving those vehicles were probably just doing their jobs – and he hadn’t even hesitated to shoot at them.

  In fairness, they shot at him first, but still. It was the principle of the thing. Or something, anyway – he’d always privately thought that principles were a luxury that only the successful could afford.

  “Well,” Corin chirped as he rejoined the group, “That was exciting.”

  Tarek snorted. “Speak for yourself. I could have done without the running.”

  “Oh please,” Lena rolled her eyes, “You loved every second of it.”

  “Heh. You’re not wrong,” Tarek admitted, a grin breaking across his face. Darius blinked in surprise at seeing it – he hadn’t known the surly man was capable of expressing positive emotions. “You handled yourself pretty well there, Kallan,” the man continued, turning to him. “Froze up at the beginning, but that’s not unusual. You’re not bad with that pistol, either.”

  And the surprises kept on coming.

  “Uh, thanks,” Darius managed. “Beginners luck, I guess.”

  “Told you you’d be happy to have it if things went south,” teased Lena. “Mayfly says you did better than expected!”

  Tarek groaned loudly and turned away, and Corin quickly hid a grin.

  “Mayfly?” Darius asked with a raised eyebrow. Was there another member of the squad that he had yet to meet?

  “It’s her VI interface,” Tarek broke in, rolling his eyes. “She doesn’t like using the menus like a normal person, so she bought this voice interface VI. Insists on treating the stupid thing like a person. Gave it a name and everything.”

  “It’s not stupid!” Lena shot back defensively, pouting. “I get eye strain trying to use the menus. And of course I use her name – it’s called being polite!”

  VI’s were not a new technology – they had been around in some form or another for centuries. The exact quality tended to range from ‘barely coherent text-to-speech’ all the way to ‘scarily human’. Once upon a time, humanity looked to these machines and saw the future of artificial intelligence. They thought VI technology would revolutionise everything, ushering in an era where humans and machines worked in harmony, where menial tasks and even complex decision-making could be entrusted to something without flaws, without bias.

  But somewhere along the way, reality lagged behind those grand ideals. VIs could process a limited scope of commands and information well enough but failed embarrassingly whenever they encountered a task they weren’t explicitly designed for.

  Nowadays, they were mostly used for narrow, repetitive functions. Call up the data feed. Analyse shipment schedules. Log maintenance routines. A few tech-heads had held onto them for their novelty factor, like Lena, who used her VI for basic HUD navigation, a task any basic manual control could handle. Her “Mayfly” could open a menu and navigate an interface, sure, but expecting it to do anything beyond that was laughable.

  And so people did laugh, mostly at Lena, whenever she treated it like it was something more than a glorified voice prompt. No wonder they teased her about it. Darius opened his mouth to join in the ribbing, half a smirk forming on his lips.

  Except…

  Oh, hell.

  It was the perfect cover. He’d been worried about looking like a lunatic, talking to Echo when no one else could hear it. Now, instead of just looking crazy, he risked looking like a complete loser. Darius ran a hand over his face, still grimy from the mad dash earlier. Dignity or discretion—he’d have to pick one.

  And, really, there was no choice at all.

  “I… actually have a VI of my own,” he admitted, voice tinged with reluctant misery as he cut into the conversation. Tarek and Corin looked over, incredulous.

  “I’m sorry, what was that?” Corin asked, his voice thick with amusement. “Didn’t peg you for the type, Kallan.”

  “You heard me,” Darius muttered, resigned.

  Lena’s eyes widened, delighted. “No way! Finally, someone else who gets it! You’re serious, right?”

  Darius forced a weak grin, scratching his neck. “Yeah. My sister got it for me,” he added quickly, glancing around and catching Corin’s raised eyebrow and Tarek’s smirk. It was already starting.

  “That’s so cool! Just ignore them—they’re behind the times,” Lena said, waving a hand at the snickering duo. “What’s its name?”

  “Echo,” he muttered, wincing as he felt his dignity wilt. He’d done some cringey things over the years, but this was near the top of the list.

  *An excellent cover,* Echo chimed in through his augs. *I believe it would be well within my capabilities to mimic a standard VI interface.*

  “Echo, huh?” Tarek snorted, crossing his arms as Corin’s shoulders shook with silent laughter. “What, you were so lonely that your only company was your own echo?”

  Darius clenched his jaw, cursing himself for falling into this mess. Though, admittedly, it was actually a pretty good insult. “Yeah, yeah, get it out of your system,” he muttered, knowing full well they wouldn’t.

  Then, as if things couldn’t get worse, Harlan finished his call and strolled over, his eyebrow raised at the scene. He didn’t say anything, but the glint in his eye spoke volumes nevertheless. He’d clearly overheard Darius’s shame.

  Darius shrugged, trying to look casual. “Hey, it’s just a tool, alright?” His voice came out more defensive than he’d meant. “Keeps me efficient.”

  “You’ve gotta let me meet him!” Lena said brightly, either oblivious to or ignoring the other two. “VIs are amazing! Uh—useful,” she corrected, her cheeks a little pink. Her enthusiasm didn’t do much for Darius’s sense of dignity.

  Echo, apparently, took that as an invitation.

  {It is a pleasure to meet you all,} it intoned, its voice echoing from Lena’s dataslate.

  Darius wasn’t sure who was more surprised. The group froze, Tarek’s smirk faltering and Corin’s hand dropping to the grip of his weapon as they stared at the dataslate. The synthesised voice was calm, unnervingly articulate, and very… not human.

  Not to mention, Echo had somehow casually hacked into a nearby device. Darius doubted Lena’s slate had any serious encryption, but even so, an off-the-shelf VI should not be capable of that.

  Even Lena looked taken aback for a second before a delighted smile lit up her face.

  “Oh wow!” she exclaimed. “It’s great to meet you! You must be really advanced!”

  Tarek and Corin relaxed slightly, their curiosity piqued, but Harlan’s expression changed. A look of dawning horror crept across his face. He swore, spinning toward Darius.

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  “Shut down your augs,” he snapped. “The Empire can track them, and after they spotted you on the streets you can be sure they’ll be trying.”

  The older man swore again, storming over to the windows and peering out at the empty streets. “It’s a goddamn miracle they haven’t found us already,” he bit out. “We’ve got a jammer set up back at base, but there’s no way we can lead them back…”

  {I have been rerouting the Empire’s attempts at tracking for several minutes already. The chances of them successfully cutting through my interference are slim.} Echo volunteered, to general disbelief.

  “That’s… not a standard VI thing, is it?” Corin whispered to Lena after a moment.

  “Uh, no. Well, at least Mayfly can’t do anything like that. Are you sure it’s working, uh, Echo? Not that I doubt you or anything, but, well, it’s surprising.”

  “How confident are you in your VI, Kallan?” Harlan asked intently before Echo could respond. “This is no time for playing around – if you have even the slightest doubts, tell me now and we can work around it.”

  Darius smiled through gritted teeth. Was the stupid AI going to reveal all of its secrets? ‘Well within its abilities to mimic a standard VI’ his left foot! He was starting to get the terrible feeling he had given up his dignity for nothing.

  “Well, I’m hardly an expert myself, but apparently, the Empire was trying to track me through my augs before I ever met up with the Freeholders in the first place, and they never found me, so…” he trailed off with a shrug.

  Harlan didn’t seem terribly satisfied with his answer, but it was the only one he had to offer.

  “I suppose if they were able to track you, they would probably already have arrested us by now,” he admitted. “Unless, of course, they’re hoping you’ll lead them back to our base.”

  “Judging by how they were looking for him specifically at the checkpoint, they probably would have been trying to track him already,” Corin pointed out.

  Harlan raised an inquisitive eyebrow. “What’s your point?”

  “Well, if they had already tracked him, they would have noticed his signal pop up as soon as he left the jammer’s range. So they would already know where the base is – or close enough for it not to matter, at least.”

  Tarek’s expression was darkening, and he was clutching his rifle in a way that made Darius distinctly uncomfortable, but Lena was nodding along.

  “So if Echo isn’t able to hide Darius, then the base is already compromised, and they wouldn’t have any reason to hold off on arresting us? Which means… the fact that they haven’t arrested us is proof that Echo’s… whatever, is working?” she asked.

  Harlan nodded slowly. “It’s relying more on chance than I would like,” he admitted, “but the logic does check out. I’ll call the boss lady and tell her to start shifting things around, just in case. We’ll hang around here for another hour or so before making our way back. Worst case scenario… hopefully they would have had enough time to get out before we arrive.”

  The rest of the squad nodded, though the previously light mood was well and truly gone. Darius shuffled over to a makeshift seat, sagging down on the rubble while rubbing a hand over his face and trying to look for the silver lining. If anything, his squad was likely to be more suspicious of his VI now, and there was a not-insignificant chance the Empire would be waiting to arrest them back at the base.

  At least he could talk to Echo without being suspicious?

  – – –

  The trip back to the Freeholder’s home base was thankfully free of Imperial presence, though the tension was definitely high. Darius found himself peeking around every corner and checking every shadow like there was an Imperial patrol just waiting to spring out with a ‘gotcha’.

  The rest of the squad dealt with the stress differently. Tarek held his rifle at the ready like he was itching for a chance to use it. Corin seemed casual at first glance, but a closer look revealed the tension around his eyes. Harlan was… well, Darius couldn’t really get a read on Harlan, to be honest.

  Lena was skipping along.

  He wasn’t sure if she was putting up a front like Corin but with better acting, or if she genuinely wasn’t bothered by the potentially impending doom.

  Either way, he was jealous.

  By the time they got to a section that Darius recognised, he was discretely palming the grip of his pistol tucked under his jacket. It was a little concerning how quickly he had gotten used to the sensation of a weapon in his hands, not to mention how he already seemed to be using it as a stress ball of sorts. It probably said something about him as a person, but he wasn’t qualified to say what it was.

  Even to Darius, who had spent all of a night here, the base felt different as they filed in. It was like someone had taken the usual hum of activity and muffled it. Half the lights were off, and where there were usually groups huddled around consoles or stockpiling gear, there were only a handful of people, each looking more focused – and more nervous – than usual.

  “Guess they weren’t taking any chances,” Corin muttered as he glanced around the room. “Looks like a lot of folks have already cleared out.”

  “Better to assume the worst than wait around and get caught in the act,” Harlan replied, his voice low but approving. “Voss had the right idea.”

  At the sound of her name, Kara Voss appeared from one of the side corridors, her figure silhouetted against the dim light. She approached them with quick, precise strides, her gaze landing on each of them in turn. When her eyes met Darius’s, he felt the weight of her scrutiny and managed not to fidget under her stare.

  “You’re back,” she said, curtly but with an air of relief. “Good. Follow me—we’ve got a lot to discuss, and you’re going to need to answer some questions, Kallan.” Her eyes narrowed, and he got the impression that any attempts to brush things off would be crushed before he even started.

  The squad exchanged looks but followed her without a word. She led them past the office she had used before, through a series of winding corridors that seemed more deserted with each turn. Finally, they reached a small room tucked away into what Darius assumed was the back of the base. The walls were lined with crates and dataslates, and a single, dim ceiling light cast a hazy glow over a central table.

  Voss leaned against the table, crossing her arms as she studied the group. “Alright, give me the rundown. Anything I need to know right off the bat?”

  Corin cleared his throat, giving a quick, efficient report of the supply run and the encounter with the Imperials, omitting no detail. When he was done, Voss nodded, then looked at Darius again, her expression unreadable.

  “I don’t suppose you’re going to volunteer any information?” she asked sardonically. “I’m starting to realise that Finn was rather light on the pertinent information about your situation.”

  She stood, grabbing a chair from the corner and dragging it over to the table letting it scrap loudly against the dura-crete floor. “So I’m going to need some more than vagaries here, Kallan. By all accounts, the Imperials were looking for you. Specifically. And not just the patrol you encountered – every squad on the station reported the same thing.”

  Voss fixed him with an intense look. It wasn’t quite hostile, but it wasn’t terribly far off either. “I’m not asking you this to give you a hard time – everyone here understands what it means to run from the Empire.”

  Darius licked his lips nervously. Really, it was surprising that his vague stories had gotten him this far – either the Freeholders were really desperate for new blood and didn’t look very closely at where it came from, or Finn’s word carried more weight than he had thought. Either way, he was going to have to give them something.

  “I… was working on the Imperial warship that landed a few days ago,” he began, picking his words carefully. “During my work, I accidentally got access to the ship’s restricted areas, and I believe they think I may have stolen some… important information while I was there.”

  Voss processed that for a moment. “And do you have any information, stolen or otherwise?”

  {I believe it may be best to refrain from providing any further information.} Echo’s voice crackled through his augs, making him twitch in his seat. It wasn’t that he disagreed with the AI’s statement, but he also wasn’t sure if they would accept that.

  “Did your VI just…” Tarek broke in, noticing his reaction and raising an eyebrow as he glanced at Darius.

  Darius forced a shrug, hoping it looked casual. “It likes to chime in. Keeps me… efficient.” He aimed for an offhand tone, but Voss’s sharp gaze didn’t waver.

  “I suppose that leads to my next question,” Voss said dryly, shifting her approach. “How, exactly, is it that your VI is able to hide you from Imperial tracking? As I’m sure you understand, the Freeholders would very much like to get their hands on whatever program or implant allows you to do that.”

  Darius swallowed, acutely aware of the squad’s attention on him. “It’s, uh… something my sister got me,” he began, feeling the familiar discomfort rise. “It has some enhanced capabilities, I guess, compared to standard models. But it’s still a basic interface – it’s just good at rerouting signals.”

  Voss arched an eyebrow, and he resisted the urge to squirm. Or slap himself in the face – that was a terrible excuse.

  “Interesting. I’ll admit, we don’t see that kind of rerouting often,” she replied, her tone lightening almost imperceptibly. “I suppose it’s fortunate that you have it, though. Given how persistent the Imperials seem to be, we might all be in trouble otherwise.”

  Darius blinked, uncertain if she was mocking him. She met his gaze levelly, not breaking eye contact as she pulled her chair a little closer to the table, as though they were settling in for a friendly conversation rather than an interrogation.

  “Either way, you showed real resourcefulness out there. Keeping a level head during a firefight isn’t exactly beginner’s luck, is it?” She gave him the faintest hint of a smile. “We can use that kind of focus.”

  He opened his mouth, about to make some self-deprecating remark, but her look stopped him. She wasn’t trying to corner him; it was as if she was leaving the door open for him to volunteer more… if he wanted.

  “Look, I know you don’t want to show all your cards,” she said, her tone almost conversational now. “I get it. But if you do happen to remember anything about how that VI of yours operates, anything that might help us—” she shrugged, keeping her voice casual, “I’m sure the Freeholders would be very interested. And, of course, we’d make it worth your while.”

  Darius nodded slowly, feeling a little off-balance. He hadn’t expected Voss to shift gears like this. “I… I’ll let you know,” he managed.

  “Good.” She straightened up, her sharp gaze sweeping the rest of the group briefly before returning to him. “In the meantime, we’re going to put those new skills of yours to work.”

  “New skills?” Darius asked, unable to stop the sceptical look that crossed his face.

  A small smirk touched Voss’s mouth. “You can evade Imperial tracking, Kallan, which is more than I can say for half the people here. That’s valuable, and we need to make use of it.” She folded her arms and leaned back in her chair, but her eyes didn’t leave his. “Besides, since they were so intent on tracking you down, we’ve had to shift everything out of this base for the foreseeable future. That’s created a logistical headache, which you’re going to help fix.”

  Darius looked around at the squad, expecting amusement or judgment, but they just watched him neutrally, waiting for his response.

  “I… sure, okay,” he said, a bit surprised to hear his own voice. But as he processed the words, he found that he wasn’t as reluctant as he thought he’d be.

  Voss inclined her head, the faint smirk returning. “Good. We’ll work out the details. Get some rest – you’ve earned it.” She glanced back at the others. “You all have.”

  Darius followed the others out of the room, feeling like he’d narrowly dodged a bullet. Voss’s shift in tone at the end there was disquieting. She was clearly playing her own games, changing approaches to best suit whatever goal she was pursuing.

  He only hoped he would be able to get out before she decided he was more useful as a martyr than a member.

  very unprepared for it.

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