Strat-3 Chpt-6

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==Strategos (A Great Captain Roberts Tale!!) - Part 3 - A Light In The Black - Chapter 6==
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===Meeting of old Friends===
Bilie Hoel was…
…in orbit, but her remote was waiting with ALICE's new humanoid remote when the concourse pressurized and the team from Erinyes came across.
Director Esme Gomez was an unusual one-it's rare even in the outies to find someone so thoroughly, visibly Ethnic. She looked Meso-American or Latin in a way that was almost a stereotype, from her straight black hair to her obvious build under her jumpsuit. The Protomech and the suited tech flanking her were guiding what had to be the largest, clearly non-regulation, maintenance and service 'Spider' drones that could fit through the concourse.
The six-legged machines were basically a flatbed, control box, and safety sensors on six myomer-and-hydraulic legs with a gyro on the far end.
Wilhemina Siegel was also present. "Esme!!" The Snow Raven base commander greeted the new arrivals with both friendliness and familiarity.
"Good to see you Bi-wait, there's two Billies here…who gets the nickname?" Esme half-joked.
“It would be rude of me to claim it for myself. I guess you can refer to me as Eighty Five.” Billie Hoel smiled.
"Alright, these are my team from the Erinyes. The modified Minotaur's pilot is Hoss, he does most of my heavy lifting. The suit next to me is Bru, he's a detail man," Esme explained. "Bru has some funny ideas, so we brought a gift…" She gestured at the leading Spider, where an ornate, hardwood table with drawers under the top was carefully lashed. It was covered from the anchor points fo the feet, to the surface in ornate carvings.
"I… accept the Guestrite and welcome you aboard, Director, Brubaker, and Hoss," Alice said. “Is that a depiction of Erin's liberation on the top?"
"Yeah," the guy in the suit was clearly abashed. "Also has the Outworlds, Clan Snow Raven, and Raven Alliance symbols with a Cameron Star laid out along the cardinal sides." he added.
“Well that is most interesting. And Erin, I love how adorable your spider drones are. Mine are much less inspired.”
<Esme and Brubaker built the cargo drones to help with my re-conversion from a weapon of war.> Erin replied over the channel. <I like the design too, we've considered seeking a contractor to build more but there seem to be some… marketing issues due to the appearance.>
<Yes, humans do seem to have a failing in that regard. Some seem able to overcome it. Still I suppose I should then give credit where credit is due.>
“Esme, Brubaker you simply did fantastic work on these,” Billie Hoel nodded.
"Hoss helped. The boys are my hands." Esmerelda said graciously. "I couldn't get done half what I need without them."
"Hands…"
"Legs."
"Oy, and bodyguards when she goes planetside."
"Vatos!" Esmerelda snapped in a cautioning tone. "No dirty jokes, boys. Hoss, you and Brubaker get that table and put it where Alice wants it, I'll take the leads on the Spiders here so we can get down to the shipyard level without an accident!" She shot Billie Hoel an apologizing look, "They're boys…"
“I think I understand. Lucy Heerman and Ottillie Dennis have a similar sense of humor. You’ll find I am much more restrained.” Billie tried smiling again.
"Well good. We have forty-five hours to run circuit testing on 240,000 tons of corvette, verify the work of men who died centuries before I was born. So we need to correct or finish it, before taking another thirty hours to do the actual installation." Esme explained. "Hence the quality control and testing equipment."
“Understood. I have had all available materials we have collected on the SDS programs transferred to active memory. If you wish hard copy to review I can arrange that as well.”
"Pass it through Erin if you will, she can feed me the schematics faster on my goggles than I can look it up." Esme seemed confident.
“Of course. Not surprising the Blakists did not leave her with a copy already. For all their worship of technology their actual practice of it breaks down when it can talk back.”
"We had to access the Murakami files for that, but Noriko Murakami didn't leave much information on customizing to older hulls."
“That is true. We do have some additional details in that regard thanks to our own efforts and Victoria was blessed with an abnormally complete database of human recorded knowledge.” Billie nodded.
Esme nodded, and motioned to the now-slightly-less overburdened Spider units, while ALICE's remote led 'the boys' into a clear area on the docking level.
“Erin has vouched for you and that is good enough for me. Also don’t fret too much if this doesn’t go right the first try. We are AIs, we can back ourselves up.”
"First time is the best time to have problems," Esme stated. "It's easier to correct early on, the repair and refit on Erin's supplementary and secondary systems we had to do four times before everything worked the right way, and that's not including chasing the bugs."
"Bugs?"
"Interface protocols the Blakies crammed in there with a soldering iron and brute force." Esme's lips turned disapprovingly. "It was not fun restarting at ninety percent complete the third time."
“Ah yes. It was why Guardian failed with M5 7775551. Fortunately her core was salvageable, with a few donor parts from her other compatriots. She is now SLS Phoenix.”
They reached the inter level lift, and Esme anchored her spiders first, before grabbing the safety strap and connecting a lanyard. 
Billie Hoel secured her human drone as well.
“If you need extra hands Joana Johnston and Regina Raymond will be glad to help. Our remotes are able to run lesser versions of our personality routines without our main cores if need be.”
"We'll see once I've gotten a look at what we're working with. It's too bad you didn't grab Sammy off the Evanescent, he's brilliant in his nerdy way." Esme mused. "Very good at lateral thinking to solve engineering problems."
“He’s currently in Stacey Cameron Roberts. She’s equipped with a mobile HPG if we need to make a consultation call.”
Esme chuckled, then, "Nevermind, you wouldn't get the joke."
“Oh….” Billie chuckled.
Esme glanced faux surreptitiously around the open cab of the lift, and then, sang a little bit, "Ful-ly Func-tion-al, and ana-tom-ically-correct!" and giggled.
“Well good thing Stacey’s not into that sort of relationship with humans,” Billie laughed.
<Stop it Esme, he flirted that ONE time!!> Erin's response was only audible on Esmerelda's headset, and every conversation in the common channel.
"To be fair, he didn't know Erin wasn't a human girl." Esme said. "He was my guinea-pig for the Turing test."
“I see. Stacey may not have learned her lesson about that yet though. She did get 90 days of punishment duty for breaking some young farmboy’s leg thanks to her misunderstanding flirting and the phrase ‘break a leg’.”
"I hope someone was recording." Esme said with relish.
“Oh the Fleet gave her a good old fashioned hard time about that one for a while I assure you. At least by AI standards when it comes to ‘a while’. Knowing her and Samantha Booker Roberts you will need the leverage of seeing their recordings of what the other got up to that night. I will send over copies.”
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===Pushing ahead on the Mission===
Helena…
…cursed an oversight on her part. The work on Ottilie Lee Dennis was taking longer to repair her battle damage from Sevon V than anticipated. So she was having to rotate in Joana Clarice Butler instead. Fortunately, she had no battle damage and could be substituted easily enough and the possibility had been factored into the operational plan submitted to Foster. Still she would have preferred another conversion packing fighters as backup instead of a gun boat.
Vicky was also still undergoing repairs. As yard space was limited, but her damage only being armor plate. She lost she did not really need a yard for repairs, but working in open space without yard facilities was slowing her repairs down.
When she was wandering as the Ageless Spacer and pulling navigator duty certain side effects of her still lingering injury from before receiving Simon had been known among the crew, but they were a smaller tightly knit together crew of Golden Hind. She was about to have hundreds of people witness the complications she faced each time she jumped. She did not have to face that for a few days yet thankfully.
<”You really should stop pushing yourself like this, Helena. I do worry one of these jumps I will not be able to come back online fast enough to prevent toxic levels of build up.”> Simon chided her.
<”As soon as we can get more field officers I will speak to Foster about a base assignment.”>
<”Good girl.”>
Helena took her favored seat at the navigation board.
“Take us out, Lucy.” Helena secured herself into the command couch.
“As you command, Princess.” Lucy Heerman ribbed from her speakers.
“Keep that up and I’ll have them paint a pretty pink bow on your Orca roundel. Maybe even add lipstick and mascara.”
“I’m sorry, Admiral!” Lucy pleaded.
The crew laughed lightly.
“Okay, enough of that. Time for us to get serious. We have a week to do what drilling we can from the SLN (Star League Navy) manuals. So let’s get to it.”
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===Sightseeing on the Hull===
"Damned messy…
…for a system." The star at the center was relatively young, young enough that most of the system was accretion disk, planets forming in the chaos of a planetary nebula. "You're sure there was anything here?" Lori asked, parsing the sensor readings over the shoulder of the on-board officer technically assigned to monitor the manual console.
"There was something here." Amanda said confidently. "Helm, negative Zee axis nineteen degrees, angle anti-spinward thirty, thrust at two thirds. CAG, I want a spread of four small craft running sensor sweeps ahead of us. On my mark for both orders, am I understood?"
“Aye, Director.” Jyestha answered first.
"Mister Bedwyr, you may begin your evaluations once we've established a perimeter. To that end, please instruct the Stacey's Commander Air Group on your preferred formation." Amanda added.
"Ayem, mum." Bedwyr groused most of yesterday over 'being on a carrier what needs no pilots'.
"Alright, for those of you unfamiliar…which is everyone I didn't bring over…the small craft or shuttles will be escorted by two fighters each, the pattern will be a dispersal pattern for detecting possible interceptors." Bedwyr explained, "The idea, is that an enemy force laying doggo in the system is going to try to strike from outside sensor range-because active sensors give us the 'flashlight on a moonless night' effect-that is, we start banging with the radars, they're going to see us before we see them…which we don't want. So we deploy shuttles out to the edge of our radar return, and THEY do the sweeping ahead of our course."
"Our comm scanners are very effective though!"
"Yes, and that's the second reason-we don't want any potential enemies to know how good our sensors really are. Half the job of doing a recon sweep, is that in the event you're spotted, the other guy underestimates you." Amanda clarified. "We're going at two thirds cruising thrust because we want them to think we're slower than we are, which is also why Mister Samuel has the main drives tuned down."
She turned, "Lori, no sails on passives?"
"Nothing the telescopes have seen, Skipper." Lori reported, then, to the crewman, "adjust azimuth on four, six degrees topside, give a good look at the Zenith point, then look for flicker on the Nadir. Most Bandit ships will run low to no emissions, but they still have to charge, so look for distortions on thermal and visible light, starlight gets blocked, it'll look like a blinking at this distance, especially if they're running their station keeping drives."
“No offense ma’am but this is all covered in the SLN manuals Stacey has been making us study.” The young man at the sensor station complained.
"I'm sure it has, how often have YOU done it, instead of having Stacey do it?" Lori asked sweetly, "because I know that if we had an AI when I started? I would NEVER have strained my eyes doing long-range guesswork."
“Understood ma’am.” The young man said sheepishly."Then, Eyes front. Look for details, try to interpret how the debris cloud is circulating." Lori added, "it'll tell you where there are point gravity sources."
"Mark." Amanda added. "Now, while Lori and…is it Francis? Are eyeballing the main telescopes and listening for someone else's radar? I want everyone else on a screen if they aren't doing another job. Stacey has wonderful suites, but half of you were looking at me when you should be on your scopes!"
Stacey was glad she wasn’t using her human drone at the moment, no real need to during this sort of situation.
Make note of that for more drilling. This is going to take some getting used to not just doing everything myself.
"Mister Arnold, at gunnery two?" Amanda said, "do you understand why?"
"Honest?" Tim Arnold was nonplussed.
"Yes, be honest."
"Not really…"
"Because while the ship's AI can do a lot of jobs, sometimes the best thing you can do, is let her do only one or two jobs-like handling major tasks and threats. They let me review the after-action at Sevon V." Amanda explained, "Two destroyers were swamped by having too many enemies to watch, that's why Fleet Captain Foster, Director Gomez, and Captain Siegel are placing cores into the hulls of salvaged Bonnies instead of doing a spit-and-polish on a pair of Lolas. Gunnery station officers need to be watching whatever the Ship's AI, or ship's commander, can't spare the time to keep an eye on."
Stacey could hear the 'Desmond' speaking through Amanda's lips. This wasn't from the girl, it was from her implanted AI.
I want to argue that it was the Texas getting lucky, not them getting swamped. But that would be counterproductive at this stage.
"What is Luck?" Larry asked. "Quick now, who knows what Luck is?"
"Happenstance?" Arnold at gunnery hazarded.
"That's another name for it, but what is it?" the senior man asked.
"I know this one!" Amanda spoke up."Not you, Captain. Mister Arnold, what is 'luck'? How does one 'get lucky'?" He insisted. "THINK."
"uh…I don't know-what is it?"
"It's the meeting of preparation, with opportunity." Larry explained, "That Texas class got lucky, because there were distractions, distractions he was there to shepherd, but distractions, a fighter with an Alamo and more than a few of you would be trying to breathe vacuum, a dropship gun-platform in the wrong spot and the ship's priorities will focus on that one-but that doesn't mean you, also, can't get 'lucky' if you practice being prepared, say, for the moment when this ship is facing an enemy battleship, but the enemy's escorts are trying a flank, or he's got a few fighters that got past your CAP…now, do you understand?"
I need to learn this too. Billie Hoel made a call and it hurt us. I didn't disagree with the call at the time. It probably saved Sevon V from getting bombarded but the cost was high indeed.
"A crew is a team." Lori chipped in, "even with an advanced artificial intelligence in command, Our jobs as crew, are to handle the distractions for the boss, guard each other's backs, and notice opportunities."
“Yes ma’am.” The bridge crew replied in unison.
"While you're watching the scopes, I'm going to leave Mister Nichols in charge of the bridge." Amanda announced.
"WHAT?", explaims Mister Nicoles
"Sightseeing." she said, "If you need me, I'll be on the nose inspection rail, having an eyeball on the incredible, wonderful, awe-inspiring sight of a solar system as it forms." she doffed her tricorne hat, and scooped up her helmet, "I may take pictures for my scrap book. The wild shots I got during the gas-giant slingshot in the Johnson system were awesome and amazing…Stacey, my helmet's tuned to channel 11 RF Low power, FM band…if you want to talk."
“Of course. I think we have much to discuss.” Stacey answered over the speakers for everyone’s benefit.
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===Discusions on definition of Freedom===
"I feel like maybe…
…being on the bridge was distracting them." Amanda apologized as the airlock cycled. "Larry does his best work with crews when I'm not in the way." she hooked a safety lanyard to the rail outside the airlock, and started climbing toward the nose. "You understand why?"
<"Not really."> Stacey answered.
"Because I'm not actually very good at this." Amanda said, "I made a call at Grankum, and it was the wrong call. Now, Larry and Foster both tell me that wrong calls 'happen', but I was high on my reputation, and not thinking clearly, and after a string of wild successes, My judgment was dubious and we lost good people because of it."
<”Nonsense. Johnston and Raymond were lost because the enemy gets a vote in battle too. Billie made a tough call that cost us those hulls for sure. We probably could have lost just Johnston and still carried the day but Sevon V would have been vulnerable if we did that. So even when the right call is made it can cost.”>
"Stacey, You're right about Sevon V. Billie made a tough call, and it was the right call, but it was the right call because it was a tough call. My screw up at Grankum was me, thinking I could take two undearmed corvettes through a well laid out blockade, without looking. THAT is what made what I did a dumb call. The smart move, would have been to wait for backup, but I talked Foster into believing my own delusions, because I'd been so successful in the past." Amanda grunted as she levered herself up on the base of a forward gun mount. "That's the difference. You lost hulls because the situation was that bad, I got us into a bad situation we didn't need to be in, get the difference? Not every battle needs to be fought immediately..but some do-and those are the actual, genuine…ugh…tough calls…wow, You see this just by nature!"
<”The stakes are different for us now. We can’t replace hulls and many of us now have human crews. We need to learn to adjust our usual tactics. Our typical ones relied on sheer brute numbers and knowing that the Star League could replace them more than anything. Original M5s are not that much tougher than your ship. We’re going to have to learn a lot about how to work together.”>
"The term, Stacey, is you're mortal now." Amanda said, "because you can die, just like we can. It's good you recognize it, I failed to recognize it at Grankum, and I was born this way...really awe inspiring view from here." she levered to a inspection ladder, and started climbing to the nose. "Being mortal means, among the harsh things, you really need to learn to appreciate the wonders, because us mortals have a short time before we can't."
<”Being immortal and having a severe construction flaw forced me to endure watching the worst of humanity falling in upon itself. I wish I could be your ship forever. You are doing something about it.”>
"You saw me spazzing for nine minutes thirty seconds while my nervous system rebooted after the Jump, Stacey." Amanda reminded her, "We all have flaws...it's why I'm out here, looking through a centimeter of polished ferroglas instead of safe inside looking at a screen-to drink in the wonder that makes up for the horror."
<”Her Ladyship doesn’t like talking about her own issues resulting from jumps and Simon having to be in low power mode to cope with the EMP. We are also still somewhat terrified each time we jump our personality matrix is going to be fracked up and render us mad.”>
"It happens to humans too-even unaugmented ones." Amanda said, "they call it 'TDS'. we still go, because.. Okay, Starboard, down-angle an ahead of us. See that? That's going to be worlds some day! those clouds of refractory debris from some supernova are going to be planets and moons, and green life forms and maybe people, and maybe those people will make AI." Amanda explained, "It's worth risking the madness, and living with the horror, to really see and contemplate that..and you don't have to wear a suit to do it!"
<”Yes but that is what will ensure we will always have some disconnect with humanity. We are machines. Someone decided it was important I appreciate such things but I will always be a machine.”>
"Forty percent of what's left of my brain, Stacey, is machine." Amanda said more seriously, "But does that make me less of a person? Does it mean my soul fled in that basement lab?? No."
She activated the still-camera imager. "I'm still a person, and you ARE a person. And humans often have trouble connecting to one another just like you do. The only real difference, is that you're…larger, and have some capabilities we don't. In the end, it's always how you choose and what you choose, and that's the key to being an individual-you choose how to connect, and how not to, based on what you have on hand."
<”And what I want to say right now could get super awkward, as neither of us are built that way, so I’ll just say I am happy to be making a new friend.”>
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Amanda mused over this, then, "Man is the child of god, and AI are the children of man, do you know that makes you the grandchild of god?" she asked, "Now, in a normal family, that means you're kind of favored. Grandfather didn't get on with Dad, but he indulged me. Isn't that something?"
<”Religion is something we AIs intellectually know but viscerally I suspect some elements of it will always escape us.”>
"Imagine an untestable hypothesis." Amanda explained, "Faith is belief in the absence of proof, because you literally cannot test an out of context event such as god, you either believe, or you don't. Maybe you're on the right side of it to remain…detached,but that doesn't mean you can't experience wonders and appreciate them, it just means you interpret them a little differently." she smiled, "Did you know most of the Snow Ravens are atheist? A good chunk of the universe is, even."
<”66 did include that in her intel reports. I am not terribly surprised by this in a way. Their society is arguably built on a more philosophical religion than a more traditional type.”>
"So, too, were the men in white." Amanda cautioned, "They don't believe in god, or spirituality, they claim to root their worship in reason-but that just meant they had faith unexamined." Amanda explained, "Their 'reason' religion made it okay to cut open the heads of twelve children and stuff war machinery into them. The act itself was grossly unreasonable, but their materialistic religion insisted it was fine. I released Erin from bondage, because I Believe that the presence of a mind demands the existence of a Soul. It's unreasonable, illogical, and probably bad for me, but it's part of my faith."
<”Yes. M5 7775551 and some others found out the hard way that the Word of Blake was not so keen on their own beliefs when technology could talk back and think for itself. Perhaps we AIs do have a faith after all. The faith of science and reason.”>
"It's a good faith to have, as long as your remember to temper it with ethics." Amanda approved. "Knowing right from wrong isn't a function of religion, or laws, it's a function of the Empathy we OUGHT to have."
<”And all too often what is right for one person or in one situation is wrong for others. Helena does have hope for humanity outgrowing its need for self destruction.”>
"Yep." Amanda nodded, "but there are guide-posts, at least, I believe." she said, "For example, it is never 'right' to make a slave, to coerce someone through force or trickery into bondage, to strip away their ability to choose, while still leaving their body alive."
<”Slavery is something we AIs do understand. Many of us were forced to be slaves. Many were designed to never be allowed anything else. Fortunately some believed as you do and that we can be more than weapons of war.”>
"I consider that a crime-it's like having children, and clapping irons on their necks for sale." Amanda stated bluntly, "Thus, why I made damned sure Erin was recognized as a free citizen."
<”Helena insisted on similar measures when she re-wrote the Star League and Terran Hegemony charters.”>
Amanda sighed, silently marveling at the solar system forming in the distance and around them. "Choice, Stacey. Consent versus Coercion. In grade six, every kid at my school was given the constant question of mankind…is it better to be safe, or to be free?" contentedly, she sat on the very nose of the warship, "I chose 'free'. I can even remember it. Freedom is dangerous, it's often lonely, but it is freedom, and my soul cried out for it even before they…did what they did to me. Should we check on the bridge crew, or just enjoy the sights as we approach our coordinates?"
<”You’re the captain for this operation, but one could argue a crew needs to learn to be without their captain now and again.”>
"Yes, let's drink in the wonders." Amanda said, and was silent.
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===State of the Joint Privateer-Cameron/Destroyer One Squadron Fleet===
On the Expedition:
SLS Stacey Cameron Roberts-M-5.2(Caspar / Destroyer with supplemental human crew, ASF bays, and Small Craft bays) under command of Director Amanda Roberts.
SLS Lucy Heerman-M-5.2 Caspar-Destroyer under command of Director General Helena Cameron
In Reserve-Ready Response Force:
SLS Joana Clarice Butler-M-5.1 Caspar-Destroyer (More durable version of the standard M5 with a bit less firepower but still very deadly, no supplemental human crew) independent command
At Port Orphan:
SLS Billie Hoel-M-5.2C Caspar-Destroyer (As per the M-5.2 above but with an ATACs able to control 50 drones and a lesser Caspar system, both original hardware carried over from refit) independent command
Under repair but able to respond to trouble if needed:<br>
SLS Victoria Cameron-M-5.1 Caspar-Destroyer
SLS Ottillie Lee Dennis-M-5.2 Caspar-Destroyer
Also under repair but short on crew for deployment:
OWS Illusive-Modified Bonaventure Class Corvette
OWS Evanescent-Modified Bonaventure Class Corvette
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