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Edited by Arveliot: 2/16/2017 7:01:30 AM
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Ratterson's Recollection (part 2)

"What do you do for a living, Doctor Ratterson?" She asked, all trace of humour gone. "You're lucky I factor in your snark as a variable, Theo." Belisarius sent. Another surprise. "You sent her here?" I asked, out loud. "Who else are you talking to?" She asked again. "The Sergeant is competent, reasonably intelligent." Belisarius sent. "Additionally, she's the closest thing to a veteran soldier your civilization has. I had her deliver the package because she was guaranteed to get suspicious. Tell her enough truth to get her to trust you. Reveal nothing about MIDNIGHT EXIGENT." "Okay." I said aloud. I fixed my sight on her eyes, and tried my best to ignore the gun she was pointing at me. "I'm Theo Ratterson. I work in theoretical and applied neural network development." "That's a soft and fluffy euphemism for 'I make warminds', isn't it?" The Sergeant asked. I nodded, impressed, but not surprised. Belisarius said she was quick. "I'm here as chief developer for a new Warmind. Part of that job is getting feeds about what the Warminds are saying." I explained. Not entirely true, but not entirely a lie. Unless the war department wants me helping with a war game, the Warminds themselves keep me isolated from their communications. If one of them chooses to talk to me, that's considered the perogative of the highest authority on warfare in existence. Of course, Belisarius isn't connected to the hierarchies, so it isn't allowed to share what it knows. Not that sharing that little gem would help my case. "Charlemagne just declared ISOLATE THERMOPOLYAE. It's....." I began to explain, but the sergeant cut me off. "Pick battlefields to prefer choke points to multiply war asset effectiveness against a numerically superior force." She told her companion. "Means the Warminds are preparing for an invasion." "Aliens?" Her companion asked. "Possible." I lied. The Warminds would not have declared our situation hopeless over some alien armada. Not to a Civilization that could chuck micro-singularities through starships or mass produce AI controlled warships through SIVA. I had overseen some of the simulations the Warminds had run to test our ability to best an invading force. In one of the tamer simulations where we pitted one Warmind against another, Charlemagne stripped all of Demos into half-tonne chunks and fired each chunk at relativistic speeds at an alien armada. After coating each chunk in radar soaking stealth material. We couldn't simulate a fleet large enough to overwhelm that particular move. "Look, you'll probably get orders in the next few minutes. There's a lot of the Jovians between us and Ganymede, but the Warminds don't know how to dither. I just didn't want to be caught with my pants down." I said. Sergeant Kyrea finally holstered her weapon. "Well, it was bound to happen eventually. Not everything out there is going to treat us like the Traveller has." She nodded to her companion, and added "Private Ratterson, welcome to the Marines." "I don't remember enlisting." I mentioned. To Belisarius, I sent "was this part of your plan?" "I am a Warmind." Belisarius replied. "What use would I be I couldn't predict the course of this conversation?" "I'm glad to see your short-term memory isn't impaired." Kyrea said aloud. "Well, private, I'd hate to waste the glimmer you put into your suit, so I'll allow the departure from your regular uniform. You're now a specialist in the first platoon, Delta Company, Fourth Fleet Marines. Your official rank is Private-recruit, reflecting your field enlistment. Your salary is a pittance compared to what you probably earned before, although the healthcare benefits are top class. Get suited up." "Are you going to submit an order to have me transferred to Mars?" I sent to Belisarius. "Not yet." It replied. "We need to integrate you into the marines a little. Also, Warmind comms just went out. No, strike that, they're being jammed." "Jammed?" I asked aloud. "Update me, private." "Something's jamming the Warmind intercom relays. Which, unless you're a Warmind, should be impossible." I said, carefully. "Our enemy's made contact?" Sergeant Kyrea asked. "No. Okay, I need to explain myself better." I said. "Jamming a packet based digital network propagated by entangled quarks requires access to that network. Which requires that you be given a key created by the quarks that made up a single helium atom. The Warminds can communicate with each other in real time across the entire universe, even while every star in the whole of the universe was blowing up in between." "Okay, what?" The other soldier asked. "The egg head is saying that a Warmind is jamming the network. Is it your new Warmind doing that?" Kyrea asked. "No." I said. To Belisarius, I sent "Which Warmind?" "Flooded with junk data." Belisarius said. "No ID protocols. The network designers didn't anticipate a Warmind compromising the network. Running simulation." To make my day worse, sirens stared to blare. "Ratterson, get that damned suit on! Hendricks, head to the CIC and get a handle on our larger situation. I'll be along with our new recruit." I didn't argue, and didn't bother to fuss over my modesty, as I stripped down and assembled myself into the gear. While I dressed, I began interfacing with the computer system built into my gear, and installing the extra software I had purchased. As soon as the helmet clicked into place, and the HUD turned on, I looked back at the Sergeant, who held a small device up towards me, and pointed. Below, I found a new news scrawl, and extra permissions with my new status as a private in the Planetary Defence force. Ironically, all of these permissions were immediately supplanted by my status as lead developer for Belisarius. "Let's go, Private." Sergeant Kyrea said, leading me down the hall. As we ran, I sent information requests fobbing Belisarius' authorizations, and began snooping through the packets in the local network. One of them caught my eye. AI/COM/NPLN: OBESCIENCE, VIKING PYRE. Initiate, announce initiation on wide channels. All local asset compliance. I still wish I was better at swearing. "It's Napoleon. It's jamming the comms. OBESCIENCE, VIKING PYRE had better not be what I think it is." I sent to Belisarus. Immediately, it replied "Sacrifice war assets to prove loyalty." Our last light cast into the void, and nothing but darkness after.

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