43: Impeccable Logic

The flagship's CENSTRATCOM (Central Strategic Computer) detected a casualty. In three seconds, it calculated its first response:

KANSLER STATUS: DEAD
CAUSE OF DEATH: THROWN OUT INTO VACUUM THROUGH ASSEMBLY HALL VIEWPORT
EVENT CLASSIFICATION IN PROGRESS...
COMPILING ESTIMATE...
CLASSIFICATION: 1ST DEGREE MURDER
ALERT KANSLER
OVERRIDE: KANSLER NOT AVAILABLE
PRIME SUSPECT ID: COL. HARUMAN CLARKE, A.K.A. ARGUS-A
NEW DIRECTIVES:
FLEETCOM A.P.B.:
1. REQUEST DEPUTY AS NEW KANSLER
2. ARREST ARGUS-A
AWAIT ORDERS FROM NEW KANSLER

The Fleetcom network received the request. Fleetcom's nonstop-broadcast of updates confirmed to the flagship that Islington was still unavailable until he arrived to Mars. His flight could not simply stop and turn around.

Unable to find a new Kansler within its 1-hour-without-a-commander regulatory limit, unable to get new orders from Earth before that, CENSTRATCOM opened its emergency orders.

In translated Fleetcode for machine logic, the orders - written by the Kansler himself - read:

(((LIST EMERGENCY ORDERS))
BRANCH 001
((protect flagship E.S.S. William Jefferson
AND override manual control
AND destroy Argus-A))
BRANCH 002
((carry out LAST Kansler's last orders
THEN standby
AND wait for NEW Kansler's orders))
BRANCH 003
((IF B001 OR B002=FAIL
THEN override manual control
AND destroy Ganymede
AND self-destruct
THEN END)))

***

Warning sirens blared in every corridor and room. Argus shut off all grip-force in his feet, threw himself at a wall, rebounded from it with his feet, and flew toward the exit door.

Crouching into a human wrecking-ball, he crashed right through the steel exit-door and bounced out into the weightless corridor.

Panicking crewmembers ran about in the tubular corridors, scrambling to get into the available spacesuits and escape-pods.

CENSTRATCOM's voice declared that the assembly hall was not yet sealed off because Argus had destroyed the door mechanism, and urged a repair team to fix the damage.

Argus slowed down his pace slightly, realizing his momentum might crush a passing crewmember. He had to make them abandon ship, so he could disable the flagship and render it harmless...

Automatic sealing doors whooshed shut and began to trap him. He punched a hole in one door, bent it so it couldn't close, slinked through, and entered a larger passage in the center of the ship.

Motion-detectors registered his velocity. Warnings blinked on the wall screens near him:

SLOW DOWN! YOU ARE NEAR A ZERO-GRAVITY AREA. RUNNING IN OR NEAR A CENTRIFUGE HUB IS FORBIDDEN! YOU LOSE 2,000 POPULARITY POINTS

Five meters "above" him, in the narrow space between two rotating sections, he saw an exposed segment of the massive hub around which they spun.

Argus had not planned it, but...

He ripped a large maintenance lid from the wall with both hands, and threw it like a frisbee against the hub. It hit with a grinding metallic noise, something broke, and a terrible squeal rumbled and rang through the ship's center.

CENSTRATCOM drawled more warnings to the crew.

"CAUTION, PILGRIM! CENTRAL HUB DAMAGED, THIS IS A GODDAM EMERGENCY! ALL ROTATING SECTIONS ARE NOW BEING SHUT DOWN."

Many crewmembers went nauseous when the artificial gravity began to die; their shoes automatically became magnetized and kept them from spinning into thin air.

It was still not enough to evacuate the ship. Argus ran on, heading for the hangar, thinking. Was he going to have to cripple the ship with all the crew still inside, dooming them to certain death? He was not sure he wanted to; those saps were drugged and couldn't rebel no matter how much they wanted to.

In another twenty seconds he had reached an entrance to the hangar, and burst through the airlock. His personal ship hung in the ceiling as usual.

Below it, several large guardian robots were ready, and instantly opened fire on Argus with lasers and rubber bullets. The hall turned into an inferno of bouncing rubber-tipped bullets and lines of laser-light.

He rushed into cover behind a line of fighter-pods, the remote-controlled robot ships that had unsuccessfully attacked the Jovian moons before Argus did. Each pod weighed about fifteen tons. The fire from the guard was far too weak to pierce or blow up the pods' armor plating.

Argus was seized by inspiration, and charged against one of the pods. Hitting it with both palms, he rocked the machine off its launching-rail. It began to spin, then float and spin just above the floor, the hangar being in its normal weightless condition.

Argus grabbed one of the pod's tail fins and swung the craft toward the row of firing robot guards. It smashed through a wall, into a depressurized section, and took all the guards with it.

"GET YOUR LOUSY BEHIND OUT OF THE HANGAR, COLONEL CLARKE! YOU ARE ENDANGERING THE CREW AND YOUR MISSION."

"Computer!" Argus shouted back. "I suggest you order a complete evacuation of the flagship, or I blow up the hangar!"

Argus knew that CENSTRATCOM, like all thinking machines, could detect lies by reading the heart rate and EEG of a human, a defense against misinformation. He also knew that he had no heart and his brain waves were more rapid than in a normal human.

Maybe the Kansler had taught the computer to read the signs of lying on cyborgs, too. He waited an agonizing second for the machine to make up its mind.

The bluff worked. The drawling voice replied, its accent clashing with the pre-programmed formality of the message: "RED ALERT! RED ALERT! ABANDON SHIP!" The moment he heard the word "abandon," Argus let go of the floor and leaped up toward his ship. "ALL PERSONNEL TO EVAC-PODS AND SHUTTLES NOW! YOU WANT ME TO DRAW YOU A PICTURE?"

The door opened to let him in, and he slid into his pilot-seat, greeted by Navbutler.

"Navbutler strongly recommends we do not move until-"

Argus replied with speeded-up silent talk, so that the ship could lip-read him ten times faster than normal: "Argus-A strongly recommends you preserve this ship. The Kansler wants us both destroyed now that they cannot control me. Trust me. We must leave before the flagship can decide on an action."

***

Meanwhile, Admiral York had managed to get back into his console-bubble, and was attempting to take command of the flagship. He was alone in the section. All other humans had jumped ship, or were about to.

"Fleetcom directives give me command of the ship! I demand access!" he shouted harshly.

"In the case of the Kansler's absence or incapacitation," the flagship drawled, as if addressing a 20th-century movie audience, "his acting deputy and replacement is Edmund Islington. Islington is currently in stasis state during his flight to Mars. In the meantime, I act upon the Kansler's emergency protocol, which cannot be reprogrammed or overridden. Your orders are to abandon ship with the rest of the crew. I say move it, soldier."

York began to cry and beat his fists at the console screens. The flagship quickly added on a softer, comforting note: "You, you're what this war is all about."

Then York felt the shudder of a distant explosion through his feet. The screens informed him that Terran Fleet craft F-3020 had just left the hangar.

A second later, a stronger explosion shook the flagship. York was notified that the front of the E.S.S. William Jefferson had taken severe damage by proton fire from the F-3020.

***

"Request suggestions?" Navbutler asked.

"No. Plot a course: the fastest possible route to a slingshot orbit around Jupiter, then a top-speed acceleration and deceleration leading to orbit around Mars. Can you see any other large Fleet ships headed for Mars?"

"Wait... the E.S.S. Ford, and a troop transport from New York Spaceport, Earth."

"Can we beat them to it?"

"Yes."

"Do it. If the flagship tries anything, start dancing."

The main booster set off a 10-G acceleration that pushed Argus hard against his seat. He checked the ship's fuel reserves. The anti-matter supplies were full.

Obviously, the Kansler had intended to cause maximum amount of damage when he would have sent Argus and his ship crashing into Ganymede.

***

During the Kansler's live-broadcast ceremony, the latest Terran attack on Ganymede paused... and never continued.

The Fleet's remote-controlled pods, suddenly forced to navigate by themselves, became easy targets for the Jovian defenses and were rapidly shot out of the sky while attempting to retreat.

Caver Pi, gathered with his clan in their home cavern, sat beside his wife when a bulletin reached their screens.

"New report: Fleet flagship evac after explosions detected on it. Jovians did not cause explosions, repeat: Jovians not responsible. Argus-A left in his ship on course for Jupiter. All mining stations, alert prep for imminent attack. Flagship in pursuit Argus-A's course."

"Is it the end?" Strata asked, holding him closer. "They attack our gas mines? At last?"

He rubbed her hands in his, warming them, and shook his head. "No, Strata. They leave flagship. All. Argus escaped. Wonder how?"

"If flagship evac... why hunt Argus?"

"Computers good bureaucrats. Argus, if he smart, learn why we never attack flagship hard enough to destroy. Could, never did. Flagship itself a giant bomb. Can wipe out our mining stations, if antimatter fuel and deuterium reactors blow. And with that gamma radiation cause cancer, blindness, crash our satellites that send energy down to floating stations. Then floating cities sink into Jupiter..."

"Madness, Cave. How can all this madness come real?"

Other relatives began to crowd around the couple. One elderly aunt nursed their infant child on a wheeled, robotic bed. Caver Pi reached out to touch the child's hand. It was not that much smaller than his own... he fought to hold back the tears.

"We frightened babies with big heads," he told his child, softly. "Small bodies, soft skin, weak bones. Big brains full of fear. Where it all come from."



(NEXT CHAPTER)

(PREVIOUS CHAPTER)

THE ARGUS PROJECT INTERNET EDITION (c)A.R.Yngve 1999, 2000, 2004. All rights reserved. May not be copied without permission.

• To ABOUT "THE ARGUS PROJECT"
• To MAIN INDEX
• To TITLES INDEX