Blood Impulse

Part 38.1 - CARNAGE

Cardioid Sector, HR-14 System, Battleship Singularity

The voice of the Singularity's automated protocols was a steady, mid-range female. Most ships had female voices, as most maritime traditions considered the ships themselves to be female, but the voices always varied, selected by the shipyards that integrated the command and control systems. For that reason, the Singularity's decidedly lacked a distinct accent. Save the slight drawl common to the agricultural workers, the mid-continental region of Ariea, where the ship had been built, had no notable accent. Their intonations and pronunciations matched that of most of the central worlds.

Despite that, the voice of the automated protocols was familiar to all of the crew. A database of pre-recorded sounds, it spoke with odd breaks and pacing, but was always understandable. Any crew member that had been with the ship a few years could recognize that voice like they could their crewmates'. It was the voice that gave announcements during the scheduled tests of the ship's automated protocols. And though it was hardly ever used for such purposes, it was also the voice that answered vocal inputs made to the central computer.

Keifer Robinson knew that voice. Over the years, as she recognized it, she had come to trust it. Perhaps that was why, as she watched the ship's communications arrays once again redirect themselves, she did not panic when the broadcast began. "Allied craft, be advised. High-energy debris warning is in effect southeast of Base position. Repeat: high-energy debris warning is in effect southeast of Base position." The warning went out on their standard communications channel with the default encryption, exactly as the automated protocols were meant to transmit. The warning also played across the bridge, and Keifer could tell by the settings of the console in front of her that the speakers were also set to play the audio of incoming transmissions.

True enough, a response to the automated warning came from the leader of the ship's pilots, Captain 'Fireball' Adams. "What the hell are you guys doing over there, making high-energy debris? That wasn't part of the damn plan!" That was beyond dangerous to small support craft like her Arcbird and the slightly larger Warhawks carrying the Marine strike teams.

Standing beside the flat top of the radar console Admiral Gives masked an annoyance beneath his calm. He had no issue handing command of the mission to the ghost, but he did not enjoy dealing with the unknown. And Hydrian involvement in this situation, very much was an unknown. He had never engaged the Hydra, nor did he have any idea how Hydrian code had come to be involved with Crimson Heart. And at present, with the automated protocols running the ship, it was all he could do to stand there and look calm. "Remind me to have a conversation with Captain Adams about radio formality," he told the yeoman beside him. If Adams were to address the ship properly, the automated protocols would be able to issue a response with a status update.

Still, it hardly mattered. As long as their support craft hugged the Singularity's flank, they'd be safe – relatively at least. The mission plan had always been to escort them. With the Warhawks packed full of Marines, they'd never been intended to engage. The Singularity had been tasked with taking out the pirate fleet, and ordinarily, that shouldn't have been an issue, but the worlds had a vicious way of treating overconfidence.

Watching over the ship's automated protocols, Lieutenant Foster could not help the gasp that left her lips when she saw them start to shift. Was this the moment the virus finally started to take control?

No, she realized, watching the code grow in complexity and attack that around it. These changes weren't damaging the protocols, they were rebuilding them, but not to the code they had once been. It was altering and improving them, protecting them as the virus ran its own parallel processes. A counter-attack. "Sir," she called to the Admiral, "the automated control network... It's fighting back." Before her eyes, the automated control network was adapting, building cyberwarfare programs. "I've never seen anything like it."