A Pilot's Diary - The darkness beyond the stars.

[LoneTiger]

Location: Liberty Space, New York system, Planet Manhattan.
10 days later.

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After returning to liberty and the shuttle took me to Manhattan to a secluded warehouse and cargo area my new papers were given to me, as far as the world knew Steve Dexter was gone and dead, the new file and id had no name on it only a call sign... "LoneTiger" interesting choice considering he always enjoyed the company of felines, and the name of that old specie long extinct back on earth had a predator feeling of it. I was feeling a little dizzy and sleepy, I know i was drugged during the way back probably to keep the plausible denial from the government in case things went south.

But enough of that, striding towards the local equipment store I had the good fortune of finding out all paperwork for the new ship and equipment needed was ready, even the new id that made me stand as civilian, would prove useful to obtain advantage of the local law enforcement for the plans ahead, I did find myself wondering how the president and the admiral would keep this hidden, the answer came the moment I put my fingers on the bio-metric readers, it displayed the information, the most simple information anyone could have, just the call sign, the picture, place of birth and current ship registration, even body markings that were not there before, only then i noticed that my fingerprints had been changed, probably during my sleep, wonder what else they did to me...

No matter, first things first, the shop keeper was not very helpful but took me o the Starflier Class A ship location and told me I had 48 hours before the parking lease expired, more than enough time to put everything together. I entered the cockpit and connected the wrist interface to the ship's computer and began to run tests, checking and double checking the status of the ship, overall it was not a bad ship, not good either, but not bad, it would have to do for now. Opening the case that contained the rest of my 'equipment'... 5000 credits, a trade & transport pad log with routes and goods, 2 hand pulse blasters with 3 clips each all charged, a... now this is a surprise; an AI data chip most probably assigned to me, that could prove very useful. Taking the small chip and putting it on the computer reader port of the ship and starting it the chip began to glow with a green bluish light, on the 10x10cm holo-pad to the right a small red dot appeared with a blue dot circling around the red one slowly and steadily; an hydrogen atom.

The 'atom' on the holo-pad pulses a few times creating more virtual electrons, neutrons and protons before a low steady female but firm voice with a noticeable slavic accent spoke from the com speakers "Counter intrusion routines initialized, Starflier class-A ship being secured" I turned around with a start as the access door and every single opening outside suddenly closed and even the cockpit was pressurized as the ship's insides separated from the world outside, before I could protest the voice spoke again "Ship secure, greetings LT, I am Veca and I have been assigned to you for your mission to assist you in any and every possible way, I apologize for taking control of the ship like this, I was instructed to do so at the first opportunity."

"I realize you have questions, but let me assure you I am here to help you and assist you, I have full knowledge of your mission and only you will be able to speak freely of it with me, if anyone else is close no mention of the mission will be made at all

This AI really had no idea of how many questions but the most important one came to mind... "Wait just a minute" I said "If you are here it means there are other people who know about you, more so technicians, programmers not to mention anyone involved with your development, if you are an AI by being this size should be hard enough to keep security off a project like yourself itself." Which made me check by the side the port panel to make sure Manhattan security was not about to fall on my head.

"That is only partially correct LT, my series of AI is a prototype developed by LSOC in conjunction with The Order intelligence, just like your identity mine was scrapped and deleted from every single secure terminal and LSOC also issues a mass purge of any data related to me, as some humans would say, 'we are stuck together' even though my processing capabilities are not equal or greater than a full system AI my design allows me to be easily transferred and carried and limited equipment control."

As the AI spoke I leaned back on the pilot's chair gazing through the glass-steel polymer window towards the wall of the landing pad, it sounded risky but the AI might be able to make things easier "What about capture or hacking or deactivation? what happens if I die and you are captured by someone alongside the ship?"

The holographic atom on the pad sprouted several little electrons that seemed to collide with one another "If that were to happen my memory core will melt down in 0.0056 seconds destroying me completely, also my functions are linked directly to the primary and secondary coil drives of the ship, the ship, the data, the cargo everything in it will detonate alongside any ordinance the ship might be carrying, capture is not an option, however I will do my best to ensure the safety encoding, encrypting and delivery of any data you and me have gathered to LSOC"

It took me a few moments to realize the implications of this AI, but then again as the saying goes 'Don't look at gift horse in the mouth' as he spoke "Very well, show me current data of trade routes and items between Manhattan and the other planets and stations in system, and please an overlay of the time between travels via transit lanes".

A moment please... processing... data on screen.

Leaning back on the chair I gazed on the display, arms crossed watching the data and the current prices of merchandise...
Good this ought to give a good start to gather information, most of this is already known through Manhattan, but perhaps something else could be learned. Pulling a datapad and taking a few notes ordering some extra items to be bought for the first trades he needed and supplies for the ship.

This could work well, but will take some time.