I look to the others. ‘But Mother taught a virus was a punishment only for humans.’
‘Punishment? I wouldn’t describe it…’ she shakes her head, ‘that’s a discussion for another time, no, a virus is also a term for something that can attack a machine.’ Namika leans forward and places her chin in her hand. ‘My people discovered it, eighty-two years ago.’
‘How?’
She stands, moves to the far wall and waves her hand across a blinking red light. The wall slides up to reveal a screen.
I sit up. ‘I saw one like that on the upper levels.’
She nods. ‘You would, all ships had the same system for communications.’
‘Oh, I see. Sorry, you were talking about the virus.’
‘Right, let me see if we have some power to spare.’ The screen flickers and glows as Namika swipes her hand across the pad beneath. ‘The cyber-attack that disabled Pandora, also opened a channel back to your ship. When our engineers realized what was happening they tried to retaliate by—’
I raise my hand. ‘Sorry, I don’t understand what any of that means.’
‘Of course, no, you wouldn’t.’ Her eyes wander across the ceiling - she clicks her fingers. ‘What you call Mother is actually a complex network, a collection of processing units. Let me see… yes, like your brain, but the ships have hundreds, each controlling a vital function. Either Mother wasn’t aware the link was established, or she assumed all our systems were lost in the attack.’
I glance to Reuben and Amos. ‘And they weren’t?’
‘No, had they been, we wouldn’t have survived the first year. Despite the panic, the essential components of our central control system were saved. The survivors had to disconnect all incoming links from Discovery to prevent further corruption. It was several years before we found an outgoing active link.’ She sees the lines on our foreheads. ‘This means we can read some of your ship’s data, or if you like, Mother’s mind.’
Reuben laughs. ‘Now there’s a thought. Not sure I’d want to see inside her head.’
Namika taps the panel below the screen and pictures of our ship with rotating wheels, appear. ‘We’ve carefully probed a little deeper and, as far as we can tell, Mother is still unaware of our presence.’ The screen flickers and fades. Her fingers work across the screen but nothing happens. Her lips purse. ‘I’m afraid that’s the extent of our power for the moment. Unfortunately, the crew from Challenger did not have time to complete construction of the power grid before your ship arrived.’
She turns back to face us. ‘Our engineers found large parts of code, Mother’s instructions, that should not be in the system. The encryption,’ she sees my eyes wander, ‘attempts to stop us reading it, are virtually impossible to undo but from what we can see, it’s obvious that the Reapers weren’t satisfied with destroying just the one ship. They wanted the whole fleet.’
I stand. ‘But why? Why attack the ships taking people away from Earth?’
She shakes her head. ‘These were no longer people thinking logically… if they ever were. They came to regard the whole human race as parasites, a disease if you like, and didn’t want it to spread across the universe.’
Amos raises his hand. Reuben sighs. ‘No need for that now, Amos. I’m sure Namika will let you speak.’
Amos glances my eye before turning to our host. ‘But if that was their plan, why hasn’t Mother or these death people, killed everyone onboard our ship?’
‘Ah, good question. That is because, I believe, a result of a conflict between the virus and Discovery’s original code. The virus was meant to stay dormant to prevent detection by the fail-safe system that would have erased it.’
I make a face. ‘And what is fail-safe?’
Namika sighs. ‘I’m sorry, there are so many words I use that will mean nothing to you.’ Her eyes flick back to the blank screen. ‘The fail-safe is like a backup, sorry, that’s another one, it’s an original copy of Mother’s coding as it was when first designed. At times that copy will have been updated as the ship evolved, but only once it’s been proven to be safe. If the fail-safe detects a catastrophic failure, it’s supposed to activate, then override the existing system, and roll-back to the last known safe code.’
I nod. ‘I think I get that. So, in effect it’s like putting a younger Mother back in control, one that hasn’t gone mad.’
‘Well it’s a bit more complicated than,’ she shrugs, ‘actually yes, that’s exactly what it does. But as yet I can’t detect if the fail-safe is still operable. The Reaper code was only meant to activate on arrival at New Dawn and wait for the rest of the fleet. In short, it would destroy the other ships, then self-destruct. But the coders of the virus couldn’t have fully anticipated Mother’s capacity to learn and evolve. We believe the virus was partially initiated when it identified changes in the core code as Mother learned and made modifications. The partially active virus in turn, corrupted the original program and changed Mother. Those changes would cause further distortion in the evolving support systems, resulting in the mess we have now.’
I slap my leg. ‘Lonely!’ The others turn. ‘Mother said she’d become lonely, that’s why she began to wake the crew.’
Namika lets out a long breath. ‘That makes sense. I should imagine the original coders would want to prevent human emotions developing as it could lead to rash actions when hard logic is required. If the virus prevented the fail-safe systems intervening and she evolved to experience the sensation of loneliness that would explain what happened next.’
I look to the others. ‘And what was that?’
‘When she woke the inhabitants of a select number of suspension units, it triggered the full virus into action.’ She clears her throat. ‘I’m sorry, I’m not used to talking for so long.’ She takes another sip of water. ‘Mother reviving the first of the crew would have been interpreted as final preparations for the end of the journey.’
I rub my temples. ‘But if the Reapers only need the ship’s weapons, how come it hasn’t killed everyone onboard?’
She holds up a finger. ‘Ah. You see, we’ve managed to isolate some of the ships functions from the Reaper virus.’ Namika sighs. ‘But the virus also effectively lives and grows. It’s a constant battle for us to keep it at bay. Mother is a slave to both sets of commands, so while she finds no issue with destroying inhabitants of other ships, she’s still protecting her own as instructed, despite the underlying virus that wants to eradicate you.’
I look to Reuben. ‘That explains the harsh treatment during the Purge.’
Reuben shakes his head. ‘And we thought it was all for our own good.’
Namika stands. ‘According to her conflicted mind, it was. You see, in an odd way she has come to love you.’