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Olivia fidgeted in her seat as she slowly scanned the empty void of space. Hours had passed while she, Javi and Noah searched for Vlasa and Serene. Early on, she had been hopeful but after several heat sources had turned out to be debris or gas pockets charged by the battle, her spirits had dropped. Nevertheless, the search continued.
“Captain, I have successfully integrated with the drone-ship's AI.” Mesu’s chipper voice said over the communication network via his replaced wifi implant.
Olivia involuntarily shuddered at the voice, but said nothing. Ariana’s voice came next, “Can you keep it shut down?”
“Yes. With limited functionality. Most systems are encrypted and I cannot bypass. I’m a doctor, not a code monkey.”
“Very well. What can you access?” Ariana asked.
“Just the restart sequence, diagnostics and passive sensors.”
“Can you relay that information to us?” Ariana asked, “I’m sure even in passive mode, the drone's sensors are more precise than our damaged system.”
“I could, but that would require a direct computer link. I would have to link via a hacking drone. Fortunately, one is already linked to the ship.”
“What?!” Olivia and Ariana blurted out at the same time.
“Yes, the drone-ship has a link with Seraph.”
“How? It never fired a hack drone during the fight.”
“That we know about.” Olivia added, “Remember, we’re half blind.”
“True but those things aren’t stealthy, and we’d feel the impact on the hull.” Ariana said, “The teleportation alarm never sounded.”
“The drone ship’s records match your assessment as it does not record launching or porting a hack.”
“So where did it come from?”
“I do not have that information.”
“We’ll have to figure that out later. Where is it?”
“I do not have that information.”
Ariana sighed audibly over the comm line, “Okay, what information do you have access too from Seraph?”
“Sensor data. Communications. Entertainment files.” Olivia nodded with each thing Mesu mentioned. All so far were the only systems on the ship accessible via a computer network. None could be used to cause serious harm to the ship remotely, which was why they were allowed to be networked.
“FTL systems,” Mesu added filling Olivia with cold dread. If a drone had access to a ship’s FTL system, it could override a ship’s course and jump it anywhere without the crew's input.
“If they’ve had access to our FTL, why haven’t they jumped us to them?” Noah asked.
“Navigation is not networked.” Olivia explained, “It’s a one-way link to the FTL system. The nav computer tells the FTL how and when to jump, but the FTL can’t tell the nav computer anything.”
“Okay, but they could still tell the FTL to jump, right?”
“It would be very hard to tell us to jump to a particular place without a local ship feeding it navigation data. But they could have triggered the FTL, and sent us to the middle of nowhere.”
Ariana cut off Noah’s next respond, “Now’s not the time to speculate. Let’s use this opportunity to try and find Vlasa. Olivia, access the drone-ship's sensors. Noah, keep on ours. I’ll begin searching the FTL systems for this hack.”
The comm channel went quiet again. Olivia hesitated for a minute. The idea of allowing a drone access to the ship’s systems worried her. But, it must have had access for a while now. Might as well turn the table.
Opening the network address Mesu provided, she began sifting through the available computer systems. She found the sensor telemetry from the drone ship and configured the computer to filter the data for heat signatures like it had been doing with Seraph’s data.
The sensors aboard the drone-ship were vastly superior to Seraph’s. Heat anomalies that she would have had to check manually were now quickly ruled out. With far less manual input to exert, Olivia turned her attention to what other information she could garner from the drone-ships computers.
Mesu’s report that all critical ship systems were encrypted, turned out to be correct. She could read some logs and verified what Mesu had told them. But if she wanted to know what the drones knew, she would have to get past the encryption.
Glancing back at the sensor data, Olivia saw no pending results waiting for her to check. She brought up the drone-ships core boot file and started studying it. At first glance, it didn’t look much different than Seraph’s. If she could find a way to load the computer systems using a replacement boot file, she could gain access to the whole drone.
Mesu’s cheery voice interrupted her train of thought, “I would not recommend that. These systems contain multiple layers of security.”
“I am aware of that. Unlike you, Doctor Drone, I actually evolved from a monkey. I think I can handle the code part too.” Olivia blustered.
She started entering boot commands while Mesu continued to talk, “I fail to see how the evolutionary origin of your species has anything to do with your programming skills. The personnel file the captain provided did not mention any advanced programming skills.”
“I don’t tell the captain everything.”
“That seems inefficient.”
“It’s not all about efficiency for people.”
“That would explain your code.”
Olivia frowned. She glanced back at what she had just coded, and deleted the last line and started over. Stupid AI. She tuned Mesu out as she continued to work.