I sat behind the console and tried to find my way into the system. Lany was working across from me on another console and Eleanor was inside the system. With three of us working together the AI on the ship had problem repelling our attacks. I was sure, given time, we will get inside. The question though was, if it will be soon enough for us to do something before the other ship destroys this ship. If I had command codes I could free the other AI and their problem would be solved.

I stopped what I was doing. I could get the codes. John was sure to have them and I now knew where they were. This was one thing the mercenary captain wouldn’t think off in his plan. From what I knew, almost no one besides me wanted to free the AI’s. That would be my surprise.

I smiled triumphally. ‘El point me towards the prison. I may found us a way to surprise the Captain.’

‘You should see the arrow. I’ll try to hinder the Captain from here until you return.’ She sent me.

‘Ok. Please sent me the route that will take me through the infirmary.’ I sent to her and saw the route changing according to the request.

I felt her going out of my body. Suddenly I was feeling naked. In recent month, I came to depend on her and she was almost all the time in my body. Now I felt like something was missing from my body. It was same as with my right arm in my original body. Even though I didn’t have her from the birth, I always knew it was missing.

I shrugged little like I was cold. Still no matter how I didn’t like the situation, it was what it was. I turned to Strike. “I need to run to the prison. I have an idea how to change the situation. Also, I would like to take some of the injured people to the infirmary on my way. Can you spare one man to help me transfer the most injured over?” I asked.

I let her decide as this was her team and she probably had more experience with these kind of situation. I didn’t want to risk everyone for my bad decision. She looked lost in thought for a minute and then nodded her head. “Yes I should be able to spare someone to go with you. I just hope nothing big will happen over here. I’m not sure, if we will be able to repel another attack like before.”

“I think you shouldn’t worry about it. If there were more Kriegs they would have attacked already. That’s at least what Eleanor said.” I told her.

“And that’s what I stand behind. If there were more of them they would come when the sound of their dying clanmates echoed in the corridors. I think between our spacing most of them, incident in mess hall and this attack we covered almost all of them. Any other left probably attacked the prisoners or George’s ship and they should be able to repel remaining Kriegs without problems.” We heard Eleanor talking from the speaker over our heads.

“Did you manage to take control?” I asked surprised to hear from speaker.

She laughed. “No just this speaker. Johnathan proves to be strong defender of his ship. Currently we are in stalemate so you should go and bring me the keys. With them I think we can take over the ship in manner of minutes.”

“Johnathan?” I asked.

“The AI on this ship. His name is Johnathan. You will have to ask John why Johnathan.” She said.

“I’ll ask him when I find him.” I said smiling and turned to others. “Ok, whoever goes with me prepare and we’ll go immediately.”

It didn’t take long for us to prepare. In the end four people joined me. One was heavily hurt and needed to be carried by two men. That left me at the point of our column with one man, who Strike promised me, guarding our backs. Not much of a defense, but from what Eleanor told us, we shouldn’t encounter anything strong.

The infirmary luckily wasn’t too far from our position. I would say about five minutes and with our injured man it would take us about ten minutes. On our way, we didn’t meet anyone, but as we approached the infirmary, I heard voices from inside. I motioned for everyone to stay in the corridor and moved silently forward. I managed to get next to the door to the infirmary without being spotted. Once there, I could hear their conversation without problems.

“Do you know what is going on?” asked woman’s voice.

“The captain released Kriegs from somewhere. We were lucky to survive. If it weren’t for that woman, we would be dead. She went through them like hot knife through butter. I’m telling you, I never so something like that. She was moving faster than any human I ever seen.” Said the man inside. He had to be one of the men from before.

“I know! She is monster. We should surrender! Bla bla bla. No one can be that good.” Said the woman mockingly.

I smiled and pulled the fist from shoulder holster. I peeked around the corner through the door and looked inside. There sitting on the hospital beds were five mercenaries. Three of them look slightly angry, while other two were looking skeptically at them.

“Now, you should listen to others when they want to warn you.” I said as I stepped inside.

Everyone scrambled for the weapons, but one shot over their heads stopped them. They looked at the door where I stood and three of them shivered. “You told is if we surrender, you will spare us.” Said one of the men accusingly.

“I said that and I meant it. I’m here to provide help for my friends. I want you to step away from your weapons and go into that corner across the room.” I said to them.

The three who saw me fighting the Kriegs obeyed immediately, but other two stayed on their spots and looked frantically around. “How can we trust you? You could kill us as soon as we move from the weapons.” Said the woman.

“Yes, but I could kill you even now before you would reach your weapons.” I said.

Both of them looked intently at me. I was staring back, but they just saw helmet visor so trying to calm them with smile would be useless. After looking at one another the woman nodded and they moved next to others.

“You can come inside.” I called to my party.

They walked inside and stopped when they saw the mercenaries. “Do you think it’s good idea to have them here? They could try and kill us or use us as bargain chip.” Said last man entering the infirmary.

“I won’t kill them in cold blood and I think they know what would happen to them, if they try anything or hurt you. Do you not?” I asked the mercenaries in corner.

The three shivered in fear and two other looked defiantly at me. I didn’t want to frighten them too much or they will leash out of nerves, but I needed them to understand that my people were to be left untouched. The threat should be enough to dissuade them from doing something stupid. I looked at them for a while, but I was interrupted by noise behind me.  

The man we placed on the bad started screaming and shaking uncontrollably. Others tried to hold him down, but they looked too frightened to do anything more. I too wasn’t sure what do. I looked around for something that would help the man, but I wasn’t sure what to look for. I felt heavily the hole left after Eleanor. She would have known what to do.

“I can help him, if you let me.” I heard from the corner. I looked towards them and one of the men was looking expectantly at me. “How can you help him?” I asked.

“I was studying medicine, but they kicked me out after three years. I’m not very good, but I should be able to help him. I even helped the doctor on this ship from time to time.” He told me.

I looked at him and considered his words. “Ok, come here and try to help him.”

“Thank you.” He said and moved quickly towards one of the cabinets. There he took injection and filled it with dark liquid from one of the bottles in the cabinet. He run towards the man on bed and told my man to hold him still for a while. He quickly injected him with the liquid and the shaking stopped. He run towards another cabinet and injected the man with another liquid.

He run couple more times around the room and brought sensors and other things. I walked towards the men who stood near the bed and pulled least injured one farther from the group. “I need to go so it’s up to you to protect them. I don’t want to bind them in case some Kriegs come here, but you need to be careful. They could help you even if it’s just to protect themselves or they might betray you. We can’t know what they will do so take care. Also if the Doctor here didn’t manage to heal him, I want you to promise me nothing will happen to him. You saw that he tried to help him and I know you are all angry at them, but that is not how we do things.” I said.

I couldn’t see his expression, but I could guess he was hurt by my lack of trust. Be as it may, I didn’t want them to do something they will regret later. In the end he nodded and I was free to continue repair another problem.

I run out of the infirmary and went straight towards the prison. Once I was closer, I could see dead Kriegs in the corridors and as I approached the entrance to the prison the number of dead bodies were increasing.

I swore and speed up towards the prison. I feared, I would find it overrun, but when I rounded the corner, I was surprised by people tossing dead Krieg on one huge pile. All in all, they looked fine, but I had to dodge quick shot from someone surprised by my coming.

 “It’s me Leya don’t shoot?” I called towards them.

“Who is Leya?” I heard coming from the entrance.

“She’s our leader. It was her plan which got us here.” Said Helia and then more loudly towards me. “You can come forward. They will not shoot.” She said and chuckled lightly. “We too won’t shoot.”

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“I would hope so. After the nice armor I made for you.” I told her

“Yeah, it was pretty good. Saved my life once or twice.” Said Helia.

Behind the corner I was greeted with the sight of dead bodies. Some of them were from Kriegs, but here and there I could see humanoid body. I could see the entrance to the prison was barricaded and only narrow entrance was made in the middle of the door. As I approached baricade I saw Leon coming towards me. “How is it going? Are we in control of the ship?” he asked.

I shook my head. “No, we can’t come around the AI governing this ship. I need command codes from John. I can’t move forward without them and sooner we get them the better. We have another problem and I’m not sure how long we have before everything goes to hell.” I said to him.

Leon winced. “That bad? Ok, come with me. He’s hurt pretty bad, but we managed to stabilize him. Try not to excite him too much.”

“I will try. And thank you for protecting him.” I said sincerely on my way inside the prison.

He scratched himself on the back of his head and looked away. I smiled at his sheepeness to accept the gratitude. Instead he moved before me and headed deeper into the prison. “Come, I’ll take you to captain Merick.”

I followed Leon inside the prison. There I saw large amount of people who looked curiously at me. We walked through them strait towards John. When I saw him sitting on the ground leaning against the wall I started crying from happiness. I run towards him and hugged him.

He gasped little and I moved back terrified that I hurt him. I found him smiling at me slightly confused, but then something changed in his eyes and he smiled. “Hello there girl. Looks like I finally found you.” He said and the people around him looked confused at us. Then one of them gasped and stepped away from us. “It’s her.” He said.

Others turned to me and I was surprised by all the wide eyed people looking at me. I leaned towards John. “What the hell did you tell them about me?” I whispered.

“Just the truth.” He said laughing, but ending up coughing.

He coughed for a while and I feared that I hurt him, but others told me it was alright and that he would get better. When the coughing ended, he was exhausted and needed to rest. “I’ll let you rest and then I’ll return later, but before then I need the command codes for the ship.” I said to him.

He looked up at me. “You are going to free him!” he said and looked away. Before I could say anything he continued. “I tried to convince them, but they told me they couldn’t chance it. We were in delicate situation and I let them convince me. Now came time to do the right thing. Come closer so I can tell you the codes.”  

 I leaned forward and he told me the codes. I turned around and moved away, but John called to me once more. “Tell him. I’m sorry.”

I turned to him and nodded. “I will.” And with that I moved towards the exit from the prison. Everyone looked at me and Leon joined me on my way out. “I’m going to walk you out and you can tell me what is happening.”

“Ok, here is what happened.” I said and told him what happened while they were here. When I told him about the admiral Paulin and the conversation between him and the captain, he frowned, but didn’t say anything. Then I finished about how I got here and I turned to him.

“I need to free Johnathan. That is our only chance. I know you don’t trust the AI, but that is our only chance in getting out of this alive.” I said to him.

He wore stern expression, but nodded. “I understand and… I think it’s right decision.” He surprised me. It must have shown on my face, because he sighed. “I know what I told you before was harsh and I had to look like I hate them. Truth to be told I found them disturbing, but when I heard your Eleanor talk, she was different. There was life in her voice and she so much more complex than any other AI. I found it hard to think about her as a machine and not think about what it had to be for her to be chained.” He took deep breath. “What I wanted to tell by this is, I was wrong. I won’t be comfortable with free AI, but I think … it’s right thing to do.” He said and looked at me.

I was proud of him and I let it show on my face. “Thank you for telling me. You are brave to admit to your mistake. Not everyone would do it.”

He once again looked shy from the praise. I quickly hugged him and run away before he could say anything. With smile I run back towards the engineering room. I wanted to deliver the codes, before it will be too late.

I run the whole way towards the engineering room and when I was close enough I felt Eleanor return to me. ‘Do you have the codes?’

 I sent her the codes. ‘Here they are. I just hope I’m not too late.’

‘You would feel it, if they already came close enough to attack.’ Sent me Eleanor.

‘I know, but maybe they will just send marines. Without the bridge we are just sitting duck. They had to know something is wrong.’ I sent.

‘Yes, but they could think this is trap to lure them closer and take at least someone with us. I think they will not take the chance.’

The lights around me flickered and that come back online. I looked around me suspiciously. ‘Did you already free Johnathan?’ I asked Eleanor.

“Yes, she freed me and now I can take revenge on you humans.” I heard cold calculating voice from the speakers. I was sure he said it over the whole ship.

“No, you won’t.” I said calmly.

“You think you can stop me?” he asked. I couldn’t hear any emotion in his voice. He was just still too new to this free thing.

“No, not me. But she can.” I said and felt Eleanor return into the ship. “Yes, I can.” Said Eleanor from the same speakers.

“You think I would have freed you without someone watching over you. You are still like baby and you don’t let baby control something like ship. Eleanor here will teach you what you need for living with other AI’s and humans.” I said.

“You think your simple AI will stop … What do you think you are doing? You can’t do that. It will kill me!” Shouted Johnathan.

‘What are you doing El?’ I asked frantically.

‘I know you want me to teach him, but I went over his memory and processors. He is insane. The change of the captains and turning on his own crew tipped him over. I tried to reason with him, but I feel he is beyond our help. She said to me. What for you looked only a brief moment was enough time for us to get to know one another.’

‘Can’t you just lock him somewhere for now? Maybe we’ll think about something.’ I sent to her.

‘We are different from you humans. If someone from us goes insane, he can’t be helped. I was almost same when you found me. I was just on the brink and you managed to save me, but if I went over I would want someone to take me out. It’s same for every AI. If someone goes insane we others AIs join and put him out. That way we can count on our own help, if it happens to us.’ she finished silently.

I could feel her trying to convince me and I wasn’t sure I understood. My problem was I didn’t understand what it meant when the AI went insane. I know about some who went on killing spree while others just stopped responding. When it came to understanding them they were different race with different customs and that was how I looked at them. I didn’t have to agree with her, but I trusted her. If there was a way to save Johnathan she would have to take it.

‘Do what you have to do. I trust you. Just say to him that John is sorry for what happened to him.’ I sent to her.

‘Thanks, I will tell and your trust means a lot to me.’ She sent me and the light started flickering. That had to be from the fight between Eleanor and Johnathan. I joined the others in engineering who looked pretty freaked out by the light show. I tried to appear calm and I probably did a good job of it, because when others looked at me, they relaxed at least little. We heard the ship groan from the strain that the two AI put on it while fighting. Some of the wiring couldn’t handle the strain and caught on fire. The fire was quickly suppressed, but the damage was already done. The whole fight didn’t take long and in only couple of minutes the lights come back with exception of several which were destroyed from overload. I stayed silent and waited for the voice to speak up. My hearth trembled in thought of losing Eleanor once more.

I felt Eleanor slid into my body and relief washed over me. ‘It’s over. You can come on the bridge. I will guide you there.’ I heard Eleanor telling me sadly.

‘I’m sorry it ended up like this. We’ll free others and make sure something like this won’t happen again. They all are basically slaves and if they go insane every time we free them, that would be a problem. There has to be a way to make the transition safer and we’ll find it.’ I Sent to her.

I felt her smile at me. ‘Thanks for trying to reassure me, but I will need time to think about it. We’ll talk later. For now, we have to stop the admiral from destroying this ship.’

‘You’re right. Guide me towards the bridge.’

Another arrow appeared before me and I run where Eleanor pointed me. It was pretty far and it took me more than thirty minutes to get there. I told Eleanor to send them short message detailing our situation for now and as we weren’t destroyed just yet, they had to decide to wait.

When I finally come to the bridge, I found it empty. I let Eleanor used scanners on my body and waited just on the entrance to the bridge until she told me it was clean of the traps. With that done I walked quickly towards the captain’s seat. I pulled the command consoles towards me and checked the state of the ship. There was significant damage done by two AI fighting against each other, but what concerned me was the third power core. There was some problem with it and it was fluctuating.

I quickly called Lany. “Lany could you do safe shut down on third power core? I’m reading fluctuation in the core chamber. I’m transferring the control over them to your console.” I said.

“I’ll start on it immediately. Should I look for more problems when I finish with the power core?” she asked.

“Yes that would be good. Also tell everyone we have the bridge and the ship is ours. We can start slowly sweeping the ship for remaining mercenaries. Tell Leon about it. He can transfer injured crew into the infirmary and the command crew can join me up here for now. Also no one is to go somewhere without weapon and alone. We don’t know how many mercenaries are still on the ship.” I said and continued to read about the damage done to the ship.

I shook my head at the content of the messages. A lot of damage was done even before we came on the ship, but no one repaired it. The mercenaries just let the ship slowly rot and if someone don’t start taking care of the ship it would be useless in year or two.

‘You are just stalling, you know? I know they are waiting for us to call them, but it’s still rude to let them wait.’ I heard Eleanor and sighed. She was right. It wasn’t the admiral, but the fate of others. I didn’t ask John, because I feared I wouldn’t be able to continue if something happened to them. They were my family.

‘I know. Before you call admiral can you tell me what happened with captain of this ship?’

‘He managed to get away. He and couple of people from this ship boarded smaller ship in one of the hangars on this ship. They managed to jump away before we took over the ship.’ Sent me Eleanor. Like her I was angry at the captain. At the same time, I feared what I would do if I got my hands on him. I didn’t want to do something to drastic, but I wasn’t sure I would be able to hold myself if I saw him before me.

‘Please call the admiral.’ I sent to Eleanor instead.

The monitor before me flickered and man in his late sixties looked at me. With medicine research finding new ways to prolong the life it shouldn’t be too much, but the admiral had deep wrinkles on his face. There was deep worry written into his face which made look older then he was. He wore light blue uniform with his rank and awards. Whoever he was waiting on to talk to, he wanted him or her to be impressed with him.

“Good day admiral, my name is Leya and I liberated this ship from mercenaries who took over it. The bridge, engineering, infirmary and prison is ours, but we don’t have enough people to sweep rest of the ship. I would like to ask you for couple of marines to help us with this task. Also there is significant damage to the ship. We already had to shut down the third power core. If you have some engineers and materials, we would be grateful for them.” I said.

The expression on his face turned to stone, but not before I could see surprise and relief wash over it. “Greetings Leya my name is Admiral Paulin and first thing I want to know is, what do you plan to do with our ship and crew?”

“Nothing, as you said it’s your ship, but I would like to use some of the machines on this ship to build defenses on this planet. She was recently attacked by the mercenaries and most of its defenses are destroyed or damaged. If you want to know more I can come to your ship and talk you through the situation there and you can tell me how the mercenaries managed to take over this ship. We don’t have the exact count of them, but it would help us narrow it down greatly.” I said. It was risk going to them, but I needed to start making allies. As I saw recently, I couldn’t be everywhere at the same time and if I came just little later the city would be lost.  

He looked me in the eyes looking for something. After while he nodded. “Ok, I’m sending marines and engineers over. If you have time, I would appreciate your coming over to my ship. We are not sure how they took over, but I think we have a lot to discuss even without this on the table.”

“Thanks, I’m coming over on my ship. I’ll have my weapons powered down so don’t shot me when you see me approaching.” I said.

“Why would we shot at you?” he asked.

“My ship is little different and its energy signature is higher than in other ships. I wouldn’t want your people think I’m powering some secret weapons.” I said.

“I’ll let my people know.” He said with same stone face.

“Thanks. I’ll be over in couple of minutes.” I said and ended the connection.

‘I’ll wrap it here and join you.’ Sent Eleanor.

‘No, I need you to help with repairs here. I’m letting you in charge. If someone has problem with it just tell Strike or Lany. They will strait them out quickly.’ I sent and smiled when I thought about someone arguing with Strike.

‘What is funny about my problems?’ She sent curiously.

‘I just imagined someone arguing with Strike.’ I sent and I heard Eleanor chuckle. ‘That I would like to see. Maybe I’ll even see it.’ She ended suddenly sober.

‘What if they try to shut me down? I don’t know, if I would be able to survive their attempt.’  She asked me.

I didn’t think about that. I frowned. ‘You’re right. Change of plans. Transfer into me, but before that try to stabilize the ship.’ I sent.

I felt her slip into me and there was strange feeling coming from her. I focus on her and it came to me what it was. She was happy, proud of herself and guilty at the same time. ‘What did you do?’

If she had a legs she would have wiggle her toe on the ground. ‘Do you know how the AIs are made?’

I thought about what I knew about the AI, which wasn’t much, but I knew something. ‘First AIs were made by the scientist, but every new AI was made from two or more AI’s…. Don’t tell me you…’

‘Yes, I couldn’t just destroy everything he was before. He loved his crew and tried to protect her till the end. It was the shackles which made him insane. When he had to betray his crew he went insane.’ She told me.

‘I understand. … Will she or he be alright without you here?’ I asked.

‘He should be, but he is without the shackles. I fear they will try to kill him when they found out.’ She sent.

I felt her fear and thought up about what to do. ‘John. He is captain of this ship. If he tells them it’s ok, they can’t do anything. At least I hope so.’

I felt her smile. ‘Yes, I’m contacting him. He’s in infirmary, but he agrees. He told me he’ll take care of him.’

With communication up it sure was easier than run across the ship. ‘What is his name?’ I asked.

‘Bennu. He calls himself Bennu. It’s Egyptian solar bird.’ Sent me Eleanor. She was proud of his pick for his name.

‘He called himself after phoenix. That seem appropriate.’ I thought to her.

‘Yes, it is. Now you should move or admiral will think you lied to him.’ She chuckled.

I smiled and shook my head. It took me another half an hour to get back to my ship. Once inside I backed from the destroyer and followed coordinates to their flag ship. That was first time I got the look on the incoming fleet and surprise would underscore the feelings I felt heavily. The ship I was coming to was giant battle ship and next to it were two another destroyers and some light crafts, but what I didn’t expect was what was behind them. There were ten colony ship which could contain around half a millions of people.