“Given under my hand and seal this second day of October 2398 at McNair, Commitment. Carlos J. Ferenici, Deputy President, Supreme Tribunal for the Preservation of the Faith.”
The lieutenant paused long enough to wet his lips before continuing. “Kaspar Anjar Herris, 5300-718994-91F. Do you have anything to say?”
“No,” Herris said curtly. It had been good while it lasted, and he had always known the risks he was running. “For Kraa’s sake, get on with it.”
As the DocSec officer backed out of the narrow cell, two DocSec troopers, covered by two more with stun guns, grabbed Herris, spun him around, and secured his wrists with plasticuffs. Then, blindfolded and gagged despite his protests, he was hustled out of the cell, down the corridor, and out into a small dirt-covered yard. As he was strapped to the single post set against the high wall at the back of the yard, the lieutenant, now briskly efficient in an effort to get the whole awful business done with, called the firing squad to order.
Seconds later it was over except for two last pieces of ritual.
First, the doctor, casual, disinterested, and as always visibly unhappy at being out of bed at such an early hour, checked that the firing squad had done its job. The lieutenant held his breath. He did not want to have to administer the coup de grace, and it was with heartfelt relief that he acknowledged the doctor’s curt nod of confirmation that the firing squad had done its job.
As Herris’s body hung in its straps, shattered and still bleeding, the blood stark against orange prison coveralls as it dripped slowly to the dirt, the DocSec lieutenant stepped forward and in a clear firm voice called out the words that had followed countless victims of the Hammer of Kraa into darkness.
“Kaspar Anjar Herris. So die all enemies of the peoples of the Hammer of Kraa.”
Dismissing the firing squad and leaving the body of what once had been one of the most powerful men in the Hammer Worlds to the burial detail, he left the yard to get some breakfast, his appetite powerfully restored by successfully completing his first execution without a single fuckup.
Monday, October 5, 2398, UD
“I think to call that a debacle is being a bit unkind to debacles. And Michael, I hold you largely responsible.” Ribot’s face was as unsympathetic as his voice.
Michael squirmed in his seat, miserable and embarrassed. “Sir” was all he could say.
“Three points to make,” said Ribot. “First, there is no excuse for not liaising closely with Warrant Officer Ng’s teams. If they run into unexpected problems, it is you who has to adjust, not them. They are, after all, the whole reason why you are there. You support them and not the other way around. Now look.” Ribot brought up the holovid of Hell-14, the two tortuous routes to the poles marked in livid red.
Ribot’s fingers stabbed at the display. “Route South first. Here, here, and here. Three times, same problem. You should have shifted resources from Route North to compensate for the extra work needed to get past these bottlenecks. OTTO’s maps are good, but they’re not that good, and there will always be parts of the route that are narrower than we expect, and that means finding a way around or cutting rock to get Warrant Officer Ng’s equipment through. Route North, same problem. So be prepared.”
Michael nodded. Much as he hated being dressed down in public, everything Ribot had said so far had been fair enough.
“Second problem is AI overdependence. It takes time to truly understand their limitations, but we don’t have much time, so learn fast. There is no substitute for the human brain, well, not yet, anyway, so don’t take Mother’s advice uncritically.” Ribot paused as Michael’s finger came up. “Yes?”
“Understood, sir,” Michael said cautiously, “but part of the problem is that we haven’t given Mother enough learning time and Hell-14 is a unique problem. Such a problem in fact that the standard libraries of AI rules for covert operations haven’t been much use. I’ve spoken to Lieutenant Hosani and Warrant Officer Ng about the problem. What we are going to do is set up secondary sims running in parallel. Two of Warrant Officer Ng’s team will oversee those while the rest of us concentrate on the primary sim. That way, Mother will see multiple attempts at the problem. That way she’ll get more exposure to the issues we’ll face as well as the benefit of the real-life experience from Ng’s people at the same time. Hopefully, that means Mother will be better at supporting us when the real thing happens.”
By the time he finished, Michael’s voice reflected a confidence he didn’t feel. Managing the support teams- sherpas, as Ng called them-had proved surprisingly difficult. Not only was wrestling the recalcitrant sleds very hard work physically, the problems came thick and fast, the timetable was unyielding, and the adjustments were never ending. Michael and his team had to get Ng’s teams to their targets on time, and that was that.
“Neat, Michael. Neat. But is the experience Mother gets from sim on sim, as it were, going to be useful?” A shadow of doubt tinged Ribot’s voice.
“We think so, sir.” Ng sounded confident. “Lieutenant Hosani has split Mother’s experiential base into two, one taking input from all three sims, the other from the primary sim only. We’ll analyze and compare the two as they grow, and if we see inconsistencies between them, we’ll trash the one using the secondaries. But I don’t think we’ll have to do that.”
“Oh?” Ribot didn’t look convinced. “Why?”
“Well, because the secondaries get the benefit of my people’s contribution. In the primary sim they are really nothing more than pack mules, there to move gear from A to B. But in the secondaries my people work at the command level. That way Mother’s experiential base not only grows faster, it gets multiple command inputs.”
Ribot thought about it for a while before nodding in agreement. “Okay. Makes sense, so let’s see how it goes. Maria, the comparative analysis has to be good, and I’d like to understand the methodology as well as the results. Can you talk me through what you plan to do on that front?”
“Sir.”
“Okay. Where was I? Ah, yes. Lightly roasting Mr. Helfort.” Michael could manage only a half frown, half smile as laughter rippled around the room. They’d all been there, and Warrant Officer Ng knew that her turn was coming fast. Ribot paused for a moment. “Michael, for fuck’s sake, don’t take this too seriously. The reason we have sims is so that we can get most of the mistakes out of the way first. You know that.”
Michael nodded. “I know that, sir. But there’s a lot at stake and a lot to think about.”
“There is. So let’s get back to it. I’m happy on the AI front, so here’s my last point. Michael, I’ve told you before, and I’m sure I’ll tell you again. You get too involved, too close to the action. You must remember to stand back. If you don’t, nobody else will, and we risk the operation if that happens.”
As Michael acknowledged the point with another nod of his head, Ribot turned to Ng.
“Warrant Officer Ng, two points. It’s taking far too long, as I’m sure you know, but hopefully the next run- through will benefit from lessons learned so far. And second, some of your team are too casual, it seems to me, about concealment discipline. We all know that the Hammer’s sensor technology is crap compared to ours, but that’s no excuse for pushing the envelope.” Once again Ribot paused as the holovid bloomed. “Here and here, overaggressive cutting. Too much debris too quickly, and hot debris at that. And here, moving too fast too high. Asking for a radar paint and we can’t afford that.”
Ng nodded. “Fair points, sir. We’ll do better next time.”
“Okay. Now, any comments from the teams? Michael?”
“No, all covered, sir.”
“Warrant Officer Ng?”
“Yes, sir. I’d like to see if we can beef up the sherpa teams supporting Route North. I know there’s not a lot of room and that more bodies do not necessarily give us a better result, but it’s well protected. If we can save some time, we may need it. I think it’s worth a look, and I’ll talk to the XO about where we get the bodies to do it if that’s all right.”
“Fine by me.” Ribot looked across at Armitage, who nodded her agreement. “Any more? Okay, then we’re done. Twenty-four-hour stand-down and if all goes well, we’ll run the next sim after we’ve dropped into normalspace.”
As the meeting broke up for a moment, Michael sat back with his eyes closed, his mood flattened not just by
