Aneka Jansen 6: The Lowest Depths of Shame Read Free

role.’
    ‘Speaker will work alongside Gillian,’ Winter continued, ‘so we get all the talents of a Higher AI, but without the tendency to indecision since Gillian will be there to figurehead things. There is one other obvious reason for doing it this way…’
    ‘It’ll go down better with the people coming to learn,’ Ella finished for her. ‘It makes perfect sense to me.’ She gave her boss a small grin. ‘You’re just worried you’ll never get to do field work again.’
    ‘Yes,’ Gillian said, ‘but watch yourself. If you accept, you’ll be heading up archaeology, social sciences, psychology, and psionics. Speaker will be helping you too…’
    ‘I don’t know the last thing about psionics!’ Ella broke in.
    ‘Neither do the AIs. The Xinti never developed the talent and then they went electronic.’
    ‘We’re creating our first new Higher AI in centuries to head the sub-department,’ War said. ‘We haven’t selected a name for it yet, it’s barely conscious, but your telepathic pilot, Shannon, has taken to calling it Psyche.’
    ‘Abraham will be heading up the physical sciences with Reality,’ Gillian went on. ‘Cassandra is going to split her time between his department and yours. Machine psychology fits into both, to some extent, and she is quite knowledgeable about physics.’
    ‘Bash…?’ Aneka began.
    ‘Is heading up “vocational studies” with Drake, which means you will still be our lead Facilitator. Again, this assumes you’re both happy with the jobs.’
    Ella was frowning uncertainly. ‘I guess… Do you really think I’m up to it?’
    ‘Before you met Aneka I’d have had to say no, but the last couple of years have changed you. For the better, I might add.’
    ‘You’re up to it, love,’ Aneka stated, ‘and there doesn’t seem to be much change for me. We’re keeping the Hyde?’
    ‘In a manner of speaking,’ Gillian replied, ‘but Drake and Aggy wanted to tell you about that. I’m sworn to secrecy.’
    ‘What’ve they been up to?’ Aneka asked, narrowing her eyes.
    ~~~
    ‘The Amethyst Hyde,’ Drake said as they looked out through one of the observation windows at the huge bulk of starship sitting in one of the hangar bays of the orbital starport. ‘Three thousand tonnes of state-of-the-art science vessel. She’s ten times the size of the Garnet Hyde, but she’ll do twice the speed in warp and she’s got one of their high-end reactionless drives in her so she’ll turn on a pinhead and pull a hundred Gs.’
    She was an attractive vessel, all gleaming white metal. The hull was smoothly curved and more or less elliptical with the front slightly raised toward the nose and more pointed, and the rear a blunter shape housing that powerful reactionless drive.
    ‘The sensor systems and lab are incredible,’ Gillian said. ‘The lab space is not quite up to what we have at the university, but it makes what we had on the old ship seem like heaven. And the drones…!’
    ‘There are two hangar bays,’ Drake said. ‘One’s big enough to house Gwy, and the other is fitted out for launching ten-tonne drone ships. We can carry ten, and they come in defensive, survey, or transport models. We can pick and mix according to the expected needs of any operation. The ship has no weapons, but between the drones, the exotic matter stealth hull, the force screen and the cloaking system, we figure we’re covered for all eventualities. And there’s one other gadget we won’t be able to test for a while, but Abraham is very excited about it.’
    ‘Oh?’ Aneka asked, raising an eyebrow. ‘Can you tell me, or are you sworn to secrecy?’
    ‘Wormhole transition shielding system.’
    ‘They’re building another wormhole system? I thought it took a collapsed star to power those?’
    ‘According to Abraham and Reality,’ Gillian said, ‘they’ve got a lot better at it. It’s still going to take some engineering, however. They’re building another star tap in one of