Book 2 news - ModDB Stories

<!-- Piper now stays in the hangar most of the time, and took such a liking to the Al'kesh that she doesn't let anyone in it unless she is with them. She even started to refer to it as her "baby."
SoE has taken over the armory and set up a shooting range in one of the hangars, using a small forcefield as a backdrop and empty crates and barrels as targets.
Alex, and Bob have spent a lot of time in the flight sims, earning themselves the nickname of "Flyboys," and Alex couldn't be happier about that. They also spar and use the range, kind of making them the main military force on the ship.
Mularac has read most of the books on ship about heath care, making him the effective chief medical officer, taking care of the crew when they are wounded while at work or play.
Warren and Kara have done modifications all around the ship, including installing one of the first Tau'ri made ZPMs, which they got at the Alpha site, and replacing Wolf 2's rear seat with a second computer core.
Af claimed the mess hall, and will slap anyone that tries to enter his kitchen.
Caine moves around the Aries learning about its systems and programming new ways to use them. He also hid Wolf 3 away in his "workshop," a cargo room attached to the hangar.
Warren and Kara were called to the "workshop" one evening, and when they get there, they knock on the door.
"It's open." is heard through the heavy steel.
They walked in to see stacks of spare circuit board and cables. Caine seems to dig his way out of one of the stacks, and stands in the middle of the room by a computer with a look of pure joy on his face.
"Guys, there is someone I want you to meet. Felix, say hi."
A voice like Caine's but younger starts to speak from the computer,
"Hi Captain, Hi Kara, it's nice to finally meet you"

Warren and Kara stare at Caine, then each other, Caine again, "Felix," then back to Caine.
He holds up both hands to stop them before they even ask,
"He is a upgrade to the ship's automation code, and will make it full AI. All these..." He points at the stacks "...are memory banks and data storage. Felix was built for the main computer core, so when he is in this set up, he has the mind of a young child. Like that of a fix year old, hence, him sounding like one. But, trust me, when he has the full computing power of the main core, he could run the ship by himself."
Before Warren and Kara can say anything, Felix starts to beg,
"Please! I can do it! Really! You can even lock me out of most of the systems till you trust me. Please! I have been online in this little room, in this little computer for days, please let me go play."
Warren holds up a finger,
"Fine, but keep 'him' out of navigation, weapons, and anything to do with life support for now. And Felix, don't talk to anyone till after we are all in the mess hall, and I say to, ok? Don't need people getting scared."
As Caine plugs the computer into the ship's data network and starts to upload Felix, Warren walks over to a panel on the wall and presses a button,
"All crew report to the mess hall for a meeting, that is all."
The three walk out of the room, headed for the mess hall....

When Caine, Kara, and Warren reach the mess, everyone else is already seated, with a look of horror on their faces, but the mood lightens when they see the smiles on the three that just entered the room.
Warren doesn't waste any time,
"Ladies...er...Lady..and Gentlemen, meet Felix..."
After a moment of silence, all but Kara and Caine stare at Warren like he is a mad man. Just as he is about to explain, Felix's voice comes out of the PA system, still not sounding much older like Caine said he would.
"Sorry Captain, I was checking out the ship, it's nice to be out of that little room. Just so you know, one of Wolf 1's missiles is going to fall off the hardpoint if anyone bumps it even just a bit. Someone didn't mount it right. Anyway, nice to finally meet you all. By the way, who flies the Al'kesh?"
Piper jumps up,
"Is there something wrong with my baby? Who did it? What'd they do?"
"Nothing, it's just parked on Wolf 7's power cable."
She sits back down,
"Oh."
Caine clears his throat,
"Felix is an AI made to run Aries. Though he may sound very young, he could run the whole ship by alone. Weapons, navigation, all of it..." He looks at Warren "...Once he is given access that is."
Warren asks the crew "Should we let him try?"
A mix of nods and shrugs all around the table
"Right then, Caine, let him."
Caine walks to a console and taps a few keys. After he hits the last one, the lights in the room go out, only the glow of hyperspace letting them see each other. The lights return,
"Just kidding!" is heard over the PA speakers, those in the console, and the radios most of the crew is wearing.
"Felix!" yells Kara.
"Sorry"
Warren rubs his forehead,
"I think that is enough 'fun' for the night, time for bed everyone. Felix, you have the bridge."
"Aye aye Capn', you can trust me" he replies, as his voice seems to move down the hall...

Warren wakes up, and starts to put his day clothes to check the bridge, but remembers Felix.
"Morning Felix. How was your first night?"
An anime-style face appears on the computer screen,
"Fun! How'd you sleep?"
Warren has drops into his chair and rubs his eyes, unsure if he is awake or still dreaming.
"Good, I guess. Why was it fun?"
"Cuz there was so much to do! I checked out all the ship systems, all green by the way, ran analysis on all the fighters, even ran virus scans on all the PC's on the network. And then..." the face on screen hangs it's head "...watched all the anime, shows, and movies I could find. Sorry." he perks up again. "Alex even was awake for a bit, so him and I did flight sims for a while. Don't ask him about it though, I don't think he liked me beating him so much." he looks off screen, then looks back. "Kara's up, I am going to go say hi" He gets up and runs off screen, then returns and taps something at the bottom of the frame, making the screen shut off. Warren's eye twitches and he decides to get some coffee...

Now dressed and ready for the day, Kara walks to her bedroom door. Just before she reaches it, she hears someone knock.....from her computer.
"May I come in?"
Kara has a look of curiosity on her face,
"Yes?"
The computers screen comes on showing Anime Felix facing away from the screen.
"Can I look?"
"Would I let anyone in if they couldn't?"
"True" he says as he turns around, the web cam on her computer coming online are turning to face her.
She now see his full Anime face.
"When do you get that?"
"Last night. I was watch Anime and stuff and I saw how important a face is conveying meaning. I used an Anime face because it can show more emotion then a normal face. I also made an Anime version of the ship in VR, so if Anime me is moving around, like going screen to screen in the real world, it's because I am really moving around the ship. When in this form, I can only be in one place at a time."
"Wow."
Felix reaches down and picks up a piece of paper, then sticks it to her screen, and it changes in to a text document she can read and scroll around on.
"These are the reports from last night's scans. Most of the crew is down in the mess for breakfast, so I am headin' down there. Want me to order you something?"
Kara rubs her head, still getting used to the idea of a seven year old that's really a three day old AI that runs the ship.
"Coffee. Today deserves coffee."
"Okay, see you down there." he says as his voice fades, like he is moving down the hall...

As Warren steps out of his room, so does Kara. They look up and they both see the same blank gaze of wonderment on the each other. Warren blinks a few times,
"You saw Felix too I take it?"
"Yea..."
"Was he.."
"Yup...
"Need coffee?"
"Oh yea..."
She looks down the hall, rubs her head and gets a twitchy smile.
"He already asked if I wanted some. I think I have a cup waiting for me in the mess."
About half way there, Caine stumbles out of his room and into their path, he sees them and asks
"Did you guys..."
"Yea..." they both say at the same time.
Once in the mess, they see everyone eating...including Felix eating rice cakes in his VR world.
"That's going to take some getting used to."
"Yea..."
After eating, SoE stands up and rubs his healing wound.
"I am heading to the range, any takers?"
Felix puts down his food on screen and raises his hand but lowers it.
"Kara? Could you watch the bridge? Please!"
"Okay, have fun."
SoE walks down the hall as Felix runs off screen.

[This is were part one ended, good place to take a break if you want to -<(@)__(@)>- ]

In the shooting range, SoE has worked out how to use a Asgard hologram device to make as many targets in whatever shape he pleases and uses his "Weapon of the day" to hit them all in as little time he can, than sets them up again to see if he can beat his own time. Today he is just using standard round targets and a 7.62mm bolt action sniper rifle, he walks over to the controls and makes the targets appear about 20 meters away, than lies down in the prone position for better aim. After a deep breath, he lightly presses the trigger and fires, and moves his sight over to the next target, cycling the bolt as he does so. Shortly after he hits the last target, his radio crackles to life,
"SoE, you there"
"Yea Mularac, I'm down in the shooting range. What's up?"
"I am up here on the bridge with Warren, Kara and some of the others. They want Felix up here, but he didn't respond to them when they called and they thought maybe he was down there and just not listening to them because he wants to watch you."
"He's the ship's AI, can he do that?"
"Honestly, no one is sure, we're all kinda new to this whole AI thing. Anyways, thought we'd check. See ya for lunch."
"Alright, see ya."
He starts to retrain his sights on the targets, but is shocked by the fact they are now the faces of main characters from video games, so he looks over to the controls, only to be shocked again as he sees some creature running through the shadows along the wall, away from the console and into an air shaft.
He reaches up and hits the talk button on his comm,
"Bridge, this is SoE...I think we may have have a problem..."

Up on the bridge, Warren leans toward the speaker,
"Problem?"
"Yea...like...I just saw... I guess a creature playing with my target generator."
"Creature?"
"Not sure what it was, but it was humanoid and small. It was in the shadows, so I didn't get a good look at it."
"Where'd it go?"
"Air shaft."
A moan is heard from Alex,
"Don't they always?"
Piper plops into a chair,
"Seems like."
Warren holds up a hand to quiet them down,
"SoE, we'll just have Felix scan for it. Felix, need you to scan the air system."
Nothing.
"Felix?" He taps the talk switch on his radio, "Caine, report to the computer core room when able." He taps it again, "Kara, can you come too?"
"Sure."
When they get to the computer core, they Caine is already at the main terminal, and judging by the wrappers and cans, has been there for some time. He looks up with bloodshot eyes,
"He's gone."

"Gone?"
Kara and Warren say at the same time. Caine nods,
"Yes, gone. And, near as I can tell, there is something else in the core, not sure what it is. All I know is it's not Felix, and smart. I am trying to reach it's core files, see if I can find out anything..."
After a few moments, the screen pops up "Access Denied" and then the ship drops out of hyperspace, light-years from anything. Caine stands up with his hands in the air,
"Didn't do it"
Then the screen explodes, showering Caine with sparks, he shields his face with his arms, but they still get burned. All the lights on the ship go out, leaving only E lights at run on battery power.
Kara turns on her mic,
"Get Mularac down here with a Med kit, we also need flashlights in engineering and get SoE to bring some of his 'toys.' Well, have everyone get a Zat, we have no idea what we are dealing with here."
Mularac gets there and starts to tend to Caine,
"He'll be fine, it's only about as bad as a sunburn, you guys go find out what's going on."
Kara and Warren start to run, but Kara taps him on the shoulder,
"I am heading to the bridge to keep tabs on things from there."
She heads down another hall and Warren is joined by Piper, Alex, SoE, and Bob soon after. They walk into the room as they swing their flashlights around, bathing the room in light.
A clicking noise is heard from the far side of the room and they all point the lights at it, just in time to see something move. Alex, Bob, and SoE all fire their Zats, but the thing runs past them, now making a noise like a child screaming. They all chase it, never getting a good chance to fire, as it runs through the ship. It leads them to the bridge and it jumps on Kara, still making that sound, but not as loud.
Her chest feels damp, and she forces herself to look down, then she sees it really is a screaming child, but it's head is turned downward, dripping the tears that made her shirt wet. It turns it's head up to look at her, showing that it's a young boy in a state of pure terror,
"KARA, WHY DID THEY SHOOT AT ME?!"
She stares back at him in shock, now knowing that voice,
"FELIX?!"

[I know, right?]

"Sorry, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to break the ship, I'm sorry..."
Felix sobs out as he shakes his head back and forth on Kara's shoulder. She starts to rub the back of his head,
"It's ok, just help us fix it and tell us what happened."
He wipes his eyes and sniffles a bit, then looks over at the rest of the crew, who are still in shock.
"I found designs for replicater blocks, and used the teleporter to generate one, and had it build more using metal from the crates SoE used to use for targets. After that, I made an AI to run the ship while I was...doing other things"
Caine looks up from the bandages on his arms,
"That thing in the core?"
"Yup, and after I got to play a bit, I was going to tell you."
Bob speaks up,
"Play? You mean play with our heads?"
He nods.
"Yup, he's like Caine after all."
Much to everyone's surprise, Felix jumps up and gets a cup of water, takes a drink, and goes back to explaining,
"Hmm, I like water. Anyways, the AI failed, making the ship drop out of hyperspace and shutting off the lights. Whatever happened also cut off my link to the computer core, so I had to use a terminal and I thought you guys would find me in engineering and then I would tell you. BUT NO, you shot at me!"
SoE hides his Zat as him and the others hang their heads. Piper smacks Warren, SoE, and the Flyboys, and they say in one all together,
"Sorry Felix."
Felix moves over to a workstation and types for a moment, bring the lights back on, then he stops and sits on the floor with his eyes closed.
"Link reestablished, lower AI removed"
Warren just rubs his head,
"Well...it's been a full day...I think we all need rest. Off to bed, I'll take first watch, I can't sleep."
As the crew files off the bridge, Felix pokes Warren's arm,
"Where do I sleep?"
"Right...guess you need a bed now, don't you? Wait, do you?"
"I want one."
"Alright, jump us back into hyperspace, and I'll help you find something."
Felix closes his eyes, and the ship jumps as they walk off the bridge...

[Just a side note, my firefox adds spaces at each line break, so I have to go through it and nuke them...Takes a long time....(v)__(v) So if anyone know why and how to stop it from doing that, I would like to know, thank you. By the way when I put stuff in [] it is to show that it is a note from me, Warren. But you guessed that by now, didn't you?]