Fool's Gold (The Wandering Engineer) Read Online Free PDF Page A

stock information was next to
useless. She had been severely modified over time so nothing would be to spec.
He checked the logs of the family junk pile Sprite had compiled.
    After
nearly a half hour of browsing the known list he signed off. It was interesting
really, the family had been collecting junk either on the station through trade
or salvage for possibly centuries. Much of what Sprite had listed in the spread
sheet was only the top layer closest to where he had been standing. If you
added in the past one hundred years or so below and behind that, it was quite a
haul. Some of the data was sketchy at best, with just a weak transponder link
to identify the object. He sighed and rolled over, letting slumber finally take
him.
     

Chapter 2
     
    The
next morning he woke after his customary four hours of sleep, but spent an hour
digesting reports from Sprite while he tapped the power net to recharge his
implants.
    “So
you can't get into engineering or the luxury suites at all?” he asked, going
over the AI's report. She had mapped out areas in the mainframe that were
jealously guarded by what she called a senile civilian AI. He shook his head
and grimaced.
    “Not
without tripping every alarm that overloaded AI has. It's so senile I am afraid
of what it would do, it could send bots after me and wreck something
important.” She shook her virtual head. “It has the home field advantage here;
it was built into the network. It may have retreated to the critical systems
areas, but I am not going to push it unless I have to,” she reported. He
grunted.
    “Did
you get any more information on the station itself?” he asked. Data scrolled
across his field of view, then her virtual image.
    “Oh
loads, but its eight centuries of junk and debris. It's going to take a
dedicated librarian AI to sort out this mess. There is crap... Let's just say
organics aren't the only pack rats in the universe.” She sighed. He chuckled.
    “Yeah,
I can imagine,” he replied.
    “Then
again, since you created us, it's not exactly our fault,” she said smiling.
“Fruit doesn't fall far from the tree in other words?” he said getting dressed.
“Something like that Admiral. By my calculations the family should be getting
up right about...” He heard a soft thunk in the living quarters. “Now,” she
said rather smugly. He chuckled again.
    “That
sounds like O’Reilly; he has a bounce shift and should be heading off soon.
Mrs. Valdez is in the refresher now; she should be getting ready for her shift
in the greenhouses as soon as she chases the kids off to school,” Sprite
reported.
    “They
have a school here?” he asked looking up.
    “Rudimentary
one Admiral, circa eighteenth or nineteenth century Earth. It is as much a day
care and child labor camp as it is a place of learning. The basics are taught,
reading, writing and arithmetic I believe you call it. During periods like
harvesting and planting, they have no schooling at all.” Sprite brought up a
timetable and showed it to him as he stretched. He wasn't happy about seeing
the kids cleaning air ducts. That wasn't kosher in his book.
    “Right.
So they rely on manual labor as much as mechanical labor even on a space
station. That also means they are not afraid of work and getting their hands
dirty. Good to know,” he nodded as he pushed the key to open the door. It
didn't budge.
    “Locked
in,” Sprite reported. “Mechanical lock outside the mainframe.”
    “Jack
in Admiral and I can get us out,” Proteus replied. Defender sent a concurrent
thought.
    “That
may not be wise; it may alarm our host’s Admiral,” Sprite reported.
    The
Admiral shrugged. “No helping it, I'm not going to be a prisoner. I had fifteen
months of that on Io.” He placed his right hand up to the keypad. Proteus sent
tendrils of nanites out into the cracks around the buttons, entering the
electronics. After a moment the door opened.
    “Did
you log the things the living quarters need?” he asked