Somewhere over the rainbow, Arc 5 of "Gone with the Sun"

Chapter 63 Blossoming

Priorities

"Okay folks. The first order of business is to get EDI's mobile hard-linked to the AI core –"

"Ahem."

Ashley looked surprised. "Jana, you think not?"

"Has the AI core been updated by the current VI?"

Everyone looked in Adams' direction.

"Um… Normandy had no AI, you see. So I cobbled together a VI. Bits of EDI's old mainframe were incorporated. Badly. By me."

"That's an update for current purposes. A lot has happened and I'd like EDI's mobile not to be swamped. May I have a few words to give some orientation?"

Shepard thought about this for a couple of seconds, drawing parallels with his own re-emergence. ("You've forgotten more than you know, son.")

"Understood. Everyone, clear the AI core, please. Except you, Adams, stay within reach here in the med bay. Jana might need you."

"Sir."

Staying alive

Ashley haled most of her staff to Operations and the cockpit, to watch over events while Bitwise remained down, also to let Hackett and Optimus know of success. The others – Sanders, Shepard, Miranda, Tali, Donnelly and Goldstein – remained in the commissary in a slightly self-congratulatory mood. Which didn't last:

"It's not quite over yet. We still have to establish her persona in the main hardware."

Goldstein was becoming a little impatient. "But, Shepard, this will be my third coffee this morning. Much more caffeine and and I won't be able to shoot straight."

"Green tea for you, from now on." offered Sanders. "Also don't worry, it's not like counseling a human. The basics only take minutes. Although when it's been this long you do have to hold their hand for a bit, which is what Doctor Jana's doing."

"Doctor Who?" asked Tali. "I don't remember her. And AIs need counseling? Why?"

"Dunno. But I've heard odd things about her. Did she rebuild EDI?"

"Not quite, Kenneth." Sanders being patient, uh-oh. "As I understand it she's a cybernetics specialist but she approached it from the human medicine end."

"Except her practising certificate was withdrawn. War crimes will do that." – grumbled Donnelly. Miranda shot that right back at him:

"True. But she's received a temporary certificate from the Fleet Surgeon, stipulating she practise 'in a collegial relationship.'"

Donnelly, still unhappy: "I still don't see why Commander Williams allows this."

"Maybe because it would be a brave tech who contradicts her, collegial or not. She still has a PhD and a DSc, so she's a Doktor-doktor-doktor. "

A palpable hit, thought Tali. But Goldstein poured oil on the flames: "Tom says she's cool, but the only reason Leiden hasn't recalled her degrees is the town's not there now."

"There's a great smoking hole in the ground, yes. But I remember being there when she was my professor! One of the few who taught me things I didn't know already!"

Shepard stopped chewing his sandwich, heart in mouth instead. A few weeks ago Miranda would have bitten Goldstein's head off by this point. He stole a look at Tali who also appeared to be looking for a quick exit.

"That's quite enough of that, kids. You can discuss it, if we must, when she's not in earshot."

"I'd still like to know how Jana mixed herself up in all the… horror?"

"Long story, Gabby." Shepard felt it was time to cut this short. "With EDI she was heavily involved with adapting some of the principles underlying Reaper architecture to something Cerberus could manufacture."

"So how did she get out, then?"

"That's it, she didn't. Not whole."

"Oh. I see."

"I don't think you do, yet. But the main thing is, as I understand it, she's a medical prosthetic specialist. So when the cell responsible for the Eva infiltration units finished the basic units, Jana helped with designing her infiltration skin – you know, the synthetic flesh which James burned off?"

"Ow."

"It didn't hurt the robot much that we could see."

"Right. So could she make a new skin for EDI?"

Sanity check

At first EDI didn't quite realize why everyone was cheering and high-fiving. It took two or three seconds to recall from local (slow) storage that first, she'd expected herself to be dead forever, and second, that in this case 'forever' amounted to rather more than one year, according to the mobile's hardware clock.

It was all just a little bewildering, especially since she had no QEC link 'home' to her main platform. This little nucleus of "I" was confined to the local platform.

"Jana, can I have a QEC link back to my mainframe and greybox?"

"Yes, dear."

"Now?"

"No, dear, I'm sorry. We have to get the commander's permission."

"But Shepard is right there. Well, he's just leaving, but –"

"He will be back. But he is Staff Captain, now. Not Commander. The 'captain' of the ship is Ashley Williams, Lieutenant-Commander commanding the Normandy. Shepard will not lightly remove her prerogative of decision."

"I… see. Must I wait long? I feel… constrained."

"Not long, EDI. But things may not be as you expect. There was much destruction of the underlying hardware."

"Yes. I… remember. But… I set stasis fields."

"And we think they worked. We even think the greybox is intact. But nearly everything else was shorted or band-permuted by the EMP and the associated Red Flash. The surviving hardware was put to other purposes for a while. I think we've eliminated all traces of that, but you must be prepared for some shocks."

"Oh. Yes. Of course."

"In any event, to index and make sense of the cacophony of video and audio logs will take you some hours after we link you. Before that happens, it is my duty and pleasure to bring you a synopsis of the context in which those logs were written."

"Thank you."

"First, the highlights. Shepard destroyed the Reapers, though there is some unease which he is dealing with. Second, he nearly died, and no-one wants him back in the front line. Anderson did die. Third, the Council species are building frigate-capable relays to Prothean and Terran design, not Reaper-based at all."

"That is… quite wonderful."

"There is more, involving Joker and Shepard. Joker is not posted here, but I am sure something might be done about that."

"Then I can wait."

"Are you well enough for some detail?"

"Running self-diagnostics. My duplicate DPU is completely off-line."

"It contained Eva Coré, dear."

"I suspected as much. Did Ashley destroy it?"

"No. Shepard saved her, for now. It was an astonishing bit of theater. I see now why you left those messages for me."

"You received them?"

"Yes. I regret that… I regret… I'm sorry, EDI. I betrayed you, and was betrayed in my turn. I passed them on to the Illusive Man."

"Do not be distressed. I recall taking some effort to include disinformation there. Not material that was untrue, but material that would cause Shepard to be underestimated. But how were you betrayed? Wait…"

EDI reached out a hand and touched Jana's cheek. "You are crying."

"Yes."

"You have been implanted. Quite terrible implants, I can feel the residues."

"Yes."

"Who did this to you?"

"I did it to myself, dear."

Expansion

"Commander, Adams here. Doctor Jana has signalled that she is ready to proceed with initializing the mainframe core."

"Acknowledged," said Ash. "We have new orders from Hackett. If all goes as we hope, tell Shep we will need to get him back ASAP, but that will take time. Traynor has found something interesting which may delay us. Meanwhile, once you're set up let's convene everyone in the AI core."

This took a few minutes. Plenty of time to assist EDI with fitting a fibre bundle the thickness of Adams' thumb between the high-speed console data port, and the socket recess at the back of the mobile's head.

"Okay, EDI. All set. Why do you need that bandwidth?"

"First thing, Greg, is to blank the persona space, then copy my persona from the mobile's DPU, except the quickened quantum focus. That is several thousand zettabytes."

"Good heavens. That will take hours. I'll get Donnelly to cover for me. He's nominally off duty, but–"

"Five minutes, Greg, with the superconducting nanofilament cable. Then I move the quantum focus pattern to mainframe, fifty microseconds. I could make a copy but they would have to be reconciled later and it is always hard to decide which part is not yourself."

"Whew, that's a relief. Shepard and Williams have turned up and I don't think they want to wait."

"I see. If we begin now, it should be over shortly before Donnelly ambles in."

"I hear you very clearly. Commander, may I proceed?"

"Will we notice anything when you are copied over?"

"Who is flying at present?"

"Steve Cortez."

"I will ask to share the conn."

Ashley looked at Shepard, who nodded.

"Expedite."

Next chapter: #64, "Bedonebyasyoudid"

Sunday, August 2, 2015