"Jummie boi! took your time eh?" Sam, the engineering chief of the division eyed Jumar as he floated down from the top. "Ya like that CK-N stuff that much?"
Jumar chuckled. "No, not really, sir."
"Then glad to see ya haven't gone bonkers yet, mate." Sam smirked. "We're preparin' for the maintenance. See if ya can find some madlads fixin' the dockin' modules."
Sam then turned to look at one of the personnel above him and spoke.
"Make sure them bloody hatches be fokin' alright, aye mates? SOCS ain't innere to babysit ya assies."
"As for you, Jummie boi, get bloody goin'!" Sam laughed as he shooed Jumar away.
Jumar chuckled as he hopped towards the 'Roof' of the bay area and made sure that the piping was ready for a vacuum purge, looking for loose fluid cables, tightening fixtures, making sure that the fundamental system parts were well connected to the auxiliary generator.
It was a great distraction for Jumar to take his mind off of the life threatening implant he was going to get 56 hours from now.
"Jummie boi! Come downnere mate!" Sam called out to him.
"Yeah, wait a second!" Jumar fastened a loose bolt on a panel and hopped across the bay. "What's the problem here?"
"Ya see here Jummie, the A.I protocol's all messed up cause SOCS hadda'n oopsie. Think ya can fixit?" Sam asked.
"I'll take a look." Jumar crouched down on the terminal.
Jumar had a background experience in programming and software engineering back on Earth when he was still 14 years old. He did a lot of odd jobs, he only stopped once he got caught stealing some data from an insurance company.
He helped design some basic A.Is before, so he was familiar with the basic framework of SOCKS' sub-ai's.
He browsed through the coding slowly as he figured out some minor problems here and there like the massive stacks of repeat commands that are pending and causing a system latency issue. Jumar cleared them but there was still a problem with the command prioritization of the basic access and information log. According to the coding only Class 6 personnel was allowed remote access to anything, making it confusing since MAIRA, formally known as Maintenance and Administration Interface Recognition Access System, was built for the use and access of Personnel Class 5 and below.
It did not make sense for MAIRA to suddenly cease all access for the personnel it was made for.
Jumar held a True/False test on MAIRA's command prompt and all of MAIRA's responses were all nominal, there seemed to be no problem in the programming.
'Something's not right.' Jumar furrowed his brows. 'Lets try this then. The most classic command is command_000, I hope it can give me some access to the logs at the very least.'
[execute: command_000] Jumar typed.
[Access Granted_Decompressing files]
[System Administrative Log]
[Personnel Log]
[Network Log]
Jumar browsed through the [System Administrative Log] and found that MAIRA had not permitted any personnel below Class 6 access to anything in the past 7 hours.
Weird. MAIRA had been acting weird for the past 7 hours? It's not just the prioritization that's been fucked with. It was he whole goddamn system that's been tampered.
'The hell is going on…' Jumar sighed. 'Let me try my luck again.'
[execute: command_1] Jumar typed.
[Error: Unknown Syntax]
Jumar sighed as he pressed back. He knew he wouldn't be that lucky.
Jumar browsed the [Personnel Logs] on MAIRA and found out a bunch of requests for remote access from personnel that have been outright denied by the system. Hundreds of them piled out on a list as many of them were classified as spam authorization requests that were mainly messages from pissed personnel stuck in modules.
"This is really weird." Jumar could not help but be surprised.
Dozens of messages were still flowing in to request remote access to the hatches in real time. This meant that dozens more personnel were still stuck somewhere because MAIRA was acting weird.
Jumar furrowed his brows further and looked at [Network Logs] and found out the reason.
[Received: Directive_568]
[Time received: 3:6:4:8:136:17]
[Sender: Director Marx Lindon Class 8 Personnel of the Executive Department of Exodus Starship]
Jumar cocked his head back in surprise.
'Sir Lindon issued directive 568?' Jumar furrowed his brows in confusion. 'He was the Director of the software development project… Technically the founder of SOCS and the sub A.Is.'
Jumar rubbed his chin.
"Why would he restrict system access…"
The answer to the question was beyond Jumar, as he realized it, the more helpless he felt.
[Central Control, this is Jumar Ordis, requesting authorization to meet Mr. Lindon.]
[Denied.] A robotic voice responded.
Jumar switched to general frequency.
[This is Dispatch 7, is there anyon-]
[Denied.]
Jumar switched to personal frequency.
[Eliza, do you co-]
[Denied.]
"Fuck." Jumar cursed.
He opened his IRIS and tried to contact Eliza with a text message.
[Message Failed to Send]
[ERROR: 1502912311]
Jumar grit his teeth.
"Diagnostic report."
IRIS went blank for a few seconds before displaying the diagnostics.
[Hardware Diagnostics]
[System Diagnostics]
[Network Diagnostics]
"/Test_System_Diagnostics:(T/F):?"
[Running Diagnostic Check]
[Processor: 98% Efficiency]
[Storage Used: 67%]
[Pending System Processes: 0]
[Status: Nominal]
[IRIS OS version: Ver. 12.31 (Most recent version: Ver. 12.31)]
Jumar sighed in relief, at least his IRIS seemed alright, system wise.
"/execute: Network_Status_Diagnostics."
[Warning: This command will cause IRIS to consume 20% of total power in the next 45 seconds.]
[Do you wish to proceed, Administrator?]
[Y/N]
Jumar checked his battery. '98%, should be enough to last a few days even with 20% gone.'
"Proceed execution."
IRIS immediately shut down and rebooted back up. Jumar could then feel the implant heating up as the power started to drain extremely fast.
Finally, IRIS HUD was back online in his right eye and gave him a message.
[Network Diagnostics have been updated.]
[Radio]
[Pulse]
[Router]
[Cable]
"The IRIS network was also silenced huh…" Jumar slumped down the velcro padded wall. "This isn't funny."
"Waddya find there mate?" Sam asked with concern.
"Entire network is down, Executive board sent a directive to isolate us from one another." Jumar rubbed his hair. "A few dozen pissed personnel have been isolated for a while. Trapped in hatch modules."
"Bloody hell, mate." Sam held a look of disbelief. "What the bloody fuckwit are those wankers doin'?"
"I don't know." Jumar shook his head. "I suggest we get mechanics to do a manual override on the hatches where some personnel are trapped in."
"Bloody hell alright." Sam went off to call on some spare engineers to go and contact the mechanic division.
"The fuck is happening…" Jumar rubbed the back of his neck.
[Administrator, you have a scheduled {Implant Surgery} 15 minutes from now on {Cybernetics Ward 7}. Please be there on time.]
IRIS displayed the message in front of him.
'Great. I almost forgot about that.' Jumar sighed.
"Sir, I have to go." Jumar called out to Sam. "I have an appointment with the scalpel."
"Do ya now Jummie?" Sam laughed. "Be sure to survive out 'ere will ya, we need that noggin of yours to find out what those executive wankers are up ta."
"Yes sir, I'll keep that in mind."
Jumar detached himself from the velcro padding and hopped off to the corridors again, floating like a suspended balloon as he nimbly flew across corridors and connector joints where he soon managed to reach the central access hall.
The central access hall was a massive tube that was 12 meters in diameter and was 800 meters long which connected the entire starship. Dozens of personnel zipped past one another on this area as they made their way across the entire ship and into the rest of the areas.
Jumar climbed on to the side and launched himself from the railings towards the Cybernetics ward where he entered a large access joint and into the massive cavern full of metal and sparks.
There were arc welders everywhere trying to cut or weld together some parts that seemed to be a mix of metals and computer parts.
Jumar shook his head and focused, trying to find the entrance to the surgical room in the ward.
"Fuck sake, there it is." Jumar sighed as he saw a well lit corridor with white aluminum plating.
Jumar flew past all the obstructions and successfully made his way to the room where a few personnel in lacquered white coats stood by with a bonesaw in hand.
Jumar instantly paled a few shades of grey.
"Um-"
"OH YEz!" The doctor(?) smiled widely at Jumar. "YOu ah JyuMAR OrdiS, yaS?!"
"Uh…"
"SCHNELL! SCHNELL!!" The doctor(?) dragged Jumar by the hand towards the gurney. "HAHAHA! Zis is so rewarding…"
"Um, I'm not sure about this-"
"Ay, nonsense mein engineer." The doctor(?) giggled as he strapped Jumar to the gurney.
"But- Ah! Wait! WHY ARE THERE SO MANY HARNESS-MHHHPHHH! MMMHHPPHH!" Jumar panicked as the doctor(?) placed a gag on Jumar's mouth.
"Trust me, I'M ze DOCTOR! HaHA!" The Doctor(?) laughed as he strapped on his red gloves and opened a bloodstained drawer. "Now where was- ah! ACHIMEDES! Raus! RAUS! Itz filthy down there!"
The Doctor(?) shooed away a mechanical pigeon that was hiding the drawer as it flew away holding a bloody finger on it's small feet.
Jumar paled even more at the sight. This Doctor(?) clearly needed some psychiatric help, perhaps suffering from closed space induced Psychosis or something.
"You must be wondering my name, ah, kamerade?" The Doctor(?) hovered inches away from Jumar's face, he could even feel the unstable breathing of the Doctor(?).
The Doctor(?) did an aerial curtsy as he kept a solid gaze on Jumar's eyes.
"Forgive me vor not introduzing myzelf." The Doctor(?) spoke slowly. "You can call me… Medic."
"Introductions azide…" The doctor(?) pulled out a syringe. "Letz go practice medizin…"