Free Destination: Void: Prequel to the Pandora Sequence by Frank Herbert

can’t see all their behavior . If we miss one linkage we could upset a vital master program.”
    “We’re just not going to miss any linkages. The schematics are all available. This isn’t flying blind. The AAT is the only thing we could really foul up, and at this distance from Moonbase it’s of dubious value.”
    Does he want to cut us off from the UMB? Flattery wondered. They suggested he might try it. We can’t let him do that.
    “If you demolished the AAT system,” Flattery said, “how long would it take to restore communications?”
    “Fifteen to twenty hours,” Bickel said. “We could have a jury rig doing the job by then.”
    Flattery looked questioningly at Timberlake.
    “That’s about right,” Timberlake agreed.
    “We use the AAT as a basis for our simulator,” Bickel said. “We’ll raid colony stores for reels of neuron fiber, Eng multipliers, and the other basic components. What we have to get is a system that simulates human nerve-net function.”
    “But will it be conscious?” Flattery asked.
    “All we can do is cut and try,” Bickel said. “Our computer and even the AAT work on analogue additive principles. We’re going to build a system that’s strictly infinite multiplying. Our system will produce message units that are products of many multipliers.”
    “You make it sound so simple,” Prudence said. “Connect net A to net B at points D and D prime and you get the Consciousness Factor—CF for short.”
    Bickel’s lips thinned. “You have a better plan?”
    Did I push too hard? she wondered. And she spoke quickly, “Oh, I’m with you, Bickel. You obviously know all the answers.”
    “I don’t know all the answers,” Bickel growled, “but I’m not going to sit out here moaning about fate … and I’m not turning back.”
    What if we have to turn back? Flattery wondered. What do we do about Bickel’s inhibition then?
    “Are you going to wait for Moonbase to answer?” Flattery asked.
    Bickel glanced at Prudence. “I’d prefer starting at once, but that means I’d miss my shift on the board … and since I’ll need Tim—”
    “We can handle it,” Flattery said. “Everything seems to be running smoothly.”
    Prudence looked up at the big board and the inactive repeaters over her couch, wondering at her sudden feeling of chill. I’m afraid to take that board, she thought.
    Those thousands of lives down in the hyb tanks … all depending on right-the-first-time reactions. Did the UMB big-domes really know what they were doing when they sent us out here? Was this the only way? Should we dehyb more people to help us? But that would overload several systems … including the Bickel system.

Chapter 10
    The Chase has fascinated humankind from the beginning, and with good reason. What many failed to understand, however, was that there could be the excitement of the chase even where the only thing you were chasing was an idea, a concept, a theory. As awareness developed, it became apparent that this was the most important chase of all, the one upon whose outcome all of humankind survives or fails.
    —Raja Lon Flattery, The Book of Ship
    The creaking of their action couches, the click-click of relays—all of the subtle and familiar sounds of Com-central worried at the edges of Prudence’s awareness.
    For the past half-hour, Bickel had been fussing through the schematics, plotting his way into the computer, sharing parts of his plan with the others. She had come to dislike the sound of the schematics being shuffled.
    There were tensions here that she did not fully understand, but her own role remained clear—mediate and goad … mediate and goad.
    The common stench of Com-central carried an acridity which she identified as fear.
    We have a chance at glory, she told herself. Very few people ever have that opportunity.
    It was an empty pep talk, forever confronted by that inescapable fact:
    I am not people.
    For the first time since coming out of the hyb tank, she felt