Session 30 – OC Prime

We see server racks and storage cases, as well as the corpse drawer. The hacker has loaded the data we need on one of the drives. Cam starts to download it. Eve and Raptor stand guard.

No more robots appear. We finish the download and head out the back emergency exit. We ascend 13 stories to the main spaceport level.

We see a security guard ahead of us and he motions for us to get down. We see the signs in the area are all static and some of them are showing cartoons. Suddenly a hail of gunfire comes toward the guards and they return fire. It sounds like sentry guns — is this the AI controlling everything?

Cam tries to message the AI but does not hear back. We try to sneak away amid the fighting. Raptor jetpacks away and Eve does some acrobatics. Cam gets grazed by autofire.

We seem to have reached relative safety. There are security guard, and they escort us to the landing zone, apologizing for the inconvenience. We hurry to the ship.

As we arrive, they tell us that the ship has already left port. In fact Eve, by video, asked for permission to leave. We assume Canti is still on board, but he does not reply. Cam hacks in to the main (inactive) system and sees the ship is outbound at full burn towards Pallas. Next he hacks in to the cameras and sees Canti trying to hack into the system.

Cam tries to get into the engine settings but realizes that may be too overt. He lets Canti know by direct message to switch the hard line in 5 minutes. Cam then locks out all other users.

Eve contacts a taxi so we can get to the ship once it has stopped. Canti switches over the system and Cam gains control. He checks the system and it seems ok, then slows the ship so we can catch up. We will get there in 10 minutes.

We catch up and Cam logs in to the full VR. He sees that the backup is trying to get into the main system. He tells Canti to cut the power on the secondary. It shuts off and everything seems okay all of a sudden.

We dock with the ship and Canti says that he was just sitting there and the ship took off by itself. He was in cyber combat with whoever was controlling it when Cam contacted him. The combatant was an anime-like energy being chick.

We redirect to Ceres to lie low for a while. Eve contacts Yusuf to visit from Luna and help us. Cam tries to pick through the data of the break in and sees that it was an extremely complex AI.

Yusuf arrives and looks at the data we lifted. The whole planet-killer virus was apparently a ruse. The program would never work, it is just a bunch of bullshit. Yusuf looks at the logs of the break-in. He says it seems like a person’s hand and couldn’t possibly be an AI. He asks to see the core data. Cam lets him even though it might be dangerous.

We search the whole ship for intruders and find nothing except one of the tower relay droids downloaded and then uploaded a huge amount of data to the ship. This likely happened on Hektor.

Yusuf says that the AI is extremely close to human, as if the hacking programs had been installed directly into brain cells. We should wipe everything just to be sure. On the logs he sees a set of signature bytes — it was Overclock?!

We decide to load up the AI on a standalone terminal with no wireless access. She says that her name is OC Prime. ZilchCorp activated the AI at their facility after Overclock died. She tried to get away using our ship. We turn her off and decide what to do.

We recall that the job with Overclock was fixed by Bengal. WE have Raptor call him but someone named “Scooter” answers. He says Bengal was hauling precious metals and was jumped by some punks and was killed. Scooter is trying to take over his remaining business. Raptor says that he will never be successful using a name like “Scooter.” Scooter hangs up on him. Raptor adds Scooter to “the list.”

We boot up the AI again and ask her if the lured us to Hektor. She admits that she did. Eve says in exchange for finding info on Artemis we will set her free. We will even give her access to a computer in the drifts (near the manufacturing company we infiltrated) as a safe haven for her code if she needs to hide out.

She agrees to our terms. We decide to put her on a server on Mars and set up a spot on a private message board for her to leave messages for us to let us know of her progress.

We wipe the ship’s core with the AI. Yusuf creates a custom firewall so she can’t get on the ship again.

We head to the the drifts and separate the factory from the local receiving node, so OC Prime can’t take advantage of the factory’s resources while she si there. We create a lead box so she can’t access anything else. Raptor rigs C-4 to the room and gives Eve the remote detonator.

We move to the next mission.