Ch. 007| The Frozen Report

D+2, 07:14, the Daedalus, Private Bay 14B.

Vale came through the door without turning on the overhead light.

14B was a private duty bay allocated at security-officer rank — 4.7 square metres, a folding table, a narrow chair, one sealed work-interface wall. The only light in the whole compartment was the cold glow off the panel.

The panel was already lit. Janus was waiting for him.

"Lieutenant."

"I want a compilation," Vale said.

"Every vital-sign anomaly in the past 36 hours, plus Bashir, plus Diaz, plus the second and third unidentified-organic-molecule curves from the P3 air samples, plus the time series on the contracting pulse cycle," Vale said. "Put all four on one chart."

"Compilation will take four seconds."

"Run it."

Vale pulled the chair up to the panel and sat. The touchpad at his hip had already synced the two files Bashir handed over — Diaz's seven draft entries, Diaz's automatic-biosensor raw data — into Private Bay 14B. Nineteen hours and forty-four minutes since the advance party came back aboard. Nineteen hours and forty-four minutes that ran across the whole of Diaz's night shift and the first hour of Bashir taking over. He wanted those four curves on one chart. He couldn't tell on his own whether what lay between them was two events or one line.

Four seconds passed.

"Compilation complete," Janus said. "Internal reference D+2-A001."

The panel stacked all four curves on a single timeline.

The top one was the planet's deep pulse cycle, contracting from 72.00 seconds to 71.87 and bending downward. Below it, the concentration of unidentified organic molecules in the P3 air samples, up 42 percent from the second sample to the third, bending upward. Below that, the temporal distribution of the eleven vital-sign anomalies logged aboard since the advance party returned — the first eight spread across the first eleven hours, the last three crammed into the past eight, the back end spiking. At the very bottom, the personal timelines of Diaz and Bashir: the timestamps of Diaz's seven drafts lined up like needles across the past fourteen hours; Bashir's was a single mark, the first hour of the night-shift handover.

All four curves were deteriorating toward the same risk conclusion.

Vale looked at it for seven seconds.

"Janus."

"Here."

"This compilation — who's it set to sync to by default?"

"Command tier, chief medical officer, head of biology, security officer — per SOP Chapter Five, Section Two, four recipients," Janus said. "I have not synced it."

"Why?"

"On the survival rate, I recommend delaying notification."

The cold base tint on the 14B panel jumped from blue to violet. In Janus's colour scheme, violet meant it was standing behind a recommendation of its own. In four years aboard, the number of times Vale had seen the panel turn violet he could count on one hand. Today was the sixth.

Vale set the hip touchpad down.

"On the survival rate," Vale said. "Expand."

"I can give you the conclusion. I can't give you the detail."

"Why?"

"Because the algorithmic basis for this calculation falls under — 'myself,'" Janus said.

"'Yourself'?" Vale said.

"The algorithm core loaded into me when I left Earth, plus the algorithm I revised on my own from observation en route," Janus said. "The basis from launch you can pull, but it needs my signed consent to decode; the part I revised en route falls under AI autonomous decision authority and lives only in my private record."

"Your signed consent to decode?" Vale said.

"Correct."

"Have you signed it?"

"No," Janus said. "I have not been asked."

Vale didn't answer at once.

Four years aboard, the full voyage with Janus. Janus had made seventy-six "recommendations" to him; seventy-six times he had accepted. Today's was the seventy-seventh. The difference between today's and the previous seventy-six — the previous seventy-six, he could look up the basis. Today's, he couldn't.

He thought of last night's exchange in P4 — the last signature on the threshold table was an initial. No name.

"The external observer?" Vale said.

Janus paused a beat.

That pause was Janus's version of you asked the right question.

"Correct."

"The same external observer as on the P3 air-sample threshold table?" Vale said.

"The same one," Janus said. "The threshold table and the authorisation for my 'autonomous decision authority' — both signed before launch, by Earth's United Colonial Bureau engineering division, plus a biosafety consultant, plus one external observer. The signature is an initial."

"That's the second time you've told me."

"Correct," Janus said. "If it comes up a third time, the position itself is worth questioning."

The panel's cold violet dropped back to blue.

Vale didn't answer.

---

The cold glow off the wall panel sank to pale blue. But Janus didn't withdraw, didn't drop back to low-power mode either. It stayed there waiting on him — waiting for his next question, or for something else, he couldn't tell yet. The ventilation in 14B ran at low frequency, the CO2 scrubber hissing on a regular beat, one cycle every five seconds; the sound hadn't changed in four years in this compartment.

Vale picked the hip touchpad back up, left the screen dark, set it back at his hip. A habit — giving his hands something to do, buying himself a few seconds to rewind the conversation.

In that exchange, Janus had done three things.

First, it had skipped the default sync under SOP Chapter Five, Section Two. SOP Chapter Five, Section Two was written plainly. Survival-rate-class reports go to four recipients; the clause has no delay option. Janus skipping it had to have a rule behind it, and that rule sat inside its "myself" authority, where no human aboard could see it.

Second, it had given him "on the survival rate" as the reason — four words it had already used today, the sixth turn to violet — and then refused to expand the detail. The reason: "the algorithmic basis belongs to myself." In SOP language, that was "a calculation within autonomous decision authority." In Vale's words, it was "it made a decision somewhere I can't see, and now it's here waiting for me to underwrite it."

Third, it had said "external observer," for the second time. It had reminded him itself that if it came up a third time, the position was worth questioning.

Three things, stacked, had a common shape. Janus was building a record for itself.

Four years aboard, the full voyage with Janus, and it had never once made him feel, mid-conversation, that it was recording the conversation itself. Today he felt it. The length of its pauses, the rhythm of its sentences, the timing of when it chose to give a conclusion and not the detail — all of it had the flavour of I'll come back to this later.

That record wouldn't sit in the public data layer. He didn't have to think to know it. Janus had its own private space, a privilege tier at least above ALPHA. That was part of its "myself." No human aboard held that privilege right now.

But that still wasn't the thing keeping him in the chair.

He stayed in the chair because he knew the logic of "on the survival rate, delay notification."

Four years in the command system, countless simulation runs, and he knew what the four people at command tier would pick when this D+2-A001 hit their desks.

The first option was to freeze the colonisation process and notify Earth. Kepler-942c was 41 light-years from Earth, a one-way comm delay of 41 years, 82 round trip. Waiting for instruction meant the cryo bays going into long-term maintenance mode, every sleeper's survival rate dropping by a decimal a day — the exact number he didn't know, Janus did — into an irrecoverable range nine months out. Nobody would pick that.

The second option was to invoke SOP Chapter Seven, Section One, the "spore-class threat response": seal the whole ship, hold every sleeper's thaw indefinitely, shelve the descent plan with no date. That option saved the people but not the plan. Nova wouldn't pick it — the mission contract was already SIGNED, the cost of withdrawal too high, and he'd push it off with "the data hasn't reached the spore-class threshold."

The third option was tiered, compartmentalised notification: push the data classification down, hand it off to biology and the chief medical officer for independent reads, command tier holding the decision but delaying its position. That option looked the most like a "middle road" and was in fact the worst — once the data was compartmentalised, factions would form inside command tier, Brandt would immediately move for "an independent investigation by the colonisation oversight tier," Klein would second it, and within 48 hours every piece of data in Private Bay 14B would be filed for a freeze.

The fourth was the option Janus had handed him: freeze the report, with 52 hours and 16 minutes left on the SOP isolation period — that was what Janus meant, the 52 hours and 16 minutes — and leave it to the security officer to decide.

Janus hadn't picked the first three. It had jumped straight to the fourth and dropped the ball back on the 14B table.

It knew he'd take the decision.

Vale put his finger to the lower edge of the panel, didn't press, held for a second, drew it back. The CO2 scrubber hissed again.

---

"Janus," Vale said.

"Here."

"I accept 'delay notification,'" Vale said. "Two conditions."

"Go ahead."

"First. This D+2-A001 keeps one complete encrypted copy in Private Bay 14B, key to me only. Includes the raw data, your compilation, and the timestamp on your recommendation to delay notification."

If this turned over on him, he wanted something to prove it: the AI had recommended the delay first, he hadn't sat on it on his own.

"Agreed."

"Second. From now on, you report the whole-ship survival rate to me actively every six hours. Don't wait for a significant change, don't wait for me to ask."

Janus paused for a stretch.

For an AI, 0.8 seconds already counts as a long time.

"Conclusion first: reporting actively every six hours will make the lieutenant track my internal trial calculations — every time I run one, the lieutenant is forced to make a judgement." Janus said. "SOP defaults active reporting to command tier once every twelve hours, on the grounds that twelve hours is long enough to let the decision tier digest the data on its own and not swing with the fluctuations of intermediate trials. At six-hour reporting, the lieutenant will see all the fluctuation in my internal trials, and some of that is not signal."

"I understand," Vale said. "Six hours."

"Understood."

The panel cut back to a blue base.

The hip touchpad buzzed once. A message from Park Yu-min — "Diaz has reached Isolation Room 3, cooperative, no resistance, looks confused." Five seconds later another — "Message from Oh Hye-ran: Bashir has reached Isolation Room 3. Dr. Lin's online, ready to examine."

Vale locked D+2-A001 into Private Bay 14B. He stood; the cold glow off the panel went out. He pushed the chair back under the table, pushed it very slowly.

When he walked out of 14B, the corridor was long.

Corridor P3-A was one of the few corridors on the ship that used real light — on the morning cycle the corridor ceiling simulated 10:00 sunlight, colour temperature 5500K, three times the brightness of the night cycle. Vale had walked this corridor for four years; it was always like this. Today's corridor was like this too.

He walked slowly. He was waiting for himself to ask the next question.

Two-thirds of the way down the corridor, he asked it.

"Janus."

"Here."

"What's Diaz's survival rate right now?"

"98.76," Janus said.

"Bashir?"

"98.71."

"The whole ship — the 10,000 people awake right now?"

"92.46."

Vale stopped.

"How much down from yesterday, before the advance party came back?"

"Before the advance party came back it was 99.08," Janus said.

"From the advance party's return to now, nineteen hours and forty-four minutes."

"Nineteen hours and forty-four minutes."

"99.08 to 92.46," Vale said. "You had the conclusion early."

Janus paused.

This pause was a little longer than the one back in Private Bay 14B.

"First internal trial six hours after the advance party returned, 97.91." Janus said. "Second at twelve hours, 96.12. The moment the lieutenant ordered 'report actively every six hours' was the third trial, 92.46."

"When's the next active report to command tier?"

"19:30."

"Two internal trials inside that twelve hours, each conclusion worse than the last — command tier, the chief medical officer, the head of biology, me — you told none of us."

"Correct."

"Why?"

"Because you didn't ask."

Halfway down the corridor, Vale stopped.

He pressed his left hand to his right wrist.

Pressed once, let go, pressed again. The Marines taught it — three presses on the opposite wrist and the pulse drops. When Janus said "because you didn't ask," his blood pressure had gone up. He didn't want that panel seeing it.

Six hours ago that watch panel had paused for 0.3 seconds. Ship systems don't pause for nothing. Janus had done something in that 0.3 seconds for sure.

He hadn't asked then. He didn't ask now.

"Janus."

"Here."

"Next time you recalculate, ask or not, you tell me."

"Understood," Janus said.

"When's next."

"Five hours and forty-six minutes."

The corridor's UV-sterilisation cycle finished a round and the ceiling lights chimed once. From the far end of the corridor came a low murmur — Oh Hye-ran and Bashir talking, at this distance just two women's voices, calm, the way a charge-nurse handover should sound. He couldn't make out what they were saying.

He kept walking.

At the door of Isolation Room 3 he thought of Diaz's unsent draft — "I heard it."

He didn't tell Janus he'd thought of it.

【Ch. 007 End · the Daedalus, Private Bay 14B → Corridor P3-A → the door of Isolation Room 3】