“So, Sal, what did you do?” Kris asked.
“I tried to organize all the data I had. I could not find a logical decision tree to fit the data. So I downloaded more data from the ship’s computer and applied several different algorithms. None of them successfully resulted in any kind of logical structure for the data. I did further research, tried more, then decided to wake up Jack to discuss some of the various data sets that were puzzling me.”
“ ‘ To be or not to be’? What kind of question is that?” Jack asked around a yawn.
“Does it really mean he was considering suicide?” Sal asked.
“If he’d had a computer like you messing with his head, he would have done it long ago.”
“But Nelly, I’m not supposed to harm a human. Yet my human tells me I am driving him to self-destruction. Are all humans so fragile?”
“No, dear, they just have a twisted sense of humor. I’ll explain that to you off-line.”
“Nelly, you take your computer off-line, and you get her out of my head so I can sleep.”
“Yes, Jack, I will do that. You can safely go to sleep now.”
“Hold it, Nelly,” Kris said. “Are all the new computers causing this kind of trouble? Am I going to have more people pounding on my door?”
“I don’t think so,” Nelly said, a bit slowly, and not nearly as confidently as Kris wanted to hear. “Penny and her computer are engaged in a lengthy discussion of crime, both actual and fictional. She seems to be enjoying it. The same with the colonel, although their topic is the history and causes of war. I’ve reconnected to them on net, and I’m updating them on how to keep their thoughts to themselves if and when their friends need to get some sleep.”
“Abby?” Kris said, ticking them off on her finger.
“She and Sergeant Bruce apparently turned their computers off before going to bed. Cara is still playing games with her computer. She says it’s ‘way far too cool.’ ”
“Chief Beni?”
“He and his computer are busy examining aspects of electronic wizardry that I will want to drop in on and look at later. I doubt if the chief will get any sleep tonight or be of much use tomorrow. Should I order him to sleep?”
“No, Nelly, we don’t want the computers to become Big Brother. Besides, I doubt if there will be anything happening tomorrow.”
“Big Brother?” Nelly said. “Oh, yes, that is an old book. But you humans still worry about those things, don’t you?”
“Yes, we do. Nelly, there are two more names on the list.”
“Yes, I know, Kris. I’ve brought both Professor mFumbo’s and Captain Drago’s computers back up on my net. I’ve instructed them on how to limit the power of their reflections and keep them out of the heads of their humans. When they wake up, they should not remember any of the dreams they had earlier in the night.”
“Shouldn’t, huh?” Jack said.
“We’ll see how they are at breakfast,” Kris muttered, and now it was her turn to yawn.
The morning, no doubt, would be interesting.
Kris was at her usual seat in the wardroom only fifteen minutes later than usual. Since the Wasp was decelerating toward the nearest jump point, she could expect a quiet day. She was comfortable in a Navy shipsuit.
Jack wandered in, his uniform sharp, undress khakis, even if his eyes were black and bleary.
“You sleep well?” Kris asked as he settled into the seat beside her with a breakfast of dry toast and coffee.
“Once I finally got to sleep. Though my dreams! I ought to sell them to some horror media.”
“Uh-oh. You remember them?” Kris asked.
“No and yes. No, I don’t remember them vividly enough to dictate them and sell them for a plot, but yes, they’re kind of hanging around the back of my head, like a shadow of a shadow.”
“Sal,” Kris asked, “do you remember Jack’s dreams?”
“No, I don’t think so. I got mixed-up images and things that weren’t quite a thought.”
“I told you to ignore them,” Nelly said.
“I did, but they were there, and I had to look at them to see if they were orders for me or instructions or . . .”
“Nelly, do you get things like that from me when I’m sleeping?” Kris asked.
“Not really, Kris. I know that when you’re asleep I’ll get no orders, so I ignore anything coming from you. Maybe this is something else I need to warn my children about.”
Penny arrived next; like Kris, she was in a blue shipsuit. Only when she had her plate settled down across from Kris, did she admit, with a good Irish sigh, that she was tired.
“You stay up all night talking girl talk with your new friend?” Kris asked.
“Mimzy is very interested in crime tales,” Penny admitted. “We had a ball taking apart several cracking good stories.”
“And got to sleep quite late?” Jack said.
“Yes, as a matter of fact.”
“And slept soundly?” Kris asked. “No bad dreams?”
“No dreams at all. Want to tell me how you know and why this matters?” the intelligence officer asked.
Before Kris could answer, two more of Nelly’s kids arrived in the room, one around Professor mFumbo’s neck, the other in Captain Drago’s hand. Held at arm’s length. As if it were venomous.
“Take this thing,” the captain demanded.
“Mine, too,” the professor said, lifting it from his neck.
Both landed on the table none too gently in front of Kris.
“I take it you remember some nightmares,” Kris said slowly.
“God, what horrible. Horrible. Horrible things,” mFumbo spat. “Never. Never again.”
“And you’re sure they came from these?” Kris said, gently moving the computers out of reach of their previous users.
“I never had anything like them, and I’m never going to have anything like them again,” the captain half shouted, “because I’m never putting something like that on again. Ever. Again. I will smash it under my boot if it comes near me.”
Kris pulled them into her lap and out of sight.
“Your concerns are recognized and accepted,” she said, trying to put an end to the show that was drawing attention from everyone present.
The two began to turn away, but Nelly intervened. “Penny, could you please remove their communications interfaces.”
The men showed no interest in pausing until Nelly added, “If you don’t get the wires off them, they may keep hearing things from the computers.”
That froze the men in place just long enough for Penny to hastily, and none too carefully, remove the wires from their temples and around their ears. Then the captain and professor exited the room posthaste, congratulating each other for surviving this inhuman experiment and proposing to eat breakfast in the Scientists’ Refrectory.
“I’m glad that’s over,” Kris said softly to Jack.
Penny handed the wires to Kris. “I take it that these had something to do with you asking me about nightmares.”
“Yes. There was a problem. We solved it before you went to sleep, but not before they did.”
“And not before I did,” Jack added.
Abby and Cara passed the captain and professor on the way out. As soon as they went through the chow line, they joined Kris at her table.
“What bee was in their bonnets?” the maid asked, buttering her toast.
“The computer gave them nightmares,” Kris said. “You turned yours off.”
“Yes. I know Nelly doesn’t like that, but I like to dip my toesies into hot water an itty bit at a time. See how it goes with others,” she said, glancing over her shoulder at the now-empty door. “What was eating them?”