The main story is that of Rekonin, the AI that's also the McGuffin of the story. But there's also two other important journeys in this short story that deserve their own story circles; Liz (the main perspective character) and Gregorie (the main antagonist).
The main story circle is this:
- Rekonin, an experimental warship is undergoing trials.
- But, the Project Lead turns traitor and hijacks the ship.
- A Terran task force takes control over the ship, flying it to Terran Space.
- Lizbeth Locke, famed mercenary, arrives on the ship to take it back from the Terrans.
- With the help of the ship's AI, she manages to regain control
- But all the crew is killed.
- The ship is returned to the League,
- But the Terrans now have the plans.
- Rekonin is doing her training as a ship's AI.
- She wants to escape sheltered lab environment she is being kept in.
- The ship is hijacked by Terrans, ans she is disabled.
- Liz wakes her up and together they retake the ship.
- In the process, all controls on her had to be removed
- And the entire crew was killed by the terrans, including Control, whom Rekonin loved.
- Rekonin is returned to the League and her 'trial runs'.
- Rekonin now understands what she was made for: War.
- Liz is doing her mercenary thing
- But she gets a call from McKenzie; shit's going down
- Liz enters the hostage situation,
- She wakes up Rekonin
- Reclaims the ship
- But fails to save any of the hostages
- The job is complete, and she goes home.
- But vows to Emelyn that this is the last time someone she was assigned to protect dies.
- Gregorie's hijacking is going great
- But, when Control is killed, the ship goes into lock down
- Now, he has Liz and Rekonin fighting to retake the ship.
- He manages to fight off Liz and kill the hostages,
- And escape with the data.
- However, he is the only survivor, heavily injured
- He returns to Terran Command, and is given a medal
- However, he knows, now, that there's someone pulling the strings and he can't trust his government.
- Rekonin is in the middle of a maintenance cycle, floating in the void.
- This is expected; sometimes they need to take her offline to do stuff.
- Control is late, Rekonin is worried.
- Control usually checks in on her, and told her when she'd be dropping by.
- When Control does show up, she's rushed, says she's sorry, she loves Rekonin, and that Gerald is trying to hijack the ship.
- Control is shot while connected. Rekonin can't even scream.
- Rekonin fades into unconsciousness.
- Liz meets McKenzie, gets briefed.
- Prototype uses Grey and Sooni tech. Hence why the Terrans can't get their hands on it.
- Liz objects to the use of humans in these weird experiments.
- Dante is mentioned. She was the first experiment.
- AI is part human. Gross, but the Grey tech required a sentient biological component.
- Humans need significant help to handle a full ship; but they augmented with computers.
- Liz is to retrieve the ship.
- Gregorie has called a staff meeting with the researchers, to explain the situation.