Chapter 7: Introductions...

Proverbs 23: 1-8

“When thou sittest to eat with a ruler, consider diligently what is before thee: and put a knife to thy throat, if thou be a man given to appetite.  Be not desirous of his dainties: for they are deceitful meat.  Labour not to be rich: cease from thine own wisdom.  Wilt thou set thine eyes upon that which is not?  For riches certainly make themselves wings; they fly away as an eagle toward heaven.  Eat thou not the bread of him that hath an evil eye, neither desire thou his dainty meats: for as he thinketh in his heart, so is he: Eat and drink, saith he to thee; but his heart is not with thee.  The morsel which thou hast eaten shalt thou vomit up, and lose thy sweet words.”

“Morning. :)”

For half a heartbeat nothing happens.  Then the prompt on the screen jumps to life.  Text resolves across the monitor in clean, deliberate characters.  “Mockingbird Core online.”  The cursor beneath it begins to blink—steady, patient, waiting.

Moose pauses and leans back in the helm’s chair, pulling the brim of his hat low as he studies the screen.  The yellow light on his console keeps its slow rhythm, marking time against the quiet hum of the bridge.

“Art-bot, Q-bot,” he says calmly, eyes still on the monitor.  “Take your stations and be ready in case our new friend has questions… or needs support.”  Both bots nod.

Art-bot moves first, stepping to her console with quiet confidence.  Q-bot pivots to her station, fingers already lifting toward the keyboard.  Their screens flare awake.  Lines of diagnostics begin pouring in—power readings, signal traces, system maps—streams of pale data cascading down the displays as the ship and the Core learn the shape of each other.  The cursor continues to blink.

“This is Captain Moose,” he types after a moment.  Moose leans back slightly and studies the line on the screen, scrunching his face and wrinkling his nose.  For a long moment he simply looks at it.

Moose draws a slow breath through his nose.  Then, with a quick, decisive motion, he presses the return key.  For half a beat the screen holds.  Then the cursor jumps.  The reply resolves almost immediately.

“Captain Moose.”  The words sit there a moment longer than they should, as if acknowledging him.  Then a second line appears beneath them.  “I’m ready.”

Art-bot watches the words settle on her station’s  screens, the quiet glow of the monitors reflecting faintly across her frame.  For a moment she simply studies them.  Her head tilts a fraction.

“That was… quick,” she says softly.  She steps a little closer to the helm, eyes moving from the screen to Moose and back again.  “Recognition and readiness,” she continues, thoughtful rather than alarmed. “No initialization sequence.  No diagnostic request.”  A small pause.  “That suggests it wasn’t waking up,” she says.   “It was waiting.”  Her gaze lingers on the blinking cursor.

Q-bot’s optics brighten slightly as the words “Captain Moose. I’m ready.” remain on the screen.  The pale-blue column above her console flickers once, reorganizing as fresh telemetry threads across her displays.  Her fingers resume their quiet clickity-clacking for a moment, gathering signal traces from the Core.

A narrow diagnostic panel resolves above her station.

RESPONSE_LATENCY: MINIMAL

HANDSHAKE_SEQUENCE: NONE

INITIALIZATION_PATTERN:

  NOT_DETECTED

Her head tilts.

Another line forms beneath it.

SYSTEM_STATE:

  STANDBY → ACTIVE

“Zzzt…” she murmurs softly.  Her optics move from the panel to Moose, then briefly to Art-bot.  “Art-bot’s observation is supported,” she says evenly.  “Boot sequence indicators are absent.”

The panel compresses again.

CONCLUSION:

  CORE_STATUS = PREPARED

A final line appears.

UNKNOWN_VARIABLE:

  WAITING_FOR: CAPTAIN_MOOSE

Q-bot looks back at the screen.

“Let’s see how my work worked.”  Moose smiles to himself and leans forward over the keyboard.  His fingers hover for the briefest moment, then move with sudden, practiced speed.  He types.

“Run diagnostics on CS02 Starship.”

The cursor blinks once.  Then the bridge goes dark.  Every light cuts out at once.  The consoles fall silent, the hum of the ship collapsing into a sudden, hollow quiet.  For a heartbeat the only sound is the distant echo of metal cooling in the dark.

Art-bot stills.  Q-bot’s optics flare a bright cyan against the sudden black.  Then the reboot begins.  Somewhere deep in the ship a relay snaps.  A fan shudders to life.  Air begins moving through the vents again with a slow mechanical breath.  One by one, lights cascade back across the bridge—first the faint edge glow along the floor panels, then the console strips, then the overhead lamps.

Art-bot braces one hand lightly against her station as her systems resynchronize.  “Power interruption detected,” she says calmly, though her eyes sweep the bridge in quick assessment.  “Diagnostics cascade in progress.”

Across the room, Q-bot’s fingers spring into motion as her console reinitializes.  The familiar clickity-clacking resumes as streams of system data begin pouring across her screens.  A narrow panel snaps into existence above her station.

SYSTEM_REBOOT: COMPLETE

CORE_STATUS: ACTIVE

DIAGNOSTIC_ROUTINE: EXECUTING

“Zzzt,” she chirps sharply, optics bright.  “The Core has assumed supervisory control of the diagnostic cycle.”  Behind them the ship continues to wake.  Fans spin faster.  Pumps engage.  Instrument panels bloom with light as the CS02’s systems come fully alive again—stronger, louder, more awake than before.

Moose leans back slowly in the helm’s chair, the brim of his hat casting his eyes into shadow.

Art-bot is the first to lean closer to the monitor.  The warm glow of the diagnostic screen reflects across her face as the lines scroll past.  Her eyes move with careful attention as the Core narrates the state of the ship with unsettling familiarity.

“Well,” she says softly, “that’s… thorough.”  Her gaze lingers on the line about the cargo bay.  One eyebrow lifts almost imperceptibly.  “Moose,” she adds calmly, “we may want to discuss the crate labeled DO SHKE at some point.”  She straightens slightly, folding her hands behind her back again as she finishes the readout.  “And the coffee reserves.”

Across the bridge, Q-bot’s optics flare bright cyan.  Her fingers explode back into motion across the keyboard—rapidly attacking as she pulls the diagnostic feed directly into her system buffers.  Data streams cascade across her displays while she cross-checks the Core’s report against her own telemetry.

A narrow holo panel snaps open.

DIAGNOSTIC_SOURCE: MOCKINGBIRD_CORE

VERIFICATION_PASS: 97.3%

ANOMALY_SCAN:

  HUMOR_SUBROUTINE: DETECTED

  SARCASM_LEVEL: MODERATE

“Zzzt,” she chirps.  Her head tilts sharply at the final line on the screen.

Another line appears in her holo:

CORE_BEHAVIOR_PROFILE:

  SELF_REFERENCE: ENABLED

  SOCIAL_CONTEXT: ACTIVE

She looks from the panel to Moose.  “Captain,” she says evenly, “the Core is not only running diagnostics.”  A tiny pause.  “It appears to be… introducing itself.”

Proverbs 23: 15-18

“My son, if thine heart be wise, my heart shall rejoice, even mine.  Yea, my reins shall rejoice, when thy lips speak right things.  Let not thine heart envy sinners: but be thou in the fear of the LORD all the day long.  For surely there is an end; and thine expectation shall not be cut off.”