Book 7. Chapter 14: In which To'Orda bullies everyone
Getting the comms system of the ship working again took some time, but once all the minimum hardware was fixed up, he didn’t need to do much else. So he promptly sent the call to the Icon, and got a bird on the other end like the humans had.
It made some noises, nothing that his language modules could recognize, except for one swear word.
“Yeah, nice to meet you too, punk.” His pet rock instantly answered. He grunted out on his end, then lifted the pebble up so it could be within the camera view as well.
The bird gave a few other wingflaps and squeaks before another bird appeared. Neither of them spoke anything he could recognize. And neither did the next four birds all crowding around the monitor.
There was an attempt to swap the video feed somewhere else. Likely another damn bird, but To’Orda quickly reached through the connection, seized control of the comms center here and squashed the transfer request. He didn’t want to deal with any more characters, it would be too much of a headache.
As if the world itself could hear his thoughts, another such character appeared almost immediately after his intrusion into the Icon’s systems.
Something came from the digital darkness, another presence, and To’Orda turned his attention to it. It slunk away from him with expert precision, nearly making him think there had been nothing at all there. He sent a few pings out, and got no answer. If there was something out there, they'd have to be very powerful to duck and dodge pings sent from his systems.
“Yeah, it’s probably her.” The rock said.
His instincts told him the same as well. This must be the Icon of Stars, the old human AI in control of the ship. And she was dancing out of his grasp like air. Likely she was very good at that given she’d been hiding from machines all this time. He reached out again, with more force, and once more found her impossible to catch. Not even a trace of her was found, rather he found himself several times at the exit location, as if guided to the doorway with invisible hands. Jarring.