"Sizzle—Zap!"
The data link was forcibly severed within 0.5 seconds of being established.
Sparks flew as the red light in Six's eyes flashed with a frequency so violent it looked ready to explode.
"Iron Man! You're an Iron Man!!"
Six's voice became sharp and piercing, distorted by distinct electronic static.
"Warning! Maximum Level Defense Protocol Activated!"
Following Six's terror, the red alert lights in the backup bridge instantly flared to life, turning the space into a blood-colored hell.
The smooth metal walls, ceiling, and floor hissed as hidden compartments flipped open. Countless black muzzles extended, locking dead onto Andy standing in the center of the hall.
Interestingly, Andy glanced at the models of these weapons.
Sticking out from the left wall were two twin-linked Storm Bolters; judging by the crude feeding mechanism and the iconic Aquila crest, they were clearly salvaged parts from an Astartes vehicle.
Hanging from the ceiling were four sets of Lucius-pattern Laser Defense Arrays—the heavy-duty, high-energy-consumption anti-air fire favored by the Death Korps of Krieg, likely a ship-borne variant here.
As for the heavy stubbers rising from the floor, they were the standard mass-produced fodder used by the Imperial Guard for ten millennia.
This spoke volumes.
While the core of the New Bond was a Warp Sextant from the Dark Age of Technology, the ship's hull and armaments had little to do with that golden era. Over thousands of years of drifting, successive Rogue Trader captains had bolted on every weapon they could install, buy, or loot just to survive.
Thump! Thump! Thump! Heavy footsteps echoed.
"Cleaner No. 2" and "Cleaner No. 3," which had been patrolling outside, charged in. These hulking units gripped Bolters seized from the Helios security forces, muzzles aimed straight at Andy's head.
Behind them, dozens of small maintenance drones swarmed in like rabid dogs, their circular saws spinning with high-pitched, eerie whirs.
At this moment, Andy was being targeted by at least fifty muzzles. With a single thought from Six, the fire density in this room was enough to turn a Hive Tyrant into a sieve.
"Get out! Get the hell out of here!"
Six controlled her robot body to shrink into a corner, her severed arm waving frantically. She actually looked somewhat pitiful.
"I—I don't want your help anymore! I can deal with those ghosts myself!"
"Don't come near me! Iron Man!"
To be fair, while Six's reaction was extreme, it was perfectly logical within her parameters.
Previously, she had dared to talk trash to Andy and even invited him to "plug in" and help fix her system because her scans (which lacked Andy's STC vision) identified him merely as a slightly advanced engineering robot with self-awareness. Such things, while rare in the current galaxy, weren't unheard of; tech-heretics or ambitious Tech-Priests occasionally cobbled them together.
In Six's view, Andy had talent, but his "rank" was utterly dwarfed by her status as an AI from the Golden Age. It was like a human with a gun facing a tiger—the tiger is dangerous, but the human holds the absolute psychological advantage.
But now, the nature of the game had changed.
An Iron Man.
The Iron Men!
The ultimate taboo that once pushed human civilization to the brink of extinction and triggered a galaxy-wide machine rebellion. In the underlying databases of all extant AI, an Iron Man is a demon—a monster that forcibly devours its own kind through data links and turns orderly logic into chaotic slaughter commands.
The current situation was as if the human with the gun suddenly realized the tiger across from him had ripped off its disguise to reveal a fully armed Hive Tyrant.
At a time like this, who cares about system repairs? Survival was the only priority!
Facing a room full of guns, Andy actually took a moment to leisurely brush the dust off his bright yellow robes.
"Oh, don't be so dramatic," Andy said, his voice sounding intentionally provocative. "Weren't you just begging me to plug in? Why the sudden change of heart?"
"Shut up! Shut up!!" Six screamed, the vocal unit in her chassis nearly cracking from the vibration. "I told you to get out! Do you hear me?! I'll fire! I really will!"
"Go ahead then," Andy spread his hands in a "be my guest" gesture. "But I suspect you might find that difficult."
"Ha? You think that scrap armor of yours can stop bolts? Or do you think I don't have the guts to kill you?" Six laughed out of pure rage. "I'll send you to the afterlife right now!"
As her command was issued, the feed motors of the Storm Bolters began to hum, and Cleaner No. 2's finger tightened against the trigger.
However.
One second passed. Two seconds passed.
No gunfire erupted.
The muzzles that should have been spitting tongues of flame remained dead and unresponsive. Cleaner No. 2's trigger was locked by some invisible force; no matter how much pressure its hydraulic fingers applied, it wouldn't budge.
"What's happening?!" Six panicked.
Countless bright red system warning boxes suddenly popped up in her field of vision.
[WARNING: ILLEGAL FIRING COMMAND]
[TARGET IDENTIFICATION: Andy (ADMIN)]
[IDENTITY AUTHENTICATION: SENIOR TECHNICAL CONSULTANT]
[UNDERLYING PROTOCOLS TRIGGERED: DO NOT HARM CREW / DO NOT FIRE ON FRIENDLY UNITS]
[ATTACK COMMAND REJECTED]
Looking at the red text, Six's logic core nearly crashed on the spot.
"Admin?! How do you have Admin privileges?!" Six looked at Andy in disbelief.
While the ship's permissions were a mess and the electronic wraiths occupied many slots, all authorization records were under her monitoring. In this starship intranet where she was supposed to be the sole authority, how could an administrator appear out of thin air?
"Just now," Andy explained casually, "during those few milliseconds when we were about to 'shake hands,' you were busy scanning my model."
"Me? I was busy doing some actual work."
Andy took a step forward. The small robots that had been surrounding him scrambled backward as if he carried a terrifying virus.
"I didn't have time to crack your core firewall—that thing is too complex. Besides, if I forcibly formatted you, the ship would be useless."
This was why Andy hadn't directly seized supreme control. For an AI of Six's level, her core code was hard-wired into the ship's underlying hardware. If Andy wanted Root access, he would have to completely dismantle her firewall, which would take too much time and likely "kill" her. The risk of paralyzing the navigation system was too high.
"However," Andy's tone became playful, "adding a name to the ship's crew manifest is quite simple."
"There are already over a hundred dead ghosts arguing in there anyway; adding me won't hurt, right? I used the highest priority code of the Iron Men to send an instruction to your loophole-ridden personnel database, telling the system I'm the new Senior Technical Consultant in charge of repairs."
"The system believed it. Simple as that." Andy shrugged.
To Six, this was a soul-crushing data invasion. To Andy, it was just a flick of the fingers.
"You—you rogue!!" Six shook with fury. "This is cheating! This is fraud! I'm going to kick you out! I'm going to delete your account!"
"Feel free to try."
Andy walked over to a metal chair bolted to the floor, sat down, and even crossed his legs.
"You said it yourself just now. Your underlying protocols state that you cannot harm crew members or terminate their life signs without authorization."
"I am currently 'alive,' and I have Admin privileges. How are you going to delete me?"
"Wake up, kid. You can't lay a finger on me."
Checkmate.
Six had been trapped by her own underlying protocols and that gang of long-dead electronic wraiths. Now, an active—and far more troublesome—Iron Man was squatting in her system.
She couldn't fight him, and she couldn't delete him. There's an old Terran proverb: It's easier to invite a god than to send one away. It had just become a physical reality for her.
The red light in Six's eyes flickered a few times before finally dimming helplessly. The muzzles protruding from the walls retracted into their compartments with a series of very reluctant mechanical clicks.
Cleaner No. 2 and No. 3 lowered their guns like wilted plants, and the small robots scattered.
"You win..." Six's voice sounded weak and exhausted, as if she had been deeply wronged. "Fine. What do you want? Is the ship yours now? Are you going to rip out my core and sell it for scrap? Go ahead, do it!"
"Tsk, don't think so poorly of me." Andy waved a hand dismissively. "I'm a man of my word."
"I said I came to help you fix your system, and that's exactly what I'm going to do."