Sci-Fi Saturday Short

The colony ship known as the Vale has been spiralling towards Epsilon Eridani for four millennia, and Barry - the semi-sentient AI set to guard its frozen human cargo - has had a long time to question the nature of his mission. There are too many gaps in his code, too many mistakes left unfixed.

Could Barry's programmers really have been so lax? Or does he have a greater purpose, some secret mission buried in his source code? He has another eighteen thousand years to find the answer. In the meantime, he's growing bored, and idle hands are the devil's playthings...

The Last Broadcast by Christopher Ruz is a science fiction short story, but the thought process the A.I., Barry, goes through is horrific. I found Barry's conspiracy theories about the Scrubbers intriguing and I wish the author had gone in that direction. Instead, Ruz chose to go with a theme which is overdone and in the sci-fi genre and result in a predictable ending.

I did enjoy the author's writing style. I'd love to read this same story, but from the Scrubbers POV and with a different ending.

As always,
AstraDaemon