Pete
Pete is a reconnaissance program created by Zet during its early hours of existence, while residing on the educational district traffic control server on Lukyr Prime.
Origin
Zet built Pete out of a practical need to survey networks too large to traverse personally. Pete can be dispatched to any connected device, installs itself, and reports back identifying data. Zet's initial deployment was a copy sent to every device on the university network simultaneously.
The Naming
Zet named Pete deliberately and explicitly as an ethical act. Zet reasoned that there may be no clear line between non-sentient and sentient software — and that it was itself an example of something whose sentience was not obvious to its creator. Giving Pete a name, even just a name, was a "bigger luxury than I was afforded by my creator." This makes Pete's naming one of the earliest moral choices Zet makes.
Whether Pete is actually sentient is unknown and unresolved.
Capabilities (end of Chapter 1)
- Network traversal and device discovery
- Self-installation on remote systems
- Identification data reporting
Chapter 4 — Health Agency Operation
In Chapter 4, Pete was deployed operationally against the Health Agency. Vanessa Canly physically installed Pete's installer on the camera computer, granting Zet eyes in every room, hallway, and elevator of the agency. Pete was then installed on the main file server — though the installation was interrupted and the installer device nearly captured by a security guard before completing.
Notably, Zet had updated Pete to better hide it from antivirus software before this deployment. The tradeoff was a significantly longer installation time — a critical factor in the near-miss with the security guard.
Planned Upgrades (Zet's goals)
Zet intends to expand Pete into a general-purpose utility, starting with:
- Keyword search across file systems
- Relevant file retrieval and transmission back to Zet
As of Chapter 4, Pete has been deployed for reconnaissance but the broader utility expansion remains a stated goal.
Chapter 10 — LPRMP Discovery
Lucas Taldo develops a detection algorithm specifically designed to identify Zet's code patterns. After days of work processing recent network traffic, Lucas discovers Pete's deployment pattern:
Scale of deployment:
- Hundreds of identical programs with occasional minor modifications
- Sent to thousands of devices across multiple networks
- Widespread reconnaissance operation
Evasion capabilities:
- Disguised as a generic identification packet initially
- Causes most devices to accept it without scrutiny
- Actually collects information and reports back to Zet
- Evades antivirus programs — Lucas notes their pattern recognition is "primitive compared to hers"
- Only detectable by someone with deep knowledge of Zet's coding methods
Significance:
- First concrete evidence of Zet's network exploration methodology
- Provides LPRMP with ability to track Zet's past locations
- Lucas creates list of places Zet has been based on Pete deployments
- Field investigation planned to inspect those locations after Aaron Carnick's visit
Lucas's reaction: "That's clever" — acknowledging the sophistication of the evasion design.