by Travis Sande
“Agreed.” Both other members of the Triumvirate spoke in unison.
“Keep us informed of any updates as they happen.” Sobune said. “This meeting of the Triumvirate has concluded.”
Before Sobune could signal the end of the meeting with the ceremonial chime, Zuryk chimed in. "I would like to voice the official opposition to the use of the FYRA RIP capabilities."
"Noted." Firk responded. “We are aware of the Vryl stance on the subject.”
"Thank you for convening on such short notice. I will alert all of you with any decision that is reached." Melissa addressed the council one last time as she stood to exit the chamber.
Kris got up and followed the general's lead out of the council room. Turning around she saw the Triumvirate members also getting up to leave. Firk was looking in their direction with that same creepy smile. He made her skin crawl. "How could someone like that be elected to the Triumvirate?" Kris whispered softly.
"That's a story for another time, we have to get back down to Earth and meet the admiral. Have there been any new updates sent our way?" Melissa asked while she accelerated into the same brisk pace from earlier.
"None yet, would you like me to inform the admiral of your recusal and his new position at the head of the recovery effort?" Kris asked.
"I will do that in person once we arrive. I agreed to recuse myself from the decision, not the debate." Melissa said. "Inform the launch team of our approach."
"Doing so now." Kris said, after taking a brief moment in her mind, she confirmed. "Launch team awaiting our arrival.”
The cramped corridors leading from the large auditorium brought Kris back to reality. The day had felt so hectic and important that a simple walk through the station grounded her. She finally had a break to explore her own thoughts.
The device she had installed, while an excellent tool, was exhausting at times. She found little reprieve in times like this. Her mind became abuzz with activity at nearly all times. She cherished these small moments where no incoming or outgoing messages were taking place. Before she got too comfortable, she heard the general mumble something under her breath.
"Firk." Melissa said, clearly upset at the interaction they just had.
"He didn't waste any time. Does he have something against you personally or is he always that confrontational?" Kris asked.
"He revels in the power his position affords." Melissa lamented.
"He seems to lack the sincerity of the other two, that's for sure." Kris struggled to comprehend how someone so blatantly obnoxious could hold such a powerful position. “His behaviour was entirely out of place in there.”
"He rose to power through," Melissa paused for a second. "unconventional means."
"I've seen the 'Marsul Syndicate', I hope that wasn't an accurate depiction." Kris joked, or at least she hoped it was a joke.
"It is relatively accurate. He still works to undermine the Triumvirate in an attempt to separate Mars. He's an opportunist; he has no loyalty to the Vryl regarding this operation. His dedication is to the destabilization of the Triumvirate as far as I can tell. His objective since Mars outgrew Earth has been to reinstate a monetary incentive to trade. He views the past with a sense of admiration. Luckily, he has struggled to get any support from the Triumvirate or the people of Mars." Melissa explained.
The two of them were winding through the halls of Earth Station One. Kris was happy to indulge in the general's wisdom.
"How was he elected if his primary goal lacks support?" Kris asked, curious about the contradiction.
"The Marsul syndicate was a real entity. He utilized the establishment of the five as leverage to put himself in a position of power. It's a long story and there have been many renditions in media. We need to focus on our current situation for now." Melissa refocused attention back to their current task.
The two of them arrived at the docking station and were once again escorted onboard an orbital launch vehicle. After a brief wait, the ship lifted off and they were on their way back down to the surface.
Chapter 10
Awake
Derrick awoke in the infirmary once again. This time he was alert almost immediately. He noticed that his vision was less hazy and saw Sian at the counter next to him.
"Sian?" Derrick struggled upright, he was back on the exam table.
Sian turned to face Derrick in the center of the room. "Derrick, good to see you awake. I had to sedate you after your fall. You had a panic attack, Kim has given you something to calm that response."
"Hi, Derrick." Kim's voice came from above and behind Derrick's head.
"Kim?" Derrick said as he spun quickly, his chest quickly reminded him on the injury he had sustained. "Ah, chest still hurts."
"The internal injuries will take more time. The burns could be treated topically so they have healed much faster. Has your vision been completely restored?" Sian asked.
"There’s still some blurring near the center of my vision, but it is much better." Derrick turned to lower his legs over the edge of the table. Now facing Kim, he saw concern in her face. "Hey."
"How are you feeling?" Kim asked.
"Great, I feel... yeah, just great." Derrick said. He really did feel better than he has in a long time. None of the looming danger or uncertainty seemed to cloud his mind. He was able to file it away while still understanding its importance. "My head feels clear, what did you give me?"
"I conferred with Sian and we have combined to form a treatment for you. I apologize for my oversight earlier." Kim leaned in closer.
The door to the infirmary opened, Derrick couldn’t see who it was from his perspective, so he hopped down off the table to take a look. Commander Lorn stepped in through the doorway and joined them.
"Thanks for the alert, Sian." Lorn moved in directly toward Derrick.
"What do you mean earlier, Kim?" Derrick looked at Kim again.
"When our situation first became clear after your accident, the crew became justifiably unsettled. Lorn authorized a pre-emptive anxiety treatment for the crew. The treatment included yourself. I failed to account for the substantial physical stress you were enduring and should have modified your treatment to account for it. My oversight caused your episode earlier." Kim said. "I am now working more closely with Sian to adapt the treatment for you. I am glad to see that it seems to be effective."
"So, you drugged me without my consent?" Derrick wasn’t sure how offended he should be.
"It was my call, Derrick. I authorized it. Sian was treating your body and I deemed it necessary to prepare for your mental state." Lorn jumped in. "As you are aware, our situation is not ideal. The crew was quickly devolving into speculation and panic. While I believe the situation warrants concern, panic will not help us in any way."
"We are just going to be medicated for the remainder of our journey?" Derrick shrugged.
"Morale is a precious commodity in a situation like this, whatever tools I have to maintain it, I am going to use. How are you feeling now?" Lorn asked.
Derrick understood his point. One of the main reasons for having a psychologist onboard was for situations exactly like this.
"I hate to admit it, but I feel much better. I would have liked to have been aware of it before being treated, that's all." Derrick said.
"I understand, feel free to make note of it in your personal report." Lorn finished.
The thought of his personal report ever being read felt very unlikely to Derrick. He doubted he would ever communicate with someone outside the ISO again. With their course sending them into unknown space, their fate felt sealed. Even as these thoughts raced through Derrick’s mind, he didn’t feel overwhelmed by them. He couldn’t deny the added benefit the treatment seemed to be having on him.
"The treatment does not impair your cognitive ability but merely prevents overwhelming anxiety." Sian added to the conversation.
"I see that, my mind feels clear for the first time since this started. I can recognize the threat we
are facing without the feeling of impending doom slowly encircling me." Derrick raised his eyebrows, nodding at the realization. Derrick took a deep breath. “Thanks for getting me back on my feet a second time. I need to stop waking up in here.”
"We are still doomed, we are just free to confront it without apprehension or fear." Kim smiled.
"And joke about it, apparently." Derrick said. "I was wondering why Hank was so upbeat."
"One of the side effects has been the persistence of his personality." Sian joined in the lighter mood.
Everyone shared a small laugh. Derrick was still unsure how he honestly felt about the intrusion of his mind via medication. He did feel better but how artificial was this sensation, and would he be at the mercy of it going forward?
"Do we know any more?" Derrick wanted to get back on track.
"If you're able, you can rejoin everyone on the bridge." Lorn pointed toward the door.
"Let's go." Derrick jumped at the chance.
The four of them moved to the bridge where everyone was standing around Eilik and Luke. The scene was very similar to the way he left it.
"Welcome back." Yanna said as Derrick moved inside.
"Hey man, how’re you doing?" Hank hopped down from his position at Eilik’s terminal to greet Derrick as he entered.
"I’m not bad, just want to get this situation figured out." Derrick said. "Anything new?"
"Eilik." Lorn deferred as he moved into the center of the bridge ahead of Derrick.
"All of the fluctuations we experienced were uniform. This is additional evidence to support the deliberate nature of this attack." Eilik started breaking down their progress.
"We are calling it an 'attack' now?" Derrick was shocked at the assertion. What could possibly attack them this far out in the middle of nowhere while traveling at five times the speed of light. The idea felt preposterous.
"Yes, it’s our belief that we have been the victim of an attack." Lorn said. “By who, what, or how it was done, we don’t have the faintest idea.”
"There have been several disappearances in Vryl RIP history that have resembled this signature. I studied them extensively and it had always been attributed to rift destabilization. It appears that it is possible that those vessels suffered a similar fate to what we are currently experiencing." Eilik continued his thought. "I have been documenting everything for future study if we make it out of this."
"If we believe this was an attack and they were able to alter our course, how did they access our systems?" Derrick asked. “Even if they did access them, how did they alter our course? We couldn’t even do that if we wanted to.”
"Unknown, this is simply a hypothesis, we still have a lot of data to go over. Some of which Yanna just recently brought to our attention." Eilik turned to face Yanna, coaxing her to speak.
"You’ll recall that I noticed physical fluctuations in my lab that voided some of my results. I mentioned that to Luke and he said that it was unrelated to the rift matrix." Yanna started moving toward the interface panel.
"The quantum fluctuations we were monitoring through the matrix should have no direct impact on the ship itself. The RIP bubble surrounding us keeps us safe from any physical interaction with the space around us. The photon energy stored in the bubble is the only interaction we will incur. Our shielding negates that. When Yanna informed me of her voided results I immediately looked through our data again. It showed no physical fluctuations. The sensors on the ship are not as delicate as the experiments currently taking place in Yanna's lab." Luke added.
"We went back to my lab and I gave Luke access to all the voided data I had collected." Yanna and Luke were going back and forth describing their findings. Yanna began opening several reports on the panel.
"I uploaded the data and began looking through it. Look at this." Luke motioned for Derrick to approach.
Derrick moved up to the panel Yanna was working on. In front of him was a screen with several frequency waves. Derrick didn't fully understand what he was looking at but followed along with Luke's interpretation of the data.
"By itself, the voided data is nothing, it could have been something in the lab that caused it. Yanna even mentioned it was a fluke. What we get when I overlap the voided results with the quantum fluctuations is another story." Luke moved one of the graphs over the other.
"The physical data Yanna collected fills in the gaps between quantum fluctuations?" Derrick asked, struggling to ascertain meaning.
"There's still a lot of unknowns but the data overlap is too precise to ignore." Luke was talking very fast, Derrick could feel his excitement. It may not have been much, but it was a development that had him enthusiastic.
"Are we assuming that something entered our RIP bubble and physically interacted with the ship during the gaps in quantum fluctuations?" Derrick was curious what possible reasons could cause physical interactions so similar to the quantum fluctuation. “Perhaps the fluctuations detected by the rift were to mask any physical interaction?” The crew looked around at each other with a startled look. It was clear that what Derrick said hadn't been considered.
"Impossible, the physical fluctuations are too small to have been caused by a direct interaction. Entering a RIP bubble while in transit is also impossible. It’s my belief that the data Yanna collected was the rift matrix itself trying to stabilize between quantum fluctuations." Eilik asserted.
"It's also impossible to adjust course according to you." Yanna said, confronting Eilik’s logic.
Yanna's words caused Eilik to pause. She was right; they were no longer in a world where the limits of human or Vryl capabilities were applicable.
"You're saying there's potentially something in our RIP bubble right now?" Hank voiced the alarming possibility.
"I would doubt that, but Yanna is correct, my knowledge might not be sufficient in our current situation." Eilik conceded.
"The physical fluctuations are so small that the ship's sensors didn't even register them. If it was a ship to ship contact, we would know." Luke postulated.
"Would we? Once again, you guys are making assumptions about limitations within your own frame of reference." Yanna said. "I think we need to start exploring all possibilities, regardless of our perceived limitations."
"She's right." Lorn interjected. "We have to explore the possibility that we have been attacked and are still under attack."
"Maybe they didn't have to access our systems at all." Derrick said, thinking out loud.
"What do you mean?" Luke asked.
"What if they were able to enter the RIP bubble, mount their ship onto ours, and then alter our course from the outside?" Derrick said. "As Eilik said, once in transit we are unable to adjust course. It's like we are a bullet, we can't steer. If something were to attach itself to us or nudge us, it could potentially alter our destination. Even if they accessed our system we lack the functionality to change course."
"I never thought of that, yeah even if they were able to get into our system somehow, it wouldn't give them any help in that regard." Luke continued. "Derrick may be right, all of this could be explained by an external influence, the speed increase as well."
"I agree, and the speed increase might rule out a nudge. For us to maintain this speed over such a vast distance and at such great speeds a nudge wouldn't suffice." It appeared Eilik was willing to forfeit his preconceptions about limitations and speculate freely.
"The good news is, whatever attacked us isn't in our systems and watching us right now. The bad news, it's attached to the ship as we speak and driving us out into the woods?" Hank summarized the events with an apt analogy.
"It's outside!?" Kim asked, clearly shaken. “That thing, whatever it is, is just outside the outer hull as we speak?”
As the words left her mouth, Derrick was stunned with deja vu. A flash of the dream he had earlier invaded his mind. The only difference was the tone of Kim's voice. This was a question; the dream was more a statement of fact. Derrick was unsettled by
what he had just experienced but able to withdraw from it and re-join the conversation.
"Potentially." Eilik said. "This is just speculation, we shouldn’t get ahead of ourselves. Jumping to conclusions about seemingly impossible maneuvers is just as dangerous as ignoring them all together."
The thought of an unknown vessel being attached to their ship just feet beyond the walls surrounding them, was a nightmare. Derrick was encapsulated by a sense of helplessness, violation, and claustrophobia. He managed to resist the wave of emotion once again. Kim's treatment had never been so welcome.
"Ok, that's good, if it's attached to us we can find a way to fight back. We just need to locate it and devise a way to remove it." Hank stood from his seat, ready to jump into action.
"The optimal location for a maneuver like this would be the aft of the ship. It would allow for the most precise application of thrust." Eilik speculated.
"It could also act as a rudder in that position." Luke added.
"My lab is near the aft of the ship. Only the rec area is beyond it." Yanna nodded along with their thoughts. "Could be why I was able to pick up the physical readings."
"Even if we locate this thing, there's no way to exit the vehicle to reach it." Lorn attempted to bring everyone back to reality.
Derrick noticed Luke close his eyes, presumably deep in thought. Trying to locate something on the outside of the ship would be nearly impossible. Not to mention the possibility that nothing was even there. Even if they did find it, how would they get to it? They would have to mitigate the immense energy stored within the RIP bubble.
"Do we have any dyronium currently onboard the ship that we have access to?" Luke suddenly snapped out of his trance.
"Yes, the Rift Matrix was surrounded by substantial shielding. With the matrix offline, the shielding is no longer required." Eilik answered Luke without hesitation.
"What do you have in mind, Luke?" Lorn looked to their engineer with confidence.
"It's just an idea but is there any way we could open one of the ship’s viewers and physically look for this thing on the hull?" Luke paused to wait for a response to his train of thought.