Chapter 016: Shock

Liberator is often considered to be the last of the genetic warlords. He was certainly a skilled geneticist with access to a Gene Artificer, who seemed to share the warlords’ love for theatrical over-exaggeration and publicity stunts. He also created his own brand of supersoldiers, which he used to engage the Solar Commonwealth in all-out war.

Unlike the rest of the genetic warlords, however, he rose to prominence after the War of Purity, in the era of the Commonwealth’s decline. Rather than using cloning and accelerated growth to create his supersoldiers, Liberator was a pioneer in the field of biological augmentations of pre-existing human beings. What’s more, soon after he started his insurgency, he and his army joined forces with the Rebel Council, becoming a part of the last attempt to overthrow the Commonwealth’s government and reinstitute democracy.

Liberator turned out to be a gifted tactician and strategist, which soon led to a long string of rebel victories. What’s more, he also proved to be a deadly combatant on his own during the Nightmare War, when a sudden assault of the forces of the Discord on the Coreworlds forced the rebels and the government they fought against to join forces. It was Liberator who personally led the assault on the Sorrowful Night, the flagship of the Discord’ Nightmare Fleet, during which he slew the first and last Hegemon of Discord in single combat.

He died during the Battle of Alpha Centauri, a decisive rebel defeat that had the Rebel Council scattered and the rebel forces defeated. However, there is a legend (especially popular in the outer Solar Federation) that he faked his death and will return in Mankind's darkest hour. Due to his body being found and more than 400 years passing since the battle, this is highly unlikely.

Encyclopedia Galactica

Book 3, page 467

***

Christopher expected the bridge to be secure. For some burly marine to ask them why they came and refuse them access, though relaying their message to Tendrik so he could pick up the lunchbox. Instead, they were welcomed with an absolute lack of any physical security. They walked onto the bridge unmolested by questions.

The bridge was … bridge’y. Captain’s seat in the back, overlooking the entire room. Massive screen under the ceiling in the middle. Lots of seats with computer terminals in front of them. Most of them were arrayed in groups of four - one large behind and then three in front of it, arranged into a semi-circle and placed slightly beneath the level of the large seat. Since they were placed in front of the captain’s seat, this made the entire room be built like a stairway, with the captain’s seat at the uppermost level of it.

How fitting.

The Captain was there, nesting in his seat overlooking the bridge. He was drinking something from a cup which seemed to resemble an alien skull. He nodded towards Christopher when the three of them entered the bridge.

Other than the captain, the bridge was almost empty. Where fifty people could work, Christopher saw five. He noticed Tendrik, sitting in front of one of the semi-circle terminals which Christopher’s overlay identified as a tactical officer’s seat. The cyborg was wearing the typical skinsuit/work clothes, in a combination of black and gold colors.

A priest accompanied him. Or at least this was Christopher’s first assumption because of the person’s attire. The cassock was there, and so was the clerical collar, but that’s where the similarity to priests Christopher knew ended.

The priest’s head was covered in a closed and non-transparent helmet, which was unusual for someone aboard the Echo. The metal back and side of the helmet were black, and most of the faceplate was black too. A large, white cross in the middle of the faceplate lessened this notorious lack of color diversity.

The priest was standing beside Tendrik, both of them observing something that Christopher couldn’t see.

“All right, time to say hello. And do what we came here for.” Nekia nodded. Kivanna did so, too, but her eyes were still ones of a cornered animal. Christopher once again withstood the overbearing urge to vomit when he remembered what he saw earlier. He would need awhile to get over it.

The three of them approached the tactical officer’s seat. Christopher’s greeting was met with no response, save for a sudden chuckle coming from the direction of the captain’s seat. However, when his eyes followed the sound, they found Captain’s eyes dead serious and fixed at the main screen.

Goodness gracious, can’t he at least PRETEND he is an adult?

Once they got closer to Tendrik, everything changed. A UI overlay got installed on their implants and activated. Earlier they saw two people looking into nothingness and surrounded by some computer terminals. But with the UI they saw those same people surrounded by a non-transparent (and round) wall of data. It didn’t matter which direction they looked; they saw computer screens displaying things they couldn’t understand.

Tendrik - and whoever is with him - went into some sort of full-isolation mode and forgot to leave the walls transparent. They also most likely switched off all sounds coming from the outside. Which explains both their apparent lack of awareness of our presence AND the Captain’s chuckle. Are they all conspiring to make this trip more awkward?!

“Uhm, Tendrik?” Christopher said. Since he was inside the ‘dome’, this time the duo heard his voice. Both of the people in front of them turned their heads towards them.

“Chris! What brings you here?” Tendriiiik, how dare you fail to notice the lack of sandwiches! Tiriel won’t forget that. “Nekia and Kivanna too? What’s the occasion?” He quickly added, as the two girls accompanying Chris entered the dome too and paused, surprised by the change in scenery.

“You forgot your sandwiches. Tiriel sent me with them to save you from starvation.” Tendrik made an O face.

“I didn’t even notice! Thank you!” Christopher handed him the lunchbox. “Yay. So, uhm, I think some introductions are in order. They are…”

“Interruption: I know.” The priest answered with a robotic voice. “Petty Officer Christopher Hall. Enlisted 3rd Class Nekia Sistonen. Enlisted 3rd Class Kivanna Elsafir. Welcome to the Echo’s bridge.” The priest nodded slightly.

“Yes.” Tendrik confirmed and continued. “And that’s Lieutenant Commander Innocent, tactical officer, chaplain, and psychologist of Echo.” Oh, dear.

Wait a second. He looks like a robot, but didn’t Tendrik mention a few days ago that he is an alien? If that’s a ‘he’… I mean, Tendrik referred to him like that, but its Tendrik we are speaking about.

“Explanation with a Hint of Tiredness: The official term is SSB.” The priest spoke. “Synthetic Sapient Being. In more human terms, a sapient robot of non-human origin. Berserk of the mimic subspecies, in case you wanted to read details on the ship’s network.” Did he read my mind?! “No, I didn’t read your mind, ‘what is he’ is always the first question I receive. Also, you can refer to me as ‘father’, or use the second person singular. I don’t mind.” The priest paused for a second, then it continued. “Quick Explanation: That’s the second thing I’m asked about.”

On one hand, I’m surprised that people here are sane when their psychologist is an alien robot priest. On the other hand, I’m surprised they aren’t sane when their psychologist seems to read their minds. The fact it… he explicitly stated that this isn’t the case didn’t persuade me at the slightest.

“Subtle Hint: Tendrik, this lecture can wait.” Innocent turned towards the cyborg. “And your friends seem to be very interested in how the bridge looks like. If you’ll need me for something, I’m at my seat, trying to continue my crusade against the heathen paperwork.” What part of this was subtle?!

***

The first person to notice her arrival was Captain Keller. She barely entered the bridge when he waved towards her.

“Lena! How nice to see you!” She was torn apart when it came to him. He was a genius on the battlefield which he proved during their battle against Rear Admiral Hao. But he was so much of an extrovert ,she sometimes felt a sudden urge to mutiny. “And you’re back in your old body, great!”

“Yes, I got my doll fixed.” Thank the gods I packed four spare cybernetic brains. Too complicated to manufacture them aboard Echo. “Lieutenant Commander Khardum and his engineers were very helpful.” She sat on her seat next to the Captain. “Uhm, are we letting people off-duty lounge around the bridge?”

One of Innocent’s assistants was showing something she couldn’t see from her seat to two humans and a catgirl in civilian clothes.

“Well, it’s not a real problem.” Captain responded. “We have all the buttons locked biometrically, so even if they tried, they can’t activate the Echo’s self-destruction protocol. I think you should go say hello. Especially to that slightly puzzled man who is the head of the Recovery Team Eight.”

“Why?” Captain Keller’s interest in micromanagement never ceased to amaze her. Officers rarely were interested enough in regular crew members to recognize them at will. Unless the crew members screwed something up, leaving them to petty officers was normal.

She could barely remember cases of captains personally knowing petty officers - especially new onboard - from the navy, as most of them were content with using chief petty officers as their enforcers. The one case she was certain about was because one captain had an affair with a rather young petty officer. Which didn’t end nicely for anyone involved.

“Because I have a strange feeling he will be important.” Captain winked towards her. “Potent sorcerer, he learns things fast. Who knows, maybe in two or three decades he will take my seat? On an unrelated note, aren’t you off-duty too? I thought you were sleeping.”

“Hilarious.” She made sure that her tone left no doubts whether she meant that for real. “I’m a Virtual transhuman. I need not to sleep. While you, inferior fleshbags, waste time on sleep, I’m busy min-maxing my true self. You think I got to level 124 by sleeping?” Captain responded with a loud chuckle.

“Oh, yes.” He said once he calmed down. “You were so serious about the discipline and so on that, I almost forgot what nerds all Virtuals are. You’re pretty much spending every spare second in VR games.”

“What a common misconception.” Lena responded. “I am what you consider ‘my character’ in the Gates of Infinity. I spend most of my time in the game, I live most of my life there. Lena Drathari, level 124 moonborn paladin, at your service. I’m just occasionally uploading myself into a doll to run a boring, recurring quest about being an executive officer on a weird spaceship.” Captain grinned.

“Yes, as I said, nerds. All of you.” I swear, if he ever logs into GoI I will use my secondary character to PK him SO much. “So, why are you here? Outside of your shift?”

“A raid boss killed me.” And to Hundred Hells with him! I will figure out which of the resident programming jackasses added ‘Ahriman, the Forgotten’ boss to the local GoI server and… do something. It will be a creative and horrible something. ”I decided to cool my head a bit. Read some reports, and so on.”

“Ah, yes.” Captain replied. She knew what would happen, but she could do nothing about it. “Just like a neeeerd would.” Calm down, Lena. You are an exec. Even outside of your shift you should act like one. “Ok, so time to change the subject. Are you going to meet them or not?”

***

“And that’s… well we call that ‘spatial sensors’, but it’s just space sonar.” Tendrik pointed towards another screen. “Works only in Hyperspace, because it behaves like a liquid. Alien liquid. Honestly, that’s more like a combination of sonar and detector of waves which other objects in the Hyperspace might be causing.”

“Uhm, that’s… nice.” Christopher replied. It was at this moment that Innocent had enough.

“Regretful Statement: Tendrik.” The cyborg looked towards the tactical officer. “When I said ‘your friends are interested in how the bridge looks’ I meant the entire bridge. Not an unexpected and long lecture on how our sensors work.”

“Oooo…” Tendrik once again made an O face, obviously shocked and surprised. “Oh. Damn it. My bad. I always get SOO excited with that, the technology aboard the Echo is just SO wonderful!”

“Tired Statement: We noticed.” Innocent was audibly sarcastic, even with a robotic voice. “Besides, I need you to divert attention from me. Commander Drathari is talking with Captain Keller. She was just slain in the Gates of Infinity by an unexpected boss. One I tailored precisely for her skillset, making him undefeatable when she tried to solo it. Go trigger the ship’s self-destruction or something before she comes here to ask questions.”

Is that something an OFFICER should say? And doing? And what the hell is Gates of Infinity? I will ask Tendrik later. If anyone from my team knows anything, that’s probably hi…

A loud ‘ding’ sound reverberated through the tactical area. Tendrik and Innocent turned their attention towards the monitor cyborg earlier described as spatial sensors.

“Is that…” Tendrik said but was interrupted.

“Interruption: Yes. A potential contact on the spatial sensors.” The screen suddenly enlarged several times. “It’s behind us and is following us at the edge of the range of our sensors… IF that’s actual contact. What’s the proper course of action right now?” The question was directed at Tendrik.

“We… decelerate to see more details? Or to see if it will decelerate too and keep tailing us?” Tendrik answered.

“Proud Answer: Correct.” Innocent replied. “Tendrik, switch off the isolation mode. I need to speak with the Captain.”

“Uhm, should we still be here?” Christopher asked.

“Answer: Yes, it’s not a problem. Just be ready to cover your ears when I tell you.” Wait, what? “Captain Keller, we have a potential contact tailing us. Requesting permission for deceleration.” When Captain Keller responded with a nod, Innocent turned towards them once again.

“Warning Statement: Cover your ears.” They did as he ordered, though without having the tiniest idea of what he is plotting. “Tendrik, deceleration alert, please.”

What came from the speakers was no deceleration alert. Instead, they were greeted by what sounded like a metal version of some old Christian religious song. The UI identified the song as Magnificat, believed by most scholars to be the oldest known Marian hymn. In this case, the song was in Latin, though this wasn’t something that their translator implants (and ability to speak all languages) struggled with.

While the music played in the background, Innocent was busy playing an invisible guitar. The volume was set to max, making the concert rather deafening.

They are insane. Everyone on board is insane. Including the ship’s psychologist, which explains most of it.

After ten seconds the music was suddenly switched off.

“INNOCENT!!!” The voice was recognizable. Captain Keller. “WHAT DID I TELL YOU ABOUT MESSING WITH ALERTS!” Innocent responded with a recording of Captain’s voice.

“Only if it’s really funny, Innocent!” For a second Christopher thought the Captain would have someone throw Innocent through the nearest airlock. But Keller controlled himself.

“I invalidate all cases when I said that! Decelerate and check out the contact. We will join you in a second.”

“Request: Tendrik, please confirm that all crew members left the areas of the ship that aren’t acceleration-proof.” After a few seconds, Tendrik nodded. “Request: Quartermaster, decelerate. 5g.” A petty officer - one of the few people on the bridge - nodded and started pushing some buttons on his terminal.

“Informative Statement: Contact confirmed.” Innocent said. “Frigate-size, of unknown configuration and class. Contact is faint but with signs of wave vibration. High possibility of it being a ghost. Tendrik, run it through the database of ships that disappeared in the Hyperspace.” Ghost? Should I ask that question? They look busy.

“Informative Statement: Ghosts are ships that were lost more to Hyperspace than the average lost ship.” Innocent explained the issue on his own. “They are not fully material and are better described as areas of the high density of Hyperspace that resemble ships in form. Unless they are still retaining elements of their material form, they can’t use weaponry, so they are not a threat, and there is nothing to board. This ship seems to ‘vibrate’ when hyperspatial waves hit it, indicating that it’s not fully solid. Hence my suspicions. Tendrik?”

“Nothing on the list.” Tendrik responded, his brow furrowed. “Weird, it takes a while for a ship to turn into a ghost. The list of spotted ghost ships we have should be up to date.” Oh please, let it not be another brush with death.

“Hmmm: Hmmm.” Seriously? “Enlarge the screen, put in the middle of it, and give it some sonar pulses.” Soon the blurry outline of a ship started being more and more detailed.

“Summary: An unknown class frigate, doesn’t seem to be armed.” Innocent commented. “Probably someone’s personal yacht. Design is very old, and predates the War of Purity, but the ship is still at least 50% solid matter instead of ghost structure. Interesting. From the scientific point of view, as it’s rather useless to us. Everything aboard has a consistency of rubber, if not tar, and is psychoactive enough to cause mental disorders by gazing at it too long. Tendrik, add it to the Echo’s databa…”

A loud noise of something small falling on the ground startled all of them. When he searched for the source, Christopher discovered that Captain Keller tried to sneak up on them together with some straight-legged draenei rip-off with different formed (and much smaller) horns on her head.

The Captain’s cup was lying on the floor in the middle of a puddle of some orange-ish liquid. The Captain didn’t seem to notice it, as he was staring at the outline of the ship on the tactical officer’s screen. With his face almost pale.

It was the first time that any member of the Recovery Team Eight saw the Captain this shocked. Judging from the blue-skinned female’s face, this extended to at least some officers.

The captain suddenly shook his head, with his eyes closed during the vigorous shaking. When he opened them again, he looked almost normal.

“Oh my, it resembles a ship that once almost destroyed a passenger vessel on which I was a part of the crew.” He picked up the cup which was still in one piece. “I overreacted, it seems. Looks like that trauma runs deep, haha.” Captain didn’t even try to make it look like genuine laughter. “Did you find any match in the database, Innocent?” Now I feel like we shouldn’t be here.

“Brief Answer: No.” Innocent was staring at Captain, much less talkative than he used to be. Or, at least Christopher assumed, the robot priest was staring at Captain, mostly due to Innocent’s head being turned towards the Captain’s general direction.

“I see. That’s weird.” Captain made a thoughtful face. “Well, you seem to have everything under control. I’ll be going then. Since you are already here, could you finish this shift for me? I need to go check something.” He added, this time towards the blue woman.

“O...kay?” She was as startled as everyone else. Captain replied with a nod, and then he scurried away. “All right, what in space was that?”

“Surprised Statement: I do not know.“ The woman gave the robot a look of disbelief. “Contrary to popular opinions, my awareness of Captain Keller’s secrets is, at best, limited. I’ll try to analyze what we know about the frigate we detected. In the meantime, Commander, focus on leading the bridge shift.” She nodded and left the tactical ‘room’.

“Relieved Statement: At least she’ll have other things to do than asking questions I do not want to answer.” Innocent turned towards Christopher and the two girls. “I apologize for the situation, things got a bit out of hand.”

“Oh, no, it’s not a problem.” Christopher answered quickly. He had a feeling they just saw something they shouldn’t have, but at least it didn’t look like someone was planning to silence them because of it. “So, uhm, are we free to go?”

“Uhm, can I at least show you the rest of the bridge? It’ll be quick, I promise.” Tendrik gave them puppy eyes. Christopher glanced at Nekia and Kivanna. Nekia nodded fervently. Kivanna reluctantly.

“Final Word: Great. I’ll be here, fighting the paperwork, if you need me for anything.”

***

Christopher waited for a while. He decided the moment was right, when Tendrik was showing them the damage control station.

“Tendrik, I have a quick question.” The cyborg turned towards him. “So, what are the Gates of Infinity?” It sounded like a VR MMORPG game… which gave him a bit of an idea. But he had to confirm something.

“A fantasy VR MMORPG.” Tendrik answered. “A game set in a fantasy world that you play in Virtual Reality. With lots of players being allowed to play together.” I need to tell him finally that we had computers in the 21st Century… “Interstellar in range, and very popular. Because of the Wall of Faith that the genre hit AND its ability to be modified, it’s around for several decades now, I believe.” Wow. That’s… an achievement, certainly.

“Uhm, how do you make interstellar VR games without FTL communications?” If I discover that they HAVE FTL communications but are using it only to play games I’ll be… less shocked than I should.

“Oh no no, not like that.” Tendrik answered. “Most of the inhabited world and lots of ships are connected to GoI. All you need to do is get a general blueprint of your ship, or the data about geography, geology, biological and architecture of your world. The game will use it automatically, creating a new part of the setting. Then you have some people design dungeons and other instances, and the Simulated Intelligence in the local server decides if they are balanced. If it’s ok, they get added to the world. The entire thing is made to resemble a fantasy multiverse, with worlds being planes of existence and ships being ancient machines prowling through the nothingness between them and carrying people from one dimension to another.”

Christopher unpacked what he just heard.

“So, let me sum it up.” He began his reply. “You make yourself a character, and you ‘play it’ in a VR game with a world map the size of your planet, filled with dungeons and other locations with enemies to defeat and goodies to pillage. And if you travel around the Galaxy, your character travels with you and you can have it ‘visit’ the GoI equivalents of the worlds you visit?” Tendrik nodded.

Wow. That adds a new level to the map size of sandbox games. Aren’t there like tens of thousands of inhabited worlds out there?

“You should have seen what we did on Tavia!” Tendrik chuckled. “Most of Echo’s players led a GoI equivalent of planetary invasion on the planet, PKing locals like crazy and leaving anti-governmental brochures and graffiti everywhere they could. They even stormed the headquarters of a local guild mostly composed of the local StateSec members and resculpted the massive monument to the founder of the Republic in the middle of it to look like Captain Keller. Absolutely HILARIOUS.” I’m beginning to understand why said StateSec wanted Keller dead. “That’s what you get for limiting the game availability to your population for political reasons! Ha!”

“You’re playing the game too?” Christopher asked the important question.

Tendrik nodded. “Yeah. Human techmaturgist, level 17.” Technology, even in a fantasy game. Tendrik, dammit. “I’m on a break from it. There is a dungeon on the Engineering Deck that has things I need, but it’s too much of a pain to break in solo. I tried. It was painful.” The urge to take advantage of my higher rank and scream OFF WITH HIS HEAD is so powerful right now.

Christopher looked at Nekia and Kivanna. They figured out what he meant. They shook their heads. Nekia, however, looked interested in what the transhuman was saying. Christopher’s plans were solidifying in his head. But he had to talk with Tiriel and Ryan first.

***

Half an hour later they were all about to leave the bridge, when Christopher suddenly received a message from Lieutenant Commander Innocent. According to its contents he told Nekia and Kivanna to wait for him outside the bridge, and Tendrik to run some unimportant errand for Innocent. Then he returned to the tactical room.

Innocent was sitting in his seat, the room once again being in isolation mode. The robot spoke after Christopher had entered.

“Statement: You awakened the meta-empathy.” How? How does he know that? “Continuation: I will take your shocked silence as yes. Meet me in three days, which is Friday, at 4th o’clock Standard Terran Time. In the Storage Area 42-D. Alone.”

What? A meeting? Did I think about ‘not getting silenced’ too early?

“Restriction: Do not speak with anyone about this power. Nor about what you saw in Kivanna’s emotions. We will talk about that. And about respecting people’s privacy.”

Now I regret having done it even more.