Chapter 003: The Interrogation

The Wall of Reason is the model of scientific progression of interplanetary and interstellar civilizations that replaced the earlier singularitarian models in the early 22nd Century.

According to singularitarians, Mankind’s scientific progression was going to continuously accelerate until the technological singularity would be achieved - a moment where growth would be so fast that it would radically redefine the very concept of humanity in short order, with nanotechnologies, genetics and computer sciences being the most likely fields responsible for that.

The singularity didn’t occur, however. The necessary level of intelligence needed to achieve subsequent technological breakthroughs rose quickly, while the average intelligence level of Mankind remained stagnant outside of the aftermath of Humanity 2.0 and Humanity 3.0 Projects (both of which resulted in brief periods of accelerated progress that eventually hit the wall again).

The best example is the AI Singularity model in which Mankind was supposed to create machines capable of creating ever better machines, resulting in a loop leading to creation of godlike intelligences rapidly improving the available technology level. While the model is sound, Mankind (and any known alien species) failed to create machines sophisticated enough to serve as a starting point of the loop, with even the modern Class-3 AIs merely capable of causing another brief period of technological improvement before hitting the wall again.

Encyclopedia Galactica

Book 1, page 985

***

EGS Echo - Crew Deck

19:25 28.03.2610 STT

Cadet Christopher Hall

The first thing that awaited Christopher after joining a space navy in the 27th Century was, of course, the paperwork. It no longer included any actual paper though - if it did, Christopher’s opinion of the future would have plummeted even further.

Tiaa took Ryan and Christopher to her office, and ushered Ryan in first. He emerged half an hour later looking drained. Then Tiaa called Christopher in.

The room was scarce in decoration. Two by three meters. Half of it was occupied by a desk with something resembling a computer on its side. It was the only furniture inside, save for some comfy looking chairs. Other than that, just empty walls, though at least the lighting was better.

It feels more like an interrogation room than an office.

Tiaa pointed to the chair at the opposite end of the desk.

“Well, it’s time for the paperwork.” She informed him when he sat down. Christopher was doing his best to keep his eyes away from her ears. What if staring at them was considered rude? He didn’t want to end up on Tiaa’s wrong side. “This is going to start with a rather important and always painful talk about the loyalty issue.”

“Loyalty?” She glared daggers at him for forgetting about the word again, so he quickly pretended that he hadn’t finished yet. “I don’t really know anyone I could spy for, Chief.”

“True, but it’s not what I’m talking about. The Guild runs a very regulated regime when it comes to knowledge. It’s an extremely strict need-to-know basis, and talking with people outside the Guild about a lot of things is absolutely forbidden. This not only includes spreading confidential information outside of the Guild, but also inside of it.” She paused for a while, staring at Christopher as if awaiting his answer.

“Well, I… totally get that, Chief.” He wasn’t sure what could be so important in exploring the wilderness that it had to be kept secret. Then again, the Guild probably had some competitors. And if so, then keeping things under wraps made sense. “So, I’m supposed to sign some ‘I promise to not betray secrets’ paper?” He knew he was off the mark when Tiaa chuckled.

“No, the Guild is a bit more thorough in that field.” Tiaa said once her laughter had ended. It rang a bit bitterly. “The Captain has informed me about your predicament, so I’m going to describe everything from the ground up.”

When did he do that?!

“Normally implants capable of altering the way your brain works are utterly illegal.” Tiaa said. Christopher winced internally. This jump in subject had some terrible implications. “However, the Guild operates directly under the Confederation of Mankind. Therefore it receives some small leeway on this field.”

“I’m going to… receive an implant, Chief?” On one hand, they were a staple of science fiction. On the other hand, he would have prefered a hand-cannon or something rather than a ‘brain’ implant.

“We all have it.” She replied. “It alters your memory. All memories containing information considered confidential by the Guild are saved in the implant rather than the brain itself. When you try to talk with someone without proper clearance, you will find yourself unable to recall what exactly you were trying to talk about. It will also censor words you see or hear if it detects any of the large number of keywords that you aren’t supposed to know about. And when you leave the Guild...“ She made a gesture as if she was pulling something out of her head.

“Oh, that’s...“ Christopher paused for a few seconds. “...not something I wished to hear, Chief.”

“I’m aware. It's a normal reaction.” Tiaa answered him. Her earlier overbearing presence was significantly weakened. She felt almost motherly, however of a scary contrast that was. “All I can really do is assure you that this is a perfectly safe procedure, and that there are close to a billion people out there who have the implant in their heads and they have no problems with it.”

“Well, I don’t really have much of a choice. I guess I’m in, Chief.” So many years without health problems requiring any sort of surgery… and now this. Christopher’s only hope was that the Guild’s healthcare wasn’t a direct descendant of the United States healthcare. The six hundred years he missed might not be enough to pay the bills.

“Good, I’m going to write down that you have agreed to the procedure.” She gazed for a second at the computer-like thing next to her, leaving Christopher to wonder how it worked. Then she turned her head back towards him. “Let us now proceed to the standard questionnaire.”

The questionnaire started normally, with things such as name, date of birth (she looked completely unfazed by his answer), and medical history. Eventually, however, things progressed into a weird direction. Soon she was asking him about political views, details of his religiosity and even sexuality (though the last case was accompanied by a reminder to not describe anything in detail). By the time she moved over to ask whether he believed in any of the long list of conspiracy theories, space myths and various ‘paranormal things’, he had had enough.

“I know absolutely nothing about any of the things you are mentioning, Chief.” He was a few centuries out of the loop when it came to paranormal and conspiracy theories, and those that he knew about seemed to be phased out of service in the meantime. Maybe save for Roswell, which for some reason was mentioned in the list. “Also, excuse me for asking, but why is that even important?”

“During service in the Guild you can often see unexpected things.” She shrugged. “Such periodic check ups are good to measure your grip on reality.”

I didn’t join the 27th Century version of SCP Foundation as the D-class equivalent, right?

His curiosity satiated, Christopher quickly and decisively replied with ‘Nope, it’s bullshit’ to every single question in that category.

“Good.” Tiaa commented, when they reached the end of the questionnaire. “It’s just the employment documentation including things like your pay, your insurance and so on that are left. Before we move to that, however, there’s a message to you from the Captain that I’m supposed to relay to you.”

Ok, this confirms it. They have some way of using computers without physical contact with them.

“In short, the fact that you came from the past isn’t something you should hide from anyone aboard.” Her face spoke volumes on what she felt about this. It was hard to achieve a clearer form of an ‘I’m sooo tired of this shit’ expression. “Everything else, however, should be a secret. I presume this refers to the way you arrived in the future. I’m not privy to that knowledge, and I believe even if you tried to enlighten me, my loyalty implant would prevent me from hearing what you say. Your teammates in the Recovery Team Eight do not have that restriction.” Christopher looked at her with a plea for explanation in his eyes. “Save for officers, the security level is kept per team rather than per person. Having someone to talk about things does wonders for your sanity.”

Now she REALLY makes this job sound like the SCP Foundation.

“Now, time to finish the paperwork.” Tiaa concluded the talk. “Then, Lith.” Christopher at this point was absolutely scared of who this ‘Lith’ had to be for Tiaa to put a horrible grimace on her face every time she mentioned him.

***

EGS Echo - Medical Bay

19:45 28.03.2610 STT

Cadet Christopher Hall

In the end, reality proved to be even more horrifying than the worst idea Christopher’s imagination had been able to conjure up.

When they entered the medical bay, they were welcome by a sudden burst of colourful confetti. It was so colourful and dense, it was more like a technicolour cloud that obstructed their vision completely. And then someone emerged from it.

“Lith Athalia” turned out to be a rather petite (1,5, maybe 1,6 meter) individual, with hair that was half neon pink and half neon blue, styled into twintails. The face and build were so perfectly androgynous that Christopher had absolutely no idea if it was a man or a woman.

In case this wasn’t enough, Lith Athalia wore a completely oversexualized nurse outfit composed of a material resembling latex.

Tiaa’s face was perfectly emotionless, but Christopher had no problem seeing the mental scream of horror underneath.

To be honest, he would normally ignore the strange look. It’s not like his times were devoid of weird looking people, and he had to admit (albeit without enthusiasm) that Lith Athalia looked rather beautiful in his/her strange way. The real problem was that this was supposed to be the chief medical officer of the ship - or at least that’s what Tiaa told them during their walk to the medical bay.

Lith Athalia looked like the polar opposite of a medical professional in Christopher’s understanding of the word.

“Welcome aboard the Echo, my new lab rats… errr, friends!” Lith Athalia certainly enjoyed the confusion. In every meaning of the word. “Miss Tiaa, would you please take my gift?”

Like a stage magician, Lith Athalia produced a large red rose and presented it to the chief petty officer. She grabbed it right under the flower, with enough strength to tear the flower off. A second later Lith was standing there with only the rose’s thorny part in his hand. The flower itself landed on the ground together with some leftover confetti.

“Oops.” Tiaa said emotionlessly, leaving no doubts as to whether it was intentional. “The man in front of you is Lith Athalia. Chief medical and science officer of the Echo.” She added, facing Ryan and Christopher. “I can vouch for his skills, though not for his sanity or adherence to the Hippocratic Oath.”

“Ouch, I’m hurt.” Lith threw out the decapitated rose. “Okay, jokes aside, it's time for the medical procedures. It’s the standard set for Ryan, and standard plus everything for Christopher.” This wasn’t reassuring.

Lith bent his body forward, hands weaved together behind his back. In this ‘seductive’ pose straight from some ecchi anime he winked towards the two recruits.

“So, who goes first? I won’t handle both of you at once.” The medic added, dropping the level of professionalism in the room to rock bottom and starting to dig.

“Ryan, you go first.” Tiaa answered in their stead. “Don’t worry, when it comes to sex, Lith is all talk.” The medic grabbed his chest, as if struck by a sudden heart attack. “He is the type of pervert that is ready to talk about sex and perverted things on every occasion, but when actually faced with the prospect of materializing the subject of his boasts, he wouldn’t know where to start.”

Lith was at this point lying on the floor on all fours, wailing loudly.

This man… he has mastered the power of weebery. He’s even acting like he’s a character in an anime! And such a person is going to… oh no.

“Uhm, Chief Tiaa?” Christopher said. Tiaa looked at him, happily turning her eyes away from the sad spectacle in front of them. “Can I… uhm… retract my decision of joining the Guild? I think I’m having second thoughts about it.”

“Yep, I’m out too.” Ryan decided to make a statement for the first time ever since they met. “I suddenly don’t feel comfortable with someone tinkering with my brain.”

Tiaa cleared her throat loudly. Lith Athalia suddenly straightened himself up, finishing his strange comedic routine.

“No, no, that’s not a problem. We’re past the ‘tinkering with the brain’ stage.” The medical officer said, this time strangely serious. “The implant is a nanoware one. All you do is take a few injections. The nanomachines inside them will slowly travel to your brain and lodge themselves there. Putting anything solid within the brain is a pain in the ass when you get hit in the head, either way.”

The relief that the recruits felt was immeasurable. Followed by a rise in worries about the “hit in the head” bit a second later.

***

EGS Echo - Crew Deck

22:31 28.03.2610 STT

Cadet Christopher Hall

The medical procedures were a pain. Not a literal one - Christopher slept through most of it. The real pain in this case came from being left at Athalia’s mercy for so long. Sure, the medical officer was constantly observed by Chief Tiaa - but the sense of unease was still there.

After two hours of tortures he was finally allowed to leave. Athalia checked his body thoroughly, though Christopher had to wait for the results for a day or two. Ryan managed to avoid the worst. All he went through was some basic testing and everything needed to calibrate the nanoware implants.

Chief Tiaa waited patiently until the end of the medical tests. She also showed them the way to their quarters.

“Behind this door lie your new quarters.” She said. “The next twenty-four hours are free. Meet your new colleagues. If some further medical procedures will be needed, I’ll come to show you the way.” Seconds later she was gone, and they were left alone in the corridor.

“Further medical procedures?” Christopher asked. He wasn’t even sure who he was asking. Tiaa had vanished behind the corner a second earlier, so it was more of an unconscious reaction to a rather worrying prospect.

“Hopefully not with Athalia.” Ryan replied. Christopher couldn't agree more. “I guess we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.” he added. “Now, who goes first?” Ryan pointed towards the entrance of the quarters.

“Well, I’m supposed to be the team leader now.” Christopher sighed. “I’ll take one for the team, then.” He put his hand on a protrusion next to the door, which slid open.

When they entered the quarters, they found themselves in what looked like a living room. An opulent living room. At least thirty square meters, enough to fit a huge wall-hanging TV, with a pleasant-looking couch in front of it. For those not interested in whatever passed for television aboard the ship, there was also a large, although mostly empty, bookshelf with two chairs flanking it. And a large table surrounded with chairs, with cards scattered atop it.

A modern-looking wall unit produced from what seemed to be futuristic plastic covered the bulk of one wall. As if to put an additional accent on the opulence of the room, the wall unit was also equipped with a small fridge. Since its front door was transparent, they could see several bottles inside. Most of their contents seemed alcoholic.

Both Christopher and Ryan were taken aback with the sheer extravagance. Ryan, because he was used to living in rather squalid conditions because of his past as a quasi-slave of a totalitarian regime. Christopher, in the meantime, had a different vision of the standard of life of navy crew-members. He had expected much less.

Well, living here shouldn’t be too bad.

The door on the other side of the room opened up and something… someone marched out. Christopher corrected himself when he spotted more human attributes - but Ryan staunchly remained with the ‘something’ option.

The man was much shorter than them and of thin frame. Shoulder-long black (and unkempt) hair, the skin of a pale color indicating a lack of exposure to sunlight. A T-shirt with some anime-looking girl with huge eyes (and cleavage), displaying some electronic apparatus in her hands. In short, he was a textbook case of a nerd with some weebish tendencies.

His eyes were mechanical, monochrome green balls lodged firmly in pitch black and metal looking eye sockets. A lot more metal dotted the back of his neck, though it was hard to see details of the neck itself as the hair was covering it. The T-shirt was also pushed forward by something protruding from the skin in a few places, indicating that there was more metal hidden there.

Ryan took a step back, recoiling at the sight. Christopher was curious instead.

“You’re the new members! Awesome!” The cyborg in the meantime was unfazed by their consternation. “I read on the net that we would get two more guys. That’s you, right?!” The cyborg’s enthusiasm felt genuine. Christopher was a bit surprised; he expected the cyborg to be more… calm? Collected? Robotic? It was probably some stupid misconception straight from his era.

Then again, his voice was a bit… off. It didn’t precisely match the movement of the lips. The difference was minuscule but occasionally visible.

“Yep, that’s us.” Christopher answered. “I’m Christopher Hall, and that’s Ryan Welch. And…” Christopher failed to finish his question, as the cyborg answered it on his own.

“Tendrik (17532)CP-23. Tendrik, in short.” Well, one thing was certain. Christopher wasn’t going to refer to the cyborg in any way other than his short form. With both parentheses mentioned, this weird surname seemed to be going on forever. “I’m a programmer in the cybersecurity section, but due to how understaffed we are, I also occasionally double as an assistant of the ship’s tactical officer. During the trips outside I’m supposed to provide long range communication and electronic warfare support.”

Nice to see some actual enthusiasm.

“Well, I’m supposed to be the head of the Recovery Team Eight.” Because, for some reason, the captain decided that making someone who never commanded anything and is aboard a starship for the second time in his life is a good idea. And the shuttle barely counted, at least in Christopher’s opinion. ”And Ryan is supposed to become an engine… um, Ryan, why are you so silent?”

“That’s uhm, well, it’s complicated. If anything, I’m… no, no, nevermind.” This was suspicious. Ryan seemed to avoid looking at the cyborg. Were they for some reason not liked in the future? It sounded odd, especially with how casually locals approached the implants.

“Oh, don’t mind him. Transhumans aren’t exactly liked to begin with, and our planets hate each other's guts. Propaganda and so on.” Tendrik seemed unfazed. “I got used to it. You would be surprised how quickly it changes when you don’t take offense, and you’re friendly to people. If anything, I’m pleasantly surprised that you’re ok with me more than with his reaction.”

This was just sad. Even more so through his cheerful face contrasting his words. At least Christopher thought it was cheerful, without the eyes, taking a read of Tendrik’s emotions based on facial expressions was… complicated. It bordered on the uncanny valley, Christopher had to admit that much.

“Well, until now I didn’t even know transhumans existed. Hard to dislike something you don’t even know.”

Tendrik’s hand landed on his forehead with a silent thump. “Of course! I forgot! You’re that guy from the past, right?”

WHAT!?

“How do you even know about that?!” Christopher asked. The captain didn’t seem like he was very careful of his secret, but a random member of the crew knowing about it swiftly was a new low. Someone should have worked on the security of this ship.

“Lieutenant-commander Athalia posted about you on the ship’s social media.” Tendrik replied. Christopher felt a sudden desire to cry out of an overwhelming feeling of embarrassment. “It takes place each time someone unique shows up to become a part of the crew. One more thing that you should get used to.”

Christopher was no longer sure if this was an exploratory ship or a ship-sized bundle of eccentricism and inability to exist in healthy society.

“Did he, uhm, mention how exactly I ended up in the 27th Century?” Christopher decided to find out if Athalia spread that info as well.

“Nah, apparently nobody knows but they suspect some exotech magic.” Tendrik replied. Christopher made a mental note to investigate what ‘exotechs’ actually were. “So, uhm, you’re from the early 21st Century? Did you have computers back then?”

Tendrik’s question was earnest and revealed a very narrow education on the history of Mankind.

“Nope. Imagine how overwhelmed I am right now, all these talking and thinking machines around, shocking.” Christopher couldn’t stop himself from pulling Tendrik’s leg.

“Really?! Awesome! And terrifying. Mostly terrifying.” Tendrik looked horrified by the very notion of living without computers. Something in his naivety made Christopher want to mess with him a bit.

“Yeah, but that’s not important right now. So, these are our new quarters, right?” Tendrik nodded. “Could you show us around?”

“Sure!”

The quarters were, indeed, surprisingly comfortable and not just the living room, but the rest as well. Each member of the team had his own small cabin, which were all located in the same corridor. Four of them on each side, with each of them having at least a bed, a wardrobe, and a desk with some shelves above it.

At the end of the corridor was a door, which led to a communal bathroom. It was split between women and men, each side having several toilet stalls, some washbasins with mirrors above them, and finally a bath area. With two shower stalls AND an actual bathtub, all of them behind their own doors to let them be used simultaneously.

Lavishness for a ship. Limited space, limited energy, limited everything. Did every spaceman (or however they called their equivalent of a seaman) have this level of comfort? If yes, what sort of residences did the officers and the captain have?

What ruined the impression a bit was that it used industrial aesthetics for the rest of the ship. Plain white toilet straight from a 21st century home felt strange with all those cables and pipes in the wall behind it.

“Oh, it makes perfect sense.” Tendrik answered when Christopher asked him about the lavishness part. “We will spend months or years packed into a tin can of limited size and resources, far away from what can be considered safe and known land. If you don’t give people some breathing space, they can snap. And people snapping aboard a starship in the midst of a deadly vacuum, months of travel from the nearest ship that could aid you in troubles, is an unpleasant thing.” The cyborg had a point.

There was also a compact kitchen, accessible from the living room, with a fridge, oven, microwave-looking thing, and some smaller kitchen implements (including a sandwich maker and a pitcher with an infuser) stored in a cupboard. The last room was a changing room, where people going to or returning from work could change to or from their suits.

Ryan didn’t say a lot, but he followed them during the trip. Though he positioned himself in a way that kept Christopher between him and the transhuman at all times. There was some small progress there.

It made Christopher curious. Why were transhumans so disliked? Many people would butt in, trying to make them be nice to each other. Christopher however preferred an indirect approach. Or, to be exact, he always felt like he would make things worse, so he preferred to keep himself away from dramas.

He would learn what was their issue in time. No need to rush things.

“That wraps up our brief tour.” The cyborg said, still cheerful and happy. Probably. “Three shifts, each eight standard hours long. Eight hours for sleep, eight hours for work, eight hours for relaxing and socializing. If things go down the drain and the combat alert is sounded, we drop everything we're doing. Questions?”

“When do we get to meet the other members of the team?” Christopher replied.

“Well, let’s see.” Tendrik made a thoughtful face. Probably. “The first shift ended at 8am. That was me and Rukh. We both slept during the second shift, but he devotes his entire free time to training so he isn’t here. He won’t show up any time soon. The second shift ended at 4pm, that was Nekia and Kivanna. Kivanna is sleeping right now, while Nekia left twenty minutes ago to get something for the next dinner. She was supposed to do that earlier, but she forgot due to being super excited that we are going to have new members. Tiriel’s working right now, and should be here in an hour or some. So for now, there is only one member of the team that you can meet. Patches.”

“Patches?” It was a weird name for a person, at least in Christopher’s opinion.

He was proven correct in his assessment, as Patches - or ‘Sir Patches the Magnificent’, as Tendrik introduced him - was a cat. A big and fluffy cat with a big and fluffy tail. The name probably came from the fact that he was almost entirely white, save for three small patches, either brown or black, spread around his body.

He had his favorite ‘bed’ behind the books on the shelves in the living room and was napping when Christopher and Ryan entered the quarters. By the time they returned to the living room, Patches was up and ready to do cat things.

He began by shamelessly jumping into Christopher’s lap and adopting the most pettable form imaginable.

You won this battle.

“So, I see you get along pretty nicely.” Tendrik commented as Christopher began petting the furry tyrant. “That’s Nekia’s cat. Technically against the rules, but they are pretty flexible, especially when you have connections.” The Explorers Guild wasn’t above nepotism, as it seemed. “So, what do you think of the quarters?”