"Are you insane?"
The shout shattered the silence that had previously filled the cool stone observatory. Sound waves, mere vibrations of the air, rang for a split- second before they rapidly vanished, a diminuendo of noise, like the thin grey clouds that sometimes hovered over the Great Banded Desert. But the emotion, the anger, in the shout remained between them. The space between the two figures became impenetrable because of it. One stood at the base of an old-fashioned telescope, the other at the entrance. An uncomfortable tension held them apart. The young woman, barely out of her teenage years, shuffled nervously and took a deep breath. The shout had been entirely expected. Her solution was so radical, so bizarre, that most people dismissed it as a joke or the rambling of a lunatic. But it would work. She was certain. It had taken her months to come up with a plan that would solve the information bottleneck, and now that it was here, she feared the reaction of others. She had a reputation amongst the kiithid for her previous research. Would she be ridiculed? Would she be an outcast in the scientific community? She couldn't afford to be. Then again, her people couldn't afford to languish while the ubiquitous sands crept towards the settlements in the north. The Truth had sang to her that night, and it was her responsibility to inform everyone of her solution. She had to act, lest the Kharakid were wiped out.
Huur Sjet-Sa glowered at his only daughter from his walking frame. The robes of Kiith Sjet, decorated with the clan sigil and generous enough to provide protection from the desert heat, could not disguise his physical frailty. The framework of semi-flexible metal rods kept his aged bones from grinding themselves away with the simple act of movement. The frame had been of his own design, and employed rudimentary neural circuitry to spare his legs the effort of walking. "Did you not hear me, daughter? I asked if you were insane. Surely you must be, for what you are suggesting is impossible!"
"It's not impossible," she countered, softly, but with enough force to be authoritative. "All the calculations are correct. This is the only viable solution, father, and our only hope for survival."
"But it's.it's preposterous! There isn't a neural interface like that in existence!"
"Not yet, but it's feasible with our technology."
"Out of the question. You are next in line to assume leadership of the kiith."
"There won't be a kiith to lead if the mothership doesn't leave orbit!"
"It will never work, daughter. We will design a new mainframe, expand the artificial intelligence subroutines."
"No!"
Karan Sjet was gripping the datapad so tightly that her fingernails were leaving tiny crescent-shaped dents in the metal case. She forced herself to relax, ran her free hand through her long brown hair, and tried again. "It won't work, father. Trust me. The mothership is too intricate, too complex, too." - she searched her extensive vocabulary for a suitable term, but came up short - ".too big for any artificial intelligence program to supervise. For isolated operations, like controlling the cryonics vault, computers are in their element. But the mothership is comprised of thousands of subsystems. Our simulations have shown that true AI cannot be trusted under crisis situations. We need to take a step in another direction. That's why this might work."
Huur's frown deepened, and he turned away from Karan, peering into the eyepiece of the ancient telescope before him. It was an antiquity, fashioned from flimsy sheet metal and glass lenses: it was no competition for the latest sensor equipment that was built into the mothership and her support vessels, but it was a remnant of the earlier days of the kiith, when they had started to scan the skies for the very first time. He twisted a focusing knob with a growl as Karan took a few steps closer. "Our kiith engineered the supercomputers that made the project a possibility," he spat angrily, "and constructed the cryogenics pods that house the colonists. Surely, it is within our grasp to build a new command core." Cold fury held back the rest of his comment, a fury that shrieked there was another way, another plan, one that did not involve his daughter giving her life.
In the midst of his mental maelstrom, a small and rational voice asked: Do you believe that to be the Truth? If there was another way, don't you think Karan would have opted for it?
No. He shook his head to the silent question. He had heard about the problem, and had brushed it off, believing that his kiith would merely build a more powerful computer. This insistence that Karan was throwing her life away was not the Truth. And it frightened him because she was right. He felt his own expression harden against that fact.
"Twelve years ago, when research first began on the command core," he said hoarsely, "I believed that we could bring the launch date forward if we just managed to find something with enough power to run the entire ship." He let the words speak for themselves for a moment, then watched with satisfaction as all traces of anger melted away from his daughter's fair, beautiful face, her body. Let her be filled with sympathy; let her realise her mistake now and ask forgiveness. He alone knew that something had to give. "So, as you can imagine, I have a somewhat-personal attachment to this. You are my daughter. Your proposal sounds both foolish and wasteful of your own life. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some work to do."
And he reached for the telescope's focusing dials, twisting a knob, touching a button, realigning the large metal contraption. He did not look at her, but he did not hear boots on the stone floors, and felt her gaze drilling into the back of his head nonetheless.
"I realise that the idea is unorthodox," she admitted from across the room. "But without some kind of solution soon, the entire project will stay stalled. The mothership is our last hope. There's no back-pedalling now, father, and I will gladly give up the time the voyage will take if that means that it goes ahead."
He jerked his head as if she'd slapped him. "I don't have the time for this, daughter!"
"There is no other way to save our world - "
"No! No! There has to be! There is always another way!"
"Father, just accept the Truth and be done with it!" Karan's voice was echoing off the stone walls, and to Huur, it was like she was already a ghostly presence, an ethereal shadow, an echo in his life. He could no longer think about it. The force, the volume, the pure bittersweet love and anger he felt poured out in a gasping breath, and he drew back, startled into silence.
"I know." he whispered.
Karan's moment of frustration was gone, replaced now by genuine compassion. She had been right, had come here to show him that her people could have life at the expense of her own. Not entirely, he reminded himself quickly. Karan had insisted that the procedure could be reversed, given time and the correct equipment. She had gained so much in her few years as a scientist. It would be a shame if she were not credited for her brilliant, if not desperate, solution to the stalling of the mothership project.
"I go before the Daiamid tomorrow morning," she said, finally crossing the final space between them. "If you were there.it would lend some credibility to my case. And it would mean a lot to me. Please, father."
"I will go," he said, shakily standing. The frame soundlessly propped him up. "We will show the kiithid-sa that the mothership will leave on schedule.and it is all thanks to you."
* * *
The Daiamid Chamber was enormous, nearly a hundred metres in circumference, and shaped like a shallow bowl. The only point of natural light came from a circular light well set into the middle of the ceiling, which cast a dramatic pool of brilliant sunlight onto the central podium. Solid stone walls kept the inside temperature to tolerable levels. It was approaching midday, and Karan Sjet noted that the Chamber was beginning to feel a little warm. Then again, she mused, it was nearly impossible to find a place on Kharak that wasn't a little warm. She silently envied those working up in space on the mothership, where the orbital habitats had computer-regulated environments. She peered over the edge of her booth and saw hundreds of other people talking animatedly, questioning, or just squabbling: such was the way of any meeting of the kiithid-sa. There was always some old animosity, violated edict, outmoded trade agreement, or failed exchange of knowledge that was raised. Karan silently hoped that she would present a case that would unite them.
"The Chamber will come to order!"
A lone voice, amplified by equipment, cut through the babble. The noise of the crowd gradually diminished into a whisper. Karan felt her fingers grip the smooth plastic rim of the booth, which was securely fixed to the side of the Chamber's sloping floor, but still felt unstable. In a flash of embarrassment, she realised that it was because she was shaking slightly. What is wrong with you? she asked herself. You are Sjet. Yours is not to go red-faced in front of bickering kiithid-sa. Yours is to question, to observe, to record, to investigate. You have the task of serving the Truth, whatever that might be, no matter how horrible or whatever the effects. Unbidden, she remembered the historical records of the Xenogenesis Theory: it seemed only natural to her now, but how shocking it would be to the Kharakid at the time! Her kiith had discovered the genetic dissimilarity between her people and the rest of the planet's meagre life-forms. Her ancestor, Kriil Sjet, had presented the evidence here, in the Daiamid Chamber of Tiir.
"Karan Sjet, of Kiith Sjet, the stand is yours," said the unseen corypheus. A shifting noise accompanied the appearance of a pair of guards at either side of her booth; they opened the hatch for her and escorted the young Sjet down a stair towards the central podium. She clutched her research data tightly to stop her hands from shaking. Remember the Truth, Karan. The Truth is what will guide you. She reached the top of the podium and cleared her throat - she had practiced her delivery hundreds of times. Now, it was time to present the evidence. Karan took a breath, and began to speak.
"Honourable kiithid-sa, members of the respected Daiamid Assembly, I come before you with some news of great import pertaining to the mothership project. I am a humble scientist, nothing more, and would normally never present my research to such a prestigious organisation without a precursor to do so. However, the findings of my work have made this matter somewhat dire."
Her opening had worked. Every eye in the room was focused on the petite figure that bathed in the actinic white ray of the sun. She continued with renewed confidence.
"As you know, I am a neuronicist in charge of the research division that is designing the command and control systems for the mothership. For the past five years, we have been struggling to plan and build an artificial intelligence core to supervise and integrate every system onboard, and as you may or may not be aware, every attempt has failed. We have only been made painfully aware of the full size and complexity of the project. Our efforts have focused on an automated computer, but there is no way our technology can produce a computer capable of analysing the sheer amount of data." She dropped a memory rod into a slot on the console before her. The air above her head rippled and coalesced into a series of glowing azure holograms. "As you can see, the sheer size of such a device would prohibit its placement inside the mothership superstructure. We have had Systems Coherency specialists go over our designs, and it seems that there is so much data to be analysed, so many responses per second required to keep the ship running, that computers cannot be trusted to run even the most basic functions. We attempted to increase the size of the crew, but it quickly ran into the hundreds, then into the thousands, and the hierarchy became unmanageable."
Karan ejected the rod and set it aside, pausing for emphasis.
"Our dream of finding Hiigara is in jeopardy."
That caused a stir among the kiithid-sa representatives. There were shocked whispers and murmurings that sent a pang of guilt through Karan. She had kept true to the mandate of her kiith, and now she had presented the Truth to her people. The mothership project was nearly complete - only months remained before the hyperdrive tests could be conducted - and the Kharakid were full of optimism and hope. For the first time since the dawn of the Age of Reason, it seemed that the kiithid-sa were not constantly arguing and waging civil wars. Now, she may have disrupted that fragile peace. She closed her eyes for a moment as the garbled ebb of the crowd began to crescendo into occasional shouts of protest.
"However, there is a solution, desperate as it may be."
Once again, silence reigned.
Her fear was gone in the face of the Truth.
"The mothership will suffer communications paralysis and never leave the Scaffold until we radically redesign the command core. I have been researching biological circuits for use inside supercomputers; these neurocircuits are designed to mimic brain functions to increase multitasking and decrease response time exponentially. They are not out of the prototype stage, and because of resource shortages, I have not completely analysed the long-term effects of a neurocircuits-powered computer. An organic brain has the capacity to solve the information bottleneck and bring the mothership to operating capacity." She silently dropped another memory rod into the console, causing a new hologram to take shape: a diagram of the Kharakid nervous system, augmented with hundreds of cybernetic devices. "By implanting a complex series of neurocircuits into the central nervous system and brain, one individual could boost the computational efficiency of the mothership by several hundred orders of magnitude."
The statement had inflamed several kiithid to break the quiet. One, whom she recognised by the symbol as a Nabaali, leaned to the edge of his box and shout, "You are proposing a plan that will butcher an individual for the sake of science! What use is this? Where will you find such a volunteer?"
"It is not butchering," she replied, calm and measured. "The process is, theoretically, completely reversible, with no side effects. While the subject is immersed within the mothership's command core, there should be no neurological damage to speak of. I imagine it will be an interesting experience."
"But no-one will volunteer for this, Sjet!" the Nabaali cried.
"I'm not asking anyone to volunteer. That is why I demand that I be the one who is subject to this process."
For a moment, the Nabaali was stalled between anger and surprise. Karan took advantage of that moment and bowed in apology. "It would be unfair to put another through such an extensive and invasive procedure. I have already done deep scans on my neural pathways, and the medical computers have determined that my own brain will be able to provide a bridge between the nerve branches in my body and the mothership's data shunts."
"You have consulted with the mothership technicians?" another voice asked.
In the bright column of sunlight, Karan could not see the speaker, but she attempted to answer anyway. "We have already designed the command core to accommodate my plan. It will take mere months to construct it, and the neurocircuits and transmitter fluid can be synthesised within days. All that remains then is the operation. I am willing and able to solve this problem. What is needed is approval from you."
The entire chamber was silent, and for a long moment, Karan Sjet was afraid that the Nabaali would ridicule her, or someone else would speak out and mock her for her insolent scheme. But then there was a lone crack as two hands came together.and another, and another. Gradually, the sound of applause built in the Daiamid Chamber until it reached a thunderous climax, like rain beating on a metal roof. The analogy was somewhat lost on Karan, seeing as it had not rained naturally on Kharak for millennia, but she felt a smile split her face and bowed graciously as the kiithid-sa voiced their approval with their hands. The corypheus stepped forward, and she yielded the podium.
"Neuronicist Karan Sjet, you have displayed the true spirit of the Kharakid in your willingness to sacrifice yourself for the mothership. We give you full approval, on the proviso that you return to us at the conclusion of the voyage. Is this arrangement acceptable?"
She was speechless, and could do nothing but nod.
"Then permission is granted. Inform the mothership team to prepare the command core systems. We will proceed as planned."
Karan smiled broadly, glad that the Daiamid had allowed the Truth to prevail.
* * *
Time passed quickly for Karan Sjet over the next few months, to the point where the hyperdrive test lay only three scant weeks away. Her trepidation mounted over that time, slowly, like the sands of the deserts as they crept forward to engulf the Kharakid who huddled in their settlements. She was keenly aware that her world was trying to expunge the people living on it. But her plan was the factor that might enable the mothership to launch on schedule, taking hundreds of thousands of Kharakid towards the conjectural location of Hiigara. They could return later to bring the rest of her people with her.assuming we get there, she thought automatically, scolding herself in the next instant for being so pessimistic. The Guidestone, an obsidian-black rock fragment with a galactic map etched into one smooth side, had become the focus of the mothership and its mission, but Karan could not help but listen to the Truth as well as the call of the Guidestone. Many astrophysicists and biologists in her kiith had theorised that, as one approached the galactic core, planets became richer in resources, and therefore the chances of finding life was far greater. Often, this was not a cause for concern, as people naturally assumed that the mothership would find allies. But Karan did not want to ignore the possibility that they may find enemies as well. Kharak was an isolated world, and so they had never witnessed evidence of other life.
But something removed us from our homeworld.
Someone.
Who is still out there.
She stood on a balcony outside one of her research labs, taking in the clear night sky, feeling the chill of the desert air on her skin. Any moment now, she would get the call. Karan was immensely proud that she was the one to lead their people back home, but beneath her desire for Truth, she was a frightened child. If the surgery were not performed to perfection, she could die on the table, or at the very least, suffer nerve or brain damage that would render her helpless. She was young, fit, and certainly mentally capable. But, she reflected, she would rather die a thousand times than live as a mindless, brain-dead shell of the neuronicist she was now. Karan valued her mind above all other attributes. To lose it would mean the death of the mothership mission, if nothing else. A few other people had been matched up as potential replacements for the command core, but she was the closest match to the ideal neurological profile. It was her position, and she had to fill it.
High above, the glimmering lights of the Scaffold winked down on her, an artificial moon in a dark sky. The shuttle would take her there within minutes. She could not help herself as her thoughts inevitably returned to the upcoming operation. All she managed to do was remind herself that this was not for herself, but for the good of her people, especially the six hundred thousand colonists who were deep-frozen in the cryonics trays in orbit. Better that you are awake and influential in the voyage than numbed and asleep, she told herself. As the mothership's command core, she would have, theoretically, access to every single system. But was that too much of a responsibility for one person? One being? One mind? Would she suffer, as she feared, some form of neural or cerebral burn-out at the sheer overload of information? The Truth sang to her that the neurocircuits and transmitter fluid regulated the process to a level at which the Kharakid anatomy could maintain, but there was still the itching, smouldering fear.
Too many variables, she thought miserably. Too many theoretical variables.
"Neuronicist Sjet?" a voice asked.
Karan turned slowly to see one of her assistants - Freyar Nabaal - standing by the doorway to the balcony. He held a datapad in his hands, and wore a slightly nervous expression on his young, chiselled face. "Freyar," she said. "Come join me here."
The assistant edged across the threshold, as though it were inappropriate for him to enter arms' reach of his professor. Karan beckoned with one hand, and Freyar gradually shuffled beside her. "I imagine that the medical team is ready to take me away?" she asked.
"Yes, ma'am, but."
"Call me Karan, Freyar. We've known each other for too long."
".yes, ma'am - um, I mean, Karan, - the team wishes to know if you are ready."
She thought about that for a second. "Not quite yet. I need a moment or two, if that's alright with them."
Freyar paused, unsure of what to say. Then, "Karan.are you.are you worried? This is a task unlike any other, a new field of science, and we only have one shot at this. I mean.aren't you upset? It's just that you seem so calm." He paused in the middle of his babblings and placed a hand over his mouth. "I'm dreadfully sorry, ma'am. I didn't mean to say that."
"It's quite alright," she replied with a small smile. "To be honest with you, I'm just hiding it. I wish that I'd never told anyone about the neurocircuits; that might seem selfish and irrational, and it is, but I think the idea of having my spinal cord and brain laid open seems a little too scary for me." She sighed and ran her fingers over the handrail, snorting once, softly, in laughter. "You know, when I told the Primary of Kiith Sjet, he nearly killed me out of anger. Imagine - his daughter, the next in line for leadership, wanted to plug herself into a spacecraft! But I was brave enough to go through with that. I must be brave enough to go through with this. That is part of my duties, as both a scientist and a Sjet, Freyar. I must answer to the Truth, instead of to my emotions and fears."
A pause. Then.
"Ma'am, if anyone can do this, it is you."
She looked up at Freyar and felt warm tears in her eyes. "Thank-you, Freyar," she whispered, straightening up and enfolding her assistant in a delicate hug. "I know you're not just saying that, and it means a lot to me." She stepped back, seeing that the Nabaali was blushing red in the faint, pale glow of the city and the Scaffold, and folded her hands. "I only wish you were coming with us. There will doubtlessly be many new life- forms for us to discover."
"I wish I were coming as well." Freyar's eyes flitted upwards to the cluster of lights in the sky. "But my duties here cannot be ignored. There are certainly things I can be doing to keep us alive while the mothership is away."
"Yes."
The single word was all that was needed. It was an agreement, an affirmation, a statement of her intentions, both external and internal. She had become friends with the introverted young scientist, and would miss him while she was tethered to the mothership's command systems. But moreover, she was saying 'yes' to her mission. She could no longer back out, nor did she want to. The mothership was the last and best hope for the Kharakid. They had exhausted their barren prison's resources in constructing it, and so there was no way they could renege on their mission. She peered upwards and imagined that she could make out the clean lines of the leviathan, the straight vertical wall of the plasma thrusters and the gentle arc of the prow. She would be there soon. Karan smiled wistfully, then looked back over the broad desert horizon.
Answer to the Truth, and it will lead you home.
"It's time," she said.
"Ma'am?" Freyar asked, brandishing the datapad with a quivering hand.
"Call the med-techs and inform them that I'm ready to go under. I have to do this, now."
It took seconds for the medical technicians to collect her from her laboratory. They wore sterile white robes, crisp and starched to razor- edged perfection, making them seem like ghosts that shuffled through the brightly-lit halls of the research station. Ghosts.or guardian angels? Karan reminded herself that she was in the hands of the best surgeons on the planet. She would be sedated on the shuttle ride to orbit, and transferred to the mothership, where the actual operation would take place. Hopefully, when she awoke, she would be integrated into the ship computers.
"Alright, Karan, we're going to give you some anaesthetic in a moment," an unseen nurse said as they loaded the antigrav gurney onto the shuttle's ramp. "It'll take a few minutes to kick in, but we want to make sure that your body will be safe during the procedure." Karan nodded, and tried to let the noise dissolve around her, seeking the inner peace that always accompanied the finding of the Truth. She was dimly aware that there was no crowd at the shuttle pad. Perhaps this is a secure location.
There was a cold metallic sensation against her neck, then the sharp prickle and hiss of a medical injector as it dumped its payload into her circulatory system. "Monitor her BP and heart rate," the nurse said to a subordinate. "And keep an eye on CNS activity. We want the levels to stay below one-forty." Sjet recognised the order. The sedative was designed to keep her nerve branches to a minimal level of activity, in order that they could implant her neurocircuits without any unnecessary trauma. The surgical component of the procedure would take at least twelve hours.
Why did I just think of that?
An unfamiliar cloud was spreading through her brain, and she found that it was becoming difficult to speak, to keep her eyelids open, to breathe. Her heartbeat was gradually getting slower and slower.what if the med-techs forgot to keep her on life support? That thought cut through the mental fog, but as soon as she thought about it, she felt something start to take over for her.
As she passed out, the final thing she saw was the graceful curve of the mothership's hull, just emerging through the outer atmosphere. Inside, she smiled, as she realised that she would be underway soon enough.
* * *
"How much longer?"
"A few minutes, maybe. Don't push her too hard - we have to see if her immune system will take up the implants. Just wait until the transfer is complete."
"But there may not be much time left! We have to bring her around now."
"Things have to be adjusted. We've never done this before."
The heated conversation bounced off the harsh metal walls of the command core sector of the mothership. It was dark and cold; the environmental systems were running at minimal levels in order to preserve energy, and as such, the bare bulkheads seemed to suck heat out of anyone present, as well as causing sound to echo unnaturally loudly. One of the voices was Admiral Majiir Manaan, who was overseeing the new command protocols for the mothership. The other, more rational voice belonged to a technician of the Paktu kiith - Manaan could not remember his name, but he was an expert in this bizarre marriage of metal and flesh that lay before him. The brave Sjet who had volunteered to plug herself into the mothership itself was now surgically altered, and appeared as a curious octopus-like figure, given the number of tubes and pipes connecting to her arms, leg, back, sides, neck, and head. Her eyes were closed against the world, but that would change when she came on-line.
If she came on-line.
"Neurotransmitter fluid has equalised," the technician said.
"Is she ready?"
"Not yet, sir. Give me a moment to make sure everything is ready."
Karan Sjet had been placed inside a suspension field, partly to prevent the weight of all the equipment from harming her, but also partly to keep her cushioned against possible turbulence. The technician calibrated the field controls and raised the control ring until it locked into place at her waist height. Initially, Sjet was going to be submerged in a fluid tank, but that would have been both impractical and difficult, given the delicate nature of the neurocircuits. The suspension field would keep Karan stable and upright while also maintaining a constant set of environmental conditions - primarily humidity, air temperature, and gas mixture, but also controlling the amount of bacteria that built up within the command core. Theoretically, she would be remain physically clean from now until the day she was detached from the mothership. A form-fitting jumpsuit covered her from neck to knee; it was woven out of silver and black fabrics, and served the twofold function of modesty and protection. A kudzu of pipes and cables connected to her waist, sides, and the length of her spinal cord.even a handful penetrating into the base of her skull. Her long brown hair had been tied up into a tight bun to allow a full surface area contact.
The Paktu technician nodded as the readings came back onto his datapad. "Alright, admiral. The medical team confirms that we can bring her around."
He pressed a key on the datapad and stepped back until he was outside the suspension field's influence. Then, with as much speed as he could muster, he signalled the med-bay and informed them to take over her blood-chemical mix. A set of gauges and graphs appeared on the tiny screen - normally, a cluster of consoles would be dedicated to monitoring Karan's life signs and automatically adjusting and correcting as needed, but they first required the extra computational power. There were monitors and screens everywhere in the command core sector, but every single one of them would stay blank until she assumed control of the mothership and its systems. It was a situation that no-one wanted to be in - mainly because that if something happened to Sjet and the core never came online, the mothership would be grounded for a long time - but had to accept and proceed as best they could.
The grey bar on one of the gauges began to drop. That meant that the amount of sedative in her system was winding itself down. He looked up, and saw her eyelids flicker gently.
Images.
Sounds.
Pain!
"She's waking up!"
No body.
"Somebody call the paramedics!"
No soul.
"Her brain functions are going through the roof!"
Just the monstrous glory of the machine.
Karan Sjet's mind began to awaken from a drug-induced stupor, realising that it was no longer restricted to the flesh and bone of its shell. Her limbs began to twitch as the carefully-controlled neurotransmitter fluid regulated interactions between her brain and the mothership itself. Each tiny electrical impulse of her cerebral cortex was now capable of moving the immense weight of the ship, or communicating with Kharak, or destroying a vessel. Endless possibilities stretched out to her, but something inside balked at the infinite complexity of each system. There were literally millions of tasks that had to be performed every second in order to maintain a smooth functioning of the mothership. Karan did not know if this was normal, but she could not take it. She felt her body, now largely beyond her control, thrash violently inside the buoyancy of the suspension field.
No control! No control no light no anchor to what is real inside my soul there is no soul only the mothership no bone but metal no flesh but pain. Calibrate docking weapons environmental functions shunt plasma drives primary failure in shunt primary data buffer online download cryogenic vault life support hangar bay seven rack twelve deck ninety-four warning overload calling medical team.
Her eyes snapped open.
Her mouth gaped wide in a silent scream.
Medical team to command core emergency medical emergency.
Warning emergency warning warning warning warning WARNING!
She could see everywhere, and yet nowhere at once. She heard hundreds of different sounds, conversations, warnings, but none of them came from the silent command core. There was a medical team coming.she was dimly aware of a technician asking for them, and in her mind's eye, she could see them as they ran out of the med-bay and down a corridor. It was hard to track their progress, as conflicting images kept overlaying themselves over her vision.
The paramedics entered the command core chamber with dramatic suddenness. The head of the team spotted Karan and her spasms and opened the diagnostic scanner. "Her alpha brain functions have peaked. She's going into synaptic shock," he declared. That was one of the fears of Sjet's work - that the sheer amount of information would overload her nervous system and brain, and send her into a neural burnout. That would effectively kill both her mind and body, as well as set back the mothership project for at least a decade. "Increase the power to the spinal neurocircuits.a little more.alright, hold it."
Sjet's limbs had stilled, but her eyes and mouth were still locked in their ghoulish visage. The swath of black cables made her petite form seem small, pale, and vulnerable; tubing lashed like serpents of insanity before dying and falling still around her head and neck. The doctor in charge watched her nerve system activity levels with trepidation. They were holding steady, but they were still way too high for her brain to comprehend the amount of input she was receiving. They had to find a way for her to cope.
"Stop it!" the technician said, unable to watch the torment any more. "You have to put her under - this is killing her!"
Admiral Manaan shook his head once and allowed a small, tepid smile to cross his lips. "Nonsense. This is, rather, to the contrary: it's bringing her alive."
And then she was still.
Karan Sjet's mind was calm now.
There was no longer the cacophonic storm of sound and light that had battered her nerve endings before. It was as though the violent tempest were gone now, and all that was left was the clear air and first shafts of sunlight. The hundreds of thousands of impulses had organised themselves into something she could only describe as a symphony of understanding. She had expected it to feel like awaking from intoxication - she had only become drunk once, and she had felt as if she'd done her best to drain every drop of liquor from a bar where the drinks weren't labelled, the mugs weren't cleaned, and the medikit consisted of a pulse blaster pistol with which you could put yourself out of your misery - but instead, her head was hyperactive and sharply aware of everything. The insistent screams of the mothership, like an incessant child crying for attention, had now faded into a burble of soft background noise. With some concentration, she could pick up individual systems and the data flowing in and out. It would take some time to get the hang of it. But the important thing was that she was in.
She was now part of the mothership, the vessel of her people's salvation.
She was the mothership.
"Karan Sjet?"
The voice came from both within and without. She tried to focus her mental vision on the room she was in, using the internal security net as her 'eyes', but she wasn't able to locate it in the proverbial haystack of mothership systems. With a little effort, her bleary eyes managed to find a cluster of Kharakid standing in front of her. There wasn't a lot of light, which didn't help. Karan also felt as though she'd run the distance from here to Hiigara and back. Despite her better judgement that urged her to lie down and die, she tried to focus on the one wearing a command uniform. That helped her focus, even though her muscles felt as though they were sealed in stone. So did her vocal cords.
"Yes?" she croaked. At least her mouth was still under her control.
"Karan, my name is Admiral Majiir Manaan, and I am in charge of the command protocols being installed on the mothership. Are you capable of communicating with me?"
Manaan, Majiir. Admiral. Forty-five years old. Currently assigned to oversee the installation of the new command core on the mothership. Impending transfer to the orbital Scaffold upon completion of assignment. Karan took a sharp breath inward as the personnel profile of the admiral appeared in a corner of her mind. A standard hologram and lines of information detailing the Manaani's career flashed through her consciousness like the silver fin of a fish in deep water before fading away at her will. She tried to keep her attention on the people in front of her, rather than constantly looking inward. "Yes," she murmured again. Her throat was scraped raw. "I can communicate."
"Good. I am pleased to inform you that the procedure seems to be a complete success. There was a little trouble in bringing you back, but according to the medical team, you are now integrated into the mothership's command structure."
Karan tried to move her hands, but found that they remained stubbornly lifeless.
"I can't move," she said, sounding a little more plaintive than she had wanted to.
"That's because of the neurocircuits. Remember?"
The memory came to her instantly, as both a recollection and a series of data files. There were several implanted neurocircuits attached to salient nerve branches. Because they were designed as input/output mechanisms, she lost use of limbs while they were functional. She saw another figure approach her, and the personnel listings identified him as one of the mothership's many doctors, a Paktu. "Ma'am.we could only leave a few of your external features functional. You can see, hear, and speak in a physical sense, and you should have some limited movement of your head and neck, but everything else was sacrificed for extra bandwidth to your cerebral structure. In terms of speaking to the ship's crew, you need to mentally direct where you will be heard, then speak out loud. We're not entirely sure how you can accomplish everything, so it's up to you."
A weak smile crossed Karan's face. "I see."
Admiral Manaan stepped forward again. "Miss Sjet, for the duration of the mothership's voyage, you will be designated as Fleet Command. Your duties will be to the entire support fleet as well as to the mothership itself. Each vessel in the fleet can be equipped with a full crew complement, but if any ship is rendered unable to function under crew control, you will have access to limited options, including navigation, low-level ordnance, and self-destruct. You will also be the primary liaison for Fleet Intelligence."
"Understood."
"Now, I know you must be exhausted, but I'd like you to do a little test for me."
Karan recoiled internally at the way she was treated like a little girl again, but was too tired to fire back a cutting response, and so managed to bob her head a little instead. She could feel the weight of cables flowing out of her skull and neck, which made the movement a little more uncomfortable, but she didn't want to berate the admiral for patronising her.
"As you know by now, the entire ship is running on minimal power only. Main power is off-line because - "
".Because the temporary processor is of inadequate capacity to maintain the ship at optimal levels. I understand, admiral." Karan felt the information come to her within a nanosecond. The instant gratification was daunting at first, but she was becoming accustomed to it. "Systems that are non- functional include plasma drives, manoeuvring thrusters, long-range sensors, short-range sensors, long-range communications."
"Yes, yes, we know," Manaan said impatiently. "You are now immersed in the command protocol structure, and as part of that, you can shoulder the computational load, which would let us bring everything up to speed. The plasma drives provide a perpetual energy source for the mothership's main power, but the Scaffold has a series of umbilical ports that will suffice for this test. I want you to bring the plasma drives on-line using this external power. Can you do it?"
Karan spent exactly one-point-eight seconds searching for the interface to the Scaffold, locating the umbilical connections, and priming them for their new task. "Yes," she said, now more confident in her abilities. She opened the valves, and the power transfer conduits that ran throughout the ship like veins pulsed with fresh plasma. While this was happening, she set another part of her brain working on the engineering sector. Point-four seconds later, Karan had notified Main Engineering and mentally toggled the intercom to broadcast on all decks.
"Attention, all personnel," she said, and her voice flooded outwards across every deck. It came from both her mind and her throat, echoing slightly off the metal bulkheads, and tinged with the synthesised nature of the speakers. "This is Fleet Command, now on-line. Prepare to initialise main power and primary ship functions."
Engineering sent a confirmation, and she saw that the plasma drive start-up sequence was in its first stage. A series of electromagnetic reactor chambers buzzed to life along the length of the mothership's spine, causing the four long emission grilles to go from black to a warm orange glow. The entire ship seemed to stir within its own superstructure. Karan made sure she was distributing and transferring power throughout the ship as necessary, but that did not require a large amount of her concentration. She was seeing the mothership from the inside and out, watching as it began to awaken out of its slumber, trembling invisibly inside the protective filigree of the orbital Scaffold. It was completed now - technicians had applied the final layers of ceramic hull armour - and seemed to her as a myth finally coming alive. Internal systems that had lain dormant, individual flowers in an immense tree, activated with a feather-light mental touch. Hundreds upon thousands of screens lit with the standard boot- up pattern. Lights came on as the vast network of power distribution hubs spread the plasma drive's output. The mothership came alive.
Then the flood hit her.
As the ship's systems became available, the amount of computational power required to maintain them increased, mounting into a wave that began to press upon her. Most of it did not need her conscious attention: her enhanced brain and nervous system processed the data without any volition on her part. But it felt like a large part of her was being weighed down by invisible strings that threatened to draw her down into insanity. Karan panicked. However, she was not going to go quietly. She redoubled her efforts to clear away everything and get the systems running to speed. Come on, Karan. You knew it wouldn't be easy at first. Once you've initialised everything, there will be less computational cycles per second. The rational explanation seemed to soothe her. "Bringing primary systems on- line for testing," she said, and her voice bellowed throughout the ship. The best way to tackle this was methodically, working from the top down. "Plasma drives now on-line; thrust vectors cancelled, speed set to zero. Short-range communications array now engaged and active. Long-range communication on standby. First-stage sensors active. Second-stage sensors active. Third-stage sensors to standby. Weapons powered; now on standby for testing." Her mind's eye saw each one of the mothership's main systems, in both status reports and visual images, as they were powered and brought into functionality. Because the neurocircuits could not magically transform raw data into something readable to Karan, an optical matrix embedded into the base of her skull converted information into a format that was easily interpreted in a visual medium.
"Hyperdrive module powered. Diagnostic teams, report to hyperdrive module."
"All primary systems engaged."
Manaan nodded approvingly.
Karan smiled as best as she could.
"Excellent work. Bar any future complications, we can begin hyperdrive tests next week," the admiral murmured to her, almost conspiratorially. "Our future is bright, Karan." Then, without another word, he turned on one sharp boot and marched crisply out of the command core. Karan watched him go; she could not do otherwise, but her mind was elsewhere. The hyperdrive module was the catalyst to their journey home - it allowed the mothership to travel a lot faster than conventional drives could ever take them. Testing it would involve departing the Scaffold and jumping out to the edge of the Kharak system, to a predetermined point where a support vessel would be waiting to assess and repair. If it checked out, they would return to the Scaffold and have the rest of the mothership's systems completed by the construction teams before loading the cryogenic pods on board and departing for Hiigara.
She looked forward to that day.
The shout shattered the silence that had previously filled the cool stone observatory. Sound waves, mere vibrations of the air, rang for a split- second before they rapidly vanished, a diminuendo of noise, like the thin grey clouds that sometimes hovered over the Great Banded Desert. But the emotion, the anger, in the shout remained between them. The space between the two figures became impenetrable because of it. One stood at the base of an old-fashioned telescope, the other at the entrance. An uncomfortable tension held them apart. The young woman, barely out of her teenage years, shuffled nervously and took a deep breath. The shout had been entirely expected. Her solution was so radical, so bizarre, that most people dismissed it as a joke or the rambling of a lunatic. But it would work. She was certain. It had taken her months to come up with a plan that would solve the information bottleneck, and now that it was here, she feared the reaction of others. She had a reputation amongst the kiithid for her previous research. Would she be ridiculed? Would she be an outcast in the scientific community? She couldn't afford to be. Then again, her people couldn't afford to languish while the ubiquitous sands crept towards the settlements in the north. The Truth had sang to her that night, and it was her responsibility to inform everyone of her solution. She had to act, lest the Kharakid were wiped out.
Huur Sjet-Sa glowered at his only daughter from his walking frame. The robes of Kiith Sjet, decorated with the clan sigil and generous enough to provide protection from the desert heat, could not disguise his physical frailty. The framework of semi-flexible metal rods kept his aged bones from grinding themselves away with the simple act of movement. The frame had been of his own design, and employed rudimentary neural circuitry to spare his legs the effort of walking. "Did you not hear me, daughter? I asked if you were insane. Surely you must be, for what you are suggesting is impossible!"
"It's not impossible," she countered, softly, but with enough force to be authoritative. "All the calculations are correct. This is the only viable solution, father, and our only hope for survival."
"But it's.it's preposterous! There isn't a neural interface like that in existence!"
"Not yet, but it's feasible with our technology."
"Out of the question. You are next in line to assume leadership of the kiith."
"There won't be a kiith to lead if the mothership doesn't leave orbit!"
"It will never work, daughter. We will design a new mainframe, expand the artificial intelligence subroutines."
"No!"
Karan Sjet was gripping the datapad so tightly that her fingernails were leaving tiny crescent-shaped dents in the metal case. She forced herself to relax, ran her free hand through her long brown hair, and tried again. "It won't work, father. Trust me. The mothership is too intricate, too complex, too." - she searched her extensive vocabulary for a suitable term, but came up short - ".too big for any artificial intelligence program to supervise. For isolated operations, like controlling the cryonics vault, computers are in their element. But the mothership is comprised of thousands of subsystems. Our simulations have shown that true AI cannot be trusted under crisis situations. We need to take a step in another direction. That's why this might work."
Huur's frown deepened, and he turned away from Karan, peering into the eyepiece of the ancient telescope before him. It was an antiquity, fashioned from flimsy sheet metal and glass lenses: it was no competition for the latest sensor equipment that was built into the mothership and her support vessels, but it was a remnant of the earlier days of the kiith, when they had started to scan the skies for the very first time. He twisted a focusing knob with a growl as Karan took a few steps closer. "Our kiith engineered the supercomputers that made the project a possibility," he spat angrily, "and constructed the cryogenics pods that house the colonists. Surely, it is within our grasp to build a new command core." Cold fury held back the rest of his comment, a fury that shrieked there was another way, another plan, one that did not involve his daughter giving her life.
In the midst of his mental maelstrom, a small and rational voice asked: Do you believe that to be the Truth? If there was another way, don't you think Karan would have opted for it?
No. He shook his head to the silent question. He had heard about the problem, and had brushed it off, believing that his kiith would merely build a more powerful computer. This insistence that Karan was throwing her life away was not the Truth. And it frightened him because she was right. He felt his own expression harden against that fact.
"Twelve years ago, when research first began on the command core," he said hoarsely, "I believed that we could bring the launch date forward if we just managed to find something with enough power to run the entire ship." He let the words speak for themselves for a moment, then watched with satisfaction as all traces of anger melted away from his daughter's fair, beautiful face, her body. Let her be filled with sympathy; let her realise her mistake now and ask forgiveness. He alone knew that something had to give. "So, as you can imagine, I have a somewhat-personal attachment to this. You are my daughter. Your proposal sounds both foolish and wasteful of your own life. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some work to do."
And he reached for the telescope's focusing dials, twisting a knob, touching a button, realigning the large metal contraption. He did not look at her, but he did not hear boots on the stone floors, and felt her gaze drilling into the back of his head nonetheless.
"I realise that the idea is unorthodox," she admitted from across the room. "But without some kind of solution soon, the entire project will stay stalled. The mothership is our last hope. There's no back-pedalling now, father, and I will gladly give up the time the voyage will take if that means that it goes ahead."
He jerked his head as if she'd slapped him. "I don't have the time for this, daughter!"
"There is no other way to save our world - "
"No! No! There has to be! There is always another way!"
"Father, just accept the Truth and be done with it!" Karan's voice was echoing off the stone walls, and to Huur, it was like she was already a ghostly presence, an ethereal shadow, an echo in his life. He could no longer think about it. The force, the volume, the pure bittersweet love and anger he felt poured out in a gasping breath, and he drew back, startled into silence.
"I know." he whispered.
Karan's moment of frustration was gone, replaced now by genuine compassion. She had been right, had come here to show him that her people could have life at the expense of her own. Not entirely, he reminded himself quickly. Karan had insisted that the procedure could be reversed, given time and the correct equipment. She had gained so much in her few years as a scientist. It would be a shame if she were not credited for her brilliant, if not desperate, solution to the stalling of the mothership project.
"I go before the Daiamid tomorrow morning," she said, finally crossing the final space between them. "If you were there.it would lend some credibility to my case. And it would mean a lot to me. Please, father."
"I will go," he said, shakily standing. The frame soundlessly propped him up. "We will show the kiithid-sa that the mothership will leave on schedule.and it is all thanks to you."
* * *
The Daiamid Chamber was enormous, nearly a hundred metres in circumference, and shaped like a shallow bowl. The only point of natural light came from a circular light well set into the middle of the ceiling, which cast a dramatic pool of brilliant sunlight onto the central podium. Solid stone walls kept the inside temperature to tolerable levels. It was approaching midday, and Karan Sjet noted that the Chamber was beginning to feel a little warm. Then again, she mused, it was nearly impossible to find a place on Kharak that wasn't a little warm. She silently envied those working up in space on the mothership, where the orbital habitats had computer-regulated environments. She peered over the edge of her booth and saw hundreds of other people talking animatedly, questioning, or just squabbling: such was the way of any meeting of the kiithid-sa. There was always some old animosity, violated edict, outmoded trade agreement, or failed exchange of knowledge that was raised. Karan silently hoped that she would present a case that would unite them.
"The Chamber will come to order!"
A lone voice, amplified by equipment, cut through the babble. The noise of the crowd gradually diminished into a whisper. Karan felt her fingers grip the smooth plastic rim of the booth, which was securely fixed to the side of the Chamber's sloping floor, but still felt unstable. In a flash of embarrassment, she realised that it was because she was shaking slightly. What is wrong with you? she asked herself. You are Sjet. Yours is not to go red-faced in front of bickering kiithid-sa. Yours is to question, to observe, to record, to investigate. You have the task of serving the Truth, whatever that might be, no matter how horrible or whatever the effects. Unbidden, she remembered the historical records of the Xenogenesis Theory: it seemed only natural to her now, but how shocking it would be to the Kharakid at the time! Her kiith had discovered the genetic dissimilarity between her people and the rest of the planet's meagre life-forms. Her ancestor, Kriil Sjet, had presented the evidence here, in the Daiamid Chamber of Tiir.
"Karan Sjet, of Kiith Sjet, the stand is yours," said the unseen corypheus. A shifting noise accompanied the appearance of a pair of guards at either side of her booth; they opened the hatch for her and escorted the young Sjet down a stair towards the central podium. She clutched her research data tightly to stop her hands from shaking. Remember the Truth, Karan. The Truth is what will guide you. She reached the top of the podium and cleared her throat - she had practiced her delivery hundreds of times. Now, it was time to present the evidence. Karan took a breath, and began to speak.
"Honourable kiithid-sa, members of the respected Daiamid Assembly, I come before you with some news of great import pertaining to the mothership project. I am a humble scientist, nothing more, and would normally never present my research to such a prestigious organisation without a precursor to do so. However, the findings of my work have made this matter somewhat dire."
Her opening had worked. Every eye in the room was focused on the petite figure that bathed in the actinic white ray of the sun. She continued with renewed confidence.
"As you know, I am a neuronicist in charge of the research division that is designing the command and control systems for the mothership. For the past five years, we have been struggling to plan and build an artificial intelligence core to supervise and integrate every system onboard, and as you may or may not be aware, every attempt has failed. We have only been made painfully aware of the full size and complexity of the project. Our efforts have focused on an automated computer, but there is no way our technology can produce a computer capable of analysing the sheer amount of data." She dropped a memory rod into a slot on the console before her. The air above her head rippled and coalesced into a series of glowing azure holograms. "As you can see, the sheer size of such a device would prohibit its placement inside the mothership superstructure. We have had Systems Coherency specialists go over our designs, and it seems that there is so much data to be analysed, so many responses per second required to keep the ship running, that computers cannot be trusted to run even the most basic functions. We attempted to increase the size of the crew, but it quickly ran into the hundreds, then into the thousands, and the hierarchy became unmanageable."
Karan ejected the rod and set it aside, pausing for emphasis.
"Our dream of finding Hiigara is in jeopardy."
That caused a stir among the kiithid-sa representatives. There were shocked whispers and murmurings that sent a pang of guilt through Karan. She had kept true to the mandate of her kiith, and now she had presented the Truth to her people. The mothership project was nearly complete - only months remained before the hyperdrive tests could be conducted - and the Kharakid were full of optimism and hope. For the first time since the dawn of the Age of Reason, it seemed that the kiithid-sa were not constantly arguing and waging civil wars. Now, she may have disrupted that fragile peace. She closed her eyes for a moment as the garbled ebb of the crowd began to crescendo into occasional shouts of protest.
"However, there is a solution, desperate as it may be."
Once again, silence reigned.
Her fear was gone in the face of the Truth.
"The mothership will suffer communications paralysis and never leave the Scaffold until we radically redesign the command core. I have been researching biological circuits for use inside supercomputers; these neurocircuits are designed to mimic brain functions to increase multitasking and decrease response time exponentially. They are not out of the prototype stage, and because of resource shortages, I have not completely analysed the long-term effects of a neurocircuits-powered computer. An organic brain has the capacity to solve the information bottleneck and bring the mothership to operating capacity." She silently dropped another memory rod into the console, causing a new hologram to take shape: a diagram of the Kharakid nervous system, augmented with hundreds of cybernetic devices. "By implanting a complex series of neurocircuits into the central nervous system and brain, one individual could boost the computational efficiency of the mothership by several hundred orders of magnitude."
The statement had inflamed several kiithid to break the quiet. One, whom she recognised by the symbol as a Nabaali, leaned to the edge of his box and shout, "You are proposing a plan that will butcher an individual for the sake of science! What use is this? Where will you find such a volunteer?"
"It is not butchering," she replied, calm and measured. "The process is, theoretically, completely reversible, with no side effects. While the subject is immersed within the mothership's command core, there should be no neurological damage to speak of. I imagine it will be an interesting experience."
"But no-one will volunteer for this, Sjet!" the Nabaali cried.
"I'm not asking anyone to volunteer. That is why I demand that I be the one who is subject to this process."
For a moment, the Nabaali was stalled between anger and surprise. Karan took advantage of that moment and bowed in apology. "It would be unfair to put another through such an extensive and invasive procedure. I have already done deep scans on my neural pathways, and the medical computers have determined that my own brain will be able to provide a bridge between the nerve branches in my body and the mothership's data shunts."
"You have consulted with the mothership technicians?" another voice asked.
In the bright column of sunlight, Karan could not see the speaker, but she attempted to answer anyway. "We have already designed the command core to accommodate my plan. It will take mere months to construct it, and the neurocircuits and transmitter fluid can be synthesised within days. All that remains then is the operation. I am willing and able to solve this problem. What is needed is approval from you."
The entire chamber was silent, and for a long moment, Karan Sjet was afraid that the Nabaali would ridicule her, or someone else would speak out and mock her for her insolent scheme. But then there was a lone crack as two hands came together.and another, and another. Gradually, the sound of applause built in the Daiamid Chamber until it reached a thunderous climax, like rain beating on a metal roof. The analogy was somewhat lost on Karan, seeing as it had not rained naturally on Kharak for millennia, but she felt a smile split her face and bowed graciously as the kiithid-sa voiced their approval with their hands. The corypheus stepped forward, and she yielded the podium.
"Neuronicist Karan Sjet, you have displayed the true spirit of the Kharakid in your willingness to sacrifice yourself for the mothership. We give you full approval, on the proviso that you return to us at the conclusion of the voyage. Is this arrangement acceptable?"
She was speechless, and could do nothing but nod.
"Then permission is granted. Inform the mothership team to prepare the command core systems. We will proceed as planned."
Karan smiled broadly, glad that the Daiamid had allowed the Truth to prevail.
* * *
Time passed quickly for Karan Sjet over the next few months, to the point where the hyperdrive test lay only three scant weeks away. Her trepidation mounted over that time, slowly, like the sands of the deserts as they crept forward to engulf the Kharakid who huddled in their settlements. She was keenly aware that her world was trying to expunge the people living on it. But her plan was the factor that might enable the mothership to launch on schedule, taking hundreds of thousands of Kharakid towards the conjectural location of Hiigara. They could return later to bring the rest of her people with her.assuming we get there, she thought automatically, scolding herself in the next instant for being so pessimistic. The Guidestone, an obsidian-black rock fragment with a galactic map etched into one smooth side, had become the focus of the mothership and its mission, but Karan could not help but listen to the Truth as well as the call of the Guidestone. Many astrophysicists and biologists in her kiith had theorised that, as one approached the galactic core, planets became richer in resources, and therefore the chances of finding life was far greater. Often, this was not a cause for concern, as people naturally assumed that the mothership would find allies. But Karan did not want to ignore the possibility that they may find enemies as well. Kharak was an isolated world, and so they had never witnessed evidence of other life.
But something removed us from our homeworld.
Someone.
Who is still out there.
She stood on a balcony outside one of her research labs, taking in the clear night sky, feeling the chill of the desert air on her skin. Any moment now, she would get the call. Karan was immensely proud that she was the one to lead their people back home, but beneath her desire for Truth, she was a frightened child. If the surgery were not performed to perfection, she could die on the table, or at the very least, suffer nerve or brain damage that would render her helpless. She was young, fit, and certainly mentally capable. But, she reflected, she would rather die a thousand times than live as a mindless, brain-dead shell of the neuronicist she was now. Karan valued her mind above all other attributes. To lose it would mean the death of the mothership mission, if nothing else. A few other people had been matched up as potential replacements for the command core, but she was the closest match to the ideal neurological profile. It was her position, and she had to fill it.
High above, the glimmering lights of the Scaffold winked down on her, an artificial moon in a dark sky. The shuttle would take her there within minutes. She could not help herself as her thoughts inevitably returned to the upcoming operation. All she managed to do was remind herself that this was not for herself, but for the good of her people, especially the six hundred thousand colonists who were deep-frozen in the cryonics trays in orbit. Better that you are awake and influential in the voyage than numbed and asleep, she told herself. As the mothership's command core, she would have, theoretically, access to every single system. But was that too much of a responsibility for one person? One being? One mind? Would she suffer, as she feared, some form of neural or cerebral burn-out at the sheer overload of information? The Truth sang to her that the neurocircuits and transmitter fluid regulated the process to a level at which the Kharakid anatomy could maintain, but there was still the itching, smouldering fear.
Too many variables, she thought miserably. Too many theoretical variables.
"Neuronicist Sjet?" a voice asked.
Karan turned slowly to see one of her assistants - Freyar Nabaal - standing by the doorway to the balcony. He held a datapad in his hands, and wore a slightly nervous expression on his young, chiselled face. "Freyar," she said. "Come join me here."
The assistant edged across the threshold, as though it were inappropriate for him to enter arms' reach of his professor. Karan beckoned with one hand, and Freyar gradually shuffled beside her. "I imagine that the medical team is ready to take me away?" she asked.
"Yes, ma'am, but."
"Call me Karan, Freyar. We've known each other for too long."
".yes, ma'am - um, I mean, Karan, - the team wishes to know if you are ready."
She thought about that for a second. "Not quite yet. I need a moment or two, if that's alright with them."
Freyar paused, unsure of what to say. Then, "Karan.are you.are you worried? This is a task unlike any other, a new field of science, and we only have one shot at this. I mean.aren't you upset? It's just that you seem so calm." He paused in the middle of his babblings and placed a hand over his mouth. "I'm dreadfully sorry, ma'am. I didn't mean to say that."
"It's quite alright," she replied with a small smile. "To be honest with you, I'm just hiding it. I wish that I'd never told anyone about the neurocircuits; that might seem selfish and irrational, and it is, but I think the idea of having my spinal cord and brain laid open seems a little too scary for me." She sighed and ran her fingers over the handrail, snorting once, softly, in laughter. "You know, when I told the Primary of Kiith Sjet, he nearly killed me out of anger. Imagine - his daughter, the next in line for leadership, wanted to plug herself into a spacecraft! But I was brave enough to go through with that. I must be brave enough to go through with this. That is part of my duties, as both a scientist and a Sjet, Freyar. I must answer to the Truth, instead of to my emotions and fears."
A pause. Then.
"Ma'am, if anyone can do this, it is you."
She looked up at Freyar and felt warm tears in her eyes. "Thank-you, Freyar," she whispered, straightening up and enfolding her assistant in a delicate hug. "I know you're not just saying that, and it means a lot to me." She stepped back, seeing that the Nabaali was blushing red in the faint, pale glow of the city and the Scaffold, and folded her hands. "I only wish you were coming with us. There will doubtlessly be many new life- forms for us to discover."
"I wish I were coming as well." Freyar's eyes flitted upwards to the cluster of lights in the sky. "But my duties here cannot be ignored. There are certainly things I can be doing to keep us alive while the mothership is away."
"Yes."
The single word was all that was needed. It was an agreement, an affirmation, a statement of her intentions, both external and internal. She had become friends with the introverted young scientist, and would miss him while she was tethered to the mothership's command systems. But moreover, she was saying 'yes' to her mission. She could no longer back out, nor did she want to. The mothership was the last and best hope for the Kharakid. They had exhausted their barren prison's resources in constructing it, and so there was no way they could renege on their mission. She peered upwards and imagined that she could make out the clean lines of the leviathan, the straight vertical wall of the plasma thrusters and the gentle arc of the prow. She would be there soon. Karan smiled wistfully, then looked back over the broad desert horizon.
Answer to the Truth, and it will lead you home.
"It's time," she said.
"Ma'am?" Freyar asked, brandishing the datapad with a quivering hand.
"Call the med-techs and inform them that I'm ready to go under. I have to do this, now."
It took seconds for the medical technicians to collect her from her laboratory. They wore sterile white robes, crisp and starched to razor- edged perfection, making them seem like ghosts that shuffled through the brightly-lit halls of the research station. Ghosts.or guardian angels? Karan reminded herself that she was in the hands of the best surgeons on the planet. She would be sedated on the shuttle ride to orbit, and transferred to the mothership, where the actual operation would take place. Hopefully, when she awoke, she would be integrated into the ship computers.
"Alright, Karan, we're going to give you some anaesthetic in a moment," an unseen nurse said as they loaded the antigrav gurney onto the shuttle's ramp. "It'll take a few minutes to kick in, but we want to make sure that your body will be safe during the procedure." Karan nodded, and tried to let the noise dissolve around her, seeking the inner peace that always accompanied the finding of the Truth. She was dimly aware that there was no crowd at the shuttle pad. Perhaps this is a secure location.
There was a cold metallic sensation against her neck, then the sharp prickle and hiss of a medical injector as it dumped its payload into her circulatory system. "Monitor her BP and heart rate," the nurse said to a subordinate. "And keep an eye on CNS activity. We want the levels to stay below one-forty." Sjet recognised the order. The sedative was designed to keep her nerve branches to a minimal level of activity, in order that they could implant her neurocircuits without any unnecessary trauma. The surgical component of the procedure would take at least twelve hours.
Why did I just think of that?
An unfamiliar cloud was spreading through her brain, and she found that it was becoming difficult to speak, to keep her eyelids open, to breathe. Her heartbeat was gradually getting slower and slower.what if the med-techs forgot to keep her on life support? That thought cut through the mental fog, but as soon as she thought about it, she felt something start to take over for her.
As she passed out, the final thing she saw was the graceful curve of the mothership's hull, just emerging through the outer atmosphere. Inside, she smiled, as she realised that she would be underway soon enough.
* * *
"How much longer?"
"A few minutes, maybe. Don't push her too hard - we have to see if her immune system will take up the implants. Just wait until the transfer is complete."
"But there may not be much time left! We have to bring her around now."
"Things have to be adjusted. We've never done this before."
The heated conversation bounced off the harsh metal walls of the command core sector of the mothership. It was dark and cold; the environmental systems were running at minimal levels in order to preserve energy, and as such, the bare bulkheads seemed to suck heat out of anyone present, as well as causing sound to echo unnaturally loudly. One of the voices was Admiral Majiir Manaan, who was overseeing the new command protocols for the mothership. The other, more rational voice belonged to a technician of the Paktu kiith - Manaan could not remember his name, but he was an expert in this bizarre marriage of metal and flesh that lay before him. The brave Sjet who had volunteered to plug herself into the mothership itself was now surgically altered, and appeared as a curious octopus-like figure, given the number of tubes and pipes connecting to her arms, leg, back, sides, neck, and head. Her eyes were closed against the world, but that would change when she came on-line.
If she came on-line.
"Neurotransmitter fluid has equalised," the technician said.
"Is she ready?"
"Not yet, sir. Give me a moment to make sure everything is ready."
Karan Sjet had been placed inside a suspension field, partly to prevent the weight of all the equipment from harming her, but also partly to keep her cushioned against possible turbulence. The technician calibrated the field controls and raised the control ring until it locked into place at her waist height. Initially, Sjet was going to be submerged in a fluid tank, but that would have been both impractical and difficult, given the delicate nature of the neurocircuits. The suspension field would keep Karan stable and upright while also maintaining a constant set of environmental conditions - primarily humidity, air temperature, and gas mixture, but also controlling the amount of bacteria that built up within the command core. Theoretically, she would be remain physically clean from now until the day she was detached from the mothership. A form-fitting jumpsuit covered her from neck to knee; it was woven out of silver and black fabrics, and served the twofold function of modesty and protection. A kudzu of pipes and cables connected to her waist, sides, and the length of her spinal cord.even a handful penetrating into the base of her skull. Her long brown hair had been tied up into a tight bun to allow a full surface area contact.
The Paktu technician nodded as the readings came back onto his datapad. "Alright, admiral. The medical team confirms that we can bring her around."
He pressed a key on the datapad and stepped back until he was outside the suspension field's influence. Then, with as much speed as he could muster, he signalled the med-bay and informed them to take over her blood-chemical mix. A set of gauges and graphs appeared on the tiny screen - normally, a cluster of consoles would be dedicated to monitoring Karan's life signs and automatically adjusting and correcting as needed, but they first required the extra computational power. There were monitors and screens everywhere in the command core sector, but every single one of them would stay blank until she assumed control of the mothership and its systems. It was a situation that no-one wanted to be in - mainly because that if something happened to Sjet and the core never came online, the mothership would be grounded for a long time - but had to accept and proceed as best they could.
The grey bar on one of the gauges began to drop. That meant that the amount of sedative in her system was winding itself down. He looked up, and saw her eyelids flicker gently.
Images.
Sounds.
Pain!
"She's waking up!"
No body.
"Somebody call the paramedics!"
No soul.
"Her brain functions are going through the roof!"
Just the monstrous glory of the machine.
Karan Sjet's mind began to awaken from a drug-induced stupor, realising that it was no longer restricted to the flesh and bone of its shell. Her limbs began to twitch as the carefully-controlled neurotransmitter fluid regulated interactions between her brain and the mothership itself. Each tiny electrical impulse of her cerebral cortex was now capable of moving the immense weight of the ship, or communicating with Kharak, or destroying a vessel. Endless possibilities stretched out to her, but something inside balked at the infinite complexity of each system. There were literally millions of tasks that had to be performed every second in order to maintain a smooth functioning of the mothership. Karan did not know if this was normal, but she could not take it. She felt her body, now largely beyond her control, thrash violently inside the buoyancy of the suspension field.
No control! No control no light no anchor to what is real inside my soul there is no soul only the mothership no bone but metal no flesh but pain. Calibrate docking weapons environmental functions shunt plasma drives primary failure in shunt primary data buffer online download cryogenic vault life support hangar bay seven rack twelve deck ninety-four warning overload calling medical team.
Her eyes snapped open.
Her mouth gaped wide in a silent scream.
Medical team to command core emergency medical emergency.
Warning emergency warning warning warning warning WARNING!
She could see everywhere, and yet nowhere at once. She heard hundreds of different sounds, conversations, warnings, but none of them came from the silent command core. There was a medical team coming.she was dimly aware of a technician asking for them, and in her mind's eye, she could see them as they ran out of the med-bay and down a corridor. It was hard to track their progress, as conflicting images kept overlaying themselves over her vision.
The paramedics entered the command core chamber with dramatic suddenness. The head of the team spotted Karan and her spasms and opened the diagnostic scanner. "Her alpha brain functions have peaked. She's going into synaptic shock," he declared. That was one of the fears of Sjet's work - that the sheer amount of information would overload her nervous system and brain, and send her into a neural burnout. That would effectively kill both her mind and body, as well as set back the mothership project for at least a decade. "Increase the power to the spinal neurocircuits.a little more.alright, hold it."
Sjet's limbs had stilled, but her eyes and mouth were still locked in their ghoulish visage. The swath of black cables made her petite form seem small, pale, and vulnerable; tubing lashed like serpents of insanity before dying and falling still around her head and neck. The doctor in charge watched her nerve system activity levels with trepidation. They were holding steady, but they were still way too high for her brain to comprehend the amount of input she was receiving. They had to find a way for her to cope.
"Stop it!" the technician said, unable to watch the torment any more. "You have to put her under - this is killing her!"
Admiral Manaan shook his head once and allowed a small, tepid smile to cross his lips. "Nonsense. This is, rather, to the contrary: it's bringing her alive."
And then she was still.
Karan Sjet's mind was calm now.
There was no longer the cacophonic storm of sound and light that had battered her nerve endings before. It was as though the violent tempest were gone now, and all that was left was the clear air and first shafts of sunlight. The hundreds of thousands of impulses had organised themselves into something she could only describe as a symphony of understanding. She had expected it to feel like awaking from intoxication - she had only become drunk once, and she had felt as if she'd done her best to drain every drop of liquor from a bar where the drinks weren't labelled, the mugs weren't cleaned, and the medikit consisted of a pulse blaster pistol with which you could put yourself out of your misery - but instead, her head was hyperactive and sharply aware of everything. The insistent screams of the mothership, like an incessant child crying for attention, had now faded into a burble of soft background noise. With some concentration, she could pick up individual systems and the data flowing in and out. It would take some time to get the hang of it. But the important thing was that she was in.
She was now part of the mothership, the vessel of her people's salvation.
She was the mothership.
"Karan Sjet?"
The voice came from both within and without. She tried to focus her mental vision on the room she was in, using the internal security net as her 'eyes', but she wasn't able to locate it in the proverbial haystack of mothership systems. With a little effort, her bleary eyes managed to find a cluster of Kharakid standing in front of her. There wasn't a lot of light, which didn't help. Karan also felt as though she'd run the distance from here to Hiigara and back. Despite her better judgement that urged her to lie down and die, she tried to focus on the one wearing a command uniform. That helped her focus, even though her muscles felt as though they were sealed in stone. So did her vocal cords.
"Yes?" she croaked. At least her mouth was still under her control.
"Karan, my name is Admiral Majiir Manaan, and I am in charge of the command protocols being installed on the mothership. Are you capable of communicating with me?"
Manaan, Majiir. Admiral. Forty-five years old. Currently assigned to oversee the installation of the new command core on the mothership. Impending transfer to the orbital Scaffold upon completion of assignment. Karan took a sharp breath inward as the personnel profile of the admiral appeared in a corner of her mind. A standard hologram and lines of information detailing the Manaani's career flashed through her consciousness like the silver fin of a fish in deep water before fading away at her will. She tried to keep her attention on the people in front of her, rather than constantly looking inward. "Yes," she murmured again. Her throat was scraped raw. "I can communicate."
"Good. I am pleased to inform you that the procedure seems to be a complete success. There was a little trouble in bringing you back, but according to the medical team, you are now integrated into the mothership's command structure."
Karan tried to move her hands, but found that they remained stubbornly lifeless.
"I can't move," she said, sounding a little more plaintive than she had wanted to.
"That's because of the neurocircuits. Remember?"
The memory came to her instantly, as both a recollection and a series of data files. There were several implanted neurocircuits attached to salient nerve branches. Because they were designed as input/output mechanisms, she lost use of limbs while they were functional. She saw another figure approach her, and the personnel listings identified him as one of the mothership's many doctors, a Paktu. "Ma'am.we could only leave a few of your external features functional. You can see, hear, and speak in a physical sense, and you should have some limited movement of your head and neck, but everything else was sacrificed for extra bandwidth to your cerebral structure. In terms of speaking to the ship's crew, you need to mentally direct where you will be heard, then speak out loud. We're not entirely sure how you can accomplish everything, so it's up to you."
A weak smile crossed Karan's face. "I see."
Admiral Manaan stepped forward again. "Miss Sjet, for the duration of the mothership's voyage, you will be designated as Fleet Command. Your duties will be to the entire support fleet as well as to the mothership itself. Each vessel in the fleet can be equipped with a full crew complement, but if any ship is rendered unable to function under crew control, you will have access to limited options, including navigation, low-level ordnance, and self-destruct. You will also be the primary liaison for Fleet Intelligence."
"Understood."
"Now, I know you must be exhausted, but I'd like you to do a little test for me."
Karan recoiled internally at the way she was treated like a little girl again, but was too tired to fire back a cutting response, and so managed to bob her head a little instead. She could feel the weight of cables flowing out of her skull and neck, which made the movement a little more uncomfortable, but she didn't want to berate the admiral for patronising her.
"As you know by now, the entire ship is running on minimal power only. Main power is off-line because - "
".Because the temporary processor is of inadequate capacity to maintain the ship at optimal levels. I understand, admiral." Karan felt the information come to her within a nanosecond. The instant gratification was daunting at first, but she was becoming accustomed to it. "Systems that are non- functional include plasma drives, manoeuvring thrusters, long-range sensors, short-range sensors, long-range communications."
"Yes, yes, we know," Manaan said impatiently. "You are now immersed in the command protocol structure, and as part of that, you can shoulder the computational load, which would let us bring everything up to speed. The plasma drives provide a perpetual energy source for the mothership's main power, but the Scaffold has a series of umbilical ports that will suffice for this test. I want you to bring the plasma drives on-line using this external power. Can you do it?"
Karan spent exactly one-point-eight seconds searching for the interface to the Scaffold, locating the umbilical connections, and priming them for their new task. "Yes," she said, now more confident in her abilities. She opened the valves, and the power transfer conduits that ran throughout the ship like veins pulsed with fresh plasma. While this was happening, she set another part of her brain working on the engineering sector. Point-four seconds later, Karan had notified Main Engineering and mentally toggled the intercom to broadcast on all decks.
"Attention, all personnel," she said, and her voice flooded outwards across every deck. It came from both her mind and her throat, echoing slightly off the metal bulkheads, and tinged with the synthesised nature of the speakers. "This is Fleet Command, now on-line. Prepare to initialise main power and primary ship functions."
Engineering sent a confirmation, and she saw that the plasma drive start-up sequence was in its first stage. A series of electromagnetic reactor chambers buzzed to life along the length of the mothership's spine, causing the four long emission grilles to go from black to a warm orange glow. The entire ship seemed to stir within its own superstructure. Karan made sure she was distributing and transferring power throughout the ship as necessary, but that did not require a large amount of her concentration. She was seeing the mothership from the inside and out, watching as it began to awaken out of its slumber, trembling invisibly inside the protective filigree of the orbital Scaffold. It was completed now - technicians had applied the final layers of ceramic hull armour - and seemed to her as a myth finally coming alive. Internal systems that had lain dormant, individual flowers in an immense tree, activated with a feather-light mental touch. Hundreds upon thousands of screens lit with the standard boot- up pattern. Lights came on as the vast network of power distribution hubs spread the plasma drive's output. The mothership came alive.
Then the flood hit her.
As the ship's systems became available, the amount of computational power required to maintain them increased, mounting into a wave that began to press upon her. Most of it did not need her conscious attention: her enhanced brain and nervous system processed the data without any volition on her part. But it felt like a large part of her was being weighed down by invisible strings that threatened to draw her down into insanity. Karan panicked. However, she was not going to go quietly. She redoubled her efforts to clear away everything and get the systems running to speed. Come on, Karan. You knew it wouldn't be easy at first. Once you've initialised everything, there will be less computational cycles per second. The rational explanation seemed to soothe her. "Bringing primary systems on- line for testing," she said, and her voice bellowed throughout the ship. The best way to tackle this was methodically, working from the top down. "Plasma drives now on-line; thrust vectors cancelled, speed set to zero. Short-range communications array now engaged and active. Long-range communication on standby. First-stage sensors active. Second-stage sensors active. Third-stage sensors to standby. Weapons powered; now on standby for testing." Her mind's eye saw each one of the mothership's main systems, in both status reports and visual images, as they were powered and brought into functionality. Because the neurocircuits could not magically transform raw data into something readable to Karan, an optical matrix embedded into the base of her skull converted information into a format that was easily interpreted in a visual medium.
"Hyperdrive module powered. Diagnostic teams, report to hyperdrive module."
"All primary systems engaged."
Manaan nodded approvingly.
Karan smiled as best as she could.
"Excellent work. Bar any future complications, we can begin hyperdrive tests next week," the admiral murmured to her, almost conspiratorially. "Our future is bright, Karan." Then, without another word, he turned on one sharp boot and marched crisply out of the command core. Karan watched him go; she could not do otherwise, but her mind was elsewhere. The hyperdrive module was the catalyst to their journey home - it allowed the mothership to travel a lot faster than conventional drives could ever take them. Testing it would involve departing the Scaffold and jumping out to the edge of the Kharak system, to a predetermined point where a support vessel would be waiting to assess and repair. If it checked out, they would return to the Scaffold and have the rest of the mothership's systems completed by the construction teams before loading the cryogenic pods on board and departing for Hiigara.
She looked forward to that day.