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They were still getting updates from their friends all over the Goldilocks
Corridor. Things were changing. The Ex-666ers had formed a rebellion, and
were at the beginning of a war against the establishment, particularly the
military planet of Ex-182. It was pretty bad, and some will fault Team Matic
for starting it, but this region of space was being ruled by an oppressive
empire. Only a naïve fool would think that the end of such unjust violence
would be caused by an abstract injection of peace. It was always going to
end up like this. Things were going to get worse before they got better, but
they were going to get better, and in order to keep going, everyone
had to truly believe that.
After they left Korali with her people on Ex-18118—a designation which still
bothered Ramses—they jumped back up to the Vellani Ambassador, and flew off
to a random meteor to prepare for their next mission. They were finally
going to Ex-42, which would hopefully give them the answers that they need
to find Ex-69, which was their true goal. That was why the updates regarding
the freedom fighters from Ex-666 were important, because it sort of gave
them permission to skip all of the worlds in their original path. It was
time to buckle down and focus. They didn’t have a plan, because they had yet
to meet anyone who had ever been to Ex-42, except for Korali, who admitted
to only having seen a very small part of it. Besides, while she was friendly
with them, and promised not to rat them out, she remained loyal to the
Empire, and refused to provide them knowledge that could dismantle a system
that she still believed in.
While they were gone, the ship parked itself in a hiding spot, and turned
itself invisible, as per usual. This was a particularly risky mission,
though. They would likely face profound opposition from whoever ran the
archives. Being invisible was only good enough while they were stationary.
When they were moving, even at only subfractional speeds, they still gave
off a heat signature, just like any other vessel. They needed some way of
being totally imperceptible, to the naked eye, and other sensors. This was
where the Heat Shunt came into play. This was one of those projects that
Ramses worked on when he wasn’t actively participating in missions. Though
not completely finished, it was finally ready to at least be used once. It
worked by shoving all waste heat into a totally uninhabitable pocket
dimension. The space within this pocket was not infinite, so all that energy
had to be released eventually, which they were intending to do at safe
times, like when they were traveling at reframe speeds anyway, or near a
star, whose intense radiation would mask the negligible signature of a heat
dump.
This made them truly invisible, as long as they didn’t forget to purge it
eventually. Ramses included safeguards, which would trigger a purge
automatically as it approached critical mass, but this was not a perfect
solution. What if they were, say, on the surface of a planet, or docked at a
space station? He was contemplating a means to a telejettison subroutine,
which would dispatch the dimensional generator to a safe distance, but it
wasn’t only about distance. The specific vector mattered, and that was
always different. The teleporter might have to calculate the destination on
the fly. To address the constantly changing variables, it was probably
better to make those calculations constantly as well. Hopefully, this was
not anywhere near a problem yet, and they wouldn’t have to worry about it
until another day. For now, it just had to work in the first place. “Hot
pocket is live,” Ramses announced confidently.
“Is that what we’re calling it?” Leona asked.
“You got a problem with that?”
“I guess not, they don’t exist anymore.”
“What don’t exist anymore?”
Leona was done with the conversation. “Is everyone ready to go?”
They were all standing on the bridge. While their enhanced substrates would
help them survive in many harsh environments, redundancy was a core
principle of SCR&M, so they were also wearing Integrated Multipurpose
Suits. These were not the result of one of Ramses’ projects. They were
standard dress for spacefarers in the stellar neighborhood, and to varying
degrees, average, everyday people, and Mirage had equipped the Ambassador
with enough for the whole team, and more. They came in layers, each one
designed to protect the wearer from projectiles, blades, concussive forces,
or even radiation. Different models had a different mix of these layers. The
ones that they were wearing right now had all of the layers, for ultimate
protection. To be honest, they looked pretty badass, standing there in the
same sleek black and gray outfits, their air packs and helmets affixed to
the back with magnets. Though, they didn’t have to look the same. The outer
layer could shift colors to match personal preferences. They nodded
affirmatively at Leona’s question.
“All right. Yalla.”
Marie engaged the subfractional engines, and headed towards the inner solar
system. Before they knew anything about this place, they expected to find
another space station, like Ex-467, but it wasn’t. It wasn’t a planet
either. According to Korali’s intel, it was the smallest possible coalesced
asteroidal sphere. That was, it only had enough gravity to form into a
sphere, as opposed to the usual oblong shape of some other subplanetary
bodies. A moon. It was basically a moon, except that it orbited the host
star directly, and had Earth-comparable surface gravity, which Korali
figured was powered artificially by a microsingularity in the center, though
no one ever specified to her while she was there, and she never bothered to
question it.
They made it into orbit. Ramses had to stay with the Ambassador, so he could
monitor the new hot pocket. He insisted that he do this alone, so the rest
of the team could teleport into the facility, even though they had agreed to
never let that happen. They were already down one person, and they still
didn’t know what they might be up against in there. He promised to stay on
comms, and request help if he needed it. To be fair, his would probably be
the safest job. Theirs was not going to be easy. Stealth continued to be
vital while on the ground, and there was a downside to that.
“Okay.” Olimpia huddled them up. “Invisibility is invisibility. There’s no
magical way to let you see others who are also invisible. I suppose Ramses
could try to work on that later, but until then, we need to lean heavily
into our group empathy. Try to stay connected at all times. We don’t have a
built-in homing device to locate each other, but we should be able to get a
sense of distance and direction. I thought about having us hold hands, or
tying a rope between us, but there are so many things that could go wrong
with either of those options. Invisibility is hard to maintain; harder than
other illusions. You have to constantly let the light pass around you, and I
do mean to use the word let, because if you concentrate on doing it,
you will probably only end up psyching yourself out. Just...go with the
flow.” She loosened herself up to demonstrate extreme chill.
“Thank you, Pia,” Leona said. “If any of you feel like you’re losing it,
jump back to the ship. It’s better to be safe than sorry. We don’t know what
people look like there, or how well they recognize each other’s faces. We
might be able to blend in with them with holographic illusions, but it’s
impossible to say for sure, so this is our only hope. The situation may
change when we get down there, but I can’t promise anything. We
will resort to brute force if we have to. I want..that information.
Is everyone cool with that?”
They nodded.
“Okay.” Leona nodded too, and then looked back over at Ramses. “You good?”
He was munching on a snack, so he just held up an a-okay sign.
Leona made sure to make eye contact with each member of the away team. With
a shrug of her eyebrows, she decided to repeat, “yalla.” They turned
themselves invisible, and jumped.
They were immediately assaulted by a sensory overload when they landed
inside the archive facility. A siren was blaring, trying to deafen their
ears. Lights were flashing all around them, making it impossible to get a
good look at what was around them. They were immediately wet, and getting
wetter. It felt like a room temperature mist was falling all over the place.
When they could get a look at it, the water appeared to be a neon orange,
rather than transparent. They found themselves on the floor pretty much
immediately, or that’s what they assumed. It was also difficult to keep
track of the passage of time as they were squirming around in...baby powder?
Someone yelled that they should try to teleport back up to orbit, but they
couldn’t. The rubber band snapped them right back to where they were
whenever one of them tried. At least the teleportation dampener didn’t hurt,
as it did on that one planet. It was just an unbreakable barrier.
“Korali gave us up!” Marie cried.
“I won’t believe it!” Mateo shouted back.
“Who else knew what we could do?” Leona questioned. “This is obviously a
trap for us!”
“Who else knew?” Mateo echoed. “Anyone who noticed that we only ever show up
once a year, like Santy Claus!”
They could sense Olimpia trying to send Ramses the feeling of
escape that they agreed upon, which was marked by rapidly switching
between regret and satisfaction, over and over and over again.
He replied that he understood by sending it back. After a few times, he left
his own feelings on regret, which was likely what he was truly feeling at
the time, due to having to leave them behind. They didn’t make any sort of
specific plan for what to do after the designated survivor escaped,
but he would probably go seek help from Ex-666, or maybe one of the
Caretakers.
The lights and sounds ceased, but the mist still fell, and they were still
covered in the powder. Theoretically, all they would have to do was to
incorporate the new outer coating on their bodies into the invisibility
illusion, but they were not feeling well enough to do that. Mateo was
particularly out of sorts since he was relentless with his attempts to
teleport back to Ramses, and was extremely exhausted. They were only as
strong as their weakest link, so they were stuck as the bad guy walked up to
them.
“Sir, be careful,” someone said.
“I know what I’m doing.” They recognized that voice. It was Bronach Oaksent
himself. Yay! They didn’t even have to figure out where Ex-69 was! Their
enemy came right to them. How nice of him. Now he just needed to give them a
few minutes to several hours to recover from this, and then they could put
up their dukes. He crouched down in front of Leona. “How does it feel? How
does it feel, knowing that nothing you do matters? You think you made any
sort of impact in my empire? You think that was the first prison break I’ve
ever seen? You think I can’t blow up all of the ships that they commandeered
with a wave of my hand?” He held up a hand, and kept it aloft.
Leona blinked, struggling to see him better, as the mist cleared up, and her
vision returned. She saw him smirking, and occasionally looking over at his
own hand, as if he was anticipating that dreadful wave, and that he didn’t
necessarily have any control over it. There was a chance that an actual wave
of that hand could trigger the mass death that he was warning them about.
“State your terms,” Leona responded, making herself fully visible again, and
staring back at him with an expression of professionalism, but not letting
herself appear weak, or submissive to him.
“Call your boy back. I wanna take a look at that pretty purple ship o’
yours.”
Leona tapped on her comms. “Ramses, come back. Open a channel, and ask for a
place to dock.”
“I’m on my way, sweet girl,” Ramses replied.
Bronach dropped his hand and chuckled. “I admit, we can’t detect if that
message went out, or if you’re bluffing, but you go ahead and send another
one. He has ten minutes, or I’m killing one of you. Then it’s one person
every...thirty minutes, I guess.”
“He heard,” Leona explained.
“I’ll be there in five.”
“He’ll be here in five. Tell him where to go.”
Bronach looked up at his man-servant, and nodded. The man-servant walked
away with purpose. Bronach stood back up himself, and suggested that the
team do the same. “No more tricks, please. I’m an honest man. We may
disagree, but know that. I don’t like to lie, and I don’t like to fake it.”
Leona stood, and took a breath. “Even Donald Trump didn’t drink alcohol.
Doesn’t make him a saint.” The rest of the team stood as well, now visible.
Bronach laughed. “I don’t know who that is.” He started to wander around the
room, playing with the mist that continued to fall, though it was no longer
neon. “Do you know why I called this place Ex-42?”
“Because it holds the answer to life, the universe, everything?” Olimpia
figured.
“No,” Bronach contended. “Wrong reference. It’s because the information
stored here keeps the island from blowing up. He placed airquotes
around the words, implying a connection to the show LOST, though it
was difficult to comprehend a reality where an alien had a frame of
reference for that and Douglas Adams, but not Trump. He smiled. “And it does
more than that. It does a lot more.”
“Remember the lining of your suit?” Ramses asked through comms. “You
noticed how different it was from the standard model. Open your hands, and
tap both of those seams twice fast with your pinkies. The hot pocket
is about to explode, so on my mark...” He waited for a few seconds. “Now!”
The seams that he was talking about were around their crotches. The gesture
that he was describing carried a crude meaning, which was surely the point.
But still, they had to do it, and they did it in sync. Personal force fields
formed around them just in time for the explosion that blasted into the
room. The ship was not designed with a weapon, but that heat shunt could be
purged safely...or not so safely. They were protected, but not unmoved, by
the eruption. It threw them across the room, but they didn’t run into a
wall. Instead, they landed in a river outside.
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