The World Of Alcubierre

Episode XXXVI

Xy had reached a conclusion.

It disliked Firsts.

An aversion to change was not a particularly revelatory inclination for a Left, to the extent such a label still applied to Xy, though the zeal of its distaste was atypical for an Observer. Historically, Xy had elected to merely be skeptical of the new rather than fully commit to active dislike. However, the disastrous First Cascade originating from the initial report of the Sol Object was enough to harden Xy's mind on the subject. It would be quite content to not experience another First for the remainder of its existence.

Unfortunately, there did not seem to be a means of restoring normalcy to its immediate surroundings, much less the universe. This was the danger of a First Cascade, it created a ripple that spread outward, disrupting flows and creating currents that then swept the hapless beings caught in them away. To wit: Xy. It had gone from Observing in its orderly sub-float in partnership with an only moderately impaired Right to its present circumstances. There was little to be done now but ride the ripple and hope to exist when it dissipated.

Despite the disruption, Xy had become convinced that the events had transpired as they should have. Zyy's actions had been justified and required, even if the consequences were dire. The alternatives would have been worse. Odd that Xy should come to believe that being slowly suffocated in a blasphemous float with a dying partner in restricted space was the right outcome. It was certainly the Right outcome.

A small emotion-thread injected itself into Xy's consciousness.

Gratitude. Happiness.

Zyy. Since their split, Xy had intertwined a few cilia with its partner to assist in its recovery and in hopes of re-establishing contact, but Zyy had been unresponsive. The process that allowed it to subordinate Xy in the merge had also increased Zyy's susceptibility to the strange forces at play within the flows. It was only when Zyy had been drained of energy and helpless that Xy had regained the agency to act apart of Zyy's will. There had been no joy at the moment, just a grim determination to do what needed to be done to survive. Eventually, there would be a time for Xy address Zyy's actions, but its ingrained Left sensibilities forced it toward more pressing priorities. Among them being the restoration of its partner.

Xy tried to establish a thought-thread, to form a basic link that would allow the two to communicate Zyy's health status. The thought-thread could not find purchase. Only the cilia carrying the emotion-thread would respond, the others, even those Xy had grasped in its own, remained silent. Xy attempted to nurture the emotion-thread, to try and coax a greater shared consciousness out of it. The thread resisted the effort, instead thrumming arrhythmically with pulses of barely discernible from the ambient noise of the float.

Gratitude. Happiness.

Xy felt helpless. It could not establish a thought-thread to obtain direct access to Zyy's consciousness. Xy also could not manipulate the flows to the degree necessary to utilize the float's diagnostic capabilities. More extreme measures were also unavailable. Xy was not strong enough to force a merge, and Zyy would likely not survive such an attempt. Without other tools, Xy was forced to gather what information it could by probing Zyy with its cilia. After careful effort, all Xy could ascertain was that Zyy's state was dire in a general sense.

The only tools at its disposal were systems with low flow requirements, such as communication. Unfortunately, the humans seemed to be wildly unprepared for the complexities entailed in treating Zyy's condition, and Xy did not have the strength to communicate anything more than basic dictates. There was little else Xy could do but attempt to find some means of fighting the currents against it, dragging Zyy along behind it.

The emotion-thread was a comfort, but it did not resolve matters. It also confused Xy.

Zyy was happy.

This made little sense. Perhaps the Right's pre-existing mental deficiencies had been exacerbated by the wrong flows and it was now insane. Another First.

Xy disliked Firsts.

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In the quiet of her perch, Overseer Neeria reflected on her interactions with the Human. Many of the subtleties of the species would not be understood without additional information and scrutiny, but the Overseer believed the Human was being honest. It was clear that crucial information was being omitted and potentially obfuscated, but this was not uncommon for species involved in novel contact. In anything, the Humans seemed more direct than many, though their penchant to behave mischievously seemed to exceed other species by orders of magnitude.

Overseer Neeria did not expect Premier Valast to accept such a charitable view on events. Intentional or not, the Humans exuded a penumbra of chaos, disrupting the machinery of the Combine and surfacing nascent divisions with alarming effectiveness. This complicated matters greatly, particularly in light of the Cerebella's interest in the species. Under normal circumstances, the species would be adjudicated and justice meted out. It would be difficult to justify another course of action without revealing other dynamics that were best left hidden.

Unfortunately, conflict seemed increasingly inevitable. The destruction of the Combine ship placed the Overseers at odds with the Premier. The Premier sought to gain political advantage by placing the blame for the incident upon the Overseers and further capitalize on the sense of panic that had developed as a result. Halcyon had been a place of stable peace for generations and the destruction wrought by the Humans had enormously disruptive effects on the Combine's seat of power.

There was also the matter of the Human-created artificient, the Automics. If the representations of the Witness were to be believed, then the Humans had managed to rid themselves of their creation, a heretofore impossibility. The very formation of the Combine was predicated on the inability to resist the rise of an artificient in a civilization. The prospect of resistance was discounted because pre-Combine history had so thoroughly established its impossibility. Prevention was the only solution. As a result, the entirety of Combine space was subject to strict monitoring for quantum signatures, the precursor technology for the construction of an artificient.

No, that was not quite true. Not everything had been monitored. The Humans were proof enough of that.

The restricted zones were beyond the Combine. Little was known of the nature of these spaces, and Neeria's efforts to gain more information had been rebuffed. The Cerebella provided information as she saw fit, and, despite the Cerebella's expressed interest in the Humans, the Matriarch of the Evangi had not made additional information available to Neeria. Neeria's known facts had come from her own sources and were quite rudimentary. The Humans had come from a restricted zone created by the Divinity Angelysia. There were strange properties at play within the restricted area, as evidenced by the Human's incredible strength, reliance on inefficient transportation methods, and the concept of "power starving." The Humans were naïve with respect to interstellar matters, but they did not appear to be inherently belligerent. They were simply beyond their frame of reference.

All of this left many more questions than answers. Unfortunately, events were moving quickly, and Neeria suspected she would not be granted the opportunity to secure the answers she needed to make thoughtful determinations. The Combine Council, long a passive governing instrument under the watchful eye of Evangi Overseers, was increasingly emboldened under Premier Valast following the destruction of the Combine ship. For now, the Council' actions were confined to Inquiry Committees and Requests for Information, but Neeria was a seasoned enough hand to see the beginnings of an effort to disintermediate the Evangi.

If the Cerebella shared Neeria's concerns, she did not express them to Neeria directly despite repeated entreaties. While Neeria held a position of prominence within the Combine, she was not among the Cerebella's inner circle. This was natural. The Combine was a tool for a specific purpose. One of many tools at the Cerebella's disposal, though perhaps more prominent and valuable than most. As Council Overseer, Neeria was to ensure the tool remained in good repair. She played an important role in a piece of a much broader machine, and her responsibilities did not require her to understand and participate in the machinations around the Evangi's broader purpose.

Neeria knew this purpose, as all Evangi were aware of the reason they had been created and vested with control over the Combine. She would serve diligently until that purpose was realized, her existence was predicated on it. Wishing that she had more information, time, and resources at her disposal would not aid her cause in any way. The Cerebella would provide as she saw fit, and Overseer Neeria would be expected to keep the tool she had been entrusted with ready for use.

Nimble arms unfolded and punched into the air, aiding her effort to connect to the thought-web and push her consciousness outward. She pressed her mind against Premier Valast's consciousness, seeking a connection. He hesitated for a moment and then accepted it. As always, the connection was limited in nature, preventing Neeria from gaining an understanding of thoughts beyond what the Premier chose to reveal. Even through the mental separation bubbles of emotion boiled to the surface. Intensely felt emotions could never be fully scoured away, and the Premier remained consistent in his over the prior few interactions.

Disgust. Alarm. Anger.

"Overseer Neeria. What have you learned of the Humans?"

Always the Humans. The Premier had little desire to hear of anything else. Efforts to steer his attention to other matters were met with hostility and accusations of foul play. His fixation was understandable but curious. While the events surrounding the Humans merited substantial scrutiny, Overseer Neeria sensed additional dynamics at pl. One thing was certain, the Premier's interest in the Humans was not academic.

"Data surrounding the Humans continue to be scrutinized. Since our interactions with them have been limited, we do not have a proper behavior model trained to viability. We have attempted to match Human behavior to known species and orchestrate behavioral analysis from there, but the error margins are quite high, this requires--"

"Overseer. Stop."

Overseer Neeria fell silent, no longer projecting her voice into Premier Valast's mind via the thought-cast.

Premier Valast let the quiet hold before responding. "I asked a question. The question is simple: What have you learned? If the answer is nothing, then say so. If the answer is something then say what it is. I did not ask for a detailed accounting of your four-armed flailing."

Neeria felt an urge to demonstrate to the Premier who was in control and who was not. However, doing so would validate the criticisms the Premier had raised with respect to the Evangi's role within the Combine and potentially alienate the Member species in the process. Neeria suppressed her annoyance and responded. "We believe the Human known as Kai Levinson is telling the truth."

"About?"

"Everything. The series of events creates a highly unusual and improbable fact pattern. Witness Levinson's explanation provides a suitable explanation for the causal chain and a consistent motivational basis for the underlying behavior."

Annoyance spiked again in the emotional stew beneath the surface of Valast's mind. Suspicion as well. "Your position is that the Humans are super-powered hapless simpletons that go about the galaxy mistakenly destroying everything they come across?"

"No, Premier, that is not my position."

"Then try again, very slowly, without the behavior model nonsense, to explain," Valast said.

"The Humans are explorers, originating from a place with rules vastly different than our own. Their interaction with these rules has created unexpected outcomes and collateral damage. They do not mean harm, but they have created it."

"That sounds exactly like what I just said, but nicer." The Premier fell quiet, the suspicion still spiking. "What are you not saying Overseer? What are you hiding?"

"I have been fully transparent, Premier," Neeria replied.

"Your behavior does not have a...what was it?" Another pause. "A 'consistent motivational basis' for this 'improbable fact pattern.'"

"You will need to explain further, Premier."

"Why did you give the Zix plenipotentiaries access to a Combine wormkey?" The question sounded more in accusation than curiosity.

Back in her perch, Neeria folded her arms around her torso, her fingers lightly drumming against her sides. This was an unexpected line of questioning. The question suggested an effort by the Premier to paint her, and potentially other Evangi, as a part of a conspiracy. Even so, the answer was simple and she provided it. "It was the most expeditious way of ensuring the galaxy would not come to harm."

Valast pounced on the answer, clearly expecting it. "Entrusting a highly isolated and generally confounding species with access to a Combine wormkey was the best way of securing our safety?"

"Indeed. Were you aware of another, superior path?"

Glee appeared within the background emotions of the thought-cast, sharp and pointed. "It would seem wiser to simply amend the Combine wormkey to grant it access to the location."

The Overseer was aghast. Once the Sol object had exited the restricted zone, it had entered Zix space. The Zix had dominion over their sovereign space, and permitting an unauthorized wormkey access was a violation of the core tenets of the Combine Compact. "Premier, as you know, Zix space is heavily restricted by the Zix's Membership Charter. Granting access--"

Valast cut in. "Overseer, the fate of the galaxy was in the balance. The Combine Compact clearly grants the Combine Council emergency powers when there is a threat to the 'safety and integrity' of Combine space. If that doesn't qualify, I do not know what does."

The thrumming on Neeria's sides increased. "As I was attempting to explain, even if there was a desire to do such a thing, granting access is not a decision that can simply be made. It requires the access keys held by the Zix. This is how we protect the sanctity of Member sovereignty."

"There is always an excuse, isn't there, Overseer?" Suspicion flared.

"An excuse for what?"

"Doing whatever you want," the Premier replied, a low menace lurking in his tone.

"I do not understand what you are implying, Premier."

"You will." He cut the thought-cast off, leaving Overseer Neeria alone in the quiet of her perch.