Chapter 383 - Far Future Ch. 93 – The End of a Five-Year Mission (1/2)
”No biomass,” I muttered.
”Stripped right clean by something,” Briggs agreed. ”A virus would have left inorganics behind, something...”
”So, a biovore?” I looked back at the ten-mile plain of glass around the ship. It had been shooting at enough creatures to turn that entire area to glass... and judging by the desert, it had failed to contain them.
”A lot of biovores. Trying to get away from the ship...” Briggs murmured.
”Uh huh. And just where might all of those biovores have come from?”
We both looked at the mass of the huge colony ship in front of us.
”To explore strange new worlds. To seek out new life, new civilizations...” his voice almost cracked. A colony ship, full of volunteers on their way to a new life in the stars, full of hope and wonder.
”Boldly going where no man has gone before,” I finished for him, and my hands popped as I clenched them. ”Briggs, I really, really hate this place...”
”Yeah,” he agreed, and in tandem, we turned in opposite directions, looking around.
Something had come out of the ship. The question was, where had it gone?
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Crim's Markdoor lit back up as he came inside the Ward, but I knew the news wasn't great by the emotions coming through.
-Sage Sama, given the sensitive nature of the information, we executed every cut-out protocol we could, complete with using a Marked psi-crystal Matrix clone-out to do the accessing. We found an old nobleman with a hobby of collecting information about antique ships who had what we wanted, but...- His /voice was a bit shaken, the girls who'd done the work had probably been a bit tense.
-The whole datafile was a worm at TL 14+?- I /hazarded coolly.
-Yes!- he /breathed in relief when I got ahead of him, thanking the stars Ranthas were so smart. -The access site was bombarded within two minutes of datatouch, and a Mekker forensic team was on site and in the Boole going crazy behind the scenes trying to find out who did it via teleport thirty seconds later. The worm was actually psychoactive, and they had to dust the psi-crystal that was transferring the video before it was sublimated. There was teleport-tracking and obscene amounts of video tracking and analysis going on from all directions, looking for potential tie-ins.-
Since they knew what had been done, that also meant the girls had taken precautions and kept two and three steps ahead, probably considering it a light intellectual challenge. -What was their estimation of discovery?-
He /sighed in relief. -They said because of Beyond Law and Chaos, under 1%, and they'd need a Sixteen on-site right now for that to happen.-
Like, oh, that Tekron down in The Hole. I was sure if a Sixteen was present, the Powers That Be would know. The Mekkers were good, but keeping one of their own of that Level of power hidden from the Mentats and Umbrans for any period of time was basically impossible. Hyperanalytic divinations would reveal that they were present, even if nothing about who they actually were... but knowing they were there, the psions would go looking, and asking questions. The Guild could be secretive, but stonewalling the Umbrans was a Guild-wiping mistake in judgement.
Vampire's Veil, Beyond Law and Chaos, and teleportation were freaking nightmares for any data-happy surveillance network and number-crunching analytical software to deal with. I had girls who literally did not exist as far as the system was concerned, and they very proudly and thoroughly kept it that way. Some considered it a challenge to not exist in the information files, while others had multiple identities, none of which were real, which they could expose and throw away on a lark as required.
After all, the whole range of human Talents was present on them, and some of them had Talents dealing with hyperterritorial paranoia. They were really, really good at staying off the radar, while others were Self-Reliant to a degree that would make Libertarians weep with joy. Sisterly support meant woo-hoo! enthusiasm in support of casual law-breaking for a good cause, and away they went, them rebellious criminal scum, them!
Given how many Ranthas were scattered among the Juris upholding the law and righteousness, and laughing at their sisters doing all this criminal shit in support of the Right Thing, it was good times all around.
And of course, informing the Juris and the Umbrans that a covert Mekker forensic team had fried a couple buildings in a condemned zone and crawled all over it with their men without telling anyone was always good for laughs. Mekkers' lies were unconvincing because they were so out of tune with emotions the bit-heads could only try the robotic approach and repeat the same words, thinking that they would be believed by sheer repetition...
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”There is a Galactic Omega Threat existing at the center of the Warp Zone,” Vala told Duke Parablum. ”Bluma is telling Duke Rimval in his Quiet Room right now as well.”
Duke Parablum stared at Vala. He trusted her, because she was a part of him. A Galactic Omega threat... that meant humanity-ending, or worse!
”And you can't tell me the particulars.” His voice indicated he was not surprised.
”The only people who know the full details are Sources and Nulls, to ensure it does not permeate in the Mindscape or Dream. And... the Mechanists have always known it was there.”
Duke Parablum stared into those dark eyes, which were cold and hard right now, a lethal edge to them he had never seen. Concealing a Galactic Omega threat... was grounds for termination, from high to low, of every member of the guild on Janus III, and their superiors who knew about it. It could reach all the way back to Tellus!