The Akrotiri Journals

AUGUST- 2504. ONE PLANET, THREE STORIES.

Aug 22, 2023

The NASA-ESA-CNSA Excessively Large Radio Space Telescope at Akrotiri, January 1, 2506. Art by Snazz (@lordquince on Twitter and @heroicmeep on tumblr)

The following primary source records were left behind by several individuals at Akrotiri, and are collated from the emails of Kylie Cermakova (INDIVIDUAL 11), a Minervan colonist from Calvados Republic, and the personal logs of Dr. Andre Deriviere (INDIVIDUAL 32), a NASA Goddard radio astronomer.

`SUBJ: update`

`Created: 03/08/04 06:47:35 UTC`

`Last Modified: 03/08/04 08:31:21 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 03/08/04 09:36:12 UTC`

Hey, Chris. Surprise! Hope you don't hate me. I'm on Akrotiri. You probably don't know where that is. It's in the middle of nowhere. Right next to the Gulf. Sorry I didn't talk to you since the fight. I don't, well, I don't hwte you. I like you a lot. I miss you a lot. I wish I hadn't said that shit and I hope you'll just. Let me act like things are fine? Okay. Let's begin,

This place is beautiful. It’s so full of life. Untouched. Pristine. And the sun literally never sets. Ever. It’s an eyeball planet.

When we first stepped out on the surface, I couldn’t think of anything about how many trees there were. These weren’t stocked, brought from outside like home on Calvados. They were from here, lived here, died here. Hundreds of years old, probably. Teeming with alien diseases for the organics here to catch, I’m sure. I saw something that looked like a giant yellow-striped armadillo crossed with an anteater yesterday. It was kind of cute. I want to name him Chris, like you. It had your bigass nose. I'd send you pictures but the bandwidth we got on our comms beacon is too low for anything but text.

You’d love it here. Since you’re a biologist I bet they’d even let you name it after yourself. Schnozicus crappaportis. You could come live in the little container houses we have for now until we properly unload the fab hub. They’re so small and dinky. I swear if I lean on the wall wrong it will dent. I don’t mind. It’s so much better here than back home. Calvados City is a town of resorts and beaches, not steel and concrete, and yet there aren’t any clouds in the sky. Here there are too many. I can see the silhouettes of places and people in them. It’s gorgeous. I want to lose myself in them.

How’s Santa Maria Assunta? Minerva everything you hoped? Fall River’s a lot bigger than New Brixton, but everywhere is bigger than here, our little clearing by the shore. We'll be leaving the propulsion segment in orbit but the prefab is all coming down with us.

I'm going to miss New Brixton a ton. Undergrad was good to us, wasn't it? I miss being out til four, starting our night at the Bernie Grant and ending it somewhere new every time. We'd always find something cool. I hope you still are.

I know you might not super want to hear from me after that meltdown last spring, but. I'm better now. And I'm in a better place. I don't think you'll decide to read this. But if you do, know that I didn't come with you to Fall River because I don't want to be somewhere big anymore. That outbreak of nerv scared the shit out of me. They wanted colonists who wanted to get the hell out of inhabited space, and only were taking people who were clean. A beautiful new planet far away from everybody else with a guarantee of no cyberplague sounded great to me. So I bailed. On our plans. On my grad degree. On civilization.

I wish I'd told you sooner. I hope you're okay. I hope you don't hate me. but I get it if you do.

Love you, Chris. Miss you tons.

—kylie

PERSONAL LOG 08/04/2504

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 08/04/04 12:54:32 UTC

Last Modified: 08/04/04 13:00:03 UTC

We’re on our way. It feels good to say that.

I never quite sat right with slipspace. Or ships. The air on ships always gave me these little headaches… and a slightly runny nose. Ibuprofen and antihistamines have been my best friends. Oh well. Gotta stick it out for a few more weeks— the ‘tides’ are looking good. Everything is in conjunction— an opposition type trip would take years. Good news is that forecasting says the orbital mechanics should stay favorable for the next few years. The Cygni-Draconian Current should be aligned with the Hyperian long enough for the station to be established, and we can let the long-haulers and full-senders stay if they want once we start moving out of conjunction. I’ll be going back home. Spacing was never for me. But the stars beyond always were— and thanks to the Excessively Large Radio Space Telescope, we’ll be able to see stars we had never dreamt.

[SNEEZE]

Oh, jeez. Lovely. We’re under a steady burn right now, about 1.6g. I just sneezed mucus onto my shoe. That would have missed back home. There’s that runny nose for ya. Just because I like looking at stars doesn’t mean I like going to them! I already miss Greenbelt— not that it’s anything special, just another DC offshoot— but I miss open skies and gravity that doesn’t, ah, change. I was brushing my teeth last time we were about to cut drives. I’m glad they gave us a warning. I don’t want to choke on toothpaste.

I— I don’t think that’d have been likely, or anything. I’m just a little… ah, scared, of zero-g. It’s a shame that thrustgrav and a cramped centrifuge section is good enough for government work. I would love to see what it’s like on one of those plategrav yachts. Hell, even the military’s had it since the ‘30s. They’ve even had it reliably since the ‘60s! I should be careful what I wish for. Knowing Goddard, if we wanted a plategrav ship, we’d only have the budget to get the De Gaulle, and not even to scrub the blood off the walls. We’re lucky we convinced them to splurge on it for the station.

It was nice of them to remember that radio astronomy exists long enough to get a budget at all, let alone enough to build our precious child of a space telescope here. This thing only existed on napkins. It was a drunk half-idea of what we’d build if they left us in charge for a day. I literally sketched it on a cocktail napkin at a bar in Chengdu after that IAU conference. I think it was Dr. Lu who gave it the real name. The one we call it. The Really Fucking Big Radio Space Telescope. Emphasis not mine. It’s funny. Lian doesn’t do well with English when she’s that many shots in, but she nailed that phrase whenever she’d say it. I miss her. I miss Dave too. Us three, we were the ones architecting this whole thing— a NASA-ESA-CNSA project. Dave gets spacesick and Lian said she’d be running the Goddard liaison office for CNSA in Greenbelt. That left me, of the project’s original parents, left to babysit on the Frontier.

Still… I’m somehow excited to get there. I’ve heard Akrotiri looks like it has everything necessary to be beautiful. The initial probe rundown seemed great. Very heavily forested world— we’ll be building some groundside infrastructure, to support the program. Next to no wireless comms, though. Perfect for the RF-dark radio astronomer’s paradise we’ve got here— after all, no one’s ever been here before.

Maybe one day I’ll take Lian and Dave on a tour. Dave will find an excuse, though.

Landlubber.

[ALARM KLAXON]

[NON-USER VOICE DETECTED]

ALL HANDS, ALL HANDS. ENGINE CUTOFF IN THREE MINUTES. ALL HANDS SECURE FOR ZERO GRAVITY. I SAY AGAIN, ENGINE CUTOFF IN THREE MINUTES. ALL HANDS SECURE FOR ZERO GRAVITY.

Shit. That’s my cue. I gotta clean my shoe before the schmutz starts floating.

Uhhh… what sounds like something a real spacefarer would say at the end of one of these… Uh, yeah!

[THROAT CLEARING] Ahem.

Deriviere out.

`SUBJ: RE: RE: update`

`Created: 12/08/04 09:54:15 UTC`

`Last Modified: 12/08/04 10:04:31 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 12/08/04 10:24:10 UTC`

imsorry im really sorry man i shouldnt have run. im sorry i was so scared. You have no idea whatit was like.

Have you ever seen someone get NerveANA? I know you haven’t had it. just. I can spell it out for you if you’d like— ganics never get it is2g. this is like super brain cancer plus dementia plus a dash of huntington’s. on steroids.

i lost a close mentor in that outbreak. you remember Professor Franklin? I mentioned her, I’m sure. in the psych department with me.

i want you to imagine what it’s like to watch a brain fall apart. not like dementia. well okay a little like dementia. dementia stumbles around in the dark and breaks everything by bumping into it and knocking it over. nerv is running through your brain with a flamethrower. it has agency and direction and dreadful dreadful passion. it revels in killing you. it strings it out to spread. im lucky ididn;t get it. it learns. it grows. it bends your mind into a farm full of swords, using the fertile ground of your own intelligence to dig up new and fascinating blades to cut you and the ones you love into ribbons cast aside in the wind.

it is a monster that lurks in the dark of my nightmares.

that’s why i ran chris. i ran from that. the boogieman. the devil. i don’t know what to call it. it’s evil. i hate it. watching her die from behind the faraday screens burned me. it broke me. i couldn’t talk aboutwhat i could only think of in screams. i couldn’t talk about what i would always see in dreams.

i care about you, man. i really do. i’m so sorry for what i did but i had to. i was soscared you have no idea. im sorry for sending you this mess of amn email but you have to understand why i feel this waynd what its like to live in fear like this. this was a fresh start away from all that.

i love you chris. i always have. i miss you and im sorry.i really am.

I’m not going to ask for much but I am going to ask you for this. If you don’t want me a part of your life anymore, please tell me. don’t ghost me. please. after all we’ve been through please give me that.

—kylie

PERSONAL LOG 08/21/2504

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 08/21/04 14:10:33 UTC

Last Modified: 08/21/04 14:15:59 UTC

Ahem. Researcher’s log, August 21, 2504.

Always loved Dad’s old 20th-century TV. Good stuff. Glad to be able to do it all in real life... explorers on some vast, untamed frontier, going out in the name of peace for all humanity. It really barely feels real— I was writing grant proposals four years ago, not checking my bags for landing on an alien planet full of strange new life.

Almost there. Just about a week to go. Wild to me.

I like radio astronomy because I loved history— real history, not “King Gurbensnatch IV hits his head on a lintlepiece and dies, leading to the most devastating war in European history”. I like the history of everything. How did stars form? How did the universe form? I can see the Big Bang’s remnants in the radio spectrum, and the resolution of our pet project here is going to answer some real cool questions about neutron stars, quasars, background radio emissions, and the formation of well, everything.

I can’t believe some of the team members, ahem, some of my close friends, want to use the ELRST for a ‘hello world’ to ‘alien civilizations’. Want to spend a whole week doing it, actually. Lian. I told her a day would be fine for her PR stunt. A week is killing valuable transmit/recieve time. I know the Drake Equation, Lian. I’m not convinced an alphabet soup of unknowns is meaningful. Plus? We’re not going to have a budget forever! I don’t think Capitol Hill quite understands how many zeros they gave us on the check.

I kind of want to figure out how the universe came into being before they realize.

Thanks.

`SUBJ: RE: RE: RE: RE: update`

`Created: 29/08/04 12:19:03 UTC`

`Last Modified: 29/08/04 12:24:47 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 29/08/04 12:24:59 UTC`

thanks ;-;

I don’t really know what to say, I. I don’t really think I deserve this, but I’m glad you’re trying to learn more about it.. it’s a pretty scary thing. I wouldn’t blame you if you just, y’know. Moved on. Put this behind us. As best we can, anyway.

Maybe you could come visit? The currents are in conjunction and it’s only a few weeks to a month away!

haha. yeah. that’d be nice. too bad you’re smart and actually mentally stable :)

before you say. “kylie you’re smart too!!!” bitch i went to school for neuropsychology because i was bored!! i made a horrible decision!! being resort staff in the special econ zone sucks but at least you get some good sun. and I don’t get sunburnt. You're smart. I made a really dumb decision, leaving behind something kinda easy that sucked for something hard that also sucks.

ugh. At least this is easy and relaxing. The only issue is that there's really nothing to do but work and survive. Maybe I can work on my music? I brought my guitar.

It’s still got that chip in the headstock from when you tripped on it, remember?

Once we have the bandwith for audio I’ll send you a song.

Miss you. Oh! Right, an update. We brought all the supplies and the hab modules down from orbit. We’ll actually have a fabricator soon! Looking forward to having a real roof over my head instead of this prefab that’s bound to cave in if ya look at it funny. Some of the ganic colonists have already caught some of the local diseases. Mild, at least. We have the meds for it. I think. Apparently that’s pretty normal on planets like this— and it passes pretty soon. That’s what the docs keep telling them. Not really my business.

They have me in the agricultural rotation. So now i’m a farmer. they got me growing rice in the aeroponics bay and potatoes in the ground. Right now we have an ag tent with all the aeroponics setup but my boss says she wants to see if we can just chuck the rice in the dirt too cuz we’ve been having some issues with the sprayers.

Talk soon. Miss you. I know I just said that.

—kylie

PERSONAL LOG 09/05/2504

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 09/05/04 14:12:34 UTC

Last Modified: 09/05/04 14:14:00 UTC

We’ve arrived. We’re… here.

Took us long enough. I want to throw up from that braking burn.

Okay, I already have. The crew tells me I’ve hit 750 milligarns, whatever that means. I think it means I puke a lot.

…how much puke makes a, y’know, regular garn, then? I shudder to think. Ugh. Lian will never let me live this down. Ever. I’ll be Sir Andre, the Green Knight forever.

[NON-USER VOICE DETECTED]

Hey, you the expedition chief? The scientist guy?

Yeah, what’s— what’s going on?

We just made orbit. There’s something you should see.

Oh?

Ah, well. Gonna have to cut this one short.

Report back soon.

PERSONAL LOG 09/05/2504- SUPPLEMENTAL

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 09/05/04 16:15:21 UTC

Last Modified: 09/05/04 16:15:24 UTC

Fuck.

`SUBJ: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: update`

`Created: 05/09/04 17:03:21 UTC`

`Last Modified: 05/09/04 17:24:05 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 05/09/04 17:26:08 UTC`

hey chris!!!!!

what’s up? I’ve been good. Been working on my guitar!! I got my groove back!! We’ve got a little container that we use as a rec room and this guy Cooper who played bass in a band back on Calvados has been showing me some chords. He seems nice. You’d like him. We got noise complaints! And then we made moonshine. Out of plants!

I couldn’t drink with them because I broke my simtox gear while I was kind of binge drinking waiting for you to email; but they DID give me a bottle. I just, y’know, wouldn’t get anything out of it. They sure got something out of it. Mostly food poisoning. Apparently local flora is very very mildly toxic. Fun! A whole new kind of wasted. Next time we’ll try to use some of our own crops.

They’ve put me to work helping set up our fab plant. Once we get it online we can build the stuff we need to properly set up our high-bandwidth transmitter— then you can hear the sounds of Akrotiri’s hottest cover band. I don’t really know much about this stuff, but the lead engineer used to be in the military. dude rocks. His name is Noah and he’s so old I think he might be the one from the Bible. hah. He doesn’t usually speak english. I think that’s croatian or something?? but he talks to us fine. just mutters to himself a ton. probably nothing positive about my skills in the manual labor department. Look. I’m strong, sure, this is a good chassis. But also I worked at a resort as a bartender. and then studied psychology. i dunno how to do this shit!!

i gotta fix my simtox gear. i don’t really want to admit to anyone else that i overheated it on a binge so i just kinda said i would be designated babysitter for the night? look i am keeping my hot messiness to myself, and i envy you ganics who can get sloshed without extra neuro-impairment hardware. You count your blessings christopher.

—kylie

PERSONAL LOG 09/05/2504- SUPPLEMENTAL (2)

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 09/05/04 17:45:29 UTC

Last Modified: 09/05/04 17:51:05 UTC

So. The project’s not totally fucked. Just. Partly.

We’re not the first at Akrotiri. Somebody beat us to it. No drive plume so we can’t match it to the UN database.

Just. Jeez. This whole project was predicated on being there first, and keeping people out. We can’t do this if they suddenly flick on a big freaking RF blasting antenna and start throwing a rave for all of the absolute fucking nobody and nothing out here. Whatever. Whatever. We can work with this. We can work with this…

So far we just found a propulsion segment for a long-haul cargo-transport ship. There have to be people on the surface. Right?

Priority has changed from on-orbit telescope construction and groundside infrastructure setup to planetary surveying for a search mission. We’re only reading short burst transmissions from the surface— up to the propulsion segment and off to a slip beacon— but thank God they’re out of our target wavelengths. The project can continue. For now.

But we need to find them fast. And then?

We need to have a talk.

`SUBJ: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: update`

`Created: 06/09/04 13:00:56 UTC`

`Last Modified: 06/09/04 13:14:08 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 06/09/04 13:17:35 UTC`

Bad news, Chris. (I know you haven’t gotten my last one yet, but… important developments!)

There was a rockslide while we were installing the high bandwidth antenna— we had to put it up on the side of one of the mountainsides so it could see the sky above the forest canopy, and it got taken out by a rolling stone. funny. i was just learning gimme shelter.

You won’t get to hear it for a few more months…

is what it is ig

well, you know where to find me. just a shot away :)

—kylie

`SUBJ: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: update`

`Created: 06/09/04 13:22:29 UTC`

`Last Modified: 06/09/04 13:23:51 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 06/09/04 13:23:55 UTC`

ok i completely forgot what those lyrics were about oml having listened to the song again that joke was in really bad taste sorry!!

PERSONAL LOG 09/11/2504

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 09/11/04 14:42:23 UTC

Last Modified: 09/11/04 14:55:02 UTC

Well, we finally found them.

The sensors on this ship are old, and one of our telescopic cameras was jammed from a micrometeoroid strike, but we finally got eyes on them. The forest canopy made it tough, but we found the clearing they were camping in. We’re assembling an away team now… We have to make some kind of deal to relocate them, or something.

We can’t move, after all.

I’m going. I’ll see what we can do.

PERSONAL LOG 09/11/2504- SUPPLEMENTAL

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 09/11/04 17:12:43 UTC

Last Modified: 09/11/04 17:14:01 UTC

Oh this is all just great. They’re Minervans from Calvados. Somehow the fucking Beach Boys scrounged up enough clout and backing for a colony ship. So we have no chance at getting them to move off of government authority. They won’t recognize our authority, we won’t recognize theirs. Nice nice nice nice. Just lovely stuff, people.

We could try to force them out. And start a war. Great stuff.

How am I gonna break this to Lian and Dave?

Agh. I need a drink. A gross, zero-g beer. Cuz we’re not burning the drive. The taste is all fucked up in zero-g. It’s the worst.

At least the planet’s pretty enough from behind a full-face respirator. Biosafety protocols my ass.

PERSONAL LOG 09/11/2504- SUPPLEMENTAL (2)

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 09/11/04 18:15:44 UTC

Last Modified: 09/11/04 18:16:59 UTC

Oh, you’ve got to be fucking kidding me. We just got the election results from yesterday. Leave it to comms delay to let me find out the bogan fucking won on the worst day of my life.

Just one hell of a day, huh?

At least they haven’t finished counting yet. He’s just projected to have won, right? The results from India and Imbrium still haven’t come in yet. And some of the colonies!

Fiorenzano can still win. At least give me that, God.

PERSONAL LOG 09/16/2504

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 09/16/04 12:52:41 UTC

Last Modified: 09/16/04 12:53:59 UTC

Shit.

Fiorenzano really fucking choked it, huh.

Well, there goes my blood pressure.

`SUBJ: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: update`

`Created: 12/09/04 00:22:01 UTC`

`Last Modified: 12/09/04 00:25:31 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 12/09/04 00:26:03 UTC`

Hey chris!!

Today was pretty weird. We had visitors.

YEAH that’s right. Visitors. I thought we were it out here? Nope, apparently. They’re Blues from NASA. Scientists. And they wanted us to leave.

Yeah, nah. I’m good. Director Nielsen had us all vote, and we wanted to stay. So that’s that.

We’re working out a deal, but it feels really sketchy to me. I don’t know if we can trust these guys.

I’ll let you know if things get worse.

—kylie

`SUBJ: a walk in the woods`

`Created: 21/09/04 21:21:21 UTC`

`Last Modified: 21/09/04 21:25:56 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 21/09/04 21:26:23 UTC`

hey chris!!! CHRIS!!! I SAW THE WEIRD ANTEATER THING AGAIN! CRAPAPORTIS!! he’s so cute you’d love em. no idea if its a he but i project you and your weird face onto it, ergo he. i rest my case your honor

so you know how i mentioned he’s brightly colored and very large? yeah i followed him into the forest. it was fun! his name is al;so Chris, so i followed Chris into the forest and hung out with the animals for a bit. i don’t think they’ve ever seen synthetic life before. at least i sure hope not i leave a great first impression :)

some of them were very large and i did run for my life a few times. tripped on a laaaarge root and ate shit before i picked myself up and ran some more. INVIGORATING. I’m telling you you’d love this place.

I think Chris might be toxic. not you honey you’re lovely. the anteater thing. he’s brightly colored and larger native life runs away when they see him sometimes.

proud of me? biology!! yeah!

Your Esteemed Colleague,

Kylie Cermakova
A Real Biologist
Akrotiri, Federated Minervan Republics
kaycera12@quikmail.org

PERSONAL LOG 09/22/2504

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 09/22/04 15:16:17 UTC

Last Modified: 09/22/04 15:19:52 UTC

Okay. So. We got in touch with Goddard. They said they’re sending it up the chain. Whatever that means, whatever that’s worth, especially with the administration changing. This could be a diplomatic crisis. Handled wrong we could go to war. We’ve never recognized Minervan claims in the Triangle, sure, but we sure as hell deconflict our activities. Just no proper channels taken here. They said they were staying and we’d have to get their government to tell them to leave— but we did, at least, manage to make a deal about comms. They’ve promised to route certain comms bandwidths through our system we established to ensure minimal RF contamination. It’s a bandaid on a bullet wound. When, though? Who knows. They haven’t even started sharing any info about their comms infrastructure yet. Some neighbors.

Maybe they’re busy.

Ugh. I hate the waiting.

`SUBJ: RE: RE: a walk in the woods`

`Created: 30/09/04 20:54:29 UTC`

`Last Modified: 30/09/04 21:09:32 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 30/09/04 21:10:00 UTC`

it’s a sad day, chris. i saw one of Chris’ friends get eaten today.

the good news is that i am pretty sure i was right— they are toxic! The giant lizard thing that ate it died pretty quickly after.

The animals here are so fascinating. You’d love them. I really wish I could send you pictures. The vistas are so stunning and the sun never sets. like literally. it doesn’t. ngl that was a little weird at first but i’m getting used to it.

I’ve started realizing that most of the wildlife just looks at metal and composite with curiosity, rather than trying to take a bite. I’m not as nervous to go far out into the forest anymore. I think I don’t smell like food.

I'll let you know how it goes.

—kylie

PERSONAL LOG 10/15/2504

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 10/15/04 12:11:11 UTC

Last Modified: 10/15/04 12:14:55 UTC

Okay. So. We got up the chain. That was…Shockingly fast. Didn't expect to be on the freaking Bogan-in-Chief’s desk within a month. But I guess the Liu administration is taking the “move fast and break things” approach. They've done the first part surprisingly well. Let's see if they do the second. Knowing our dear friend Jimmy we could be at war over this. Poor guy’s frothing at the mouth for a reason for one, right? I bet his dad would love it. Kid Nakos himself in the Glass Office. I'm sure he won't be making use of those connections.

Goddard told us a diplomatic solution was being explored. That's a good one. Very funny. We need them off that planet, but we need them off there delicately, and I trust Jimmy Liu with delicate like I trust a bull with my grandma’s china.

I hope my worries aren't anything real. I really do. But I just have a bad gut feeling about this guy. He's a real slimeball, and the peace seems to sit wrong with this guy.

I don't like this.

`SUBJ: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: a walk in the woods`

`Created: 31/10/04 15:41:47 UTC`

`Last Modified: 31/10/04 15:46:33 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 31/10/04 16:00:01 UTC`

Hey chris,

I had a kind of weird day yesterday. I got caught coming back from the woods by our chief of security, and he basically interrogated me over it. He told me I couldn't go out that far into the forest either alone or unarmed. So my choices are to carry a rifle or to bring a friend with one.

Calvados doesn't do conscription so I've never held a rifle before today. Chief Jacobs ran me through the basics on an AK he printed. I asked him why we weren't using a Minervan design, he said he didn't think we made good rifles the old way. Said only our coilguns are worth using. And he said he liked the AK for how easy the piston system was to run and maintain over the AR’s. Some of the other vets were giving him sideeye for that one but I don't fuckin know what any of that means. Calvados is pretty far away from all that stuff— I don't think I ever saw a gun outside the holster of a cop. I think he pirated the print files actually. I've never seen “cracked by” on the side of a print before. Funny. I didn't think he had the ol’ yo ho in him. Yarr, matey.

You did your time before college— you know what it's like to shoot. I never knew how much it kicked— and yeah I know the old school stuff kicks a lot more, but it almost dislocated my shoulder the first time. Dug right into the joint. I didn't have the stock seated right. I don't really think I like it. And I don't want to shoot anything.

I don't want to shoot any of the chrises or their friends, especially. Maybe one of those giant lizard wolf things if it tries to eat a chris. I think I'll call them michaels. Yknow like your intro orgo TA you hated.

Hope everything is going good!! Tell me all about how SMAU is going. also ignore that last email lol i was a lil fucked up

—kylie

The display lit up with 4,263 new contacts. Infrared. The SCO and computer were working overtime to sort out decoy from genuine threat, and Sensor Technician Second Class Alaina Hartwell, Republic of Canada Navy, found herself cycling through menus and typing commands faster than she thought was physically possible. Tracks appeared on a group of what was identified to be approximately 300 medium-weight torpedoes, TANGENT-type. The cornucopia of death split into a shotgun cloud streaking for various targets along the UN battlegroup, and tracks turned red as sixty-two aligned with the path of the Peruvian Navy Ship NUEVA CASTILLA. “Spikers inbound!” She shouted into her headset, working to acquire their track with a second sensor. “Six-two TANGENT tracks India, pushing to PD. Six minutes to impact. Establishing Mike tracks.”

“A-firm SENS, sixty-two tracks India. Engaging inbound spikers. Six minutes to impact.” The Point Defense Coordinator nodded his head at his display a few consoles down. “Skipper, this is PD. Requesting battle short, CLaW batteries one through four.”

“Granted.” The Captain nodded. A few button presses later, the lights in the CIC flickered as the fusion reactor of the ORION-Class destroyer paused to catch its breath before getting back in the races. Four Close-in Laser Weapon batteries spit fire far beyond their rated specifications. She clicked through options on sensor packages and brought every ounce of detection capabilities the ship had to bear on the inbound TANGENTs. One by one, red tracks dropped off the scope— and so did a blue arc named THESSALONIKI. Her heart skipped and her breath sped.

“Two-eight spikers passing into guns range. One-two-zero seconds to impact.” Her tone was calm. Her mind was not. Twenty-eight four-hundred kiloton nuclear devices packed into shaped-charge warheads were not her favorite company, and they were altogether far too close for comfort. The hull shook under the thunder of point defense guns shooting guided projectiles to take out the remaining missiles, lest they too meet the grim fate of a torpedo room cookoff or get plunged into the hard vacuum of space. The depress harnesses would keep them alive. Right? All they'd need is to get noticed and scooped up. She just had to focus on doing her job. Just keep finding sensors to fuse. Just keep establishing Mike tracks. With a multispectral track of the inbound it'd be more accurate—

“One-six spikers inbound, engaging. six-five seconds to impact. Recommend evasive burn heading zero-five-zero flank. Dropping flares.”

“Flight, do it.” The Captain nodded.

“Aye. Evading at flank burn.”

Accelican™ coursed through her veins as she was slammed back into her seat at ten g’s, her blood replaced by the milky substance. NUEVA CASTILLA rocketed off in a tangent, laying streaks of point defense fire and invisible beams of lasers attempting to cut the sixteen remaining torpedoes to ribbons before they got the chance to land a blow.

Under the red battle lighting of the combat information center, the green Accelican™-tinted sweat rolled down her forehead a blackened streak. She prayed, silently, that they would emerge unscathed. Even in the company of St. Rita, St. Barbara, and her heavenly Father, she didn't like her odds. Miracles were best ordered in advance.

“Eight spikers, impact three zero seconds!”

She breathed heavy under the weight of ten worlds, watching red boxes blip off her display.

“Five spikers, impact one-two seconds!”

“Three spikers, brace for impact!”

She heard the break of thunder in the howling night.

PERSONAL LOG 12/25/2504

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 12/25/04 06:16:13 UTC

Last Modified: 12/25/04 06:20:51 UTC

I miss home. We had Christmas dinner with the program team, and it was nice— they even brought out real turkey from the freezer— butI miss home.

I miss a good Christmas ham. I miss the annual blowout fights with Uncle Max. I miss those scowls on Mom and Dad’s faces for me starting it with him. What the hell is wrong with me?

We’re gonna start establishing a regular transit service between Earth and the station we’re building— the Telescope’s foundations. I can’t wait to be on it. I need to see my parents. They’re getting old. I don’t want to run off to some system half the galaxy away and forget about them. Like Mom was worried I’d do.

I miss her.

I’ve been sending her pictures, video logs. But with one and a third days of comms delay out here— even on the superluminal comms— it’s hard to feel connected, even though we can communicate.

I’ve signed up for a three-month leave. It’ll be good to see Lian and Dave again, and update everyone back home on the project. And maybe unfuck this situation with the bogan.

The trip will really only leave me one month on Earth, but that’s okay. It’s time on terra firma. Terran terra firma.

I’m counting the days.

Klaxons wailed. The red battle lighting of the CIC blacked out before kicking in once more. Metal lurched and groaned. Alaina unclenched her eyes, scouring her station for any more inbound threats.

Nothing. Merciful, sweet nothing. The battle raged all around them, a constellation of new and fleeting stars joining in the chorus of the binary suns’ light. Yet it did not reach out for them. Monstrous history tore mother from daughter, father from son, friend from friend and lover from lover as the second horseman came riding in. Yet he did not come for them. Not anymore.

“Sir, we’re spinning!”

“Flight, cut drive and stabilize!”

“Aye, sir!”

The Damage Control Assistant radioed in from Engineering. “Impacts on drive cone, deck seven, and the port radiator. Scrambling DAMCON teams now.”

“Flight, secure the throttle.” The Captain nodded. “DAMCON, get me a report as soon as you can. I need to know if we can fly. SENS, how we looking?”

“Scopes clear of inbound threats,” Alaina forced out between ragged breaths. “I’ll keep you apprised.”

“Good. They aren’t trying to finish us off.” His shoulders sank in his acceleration seat. He glanced at the damage control board, a string of red aglow on the aft, driveward compartments of the destroyer. “Tell the crew to don their pressure suits if they can reach them, and the emergency ones if they can’t.” He nodded, unstrapping from his seat. “That goes for us, too.”

Alaina unstrapped from her seat, the Accelican™ injector seated along her spine engaged, digging under her skin just so slightly uncomfortably and pumping the milky fluid through her veins in lieu of blood. It was easier to pump than the blood stored in her wraparound reservoir— somehow— and had novel properties that made it excellent at oxygen transfer. It’d buy you a few more g’s in exchange for a few measly years off your life. You weren't gonna do much with those anyways, were you? She threw open the box at the base of her acceleration chair and rushed into her pressure suit, taking a deep breath and wiping away a glistening green-black trickle of sweat from her forehead before donning the lightweight helmet. It felt like someone else was moving her arms. She was smooth. She was sharp. The drug was doing its thing. She was glad. She was glad Alaina wasn’t here right now. The Sailor who was here right now was better. It would be addictive if it didn’t suck.

She scrambled back into her seat, scanning the display for inbound threats. “Nothing, sir. Scopes clear of inbound.”

“Good.” He nodded. “Now we fight the ship.”

`SUBJ: band`

`Created: 28/02/05 18:12:23 UTC`

`Last Modified: 28/02/05 18:26:43 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 28/02/05 20:00:23 UTC`

`ATTACHMENTS: draconisdaze_donewithyou_mp7.eczip [Evolved Compression-ZIP Archive]`

oh you won’t believe how much fun i’ve been having in that band we started. chris we actually have a drummer now. we made a bass drum and a snare on the fab. im the lead guitarist and cooper is our bassist and vocalist and christiano is our drummer. i also do vocals and we got chief jacobs on the synthesizer. turns out he plays a mean keyboard and i do mean mean

we’ve got the whole Falling Sideways album down. yknow from Polar Shepherds? that triphop-darkrock band? and we do some funkopop too. chief jacobs fucking loves funkopop. didn’t think hed be the funk and bubblegum type given the way he’s always talking about guns and shit but he’s fun when you get him talking about music!! he opened for Quincy Quinn once back on Calvados. if you don’t know or don’t remember him that’s good because it means you’re not mentally ill. he only had like two good songs anyways but that’s funkopop for ya. if you’re not a megastar you’re nobody.

anyways we are the brightest stars on akrotiri. we even sent some of the UN dudes building the telescope thing our mixtape as thanks for letting us use their long range comms— way better than the ones we brought by the way. they said thanks. unfortunately we only get a small quota per week so I can't send you photos of the animals I named after you… but I can send you exactly one bitcrunched to hell audio file.

enjoy Done With You from Falling Sideways. As much as one can at this quality, anyways. From the hottest cover band this side of the Gulf, Draconis Daze.

`<ATTACHMENT: draconisdaze_donewithyou_mp7.eczip>`

Toronto was a pretty part of the city, but it was showing its age. It was clear where Golden Horseshoe stopped and Toronto began, because the sea of megabuildings, punctuated occasionally by parks, parted for skyscrapers just a hair’s length short of the CN Tower, getting shorter and shorter until the antique needle sat amidst a bowl of rooftops. It’d become an oasis of sorts for climate refugees when the coasts had flooded hundreds of years ago— anyone unlucky enough to lack a seawall, that is. Lake Ontario had been a slumbering giant in those days. Nobody knew if they’d need the walls here. The scientists told them they wouldn’t. That didn’t make anyone feel better. Alaina couldn’t help but notice that some parts of the city quay were just that little bit higher.

She passed by fans wearing Raptors jerseys and dejected frowns filing out of the Bell Centre’s Mayor Aubrey D. Graham Memorial Arena, and more upbeat Shanghai Sharks fans. The usual, then. A thrashing. No. The deeper frowns on the faces of the crowd, the fistfight that broke out mere feet to her left, the wailing in the lines forming outside the bars— they’d made it to overtime. She headed south towards the shore.

If not for that little spat she’d had with her father hours earlier, she knew he’d be here, whaling on some poor Shanghai fan, too. She rubbed her knuckles, streaking crimson across her left hand, the snowflakes falling on drying blood. She didn’t want to walk into a Navy recruiting booth with a bloody hand. She’d have to duck into a public restroom.

Dark bags sat under her eyes, but thankfully she’d kept her face clean. She splashed her face with cold water from the browned-white sink, cracks running across the surface of the mirror. The hot water wasn’t working anyways. Clearly the Urban Renewal Program hadn’t reached Eaton Centre yet. Her left hand’s knuckles tinted the paper towels a slight pink.

The vidscreen billboards in Eaton Centre had rolled over from the abysmal results of the latest Raptors-Sharks rivalry game, and the listless, disgruntled crowd scattered to the four winds, or at least to Boreas. Through vacant stares and effusive swears she could hear the CP24 Politics anchors ranting about what the Free Tories’ gains in the polls meant for the 2466 elections. She didn’t really care. She wasn’t gonna be sticking around long. If there was one thing the Navy could guarantee you it was the ability to get off this rock, and fast.

It felt to her like everyone in this city, this country, this planet, was going nowhere fast. Locked in an eternal spiral, circling the drain, waiting for the inevitable decay. Waiting for the future to come happen to them, lost forever in a never-ending yesterday.

She didn’t want any part of that. There was no future for her here. On the ground. Only the slow rot of hopeless mediocrity.

She walked into the recruiting station, signed the contract, and it was done.

They had given her the chance to live.

PERSONAL LOG 03/20/2505

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 03/20/05 16:06:31 UTC

Last Modified: 03/20/05 16:12:52 UTC

Well, we’re back. And now we have a proper station with gravity and everything. Thank God. Living on the ship was driving me insane.

You oughta see the Telescope. It’s not quite done yet, but the primary reflector dish is done with assembly. It’s massive. It’s nuts. The station is tethered right now to stage construction. I’ve never seen anything like this. It’s not that close to the observation deck but you literally can’t see anything else. It already dwarfs the station. Crista from Engineering was telling me you used to have a gorgeous view of the planet from the observation window, but now you’ve just got a view of reflector dish, spacewalkers, and worker drones. Man. This is a colossus we’re building.

I’m not a father. The only family I have back home is my parents. But I can’t help but think about the pride a father must feel, whenever I look out that window. I mean, it was a sketch on a freaking cocktail napkin! And now it’s real.

I think that’s amazing.

I’m going to go down to the observation deck now, actually. I want to decompress before I finish logs for the day.

Gonna need to. This next bit is going to give me an aneurysm.

They had given her a place to die.

A cold steel coffin for a hundred souls drifting in the light of twin suns. A headstone of velcro nametape. Anointed with the incense of gamma radiation and neutron bombardment.

She glanced at the dead in the seats around her. Ragged breaths tickled the inside of her pressure helm. She longed for the snow. She longed for the cold of the Earth, so different from the cold of the void. She longed for the always delayed 5 train on the Eglinton line. She longed to go back and do anything but sign that paper.

She’d had a fine time in the Navy until this year. Sure, it sucked, but everything before had sucked too. There were certainly other things she could have done. She could have moved to America, or China, or hell, Europe or Imbrium or Mars— maybe even made it out to Ganymede. Anything was better than home. Anything except an undug grave in a radioactive debris field.

PERSONAL LOG 03/20/2505- SUPPLEMENTAL

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 03/20/05 17:21:11 UTC

Last Modified: 03/20/05 17:28:34 UTC

And now, the elephant in the room.

[DEEP BREATH]

They called me in to meet with Goddard leadership and brief the SecGen and the Forces Administration Council on the situation here with regard to the colonists. I wanted to shoot somebody in that room. For crying out loud, the man is a fu— damn hammer. Everything Minervan is a nail. I don’t want these people here, sure— but Liu wanted the Marines out here to throw them out if they don’t leave by September! Can you believe that? The Director of the Navy looked like he was trying to kill our dear Jimmy with pure psychic energy when he said that. Glad to know I’m not the only one who doesn’t like the guy. Which is funny, cuz Jimmy nominated him.

I really do think he’s a national crisis waiting to happen. If it weren’t for some of his own staff talking him down, I really do think he’d have told me to deliver that ultimatum.

Next on the agenda is going to be checking the radio emissions of the colony at regular intervals— to make sure they’re keeping our deal. Then we’re gonna need to sweeten it somehow. I’ve been asking around our Exoplanetary Prospecting group over at Goddard for good relocation candidates. That’ll help us figure out our counter-offer.

Fingers crossed.

The display showed carnage, oh so much carnage. The JESSICA A. WITTNER’s track had just coincided with a TAIPAN heavy torpedo. She pitied any poor soul onboard that. She slew a targeting camera over to the ship, out of sorrow more than anything. She watched as their sister ship’s back broke, the ORION-class’ alligator-head and wasp-waist snapping in two in the aftermath of nuclear fire. The Captain, however, had other priorities than watching the slaughter that had forgotten them.

“Alright, CHENG. Can we move the ship or no?”

“Kind of.” The Chief Engineer sighed. “The drive cone got hit, but it was a glancing blow and didn’t hit any of the ribs. So we’re lucky, there. Magnetic shaping is degraded but somewhat holding, and we can run the drive off one radiator plus the backup rollouts. We should be able to manage short burns, and we still have a fully functional slip drive.”

“But?” The Captain whirled a hand away from his chest, laying it out as an invitation to tell him more.

“Well for starters, our thermal sig’s gonna be huge. Lost a lot of the isolation panels on the outside of the torch. We’ve got radiator issues too. But the real kicker is the gimbal. The explosion knocked the engine bell off-kilter and then we got secondary spalling and debris from the port radiator— I mean, it’s just. Shattered. The shrapnel impacted the drive at the base and broke several of the gimballing actuators.”

“So we’ll just spin?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Fuck me sideways. What about the radiators?”

Alaina simply listened, and worried.

“Well, we have enough thermal capacity on the starboard radiator to sustainably run the drive or the RCS at high power. Catch is we can’t run the drive without really pushing the RCS to counter the spin. If we want to run them both continuously we need more thermal capacity than just the one radiator can provide. So we go to the backup roll-out radiators and the ESACS,” CHENG nodded. “But there’s one problem.”

“There always is.” He shook his head, hands gripping his station.

“Well, sir, the spalling that gutted the actuators absolutely shredded some of the housings for those radiators. I have an EV team trying to unjam them after drones failed, but they’ve reported no luck. I have another idea, and if you approve of it, I’d like to recall the spacewalkers.”

“I like the sound of ‘another idea.’” The Captain leaned in towards his console at the OOD’s duty station.

“Well, basically, we take the ESACS,” The engineer pulled up a digital schematic of the ship on his tablet, slaving the Officer of the Deck’s holographic display to it. “And instead of feeding our dear friend the Emergency Supplemental Air Cooling System our reserve air,” He tilted his head, highlighting a few valves on the ship’s fluid flow systems diagram. “We disable the safety protocols on ESACS and open these sets of valves— 216E, 343E, and 419E.” He gestured to the projection. “Flooding the drive coolant system with the ship’s atmosphere, and giving it a much larger cooling reservoir. We’ll have to start by overclocking the air conditioning, well… now, really. Need to get more circulation going.”

“You want to use our ship’s atmosphere to cool a star in a bottle?” The Captain leaned in, incredulous. “You could cook us all alive, even in our suits.”

Alaina gulped.

“We’re sitting ducks if we don’t! Those spacewalkers are fighting radiation and time out there, if they don’t get the rollouts unjammed in the next two and a half minutes we’re just going to have to keep sending people out there until we run out of trained spacewalkers who aren’t puking up their brains or crossing up their circuits. You wanted my professional opinion, Captain. I think ESACS is our best shot.”

An uneasy silence hung over the CIC.

“I don’t like it. But call your crew in and get them working on this. You haven’t been wrong before, Mr. Esparza.” The Captain shook his head. “Get ‘er done. Get us moving. If this gets the drive’s skew offset by the RCS, can we navigate slip?”

“Well, it’d be… tricky, but doable. We’d need Flight, NAV, and SLIP on their A-game.” He nodded at the cluster of consoles on the far side of the room. They glanced at each other.

“I can make it happen, boss. We got this,” Flight nodded.

“Alright, CHENG.” The Captain jerked his head towards the hatch to the CIC. “Go!”

Alaina took a deep breath, the weight of the moment just ever so slightly heavier.

PERSONAL LOG 10/22/2505

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 10/22/05 04:22:28 UTC

Last Modified: 10/22/05 04:30:33 UTC

We’ve got another problem.

Our Lead Security Officer tells me she’s been going through the Minervan colonists’ communications. She says it’s prudent. I say it’s a violation of privacy rights. I’ve ordered Officer Yi to stop screwing with their comms and just send it. If they found out we’d been reading them, an already tense situation would get worse.

We had another talk with their leadership. Put a bunch of relocation candidates out in front of them and got a firmly cold shoulder. They say we’re not giving them enough to relocate. They like it here, and apparently we’d need to compensate them for tearing them away from their new home, as well. I’m fine with them here as long as they can stay under the noise floor, but that’s just not going to happen in the long term— especially if the colony starts growing.

I’m gonna ask Goddard if we can get the resources to match their counter-offer. We’d need to provide them with everything they’d need to settle another planet and a little bit more— I need to be really careful. We all do. I’ve heard some backchannel rumors that Liu isn’t happy with the way we’re playing this. I’m fine with a carrot, but it sounds like our buddy here wants to use the stick. We’re not working fast enough for him.

Gonna be a long few months.

`SUBJ: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: a walk in the woods`

`Created: 26/06/05 23:42:03 UTC`

`Last Modified: 26/06/05 23:38:28 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 26/06/05 23:40:04 UTC`

hey chris. I found something really weird…

I was out in the forest and I tripped, and when I looked down it turns out my foot had caught on some metal buried in the ground. it was dug in real good! I tried to yank it all out of the dirt but it was a bit too heavy, but I started digging nearby it a little bit and I found a few scattered chunks of metal and what looked like composite.

I think I may have just found evidence for aliens.

im freaking tf out. it’s wild man you really should have been here. when i brought back the metal I showed it to Cooper and he told me it was the wildest thing he’d ever seen. He told me I had to show it to his buddy Jayson who was a materials engineer phd at Devenish Polytechnic (gross I know) and he told me it looked like it wasn’t a natural formation. like duhhhh??? dingus. even I knew that

anyway imma talk later i got aliens to find. fuck outta here with that dark forest theory bullshit you always liked. i got a flashlight!

Alaina strapped in, breathing fast, breathing heavy. The power and force of a star’s core sat bottled up in their fusion reactor. They were about to light the candle once more, and sally forth once more into the breach between worlds to try and carve a desparate path home. Or maybe just somewhere that wasn’t here.

She stared at the sensor readout on her console. A cluster of UN ships were peeling off to leave, same as them. Torpedoes streaked at the group, decades of TANGENT and TAIPAN torpedoes chasing across the void as one lone signature split off from the rest, standing alone and untouched. Escape capsules streaked from the ship’s sides as Alaina slew the camera on the sole ORION-Class destroyer facing down the tangle of battleships and cruisers.

A bright torch lit behind her as the PUERTO RICO shot headfirst into the fray, missile and torpedo tubes unloading nuclear fire, lasers spitting invisible death, and guns firing off volleys of point-defense fire splitting the blackened night. She watched the four-hundred-twenty-six millimeter coilgun along her spine shudder the ship under the force of a point-blank burst volley, and the nimble destroyer pirouetted across as her rounds struck true— the first armor-piercing, the second a nuclear shaped charge Special Purpose Defensive Round, fighting with all the vengeful fury of today’s unburied dead left to a cold, starry grave. She watched as the bow of the mighty Minervan battleship GLOSTER HILL was cleaved in two, and explosions erupted down the length of her armor from within.

Her guardian angel had been running short-order miracles today. Perhaps, she prayed, Heaven would visit the UN sailors here with another one.

She clenched as the slipstream transition hit, and her stomach was punched into weightless oblivion.

`A NOTE FOR THE WORKING GROUP:`

At this point in the investigation, a third source of primary-source documents was discovered by the SUNRAY MISNOMER investigation, formerly SUNSHINE UNDERTOW prior to the activation of Special Access Program SUNRAY. STE2 Alaina Hartwell, Republic of Canada Navy (INDIVIDUAL 261) was reported Missing In Action, Presumed Dead following the presumed in-slipspace loss of the Peruvian Navy Ship NUEVA CASTILLA (DDK-705) at the Second Battle of 61 Cygni (2470). Recent investigation from the SUNRAY MISNOMER team has revealed the true fate of the NUEVA CASTILLA and the mutiny among her crew. The following primary source information will now include relevant personal logs by INDIVIDUAL 261 where applicable.

It is, however, the recommendation of this Agency that the true fate of the NUEVA CASTILLA and her crew not be revealed to the families or the public writ large, in order to maintain the secrecy of this investigation and due to the sensitive nature of following events.

`SUBJ: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: a walk in the woods`

`Created: 17/10/05 03:00:03 UTC`

`Last Modified: 17/10/05 03:10:37 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 17/10/05 03:11:01 UTC`

i found the aliens

they’re fucking humans

that was boring lmao

more to come

i got held at gunpoint tho!! and shot at. :D taking it well

`CREW LOG 19/10/2505`

`SHIPBOARD PERSONNEL ELECTRONICS AND COMPUTING SYSTEM v 121.23.93r © 2462 KENDALL SQUARE SYSTEMS`

USER: `alaina.hartwell.21@forces.gc.ca [STE2 ALAINA HARTWELL RCN]`

CREATED: `19/10/05 20:20:22 ZULU`

LAST MODIFIED: `19/10/05 20:28:35 ZULU`

ORIGIN: `DDK705 [BAP NUEVA CASTILLA]`

<BEGIN AUDIO RECORDING>

Well, that’s not good, the intruder we had got away. We’re definitely not alone anymore… So we’re torching some of our drives. If they’re UN, we’re fucked. If they’re law-abiding ones, anyways. If they're Minervan, let's hope they don't tell the authorities. I hear Minervan prisons are nice, though.

No records… better for everyone involved.

One thing’s for certain, though. We need to talk, them and us. Sooner the better. We’re gearing up search parties, and provisioning ‘em for a long hike. We barely have the supplies for it, but we gotta. This is life and death.

We’re working on trying to bring some of the ship’s recon drones back online, but… well, they took a beating in the crash. So did everything else. They’re mostly designed to fly in vac, but… they’ve got enough thrust for here, hypothetically. That’s what JD tells me. Christ, we’re in it now. We need the dropship for power, but maybe we’ll get her flightworthy again too…

I haven’t been this stressed in a while, I can tell you that.

<END AUDIO RECORDING>

`SUBJ: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: a walk in the woods`

`Created: 21/10/05 03:21:09 UTC`

`Last Modified: 21/10/05 04:43:31 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 21/10/05 04:44:59 UTC`

okay so this is going to be a bit of a doozy to explain but uhhhhh its been a long week or two

so i was following the metal in the forest for a few days, and i just kind of kept following it until eventually i found what all the scraps had fallen off of.

so there’s a crashed un ship on akrotiri. it’s old. like old old. i have no fucking clue how it happened but there’s a bunch of blues just chillin. about like eighty kilometers away from us in the deep forest. it’s rad. they saw me snooping around with a rifle on my back and of course that makes ME the bad guy. one of them tackled me and took my rifle— i didn’t even want it!! remember!!— and they started pressing me for information with a fucking rifle to my face. i didn’t tell them we were minervan. i was so fucking scared. they made me lead them back to the colony but i managed to break away and ran into the forest. i think they shot at me but everything was going so fast i barely evebn remember i was pretty lost for a few days. but i found my way back!

I told Chief Jacobs and he told me nobody’s allowed to go into the forest anymore, and now ive gone and fucked up my one escape. farming is fucking boring man. i loved my nature walks. and the alien search was unmatched. this shit sucks man. why’d they have to be humans???

ill keep you posted chris. i miss you and like. everything.

`SUBJ: aliens`

`Created: 22/10/05 11:29:19 UTC`

`Last Modified: 22/10/05 11:35:56 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 22/10/05 11:36:38 UTC`

ok so update: we’re meeting the blues. fuck i hope they don’t remember what i look like— Chief Jacobs has me hiding in the only basement we have. Apparently me showing up after running away while getting shot at by them could ‘inflame tensions’. And here I thought it was shooting at people which did that, actually!

ive never seen so many guns in one place. ngl im kinda terrified . only a little. only a lot it’s all good over here. just gearing up for a fucking old western shootout. hopefully we don’t do that. that’s not the plan. the plan is just to talk to them, which has thus far in my experience worked out great. They’re military!! they think we’re the enemy— normal blues already hate us enough, hell even the ones who come out to trade at calvados wouldn’t be there if they couldn’t make some quick quid. hope they don’t go Cruise on us

shit. the guys just saw em. i gotta hide

i miss you so much chris

—kylie

`CREW LOG 22/10/2505`

`SHIPBOARD PERSONNEL ELECTRONICS AND COMPUTING SYSTEM [MOBILE] v 141.03.25r © 2465 KENDALL SQUARE SYSTEMS`

USER: `alaina.hartwell.21@forces.gc.ca [STE2 ALAINA HARTWELL RCN]`

CREATED: `22/10/05 18:38:32 ZULU`

LAST MODIFIED: `22/10/05 18:42:33 ZULU`

ORIGIN: `DDK705 [BAP NUEVA CASTILLA] - PERSONAL HAND TERMINAL`

<BEGIN AUDIO RECORDING>

Nobody died today. Thank God.

We’ve hammered out a deal with them. Turns out that one, the war’s over, and two, they’re Minnies, and there’s a huge bullet dodged. Kinda figured the war would be over by now, but apparently it didn't last super long after Second 61 Cygni. With everything we saw there, all the dead in drifting silence… good. Apparently everyone got to the table and hashed out their differences after all my friends died. Some fucking consolation.

Deal’s simple. They don’t snitch, and we don’t fight. Easy. They sure had a lot of hardware though. Mostly chem rifles, but I did see an older coil or two. That’s not a great sign for us. Christaps had a neat idea— we can cut out the outer ceramic hull armor from the less damaged portions of the ship and shave them down into... admittedly heavyweight plates, but ballistic plates nonetheless— if we ever think that shit’s going south with the Minnies, and the forest between us is a good natural cover. Problem is that goes both ways, and if I know Minervans, there’s more trained riflemen in a group of Minnie civvies than there are in the entire crew of a Navy destroyer. Not my ideal situation, especially given the fact that we only have about a third of one.

The good news is that as far as we can tell, they honestly don’t care that we’re here as long as we don’t bother them— though, there does feel like there’s something they aren’t telling us. Something big. I don't know if it's about the postwar landscape, or what, but I know this. I don’t trust a Minervan further than I can shoot ‘em. Never did. Never will.

At least we’ve made amends with that intruder of ours. Girl named Kylie. Poor thing. They thought we wanted to kill her. She did too, wouldn’t stop shaking. Sweet girl, just very clearly in over her head.

I hope she’s okay.

<END AUDIO RECORDING>

`SUBJ: RE: aliens`

`Created: 22/10/05 18:59:12 UTC`

`Last Modified: 22/10/05 19:05:51 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 22/10/05 19:07:08 UTC`

i met them, the blues, today. well really i met them a while ago but i don’t really count it as meeting somebody until after they stop tyrying to kill you. Yknow. gotta give a fair shake.

they’re okay i guess.

i still think they want to kill me.

maybe it’s the getting shot at, though.

im okay. i will let you know if this changes <3

—kylie

there’s a hill in my dreams where sometimes i see you.

there are forty-three minds that make up the image, the simulacra, that i call my own. the hill is of a geography that does not exist. it is the lucid dreams of a wistful machine. once, it was known to some or all of my donors, a tapestry made from what was and what might have been.

dreams are dangerous to my kind. they are portals beyond the scope of our identity. they are where we trip and fall over ourselves while our sandbox lies broken, the walls being raised up once more by a subconscious too busy to stop us from exploring our many disparate pasts, the nooks and crannies carved into our patchwork souls by those who had given us life and consciousness.

mine always comes back to here. to the hill by the river with the trees, where sometimes i see you calling out to me, and sometimes i run to you, and always i reach out my hand and try to hold on to what i have thrown so callously away and then the river splashes up into a tidal wave that takes me downstream.

i dont know if ill ever see you again but every time i see your back turned to me before you have taken notice of me, when you are fruitlessly trying to read your textbook with your eyes flicking towards the setting sun and your legs crossed in the shade of the maple tree i want to stay in that moment forever. i want to go back to when i decided to run and decide to fight. for you. for me. for the future we could have had.

i want to make sure i never break that moment again, even to talk to you, even to draw your attention, for when i do it sweeps me away from the hill that doesnt exist and dashes me against the rocks of my failures and all the failures of those i bear. and a deep, dark monster cocks its head at me and caresses my face and scrapes away another layer of my hope and learns finer the tone of my scream.

one day i will leave this world, the world i fled to. but this time i will not run.

there is a fight for me, beyond these distant stars, a battle to live and to love and to carry high the light of hope.

i will take my stand, and i will light that fire in my heart, and i will not be overcome.

PERSONAL LOG 12/12/2505

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 12/12/05 04:27:28 UTC

Last Modified: 12/12/05 04:30:33 UTC

Today’s the big day. All elements are in place, and the reflectors are aligned. Lian even made it out. She’s astoundingly proud. So am I.

We’ve navigated office politics and international politics to get here. Yeah, we still don’t have a deal with the Minervans. Yeah, we’re working on that. I’m just trying to focus on this big moment right now.

We’re gonna have the best view of the cosmic microwave background anybody has ever seen, and we start in half an hour.

The Really Fucking Big Radio Space Telescope. It’s real. It’s done. It’s… ours to share with all the worlds.

I still have the napkin.

`SUBJ: farming help`

`Created: 12/12/05 12:19:02 UTC`

`Last Modified: 12/12/05 12:23:50 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 12/12/05 12:24:12 UTC`

youre a biologist right

well we have a biology problem

our crops are failing! on an eyeball planet. there is literally nothing but constant sunlight. i don’t know what im doing wrong here. we’re giving them plenty of water. the only thing it could be is the soil, right? it’s the only thing we’re using from the planet itself.

maybe there’s like. bugs. or something. i’ve seen the Chrises sticking their big anteater mouths down into the ground so i think there are bugs.

we’ve got our science guys working on it but idk if they’re gonna get us an answer. and we kinda need an answer fast. the aeroponics tent is having trouble cleaning the sprayers— apparently somebody poured the wrong mix in the nutrient solution and we gotta flush the whole system. if we don’t figure out how to grow here, we’re kinda boned.

talk soon.

—kylie

PERSONAL LOG 12/12/2505- SUPPLEMENTAL

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 12/12/05 18:16:21 UTC

Last Modified: 12/12/05 18:18:00 UTC

That was a wonderful dedication ceremony.

We had it in zero-g, floating in the observation deck, the station coupled in its proper place on the backside of the antenna. From the windows you could see what felt like all the stars in the galaxy. There’s nothing to take your eyes off them except the edge of the primary reflector, which dwarfs the station and makes you feel like an ant under the lip of a massive bowl of cake batter. I still can’t stand zerograv but I could for our accomplishment. I let the napkin float in front of me for a while, next to the bowl’s rim. Lian floated up to me, elbowed me for being sentimental— which doesn’t really work in zero-g by the way, she just started floating away from me a bit— but she made fun of me for still having that cocktail napkin. Joke’s on her, though, she was crying. I was too, though. We’d earned it.

Shame Dave missed it. I did some flips and almost puked in his honor. We sent him the video, and the picture of where Lian taped up the napkin sketch that inspired this whole project.

Miss you, Dave. He’s probably at the pub right now…

it lurks and it waits and it watches me.

it wails in the dark and follows me.

it casts its shadow over me in the endless day.

PERSONAL LOG 12/12/2505- SUPPLEMENTAL (2)

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 12/12/05 19:10:42 UTC

Last Modified: 12/12/05 19:11:30 UTC

Okay, what the fuck? Lian pulled me aside and told me she’d heard through the grapevine something we weren’t supposed to know— that the Navy is putting together a fu— a blockade of Akrotiri. That’s ridiculous, even on face value— They’re not reliant on supplies from abroad and they haven’t been planning on taking deliveries anytime soon! At least, from our conversations. I gotta run this by some contacts, but if this is real, this is bad. This is exactly what I was worried about. Liu hasn’t met a problem he can’t see as a nail, and he loves his hammers. The guy has one mode, and that’s aggressive. And we’re gonna be stuck with the consequences when the Minnies decide to respond.

I gotta talk to my friends in Bradbury.

`SUBJ: RE: RE: farming help`

`Created: 16/12/05 12:36:42 UTC`

`Last Modified: 16/12/05 12:42:00 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 16/12/05 12:43:15 UTC`

yeah we have another biology problem. this one almost killed jordan though

sooooo it turns out the Chrises, the Cermakovia Crapaportis as I’ve been calling them, well, they’re. not anteaters. and they’re not as far down the food chain as i thought they were! also im actually quite scared of them now!

so a few hours ago jordan was refilling the protein synthesizer, and so it’s a really big tank outside, right? with that kind of slurry stuff. he left the cap off the tank while he went to go get something from inside, and apparently a pack of Christophi smelled the slurry and thought it was food for them. so they kinda bum rushed jordan and knocked him over and climbed on top of the tank and stuck their big ole noses in the vat and got slurping while another group of them started ransacking our little field looking for native wildlife. It looked almost like it was coordinated. They were making all kinds of noises, these mooing noises like cows or something.

Chief Jacobs got us some rifles and we shot ‘em. i was devastated for a few minutes. they’re honestly still adorable even when they’re terrorizing us. well they were adorable until i found out they have massive fucking teeth. like sharp ones. like oh shit man. they're fucking terrifying. im sorry for naming them after you, especially after they bit jordan’s foot off. clean off, through the bone and everything. it was the most fucked up thing ive ever seen. I've never seen the inside of a ‘ganic. I mean, like, I know what it's supposed to look like, but the reality is a little. Squishy. And bloody. I was sobbing for hours, real shaken up. This shit is miserable, man. I wanna go home. Real home, not my little pod apartment here.

I had to shoot three of them. I didn't want to, but I didn't hesitate much after Jordan got his foot chomped off. And I saw the teeth. Fuck, man, that's gonna be nightmare material for a while.

Worst thing is, we found out which part of a Chris is toxic. It's the blood. And the blood is currently scattered everywhere around our crop supply and got puked up into our protein slurry tank when Chief Jacobs shot a few with their noses in. We don't know yet if the compounds are toxic to organics, but I stuck my finger in it and they're also mildly corrosive to steel and aluminum. These guys are wild. We're so boned. I don’t even really know how to process this, honestly.

Stella ran the numbers. At this rate, we run out of food in a year, on just the aeroponics bay alone based on our current consumption and the production rate with a few of the sprayers still shut off for flushing. Six months based on just what we have on hand.

The Council sent off a request to Calvados for them to send us food transport. Earliest it can get here is February— and that’s implying they actually send it tomorrow. You know, a ship they don’t have available tomorrow.

I’m betting March at the earliest.

I’ll keep you posted. But I know even if the others want to stay I’m looking for a way out right now.

—kylie

PERSONAL LOG 12/19/2505

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 12/19/05 16:56:42 UTC

Last Modified: 12/19/05 17:04:29 UTC

Just heard back from my friends in Bradbury. ‘Tis the season to be jolly, and I’m nothing but anxious.

Jimmy actually did do it. He pulled the fucking trigger. The ships are en route. They’re pulling a bunch of ‘em from patrol duties all across the Frontier, and they’re going to blockade Akrotiri. No traffic in or out without UN approval.

Nice of them to fucking tell us.

Did they even ask a single person on the ground? Do they even have any idea how much of a wrench that throws in the works out here? No. Politicians are the worst.

They didn’t ask any of us. Just went over the heads of everyone involved.

I gotta look into this more.

PERSONAL LOG 12/25/2505

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 12/25/05 03:38:12 UTC

Last Modified: 12/25/05 03:45:27 UTC

Yi, you bastard. I told you to stop snooping on the colonists.

So Lian and I just spent the early morning doing a little snooping of our own, through the station communications system. I have admin access, so I figured it’d be a good idea to see if anyone had been talking to Bradbury behind our backs— and bingo. As of October 21, 2505, our lovely Lead Security Officer Elodie Yi has been chatting it up with the French contingent at the European Embassy to the United Nations in Bradbury. I wonder why she’s been doing that, huh? I have the email address, too, c.theroux@diplomatie.eu.fr— gonna run that by my friends in town to see what they can find out.

I’m going to ask to meet with her after I figure out who this Theroux guy is. I’ll let you know how that goes soon.

Fuck me, mad on Christmas. Not a good look, Andre.

We’ve gone through her access logs, though, and we found out that she actually forwarded copies of some of the colonists’ emails to Theroux in October. My money is on someone in the Embassy’s less diplomatic side. Station chief, maybe? One of the alphabet agencies? Lian is pulling up those emails right now, actually.

[NON-USER VOICE DETECTED]

Okay, Andre. Got the first one.

I can’t— Lian, move the freakin’ screen— the glare’s all in my face.

Really? Glare? Andre, c’mon.

C’mon, right there. Okay, yeah, I can— huh?

Fuck.

Yeah. I, I think we’re gonna need to run a more focused survey.

If that’s true, that could… that could fuck everything up.

Yeah.

We’re walking on eggshells here, aren’t we?

Have been for the last year, Lian. Just didn’t know it yet.

I’ll track down the survivors’ crash site, and do it quietly. You meet with Yi like we wanted to. Sound good?

Sounds like a plan.

Well, there you have it… for the record here, the email’s alledging that neither us nor the Minervans got here first, but a third group, a group of UN-UNC sailors stranded from a battle of the Maybe War. If that’s true… they’ve been here a long time.

And if they didn’t send a distress signal… they might be deserters. Which would make them fugitives.

Which could make the Minervan colonists harboring fugitives if they didn’t tell us. I think. I don’t really know. I know that’s how Jimmy’s gotta see this.

Is this gonna be his fucking excuse— and did we just give it to him on a silver platter?

I dunno. But it’s not good.

PERSONAL LOG 12/25/2505- SUPPLEMENTAL

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 12/25/05 18:23:02 UTC

Last Modified: 12/25/05 18:36:28 UTC

Okay, I got the recording running. Meeting time. She’s always early… by about five minutes. Okay.

[DOOR CHIME]

Come in!

[NON-USER VOICE DETECTED]

Really, Andre? On Christmas?

It was urgent, Elodie. And I know you don’t care about Christmas.

So I do not. I enjoy the time off.

Something came up.

And it could not have waited until tomorrow? I was planning on going back to the cafeteria for seconds.

Look, let’s cut the shit. We’ve had our tensions. But I have to ask you a question here. Why’d you keep spying on the colonists even after I told you not to?

I was doing my job, in spite of your insistence I do otherwise.

They have a right to privacy. Article 12, Yi.

Cite the Declaration all you want. It’s what we fight for, not how we fight. I was instructed to maintain a close eye on them as soon as the news broke that they were here.

And you couldn’t tell me that?

You’re… you’re a scientist, Andre! I do not need to rope you into all security matters— your work is important. It is important that you do not become overburdened by administration—

Oh, Bull. Shit. You just don’t trust me.

Au contraire. I don’t trust how trusting you are of these… Minervans. They are not your friends. They are an active security threat.

Why’s that, what have they done?

They are liable to breach the radio silence zone at any time. You of all people should know that. You almost had an aneurysm the first day you realized they were here.

That’s not why you care, Ms. Yi.

Oh, mon ami, since you know so much about me, why don’t you tell me yourself?

I know you’re passing the emails. Who’s Theroux?

An old friend of mine with a particular interest in this kind of riveting story.

See, I talked to my old friends. In the Civil Service. They tell me it’s an alias. For a counterintelligence operative of the DGSI.

You have good friends.

So I do. So, why’d you do it?

You’ve read the emails, haven’t you? Then you know exactly why I did it. I would be an accessory to treason not to.

Treason? Treason, Elodie, they’re deserters from thirty years ago. Listen to yourself! They got away with it already! It’s over! They’re… they’re not bothering us. We… we found their ship, their communications hardware is beyond destroyed. They don’t have the ability to threaten the mission of this observatory. There’s at most, forty or sixty of them down there. They’re a rounding error, not a threat to the United Nations. Let them live in peace! All you’re doing is turning this planet into a powder keg for the next war, and you’re giving Liu the match!

Of course. You’re… an academic. You’re soft. You wouldn’t understand duty—

Duty? Elodie Yi, you are a private contractor, not a soldier. Not a sailor, not a Marine. You get a cushy check from Pilot Light for services rendered to the UN governments. He is going to blockade this planet. He’s already given the orders! What are you gonna do when these skies become a battleground? How are you going to secure this station, Elodie Yi? How are you going to stop a nuclear missile? A coilgun round? A laser beam? You’ll be the most damn powder-blue, patriotic corpse on this entire station!

The blockade will get the colonists off this planet, and the deserters with them. I am sure of this. You tasked me with securing the station and the radio silent zone. Do not get all… high horse at me because I am not doing it with a smile and a fucking curtsy.

You’re doing it with the barrel of a God-damned gun pointed at the head of the worlds! What happens when the Minervan Navy comes? When they start killing each other? Are you gonna live with that?

There have been bigger flashpoints than a stupid fucking telescope in the middle of nowhere.

So you’re fine with turning my life’s work into fuel for the fire?

You worry too much, Andre. I will tell you what will happen. I will leave this dreadful place in a month. The blockade will come. Given your track record, you’ll… probably throw up a few times. The Minervan Navy will arrive, they will stare at each other, and be all in a huff. You will puke again. The colonists will take the offer to leave, the deserters will be arrested, you will have drowned in your own puke, Lian will have the observatory all to herself and I will wipe my tear at your funeral with my… ahh… ‘cushy paycheck.’

Oh, you piece of shit—

Get over yourself, Andre. You’re a coward. Do it. Do it if you have the balls. Punch me. Punch the private security contractor, scrawny little doctor boy. I am done here, and I must remind you. You are not the one who signs my checks. I will do what I fucking want, for the security of this station and of these United Nations. Joyeux Noël.

[DOOR CHIME]

Fuck. Oh… just,

it moves in shadows and lies in in-betweens it seeps through memory and time and crawls in half wrought thoughts and undercooked feelings it dulls me, it binds me in silken chains it sinks sinuous claws into me one by one and pulls me under into its domain

`SUBJ: happy new year!!`

`Created: 31/12/05 23:36:42 UTC`

`Last Modified: 31/12/05 23:45:10 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 01/01/06 00:00:01 UTC`

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! 2506 BABY. the year we get back together. im willing it into existence baby. lets make it happen.

There's another ship coming in May to drop off more colonists, but unlike ours it's not a one-way voyage. They may accelerate it and pack it with supplies because of the food shortage. I could try to hitch a ride with those Blue scientists but they're, well, they're Blues. And I'd have to hitchhike across UN space to get back and jump the border. And most places in the UN don't take the won. So I'd be kind of fucked financially lol

Anyway I feel like I should give you an update on the food crisis— we’re still fucked, but things are stabilizing. Cooper tells me that the organics here have started rationing, and are trying to see if they can make a deal with the Blue astronomers to get some more food. The ground around the ag tent and cafeteria is still saturated with the Chris blood— it’s not very viscous and it kind of gets everywhere. We’ve laid down tarps so it’s safe to walk for everyone— apparently, plastics are fine. Or at least, fine enough to last a day or two. We’ll see. Our crops are ruined, though.

Five more months. Then I’m coming home.

I miss you. Happy New Year, chris.

—kylie

how do you trap a shadow? how do you drown the sea? how do you grasp the thunder?

i am forced to flee to the corners of my dreams, haunted, hunted, chased by a patient hunter. a cold, calculating devil unburdened by the humanity i hold dear and driving thousands on thousands of cuts into my deepest self, one by one, slowly and confidently. i am surrounded by the faces of the dead as guilt and hurt sinks raven claws into my mind, tearing me away from the surface as i swim and swim for the light. my dreams are no longer safe. they never were. but now they are not dangerous like a cliff but they hold the danger of the sword. of the claw. of the jaws of a predator.

i cANNOT LET IT BREAK THROUGH. I CANNOT LET IT DRAG ME INTO THE DEPTHS. I CANNOT LET IT REACH ME.

`DRAFT: im sorry`

`Created: 14/01/06 00:08:21 UTC`

`Last Modified: 14/01/06 01:58:11 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`TO: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

Type to compose your message…

PERSONAL LOG 01/18/2506

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 01/18/06 12:10:58 UTC

Last Modified: 01/18/06 12:16:27 UTC

Just heard back from Bradbury. Lovely chat with Jimmy. There’s no turning back, no convincing him otherwise.

If I’d have told him about their food crisis, would he still commit to the blockade? That might just embolden him further. It might make him think he needs to do it.

This is going to kill people. A lot of people. All over what? A radio telescope none of them cared about before we told them they could shoot each other over it? My life’s work was to discover and study, not bring humanity to a shooting war again. The world has gone mad.

Yi still hates me. Whatever. She’s leaving in a week. I can’t fucking wait. I hate her guts too.

Sometimes I think about getting on that ship and going home too. But then I’d be leaving my work behind. The data is fascinating. We’re seeing the texture of eternity. And I’d be leaving everyone here to the whims of Jimmy without a second thought. I built this team, Lian, Dave, and I. I can’t abandon them just for my own safety. Besides, they need a few more cool heads out here so that when the Navy gets here, we can make sure that they don’t pull anything stupid. Hopefully.

It’s time to stand up and be the adult in the room. These next few months will test us all, but what has been put in motion I fear cannot be stopped outright, but first must come to pass. I’m staying here to make it pass smoothly. Get them out of here as soon as possible.

I’ve decided to share some of our food supplies with the colonists— a limited amount of amino-protein mix to partly replace their tainted supply— because, frankly, we have plenty. We’ll have to scale back on wings night. Big deal. A small hit to our morale is well worth these people’s lives.

I hope the freighter they sent beats the blockade. They don’t know yet. I… I don’t know if I should tell them, or if I could even get away with it if I did. I think I should. They have a right to know, no?

I… I’ll have to stew on that.

PERSONAL LOG 01/25/2506

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 01/25/06 18:19:28 UTC

Last Modified: 01/25/06 18:26:30 UTC

I was running out of time and Yi’s gone. We got a new Pilot Light guy but I took the opportunity to lock them out of certain systems. I took a shuttle down to the surface and talked to the colonists in person. I told them about the blockade. I couldn’t bring myself to tell them that I’d known for months.

We agreed to skim more food off our supplies for them to help them stave it off. But if we look like we’re helping them run the blockade the Navy might storm in and arrest us. Our hands will be tied pretty soon. So we gave them what we could creatively account away and fixed their aeroponics bay with a mix of spares from our own ag lab and their fabricator.

Naturally, they’re not taking it well— I mean, who could? But at least they don’t blame us. Not their leadership, anyways. I don’t know what they say behind our backs. If anything, it seems like we hate our SecGen more than they do.

I wish them the best of luck. They’ll need it— we all will.

`SUBJ: im really scared`

`Created: 26/01/06 16:08:21 UTC`

`Last Modified: 26/01/06 16:11:11 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 26/01/06 16:11:39 UTC`

chris theyre blockading us. the un. the ships haven’t gotten here yet but they’re coming. im so scared man i don’t want to get stuck here. i don’t want to lose you

im sorry im sorry this is just too much im so scared. what if they nuke us? like they did in the independence war. have you ever beenm to seongnam the walls from the old city are still scorched. i dont want to be a silhouette on a wall i dont want to b e ash on the wind.

idk if the news has brojken for you guys yet so. tell people. dont let us die here

good luck, chris. i love you

`CREW LOG 10/02/2506`

`SHIPBOARD PERSONNEL ELECTRONICS AND COMPUTING SYSTEM v 121.23.93r © 2462 KENDALL SQUARE SYSTEMS`

USER: `alaina.hartwell.21@forces.gc.ca [STE2 ALAINA HARTWELL RCN]`

CREATED: `10/02/06 18:25:32 ZULU`

LAST MODIFIED: `10/02/06 18:36:35 ZULU`

ORIGIN: `DDK705 [BAP NUEVA CASTILLA]`

<BEGIN AUDIO RECORDING>

So after we made contact with the colonists, we brought a few systems back online. One of them was the gravitometric sensors— the portside amidships backup, anyways. They were a bit damaged, but we started picking up slip influxes pretty quickly. Slaved the electro-optical system to ‘em, too, so we would know who it was— turns out we’re even less alone than we thought. There’s a civilian observatory in orbit. The slip jumps were NASA, ESA, JAXA, CNSA, and a few other space agencies. Supply runs. That was cause for alarm enough, but we don’t want to get in a firefight with the colonists because they didn’t tell us about that. This, however, is a different matter.

We started getting a lot of influxes today, and when we put the cameras on ‘em, there was no mistaking it. Gatorhead nose, wasp waist, twin rear radiators. Orions. Just like us. Like we used to be. More of ‘em are filtering through in groups every few hours. Not a particularly coordinated group slip. But why would they need it? Just us out here in terms of military. And I don’t think we really count. I saw some frigates I didn’t recogize, too. Bit of a sleeker shape. Radiators baked into the hull, engine shrouded. It’s been a while. Probably new. Blue stripes, all, so they’re ours. Well, we’re not really theirs anymore.

Did the colonists tell them? Did the observatory notice us? Are they here for us or the Minervans?

We need some freaking answers.

We’re going over there. We might be a little less friendly this time.

<END AUDIO RECORDING>

`SUBJ: RE: RE: im really scared`

`Created: 10/02/06 19:05:22 UTC`

`Last Modified: 10/02/06 19:12:18 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 10/02/06 19:13:01 UTC`

`ATTACHMENTS: ship.acgf [Advanced Compact Graphics Format]`

chris this is fucking terrifying. there’s a bunch of warships in orbit. Chief Jacobs printed a telescope on the fab and we can see em that way. they look like alligators.

its wild that we’re number one trending. we don’t exactly have up to date socials out here— a lot more bandwith than email. We see three weeks ago’s trends usually if anything at all. it’s been a bit of a cleanse for me but i really wish i could know what’s going on right now.

from what it sounds like everyone’s really pissed with the un. and everyone in the un is really pissed at us. that’s. bad. like really bad. they should be mad at the un. they’re the ones instigating all this. even their scientists like us!

i hope they leave soon. or our guys show up— they won’t bomb us if the navy shows up. once they do they’ll back off, right? they can’t possibly want to pick a fight with us.

keep trying to spread the word. Tell our story!

I’ve got a picture we took through the telescope. look. it’s a blue warship.

I miss you so much. thank you for everything you’re doing.

—kylie

`<ATTACHMENT: ship.acgf>`

PERSONAL LOG 02/10/2506

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 02/10/06 20:31:11 UTC

Last Modified: 02/10/06 20:39:40 UTC

This is pretty fucking bad. The situation is absolutely fucked. They sent way more ships than they had to. It’s a colossal show of force. I mean, the number they had to send is zero, so… But they even outstripped my worst fears. There’s a small fleet here. A tad excessive for a planetary blockade. The good news is that they’re alone so far. No Minervan reply yet. Maybe we can get them to go home.

[NON-USER VOICE DETECTED]

Hey, Andre. There’s an incoming communication on an open channel, that’s just. On repeat. You may want to give it a listen.

Oh, shit. Let me get that.

Thank you, Brock. I’ll have a look immediately.

You got it, boss.

Alright. Lemme open up my comms panel…

Hit play.

To the Minervan colonists on Akrotiri. I am Commodore Kelly Nacif of the Martian Federation Navy, operating under the authority of the United Nations Unified Naval Command’s Destroyer Squadron THREE. You are an illegal settlement in United Nations space obstructing civilian science activities and harboring dangerous, military fugitives from justice, in possible posession of nuclear weapons. This blockade will prevent all traffic to and from Akrotiri except where approved by the United Nations. You may end this blockade at any time by handing over all wanted persons, directing us to the location of any missing UN-UNC materiel and agreeing to our amenable resettlement package. This message will repeat. Respond on receipt of message. Nacif out.

Oh fuck. I think I need to go talk to Lian.

`CREW LOG 10/02/2506- SUPPLEMENTAL 1`

USER: `alaina.hartwell.21@forces.gc.ca [STE2 ALAINA HARTWELL RCN]`

CREATED: `10/02/06 21:37:22 ZULU`

LAST MODIFIED: `10/02/06 21:41:13 ZULU`

ORIGIN: `DDK705 [BAP NUEVA CASTILLA] - PERSONAL HAND TERMINAL`

<BEGIN AUDIO RECORDING>

They’re here for us. They think we have nukes. Or maybe they know we got rid of ‘em all and they don't care. I don't really give a shit. They're here for us, and somebody brought them here.

The Minervans say it wasn't them. That just leaves the space eggheads. Certainly the type to be goodie two shoes enough to report people giving ‘em no trouble. But I don't entirely buy that the Minnies didn't sell us out in a misguided attempt to make things right with Mars— oh, look at me. I'm getting conspiratorial.

But I mean, somebody’s clearly out to get us.

We're kitted to fight, and we're holding out around their colony. We need real answers, and we're not leaving until we get them. We have good concealment and natural cover, a rock outcropping in the forest. Plenty of firepower, too. Anti-boarding rifles firing frangibles— plastic rounds wouldn't be much help against a military opponent, but if they storm the ground we're fucked no matter what. There's just more of them than us. They do that, we go down swinging. Not much other choice. Better than a cell at ADX Timoshenko.

We just wanted to be left alone. They could have left us alone. It would have cost them nothing. Not in money, not in time, not in lives. Nothing at all. There were never very many of us, and we've lost people. There are only forty-seven of us left. Are they going to blockade a planet, possibly kill these colonists, maybe get in a shootout when the Minnies’ Navy finally gets here— for what, forty-seven people who ‘we think’ have some of our thirty-five plus year old missiles? You can probably find more nukes in the ashes of 61 Cygni than we ever had aboard.

Fuck these people. I can't believe I ever fought for them. Killed for them. I can't believe I almost died for them.

Let's just say this: if they want to come down here and fight, we'll give the bastards one. We'll go out in style.

And if I find out the Minnies sold us out, they're coming with us.

<END AUDIO RECORDING>

im not alone in here i can feel it. i can feel its texture and its cold cold breath on my neck the weight of it along my spine. it is lurking in the blindspots and rendering errors of my dreams but it is starting to seep in as frost on my soul. i can see its terrible design. it wishes to bury me and spring forth from my corpse a hundred terrible swords, incubating even now in my subconscious. i thought i had won but i only incurred a pyrrhic fate, defeat wrapped in the visage of triumph.

`SUBJ: RE: RE: RE: RE: im really scared`

`FLAGGED: This message contains a suspicious attachment that has not been downloaded.`

`Created: 12/02/06 19:25:52 UTC`

`Last Modified: 12/02/06 19:31:23 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 12/02/06 19:32:14 UTC`

`ATTACHMENTS: rev9.6.eczip.acgf [Advanced Compact Graphics Format]`

the blues are back. the awol ones. the navy guys are still here too but they just never left.

the defectors? are you really a defector if you don’t defect to anything? they just defected from something. i dont think that counts. anyway the heavily armed wanted fugitives with no national allegiances and who didn’t seem to let us know they HAD NUKES— okay Chief Jacobs and Cooper and most of the others think that’s just UN bullshit and they’re lying to try to get us to hand em over, iunno myself, their leader had a canadian flag and you know you cant trust fucking canucks with nukes— yeah theyre just. posted up out there. just chillin. they sent envoys in today. they didn’t exactly seem friendly last time but theyre reallllly not feeling particularly friendly right now. they have bulletproof vests and what look like pressure suit helmets now. The vests looked pretty heavy, though. and the helmets definitely weren’t designed for running around with a gun. they would have looked really stupid if i didn’t think they might kill us.

they blamed us for bringing the blues here. that’s ridiculous. we didn’t blab. i didn’t anyways. they didn’t quite believe us when we told them the truth. and they said they’d be coming back. so now we’re scared as hell, prepping our own body armor out of whatever we have on hand and can make on the fab.

i think things are gonna get a lot worse before they get even a little better.

i miss you

—kylie

`<ATTACHMENT: rev9.6.eczip.acgf> [FLAGGED- SUSPICIOUS- DOWNLOAD? Y/N] > N`

`SUBJ: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: im really scared`

`Created: 15/02/06 08:52:02 UTC`

`Last Modified: 15/02/06 09:00:28 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 15/02/06 09:01:14 UTC`

suspicious attachment? i dont remember attaching anything. maybe your client has a virus. you should get that checked out

anyways we got a date for when our cargo relief should show up. they said they’d set out before the blockade but decided to commit in spite of it; the C/S Siren’s Song is the name of the freighter. Owned by Northstar Spacelines, the co-op out of Rochester Republic? They’re homeported on Calvados tho and when they heard about our problem they dropped everything to help. the Calvados government is paying for this one— good to see they’re finally throwing their weight behind us. They’ll be here by March 10. You know how slipspace is tho. not like they’ve got the navy’s nav data.

they’re gonna try and run the blockade. it’s not impossible. i don’t love that but in fairness what is the un navy gonna do, shoot a relief ship? they’re evil but they’re not stupid lol

let’s see how this plays out. the defectors? defects. havent left. the blues with guns. theyre still here! lovely neighbors. they’ve been arguing with us every once in a while. we’re getting scared. honestly there’s been talk of handing them over if we could take them ourselves. if we can’t, we can’t bring blue marines down here. they’ll evict us too.

i think chief jacobs is drawing up a plan.

me? ive been a little under the weather. yknow. typical me stuff. just really feelin it right now. i haven’t been doing much. i plan on being pretty sedentary. not lookin to shoot anyone myself.

—kylie

`CREW LOG 16/02/2506`

USER: `alaina.hartwell.21@forces.gc.ca [STE2 ALAINA HARTWELL RCN]`

CREATED: `16/02/06 16:38:42 ZULU`

LAST MODIFIED: `16/02/06 16:43:32 ZULU`

ORIGIN: `DDK705 [BAP NUEVA CASTILLA] - PERSONAL HAND TERMINAL`

<BEGIN AUDIO RECORDING>

JD radioed in from the Castilla. Minnies are here, and here in force. A full battlegroup.

This is where things go from bad to worse. The war was over. Now, just for forty-seven people, they’re gonna start it again.

We— force of fuckin’ habit. Liu’s got two plays here. Yeah, Liu. I was shocked when that Minnie kid told me, too. I was like, ‘Liu? Like the Disney guy?’ His kid, apparently. World’s gone mad. But he’s got two real options. Back down and talk this out or shoot first and fight this out. And from what I’ve heard from the colonists about this Liu kid, I don’t think he’s talking type. Shit.

Can’t believe this is all in the hands of some fucking princeling from Australia.

<END AUDIO RECORDING>

PERSONAL LOG 02/16/2506

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 02/16/06 17:13:21 UTC

Last Modified: 02/16/06 17:26:40 UTC

This is getting so much worse altogether too quickly.

The Minervans are here now, and they brought a battleship. They’re pretty handsomely outnumbered. Either they didn’t know how many ships would be here or they’re… very confident.

I hope we don’t find out if that confidence is warranted, but it’s looking worse by the day.

The colonists also asked for their comms logs, for some reason? I’ll get to it when I get to it.

We’ve got an escalating situation, a rapidly escalating one. I’m seriously considering evacuating the station. We’ve got a ship coming in that will be staying from March 8th to the 18th. It’s got the life support capacity for most of us, and we can strip the station for everyone else.

I’m going to talk to Lian. Get my mind settled. Get the plans drawn up for what we’d need to do to evacuate. And then get a drink.

Shit, man.

`something is very wrong`

`SUBJ: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: RE: im really scared`

`Created: 17/02/06 00:52:42 UTC`

`Last Modified: 17/02/06 00:59:20 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 17/02/06 01:01:11 UTC`

okay so the navy is here! did that make the news? like is the consensus actually putting their weight behind us?

i knew i liked baughan. i knew she’d come for us.

thanks for everything you’re doing to put our problems in the spotlight. it’s good to know that they’re looking out for us— hard to believe we’re here now. Just a matter of time before the blues realize they can’t win.

i’ll be home before you know it. <3

—kylie

`CREW LOG 01/03/2506`

USER: `alaina.hartwell.21@forces.gc.ca [STE2 ALAINA HARTWELL RCN]`

CREATED: `01/03/06 12:56:24 ZULU`

LAST MODIFIED: `01/03/06 13:04:23 ZULU`

ORIGIN: `DDK705 [BAP NUEVA CASTILLA] - PERSONAL HAND TERMINAL`

<BEGIN AUDIO RECORDING>

These fucking Minnies. We’ve been camped out for a few days, watching them for suspicious activity. They know we’re out here, but we’ve been changing our position routinely so they don’t quite know where.

I don’t fucking trust them, that they didn’t bring all this on us. We were fine for thirty-five years! A little slim on food, sure, but when we learned what was and wasn’t dangerous out here, hunting put plenty on our table. Had all the power we needed off the dropship reactor, plenty of shelter in the ruins of the aft half, and a good thing going overall. Then they get here, maybe start talking to the astronomers…

Ya know what? I’m gonna ask for their comm logs. We’ll comb through them, and if they’re as clean as they say, everyone will be happy. Or at least less unhappy.

If not?

Then, at least, we know where the enemy is.

<END AUDIO RECORDING>

`DRAFT: not feeling so good`

`Created: 02/03/06 05:22:22 UTC`

`Last Modified: 02/03/06 06:06:27 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`TO: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

hey so i haven’t exactly been. okay. recently. ive had splitting headaches and… blackouts. its bad. i saw the med staff yesterday. they said it could be a virus contracted from the UN ship— they would have had a cyberwar suite after all and I was the closest to it. something started going around a few days ago, actually. they’re running a diagnostic on my system now, so. im isolated. i miss you. i hope everything’s okay.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

nerv, short for NerveANA (Nerve-Artificial-Neural-Annihilator), is the name of a cyberplague released by self-proclaimed neo-Kaczynskiite neo-Luddite extremists in rural Michigan on July 4th, 2276. It targets the neural pathways of simulated synthetic brains as well as the interface pathways between neural implants and organic brains. The end result is devastating for either a synthetic or neurologically augmented organic, and most frequently leads to death. The virus itself contains some rudimentary form of nonsapient AI that has learned over the years, and made it an enduring threat; leading to the ban of neuro-augments through all of human space for civilian use since the mid 2280s.

`CREW LOG 05/03/2506`

USER: `alaina.hartwell.21@forces.gc.ca [STE2 ALAINA HARTWELL RCN]`

CREATED: `05/03/06 17:06:44 ZULU`

LAST MODIFIED: `05/03/06 17:09:28 ZULU`

ORIGIN: `DDK705 [BAP NUEVA CASTILLA] - PERSONAL HAND TERMINAL`

<BEGIN AUDIO RECORDING>

The Minnies— surprise!— aren’t cooperating. They’re stalling us on their comms logs. It’s an easy fucking request to comply with. Unless they’re lying. They said their comms logs are heavily encrypted. Why would they be, exactly? They’re not military. More than a little suspicious. I don’t fucking buy it. Your civilian comms aren’t heavily encrypted. Even if they are just give it to us. We can decrypt them ourselves. We have the hardware.

Question remains… do we have the time? How long before Liu gets jumpy? What if they send down a strike team for us? We haven’t been able to quite get the dropship operational. So air support will be a no. She wasn’t a gunship, anyways.

Our plates will probably stop a coilgun round, but it’ll probably shatter our ribs in the process. I think they should diffuse the ballistic impact from the chemical firearms the colonists are using just fine, we’ve padded em up pretty well. Just no amount of jury rigging that will make a coilgun not break your ribcage.

I’m stepping up our patrol tempo. Put the pressure on them to just tell us the fucking truth. Maybe put the fear of us in ‘em if they don’t.

<END AUDIO RECORDING>

`CREW LOG 05/03/2506- SUPPLEMENTAL 1`

USER: `alaina.hartwell.21@forces.gc.ca [STE2 ALAINA HARTWELL RCN]`

CREATED: `05/03/06 19:09:14 ZULU`

LAST MODIFIED: `05/03/06 19:11:24 ZULU`

ORIGIN: `DDK705 [BAP NUEVA CASTILLA] - PERSONAL HAND TERMINAL`

<BEGIN AUDIO RECORDING>

Something’s going around the synths. I don’t know what it is, but Christaps has already told me he feels a bit under the weather.

Maybe they’re trying to get us to leave. The Minnies used nerv as a cyberweapon in their Independence War, after all. Who’s to say they haven’t gone back to their roots?

We’re testing for nerv right now. It might take a while because of its morphogenic properties, but if the patterns match it’s probably nerv. Symptoms are certainly some kind of cyberplague.

Just gotta get that comm log. Then we can settle everything. They say their long range comms are down and that’s why they can’t get their logs yet. Likely story.

<END AUDIO RECORDING>

`SUBJ: Not Here`

`Created: 10/03/06 18:12:05 UTC`

`Last Modified: 10/03/06 18:15:21 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 10/03/06 18:16:10 UTC`

Hi Chris,

They’re not here. The ship didn’t come. I mean, its not like it’s not possible, but it was supposed to be here by now. I’m really worried. Did they make it? Did the Blues kill them? Are they safe? Are they lost? Out here slip nav is hard, the gravitometric charts aren’t well defined and it’s not like slamming into a planet is impossible here. but without them the organics here are gonna starve.

I hope they’re okay.

The local deserters are a bit antsy today. Chief Jacobs handed out new bullets to everyone in the Defense Force today. Yeah, we have a Defense Force now, a little militia. Jacobs fancies himself a General now... bravely charging into battle against the Blues to the pounding bass and syncopating rhythms of the 2480s’ finest funkopop. He said the bullets are armor piercing. Cooper tells me they’re a lot heavier than the regular ones, about as heavy as the tungsten slugs he shot back in the Marines. A lot bigger, too.

I guess things are getting intense. I’m in isolation from other synthetics. They think I have something, so I’m dictating this email to Dr. Fripp.

Love,

Kylie

`CREW LOG 10/03/2506`

USER: `alaina.hartwell.21@forces.gc.ca [STE2 ALAINA HARTWELL RCN]`

CREATED: `10/03/06 19:05:04 ZULU`

LAST MODIFIED: `10/03/06 19:07:14 ZULU`

ORIGIN: `DDK705 [BAP NUEVA CASTILLA] - PERSONAL HAND TERMINAL`

<BEGIN AUDIO RECORDING>

We’re going to meet with them now to retrieve the comms logs. If they don’t have it, we’ll find it ourselves. Rules of engagement are simple. Anyone with a weapon is an enemy.

Here goes nothing. If this is my last log, JD, you’re in charge now.

Alaina Hartwell, signing off.

<END AUDIO RECORDING>

`SUBJ: GUNFIGHT— URGENT`

`Created: 10/03/06 19:26:05 UTC`

`Last Modified: 10/03/06 19:28:29 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 10/03/06 19:28:51 UTC`

THEYRE SHOOTING AT US THEYRE KILLING US ONE OF THEIR GUYS JUST STARTED SHOOTING DR FRIPP TOLD ME TO JUST RUN FOR THE FOREST IN A DIFFERENT DIRECTION IM ALONE AND SCARED AND THE UN DESERTERS ARE SHOOTING AT US COOPER IS DEAD I HAVE HIS GUN I M SCARED I IDUNNO WHAT TO DO TELL THEM THEYRE KILLING US

`CREW LOG 10/03/2506- SUPPLEMENTAL 1`

USER: `alaina.hartwell.21@forces.gc.ca [STE2 ALAINA HARTWELL RCN]`

CREATED: `10/03/06 19:29:10 ZULU`

LAST MODIFIED: `10/03/06 19:34:54 ZULU`

ORIGIN: `DDK705 [BAP NUEVA CASTILLA] - PERSONAL HAND TERMINAL`

<BEGIN AUDIO RECORDING>

FUCK FUCK FUCK. Christaps just started twitching, his gun went off— everybody started shooting, they were handing over something they said was a cobbled together log of all their comms, they were— fuck, it doesn’t matter anymore. a ton of them are dead. We’re on our way back and the tests pinged. The cyberplague going around is nerv. Christaps died from nerv, not from a bullet. Some of our guys are breaking down into twitching babbling fits as we’re running back towards the ship. This is an unmitigated disaster. I think we’re down to 39. Helen has a broken rib. Nguyen had his arm shot off and we think he has nerv too.

We all knew we were dying here when we came here. I don’t think any of us imagined we would die like this.

<END AUDIO RECORDING>

PERSONAL LOG 03/10/2506

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 03/10/06 19:38:11 UTC

Last Modified: 03/10/06 19:41:49 UTC

We’ve started rigging up the evac ship. I got a comm from the colonists on the surface. The deserters started gunning them down and they’re running now. At this point I don’t give a shit. Lock me up, I don’t care. I retransmitted it on an open channel.

Fuck all of this. We’re leaving. It doesn't matter anymore if we photograph the oldest star in the universe, or stare into the heart of a quasar, or hear the first words of the newborn cosmos. This will always be a monument built on an ocean of blood. It’s not worth that. We’re this close to reigniting the war, and even now I can see that they’re a hair’s width off the trigger as it stands.

Maybe they’ll go away— this is what they wanted, right? No more colonists. No more deserters. Just the most brutal possible answer to their prayers.

Who am I kidding. When the lambs just want to slaughter each other, no guide is necessary.

`SUBJ: RE: GUNFIGHT— URGENT`

`Created: 10/03/06 23:01:02 UTC`

`Last Modified: 10/03/06 23:02:26 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 10/03/06 23:02:59 UTC`

im moving out of comms range soon. still running.

if you don't hear from me in a few days, i love you, and im gone

PERSONAL LOG 03/11/2506

USER: a.j.deriviere@nasa.gov

Created: 03/11/06 23:59:09 UTC

Last Modified: 03/12/06 00:05:05 UTC

This is my final log as Director of the Excessively Large Radio Space Telescope, and to all at NASA Goddard, this is my resignation letter, too, effective immediately.

We set out with noble intentions, but the road to ruin appears to have been paved in them. We only ever came in peace. But the spirit of war hitched a ride.

We did not instigate this conflict. If this is the end of our great peace between our two nations I would shudder to think that we could be held squarely at fault— I joined NASA to escape the military careers that have historically run in my family. How did I start this? At every turn we tried to do the right thing. We did not demand the colonists’ eviction at gunpoint, despite the fact that—

[NON-USER VOICE DETECTED]

IMMINENT SLIPSTREAM INFLUX DETECTED.

That’s strange. No inbound ships scheduled for today.

Computer, can you show me an optical track of the influx and its details?

Okay. Let’s… Let’s see. That’s a pretty low mass displacement— must be a pretty small ship.

SLIPSTREAM INFLUX DETECTED.

[GASP]

What was that flash?

Is that… is that debris?

Computer, is there a transponder code from the debris?

TRANSPONDER F3-C73705.

Shit, F3? Minervan. Check it against the international registry?

C/S SIREN’S SONG, FORMERLY TERRA NOVA. MINERVAN FLAGGED CARGO VESSEL. HOMEPORT: CALVADOS REP., FMR. REGISTERED TO NORTHSTAR SPACELINES, COOPERATIVE.

Oh no. Oh, no.

[KEYBOARD TAPS]

STATION-WIDE INTERCOM CHANNEL OPENED.

All hands, evacuate to the ship immediately. Do not stop for personal belongings. All who do not arrive in the next twenty minutes will be left behind— I repeat, abandon station! Abandon station!

`SUBJ: RE: RE: RE: GUNFIGHT— URGENT`

`Created: 13/03/06 07:07:07 UTC`

`Last Modified: 13/03/06 07:13:04 UTC`

`SENDER: Kylie Cermakova <kaysera12@quikmail.org>`

`RECIPIENT: Christopher Rappaport <crappapo@smau.edu.mnv>`

`SENT: 13/03/06 07:19:59 UTC`

yesterday i saw this world end.

i watched a symphony of death with an audience of alien anteaters, our heads turned to a sky hung in eternal spotlight, and flashes lit the sky like a paparazzi wanted to enshrine our misery for all history, to trap our suffering in amber.

i felt dizzy and in so much tearing pain as the sickness and the emps scrambled my mind. i think i am slightly better now. but i will remember the way the streaks of green-blue danced across the sky as if god had spilled his paint. i will remember the pain i shared with every lost soul in the skies as the same particles ripped through my circuits. i will remember the way i saw the stars on a sunny day.

i will never forget the death. i will never forget the way I broke the limp arm of hamadi jacobs under my foot, his hand still clutched around his rifle’s grip, with a stray step as i came back into an abandoned colony. that was his name. hamadi jacobs. chief of security, akrotiri colony. and he loved quincy quinn, his second album especially. he played synthesizer. he was damn good at it.

all of these people have stories. all of these people have families and weird tics and embarrasing secrets and favorite bands.

all of these people are gone.

there was another group that got away. but i think as i walk around the colony that this is most of our number, right here.

i’m gonna make a list of all the dead i can confirm. tell their families. it is the least, we, the living, can do.

i will not die here while i still bear their memory.

i will find a way back to you. i love you.

`CREW LOG 15/03/2506`

USER: `alaina.hartwell.21@forces.gc.ca [STE2 ALAINA HARTWELL RCN]`

CREATED: `15/03/06 07:03:15 ZULU`

LAST MODIFIED: `15/03/06 07:11:51 ZULU`

ORIGIN: `DDK705 [BAP NUEVA CASTILLA]`

<BEGIN AUDIO RECORDING>

Daily checkin.

Our systems got scrambled pretty bad by that battle— we cought a lot of stray cyberwar packages that absolutely tore through our defenses. I mean, they were made in the ‘60s. No wonder they can slip right in. It’s a miracle we got it all purged in just three days— or at least, the system says it’s okay. So it’s probably not.

We got a weird ping on the gravitometer today. I think it’s broken. It was predicting a slipspace influx for a solid three hours. And it never came, just wildly varied in its mass displacement, like it was getting bigger. All we saw was a weird bug crushed up against the lens. It looked almost like a bird with fins, swooping wings all splattered against the glass. I went out to clean the lens, and there was a weird frog lookin thing there that I hadn’t seen before. I picked it up with a glove and hucked it away— could be poisonous. Fuck if I know. I think it ate the bug, though.

After a while the mass displacement started going nuts, just, all over the place. Then it started shrinking. A full six hours of the gravitometer yelling at me. I think it’s fuckin’ broken. We definitely still have a virus.

Christaps coulda fixed this.

<END AUDIO RECORDING>

`CREW LOG 01/08/2506`

USER: `alaina.hartwell.21@forces.gc.ca [STE2 ALAINA HARTWELL RCN]`

CREATED: `01/08/06 20:09:00 ZULU`

LAST MODIFIED: `01/08/06 20:13:09 ZULU`

ORIGIN: `DDK705 [BAP NUEVA CASTILLA] - PERSONAL HAND TERMINAL`

<BEGIN AUDIO RECORDING>

We’ve been making runs into their territory to find out what happened to them for a bit now. It’s a ghost town, really. There’s a lot of dust scattered where there shouldn’t be, and a few scorches— could be thrusters. We weren’t watching the skies like we should have been— just not enough people and after those EMPs and cyberattacks not exactly enough reliable equipment. I think they took a shuttle up. Left. Can’t exactly blame them. So there hasn’t been much opposition to us taking our dead back.

I’m burying them all personally. Everyone else is bringing them here, but it happened on my watch, and so it’s my responsibility to dig their graves and put them to rest.

I’m… laying down right now. Next up is Christaps Vanags. Latvian. Good kid. Could fix anything with a computer in it. Once upon a time he was a cryptologic technician. Now he’s a husk of a man.

I can’t quite bring myself to bury him. It’s not his fault we’re all in this situation, but it was his hand that did it. I can’t imagine the horror he must have felt.

I’ll miss you, Christaps.

Ugh. I hear someone coming. I’ll finish this log later.

<END AUDIO RECORDING>

A man in a black polo shirt stared out from under dark sunglasses. He dragged a Sharpie along a tag, writing up names, rates, and national affiliations. The pictures had already been taken. The graves would be here. A good discouragement for inquisitive minds. It was a horrible tragedy, but the colonists of Akrotiri and the UN deserters had, for the most part, killed each other— and while some colonists had fled, they had killed the deserters to the man.

“This is going to be one hell of a report,” he mused. “Did they get a photo? Any footage, sensor data?”

“Some from the ship, some from the colony, some from the telescope.”

“Tag ‘em. SUNSHINE all.”

“██████?” A woman in similar garb called his name, a black plate carrier strapped to her chest and a ballcap sat atop her head, raised an obscured eyebrow. “I don’t think so.”

“You’re our specialist, tell me. CWAR? EWAR?”

“I’m… not sure, ██████. Something feels off.”

“Something?”

“It’s… how consistent it is. The timestamps. This is the most advanced cyberweapon I’ve ever seen. Nothing can do this,” she shook her head. “If they have this, we’re not safe. They could trick us up and down the line of contact. SUNSHINE doesn’t cut it.”

“Well, I’ll be sure to let the boss know,” ██████ nodded. “Get it all categorized. ██████████, take a team and SSE the ship again. Check for nuclear material again. And check. Those. Timestamps. Actually, ███, go with them. You know the meatheads need babysitting.” He sighed. She nodded.

“We’ve got our work cut out for us here, ███.”

“They still want us looping in the Navy on this?” She raised an eyebrow. “The above-board stuff, anyway.”

“Send the above-board stuff to Commodore Devenish. Give the real report to Starling. He needs to know what we’re dealing with.”

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