059: Trust In Skill – One
The recording of the staccato of rain that she played to calm her restless mind did nothing to quell the horror that was skittering along every nerve in Nevara's body as she lay abed, mandibles twitching in subconscious agitation as her thoughts drifted back to the dilemma at hand.
The Bernetigan.
The name alone was enough to bank the pyre of dread that had caught fire within her when Viatrix had delivered the news of where, exactly, the Storlayacas signal was coming from, and alone in her room, Nevara did nothing to stop the shudder of terror that shivered through her.
The Bernetigan.
A singular race, in that they'd made themselves singular. One culture, one people, uniform across the board from their fashion down to their very genetics.
Not content to unify just their own people, they'd sought the means to convert the rest of the galaxy to their way of life, and through unknown medical practices, they'd found a way to transform any race into their own.
And not just in appearance. If they got their hands on you, everything from your genes to your thoughts would be rewritten. Anything that made you you would simply cease to be, and all that would be left behind would be a stranger.
A Bernetigan.
Even the so called Enlightened races of the galaxy feared them. Zymeth technological advancements, Thalatte martial prowess, and Necupole economic weight were nothing against the threat of the Bernetigan ability to completely overwrite a people. It was only through an AI-manned drone fleet, created, armed, and maintained by the resources of the Enlightened, that the Bernetigan were confined to the borders of their territory.
And it was only a matter of time before the Bernetigan amassed enough ships to punch a hole through this blockade, bringing their "unity" to the rest of the galaxy.
Every year, reports came in from the drone fleet of new shipwright factories springing up, and every year fleets were sent in to bomb them from the faces of the worlds they found them on.
But every year, these drone fleet incursions were decimated by more and more ships, as new as the factories they were destroying, making it obvious that for every factory they found and destroyed, there were at least two more that no one was able to account for.
Statisticians predicted that within the next thousand Galactic Standard Cycles, the Bernetigan forces would swell to numbers that could rival what the rest of the galaxy could bring to bear, leading to the eradication of every other unique race in the galaxy.
Only, the thing was, the best statisticians had made the very same prediction more than a thousand Galactic Standard Cycles ago, and yet the Bernetigan population and tools of war never seemed to reach the numbers needed to breach the fleets that kept them penned into their corner of the galaxy.
No one knew how, and no one knew what, but something within Bernetigan space was keeping them from expanding out into the rest of the galaxy and enacting their terrible plan, and it was to this unknown ember of hope that Nevara clung to as the half baked plans she and the others had come up with rattled around in her head as she lay there.
Because the thought of leaving that Storlayacas signal unanswered hadn't crossed any of their minds. A dangerous journey across accursed territory, and their only question had been how.
Nevara placed a hand against the plate of her chest, able to feel the pounding of her heart even through that thick shell. Fear had her pulse roaring in her ears, but there was an undercurrent to it that had been steadily growing ever since Viatrix had played the signal she was picking up.
Longing. Compulsion.
Unlike the signal of whatever the device the Briddbragnan had stolen from them was, this signal had resonated with them all, though none so deeply as in Nevara herself.
Because the signal of this Storlayacas was calling out to her.
She took a deep, steadying breath, and the exhale came out shakier than she could have imagined. Her Storlayacas was calling out to her, from the heart of enemy territory, and through whatever means she had at her disposal, she was going to unite with it.
The Bernetigan's own plans for forced unity were nothing in the face of that iron clad certainty, and that faith was what finally allowed her to drift off to sleep.
She needed it, after all, for in the morning they needed to come up with a plan.
Pryseia and Malakh had a manic energy about them as they worked in tandem to prepare breakfast the next day. Elytra was practically buzzing in her seat at the table, eyes darting between the two data pads she was working on when Nevara stepped into the mess hall. Taking a page out of Malakh's usual coping mechanism, Rhea was pacing back and forth as she worked on her own data pad, shooting Nevara a grim smile the instant she caught sight of her.
"I don't know about you, but I haven't been this riddled with anxiety since I was taking my final exams for my doctorate, and I was on a medically inadvisable amount of caffeine at the time." Rhea joked as Nevara took a seat at the table.
"That's the stimulant found in the coffee plants you're growing, yes?" Nevara asked.
Shooting her a wink, Rhea said, "Sure is! They're coming along well, maybe a few months away from fruiting. And let me tell you, I cannot wait until I can saturate my blood with that stuff again!"
"That sounds... concerning." Nevara admitted, which got a laugh out of Rhea.
"Anyway," Rhea said as she shook her data pad for emphasis, "We've been doing some research, and we've got information to build off of now."
Elytra slid one of her data pads over to Nevara as she explained, "Accounts of those who have made it safely through Bernetigan space. There ended up being a lot more than I would have thought, which is hopeful in and of itself."
Viatrix popped up on her normal console as she added, "I've been tabulating commonalities across these successful endeavours, and some key points have emerged."
Nevara couldn't keep the hope out of her voice as she asked, "Anything we can use?"
"Stealth drives, for starters," Rhea began listing off as she continued to pace, "So that's already a point in our favour. Malakh and Viatrix are going to go over specs later to see how our own would fair in comparison to the rest of these, because in the accounts some drives seemed to go more unnoticed than others."
"The use of subspace is another factor," Elytra continued, "Using it to get out of Bernetigan territory doesn't pose a problem, but using it to get into it does. They seem to be able to pick up the energy readings given off by a tear out of subspace opening up with an accuracy that far outmatches anyone else in the galaxy, and are able to get an answering force to that location in minutes."
"That sounds like tactical information." Nevara questioned.
"It is," Viatrix confirmed, "I thought I'd have to break into military databases in order to dig this stuff up, but it turns out that the joint defence fleet around Bernetigan space publishes their findings to the general public, you just need to know where to look. My guess is they want anyone foolish enough to head into Bernetigan space to be forewarned against them."
"So with that in mind, it means that our safest bet to get into their territory undetected is going to be to fly straight to our destination through normal space, only ducking into subspace when we have what we're looking for," Rhea concluded as she finally sat down at the table, "Which means we're looking at a bit of a long haul journey."
Conversation was cut off as Pryseia and Malakh made their way over to the table, platters in hand.
"Planning will commence once we've tended to our hungers," Pryseia said as she bumped her hip against Nevara, "For I've a feeling we're going to lose ourselves to the pursuit and ignore our needs until we settle on a plan."
"And the last thing we need is a bunch of hangry bitches when we're supposed to be scheming." Rhea added with a wink.
Nevara couldn't prevent the chuckle that got from her.
A plan came together quicker than any of them would have guessed.
"I guess after all the work we put into getting the Storlayacas from Ritroser and Miasferr, we've been inadvertently practicing how to throw a plan together with efficiency?" Rhea pointed out, half joking and half in awe as she stared at the information spread across the low table of the rec room.
"Regardless, I believe this will be the key to our success," Pryseia said as she tapped her tail against table, "A swift and silent journey through Bernetigan space, and an even swifter exit once we have what is ours."
Nevara reached across to bring up a document of astronavigation data, tracing a flight path with her finger. "The Kith fleet drifts along with the currents of the galactic core more than it flies through them - far safer and fuel efficient than it would be to go against them - and so we've a few days yet before those currents bring us to a viable jumping off position to take a straight shot through to our destination. Time enough for us to complete any upgrades we need."
Her avatar popping up on the table, Viatrix announced, "I've put in a requisition for the extra food, fuel, and resources we'll need for the journey. I've been informed that our supplies will be ready for pickup before the afternoon is over."
"Thanks for getting a jump on that," Malakh said as she brought up a different document, this one showing technical data, "Would you be able to get them to forward that stuff to whatever dry dock we end up in? There's a few things I want to get implemented into our stealth systems before we leave."
Viatrix confirmed the pickup location as Pryseia asked, "What manner of upgrades are you needing to install?"
"Not as much as I'd feared," Malakh told her, "The big one- hm. Simplifying it so that I'm not here explaining the nuances of output for hours, I'm basically going to slap a diffuser on our engines so that the assorted energies given off by their use will be even harder to pinpoint than they already are. The bulk of ships that have successfully made the journey did so because of this style of diffusion."
"What about the others?" Elytra asked.
"Luck and skill," Malakh said, shooting Nevara a look, "And we've got no worries when it comes to the skill department in this regard."
"What about any means of increasing our speed? In all truth, the thought of spending more than a week in Bernetigan space has my nerves beginning to fray." Pryseia admitted.
Malakh hummed as she brought up a different document, "Getting slingshot out of the core is going to give us a considerable, natural boost, and will also help to disguise us as random shit gets thrown out of the core all the time. But any boosts to our engines are going to increase how easily their output can be picked up, and as is, we're already towing the line between speed and our ability to remain hidden. That's one of the main reasons I want to get a diffuser installed. I could definitely tweak things until we hit a higher threshold of both speed and stealth, but that would take more time than we have before our window, and I don't know about you, but this close to completing our set, I don't think I could wait it out for another rotation through the core for another shot at this."
Nodding along, Pryseia said, "I certainly agree with that sentiment. This close to achieving our goal, I feel as if I have been electrified."
"You've gotta be feeling it now." Rhea said as she turned to Nevara.
"I very much am," Nevara confirmed, "The intensity of this feeling wasn't present when it came to the device stolen from us."
"A mystery to solve at another time, then. This is a far more pressing issue." Pryseia agreed, clapping a hand on Nevara's shoulder.
"With a working plan in place, I'd like to bring up something less mechanical but just as important," Rhea said, continuing on once the others had turned their attention to her, "The issue of our own morale over the course of this journey. We're going to be hightailing it through enemy territory for days, and even if we don't come across anything untoward, we're going to be expecting it, so our nerves are going to be shot. I've got a couple options in mind I'd like to discuss."
"Please." Pryseia said, motioning for her to continue.
"Easiest way to skip the journey would be for us to enter into stasis," Rhea said with a frown, "Us in cryo, and Viatrix in shutdown."
"I could stay operational to monitor our journey." Viatrix offered.
"Okay, and be honest with me, do you really want to spend a week alone flying through Bernetigan space?" Rhea asked.
"The idea… is churning an unpleasant mix of emotions within me." Viatrix admitted after a moment.
"So we're not leaving you to face it alone." Rhea said with finality, "As such, we'd need to trust in our automated flight path to get us to our destination safely."
"Given the unknowns, I would rather be conscious to get us there myself." Nevara said.
"And if you're staying up, then so are the rest of us." Elytra told her, the others nodding their agreement.
Tapping her fingers together as she had them steepled before her, Rhea continued, "So if we're going to be up, we're going to need something to occupy our minds, while also not interfering with our ability to leap to our stations should the need arise. Plotting and filming things in regards to our Kith characters would be the logical course of action in that regard."
"Having periodic content drops turning our journey would certainly help to keep our engagement up," Elytra said as she brought up their social media page, "The Bernetigan aren't exactly a topic Kith crews get involved with on the regular, but the numbers always trend high. Audiences seem to enjoy the impending horror aspect, especially with the catharsis of a clean escape."
Turning to Malakh, Pryseia asked, "Given what you know of the Kith broadcasting equipment, do you believe that periodic live-streaming would endanger our efforts in regards to stealth?"
"I can't be one hundred percent certain, but from what information we are allowed to have on how these systems work, I don't think it'll cause us issue," Malakh told her, "The only people who are able to access our broadcast signal are those paying for the service, it's not something anyone can tap into. So unless there's someone within the Kith broadcast monitoring division who would sell us out to the enemy, or we've got paying Bernetigan audience members who will be able to access the stream, broadcasting won't be a security risk."
"That's right!" Elytra exclaimed, sitting up suddenly, "With the worry about the Bernetigan, I forgot to mention that Glare contacted me earlier to let me know that they'd discovered that someone on the Briddbragnan had been subscribed to our content, no doubt in an effort to monitor our actions. They discovered the account when they were in the middle of shutting down their access to Kith funds."
Rhea scoffed at that. "Wait, that doesn't make sense. Kith crews are able to watch each other's stuff for free? That's how we got the background info about the Sudoxe and their situation. Why would the Briddbragnan go to the effort to pay to watch our shit?!"
"As far as they can figure, it was to not appear like they were keeping tabs on us," Elytra explained, "It's not uncommon for people to use proxy servers to access the streams, because some places don't exactly support our way of life, and try to have access to those feeds shut down as soon as they find them. Kith ships, however, will have their viewing history logged, and since we're all part of the same network, you can't mask that access with a VPN. By paying for access, and using a proxy to view it, they were able to hide what they were doing."
"The extent of their grudge never ceases to baffle." Pryseia sighed, "Would that they had spent the effort on actually manifesting their own success, then perhaps they wouldn't have felt so threatened by every crew who preceded them."
"And now that they don't have the protection of being fellow Kith anymore, we can show them exactly how we feel about them." Malakh growled, her voice nothing but deadly promise. Rhea slipped a hand into hers without thought.
Pryseia let out a grim laugh at that. "We will indeed, but that will have to wait until after we are done with our current mission. Retrieving the last Storlayacas is where are priorities lay."
Pushing herself out of her seat, Nevara said, "And to that end, I'll bring us into a dry dock so we can get our preparations underway."
"And I'll head to the Quanvengier in order to get things organized on that end." Malakh said as she and the others stood.
Nodding over to Elytra, Rhea asked, "You up for some brainstorming?"
"Of course," Elytra responded with a grin, "The sooner we can get a teaser out to our audience, the better!"
"Then I will see to our supplies," Pryseia said as she looked around at them all, "This is going to be a dangerous undertaking, to be certain, but my faith in you all is absolute."
From her spot on the table's screen, Viatrix's avatar flickered with amusement as she said, "And if the worse comes to pass and the Bernetigan find a way to get into the Pelekys, I'll tamper with the Kith broadcasting equipment in such a way that it'll detonate and wipe us all out."
"That's more comforting than you realize," Nevara said with a grim snort of laughter, "I would much rather be dead than Bernetigan."