Chimera 🌈 [ONC 2024]

11: Amnesia

"You said that when you inserted your ID key-card into Commander Malinowska's quarters, the door opened?"

"Yeah. I don't know how, but, yeah."

"This door isn't the same. When I was inside, every portal and bulkhead looked different. There were the ones Valkyrie controlled and the ones that could be overruled by the crew. The cockpit, the crew quarters, the control centre, basically everything along the central spine... They could all be countermanded by crew ID. But this door, this is just Valkyrie."

It didn't sound hopeful. Ryan stood beside the huge circular door that marked the boundary between the known and the unknown. Beyond it, Leanne knew, was the centrifuge: that great, rotating structure that had started itself. Ryan's journey through synthetic space had brought her here.

"I couldn't see the crew," she continued. "But I felt their lifelines on the other side. They're still there somewhere, or at least their imprint. I'm sure of it."

"How do we get past the door?" Leanne asked. "If ID cards don't work, and Valkyrie has locked it down..."

"That's what I wondered. The ID cards are linked with DNA, just as yours from the BASE are. But, Valkyrie is like another form of DNA. And her power banks are also beyond this door. I found them."

Leanne tilted her head. She had been leaning against the bulkhead, arms crossed, not confident that Ryan, for all her technological wizardry, had made much progress. Now, she stood up straighter. "What were they like? Her power banks?"

Ryan paused. "It's strange. With Imperium, everything is clear. Everything is connected and makes sense. I can go from one side of Nerio to the other without tripping. But Valkyrie, it's like... It's like there's something else in there. There's her and then a...a dark mass. It's new. It wasn't there when she was programmed and created. It's like an invading force, an anomaly."

"My god. She's been infected?"

Since the early days of computers, viruses had been an issue. Some downloaded dodgy websites, some stole unsuspecting users' money, some apparently caused spaceships to go haywire.

"There's some kind of corruption in there," Ryan concluded. "Something that means her processors aren't working as they should. That probably explains some of her strange behaviour."

"You've noticed it too then?" Leanne was almost relieved. "I thought you and Valkyrie understood each other."

"Understood, yeah, but I know how AIs and synthetics should work. This isn't it. Anyway..." Ryan had her own data pad in her hands, a far more robust one than Leanne owned. She had hooked into it multiple times and calibrated it with some of the Arcadia's systems. "I took advantage of that black spot a little. It's not something I'm proud of but it had to be done to get through this door. I don't even think Valkyrie knows what's happening in those shadows."