Garrick stared at the panel, almost hesitating to open it. This was the single to last of the aft sensors, and if it was just as broken, they would have one chance left.

"There's a better chance, Garrick," Macdewil said. "The destroyed section might have cut it off from most of the power spike."

"Let's see if you are right," Garrick said, opening the panel and calmly pulling it open.

The sight of the pristine set of electronic boards with neat multicolored cables pulled taunt across the sides, with no sign of any burns, made him sigh in relief.

"Alright, now let's see if we can get it running," Macdewil said, sounding as happy as Garrick felt.

He stepped aside to let his engineer start rummaging through the panel interior. After a short while, he pulled back and nodded. "I can't find any damage. Now, we just need to get the power back to this section, and we will have some idea of what is happening."

A very limited idea, Garrick thought, recalling what Sibilis had told them. With just one or two sensors, it would have massive blindspots.

He followed Macdewil, helping where he could to open panels and check the thick electric backup cables that ran along the walls. They weren't normally used, as the regular energy transmission didn't require them, but he was again happy for the fail saves the shipbuilders had installed.

It took them half a day to check all of the cables, eventually finding that only the corridors that had blown up halfway to the front section were gone.

"I'll get some help, and we can create a bypass," Macdewil said. "It might take a day or two, but we can get them up and running."

"Get it done, Jack," Garrick said as he began pulling himself along the ceiling hooks back to the engineering bay. "After that, work on power for the medbay."

"Sure. What about the rocket you had me make?"

Garrick sighed as he thought of the next part of what he'd have to do.

"Let's see what kind of plan Sibilis came up with. If it's the same as what we think, I'll have to use it to reach the nearest frigate."

Or what's left of it, Garrick thought.

As they continued forward, he felt a very slight headache build. It had come on and off for the last few hours, and he couldn't help but think about his implant.

Checking the H.U.D. and its statistics, it showed nothing wrong, but he wasn't sure he could trust that.

The rest of the day was spent getting information on the different systems, figuring out just how much food and water they had left and exactly how long they could do without gravity. With Sibilis back up, a much clearer and worrisome picture was growing.

"So, if we don't find anything from the other ships, we have ten years of food left, and that's if we don't wake up any of the others," Garrick said, hovering near the wall.

"Correct, Captain. Roughly the same amount of water, but we should be able to get more of that from the dust belt that encircles the small frozen moon," Sibils calmly stated.

Garrick added to his notes and plans until his headache returned. He'd yet to talk to Sibils about the implants, giving other things priority constantly. He knew it was because of the nagging worry about the System-AI, but as the headache continued to increase, he knew it was about time to discuss it.

He called Yuri, who he'd ordered not to discuss it yet, and she joined their conversation instantly.

"On my way, Captain," she said.

"No rush, Yuri," Garrick said before focusing on the Sibils.

"Sibils, there's another thing that happened after the explosion of the Precursor Shipslinger," he said before slowly explaining their findings about the implant to Sibils.

"I see, captain. Permission to examine the implant readings and logs for the crew?"

Garrick hesitated, then nodded. "Granted."

There was a second of quiet.

"Nurse Yuri's worry is correct," Sibilis said. "Although it is very difficult to detect, there are both fluctuations and oddities in the logs and statistics of the implants. Especially your own, captain, is showing signs of…"

Garrick frowned as Sibils fell quiet.

"Sibils?"

"I am sorry, captain. It is hard to express the readings. The best I can say is that your implant is working at one hundred and four percent capabilities, and from the logs, it seems to be slowly increasing. At the same time, the energy drain on your system has increased. Your headache seems to be from a slight dehydration in combination with whatever your implant is doing."

Garrick shivered as he imagined his implant growing. Although the idea of its functionality increasing seemed fine, what was the cost? Then he frowned. Why did Sibils hesitate, though? Although it was an oddity, its eventual response was easy enough.

"Sibils, why did you hesitate?"

"There are inconsistencies in the different readings, and I had to run three simulations. Those readings were also inconsistent."

"Incosisten how?" Yuri asked.

"There are large differences between the readings of the X4 and X5 implants," Sibils said calmly. "The growth seems larger with the X4 implants, with your implant showing especially significant increases, Captain Dasbartin."

"It must be because you were on the bridge, and then you went out of the ship while that radiation was still happening," Yuri muttered.

"You think the radiation is doing this?" Garrick asked.

"What else can it be?" Yuri asked just as she pulled herself toward Garrick.

Garrick didn't answer, but he knew a bit about radiation, which seemed odd.

"Sibilis, can you determine how this could have happened?"

"Not right now, captain. I would need both scans of the current status of the implant and access to its detailed running data."

Garrick knew there was no way for anyone but him to get that data, but it was also entirely unreadable by a human. It was a dump of the last few days of activity, and his emotional state and many other things could be inferred from it. Rumor had it that The Unity Pact even had an AI that could predict thoughts and thought patterns.

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He thought about it for a bit, looking at Yuri and seeing the conflict in her mind. Not sharing these readings and respecting its citizens' privacy was what separated The Igniz Commonwealth from the two other large powers.

And if we weren't in the current situation, I'd never do it, Garrick thought.

"Very well," he said, triggering his implant to create an in-depth dump of everything that was still available. It would take a while due to the implant's limited processing power... Would… which…

Garrick's thoughts stalled as his headache increased rapidly, a throbbing pain right behind his head. It slowly spread across the sides of his head to the back.

"Captain?"

"Captain Desbartin, your combat suit's readings indicate abnormal fluctuations in your heart rate and blood pressure," Sibils said, the mechanical and always calm voice suddenly growing serious.

Garrick gritted his teeth, and as the headache increased, it took all of his considerable willpower to stop himself from curling up. Something dripped on his upper lip, and he shivered.

"Captain, your nose is bleeding," Yuri snapped. "Stop the dump!"

Garrick barely heard her, but the tiny part of him not being wrapped in pain did, and he ordered his H.U.D. to stop all active actions.

The headache stopped building instantly, and very slowly, the pain receded as he regained his ability to think straight.

"Well, that was unpleasant," he said, trying to remain calm.

"Captain…" Yuri whispered.

The worry in her voice was so thick that Garrick felt his own skin crawl.

"You were bleeding from your nose, eyes, and ears…"

Garrick didn't react for a moment, sensing the headache receding until it was no more than the slight throbbing it had been before.

"Then I guess I look rather gruesome right now," he said.

"Captain Dasbartin, based on the readings and the fact that they rapidly returned to normal after Nurse Yuri's suggestion, can I assume you stopped the dump?" Sibils asked her voice back to the regular calmness.

"Yes," Garrick said as he focused on a flashing warning on his H.U.D.

~> Implant X4: memory dump aborted at seven percent…

~> Creating readable file… DONE.

"Sibilis, you have my permission to check the partial file," Garrick said, suddenly far less worried about Sibils perhaps being compromised.

"Yes, Captain."

There was a three-second pause before the LLM resumed speaking.

"Captain, your implant's log is either corrupted, or the BIOS code has been rewritten in something that I cannot parse."

Garrick heard Yuri suck in a deep breath, and he held back a curse of his own.

"You cannot determine which of the two?" he asked.

"I have started a background process to analyze the data. It will take a few days before I can give any answer with more than eighty percent surety."

"What would you say now?" Yuri asked.

"Currently there is a sixty to forty probability that the captain's log output is based on another BIOS."

Garrick and Yuri shared a look of deep, unsettled worry.

Garrick felt his worry grow as he thought about something outside of his control, potentially tampering with his brain. Something different from what had been in his mind since he was younger than he could recall.

"Is this something done by the System-AI?" Garrick asked.

"No, Captain. It is unlike anything in my databases."

"Very well," Garrick said. "I want you to keep this information classified between me and Nurse Yuri. Also, keep an eye on all crew, and if you notice something similar to what I just had, warn Nurse Yuri and me in that order, and immediately warn the crewmember in question to stop all implant operations."

"Yes, captain."

"Captain?"

Garrick turned to Yuri, who was staring at him. Her eyes locked on his face.

"You are going to have to come up with an explanation for the dried blood," she said.

Garrick sighed. "Sibils, we need a way to get out of these suits. I need you to work together with Engineer Macdewil and the others to find a room that we can pressurize."

"Yes, captain. I'll contact Engineer Macdewil right away."

"Yuri, can you warn the others that I had a little accident and that they aren't to be surprised by my appearance?"

"Yes, Captain…" Yuri muttered. "Are you sure you are feeling alright?"

Garrick wanted to say yes, then stopped himself as he focused on how he did feel.

"Yes," he said. "A slight headache, but no more than I had before all this happened."

"I need the medbay," Yuri said as she turned and pulled herself away.

Garrick sniffed, smelling the rank odor that had slowly been filling his suit. The fresh blood was still in his nose, and he sighed as he violently blew it out, causing a mist of blood and snot to hover before him for a moment. Then his helmet sucked it away before It could line the inside of his glass.

I really could do with a shower, Garrick thought.

--

"God, I'm glad the captain told us to work in a pressurized room," one of the engineers muttered.

He was working together with four others, including Macdwil, on moving and lining the emptied-out sixth cargo hold with nanotube material. Normally used within the shuttle bay, it had taken days to get enough here, and even now, the other engineers were cutting more out and bringing it here in ten-foot-long pieces.

Macdewil was working on a double airlock, for which he'd had to enlarge the door opening to get it to fit. The entire thing looked straight from a crazy scientist's basement, and he knew that if any of his friends back home would ever see it, they wouldn't ever stop laughing.

"Which god would that be, Rikkert?" Macdewil asked, grunting as he pulled a large pipe through a hole that felt too small for it but, according to his H.U.D. should fit neatly.

"Whichever is willing to help us get this thing up and running so I can clean out this bloody suit," Rikkert replied, snickering softly.

"Sir, what is your problem with faith anyway?" another engineer asked.

Macdewil ignored a weary groan from Rikkert, who probably knew the story.

"Glad you asked! Have you ever heard of the Saulites?" Macdewil asked, happy as the pipe finally slid through.

"I.. aren't those some crazy sect?"

"You're not wrong," Macdewil said as his hands expertly did their job.

With the specs and guides of his H.U.D. back, including Sibilis' assistance, the job was going a lot faster than it would have without, but not nearly fast enough. Every time he saw Garrick's dry, blood-stained face, he felt sick.

"Well, my dear mother was one of those crazy people, and she believed that the best way to raise children was the old way," Macdewil said. "And with old, I mean three thousand years old. With canes and belts."

"Right…" the engineer whispered.

Macdewil snorted, knowing he was making the other uncomfortable and not caring a bit.

"Don't feel bad for me," he said. "That was a long time ago. But, let's just say that one can only be lashed while being told about the greatness of some god so many times. At some point, the belief in said god dies."

"Really, sir?" Rikkert said wearily. "Couldn't you have given them the nicer version? The one you told the others a few months ago?"

"No," Macdewil said, unable to keep the grin from his face. "Sometimes it's good to hear the unsalted truth!"

A loud, clear, and commanding voice interrupted anything else he might have said.

"Engineer Macdewil, please refrain from scaring the few engineers you have left!"

"Yes, Captain," Macdewil said, humming happily.

"Good. Now, as you all seem to be able to chat so much, I take it there's good news?"

"Yes, Captain," Macdewil agreed, his grin returning.

"Right. And, this news would be?"

Macdewil heard the slight annoyance in Garrick's voice, and he decided he'd had his fun. If he pushed the older man a bit too hard, he would likely find a way to pay him back, and Garrick was never one to do things half-measured.

"If we don't encounter any oddities, Sibils and I agree that we should finish tomorrow afternoon. As an added bonus, Rikkert found one of the shuttle's backup batteries. If we fill that, I might be able to temporarily power some of the things in the Medbay."

Macdewil was glad to see the glitter and joy in his captain and friend's eyes. He'd clearly been having a hard time, sleeping less than any of them and working twice as hard. If it wasn't that he seemed to be doing alright, he would have told him to cool it a week ago.

Bit surprising how tough he is for such an old dog, Macdewil thought as he tried to imagine working the same hours.