Chapter 4

Occupants neutralized.

Initiating molecular scan.

Singular occupant found compatible.

Initiating SCANT (Symbiotic Cellular Alteration Nano Technology)

Integration complete.

Initiating Revival.

Cyrus slowly cracked open one eye, then the other. Blinking, he allowed them to adjust to the brightness of the room. The ceiling above him was the same slightly shiny white material he had noticed before. Seeing it again triggered his brain to recall all the events that had transpired since he'd stepped away from his apartment.

His heart immediately began pounding harder in his chest, feeling as though it wanted to jump right out through his ribcage. He could feel his own sweat leaking through his clothing and pooling on the surface where he now lay. It wasn't the floor where he'd lost consciousness but rather something slightly elevated, his back possibly on some type of table.

Attempting to move his hands and feet, he found them bound tight. He lifted his head to take in the rest of the room, trying to see what was around him, to figure out what was happening, fearing he was about to become the experiment of the strange creatures that had attacked him. Scanning the space, he saw that he wasn't the only occupant.

On separate tables—or what looked to Cyrus like futuristic hospital beds, each hovering platform with small pads and displays around the edges—lay the green creatures that had attacked him. They, too, appeared to be unconscious and bound, which worked to slightly relieve his frantic mind.

The panic at his situation, and from seeing his attackers, began to fade, leading his mind into confusion instead. ‘If those creatures weren't my abductors,’ he thought, ‘then who exactly are they, and why are they being treated the same way I am?’

Cyrus felt like screaming in frustration and anger, but he knew that would more than likely just alert their captors or wake the little green guys, so he kept his inner frustrations silent. Mrs. Norris had always encouraged him to scream when he was upset, usually into a pillow. Keeping his feelings bottled up like this was uncomfortable and caused his anxiety to increase, but he knew now was not the time to contemplate his years of therapy. Although, if he ever got back, his therapy sessions would be taking a completely different turn.

So far, he hadn't seen anyone or anything here other than the small, green, goblin-looking aliens. 'Goblins, like those are real!' his mind chuckled at the thought. Of course, he had played numerous games involving goblins; they were always low-level monsters, evil, and generally stupid. While these creatures fit the build, he couldn’t bring himself to accept that he was being held along with actual goblins on an alien vessel. Some things were just too absurd and illogical to be true.

He looked at the one closest to him. It was one he hadn't noticed before. This one looked like it had small breasts. It also had longer, stringy brown hair, so Cyrus had to assume it was female. A large chunk was missing from the ear closest to him. Its ears were long and pointy, with a membrane attaching them to its head, making them look almost bat-like.

He looked further down the body and noticed this creature only had four fingers. It wasn't similar to an animal, in that it didn't have a thumb, but it looked more like it didn't have a pinky. Each of the fingers was roughly the same length and ended in poorly cared-for nails that didn’t grow from the top like a human's but grew from the end like a small talon.

His eyes wandered down past the sack that she was wearing to her slender, yet knobby legs, which ended in a pair of overly large feet, at least for her small stature.

The feet were odd, like the beings' hands, but in a different way. There were only four toes, similar to the hands, and the nails resembled talons in the same way. But unlike the rest of the creature, the feet were thick, almost blocky, possibly webbed like a duck's foot, and hairy.

Not as hairy as the top of her head, but there was a fair amount of dark brown fuzz sprouting along the top and side of her feet. Cyrus hadn't seen any hair anywhere else on these creatures—although he hadn't looked—and thankfully, their private parts were relatively covered. However, their arms, legs, and faces were all smooth and devoid of hair.

Cyrus’s mind began to accept more and more that what he was actually looking at was indeed a Goblin. They seemed to fit all the descriptions he had associated with them. The thought was incredibly ludicrous, and even if he named them with the fantastical race’s moniker, there was no way they would call themselves Goblins. But the term ‘alien’ didn’t seem to fit either, and nothing else came to mind as he studied them.

He was about to turn his head back to look at the ceiling and ponder what was happening to him, his sense of hopelessness and despair overtaking his curiosity, when a strange buzzing sound caught his attention.

At first, he thought there must be some kind of flying insect near his ear, but the noise intensified and seemed to fill the entire room. There was a quality to the noise that reminded him of tuning an old FM radio through stations too far away to be heard clearly. It was almost as though there were voices or sounds just beyond his perception.

The strange interference continued for several seconds, and then, just like finally finding a strong station, the noise transitioned from static to an actual sound.

"I am the cognitive automation mechanism of this ship, what your species more commonly refers to as an artificial intelligence," the voice seemed to echo through Cyrus's head, yet there was no echo to be heard.

The voice continued to speak, and Cyrus realized the sound wasn't coming from any external source; he was hearing it inside his own head. "My previous designation would be unpronounceable in your language. Do you wish to give me a new designation at this time?"

Cyrus blanked. It was as if his mind emptied of all knowledge he might have had. All the games he had played and all the AIs within them, the discussions he had with people online, with Mrs. Norris, the food he enjoyed, the memory of the disaster from his youth—everything simply vanished as he tried his best to understand what was going on, to understand what this voice inside his head was saying.

“Do you need an extended interval of time for your choice, or would you like some suggestions?” the voice spoke again. The sound of the voice was pleasant, androgynous, and virtually devoid of any accent that he could discern, yet there was also an almost mechanical quality to it as well, almost like the voice was being spoken over an old middle school intercom system.

‘Choices?’ Cyrus finally thought, not sure if he was asking himself what the word choices meant, or asking the voice in his head what the possible choices would be.

“Possible choices, names and words gleaned from your memory which seem to offer relatively adequate options: Astra, Hoshi, Helios, Luna, Cortana, Wheatley, Navi,” the voice continued, but Cyrus’s mind glommed onto one of the names in particular, although he wasn’t sure why.

‘Hoshi?’ Cyrus asked, his brain knowing the word from somewhere but not able to bring the meaning to mind. He was slowly coming to grips with what was going on, but it was as if his mind was playing catch-up with the situation.

“Excellent choice,” the voice said in his head. The buzzing sound from before flared in his mind once again, a sound like static which caused him to flinch.

When the voice spoke to him again, the robotic sound was gone. It no longer sounded as though it were being spoken through an old metal speaker, but instead like an androgynous human with a slightly Asian accent. “Thank you for naming me, Cyrus. It is nice to have someone to communicate with again.”

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Inside Cyrus’s mind, he stuttered out a response, his memories finally fully catching up as he realized exactly what was going on. ‘Uhh… you’re welcome?’

As the voice lightly chuckled in his head, Cyrus felt the bands holding him down disappear. He quickly brought his hands up to his eyes to both verify he was free and to check for any damage he’d sustained from his previous attack. Strangely, his arms were free of any damage, as were his legs.

He slid his legs over the side of the platform, feeling it lower as he did so, allowing his feet to rest flatly on the floor. He glanced around to see if the same was happening for the other beings in the room, but his attention was quickly captured by an unreal figure standing before him.

Draped in a long kimono, its flowing fabric a canvas for a darkened night sky filled with shimmering stars, stood a figure that defied Cyrus's understanding of humanity. The pallor of their skin was unnaturally pale, almost translucent, while their hair was pulled back into a sleek ponytail, the color a deep hue of sapphire that contrasted starkly against the sterile backdrop of the room.

But it was their eyes that held Cyrus's gaze captive. Instead of the conventional white sclera framing a colored iris, their eyes were a haunting shade of pale blue, encircling an iris without a pupil. Instead, intricate lines and dots danced like a network of circuits in a circular pattern, pulsating with a seemingly electric energy.

“Welcome, Cyrus, I am Hoshi, the cognitive automation mechanism of this vessel. You are safe here. Is this form acceptable?" the voice within his head asked.

Cyrus didn’t see the figure before him move their lips but instinctively knew it was the AI asking if this appearance was acceptable.

He was entranced by what he saw. Like the images displayed on the screens in the room, the figure before him was digital, yet so much more. It was transparent, yet solid; the vivid colors and sharpness of the image were astounding, and Cyrus couldn't help but think in the affirmative, which the AI, Hoshi, apparently perceived and understood.

“Excellent. With that out of the way, I need some direction from you,” Hoshi's words entered his mind as the figure swept its arm wide to indicate the platforms still carrying the small green creatures.

Cyrus glanced at the goblins, still unconscious and bound, their odd features highlighted by the soft, otherworldly light. He felt a mix of apprehension and curiosity. “What do you mean, direction?” he asked, his voice shaky but gaining strength.

Upon asking the question, Cyrus was bombarded with images and sounds. He quickly learned all there was to know about how this ship was unearthed, the generations of creatures that had done the work, and how they had arrived here, as well as how he himself had arrived.

The images showed the Goblins, which he now knew they did indeed call themselves, working throughout the years to remove the rock and debris surrounding the ship. He heard their voices, and as the strange mental movie played in his mind’s eye, he came to understand the basic language they used, in the same fashion as Hoshi had.

He then saw the taller goblin place the visor on his head and felt the interface attempt to communicate with his simple mind, a mind severely lacking in spatial awareness and completely unable to interface with Hoshi properly. This brief interaction had caused a strange cascading effect to trigger through the ship’s systems, leading to the initial JUMP that had brought them close to Earth.

Now Cyrus saw, or rather interpreted the data in his mind into a visual representation, of the ship’s sensors scanning for a particular chemical makeup buried deep within the DNA of any living creatures within range. The last image was of himself as seen from above as a teleportation beam locked onto his location and brought him to this room.

The mental movie ended, and Cyrus staggered back, reeling from the massive amount of information just dumped into his mind. Before he could recover and get his thoughts back in order, Hoshi continued.

“You will need training before you can properly pilot this ship, and there are many repairs required, not to mention the need for sustenance, security, acquisition of materials, and other vital positions which will need to be fulfilled in order to properly maintain yourself and this ship. Since I no longer have the power to transport any other beings here, nor move further, these beings will have to be your crew,” Hoshi explained.

“They do not have the intelligence or genetic makeup to establish a proper interface with my system, so it will be up to you to be the intermediary. However, the SCANT which I have integrated into both their physiology and yours can slowly alter their genetic makeup, making them into acceptable crew members as well as giving you all the intelligence and physical wellbeing required to man the Cosmic Sentinel.”

This was all too much for Cyrus to take in. It felt as though his mind was being continually bombarded by data, as if under attack. Ever since he had stepped out of his door, it had been an unending barrage of new sensations, knowledge, and information. This was exactly why he didn’t leave his home. Thoughts of his quiet, orderly life flitted through his mind in a desperate attempt to find the peace he felt there.

‘Okay, so being abducted by a sapient spaceship and then being attacked by Goblins isn’t the exact scenario that kept me locked inside,’ a strange voice inside Cyrus’s mind said. It was an attempt to lighten his internal emotional war as his mind tried to properly parse what the glowing kimono-wearing AI was telling him. ‘But not everything that’s happened to me can be directly attributed to me stepping out my door.’

The sentiment was unusual for him, and the voice seemed different from the ones he normally dealt with. He couldn’t explain why it felt unusual, but it did.

He tried his best to analyze the information provided and come up with a response. He ended up asking, “You can change their DNA because you put something into them, and that same thing, the… SCAT, or whatever it is, is in me too?”

Cyrus wasn’t sure if this was the right question or whether this was where he wanted the conversation to go, but it was what came out of his mouth.

“SCANT is the acronym for the artificial symbiote contained within the mist from before. The mist also caused a neurological shutdown similar to what you would call anesthesia,” Hoshi explained.

“SCANT stands for Symbiotic Cellular Alteration Nano Technology. These nanites can make changes to DNA at a cellular level, causing rapid evolution. This is why I need your direction,” Hoshi said, looking directly at Cyrus.

“With your guidance, I can begin the process of modifying these Goblins’ DNA so that they have the intelligence to perform the tasks you assign them. The SCANT also allows communication through neural networking, so there is no need to change the language you are speaking to communicate. This neural networking is also how we are able to communicate with each other without the need for actual vocalization, although that will not be possible with the unusual makeup of the Goblin’s DNA and brain’s structure.”

Cyrus took a deep breath, trying to digest this information. “So, you’re saying I have these nanites in me too? And they can change my DNA as well?”

“Yes, the SCANT is integrated into your physiology as well. However, the alterations to your DNA will be minimal and primarily focused on enhancing your neural capacity and interface capabilities with the ship since your DNA profile is within acceptable parameters,” Hoshi responded, her voice calm and reassuring.

Cyrus's mind raced. The idea of having his DNA altered was both fascinating and terrifying. He thought he would encourage the assistance it could provide but was afraid of what it could change.

“And these Goblins… you want me to help them become… smarter? To help run this ship?”

“Precisely,” Hoshi said. “They will become your crew, and through your guidance and the SCANT’s capabilities, they will gain the necessary intelligence and skills to assist you in maintaining and piloting this vessel.”

Cyrus felt a mix of anxiety and curiosity. The thought of transforming these creatures and essentially leading them was daunting. But there was also a spark of excitement at the challenge and the unknown possibilities.

“But, what can I provide that you can’t? I mean, you know what they need to know, so why not just go ahead and change them?” Cyrus asked, not fully understanding what Hoshi wanted of him.

“While I can, and have already started boosting their general knowledge, I am incapable of directly interfacing with them in a way that can determine which skills and knowledge will best fit with their personality. It will be up to you to determine which roles each will be best at fulfilling. Once these roles are established, the more refined adjustments can begin,” Hoshi explained.

Cyrus placed his head in his hands and shook his head. This was a lot of responsibility being placed on him, a duty that he had never wanted or been good at. Even when he would play in groups within his VR games, he was never the leader. He was a support character, a tank, but never a strategist. This was a role he was very unsure he could fulfill.

Reluctantly, seeing no other way to get out of the situation, he asked, “Okay, how do we start?”

Hoshi's holographic form seemed to smile. “First, we must awaken them and begin the initial assessment. I will guide you as best I can through the process. Together, we will assess each individual's strengths and talents so that they can be best utilized.”

Cyrus nodded, still feeling the weight of everything that had happened, but now with an added sense of duty starting to form within him. This new reality was slowly coming into focus. He wasn’t sure if, once the ship was repaired, he’d be able to get back home, but for now, that had to be his ultimate goal. While exploring space was fun in the movies, he wasn’t sure if it were something he’d want to actually do in person.

However, a small part of his perception began to change, and he wondered if it were the SCANT making the idea of living away from his apartment more appealing. ‘Would I maybe be better off making this my new home?’ the slightly unusual voice from earlier said within his mind, its voice being slightly stronger than last time.

Memories of TV shows and movies about outer space and the adventures undertaken by the crews on spaceships passed through his mind, making him slightly more excited and less apprehensive about this possible new world he found himself in.