Kin’Tara was bored, it had been more than six months since the last exciting event happened under her watch and she was getting tired of classifying the different daily events that happened throughout the Empire, but that was still her third year so it was quite normal for someone like her to do these jobs.
Granted, the AI did the most of the grunt work by analyzing all the local and interplanetary press, and since the Empire didn’t believe in suppressing points of view there was a lot of press.
But then she would receive hundreds of events, all properly ordered for her review and final classification.
She started to think how these last months there had been more natural events happening than normally would. Earthquakes, hurricanes, tsunamis, it was like all the planets of the Empire were fighting against them.
A beep sounded on, incoming communication, a humanoid figure with pinkish skin, blonde hair and penetrating green eyes was in front of her. Oh right! She also was in charge of calls for the week.
“Historian guild, this is XDR-9087234122, but you can call me Kin’tara. How can I help?” - she answered using her best public tone
“Hi, this is XEA-6889475861, explorer full-grade, reporting. I sent a report a few minutes ago and would like your thoughts before continuing. I know it is not a normal procedure but I would like someone there to have a look before I leave the system for good.” - he responded
A report sent a few minutes ago and he already expected someone to have read it? She looked at the guy, it looked human, you could tell by that skin tone; and he looked young to be a full-grade, he probably mentioned it so he wouldn’t get ignored.
She typed in the console the explorer ID and got a list of his reports, the last one had been received just ten minutes ago and it was at the bottom of the queue.
“Very well, let’s see what you have found” - she said, profoundly amused.
She opened the report and first there was the quick review of planets, moons and other stellar objects, there were 3 things red-flagged and one yellow.
She went to see the first flag and saw the asteroid belt formed by millions of ship parts, her smile froze in her face, there was an analysis of the parts and their materials and some attempts to resolve the puzzle that was those ships' original forms.
Then she switched to the next flag, and she could see a planetary ring half made by rocks and the usual stuff and half made by more ship parts, same analysis as before.
The next flag was the yellow one, the planet with the weird magnetic field on the goldilocks zone, and it was indeed weird at first sight.
And then her brain exploded, what the hell was that? She was looking at the metallic attempt to make a planet that was orbiting the binary stars of the Alkagoria system; she didn’t recall ever seeing or even reading about anything like that. It was 8500km in diameter, tidally locked to the center of the binary system and moving at an incredible speed, and it was definitely not of biologic origin. She needed more opinions before deciding what to do.
“Wait a second please” - she said while muting the audio and ran out of the plane. Who was around? There was T’hrki, a bipedal form with compound arthropod-like eyes, an image expert, she could verify the raw recording.
There was also Kurrer, a wolf-like form with the patience of a mountain, a spaceship expert. Then you had the blob form Jhurrnna, she really didn’t recall what their specialty was, and the fully insectoid Yksjnâ, a drone expert.
She went around all of them, calling some and nudging others. - “You guys need to SEE this” - Kin’Tara said, and did a quick version of what she had seen.
All of them ran towards the screens where she had the report loaded and started looking at the data. T’hrki took out from some bag pocket a terminal and started looking at it.
“Hi, mr. Jordi. “ - said Kurrer, with his profound guttural voice - “What made you believe this planet artefact, the closest to the stars, might be a bomb?” - the researcher asked.
“Well you see, I’m human. Maybe you know about humanity's sixth sense, our brains process things that we cannot comprehend and send us messages and warnings that we need to interpret.” - the pinkish explorer explained
“Sometimes we don’t even understand after well past the moment and sometimes never.” - he continued -”and when I saw the thing, the planet artefact as you call it, and saw that it didn’t have emissions of any type, something inside me screamed. Especially after seeing those many ships destroyed throughout the whole system, and the 10th planet magnetic field was weird.” - the explorer finished
“10th planet? Oh right! Explorers count from the outside in!” - said Jhurrnna with their ringing voice, and all of them looked at all the screens again, fitting all the pieces together.
“DX-203LB… that’s a nice exploration drone but if we could add the RKI module” - said T’hrki with a hopeful tone
“The explorer guild doesn’t have the RKI!” - responded confidently Yksjnâ
“Well then I say we sent him the blueprint! And he can leave 5 RKIs for when we get there!” - answered back Kurrer
“Sounds good to me! Who can give us authorization?” - said Jhurrnna with expectation
That’s when Kin’Tara realized the screen and voice were still on and the explorer had seen this, nothing strictly confidential anyways, no one would tell him or give him access to RKIs just yet but she ran towards the console anyways.
“Please wait by the beacon for a while, we’ll contact you shortly” - she said with a smile, shutting down the call quickly afterwards.
Then the graveyard shift of the historian guild started making calls, something really big was starting and they were going to be in the center of it, but they were going to follow protocol.
First they woke up their direct superior, they drew lots and Jhurrnna lost.
“This better be important” - said the guild administrator with a hoarse voice
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
“Well, sir, you see, we believe it kind of is” - answered Jhurrnna with her ringing and calming voice, and sent a quick review of those three red and one yellow flags.
Ten seconds of silence went on, Jhurrnna could hear the administrator breathing accelerating.
“I’ll call you back.” - he said with a low tone and hung up.
“And now we wait!” - Jhurrnna said triumphantly to their colleagues.
In the meantime, they were all over the results of Jordi’s report. The scans, the detailed video and pictures of the belt and ring, plus the first attempt his AI had made of developing a program to solve the puzzle that was those ship parts.
Kin’Tara was looking at it, it was an original but brutish attempt, but there was something there she could use, and started typing an improved version with her personal AI.
Jhurrnna were a materials expert, that is they knew every single element of the periodic table personally and intimately, all 433 of them, and they were intrigued.
They were looking at the scan of that thing, that artefact-planet. That perfect sphere seemingly metallic but no metal she knew was capable of what it was doing, was there any kind of shielding? What was powering it then, when no emissions were detected?
They needed a scan from other dimensions than these ones, they needed an RKI. RK was for Relativity Kills, meaning if they made a mistake with it they could either destroy the drone - which wasn’t so much of a worry - or tear open the fabric of reality, which was all kinds of bad.
To operate it properly one had to be a pandimensional being, 6 dimensions minimum. Lower dimension beings could attempt to run one but they didn’t have the proper instincts developed for what their brains were going to go through.
Still, there was one of them who could run a RKI, or at least, did get the license for it.
Yksjnâ was sitting on a chair, head looking down with eyes closed. He had seen the drone's holo-video of the artefact-planet and was imagining what route and analysis would he run with an RKI. They were going to get one, he could trust them that much, and he was going to be ready.
Still, a bomb? That’s what the explorer had said. He had heard these humans had a surreal instinct, maybe that was that 6th sense. To him it was logical that a species who had to face everything humans had would develop a way to warn them even when they had not realized the danger. He thought he would do well to heed the warning.
Meditating, visualizing the path and steps to take, the voices of others around him were but a whisper.
Meanwhile, the administrator had decided to jump ranks and called the head of the guild straight away.
“This BETTER be important.” - growled the head of the historian guild, interrupted in the middle of something fun.
“Yes ma’am, I received this [and he sent the file] and, after checking the charting table, believed that time was of the essence” - was the administrator response
The guild head checked the report, her lizard eyes becoming a thin line, then she checked the attached charting table and understood what the administrator meant.
“Very well, I understand. I’ll call you back”. - she dropped the call and looked apologetically to her bedmate, then left the room while making an important call.
“Huh, that’s weird, I didn’t thought I would go through Hell today” - was the response at the other line of the call
“That's cold, general*, I might be the head of the historian guild but I’m still your sister Rk’hoo”* - was her answer
“And of course you're calling me for unofficial stuff and not to make my life complicated, aren’t you sis.” - he replied
“Well, there’s this little thing involving one little advanced science vessel called Rk’smir that I would very much like to be sent to somewhere else.” - she said and sent the report of the Alkagoria system
“You want WHAT sent WHERE!?” - screamed his brother, because that was the flagship of the research guild and was about to jump to the other side of the Empire domains in the following hours; then a ten seconds pause, then - “Oh, I see. dammit sis. Why is it always you bringing me headaches?”
“Oh brother of mine, just the Emperor messing with your Destiny” - she said sardonically
Meanwhile she had been getting dressed and was leaving her apartment; she was awake and her night ruined so might as well share some of the fun, she thought while on her way to the guild.
She lived close and at this time of the day it was night on the planet, hours before sunrise, so she ran and jumped letting the excitement flow, rarely did she have the occasion to release her inner beast in that way.
She entered the main room, at times crowded with people from all the races of the Empire and saw just a bunch of renegades who, in one way or another,had managed to stumble onto one of the discoveries of the decade.
She crossed the room towards the main set of screens. A silver mane over a purplish skin was looking attentively at some books - books! - and sitting in front of it.
The room had gone silent but Kir’Tana didn’t realize what was happening, and then she jumped.
“Found it!” - she screamed while turning around, seeing now the scene of everyone looking at her in panic and in front of her, centimetres away, the head of the historian guild, a reptilian form called Rk’hoo, her eyes looking intensively at her.
“Pray tell, what have you found?” - was all Rk’hoo could muster
“A loophole! We don’t need to wait for the science vessel to arrive” - Kir’Tana said - “if the explorer deploys a 3d printer as per this standard” - she continued, showing the book - “and leaves enough material, we can connect to the printer after he has left the system and do the scans without infringing any confidentiality law” - she finished
Rk’hoo arched an eyebrow and grabbed the book.
“Interesting” - she said - “That could work, didn’t know we could have that much flexibility with the RKIs” - she finished looking at the name of the book: Book 7 of Exploratory Mysteries, a guide for unknown events. In her defense it had been centuries since a thing this big had happened.
“Well, in any case, I’ve convinced the Rk’smir to come look at it so we will have a second lap exploratory approach only, am I clear?” - she said, with a deeper tone than before, in the middle of the room and looking intensely at Yksjnâ.
Then looked at Kin’Tara -”Make the call to the explorer please”
Kin’Tara pressed some commands and the explorer appeared on screen.
“Hi, mr. explorer, Jordi… sir” - said Kin’Tara.
“We would like to ask you for a favour. It turns out that we need some drones with a specific configuration but you are not yet authorized for it.” - she continued
“So, we would need for you to set up a 3d printer as per the ..” - and a hand appeared with a piece of paper - “10532 specification, book 7 of exploratory mysteries” - she read out loud, then looked at the screen. That hand must have been the head of the guild Rk’hoo!
She concentrated on the screen and saw the human looking up, as if talking to the ceiling of the room, and said - “Friday?”
Then a femenine human voice answered - “Printer has already been deployed boss, 300kg of material attached to it, as per specification 10532.7” - was that the ship? Was Kin’Tara asking herself, that was cool AI! She would have to find more information later.
The explorer then looked at her. - “Sending the encryption details so you can take control of it once I’m gone, please allow a couple of hours for me to finish the set up and leave the system” - the explorer informed her
“Details received” - Kin’Tara said while checking the screen by her right - “Communication established, ready to work.” - she finished, looking at the main screen again. - “And thank you for letting us know! We are excited to find out more and we’ll be there shortly” - she finished, with a smile
“My pleasure! I look forward to reading about it when I come out of jump on the next system” - the explorer finished, smiling as well.
When the call dropped Kin’Tara already had a note in her terminal, the blueprint ready to be sent with the necessary instructions for the printer to make it.
Normally weeks would have passed since a report was sent and they acted on it, but there usually were less yellow and much less red flags; the important thing this time was what they couldn’t share with the explorer, that he was right and that the artifact was a weapon.
They had seen them in the past, the artifact would first rotate quickly around the sun, changing rhythm and provoking waves of solar winds, then it would accelerate closing its circumferences and making the sun go nova.
Those things were the reason the Empire shields became as sturdy as they currently were, because there was a time that they were everywhere, a war against a race long forgotten.
That’s why they needed the RKI too, to see if there was any of those beings still around.