Selia shifted her position on her floor, as she made herself comfortable. She was about to do something that was a bit of a first for her, but they had been unable to contact the Refuge via conventional means. They knew that the Refuge was somewhere in the Ikar radiation belt, and that FTL shockwave passing through the region was disrupting conventional communications. This meant they had to try unconventional methods of communications. She already had a psychic connection with one of them, and that was going to help her with establishing contact at this distance. Finally feeling comfortable on the wet floor of her room, she began to focus on that connection from five years ago. A part of her knew this was going to be an awkward conversation, but it needed to happen.
After awhile her quarters faded away, and soon she found herself in that familiar yet mysterious place known as the mindscape. All around her was images of death and destruction, but with her training, she could now better read the imagery. This imagery wasn’t from the mind she wanted to contact, but hers. Selia had spent the last five years going deeper into her own mind, meditating on her own regrets, fears, and darker impulses. The imagery before her was that of what used to be her greatest fear. The images showed her own home burning and ruined with alien ships overhead raining destruction down upon it. For years she had been afraid this would happen and even had nightmares about it, but having faced it in the mindscape those fears no longer unsettled her. It did help that the recent shift in the war made this very unlikely.
Her thoughts shifted away from the war, and she dismissed the imagery, with a thought she was in another part of her mind entirely. Here the imagery was very different, but most important were the permanent marks from her interaction with Countryman. Every interaction left a mark on a person, but a psionic interaction like the one she had was far more intimate, and left a longer-lasting mark on both parties. She hesitated for a moment, before gathering her will and focusing her own psionic energies on the connection. Like a gateway it opened, an expanding passage formed, and with it came a familiar presence. A surge of emotions flooded her being as well. She was almost overwhelmed by the sheer power of the mind that she had connected to. Selia knew he was far more powerful a psionic then she was and that he had been shielding her from his full power the first time, but feeling his raw presence was such a shock that she nearly lost herself in his emotions and thoughts.
Thankfully his presence pulled back, and with it, she was able to recover herself. However, not before she, a few of her mental safeguards had been shredded by sheer presence alone. She had known there was a risk with establishing a connection like this, especially with a psionic that was so much more powerful than her. Naturally, she had hoped that her recent training had prepared her, but clearly it wasn’t enough.
Soon the landscape changed, and she found herself surrounded by gray, white and black mists swirling and twining around her. The environment felt warm and open in the distance mountains could be seen rising above the mists. Lightning sparked, and fires erupted in the distant landscape. Overall the scene around her was quite impressive.
Suddenly a familiar figure emerged from the mists. It was the same androgynous winged figure she had met last time she had joined Countryman in the mindscape. His presence was not the only presence she sensed here, but the others seemed content to stay within the mist. “I didn’t expect you to contact me so suddenly like this, but it does answer a few questions about the range of psionic contact. Anyway, to what do I owe the pleasure?”
She sighed mentally, and began, “This is going to be awkward, but did your people have anything to do with the wave tearing across space in the Ikar radiation belt, and parts of the Orialias belt?”
Countryman conjured a chair, and settled into it, and replied, “Unofficially, yes we are responsible, but I would appreciate it if you don’t spread that around to the less mature races in the quadrant. I doubt they would have the emotional maturity to understand that this was an accident.”
She glanced at her tentacles, and then looked into his face, “We didn’t think you did it on purpose. The Elders couldn’t think of many people who could be responsible, but of the ones they could such as you, they found no reason for them to initiate such a wave. Anyway, we were hoping that you at least knew how the wave was created. We need more information, as we have been asked to stop the wave, and since it is an artificial disaster and not natural the elders are inclined to stop it.”
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Countryman’s expression shifted, but she couldn’t read it. “We would have stopped the wave ourselves if we knew how. As for how the wave started, we subjected a star to multiple directed multispatial projector beams modulated to induce collapse. We were trying to see if our new weapon system could be used to induce a supernova. The answer is sort of.”
“Yes, we know the origin of the wave was a system called I-22. At least on the Cylovan charts, but thanks to the Cylovan broadcast, everyone is calling this I-22 Hypernova.”
Countryman nodded, and said, “We called it M-237, but anyway, the star did go nova, like we wanted, but the FTL component of the shockwave was outside our predictions. As near as we can tell, the wave pulled energy directly from the deeper layers of hyperspace. Part of the shockwave actually originated from hyperspace, and sent exotic particles into normal space. These particles actually overloaded our shields, but thanks to our position relative to the star at the time that was all we suffered. What happened to the surviving stellar remnant is far more interesting. The core of the star collapsed and was subjected to a significant amount of hyperspace radiation and exotic particles. The result has formed a new type of exotic matter that we are already studying. The material is remarkably dense with some unique energy properties. So far we aren’t sure of any practical applications but our research has barely started. Not to mention we have only identified a handful of its properties.”
Frowning she said, “Sounds like it might be a hyperspatial material. They are often formed by exposing ordinary matter to the more exotic particles found in hyperspace. Most of them are rather useless or too difficult to produce in significant quantities for practical applications, but you are quite lucky to be working with one given the age of your civilization.”
“Hyperspatial materials? Sounds like an interesting topic. I would love to learn more about them,” replied Countryman.
“I can’t really help with that,” she sighed mentally and looked around briefly before she continued, “Most of what I know about those materials I learned in school. They are highly exotic materials with a wide range of unusual properties. One material might naturally lend itself for use in an exotic weapon system, while another might be good for use in shield generator construction.”
Countryman shifted, and replied, “I thought that might be the case. Now I guess, I’ll relate to you our sensor readings on the wave when it happened...”
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When Selia finally came back to herself, she reflected on the recent contact with Countryman. Next time she needed to speak to one of his race in this fashion, she concluded she would need to be more careful. They were very powerful telepaths, and she had nearly lost herself in his mind. Honestly, she was blaming herself for that, but she didn’t feel she had the time to dwell on what she could have done better.
Pushing herself off the floor, the young Sylnari female stretched a bit before darting towards the door. She needed to speak with the elders. Countryman had been very detailed with relaying the scans, and he had made sure she remembered every detail. Some of this information was very important, and they had just enough time to find a solution and send a ship. Selia knew that millions would still be killed by the wave. Most of those threatened were on the side of the Ikar belt opposite of Ilyatria. That part of space was also being invaded by the Cylovans, but there were still countless millions living on worlds that had so far resisted the ongoing Cylovan invasion. Then there were the people living on the worlds they had conquered. Even if it wasn’t much of a life, they were at least still alive. True every detail of their lives were being controlled by machines, right down to when they die, and how many children they get to have, and with who. However, as long as they were alive they could be rescued.
The Alliance had grown into a real power over the last five years, and if they continue to grow they may be able to keep the Collective in check, and hopefully even rescue some of the poor folk the Collective had conquered. She knew her own people could really do it. They were stretched thin with the current war efforts already. A sustained war would be out of the question for them.
She found the Elders discussing the wave in the central meeting chamber, and she rather excitedly swam into the room.
“I take it your contact attempt was successful?”
She quickly confirmed it, and then began to spew out the details she learned. So quickly in fact that the words blended together a bit. The elders made her slow down, and repeat what she told them. “They do know how the wave was caused. As we thought they weren’t trying to cause this, but are responsible for it. Supreme Protector Countryman relayed to me the full details of their scan data. With this information, we can stop the wave easily.”
Then she relayed the key details, which another person quickly fed into a computer. The young man feeding information into the computer was an assistant. He even turned on a projector, and within moments they were watching a holographic recreation of I-22 the instant before the shockwave occurred. Soon the elders were discussing the implications of the data, and how to stop the shockwave.