Kordut padded through the Sanctum’s central corridor, knowing there was a chance he might not leave the station alive.
He focused on blending into the pedestrian traffic as he watched his surroundings. He had no formal training in tradecraft, so he carefully followed all the instructions provided by his Acculturation contact.
First, he’d altered his appearance before he snuck off the Ever Golden; injections in his cheeks and forehead to throw off facial recognition, blushing his blue skin, shortening and dyeing his tendrils, and dressing in business attire. Now, he looked like an executive with enough gravitas to be left alone by nosy admins, hustlers, and the occasional criminal alike.
He changed his route as he walked, scanning around him for any tails, and avoided the station’s SecForce division. The Provenance could attempt to label him as a scientist gone rogue, or even a terrorist, and have him extradited. He also feared security could leak the truth if he were interrogated. Neither scenario was acceptable. Acculturation leadership needed to see it first before he brought it before the Commonwealth.
A message notification appeared on his PD. He read it. “The couriers are due to arrive in: <02:21:03> hours. Contact them via the secureComm included in this message to arrange a delivery location.”
Kordut’s journey was almost complete. He considered sitting down for a plate of gata as a reward. He craved the fish after having gone without it during his escape.
Instead, he stopped at a basic goods vendor and purchased a nutrition bar. As he paid, a Human came in behind him and picked up two for himself. He bit into one and gave Kordut a polite nod.
Kordut watched the man as he strolled away. The unremarkable interaction was so ingrained in everyday life that few recognized it as the miracle that it was. One Kordut had a hand in creating for his people when he served on the Pree nanite development team.
The nanites—ingenious combinations of organic and inorganic molecules—assisted in digestion, sequestering toxins, detecting pathogens, and engaging host immune responses. Each race partnered with the Commonwealth to develop specific decentralized formulations for their biology. From there, a host’s Personal Device coordinated the responses of their nanites.
The program’s success dramatically reduced the strife from resource and habitat scarcity. Access to compatible food sources and atmospheres promoted diplomacy and commerce. The transformative technology doubled as a stunning advertisement for the benefits of inter-species cooperation.
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For the Pree, it began over twenty years ago after the disastrous Auturia incident. Multiple races had fought for years over the prime uncolonized world. It wasn’t until Human and Gyhera forces slaughtered each other that the fledging Commonwealth gathered the political support to enact the Reconciliation, ending major hostilities between all races.
The seminal event granted interim charters to all space-faring civilizations—including the Pree—setting them on a path to eventual membership by developing their nanites and loaning resources to construct channel region stations for facilitating commerce, diplomacy, and transportation.
The mass exposure to other cultures, ideas, and technology pushed more of the Pree common people to question the Provenance that ruled for millennia. Failing to head off the impending crisis, drastic measures were needed.
Kordut first heard of Kosmogenic as whispers and ghosts. He discovered the movement was quite real, and as he later came to learn, terrifying.
Rumored to have formed from members of the Human Coalition’s military—the Fleet—and other forces disillusioned with the Reconciliation, they believed the Commonwealth needed to be stopped. Not every species that made it to the galactic stage deserved to be there, especially those who preferred to dine on other races.
Project Fidelity would give both parties what they desired. Kordut’s nanites expertise meant he was one of a hand-selected team chosen to make the project a reality.
And then Auturia was mysteriously destroyed, putting the entire galaxy on edge and the Commonwealth on a countdown to irrelevancy.
The pristine colony world, now a mass formation of rocks and dust, took fifty million people of many races with it. That Commonwealth investigators had yet to find the cause stirred growing tensions with member states.
Forced to address their wavering support, the Commonwealth moved to ratify all outstanding charters, beginning with the Pree. Through Project Fidelity, they would fail.
Kordut wouldn’t let that happen.
All he needed to do was deliver the luggage he carried to the Acculturation couriers.
As he munched on a bar, another message came through. “URGENT: Provenance operative team has been dispatched to your location. Use extreme caution.”
Fear squeezed Kordut’s torso. He peered around, his breaths coming in short gasps. About thirty people were in sight but no one appeared to be a threat. A pair of SecForce officers stepped out of an office and strode past him without a second look.
He shouldn’t have been surprised, he chided himself. One didn’t flee with government secrets and expect a clean getaway.
His appetite lost, he stashed the nutrition bar and continued walking along the corridor. Opening the station map on his PD, he searched for a discrete meeting location. He needed to make sure he wasn’t followed to the courier ship, risking his whole defection.
As he passed a devices vendor, he failed to spot a man discretely twist his head toward Kordut, watching the defector walk by.