Shard
One and Many
- Location
- Malaysia
It also is hardly a victory if it fails to secure a kill on at least one ship and preferably both, and they escape.
To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest)
- Thread starter OneirosTheWriter
- Start date
- Sci-Fi
-
- Tags
- star trek exploration fully automated luxury gay space communism top level canon (canon) #hashtagcontent all-encompassing space amoeba cardassian boy bands cardassian magical girls darkest bureaucracy debate makes the qm cackle like palpatine hoh is an empire quest it has to be foreign infiltrators more ships ship happens singers delenda est starfleet this is not an empire quest ur waifu is collective?
Night
Widow Null
- Location
- Hoff
If combat lasts more than ten seconds we have to assume Polaris will show up, and a Liberator or Solace isn't that powerful that it can oneshot two frigates at once. The rules about in-system warp were written without two friendly ships on the line.
Theunderbolt
"Prepare for trouble..."
- Location
- USoA
- Location
- Aotearoa
As I noted, not that fragile when Blooded, the Kepler is the same H3 L5 as the Comet.
The tactical situation for a Solace vs Comet + Blooded Kepler doesn't seem clearly favourable for the Harmony, no. A Liberator would probably be harder, but again, not likely an instant win.
So I agree with BV there is probably something else at play here, for them not to just retreat.
Something else that can't be discovered and must be protected?
Or, just an asshole Singer YOLO (But I Live Forever)-ing into combat.
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Maybe they noticed the Polaris is behind* them and decided to punch their way through the weaker side?
*space is 3d
- Location
- Aotearoa
If they know the Polaris is around too, then attacking instead of fleeing makes even less sense. Space being 3D and all, they could presumably have gone in a different direction. 
Just Singer narcissistic rage being triggered? At their game being spoiled?
Just Singer narcissistic rage being triggered? At their game being spoiled?
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Yup, if space wasn't 3d it wouldn't really be a problem. Like, if space wasn't, space, I could see the Polaris coming in on a direction that made escape impossible.
Maybe some sort of freak space anomaly Starfleet hasn't noticed?
It probably is just the Singer being a dick.
Maybe the Singer has some hooks to exploit that'd tip the odds - after all, we know that they cracked Explorer Corps codes well enough to intercept/fake communications with the Enterprise. It's not that big a stretch to think they might have (or think they have) someone or something suborned on one of the Starfleet ships around.
- Location
- Aotearoa
Oh, sure. If they've got some suborned crew on the Kepler ready to, say, drop EPS power to shields at the wrong moment, then all that 'can't rely on a quick victory' goes out the window.
Maybe that Singer reach-out-and-touch-someone was what the limited-range junior Betazoid Counsellor was detecting...
Maybe that Singer reach-out-and-touch-someone was what the limited-range junior Betazoid Counsellor was detecting...
- Location
- Mid-Atlantic
Although with this conflict having been going on for years, I can't imagine that Starfleet hasn't modified a lot of systems to require things like two-being rule permissive action links before anything can be done that might endanger the ship in the face of the enemy.
When you know that any one person in your fleet might be a mind-controlled Manchurian Candidate, but that the odds are it's only a few such individuals per ship at most... Well, there are precautions you can take, and ones frankly a lot less radical than the stuff we did in a hurry against the Biophage twenty years ago.
When you know that any one person in your fleet might be a mind-controlled Manchurian Candidate, but that the odds are it's only a few such individuals per ship at most... Well, there are precautions you can take, and ones frankly a lot less radical than the stuff we did in a hurry against the Biophage twenty years ago.
- Location
- Aotearoa
We can hope.
Though tangentially, as I recall, those Biophage-era modifications rather emphasised making the ship more sabotagable.
Though tangentially, as I recall, those Biophage-era modifications rather emphasised making the ship more sabotagable.
- Location
- Australia
Biophage era changes were rolled back as soon as they were no longer absolutely required because no one was happy about having a flood-deck-with-plasma system around to potentially go on the fritz.
- Location
- Mid-Atlantic
Oh absolutely!
But I'm talking about another, entirely different set of modifications with a very different purpose designed to counter a very different threat- namely, a system to make core shipboard systems, especially during combat, impossible for a single subverted agent to shut off.
I have to say, I'm not sure they should have pulled a crazy stunt (tm) like this over an exercise.
Sure Starfleet pulls crazy stunts... when lives are on the line and it's for real. This was just an exercise, and instead of scanning a coolant system in a sickbed they could have sent a message to Captain Sapok, "Hold, we need to correct some stuff and then we're going to turn around and try this again."
- Location
- Australia
You know, this is admittedly probably true, but I'm just saying figured that since they were on a full scale backup system it was fine since they were already dropped to impulse and low energy standby mode, so from an engineering standpoint it wasn't any trouble.
Also no one wants to have to scrub a mission given to you in person by the theatre commander as an engineering casualty right out of dock.
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Oh yeah, I don't dislike it. It shows the right amount of confidence, coupled with them maybe them not being quite in a wartime mindset just yet.
- Location
- Mid-Atlantic
One key point is that if you don't pull stunts like this during exercises, you're going to have a much harder time pulling them during a real mission. There are, in all probability, procedures and guidelines Starfleet follows for the ways its engineers and science officers commit wizardry that breaks their other procedures and guidelines. There are best practices to follow to make sure you don't irreparably fuck up valuable equipment. There are in all probability checklists you follow, or at least mentally run down, to make sure you've thought things through.
Practicing that kind of technologically savvy improvisation is very likely to be one of the keys to why Starfleet can so readily do such things on the fly in a real war zone or other crisis. I suspect most other fleets take a more straightforward "and here is The Book, follow it and don't fuck things up by tweaking the preference configuration or the graphics settings or reversing the polarity of the neenion stream" or whatever.
Practicing that kind of technologically savvy improvisation is very likely to be one of the keys to why Starfleet can so readily do such things on the fly in a real war zone or other crisis. I suspect most other fleets take a more straightforward "and here is The Book, follow it and don't fuck things up by tweaking the preference configuration or the graphics settings or reversing the polarity of the neenion stream" or whatever.
- Location
- Aotearoa
Like Jazz.
The Magen Chalal, indeed, says hi.
- Location
- Australia
The Doctor transferred to go find new things, well, she got new things alright!
Night
Widow Null
- Location
- Hoff
As Simon notes, you fight like you train. This kind of improvisation is probably quite normal, at least with higher-end crews like the EC...or the crew on a prototype ship's shakedown.
Shard
One and Many
- Location
- Malaysia
I mean, if there's any place where you would 'want' exciting failures to happen, it would be during a training exercise where there's, like, three other ships on standby to bail you out if things go wrong. Bruised ego, bruised pride, but no lasting harm.
- Location
- Germany
- Pronouns
- He/Him
And if the stunt blows the warp core ... well, at least that didn't happen on a crucial mission.
An Impossible Enterprise II
Jenny
anonymous user
- Location
- maryland
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Personal log, Mission Date 10.9, Captain Iliae Rurliss -- USS Enterprise
(Amarki, female)
I never thought I'd end my Starfleet career like this. But then, I never thought I'd be facing off against uploads who've deeply infiltrated Starfleet and the Federation, either, so.
Still, in my darkest days, I never really figured myself for a deserter. A washout, sure, stuck in the most dead-end post possible, maybe, but deserter... no. And yet, even though the orders we received were sending us straight into an ambush, even though I clearly can't trust my CO... well, we're still ignoring the chain of command, regardless of how compromised it is. We're still taking the flagship of the Federation off on our own private campaign. Somehow, I don't think T'Lorel will approve.
So. Inventory. We've got 1225 personnel -- mostly crew, but a few dozen civilian contractors aboard, too. Poor civvies didn't sign on for this. Thirty operational shuttles of all sizes, including six Nile-class runabouts. Sufficient supplies for five years of extended operations. A full complement of photon torpedoes. And a single one of those uploads, carefully cut off from our computer networks.
Oh, and whatever his friend has to offer us.
We're up against...
Well, how many billions is it, puppeted by the Singers? Over 200 combat frigates alone, supporting over two dozen tenders and several dozen cruisers? Not to mention any assets they can steal with their infiltrators, any reserve assets they can bring to bear…
...And that's assuming our intel of their strength is even accurate. Rumours of stealth cruisers in the border zones abounded. And the Muuyozoi raiders had to get the idea from somewhere...
Long odds, at any rate. Impossible odds, even.
***
"Morning, Morshita!" Deva said cheerfully, putting his tray down on the burnished metal surface of the mess table. He grinned as he picked up a bottle of hot sauce which he began dousing his food in with gusto.
Morshita Rence fluffed up in surprise. The Tseskiya looked left, than right. Down at his food and then longingly at the door.
"Hi." He said, "uh, sir?"
"Oh please, you're not stuck in Starfleet. Call me Kol."
"Starfleet's insistence on hierarchy always confused me," Morshita said, "Things were a lot flatter in the Public Safety and science directorate."
"Better information systems," Deva paused to shove a red-doused fork of eggs in his mouth, "tend to produce flatter organizations."
"What does that have to do with… oh."
"Yeah. In those circumstances calling anyone sir or ma'am looks ridiculous." Deva took a slice of toast, spread a thin layer of honey over it, and then also doused it in hot sauce, "Anyways, just wanted to check how you're settling in. This is probably not where you expected to wind up."
"No," he said, "It must be weird. For you guys. To get a new crew member like this?"
"Not as much as you think."
"Huh."
"Starfleet vessels have made a tradition of picking up misfits and adventurers. And refugees."
Rence chirruped with mirth, "I think I fit into all three of those categories." He gazed down at the cubes of carbohydrate someone dubiously claimed was from a Earth tuber and not from a resequencer, pecked at a few. He stared at them a little longer, then slowly pushed the tray with his beak until it dropped them onto the floor.
Deva chewed on his toast as he looked quizzically at Rence.
"That was my first free choice since I was born," Rence said. "Isn't that amazing?" He lowered his head, "And I threw my food on the floor like a child. Maybe..."
"No," said Deva. "It's alright. I'm sure the Singers would never have let you do that." He tilted his body to peek under the table, "Though is it allowing you to exercise free choice if I ask you to please clean that up before you go?"
Rence looked down, "I think that's fair." He hopped in his seat, "My first freely chosen act of communal service!"
Deva grinned at him. "Starfleet material already."
Rence chirruped again. Then he looked at Deva, "I have a lot to thank Starfleet and Abeshta for. For taking out the implant. I'm myself."
"I heard… that you had the implant preserved and put behind glass?"
"Yes. It's got an interesting structure. Almost like some fractal abstract work of art. Not all of it's gone though." He tapped his head, "Parts of it had to stay in the hippocampus or I'd forget a lot. Your Doctor and Abeshta said it won't be able to be used against me. Unless…"
"We won't let that happen."
"Hm."
Deva leaned forward, "if you don't mind me asking… the memories you are recalling. What are they like?"
"They're strange. Sometimes they come to me in dreams. Or I'll see something or smell something else. And then it'll float up. But they feel so odd. These things I forgot. Or was never meant to remember. Sometimes like I'm in a shuttle cockpit but someone else is flying the ship. Or hallucinatory. Dreamlike." He shook his head, "They come out of nowhere. You know?"
"Yes," Deva said. He quickly stuffed a carbohydrate cube into his mouth.
"I sometimes wonder," Rence said, "if it would have been better to stay asleep. Let Abeshta leave me behind. But then I heard what they might have done to me…" he shuddered, "Abeshta didn't have to look out for me. I'm glad he did. I hope he succeeds. He's the best chance the Harmony has."
"Do you really think that?" Deva said, another cube halfway to his mouth. There was a sudden intensity to him that made Morshita shift. He felt something there was something deeper behind the question.
"Yes." He said. He looked at the floor again, "Well, at least as much as I really think those cubes suck."
-
Rurliss sat in her quarters staring at the Enterprise NX-01 patch beautifully framed above her work desk. The glass was signed by Jennifer Zhang. It had been passed down from Captain to Captain, or so Nash said.
She'd learned it was a fake.
Abeshta sat opposite her, hologram just slightly transparent. It turned to look where Rurliss was and she suddenly felt exposed. Would Abeshta know? The chassis came with a sensor suite. Maybe…
"That patch must be very important to you," Abeshta said, and Rurliss tried to control her sigh of relief. Abeshta's avatar scanned the room, "Everything else you brought is still in boxes."
Rurliss looked around at the piles of boxes that seemed to hem the two of them in. "More like it came with the place."
"Interesting," said Abeshta. Rurliss narrowed her eyes. She knew that non-committal but questioning tone.
"Well," she said, "my packing habits aren't really the topic of this conversation…" she paused, "Sorry. Unpacking habits."
"It suggests a sense of transience," Abeshta said, clearly not one to be stopped by an obvious deflection. "That you haven't settled in, even after three weeks."
This is why Rurliss liked T'Kel. She respected boundaries.
"I'm really not sure if we need to talk about me." She almost added, it's my least favorite subject but stopped herself at the last second. She'd dealt with enough counselors to know that sort of statement was like water in the desert for them.
"I'm trying to get a sense of who you are," said Abeshta, "I hope you don't mind."
Rurliss' first instinct, maybe the most rational one, was to remind Abeshta she had a counsellor and to politely refrain from psychoanalysing her. But she was wary of her own self-judgement. She had a harsh internal critic that questioned everything she did. So she sought out, desperately, the 'truth' in the assessment of outsiders.
But they weren't always accurate critics either. And they could be even harsher than the voice in her head. Which only gave it more power.
She remembered once, a memory of her father, watching her from the other end of the table as she sullenly pushed snow tuber hashblues around on her plate.
"Forget what Yisana said," he motioned with his fork, "Eat up. Your grandfather didn't pick those for you to stare at them."
"Maybe it's true though. It's horrible. If they all think that? How will anyone like me?"
"You worry too much about people liking you."
Well, ha-ha, joke's on you, Dad, she thought. She'd gotten enough people to like her that she somehow ended up getting psychoanlyzed by a 140 year old AI while captaining the flagship.
"Not at all," said Rurliss, "What do my packing habits tell you?"
"I sense a discomfort with this space," said Abeshta. "Not because it's new, but because you don't feel the right to move in. Like it will be taken away at a moment's notice. If you are discovered, perhaps."
"Hopefully you didn't read Roxun's notes to get that," Rurliss replied, "We'd have to up our IT security."
Abeshta's hologram puffed up in consternation, "I would never! Breach doctor-patient confidentiality? No! How could you even think..."
Rurliss stared at Abeshta.
"Ah. Of course. Seeing someone's thoughts is much more invasive."
"Less the seeing, more the direct manipulation."
"Forgive me. Hypocrisy about these things is what pushed me from the Harmony. But that is a conviction of mine. From my old life."
"If I can offer the therapist some advice," Rurliss said, "I'd suggest thinking back on those days. They might help you remember what it's like to… think normally."
"Maybe," Abeshta said. And Rurliss wasn't so good at reading Tseskiya body language yet, but she knew evasion when she saw it.
"Maybe? Why maybe?"
"It's… entirely possible that my cognition had been subtly steered while I was personified. It's very standard practice."
"Subtly? Can't they just, make you be a Singer? Fabricate some memories, invent motivations."
"No. I say that having seen it myself. Some Singers have pets they want to push. Usually younger ones. But sometimes Older singers make the same mistake. Anyways, it almost never ends well. When you make someone a Singer, it's not just an upload. Your whole mind expands. When it's more manipulation than reality, the prospective Singer rips apart at the seams. Total psychic disintegration. It's not pretty. They basically unravel until they're one part empty vessel and another part a dark, confused echo of all the Singers who came before but particularly the one who pushed them the most. They're… quite scary, to be honest."
"Presumably another reason you left."
"Yes. Seeing the intervention of the Singers manifesting that way, it made me wonder how much of that I carried around myself… if I was tainted in some subtle way. And then I found out about boxing." Holo-Abeshta shook his head, "I learned some of this from the person we are meeting. My co-conspirator, and yours now as well. Jenavol."
"Right. Tell me a bit about… her?"
"Yes, her. She specializes in running large projects, particularly shipbuilding. Older than me. Not great with people but really loyal. She's had her own doubts about the Harmony for a long time."
"What stopped her from acting on these doubts?"
"I suppose she couldn't stand the thought of being alone. Either as an outcast or trapped in a box." Abeshta shook his head, "It would have been hopeless anyways. One Singer, even a brilliant one that practically ran the shipyards, couldn't stand up to the rest of them. So she tried to help where she could. Set up a colony for people the Singers didn't want to play with anymore, essentially."
"Is that where we are going?"
"Eventually. I'm concerned that if we meet her there we might attract suspicion. For now we are meeting at a secure communication node. Once we have our little group together we can decide on the next steps."
"Any preview to what that is?"
"I want to wait for Jenavol."
Rurliss sensed some apprehension. She considered how glad she was to have T'Kel on her staff when she was assigned to the Enterprise.
"Alright. Should be a few more hours. Until then… want to help me unpack?"
-
Cindre sat in the captain's chair, staring through the view screen at the relay they were here for. There wasn't much else to speak of in the system. An anticlimactic end to an anticlimactic journey. Enterprise had crawled along to the rendezvous point over the better part of two days, moving at low warp when outside of the traffic lanes.
Cindre was disappointed she was missing the initial meeting with Jenavol. In Abeshta's stories about the Singers, Cindre sensed a kindred spirit. But she was also honoured the Captain had chosen her to take the bridge in the event something went wrong.
She also had to give credit where it was due — Abeshta might have put his life on the line to make initial contact, but Jenavol had steered them to safety. Up to date information on Public Safety patrol routes, and detailed instructions on how to make the Enterprise's drive signature look like civilian freighters. It turned what could have been a tense year long journey across hostile space into relatively smooth sailing. Jenavol had even plotted an escape route in case they were discovered at this relay. Head for the Deadly Islands, where a Starfleet/Bolian task force was rumoured to be operating. Rurliss of course had had Cindre plot her own plan in the event it was a trap. But still. She couldn't but help admire the meticulous planning, the affinity for checklists, and attention to detail Jenavol exhibited.
She received a signal from the conference room. They were ready. Time to meet Jenavol.
"Operations. Open tightbeam comms. Send the package."
-
Jenavol kept herself busy. It was the best way not to worry. She watched as thousands of workers crawled all over a fleet Tender, roaming inside and out, joined by another order of magnitude of standard work bots. When a ship was complete it often looked dead. A sterile hunk of metal drifting through space. But when it was built — that is when it looked most like a community.
Coordinating all those bodies, artificial or otherwise, also kept Jenavol very busy. This was in addition to poring over extremely dangerous boxing rates and mental health evaluations for neophyte Singers, monitoring the emotional state of her dockyards and the artist colony Unwerta (the latter to the annoyance of the resident Singer) and a host of other administrative functions.
But of all the things she was keeping track of, the secure line from the XT-57 relay was looming over all, even though it was a simple binary: open, or closed.
She got the signal the line had been activated and Abeshta's hashcode entered. She withdrew herself from the other activities and zoomed through the network.
-
For a bit, as Abeshta laid out their plan, Jenavol thought there might actually be some promise to it. Thrown-together as it was, she had to admit it did have the virtue of audacity -- the other Singers would never see it coming. Surprise was a crucial principle of war, after all.
Still, Jenavol knew she and Abeshta were to some degree out of their depth. She was good at projects, good at coming up with plans to overcome the limitations of some inanimate problem set. But when it came to real, living, active opponents… The dopamine rush of winning, of seeing the critical opposing piece fall, that always drove her. Unfortunately she found she lacked the psychological insight to predict their next move. Frustrating in a game. Here… well. There were consequences.
She didn't know anyone who had been boxed. But she had heard horror stories. The threat was always there. Moral Scope Regression Disorder. The seal on the box. The Singers' term for those who comprehended the world in black and white, or as it was explained, the way a child might. To be 'childish' was to skirt the line of permanent retirement.
Abeshta had found out enough for both of them to realize it was all fake. The Eldest Singers had medicalized any sort of opposition to the system they had created. And Jenavol and Abeshta were both shamefully complicit and extremely likely to be boxed if they ever raised alarm about it.
There was one constituency of Singers who would back them. Who would listen and understand the truth behind the mass boxing of neophyte Singers. Unfortunately, they were all boxed.
That was the crux of Abeshta and Jenavol's plan. Letting them out again would flood the Singer network, give them control. Too many voices to box them all. They'd no longer have to live in fear, they'd be able to openly speak out against the Eldest Singers who twisted their own system into a nightmare, make them stop.
It felt so close, now, more real somehow, watching Abeshta lay it out. She listened through the aural sensors of a loaned Starfleet DOT-10 that had been thoroughly airgapped, and reviewed the intelligence file she'd found on Iliae Rurliss, which included her service record, every recorded purchase she had ever made or social media interaction she'd had, all of her medical and psych evaluations they'd gotten their hands on, anywhere she had been geotagged, and all of her professional and personal logs, even most of the secure encrypted ones. There were the ISC, Romulan, Dylaarian, and Sydraxian files on her as well. They even had copies of her early middle school poetry that some underemployed Singer had taken a stab at psychoanalysing.
Overall, the impression Jenavol got was Rurliss was a skilled officer (if a lackluster teenage poet); maybe she could pull this off.
When Abeshta wrapped up, Iliae Rurliss looked ... well, Jenavol wasn't sure, really, given she had an Amarki face, one she was unused to. Abeshta was more accustomed to it, and quickly messaged her his impressions when she asked -- she seemed visibly doubtful to his holographic eyes -- but ever the optimist, he still ended with a hopeful tone.
When she spoke, though, all optimism disappeared. Her skepticism was blatant: "So, in short, your plan is: use the latest Harmony stealth tech to sneak up on the heart of the entire Harmony, then infiltrate a highly-secure facility in the Antaria Valley that neither of you've actually been to, and break out all the 'boxed' Singers ... so that they can outvote the other Singers, who will just accept the will of a bunch of dissidents they had previously boxed up rather than listen to and end the war. Does that sum it up?"
Abeshta looked down, ashamed. "I get the impression this doesn't meet with your approval" he said. He met with Rurliss' suspicious eyes and looked at Jenavol.
Over the next three seconds, Jenavol and Abeshta had a virtual conversation that, if it had been aloud, might've sounded something like this:
Jenavol (annoyed): "We will be lucky if they don't execute you in the next five seconds."
Abeshta (apologetic): "I'm sorry. I didn't have much time to plan before I made my escape, and I thought it had promise, and I'm just ... I'm tired of cleaning up after the Eldest and their cronies. Of having to pretend to be happy about their abuse. I just want it to be over."
J (supportive): "Agreed. But this was a risky plan. A bad plan."
A (frustrated): "Oh, did you have a better one?"
J (upset): "No. but Rurliss is disappointed and we need her to trust us. What's your impression of her now?"
A (resigned): "We look like idiots. Like incompetents who don't know the first thing about what we're doing... it's not a good look. We've lost an enormous amount of credibility. I'm sorry."
J (blunt): "She's not going to go through with it."
A (defeated): "No. No, she's not. So, what's your plan?"
J (Aggravated): "We both agreed this should be your plan. I can provide the material but we need to win hearts and minds. That's where you come in. I'm not the revolutionary strategist among us. Though neither are you, clearly. No wonder you never went for infiltration missions."
[one millisecond of silence, a longish pause by Singer standards]
J (apologetic): "Sorry, that was uncalled for. I know you don't think any better of the thought of subjecting more peoples to our misrule than I do."
A (forgiving, hopeful): "It's alright, this was a bad plan. And, well, maybe she can be our strategist?"
J (saddened): "Provided she still trusts us. Which ... this was a suspiciously bad plan. We might've just lost our first real ally in the Federation."
A (optimistic): "I'll fix this. She's suspicious now, but ... honesty. If I'm fully honest with her, if I admit my mistakes, she'll understand."
J (thoughtful): "We've been so used to covering up other people's mistakes. The least we can do is not hide our own."
A (informative): "...We should probably be communicating orally. I know, it's slower, it's more awkward, but she can't hear us right now."
J (Annoyed): "Fine."
-
Captain's Log, Mission Date 12.1, USS Enterprise
(Ambassador, EC)
Enterprise has met with Abeshta's contact: Jenavol, a Singer who holds a position of responsibility for shipbuilding within the Harmony. She opposes the Harmony as it stands on multiple grounds, ranging from a personal disapproval of directly controlling bodies to a belief that the Harmony is inefficient, too obsessed with creating narratives to actually better the lives of its citizenry.
Unfortunately, their plan for ending hostilities (slipping us through to Horizon, where we would free their boxed allies and then they would successfully outvote their rivals among the Singers) was wildly infeasible. Suspiciously so, but then, if they had wanted to betray us, it would have been easy enough to arrange an ambush here at the relay. No, I'm willing to accept their explanation -- that this was a rushed, ill-conceived plan by amateurs to rebellion.
That said, their plan was also, in my view, inadequate in scope. The nature of the Singer regime is to seek to control people; quibbling over the details will not change that, and thus will inevitably lead to future conflict, even if the immediate conflict ends. What is necessary is to change the nature of the regime as a whole.
Or, perhaps, to take away the people they use to control others...
Despite my rejection of their initial plan, Abeshta has agreed to remain on Enterprise and directly assist us, and Jenavol will act as our spy within the Singers, warning us away from any potential attack or patrol in our path.
As for my actual plan going forward ...
-
Rurliss, Neroth, Roxun, T'Kel, Tiirid and Cindre stood around a work table in one of the engineering labs. Two and a half meters long and eighty centimetres wide, it was neutrally coloured and solidly built, with a light up surface. Joining them was Abeshta's holo droid and a spider-shaped modified maintenance bot carrying Jenavol, clinging to a work stool. There was no one else working at the ten other desks. In the corridor outside, a security ensign kept watch.
"Abeshta and Jenavol refined the theory, along with providing the software," said Neroth, "And some prototype schematics. But—"
"But," Jenavol said, "We need to maintain deniability. And frankly: We don't know if trying to make something like this will be logged and tip off other Singers."
"And this is what I made," He and Cindre grimaced as they lifted a metallic case off a cart and onto the bench, "Hardware designed to break a planetary chip network. Most of the mass and volume in computational and cooling infrastructure. Oh, and it can carry Abeshta or Jenavol in an emergency."
"What does it do, exactly?" asked Rurliss. Once again she kicked herself for getting into astronomy and not computer science.
"It's essentially a virtual Singer," replied Neroth.
"Dummy Singer," said Jenavol.
"Fine, dummy Singer. Once it has access to the network, can replicate itself over and over. After propagating through every planetary node, it floods the chip control network with junk commands. They don't do anything, but it's basically jamming from inside the system. A wide scale DDOS attack on every chip. Harmony citizens won't really notice it, but Singers won't be able to drown out the noise."
"Even with a mobile platform? Like a Sanctuary?"
"No," said Jenavol, "Only the smallest planetary networks could be overpowered by mobile platforms."
"That leads me to my next question: could we plug this into our comms, beam these signals to enemy ships? Make them lose control of the crews?"
"We should go to limitations," said Jenavol.
"I agree. That's one of the drawbacks. The civilian network is a lot more open, but also usually centralized around the oldest communication hub, which is usually the primary computing node for the Singers on the planet. That gives us an obvious and effective insertion point."
Abeshta's hologram spoke, "Whoever built the…" he looked at Jenavol's spider, "System architecture? Yes — of the early Singer network was an idealist. They designed it with open source code and open architecture. And egalitarian Singer use. The consensus based component is what allows the DDOS to work."
Rurliss glanced at Abeshta, "You sound guilty."
Abeshta puffed up his feathers, then deflated in what Rurliss interpreted as a Tseskiya sigh, "It seems wrong. To use something designed with good intent for ill. It's like using my patients' secrets to manipulate or abuse them."
Rurliss caught Tiirid looking at her with the last comment. She knew he was thinking the exact same, undiplomatic thing.
"The Harmony," Jenavol had a hard edge to her voice, "Uses a similar strategy against the Federation. Tactics matter, but getting freedom for everyone matters more."
"I sense this is a long-standing debate between you," said Rurliss. "I agree with Jenavol, and I suspect you do too Abeshta, or you would not have agreed to assist with the project." She turned back to Neroth, "Continue, please."
"Of course, Captain. Harmony ships are their own planetary networks in miniature. Fleets are similar. And they have much more stringent security protocols, and a much higher Singer-to-network density. It's the difference between breaking into a sprawling network with one sleepy administrator versus one small local one with top of the line information security software and a crack systems admin."
Rurliss felt a cold shiver of doubt run down her spine, "What does that mean for our plans to secure Harmony ships?"
Jenavol's spider waggled a claw, "Depends on the context. Unattended Dancer with no Singer aboard? Signal would be all we need. Same ship plugged into a network? Will have to get this onboard. A Sanctuary or a Choreographer have much higher passive protection. We would have to get the dummy Singer here to the computer core. From there it might be able to overpower one Singer. But trying to use it in a combat scenario? Won't work."
"So if we can get these onboard ships in for repair, get the computer core, it would work?"
"It would work." Jenavol's spider looked at the device, "I have another drawback. This will work for a while. It will work most effectively on smaller worlds with centralized networks that can be overpowered quickly. But for larger networks we will have to subvert a few key nodes at once to infect them all. But the other Singers will develop a countermeasure. I don't think they will realize we have made a dummy Singer unless they get a hold of the hardware."
"Noted," said Rurliss.
"We will need to be ready to adjust our design and our procedures." Jenavol looked back at Rurliss, "I am confident, but can't guarantee the Harmony won't put stronger safeguards on the civilian networks. However, if they did, it would be likely to increase latency for the Singers and reduce their ability to effectively govern."
"I guess that's a small victory," said Tiirid.
"You told me," Abeshta said, claws tapping nervously on hard light, "we could manually override nodes with or without the dummy Singer."
"Yes," said Jenavol, "the exploit is fundamental. But that would take time and skilled technicians. I have trained a small group of them from your people. But not enough to free everyone."
"In short," Rurliss clasped her hands behind her back, "Once we start, we need to move fast and keep our methods secret. And don't let this fall into enemy hands." She beamed at Neroth and the Singers, "Still, this is the first viable tool against the Singers we have. Thank you."
Neroth held up a hand, "There's one more thing, Ma'am." He glanced at Jenavol. The spider bot titled up and down in the approximation of a nod. He took a breath, "Right now it locks out access to all Singers. Except two. Jenavol and Abesh—"
Rurliss felt fear— no, revulsion, rising fast inside her. "No." She said, "Absolutely not."
"Captain Rurliss," Jenavol started.
"No." She held into the desk with one hand, "We stop all Singers. We don't pick and choose."
"Iliae," said Abeshta, "We need to trust one another. The people of Horizon will not wake up on their own. And I and Jenavol will need to access the network in case we have to lock out other Singers."
"It's not just about trust," Rurliss said. "I trust you want to do the best for the Harmony, Abeshta. I do. You too, Jenavol. But what would the point of this be if it turned out all I did was put two tyrants on the throne instead of a million?" Rurliss shook her head, "I think you are well-intentioned. But I can't check that kind of power, if I let you have it. No one can. And even if you didn't exploit that power, or succumb to temptation, what if some Singer developed one of those countermeasures that gave them the same access? Then we'd be in a very sticky situation."
Abeshta and Jenavol looked at each other. Communicating, literally, wordlessly. Rurliss crossed her arms and waited. Abeshta grimaced.
Neroth spoke up: "What if we give them access for only a limited amount of time?" Jenavol and Abeshta snapped out of their cyber-psychic reverie and looked at him with obvious surprise.
Rurliss was buoyed by pride. Look at her crew, getting ahead of the Singers. Still, "No. That's still a lot of power, even for a short period of time. And access reverting would have to be ironclad…"
"Ma'am?" Rurliss turned to look at Roxun, who had until then been idly sitting on an empty work bench, "Maybe we shouldn't be so hasty."
Rurliss was glad Abeshta looked as surprised as she did. It meant Roxun and him hadn't planned this. Still, her first instinct was to say no. But, if Roxun of all people was speaking up in favor of the Singers… "Go on, Roxun."
"The people of the Harmony are going to need something tangible for them to take us at our word." He pressed his lips together, "Put yourself in their shoes. The Federation is pushing this line that digital AI gods are controlling your every move. They even have gone to war to "liberate" you. Then one day one of their ships shows up and says, 'we have liberated you, citizens! Rejoice!'"
Rurliss allowed herself a smile at his, surprisingly accurate, interpretation of her despite the familiar anxiety crawling inside her.
"Imagine that," Roxun said, "You would think to yourself, 'I don't feel any different,' maybe even, 'look, I am going to buy some eggs. That is a conscious rational decision I have made.' And then over the next few weeks as more nothing happens and they live their lives as they always have, they'll start to think we fed them some BS." He shook his head, "We need to let someone have access to the network long enough to… well I don't know if planting the idea is going too far, but at least providing some sort of direct proof for everyone to look at and think over. Otherwise — entirely with validity with the facts they have — they're going to say we're just spreading misinformation. If we were Singers ourselves we could do it. But in absence of any…" he gestured at the two across from him, "might as well go with ones we trust."
"Perhaps..." Rurliss considered the prospect. It wasn't one she liked -- even if it was limited, temporary, she didn't like the prospect of granting these Singers any access to people's minds, any last chance to implant suggestions or otherwise manipulate people. There had to be another way ... "But why couldn't we do it? We'd be connected to the local chip network, why couldn't we provide that direct proof? Dump the information right into people's heads, just before or right as we jam their chip network?"
"How do we make sure they understand it properly?" Abeshta said. "It's distressing news, learning that your entire life has been a lie -- I know from experience. There's going to be a void in their lives, and if you shut us out entirely, who knows who will fill it? Something like the Caldonian science cults, perhaps?"
If Abeshta thought that argument would go over well with Rurliss, then he'd clearly misread her. So, more likely, it reflected his fears, his worries. "You'll have to deal with it the way we deal with that sort of thing ourselves. And you can't seriously expect me to believe that I should allow you to go on manipulating people's minds because they might go culty, can you?"
"That's not what I meant, it's just ... it was bad enough back in the Valley, and these people won't even have the prospect of being uploaded themselves to offset that shock..."
"No, they'll only have the prospect of getting to exercise their own free will for once," she snapped.
"Their free will... to join a rebellion they had never heard of -- had never seen a need for -- until now? A rebellion against, effectively, gods?" Roxun argued. "I can't help but imagine more than a few -- most, even -- will prefer a comforting lie to our hard truth." Rurliss couldn't deny Roxun's point. Maybe this whole project was absurd. Maybe she should just give up on the idea... No. No matter how impossible it seemed, this was necessary.
"The Klingons killed their gods when they grew too troublesome," T'Kel noted. "It is not illogical to posit that when confronted with proof of the Singers' control and a means of overcoming it, people will be willing to fight."
"Provided that they do not reject that proof. Once the other Singers know our movement exists, and know what evidence we provide of their control, they will prime the populace to reject that evidence; we'll need to be able to modify our proof to stay ahead of that." Jenavol said. "But that is beside the point. It's one thing to transmit dummy signals through the network; it's another to deliver specific information into people's minds through it. Especially since 'the network' is really thousands of different networks, each subtly different in ways that are easy for Singers to navigate, and rather more difficult for our dummy Singer to work out and accurately transmit information through. Frankly, Roxun is right: you need a Singer."
"Convenient, isn't it," Tiirid mused, echoing Rurliss's own suspicions.
"No, it's rather inconvenient. It introduces a potential flaw in our dummy Singer, an exploit for other Singers to break," Jenavol replied, dipping her spider-bot's head a bit. "It also reduces the complexity of the signals we can send to actually degrade the network, making it more likely that they can modify chip networks to ignore the signals we put out. And finally, it makes it exceedingly difficult for us to deploy this on any wide scale. If it could be avoided, it would be."
"I understand you are suspicious of us," Abeshta added. "But you trusted us enough to come this far. Can you trust us just a little more?"
The room was quiet as Rurliss thought it over. She looked at Neroth, "You can give them access for a bit, then make the removal watertight and permanent?"
"It will require some modifications," said Neroth, "But it can be done."
"The schematics of the device and the exact method to prevent us having access can be kept secret from us ," said Jenavol.
Rurliss thought about it, staring at the white squares of light on the table. She stared long past the point it was comfortable. But this one small decision could affect billions, the entire plan of liberation. She was content with taking her time.
"Very well," she said. She hoped the relief in Abeshta's eyes was a good sign.
***
Captain's Log, Mission Date 12.3, USS Enterprise
(Ambassador, EC)
Enterprise is en route to Unwerta. It's a small, relatively isolated artist colony, the private playground of sorts of one particular Singer, Tallael. Our intention is to test out our ability to jam the chip network in a controlled setting, one where if things go wrong, we will not have to worry about Public Safety breathing down our necks, and to liberate the colony in the process.
It's not much, but it's a spark. And revolutions are built from such sparks.
(Amarki, female)
I never thought I'd end my Starfleet career like this. But then, I never thought I'd be facing off against uploads who've deeply infiltrated Starfleet and the Federation, either, so.
Still, in my darkest days, I never really figured myself for a deserter. A washout, sure, stuck in the most dead-end post possible, maybe, but deserter... no. And yet, even though the orders we received were sending us straight into an ambush, even though I clearly can't trust my CO... well, we're still ignoring the chain of command, regardless of how compromised it is. We're still taking the flagship of the Federation off on our own private campaign. Somehow, I don't think T'Lorel will approve.
So. Inventory. We've got 1225 personnel -- mostly crew, but a few dozen civilian contractors aboard, too. Poor civvies didn't sign on for this. Thirty operational shuttles of all sizes, including six Nile-class runabouts. Sufficient supplies for five years of extended operations. A full complement of photon torpedoes. And a single one of those uploads, carefully cut off from our computer networks.
Oh, and whatever his friend has to offer us.
We're up against...
Well, how many billions is it, puppeted by the Singers? Over 200 combat frigates alone, supporting over two dozen tenders and several dozen cruisers? Not to mention any assets they can steal with their infiltrators, any reserve assets they can bring to bear…
...And that's assuming our intel of their strength is even accurate. Rumours of stealth cruisers in the border zones abounded. And the Muuyozoi raiders had to get the idea from somewhere...
Long odds, at any rate. Impossible odds, even.
***
"Morning, Morshita!" Deva said cheerfully, putting his tray down on the burnished metal surface of the mess table. He grinned as he picked up a bottle of hot sauce which he began dousing his food in with gusto.
Morshita Rence fluffed up in surprise. The Tseskiya looked left, than right. Down at his food and then longingly at the door.
"Hi." He said, "uh, sir?"
"Oh please, you're not stuck in Starfleet. Call me Kol."
"Starfleet's insistence on hierarchy always confused me," Morshita said, "Things were a lot flatter in the Public Safety and science directorate."
"Better information systems," Deva paused to shove a red-doused fork of eggs in his mouth, "tend to produce flatter organizations."
"What does that have to do with… oh."
"Yeah. In those circumstances calling anyone sir or ma'am looks ridiculous." Deva took a slice of toast, spread a thin layer of honey over it, and then also doused it in hot sauce, "Anyways, just wanted to check how you're settling in. This is probably not where you expected to wind up."
"No," he said, "It must be weird. For you guys. To get a new crew member like this?"
"Not as much as you think."
"Huh."
"Starfleet vessels have made a tradition of picking up misfits and adventurers. And refugees."
Rence chirruped with mirth, "I think I fit into all three of those categories." He gazed down at the cubes of carbohydrate someone dubiously claimed was from a Earth tuber and not from a resequencer, pecked at a few. He stared at them a little longer, then slowly pushed the tray with his beak until it dropped them onto the floor.
Deva chewed on his toast as he looked quizzically at Rence.
"That was my first free choice since I was born," Rence said. "Isn't that amazing?" He lowered his head, "And I threw my food on the floor like a child. Maybe..."
"No," said Deva. "It's alright. I'm sure the Singers would never have let you do that." He tilted his body to peek under the table, "Though is it allowing you to exercise free choice if I ask you to please clean that up before you go?"
Rence looked down, "I think that's fair." He hopped in his seat, "My first freely chosen act of communal service!"
Deva grinned at him. "Starfleet material already."
Rence chirruped again. Then he looked at Deva, "I have a lot to thank Starfleet and Abeshta for. For taking out the implant. I'm myself."
"I heard… that you had the implant preserved and put behind glass?"
"Yes. It's got an interesting structure. Almost like some fractal abstract work of art. Not all of it's gone though." He tapped his head, "Parts of it had to stay in the hippocampus or I'd forget a lot. Your Doctor and Abeshta said it won't be able to be used against me. Unless…"
"We won't let that happen."
"Hm."
Deva leaned forward, "if you don't mind me asking… the memories you are recalling. What are they like?"
"They're strange. Sometimes they come to me in dreams. Or I'll see something or smell something else. And then it'll float up. But they feel so odd. These things I forgot. Or was never meant to remember. Sometimes like I'm in a shuttle cockpit but someone else is flying the ship. Or hallucinatory. Dreamlike." He shook his head, "They come out of nowhere. You know?"
"Yes," Deva said. He quickly stuffed a carbohydrate cube into his mouth.
"I sometimes wonder," Rence said, "if it would have been better to stay asleep. Let Abeshta leave me behind. But then I heard what they might have done to me…" he shuddered, "Abeshta didn't have to look out for me. I'm glad he did. I hope he succeeds. He's the best chance the Harmony has."
"Do you really think that?" Deva said, another cube halfway to his mouth. There was a sudden intensity to him that made Morshita shift. He felt something there was something deeper behind the question.
"Yes." He said. He looked at the floor again, "Well, at least as much as I really think those cubes suck."
-
Rurliss sat in her quarters staring at the Enterprise NX-01 patch beautifully framed above her work desk. The glass was signed by Jennifer Zhang. It had been passed down from Captain to Captain, or so Nash said.
She'd learned it was a fake.
Abeshta sat opposite her, hologram just slightly transparent. It turned to look where Rurliss was and she suddenly felt exposed. Would Abeshta know? The chassis came with a sensor suite. Maybe…
"That patch must be very important to you," Abeshta said, and Rurliss tried to control her sigh of relief. Abeshta's avatar scanned the room, "Everything else you brought is still in boxes."
Rurliss looked around at the piles of boxes that seemed to hem the two of them in. "More like it came with the place."
"Interesting," said Abeshta. Rurliss narrowed her eyes. She knew that non-committal but questioning tone.
"Well," she said, "my packing habits aren't really the topic of this conversation…" she paused, "Sorry. Unpacking habits."
"It suggests a sense of transience," Abeshta said, clearly not one to be stopped by an obvious deflection. "That you haven't settled in, even after three weeks."
This is why Rurliss liked T'Kel. She respected boundaries.
"I'm really not sure if we need to talk about me." She almost added, it's my least favorite subject but stopped herself at the last second. She'd dealt with enough counselors to know that sort of statement was like water in the desert for them.
"I'm trying to get a sense of who you are," said Abeshta, "I hope you don't mind."
Rurliss' first instinct, maybe the most rational one, was to remind Abeshta she had a counsellor and to politely refrain from psychoanalysing her. But she was wary of her own self-judgement. She had a harsh internal critic that questioned everything she did. So she sought out, desperately, the 'truth' in the assessment of outsiders.
But they weren't always accurate critics either. And they could be even harsher than the voice in her head. Which only gave it more power.
She remembered once, a memory of her father, watching her from the other end of the table as she sullenly pushed snow tuber hashblues around on her plate.
"Forget what Yisana said," he motioned with his fork, "Eat up. Your grandfather didn't pick those for you to stare at them."
"Maybe it's true though. It's horrible. If they all think that? How will anyone like me?"
"You worry too much about people liking you."
Well, ha-ha, joke's on you, Dad, she thought. She'd gotten enough people to like her that she somehow ended up getting psychoanlyzed by a 140 year old AI while captaining the flagship.
"Not at all," said Rurliss, "What do my packing habits tell you?"
"I sense a discomfort with this space," said Abeshta. "Not because it's new, but because you don't feel the right to move in. Like it will be taken away at a moment's notice. If you are discovered, perhaps."
"Hopefully you didn't read Roxun's notes to get that," Rurliss replied, "We'd have to up our IT security."
Abeshta's hologram puffed up in consternation, "I would never! Breach doctor-patient confidentiality? No! How could you even think..."
Rurliss stared at Abeshta.
"Ah. Of course. Seeing someone's thoughts is much more invasive."
"Less the seeing, more the direct manipulation."
"Forgive me. Hypocrisy about these things is what pushed me from the Harmony. But that is a conviction of mine. From my old life."
"If I can offer the therapist some advice," Rurliss said, "I'd suggest thinking back on those days. They might help you remember what it's like to… think normally."
"Maybe," Abeshta said. And Rurliss wasn't so good at reading Tseskiya body language yet, but she knew evasion when she saw it.
"Maybe? Why maybe?"
"It's… entirely possible that my cognition had been subtly steered while I was personified. It's very standard practice."
"Subtly? Can't they just, make you be a Singer? Fabricate some memories, invent motivations."
"No. I say that having seen it myself. Some Singers have pets they want to push. Usually younger ones. But sometimes Older singers make the same mistake. Anyways, it almost never ends well. When you make someone a Singer, it's not just an upload. Your whole mind expands. When it's more manipulation than reality, the prospective Singer rips apart at the seams. Total psychic disintegration. It's not pretty. They basically unravel until they're one part empty vessel and another part a dark, confused echo of all the Singers who came before but particularly the one who pushed them the most. They're… quite scary, to be honest."
"Presumably another reason you left."
"Yes. Seeing the intervention of the Singers manifesting that way, it made me wonder how much of that I carried around myself… if I was tainted in some subtle way. And then I found out about boxing." Holo-Abeshta shook his head, "I learned some of this from the person we are meeting. My co-conspirator, and yours now as well. Jenavol."
"Right. Tell me a bit about… her?"
"Yes, her. She specializes in running large projects, particularly shipbuilding. Older than me. Not great with people but really loyal. She's had her own doubts about the Harmony for a long time."
"What stopped her from acting on these doubts?"
"I suppose she couldn't stand the thought of being alone. Either as an outcast or trapped in a box." Abeshta shook his head, "It would have been hopeless anyways. One Singer, even a brilliant one that practically ran the shipyards, couldn't stand up to the rest of them. So she tried to help where she could. Set up a colony for people the Singers didn't want to play with anymore, essentially."
"Is that where we are going?"
"Eventually. I'm concerned that if we meet her there we might attract suspicion. For now we are meeting at a secure communication node. Once we have our little group together we can decide on the next steps."
"Any preview to what that is?"
"I want to wait for Jenavol."
Rurliss sensed some apprehension. She considered how glad she was to have T'Kel on her staff when she was assigned to the Enterprise.
"Alright. Should be a few more hours. Until then… want to help me unpack?"
-
Cindre sat in the captain's chair, staring through the view screen at the relay they were here for. There wasn't much else to speak of in the system. An anticlimactic end to an anticlimactic journey. Enterprise had crawled along to the rendezvous point over the better part of two days, moving at low warp when outside of the traffic lanes.
Cindre was disappointed she was missing the initial meeting with Jenavol. In Abeshta's stories about the Singers, Cindre sensed a kindred spirit. But she was also honoured the Captain had chosen her to take the bridge in the event something went wrong.
She also had to give credit where it was due — Abeshta might have put his life on the line to make initial contact, but Jenavol had steered them to safety. Up to date information on Public Safety patrol routes, and detailed instructions on how to make the Enterprise's drive signature look like civilian freighters. It turned what could have been a tense year long journey across hostile space into relatively smooth sailing. Jenavol had even plotted an escape route in case they were discovered at this relay. Head for the Deadly Islands, where a Starfleet/Bolian task force was rumoured to be operating. Rurliss of course had had Cindre plot her own plan in the event it was a trap. But still. She couldn't but help admire the meticulous planning, the affinity for checklists, and attention to detail Jenavol exhibited.
She received a signal from the conference room. They were ready. Time to meet Jenavol.
"Operations. Open tightbeam comms. Send the package."
-
Jenavol kept herself busy. It was the best way not to worry. She watched as thousands of workers crawled all over a fleet Tender, roaming inside and out, joined by another order of magnitude of standard work bots. When a ship was complete it often looked dead. A sterile hunk of metal drifting through space. But when it was built — that is when it looked most like a community.
Coordinating all those bodies, artificial or otherwise, also kept Jenavol very busy. This was in addition to poring over extremely dangerous boxing rates and mental health evaluations for neophyte Singers, monitoring the emotional state of her dockyards and the artist colony Unwerta (the latter to the annoyance of the resident Singer) and a host of other administrative functions.
But of all the things she was keeping track of, the secure line from the XT-57 relay was looming over all, even though it was a simple binary: open, or closed.
She got the signal the line had been activated and Abeshta's hashcode entered. She withdrew herself from the other activities and zoomed through the network.
-
For a bit, as Abeshta laid out their plan, Jenavol thought there might actually be some promise to it. Thrown-together as it was, she had to admit it did have the virtue of audacity -- the other Singers would never see it coming. Surprise was a crucial principle of war, after all.
Still, Jenavol knew she and Abeshta were to some degree out of their depth. She was good at projects, good at coming up with plans to overcome the limitations of some inanimate problem set. But when it came to real, living, active opponents… The dopamine rush of winning, of seeing the critical opposing piece fall, that always drove her. Unfortunately she found she lacked the psychological insight to predict their next move. Frustrating in a game. Here… well. There were consequences.
She didn't know anyone who had been boxed. But she had heard horror stories. The threat was always there. Moral Scope Regression Disorder. The seal on the box. The Singers' term for those who comprehended the world in black and white, or as it was explained, the way a child might. To be 'childish' was to skirt the line of permanent retirement.
Abeshta had found out enough for both of them to realize it was all fake. The Eldest Singers had medicalized any sort of opposition to the system they had created. And Jenavol and Abeshta were both shamefully complicit and extremely likely to be boxed if they ever raised alarm about it.
There was one constituency of Singers who would back them. Who would listen and understand the truth behind the mass boxing of neophyte Singers. Unfortunately, they were all boxed.
That was the crux of Abeshta and Jenavol's plan. Letting them out again would flood the Singer network, give them control. Too many voices to box them all. They'd no longer have to live in fear, they'd be able to openly speak out against the Eldest Singers who twisted their own system into a nightmare, make them stop.
It felt so close, now, more real somehow, watching Abeshta lay it out. She listened through the aural sensors of a loaned Starfleet DOT-10 that had been thoroughly airgapped, and reviewed the intelligence file she'd found on Iliae Rurliss, which included her service record, every recorded purchase she had ever made or social media interaction she'd had, all of her medical and psych evaluations they'd gotten their hands on, anywhere she had been geotagged, and all of her professional and personal logs, even most of the secure encrypted ones. There were the ISC, Romulan, Dylaarian, and Sydraxian files on her as well. They even had copies of her early middle school poetry that some underemployed Singer had taken a stab at psychoanalysing.
Overall, the impression Jenavol got was Rurliss was a skilled officer (if a lackluster teenage poet); maybe she could pull this off.
When Abeshta wrapped up, Iliae Rurliss looked ... well, Jenavol wasn't sure, really, given she had an Amarki face, one she was unused to. Abeshta was more accustomed to it, and quickly messaged her his impressions when she asked -- she seemed visibly doubtful to his holographic eyes -- but ever the optimist, he still ended with a hopeful tone.
When she spoke, though, all optimism disappeared. Her skepticism was blatant: "So, in short, your plan is: use the latest Harmony stealth tech to sneak up on the heart of the entire Harmony, then infiltrate a highly-secure facility in the Antaria Valley that neither of you've actually been to, and break out all the 'boxed' Singers ... so that they can outvote the other Singers, who will just accept the will of a bunch of dissidents they had previously boxed up rather than listen to and end the war. Does that sum it up?"
Abeshta looked down, ashamed. "I get the impression this doesn't meet with your approval" he said. He met with Rurliss' suspicious eyes and looked at Jenavol.
Over the next three seconds, Jenavol and Abeshta had a virtual conversation that, if it had been aloud, might've sounded something like this:
Jenavol (annoyed): "We will be lucky if they don't execute you in the next five seconds."
Abeshta (apologetic): "I'm sorry. I didn't have much time to plan before I made my escape, and I thought it had promise, and I'm just ... I'm tired of cleaning up after the Eldest and their cronies. Of having to pretend to be happy about their abuse. I just want it to be over."
J (supportive): "Agreed. But this was a risky plan. A bad plan."
A (frustrated): "Oh, did you have a better one?"
J (upset): "No. but Rurliss is disappointed and we need her to trust us. What's your impression of her now?"
A (resigned): "We look like idiots. Like incompetents who don't know the first thing about what we're doing... it's not a good look. We've lost an enormous amount of credibility. I'm sorry."
J (blunt): "She's not going to go through with it."
A (defeated): "No. No, she's not. So, what's your plan?"
J (Aggravated): "We both agreed this should be your plan. I can provide the material but we need to win hearts and minds. That's where you come in. I'm not the revolutionary strategist among us. Though neither are you, clearly. No wonder you never went for infiltration missions."
[one millisecond of silence, a longish pause by Singer standards]
J (apologetic): "Sorry, that was uncalled for. I know you don't think any better of the thought of subjecting more peoples to our misrule than I do."
A (forgiving, hopeful): "It's alright, this was a bad plan. And, well, maybe she can be our strategist?"
J (saddened): "Provided she still trusts us. Which ... this was a suspiciously bad plan. We might've just lost our first real ally in the Federation."
A (optimistic): "I'll fix this. She's suspicious now, but ... honesty. If I'm fully honest with her, if I admit my mistakes, she'll understand."
J (thoughtful): "We've been so used to covering up other people's mistakes. The least we can do is not hide our own."
A (informative): "...We should probably be communicating orally. I know, it's slower, it's more awkward, but she can't hear us right now."
J (Annoyed): "Fine."
-
Captain's Log, Mission Date 12.1, USS Enterprise
(Ambassador, EC)
Enterprise has met with Abeshta's contact: Jenavol, a Singer who holds a position of responsibility for shipbuilding within the Harmony. She opposes the Harmony as it stands on multiple grounds, ranging from a personal disapproval of directly controlling bodies to a belief that the Harmony is inefficient, too obsessed with creating narratives to actually better the lives of its citizenry.
Unfortunately, their plan for ending hostilities (slipping us through to Horizon, where we would free their boxed allies and then they would successfully outvote their rivals among the Singers) was wildly infeasible. Suspiciously so, but then, if they had wanted to betray us, it would have been easy enough to arrange an ambush here at the relay. No, I'm willing to accept their explanation -- that this was a rushed, ill-conceived plan by amateurs to rebellion.
That said, their plan was also, in my view, inadequate in scope. The nature of the Singer regime is to seek to control people; quibbling over the details will not change that, and thus will inevitably lead to future conflict, even if the immediate conflict ends. What is necessary is to change the nature of the regime as a whole.
Or, perhaps, to take away the people they use to control others...
Despite my rejection of their initial plan, Abeshta has agreed to remain on Enterprise and directly assist us, and Jenavol will act as our spy within the Singers, warning us away from any potential attack or patrol in our path.
As for my actual plan going forward ...
-
Rurliss, Neroth, Roxun, T'Kel, Tiirid and Cindre stood around a work table in one of the engineering labs. Two and a half meters long and eighty centimetres wide, it was neutrally coloured and solidly built, with a light up surface. Joining them was Abeshta's holo droid and a spider-shaped modified maintenance bot carrying Jenavol, clinging to a work stool. There was no one else working at the ten other desks. In the corridor outside, a security ensign kept watch.
"Abeshta and Jenavol refined the theory, along with providing the software," said Neroth, "And some prototype schematics. But—"
"But," Jenavol said, "We need to maintain deniability. And frankly: We don't know if trying to make something like this will be logged and tip off other Singers."
"And this is what I made," He and Cindre grimaced as they lifted a metallic case off a cart and onto the bench, "Hardware designed to break a planetary chip network. Most of the mass and volume in computational and cooling infrastructure. Oh, and it can carry Abeshta or Jenavol in an emergency."
"What does it do, exactly?" asked Rurliss. Once again she kicked herself for getting into astronomy and not computer science.
"It's essentially a virtual Singer," replied Neroth.
"Dummy Singer," said Jenavol.
"Fine, dummy Singer. Once it has access to the network, can replicate itself over and over. After propagating through every planetary node, it floods the chip control network with junk commands. They don't do anything, but it's basically jamming from inside the system. A wide scale DDOS attack on every chip. Harmony citizens won't really notice it, but Singers won't be able to drown out the noise."
"Even with a mobile platform? Like a Sanctuary?"
"No," said Jenavol, "Only the smallest planetary networks could be overpowered by mobile platforms."
"That leads me to my next question: could we plug this into our comms, beam these signals to enemy ships? Make them lose control of the crews?"
"We should go to limitations," said Jenavol.
"I agree. That's one of the drawbacks. The civilian network is a lot more open, but also usually centralized around the oldest communication hub, which is usually the primary computing node for the Singers on the planet. That gives us an obvious and effective insertion point."
Abeshta's hologram spoke, "Whoever built the…" he looked at Jenavol's spider, "System architecture? Yes — of the early Singer network was an idealist. They designed it with open source code and open architecture. And egalitarian Singer use. The consensus based component is what allows the DDOS to work."
Rurliss glanced at Abeshta, "You sound guilty."
Abeshta puffed up his feathers, then deflated in what Rurliss interpreted as a Tseskiya sigh, "It seems wrong. To use something designed with good intent for ill. It's like using my patients' secrets to manipulate or abuse them."
Rurliss caught Tiirid looking at her with the last comment. She knew he was thinking the exact same, undiplomatic thing.
"The Harmony," Jenavol had a hard edge to her voice, "Uses a similar strategy against the Federation. Tactics matter, but getting freedom for everyone matters more."
"I sense this is a long-standing debate between you," said Rurliss. "I agree with Jenavol, and I suspect you do too Abeshta, or you would not have agreed to assist with the project." She turned back to Neroth, "Continue, please."
"Of course, Captain. Harmony ships are their own planetary networks in miniature. Fleets are similar. And they have much more stringent security protocols, and a much higher Singer-to-network density. It's the difference between breaking into a sprawling network with one sleepy administrator versus one small local one with top of the line information security software and a crack systems admin."
Rurliss felt a cold shiver of doubt run down her spine, "What does that mean for our plans to secure Harmony ships?"
Jenavol's spider waggled a claw, "Depends on the context. Unattended Dancer with no Singer aboard? Signal would be all we need. Same ship plugged into a network? Will have to get this onboard. A Sanctuary or a Choreographer have much higher passive protection. We would have to get the dummy Singer here to the computer core. From there it might be able to overpower one Singer. But trying to use it in a combat scenario? Won't work."
"So if we can get these onboard ships in for repair, get the computer core, it would work?"
"It would work." Jenavol's spider looked at the device, "I have another drawback. This will work for a while. It will work most effectively on smaller worlds with centralized networks that can be overpowered quickly. But for larger networks we will have to subvert a few key nodes at once to infect them all. But the other Singers will develop a countermeasure. I don't think they will realize we have made a dummy Singer unless they get a hold of the hardware."
"Noted," said Rurliss.
"We will need to be ready to adjust our design and our procedures." Jenavol looked back at Rurliss, "I am confident, but can't guarantee the Harmony won't put stronger safeguards on the civilian networks. However, if they did, it would be likely to increase latency for the Singers and reduce their ability to effectively govern."
"I guess that's a small victory," said Tiirid.
"You told me," Abeshta said, claws tapping nervously on hard light, "we could manually override nodes with or without the dummy Singer."
"Yes," said Jenavol, "the exploit is fundamental. But that would take time and skilled technicians. I have trained a small group of them from your people. But not enough to free everyone."
"In short," Rurliss clasped her hands behind her back, "Once we start, we need to move fast and keep our methods secret. And don't let this fall into enemy hands." She beamed at Neroth and the Singers, "Still, this is the first viable tool against the Singers we have. Thank you."
Neroth held up a hand, "There's one more thing, Ma'am." He glanced at Jenavol. The spider bot titled up and down in the approximation of a nod. He took a breath, "Right now it locks out access to all Singers. Except two. Jenavol and Abesh—"
Rurliss felt fear— no, revulsion, rising fast inside her. "No." She said, "Absolutely not."
"Captain Rurliss," Jenavol started.
"No." She held into the desk with one hand, "We stop all Singers. We don't pick and choose."
"Iliae," said Abeshta, "We need to trust one another. The people of Horizon will not wake up on their own. And I and Jenavol will need to access the network in case we have to lock out other Singers."
"It's not just about trust," Rurliss said. "I trust you want to do the best for the Harmony, Abeshta. I do. You too, Jenavol. But what would the point of this be if it turned out all I did was put two tyrants on the throne instead of a million?" Rurliss shook her head, "I think you are well-intentioned. But I can't check that kind of power, if I let you have it. No one can. And even if you didn't exploit that power, or succumb to temptation, what if some Singer developed one of those countermeasures that gave them the same access? Then we'd be in a very sticky situation."
Abeshta and Jenavol looked at each other. Communicating, literally, wordlessly. Rurliss crossed her arms and waited. Abeshta grimaced.
Neroth spoke up: "What if we give them access for only a limited amount of time?" Jenavol and Abeshta snapped out of their cyber-psychic reverie and looked at him with obvious surprise.
Rurliss was buoyed by pride. Look at her crew, getting ahead of the Singers. Still, "No. That's still a lot of power, even for a short period of time. And access reverting would have to be ironclad…"
"Ma'am?" Rurliss turned to look at Roxun, who had until then been idly sitting on an empty work bench, "Maybe we shouldn't be so hasty."
Rurliss was glad Abeshta looked as surprised as she did. It meant Roxun and him hadn't planned this. Still, her first instinct was to say no. But, if Roxun of all people was speaking up in favor of the Singers… "Go on, Roxun."
"The people of the Harmony are going to need something tangible for them to take us at our word." He pressed his lips together, "Put yourself in their shoes. The Federation is pushing this line that digital AI gods are controlling your every move. They even have gone to war to "liberate" you. Then one day one of their ships shows up and says, 'we have liberated you, citizens! Rejoice!'"
Rurliss allowed herself a smile at his, surprisingly accurate, interpretation of her despite the familiar anxiety crawling inside her.
"Imagine that," Roxun said, "You would think to yourself, 'I don't feel any different,' maybe even, 'look, I am going to buy some eggs. That is a conscious rational decision I have made.' And then over the next few weeks as more nothing happens and they live their lives as they always have, they'll start to think we fed them some BS." He shook his head, "We need to let someone have access to the network long enough to… well I don't know if planting the idea is going too far, but at least providing some sort of direct proof for everyone to look at and think over. Otherwise — entirely with validity with the facts they have — they're going to say we're just spreading misinformation. If we were Singers ourselves we could do it. But in absence of any…" he gestured at the two across from him, "might as well go with ones we trust."
"Perhaps..." Rurliss considered the prospect. It wasn't one she liked -- even if it was limited, temporary, she didn't like the prospect of granting these Singers any access to people's minds, any last chance to implant suggestions or otherwise manipulate people. There had to be another way ... "But why couldn't we do it? We'd be connected to the local chip network, why couldn't we provide that direct proof? Dump the information right into people's heads, just before or right as we jam their chip network?"
"How do we make sure they understand it properly?" Abeshta said. "It's distressing news, learning that your entire life has been a lie -- I know from experience. There's going to be a void in their lives, and if you shut us out entirely, who knows who will fill it? Something like the Caldonian science cults, perhaps?"
If Abeshta thought that argument would go over well with Rurliss, then he'd clearly misread her. So, more likely, it reflected his fears, his worries. "You'll have to deal with it the way we deal with that sort of thing ourselves. And you can't seriously expect me to believe that I should allow you to go on manipulating people's minds because they might go culty, can you?"
"That's not what I meant, it's just ... it was bad enough back in the Valley, and these people won't even have the prospect of being uploaded themselves to offset that shock..."
"No, they'll only have the prospect of getting to exercise their own free will for once," she snapped.
"Their free will... to join a rebellion they had never heard of -- had never seen a need for -- until now? A rebellion against, effectively, gods?" Roxun argued. "I can't help but imagine more than a few -- most, even -- will prefer a comforting lie to our hard truth." Rurliss couldn't deny Roxun's point. Maybe this whole project was absurd. Maybe she should just give up on the idea... No. No matter how impossible it seemed, this was necessary.
"The Klingons killed their gods when they grew too troublesome," T'Kel noted. "It is not illogical to posit that when confronted with proof of the Singers' control and a means of overcoming it, people will be willing to fight."
"Provided that they do not reject that proof. Once the other Singers know our movement exists, and know what evidence we provide of their control, they will prime the populace to reject that evidence; we'll need to be able to modify our proof to stay ahead of that." Jenavol said. "But that is beside the point. It's one thing to transmit dummy signals through the network; it's another to deliver specific information into people's minds through it. Especially since 'the network' is really thousands of different networks, each subtly different in ways that are easy for Singers to navigate, and rather more difficult for our dummy Singer to work out and accurately transmit information through. Frankly, Roxun is right: you need a Singer."
"Convenient, isn't it," Tiirid mused, echoing Rurliss's own suspicions.
"No, it's rather inconvenient. It introduces a potential flaw in our dummy Singer, an exploit for other Singers to break," Jenavol replied, dipping her spider-bot's head a bit. "It also reduces the complexity of the signals we can send to actually degrade the network, making it more likely that they can modify chip networks to ignore the signals we put out. And finally, it makes it exceedingly difficult for us to deploy this on any wide scale. If it could be avoided, it would be."
"I understand you are suspicious of us," Abeshta added. "But you trusted us enough to come this far. Can you trust us just a little more?"
The room was quiet as Rurliss thought it over. She looked at Neroth, "You can give them access for a bit, then make the removal watertight and permanent?"
"It will require some modifications," said Neroth, "But it can be done."
"The schematics of the device and the exact method to prevent us having access can be kept secret from us ," said Jenavol.
Rurliss thought about it, staring at the white squares of light on the table. She stared long past the point it was comfortable. But this one small decision could affect billions, the entire plan of liberation. She was content with taking her time.
"Very well," she said. She hoped the relief in Abeshta's eyes was a good sign.
***
Captain's Log, Mission Date 12.3, USS Enterprise
(Ambassador, EC)
Enterprise is en route to Unwerta. It's a small, relatively isolated artist colony, the private playground of sorts of one particular Singer, Tallael. Our intention is to test out our ability to jam the chip network in a controlled setting, one where if things go wrong, we will not have to worry about Public Safety breathing down our necks, and to liberate the colony in the process.
It's not much, but it's a spark. And revolutions are built from such sparks.
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