Command decks stately ready room, a very startled Jaz was huddled by a bulkhead staring blankly out into the inky black depths of endless space. As commanders with their cadres of junior officers rushed about the room, pulled out sheets of paper, maps and rushing to monitors to account for this point of conjecture or that. Raised voices and shouting permeates the massive room. With sixty people plus their retinue of advisors, councillors and experts the room was a shambles of order and coherence. Arguments bursting here and there, with academics butting heads regarding every single data point imaginable. It was heaven for those inclined to be pedantic, and hell for everyone else. The slow moving bureaucratic creep of something completely unexpected.
For Jaz and Jorec it had been seventy two hours of hostile interrogation and questioning, and unabashed harassment from the security divisions, senior science officers and almost the entire rank and file aboard the UB313 research outpost. Jorec wasn’t in much better shape for being slightly more senior than Jaz. Seems that in their vigor to get a jump out of archiving the old tight beam network they had maneuvered themselves, by leaps and bounds no less, over top of the appropriate chain of command with the news of a far off human distress signal. The Admiral, captain and station CO were not impressed to say the least. Both of the recent science grads had been separated and grilled harshly on the finest details and minutia of their seemingly tall tale. But after blood tests, psychological evaluations, additional strenuous back ground checks, extreme vetting of their lineage and current health records the command team had no choice but to review the details of this once in a lifetime dispatch from the brink of the void. A call from some where out passed the boundaries of the known universe. It was pretty tense for all involved. The security team had not only withheld food, water and sleep in an attempt to coax out even one millimeter of difference in their statements, but pulled out each science graduates catheter and colostomy bag. Rendering them dependent on an actual physically working toilet which the security forces guarded fiercely. The inquisition team had a plan of repeatedly attacking their recollections of time stamps, and the order to the series of events. Was this a direct quote, was that paraphrased, how do you know if you remembered seeing it, did the other person tell you to say this, to say that, did either of you attach a contraband device to initiate the call. Do you have friends working with you on this, are you a terrorist, an insurgent, do you realize the enormity of what you are saying here today? Would you testify to this in a court of law, will you sign away your life on the strength of not only your recollections but that of your colleague. That sort of thing. Extraordinary – high intensity, with no rest, no bathroom breaks except under direct personal supervision. Which in the case of Jorec meant a security escort would have to hold his member in order to allow him to evacuate his bladder into a sealed and then later tested container. They even pulled their biometrics out to monitor the internal body receptors at specific time stamps to make sure each aspect of their subconscious bodily responses were genuine. In the case of Jorec, he suffered many – very real hours, of government mandated torture. He was currently wrapped in a thermal blanket hiding his sudden lack of finger nails and all of his broken toes from the rest of the gathered group. His swollen visage dismissed by everyone in an orange or maroon coloured jumpsuit. His lowly cyan coveralls soaked in blood and vomit didn’t even register with this crowd. He just sat in a heap, rocking himself almost imperceptibly as he too stared out the view ports in the cavernous ready room. Watching Pluto, which was the only thing that could be seen with the human eye way out by the UB313 research outpost anyway.
Up until recently this branch of humanity had assumed they were the furthest humans from earth. During an early schism among the highest ranks of The Company one intrepid individual broke away from the monolithic business entity and struck out on his own and fled beyond the easy grasp of the populations of the earth and moon. This particular order of scientists had not been present during the Nano Tech boom, nor were they aware of the technological breakthroughs that came about decades after the For E’s engine debacle aboard Margot’s Fever or the mysterious disappearance of the oil refinery come research flag ship The Lark Song some five hundred years ago. In fact this faction of people was not privy to a great many important details surrounding humanity as a whole. Being fractious and isolationist meant that they were only as good as their echo chamber allowed them to be.
Back in the cacophany of the ready room the question at hand was what to do with the news of this distress call. If they’d managed to hear the call then surely The Company back on earth would have heard it too. Do we ignore it, or do we send a probe back to gather more intelligence? At no point did anyone seem to care that the message had travelled several billion light years one way and thus whomsoever set the distress call was likely long dead. This discussion revolved around the potential to discover new territory and to lay claim to new resources. But primarily they wanted to know if the call was a trap. An ambush lying in wait for them. The heated and tumultuous discussion carried on for months. In the mean time two new items were able to be seen by the naked eye from the ready rooms observation windows. Those were the flash frozen, and boiled bodies of a badly beaten Jaz and Jorec, recent graduates of the Torus Station science academy post graduate program being taught on UB313 with five hundred year old out of date knowledge.
PART TWO of : The Company A Call To The Void
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