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"Hey Theo if you press that button it should give us a switch to power the redstone and blow up the tnt since we don't have a flint and steel." His life hadn't changed much since the announcement about the Petrova line situation. The situation was dire and deadly, but it was also the norm. Even with the apocalypse looming – possibly caused by an alien life form – he'd still be here doing treasure hunts and escape rooms with his friend. What's the point of just waiting around for death and doing nothing? He'd rather spend time with his best friend. Parrot snapped back to attention as the hiss of TNT reached his ears. He retreated away from the TNT and pressed his headwings against his head. The TNT blew up and exposed the last part of the puzzle. Theo grinned and clapped his hand on Parrot's shoulder. "Bingo! Cmon bro, let's get outta here." Parrot chuckled and followed Theo to the next room. It was surprisingly simple, no Spoke to chunkban one of them this time. They escaped the room completely within minutes. Parrot took his spyglass out of his bag after they got their stuff back and used it to scan the area for any players. He confirmed there were none and he and Theo began the flight back to spawn. Parrot smiled as he listened to Theo complain about how they took his carts and hadn't given them back. Typical Theo. The back of Parrot's neck prickled as he realized there was the sound of 3 wings beating instead of two. "Hey Theo we should land on those trees over there to regear, just incase." Theo nodded and flew towards one of the trees. He and Parrot landed and Parrot scanned the area they had just been flying. There was no sign of anyone there now...he didn't relax. "Do you have an end chest." Theo nodded and set one down. "Yeah here ya go." Parrot opened it and pulled out his bow and arrows. "Thanks." Theo tilted his head and stared at Parrot for a moment. "Are you ok?" Parrot didn't turn to look at Theo. "Just heard something." Parrot suddenly drew his bow and aimed at something. "I see you. Say your name and your intent." The person stood calmly despite the threat, the invisibility potion wore off which exposed MinuteTech himself. "Parrotx2." Parrot loosened the arrow and pointed the bow at the ground but didn't set it down yet. "Yes I am. Can I help you?" MinuteTech nodded and folded his wings neatly against his back. "I believe you can." His voice had a slight accent that Parrot couldn't place. Did voidlings have accents? He didn't know. "My name is Minutetech, as you know. I'm with the Petrova task force." "The what...?" Parrot was intrigued. Why would they be reaching out to him specifically? Theo moved and stood beside Parrot. "The Petrova task force." MinuteTech repeated himself. "It's an serverwide body set up to deal with the Petrova-line situation. I've been tasked with finding a solution. They've given me a certain amount of authority to get this done." Parrot finally lowered his bow completely, putting his arrow away. "They?" MinuteTech nodded. "Unanimous secret vote, it's complicated. I'd like to talk to you about something you wrote." Parrot was baffled. "Secret vote?! Uhm nevermind not the weirdest thing I've heard, my paper writing days are done. Academia didn't work out well." Minutetech tilted his head. "That or the assholes who got you kicked out of your university and got all your funding cut off to ensure you never got published again because you called the leading astrologist a staggering waste of carbon?" Parrot went tense. "Yeah...that." Minutetech held out a binder to Parrot. "You wrote this, correct?" Parrot skimmed it. "How did you get that." MinuteTech put the binder back away and straightened up again. "A dull title, but an interesting read I must say." Parrot shook his head and pressed wings wings tight against his back, Theo noticed his tenseness and put a hand on his shoulder. "Look, I was in a really bad place when I wrote that, ok? I've had enough of that stuff and that was the end of it. I'm much happier with what I'm doing now anyways." Minutetech tilted his head, raising an eyebrow. "Right. Meaningless puzzles and hunts that could get you killed just for the enjoyment of whoever you're doing it for that time. You called out hundreds with your paper. That's not something many would do. I suppose though, I believe you are more happy with this." "Thank you." "You are aware of the Arclight probe and Petrova line correct?" Parrot nodded. "I am." "Do you think those dots are alive?" Parrot opened his mouth and then closed it. "I mean they could just be dust bouncing around in the magnetic fields. I don't know. It gets back in like, a few weeks now right?" MinuteTech clarified "It returns on the 23rd. It will be recovered from low orbit earth and then we will have the most brilliant minds on it." Parrot was interested by that. "The brightest minds? Who's doing that, do you know?" "You are." Parrot blinked. After a moment of silence Minutetech waved his hand infront of Parrot's face. He snapped out of it and reacted. "Me?! The whole world elected you to solve this whole thing and you came to me about it? I'm sure there's much more qualified people, like Wato or something!" Theo, who had been silent up till now, finally spoke. "Why Parrot?" Minutetech ignored the questions. "Parrotx2. This is not optional." Parrot thought about it for a moment. He wasn't an extremely sciency person but if he could help save the server... "I'll help you." Theo looked almost panicked for a moment. "Parrot what if this is some kind of trap?" Minutetech spoke, trying to soothe his worry. "I can assure you I am genuine." There was a short 20 minute flight to a generic looking business park building. Parrot barely got to catch his breath from the flight before Minutetech was walking down the hall. The hall itself was empty minus unmarked doors every 30 feet. They finally reached the end of the hall to a set of double doors and went inside. Unlike the rest of the building the room was filled with furniture and shiny, high-tech devices. It was the most well stocked biology lab that Parrot had ever seen. Minutetech stopped and turned towards Parrot, guards closed the doors behind them. "This is your new lab, Parrot." Parrot glanced at the door. "So when you said you "had a certain amount of authority." "All the authority." Parrot nodded. "So uhhm, you have an accent, are you from the overworld...?" Minutetech stared at Parrot for a minute, likely wondering what his iq was. "I'm a voidling, from the end. I was the protector of the end. That doesn't matter now. I'm in charge of this and there is no time for the slow server wide committee to make decisions after a week. The sun is dying, we need a solution. It's my job to find that." Minutetech sat down on a lab stool. "These 'dots' are likely a life form. The exponential progression of the solar dimming is consistent with the exponential population growth of a typical life form." Parrot was mildly unsettled by that. "So they're eating the suns energy output? That is terrifying. Wait...then what do you need from me?" Minutetech looked at him directly, Parrot shuffled slightly. "The Arclight probe is bringing the samples back to earth. Some of them might still be alive. I want you to examine them and find out what you can." "Yeah you said that earlier," Parrot said. "But I have to believe there are more qualified people than me." "Scientists all over the world will be looking at them but I want you to be the first." "Yeah, but why though? It doesn't make sense." Minutetech didn't answer the why. "It is what it is. Be here on the twenty third at 7 pm. I'll have the sample then." Parrot tilted his head, confused. "It would be in Zam's empire then wouldn't it?" Minutetech shook his head. "I told Zam to land it in capital city, LettuceK and LeoWook will make sure it is secured and then send it to us. Ashswagg will allow him to borrow the airspace." Parrot blinked, processing that. "Wait, you have Zam, LettuceK, LeoW0ok and Ashswagg just doing whatever you want?" "Yes. Without question." "Are you screwing with me right now?" Minutetech sighed and rubbed his head like Parrot was giving him a headache. "Get acquainted with your new lab, Parrot. I have other things to deal with." Minutetech walked away without another word. __________________________________________ "Angular anomaly." The computer says. Parrot sighs. "Dammit..." "Angular anomaly." Parrot stood up and looked around for Spoke. He hadn't actually seen him since he disappeared to go clean. He found Spoke in the storage room and nudged his shoulder. "The computer is saying something about an Angular anomaly." Spoke tilted his head and stood. "Odd. Follow me." Parrot was slightly anxious at the request to follow but followed him. The door opened with ease. The room was round, like the other rooms, but this one wasn't a cylinder. The walls tapered inward towards the ceiling. It was a triangulated cone. The amount of information everywhere almost gave parrot a headache. He was curious and looked at various screens. Every surface was covered by computer monitors and touchscreens. The sheer number of blinking lights and color was almost staggering. Some screens had rows of numbers, others had diagrams, others were just black. On the edge of the conical walls was another hatch. That one was less mysterious, it had 'airlock' labeled across the top and the hatch had a round window. Through the window he saw a small chamber, just big enough for one person, with a spacesuit inside. The far wall had another hatch. That was definitely the airlock. In the center was a chair. It was positioned to be able to reach all the screens and touchscreens easily. Spoke sat in the chair. "Ok where is the anomaly..." "Angular anomaly." Spoke's ears pinned in annoyance, he was clearly not in a good mood. Parrot watched him look around the room before he pointed at a screen. "This one." Angular anomaly: Relative Motion Error Predicted Velocity: 11 ,423 KPS Measured Velocity: 11 ,872 KPS Status: Auto-Correcting Trajectory. No action required. Above that was a picture of the sun. It jiggled around slightly. Scratch that, it could've be a video or a live feed. That, or it was his imagination acting up. Parrot reached over and zoomed in the screen. There were a few sunspots on the left side. The image stayed surprisingly clear. "There's no need to panic, the system automatically fixed our course." Spoke explained. Parrot nodded. "That makes sense, kinda."