Work Text:
Bins have so many things to tell, as well as "highly" encrypted data archives (made with the one and only archiver and this is the only case of monopolization Verona doesn't mind), with 1234 for a password and all that.
This storage, however, is taking ages to decrypt. It is actually protected, and it makes Verona anxious.
What would the Commonworld have wanted to hide so well?
Every single file has its own password, naturally, and there are hundreds of them. None opened so far.
What's worse, she can't even download this data. Considering the estimated time of hacking (an eternity, if I'm lucky), she will have to live the rest of her life on Ego 55, and it's not the ideal place for that, mildly speaking. She suggested they just pull the whole fucking machine out of the wall and take it home, but the chief scientist Anora Welk (who has been hovering behind Verona's shoulder for the entire mission, at the same time doing lots of other annoying things) didn't like the idea and flatly told Verona to behave professionally and "get through with it already".
◇◇◇
The mission, all in all, goes smoothly.
Ego 55 is one of the major Commonworld's scientific research outposts, which existence was revealed after the CW's fall. Despite the Commonworld being an epistemocracy (technically), the science-related activities on Ego 55 were discontinued several years before its fall, and the good old Believer arrived at an absolutely uninhabited planet.
Their crew consists of eight people, including Verona and Welk.
(Verona hates being controlled and patronised, hates it with the intensity of a teenager, although she's not one for years now, and for many of those years she has been much more patient about this. It's Welk's fault, obviously.)
There’s more than a dozen of various New Aurum production facilities/laboratories on Ego 55, and the crew has been scouring them thoroughly for two days already. The place has some sort of its own data-managing system, straightforward and not complicated, and files and logs are easily accessible, so Verona's task has been a child's play until someone pinged her and called her over to one peculiar lab.
Yet another player in the list of arch nemesis I’ve given up on maintaining.
◇◇◇
The atmosphere of the laboratory is unsettling. Its walls are lined with reflecting film, and in the centre of the room there's a weird more-a-construction-than-a-device that takes up the half of the space.
All attempts to access the computer via any wireless networks failed. It’s as if there’s none. Physically, the computer seems to not be connected to anything except for power via a thick, thick cable. It does have one more socket, but no cable to lead anywhere, so it’s just one more mystery. Verona asked her colleagues to look for cables with ports that fit, but her hopes are low. Also, the machine sticks out of the wall, so maybe there are some connections hidden there.
The only thing Verona has already done successfully is entering the system. It was humiliatingly simple by contrast to everything else, she just tapped a personnel card with the number of the lab on it when the machine asked for authentication. Now she thinks she might be just lucky and any other card wouldn’t work and would shut the system completely instead.
However, this challenge, no matter how hard and irritating, makes Verona feel like she hasn't felt for a long time. Immensely intrigued, appalled, jealous. She would even commend the creators of this, erm, thing, if they weren’t fascists.
Verona sighs and takes her beloved decoder out of her pocket again. It’s a little device with a universal connector and a wireless transmitter, which can be used as a skull-crushing weapon because it’s not only smart, but sturdy as fuck (Ash made a like mother like child joke when Verona finished making it, and she begrudgingly accepted the compliment). At the moment, though, it can only serve as the latter. She turns it on and puts it on the screen panel in the place where it would usually connect best, and attempts to access the mainframe once again. She predictably fails and considers something that would be called keyboard smashing if there were any keys. Just smashing is a thing that has already been considered earlier, but the dumb (though clever) piece of enemy technology shall not win this easy.
Alright. Let’s try to think outside the box. What else do we have here?
She looks around. Light panels on the ceiling won’t be of much help (but are still on the we’ll try it if nothing else fucking works list), the same goes with the air conditioning and vents.
It is obviously the time to address the uncanny weird shiny elephant in the room, and Verona reluctantly circumambulates it for a minute, hand ready to facepalm.
There are more cables, that’s for sure. Most are power, but not all of them.
Suddenly, Verona realises what it reminds her of. Even two things.
The first one is the cage the CW used to extract Arcadia’s coordinates from Emma, which sort of makes sense in a New Aurum research centre. The second one – and now Verona understands why it creeps her out – is a torture chamber she once saw an image of in a book that scared the shit out of her when she was a little girl. Come to think of it, it would work great for interrogations and, well, torture.
The door to the cage is shut but obediently opens when Verona taps the card on its lock.
Should've tried it sooner, here’s your well-deserved facepalm.
She doesn’t go inside, because she’s afraid it will close behind her, and she will have to spend the rest of her life on Ego 55 after all, and it might be shorter than she would like it to last.
Will you stop it already, you fucking coward?
She sends a message to the crew channel, asking someone to come, and closes the door. It immediately shuts again.
Verona inspects the lock closer. It doesn’t have a full-featured screen, only a keypad.
1234? Nope.
Frustrated, she returns to the bloody computer and picks the decoder.
Please work this time, I believe in you.
I have no idea what you can do, though.
The decoder beeps, reacting to some sort of signal and shows a password. Fifteen numbers.
Verona sighs and enters it. The cage does nothing. She taps the card. The door opens, but nothing new.
Superb.
She taps the card again, just in case, and then enters the password. Nothing.
She taps the card, closes the door and then enters the password.
Something opens on the computer’s screen. Verona rushes there, excited, but still not exactly optimistic.
There are several options, including “Initiate” (I’m not gonna press that), “Analyse”, and “Review data”.
Reviewing is just what Verona wants to do. The screen then shows a long list of saved files (those that she has already seen but failed to open). She taps the top one.
Thankfully and finally, a text appears. A bunch of scientific terms and numbers which she doesn’t understand, but “New Aurum”, “human subject” and “fatal” are enough to make her shiver. She decides to sit down. There's no excitement or protest in her any more.
The first report is dated September 2050. The last one – March 2145.
Holy fuck.
“I think I found something?..” she says weakly into her comm.
◇◇◇
There are debates whether to disclose this new information about the CW's experiments to reproduce the effect of the explosion that imbued doctor Emma Grieves with New Aurum, but it is decided that Arcadia's principles of honesty and integrity are more important than hiding disturbing information that may frighten people.
Verona, personally, thinks that the only person who should have not known about it is Emma herself. She has never seen a person so furious and broken at the same time. By accident, Verona was standing right by her side when the crew did a short report upon their arrival home, and had to catch her when she dropped, shaking and crying and glowing with golden glitches. Verona held her, with no idea what to say, and just gingerly stroke her back.
◇◇◇
"I'm very tired, but I can't fall asleep when you are awake," Ash grunts. "And you know that perfectly well."
It's been a month since the mission, but Verona still struggles with sleep.
Is it insomnia if I can't sleep because I don't want to dream?
"I will assume you wanted to show you care for me but accidentally said it with a wrong intonation," Verona mutters in response and goes back to staring vacantly at the slightly swaying shadows on the ceiling. They are cast by trees outside their window.
Ash makes a somewhat successful attempt in speaking softly.
"The experiments again?"
Verona sighs deeply.
"Uh-huh."
Ash props herself up on one elbow.
"Wanna talk about it?"
They haven't really discussed it.
"No."
No, I don't want to talk about it.
"It's just…"
And here you are, fucking talking about it.
"I've seen many terrible things. Many. Terrible. Scary. And these videos are, I don't know, top two?"
In the course of time, Ash has been refining her skill of tactful silence. Still not perfect, but at least, now she doesn't emit annoyance or impatience every other time Verona makes a pause.
"I don't know why I even watched them. Was of too high opinion of my sensitivity, apparently."
She suddenly realises that her lower lip is bleeding. She jerks her hand away, cursing her anxious fingers, and licks the blood off.
Ash cuddles closer and hums into Verona's shoulder, "I hope you won't be awake for long," and immediately drifts off.
Verona stares at the shadows until it is morning and they are dispelled by sunlight, but the following night is fine.