[Felix - 4] The Resistance of Memory

The ship, a sleek matte grey arrowhead with recessed engine ports all along its form, streaked out from the night sky. Retro thrust aglow, with faint blue-white fire flaring close to the point. It's descent was slowing as it neared the monolith. The black tower loomed in the fading light. Adorned with twinkling lights, it stood upright amid a low rolling landscape. It was the central transit hub for the city. The lights were docking platforms and hangars, guides and control modules. Each important, but just a piece of the dazzling structure. The ship slowed, but not enough. It lazily crashed into a docking bay on the monolith and blossomed into smoke.

Then time stopped, it reformed from the smoke and fire and jettisoned backwards, before it cycled again. Every time it pulled back, there was something different. A new person stuck to the front, or strapped to the adjustable wings. People I didn't recognize, then Vanessa, then Conrad, then Travis, then someone else I couldn't place, but she was tall and old, weathered in a way I hadn't seen before. In my gut, something told me she was from the wastes. Then it paused, and I realized she wasn't strapped to it, but was holding on to the ship.

Then the ship was buried in sand. It was the glass desert, harsh and reflective, ozone hole pouring in lethal cosmic rays. It hurt to stand by the damaged ship, now looming large over me. The old woman was there, her dark skin chapped by the harsh, dry wind. Permanent creases in her face from glaring and frowning. She was holding out a helmet to me, or some sort of head cover. She may have had a similar one, it looked like she did before, but she was definitely handing me someone else's. Her clothing was strange. It was real hide, not just synthetics like the stuff I wore. The clothing on me recoiled from her reach, trying to stretch away from the proffered helmet. My left hand was paused, reaching out, but not quite sure what to do. I tried to make it move, either towards or away, but it wouldn't budge. My clothing came alive, pulling away from the left arm like molting skin, and flailing up into my face. My panic started as I feared the clothing was really going to strangle me this time.

I shot awake, norepinephrine compensators pushing a slight dose into my blood, detecting the heightened state as part of a nightmare. That was another thing my past self added, Endocrine modulators, which tapped into part of the neural framework and could counteract instinctual reactions. Having my body naturally compensate for a bad dream was an incredible perk. Though with my proclivity towards dreams, I wonder if it added to the problem, or that was why he added them. Well, I added them, I guess. I sighed, I was probably never going to get past referring to the pre-crash version of me as "him."

Getting up, I walked back to the display walls. Suspended in the screen was the same arrowhead ship from my dream, though this one was bulkier, better defined, and traced with records of parts and trajectories. The monolith was pretty much the same looming central tower of Novost Sprawl as in my dream. Though my version of the accident didn't include dream specters adorning the prow.

I'd been working on recreating this disaster from what records I could find for years. I never really told anyone at work, but I'm sure they all suspected. I'd query related data when I had down time, I even visited a records vault where they kept some physical evidence in case future material analysis was needed. In that time, I was able to piece together some interesting details about the passengers and crew of GT-022-9A3QL. The 022-series inter-atmospheric shuttles were common transports, but not for large volumes, usually more climate sensitive things, such as people or plants. The hangar was booked for inter-sprawl travel, but the 022 was the ship of record. But now that I had this case, I had access to new Novost records that were inaccessible prior. now I could almost place Travis in that ship, wondering if he was steering or just sleeping.

The most interesting things I found from it were partial manifests and crews. There were 7 people accounted for, like Travis, who I ruled out as being me. The other names and designations were difficult to work with. There wasn't any directly linked data, and even tenuous connections had already been made previously and dismissed. There were at least 3 passengers from the frags. and based off incidental evidence, all records presume I was as well. But I at least must have been fairly well off, as I didn't have any telltale signs of organic decomposition. Usually fraggers show all sorts of degenerative diseases, being exposed to cosmic radiation, as well as the less hospitable atmosphere.

A chime went off in my ear. Subtle, but noticeable. Put my display gear back on, overlay recalibrating for my vision, and augmented panels shimmered back into place. The chime linked to the corner of my eye, a notice from Novost:

+ Felix

# Phirenaius

$ < new case data available

It was simple. That's usually how the notifications from Phirenaius usually went. It was the default text of a notice. He didn't add any additional details. I wonder if that's just his way of getting me to message him directly. Before I contacted him, I ought to have a shower. I put the display back down on the table.

I went to the bathroom portion, a sterilized laminate room with bathroom fixtures. The ripplesuit was convenient, but I didn't want to shower with it, so it retracted to a minimal undergarment, and loosened the binding to take it off. The minimal shape and binding were in case it failed. No one liked standing naked someplace if it failed. Heh, well, most people dont, I should say. I slipped the ripplesuit off, dropped it in a quick cleaner while I grabbed a showerhead and stepped into a fast flow of water. Reclamation ports in the ground collected the excess, and sent it off to whatever destination it had for returning to the system. The shower was smart, it cycled the water temperature, reading my impulses for desires, adding cleansers and scanning for harmful materials. It checked the reclamation water for any other contaminates and gave me a clear bill of health. 

I remembered in that rushing water when I first discovered all the subdermal implants I had. Some were damaged or only partially restored, but I still carried a few meatsinks in my back. From the restoration, my health checks after the shower always took a bit, because the non-human parts of me caused the system problems. Maybe remnants from the previous me, maybe just it couldn't calibrate for derms. Sometimes I found myself prodding a few medal nodules on my body, wondering if there were still pieces there the doctors didn't catch. Previous me spent a good amount of credit on body mods, and I doubt all of them would show up. The endocrine modulators were ones they didn't catch, so who knows what else I had.

A rush of air from the ceiling knocked most of the water off, then a set of soft absorptive towels were present, already at my body temperature, for me to finish with. I swapped the towel I used for my now clean ripplesuit, and put it back on. It stretched and crawled across me, wrapping limbs and forming into my preferred jumpsuit as I left the bathroom.

The humidity lingered in the air as I stepped out, then ambient sensors picked up, cycled the air, and dried it again. I picked up my display, and made sure I looked reasonably awake. A coffee was brewed from the synthetic dispenser while I checked, machine learning picking up the obvious next steps. A circular dietary cake formed as well, hints of steam trailing from it. The flavor was supposedly a butter pastry. But I don't know anyone who told me that had consumed real butter or pastries to verify. But it was nice, warm, and went well with the coffee. It wasn't like that came fro real coffee beans, so what did I care.

After call handshakes occurred, I was connected to Phirenaius. He looked his usual self: composed, tired, and a little bored. He gave me a quick once-over.

"Felix. You spent all night reading the case." It wasn't a question. It was a statement of fact. Phirenaius could have pulled my activity logs to figure that out. But he was an analyst, and had been for years, I'm sure he pulled that just from sight.

"Yeah. I did. What's the data?" 

"This just gets weirder. It's a dossier from GT. It's pretty much all noise, but I found a few bits of interest. Particularly the medical records."

With Phirenaius, "interest" may mean the digital equivalent of a smoking gun. He was terse, but if he said anything, it typically proved worthwhile to check. I saw the files begin transferring over. There was substantially more than I expected. Not particularly relevant to how Travis died, but it was a lot more data from GT than I think I had ever received from a separate corp in the few years I had done this job.

"So now data suddenly exists? How convenient! Now that we're investigating it I'm sure it ties everything together nicely."

Phirenaius laughed his dry, rasping laugh. "I've taught you well, kid. But you've got your work cut out for you now. This isn't just noise. I think they gave you disinformation. I think this is getting buried, and they want us to find the easy answer." He paused a moment. "What do you derive from this?"

I paused. There was weight to that last part. I recognized it, and he knew it when he said it. "Uh, I'm not sure yet, let me look at the files." I muttered, and ended the connection.

For now the second time this day, I slumped into my chair, and conjured up some synthohol. "Derive" was not exactly code, but it usually meant something bigger lay just below the surface. And taking in a few details of what he did and did not say, I was going to need a drink.