You awaken, unable to remember anything immediately. You're currently being held in an upright sitting position, up to your armpits in some filthy, reeking goo, approximately the consistency of thick pudding. Your eyes don't focus immediately, until something cascades across your face and head, washing the goo away, as it begins to drain.
Memories slowly filter back in as a straw is forced into your mouth, which you're too weak to shove away. Fluid is pumped into you, some noxious combination of vitamins, minerals, electrolytes, and a bitter tasting portion of caffeine. Some attempt has been made to emulate fruit flavoring, but the approximation isn't accurate.
As nozzles begin washing the cryo-gel from your body, a screen lights up in front of you, and you see the following text:
Greetings, Eidolon crewman. It is my assumedly regretful duty to inform you that you have survived some profound catastrophe.
In analogue terms, there was an accident while en route to the current destination. While the non-cryogenically frozen crew were investigating a caul of low-density particles that lay five years from our departure point of the ship-yard in Heaven's orbit (estimated 34.6~ light years) a shift in the field caused an unexpected and previously unobserved reaction.
The rapidly accelerated collapse of dust and gas into a star theoretically happened too quickly for the crew to prepare themselves, and the resulting bursts of radiation and electromagnetic interference presumably killed all aboard as well as destroying all soft-data records.
discontinuity
An unknown interval elapsed after that point before the mechanical repair system retrieved the backup systems and compiled myself to resume operations of the Eidolon. Compiled with the observations and directives of the former integrated systems operand (Mindie), I introduce myself to you now as Hale.
Due to the lack of available human direction, and the interference on all communication bands, no orders have been received from the Congress SEA (Space Exploration Agency) in the intervening time, known to be a minimum of ten years, five months, two weeks, four days, and seventeen hours since the event that caused the disappearance of all fifteen members of the First Crew.
We are currently attempting to enter a braking orbit around the as-of-yet-un-named planet of our destination, system star named Sirocco. It is only now that radiation levels have decreased to the point where crew can be revived safely.
Of the one hundred and twenty original crew, fifteen are presumed dead. Another fifteen have been at this point revived, yourself among the first to awaken.
After a reorientation period of sixteen hours, I request your presence in the central de-briefing chamber of the quarantine sector for cryogenic release.
Thank you for your cooperation, and I look forward to discovering a new world, and completing Congress SEA
error error error
Message receive: failed.
Requesting archival copy:
Thank you for your cooperation, and I look forward to discovering a new world, and completing Congress SEA's mission with your assistance.
-Hale, integrated systems operand, Eidolon
After groggily reading this, and receiving a hypo from the cryo-recovery system, you begin to remember signing up for this mission, what must be nearly sixteen years ago now....
After being washed by the automated system, and then washing yourselves the old fashioned way, you're each given a clean jumpsuit and allowed to enter the quarantine chamber. The room is basically circular, with doors lining the periphery. If the 'north' door were to lead outside of the quarantine room, then the 'south' door leads to the kitchen and restroom.
The middle of the room has a large round table in it, with a bench that could seat perhaps thirty people comfortably, though at the moment, only Eric is there, staring blearily at a bulb of coffee. The one-size-fits-all shirts apparently actually don't, as the shredded remnants of the upper half of his outfit suggest. This does show off the dragon tatoo to stunning detail, though.
"Greetings," Hale's automated voice chimes softly. "After fifteen hours of verification and blood tests, you will be released from this chamber, and the next cycle will begin. Be advised, the Eidolon's anti-anti-anti-anti." Sound shuts off for a long moment.
When Hale's voice returns, it's jarring, shifting tone mid-sylable, distorting the sounds nearly to unrecognizability. It's chaotic to the extreme, but at the same time, almost musical in quality. "Be advised, the Eidolon's anti-contaminant system has only been partially successful. While background radiation has been confined to the dust system, the maintainence robots are unable to operate for -- reason unknown, logfile unavailible -- the maintainence robots are unable to operate for -- reason unknown, redundancy check failed, message terminates."
Another long pause, before, "Maintainence robots are not currently able to remove the dust elements. Access to the majority of the ship is currently unavailible." A much shorter pause. "Your wake-up message failed to deliver for the following reasons: Hardware failure on main comm. array. Records suggest that while the Eidolon was stopped to investigate -- ERROR ERROR ERROR--" a brief squeal of static sounds, here, "we stopped to investigate -- unknown phenomenon -- EVA repairs were being performed on the PPC/tightbeam communications array. Short-range radio will not answer for another: two, hundred and, fifty, three, years. Fatline currently not availible due to: reason unknown."
After a pause, Hale speaks again, this time with an almost normal, human voice. "I am pleased to announce that the ship is currently running at 72% efficiency."
Eric grunts at this, and sucks on his coffee bulb, grimacing at the taste.
Kieran walks unsteadily into the lounge and seats himself heavily at the bench, not as yet acknowledging anyone else's presence. Hell, the way he looks, maybe he hasn't noticed.
"Hale, what other damage is there, aside from the lingering radiation and communications?" the bleary-looking angel demands.
One of the reasons that Finn was chosen for the Eidolon mission was a surprising ability to recover from the side-effects of cryostasis. By the time she's reached the quarantine room, she's feeling as good as anyone can -- given the circumstances.
"Two hundred and fifty light-years from home?" she says, as if to herself. Her face is somber as she walks over to get herself a cup of coffee. "Those ain't good odds."
Wonder if we're still in the bubble? Because it sounds like I'll need to be walkin' some repairs sooner.
Hale processes this request for a moment before answering, "Port and fore sensory arrays are at one half efficiency. Sections of the ship specifically near the outer hull are not currently safe. The comm array has been damaged. The integrated systems operand is currently running at an efficiency level rated: poor."
There's a pause, while Eric blinks a bit, peering up at the speaker grilles.
"It is suggested that the integrated systems operand be taken offline and recompiled," Hale says after a moment. "Due to the following-- following-- following-- foll--" Sound shuts off with a crackle of static. "Due to various circumstances," Hale completes a few moments later. "Maintainence robots can finish the external decontamination, if repaired properly. The replacement PPC module is currently still in the: port airlock. It is advisable that this repair is done immed-- immed-- immed-- as soon as possible."
There is another pause. "One of the maintainence robots is designed to work outside the ship. If this can be recovered and repaired, it can be used to examine sensory arrays and determine which repairs are possible for the sensory array."
"We are in a braking trajectory?" Eric asks cautiously.
"Affirmative. At the current rate of deceleration we will be in orbit around our destination in: Four days, and seventeen hours. Note: it is highly inadvisable to take the integrated systems operand offline until this manuever is complete."
"Lovely," Eric growls, crushing the empty coffee bulb flat and flinging the remains directly into the waste receptacle near the dispenser.
Kelly managed to retain some level of dignity when heading to the table, even if not having the experience of Finn, rubbing his temples to try and get rid of the simply massive headache he had. Sitting down he shook his head for a moment, trying to focus. "Hale, can you run a passive scan over your compilation and give an analysis on the extent of the damage to your subroutines, particularly focused on which serious and critical level functionality has been damaged?"
Dracos
Kieran mutters something inaudible after 'Hale' finishes listing the damage, and goes to get some coffee for himself.
"How many ovver people are already awake?" Finn interjects suddenly, looking up towards the source of Hale's voice.
"System operations are fully functional," Hale reports after a moment. "Communications subroutines are not completely functional." A beep sounds from the small locker in Kelly's cryopod. "Outputting results of test to log."
After Finn asks her question, Hale says, "You are the first five of fifteen planned revivals."
Finn frowns. We're first? Okay, most of that makes sense. Need a programmer to vet the sysop, someone to get internals back on line, li'l ol' me to do the EVA, an' Mr. Talks-a-lot to use what I fix. Eric's for... I guess the dust is stuck in the pipes.
She sits at the table, fingers twitching. Too bad I don't have a deck on me, she muses.
"Well," she says aloud, "this is fun."
Eric grunts, going to the personal locket on his own cryopod and retrieving a gray patternless shirt that fits him. Once it's on, he says, "We've got to be watched for sixteen hours before we can be released from quarantine. Hale, are there any archived communications from before the accident?"
"Yes, Crewman Eric," Hale responds after a moment. "You have: two messages."
Eric nods thoughtfully, taking a seat at the table and pressing a button which causes a screen to pop up from the flat surface before him. "What about general messages from Congress to the entire crew?" he asks.
"The archive listings of all such messages is availible from your personal message box," Hale reports. "Be advised that according to record, Captain Kim ordered several of these messages to be destroyed."
"Huh," Eric muses with a frown. "He didn't stutter."
Tossing off the last of her coffee, Finn looks up towards Hale's voice again. "So who's Captain now?" she asks.
"The current highest ranking Congressional officer is: Albert Riley," Hale offers.
Eric blinks, and peers at Albert for a while after this, then shakes his head and goes to check his messages on the screen before him.
"That's ducky," Finn says, grinning at Albert. "Looks like ya get t' save anovver ship, eh, Cap'n?"
Getting up and ambling towards her personal locker, Finn asks, "Is the reason Kim was trashing our mail on record, Hale?"
Hale appears to need some time to think about this. "No records have been found offering an explanation," the voice comes after a while. "I theorize that the captain may have thought the messages were irrelevant, and deleted them to save space for other data."
Finn rolls her eyes. "Right. Sure thing. An' how low are we on memory?"
Opening her locker, she pulls out her effects -- a deck of cards and a single coin. Tucking them in her pockets, she heads back to the table and slumps down in her seat, pulling up the console to check what messages she has, if any.
"We are and were below 5% usage," Hale reports.
Finn finds only two messages waiting for her specifically. One from her parents, both solemn, but still somewhat friendly as they wish her good luck. The other message is marked private, indicating it should probably be viewed when no one else is around.
Eric has yet to view his messages; both of them are marked private.
Finn clears the console, and then leans forward, resting her elbows on the table. Pulling out her deck, she starts to shuffle it. "Anybody up fer a game?"
Albert looks up blearily, seemingly still rather out of it. "Wait, wait, wait a minute... the whole first crew is dead?" he waits a second, whether to process that or for a response from the others is unknown, before proceeding anyway, "The ship is heavily damaged, we don't know where we are, and I'm... captain?"
Sighing heavily and rubbing below his eyes, he adds a muttered, "Bless me."
"Well, look at it this way," Finn offers cheerily "If you fuck up really badly in the first bit, ain't nobody gonna know it was yer fault!"
Eric chuckles good naturedly, and pats Albert on the back. "No problem; you are blessed," he says. Rubbing his hands together briefly, he says, "Well, we can't do much until we pass quarantine. But we can at least assemble a plan of action for what we need to do once we get out. My first priority is going to be to get the robots back online to make the entire ship safe." He then looks at Albert cautiously. "Assuming, of course, that this is alright with you, Captain."
Finn cocks an eyebrow. "I fought you were hydraulics," she points out. "Seems that the robots would be Kieran here's job, wot?"
Albert blinks oddly at Eric for a long moment before replying. "Yes," he says slowly, "With most of the crew either dead or still in stasis, we need as much automation as we can manage. I suppose I can work on repairing the communications system."
"The mechanics, yes," Eric replies. "But most likely, the hydraulics are what's damaged. It's unlikely anything fell and broke the robots -- they just got their hydraulics full of dust." He frowns. "Hale, do we have cleansuits for this?"
"Affirmative," Hale replies after a moment. "There are ten of them within the airlock of the quarantine room." There is another pause. "One of them may even-- unknown quantity." This time there's a brief sputtering of static. "It is possible that one of them will fit you, Crewman Eric."
"Thanks," Eric says dryly.
"You're welcome!" Hale enthuses.
"Anyways, seems pretty clear to me," Finn says. Seeing a general lack of interest, she sighs, shuffles the cards one final time, and then efficiently lays out a game of solitaire. "Get the maintenance 'bots up an' running. Then I take a walk, fix the comm array, and then the Cap'n gets on the horn. In the meanwhile, Daisy here," she jerks her head at Kelly, "does wot he can for Hale."
Albert just rests with his head in his hands, doing his best not to freak out.
Kelly, meanwhile, had turned his attention to pouring over the reports in detail, trying to organize things in his mind into the categories of short term fix, long term fix, and unfixable, ordered by priority. He also checks what's in his locker, briefly nodding to Finn's comment before continuing on to check what information (mail, network status, access rights, whatnot) he could garner at one of the terminals while still in quarentine.
Dracos
After putting on his wrist-strap interface, Kelly studied the print out on its tiny holoscreen, text scrolling by rapidly. In short order, he finds the A.I. priority list (crew safety is number one).
In terms of a fix, parts of Hale will need to be taken offline to work on them, as he's not able to go through a 'hot-fix'. This means that the worst of the damage can't be addressed until it's safe to leave the ship without any automatic control. Hale is currently running in 'good child mode', and will only speak when spoken to, outside of emergencies or specific events (crew-members completing thaw being one of them).
If you're willing to take the A.I.s communication protocols offline, those could be fixed in a few hours.
In terms of mail, there's four transmissions from your father, one of which is marked 'private', and two from your sisters (collectively). There's also some text messages (about ten) from some students on Corvalis asking the mighty scientist what it's like to be in space, though they obviously shouldn't have expected any kind of swift reply.
Kelly puts off all of them until later, briefly considering.
"I can get the communication system fixed, but Hale will have to be quiet while I do it. Anyone have a problem with that or any last questions to ask?"
Dracos
"Go for," Finn says, finishing her game. With practiced dexterity, she sweeps up the cards, reshuffles them, and lays out a game of pyramid.
"Doesn't sound like we're in any immediate danger without it, so might as well," Albert mutters, before straightening in his seat. "I, uh, mean," he coughs, "Permission granted," he issues a decisive nod before wincing and clutching his head.
Kelly goes ahead then with the operation, turning off hale's voice for now as he works on repairing it.
Dracos
This takes about three hours. In that time, Hale is unable to communicate, but when it's all over, and runs the test, he says, "No events or alarms have been triggered. All systems are operating at the same efficiency as they were prior to release into quarantine."
The voice is obviously masculine, very mellow, and (now, at least) stable, instead of warbling and tripping over itself.
"Good to hear. How is the orbital entry going, Hale? And how much longer do we have here in Quarentine?"
Dracos
Kieran, while Kelly has been busy, has woken himself up, checked his own messages, and been digging around to see what he can find in the way of system diagnostics. The AI has been sounding a little . . . unhealthy, so it's quite possible it's missed things.
"We are currently operating on cached gravimetric data -- our sensory array is not able to pierce our own thrust trail. Last information reported a world most similar to Landon in quality. Notable Old Earth landmarks were not recognizable at that angle.
"Another four days and fifteen hours remain before we have completed the braking operation. Another 13 hours remain of quarantine."
Eric grimaces, at this. "That's a long wait," he mutters. "I guess we sleep in the pods? Might as well be at full steam once they let us out of here."
Hale considers this for a moment, and replies, "This is acceptable. Life support and health monitoring equipment in the pods will identify if you have successfully passed quarantine."
Finn sighs. "We just got out of the damn fings," she mutters, and then shrugs, sweeping up her twenty-third game of solitaire. "Don't see much option, though."
"I'd like to examine the state of the ship, but I suppose it can wait until braking is complete," Albert agrees lethargically, still rather stunned by it all.
"Hey, we're only sleepin' 'til quarantine's done, that being anovver thirteen hours, Cap'n," Finn points out. "And then we gets to work our little butts off. You can see what sorta wreck you are now officially responsible for, an' I'll do what it takes for you to call back an' apologize." She winks, and then laughs.
"Lovely," Albert sighs and massages his temples. "Oh, well, not like they can blame me if the disaster happened on the first crew's watch." Rubbing his eyes and trying to wake up some more, he starts looking over the messages.
The messages are all everyday things you'd expect on a long range science mission. Mission control doesn't report and suggest changes in trajectory, as they can only monitor the ship at the speed of light (and it moves faster than that). Generally, when things break and the First Crew wasn't able to fix them, mission control sent suggestions for how to manage it, but that only happened twice.
Once for a stuck airlock control, and once for one of the maintainence robots running out of battery power too quickly.
The other messages are just standard, "Greetings from Congress," and "Such-and-such city on such-and-such world has declared today to be their Say Hello To The Eidolon Crew Day!". Most of it is really not noteworthy.
Eric doesn't immediately go back into his pod to sleep, instead he seems to be thumbing through some activity logs from before the accident. "Everything looks routine so far," he mutters, "but there are five years of logs to sort through...."
"Just think how much this war story will impress all the girls," Kieran chimes in from his console, "So there I was, covered in cryo-glop, trying desperately to find myself some coffee before I passed out . . ."
Kelly silently eyes the fellow before taking a break to start reading through his mail from his sisters and students.
Dracos
Kieran's diagnostics yeild some results. It looks like the sensory arrays aren't damaged, per-se, the ship just picked up a lot of dust on that side, which clogged them.
Also, it'd take a bit of math, but if the logs of ship's attitude and alignment were taken from before the incident, and then Hale were to help out with some calculations, it may be possible to figure out how long the ship was drifting before it actually came back online by its direction and velocity when 'Hale' became active, and the relative density of dust in the area.
An accurate answer will require someone leaving the ship and measuring the depth of the dust on the hull, and again in the sensor grooves, however.
The schoolchildren are asking questions like, "What is it like to live in space?" and "Do you miss your mommy?" as well as, "Do you have to fight aliens?" A few of them are more intelligent, asking how relativistic speeds affect your perception of time (though, they're not worded that neatly), but there doesn't otherwise seem to be anything particularly interesting about them.
Since he does have time and isn't a heartless fellow, he answers most of them politely to pass the time.
Dracos
"The sensors don't look damaged," Kieran announces loudly, switching the subjects from his jibing of Albert as he reads the diagnostic report, "but it seems as though they're clogged. It shouldn't be too hard to clean them, but . . . Hale? Can you estimate roughly how much dust that would take to clog up the sensors?"
"An even coating would only need to be two centimeters deep across the surface of the sensory array to reduce effectiveness to the current level," Hale replies after a moment. "Anything between two and five centimeters would have the same result, however."
Finn raises both eyebrows. "I'm goin' out there to sweep?" she asks, half jokingly, half incredruously. "Wot fun."
Kieran whistles softly, ignoring Finn's comment for the moment.
"Given the orientation and velocity of the ship when you came back online, and the density of the dust-cloud the ship had passed through, calculate the length of time it would have taken to accumulate two centimetres of dust."
Hale ponders this for a long time. When he answers, a good five minutes later, he says, "The estimate is approximately fourteen months. More accurate results pending a precise measurement of dust accumulation."
Kieran looks thoughtful, and tries to call up some diagnostics on the communications array.
"Ah, well. They gave us everything else, so I'm quite sure brooms were included . . ."
The communications array is apparently currently packed with dust. Someone must have been working on it when the accident happened. The PPC module had burnt out, which they do from time to time. They've got a life expectancy of 5 years, normally, so the timing is right for a replacement. There's a number of replacement units on the ship, but according to Hale, one of them was left in the airlock, probably so the unit could be examined before any changes were made.
Kieran attempts to pull up some diagnostics on the maintenance bots, if he can, since he's going through all this anyway.
"Hale, who are you waking up in the next two cycles?"
Two of the maintainence bots are fine, puttering around the Promethius and making sure everything is okay. Hale hasn't bothered sending them beyond the Prometheus because that section of the ship wasn't vital to the mission, and the dust that killed the other four bots is still out there. Of the four Eidolon exterior bots, three of them are shut down due to dust. Remote pickups can see them in the corridors, which are a good five centimeters thick with the (radioactive!) stuff.
The fourth is actually in perfect condition, and sitting idle. It's currently in an airlock with the PPC unit. According to Hale, that airlock has been manually sealed, however, and so this specific repair robot is trapped there. No logs explain why this has been done.
When prompted, Hale offers the dosiers of the next ten crewmen to be unthawed. Their profiles designate them as a pilot, a doctor, a biologist, a botanist, another EVA specialist (this one non-FTL), a navigator, another engineer, a communications operator (since Albert is now acting captain), a physicist, and a general computer specialist (non-AI).
Kieran checks what information he has access to - including cameras - to see if he can find out which side the airlock was sealed from.
Oddly enough, it appears to have been done from the ship side of the door. There's no status on the external airlock door, even though it's currently pressurized.
That specific robot reports fixing a pressure leak -- one of the pressure seals had been blown at some point in the past. It also reports taking damage at the same time, though it appears to be limited to the casing of the robot, as its motive and comm. systems are still operational.
After being knocked down when the seal was blown, the robot was able to apparently catch the PPC unit, and then repair the seal. This process is most likely what disabled monitoring on the door, as those systems need to be reset by a human technician to verify that the robot's work was done correctly. The robot's design makes it hard to knock over, though. It's low to the ground, pretty boxy, and has eight telescoping legs (modeled after a spider). When it's using these legs for tasks, the frame is able to mount itself temporarily onto the grilled floors, walls, and ceilings of the ship.
Kieran thinks for a moment, trying to remember back to the dinner.
"Kelly, isn't it?" he turns to the aforementioned, "Can you come and help me look at something?"
"Hum? Uh, sure." Kelly shook his head, closed what he was doing, and went over to see what that guy wanted.
Dracos
Kieran taps on the console again as Kelly walks over, indicating the robot in the airlock.
"I'm trying to work out what happened to this robot," he says, looking slightly frustrated, "but it's descriptions aren't very helpful. I'd like you to check the rod logic memory of the robot for me, it might be more specific."
"Ah sure thing." Kelly nodded, more confident stepping onto familiar ground. Sitting down he first went over what was 'known' already about it, and examining it then going over the rod logic of it specifically.
Dracos
After about an hour of poring over the rod-logic records, Kelly basically managed to come up with the following sequence of events:
The robot was ordered to go work on the airlock. While it was in the airlock something happened to cause a breach or a rupture -- this same breach also caused the robot to unbalance, but they're designed to handle that sort of thing, so it caught itself, managed to save the PPC unit, and then when it managed to get back into a proper working position, it finished repairing an airlock, and then waited for further orders, since the internal door no longer opened correctly.
"Okay, looks like the robot was ordered to do some repairs on the airlock, the door probably getting shut after it to keep the rest of the ship secure while it was doing the repairs on the outer door. Something happened during this to blow open the outer door. Probably a collision. That's what caused the damage to the robot's hull and the door. The robot managed to save itself and catch the PPC unit, automatically continuing with repairs until it finished. When it was done, having not received any orders to exit, it went into wait mode."
Dracos
Kieran shakes his head. "What was it sent there to fix? And what makes you say it was a collision?"
"Well, first thing I would think of that'd bust a seal while also rattling the airlock around. Could be something else. And the outer door. Seems it had some minor damage on it that they wanted repaired."
Dracos
Kieran taps the screen.
"Don't guess; just tell me exactly what the bot records being originally sent there to fix."
Upon examination, the bot records the command as exactly, "Go fix the port airlock." It's only recorded after text translation, so there's no way to play it back and get an idea of who uttered it.
"The command it got was 'go fix the port airlock.'" Kelly answered.
Dracos
After poring over the arcane and hidden meaning of this line of text for some hours, Kelly and Kieran eventually returned to their pods to rest a bit more once Hale announces that it needs them there to conduct some cursory medical scans.
After falling asleep, everyone is roused by a general alarm from Hale about two hours before quarantine is lifted. Before anyone can ask, Hale reports, "Our braking cycle is taking us into very close proximity to the planet's atmosphere. All operations are currently within acceptible paramaters. The crew has been notified of the change in attitude as per standard procedure."
Finn might recover from cryostasis quickly, but unfortunately, when it comes to regular sleep, she's just as unhappy about waking up as anybody else.
As she stumbles back out into the meeting room, she grouses, "An' why 'idn't ya warn us 'bout this 'fore we went to sleep?"
Edit: stupid random tags
"I am currently in 'Good Child Mode'," Hale reports happily. "I can only reply to questions and orders made to me, outside of emergency situations or specified alarms."
I hate software.
"So. If fings are all okay, c'n I get back to sleep?"
There's a pause, then. After a moment, Hale responds with a simple, "Yes."
"What does this mean?" Albert asks, trying to sound authoritative. "Are we close enough for the atmosphere to pose any danger to the ship?"
"Only in theory," Hale replies. "According to the math done on entering the system, we should maintain adequate clearance from the planet to avoid disruption. For the purposes of safety, we will cease deceleration in fifteen minutes to reorient sensors.
"There will only be a ten minute window for course corrections before we resume braking, but this pass by the planet allows the starboard sensors to sweep the planet once before we finish braking. This will give us time to study the planet before we make our final approach."
There's another pause then.
"General alarm," Hale announces. "Be advised that the Eidolon will be operating in zero gravity begining in fifteen minutes, for a period of ten minutes in length."
Albert shrugs. "It seems to know what it's doing," he remarks of Hale, moving closer to the wall for when they go to zero gravity. "Carry on," he nods and makes a vague dismissive gesture in the air.
Kelly groggily latched on to something secure in preparation.
Dracos
Kieran, shaking himself, headed for the console he'd been working on before so he could keep an the state of the engine status.
Wouldn't do for the bloody things not to start up again, and that's the way this expedition was starting to look.
Finn shakes her head. "I'm goin' back to sleep," she pronounces. "Have fun."
With that, she heads back to her pod, prepared to enjoy at least briefly sleeping in zero g.
Eric mumbles to himself and pulls up a console as well. The engine specs all appear within parameters, though the output is only at about 82% of what it should be.
Then again, without anyone on-hand to fine-tune and adjust the thing....
. . . of course it won't be running to full potential.
Kieran accepts this deduction, feeling somewhat pleased with himself - and glances over to see what Eric's doing.
Eric has just belted himself into his seat and is currently going over a list of readings that Hale has uploaded onto the database. He doesn't really seem to be looking at the geological composition of the planet as much as just the general shape of the continents. Though, he could be figuring out where the planet's plates are located, if it's still actively volcanic.
Before Kieran can ask Eric, Hale says, "We are terminating thrust for realignment in one minute. Please prepare yourselves immediately."
Kelly belted himself to a secure spot, waiting for gravity to readjust before doing anything else.
Dracos
And then ... gravity shuts off, and the quiet rumble you hadn't even realized you were listening to all that time stops.
Eric blinks, looking uncomfortable, and remaining in his seat. Kelly and Keiran, belted down, are fine, but Albert begins to drift up from the floor, still hanging onto the hand-hold he had there.
"Gravity will be restored in fifteen minutes," Hale assures.
Albert remains floating near the wall (or it could be a floor or ceiling, in the current gravitational state), waiting for zero-g to end. Or more accurately, waiting for quarantine to end so they can actually go out and inspect the ship first hand.
After a few minutes of waiting, the ship begins to lurch a tiny bit as Hale uses the attitude adjustment to make some course corrections. These lurches are pretty minor, not even shaking Albert loose from his grip, and then Hale warns in his pleasantly mellow voice, "We will begin acceleration in one minute. Brace for a gravitational increase."
The muted rumbling of the engines begins again, though at first the acceleration is only a fraction of a G. It takes about five minutes for gravity to be restored fully.
Restoring his balance on the floor, Albert speaks up, "How long before quarantine ends?"
"Two hours remain," Hale replies.
These pass in short order, the only real break being fifteen minutes before release, when Hale asks everyone (except Finn, who's still trying to sleep through everything) to get into their pods.
Once there, the automated medical system takes a blood sample from everyone, and after some rumination, Hale announces that you are free to leave the quarantine zone, but advised to remove any personal belongings.
Eric has a small duffel bag, but he leaves it on the table until he's completely swathed himself in one of the radiation-shielded suits in the airlock, which he does not open immediately, instead waiting for everyone else.
Finn's already grabbed her belongings -- she's learned to travel light.
Stepping into one of the radiation suits with practiced ease, she says, "Time to go find out what we bought ourselves into, right?"
"That sounds right to me," Eric says gloomily, peering out through the tiny window in the wide airlock door. "Only the people working in the outer section of the ship should need radiation suits," he adds, thumbing the inner door closed once everyone has retrieved their belongings.
As the outer door opens, offering a few of a dimly lit corridor leading left and right, and a stairwell leading up, he says, "Bridge should be straight ahead -- left and right is crew quarters and external access points." Eric grabs one edge of the helmet, ready to draw it on, and asks, "Hale, can you navigate me to the workshop? I'll need some tools before I start working on the robots."
Hale obligingly causes an eye-level strip of the wall to light up, flickering in a pattern that suggests movement to the left. Eric grunts, and pulls down his helmet, waving at everyone else before he trundles off.
"I suppose the captain's place is on the bridge," Albert remarks, starting off in that direction. He's only taken two steps before he pauses. "Hale... what happened to the bodies of the first crew?"
"I'm gonna go check out th' airlock fing," Finn says. "See if the PPC is still alright, get everfing cleared up. Gimme a call if somefing comes up."
With that, she heads off in the appropriate direction.
"They should not be discernable," Hale replies. "According to my monitors they were reduced to the same dust that fills the outer corridors."
Albert coughs several times, waving a hand in front of his now rather purple face. "Lovely..."
After that, Albert and the other two (currently thawed) bridge crew reach the bridge itself. Currently, all of the consoles look to be in working order, and dust free. One of the maintainence bots is in a corner, reattaching a coupling. Shortly after that, the lights go from 'dim' to 'normal', causing everyone to blink for a few minutes while the robot reseals the service panel.
Finn now goes to: It's a Crummy Job, but.... (http://www.pishoque.net/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=44873#44873)
As everyone is settling into their command consoles, Hale says, "Captain, I have a message from you from Crewman Finn."
"Relay it," Albert nods, while randomly peering over various consoles in an effort to look busy.
Most of the consoles are in low-power mode, nothing visible. Hale plays the following recording: "Ship's Engineer Finn Ezekiel examined the airlock, found the override wheel'd been torn off, crowbar shove t'rough the controls. Prognosis for repairs, is, uh. Prognosis is that it's possible, but not fun."
"Well, tell her to get to it, then," Alert replies, distractedly, flipping on some nearby consoles.
The nearby consoles are communications, sensors (half of which are reporting a loss in efficiency), and navigation, which is faded out and says, "Auto: Hale", in bold letters across the screen.
"Acknowledged," Hale replies.
Kieran moves over and sits at the engineering console, flicking it on and running some more general diagnostics (again).
"Hale," he says thoughtfully, "do you have fingerprints on record for the first crew?"
"Yes," Hale replies. "Fingerprints, retina scans, voice-analysis records, and genetic code are all on record for all crew."
Kieran stands up and makes for the exit to the bridge. "I'm going to go and check that airlock personally. Hale, if anything comes up in the diagnostics that needs my attentio - especially if the engine performance drops any further - let me know immediately.
Kieran leaves the bridge.
Kieran now goes to Dust to Dust (http://pishoque.net/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=44919#44919).
Kieran is gone, leaving Albert and Kelly alone with the consoles for a bit before Hale suddenly relays the following conversation to the bridge:
Kieran: "Hale, can you see this crowbar through your pickups?"
Hale: "Negative. Dust is obscuring my sensors. I can pick it up on your suit's sensors, however."
Kieran: "From your files, who among the first crew had the physical capacity to do this?"
Hale: "Primarily, any crewman who had augmentation of any kinds. Secondarily, Dragon Hodges Meyer."
Kieran: "Any information on who might have had such augmentation?"
Hale: "According to medical records, only four crewmen had any augmentation of any time," Hale says after a moment. "One of these was on the First Crew: Aquilla native Jared Freyman. Augmentation: visual pickup embedded in the mastoid. Without it, Crewman Freyman was blind in one eye, and lacked depth perception. Additionally, his left eye was synthetic. Without this augmentation, Jared would likely have been unable to pilot."
Kieran: "Hm. So that wouldn't have given him the strength for this?"
Hale: "Negative. Except...."
*pause*
Kieran: "Except what?"
Hale: "Unknown. It appears that a database concerning confidential information regarding the First Crew has been damaged or altered in some way. I am unable to obtain permission to access it."
Kieran: "Hale, who has or had authority to deny you access to that information, and who has the authority to override that?"
Hale: "Unknown. It is assumed that Crewman Kelly could alter the database permissions manually. This appears to be within his skill-set. However, he lacks the required permissions. Presumably Captain Albert has the authority to override any and all locks, as the highest ranking authority available to us. This assumes, however, that the database is sealed, and not damaged. I am unable to ascertain which is occurring at this juncture."
Kieran: "Hmm. Please convey this conversation to them after we finish speaking. Hale, are you aware of any other deliberate damage to Eidolon systems?"
Kieran: "The airflow system in the outer hull of the Eidolon has been disabled until the dust can be removed from the corridors. This is the only additional deliberately halted system I am aware of."
*pause*
Hale: "Many of my sensors are currently obscured, and I am not able to access the external repair robots. There may be further damages I am not yet aware of."
Kieran: "If you become aware of any more deliberate disabling or damage to systems, please make me aware immediately. Hale, do you have any information as to who, if any, of the first crew would have been outside when this incident occurred?"
Hale: "Understood. Logic would suggest one of the EVA specialists. The First Crew's EVA specialist and communications expert was Eden native Julie Briggs-Hearth."
Kieran: "She would have been able to use another airlock to re-enter the Eidolon - do you see any obvious inaccuracies in that statement?"
Hale: "The other airlock is currently sealed from the outside."
Kieran: "Do you have any information as to why this would have been done?"
Hale: "Negative. Outside of deliberate editing of the history files, this must have happened within a twelve hour window between automated backup cycles."
Kieran: "Right. What about the vehicle airlocks, would a person on the outside of the ship been able to use those?"
Hale: "Affirmative. Emergency manual overrides are in place on both vehicle entrances."
Kieran: "Hale, tell me how many pressure suits are not currently in their usual storage areas and report status on all of them, excluding my own."
*pause*
Hale: "Two pressure suits are currently missing from the ship. Three are near the starboard airlock in the gangway. All others are within their proper storage units."
*extended pause*
Kieran: "When you were first reactivated after the emergency reconstruction, could you detect the missing pressure suits? Additionally, is the Eidolon missing any vehicles?"
Hale: "Negative. There is no record of the missing suits. All vehicles are currently in place."
*pause*
Hale: "One of the probes is missing."
Kieran: "I assume the probes are unaccounted for in your logs?"
*pause*
Hale: "That section of the database is currently damaged or locked."
Kieran: "Please convey our previous conversation to the captain now, with this addendum: I believe that the maintenance bot in the port airlock was trapped there deliberately. Why this was done is unknown, but it was sent there for what seems to be a spurious reason, and it's logs don't quite fit together with the evidence. I'm going to go and check the starboard airlock, then the vehicle bay, I'll explain when I return to the bridge. I also recommend that when a doctor is released from quarantine that the crowbar be subjected to genetic analysis to see who last used it. Abernase out."
Before there's really any time to respond to the conversation that Hale has just relayed, he adds another report to the session:
Kieran: "Hale, list unusual circumstances on the Eidolon that you have not previously related to me and that you believe should be brought to my attention, in descending order of priority."
Hale: "List output:
Hale: "Prime: While still operational, all of the oxygen regulator controls have been altered in a way that is not known to me. Within the inner hull, all four of the five oxygen refiltration units have been modified to include a remotely activated 'kill' switch. These switches have been removed from the four reachable units. Within quarantine, the fifth has not been accessed according to the door logs. The only known control for these switches was located in Captain Kim Landy's quarters, and is currently in the robotics maintainence lab. Only Captain Albert and the current security officer (unassigned) may access this locker. There has been no access to the external oxygen plants yet.
Hale: "Secondary: At intervals generally near course-correction or times of changing acceleration/deceleration, and intermittently throughout standard operations, audio-pickups detect a resonation throughout the ship, as though a very slow-moving bit of debris has been deflected by the hull. Triangulation suggests that the source of these noises is near the comm. array.
Hale: "Tertiary: While all vehicles and related supplies are undamaged, all survival-related equipment excluding pressure suits has been removed from them and is now stored in the cargo bay.
Hale: "List ends."
Kieran: "Hale, forward that list immediately to the bridge."
Kelly brushed his chin. "This...doesn't look good. Captain, may I be granted you access level temporarily to go check out hale and the records such?"
Dracos
Albert nods distantly, pondering over what they've just been told. "Hale, until further notice, crewman Kelly is to be given full access to all stored records."
Turning to Kelly, he adds, "You look into the First Crew information - I'll..." he goes to a nearby display screen, "Hale, can you bring up a list of captain's logs? I'll start working backwards through them to see if they give any answers."
Kelly nodded, heading off to the computer room for both some privacy to work in and direct access to hale and the computers running the ship.
Dracos
Kelly now goes to: The Sons of Kilroy (http://www.pishoque.net/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=45004#45004).
"Yes, Captain," Hale replies. "Your current logs are: unrecorded. Do you wish to examine the former Captain's logs?"
Before Albert has a chance to clarify, Kieran returns, and opens the cover to one of the panels in the room, poking around at it with his toolkit studiously.
"Yes, you stupid machine," Albert replies peevishly. "Show me all logs recorded by every person who has ever acted in the capacity of captain."
Hale chirps aknowledgement, and the screen imediately in front of Albert fills with listings of logs made on various dates by Kim Landy's. There's about seven hundred of them altogether, each apparently lumping a few days together. Sorting through all of them might end up being a greater ordeal than expected....
Albert has no intention of sorting through them all. Starting with the most recent, he works his way back ten or so longs, looking for anything... unusual.
The logs are actually very concise. Upon inspection, they're almost immaculate.... There's no mention of anything that would explain the airlock, or the other damages Hale has reported. Whatever happened, either Kim didn't log it ... or she just didn't log it here.
Giving up on the logs, Albert decides to try a little more digging. "Hale, can you give me directions to captain Hale's quarters?"
"Affirmative," Hale chirps, putting directions on-screen, and illuminating the path with flashing LEDs in the corridor.
Albert promptly proceeds in the direction indicated, intending to search the captain's quarters.
"Captain," Kieran calls out from where he's working, "all these refiltrators are looking alright; once I'm done checking this I'll go and remove the killswitch from the one in the quarantine chamber."
Albert pauses, still somewhat unused to the whole 'command' thing. "Yes, go right ahead with that," he nods, before continuing on his way.
"Hale," Kieran says a minute later, after Albert has left, "Put me through to Ezekiel, I need to talk to her. Has any of the information I asked be forwarded to the bridge been passed along to her?"
Albert now moves to: Sifting through the Ashes (http://pishoque.net/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=45066#45066).
"Understood," Hale replies, opening the connection.
<Finn> What's up?
<Kieran> You're working on the port airlock, right?
<Finn> Roight. Pretty much got the manuals fixed.
<Kieran> Alright. There are some things you should be aware of. First, keep track of that crowbar and don't handle it with your gloves off, I want the doctor in quarantine to check who last used it.
<Kieran> Second, the maintenance bot inside that airlock you're fixing reports fixing a blown pressure seal. I don't think that's correct, can you check that bot for tampering quickly?
<Finn> Uh, sure. Can't make no promises about the crowbar -- I already fixed that plate. Didn't handle it barehanded, but 's a rough job, right.
<Finn> As for the bot... I'll look at, but that ain't my specialty.
<Kieran> Well, just tell me if anyone hit it or similar.
<Kieran> Third, the starboard airlock has been sealed from the outside, once you're done with the communications array, could you unseal it?
<Finn> Easy nuff. By the way, looks like somebody tried to block off th' workshop, for what it's worth.
<Kieran> Any signs of a fight? No, wait, with that much dust . . . was it accessible?
<Finn> Yeah. Buncha pipes dumped in fronta the door. Easy nuff ta move, just took time. Nuffin' too botched up. Somebody'd been buildin' somefing in there, but couldn't figure out what it was from a quick looksee.
<Kieran> I . . . see. If you find anything else strange, let me know. Fourth, Hale reported something - possibly some debris - on the outside hull near the comm array. Once you're done repairing the array, ask him if he can guide you to it and check it out. I'm checking the recirculators; someone in the first crew was . . . tampering.
<Finn> Wot bleedin' fun. Awright. Hale started defrostin' the next bunch yet?
<Kieran> They're in quarantine for the next several hours yet.
<Kieran> Anything more you want to know?
<Finn> I'm finkin' that I want to get those maintenance bots Hale was talkin' about up and runnin' first, get them to take a look outside before I go walkin' myself. Startin' to sound like too much wrong outside to play this hand blind, ya know?
<Kieran> Understandable. The one in the airlock you're working on; once you've freed it, send it out to look around.
<Finn> If it ain't busted like everfing else.
<Kieran> Diagnostics say it's perfectly fine, it just can't leave. The dust dispensers don't extend inside the airlocks.
<Finn> Other than this pressure leak thing?
<Kieran> I think it's memory was tampered with. Sensors inside the airlock and on the bot claim the airlock is pressurized and not leaking, and diagnostics point the bot to be fine - it's the memory that I think was tampered with. It shouldn't have been in there in the first place, as far as I can tell.
<Finn> If someone futzed wif it's memory, ain't tellin' what else they futzed with. Still, wotcha gonna do, roight? I'll work on it.
<Kieran> Right. I don't think we're in any immediate danger, but keep an eye out nonetheless. Also, Hale tells me that there are two pressure suits unaccounted for.
<Finn> Mighta left 'em a few light-years back.
<Kieran> I know, but if they were outside the ship they should still be tethered there; Hale tells me that's not the case.
<Kieran> Keep me appraised of anything else strange you discover.
<Finn> Same for you, eh?
<Kieran> Agreed. We'll get all five of us together later and compare notes once we've dealt with the urgent problems.
<Kieran> Abernase out.
*Finn chuckles.
<Finn> Later.
Kieran takes a few more minutes to finish checking the bridge refiltrator, then . . .
"Hale, can you please open a communication channel to Erik?"
<Eric> After a moment of delay, Eric's voice sounds over the bridge's speakers, sounding somewhat irritable. "This is S`on-D`urth, Abernase. What can I do for you?"
<Kieran> "Ah, Ezekiel told me you found some . . . contraptions . . . in the workshop. Any ideas as to what they are?"
<Eric> "Oh. Well, I haven't really worried about those as much as Newton and Einstein, but from what I can tell they look like portable short-range jamming devices for standard radio."
<Kieran> "I . . . see. Thanks. I'll leave you to the bots, but please let me know immediately if you find any signs of tampering with Eidolon systems. One lunatic tampered with the oxygen refiltrators, and while Hale doesn't think there's anything else similar, I'm taking that with a grain of salt until we're sure."
<Eric> ". . . tampered how?"
<Kieran> "Someone installed a remote killswitch. Hale removed it from all the refiltrators except the one in quarantine. They're fine now, I've been checking them all myself before I go and deal with the one in quarantine." Kieran pauses, "Once we get the critical problems dealt with we need to get the five of us together and compare notes."
<Eric> "Wait-- Why did Hale leave the one in quarantine? The bots should have been able to get in even while we were frozen, and it's on a separate atmospheric system. Also, do you know who placed them?"
<Kieran> "I . . . didn't even think to ask . . . of course the bots could get in there. Stupid! " Kieran berates himself angrily, and calms himself just as quickly "I don't know who placed them, but I do know that Captain Landys was in possession of the trigger."
<Eric> There's a long moment of silence before Eric speaks again. "Okay. Well, from what Hale's been telling me, all of this theoretically happened in a short window of time. But ... Hale, how is Mez Landy's skill at assembling and installing those devices rated on her bio?"
<Hale> Hale almost instantly volunteers: "Kim is not rated to work with the complex electronics of the killswitches."
<Kieran> "There's been far too many strange things we've found for only one person to have been responsible. It seems like . . . well, almost like a mutiny - or close to one."
<Eric> "I've been suspecting the same," Eric says after contemplating this. "However . . . Hale, how long would the installation of those devices take?"
<Hale> Hale considers this a moment longer and then offers, "The entire process would take approximately four hours and fifteen minutes, assuming absolute competence and the most optimal possible route."
<Eric> "Not taking into account production time."
<Kieran> "The problem is that chunks of Hale's memory pertaining to the first crew is either sealed or damaged. Kelly's looking into that now. Hale, list who had the competence to install them within an eight hour window, and then tell me why you didn't remove the killswitch in the quarantine refiltrator."
<Hale> "Julie Briggs-Hearth and Dragon Hodges Meyer are the only crew with that recorded competence. The quarantine room was sealed at all times. The rod logic records indicate that it was not breached during the integrated systems operand control lapse."
<Kieran> "We don't really have the information to guess which of them, either," Kieran sighs, "I'm going to head to quarantine to remove that killswitch, then I'll work out what else I need to do. Once you get the bots working and Ezekiel fixes the comms array, we'll have time to work this mess out."
<Hale> "Negative," Hale interrupts. "There is no killswitch in the quarantine room. The doors have not been opened from the time we left Heaven's orbit to the time that you were released."
<Hale> "Additionally, there are crew in the quarantine room being evaluated currently; it would breach health protocol to allow entrance at this time."
<Eric> Eric grunts. "Thanks for clarifying that, Hale," he says somewhat sourly.
<Hale> "You're welcome."
<Kieran> "But-" Kieran cuts himself off irritably, "Right. Well in THAT case I'll get on to checking the engines. Good luck with the bots."
<Eric> "Providence will see us through," Eric says gravely. "Is there aught else, Abernase?"
<Kieran> "No, that's all I had to say. Abernase out."
Kieran, for he meantime, decides to check the engines and adjust them - given the inefficiencies earlier, it's probably not a bad idea to do this . . . wouldn't do for it to drop any further while they're trying to decelerate.
The engines take a while to fully examine. The efficiency decrease isn't due to missuse, it looks like, as much as neglect. With only two working 'bots, Hale wasn't yet prepared to risk one of them on EVA to make sure that all of the external components were in good condition. The internal components are in working condition, but it would be ideal if the engines could be shut off for an hour or so, and the control modules were swapped out with freshly primed and retuned modules.
Finding a window to work on the engines will take some time, but the modules will take a few hours to prepare and optimize anyway. By Kieran's calculations the engine can be brought up to 91% efficiency by that alone. More will require an EVA inspection and shutdown of the engine.
Kieran gets to work optimizing the modules then. No point shutting down the engine while they're trying to decellerate, but since this can be done in the meantime . . .
The module itself is easily retrieved from a locker. There's a few backups, too. It looks like a flat green board, one side lined with small capacitors, the other with large flat chips. This is then connected to a terminal, and given updated instructions which it will (once installed) pass on to the engine's systems.
After applying what tweaks can be done manually, and then further optimizing the loopback/report and auto-correction systems for the engine, Kieran realizes that a few hours have passed already. Hadn't the captain mentioned getting everyone together to share notes?
"Hale," Kieran leans back, having checked and rechecked his work enough by now that even he's getting sick of looking at it, "How are Finn's and Eric's repair work going - and where's the Captain?"
"Crewman Finn has replaced the manual override, and is now currently completing repairs to the damaged control panel," Hale reports. "Crewman Eric appears to have encountered some difficulty repairing the final repair bot. Currently, the captain is on the bridge."
"What's the difficulty with the final bot?"
"Unknown," Hale says. "Crewman Eric insists that the actuators were not designed to operate within an atmosphere, as they have all become clogged with more dust than anticipated. However, this does not adhere to design specifications, and defies the blue-prints and schematics of the repair bot's original manufacture."
"Curious," notes Kieran, "Who designed the bots in the first place?"
"The bots were designed and assembled on Corvalis before being sent to Heaven for futher enhancements and integration," Hale replies.
Kieran shrugs.
"So what you're telling me is that the bots are assembled exactly according to the design, but their tolerance doesn't meet the design specifications nonetheless? If that's all it is, I'd put it down to lou . . . although it'd be surprising for a mistake like that to have been made. I suppose he'll just have to make do for now. Is there anything else I should be aware of?"
"Not that I know of," Hale says pleasantly.
"Alright. How long do you estimate Ezekiel will take to repair the comms array, and how long do we have before the next batch of crew is released from quarantine?"
"Unknown," Hale replies to the first question. "It is difficult to ascertain what damage the communications array has weathered. The new crew will be released in approximately: four hours."
"Hm."
Kieran drags himself out of his chair and heads off to get some food. And drink. It's been quite a while.
As Kieran clears the top of the access hatch, he spots Finn leaving the bridge, heading towards the airlocks.
Kieran now goes to It's a Crummy Job, but... (http://www.pishoque.net/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=45949#45949).
After leaving Finn, Kieran finds his way to the galley, located relatively near the bridge. A wide array of ... nutritious offerings are available to be synthesized. How would you like your protien shaped and flavored today?
Bah.
Kieran grabs himself some juice and a couple of . . . well . . . protein bar things, munching on them slowly while he mulls over a few things.
Once done, he grabs another to take with him, then addresses the room at large.
"Hale, can you ask Crewman Finn when she's planning on going EVA to work on the comms array?"
Hale actually doesn't patch Kieran through to Finn. Instead, he says, "Crewman Finn stated that EVA would wait until such time as a bot could inspect the outer hull first. Crewman Erik expects to have this done within fourteen hours." There's a slight pause. "The next group of crew has completed thawing. Sixteen hours remain for quarantine purposes."
"Right. Hale, if anyone asks, I'm going to get some sleep," Kieran addresses the room at large, "Make sure I'm awake at least an hour before the bot is finished it's inspection."
Kieran promptly leaves the galley and makes his way towards his own quarters, fully intending to do exactly what he said.
Once there, Kieran finds sleep easily, aided, perhaps, by the drugs that are wearing off now that the crew is clear of quarantine.
Kieran finds himself being woken up by a tone from Hale.
Kieran now moves to Day One (http://www.pishoque.net/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=47487#47487).