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'Memory Lapse'


Session 1.12: Rhylanor to Caliburn


Session 1.11   Index   Session 1.13


In the hotel, we decide to look through news archives for reports of disaffected SuSAG employees and things of that nature which might give us a way to find out more. We also suggest that Ak look at the university records for the same sort of thing. Szechuan wants to look up information about (probably imaginary!) contacts in the Scout Service; there is a large Scout base on Rhylanor, so that might even be possible.

Searching through internet news archives, we find that thirteen years ago there was a scandal at the University of Rhylanor at Stillingfleet involving SuSAG-supported anagathics research. This involved unethical experiments which were exposed by a whistle-blowing research student named Jonas Harkirian. The experiments were apparently involving the development of improved anagathic techniques, and used human subjects, the poor, immigrants and so on, who were not told what was going to happen and so could not decide what to do based on full information. They were, generally, subject to a number of side effects, including some physical mutation, cancers, and mental problems including amnesia... The research team performing the scandalous research were reassigned to other posts off Rhylanor; the wording makes it sound more like they were expelled, however.

Ak has less success infiltrating the University computer system - the security seems to be quite tight...

Szechuan tells the others he is off to the scout base to find out more, and leaves the hotel. However, he lied! He instead heads off to find himself a fake identity (which is illegal on Rhylanor, he discovers from the internet). As he wanders looking for a way to achieve this, he also investigates the arcology mega-building we are in as a whole. He locates pubs and clubs, and finds some dodgy and counterculture stuff, but he himself does not seem too streetwise. He asks on the internet how to obtain a fake identity, and discovers again that it is illegal, but not how to do it anyway - the Rhylanor internet, despite the world's low law level, does not seem to have free access to all information. He also investigates how to get a 'new' Scout Service id, and finds that he would have to go to a Scout base and establish his bona fides. This is done by means of a genetic scan.

Interested in this genetic scanning idea, Szechuan investigates them further, as well as how to fool them. Genetic scanners seem to come in two varieties - an identity scanner (which costs 50000 Cr) and a medical gene-scanner, a much larger and higher resolution instrument costing 250000 Cr which can also act as an identity scanner. They work by a form of electromagnetic resonance. An identity scanner can be delivered to us today; a medical scanner will take four days. It is also possible to obtain an integrated gene-scanning system that acts as both medical, security (doorway-type) and identity scanner for 300000 Cr; this also takes four days to deliver.

He returns to the hotel and tells the other what he has found; we discuss it, and a combined scanner is ordered from 'GeneScan Inc.'. Then he and Bingbong then go off and begin to work on ways of fooling gene-scanners.

Scarlett looks for information on Jonas Harkirian on the internet. Apparently he was dismissed from the University for 'unrelated reasons' two months after blowing the whistle. He then left Rhylanor for his homeworld of Mertactor in the District 268 subsector. Scarlett then looks for follow-up news items, and also for information on other people in his years, friends and so on.

She finds that SuSAG moved the research they were conducting off-world, apparently to a new facility run by the Sword Worlds Subsector Division of SuSAG. There is not much more detail than that. Caliburn is in the Sword Worlds subsector...

Scarlett also looks for more information on the side effects that the experimental subjects suffered from thirteen years ago. Apparently they began to appear about a month after the 'treatments' were applied. We have been travelling for longer than that, but can't help worrying that, for us, the side effects may simply be taking longer to appear...

We also worry about what running from the treatment may mean for us - have we been unwittingly missing some essential drug? We also speculate that we were old when we hijacked the Dolobid and got younger in low berth, which slowed but did not stop the effect so that we woke up young.

At this point there is a knock at the door of our hotel suite.

We open it. Standing there is a tall, thin, oriental-looking man in a dark police-type uniform with a gauss pistol at his belt. Behind him is a robot, a floating sphere with many obvious sensors studding its surface. He introduces himself as Inspector Lanitch Spintle of the Trans-Imperium Police Authority (TIPA), and asks if he can come in for a chat with us.

We let him in. He sits down with the robot floating behind him. He says that the TIPA have just become aware of our purchase of the 'Fantasy', and he has come to ask us a few questions about what we intend to do with it.

Ozymandias tells him that we intend to use it to take money in danger zones, escorting ships and so on as Fantasy Escort Services.

Inspector Spintle points out the obvious uses of such a ship for smuggling, piracy, terrorism and so on. We all do our best to look innocent, but stick to our story. He tells us that we will be watched by the TIPA, as they also watch mercenary companies in the Imperium.

We claim that we are a moral step or two over common mercenaries. He looks dubious.

Then he asks us, out of the blue, if all that is so, why we have been researching SuSAG on the internet. We claim that it is Bingbong's. Honest. Bingbong says he is just considering higher education at some stage.

Inspector Spintle looks dubious. He gives us his card (a smartcard holding, among other things a PGP-style public encryption key) in case we think of anything else to tell him, or anything else which might be of use. "We've got quite a file on SuSAG and the other megacorps back at the office," he says, casually. No-one rises to this bait.

The spherical robot hovers, scanning. We worry that it could hold a gene-scanner and that Inspector Spintle could be a SuSAG agent.

He thanks us for our time, and leaves.

We go onto the internet and look for information on Spintle's robot. It turns out that it is a mobile sensor platform robot, with a multitude of sensors including a gene-scanner and EMS sensors. Performing these scans without permission is illegal by Rhylanor law, but...

We worry that the TIPA will be back once they see that their scans are obviously wrong - our DNA belongs to people who are eighty years old, after all. And that SuSAG may find out about us when this information goes into the system. Based on all that, we conclude that the time may have come to leave the Rhylanor system...

We call GeneScan Inc. and try to speed up delivery of the scanner we ordered. For 50000 Cr they are willing to bump us up the queue and let us pick up our scanner at noon tomorrow. Phew.

That done, we make ready to leave for the 'Fantasy' as soon as possible.

Ak sets up a program to use the hotel room's internet terminal to make it look like we are still using the internet from there.

Szechuan looks on the internet for a 'latex mask making machine' and finds one usable for disguise purposes. One is bought (for 500 Cr) - it will be delivered to the ship.

Most of us spend a little money booking events and activities for the next few days (after we expect to be gone) to allay the suspicions of any watchers.

A last bit of internet research is carried out to find out more about SuSAG and the scientists who were expelled ('reassigned') thirteen years ago:

All of this information is downloaded for later use. Ak finds the computers of the University of Rhylanor are quite secure - secure enough to give him trouble, anyway.

Szechuan downloads a book on scanning and counter-scanning to learn from.

Then we go the ship, and wait.

Shortly before midday the next day, Ozymandias takes the Fantasy's air-raft to GeneScan Inc. while the rest of us wait. He pays for the gene-scanner, which is twice the size of a medical gene-scanner, it is loaded into the air-raft and he flies back to the ship.

With Ozymandias back on board, after gaining permission from air traffic control, we take off into orbit about Rhylanor. Then we plan what to do next. Travelling to Caliburn seems our only option, so all that is left is to choose our route. We decide that Equus - Skull - Resten - Shirene - Spirelle - Smoug - Caliburn is the way to go.

However, before we leave, it is suggested that we send our tale and all of the associated information to Inspector Spintle as we head into Jump. He probably knows of the 'anomalies' in our DNA by now, so may be of use. After some argument we decide that simply sending him the information may not be the best idea. Instead we decide to send him the information in time-delayed form, so we can be along way off before he gets it. Six months seems a good long gap.

Szechuan likes the idea of doing this then running; he doesn't seem too aware that we are going back to Caliburn.

We head for the orbital city of Sanddorin, a 7-8 kilometres in extent space station, like Zetaddorn of a 'ball-and-stick' configuration, but much bigger than Zetaddorn. With the permission of traffic control, we dock and head out into the city. From the local internet we pick a local legal partnership, 'Lawless and Lynch', at random and head there.

Upon arrival, we explain what we want. They tell us that this is doable, and will cost us 1000 Cr. We accept their offer and go to prepare our data pack.

Back on the ship we put together a set package DNA samples, samples of the virus we had in us when we came out of low berth on the Dolobid, our real identities and a copy of our testimony in plain text. We include copies of our self-incriminating actions and our current plans (to head for Caliburn to pursue our investigations at source) in encrypted form, for Inspector Spintle's eyes only. We keep copies of all the information for ourselves, too.

With the data pack prepared all of us other than Bingbong take it to 'Lawless and Lynch'. He remains behind to do a little more research.

At the lawyers, we hand over our package. We also arrange coded messages to increase or decrease the time before the package is sent, based on the code-word 'applejack'. Any such messages will be encrypted using Lawless and Lynch's privacy key. This costs us another 500 Cr, but is probably worth it...

Then we return to the 'Fantasy', undock from Sanddorin, and with the permission of traffic control travel out to 100 diameters from Rhylanor. Then it's into jumpspace we go, en route to Equus. The transition into jumpspace is very smooth, much more so than on any other ship we've had...

While in jumpspace on the way to Equus, Scarlett and Ozymandias spar. She seems to be rather batter than him. Szechuan works on a device to fool gene-reader technology; he definitely has some idea of how to proceed with this. As we go through jumpspace, we notice that the 'Fantasy' has cleaning robots, small things that come out to work when no-one is around.

And a week later we arrive at the Equus system, as far from the system's settlements as possible. We quietly refuel and jump on to the Skull system.

Another week later we arrive at the Skull system, again as far from the system's settlements as possible. We repeat out quiet refuelling and jump on, to the Resten system.

En route, we get Bingbong to tell us what he has found out so far about what was done to us. He thinks we were infected with an anagathic virus about nine (calendar) months before we appeared at Orcrist (so more than a year ago, now). The virus seems to have undone 'copying errors' on our DNA as well as causing the regeneration of things like brain cells, joint tissues and so on. Our DNA has been altered, but only in the sense of being restored (fixed or repaired) to a young state. He does not think that we will suffer any of the side effects described in the experiments at Rhylanor. Apart from Szechuan, of course...

He thinks we will now age normally from here, but from our apparent age, not our real age. And our memory loss is permanent; he thinks that memories with deeper emotional attachments were affected more than learned skills (it would seem, then, that none of our former selves really cared for our careers!). Hmmm...

We emerge from jumpspace in the Resten system, where we intend to land to stock up on supplies, as well as just refuel. Shortly after coming out of jumpspace, while we are heading to Resten itself (which is the moon of Donaso, a gas giant planet) we detect a SuSAG ship of the 'Kantrex' class (like the Tessalon). This one is named the Tenormin.

We fly in in such as way as to appear to pay it no special mind, avoiding it and the X-Boat tender and other facilities in orbit; there is not a space station. And we landing as Resten City, the only starport-equipped settlement on Resten. It is a city of domes links together by air-filled tubes. We order in supplies and life support without leaving the ship, then leave Resten.

We refuel at Donaso, then head out again and into jumpspace, bound for the Shirene system.

Szechuan continues to work on his gene-scanner jammer.

Arriving in Shirene it quickly becomes clear that there is a large SuSAG facility here, apparently one that specialises in manufacturing chemical weapons and related equipment. We refuel and do nothing against them - it is our intention to keep our heads very much down until we get to Caliburn. And on we jump, to the Spirelle system.

Arriving at the Spirelle system we quietly refuel. There is another Kantrex-type SuSAG ship there, this one named the 'Climara'. And on we jump, to the Smoug system.

We quietly refuel in the Smoug system too. Again there is a Kantrex-type SuSAG ship there, this one named the 'Adrucil'. And we jump out, heading for the Caliburn system...

By this time Szechuan, working with Bingbong, has a working prototype of his gene-scanner jammer. It produces 'white noise' on the scanner, so that although it works it is also quite obvious when it is on...


Session 1.11   Index   Session 1.13

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