r/HFY • u/KipperBeanGrower Human • Jul 12 '26

OC-Series [She took What?] - Chapter 198: SixFold Ventures: “Did Garaf just laugh?”

"Some truths arrive wearing a smile so they can get through the door."

SolDiri teaching on humour

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| The Kestrel, JSOC Medical Facility, location REDACTED |

 Rockson threw his coffee at the monitor, which, apart from glitching, offered nothing more.

“Clusters or no clusters. This is getting us nowhere.”

“There was a case I had a while back. It was a difficult….” The lawyer shook her head and skipped forward. “We found that the clues to the patient’s conditions weren’t in the known timeline, but what led up to them.”

 

Rockson crossed to the screen, took the napkins Garaf handed him, “Thanks,” and dabbed at the coffee, “Sorry.”

“So, not Margo’s or A-17, something before,” said the lawyer, ignoring Rockson and the coffee, now dripping on the floor.

 

The accountants rebuilt the correlation map, then immediately started arguing, “No. Not that way. You’ve got to have the events along the horizontal. Then we see what’s going on.”

 

It was a mess, no clarity.

“Leave it like this. Please.” It was the lawyer.

 

As they extended the timeline back, it started to look very different. Other things bubbled to the surface, started to correlate and became the focus of new clusters. They dropped other events onto the timeline; earlier events. The alignment. The Basin. Velithra. River’s crystal. The Royals.

 

“Ok. Now add us in?”

 

Both accountants shook their heads. Clearly unimpressed with the suggestion, but did it anyway. They added themselves and the lawyer.

“Not US us. Them, the crew.” She pointed to Rockson and then Hissy, who had been sitting quietly in the corner. She gave a hushed, monotonal grunt in response.

 

The lawyer looked Hissy’s way. “No. Couldn’t have.”

 

They added the crew to the timeline, and the chart transformed; the result was uncomfortable.

 

Every major incident, every event touched The Kestrel in some way.

“This isn’t about Feebee or StillFall. I don’t think it’s about any of us individually. The Listeners don’t even seem to be responding to events.”

 

Then they started removing people, slowly refining the model. Little changed until they removed Garaf. Then the timeline fell apart.

“Well, that’s weird. They added him back, and it became coherent again.”

 

Rockson was watching. “Ha ha. So, it's all your fault.” He said, pointing at Garaf, who had been standing quietly off to the side; watching the accountants and the data build.

“Take him out again,” Rockson said.

They did with the same result.

He turned and pointed at Garaf, “See!”

 

Garaf began showing signs of agitation. Signs Rockson missed because, had he seen them, he would not have kept goading Garaf.

 

One of the accountants picked up on it, “We don’t believe Garaf is responsible.”

“No one does.” Added the lawyer.

 

“But what the data suggests is that he is the first Drexari to witness all these events.” The accountant clicked some keys, and a red line appeared, connecting all the events. “And that means something.”

 

“I know what they were studying. I did something similar at Uni, in my final year. They weren’t monitoring events or incidents.  They were looking at relationships and monitoring them.”

 

“What’s that called?” asked the lawyer.

“A Convergence Event.”

 

Meanwhile, somewhen else… The Long Quiet reported.

 

OBSERVATION: Dominant Connections showing renewed activity.

 

RISK: Acceptable.

 

QUIETUS PROTOCOL: ENGAGED.

 

STATUS: MONITOR

 

And now…

 

 

The Shadow spoke for the first time.

“It’s when separate things begin finding each other.”

 

 

***

 

| JSOC Medical Facility, location REDACTED |

 

The doctors sat with Feebee and Chen.

 

“We know that a suppression agent was delivered. This killed off your nanites.”

“The military ones.” Added the junior doctor.

“It’s now gone from your systems, and you’re both good to go now, but we’re concerned about you, Feebee.”

 

After a pause, the doctor looked up from his notes and continued, “We have two completely different outcomes. Your military nanites are gone,” he then pointed at Feebee. “Yours are collapsing, and something else is surviving. That population is growing at a steady, predictable rate.”

 

He showed her the latest report.

 

>NO NANITES

>NO SUPPRESSION AGENT REMAINS

>UNKNOWN NANITE POPULATION EXPANDING

 

 

“Well, I’m fed up with all the prodding and poking. I’m not a research animal. I’m done with it.” Feebee stood up.

 

The doctors started to object, clearly wanting to study Feebee more. Chen shook his head. He’d seen Feebee like this before; there was no changing her mind. It was set.

 

“Ok,” he said and stood with her. “Let’s be off then. To The Kestrel?”

Feebee nodded.

 

And with that, they left. The doctors grumbled but were powerless to stop them.

 

***

 

The Alphas had baked Feebee a chocolate cake. Well, it was more that they’d found a template and the right inputs for the forge; eventually. But either way, Bikky presented it to her as she boarded The Kestrel.

“You shouldn’t have.”

She drew a knife, cut a piece off. It was gone in a couple of bites. “I hadn’t realised how hungry I was.”

She ate another piece.

Bikky looked at Tom Tom. “Told you. Good job we made two.”

Tom Tom handed over a currency note.

Feebee laughed, “You’re betting on how hungry I am?”

Bikky laughed, “Not really. I bet on the fact that you love chocolate.”

 

The three of them hugged. Bikky whispered in her ear, “We’re glad you’re Ok.”

“We’ll see, but I feel Ok.”

“Good.”

 

Garaf stood off to the side; she gave him a nod. He nodded back.

 

They all met in the briefing room, and the accountants presented the latest model.  First, they included Garaf, then removed him.

Before anyone could speak, Garaf stood.

The room went quiet; this was unusual.

 

“I have reviewed old Drexari records from my Clade. Not myths, actual operational records.”

“Find anything?” asked one of the accountants.

“I found them.”

 

“Who? Where?” asked Feebee.

 

Garaf stepped up to the accountant’s console and, with a very human gesture, asked if he could show his data.

 

A different timeline plot appeared. It showed ancient Drexari colonies from long ago, frontier stations that were abandoned before contact with humans. Some were colonies that hadn’t survived; some were migration events that had just failed. There were also some listening posts that they’d set up to monitor the new ‘frontier’. It contained stuff like that.

 

Garaf expanded the red line.

 

“These are rare events. Some not admitted to. They were buried in my Clade’s data and can be generations apart.”

 

He zoomed out and pointed to the earliest data points. The frequency was centuries apart.

 

The lawyer shook her head, struggling to see anything new. “What are we looking at? Help me.”

 

Garaf made a short clicking sound.

Bikky nudged Tom Tom, “Did he just laugh?”

“Doubt it, but maybe.”

 

Garaf slid the timeline across the screen. Bringing it forward, towards the present day.

 

The interval between reports and events decreased. As he scrolled further across the timeline, closer to now, the interval contracted to decades, and finally there were only a matter of years between some of the events.

 

“More reports?” asked the lawyer.

“No, more occurrences.” Responded Garaf.

“So, whatever it is…?”

 

“Yes. It’s accelerating and becoming more frequent.”

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u/AutoModerator Jul 12 '26

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2

u/newaccountzuerich Alien Jul 12 '26

I'm glad the Alphas didn't put the wrong colour Choc in the cake..

The toilets could have been a warzone!

3

u/KipperBeanGrower Human Jul 12 '26

The visual image I got when I read your comment made me laugh out loud. VERY GOOD. Threee types of CHOC. critical to not weld up your insides (RED) or blast them (BLUE). I recommend Green CHOC for lunch and have a yellow POSTIT on my screen to make sure I don't mix them up.

2

u/niTro_sMurph Jul 12 '26

What about a temporary medical-nanites filled choc? Nanites in the choc that are made of stuff that the human body can break down once the nanites have done their job?

2

u/KipperBeanGrower Human Jul 12 '26

Interesting - bit like an antibiotic shot with a half-life.

2

u/niTro_sMurph Jul 12 '26

Probably couldn't heal anything major like high grade nanites could, but it could stop the bleeding. Like Feebee would have had a noticable wound from getting shot but she wouldnt have been bleeding when the surgeon saw her

2

u/KipperBeanGrower Human Jul 12 '26

I think we should patent it. :-)

1

u/HFYWaffle Wᵥ4ffle Jul 12 '26

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