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The drone came blasting into Sol solar system faster than the sun can emit its rays of light, riding on a deformed black hole, bending the laws of physics and pushing the little, unmanned craft to unimaginable speeds. The technology was rather amazing, but each drone had only enough power for one shot. One opportunity to get home. It didn’t give engineers any opportunity to do any testing but since these drones weren’t actually intended to be used, at least not really, nobody really cared and just trusted the technology. If it was ever needed, everyone just hoped it would move fast enough to do its job, which either was to get help or to get a message out. Or both. Technically though, it wasn’t moving. It just bent space, folding it in on itself in a little bubble, just large enough to fit the drone. It then closed and opened the faux-black hole, many, many times in rapid succession. The result was something akin to an interstellar jump-skipping. More a flat rock, skidding over water than a conventional rocket, though theoretically very far removed from either. Those less technically inclined would just call stupendously fast, though it didn’t really generate any thrust. No delta-V, no torque, nothing. If you were to take the time it would take to go from the point of departure to the intended arrival point, however, well, then one might conclude it was going very, very fast indeed. The fastest thing in the universe, as far as humans were concerned. When it was let go from the “Oiseau Blanc’’, the date was 27th of October, 2144. When it got in range of Pluto station, it was three weeks later. By this time, Pluto’s drone station, normally reserved for research and refuelling drones, received two short blips. Then it was gone, heading deeper into the system. Barely half a minute later, it passed Saturn, with several more stations picking up pings. It didn’t matter though. By the time its automated systems sent a message to Earth’s CESF HQ the drone had already dropped out of its self-imposed black hole, closing it off forever. With some minor thrusting, black hole jumping being a tricky technique to get down perfectly to the individual millimetre, it glided slowly into a near-perfect spherical orbit around the blue marble. Date: November 24, 2144, 10:28.
Sitting at her desk, drone data engineer Anastasia Valenova, Anya for short, was the first to spot up the ping. Policy dictated that all pings are accepted, by whatever system it picks up first. It seemed the stars had aligned and Anya’s workstation had just been unlocked by her, after getting her third cup of coffee that morning. She just sat down, logged on and there was this ping staring her in the face. Proverbially. At first, she wanted to shove it to the side, let it be lost in the massive list of drones that fly by, around, under and over Earth on a daily basis. She was just getting into the surveillance data of a mining scouting drone out of the belt and wanted to finish her report before noon. Hand in her report, on time for once. This one, however, was persistent. It’s systems allowed for a total override of hers, forcing itself, and thereby its message, onto Anya’s screens.
‘’What the hell does this one want? You broken or something?’’ Anya asked herself, perhaps a bit louder than intended. Not that anyone seemed to care. She had already positioned herself as the odd one out in the office. Among the straight-laced suits and immaculate military uniforms, her ill-put together slacks and an attempt at a clean jacket jarred with an environment historically known for its informal atmosphere. Not at the CESF Drone Surveillance HQ in Bucharest. It was Anya’s skill that put her in the position she was now, not how she looked. Though her boss wouldn’t let her hear the end of it at pretty much every performance review. She managed to cover up her tattoos and minimize her piercings during working hours, which for her was sufficient.
Right now, she had some other things on her mind. The message that flowed out of the drone was more than a bit of a surprise. Anya’s almost dropped her coffee, her body apparently unable to focus enough brainpower on both what her brain was processing and the arm that was holding her cup.
‘’No. No. No’’ she said under her breath. ‘’Holy fucking hole in a dyke’’. Some suits looked at her, glaring in contempt. She shot them a quick glance, a pathetic attempt at an apologetic smile. They quickly realized who was responsible for the outburst and they promptly continued ignoring her.
She closed her eyes and leaned back.
‘’Deep breaths. Deep breaths. In. Out. In. Out.’’
She opened her eyes and put them back on the screen.
‘’This can’t be happening.’’ She checked, she double-checked, she triple-checked. She considered calling over Juan, who’d normally be sitting across from her, but he wasn’t there.
Realizing there was only one course of action she could take, she swiped the info to her portable workstation, jumped up and ran across the hall. Halfway through the hall, she realized she was still carrying her cup, though not much coffee was left inside of it. Most of the java was sloshed over her jacket and the floor, she could hear a colleague shout to her ‘’are you going to clean this up!?’’
‘’Sorry!’’ she managed to call out, looking back. It took all of her dexterity to avoid her from bumping into a couple of her colleagues when she turned her head back around.
Avoiding her colleagues, keeping whatever was left in her cup and basically staying calm took pretty much all of her faculties.
‘’This is not happening, this is not happening’’. The phrase was repeating in her head with the regularity of a pulsar.
* * *
Jail had been tough on Anya. It might not have been a maximum-security prison since her crime had been hacking. Mostly hacking. Some of the others in her wing were in for some more serious stuff. With Anya’s small stature, she was often the target of harassment. Though prisons were generally geared for rehabilitation, rather than base punishment, mental terrorizing was still a thing. And even those experiences did not prepare her for the weight that this messaged had pushed on her mind.
* * *
Seconds, what had felt much longer, later, she arrived at her bosses office. Normally, she would compose herself. She wasn’t the most outwardly brash and she respected her boss. Without him, she would not have had the position she has now.
Yet, she stormed into her boss’ office, who was in the middle of a meeting.
‘’Boss! I’ve got… a… Pro-’’ She had to do a double-take before she realized she just burst in the middle of a meeting. She spotted Juan and realized she had just burst into the Tuesday Team Meeting. Which she missed. Realizing what happened, she knew she could one of two options. Either pretend she was just late to the meeting and hope the problem would go away. Innately, this suited. Some part of her being wanted that. Normalcy, just to pretend everything is fine while chaos envelops your reality. Within those split seconds, she could hear a little voice, in the back of her head, whispering almost imperceptibly… ‘’Just sit down…’’
By now her colleagues were staring, her boss glaring. She respected him, but she knew he wasn’t a big fan of interruptions.
She had to do better, she thought.
When the words came out of her mouth, they felt like it wasn’t her saying them, but rather a piece of her, somewhere deep inside that wanted something better for her, a part of her daring self that hadn’t died yet.
‘’I think we got…’’
She lost her breath. Strange how your throat always decides it’s really to swallow some saliva when you least need it too.
‘’Yes, Anya?’’ her boss finished for her.
She took a breath, stood firm. ‘’We’ve got a Protocol B.’’
Her boss raised both his eyebrows. Anya saw. She nodded. He nodded back.
And then all hell broke loose.
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