The Genesis Saga

The ship dropped out of hyperspace, the rest of the journey having passed by smoothly. There had been no hiccups and the crew had been surprisingly obedient, even though they’d tried pushing the boundaries of their authority. Jyn had been sure to stamp out any ideas about setting Adrian free and kept a tight leash on anything concerning the man.

Verilia’s beautiful purple skies looked picturesque from the image Jyn had on his holoscreen. He was glad to be home again. Glad that this headache-inducing problem was finally going to be taken care of by somebody else. He was looking forward to seeing Reya, hoping that she was doing better than when he’d last seen her.

Tassie and Rann had filled him in on her mental state as she recovered in the hospital. Despite being busy working, he’d still made sure to pop in and see her from time to time. Once it had been pointed out to him, the signs of Reya’s distress were obvious.

Daydreams of spending time with Reya distracted him while an incoming call appeared on his holoscreen. Belatedly, he noticed it but didn’t have time to answer. Tassie had the call transferred to her station and picked it up instead.

It had hardly been a minute since they’d returned to their home system and Irric was already contacting them. Jyn stood up from his command chair and approached Tassie, irritated that he wasn’t the one doing the talking.

Irric was not in a playful mood. His face was grave and serious as he issued very specific instructions to the crew. He explained that the orders were directly from Nessah herself and were to be treated as such, even if he was the one delivering them.

He informed them to put up their cloaking system and land with it up at a very specific, very carefully deserted docking port on the base. Security cameras in that section had been disabled “for maintenance purposes.” They were to make no contact with anybody else on base, not even mission control to request clearance to land their spacecraft. Those employees had been convinced, Irric said delicately, to be away from their control room for the next little while.

Nessah wanted this to remain a secret and she had gone through great lengths to ensure that it stayed that way. For the remainder of their entry back onto the planet, Irric was going to remain connected to them, both to ensure that the General’s instructions were carried out properly, and to alert her the moment they landed.

An air of tension filled the ship as they very carefully carried out Irric’s instructions, one step at a time. There was no jovial conversation while they approached the atmosphere. There was no lighthearted humour as they descended towards the ground. There was utter silence as they landed in the emptied docking bay.

Tassie informed Irric that they had successfully landed as instructed. Irric warned them to keep their cloaking device on and to exit the ship fully armed. They were to let nobody except him and the General near their payload as they delivered it to a secure holding room not far into the building. They were authorized to use lethal force on anybody that disobeyed. That order raised eyebrows. Tassie flashed Irric a hesitant look and asked for confirmation. Irric patiently repeated himself.

Beor was the only one not present on the bridge, his job being to guard Adrian in case anything happened. He was already combat ready and remained glued to his post while the others quickly prepared themselves. Not two minutes later, the door to Adrian’s cell was opened. He took one look at his heavily armed guard detail and said “So, we’re finally here.”

Adrian took no chances and obediently followed as they formed a protective ring around him. Only Tassie remained on the ship to monitor its systems as well as the docking bay. The door to the ship opened and the group descended the ramp. Irric guided them using their comms, bringing them inside the base and towards a specially designed holding room.

Adrian walked the corridors with interest, noting the difference between the research facility he’d spent so much time at and where he was now. The walls were white and unremarkable while the ceiling was uncovered, exposing the piping and electrical wires that snaked through the base. The floors were a mixture of concrete and metal grating. Adrian tried to peer down into it but was nudged forward before he had the chance to make out any other details beyond some larger metal pipes.

Soon, Adrian found himself sitting in a metal room with a chair and a table. The furniture was stuck fast to the floor, unmovable. Adrian took a seat while Beor resumed his post outside of the room, with Eimir joining him. The door shut with a click, the mechanical lock snapping into place to ensure that it would remain so.

Adrian stared at the unadorned walls. He stood up and inspected his surroundings, knocking on the walls, trying to gauge how thick they were. A dull sound resounded as he rapped his knuckles on the hard metal, telling Adrian that there was something behind the walls. He assumed that they were reinforced. Another cell, he thought to himself.

He didn’t spot any bedding or toiletry in the room. A temporary holding cell then. Likely to question me. He looked around for any cameras, checking the corners of the ceilings. He didn’t spot anything obvious. He squinted at one of the walls, finding it to be a slightly paler shade of grey than the others, his enhanced eyes allowing him to pick out the detail. I bet they can see me through that wall. He gave a wave.

“How can he see us?” Rann asked in the control room as she observed Adrian look right at her and wave.

“He can’t,” Kell confirmed. “He’s probably figured out that we can see him somehow.”

“How?” Rann asked, dumbfounded.

Kell shrugged. “Not a clue.”

“Alright, that’s enough,” Jyn clapped. “Kell, go out and guard the halls with the others. I’ll go meet the General and bring her over. Rann, you stay here and keep an eye on him.” He jerked his head towards Adrian. “Move out.”

Kell snapped to attention and left the room, followed by Jyn. Rann was left alone to oversee Adrian, who was now sitting on the table, swinging his legs. It wasn’t long before Rann heard footsteps approaching. She readied her weapon and moved out of direct line of sight from the doorway.

She relaxed when she saw Jyn’s figure enter, followed by Nessah. Only when the door to the room shut did Jyn speak. Nessah’s eyes were immediately drawn to Adrian, who was now sitting in the chair, facing them. Once Jyn was done, Rann immediately added what she’d learned by speaking to Adrian during their trip back.

“By the gods, Cyrix, what have you sent me?” Nessah whispered as she absorbed the information like a sponge. She turned around and faced Rann and Jyn. “Has he divulged any information about the research facility?”

“Nothing useful,” Rann said.

“Explain.”

“He’s remained extremely tight-lipped about anything relating to what he was doing there, what they were doing to him and why. He’s only claimed that he doesn’t know what they did to him exactly, but never elaborated on the subject.”

“Do you think he knows anything useful about the facility?”

Rann hesitated. “No, I don’t. At least, nothing that would help us immediately.”

“Assuming he’s even telling the truth,” Jyn said. “He could be lying about everything he’s said.”

“What reason would he have to lie?” Rann challenged.

“He’s already evasive about what they did to him. That’s suspicious. Why won’t he tell us? Because he’s obviously got something to hide,” Jyn snapped back.

“Did it ever occur to you that he might just be traumatised at being used as a living test subject? I’ve recognized the same behavioural patterns with Reya ever since she’s returned from the facility,” Rann said. It had taken her a while, but she finally pieced together his odd behaviour from back in the facility when they’d entered the room with the stasis pod. She noticed that there were long stretches of time where Adrian zoned out in his cell, much like how Reya would often stare into space.

“Don’t bring Reya into this.”

“Why not? I’m just saying what I’ve observed. It’s not like you bothered spending any time trying to extract information from him.”

“That’s enough,” Nessah said, cutting off Jyn’s reply. She turned to face Rann. “What makes you so sure he doesn’t have anything to offer us?”

“Why would the gru’ul bother explaining their experiments to their lab rat? He was kept in a cell with no door, behind a force field for who knows how long. He probably never had access to the results from their experiments. And even if he did, I bet he wouldn’t even know how to read their language. Short of opening him up to see what was done to him – which would be completely unethical – I don’t think we’ll ever truly know what happened.”

“They taught him how to speak our language during his time there. He could have learned theirs,” Jyn countered.

Nessah raised her eyebrows at this. “You mean we can communicate with him fully? It’s not broken sentences or a smattering of words?”

“That’s right,” Rann confirmed. “He claims that they taught him. He clamped right up when I asked how. Something obviously happened during that time period. He also speaks a completely foreign language, by the way, that he hasn’t shared with us.”

“See! Suspicious,” Jyn said.

“Come on,” Rann rolled her eyes. “He knows that we wouldn’t be able to understand him in his own language. Why would he even bother using it with us?”

Jyn had nothing to say to that.

“If we can speak with him, I’d like to question him personally,” Nessah said. She went to the data terminals that lined the shared wall between Adrian’s cell and the control room. She typed several commands and activated the communications system, allowing for a two-way conversation to take place.

“Hello,” Nessah said, testing the waters. Adrian visibly perked up at hearing the greeting.

“I knew there was somebody watching me,” he replied, perfectly fluently in their language, surprising Nessah. He sounded like a local. She turned back towards Rann and Jyn, turning off the system before asking “Are you sure he’s from an undiscovered planet?”

“That’s what he claims,” Rann said. “And to be frank, I believe him. Nothing else adds up otherwise. His reaction to our technology was very strange. He’d never seen a hoverbike before yet claims that he wasn’t born at the research facility.”

Nessah nodded and turned the communications system back on. “Do you have a name I can call you by?”

Adrian looked amused. “You mean they didn’t tell you?” He said his name aloud for his faceless company.

For the next hour, Nessah proceeded to ask Adrian questions, pressing him for answers. Some of the times he was very forthcoming, others not as much. As the session progressed, Nessah found his knowledge to be severely lacking in certain areas. When she asked him about his planet’s military, he simply laughed and said that it was a joke compared to theirs, refusing to further elaborate. When she asked about his home planet and their factions, he explained in great detail that there were many and that his planet was very fractured in that sense.

By the time they were done, Nessah had determined that he was indeed telling the truth as he knew it. There were too many details for him to be making up an entire civilization. He even spoke about hobbies and pastimes of his. Some short, common stories from his culture were recounted by him to help prove his point. His culture was a topic he was very open about.

Nessah turned off the two-way communications system and stared at Adrian. “Guard him and make sure nobody else learns of his existence,” she said without turning to face Jyn and Rann. “I’ll be back shortly with my decision on what to do with him. Until then, keep him safe.”

“Understood,” came Jyn’s reply. He and Rann briefly saluted Nessah, dropping their pose when she absentmindedly nodded at them.

Nessah left the room, prompting salutes from Beor and Kell as she passed them in the halls. She didn’t dismiss them as she normally would have, her mind too preoccupied with her newest problem. Muttering to herself, she strode back towards the vehicle she had left parked outside in order to return to the central command building as soon as possible. She needed to think this over in private.

Nessah slammed the door to her office shut, her mind awhirl with possibilities and different scenarios. She tried imagining the Elders’ reaction to Adrian and came up short. She plopped down at her desk and, for the first time in years, was at a total loss for as to what to do next. Never in a million years had she expected this to be what Cyrix had discovered.

Swivelling her chair around, she looked out the window. It was nighttime. Much of the base had gone to sleep, but there were still some souls out and about, tasked with night shifts. In a way, she was glad for the late hour. It meant that there was less of a risk of others noticing that something was afoot in the base. She couldn’t afford a leak. Not right now. She needed to act fast before others found out.

Nessah knew that she needed to keep Adrian’s existence a secret until she properly figured out what to do with him, but she couldn’t just keep him locked up indefinitely. While she could if she really wanted to, such actions would only garner animosity and make him reluctant to further share his knowledge. She needed to know his secrets. Needed to learn about what he wasn’t telling them.

An alien! A new species that so closely resembled hers. Her mind reeled from the revelation. She wondered how nature could allow such a miracle to occur. The world wasn’t ready to learn about him yet, not until they knew more. She couldn’t let him loose in society without making the proper preparations and she couldn’t keep him on the base either. Somebody would discover him and tell others about him, ruining any advantage she could gain from this discovery.

It was imperative she learn why he was in the research facility as well as what experiments were performed on him. Most importantly, she wanted to know what the gru’ul learned from them. One doesn’t simply perform experiments on other beings unless there’s a purpose to them. Or maybe they did. Who knew how their minds worked? Unfortunately, she knew that Adrian wouldn’t be much help with most of those questions. Still, he could provide valuable insight.

Taking a deep breath, Nessah opened one of the drawers at the bottom of her desk. She withdrew a decanter filled with an amber liquid and took the glass that was next to it. Carefully pouring herself a small amount, she downed it in one shot. Grimacing as the alcohol burned her throat, she poured herself another glass, this time to sip more slowly.

Turning her chair back towards the window, she gazed up at the stars, drink in hand. A delicate aroma wafted from the glass filling her nose and calming her. She felt her earlier shot settle in her stomach, a gentle warmth spreading throughout her body.

She stared out the window for some time, lost in thought. When she was halfway done her glass, she picked up her data slate and called Cyrix on their private line. She waited several long moments for him to pick up. Nessah grew annoyed when he didn’t answer but knew that he probably wasn’t somewhere secure enough to take this particular call. He must know that she was calling about Adrian.

Every second that passed frayed her nerves further, the uncertainty of the situation getting to her. She thought desperately for a solution while she waited but was no further advanced than when she’d entered her office. Finally, fifteen minutes later, Cyrix called back. Nessah eagerly picked up.

“What the hell, Cyrix!” she exploded. This was not how she meant to start the conversation, but she couldn’t help it and released her pent-up stress on her poor Commander. “Couldn’t you have at least warned me about this?”

“I did,” Cyrix replied calmly. He’d been expecting this reaction. After all, it wasn’t everyday you dropped first contact protocols in someone’s lap. Technically, there were procedures to follow for situations like this, but since they had no actual contact with Adrian’s civilization, the process became muddied. “I told you this was big. Do you see now why I had you take precautions?”

“Yes,” Nessah begrudgingly admitted. “I was expecting a gru’ul, but this? This is huge. Do you have any idea the implications of this?”

“I’m aware, Nessah. I’ve spent the last couple of weeks thinking about it. It’s vital now, more than ever, that we learn what this facility is really about.”

“By the damned,” Nessah swore. “This is a game changer. What are we supposed to do with this?”

“We hide it for now. The world isn’t ready to learn about this yet.”

“By the gods, when the Tribunal finds out about this . . .” Nessah trailed off, feeling a headache beginning to form at the thought.

“That’s why you need to keep it as secret as possible. We need time, Nessah. Time to learn this place’s secrets and its relation to what we’ve found.”

“I’ll need to put what we found in a secure location. This place has too many prying eyes.”

Cyrix nodded. “Good idea. It might buy enough time for us to learn about it. That said, losing Tassie over here is pretty bad. We don’t have enough manpower anymore to hack into the gru’ul systems, not if we want to keep the facility’s existence a secret. Things have gone slower than expected ever since she left.”

Nessah thought for a moment, before having an idea. “I’ll send Irric over. This is his area of expertise.” Cyrix turned pensive, thinking about the offer.

“That would help immensely, actually.”

“Consider it done. I’ll send him out as soon as possible. Make sure that he has everything he needs by the time he gets there. Now then, where can I put our newest problem?”

“I think it’s better if we don’t discuss that on this channel. I’ll leave it to you to figure out the logistics for this one. I won’t be there to help you this time. Be careful, Nessah.” Cyrix hung up before any more information could be divulged. He had no doubt in his mind that somebody would get a hold of a transcript of this call. It was only a matter of time.

Time he knew they didn’t have.