Something in The Far Leys
06 Nov 2024Bingo Bango
“There’s something out there, you know.”“Brother, there’s quite a bit more than something”, I spat back. Acolyte Arvid had a tendency to make conversations with him a bit tedious, but here he was, assigned to join me on this 3 month long expedition as my assistant: cataloging my findings, helping my sift through explo/bio data, and keeping an eye on me and my “preachy tendencies”. He was very gifted and well-read, but he could be tiring at times.
I gestured out the window of the bar, “I can spot a million ‘things’ just through this viewport. Have you not listened at all to Inquisitor Tel’s teachings? Or mine? There is no room for ambiguity in how we speak.”
Brother Arvid spun around on his barstool, his eyes averting my glare. He sat in silence for a moment, biting his lip. Did I spot a hint of worry flash across his face?
“Brother Bingo, I have been reading a few of the Order’s texts. Getting prepared for The Far Leys, doing my due diligence.” He got quiet again, and when he spoke again, he was almost whispering, his voice barely breaking through the murmur of the bar and the groans of The Old Straight Track. “Have you ever heard of Brother Malat?”
“Barely. I know he was one of the earlier explorers of the Order. If my memory is correct, he did make this trek once, to The Far Leys. I haven’t heard much of him otherwise. I think I saw a picture of his Diamondback, from an exhibit. Looked like it had seen its fair share of witch space. Brave explorer, for sure. But I know little else, or what came of him.”
“I think that may be by design, Brother. I did some digging, you see. He’s gone mad. His mind absolutely frayed. ‘Space Madness’ they said. Some in the Order called him blessed; said The Void had shown him some big truth. Others saw him as an unfortunate casualty, one that is very real, especially in the earlier years, before the Fleet Carriers and before Colonia. He’s still under medical care to this day, the poor soul.”
“I see.. I shall pray for him, so that the Void may see it fit to return to him what was lost.” I spun my chair back to the bar, and took a sip of my whiskey. There was an uneasiness in the way Arvid was speaking. “I assume there is more to this than us toasting the memory of a fallen Brother.” I could tell Arvid was again searching for the right words. This conversation was certainly a little less tedious than usual. Something was bothering him.
“Brother Malat spent 2 years in the black. At least. I couldn’t even find exact dates on him, in our archives, on Galnet. Nothing. But I did get access to his ship’s logs, it was in an old archived file at Wrangell Dock, where his ship ultimately ended up. Someone, thank the Void, had enough sense to at least try and take his ship's data. I could see why, too. 2 years in the black, that’s gotta be millions, if not billions, in credits from UC.”
“He didn’t turn in his data? I never heard anything about that….”
“Isn’t that strange, Brother? That data would also have been invaluable to the Order. But, what’s more distressing, is that the data was gone. Wiped clean.”
“By whom? The Order? The Federation? I didn’t think they-”
“By himself, Brother. Brother Malat deleted the data himself. All of it. The only data left was that of his last few jumps, saved on a back up.” I struggled to make sense of what I was hearing. It made no sense. To be gone for so long, to be holding a treasure trove of invaluable data, and to waste it all away. Was it part of his condition? It seemed so extreme. Arvid let the information settle in my mind, before he continued. “Curiosity pushed me to dig deeper. I had to find out more. So I accessed his personal logs. They were, unsurprisingly, locked away. Confidential. I had to… well, I had to access them somehow. I broke into the Holy Repository. I found them.”
I stared at Arvid, stunned. This was a serious crime. The Order holds very few secrets, but those it does hold, it holds for good reason. As an Enforcer, I should have immediately reported him, but I didn’t. I still haven’t. Not after what he told me next.
“He found something in the Far Leys. Something that broke him. Something that terrified him so much, he ran, and covered his tracks. I think he didn’t want anyone else finding it.”
“Hmm… Thargoid? No, not there. Couldn’t be.” My mind raced with possibilities. “No mention of what it was?”
“Nothing. All of his logs were pretty standard stuff, some exo bio, a green gas giant, a few exciting finds but nothing unordinary. Didn’t log the systems, probably correctly assumed they’d be tied to his UC data, before he wiped it clean. And then, suddenly, his logs become sparse and incoherent. Kept saying he went too far. Saw something he wasn’t meant to see. He… He mentioned the Void was ‘closer to us than he imagined’ at one point. Not sure what that means. But whatever it was, whatever he saw or experienced, it clearly broke him. And by all accounts, he was a pretty well put together Acolyte. Cleared for deep space exploration by the Inquisitors themselves.”
“I see. Thank you, Brother, for sharing this with me. Praise the Void for allowing us to partner together for this journey. I need to think this over. Go get some rest, see what else you can learn.” We bid each other farewell, and I retired back to Kindred, my newly engineered Mandalay. I entered the ship and found my tight quarters, where I threw myself onto my cot.
I stared blankly into my GalNet monitor. My thoughts raced. The Inquisitors sent me on this expedition themselves. They made no mention of Brother Malat, not his tragic fate. But why? I heard the FSD of The Old Straight Track stir to life as she prepared yet another 500 light year jump, inching us closer and closer to the Far Leys. And as we entered witch space again, one thought kept punching its way into my conscience, as if the Void itself was trying to tell me:
“There is something out there, you know.”