Once again, up on the familiar command bridge — Perlica still dimly remembered how, before slipping into her long sleep, the Administrator had always loved standing right here, gazing out at the scenery of Talos II.
For the sake of this planet, she had given far too much, and lost far too much as well.
The young Perlica back then had never understood why the Administrator, facing this very same view, could look at it again and again without ever growing tired.
In those days, she would simply stand by the Administrator’s leg, clutching at her clothes, with eyes that held nothing but that face which so rarely ever smiled.
But with the passage of time, it seemed she was starting to understand a little, now.
‘Administrator…where on earth have you gone…’
The scenery before her eyes did nothing whatsoever to wipe away the agitation inside her chest.
According to the contents of the Protocol Zero the Administrator had left behind, she ought to have awakened a full year from now.
The Administrator’s sudden disappearance, at this very moment, had clearly thrown into disarray even this Endfield Director who had weathered any number of trials and tempering.
If those few senior figures hadn’t kept their composure throughout, in all likelihood Perlica would have already lost what reason remained to her by now.
What she didn’t know was that those old codgers, in fact, had also been thrown into quite a serious panic when they’d first gotten the news — only, considering that this wasn’t the first time the Administrator had pulled a stunt like this, they’d at least managed to maintain their composure for the time being.
Only, this matter was a grave one.
If the news were to spread outside, it could well stir up no small upheaval throughout not just Endfield Industries, but the entire Civilization Belt as well — so, for the moment, it really was best that this particular matter remain known to none but the handful of them.
“Director Perlica!
Director Perlica!!!”
A frantic voice suddenly came rushing in from behind her.
Perlica turned around to look — it was a logistics operator from the Communications Department, who had come running over.
She was gasping for breath in great heaving gulps, but didn’t dare delay her report for even a moment.
She strode forward in quick, hurried steps and spoke a few words right into Perlica’s ear.
Perlica’s pupils contracted sharply.
“Understood — I’ll head over right away.”
With a nod to that logistics operator, Perlica suddenly took off as though the wind itself had sprung up beneath her feet — in an instant she had shot out of the Central Control Hub and was running in the direction of the Communications Room.
Every operator who caught sight of this scene along the way couldn’t help turning their heads to look, growing curious about just what kind of business could have left Director Perlica in such a state of urgency.
After all, the sight of Director Perlica actually sprinting through the corridors was a rare occurrence indeed.
As the hatch of the Communications Room slid open, Perlica only then adjusted her pace and walked inside.
A logistics operator pointed off toward the direction of the Communications Master Control Room within — Perlica followed the gesture with her eyes, and sure enough, she caught sight of m3 standing inside.
“m3 — is the report accurate?”
Perlica fired the question off the very moment she stepped through the door, getting straight to the point.
If it weren’t, I wouldn’t have called you over here.”
m3 gave a very grave nod, and then handed the tablet in her grip over to Perlica.
“We’ve caught that strange signal once again.
As before, it’s being transmitted from an unknown Protocol Synchronizer — only this time, after running the comparisons, we’ve already confirmed it: this unregistered Synchronizer is none other than that prototype unit the Administrator has in her possession.”
After completing the initial development of the Protocol Core, the Administrator had fallen into her long sleep.
The Protocol Originium technology and the Synchronizers that came afterward had already gone through several iterations’ worth of updates.
Although the functions of that prototype unit were complete in themselves, its system was already incapable of matching with the current version.
And that was precisely why they hadn’t been able to find a corresponding Protocol Synchronizer registration number in the system the first time around.
“And what’s more, this time around we managed to capture a fairly complete message.
Most likely, the Administrator over on her end has found some kind of workaround.”
Which meant they could now confirm that the Administrator’s current condition was, on the whole, probably alright.
At this very moment, all the worry and the fear that had filled Perlica’s heart over these past days was, at last, swept clean away.
The tightly-knit brow on her forehead finally relaxed and smoothed out.
“Thank goodness…”
Perlica’s soft murmur reached m3’s ears.
She gave Perlica a couple of pats on the shoulder — this child must have been terrified out of her wits over this past stretch.
Only — the message the Administrator had sent through this time around was, in all likelihood, about to keep this child up at night all over again.
As for Perlica’s end — once she’d finished muttering to herself, she couldn’t wait any longer and opened the file on the tablet right away.
The message the Administrator had sent appeared before her eyes in short order.
[Sorry — my sudden disappearance must have caused you all quite a bit of trouble.]
The Administrator’s voice rang out beside her ear.
Perlica lifted her head — and that very figure she had longed for day and night had, in this moment, appeared right in front of her.
Only, owing to losses incurred during transmission, the repaired audio-visual recording carried with it a slight trace of distortion.
And yet even so — even though the two of them hadn’t seen each other in nearly ten years now, Perlica had never once forgotten this appearance and this voice that had been carved so deeply into her mind.
It was just a shame, then, that this was no more than a recorded audio-visual message — and there was no time for the two of them to truly speak with each other face-to-face.
[I don’t have much time, so I’ll keep this short and to the point.]
[As of this moment, my situation is perfectly fine on all counts.
There’s no need for you to worry too much.
As for the specifics — please forgive me, but I’m unable to explain them to you for the time being.
You can simply treat this as an attempt on my part, an attempt that bears on…mm, the future of Talos II.] This chapter was taken from g.com without permission.
The Administrator’s voice paused for a small moment here, as though there had been some words she had been about to say halfway through, only to suddenly change tack.
[Next, I’ll be attempting to use Protocol Originium to perform a single long-distance Hyperdomain Teleportation.
This is going to require your cooperation — by the time I send another message through, please have a fully-calibrated Protocol Core prepared and ready.]
[I have faith — that with your capabilities, the most important corner of the blueprint I envisioned has long since been completed.]
[Perlica — I’m counting on you.]
“Administrator…”
The holographic recording before her eyes had long since faded away, but Perlica was still steeped in the emotions of the moment just past, unable to pull herself out for some time — until m3 slowly patted her on the shoulder.
“I’m alright, m3.”
Perlica shook her head.
She had long since ceased to be that tender little Liberi child of yesteryear — and she would absolutely never betray the trust the Administrator had placed in her.
“It’s time we got ourselves ready.”
Watching the Perlica before her pull herself back together once more, a relieved smile rose to m3’s face as well — but as her gaze fell on that tablet, her eyes took on a slightly mournful, resentful tint.
“You little troublemaker, you…really had nothing at all to say to the rest of us, did you…”
“Achoo!
Achoo!
Achoo!”
Standing out there in the freezing world of ice and snow, the Administrator let out three sneezes in a row, which immediately drew Saito’s attention from off to one side.
“Are you alright?
Did you catch a cold?”
The Administrator gave her head a small shake.
She didn’t feel any sort of discomfort — it was just that, for reasons she couldn’t quite put her finger on, she felt as though someone had been gossiping about her behind her back just now.
Most likely it was just her imagination.
“So — are we really going to deploy the Protocol Core here?
I still think we ought to prioritize safety considerations first, wouldn’t you say?”
Even though Saito did genuinely trust the Administrator’s judgment deep down in his heart, when he looked at the over-the-top traces of damage all around them, it was hard for him not to entertain a few misgivings.
He still wanted to take this very first step on steadier footing.
“It’ll be fine.
At the very least, in the near term, the people who left these marks behind aren’t going to be coming back here.”