Storyline Pt. 2
[MAYBE HAVE THIS SCENE BE VOICED BY LIJHO’S INNER MONOLOGUE AS HE SITS IN THE DINER]
The scene opens with Lijho sitting at the counter in the diner holding the necklace that Eckley gave him in his hand. He looks down at it to examine it a bit, and all in all, it’s pretty plain looking. It just looks like a “lucky coin” necklace. Nonetheless, he puts it around his neck and tucks it under his shirt. He knows he needs to test it out to make sure what Eckley said is true, but what does he hack first to make sure? He needs time to think. He’s just hanging out at the diner having some coffee, and also letting some time pass before returning to Lanferno, so as not to draw too much attention to himself. Hopefully by the time he gets back to Lanferno, the guy that was working the front desk will have gone home and the new guy will have started his shift.
Sitting at the counter of the diner, Lijho just tries to process all the strange things that seem to be coinciding. It could be coincidence, but he doesn’t believe in coincidence. Everything happens for a reason, and even if the reason seems random, he knows that’s not how physics, science, the world works. Just because you don’t understand why something is happening, doesn’t make the event any less real. His gut is telling him these issues are all connected. The sun seeming bigger in the sky, the earthquakes taking place, even though the Plate System is in place… something is happening and he knows he won’t be able to stop thinking about it until he figures out exactly what.
Back at Lanferno, the place is dead. Maybe one or two people in the entire place, not paying attention to anything or anyone. The guy behind the counter is someone Lijho has never seen before, and he’s so engrossed in his online game he doesn’t even bother to greet Lijho or interact with him at all when he walks in the door. Perfect.
Lijho goes and finds a computer that is facing away from the main part of the room so nobody can see what he’s doing. He takes the coin necklace that Eckley gave him, and inserts it into a slot in the computer. He stares at it waiting for it to do something, anything. Nothing happens. It just sits there. Obviously Lijho doesn’t know if it’s actually working or not, so he needs a way to test to see if it actually opens up places online he normally can’t access. He decides to log into The Guild and poke around. He navigates his way to the open jobs, and sees things he’s never seen before.
Normally when you log into The Guild, it knows your security clearance, because your security level is tied to your account, so only jobs at your level or below will be visible. But Lijho is seeing security levels he’s never seen before. Wanting to prove the necklace is working without a doubt, he signs out, puts the necklace in his pocket, and signs back in. When he navigates back to the same page, the security levels he just saw, are no longer there. Clearly whatever this necklace is, it allows him to not only be untraceable, but allows him complete access, as if he were a high-level official in the Paseo.
Putting the necklace back in the computer, he logs in once again and goes back to look through some of the high level job offerings, just curious to see what kinds of jobs there even are. Most of the jobs have to do with Genocy and being a prison guard, some of the jobs have to do with Zelan and Climatrol, but then he happens to stumble onto a few job listings listed under ‘Nebula’.
“Nebula?” he says to himself out loud. He’s confused because it’s listed as the name of a level of security clearance, but he’s never heard of that. And he knows EVERY security clearance level from his hacking days in breaking into different Paseo projects. What’s even stranger, the jobs are pretty entry level stuff. Spaceship pilots, people with combat and weapons experience known as ‘hunters’, people with basic medical experience, construction workers; nothing that requires any sort of special experience, and certainly nothing that would require a security clearance, but then he sees that they are also looking for anyone with expertise in planet terraforming.
The Paseo star system has 3 planets, and only 3 planets. This has been known for the several hundred years the planets have been inhabited. The fact that each planet has multiple artificial satellites in orbit, and that space travel between planets is part of everyday life shows that no other planets exist in Paseo. They have the technology to detect and travel to any other planets that would be in the Paseo star system, as even their most primitive spacecrafts can travel distances well outside the Paseo system. That being said, any other planets or nearby systems would have been discovered long ago. The planets that already exist in the Paseo system have already been terraformed and inhabited for over a thousand years.
He looks deeper into the job description and whatever other information he can find on the job itself, but it’s intentionally limited. It looks like the Paseo are just trying to put together some rudimentary team of people for something called the Nebula Project, but now Lijho is even more confused. Is ‘Nebula’ referring to a level of security clearance, or an actual project? Or are they one and the same?
Under the location description of the job listings, they all say “interplanetary”, meaning the jobs take place on multiple planets, but the planets aren’t listed. Everything about this listing just seems completely bizarre, and unlike anything he’s ever seen. Nothing seems to make sense. Why would basic jobs require a special security clearance? Why would they need such a random group of different skills- medical professionals, construction workers, people with combat and weapons experience, and the strangest of all, people with terraforming expertise. Then Lijho happens to see something that really catches his eye- the date of the listing was over a year ago. That means the project, and the job listings are still ongoing.
“What the hell?” he says to himself quietly.
He starts to click through other listings that have anything to do with Nebula, and finds a list of names, what he can only assume is a duty roster. It includes various people of all from all 3 planets in the Paseo system, and various levels of skill and expertise. Obviously this is more than a small government project if it involves people from across the entire Paseo system.
As he’s looking at the computer screen a distant rumble is felt, like thunder from an approaching storm. He looks out the window and sees that the sky is completely blue, not a storm or cloud in sight. The rumble reaches a crescendo until he realizes it’s not thunder but another earthquake. Not nearly as bad as the one the other night, but enough that he needs to place his hands on the desk to stop the computer screen, and objects on the desk to keep from rattling around and falling off. After a few seconds, the earthquake stops. He looks around the room, and not one of the handful of people at the other computers seem to be even slightly bothered by it, like it has become completely normal.
The earthquake sparks a memory. Lijho suddenly remembers what Eckley said about the Plate System, and how the signals to and from the artificial satellite Lizan have been insanely busy as of late. He looks for a way to check job listings and current positions for Lizan, but nothing returns any results. He can’t remember how he used to hack into the Paseo framework to monitor the activity of all the satellites, it’s just been too long. Maybe Eckley remembers. He digs further into the Nebula project to see what else he can find, but information seems to be scarce. He knows the dots are connected somehow, he can feel it. He scrolls down to look through more of the names on the job listings, and one in particular stands out. Dr. Holt.
“Dr. Holt… Dr. Holt…” Lijho says to himself staring off into space hoping to jog his memory.
He clicks Dr. Holt’s name and finds his personnel photo, but no information is given other than his title “Chief Archaeologist”. He’s so lost in thought, he’s staring at the photo as if it were real. Then he remembers- he did a report on Dr. Holt and his discovery of ancient ruins on the neighboring planet Kasto. Dr. Holt discovered an old city buried in the middle of nowhere in the caves on Kasto, everything perfectly preserved. Their technology was far advanced, and Dr. Holt pioneered a research team to reverse engineer a lot of the technology that is still in use today. But why is he doing with the Nebula project all these years later? What do all these seemingly random jobs have in common? Especially to have a terraforming team and an archaeology team on the same project, that doesn’t make sense.
“If you’re terraforming a planet, why would you need an archaeology team? The planet is uninhabited if you’re terraforming it..” he trails off lost in thought.
He scrolls aimlessly through more of the job listings and names and says “what the hell are you up to…”
He happens to gaze at the clock on the wall and he realizes he has completely lost track of time. He pulls the coin necklace out of the computer, and puts his backpack on to leave. He pulls out his phone to send Eckley a text message.
‘Dinner?’
‘Sure. Meet me at 565.’
Lijho starts his walk to the Ryuka as the sun is setting. The sky is a beautiful orange pink. Under normal circumstances he would find it really beautiful, but he still has that gut feeling that something is majorly wrong, and that orange pink sunset is somehow menacing.
He makes his way to the Ryuka and walks inside. He heads to the teleport pod, and enters 565 on the keypad. Just like when he teleported off Genocy, the quick burst of light flashes in the room, and in the blink of an eye he finds himself at Ryuka 565. He walks out of the pod into the lobby and finds Eckley sitting in the lounge area waiting for him, still in his Paseo uniform.
“What are you hungry for?” Eckley says standing up.
“I’m down for whatever.”
“There’s a really good noodle spot nearby if you’re up for that.”
“Works for me.” Lijho says, as the two walk out of the Ryuka building and onto the street.
The streets are wet. It must have just rained.
“Where are we anyway?” Lijho asks, being unfamiliar with wherever Eckley had him teleport to.
“This is Riva. Have you never been here before?” Eckley asks, sounding surprised.
“Not that I can think of. At least I don’t ever remember coming here. What’s here?”
“Not much. I haven’t really explored honestly, but they have good food here. At least everywhere I’ve always eaten has been pretty good. Find anything interesting today by the way?”
“Actually yeah…” Lijho says trailing off into silence as they walk down the wet streets. The reflection of the lights from the buildings and restaurants reflect on the shiny roads and sidewalks as the two make their way to the noodle restaurant.
Inside the restaurant, Lijho and Eckley grab a booth toward the back of the noodle restaurant. It’s busy dinner hour, so the low murmur of conversations from other tables, the clanging of pots and pans in the open kitchen, the sounds of spoons clinking on bowls creates a rich atmosphere. The waiter wheels over a cart with their big bowls of noodles, and various plates of side dishes to go with it.
“Can I bring you anything else?” the waiter asks.
“Oh no this is perfect. It looks great, thank you.” Eckley replies.
The waiter smiles, bows his head slightly, and backs away from the table leaving them to eat in peace. Lijho and Eckley begin unwrapping their chopsticks and spoon from the napkin roll. Eckley wafts the steam coming from his bowl into his face, inhaling deep, savoring the aroma.
“Ahhhh I’ve been looking forward to this all day. So what did you find by the way?” he asks.
“Where do I begin, honestly…” Lijho replies, stirring his noodles. “If I said the word ‘Nebula’…” he trails. off waiting for a response.
Eckley looks up at him and shrugs, clearly not knowing where Lijho is going with this.
“You don’t know anything about a Nebula project, or a security level Nebula?” Lijho asks.
Chewing his food, Eckley shakes his head. “Should I?” he asks with a mouthful of food.
“Well apparently it’s something major, because they created a special security level just for the project. I started seeing it in different places as a security level, but then also as a big secret government project, so apparently the security level Nebula is basically anything to do with the Nebula project.” Lijho explains.
“So what is it then?”
“The Nebula project.”
“Well I was kind of hoping you would know.” Lijho said. “I managed to find what looks like a duty roster of different jobs and people involved in the project, but I can’t find anything about the project itself. No report, no documentation explaining what is, what the goal is, nothing. It’s like the project itself doesn’t even exist, and there’s no evidence of it whatsoever, except for the list of people involved, and even with that, there’s no actual job description or anything. The only thing listed is the job title itself. And it’s really random, ordinary jobs too, like… I’m trying to remember some of them… botanist, medical personnel, geologists, environmentalists, construction workers… stuff like that. Nothing that would ever require a security level at all.” Lijho explains.
Eckley opens his mouth to say something, but Lijho interrupts him.
“But wait a minute, I didn’t even tell you the weird part. They also have people listed with expertise in terraforming. Which at first doesn’t seem like a big deal. I was thinking maybe they’re just looking to build more Genocy complexes on more asteroids or something. I mean you’d need terraformers for that right?”
“I guess so, yeah. Makes sense anyway.” Eckley answered.
“Right, so like I said I was thinking maybe they’re just building more Genocy complexes. But then why would they need a special security level for that? And.. AND… one of the heads of the project is Dr. Holt. Ever heard of him?” Lijho asks.
Eckley thinks for a minute, his eyes darting around the busy restaurant, “No. Not that I can think of. I mean the name sounds familiar, but nothing comes to mind-”
Before he can even finish the sentence, Lijho excitedly interrupts “He’s an archaeologist. And not just ANY archaeologist, his specialty is in ancient civilizations. Like what they discovered on Kasto.”
“Kasto? What on Kasto? What do you mean?”
“You didn’t know about that? Long time ago they found some ancient ruins of some ancient civilization that was like perfectly preserved. Almost like everybody just disappeared in the middle of the night and left everything exactly as it was. Apparently the civilization was really advanced too. Dr. Holt was one of the people who figured out a way to reverse engineer their technology. He’s like a prodigy with ancient societies and all that. Which is why I found it really interesting he’s basically one of the higher ups in whatever the Nebula project is. I mean like I said, I get if they’re trying to build more Genocy complexes, but that doesn’t explain why he would have anything to do with that. And I thought maybe they’re trying to terraform a new planet or something, but what new planet? We already know everything that’s in our star system here, there’s nothing left to terraform, so…”
Eckley nods his head pensively, chewing slowly because he’s processing everything he’s just heard.
A moment of silence passes where the two eat their noodles, not saying a word to each other. The waiter breaks the silence to offer them more tea, refilling their teacups while they eat.
“I mean… I don’t want to sound like some lunatic conspiracy theorist either, but ever since I ported back here from Genocy, I swear to god the sun looks bigger than I remember it. And all the earthquakes that people just seem to think is normal… something is going on. I wish I could figure out what it all has to do with everything, but I-I-I… I just know… it’s… something. There’s coincidence, and there’s a coincidental amount of coincidence. Something is going on. Every molecule in my body is telling me something is going on.” Lijho explains.
“Well I guess let me see what I can find on Dr. Holt. I mean if nothing else it may lead to other things.”
“Yeah good luck.” Lijho says almost dismissively.
“What’s wrong?”
“I dunno it just… feels almost pointless. Like I said something deep down knows that something is going on, but at the same time it just feels like what’s even the point of trying to figure it out? Even if we did manage to find out exactly what’s going on and get all the details, what then? It’s like I want to find out because it feels really important, but even if we do, so what? Is it going to make my life any different? Is it going to be some life-changing discovery? What will I even be able to do about it? I don’t know it just feels like I’m back in the old days when I used to hack into shit. I would put hours and days into something, and at the time it seemed really important, and I was almost obsessed with it, but then later on I realized it wasn’t really important. I was just looking for something to fill my empty time. Like when people have nothing going on in their lives and they take up pointless hobbies to just have something to do. Maybe I’m just overthinking shit, I dunno…” Lijho says trailing off staring into his teacup.
Eckley doesn’t really know how to respond, but he feels the need to break the silence. “I mean… I guess just take it one step at a time. If your gut tells you it’s important then keep at it. You’re only going to regret not listening to that instinct. At least that’s how I look at things anyway.”
There’s a long pause in the conversation.
“Yeah maybe…” Lijho says quietly.