Solar Communes, 17 of August of 2176
The incident of unforeseen consequences involving the Moho Mines was already over and solved when the Eris C-ship arrived with her mutated, cancer-suffering and psychologically shaken crew which was immediately sent to gene therapy and psychological treatment which would take years for them to recover. The new information regarding the so called Chaotic Psyche Energy that was collected from the Eris Anomaly Recon fleet wasn't very pleasant either, and even more strange was the fact the Artificial Intelligence of the Eris became self-aware and as soon as it was approved in the Turing Test, it demanded to be uploaded to a robotic body and to be granted full citizenship rights. A self-aware Strong Artificial Intelligence was considered impossible even with quantum computing, as it was believe certain secrets of the human brain that cannot be copied by a machine are still to be uncovered. It seemed that this Chaos Energy could really have an analogous function to that of organic molecules as an essence of some form of "life" which challenges all known laws of physics. It was noticed to react very badly when directed against a sentient being, like by what happened by the crew of the Eris, which psychologically suffered from facing their own Jungian shadows and personal phobias in the worst possible forms.
0.01 light years away from Gliese 581d
Several strange emanations of light start to apparently come from nowhere. They pulsated in a completely unexplainable pattern and their spectrum shifted in a chaotic form from infrared to ultraviolet and back to infrared, shifting through all colors of the visible spectrum.
3 days and 14 hours later
The strange light emanations are captured by a Solar Commune probe. Soon the news spread through their small solar civilization. A new anomaly was found at 0.01 light years away from them, and it behaved chaotically. It was a sign that somehow they managed to "attract" it to themselves as there was no form of strange signatures like those before. Panic ensured for the first 2 days after the news, considering the reports of the Eris wasn't something to be unexpected the terror that happened after a source of Chaos Energy was found so close to them.
4 days later
The readings on the intensity of the emissions were somewhat "stable" around a certain average for 3 days, but then suddenly they started to increase dramatically. Some people started to claim that the panic of the population was somehow "feeding" it and all were instructed by several propaganda movies to calm down and face it like the standard of capability and courage they should have, and that there was no evidence it could directly threaten Solar Communes. The panic stopped then.
29 of August of 2176
The anomaly increases drastically in energy emissions and dimension to the point it could be viewed to the naked eye at the sky during the night in Gliese 581d. Bizarre readings start to arrive regarding the energy emissions of it, which now seem to be not so random as previously... in fact now there is no doubt it is a too small quantity of Chaos Energy to affect them that is getting through that anomaly, from wherever it came from...
A daring group inside the Armada of about 6,500 among Space Guards, 36 Blackguards, Space Pirates, 96 Space Marines, starship crews and specialists wishing to take the same footsteps of the Eris Anomaly Recon, they however, not being Discordians, christened their fleet as the 2nd Emergence Anomaly Strike.
The most notorious of them was definitely the disciplined, methodical, cautious and orderly 28 years old OSA psi-corps operative and astronomer Amanda Raez Still, because, to awaken her potential as she had strange uncontrolled visions and premonitions, she had risked to pass 4 years inside a sensory deprivation tank to "wonder on the nature of matter, communication and energy", awakening and acquire control over her innate paranormal powers, particularly Extra-sensory perception, telepathy and telekinesis. It was believed that the Chaos Energy was of psychic nature, and thus more adequate to be fought against by one who can exert a degree of control such forces. Their theory was that Chaos was the "Collective Shadow", an assortment of all Psychological Shadows of all human and otherwise beings of the universe. Besides her the renowned astrobiologist Edmund Bryce Manilla and the Linguistics expert Carlos Laplace, known for his treatise on how languages could develop among sentient lifeforms which rely in other communication means rather than vocal chords and sound.
They would travel on board of the 720 meters long ACCLR-720 Emergence Long Range Assault Cruiser-Carrier, carrying three FIS-185 Asterisk Space Interceptors, three FSS-150 Anarchy Space Superiority Fighters, four IFS-50 Corsairs, four IDS-70 Blackbeards and one IBS-87 Caribbean boarding ships, two DSA-84 Scissor Standard SSTO/VTOL Spaceplane Dropships and one DSAS-55 Shadowguard Stealth Dropship. The massive cruiser was docked with the Bakunin Space Station in Gliese 581d orbit, ready to depart as its crew went to the stasis chambers in the cargo hold, the travel would take 22 days and nobody wanted to stay 22 days feeling the sensation of free fall. The Emergence weak AI would handle the travel until they were close enough to the anomaly to reach it in 30 minutes. For now they would have a 22 days sleep.
"This is Emergence... ready for launch"
"Acknowledge Emergence, clear for launch", the voice announced as
21 of September of 2176
"Reawakening crew from stasis..."
"Life signs normal..."
"Anomaly energy signature intensification detected..."
The computerized voiced announced as the 1.90 meters tall Amanda opened her gray eyes and awakened from the Stasis already trying to adjust her clothing of the Armada: a black and red synthetic fiber T-shirt with the Solar Communes emblem, and black pants and shoes, only to contemplate an uneasy sensation that started to grow inside her. She could feel there was something trying to reach her, to harm her but she could not manage to discover what it was as her tanned skin seemed to crawl like her curly black hair. Following the rest of the crew, she headed to the cruiser-carrier window-less bridge while others headed to the massive crew quarters and to guard positions around the calculated boarding areas. As she walked through the metal walkways and took the elevator to the Bridge, she felt a shiver and it seemed there were things in the corners going for her and heard her name being called in whispers and laughters, but when she looked at them nothing was there. Others though weren't having any visions at all.
She finally sat at the command chair, still feeling the frightening sensation, with Carlos and Edmund at her side and the rest of the system operators spread around through several seats. She soon too the brain computer interface plug and linked her mind directly to the navigation system through an occipital infolink. Their ship lacked computer screens, readouts and alike as all was transmitted directly from the ship systems to the mind of its operators.
Soon her vision started to be based both signals from her eyes and from the artificial optical nerve of the brain computer interface, and after 5 seconds of confusion her mind adapted to the simultaneous signals as an overlay of a heads-up display with several readings of damage control, remaining fuel and ammunition, sensors and an image of the starship outside replaced what her eyes were seeing. Trying to overcome the fear only she could feel, she started to train using her mind to pilot the ship instead of moving her limbs, something she previously had experience with. After a minute the ship started to move through all three dimensions before she got a hang of its controls.
Her hearing wasn't replaced though, and she could still talk while "piloting" the ship in such an unusual manner.
"The scans on this thing are not good", she frowned "And neither my perceptions are positive. I have a theory on this, I believe this is a tear of the fabric of space and time themselves, a potential aperture to another Universe where there are no laws of physics... and where Chaos Energy is everywhere"
"Or maybe it's just some type of exotic matter, who knows?", Carlos asked as suddenly she could hear another voice, among laughters and a cacophony of disturbing sounds: "Come to us Amanda, we are waiting you in the other said! Be friendsss... we like changesss and you all like changesss". She almost jumped from her chair and unplugged her mind from the interface as she heard it.
"What did you see?", Edmund asked, worried.
"There is... something sentient beyond and ahead of the Event Horizon of this anomaly, it must lead to somewhere of Shadows... maybe as there are the shadows of our own psyche built upon beliefs, there is a Shadow of the entire Universe as well built upon beliefs and we found it. And there is something there... something big and dangerous... of psychic nature. If any of you have any severe phobia or lack mental discipline you should take a dropship and head back NOW, really!", she announced the last part of the message through the starship communication system triggered by her brain.
Soon a few them decided to head back through one of the standard dropships, although neither Edmund nor Carlos gave up on their expedition towards the unknown parallel universe they might have discovered, but first she had one last thing to do. The ship brain computer interface could also serve as a neural amplification system when used by a psionic, capable of transmitting a telepathic message of short length much beyond the maximum known range of them. But what should the message contain. She wondered... wondered and suddenly it came like a spontaneous thought, or maybe an influence of something else. A burst of telepathy was sent towards the anomaly they would take 30 minutes to reach, the only content of the telepathic message was a single word in an elevated tone, accompanied by the sounds of flames: Tzeentch.
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Many minutes have passed and no response... maybe Amanda should start to throw off random discordianist ramblings instead as that sensation of dread now became even more real... she could see for a glimpse inside her mind an horrific image of a bizarre creature of shifting shape, flesh and orifices spitting flames and always changing...
And thus now it seemed something was coming to her, yet nothing seemed to come. There was a very strong... outside suggestion in her mind. Something that was telling her that she should go beyond the event horizon of that strange portal to an unknown parallel universe, almost in the tone of a threat... the torment... They were coming for her. Yet minutes passed and nothing. It seemed they were mocking her, trying to slowly drive her insane. Their distorted grunts and laughters interrupted for a while as Carlos touched her thin shoulder, which had half of the mass of an human shoulder:
"Amanda? You seem to be very pale! Is everything alright?", he asked as the dread remained on her mind.
She was still having the input from the ship navigation ship rather than the input of her eyes when she answered him:
"If I was a Christian, I would swear I just saw a demon... whatever lies beyond the event horizon is truly something we would rather not have to deal with. I don't think we... should...", suddenly a burst of psychic terror reached her mind...
"Arrgh! The sun! it's flaring... I'm... I'm arrgh... it burns! Activate shades!...", she said as she could feel as if her skin was being crisped by the sun rays. It was an unbearable pain that existed only in her mind, and she was losing it as a very strong influence was trying to impel her to thrust the large cruiser forward... she gave in...
"Amanda! Stop! You... cannot do it... Emergence! Lockdown on command seat interface, now!", Edmund shouted as the ship started to accelerate towards the anomaly.
"Acknowledged, disabling command seat brain-computer interface...", the artificial intelligence announced as it was shut down and it decelerated the starship back to a static position as it moved only about two kilometers further ahead.
Edmund ran towards Amanda. She was laid back against the chair, crouching herself in a fetal position and agonizing of pain as whatever lied there continued to torment her mind... but soon she took efforts and said at the same time her mind started to fend off such attack and send a telepathic answer to it towards the anomaly and portal:
"Why don't you come to us, rather than we come to you... so we can talk? Are you afraid of talking with us out of your own turf? I... want to talk... with Tzeentch or... whoever represents... it"
Soon she raised her small hand up and gasped as she managed to stop such wave of psi-attack against her mind... she sweated through all her body in panic and as she looked at Edmund she said:
"I hope neither of you are weak of will... this is not a recon mission... this is an encounter with our own worst horrors... stay concentrated and do not let your minds be distracted with the mundane!", she replied as the feeling of dread still surrounded her mind trying to find another vulnerability on her to strike.
"Amanda, what the hell is this Tzeentch you mentioned?"
"I believe it's... the 'boss', or closest thing to it of whatever twisted forms sentience lie beyond that gate, and maybe it... I don't know maybe I'm being used argh! This feeling is so horrible... they are continually probing my psyche for weaknesses and I'm trying to stand it. You are lucky Edmund... you are not psychic or they would be after you as well right now! But I can feel them... and they want... I know they want... not you or anyone else here, for some reason they want me", she explained the best she could as more and more intense became her despair.
Perhaps sending a psychic together with them was a very foolish decision...