Special Projects High-Energy Research Complex, CORE III-Deep Space Station, Deep Space, Somewhere in the Milky Way...
"This is definitely a problem," Katryna declared, the Special Projects Director looking down on the workfloor through both a camera-in-camera system and a body that was not her own. In fact her mind was not her own - another precaution in the face of newfound danger. The body was inhabited by a copy of her consciousness, a non-sentient engram that though like her and, if everthing went wrong or right, could be discarded or incorporated appropriately.
"A big one. And maybe an opportunity."
The problem wasn't in either room but both the location and present expertise was appropriate to that problem. In the large room below hundreds of people in all shapes and sizes diligently worked to put a collection of seemingly random items in small black boxes at a pace that roamed from furious to lack-a-daisy. Here and there REDSHIRTs worked to both supply their clients with additional materials - toilet paper tubes, a rubber bath duck, three jade balls - and seal the newly created units and pass them into the next room where the required warning placards would be applied before the unit was tested for the first time.
"The problem is that this is a vector. We've been trying to find a way to penetrate the Eien and affect an individual - kill them - ever since the system was created. If we know how to do it, we know how to prevent it. Now we have a way, but I'm not sure there's a prevention here. The problem is these units; They are transactional. Give and take. Put matter in, get energy out. Open the box, give it your sanity. But we don't understand that process - we're just willing to take advantage of it. It's a huge blind spot."
"So we stop using it," her companion answered. "Stop taking advantage of it."
"Which is what we should do," she agreed. "And I'll pass that recommendation back to me. But here's the bigger issue; We now know of a way to actively attack someone in the Eien. Yes, it can't kill them, but murderous insanity is just as close. We pulled the Lieutenant's ExoCortex and I've started the process of creating a sub-section within the primary Eien HBI to house similar instances - we can't just abandon her, if there's a potential for a future fix. But if someone else were to learn of this, to figure out how to weaponize it..."
Already visions of black box 'rifles' were floating through her head and she shook her head briefly to dismiss them, "No - we need to go further than that. Yes, our own matter-to-energy systems are approaching these efficiency levels, and we can play tricks with HBI entropy dumps to make them even more efficient, but we need to figure out how this," she nodded towards the display; "How this whole thing works. But we're always left with the problem that the only way to know how the box works is to open the box, go insane, and then you just want to kill everyone or trick them into opening the box. And it's not as simple as just knowing what's in the box."
The site supervisor nodded. They knew exactly what was in the box - they even knew where everything was placed, but there was something again transactional about making one of the boxes. Anyone else could do it, but unless one had already completed the first transaction the box wouldn't work. Except; "What if we were to go through the box?"
"What do you mean?"
"I mean we go through the box. Not destroy it;" Cutting the box open would somehow interrupt the whatever it was and the contents of the box would somehow become ordinary again. The prevailing theory was that placing the items in the box in such a manner was a ritual that ended with the closing of the box for the first time.
"We put matter in, we get energy out, right? But I don't think that a toilet paper tube is somehow converting matter to energy at a perfect ratio. No - something is happening inside that box. But we can't see it because when we do, we're completing that transaction and we go insane. But what if we skip the box?"
Katryna considered him, one eyebrow raised, "How do we skip the box?"
"First, I think we should bring in one of your new HMDA's. In fact, we don't need to bring one in - Procyon is still here, so I'll ask Captain Finn to take a look. See if there's any evidence of holographic manipulation. Plus she's got other sensors, so we'll put everything she has on one of these boxes, see what we find. But I'm thinking we can go further."
"Skip the box?"
"That's right. We'll skip the box, or at least try. There's always been the assumption that whatever is happening inside the box is converting matter to energy. But what if it's not? Our own systems get really close, but as you say - they're not perfect. But somehow this is? I'd suspect that whatever is happening, we're being given extra energy from whatever system is on the other side. That might indicate that the matter we're putting in is not being used up. Or it is, but this is one of those 'try it and see' ideas. So we try putting a sensor drone through."
"We have tried that," Director Silaco pointed out. "But... Now we have Plexus. So we build a drone centered around a Plexus node and send it through. In theory Plexus should be able to operate from anywhere, since it's jumping into an HBI. Do you realize how bad this potentially is?"
"Why so?"
"Because if this drone goes through and finds a big power plant on the other system that is willingly trading energy for matter at less than one-hundred percent efficiency, then that means that the insanity isn't a side effect. It's the goal. Or maybe the box really is transactional and insanity isn't the goal - maybe they want our sanity for something."
"That doesn't seem like something you can trade, Director..."
"A cardboard tube shouldn't be able to trade energy for matter, either - I think we should be ready for all possibilities here. I'll tell me that we should start rotating the Fleet through for a power plant refit. We'll leave the stickers on, but we'll move to our own systems. We can use VLEMA output to get it done quickly, but it would be wise to eliminate any CIDES use before we potentially piss off whatever might be on the other side. Which also means pulling them out of Triumvirate service, but they're not going to like this situation either..."
