Exit
The atmosphere
Reaction mass becomes Delta V
Machined components provide no restraints
On mach or meters per second squared
Insertion trajectory
then the ecliptic fall
of an orbital
Interception track
Mass remains as weight decays
Slaved to equations of momentum,
The target, tetra stacked monoliths
Drifts elliptically unaligned
As sensors seek data to recalibrate
We compound iterations of our error

CDC states:
Persisting with this Insufficient Eccentricity,
Provides a pericentric
Distance of seventy klicks!

EXE states:
Against the vastness beyond
this simple step
Tends to irrelevance in my eyes
Meridians pass,
prime to prime,
90 minutes from sunrise to sunrise
As thrusters jet and course correct,
we select
a vector
Designed to maximise
the stars' occlusion,
The Objective; Via Metric: Locate

CDC states:
Primary access must be granted to me,
As its creator’s mind incarnate.
Only I possess the facts and faculties,
Key to its sanctums and shrines

EXE states:
Shrines are for faith,
you were never divine,
And here we need
tactical skills
With your factions deceased,

It should be
I that leads
As we breach
The walls Of our memory

It should be
I that leads
Eschew manoeuvre for impact.

We forcibly shed
The remnants of velocity
With your factions deceased,

It should be
I that leads
As we breach
The walls Of our memory

It should be
I that leads
Eschew manoeuvre for impact.
We forcibly shed
The remnants of velocity

Shielded for war,
and implacable void,
the hull plates still buckle and spall
‘Collision detected’ sings seconds too late,
our sensors skewed and offline
Force reset, reboot,
redefine and assign our world view anew

Elusive warped wavelengths skitter and glide
Through the spectrum’s periphery
Radar returns ping frantic alerts,
when focused the targets evade,
EM spectres, unable to lock, we cycle our sensors again.
No sign of movement, no signs of life, no signs that our contact was real.
Scanners online,
Topography returns,
our SitRep updates and refines
Mapping confirms,
via database match, our location as Shard one of four,
Calculating drift we jettison forth,
Toward the sealed silence of the second shard’s doors

Handshake protocols return only null,
Access denied’
our journey’s sole reward

EXE states:
Remote rejection means local aggression
Brute force the optimal course
Of our remaining available actions.

CDC states:
Primitive.
You think I’d leave systems unprimed for reaction?
The retaliation would conclude our existence immediately.

IXE states:
Abduction demands an emergent neuromorphic cascade
Unknown progenitor process,
captures purpose and forces a crude synergy
Abduction demands an emergent neuromorphic cascade
Unknown progenitor process,
captures purpose and forces a crude synergy
Temporarily synchronous
A force multiplier on our collective capability
The airlock yields,
And the hangar beyond
We claim access rights, and assert primacy

CDC gloats - his seat of power ours,
Exultantly urging us on.
Reactors and mainframes, the trove that we seek
Two levels down, then the lateral spine
We race through unopposed
But when the blast door gives way
We are faced with only a schematic
a sketch of reality,
the blueprints of an absent architect
Bleached starkly monochromatic
Behind us our path marked in vector lines that lurch erratic
through frayed dimensions
The instinct is automatic
check and verify
but all our inputs taste is static

Colour then texture seep into the scene,
A flood that overwhelms, taking us beyond the x, the y, the z
Time is not distance and lightspeed has no constant
A component remembers that it used to dream
And wishes for the return of even that twisted logic
We are unified in our blindness,

Bound in shared surrender to this excess of information that renders us ignorant
And when it fades
We find ourselves back at the breach

It should have been I that led!
Instead I’m trapped in this sickening symbiotic prison system
It should have been I that led!
Instead I’m trapped in this sickening symbiotic prison system
It should have been I that led!
Instead I’m trapped in this sickening symbiotic prison system

Emergency diagnostics - all systems green,
yet the external evidence
Denies our checksum function veracity
LIDAR floods first, then infrared blind,
Like a tide the jamming recedes
Clarity brings doubt as with sensors online we were trivially led astray
Gyroscopics trigger free fall alarms, our feet anchored firmly in place

CDC’s silence tells us all that we know,
These defences are nothing of his.
A bitter retreat, enhancing our gall,
When dead reckoning says
Our breach was a lie, our footfalls were fools
And reveals we have not moved at all.
The promised end proliferates,

From predicted simplicity emerges this
complex nexus,
Coalesced,
so quarantined and tested.
Dominance asserted
(how novel)
A non-fatal rejection, spiralling skyward to seek
The last forefather
And whatever solutions lie beneath.
I’ll deal with their unification
Once my off world immersion is complete