The Enemy of an Enemy

Chapter Nine

I made my way quickly to Dr. Rannor’s officein the medical wing. I wondered why he wanted to see me. Larath’ssuggestion that he planned to offer me a way out did not seemlikely; he was not the type to get mixed up in games of deceptionand politics. Well, if nothing else it gave me a good excuse tomeet with him as the captain had requested.

As I entered his office, the ensign behindthe desk snapped to attention and stood there silently. “As youwere, Ensign. I am here to see Dr. Rannor,” I said, rememberingthat junior officers were not permitted to speak unless spoken to,a rule I had done away with in my department. All this formalityjust got in the way of getting anything done.

“Sir, he is with a patient,” was his concisereply.

“That is fine. I will wait here until he isfinished,” I said. I sat in one of the chairs provided for waitingpatients and began to think about the Magi again. This mystery keptgrowing more and more complex. I began to focus more and moredeeply on all the threads of information I had, slipping intopuzzle-solving mode. I continued by building a wall of thoughtaround my mind to block out distractions, and once that was set upI began to deeply focus both my subconscious and conscious mind onthe problem.

Once in this mode, I lose almost allconnection to the outside world and that nearly got me killed once.I was working on some puzzle as a small child when our home caughtfire. I never heard the alarms, or felt the heat. The only memory Ihave of it is my mom screaming as she ran out of the house with mein her arms. Because of that, I learned to save a bit of myattention to watch and listen for trouble around me.

I do not know how long I had been working onthe mystery of the Magi when I heard alarms sounding. I wasextremely deep into the puzzle but for the first time ever Isuccessfully managed to separate my awareness of my surroundingsfrom the puzzle solving. It was very odd. I could see everyonerunning, and hear commands being called out, but everything wasgoing very slowly. I knew it would take me at least thirty, if notforty-five seconds to fully come out of my deep focus, and I sawDr. Rannor coming towards me. As my brain became more aware I stoodand walked towards him. Out of the corner of my eye I saw all thecolor leave the ensign’s face as he attempted to stand up, withoutmuch success. Slowly the world started to come back up to normalspeed and I heard Dr. Rannor call out, “CANCEL ALERT! EVERYONESTAND DOWN!”

I realized the alarms had stopped ringing.Suddenly, without any warning, a feeling of deja vu hit me with theintensity of a tidal wave. Instinctively I grabbed a hold of thatmemory thread and started to follow it when I was struck by anagonising feeling, like liquid ice pouring through my veins. Theintense pain threatened to break my concentration on thatmemory.

“Pain is but an illusion, the mind is themaster of the body,” I chanted to myself over and over until I hadcontrol of the pain. I could not let go of the memory thread, and Ichased it to a locked door. “A door is merely a temporary obstacle;a lock is but a pattern begging for a solution,” was what I foundmyself chanting next. I had no idea where either chant came from,but that was the least of my worries. I needed to open the lock andsee where the thread led. The lock proved too simple to stand up tome. I opened it and suddenly I was transported back in time …

“Academy-Level Ensign Vydor reporting for myyearly physical, sir!” I stated as I stood at attention at thefront desk.

“Have a seat, Ensign. The doctor will see youwhen he can,” said the officer behind the desk.

This was likely to take a while; they did notattach much importance to ensigns’ physicals. It was probably doneon purpose to teach us humility or patience. This time I had comeprepared to occupy myself while I waited.

I had managed to find a contact that couldget me real encrypted messages from the communications systems ofthe Empire. I used them to keep my mind sharp, especially duringbreaks. So far most of them had been boring messages about fleetpositions and the like. This would be extremely useful if anyonewas trying to mount an attack on the Empire, but to me they weremuch more interesting as decryption problems. This latest code wasmuch more complex than the others. I had been working on it for afew days now without any real progress. As I began to focus on it,tiny pieces of it started to emerge, but nothing that made muchsense. Whatever it was, it was certain to be more interesting thanwhat I had intercepted so far.

Before I could get much further I heardalarms going off. I began to work my way back out of the puzzle. Itusually took me forty-five seconds to a minute to return to fullawareness. As I emerged from my deep focus, I realized I was on astretcher with crewmen barking orders all around me. I started tosit up. A mask was pushed on to my face …

The thread of memory ended there. I awoke inDr. Rannor’s office on his couch. He was sitting at his desk with asyringe ready to use, watching me with a look of concern on hisface.

“So you’ve finally decided to return to theland of the living,” he said.

“How long was I out?” I asked, still tryingto regain my senses.

“Which time? I guess in total around thirtyminutes,” he replied.

“Um, Doc, what do you mean ‘which time’?Perhaps it would be best if you told me what happened,” was myreply.

“Well, I am hoping you can answer that betterthan I can. Shortly after you arrived your med alert patchbroadcasted an emergency message. According to your vital signs,you were dead. No heart rate, no brainwaves, no sign of life atall. You had been dead for about eight seconds when I came out ofmy office and saw the resurrection team scrambling to get theirequipment and reach you. After you had been dead about ten secondsyou stood up and started to walk towards me. All your vitals werestill below detectable levels. Then at about fifteen seconds one byone your vitals came back slowly; by about thirty seconds yourpatch was reporting all was normal.” He paused here as if he didnot believe his own words. “After that your vitals spiked off thechart: heart rate, respiration, all at extreme levels. You startedto collapse in front of me, but I managed to catch you. I heard yousay something, but I couldn’t make it out. It sounded like a chant.Then according to your patch you died again. This time however, Iwas close enough to see you were not really dead. Your breathingand pulse were much weaker than normal, but functioning. I removedyour patch and laid you on the couch to recover. That was aboutthirty minutes ago.” A big, friendly grin broke out on his face ashe said, “Now, I think you have some explaining to do. The abilityto die and come back is something you really should let your doctorknow about.”

The medical alert patch was something thatall officers and mission-critical staff were required to wear. Itconstantly monitored their health and reported back to the medicalpersonnel. The idea behind it was that those most critical to thesurvival of the fleet needed to be monitored constantly to ensurethe fleet’s safety. For example, if one of the navigators collapsedwhile on duty, he would need to be replaced immediately in order toassure the fleet stayed on a safe path.

“Well, Doc, obviously I was not dead. Iassume it happened because of how focused I was on what I wasdoing,” I replied.

“Let’s go through what happened together andsee if we can make sense of it. You checked in with thereceptionist, and then …?” he prompted.

“He said you were with a patient and I toldhim I would wait. I found a comfortable chair to sit in and waitfor you.” I did not want to go into too much detail until I had hada chance to work it out myself.

“Look, Vydor, this room is secured andnothing we say is being recorded. Patient-doctor confidentiality isparamount here. If you are randomly dying and coming back I cannotallow you to return to duty, never mind lead a critical mission. Soyou have to open up a bit more,” he said.

I had to admit he was right. “Well, Doc, as Isaid I was not dead. I did not realize that the medical alert patchwould react the way it did. In fact, the reason I am reluctant toexplain is that I don not fully understand it.” How could I explainthis without sounding like a nutcase? “After I sat down, knowing Ihad to wait a while, I began mentally working on all the data Ihave related to the Magi problem. When I work on a complex problemwith a lot of interrelated information that seems to lead nowhere,I often drop into a deep focus. My father called it ‘puzzle-solvingmode;’ he was a computer man, so everything had names like that.While in this mode, I cut off most outside stimuli that mightdistract me, leaving just enough awareness to recognize and reactto possible danger — in this case, alarms going off.”

“Okay, it sounds like some kind of deepmeditation. That might explain the alert going off, so let’s setthat aside for a moment. After the alarms went off, you stood andwalked towards me, then your vitals spiked off the charts. Whathappened there?” he asked.

“As I walked towards you a memory wastriggered, and I decided to follow that trigger and see where itwent. As soon as I did I felt an extreme pain, like someone hadpoured ice-cold acid in my veins and was pumping it through mysystem. I am sure that is when you recorded the spike in my vitals…”

“A memory block?” he interrupted.

A memory block was something the Empirenormally used only when people retired from key positions. Theyblocked out all sensitive information that the person might have sothat in their older, weaker state there would be no risk of themreleasing critical secrets. Typically people who had one did noteven know it, and never searched for those memories again. But ifthey did, they would be discouraged with extreme, though harmless,pain. If they did get through that they would find the memory wassecured behind a psychological barrier.

“Yes, Doc, but I was able to get a grip onthe pain and continue to follow the memory through to itscompletion. But why would there be a block in my mind?” Iasked.

“I have some suspicions. But first, whatmemory was blocked?” he asked.

“Well, nothing too exciting, but I guess thishappened once before. Basically it was the same as this event,without the memory block. I was a young ensign in the academywaiting for my annual physical, and to pass the time I was workingon decrypting some messages I had brought. The alarms went off thattime too, but before I could bring myself out of it, they had me ona stretcher and put me out through a mask on my face. It’s a memorythat would have been useful today, but I do not see what … oh … themessage.” I just trailed off as I remembered something.

“Go on, what about the message?” Dr. Rannorprompted.

“The message I was decrypting I had acquiredfrom a contact who assured me it was from the highest level ofImperial communications. I did not finish decoding it, but I didget a phrase and some numbers. But it cannot be, can it?” I grabbedmy pad off the end table where I assume he had placed it. I jotteddown the numbers and could not believe what I saw.

“Vydor, do you plan to let me in on yourdiscovery?” he asked.

“Well, I am not sure I believe this. But Iremember the two pieces of data that I was able to get out of thecode before getting hauled away, a phrase and some numbers. Thephrase was ‘The Black Adders have hatched’ and the numbers … arethe stellar coordinates of the colony we are en route to.” I justlet that last statement hang in the air for a bit.

He sighed and after a pause said, “I wasafraid of this.”

“Afraid of what?” I asked.

“Well, in your file are orders that if youever hit a memory block I am to inject you with 35ccs of CrystalineBetazene before you succeed in breaking it. Apparently they did nottrust their blocks to hold against you, and it seems with goodreason.”

“Forgive me if I am off-base here, Doc, but35ccs seems far too high,” I said.

“Indeed, it would be for a normal personunder normal conditions. You were not under normal conditions. Youwere fighting extreme pain, and the normal dose would have onlystabilized you. Their goal was to push you into a coma to preventyou from discovering whatever it was they had blocked. My orderswere to keep you in the coma until someone could come andreestablish the block.” He then stood, picked up the hypodermicsyringe from his desk and tossed it into my lap. When I picked itup I saw it was completely full.

I leveled my gaze at him and said, “This isfull, Doctor.”

“Yes, instead my official report will saythat your medical alert patch malfunctioned, and that we need toorder a replacement. I will also record that you passed out due tooverexertion, and lack of rest. Your official treatment will berest and a good meal, and to leave your medical alert patch offuntil we can replace it,” was his answer.

“Why, Doc?” I asked. “You are not the type todisobey an order and get involved in a cover-up.”

“Vydor, you will learn in time that you haveto weigh each order you get against the situation at hand. In mostcases orders come down the chain of command, and often from peoplefar removed from the situation. Sometimes, as in this case, theorders were placed long before the situation came about and need tobe adjusted in light of new information and events that arose sincethe order was given. Beyond that, though, you need to use your ownmoral compass to judge whether an order is something you shouldfollow or not. In this case, it was that moral compass that told methis order is wrong. If I am questioned officially I can simplystate I took the Emperor’s orders for your upcoming mission tooverrule that order since if you were placed in a coma there wouldbe no way for you to fly The rest of the cover-up is actuallydescribed in the orders so I would not have to explain thataway.”

Well, this doctor was packed full ofsurprises. Technically I should have reported him for disobeyingorders but, as he pointed out, that would jeopardize the mission aswell as getting my memory blocked again. He had me here. I couldnot report him, and part of me felt that was good.

“Doc, I have to ask you something. Why didyou recommend me so highly to the captain? I did not think youwould have known anything about me.”

He got that faraway look about him again,just as he had in the meeting. This time I could watch him moreclosely and I saw that there was more to it than that. He seemed tobe fighting some internal struggle with himself, one I could barelydetect. After a few minutes he sighed and looked at me.

“Vydor, I know that I did, but I cannotremember doing it. You see, like you I have many memory blocks, butunlike you I have never been able to open them. I can find them,just not open them,” he stated in an almost depressed tone.

“But no alarms went off showing you in pain?”I asked.

He had a proud smile about him as he startedhis reply, “No, I have been fighting the memory blocks much longerthan you have. You will find after you defeat the pain a few timesit starts becoming second nature and you get to the point that youdon’t even notice it any more. It took all my medical training thefirst few times to get through it, but I did. Of course the realquestion you must be wondering about is why I have memory blocks,and that’s a question I have been researching ever since returningto my post here.”

“Returning to your post? As far as I know youhave not left the ship since taking over from Dr. Smith.” Thisvisit was providing all kinds of new threads to work out, and itseemed that they must be connected to the Magi. Why that should bewas a mystery, but my instincts told me it was true.

“The problem is that you think Dr. Smith andI are two different people, in fact everyone in this fleet does.However, I know for a fact that we are not. Vydor, if we continuethis discussion you probably won’t like where it leads. It willcast a doubt on everything you think you know about the Empire. Areyou sure you want to hear it?” He had a concerned look on his face,worried about how I would take all this new knowledge.

“Doctor, information is my game; all I dealin is facts, figures and numbers. I know everything we have talkedabout so far will somehow lead me to the solution to the Magipuzzle. I need whatever information you have to give me the bestchance of surviving this mission.” I had to keep him talking.

“Very well.” He started to pace a bit as hespoke. “When I came aboard this ship five years ago, I felt I hadbeen here before, but every memory of this ship was blocked. So Istarted digging in the ship’s logs and personal records. As part ofmy search I looked at Dr. Smith’s records. At a glance I knew theywere faked. In time I was able to reconstruct a series of events,none of which I can directly remember, but I know must be true.Many years ago I was a leading DNA researcher. I accumulated manyawards for my work on trying to unravel the DNA code. I even helpedto create a lot of the DNA simulation software that is being usedto test genetic treatments today…”

“Sorry to interrupt, but what do you mean the‘mystery of DNA?’ When I was in the Academy we studied it. Itseemed fairly simple and well-understood to me,” I said.

He looked right at me, locked my gaze andsaid, “You were lied to.” He let that sit in the air for a minute,and then continued, “DNA is still a complete and total mystery tous. We have no idea where it came from, or how it works. Weunderstand bits and pieces; enough to make medicines and correctsome defects, but that is it. If you take the time to do theresearch I think you will be shocked by the number of things wedon’t understand that you were told we did in school. The mind isanother; no one really knows how it works. Centuries of study havenot solved the puzzle. No matter what we learn about it, we cannotmake any theory fully fit. It is as if we are missing some criticalpiece of that puzzle. But this is beside the point …” He paused togather himself, and then continued, “It was all that time spentstudying DNA that helped me spot the tampering with Dr. Smith’srecords. In fact, the DNA was mine with some not-so-clever editingto make it look like a different person. It happened to be softwareI had helped to create which was used to fake the DNA, so I wasable to undo the changes and get back to the original code, whichmatches mine perfectly. Since then I have spent a few hours everyday trying to unravel why all this has happened. I have managed torebuild a lot of my old life, but haven’t found any answersyet.”

“Wow, this really creates a lot morequestions than answers. To start with, why would the Empire lieabout the state of medical research?” I had so many questions, buta cover-up of this magnitude was just unimaginable, and I had tostart with that.

“You are expecting some deep, dark reason,with many levels of complexity, but in reality it is deceptivelysimple. This is where we will really begin to challenge yourpreconceptions. You, like everyone else, were brought up to worshipand serve the Emperor with all your heart, mind and body. As achild you probably sent him small gifts and offerings to helpensure you would have a good path in life to follow. Now, think fora minute. If it became generally known that no one had any solididea where life came from, or how the most vital parts of ourbodies function, would you think that such worship would holdup?”

“What do you mean? We know where we comefrom, a planet near a G-class star …” I started. Then I realizedthat the planet had never been found, nor had I ever heard anythingbut the most general information on it. It was so ingrained intoour society that I had accepted it as true without ever thinkingabout it.

“I think you are starting to get it. By thelook on your face, you don’t like it very much,” he said.

My mind was reeling from the blow to thebasic beliefs I had grown up with. What could all this mean? Ineeded time to collect myself, so I took him down another road.“Doctor, assuming what you say is true, then why did the captaintell me you recommended me to him? I would think that if theywanted that buried they would have blocked his mind too.”

“Ah, now you see the trap that lies andcover-ups create. If they blocked his memory, then later he wouldnot have remembered my recommendation and would not have kept youon his staff. This of course allows the possibility of the captainasking me about it later, but in this case the imperfection of thememory blocks would help them. I think it’s safe to assume that youhave more memory blocks you haven’t yet found. In time, you willfind you still know things that you acquired during those memories,but you won’t know how you know them. For example, even though theyblocked my memory of recommending you to the captain, I know that Idid it. So if the captain asked me, they were betting I would justgo with it in order to avoid looking like a fool for notremembering.” He sat down behind his desk and leaned back. “Thequestion is, where does this all leave us? Well, from what I cantell, we have a lot more questions than answers, and you are ourbest hope for getting them. Like you, I know the answer is downthere on that planet. I can feel it calling me. If I could think ofa way to pull it off, I would be on that mission with you.”

I sat there quietly for a while just thinkingabout everything I had been told. I had never in my wildest dreamsever expected to have a conversation like this with a respectedofficer. On one hand, all my training and schooling was screamingat me that he was a traitor and it was my duty to kill him beforehe could tell more people what he told me, but on the other hand Iknew he was right. Something about all of this was calling me, anddragging me to that planet. I could not fight it. I had to followthis through and reach the planet.

He leaned forward in his chair and lockedeyes with me and said in a low tone, “Vydor, listen to me verycarefully. You must avoid Larath until you launch. If he discoversyou broke this memory block, it is his job to put it back.”

His tone implied so much more than his words.“That will not be easy. I am scheduled to meet with him at 0600tomorrow. He promised to teach me a defense against the Magi’s fearweapon.”

“You’re already able to beat that weapon.Just use the same thought shield you use when you drop intopuzzle-solving mode, without going into the mode. You will thenbecome completely immune to the Magi’s fear weapon and Larath’sempathic powers …”

“Wait a minute, Doctor, I never mentioned athought shield. How did you know that?” Just how much informationwas he withholding? As I pondered that he got that look on his faceagain. When he came out of it I said, “Let me guess, another memoryblock?” I paused as he nodded, then pushed on. “It seems our pastsare heavily intermingled and someone did everything they could toprevent us from knowing it.”

“It would appear so,” he said as he turnedand entered something in on the computer. “Either way, that thoughtshield is how you will block all the psychic powers. You areprobably wondering why I did not mention that in our briefings.That was because Larath was present at all of them. If he suspectsI have made progress on cracking my memory blocks — well, let’sjust say I would probably have an unexpected retirement party.”

“I really do not like casting Larath as anenemy,” I stated, but it was worse than that. It seemed like theenemy might be the Empire itself, but that could not be true!

“Nor do I, but really it is much worse thanthat. If both of us have had our pasts tampered with, what aboutthe rest of the senior staff? It would seem a given that if Iretired and came back as a different person they should haverecognized me.” He paused there, and then said, “One has to wonderhow deep this cover-up goes, or should I say, how high?”

“So where do we go from here? Obviously, Ihave to get to that planet, at any cost. I do not want to believethat this is how the Emperor wants it to be. I would rather believethere is some evil force operating inside the highest levels ofcommand which is orchestrating all this.” That was such a cop-out.I could see where all the evidence pointed, but I just could notbelieve the Emperor would betray his loyal servants like this.

“In any case, we can be assured that whoeveris behind this means to stay hidden at any cost. The first thing weneed to do is to arrange for you to be ordered off duty, to restand recover from your ordeal. Then we need you to leave a day earlyon your mission, in fact at 0500 hours tomorrow would be best,” hesaid.

“Assuming that could be done, that would tripsuspicions with my team since they are expecting me to make anannouncement at 1800 hours,” was my reply.

“Well that is simple; contact yourreplacement shortly before 0500 hours, saying that the mission wasmoved up, and that he has to take over as of 0515. It would not bethe first time a mission timeline was moved up. No one would bemuch surprised by that,” he stated.

“And how are we going to pull this off? Icannot just leave early; I am still waiting on a squad and shipassignment from Zalith,” I pointed out.

“I can handle that. Zalith and I have had avery good relationship ever since I saved his son’s life. I willsimply tell him that we have reason to believe that the mission hasbeen compromised and that we think the Magi know the missiontimeline. That way he will see the wisdom in stepping it up a dayso that you arrive long before they expect you. He may suspect heis not getting the whole truth, but he trusts me enough not to askquestions.” He turned back to his computer and a smile crept acrosshis face. “It seems that about ten years ago you had a faintingspell which was attributed to working too hard in school andneglecting your diet. They put you on medical leave for a fewdays.”

I looked over his shoulder and saw therecord. I knew that matched the memory I had just unblocked, butuntil that time I had had no recollection of it. “That settles it,we will go with your plan. And since I will be leaving on a stealthmission, I must conveniently turn in that faulty medical alertpatch.”

“Yes, and since it is faulty, there is noreason for me to keep it.” With that he tossed it in the trashdisposal that would quickly recycle it back to raw materials.

“There are many questions still to be asked,but I do not think we would get anywhere tonight. I must get backto my quarters and get some rest; it might be a while before I getanother chance,” I said. After exchanging well-wishes, I left andreturned to my quarters.

As soon as I entered my room, I noticed I hada message waiting from High Command. I went over and played it.

“Commander Vydor, this message is for youonly, direct from the officer of the Emperor. You are not clearedto share this with anyone except your strike team. These new orderssupersede all previous orders. You are not to attempt to contactthe Magi in any way. You will lead your team to steal one of theirplasma cannons and any information you can get with about the fearweapon you reported. Once you have that, you are to get off theplanet and it is to be destroyed. The captain will be told all heneeds to know when the time is right. When you return you willreport back all that you learned only to High Command. The Emperorsends his blessings for a successful mission.”

Great, orders to not speak with the Magi. Howwould I get any answers if I did not? This might turn out to be oneof those orders Dr. Rannor would tell me should not be obeyed.Well, there would be plenty of time to think about that on the tripto the planet. Now I would have to get some rest.