Rika rubbed her eyes resignedly as the data streamed in from the messenger ship, 16 bytes at a time. She already knew it was going to be a no before the message even opened - he hadn't bother to come, hadn't bothered to send a physical sheet of paper, or even a video, no, he'd gone for the cheapest 'official' option, a signed text file over the needlenet. Cents on the dollar. It finally blinked up on the electroluminescent display in front of her - 3 paragraphs of formalities, a single meaningful sentence, "We see no reason to institute a quarantine of Ryna at the present moment, signed...", and then another 2 paragraphs of formalities. He didn't care, wouldn't care, about Ryna, not unless it was rebelling like the ones in the Peninsula. She turned and pushed away from the wall, propelling herself to the bulkhead hatch. This was the third rejection in as many weeks, the third time she'd scurried to arrange an appropriately fast courier, the third time she'd floated at her computer as the messenger drone did its dutiful rounds. In those 3 weeks, 1911 ships had departed Ryna. She imagined the passengers of each and every one returning going to their workplaces, exhaling into the unventilated office, the messengers and needlenet mailmen dropping off packages, the wildfire spreading outwards and outwards. The bulkhead hatch finally managed to creak open, revealing the labyrinthine mess that was the crew corridors, cylindrical tubes ribbed with pipes and rubber tubing and sharp ticarbon frames jutting out at 90 degree angles.
The disease (Viral Agent 'Lila', Season 2589-2610) while debilitating, didn't kill, at least not quickly. From an epidemiological perspective, this meant it became endemic in the local population, causing widespread disability and impairment. It meant that when spreading outside that population, it did not burn quickly and obviously, containable, killing off its hosts and stopping them from spreading - no, it burned on and on, pernicious and hard to trace. From a political perspective (which, unfortunately, was most of what epidemiology consisted of in the real world), it meant no need to quarantine, another thing to brush under the rug, another disease allowed to spread with nary a news article or public health campaign. That attitude had been the reason she was assigned to this case in the first place - she was the perfect scapegoat, the middle-ranking officer who had no real power but was the perfect person to pin the blame on when things went sideways. No-one at the top could be responsible, because that would indicate systemic problems, and no-one at the bottom could be responsible, because they were just the mules, just following orders, devoid of all but the most menial responsibilities. She was the token presence when they didn't really want to do anything, the nominal commander (which did not mean 'Captain', as she'd learnt the hard way) of the pathetic little ex-millitary corvette that had had all of its weapons stripped out and the gaping holes in the hull replaced with shoddy sheet-metal patches that audibly whistled at the edges as the 1atm of pressure forced its way past the shoddy welds into the void of space.
She finally managed to navigate through the crew tunnels and opened the bulkhead hatch with a creak, arriving in the bridge - a small, tomb-like octagonal room. Zero-G windows could be durable, or they could be large - and so the 'bridge' of the Scytale had only 3 narrow windows, like eye-slits from some sort of archaic helmet. The rest of the room consisted of hulking gray computers and avionics units, with strips and points of light semi-randomly gouged into them as if their insides were glowing and the metal exterior was just a coating. At one point, the bridge had retained the anachronism of gravity, with a clear down direction, bolted-down chairs, and lighting fixtures embedded into the 'ceiling', but over years of use and multiple refurbishments, this feature was abandoned, replaced by a sort of aimless clutter in which there was no empty place to look - the fluorescent lights of what had once been the ceiling now coexisted with multiple defunct targeting units and the relative safety of the chairs was undermined by the large computer strapped into one of them like an oversized toddler in the back-seat of a car. The room was cramped even when unoccupied, and with the addition of two other people, it became almost claustrophobic. Rika drifted in lazily, managing to dodge both the coffee mug (its contents held precariously in by surface tension) and the shortwave comms manual floating near the entrance. She noticed a second too late that she was on a direct collision course for Erin, who was peering over a monitor that was hissing uncooperatively. "Mmhf." Erin stabilized herself on the handrails flanking the monitor. "Good morning, Rika." "Morning. Or whatever passes for morning out here." The outline of a coast, with gray water and black sand, was vaguely visible out the window. "So, any news?" She spoke in a tone of poorly disguised hopefulness. "Yeah, they said fuck you again." "Lovely." Her voice was so weary it was almost difficult to make out as sarcasm. "Why do the two of you even care? You're still getting paid, yeah?" An acidic voice from the corner of the room, where a woman with a buzz-cut peered over an array of gauges. "When you enlisted take any non-millitary assignment, do you lose any and all sense of discipline?" Erin retorted sharply. A vague movement of shoulders that barely passed as a shrug from the corner, then - "Fair enough. But the whole reason I put in a request to be transferred here rather than going out and dying with all the rest on the front lines is cuz' I'm FROM here. And I can tell you that the people down there give way less of a shit about what's happening than you do. Last time there was a wave of the pox, about 20 years after we landed n' 15 before I was born, an offworld doc tried to cure it, do something about it. He was mobbed in the street, beaten half to death an exiled offworld for it. Some horseshit about economics and offworld stereotypes. What you're trying is a losing battle to begin with. The only people who could enforce the quarantine don't care, and the ones down there hate ya for even suggesting it." A long pause. "Just my two cents." "Well, we're still gonna try." Rika lamely attempted a defense. "...sure. " A flicker on the comms-monitor - a warning not to leave the system. [Exclusive Clearance given to passenger liner 'MSR Normandie.' Needle-net path to avoid attached. Clearance is to last 2 minutes before and after departure.] 10 seconds later, a subtle rumble passed through the ship.
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