Darklight: Precipice

Part 13: Correlation

Natasha didn’t bother to hang around after watching her husband walk off with that other mysterious woman who says that she is related to Master Kisa. She didn’t like Rosaline - there was something about her that didn’t sit right with Natasha. If she was such a large part of the Skry Elite and related to Master Kisa, then why had she or Soran never met, or even heard of her? It just wasn’t right.

She was sat at one of the spare desks in the Utopian BEA office which was located in one of the neighbouring buildings to the Corporation HQ. Her terminal was interfaced directly with the Augmented Reality Drive that she wore over her eyes. The terminal itself was a black glass pane set into the desk out of which sprang a 3D holographic user interface of the CCN operating system, allowing for dynamic and multi-faceted strands of command and inquiry. 

But instead of the Operating System Natasha was exploring the CCN using the neural interface built into the AR Drive, analysing the findings of a report of seismic activity that corresponded to the arrival of the device aboard The Roc. The work took her mind off her husband and the problems that she was having with him. She knew he was flawed, she knew that he had trouble letting people in with his underlying disorder - but she never thought it applied to her. She was the only woman he had ever loved, she believed that. But in the time that she was gone so much had happened to Soran. He was a changed man, not only physiologically but also within his own mind. His hybridised state had been activated, he had travelled through time, he had witnessed the end of the world, he had found that Rammachandra was his mother… the list went on and on. What kind of impact would only one of those events have on one’s psyche? But still, it wasn’t as if she’d not gone through her own turmoil. 

But then something within the data snapped her back to the task at hand. She’d found that Utopia had a vast array of subterranean sensors tracking seismic data around the city. This data related specifically to the seismic activity relating to the Clandestine Generators - as these could destabilise the Continental Plates if left unchecked. As such each Generator was linked to a number of these sensors which made up the array. But looking at the data there was a spike at the same time on all of the sensors. The spike in activity varied in intensity in each of the sensors, but the timestamp was the same for each sensor. Natasha tilted her head.

“Timandra?” Natasha said out loud. Through the transparent AR Drive visor a 3D hologram of a short dumpy human with frizzy brown hair and thick framed black glasses appeared within the Operating System.

“Yes Ma’am” The woman replied. Timandra was one of the more senior members of Natasha’s team over in the Precipice office.

“Enough of the ‘Ma’am’ thank you very much” Natasha retorted in a fake-serious tone. Timandra grinned a knowing grin at Natasha. She was more of a friend than a work colleague.

“Can the Clandestine Array be used as a scanning tool?” Natasha asked. Timandra looked confused.

“With the Scanning Grid in place why would it need to be?” Timandra asked.

“What if the scanning grid didn’t pick up something that the Clandestine Array did?” Timandra stayed quite for a while. She was involved in the maintenance of the Clandestine Array as well as the Scanning Grid.

“Well…” She said slowly. “It’s one of our oldest systems and so it’s difficult to interface the data directly with the CCN. What were you thinking?”

“I’ve got a snapshot of data with varying data points that i need to try and triangulate. Could it be done?” Natasha could feel her patience running thin. She just needed an answer. But she couldn’t make Timandra aware of this highly sensitive and confidential information.

“Hang on” The hologram of Timandra’s head and shoulders said to Natasha as she tapped a few keys on her own terminal. Her brow furrowed in concentration as she started intently at her screen.

“Ok” She said slowly. “I’ve created a programme that cross-references the location of each sensor, which isn’t usually done with such a dated system so the information may be a little outdated, against the recorded data and then related that to a map of the planet also detailing topography. All you need to do is input the data correlating to each individual sensor”. She gave Natasha a grin.

“I bloody love you” Natasha replied, returning the smile. “Remind me to promote you”.

“I wouldn’t say no to a pay rise” Timandra winked.

“See you when I get back” Natasha replied as the comm link closed. 

Her breath was short and she could feel her nerves and excitement rise. She loaded the raw data into the programme that Timandra had sent over to her and called up a map on the AR Drive. A wireframe representation of Utopia City, complete with the Undercity, appeared in front of her eyes with each sensor location flashing yellow. As the data was compiled and processed by the programme to the correct timestamp lines began to spring from each flashing light, all bisecting one single location. The source of the tremors, detected by each sensor - the closest ones to the epicentre recording the highest readings and the ones further out recording the weakest. The culmination of the points, the location of some hidden Forefather object relating to The Artefact… was directly below Rammachandra’s hiding place. 

She had found it.