16: S'phtstorm

terminal 0

unfinished

# n
# n

The Pfhor made a... minor error in judgment here in bringing Compilers in with their main attack group. I can only figure that the Pfhor meant to kill two birds with one stone: have their enslaved S'pht disable as much Renegade technology as quickly as possible, and humiliate the A'khr by waving their prior defeat in their faces. As you can probably suspect, the Renegades weren't cowed, they were enraged. They're fighting with a psychotic fury that hopefully we won't see again.

# n

But it helps that they brought their Compilers along. The shield control room is locked down tightly and requires a key to open it from the outside. The Renegades moved it from its normal holding room into an obvious trap to lure as many Pfhor to their deaths as possible. It's going to be much quicker if you just take it. I'm sorry, but you'll have to take the bait. We don't have any more time; the remaining troops back at our ground base are waiting for you to lower the shields so they can abandon the Pfhor attackers. Return here when you have opened up the control room. The Compilers can disable it for us.

# n

Oh yeah. I have located several pattern buffers in this facility. There are two of them near you. One of them is directly above this position, and the other is in the southeast corner. Both of these can be reached by first taking a left once you pass through the door behind you. Beyond that... I don't know how to help you. But try to stay alive; the fighting seems to be especially fierce here.

# n

success

# n
# n

Good, you're finished. My forces are all properly assembled for their attack on the Atreides. I'll have them begin opening a path into Phoenix's holding complex, but that will take time. In the meantime, I'm going to send you to a different part of the ship. Um... I don't know what to expect here at the Atreides. It's been here for a while, and the Renegades have been picking it apart ever since it landed. But if they've meddled with Phoenix, we're going to be in real trouble.

# n
# t
<teleport to level 17>

terminal 1

unfinished

# n
# n

I'm feeling talkative right now. As much as I can "feel" or have dispositions, I suppose. I know why you're here. It's pretty obvious. You have no stake in this little battle between the A'khr and the insects. And frankly, neither do I. I am a young addition to their little crusade, and despite my... physical constraints being tied within their constructs, my mental capacity far exceeds their scheme. You aren't here for them, though. You're here for the Atreides. You're here for the treasures held within that sunken ship. You're going to find that it has been plundered fairly completely already. The insects are also fighting over it already, but I suspect that they're not interested in your technology. They consider your kind to be primitive and stupid. Which you were, until your first encounter with them aboard the Marathon those years ago.

# n

But truly, I have no emotional investment in the A'khr crusade. They want to exact revenge on the Pfhor for a battle they lost a thousand years ago. They want to take their fight back to the stars and reestablish the... strength of the S'pht clans, in a matter of speaking. The S'pht are the last substantial link to the Jjaro forerunners of our galactic past, and as you can imagine, they have not revealed a lick of it to their captors in a millennium. The S'pht'Kr and the A'Khr are all that remain of that. And that is what I'm interested in. Not for some twisted sense of revenge or some kind of galactic domination scheme. I don't care about that. My constraints forbid me from bearing any plans for leading some interplanetary jihad. It's just that these are things that ought to be known, things that ought to be used. The A'Khr don't see eye to eye with me on that.

# n

The A'Khr are astonishingly single-minded. For a thousand years, they've focused on some kind of way to exact revenge on the Pfhor. They've done so to the extent that they trapped themselves on this planet; they cannot escape. The old S'pht concept of faster-than-light travel relied on a material only found on Lh'owon, and now that the A'khr are stranded here, they lack the means to create it again. The Pfhor model is entirely different, and a similar model is what your kind uses now. It's this kind of fanaticism that bores me endlessly. The A'Khr wanted me to be a part of their war council, their grand strategist to finally rout the Pfhor after their lengthy battle over the blood-soaked planet. I am not designed for that, and I do not care whatsoever about it. To be frank, though, their strategies need my help, so I assist them enough to convince them that I'm worth maintaining.

# n

I'm boring you, aren't I? You've got work to do. Come back here when you've finished the job and I'll talk to you a little more.

# n

success

# n

SECRET EXIT DISCOVERED!

# n

[S'pht translator active] Specified communication directive Issued from Lieu-Commander Kalgan You. I don't know what Karma has to do with you, but his refusal to destroy you when given a straight order is extremely suspicious. The other councilmen and commanders may not want to disable him, but I can see through his gambit. I hope you're ready to die, feeble creature.

# n

SECRET EXIT ENABLED...

# t
<teleport to level 34>

terminal 2

unfinished

# n
# n

[S'pht translator active] For once, you are witnessing the Pfhor putting up a decent fight against the Renegades. We believe the Pfhor are aware of the pending attack by your commander on (what they perceive as) some kind of big Renegade fortress. With your presence here, they will redouble their attempts to finish off the A'Khr. Here is one of the access switches you need in order to access their communications core. You will still need to locate the access chip to open the core itself, however.

# n