The hum spiked. The lights went out. When they came back on, Dmitri and Park were gone. Elara stood alone, touching the warm casing of 6868c-2. Her lips moved, but no sound came out. Then the Odyssey 's main screen lit up with a single line of text, repeated in every language on Earth's database:
ANSWER ACCEPTED. UNIT 6868C AND 6868C-2 NOW SYNCHRONIZED. NEW QUESTION: WHAT WILL YOU BECOME? The hum spiked
She didn't. A sliver of light pulsed from the satellite's main sensor array—not a transmission, but something slower, more deliberate. It washed over her suit, and for a second, she felt understood . Not scanned. Not recorded. Understood, the way a key understands a lock. She heard a voice, though her radio was silent: We are not broken. We are waiting. Elara stood alone, touching the warm casing of 6868c-2
She led them to the cargo bay. There, behind a sealed panel, they found what the Venture 's crew had hidden: a second, smaller satellite. Identical to 6868c in every way except one. This one was labeled , and its casing was warm. Active. Transmitting. UNIT 6868C AND 6868C-2 NOW SYNCHRONIZED
"Odyssey, I've got visual on 6868c. It's… active."
When she returned to the airlock, her crewmates, Park and Dmitri, noticed nothing unusual. But that night, Elara stopped sleeping. She stared at the bulkhead, tracing patterns only she could see. The hum had followed her inside.
"It's not a weapon," she whispered. Her eyes had taken on the same oily sheen as the satellite's hull. "It's a question. And we've been answering it since the Venture got here."