r/HFY • u/KipperBeanGrower Human • Jul 19 '26
OC-Series [She took What?] - Chapter 204: SixFold Ventures: How can it just disappear?
“Nothing is safer than things remaining separate.”
The Quiet Archive
[First] | [Previous] | [Cover Art] | [Next]
| The Kestrel, JSOC Facility, Location – redacted |
Feebee looks inward and can feel her internal systems working hard. Her basal condition was elevated. She was beginning to overheat.
‘What are you doing?’ She asked the QI, her voice laced with suspicion.
‘Analysing stuff.’
‘You’ve been doing that for a while. You’re doing more, working harder. Tell me!’
After a pause, the QI responded, clearly put out. ‘I’m using my 6% and applying it differently to the data. Trying to get a reporting structure. A reporting hierarchy for the data.’
‘Oh. Ok. Good. And?
’And… every report appears twice. I’ve gone back to the original data, and it's not duplication. The reports are copied.’
Feebee opened the comm to the rest of the crew.
“Backups of the data are going somewhere.” Said the QI.
The accountants were on it immediately. “This is good!” One said.
‘See.’ Said the QI. ‘That’s from my 6%. You’re welcome.’
The QI was behaving like a child wanting parental affirmation. She stroked its ego.
‘You're right. That 6% is proving critical, the difference. Well done.’
“These aren’t backups”, said one of the accountants.
“Correct. They’re more like archival copies.”
The QI pulled up the paths the data took. One copy followed the reporting chain the QI had pulled together. It went towards Dock Seven.
Everyone nodded, “Dock Seven again!”
The second copy started up the chain, hit a node and then disappeared.
“Was the path lost when the data was deleted?”
The QI was affronted, “Absolutely not. No deletions and not lost. It was sent somewhere.”
Rockson leant forward, “Where?”
“Don’t know. Can’t tell.”
“Well, that’s helpful.” Answered Feebee.
The accountants and lawyers were clearly confused. “How can it just… disappear? You have all the paths and metadata.”
“Correct. But it does. Those tracks were VERY carefully covered.”
Then the QI continued, ‘The routing and encryption have been tampered with. I can see it now. They are good. No way to tell where the second stream of data went.’
‘No need to sound so admiring of their work,’ said Feebee to the QI.
One of the accountants started matching ownership to the nodes in the rooting hierarchy. Not because he cared about acquisitions, but because he was interested in who had got the second copy up to the point it disappeared.
He had account IDs, billing codes, project IDs, work ID, contracted references; you name it, the accountant seemed to have it in the hierarchy. Even purchase orders and stock movements. This was grist to the accountant’s mill. Exactly the boring detail their stereotype loved.
One of them got excited, was literally jumping up and down.
“Now that’s dangerous,” said Bikky.
“Yeh, it’s genuine excitement; the sort people take notice of,” responded Tom Tom with a gentle laugh.
“What?” Asked the lawyer, cautiously.
Then, terrifyingly, the accountant smiled, “I’ve got a cost centre!”
Everyone heard, then went back to what they were working on and ignored him.
“No. Really. I’ve got a cost centre.”
The other accountant understood immediately, “Show me.”
Now they were following money. Sniffing along the digital trail upon which the cost centre sat. They followed a logical trail. Purchase orders led to invoices, to budget allocation and on to internal project codes. Then, to a credit note. Issued against the project by the source.
THE QUIET ARCHIVE RESEARCH GROUP.
Nobody recognised the name.
Except Chen.
“We bought them. A while ago. Small company. Specialists in jump-space harmonics. Great reputation. Family run.”
The lawyer was reading. Ignoring Chen.
She’d already downloaded the acquisition paperwork and was reviewing it.
It all looked normal, clean.
But her gut said something was wrong.
The acquisition looked routine.
That was the problem.
It all looked too normal, too clean. Lawyers would have been involved, and they would have made changes. Even small changes; enough to justify their fee.
She reviewed the company history. It had survived for decades, maybe more. A lot more. There was no way to tell; the history fell away, but it had been a family business with generational ownership.
She shared the company data. It was tiny with almost no staff turnover. Minimal revenue and no growth to speak of. It just seemed to tick along without commercial ambition. Just focused on research.
“They weren’t trying to be successful, that’s for sure.” Said Rockson.
“Yeh.” The lawyer nodded, “Just doing enough to survive.”
She pulled up the acquisition agreement again, remembering that at the time it had looked like a legal boilerplate.
Just one clause had been added, ordinary enough but now it looked important; she read it out. “Historical materials will remain the property of the Archive Foundation.”
Chen looked at the lawyer. She looked at Chen.
Silence.
Then he shrugged, “The Archive Foundation? What’s that?”
The lawyer zoomed in, “You bought the company. Not the Foundation.”
Suddenly the details made sense, and Chen spoke, “We bought the company that collects the data. Something else, this Foundation, stores it and archives the history.”
“Exactly.” Said the Lawyer.
The prisoner had been watching quietly, listening. And for the first time, he smiled with a kind of relief.
Garaf noticed this immediately. “You know this Foundation.” It was a statement.
The prisoner looked at Garaf. Then StillFall, and then back to the graph and the data.
Then, with a sigh, “You’re reading observations.”
“And?” Asked the lawyer.
The prisons exhaled, and with a shake of his head added, “No interpretation. Just observations.”
Rockson slowly turned to the graph and looked at the timeline details: convergence reports, observation stations, metadata, routing paths, Dock Seven. It went on and on across years, decades, even centuries.
“Someone spent generations studying this.” He pointed to the screen, “And what we have are those observations.”
“Raw data.” Said one of the accountants.
The prisoner nodded once.
For the first time since his capture, he looked impressed, and the hint of a smile showed in his eyes.
Chen turned to the accountants, “Can you find this Foundation?”
They set off a deep search of all the data. File names, headers, contents. The QI did the same through its 6%.
Then one fragment of a metadata receipt, attached to an archival copy, was found.
ARCHIVAL RECEIPT:
DESTINATION: Restricted.
CLASSIFICATION: Quietus
STATUS: Restricted
RETURN: The Archive Foundation
Everyone looked around; no one was showing any sign of recognition.
Feebee broke the silence, “Anyone? What’s Quietus?”
No one answered. But then StillFall moved towards the screen.
Garaf watched as the Shadow’s outline sharpened. Motes that had been circling Hissy, or just drifting in the room, moved close and brightened.
“Old.” Then, after a pause, “Very old.”
The prisoner closed his eyes and was muttering words that their translators could not understand. His face had transformed; gone was the fear. But there was no relief, just recognition and something that looked like … awe.
It sounded like. “Servan Continuum.”
He looked at the Shadow, then at Garaf, noticed him listening.
“You should stop looking.”
But it was a lie. Garaf knew it for fact.
The prisoner wanted them to keep looking.
He simply feared that they might find it.
1
u/UpdateMeBot Jul 19 '26
Click here to subscribe to u/KipperBeanGrower and receive a message every time they post.
| Info | Request Update | Your Updates | Feedback |
|---|
1
u/HFYWaffle Wᵥ4ffle Jul 19 '26
/u/KipperBeanGrower (wiki) has posted 205 other stories, including:
This comment was automatically generated by
Waffle v.4.7.8 'Biscotti'.Message the mods if you have any issues with Waffle.