Chapter 2 - Ruins of better days

"With a sealed hatch, and no atmospheric controls, the ship is a tomb", Graham explains.
"If we can't take off and have no system controls, the hatch needs to stay open -- if we can get it to open" he adds, a little hesitantly.
Graham goes back to his console to see if he can gain some kind of control over ship systems.

SOOO dramatic! Elan thinks to himself.

"I have every confidence in Taelor's abilities to finesse a mechanical solution," Elan replies. "Or in your capabilities to program a software solution, Graham.

"Failing that, there are brute force options. I certainly don't wish to shoot up our ship, but as a last resort a laser rifle is more than capable of cutting through a ship's hull. Or, failing that, I believe I could on my own."

Statton dutifully checks the camera controls, pecking a few commands into the console. is he getting a feed from the outside? He muses darkly on what might be hiding in the ruins... what could have removed control of the ship at a distance?

On that thought, he turns to Taelor's crewmates, the ones that she had made planetfall with and that had been guarding the ship "Y-you didn't see anything, right? Nothing suspicious happened while we were gone?"

The failing departure puts everybody in a busy frenzy. Systems and components are being checked thoroughly, but to everybody's relief everything on the ship seems to be working just fine. Only the lift off is blocked by something.
Graham, after checking his console, tries to analyse the ships computer for inconsistencies. It seems to be working fine. He does however discover that someone or something else has an external connection to the ship. This possibility is completely new to him, but he thinks it might be an exploit on a service interface, but despite his best efforts, he cannot find out through which physical interface the connection is established. Either way, he tries to break the connection without luck. Also a shutdown of the system seems to be blocked. Whatever is interfering has a firm grip on the ships computer and no inclination to let go.

Examining the live feed of the outside cameras only yields a peaceful evening panorama. Nothing out of the ordinary. Asking Jasper about anything unusual only gets Statton a shrug. "Nothing happened. Noone came near the ship, as far as I know. And definitely noone came into it. Granted, I wasn't staring out the hatch the whole time, but I think I would have noticed."

Elan opens the hatch, without any problems. Cool air flows into the ship, outside the insects chirp, everything is calm.

Graham opens the ship comms, visibly relaxing somewhat.
"We may be seeing some automated security, maybe spaceport controls for traffic management. If that's the case, it's nothing malicious, but we'll have to solve it relatively soon. if we have hatch control and atmospheric control, let's close the hatch for now. What are your thoughts?"
He rests his chin in his hand, contemplating next moves. Cut starport system power, and backup power? Maybe. It adds a new layer of complexity, and it may require a new set of priorities. He waits patiently for input, and goes back to work on cracking the security protocols.

Taelor has left the cockpit and gone down to the engine room, checking systems along the way. She looks up as Graham contacts the crew through the comms. She nods along. He's probably right. If flight control is the only thing affected, traffic management makes sense.

She activates the engine room's comm panel. "Sounds like we need to get a takeoff authorization. I think our plan hasn't changed, other than having to sleep here. Tomorrow, we can go down to the basement and find the computer controlling all this. Maybe we can get it to cooperate. If not, we can turn it off."

She chuckles at the unlikely scenario they now find themselves into. "It's pretty amazing it's still functional after all this time. There has to be some sort of renewable power source. My money's on geothermic." She pauses, wondering if her new friends are the gambling kind. "Should we get a pool going?"

Elan knows better than make bets about things that require knowledge and education.

"I have about 10 credits left to my name, so I don't have much to spare for gambling," he says. "Or, at least, gambling in situations where I can't cheat."

The situation with the ship is annoying but doesn't seem to be a crisis. There are plenty of supplies available. Failing that, he knows the basics of how to survive off the land. He's hoping not to put those skills to the test, but it's comforting to have them all the same.

"I'm going to close the hatch," he says, "so that we don't have to sleep with our atmofilters on our faces.

"I'll keep watch if someone wants to get the galley going."

The night passes uneventfully and after a quick breakfast in the galley, the team heads back into the port. By now the omnipresent vegetation in the normally bleak concrete structure feels pleasant and welcome - natural. With high spirits, lifted by morning sunshine the crew enters the familiar atrium. As expected nothing has changed since the night before. A small animal scurries away, when the group enters, probably still out from the nights hunt.
The stairs to the lower floors are quickly found. Flicking on their glowbugs each oteam member lights their own way down. It's pitch dark, no sun rays reach through the ceiling and the lights have been switched off for the last time decades ago. Carefully the team reaches the first underground landing. The floors used the be lined with carpet, the structure of the layout is similar to the 'business customer service' area, just larger. Office after office fill this level. Every room is equipped similarly to upstairs, just the folders have different labels. The computers on the desks are all off.
After having investigated this floor, the team edges downstairs one more flight and finds itself in a more clearly technical area. Pipes and wiring line the ceiling, the doors on the left and right are solid, but not very pretty metal. They can be opened easily, albeit with a moan or screech, depending on the shape the respective door is in.
The first rooms contain cleaning supplies and utilities, followed by ventilation and climatisation. Towards the back of the floor the rooms contain more technical content, it's not always clear what purpose each device served during its lifetime.
Suddenly as the group turns a corner in the hallway the unnatural glow of a screen light shines through the opening of a broken door ahead. The group stops in its step and listens. No sound can be heard.

Graham holds his finger to his lips, making the universal sign for quiet. in a soft whisper, he says "Elan and I will move to the door. You two stay here, weapons ready. When we get to the door, call out a greeting, and let's see what kind of response we get. If someone tries to close the door, we'll keep it open, if we can. Any objections?"
He waits a moment for nods or objections, and preps his stun baton. He glances at the floor, looking for loose debris, or anything that will make telltale noises during his approach.

As a response, Statton nods and awkwardly draws and flips the safety off on his laser pistol. The blue light from beyond the door faintly casting his face into relief.

"Let me just glance around the corner before we call out a greeting," Elan whispers. "If there's someone in there, let's see what they're doing first. Once we know that we can judge whether it makes sense to announce ourselves or not."

He thinks about whether they have anything reflective that he can poke around the corner. A mirror on a stick is classic but Elan doesn't have one nor does he expect anyone else to. What about his metatool? Maybe there's something in there that's reflective...

Graham nods, gives Elan a thumbs-up. He's new to the sneaking around game, but Elan seems to have done this a time or two. "Never hurts to defer to the experts", he thinks to himself, and with a hand gesture, motions for Elan to lead the way.

Taelor notices Elan's searching look and passes him her monoblade. It's not a mirror Elan would trust while shaving, but it'll do. Elan nods a thank you and leans his shoulder on the outer frame of the doors. Slowly sliding the knife towards the door at an angle, he tries to see what's going on inside the room. The room is similar to the previous rooms, no other exits or windows, a few tables and shelves and on the tables a total of three computers. All three screens are on, but Elan can not tell via the blade what the screens show. He twists and turns the knife, but he can not see anyone inside. After passing the knife back to Taelor he carefully peeks into the room. Noone is in there. Only one screen is facing Elan, it shows a window on which text flies by. Seemingly random numbers and letters scroll over the terminal without much of a recognisable pattern. Whispering to the others that the air seems clear he carefully slips into the room and checks all tables, corners, walls and the ceiling. Noone besides them is in the room and no other routes of escape, except the door they just entered through can be found. Instinctively he returns to the door and observes the hallway for signs of movement.

Tensed Statton waits in front of the door, the laser pistol feels very foreign in his hands. He contemplates the physics behind the lethal rays of light he potentially wields and oddly it calms him down a bit. It feels like hours until Elan turns around and whispers that the room is empty and then disappears inside. Statton follows after a moment, together with the rest of the group. The room is indeed empty, but the screens of the computers are on, obviously the source of the light. Quickly the terminal on the screens attracts his attention. The text that scrolls by appears to be random at first, but he recognises some patterns. For some time the numbers seem like coordinates within the sector. But it is too fast to follow what the coordinates describe. But while staring at the scrolling text he suddenly notices a familiar word scroll by: 'Tsunami'. Then the numbers and letters roll past again without making sense.

Elan thinks it's a bit curious that a process like this (and whatever is fueling the process, either a VI or automation or _____) is still triggering the screen.

But that's far out of his area of expertise, so he stands back while the bigger brains go to work.

"Do we need to record it and play it back frame-by-frame to make sense of things?" he asks, not knowing if this is a brilliant suggestion or an idiotic one.

Taelor shrugs. She knew more about hardware than software. Graham seemed to know his way around a computer, though. "I'll defer to my elders on this one," she says.

She moves to look behind the computers, looking for their power cords. She hopes to follow them to their source, be it an outlet or something else. If all else fails, they can just cut the power and shut the computers down.

Graham tucks his laser pistol away, and grabs his compad, hustling to take some video of the screen. He keeps his hands away from the computer and the keyboard, and avoids getting right in front in case a camera is watching.
"I'm not sure what we'll get from this, but it's better than staring at a login screen...", he mutters.
He's prepared to stand there for minutes taking video, as long as the data keeps moving.

Despite not having the most experience with software, (He had awful trouble working with the Halianti Medical's terrible third-party-designed medical record VIs - argumentative and touchy things, they were - he was much more confident working with relatively un-sapient medical hardware) Statton points out the format of the data that he notices to Graham "Some of this data looks like stellar c-coordinates..." His eyes suddenly narrow as he scans the scrolling data "Wait, d-did you see that? I swear I saw the word Tsunami scroll past..."

Seeing Taelor crawling beneath the station, inspecting wires, something catches Statton's eye and, stooping beneath the desk, he lightly picks up one of the cables "Wait, is this a positronic control shunt? Its presence here might indicate a converter junction somewhere nearby, which in turn might indicate that the ultimate source of the power and data... [blah blah blah]"

"Found it!" Taelor says from under the desk, interrupting Statton as he takes a breath to continue his diatribe. "I don't see any other cables, must be wireless."

She blows some of the dust away. "Any luck with the gibberish? Or are we ready to pull the plug?"

While Graham films the rushing text on the screen, Taelor and Statton examine the wiring. The terminal is plugged into a power outlet on the floor, a data cable is not connected, likely a wireless network of some sorts.
Elan is guarding the door in the meantime. For a while nothing happens and everybody follows there activities then Elan gets pulled out of his thoughts by a whirring sound down the corridor. He shushes the group and takes an alert position in the door, trying to minimise visibility from the outside and at the same time trying to maximise his view of what's happening in the hallway. The whirring continues and becomes louder as two drones roll into view. It's hard to tell what kind of drones they are, definitely not a model Elan has seen before.
The drones roll a bit closer and then stop at about 10 m distance from the door. Elan waits tensed, but the drones just stand there silently.

Elan watches and waits. The drones appear content to watch and wait as well.

Elan picks up a piece of debris off the floor and throws it behind the drones to see how they react. They do not.

Elan then picks up a second piece of debris and plunks one of the egg-looking drones with it. The drone remains unmoved. Elan silently admires their stoicism.

Keeping an eye on the door, he retreats into the office to confer with the rest of the team. "Two drones in the hallway. Their function is unclear but they don't appear to be here to tidy things up.  They're on wheels and don't have visible arms.

"They don't appear dangerous for the moment. It's entirely possible they could be related to customer service or something else completely innocuous. I don't think they've seen me yet but their placement certainly suggests that they know we're here.

"I'm open to ideas or suggestions, as you are all more technically-minded than I am. If I were on my own, I'd let one see me and see how it reacts. Who knows, maybe they're friendly. For all I know they could follow us home."

Continuing his video, Graham glances toward Elan at the door.
"They're just sitting there? Sounds like some kind of service bot. A security bot probably wouldn't hold its distance like that. Be ready with weapons, though, just in case. You never know when a bot will take great offense to mustaches or whatever. Who knows, maybe they'll obey verbal commands -- if we can get access to the system, that is. If you're going to be seen, give us a heads-up, so we can prep for shooty business."
With that, he goes back to what he was doing.

Taelor pulls herself out from under the desk. "I'm going to check out those drones. If things go to shit, just pull the black cord. You can't miss it."

She picks up her gear and heads to the door. She leans forward and peeks at the drones. They're still standing at attention, unfazed. Graham said they might respond to vocal commands... "Uh... just doing some very long overdue maintenance. Nothing to see here." Wait, that's not a command. "Return to your previous location!" she says, mimicking her former CO.

Taelor calls over to the drones, but they stay put.
The data stream continues to flood by, the halls are silent.

Taelor steps out into the hallway so the drones can see her, but still close enough to the doorway to the computer room so she can dive for cover if they start shooting. "Hello? Can you help us? Something here is keeping our ship from taking off and we don't know what or why."

If the drones still don't react, she tries getting closer. If there's still no reaction, she tries going past them, down the corridor. If they still don't react, she will go up to them for a closer look.

Taelor steps out of hiding, every fiber of her body ready to propel her back into the room. The drones however stand unmoving as if they hadn't done anything else for decades. Hesitantly Taelor steps towards the drones.
Suddenly, when she is at about 5m distance to the drones on both sides of each drone rectangular pieces of the shell move out and swing forward displaying what could be barrels of guns. Taelor instinctively leaps backwards and to the floor, but the drones don't do anything else. Into the silence an electronic voice cackles from everywhere "I would very much appreciate your company a little longer. My little minions won't harm you, I merely tasked them to encourage you to stay a bit longer for good company. Welcome to my humble abode. I apologise for the mess, the maintenance staff has been slacking of late, but it is so hard to find competent personnel these days that actually manages to understand simple instructions. "

Upon hearing a new voice, Graham gives Statton a quizzical look, tucks away his compad, and steps to the door. The laser pistol still in his hand, he listens to get the tone of the conversation, even if he can't quite hear all of the words.
"Leave space for Taelor's and Elan's retreat, get ready to shoot" goes through his head.

Taelor relaxes slightly, her mind racing as she processes the words echoing in the hallway.

Could it be a survivor or one of their descendants? Unlikely. Surviving alone all this time would have been difficult. More than heading to Mani Losa for safety.

Could it be the spaceport's AI? If it was, then Astyoc had fallen from much higher than she'd thought. Whoever her interlocutor was, it was expressing loneliness, the desire for company and... it had made a joke!

"Um... Hi, I'm Taelor. Who are you?"

Elan watches approvingly as Taelor boldly takes the lead in walking out into the hallway and then initiating contact.

He's less pleased about the voice. It means there might be some logic to everything that's going on, but the electronic voice suggests that it might be non-human logic.

He frowns, slinging his rifle over his shoulder. He presumes this entity is what's behind the Tsunami not being able to take off, but he leaves it to Taelor and possible Graham to take the lead on figuring things out socially.

"Hello Taelor, nice to get your acquaintance. My name is Cerebrus, I am the governor of Mani Losa and keeper of affairs. Frankly, lately Mani Losa has experienced a bit of a dry spell, but I have good hopes for the future."

Graham speaks in a low voice to Taelor and Elan, "Maybe we can track down some information on the 'Governor of Mani Losa' on the local channels. Think you can find anything?"
He looks upward and all around, stepping out of the room, and speaks to no one in particular. "Hello, I'm Graham, it's a pleasure to meet you, Cerberus." He gives a little twist to the end of his mustache, uncertain of who or what he's speaking to. In old legends, Cerberus was a gatekeeper or a guardian, and he pondered the significance that this disembodied voice had taken that name.
"We have similar hopes for the future, and if we are successful here, we believe Mani Losa will once again be a thriving center of activity. Maybe we can help each other..." Graham says, hoping this will register with their new 'host'.

"Oh, I'm sure you can help me. Until then, why don't you keep me company down here. What do you need from me?"

"For one thing, I'm concerned that many people have left their ships and belongings here, and those people are long gone -- dead or off planet. This means that they won't ever return to claim those ships and belongings, which will clog your operations in the times ahead when visitors do return. If you can help us to find and repair them. we can fly them out of your spaceport, clearing it for proper operations."
This seems amazingly reasonable to Graham's own ears. He feels like a kid who has talked his mom into giving him all the cookies in the jar. He reaches for the jar quickly, in case mom comes to her senses.

Elan is a bit confused - 'mildly concerned' and going the wrong direction would also be accurate - and wants clarification.

"What do you mean by 'keep me company'?" he asks. "What do you like to do, tell dirty limericks? There once was a man from Bel Air..."

He trails off, his sense of good taste getting the better of him.

"And where is 'down here'? Are you somewhere specific or are you everywhere?" This might help indicate the nature of Cerebrus.

He takes a cue from Graham and tries to turn the situation to the team's advantage. "If we're staying for a little while, can you and your minions give us a tour of your humble abode?"

"I am afraid for the time being neither of that is possible. Please, be patient, I am having my minions set up your room as we speak.
But where are my manners. Please, help yourself." A buzzing and clicking sound comes from behind. The group spins towards the source of the sound and sees an old vending food printer spin up, its lights, displaying products it used to be preparing, flickers.

Elan doesn't look inclined to be eating decades-old food coming out of a food printer. He gives a sour look, then a wary eye toward the minions.

He moves to pass them by, figuring they won't shoot by default. They react by charging up their weapons, making it clear that Elan should be staying put. His esteem for the stoic minions diminishes rapidly.

Elan returns to the office, hoping to break line-of-sight and communicate freely with Taelor, Graham, and Statton. It's possible that Cerebrus can still see him, but there's not much he can do about that except maybe text things via his compad. Which isn't a half bad idea so he does that.

<<Time to go>> he taps out, lifting his laser rifle to indicate his thinking. Perhaps a cooler head will urge him to bide his time, but he has little hope of reasoning with an artificial intelligence.

Taelor looks at her dataslab, then at Elan. Yeah, she doesn't relish the idea of an extended stay either. She walks into the computer room and looks around. If the AI was housed here, it would have tried to secure it with the drones. Which means the Tsunami was still grounded and vulnerable.

What if it goes after the ship? She doesn't relish the thought of being stuck on Astyoc either. Her fingers hover over the keypad of her dataslab as she hesitates.

Fuck it. I'm just going to have to trust Jasper.

She nods at Elan.

Graham taps out a message on his compad. "If we start a fight now," he taps, "we're in a running battle with an enemy we know nothing about. If we delay, and go along for a bit, we might have a chance to find a few things out before the shooting starts. I'm game for either one, but we should consider the options."
Graham is pretty sure what the answer will be, and he starts to replay data frame by frame on the compad to see if he can find anything of value. A fight isn't ideal, but when pressed...

Statton feels his face go hot as Taelor indicates the power plug "Oh, y-yes, right, of course, wireless... haha."

~~~

Statton jumps as the voice of Cerebrus echoes from all around them. Did it just say it was governor of Mani Losa? Statton thinks back to what he has learned about the history of Astyoc, did they really appoint an AI as their leader?

~~~

As Statton's compad lights up with Elan's message, Statton frowns worriedly. If the VI could remotely hack into the Tsunami, then what were the chances that it might be able to sniff their compads as well? He messages Elan back //Oh really . I think we should stay with Cerebrus here, at least for a little bit, they seem like a fine fellow   // He sends the message, giving a huge, obvious wink in Elan's direction, hoping that he gets the point.

Mani Losa, Mani Losa,... How was it again. Statton had read about the history of the planet, but an AI as governor? It simply didn't ring a bell. But he does recall, that about a century and a half ago, give or take, that Mani Losa did introduce an AI. It was supposed to revolutionise people's every day life. "Just speak up and ask", was the line. But governor? No, that he would have remembered.
As Statton stares at the data, he suddenly recognises years. The data next to it is not clear, but the years stop roughly a hundred years ago.
That must be the point where almost all Mani Losa got wiped out. Statton wonders, not for the first time, how can it be, that a civilization that is aware of a reoccurring danger be caught so off guard?
Following a gut feeling, he asks Graham whether he can access the database and try to query data about occurrences of the Cloud.
Graham sits at one of the terminals and starts typing away. After a while he shows Statton some entries of what he found. There are four recorded events of the cloud reaching from about 137 years ago until about 102 years ago. Plus the big one that obviously wouldn't have been recorded.
More data cannot be found here. Graham assumes for more details or older records they would have to get to the archives, or to a terminal with direct access to the archives.

That helper AI... in all likelihood Cerebrus was one and the same. Statton's sense of unease deepens... He remembers snippets from his mandatory maltech 101 class back in university. The teacher, one of the Preceptors of the Great archive, acted more like a priest handing out strictures than an instructor "Thou shalt not make a machine in the image of man".

Statton considers carefully for a few moments, then opens his mouth "It must have been quite an election, C-Cerebrus, I imagine it was a blowout in your favor, given your obvious intelligence and manners." he trails off. He walks backwards towards the food printer, keeping his eyes fixed on the two drones. He peers at the printer as it works, trying to observe their "meal". When it dings and disgorges the food, he brings out his bioscanner and begins to scan for abnormalities.

Elan lowers his laser rifle, his face skeptical. He's happy to see a fighting spirit - a kindred spirit - in Taelor, but if there's going to be shooting he wants everyone on board with the plan. Granted, Elan can start firing and force everyone else's hand, but he admits the situation is a tactical mess. Trapped at the end of a hallway in an office by an unknown number of opponents of unknown capabilities? Elan's wiling to bet that he can triumph over tech that's 100 years old, but he would have said the same thing about the Tsunami but evidently the Tsunami could not. Whatever departure protocols were in place a century ago are still formidable enough to prevent the Tsunami from leaving, so maybe he needs to give Cerebrus a little credit.

"Alright," he says dubiously, but makes no move toward the food, which he presumes is laced with something unpleasant. It gives him some satisfaction to see that Statton is similarly suspicious and is using his bioscanner to screen the food.

<<How long are we waiting?>> he types out. <<A VI chilling out for a century may have lost its sense for the rhythms of a human day, or a human lifespan for that matter.>>

He leans against the wall with his rifle. Being trapped in an office and unable to leave feels a bit too much like jail, a place that Elan has spent his criminal life avoiding.

Taelor looks from Elan to Graham to Statton. Seeing Elan stand down, she feels a confusing mix of frustration and relief. She'd been ready to go and who knew if they'd have another good opportunity. Cerebrus was distracted "preparing their room". It probably had other drones working on that. Once it was done, the numbers might no longer be in their favor.

On the other hand, a peaceful solution would be preferable. If the AI was lonely, that meant it could feel. It could probably empathize and be appealed to. If they could test their cure and it worked, Mani Losa would be free to expand again and the spaceport could be rehabilitated. A better long term solution than keeping the four of them as prisoners.

//The cure is our best bargaining chip// she taps on her dataslab.

As Elan and Statton have a look at the food and Graham focuses on the terminal, Taelor keeps her eyes on the drones, ready to act at the first sign of trouble.

Graham ignores the food. He knows the crew has food for the trip, and isn't about to try anything presented by the crew's new 'host'.
Statton's information is intriguing, and give him an idea -- a new vector to try in the system. To get anywhere with Cerebrus, communication is important. If "speak up and ask" isn't working, it should be possible to find that subroutine and re-connect it to the primary code.
"Let's find out exactly what's on Cerebrus' metal mind", he thinks to himself, as he starts banging away at the keys.

The food printer makes grinding noises, as if sand got to places it shouldn't be (as it does) and huffs and puffs, but eventually produces a dish with a greyish paste that is warm, but not very visually or olfactorially appealing. A thorough scan with the scanner however does not indicate the presence of any known toxins.

Graham sits down at the terminal and tries to find code that could belong to the definition of a possible VI that could be Cerebrus. But if there is code, it must be on a system that is not directly accessible from this terminal and Graham has to give up after a while.

Eventually Cerebrus' voice sounds again over the speakers: "You flatter me, but I don't need an election.
I have prepared your rooms, so I kindly ask you to follow my minions, they will show you your place."
In the same moment one of the drones in the hallway drives over to the wall, making room to pass and the other turns around and starts driving down the hallway. The group starts following the leading drone and the second drone follows the little caravan in the rear.
The group is taken a story up, far down a hallway and then again a story down. The area seems to have served as some kind of crew quarters, at least most rooms contain two to three beds. Back in the day, this was likely a fairly fancy wing. Flower pots decorate the hallway and the remains of comfortable chairs and a working desk in each room speak of a certain level of luxury. At some points these desks also housed terminals, but they have been removed. The drones indicate two rooms to the group, one with two beds, one with three. Each drone positions itself in front of one of the doors.
The hallway stretches a little further down, but the end can be seen. The area appears to be deserted except for the group and the two drones.
"Make yourself comfortable. We shall start soon."

Taelor didn't like the sound of that. No one was this cagey when they had good intentions. Unless they were planning a surprise party, but she doubted Cerebrus had something that pleasant in mind.

She shifts her stance, preparing in case she needs to draw. The laser pistol didn't have any recoil, of course, but the rifle certainly would and she wasn't sure which to go for yet.

"Start what?" she asks, trying to sound conversational, but she shoots Elan a meaningful look. There's no way in hell I'm going in there.

Elan clucks his tongue. The sideways glance to Taelor tells her that he agrees.

"Cerebrus, what are we staring soon?" he asks inquisitively, his tone all patience and charm. As much as he can conjure, anyway, as he tries to summon his inner-Graham.

"You alluded to your manners a short while ago. - Thank you for that, by the way. - We are not acquainted with the customs from a hundred years ago but in the present day and age it is considered unconventional, even impolite, to unduly detain guests. Perhaps your minions are misinterpreting your simple instructions, but the manner in which they are 'encouraging' us to stay is most distressing.

"Would you kindly clarify your intentions? I feel that I must insist on this matter."

"Oh, but I know. But unfortunately I need to be able to monitor you closely, so I can supervise the progress of the treatment. It will be fine this time and everything will be ok. This time we won't have to wait so long again." The last part mostly direct to himself, Cerebrus' voice trails of as if getting lost in thoughts. He then continues again focused "So I must insist that two of you enter cabin A and the other two cabin B.
As if to emphasise the last sentence, the two drones unfold their guns again and roll back and forth, in an urging-forward-fashion.

"Treatment?" says Graham, looking upward as if there was a face up there to look at. "Do you mean treatment for the zombie affliction caused by the spores?"
He makes no move to walk into either of the rooms.

Elan makes sure his laser rifle is pointed in the right direction. He's willing to let Graham have his say, but Cerebrus doesn't seem to be in its right mind.

He wants to lay his cards out to avoid a firefight if possible. People get fragged in firefights. There's randomness, violent randomness. Shots go astray, walls collapse, things catch on fire, people get hurt in unintended ways.

"We have a cure for the spores, Cerebrus," he adds on after Graham. "It is not reassuring when you say that things will be fine this time and everything will be okay. We don't need treatment. We won't accept treatment."

He undoes the safety on the laser rifle, his finger resting on the trigger. He mentally raises his telekinetic defenses.