World Not Doomed Yet

DATELINE Very long ago if you’re a future researcher reading archives, otherwise not so much

The peace and tranquility of the world was shattered today when the following Navigational Warning was issued:

[A reproduction of monospace text is included in the article]

The SpinDizzy Navigation Hazard Service has issued an Advisory to operators of all atmosphere capable spacecraft and stations in near orbit.  An extreme distortion in the electrogravitic field surrounding the planetoid has been detected in the area immediately above the conduit connecting the dorsal to the ventral surface.

[A vector illustration has been helpfully included, showing a rounded shape with a more acute nose in one direction that fans out more bulbously in the back.  An arrow points to a spot on the south of the shape where it looks like someone has stuck a very sharp spike stright down into it.]

Instability in the interface in the areas closest to the disturbance has produced high spatial turbulance, therefore we advise all craft to prefer launch and landing sites on the periphery.  In addition, the anomaly has caused extreme interference in radio transmissions through the interior.  Therefore we advise the use of wired communications when possible, or that wireless transmissions be relayed through stations around the periphery.

This phenomenon does not appear to constitute an existential threat.  If an existential threat arises, the appropriate agency will issue a warning.  The Spindizzy Navigational Hazard Service is a public service of Neopolis University, administered jointly by the departments of Computational Meteorology, Technogeology, and Astrophysics.

Konov (Psionic Alien), Aquamarine (Synthetic Vaporeon), Natasha Nelson (Crazy Coati), The Riftsbats (Collection of Bats in a rift), and Azure Varisha (Corrupt Government Official) investigated the anomaly.  It was discovered that the distortion in the field was caused by a ‘rolling’ failure in the secondary engine drive, wherein one of the four engines surrounding the Wound in the World would spin down to zero, then the next in line would start to spin down while the first restarted and so on repeating.  The homeostatic network’s attempts to compensate followed a repeating pattern and set up a resonance in the field, resulting in the distortion.

Konov attempted both to disable the autocorrection system and reinitialize the engines, and to gang the four failures together, but the anomaly spread to the set of engines the next level out from the Wound in the World.  The Riftsbats, Azure, and Konov came up with a plan to shut down the two ranks of generators nearest the anomaly and boost the rest to maintain integrity.  As soon as both ranks of generators were deactivated, they started throwing repeated invalid command errors and printing nonsensical status reports.  The Riftsbats and Azure theorized that, with the energy it had been feeding on cut off, the anomaly had been attempting to restart the secondaries.

After making a psionic probe for the entity, Konov reported, “We have identified the anomaly in the SpinDizzy secondary generator network to be the result of some form of creature. The creature appears to feed on both the energy of the generators as well as the information of its control systems and likely the cognition of nearby creatures. It does so because its mind has been shattered, and it is attempting to recover itself using the resources of SpinDizzy’s infrastructure. Currently we are gathering resources for a mission to the Wound in the World, in which we hope to confront the creature and, should the ideal situation unfold, aid its recovery such that it no longer poses a threat to the continent. At this point, the anomaly is stable and poses no immediate danger, though should the isolation field containing the atmosphere begin to weaken severely, or an emergency unfold among the engines, we will be quick to correct for it.”

On facing this challenge, the Riftsbats opined: “We will fight them on the radar! We will fight them on the sonar! We will fight them on 40 meters (during the day)!  –and we will never give up?  Unless it’s a school night, of course.”

And on the subject of interpersonal management, Aquamarine noted, “Toons are entertaining: but keep them away from the life support.”

Will the residents of SpinDizzy survive to see another day?  Will the terrible alien menace join us to sing folk music and drink tea?  No one can know for sure, but this reporter casts his lot with a resounding “Maybe sorta’!”