Heavy airlock doors, powered by a combination of pneumatic cylinders and crystalline tendrils, split open and receded into their bulkheads. The air differential blew past, wisping Miranda's hair forward and into her face for a moment as pressure equalized. In the landing bay ahead, now closed off from space by an even larger airlock mechanism, a Kusari shuttle floated down gently onto the landing pad, setting down on feet-like landing gear and looking wholly like an oversized beetle with tiny, solar-sail wings protruding from its back. As the full weight of the shuttle settled, Miranda skirted around it to the rear cargo ramp.
A small team of six Kusari personnel stepped down the ramp, leaving the pilot and copilot alone in the purple and bronze insect to begin their post-flight check and prepare for return to the Musashi, a massive Kusari battleship that hovered just beyond the walls of Altair. Miranda greeted the group of scientists and engineers that had been sent to her from the arch, though each of them seemed curiously offput by her appearance. The Iseijin, like the Wilde, maintained a mostly human appearance, with no outward differences other than the occasional glow behind their eyes. Miranda, on the other hand, had pale skin, slightly purple-tinged hair, brightly glowing eyes, and an unnatural light inside of her that made it appear as if her skin was irradiated from underneath, barely able to contain an explosion of light within. Despite the mental connection they, and indeed all nomads, shared, seeing each other in person was altogether different.
"We're pleased you could spare the time to aid us, all of you will be invaluable to this undertaking, we're sure. Altair has been lonely as of late, but we've taken the time to prepare rooms for each of you, and your hosts. Settle in, and when you're all ready to begin, we will be waiting at the dockyard."
Miranda turned and the Aoi group followed as she showed them to their quarters. She was eager to begin the project, but knew that their journey had been a long one, and likely fraught with battle. She could wait another day.
Miranda's face glowed from the light of the holoprojector at the center of the command tower. Floating in front of her were two wireframe images, one depicting an unusual looking storta and the other a half finished scorpion drone. The aoi team encircled the projector with her.
Miranda gestured towards the image of the storta, "Some of you may recognize this as the ascendant, our ship from many years ago. The Oracles procured it and, with the aid of the wilde and keepers, implanted it with an irra seed. Through this process, we were able to interface and control the ascendant by thought, it served us well but had its shortcomings." she swiped at the holographic projection and the storta wireframe disappeared, allowing the scorpion drone to be enlarged, "What we aim to achieve is the conversion of the unmanned scorpion drones left here by the Wilde into habitable vessels that we may interface with in the same way. A chamber to sustain our human form while our mind is linked to the drone will be necessary. A nammu seed will need to be melded with the drone to allow a mindshare linking. We will also require an area to be dedicated to cargo storage for the progenitor keys, made as secure as possible. Is this possible?"
Miranda waited patiently as the aoi scientists and engineers muddled over the blueprints and schematics for the drone and, periodically, called back those of the ascendant for comparison.
Weeks passed with no progress. At every turn the scientists found another roadblock, another problem to be skirted and worked around, and in some cases drastic modifications were made to overcome the hurdles. Loopholes like this reduced the viability of the drones, made them less than they were originally, whereas Miranda required them to be more. She grew frustrated, pacing the halls of Altair more each day, spending more time exploring the mindshare and losing herself in the thoughts of the others. While she was no longer human, not entirely, she still suffered frequently from human qualities. Emotion, frustration, anger, aimlessness; all the traits she wish she had lost with the conversion. Alas, those remained while other, more personal aspects of her humanity had been eradicated. Frequently she would stare into the mirror, seeing the glow beneath her skin, the crystal lattices just below a thin canvas of human shape and appearance, pondering if this was truly a better form of existence.
The concerns were always shrugged off and forgotten when she merged once more with the mindshare, relishing in the overwhelming plethora of information, the feeling of absolute omnipotence as her soul seemed to stretch across the entire sector and connect with each K'hara and Wild in range. It was a truly enlightening experience, shifting at whim from an individual to a hive.
She reverted back to her body, snapping out of the mindshare with an abrupt disconnect. She stood in a control room, overlooking a hangar on Altair. One of the scorpion drones sat in the center of the landing pad, scientists and engineers scuttling about it like bees on a flower. The impending sense of failure began to grow once more, pessimism taking root in the deepest corners of her mind. How long would they continue before giving up?
"Knock, knock. Can I come in?" Muramasa stepped into the control room, displaying his ever-lasting serene face expression. Hands on his back, he approached Miranda and looked down at the hangar, shrugging lightly.
"I think about everyone at the Arch heard your sighing already. I know it's frustrating, but those... things were designed to predate anything that contained a heartbeat. Needless to mention the human DNA fused with our technology, eh, in reality we're standing in front of a true hybrid!" He chuckled, now looking at Miranda and saving a pitiful face for himself. "I think that makes the third drone we have carved in a month, it's not like we have made any progress and sometimes we couldhear them cry in pain. Or so they said."
He turned around, walking across the room as he spoke again. "Experience with human-crafted machines, and war machines more specifically, have taught us it's easier to adapt such ships to us and not the other way around. You have seen the Muramasa already, not sure about the Schiller, but that's another jewel worth looking at with your own... eyes. Oh, and the Tundra, that's definitely the best engineering you would find around, unless you want it to be less evident to the human eye. So let me ask you, do we have any other options?
Miranda faked a smile, "Other options? Sure, we'll go to the nearest shipyard and just buy one, they're sure to deal with our kind."
She looked back out into the hangar. The engineers were already packing their tools, they might as well have given up days ago, the project was doomed to fail from the beginning.
"We're not overly worried about being less evident to human eyes, integration is the most important thing, and having the facilities and resources onboard to continue our mission. Few human-made ships, if any, have links to K'vosh technology, something for us to turn into a receiver and track down the other progenitor keys. We suppose you have nothing of that sort in your fleet, Muramasa?" He shook his head.
"The search will continue, then. We will listen to the others, open ourselves to the mindshare, and hopefully an opportunity will present itself. Please give our regards to your people for their aid, fruitless as it was." Miranda returned to her quarters to integrate with her other form once more, something must exist in the depths of space that would be of use to her.