Eyeing Ted and Spec with what appears to be concern as they start getting their hacking equipment ready, the kishalee hologram answers Arc's question. "Absolutely not. When I uploaded myself to the mainframe, I made certain that it would be thoroughly protected against any tampering. There wouldn't be much sense in having an AI handling operations if it could be... tampered with." Arc, you get the sense that the hologram spoke with disgust, though its difficult to fully interpret the ancient kishalee mannerisms.
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"Isu, what if the information it gives us to activate it doesn't help to destroy it, and we accidentally kill Mataras, condemning the Pact Worlds to a slow, cold death?! I want to make sure we understand what instructions we're given, and given the way this thing's been acting I'm not certain it couldn't lie to us to get what it wants."
While Arc continues his conversation with the kishalee hologram in the robot monitoring room, Spectre quietly heads into the control room to access the main terminal.
To Arc's latest question in ancient kishalee, the hologram responds "It was only a reasonable precaution. The Sivvs had been defeated, but they weren't the only technical minds in the galaxy. Who knows if someone in the future would arrive and attempt to seize control of the systems without our approval?" The hologram suddenly sounds a little distracted "As for 'uploading' myself, how else do you think we are conversing? I was once a scientist here. We volunteered - sacrificed our mortal bodies to be bound here indefinitely, as guardians and caretakers. Myself and-" The hologram cuts off.
In the control room, Spec's computer wizardry allows him to gain access to the main terminal, bypassing a complex but beatable array of mathematical anti-intrusion measures. Once he's in though, he finds the terminal lacks any user-facing features, like an operating system or functional programs. Instead, the data within constantly changes and churns, as if being rewritten and redesigned on the fly. Whatever useful data within the terminal has been hidden within that "sea of code".
Working together Ted and Spec identify that there are three countermeasures lying in wait for anyone who attempts to tamper with the system. Each of which would deliver a deadly electric shock via the terminal itself and other equipment all throughout the building.
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Once Spectre is able to determine what they are dealing with, he works with Ted to try to disable or diminish any countermeasures. Once they have done so, he goes back to the terminal and attempts to hack in again and disable the complex countermeasures.
"I will attempt to keep us alive," he responds to Ted.
Although Ted doesn't spot any particularly suspicious pieces of equipment around the control room, Jelico and Arc spot a number of concealed nodes situated within terminals and light fixtures throughout the room. With their guidance, Ted's able to start disconnecting and disabling the various nodes.
With incredible skill, Spectre unravels the second of three countermeasures, despite the mutative nature of the code surrounding it. The last countermeasure proves more stubborn. On the first attempt , Spec accidentally triggers it just as he's about to sequester it away. Terminals in the south-east corner of the room flash and spark, but the nodes there have been disabled well enough to be harmless.
On a second attempt at the third countermeasure, Spec triggers it again, causing more terminals in the west side of the room to spark. But once again they've been rendered harmless.
As this is happening, the hologram projector in the control room flickers on to reveal a staticky kishalee. "What. What are you doing." The words sound more like an accusation than a question to Arc.
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"Fulfilling the duty you've turned your back on," Arcalinte retorts. "We aim to destroy the Stellar Degenerator once and for all. It is too dangerous to even exist, when using it as you desire would guarantee the deaths of millions, even trillions. Since we do not wish to activate it, and we don't trust you not to lie to us to see it activated, our hand has been forced."
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Jellico smiles when the countermeasures fail to go off. "Thank Desna. Maybe we do make a good team after all."
Not speaking the ancient language of the computer, and being somewhat useless at hacking into said computer, he instead moves his hands to his weapons and stands near Arc, hoping to look intimidating.
Ted and Spec, working together, secure the final countermeasure, giving them access to the system's data without fear of an electrical counterattack. The kishalee hologram almost seems to glow with anger "This is wrong! An abomination! The great weapon has a destiny. A divine purpose. A great unmaking to accomplish! You will never be allowed to touch it! Never!"
Within the system, Spec and Ted uncover a few critical facts in the first few minutes of their perusal (with Arc's help to translate the ancient kishalee). The hologram's assertion that they are an uploaded mind appears to be rooted in fact. The vast spans of ever-changing data you've been working through appears to be overlaid with the kishalee's consciousness. Essentially, the kishalee's consciousness exists as part of all the other functions of the control system for the Gate of Twelve Suns. What this means is that the only means to operate the Gate of Twelve Suns and gain access to the Stellar Degenerator is for the kishalee to choose to do so.
Furthermore, you suspect that the actual activation of the Gate will shatter the kishalee's consciousness - its a once and done operation.
Second, you learn that there's an emergency function within the system that can separate the kishalee consciousness from the Gate's control system. This would render the Gate inoperable until another creature's mind was uploaded in to take the kishalee's place.
Third, you learn that this isn't the only uploaded kishalee in the control complex. Currently in the lab area, an air-gapped computer system holds another kishalee mind. Its likely that this other kishalee mind could also meld with the Gate control system, if they had access.
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Ted and Spec, working together, secure the final countermeasure, giving them access to the system's data without fear of an electrical counterattack. The kishalee hologram almost seems to glow with anger "This is wrong! An abomination! The great weapon has a destiny. A divine purpose. A great unmaking to accomplish! You will never be allowed to touch it! Never!"
"The only destiny the Stellar Degenerator has is to be destroyed so it can never harm any star system ever again. The only unmaking it will accomplish is its own. And we don't need to touch it to do that. Goodbye."
He turns away after delivering this final statement, and listens to Spectre and Ted's findings.
"We should explore a bit more, then, see if this other kishalee mind has not been so degraded that it understands the dangers of the weapon, and would thus be willing to help us."
Once they're secure, he leads the way to the lab, taking in the environs to make sure there aren't any hidden dangers.
Spec hits his stride suddenly and whirls through the code, piecing together the activation instructions for the emergency intelligence diverter. Before the ancient kishalee can do more than protest, Spec activates the contingency and shunts his data into a quarantined partition. The moment he does so, the facility's lights begin to flicker and the sea of code within the mainframe randomizes, becoming utterly indecipherable.
Arc opens the way to the lab.
This large chamber is lit only by the bluish glow of a single monitor across from the southern door. The other computer consoles that line the walls are dark. A circular platform, which you now recognize as a kishalee hologram projector, is affixed to the floor in the center of the room. Inspecting the sole functioning computer, you recognize that this is the air-gapped system holding the second kishalee mind. Right now, there's no way to interface with it. You'd have to release the containment by connecting it to other systems.
Spec unravels the protections sealing the kishalee mind away, letting them expand to fill the available computer terminals in the lab. Lights all across the room flicker on and the terminals begin to hum. After a few moments, the central hologram generator turns on and the light coalesces into a tall, straight-backed kishalee in a uniform reminiscent of the garb of ancient kishalee on Istamak.
The holographic kishalee regards the group of you for a moment before beginning to speak in ancient kishalee "Greetings. This is... most unexpected. Just as I had started to resign myself to being sealed away forever, you've released me." The kishalee pauses, then seeing the spark of recognition in Arc's eyes continues "And there's one among you that speaks our tongue - an even stranger circumstance."
"Given that you haven't started tearing things apart while I'm still talking, I assume you're not with those cruel marauders? Servants of some black hole god." The kishalee raises fingers to their forehead. "I am Osteth."
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Arcalinte breathes a sigh of relief and bows, then displays his Society Mark on his palm.
"Greetings, Osteth. I am Arcalinte Soter, Starfinder and Sola of the Order of the Empty Orbit. These are my fellow Starfinders: S-P37 or 'Spectre,' Ted Under, Jellico Kent and Isu Greelax Zyte of Clan Tarma, House Hadula, Scion of Isuma the Missing. You are correct, the marauders in service to the Devourer are our enemies. I will be brief: we seek to destroy the Stellar Degenerator to prevent it from falling into the hands of people like them."
"I'm afraid then that you will not find it easy. My counterpart, fellow scientist and now digitized AI, Eltreth, has taken over the facility in their madness." Osteth gazes gravely off into the distance "We operated here for millennia, keeping this place functional and its terrible secret hidden, until a scant few years ago. Without warning, they began to display signs of instability and critical errors. They became convinced that the weapon, the Stellar Degenerator, needed to be used immediately. At the time I thought that perhaps there was some degradation in their code - the procedure we had taken to become custodians was experimental after all. But eventually I realized some foreign, hostile force was working to change them."
"Unfortunately, Eltreth acted before I could, and the moment I raised my suspicions they sealed me here."
Osteth's gaze turns sad as they break out of their reverie. "I agree that something must be done to secure the Stellar Degenerator, or even destroy it, but as it stands, Eltreth has full control."
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"Yes, we met Eltreth," Arcalinte replies with a nod and a dirty look out the door. "They tried to convince us to activate the Stellar Degenerator and USE it, an unconscionable act to all but the most disturbed beings, a suspicion their behavior when we refused only confirmed. It took a lot of effort, but we were able to wrest control of the systems from them. We do still need a kishalee operator to assist us, and it sounds like you're the best option. If Spectre and Ted can help you overcome Eltreth, we can work together to prevent the Stellar Degenerator from ever being activated ever again."
As you fill in Osteth on the details of your encounter and subsequent sequestration of Eltreth, the ancient kishalee slowly progresses from alarm to relief. With Osteth freed from their prison and Eltreth trapped in theirs, its a fairly simple operation for Spectre to fix the data link between the lab system and the main control system to allow Osteth to regain their previous role.
After a few minutes to probe their connections to the main control system, Osteth reappears on the hologram pad. "I am relieved to see your words were true. Eltreth is securely trapped away, using the same contingency I'd once started for that exact purpose. You have my gratitude."
"I've been able to access their logs of the last few days. Hmm. This is not ideal." Osteth remains silent for a while as they pursue some more distant data links. "I see."
"I will need some further aid from you all if we are to fully decommission the Stellar Degenerator. Allow me to explain the situation. Please make yourselves comfortable."
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After you've gathered up, Osteth invokes an intelligent audio filter - another ancient kishalee innovation - and begins speaking to you all in Common. "If you are here to stop the Stellar Degenerator, you likely already know this, but in case you do not... The origins of the Stellar Degenerator lies not with my people, the kishalee. Millennia ago, my people were locked in a war with a race called the sivvs. After decades of fighting, the sivvs fashioned a device of cosmic destruction, the one we now stand at the Gate of. Their aim was to bring the kishalee to extinction and we came uncomfortably close to that fate. But through more luck than anything else, we managed to end the war before the weapon could be activated. We captured the weapon..."
Osteth's mannerisms seem to exude discomfort "My more militarily minded kin thought to keep the weapon as a final tool of self-defense. It was used once. Once only, but one time too many by any measure. The darkened system we left behind was lost to the depths of space. After that we chose to seal it away more permanently, though even then, fears of an existential threat in the future stopped us from destroying it entirely. Of course, even I know that my people's decline was due to nothing that the weapon could solve."
"Its due to this legacy that the weapon is incredibly difficult to both access, use and even destroy. Just accessing the demiplane that houses the Stellar Degenerator requires the truly willing, un-coerced sacrifice of a life. It is only once the demiplane is open that the weapon could possibly be destroyed, though that is a problem to be worked out when we arrive to it."
"Several days ago, the adherents of the Devourer arrived with the intention of gaining access, and Eltreth was only too willing to comply. However, they did not account for the fact that in the moments prior to my imprisonment I had placed several hidden traps in the activation systems. These successfully triggered and destroyed a number of critical control chips here and at the other eleven moons."
"Unfortunately, there were thorough backups of all critical components stored across the moons. In the intervening days, Eltreth mobilized a number of maintenance robots to conduct the necessary repairs. For those components that could not be accessed by robots, the adherents of the Devourer were willing to do the necessary work."
"It seems only one final control chip now remains to be replaced, on Gate 2's controller moon. The facility there was used to monitor and adjust the gravitational pulses emanating from the planetoid's center. I can sense approximately a dozen life signs there, the marauders at work, no doubt. The facility has no functioning security features I can influence at this distance, and I suspect its only a matter of time until the adherents of the Devourer complete the repairs."
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At some point Isu grows bored of watching guard outside and comes into see things under control and with the AI speaking in common.
"Aha! We know the identity, at last, of the cult." He starts flipping through previously downloaded materials in his comm unit. " Sivvs is suspiciously close to the word six, and that number of course, is the amount of toppings on the standard supreme pizza at Sixes' Pizza Plaza in the level 6 of the Spike in Absalom Station. It is all coming together now. We shall push forward to destroy the Sivvs at this base before preparing for a final showdown back in Absalom."
Osteth answers "There is very little I can do to disable one of the other controller moons from here. The initial sabotage required me to painstakingly build a space-worthy vehicle to transport specially repurposed maintenance droids to the moons. However, the group of you are far more mobile, you could head to another moon and sabotage the systems there."
"However, if your goal is to destroy the weapon itself, any sabotage to the moons and the Gate only buys time. Although it may buy years or lifetimes, someone will eventually repair or gain access to the weapon again. To truly destroy the weapon, we will want to open the Gate on our own terms once the Devourer's adherents have been dealt with."
Osteth nods to Jelico "Yes, likely I will need to sacrifice myself to open the Gate. If you will find a way to destroy the weapon itself from there, my work will be complete, my long guardianship ultimately worthwhile."
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Arcalinte is about to volunteer for the sacrifice when Osteth explains that they will do it. He closes his mouth, and bows to the hologram.
"You humble us with your selflessness, Osteth. Thank you. As Jellico said, will we need to bring you aboard the Sunrise Maiden so you can assist or can you do that from here?"
He strokes his chin a bit.
"There's still also the matter of Xix. While I imagine she's somewhat grateful that we've spared her life, I don't trust her not to interfere with the machinery here in the event she gets bored...but if we invite her aboard the Maiden she could cause similar trouble."
"Even if you had a data storage medium that could hold me on your ship, I would not be of much help on that journey. Instead, I will attempt to remain in contact with you from here." Osteth gestures to a side terminal where a panel opens up to reveal a strange looking comms device made of a ceramic-like material. "My ability to monitor the whole Gate and its moons is quite extensive, so I can warn you if conditions change."
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"I'm inclined to agree with you, gentlemen, but let's make sure not to underestimate HER technical capabilities. If she gets the task done quickly, we're back to the same problem."
He turns to Osteth.
"How much were you aware of while Eltreth was in charge. How dangerous would Xix be to your operations if she were left to her own devices here?"