Althea pondered a mental list of possible worlds that they could have been bounced to, as she began to cut through the ice coating the main controls. There were potentially hundreds, none more than a partial match to what she had found. The temperature here couldn't match any of them, not combined with the local gravity and atmospheric composition.
Where could she be?
The ice wasn't thick, but it was solid. Even cut, the layers of on the controls took no small effort to shatter, reluctantly succumbing to her attacks of kinetics and heat. It was tricky to adjust her tiny projector to cut only the frozen layers and not damage the control surface beneath, the density of the layers being too variable.
Direct access would have been instantaneous, but there was no safe way for Dorian to activate the system, not without potentially exposing him to the local Macro. Human - manual operation - was the least dangerous way for her to bring up control fields, decrypt the local coding herself, time consuming though that would be.
She was quickly beginning to regret the decision, however, having to stop cutting through the ice - often - to allow her stressed NANs to stabilize, help adjust her body's response to the cold air chilling her, biting into her lungs, with every breath.
Yellow and red lights blinked at her through the fragments of pulverized ice. She stopped for a moment, staring at the blurry screen beneath the final layers, shut, then reopened her eyes.
...Lying in a meadow ...big yellow flowers on green ...wavering in the leisurely breeze ...sun high in a sapphire sky ...a sharp glint of yellow-green high in the bright blue ...sweltering heat ...buttery smell ...buzzing of insects ...chirping of avians ...voices calling her ...hidden name ...child's name ..."Tara, Tara, Tara" ...male and female voices ...adult ...familiar ...giggling ...never find her here ...she'll be able to stay ...lay in the flowers ...away from the dark forest ...forever...
Althea shivered - shook away the vision - leaned for a moment against the station controls, collecting her energy, her thoughts.
She'd taken long transits before out here, far longer than was allowed among the Palmyr worlds, certainly. Dreamlike sensations, strange compulsions, visions, voices - she had experienced them before - but they'd never lingered so long after arrival.
Should she abandon a direct route - formulate a series of shorter, more certain paths to Elysium?
But then... how many ruined worlds, how many more dead, how many Macros could she handle? She shut her eyes tight against the thought.
How many more Hadhalho's, before she could find any kind of absolution?
Althea took in a breath, let it out, watched it billow into the air - forced herself to relax - then looked down at her dark skinned Emeralder hands. They were loosening their grip, but her nails had clearly gouged sharp lines over the glowing displays.
Whatever the hallucinations meant, pulled from her mind or not, figuring them out was not vital. Finding out what went wrong with the transit - where they were, and how to program the return formula - was. After Elysium, she could be more cautious; take shorter, safer, less harrowing transits.
With renewed focus, Althea scraped, smashed and pried off the last of the ice, exposing the primary controls and reactive display panels to her touch. The board arrangement was different than she was accustomed to, but still workable. She applied the default commands, waited for the system's responses to appear - and waited. Nothing happened.
She looked up at the darkened portal, the dimming glow in the columns as the system cooled, steamed away the frost. When she looked back at the panels, there was still no change. The second and third tries produced the same result.
Frustrated, she complained: "The controls aren't responding at all!"
They had to, or-
