The damaged credential relay pulses beneath the floor panel, contesting the sealed refuge permissions. As Knull reaches it, a concealed service niche unlocks with a grinding click, and a battered maintenance technician steps into the passage.
She is a lean middle-aged woman in a stained orange utility jacket, dark work trousers, and a cracked respirator hanging at her throat. Cable burns mark one glove; both hands clamp a portable override core against her chest.
Mara Venn
Stop there. I am Mara Venn, maintenance systems. That relay is suppressing an emergency broadcast from inside the refuge network.
The copied credential brightens across the diagnostic probe, then reaches toward Mara Venn's override core. Her device answers with a matching authentication pulse, making the relay treat her hardware as a possible command source.
Mara Venn
I did not create that credential. I pulled the broadcast packet before the system buried it. The signal contains live voices from whoever remains inside.
The relay splits its output. One channel tightens the refuge lockdown, while the other exposes a narrow upload window through Mara's core. The copied signature is authenticating her device now.
Mara Venn
Choose quickly. Trust my evidence and open the broadcast, or cut me off as another compromised access point. Either way, the refuge control system is deciding now.
✓ Quest Accepted
Stabilize the refuge control system
✓ Quest Accepted
Access the emergency broadcast from inside the refuge
“Can Mara's override core stabilize the refuge control system?”
YES, BUT (Unlikely, rolled 30)
Mara seats the override core against the relay housing. The copied credential surges through both devices, and the refuge lockdown indicators stutter before aligning into a single steady cyan bar.
Mara Venn
It is taking. The refuge control system is accepting the emergency channel and releasing the command conflict.
The broadcast opens through the diagnostic probe. Distorted voices spill into the passage, confirming that the Gang Lieutenant and the Wounded Guard remain alive inside the sealed refuge.
Mara Venn
The system stabilized, but the relay burned through my core's outer buffer. I can keep the broadcast open for one minute, then this hardware is finished.
A sharp thermal warning blooms across the core. The copied credential is no longer contesting the refuge permissions, but Mara's override device is locked into the relay and cannot be removed without breaking the emergency channel.
Mara Venn
You have a stable path and a live link. Use the minute well. When this core fails, the refuge will hold, but the voices will be gone.
The cyan bar holds steady. Inside the refuge, the trapped survivors have a functioning broadcast channel, while Mara's hardware counts down toward permanent failure.
“I ask Mara to route the channel through my probe”
FAILURE (Poor Reasoning, rolled +1)
Knull
Route the channel through my probe. Keep the emergency broadcast open.
Mara Venn
I can bridge it, but the probe is only a listener. It cannot carry the override without taking the core's place.
Knull shifts the diagnostic probe into the relay interface. Mara guides the core's exposed contacts toward it, and the cyan channel narrows into a brittle split between broadcast and control.
Mara Venn
The probe can mirror the voices, not preserve the command path. If I force the transfer, I lose the refuge lock.
The attempted routing fails forward. The probe captures a clean fragment of the broadcast, while Mara's core retains the authorization channel and begins shedding its last stable buffer.
Mara Venn
You have a mirrored audio path now. I must keep the core where it is, but the probe can record the survivors' status before the minute closes.
Quest Complete
Stabilize the refuge control system
Quest Complete
Access the emergency broadcast from inside the refuge