Marae shrugged and turned her head towards Nirann. “Do you have anything, Nir?”

“Nothing tangible, other than that initial telemetry.” Nirann answered. “I’ve been collecting and analyzing every bit of the data stream coming from that object, checking for patterns, any way it could have been encrypted or corrupted, but…this is a process that deals with the data stream of an entire living mind. That’s a mountain jumbled up data in a programming language I haven’t seen before. Before I can even think of trying to interpret the raw data stream, I need to solve this language issue. Now, I’m good, but it will still take me [i]time[/i] to work miracles.”

Marae tilted her head and crossed her arms skeptically. “It’s just a language translation. I could understand the delay if you were restricted to just this ship’s computer, but you have the Core at your disposal. With that kind of power, you should have the translation nearly done by this point.”

Nirann suddenly appeared beside Marae’s chair, just to start pacing around it. “Correction, I have access to the partition of the Core allocated to this expedition. And, as much as I hate to admit it, I can see why the Humans have had trouble with this one. This language is…weird.”

Marae narrowed her eyes. "What sort of 'weird'?"

“[i]Weird[/i]…weird.” He answered.

Marae sighed and rolled her eyes. “Very helpful. But I know you have access to more of the Core than that. Just allocate more.”

By this point, Nirann was pacing back and forth around the entire table. “You know I have to get approval for that…”

Before the pair’s bickering could continue any longer, Rareth’Jharn made a quick connection with the outside network and, with just a few thoughts, made a decision to help move things along. “I’ve sent back my approval, with my authorization code. Make the allocation request and you’ll have as much of the Core as you need. Within reason.” 

The expression on Nirann’s face could, perhaps, best be described as “giddy.” He clasped his hands together with a wide grin. “Ah, now that’s what I’m talking about. I can practically taste that sweet, sweet processing power. I’ll see what miracles I can work while you deal with this.”

It was difficult to tell if Marae was legitimately frustrated, but nevertheless, her attention was soon back on Freyr. “As for your question Dr. Lang, yes, I think that’s about the only step we have left with this experiment. We know that there [i]is[/i] a simulation in there for the programs to observe, at least. It might just be that there’s something interfering with the return transmission. If that’s the case, our program does store a copy of all its observations in its internal memory, so hopefully we will be able to see its findings when we pull it out.”