Within the burning, pulsating core of the destabilizing reactor, static ate at the comm like a relentless plague, burned it down to a fiery cacophany of barks and sizzles, of harsh blasts of white noise broken by whistles and shrill whines. Back in Reactor Operations, Kali d’Arc stood a tense and vigilant watch over the readouts of her console, one hand pressed hard against the chunk of conductive nanofoam that relayed a continuous stream of the noise to her ears, one hand digging into the polyquid surface of the screen that seemed to hold all their fates in a carefully measured check.

“Faith.” She whispered. “Admiral.” She swallowed, mouth hanging open in a desperate sort of fear, hesitant to speak, hesitant to ask. “How goes it?”

“Slow.” Came the rough, barely readable response. A chittering, the grinding, petering squeal of radiometric noise. “I’m almost... to the core console.”

On the only monitor active in the centermost egg of the inner sanctum of the core, digital snow blasted every inch of red-tinged steel, every textured pace of catwalk grating. In the middle of it all, a console blinked, polyquid surface protected by a localized Mitarashi field kept active by a series of backup systems completely isolated from the rest of the network– another safeguard against the kind of catastrophic failure no reactor tech ever figured they’d live to see, the kind of failure that was mere minutes from turning the Hok into the galaxy’s newest black hole. A tiny bead of sweat traced its way down Kali’s temple, lingered as she drew in a shaky breath.

“It should be me down there.” Panem whispered. Kali made a gesture, a quick, definitive and silencing pinch of the fingers, her eyes never leaving the console, never leaving that blistering hell her Admiral had so willingly waded headfirst into.

“Don’t worry none about that now, Youseff.” She breathed. “Just focus on sending the Admiral that good mojo for a bit, ya? She’s gonna need all of that she can get her hands on about now.”

“Have some faith, Chief.” Came the Admiral’s weak response. “I’ve gotten this far on my own. I think I’ve... got a little bit of luck left.”

“Never deny a good spirit when it be comin’ to help ya, Faith.” d’Arc tried a smile. “My grandmother taught me that one when I was just a wee little girl.”

“Smart lady...” Static choked the response, ate the rest of her words into electric oblivion.

“That she was, that she was.” Kali added.

“Approaching the control console.” Faith managed, appearing a moment later on the screen, her suited form a block of awkward white lost in the snow of the corrupted signal. “Everything appears to be intact.”

“Can you read any of the values?” Kali asked.

“S-Value at...” Came Faith’s static eaten reply. “...alue at... 856 Y-Rehns”

“Say again.” Kali pressed the commpiece harder into her ear, trying to sort out the sounds, to separate the voice from the butchering static. “All after ‘S Value at’”

“I said the S-Value is at... P-G-K’s.” A squeal in the static tore the words to shreds, bit into d’Arc’s ear. “And the...”

“This isn’t going to work.” Kali whispered to herself, bared teeth against the frustration as she added, this time louder. “How well are ya readin’ me down there, Admiral?”

“As... can be expected...” Came the broken reply. In the depths of the screen, Faith had closed the distance between herself and the core console, gloved fingers poking through the Mitarashi field at polyquid readouts, blinking numbers.

“We need an S-Value of at least negative 300 P-G-K’s.” d’Arc’s voice came loud, slow, an attempt at a level of clarity capable of overpowering the bite and nips of the static. “Can you do that, Admiral?”

“Roger...” Came the response. On the screen, gloved fingers went to work, poked quickly through readouts, worked through operation checklists that scrolled across momentary holographic projections shaky and marred by the heat and the radiation around her. “Copy, at least... ative 300 P...”

“Right.” Kali winced, bared teeth again. “And we need a T-Value of at least 1500 Y-Rehns.”

“Say again... control.” Came the broken response.

“I said we need,” Teeth flashed in anger, fist smashing against the console. “Arh!” Kali growled. “Damn this interference right on into the pits of hell!”

“It’s okay...” Faith’s response came back, barely readable. “What was... T-Value?”

“At least 1500 Y-Rehns.” Kali said quickly. “And a marginal rotation in the SDM of less than three degrees.”

“Three degrees” Faith repeated. “Roger.” In the pause, Kali watched apprehensively, her fingers tightening on the edge of the console. More holographic interfaces came alive, glowed and were satisfied by the Admiral’s tireless movements.

“Hotter than hell down here.” Faith finally said.

“No shit, mon.” Kali laughed. “How goes it all?”

“Almost there.” Came the Admiral’s slow response. “S-Value stabilized, T-Value at 1450 and rising.” She paused, worked through a handful of urgent holographic displays as they blipped into red-blinking existence. “Marginal rotation at...”

“Admiral, I’m–” Kali paused, squinted at the console in front of her. Lights flared, blinked, sputtered, registering something on the edge of warning. A handful of finger taps brought up a series of holographic readouts filled with data, with readings of radiation values in the deep reactor, in the core... “I’m registering a backlash building in the system...” She paused, licked her lips, flicked through another pair of screens. “You might want to...”

“What was... control?” Came Faith’s response, washed out by a tide of static. “Marginal Rotation at six... falling.” In the stirring readouts of Kali’s display, detectors flared, holographic representations of data lighting up red. Klaxons blared, indicators flashed into full brilliance and bleated in sudden, desperate warning. Kali panicked, stabbed a desperate finger into the holographic display, voice already ringing through the comm.

“Admiral! Move!” Was all she had time to shout. “Get out of there now! Go!”

For one visible second, one of Faith’s gloved hands recoiled from the console like a bitten limb, and as the flare burnt its way off the core in a wave-like lash off boiling crimson that fell in an almost visible arc, the feed went mercifully blank, cut to little more than vicious snow. Only the audio remained, and as the Admiral’s scream filled d’Arc’s ears, her own hands tightened to desperate fists in response, eyes closing on the sound of what could only be the last echoes of her Admiral being burned alive, drowning into the tapering crush of a blistering sheet of white noise.