When last we saw our protagonist:
The man’s eyes grew wide. He seemed elated, but cautious. “How can I know you’re telling the truth?”

“I don’t know, but let me introduce myself. I’m John Carlson, and this is my wife, Rose. We’re from Neo22.”

The old man seemed to consider things, then he turned and motioned. About thirty other people appeared, all around the same apparent age.

Chapter 1.2

Back on Neo22, we were in the briefing room, just down the inner ring from the command center. Seated at the table were our normal command crew as well as Doctors Jack and Sylvia, Bob Grissom, and Georg Brown, the old man we had met in the ship. He had informed us that there were twenty-nine people left on left on Fomalhaut IV in total.

“So,” John asked, “what happened on your ship?”

“Everything was fine for most of our trip, but when our computer broke down, we had to turn on our backup. That caused problems.

“Not ten seconds after the backup went online, almost all of the people changed. Not physically, mind you. Their personalities seemed to change. They became apathetic and incredibly compliant. About a week later, Willem revealed himself in our computers. Even when we repaired our newer model he was there as well.”

“How come you weren’t changed?” I asked.

“All of us who weren’t changed are related. I suspect it’s genetic.”

“I suppose it has to do with your appearing older than us?”

He smiled at me. “You’re right, Mrs. Carlson. It wasn’t realized until I cut my finger as a child. My nanites didn’t heal it. Primarily because I don’t have nanites, I suppose.”

“Was that by choice?” Sylvia asked.

“No, Ma’am. I was injected with nanites as a child, but when I received the injury, it was found that I didn’t have nanites. Apparently, they were destroyed in my body.”

“How?” Jack wondered.

“We’re not really sure, but it happened with my siblings and cousins.”

“What about your parents?” I asked.

“Not my parents, nor my aunts or uncles.”

“That doesn’t make sense,” I said, thoughtfully.

“Rose?” John asked when I didn’t continue.

“If it’s genetic, why would it affect all of them, but not their parents?”

“You tell me.”

“I can’t,” I responded.

“Neither can I,” Sylvia told us. “Rose is right. It doesn’t make any sense.”

Bob spoke up. “If we could figure out, we could use this as a way to disarm Willem if and when we meet up with him again.” He glanced at Georg. “Sorry, Mr. Brown. I hope you understand my thoughts here.”

“Most certainly, the old man told him. It makes sense, and if I can help, I’ll be glad to.”

Eventually, we discovered what was happening. It was genetic. Georg’s father must have had a wandering eye when it came to sisters-in -law.

A single piece of DNA souped-up hiss immune systems. Somehow the DNA pumped up the abilities of the lymphocytes and when they met up with a nanite, they destroyed it. In the lymphatic system, antibodies were produced to kill the nanites as well.

Jack and Sylvia were able to change that strand of DNA using the nanites, but very few people wanted it done. At least not yet. We were safe on our ship for now.

Marc and John devised a method of connecting the two ships together. We wanted to be on our way, but we wanted the extra space and the research platform. We needed to know how Willem’s system worked.

They were quite happy with Georg and several of his ‘cousins’. They were all very brilliant engineers, so the idea of connecting the two ships was run by them as well. Many ideas were improved upon, and eventually, the inner circle was removed from Fomalhaut IV. Then, the upside and downside were split apart. They were then placed on either side of our ship, and their engines were reconnected in a different manner and synced with ours.

The command center was brought into a bay that was empty, and Marc connected a small non-networked computer to it, then he got to work.

We were getting close to Eridani now. We could see it through our scopes, but we made sure we stayed out of range of theirs. We were very concerned about the people on board, but we didn’t want to tip our hand until we were ready.

This time, rather than on our own briefing room, we met in the Fomalhaut IV. It was a bit smaller than ours, but not by much. The whole inner ring from the ship was supported by a complex scaffolding that was able to support the structure. One ‘J’ tube was connected to another one which came to the floor of the bay.

John and I were there early, along with Georg and Marc. We watched as the others entered, then John turned to Marc. “Proceed,” he told his friend.

“Okay. What I’ve been able to turn up is this, and I’m embarrassed to say, we should have known what was up from the start.”

I was really interested in this.

“I’ve spoken to Georg at length, and he’s been here the entire time as we went through the computers.” He turned to John and grimaced. “I can’t believe this, but it was so simple. We all have crystals to help us remember things. The crystals resonate on a certain frequency, individual to each person. Our nanites are sending a signal to our own crystals, constantly, based on this frequency. Carla and Rose both wear necklaces with their crystals embedded, but they don’t have to be on their person. They could be in their homes, and even with the women here, there would be no problems with the confusion of the resonance.”

Georg spoke up. “I thought of this soon after the problems began. It was the obvious way of connecting to the nanites, so I suggested it to our doctors and computer experts.” He looked around at us, shaking his head. “It was as if anything I said regarding this was not heard.”

“So,” I asked, “We have to stop the broadcast on all those frequencies? How can we do that?”

Georg shook his head. “No. Each person’s memory unit has a receiver to connect to a radio unit, with a two-gigabyte encryption key for recognition. Mind you, that’s gigabyte… Not gigabit. This allows for the diagnosis of nanites as well as the person’s body, if the nanites, for some strange reason, can’t repair damage.” He paused for a moment. “These encryption keys have somehow been hacked.”

“Two billion bytes, and it’s been hacked?” I asked. I couldn’t even conceive of such a job. And for how many people?

“No,” said Jack. “They haven’t been hacked. I have a copy of each person’s recognition code in the hospital computers. It makes sense that the codes are present for each person, somewhere in the computers.”

“So, if I step onto another ship, would it have mine?” John asked.

“I don’t know,” said Jack. “I suppose it’s possible.”

“I have a solution,” Sylvia told us.

“Pray, tell.” I suspected John was pissed that we had obviously been programmed by our nanites to not think of something so obvious.

She chose to ignore his sarcastic tone, and instead explained, “Inside each memory module is a mechanical switch that can move the input from the radio receiver to a hard line.”

I stared. I had been bored at times during our trips and had read just about everything I could. Now that Sylvia mentioned it, I remembered this during my perusal of the doctoral texts.

Very deliberately, I removed my necklace. I turned it over, and with a fingernail, I pried open an access cover and saw a single switch inside. It was tiny, but using my smallest fingernail, I was able to move it. I looked up and saw everyone watching me.

“So now I’m immune to ‘Total Fun?’” I asked Marc.

He didn’t say anything. His eyes were wide as he removed his watch. He handed it to Carla. She turned it over and saw a cover on the back of the crystal and opened it. She did the same as I did. Using her pinkie nail, she flipped the switch.

John handed me his watch. Very few of the men were able to turn off the radio reception because they couldn’t get their nails to the switch. A few of the engineers had very small tools that were able to reach. Those who couldn’t handed off whatever their crystals were mounted in to those of us who could.

I looked over at my sister, Carla, and she was white-faced. I was afraid I was as well. I was dizzy as I struggled to take in the number of people who had died because of a single switch in their memories. No wonder none of our kids were exiled with us. We thought it was because Caesar would retrain them with propaganda. Instead, it was probably because they didn’t receive memory modules until they were eighteen years old.

I felt like crying but I held myself away from my emotions. I think everyone was thinking about the simplicity of the solution, and those that they had lost because they didn't know.

"The doctors," I said quietly. "They would have known."

"We didn't," said Sylvia.

"I think Sis is right," Carla said. "In the last few minutes, we've learned that we should look at the obvious solutions first. You were looking for reasons five hundred or more years after N21 left. Caesar improved his program by then, including you in those who didn’t know."

While Caesar didn't have over five hundred years free after we left, I still believed Carla was right.

Again, I was thinking, trying to keep my mind off of my late sister. "So we're immune, but they aren't." I indicated out into space. I didn't know if I was pointing in the right direction, and I really didn't care.

"You're right," Georg agreed. "We are going to have to go to their ship and turn off Willem if he's active over there."

I had a fight getting into the lander as we prepared to go to Eridani. John did not want me on that ship, but I persevered, and eventually, he gave in. I believe Carla was having the same trouble with thoughts of our sister, but she dealt with it in a different way. She devoted her time to work in Neo22 and kept herself busy.

It was hardly easy to sneak up on Eridani. In fact, it was impossible. We turned off our radio however. We were impervious to our nemesis now, but we didn't want him to know until he had to. Well… we were impervious to him. Not his subjects.

We docked. I looked at John, and he was furious with me. Now that I was ready to step into possible danger, I was thinking he had a point. Even though I knew it was Marc who pressed the button, the door slid open and my heart nearly leaped out of my chest. There was no one waiting for us, so we quietly moved through the airlock.

We searched everywhere in the center ring. The command level was empty. We moved through the 'J' and 'U' tubes then into the upside.

I don't know what I expected, but it was certainly not what I saw.

The upper ring was quite wide, and several people were lining each side. We started to push through the crowd, only to nearly be run over by a chariot!