Chapter 402: Time Flies

And so, the Deep Space mission entered a phase where only seventy to eighty thousand people remained conscious at any given time. The days slipped by, one after another...

As the captain, Jason exercised his clearance to remain awake. Though not a frontline researcher himself, he spent his days drafting strict laws and safety regulations governing nanotechnology.

Even though nanorobotics was still in its infancy, rigorous oversight was absolutely essential. The technology was dangerous, easily a hundred times more volatile than nuclear weaponry!

A containment breach involving weaponized nanobots would be infinitely worse than a nuclear meltdown. If a self-replicating swarm reached a critical mass, it would become an unstoppable tidal wave, completely capable of devouring the entire Deep Space vessel.

No one wanted to be assimilated in their sleep, their bodies broken down to fuel a rogue machine swarm. If that nightmare came to pass, it would be a tragic, pathetic end for humanity.

"Therefore, uncompromising safety protocols are mandatory. The specific measures to be implemented are as follows..."

Standing at the auditorium podium, Jason spent over half an hour earnestly reading through the new safety mandates line by line.

"...You are all brilliant minds, and I have absolute faith in your integrity. I know none of you would intentionally jeopardize the ship. We have no terrorists aboard, and no one here harbors some cartoonish desire to destroy our world."

"But every society needs laws. When handling apocalyptic technology, strict regulations are the only thing standing between us and extinction. These trial protocols are final."

"Are there any questions?" he asked, wrapping up the session.

The researchers in the audience whispered among themselves. Most were far more interested in their academic breakthroughs than bureaucratic red tape.

Several department heads had even taken the opportunity to rest their eyes during the briefing. Severely sleep-deprived from their relentless lab work, they figured a safety lecture was as good a time as any to catch a nap.

When Jason finally finished speaking, they blinked themselves awake, looking groggy and disoriented.

Since they were still miles away from successfully forging weapon-grade nanobots, the scientists simply weren’t that invested in the legalities. Still, no one objected. Establishing solid safety habits early on was undeniably a good idea.

Seeing their lethargic reactions, Jason smiled helplessly. It seemed the bill had passed unanimously by default.

The new laws established clear operational boundaries. Nanobots could not be removed from authorized facilities under any circumstances, and unauthorized manufacturing was strictly prohibited without explicit oversight.

The bill also mandated rigid industrial standards for the research, fabrication, and containment of all nanoscale machines, ensuring no private enterprise could blindly experiment without intense scrutiny.

For the scientific community, the most tangible impact was the construction of a massive, centralized "Nanolab." Mirroring biohazard containment protocols, the facility operated under a strict Level-5 security clearance.

Every quarantine bay was rigged with high-voltage electrification and extreme thermal purging countermeasures. With these failsafes in place, if a high-risk swarm ever breached containment, the lab could instantly incinerate it.

By law, all nanorobotics research was now permanently restricted to this secure facility. The scientists were largely indifferent to the mandate; to them, a lab was a lab, no matter where it was located.

"Alright. Since there are no objections, that concludes the briefing. Dismissed."

Once the auditorium emptied out, Jason let out a long breath of relief. He returned to his quarters and casually scrolled through the remaining reports on his terminal.

The frantic urgency of their escape had finally faded, replaced by a quiet optimism. The future looked remarkably bright. Once they survived this long transit and found a suitable planet to strip-mine, the Federation would thrive once again.

"Looks like everything is finally under control," he muttered.

He clicked to the final page of his daily itinerary, finding it completely blank. Now that the pressure was off, a strange sense of boredom crept in.

The foundational laws were drafted, leaving only minor bureaucratic revisions. Aside from occasionally monitoring R&D progress and trying to educate Elara—the Gaia entity they had brought aboard, he genuinely had nothing left to do.

Currently, the scientific departments were dividing their focus between nanotechnology, advanced warp drive iterations, and alien ecosystem integration. All projects were progressing smoothly.

During prolonged faster-than-light transit, with so few people awake, society practically ran itself on autopilot. Without a backlog of administrative crises, Jason found himself enjoying an unexpected amount of leisure time.

The hibernation rotations required personnel to wake up for brief shifts every few months. After a few cycles, everyone had grown accustomed to the rhythm.

Waking up after sleeping for a quarter of a year felt entirely normal, like getting up from a good night’s sleep, feeling a little hungry, and heading straight back to work.

After finishing their shift, they went right back into the pods. The cycle repeated seamlessly.

Because the staggered rotations were relatively short, no one suffered from temporal displacement or felt disconnected from society.

For an established interstellar civilization, daily life was generally calm and peaceful, disrupted only by extreme cosmic anomalies.

Even without constant government intervention, society functioned perfectly.

This was the hallmark of a highly developed civilization: immense social stability, widespread prosperity, and a deeply ingrained sense of civic discipline.

Heavy-handed government regulations were practically obsolete.

If the government had to constantly micromanage every aspect of peacetime life just to prevent civil unrest, we’d still be a primitive species, Jason thought. The way things are now... it’s not bad at all.

Muttering to himself, Jason stood up from his desk. He decided to head down to the ecological lake—Elara’s new home.

Over time, the crew had grown quite fond of Elara. Though she occasionally missed her home planet and threw temper tantrums, churning the lake water and scaring the fish out of the shallows, she was generally gentle, behaving much like a human toddler.

However, her emotional intelligence was developing at an agonizingly slow pace.

She currently possessed the temperament of a kindergarten student. Perhaps this was simply the natural maturation rate for a planetary super-organism.

"Even a few centuries from now, we don’t know if she’ll ever fully mature," an early-childhood educator remarked by the lake shore. A dedicated team took turns guiding and teaching her, using the exact same curriculum they used for human toddlers.

Spotting Jason’s approach, a little green orb bobbed to the surface of the lake, bouncing twice in greeting. Suddenly, it spat a dark, marble-sized object onto the shore, sending it rolling directly to Jason’s feet.

"What’s this?" Jason picked it up, examining it closely. It looked exactly like a lump of coal. He squeezed it between his fingers; it was incredibly hard.

"Captain, she was trying to give you a diamond!" a nearby nanotechnology expert called out with a laugh. "She just didn’t arrange the molecular structure correctly, so it turned into a lump of coal instead."

To the scientific staff, Elara was the ultimate research subject.

Because of her innate ability to manipulate matter at the molecular level, she was functionally the universe’s most powerful "nanorobot." The researchers observed her constantly, hoping to reverse-engineer her abilities.

Jason looked at the chunk of coal in his hand, highly amused. So this is supposed to be a diamond?

Clearly, Elara was also practicing her own version of nanotechnology. It proved that a creature’s cognitive processing power and its emotional maturity were two completely separate things.

"Diamonds aren’t made like this, kiddo. You can’t just mash a bunch of carbon atoms together randomly," Jason lectured in a mock-serious tone, gesturing with his hands. "They have to be arranged like this... forming a specific crystalline atomic lattice, understand?"

Hearing Jason’s lecture, the little green orb suddenly flattened out against the water, clearly annoyed by the criticism. A moment later, she spat another black lump of coal out of the lake.

"That one’s too big! Make it a little smaller..."

Plop. Another lump hit the shore.

"Wow, this is massive," Jason laughed, picking up a fist-sized black sphere. "Are you trying to supply our furnaces? Honestly, pure, clean-burning coal wouldn’t be half bad either..."

Elara was furious. She had generously tried to gift him a massive diamond, and he was mocking her! With a loud whoosh, she whipped up a massive wave and splashed it directly into his face.

Jason wiped his face, chuckling. He actually loved playing with her. Having never had children of his own, he found himself deeply appreciating this kind of innocent, childlike interaction.

"Alright, alright, that’s enough," Jason laughed. "My shift is up. I’m going to sleep. With almost everyone in stasis, it’s getting too boring staying awake anyway."

Elara bobbed up and down frantically, clearly wanting to keep playing.

Jason smiled down at the little green orb. "We’ll play again in a few months. The New Year holidays are coming up, and everyone will be awake. We can all play together then."

Because of the accelerated subjective timeline caused by the stasis rotations, it felt like they were celebrating a New Year every single month. It was a bizarre, disjointed way to experience time.

The week leading up to the New Year holidays was the designated global wake-period, making the ship incredibly lively.

The little green orb bounced reluctantly a few more times, but after a bit more coaxing, she finally let him leave. For a being like Elara, a few months passed in the blink of an eye anyway.

And so, time began to slip away, moving faster and faster...

One year, two years, ten years, twenty years passed...