Ken

The following information has not been confirmed by Volition and is therefore not canon for the FreeSpace universe.

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MISSION 04
ACT 1, MISSION 04

Fighter squadron: 170th Fighting Navajas

Description: Laporte is selected for a random in-flight psychological evaluation.

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Background

You have been selected to undergo a routine in-flight psychological evaluation from the PsyOps of First Fleet. This evaluation is carried out at random on pilots across the fleet.

As you patrol a series of waypoints near Earth, your sole wingman, Lieutenant Vicmouth, will ask you a few questions and monitor your neural readings from your flight suit.

Walkthrough

This mission is a playable cutscene.

When you see the directive to "Depart When Ready", do not do so immediately on your very first run of this mission. Fly straight ahead and scan the nebula ahead of you with your targeting keys until your sensors pick up a number of TAC 1. Try to figure out the two hidden messages concealed within them before returning to base.

Ignore the nearby Shivan Comm Node. The only thing it does is flood your message list with what appears to be a random string of words. It is also invulnerable, so you cannot destroy it.

Notes

• Laporte's encounter with Ken is a reference to parts of the unrelated FreeSpace 2 campaign Transcend, where the player meets the main antagonist, the Transcendent, in a similar fashion on a few occasions.
• Coincidentally, Laporte filed a request for a personal report on her own health three days before this mission. The report returned a list of fairly common battle fatigue symptoms experienced by not just her, but by most other regular pilots, such as physical strain, hyperalertness, ethical conflict and fatigue. However, the final symptom that the report returns makes mention of memory loss and "fugue" flight, the latter being a symptom whereby the subject performs actions while conscious, but is unable to remember doing them after recovering from battle fatigue.
• The fifth reading on Laporte's flight suit, NGRI, is explained by Vicmouth as being "a diagnostic". A small number of players who are well-learned on what has been established in Blue Planet canon have interpreted this reading to represent Laporte's Nagari sensitivity.
• Ken's allegiance is ambiguous. While he sounds Vishnan in nature, he appears to exhibit the Shivan philosophy of destruction.
• When viewed from above in FRED2_Open, the containers are arranged to spell "BOZCH".

Tips

• The containers that you see spell out two separate hidden messages. If you have problems understanding them, use your normal targeting key to go through each container in the correct sequence. The start of both messages is the container designated the voices in the womb.
• Check the recommendations for this mission's debriefing.

Total number of forces

Forces involved
Belligerents
UEF	Ken
Ships
	1 Shivan Comm Node Unknown Device Unknown 33 TAC 1 the voices in the womb spoke wordlessly Cargo: BALANCE infancy is amnesia yet you remember them Cargo: MUST BE as a child you were told i was only in your head Cargo: MAINTAINED. yet where else are voices ever heard? Cargo: THE ORIGINAL PLAN you are not mad nor have you ever been Cargo: IS IMPERATIVE. you are no mystic you are a made thing Cargo: WE SEEK THE ONE gifted with an ear for the quantum whisper Cargo: OUT OF MANY you draw a line between two worlds Cargo: THE ONE WHO the world of fighters and armor and briefings Cargo: CAN MATCH and the world of dreams and portents Cargo: THE BRAHMANS but this dreamscape, this child's phantasmagoria Cargo: OF OLD. is a glimpse into a world just as real and deadly Cargo: ENLIGHTENMENT IS a place of strategems and treachery and power Cargo: A THRESHOLD that seems to you as strange as a briefing would seem Cargo: THE CATALYST FOR to an ape REMEMBER THIS Cargo: AMALGAMATION, FOR those who walk among infinite worlds Cargo: THE SINGULARITY must still wage war do not be lulled by the Cargo: THAT BINDS WHOLE soft words of mysticism and spirituality Cargo: SPECIES INTO we too struggle with our own war in heaven Cargo: THE UNION WE SEEK. our purpose is unclear the ancient design fails Cargo: THE OLD BURNT THE we perform bakhti and tapasya Cargo: COSMOS CLEAN in order to divine the will of those who Cargo: IN THE WARS OF passed deeper eons ago leaving us to preserve Cargo: THEIR YOUTH and our brothers in dance to their frigid watch Cargo: NEVER AGAIN WILL at the border where worlds fray and blur together Cargo: THAT PRICE BE PAID. brothers, brothers paramatma! why are you Cargo: Nothing so cold? you tend to the walls and the clockwork Cargo: Nothing while we, the gardeners execute your will upon Cargo: Nothing all the life within. you maintain the old plan Cargo: Nothing but do not pretend surprise when we cast it aside Cargo: Nothing your creators blundered once and in doing so Cargo: Nothing unleashed the deepness that stalks the cold roads Cargo: Nothing of the cosmos. we must prepare. Cargo: Nothing
Strikecraft
1 UEF Uhlan Alpha 2 Vicmouth 1 UEF Uhlan Alpha 1 Laporte