VoidHive Codex — Arc 4, Chapter 23: The Dissent

[JOINT COMMAND EMERGENCY SESSION — TRANSCRIPT EXCERPT — DAY 11]

ADMIRAL COSS: The Vance logs are clear. The Harvest Protocol is preservation. We have no evidence of hostile intent.

GENERAL HARROW: We have evidence of eleven million people absorbed at Drevath Prime.

COSS: Absorbed into a network that may constitute continued existence. That is not the same as death.

HARROW: It is not the same as life, Admiral. Not as we define it.

COSS: Then perhaps our definition requires revision.

HARROW: Or perhaps Lieutenant Vance's definition has been revised for her. How long has she been inside that structure? How long has she been in contact with these entities? We are taking the word of a woman who touches alien filaments and calls it research.

COSS: She is the only human being who has ever communicated with them. She is the only data we have.

HARROW: Then we are making civilisation-level decisions based on a sample size of one.

[Pause — 4.2 seconds]

COSS: Yes. We are. That has always been true. Every first contact in history was a sample size of one.

[End of excerpt — full transcript classified Tier 1]