As I am second-guessing my ability to manage operations as president after today, I am given more reason to doubt. The alarm begins to blare out, and the ship’s computer spoke two of the scariest words known to humankind: “Emergency: Code White”.

I bring myself back out of my thoughts with an uncharacteristic outburst. “Heilige kak!” I curse myself inwardly for my unprofessional demeanor, however, outwardly my body more than matches my panicked tone. The color in my face must have lightened at least six shades, as I turn pure white as the emergency code continued blaring through the ship’s speakers. I feel like I am drowning in my inadequacies and unable to perform my duties among all of this chaos, and I am afraid that I am going to go under and bring the whole ship down with me.

My worst fears have just come true. The highest alert has just been sent out, and I haven’t had enough experience as a president to handle this. Sure, I had dealt with alerts before during my tenure as Vice President of Operations, but they were nothing more than mere scuffles among the operations staff or among the staff and the people downtown. I had trained for code white emergencies, of course, when I was in training. But that doesn’t prepare you for the real thing, especially when my usual operations center crew is in the holding cells.

After what felt like days, Mario Rodriguez calls in. “President, this is an emergency. That video caused panic all over the ship. There’s violence going on everywhere, with fear and panic like I’ve never seen. As is the protocol, the off-duty security team went in to try to help their colleagues with the situation, but it’s not enough. I sent the entire operations center staff down to help. I’m the only one up here! Please, send help.”

Completely numb, and acting on nothing but pure adrenaline and instinct, I begin to try to control the situation. My words seem to come out automatically, as I feel like I am standing outside of my body watching someone else handle the situation. “Release everyone from the holding cells. We need to be at full staff.”

As the doors open, I look at my shamed crew, hoping that simply being in the holding cells would be enough to keep them from re-enacting their irrational actions from this morning. If that’s not enough, hopefully, my speech will do the trick. I don’t consider myself a wordsmith by any standard, but I’ve always been able to inspire the crew to rise above and beyond. I hope I can still do that today. “All of the highest ranking of the senior operations staff are to return to the operations center. Remember, you are all operations staff for this ship. Put all of your anger aside, and do your duty to make this ship run as safely as it can. You are the face of this vessel, as all others on this ship look up to you. Everyone here earned their position, and I have faith in you all to overcome your demons and be the best that you can be.”

As the senior operations staff all began to leave the room, I look over at Carla Jackson and Maria Corben. The physicians are amazing. They both have no outward scars from the fight, and that fact led me to think of a plan. It was a risky plan, but I am optimistic that it will work.

Both women are looking at me curiously, obviously wondering if they will be free to leave as well. I muster up all the courage I have and hope I can muster up a speech to help them rise above their hate as well. This will be the real test of my leadership, as the hate between these two is so raw, and my plan won’t work without them both.

“Maria, Carla, I need you two the most. I know that you are both furious at each other right now, but please overcome your hate for now, for the safety of this ship. Maria, as the ship’s counselor, I’m sure you want to do everything you can to ease the situation. Carla, as the mother of two of the ship’s operations staff, I’m sure that you care about that the ship remains safe as well, especially regarding the safety of your sons. I’m going to address everyone aboard the ship, and I need both of you to help. Please, help me convince everyone to settle down. The presence of you both together should be enough to get things back to normal.”

Maria Corben agrees without hesitation, but Carla Jackson doesn't share her enthusiasm. “I don’t want to be near that… her. If people are beating the splicers, good. That doesn’t affect me or my family. Splicers shouldn’t be able to mingle with the rest of us anyway. I’m not participating in your ridiculous ploy. This riot doesn’t affect me, and it won’t affect my sons. None of us were insane enough to change our genes and lose our humanity.”

I display the security footage of the Adventuressia Main Street, and grit my teeth, hoping that I can make my point without losing my cool. “That is the electronics store where your husband works.” The scene showed multiple people, non-splicers, breaking the windows, smashing the products that were on display outside the store, and stealing everything they could inside. “Don’t tell me this doesn’t involve your family. It’s bedlam out there and anyone could get hurt in this. Please, please, help me stop this.”

Carla’s eyes widened as she saw the scene, hoping that her husband was alright. His livelihood, and more importantly, his life, might be in grave danger. Begrudgingly, Carla admits that the situation has gotten out of hand, and agrees to try to help calm the situation. I began to address the people on the ship, with both women at my side.

“Please stop this violence Both of the women shown involved in the fight this afternoon are fine, and neither wants this kind of violence to continue. Remember, we may all be different, but we all came from the same planet. We are all on this ship together. We’re not just neighbors and colleagues, we’re family.” At that moment, Carla, surprising both Maria and myself, takes the initiative and speaks up: “Don’t destroy our community over me.” After that, for the first time not sure of what she should say, Maria simply states: “Please stop.”

The gamble seems to pay off as reports of fights begin to lessen. The violence doesn’t stop completely, of course, but it tapers off enough that the security crew are able to manage things. I thank Maria and Carla for their help, and in return, I convince the security staff to let them return to their homes. I am exhausted and tempted to go home as well. However, I can't stop yet. The ship’s alert system has been reduced to yellow, or medium alert. There are still pockets of violence, but it isn't near the ship-wide panic that we previously confronted.

However, the continuing violence isn't the part of this situation that troubled me the most. The computer system had obviously been hacked. Someone took the surveillance video, edited it to remove the beating of Maria’s mother, and then streamed the edited video through the emergency broadcasting system. This meant that the person, or people, involved in this had extensive technical skills. Even more worrying, the computer system is only accessible in corridors that are restricted to operations staff members. All evidence so far seems to point towards that as the most likely scenario. However, I shudder to think that a member of the operations staff would sabotage the alert system in order to promote violence against people on this ship.