Spinning in Everfall - Chapter 2: The System That Didn't Exist
19 Sep 2024Quillmonkey
Ghosts of past captains whispered through the cockpit. The souls of Witch-Space called to him, half-heard words snatched away on dreams. The sound wasn't real of course. Jump space was a noiseless vacuum. What Quillmonkey could hear in the cockpit was a confection invented by the ship's COVAS system and an eerie confection it was too. He stared at the streaks of stars, spiralling past the canopy. To his side, Baylee sat, strapped in, fast asleep. A trail of saliva stretched from the edge of her mouth to the high collar of her jacket. He thought about waking her and decided against it. Probably better to sleep through the next few minutes. Things might get rough. He looked to the hud for inspiration but the Eccentric Philosophy was an old ship, a cantankerous ship which held no truck with jump space mechanics. It would be down to Quillmonkey, down to nothing more scientific than hunches and a feel for the black.
'Okay, Verity.' he said biting his lip. 'On my signal, deactivate the Frameshift.'
Quillmonkey had selected a female AI for the COVAS system. It spoke English with the hint of a French accent and it called itself Verity. There were probably millions of Veritys out there, but none had developed their personality on a ship like the Eccentric Philosophy. It was a ship that could corrupt an angel.
'Deactivation of the Frameshift Drive mid-jump is prohibited, Commander,' it said.
'Verity, we went over this already. Override the failsafe on my signal.'
'The failsafe is in place for a reason.'
'And I'm telling you to override it.'
'I don't think that is a good idea, Commander.'
'And I don't give a shit what you think. Do it.'
There was a moment of quiet, broken only by the lights and whispers of Witch-Space.
'Now!' Quillmonkey shut his eyes and held onto the chair.
'Very well, Commander. Deactivating Frameshift Drive.'
For a second nothing appeared to happen. The whine of the jump drive cut out, but the ship continued to rumble beneath his feet. Slowly it began to spin, picking up momentum, pitching, skewing from the jump tunnel. This was the reason Quillmonkey had his eyes closed. There was no inertia, no way to feel the spin, but seeing it was a surefire path to puking. As the Eccentric Philosophy dropped from the jump tunnel she cried out in pain. Shrieks of contorting superstructure, screams of wrenched metalwork and then a seismic ripple that travelled through the floor, shuddering through the chair, up the walls. Claws of broken glass spread across the canopy with a sound like calfing icebergs.
'What the--' Baylee was awake.
Quillmonkey opened his eyes. The cockpit was dark, a smell of burnt electronics hung in the air. He looked through the splintered canopy at the dead, dark space beyond, the distant flames of far off stars. It was impossible to tell where they'd dropped out. He listened. Nothing but the low-level hiss of escaping oxygen.
'Baylee, we got a hull breach. Track it down,' he said. She nodded, unbuckled herself from the seat and engaged the maglock on her boots. As she clipped past him, Quillmonkey tried to access ship diagnostics but the pilot panel was dead. When thargoids pulled you out of jump, he thought, they had the decency to leave your ship intact. At least for as long as it took them to shoot you.
'Verity. Status update.'
There was no reply from the COVAS.
'Engineering is down. I can seal the canopy but anything else is going to be difficult to spot.' Baylee passed him a Remlock helmet. 'Best suit up.'
Quillmonkey clicked the helmet into place and the visor slid over his face. He winced briefly as environmental support kicked in. The brain was good at filtering out background noise from important sounds, like speech or the moans of contorted metal, but the suit couldn't differentiate. So, the pop and pump of his breathing was mixed with the sound of boots clicking on the deck and the protesting metal hull and their voices in a single wall of noise.
'Verity?' he repeated. Still nothing.
'Baylee, I'm going to manual reboot. Let's hope the old Python engineering holds up.' He pushed off from the pilot's chair, gliding and turning so that his maglocks made contact with the rear bulkhead. He pulled a section of floor grate away and let it hang in the air while he opened an old metal cover with a red warning triangle plastered to its top. Two levers beneath were cranked into position and turned, one clockwise, one anticlockwise. Once, twice, the ratchet priming a central button. After the third turn, the button lit up red. Quillmonkey pushed the levers down flat once more.
'Here goes nothing,' he said and pressed the button.
For a moment nothing happened and Quillmonkey felt a bolt of panic rush through him. Then the button turned green and the familiar chatter of systems restarting filled his earpiece.
'Verity,' he tried again.
'Yes, commander,' Verity replied.
'Status update and bring engineering online. We need to plug a breach.'
'Systems are currently rebooting. I will run diagnostic tests once complete.'
'Just hurry it up,' Quillmonkey muttered.
'It will take as long as it takes, commander. No longer.'
He replaced the floor section and repositioned himself to stand on the same plane as Baylee. She was spraying transparent sealant into the canopy cracks.
'Where the hell are we?' she asked.
'That's a good question. Somewhere between Mamitu and Serpentis, not that that helps.' He tried the nav panel but it was still dead.
Verity broke in, 'Main power restored. Comms restored. System scan restored. Preparing Diagnostics.' It sounded like the COVAS was about to continue but changed her mind. 'Commander, we have a priority-one Message from the Pilot's Federation.'
'Sounds interesting. Tell me more.'
'Automated Trespass Message as follows: Commander. Zero-Four, Zero-Four, Zero-six is not a valid navigable system. Please replot a course using the Pilot Federation galactic mapping tool provided with your ship.'
The scanner suddenly burped into action. Eighteen bodies detected.
'If it's not a valid system then what are these planets doing here?'
'Zero-Four, Zero-Four, Zero-six?' Baylee latched the sealant gun back to the wall. 'That's not a system name. Sound more like co-ordinates.'
Quillmonkey engaged the spectrum analyser on the inside of his visor. As it sparked into life it bathed the aging commander's face in a pale blue xeno glow that clung to the shadows of his cheeks. From outside the helmet looked like it housed a skull. 'There you are. Gotcha,' he said, flipping the navlock on.
'Commander, will you tell me what's going on?' Baylee keyed the information tab on the object Quillmonkey had targeted. 'Where are we and what is that?'
'Verity.' Quillmonkey ignored his co-pilot. 'Can you reply to the message?'
'Yes commander. Comms are working within expected parameters.'
'Okay, send them the Beethin permit. Broadcast, narrow beam.'
'Beethin permit sent,' Verity acknowledged.
'Don't suppose it'll do any good. They'll already be on their way.'
Baylee cut in. Her voice taut. 'Who'll be on their way? What's Beethin? Look, I'm the co-pilot of this junk bucket. You can't keep me in the dark.'
Quillmonkey closed the spectrum analyser. The cockpit came back into view. Baylee stood in a bright red suit and black winged jacket. The collars were large and angular around the helmet locking coil. She had her visor in place but just from her stance he could tell she was not happy.
'Okay, you're right,' he started. 'The system name is Beethin. Back in the days of GalCop it was used as an R and D hub and it was very much a navigable system.' He pulled up the Galmap in a grid between them and zoomed in on their location. A red crosshatch appeared with the word 'Error'. 'Yet it's not on the Pilot's Federation map. Just the galactic co-ordinates. With the tie-in to FSD tech, you can only plot a course using their map, so any place they don't want you to visit, they either permit lock or, even worse, they just remove the system. I mean who's going to count what you see out there against what's on the map? You can easy drop one or two stars without anyone batting an eyelid.'
'But why? What are they hiding?'
'That's what I'm hoping to find out. The Dark Wheel agent said Cardosa would be here and if I'm not mistaken, I've found where she is.'
'The targeted signal?' Baylee checked the navlock details once more. 'All the nav says is that it's old, probably human. No registration ident. But at that distance? Too far out to be an installation.'
'It's a Faraway Post,' said Quillmonkey.
'Damn right it's far away. Three-Quarters of a light year away.'
'No, a Faraway Post. It's an old Quirium Jump Relay. They were decomissioned across the old worlds when the Pilot's Federation took over. FSD didn't need them, but Beethin wasn't on the charts. The gate was left in place. That's where Cardosa will be.'