The Horsehead Nebula: A Locked Region Mystery
23 Dec 2020OmegaPaladin
After my work for Sirius, I signed a long-term contract with the company. They seemed to be interested in paying for missions gathering data, even in previously explored systems. Also, their generous discounts had come in handy.I decided to make the best of the recently announced bonus on survey contracts out of Betancourt Base, and visit some of the more interesting sites in the frontier of human space. First up was the Vela Pulsar. After surveying many valuable systems on the way, I finally reached the undead star. It was intense - like a white dwarf, but taken beyond the next level.
I had to fly cautiously as I approached it for a detailed scan - the turbulence nearly pulled my ship in. I decided to practice pulsar boosting another day, and moved on to my next goal.
The Witch Head Nebula is a fairly active area, with several settled systems supporting the research effort and the war effort against the Thargoids. I get the sense pretty much every nebula out there is a bug nest. The view was gorgeous, naturally:
While I could have stopped there, I wanted the explore further into Barnard's Loop and Orion Nebula. I left the frontier behind and continued on through the Orion Nebula, and eventually made it to the edge of the Horseshoe Nebula.
... and I could go no further.
I could see the systems on the map. I had plenty of fuel, and the range to reach the stars, but the computer would not allow me to jump there. I checked the database, and there were several regions completely locked out in the hardware of my FSD. This was something big, no doubt about it - it was not just nebulas, which could be related to the Thargoids, but there were perfectly normal regions of space like the Col 70 sector completely locked down. This was not like the soft-lockout on Sol or Achernar or Alioth, systems where you could jump in... if you wanted to face a frontline naval taskforce armed to the teeth. I heard they even shot escape pods.
There was only one group with enough power to unilaterally lock down sectors of space - the Pilots Federation. Who else could mandate a lockdown across every manufacturer and workshop? No other power would dare to try. The real question was why? The Pilot's Federation would not complain if I picked up slaves, political prisoners, or even religious dissidents and jettisoned them into a star, or murdered fellow pilots for no reason. I could blow up a cruise ship (believe me, the thought crossed my mind more than once, since their captains seem to confuse the general system network with their damn passenger intercom...) filled with tourists or perform any savage atrocity known to man, and the Pilot's Federation would. not. care. But going into these sectors was off limits.
What the hell is lurking in there?