Shadows in the Rift Part II
02 Apr 2017Jellicoe
"I'm picking up a comms beacon close to the star. It looks like it's of human origin." Claude announced in this unknown system, half the galaxy from home."Yes I see it." I replied checking my own scanner display. "What makes you so sure it's human?"
"Because if it wasn't it would show up as an unknown signal, if we could pick it up at all." Claude answered what I realised was a stupid question as soon as the words were out of my mouth as though he were a teacher trying to educate a particularly obtuse pupil.
"How the blazes did it get out here?" I wondered aloud.
"The other possibility," Claude continued thoughtfully, ignoring my question, " is that it is not of human origin but whoever put it here did so to give us a message."
"Such as?" I asked.
"Stay away perhaps? The Formidine Rift, formidine means fear in one of the ancient languages; the rift of fear - there has to be a reason for that name, perhaps we are trespassing somewhere that would be best left well alone?"
"Whoever put it there we need to see it." I said setting course for the mysterious signal."
We jumped back into normal space and closed on the signal. A large, tubular structure that dwarfed our Anaconda hoved slowly into view, bristling with coms arrays and sprouting two vast sail like solar panel wings.
"Stay sharp." I ordered. "Something that big might have defence systems. It certainly looks manmade."
"It's got power." Claude said from his scanners. "No sign of any weapons. Definitely human, there are near identical ones in the bubble."
"Any signals?" I asked.
"Not yet. If it's like the ones back in K Space it'll broadcast at set times, we just have to wait."
"How long has it been here?" Vik asked from tactical.
"Impossible to say, the tech these things use hasn't changed in a long time, it must be recent though there's no way they'd have got something that size this far out before Frame Shift technology."
"Federation?" I queried.
"No way of knowing, the tech is very uniform, that would be my guess tho... hold on it's broadcasting." Claude turned back to his instruments. "Hmmm it's some kind of code."
"Can you crack it?"
"I'm not sure, probably not with what I have on the ship if it's a high sec one."
"Alright see what you can do, if we have to we can send it back to base and see if they can make anything of it."
"We are supposed to be observing a coms blackout." Vik put in.
"I know but we won't be the only ones trying to crack it and whatever that message is it's got to be very important to this mission, I think that's worth breaking a coms blackout for."
"Ship jumping in skipper." Vik interrupted. "Anaconda class, heading right for us."
"Ship scan detected." The computer announced.
"Full power to shields." I ordered just in case somebody had travelled over ten thousand light years to pick a fight.
"Deploy weapons?" Vik asked.
"Not yet, scan him though."
"Pavel Orson, combat rating master, pledged to Zachary Hudson." Vik ran through adding the strange pilots allegiance with concern. "He's deployed hard points." I checked the range, still over five kilometres but closing fast. "Looks like an exploration fit, no boosters or cell banks"
"Weapons?" Claude asked.
"Pulse lasers and a multi-cannon, can't tell how powerful.
"Well he should have had a good enough look at us to see we're better prepared for a fight, let's hope that encourages him to be reasonable. Mira ready the alert fighter, be ready to launch on my order."
The strange ship came closer, apparently ignoring the beacon until coming to a halt at a distance of a couple of hundred metres, hard points deployed and pointing straight at us, not firing, not speaking just starting at us. The tension on the bridge was palpable, everyone knew the only outcome for the losers of a battle out here so far from home.
"Deploy hard points and launch fighter" I ordered. "Let's see if that makes him want to talk." Another thirty long seconds passed, every one seeming more like an hour. "Mira make a couple of close passes of his bridge."
"Roger that Commander."
"Hold on a moment Rogue Leader, stand by." I countermanded my order as I heard the ping of an incoming coms request and looked at Claude.
"He's hailing us, I presume you want it putting through?" I nodded and the hologram of a man in his early middle years, his high forehead showed a hairline beginning to recede beyond his ability to hide it shimmered into view, his immaculate, bespoke purple and white flight suit suggesting a degree of vanity and fastidiousness as well as considerable wealth.
"Commander Jellicoe." he greeted me brusquely .
"Commander Orson." I acknowledged him.
"Exactly what are you doing out here commander?" He asked.
"The same thing you are I would imagine." I languidly drawled in the face of his abruptness.
"Who do you plan to sell your data to?" His manner continued to border on the outright rude.
"I'm not sure how that's any business of yours."
"The Federation needs your data citizen." He must have picked up on my accent. "If there is anything out here then the human race can't risk it being found by a bunch of terrorist dreamers led by a convicted killer."
"You make a very good point Commander, I'll be sure to bear it in mind."
"See that you do Commander, there's a lot at stake here." He abruptly cut the conversation off.
"Think he'll check us out?" Vik asked.
"Possibly, so we must assume so." I replied pointing the ship towards open space and triggering the Frame Shift Drive.
"What now?" Vik said.
"We have a good look over this system while Claude works on that code." I began our exploration of the system, i planned to be methodical, scan every body in the system while looking for any signal sources in deep space and if that yielded nothing move in for a closer look at the planets themselves. It would cost us valuable time but my feeling was that the beacon was unlikely to be the only secret this system held. I had just completed our survey of the inner planets and was halfway out to the more distant worlds when Claude's voice came through on the coms net.
"Skipper you need to see this, I think I've cracked the code."