Communications Hub Zeta 12
26 Nov 2017Robert Phillips
Following a lead from Maia, I jumped to the Electra system. Scanning my Nav Computer I found 2 unusual signals in orbit around Electra 4:- Communications Hub Zeta 12
- Unregistered Comms Beacon
I dropped out of SuperCruise next to Communications Hub Zeta 12:
Dotted around the facility were 4 Ship Log Uplink points. I was scanning the uplinks when I noticed 2 ships appear on my scanner - 2 Elite Diamondback Explorers. I waited to see what they would do.
The scanned me, and then began to attack!
The area was under no jurisdiction, and my ship had been armed in case of such an eventuality, so I defended myself. I launched my fighter and opened my hardpoints.
After a brief skirmish, I destroyed the 2 hostiles. Seeing no more contacts on my scanner, I was able to resume scanning the uplink points. I received the following 4 audio logs from them:
…TECH OFFICER’S LOG 1/4…
This signal is incredible. The behaviour is almost organic.
We can’t isolate it, every time we think it’s gone it shifts to a new frequency band.
If I didn’t know better I’d say it’s…alive, maybe some military experiment. But it’s illegal to hack the public comms network.
I’ve never seen anything like it. I’ve got to get to the bottom of this.
…TECH OFFICER’S LOG 2/4…
It’s not military, at least not our military.
This code might not even be human. We managed to track it to the point of origin, seems to be coming from a system here in the Pleiades sector.
This is too big for us now, I’ve put in a report to head office, with luck they’ll let us take some credit for the discovery. I mean finding alien life has become a big thing lately, there’s got to be some kind of payout for information like this.
…TECH OFFICER’S LOG 3/4…
They arrived this morning apparently on company orders to shut us down, to make the station fully automated, they said.
This makes no sense. We’ve just discovered the find of a lifetime and now they want to automate this place, what the hell!
Another thing is they’re armed, well some of them. They say that head office has sent them here for our protection, to protect the data. Something is not right; every time we ask for details we get the brush off or we’re given more vague reasons for them being here.
They’ve taken copies of all our research and wiped any data concerning the signal from our systems. Hell, they’re wiping everything!
…TECH OFFICER’S LOG 4/4…
These guys didn’t come from head office. I overheard a conversation between the operation lead and his superiors.
They’re some kind of private military outfit. I’ve got to contact someone, ask form help.
I managed to get these logs and some of our data onto a data core. If anything happens to us maybe someone will find it and get the truth out.
I’ve encoded the location data into one of the beacons outside. Should just seem like a stream of numbers if they don’t look too closely. I’ve rigged it to go off at 10 minutes past the hour.
We’ve all been called to the docking bay. They say we’re being sent home, but I don’t believe them for a second. Everyone is really scared.
As the last log indicated, I proceeded to the Unregistered Comms Beacon. It would not respond to any scans, so I waited to see if it would transmit anything.
Sure enough, at 10 mins past the hour, it sprung to life exactly as the Tech Officer's log promised and transmitted the following message:
10 14 22 1 4 5 18 19
KLDOIQBKJ KUDOGKKF PBQODL RBL 19026 PBQD N 1 V GIQ GKJR H LIOQBVGDP HBJBHIG HKAD PQIJA NY
The numbers look like they transcribe to letters of the English alphabet: 'JNVADERS'
Applying a keyed cipher decryption to the string that followed produced the following decrypted message:
OPERATIOA OVERLOOK SITREP GIP 19026 SITE B 1 C LNT LOAG M PNRTICLES MIAIMNL MODE STNAD BY
Well, that didn't look right. The message must have gotten degraded during transmission. I corrected the cypher key to 'INVADERS', and the decrypted string changed to:
OPERATION OVERLOOK SITREP GIP 19026 SITE B 1 C LAT LONG M PARTICLES MINIMAL MODE STAND BY
Now we were getting somewhere! Since the message had degraded, there were still some minor issues. 'GIP 19026' was actually HIP 19026, a nearby star system.
This was my new lead: to check out the planet HIP 19026 B 1 C for anything unusual.