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Episode 02: Cosmic Imperative / Re: Ch 2: S [D01 | 1642hrs] The Spare Tire
Last post by Dumedion -[Show/Hide]
Her lips pulled down in a tight frown as her eyes narrowed in concentration at the sensor data. This wasn’t how I planned this day to turn out, Talera mused ruefully in an attempt to fight her own building anxiety. Pressure was nothing new, yet she felt the keen weight of being forced into a role outside her area of absolute expertise all the same. Why they had opted to leave without a dedicated science officer was beyond her, but now was hardly the time to discuss her misgivings. It wasn't as if she was incapable, either, but as a medical professional, well...she wouldn't want someone from security performing open-heart surgery. Nothing for it, now.
“Analyzing, stand-by,” the doctor murmured as her hands danced across the console of the shuttle’s modest science suite, then threw a glance over her shoulder to the pilot. “Confirm sensor tracking position – did we upload to Theurgy for triangulation?”
“Confirmed – about 20 light-minutes out away from distress signal source.”
Emlott nodded as she initiated a broad-spectrum index and began cross-referencing the anomaly signature through the database. “Whatever it is, it’s definitely not supposed to be there,” her head shook with another frown as the console bleeped with an affirmative tone. “It appears to be a mass of dissipating chronometric particles...some kind of temporal wake? But it’s tiny, barely twenty meters wide – that doesn’t make sense – every temporal anomaly ever encountered has been massive, naturally occurring or otherwise. From the epicenter, a faint trail of rapidly decaying particles leads directly to the convoy. It’s extremely faint.” The doctor glanced back to the cockpit as she spoke aloud. “Be advised, whatever it is, it left a trail right to where we’re going – but given the rate of particle decay, we wont be able to track it in time to make a difference. The EM interference from the convoy itself isn’t helping, either.”
[Just broadcast last known position Fred, then fall back as ordered], another voice cut in – female, clearly impatient. Talera blinked at the curt tone, but complied.
“We’re heading straight at it,” she whispered, then shared a worried look with everyone in the shuttle. “I have a really bad feeling about this.”
“Heading adjusted Wolf Leader. We’ll run a circuit sixty seconds out from the convoy and remain at warp on stand-by,” the pilot announced, then turned back to Doctor Emlott. “You and me both, but we’re here, and so are the Wolves. Let’s keep our heads and see it through.”
[Meanwhile...[LT (JG) Andram “Javert” Obair | Cockpit | AC-409 MK-III Valkyrie]
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Temporal what? The hell does that even mean, Andram thought incredulously as he reduced thrust. His ship was in the thick of the convoy, approaching from above their angle of orientation. Even at this distance, he could see the glittering debris cloud that surrounded the crippled, lifeless transport - drifting as it fell out of the travel column. The tac-display lit up with data as the Friedrich Mohs uplinked the anomaly’s position, which earned a confused scowl. That doesn’t make sense, that’s just the dead transport, he huffed an unimpressed snort, then keyed his coms open again.
“Data received, pushing to VR – stand by.”
As the last of the flotilla's maintenance tugs and emergency rescue pods returned to their ships – having realized any hope of survivors was futile – Javert lit the thrusters of his Valkyrie and dove at the dead transport. If they wanted visual confirmation that it was dead, he’d give it, but it all seemed a bit redundant if he was being honest. Whatever had happened, there wasn’t much any of them could do about it now.
As the dead ship grew rapidly, Abram noted what he'd thought was a debris cloud was actually sparks and forks of some kind of electrical discharge; it flashed and crawled intermittently across what appeared to be the remnants of the control section of the hull – which looked as if it had been torn apart. His eyes dropped for a second to his own sensor display.
“Salvo, Javert – we might want to get these people the hell out of here. The transport's dead but it’s giving off some...unstable energy readings. It might blow any -”
The warning died in Javert's throat as a blinding wave of blue-white electrical discharge hit his ship; shields were overloaded, power systems fried, and as sparks and smoke filled his cockpit, the pilot could only grunt in agony as every muscle in his body locked rigid. Blood spewed as he bit through his tongue. Eyes wide in pain-induced panic even though his retina’s were burned to uselessness. An eternity of agony passed, as his ship tumbled off-course, thrusters firing in impotent, erratic death-throes. Beyond the gurgled sound of his own painful grunts as his heart seized in agony, the last thing Javert heard was the muted warnings of his ship's systems failing as he drifted off into oblivion.
[The Drone]
It struck as the wave cascaded out. Mechandrite limbs uncoiled from the useless husk of It’s previous kill, the transport’s limited supply of energy drained and repurposed. Surprise had been achieved, kill-directives re-initiated; dozens of armored claws spread out to ensnare It’s new prey as the drone flung Itself into the void. The prey-ship was helpless; rendered inoperable as it tumbled with EM distortion.
Eradicate - prosecute primary directive.
The presence of the new prey was sub-optimal; an anomaly in the drone's programmed historical events. Lacking essential data to calculate a discernible favorable outcome in regard to It’s primary objectives, they would be eliminated to ensure absolute success. No alternative measures were required. In a matter of seconds, the prey-ship would be crushed and sheared to lifelessness in Its coils.
Unfortunately, the drone failed to consider or account for the stupidity of human courage.
[Talia “Shadow” Al-Ibrahim | Cockpit | AC-09 MK-III Valkyrie]
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She dropped out of warp and instantly realized two very important mistakes: one, given the fact that the cockpit was filled with the flashing crimson lights and computer’s droned proximity alert warnings – Talia had failed to adjust her exit point to account properly for her speed. Two, and this was rather more important: by re-routing power from shields and weapons, it was highly unlikely she was going to survive the outcome.
Not that there was anything she could do about it.
“Shiiit this’ll hurt,” Talia grimaced against the breaking thrusters as something chromed with a blur of what looked like tentacles filled her cockpit, even as she tried to raise her nose and roll to avoid it.
Weakened shields flared with the impact, as sparks from overloaded relays filled the cockpit. Talia was thrown forwards in the harness, then crushed back into her seat as the inertia dampening field failed. The stars tumbled beyond as everything faded to gray, then red, then black.
She woke to the sound of multiple voices; all of them distorted with bursts of static. Shadow grimaced, blinked, then swallowed a mouthful of blood. A hand wafted the smoke that filled her cockpit away from the consoles with a grunt of effort. Dark eyes narrowed as Talia struggled to reboot her systems, amazed she was still in one piece, relatively speaking.
“Fuck sakes, I’m here, give me a minute,” Shadow grunted.
Power flickered back online as she scanned the heavens, trying to find out what the hell happened. Her HUD flashed to life, and with it, the TVD. Talia swore as she looked over her shoulder, through the hull. Whatever she’d hit was slowly jerking back to life; it looked like a chrome cephalopod – twitching as it tumbled – re-orienting itself from the impact. Javert’s ship was a smoking corpse beyond it, drifting off into the void; he hadn’t punched out. Talia couldn’t tell if he was alive or dead, but her eyes narrowed as Chromie jerked its body directly at her, and pounced.
Shadow lit her thrusters and rolled hard.
“Wolf Four, engaging."
OOC: sorry for delay. RIP Javert.