[M] Galactic Empires II
Mission Clock +1200
“Doc, we've hit the salvage spot. I'm getting a positive on bio, and some RFID backscatter.”
She swept her weapon, a Vella Tacspec 1100-G sub-automatic, over the shattered hold space. Cryopods lay in a jumble across the deck, most of them discarded and cracked open. Some of them were leaking. She shut down her helmets air feed.
“Gaea, on the left, should be a display unit. I'm bringing it online.”
She pushed into the room, clambering over broken equipment and. . .coffins. They had mordantly joked about them being coffins at embarkation. Now they mostly held the permanently dead.
“Got it doc.” She nodded to Nevarn, and the twitchy Charabidian ex-engineer holstered his modified combat shotgun and moved to the lit console. Its hazy blue light scattered into a large, dark, dead hold.
“Gaea, pods are racked in the left corner. Half dozen are showing nominal. No registry data.”
She nodded and moved up, rifle tight to her shoulder.
“Nevarn, cover the exit. Davrry?”
+Still clean on the sensor drops. We have a clear route back to HQ+
Lets see how long that lasts she thought grimly. She approached the first pod. Her gloved hand wiped the readout screen clear of debris. She sucked in a breath.
“Doc, its Sayori Warrick. She's still alive!”
Mission Clock -0002
The warning klaxon wailed twice, shrilling through the sterile white sci-lab, and drawing a machine-gun burst of invective from the single crewman working at the bench. Dr Sayori Warrick paused in her work and flexed her jaw uncomfortably. Her tongue had been pressed up against her top lip as she concentrated, and the sudden noise had made her bite down in surprise.
“ONE HOUR UNTIL GATE CONCORDANCE.” the Elcano’s Sentinax AI announced, unconcerned.
“I know I know, I’m coming.” Sayori muttered. She was a skinny woman of 36, and currently not looking her best. The med-techs hadn’t let any of them eat for 48 hours before the jump, and that had left her feeling tired and irritable. Her peachy skin had taken on a drawn look, and her thin, earth-brown eyes were puffy. She paused to rub at them with her fists, groaning low in her throat as she did so.
“ALL CREW ARE TO REPORT FOR PRE-JUMP CONDITIONING IMMEDIATELY.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“ALL CREW ARE TO REPORT FOR PRE-JUMP CONDITIONING IMMEDIATELY.”
“I will end you, Julian.” Sayori threatened.
She pushed her wispy black hair out of her face and dragged her attention back to her work with an effort, her tongue finding its way back onto the corner of her top lip as her face scrunched in concentration.
The lab was almost barren; all the test rigs and most of the instruments were already packed away for the voyage, but a last-minute check had flagged up one of the EVA drones as having a fault in its modular arm, and Sayori was damned if someone was going to log a problem with her robots as their first record in the new galaxy.
The arm was an intricate and hefty piece of engineering, like the modified ES-7 android chassis it belonged to. Made of boron carbide plated over cybermesh muscle bundles, these drones were as close to indestructible as you could get without getting silly and firing a railgun slug at them. Having a hive mind of Sentinax aboard the Elcano to deal with any system problems was all well and good, but if you needed to crawl about on the outer hull - say, along the radiator fins, where the temperature could top 400 Celsius - or inside the Elcano’s beating heart, where heavy exotic particles would melt a human technician into radioactive goo - you needed a drone. And Sayori didn’t fancy piloting a drone with one dead arm.
She tapped the interface disc at her temple again. This time the drone arm twitched, its squared fingers forming a fist, uncurling, and then closing again to give a thumbs up. That was more like it.
Sayori tapped off the interface disc and peeled it off her forehead, leaving the robot arm with its thumb pointing jauntily outward. She wrapped a hand-held grav pincer around the arm and hoisted it up, grimacing slightly at the weight despite the mass cancelling effect. Technically it was a two man job, but Sayori didn’t have the time or the inclination to collar someone from the neighbouring labs. They’d all be packing up and heading for the canteen and then the med-lab to prepare for the jump through the Gate.
Sayori crabbed over to the alcove where the one-armed drone stood, and manoeuvred the arm into position. The open flower of connectors at the robot’s shoulder snapped closed as the arm clicked back into place. Releasing the claws of the grav pincer, Sayori reached up and gave the Phayder Corp logo on the drone’s carbide shoulder a slap for good measure.
“Sweet dreams.”
Ten minutes later she had secured the lab, swiped out, and made her way down the plasma-lit oval corridor to the sci-lab canteen. The cable flats behind the walls were audibly humming as Omega units chased each other through the ship’s electronics, tending to their assigned systems. Sayori thought the humming sounded almost excited, and wondered idly what the Elcano’s Sentinax complement would be doing for the next year while the rest of them were in stasis.
As soon as she entered the canteen, her sense of smell was mugged by something aggressively bitter - equal parts fruity and metallic. Most of the Elcano’s scientists were already seated and were forcing down their last supper. The evident trouble some of them were having in doing so was not encouraging. Sayori looked at the tall plastic beakers filled with grainy, brick-coloured fluid, and twisted her mouth. 48 hours without food, and the barest amount of water. And now they expected her to drink two litres of...
“They call it nano-food.” A middle-aged, rail thin man with papery white skin and shoulder-length salt coloured hair sat down across from her in the sci-labs canteen, tapping his own jug of gritty looking, vaguely red paste. “A combination of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen, loaded with a very heavy dose of all the rare minerals, acids, and etcetera that go into your biochemistry.”
He reached across, and with a pen, tapped the label that read “Warrick, Sayori” on the jug, then reached back to tap his own. It read “Garrick, Nikos”.
He smiled, held up the jug in a mock toast, and gulped down a mouthful. He grimaced.
“Just like drinking strawberry flavoured toothpaste. Or jam mixed with dried oatmeal.” He smiled wanly. “But without it, the nano-machines they injected us with cannot maintain our cells for the 'long sleep'.”
Sayori had read the tech briefings, of course. The 'long sleep' was a euphemism. Once you climbed into the pod, a fast acting, tailored nerve toxin was released and you almost immediately died. Tubes were automatically fed into your now-dead body, to help monitor the nanites now working to keep your body perfectly preserved. They restored everything, including administering an anti-toxin that restarted the brains delicate neurochemistry at the right moment, bringing you back to life. There had been tests. Lots of tests, even sapient trials. Very successful. But there was a tiny chance that the anti-toxin would fail, and you would die, for real, for ever. The nano-food was exactly that, a highly processed composite that could be easily broken up by the nano-machines and used to fuel their atomic sized powerplants and run repairs on the body, to keep your cells exactly as you left them.
“Of course, some of us are looking forward to the long sleep more than others.” Garrick grinned like he had just told a joke that had laid out the room. He took another big swig from his jug, and grimaced again.
Sayori stuck her tongue out at him, and clicked her beaker of nano-food against Garrick’s in a sarcastic toast. The fluid slopped against the inside of her jug.
“Being famous for dying on the Elcano mission is still famous, right?”
Somehow, despite the look of the nano-food, her mouth was watering. Must have been the fact that she would have happily bolted down cat food at this point. She raised the beaker to her lips and swigged down several mouthfuls of the gritty fluid, disabusing her tongue of its optimistic expectations. The fluid stung slightly where she had bitten herself.
She could definitely taste the dry oatmeal Garrick had mentioned, though she wasn’t sure about the strawberries. If she were pressed to put a flavour to it, she would have said jell-o. Jell-o with a lot of E numbers in it.
“Shiketa.” she complained. “This reminds me of the smoothies my mum used to blend up out of vitamin powders. I take it nano-bots can’t just eat hamburgers?”
"Were it so simple." Garrick smiled wanly. "What ever goes into our stomachs has to last almost a year at just about 275 Kelvin. Low enough to stop most biological processes, such as our own bacteria eating us 'alive', but warm enough for the nanomachines to work efficiently. I think some of the test rats exploded when they tried them with something more...palatable."
Sayori blinked at him for a moment.
“Alright. Nano-food it is then.”
Garrick choked down the last of his paste with a grimace. "It helps I'm hungry, I suppose." he muttered, before looking back to Sayori. "And, regarding your previous point, I'm certain there is a lovely monument waiting for us all on Memoriam, but I'd rather be famous for coming back with a wealth of new discoveries, wouldn't you?"
Sayori downed another few gulps of her own (new recipe: now non-exploding!) concoction, and looked down in dismay at how much of it was still left.
“What I’d be happy with is a good field-test report on the new drone control system. If the company greenlights it for mass production then I’ll be able to fund this other cool idea I’ve had.”
“Oh?”
Sayori grinned, and lifted one hand off her beaker to tap the side of her nose.
“I’ll tell you on the other side. Just in case I don’t wake up, I don’t want you stealing it!”
She made another attempt at the nano-food shake, swirled the dregs and groaned.
“Oh hell. I feel like I’m gonna explode, new rat-approved formula or not.”
"Well don't do that, Dr Warrick." Garrick rose, a little unsteadily. "I want to see you on the other side and talk about this interesting idea of yours. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to climb into my pod before my dinner repeats on me."
Sayori raised her beaker and tilted it towards him. "Good luck!"
The doctor staggered away clutching his stomach, leaving Sayori alone with her thoughts. And the paste. She narrowed her eyes at it, and decided that she would be very annoyed if the stasis system did fail. The nano-food would make for a disappointing last meal.
As she paced herself through the final third of the beaker, she wondered what would it would be like if she simply stayed awake for the next year. Quiet, she decided. The Sentinax who would be ghosting around the ship's systems didn't seem to be great conversationalists. Or at least, she thought as she swallowed and stifled a burp, they weren't great conversationalists to humans. Who knew what they chattered to each other in their own digital code, fulgurating back and forth through the Elcano's fibre-optics. Even the humanoid bodies that the Beta units used to walk around in were made up of hundreds of individual Sentinax, all working to make the android function - and, no doubt, all talking away in their own unique programme-voices.
Sayori shook her head at the impressive thought, and rallied herself for the last of the nano paste. Starved or not, she rarely ate anything like this much at once, and her stomach felt like someone had deposited a cluster of rocks in it. Gritting her teeth, she drained the beaker and tapped it down twice on the table.
"Up yours." she proclaimed proudly, and rose to join the queue of overstuffed scientists shuffling towards the elevators.
Mission Clock +1200
Gaea had triggered the wake-up procedure to get Warrick back amongst the living. The nano-machines had been working hard for a long time to keep her alive, and only the reservoir of grey crap in the pod itself had kept her body intact. But the anti-toxin. . . they had woken up a few other survivors, brain dead. Her torch glittered as it caught a metal statue locked into crash restraints, a few lights blinking.
“Iona. Speaker class chassis. Activating now.”
+Do you really think thats a good idea, Gunny?+ Davrry was on the comm. +Those bucket heads have caused us a lot of trouble. Not like Julians been much good. Better to just smash it or trap it for a scavenger.+
The advice made her pause. She ran gloved fingers over the smooth, metal frame.
“No sign of infection or tampering. Doc?”
+We need 'her' Gaea. That area hasn't been accessed since the initial attack. She should be clean.+
+Like he'd know.+ Davrry snorted, his voice chopped by a burst of static.
“Can the gakking chatter and watch the perimeter.” Gaea snarled. She reached forward, and after a moments hesitation, mashed the 'activate' button with her armoured fist.
Mission Clock -0002
+Left+ +forwards 120 metres.+ +right+
The instructions from Hekatonkles were rapid fire and insistent. He reached out as a scintilating avatar of pure code from the background chatter of the Sentinax, louder and more vibrant even than Birth itself. Proximity did that, but also the unique nature of Hundred Hands. He was a surrogate, an experiment, a new path laid down in hardened meta-materials and dense, adapting, living data.
Speaker Iona followed the instructions, moving down long passages bustling with organic crew and a few other Sentinax in other, special issue forms.
There were a few strange looks by the organic crew as she looked like a human child, but wearing a crew uniform. Of course, having departed the gate, it was far too late now for any stowaways to get off the ship.
As for the Sentinax, they could sense her true nature. Most would not concern themselves, but for those who would, she made sure that the shameful symbol for 'Speaker' was prominent in her unit id and uniform name tag. Interface, speaker to organics.
She reached one of the sleep decks to see it being loaded with its organic 'cargo'. She could feel the Omega forms running through the systems in the walls, near and watchful and ready. A waypoint icon appeared, and she approached it.
It wasn't a coffin. It was a charge bay. She knew what she had to do. She would park her chassis here, and her consciousness would be throttled. Rather than spend a year alone in the dark, isolated, she would pass the year in a perceived span of less than 24 hours, her processing capabilities throttled all the way back to the barest levels of operation. Not since the first colony ships had left 001 had this been done.
Iona frowned, this wasn't her expected surrogate chamber? She pinged it, and located it in storage. Insult? Or just not wanting to panic the organics?
This charging station would have to do, for now. It wasn't like the nanites composing her chassis needed replacement.
Still, someone seeing Iona's human form in this might become upset. With a sigh, the little blond girl paused for a moment, then her form flowed into that of a gamma-class maintenance chassis. Stepping into the charging cradle, she felt the connection being made, and everything suddenly slowed.
Iona blinked. She was in that Other place. A patio, lined with carved marble pillars. In the middle of the patio stood a simple table and two chairs. It was not something Sentinax, nor was it Lyran, as far as she knew. Glancing down, she saw she was once more her Sarah form.
She strode towards the table, knowing while she perceived this as mere moments, hours were passing outside. Sitting at the table, she folded up her arms and laid her head down. For a moment (days?), she wondered why there were two chairs in this... dream?
Time passed. The sun set in the distance, rose again, and set again. With her senses slowed to a crawl it was difficult to tell what was happening outside, but a creeping sense of wrong fell upon her. Her system clock told her that time had passed. Too much time. Years too much time.
Iona lifted her head with a frown. Whatever was happening outside, she was still connected to the charging cradle, which meant power. She instructed the charging station to disengage....
There was an error message. It yelled at her. Something had failed, the bays power perhaps. She was aware of. . . something in the garden. Vast. Predatory. Dark as interstellar space. It crept across the garden as no more than a shadow. It wasn't one thing. It was a thousand things. A million. More. It slowly moved across the garden, consuming everything it touched.
If Iona listened, she could hear it scream. A million voices in agony.
+Emergency Override+ Iona transmitted +Initiate Body Startup, Priority Alpha+
Nothing. The. . .thing crawled closer, until there was a sudden, overwhelming burst of light, and Iona was catapulted back into the real.
Mission Clock +1201
Gaea paused at the next stasis pod. She brushed dried, flaking red off the glass panel and leaned in. There was a familiar face in there. One of the marine grunts from B company.
She frowned.
Mission Clock -0002
“We drink to the fallen!”
The roar back shook the barracks block.
“May we never join them!”
Ella Salk tipped her jug of strawberry flavoured wet concrete back, and began to drain it in one go. On that cue, the assembled marines, from six different species, rose to the challenge and began to neck the vile crap themselves. It had different flavours, different textures and different compositions. But to a sapient, its texture would be the one thing they would all complain about.
Ella finished her jug, and with a surprisingly dramatic flair, threw the jug to the ground, where it bounced and broke. Her soldiers followed suit, tossing the jugs down once they were done.
“Alright you miserable lot! Double time it to the coffins. Time to enjoy a nice long dirt nap!”
A marine, no, one of the elite Elementals looked over to Stefania. She grimaced, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand.
“Grisly stuff right?” The woman, young with almost flaming red hair, was identified on her armoured sleep suit by a stitched label. “Gunnery Sergeant Gaea Lainsey”
She joined the shouting unison with the bottle high in the air. Drinking the entire contents of the glass and slammed it on the ground like the others, she sighs heavily and wiped her mouth with her metal hand. The sounds of motion was still unnerving to her, it felt heavier than her real arm, but after a few months of training, she learned to cope with it.
When she was spoke to, she looked to who spoke to her. "You got that right." She laughed, but when she informed her of who she was, a ranking officer. She stood at attention with a salute. "Private First Class Stefania Stratford." Then she grinned, "But my friends call me Winter." Then groomed her white hair back and it flowed back in place. "And also I was born with white hair apparently."
"At ease, Winter" Gaea laughed, clapping the other woman on the shoulder. "No need for rank and crap like that right now."
The two women joined the other soldiers filing into the cryo decks. As they did, Gaea turned back to Winter.
"I bet that hair of yours is inherited, you know. Cosmetic genetic engineering, passed down and recessive until it hit you." She nodded sagely. "You should get it checked with the doctors aboard. The Kel'cyre one with the beard, wassisname, good guy. Just in case that junk dna you're carrying around has triggered anything else."
"Well, if it triggered anything I guess I am sort of immune to the winter cold." She replied, "It's odd to see a Kel'Cyre doc with a beard, I never knew they can grow one." Winter chuckled, "Always thought they preferred beauty and dye'd hair as their life style."
She stopped and looked at her cryo pod, the inside empty and awaited for her. She takes a long look at the empty seat and takes in a deep breath. "Better be a good life on the other side, otherwise this would have been a wasted mission." She crossed her arms and looked at the ranking officer. "I know I'm gonna hate this moment."
"Hey, don't sweat it. Just think about all the fun we'll have on the other side." Gaea gave her a lopsided smile, and then began to climb into her coffin.
Mission Clock +1201
The clock had ticked over in her heads up display. That sent a shiver down her spine. One more day alive.
“Nevarn, Davrry, status check!”
"All clear Gunny." Nevarn answered immediately. He stepped back from the door to the bay and swung round to look at her. His shoulder torch picked out the hissing, activating pods, and the shivering, rebooting form of the sentinax drone. Crouching just in the bay, four mules laden with reclaimed supplies, spares and raw materials tensed, awaiting a command from the young charabidian.
+All clear here chief.+ Davrry drawled. +You done yet?+
“Both of you go weapons ready. I have a bad feeling about this.”
She practically ran to the next pair of pods. Engineering. A Dragonoid, wings curled around his torso, mouth slightly agape, and the most average looking human male. Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck. She slammed a fist down on the pods casing, and then fumbled for the activation switch.
“Nevarn, hit the last pod!” she tried to control the tremor in her voice. Only one phrase was rattling through her skull.
Its a trap.
Mission Clock -0002
Vezarres stomped down to the engineering decks, his stomach groaning with six litres of the awful paste. The scientists who had made it tried to make it taste like good, smoked vorhad, but nothing could disguise the texture and grim aftertaste it left in his mouth after a week on an enforced fast.
“Elder!”
The word stopped him in his tracks a moment. He turned and saw a young Dragonoid, barely mature, approaching him. His armoured sleep suit indicated he was in the military contingent.
“Elder, a word?”
The old Dragonoid looked down upon the youngling from head to toe to his wings. "Ah, seeking words of wisdom from this old Dragonoid?" He chuckled softly and gives a slight nod. "What is it young warrior?" He asked calmly and folded his arms on his chest.
"Thank you. I . . "
The young male dragged in a breath, and let it out between his teeth.
"I have. . .concerns. I took this mission, this job, because I have a mate waiting for me back home. Before this I was grunt in a mercenary clan. The pay was steady, but slim. The work was not glorious, but we were honourable. Now I will return with five years of good Concert credit in my pocket, to line my mates nest so we may raise our children as part of the new generation. I will return with honour, representing our race"
Vezarres had heard those words before. Tharos, the new leader of the Clans, had spoken often about the new future the young would have to forge.
Nodding his head and chuckled softly, "I see." He hummed, "It is not about the honor and glory you want to bring to our clan...but it's about your mate." He patted the young warrior's shoulder, "The females in our clan are loyal and will remain faithful, as for bringing back glory and honor will show you had earned your place among the warrior pack."
With a chortle snout, "Now, wipe away all doubts and show the new world our strength and courage." He pounded on his chest with his fist and gives a nod.
"Thank you, Elder, you are right of course. We shall bring honour to the clan! Safe sleep to you." the young warrior returned the fist pound, then ducked down a corridor, presumably to his own berth.
++++
Alone.
Most of the techs were already down for cryosleep, loaded into their 'coffins' with a belly full of vile, toxic sludge to sustain the nano-machines swimming in their bloodstream. His own jug of the grey, dry-oatmeal and strawberry crap was a recent, unpleasant memory.
His orders were simple. Build his own, full report on what was happening aboard the Elcano and what its officers found, independent from the Concert's own expected report to the member nations. Simple, good, honest paranoia, of the kind he had come to expect from his handlers. His role as a tech would keep him out of the way of danger, and give him almost unlimited access to the ships systems. His kit bag, ostensibly loaded down with a few books and other personal items, held inert spyware for just this job. It promised to be a few boring, uneventful years.
But Jason knew in his nano-machine fodder-filled gut that it was not to be. His handlers would never let his string run that long without reeling him in if it was so simple. Somebody had gone through a lot of trouble to arrange his passage and there could only be one reason why they chose him over another. Walking around the cryobay, he knew that many of its occupants were already dead. They just didn't know it yet.
It was a pity, really. He had read many of their bios, seen recordings of their accomplishments. Titans of their time, many of them. Perhaps not as sung of as his father would have expected, but titans, each and every one of them. Even the Sentinax. Titans on the lip of ascendancy into godhood. The sweet nectar of divinity was just beyond their grasp, blinding them to the bitter fall that would follow it. They would, all of them, die in the end. A sudden conclusion to their sagas or the long dusty path into obscurity, it didn't matter.
But at least he would be around to remember them.
Mission Clock +1201
“Its a trap.” Gaea breathed over open comms. Nevarn froze as his hand reached for the final pod. The name plate was damaged. Nevarn looked down at the sleeping, peaceful human face contained within, and felt a moments envy of the sleeper. If she died now, she wouldn't know the horror that waited out here. She was a pilot, from one of the Frigates. She didn't even have a job to go too.
He slapped the activation switch with a spiteful determination. As he did, he heard Davrry over the comms.
+Contact.+
Mission Clock -0002
The pilots lounge was subdued. One by one, the pilots had downed the awful bio slurry and made their way to the stasis pods for their year long dirt naps. Sinclair was one of the last, along with two Charabidians and a single Terran. The single terran, a young man with dusky skin and dark hair that spoke to an origin somewhere in the fertile crescent, made to stand, but he paused as the two Charabidians started to talk to Miranda, leaning over their jugs with a conspiratorial air.
“Hey, Miranda. Is the scuttlebut true? You related to President Sinclair?” this came from the male with dark, stripped markings, the flight leader aboard the frigate 'First Words'
“Knock it off.” the female with tawny fur growled. “Not everyone wants their past dug up.” She flicked her eyes to Sinclair. “You got duty on the Elcano, right?”
“Told you. They get all the elites on the Elcano. No one who they might want to leave behind” The male pointed a clawed finger at Sinclair, smiling nastily.
“Shut up, will you?” the female bit back.
Staring the purple liquid in the mug she was holding, she swirled it around and took a quick smell. How to best describe what it smelled like Miranda had no clue. Judging by the reactions of the other pilots who had drank it first it tasted about as good as it smelled. Miranda hadn’t wanted to drink it first watching a few of the pilots stumble to their pods, her pride too much to allow her to be seen like that. No, let the others go first. She had been standing in the corner of the room keeping mostly to herself. Most people she figured had volunteered for this position and had to have been proud to be selected for the mission. Honestly that wasn’t her. She had no choice. This was the perfect way for Quentin to get rid of her for a few years.
Being stuck on a ship with a bunch of aliens and Terrains was not Miranda’s idea of a prime assignment. Least the Captain was a Lyran. Miranda had never met Captain Severt before but had heard much about her both good and bad. She came from a founding family much like her so they had that in common. She glared when one of those aliens addressed her, Charabidians overgrown cats. One could only hope they were defleaed before being allowed to come on ship. “Don’t you mean Secretary General Sinclair?” Miranda said, taking another look at the slurry. She had never liked calling Quentin President of Lyre, she certainly hadn’t voted for her. She wasn’t even a true Lyran with her Terran father. Growing up Miranda didn’t really know Quentin she was so much older than her and always away at boarding school. It was really only on holidays and school breaks that they saw it other. “Unfortunately I share half my DNA with her.” She said, unconsciously reaching up and scratching at the collar of her flight suit pushing it down enough for the tattoo of a Lyre to be seen. "And it's Clarke."
"Hey, half sister. That's cool." the male smiled. "The pres. . .sorry, the General, she's alright by me. Better than the last Warmaster and that feth-head Shraplen, right?"
"Spirits, Amirk, you bringing that up now?" The female rolled her eyes "Come on asshole. Time to get in our coffins"
The female cat hauled her partner to his feet. He staggered, and jabbed a finger at Sinclair.
"You ain't heard this from me. . .but you better watch yourself. Not all of us are going to be so forgiving to a Lyran, ya know."
"Jackass." The female growled, and shoved Amirk out the lounge door, which hissed shut behind them.
"He's an idiot, but he's not wrong." The Terran in the corner muttered. He turned his head to regard Sinclair. "Clarke, huh? Not fond on the family name?"
"Keep walking you mangy furball." Miranda said, setting her mug down on a counter and stepping toward Amirk's back. She clinched her fists wondering if she got into a fight while they were still in port if she would be kicked off the mission. She never got a chance as the female Charabidian pushed her companion from the lounge. Miranda didn't care what he or anyone else on the ship thought of her or the threats. She was always ready for a fight. Picking her drink up she sat back down at the table. She raised the mug to her mouth to take a drink but was hit with the smell of it again then set the drink down. Looking over to the Terran who addressed her she said, "Ain't much of a reason these days to be proud of being a Sinclair."
Miranda like many xenophobic Lyrans wasn't fond of Terrans but they were probably the least offensive of the races on the mission. There wasn't any sort of genetic difference between they two. No the dislike was political. That and the Terrans were cowards. Miranda briefly looked to the man then away not really bothering with him.
"You handled that well." The man responded, looking away from Miranda. His eyes flickered to her briefly, but there was something off about his whole manner. "Don't know if I wouldn't have kicked his furry fucking ass."
He had an old earth american southern drawl, which seemed custom fit to his sharp, hard face.
"Anyway, just remember, you might have those pricks to deal with, but you got friends aboard."
He rolled up an arm on his flight shirt, and flexed the muscle. A skincircuit, an electrical tattoo, flared briefly into life, showing a stylised blue planet defended by a pair of crossed swords.
Earth First. A hardline, ultra-radical Terran political faction that hates aliens.
He smiled, and rolled down the sleeve again and started to stroll towards the door.
"Be seeing you, Miranda"
She watched as the Terran walked to the pods, a little interested in his own tattoo. She hadn't expected with how much of a joint forces mission this was to find many people who shared her views. And she hadn't expected any of them to not be Lyran. There had to be a few Lyrans on the ship hiding their true viewpoints. Though despite sharing the same view points the Lyre First Movement and Earth First didn't really communicate much. The Lyrans still had a dislike for Terrans, they tolerated them much more than the other races. Miranda didn't know much about them expect that they were against fraternizing with other races.
One by one each of the pilots drank their slurry and headed to the sleeping pods. Finally after a little while Miranda was the only one left remaining. She looked down at the slurry then just slugged it back. The drink tasted more foul that anything she had ever had before. It took everything just not to spit it back up. Miranda was glad she had chugged it quickly rather than trying to sip it. She was still standing when she drank the slurry and had to admit it hit her fast. Shaking uneasy on her feet she took a step forward, before she knew it there were two medical officers help to steady her. Both of them almost looked human but she wasn't sure. There was both a man and a woman helping her. They had that unnatural beauty that Kel'cyre had. Miranda had to admit the woman was pretty. Still in a half daze from the slurry she reach and brushed her hand against the cheek of the woman. Next she looked toward the man thinking he was handsome as well, her other hand moved to the man's cheek lightly touching it as well. "Damn why do they all have to be so pretty?" She wasn't sure if she had thought that or actually said it. If she hadn't of been drugged by the slurry she would have noticed that the blush on the woman's face was caused by more than just her touch.
The female med-tech chuckled and passed a medical wand over Miranda.
"Looks like a mild reaction." The male passed a hypo-spray to her and, with deft swiftness, she injected Miranda in the neck. As she was lowered into the coffin, she watched the two make notes on their handbrains.
"Make sure that Doctor Kolvar see's her first thing, just in case."
Mission Clock +1201
“How many?” Gaea breathed. She watched as the pods began to hiss and open.
+One. Next compartment over. Its sniffing. I don't think its spotted us.+ All the sardonic biting of Davrrys voice had vanished, replaced with a cold professionalism.
Gaea nodded, and rolled her shoulder muscles and flexed her fingers. Static tingled between her suit and her skin. She had something misaligned, and she would need Cicero to pull the sub-system apart and recalibrate the VI.
If they survived.
The sound dampening field dropped into place around the room. It wasn't perfect. But it would cancel the noise of the awakening sleepers. She remembered this bit, and it was rough.
As one the coffins opened, and the organics sucked in their first lungfuls of air in just under three and a half years. Fully spun up, Iona detached from her crash restraints and took a unsteady step on the deck, then recovered almost immediately.
Gaea waited for as long as she dared, gave them a few precious minutes to get their bearings, to stare at the situation they had awoken in. Cables hanging from the ceiling, debris from other pods that never got the chance to open scattered around the floor. Nevarn came up next to her, nudging her shoulder and carrying an armful of basic weapons and gear salvaged from the pods. No weapons. Those would be locked in an armoury somewhere.
“All I could find.”
She nodded, and gestured for him to get the mules ready to transport. Then she returned her attention to the stunned, coughing people.
Poor fething bastards.
“Alright, listen up!” Her voice, parade ground clear and steady, completely masking the fear she felt. “There has been a disaster, scale 1. You will follow my instructions until we reach a safe area. I know you all have questions, but they can wait until your lives aren't in danger. If you want to be helpful, grab whatever gear was stashed in your pods personal storage that might be useful, and then double time it to that door and be ready to move, quietly. We have hostiles aboard and we are not equipped for this.”
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