Faction Colonial Union | On Stranger Tides [Open to GA]

[Frontier Tenacity]

The Ship floated in the dark, motionless, silent and cold. A giant hunk of metal, drifting through space for countless eons, lost in time, lost to the galaxy, forgotten by history's implacable march forward. Until now.

The Ship's mind was a crude and rudimentary thing. Not truly self-aware like the droids that would be birthed by technological innovation generations after the beginning of the Ship's journey, it operated on simple, pre-programmed instructions that had been written by the Builders. It could not adapt to situations the way a sentient being could, or improvise and intuitively devise a solution. It was only a ship's mind, afterall. It could only perform the functions it had been created for. And so, when a problem occurred within the Ship's primitive hyperdrive, it had been unable to correct itself, thus it had missed its intended destination and was left to drift away into the void.

But now, after countless millennia of drifting and scanning and searching, it had finally detected the singular object of its digital obsession.

The Ship's sensors, ancient as they were, detected something in its proximity. A spherical rock, about forty thousand kilometers in diameter. Composition, a mixture of minerals surrounding a metallic core. Gasseous atmosphere consisting of mostly nitrogen and oxygen, temperature ranges within habitable parameters, liquid water on the surface... A planet! The Ship had found a planet! Deep within, some ancient piece of circuitry groggily awoke from its long slumber, drawing power from the tired reactor and sending a flurry of electrical signals down a path of cables, to the Ship's brain, an ancient supercomputer that, for millennia, had been host to the primitive AI which ran the Ship's systems.

Aboard the Ship's many chambers and hallways, atmospheric processors coughed and hummed and sprang to life, pressurizing ancient sections, warming them up in pre-programmed anticipation for the awakening of its passengers. Ancient lights, darkened for millennia, flickered back into existence as power flowed back into the systems that had been deemed non-essential for the duration of the journey.

And deep within the Ship, something else stirred. Something which the Ship's primitive mind had no way of comprehend, even had its sensors possessed the ability to detect it. Some currents of energy, beyond the perception of mechanical minds, or, indeed, the perception of most sentients, flowed and churned and spun into a whirlwind as the fabric of reality warped and twisted and ripped itself apart. But to those with the affinity and training to sense it, this one event shone like a beacon, clamoring for their attention.

There had been a disturbance in the Force...

​

 

[Kainan Wolfe]

With: Vyra Silara | Attn: Open​

• Aboard the Prospero
• Unknown Coordinates

Waves of darkness washed over him as he took a step forward, taloned hands clinging tightly to the precious bundle held against his chest as if to shield her from harm with his own flesh and bone. Every step was pure agony and the darkness threatened to overtake him, but he pushed it away. He couldn't afford to stop, not now. Not while his wife hung still and silent in his arms, wrapped in the tattered remains of his cloak.

Ripping open that portal had taken much from him, too much and he barely made it through, nearly depleted and too tired to reach out through the Force and heal her. Besides, all he knew was the Darkside and that took its toll, even when used to mend wounds. He wasn't sure she could survive it even if he were in any condition to try. No, she needed medical attention.

Covered in ash and dust, he stalked the unfamiliar corridors of the ship like a vindictive ghost, squinting to read the archaic lettering on the various bulkheads. It was something akin to Basic, but older, some kind of ancient dialect that hadn't been in use for... who really cared how long? Right now, he did not have time to dwell on it, for if he had, he might have been able to identify the language as something used on the human Core Worlds at the dawn of the first Republic.

He deciphered the words as best he could, thanking his stars that the panel seemed to be a directions indicator and not some sort of technical instruction sheet. Engineering section seventy-three, stasis facility seven-nine-seven, storage section three-one-nine... there. Medical facility sixty-four. That was what he was looking for.

He charged down the hallways like a whirlwind, heedless of the pain caused to his eyes by the too-bright light, heedless of the pain surging through his body, his willpower forcing the darkness away, holding it off just a little while longer as he passed bulkhead after bulkhead until he reached the door marked with the symbol he was looking for. With a grunt of frustration, he fumbled with the mechanical lock of the thing, yanking on the lever which turned its gears as if he were trying to rip a branch off a tree trunk, then kicked the screeching doors for the unpardonable offense of sliding open too slowly, before forcing his way through.

At first, he could not comprehend what he saw on the other side. It took his mind a few moments to process what his eyes told him, but when he did, a wave of despair hit him like a duracrete wall. There were no medical droids, here. No screens he could make sense of, the archaic devices hovering over the medbay beds hooked up to panels consisting of mechanical pegs and dials that were utterly incomprehensible to him.

No. Not now, he thought. He had come too far for things to end here. Setting his wife down gently on one of the beds, he dashed across the room and vaulted over what appeared to be the medbay's main control console, shoving aside the chair as his eyes fixated on the ancient, flickering black-and-white screen in front of him, desperately trying to find a solution.

The screen said something about cryogenics, some sort of stasis facility, status of pods... The pieces clicked together in his mind and he realized what he was looking at. This was a colony ship of some kind, with people in stasis pods. People. Specialists, medics, technicians... Someone who knew how to operate the medbay equipment.

Without hesitation, he punched in the commands as they were displayed on screen. Overrode programming, switched controls to manual mode and half a dozen steps later, the prompt he had been looking for, had finally come up on the screen, displayed in angry white lettering against the dark background. Abort cryogenic suspension for pod bays 1604-2193 Y/N?

He did not hesitate or linger.

 

[Barbie Barnabas]

Ship: Star Lancer
Weapon: Sonic blaster
Tagging : Open



Her ship used fuel...and plenty of it.
The Star Lancer was by galactic standard; ancient. It originally had set off on sub-light drives, ion based so less, for the most part of her journey out of her star system. It's current operator (Barbie B.) had been but 12 years of age when it had set out to go beyond it's own solar system. Now BB (Barbie B.) were 25. Her family members and those whom had embarked on that journey over a decade ago were all gone. BB had awakened one day and discovered she were all alone and drifting in deep space.
Her vessel were happened on by a band of pirates whom took to her and eventually outfitted her relic with basic hyperdrive engines.
But hyperdrives are great when jumping light years...not so practical when cruising around systems. It's what sub-light engines are for. And the Star Lancer did have sub-lights from the gecko...only they weren't efficient. Fast, but not at all sippers of fuel.

Which brings us to the current tale.

"Yes... yes, I can see it." BB were looking through what was a version of a magnified view screen on the console of her bridge.
Her tech of course were from a steampunk era. The only modern retrofit her ship had were what her pirate saviors had outfitted her with. Just a standard hyperdrive.
But they had little fuel left for her sub-lights and there was no sense in jumping elsewhere to do what?..drift like they were doing now without sub-light engines?

Her droid DD (Duro Duro) had picked up a large vessel that had been drifting some distance from the current planet, but had just recently seemed to have come back to life...maneuvering into orbit.
Lucky for the Star Lancer the current vessel were in an intersecting orbit...a lower orbit, but an orbit nevertheless.

BB (Barbie B.) looked over her fuel reserves and knew she couldn't recklessly burn to get them over to it as she wanted. But drifting steady she were toward it.

"Yes, yes I know... wait till we get closer to it." She replied to her droid. She had barely enough fuel to maneuver and couldn't waste it till they were close enough.
"Still no reply?...like, is our radio working?"

Yes, her ship's vacuum tubes and transistor radio tested fine, according to her droid. It just wasn't somehow tuned to what the other old relic may be on...if there was anyone on that ship to receive.
But sure and steady the Star lancer neared the old ship. It's design weren't that much different than what BB had been used to from her own system of Yamo Go. But it were alien enough for her to know it were not from the Constantine Empire by which her family had fled over a decade ago.

"Steady...steady... initializing retro thrusters ..."
BB held her breath and gritted her teeth as she gently eased her vessel closer to what seemed like a viable docking port.

Tha THUMP... "Oh!.." her ship came into contact with the relic... before seemingly moving away from it. They had bounced off.
"Shoot, quickly, anchors away, Duro!" She shouted as her droid fired two harpoons to anchor on to the other hull.

"Oh thank Berkana (her deity) ... Ok..reel us in. Get our ports aligned with theirs." BB said with relief.
The Star Lancer creaked and moaned as it were drawn closer to the other vessel till it finally made good contact.

Her droid then confirmed they had established a seal with the larger vessel.

"Awesome... any air in there?"
There was a sustainable atmosphere...pressure, temperature and all.

"Alrighty... let me go see if they have some fuel we can borrow..." BB said, securing the ship's wheel.
reaching the airlock, she peered through the view glass. The coast was clear... creepy clear despite the other vessel having a good atmosphere and adequately lit. She nevertheless took the sonic blaster with her.

"Hold the fort, DD...I'll radio you when I locate the ship's fuel tanks."

 

[Verse Branden]

WEEEEEEP. WEEEEEP. WEEEEEEP. WEEEEEP. Cryogenic suspension cycle aborted. Beginning awakening procedures.

With the bowels of the Prospero, millennia old gears and cogs twisted to life, as systems that long since should have been activated finally began their tasks. Among the millions of cryogenic pods that were held, only a few thousand or so would be awoken right away. According to the ancient protocol, these would be the people responsible for first contact, for maintenance, for scouting, and for evaluation. In short, they were the ones who would make sure their new home was safe enough to thrive on. They were the Pioneer Corp.

Bleed valves would hiss as they released the gas within one of the cryogenic pods, depressurizing it while also raising the temperature within, while medical systems within released a cocktail of stimulants in order to reawaken the occupant. After a few minutes, the cover to the pod would open, revealing the figure within; a red-haired woman with pale, freckled skin.

"UUGHHHHHHH!" A sudden gasp of life would echo from her throat, before being replaced by several harsh coughs. Standard awakening procedure, to clear the airways of any remaining solution or obstructions. Well, it seems that she wasn't suffering from any long-term forms of amnesia, she guessed. Gripping the sides of the outside of her pod, she would push her way out of it, stumbling forward onto the floor. Performing some preliminary stretches, she ensured that there was no immediate damage to her muscles or tendons. A hundred years on ice.... a lot could happen in that timespan.

Looking around, floodlights illuminated her pod sector, the Prospero's AI in the midst of its awakening process. She was the first to be awoken in her sector, since she was the chief engineer; it was her job to make sure everything was still intact, enough at least that they'd be able to awaken the other Pioneers. The same was happening in the other thousand or so sectors, she was sure. And who was she? A quick glance at the terminal near her pod provided her identity; Verse Branden, Pioneer Corp Chief Engineer of Sector 1755.

Rolling her neck to get out any remaining cricks, Verse would begin running through the subroutines of the AI, doing system software and hardware checks. Lights would blip green as the machines did their work, leaving her to stifle a small yawn as she monitored it all. "Wakey, wakey, everyone. Welcome to the new galaxy-", she cut her greeting short, as a red blip appeared on he screen. One of the medical facilities was active, though none of the sanitation protocols had been engaged. That was odd. Only maintenance personnel should be awake right now. Maybe it was a glitch? "Hmph. Well, I guess this is why they wake us up first." She mused.

Going to the side of her pod, she opened a trunk that contained a pair of pants, a jacket, and a pair of boots, pulling the clothing over her cryo-suit and beginning to make the trek to where the blip had appeared, Medical Bay Sixty Four. What she expected to find at most was perhaps the system had experienced a degradation that resulted in unintentional activation of some of its systems. Instead, she found a man messing around with the terminals within the bay, and a woman lying on one of the beds, unmoving.

"What the hell are you doing?!" She said as she moved into the bay. The man was dressed oddly; his clothing torn and covered in ash. Though she had questions, the woman took priority in the situation. Neither of them wore cryo-suits, which was odd in itself. The way the man fumbled with the terminals of the medbay, he couldn't have been apart of the Pioneer Corps. Each of them had received training in emergency medical operations in the event something occurred and they could not wake up a medic. She would move him out of the way, and begin prepping the scanners and automated systems in order to get a status on the woman, in order to diagnose a treatment for whatever was ailing her. Once that was taken care of, she would turn to the man.

"Did your cryogenics pod malfunction? You don't look like a Pioneer, so that means you shouldn't even be awake right now. And why are you and her dressed like that. What happened?" Her questions streamed out one after another, as if they were all one sentence. If the man was paying attention now, he'd notice her dialect of Basic matched that of what was found on the terminals; old.... incredibly so, and dated.

ATTN: Kainan Wolfe Vyra Silara Barbie Barnabas

 

[Nathanael Isaac Carrick]

(OOC: wrong acct post. sorry. ignore)

 

[Lt. Kastor Rau]

delete

 

[Doctor Røyskatt ”Roy” Besh]

WEEEEEEP. WEEEEEP. WEEEEEEP. WEEEEEP. Cryogenic suspension cycle aborted. Beginning awakening procedures.

Doctor Lor Bash slowly opened his eyes in his Cryogenic pod, he felt his heart flutter and not just from the artificial stims that were coursing through his body. Today's the day, we go out and explore a new planet, meet new people and I get to learn about new medicine from doctors who might have centuries more experience than me. Well, here I go... Lor slowly lifted the pod's hatch opened and looked around at the banks of cryogenic pods around him, he saw no one. Funny, they said they would wake us up all at once in the briefing we had before boarding... Maybe... As the Doctor took a closer look at his neighbors' pods, his eyes went wide in horror. All he could make out of Finch, the Senior doctor who had been so kind to him before the voyage started was a sticking pile of goo within Finch's assigned pod. The blinking neon electric label on his pod gave Lor a horror of an explanation. "Power... low... Cryogenics... unable to be... sustained... Pod... shut... down..."

Finch... Oh my... Is that... Did all the pods on this level malfunction except mine...? No, there must be more. There were ten million of us when we boarded, there must be more people somewhere... Maybe at my duty station... Medical facility... That's right, Medical facility sixty-four! There must be at least someone there that can tell me something.

WEEEEEEP. WEEEEEP. WEEEEEEP. WEEEEEP. Cryogenic suspension cycle aborted. Beginning awakening procedures.

As the good doctor couldn't get the audio message out of his bleeding brain, which right now was giving him such a headache he might raid the captain's liquor cabinet rather than go to his assigned post at the medical facility but he would do his duty as he of course must. He rounded one of the corners of the ship, he could hear babbling like a running stream coming out of someone's mouth originating from his duty station. As he entered the Medical Facility Sixty-four, he saw three people, one brown-haired woman in a cryo-suit like him that he thought he had seen ask questions at the engineering point of the deck's briefings that seemed so long ago now. She was blasting away with questions as a man who looked like some action holostar who just came off the set of a stunt scene, his clothes covered in dust and soot. The person who really got his attention was another woman who was laying on the bed and looked like she had been looked like she had the life crushed out of her. He collected his medical tools from the cabinets around him as the two occupants of his bay went back and forth as they tried to understand each other. As he gave the brown hair woman who must have been a mechanic on the ship and took over the diagnosis without another word. When the two still argued Roy only gave a tired sigh of a person who had just woken up to being berated by his mother for not getting up in time. He then tried to get the two conscious individuals' attention.

"First off, who is my patient Holostar and what does she require? Second off, why are you questioning him like you're an investigator on Coruscant's most wanted when he is clearly in a lot of shock and terror. Please, if you're going to do something, make sure we have enough power being driven to this facility to keep this woman alive for as long as it takes."

 

[Barbie Barnabas]

Ship: Star Lancer
Weapon: Sonic blaster
Tagging: Open


As ancient a relic the vessel was, it were not so unfamiliar to BB (Barbie B.)

Coupling her ship's airlock to the behemoth vessel had been tricky but easy enough. Getting past the vessel's own secured airlock was something else.
"DD...come in Dee... " Barbie resorted to call on her droid for some assistance.

"Yea, a little trouble here. The other ship's controls; I keep pushing the lock's controls but it doesn't seem to be doing much of anything...." She radioed her droid.
Of course the mechanical wonder replied, but we'll keep to BB's lines only so as not to loose the reader.

"Uhm, no. No lights are lit. I don't think there is any power to the control panel..."

"What?... did you say latch? Oh a hatch. Yes, there is one...I'm opening it.
Wow...yea, there is an open slot and a crank attached to the inside of it.
Ok thanks, I think I know how it works. I'll try it. If it doesn't work then I'll have to figure another way to get in...over." And with that she closed her link with DD, her droid who had remained back on her ship.

BB then took the crank and put one end of it in the slot and started to-.....uhm, crank it. In the right direction, on her second try.
Slowly with some creaking and metal on metal rubbing sounds the air lock to the other ship started to open.

Hissssss.... the atmosphere between her ship and the other equalized as it continued to slowly but surely open.
"Berkana (her deity)... hasn't anyone oiled this thing?" She were struggling with the cranking as apparently whatever lubricants had been used were mostly now powdered dry.

She tried once...twice really in trying to squeeze herself through the partly opened door, but to no avail. BB had to continue on cranking till she finally managed to get herself through.

Once she stepped through the threshold, some of the other ship's interior chamber's lights flickered on, revealing she were in a prep room. Pressurized suits were hung behind glass, as were helmets and other space faring equipment. Again, as old as they were by galactic standards, they were not so by BB's perspective. She had come from a steampunk tech world. Although the suits and equipment were different, they were familiar to her understanding.

"Well...at least whoever they were, they must have been human..." She were observing the male and female suit mods..and the five digit gloves. That and a plaque depicting the proper sequence of putting on the suits showed human figures.; both male and female. With different instructions as to properly fit for urine- "Oh my... Ok, moving on...." BB stopped looking at the instructional pics, giving the chamber a good look over.

The one double door to her left caught her attention as it were the only large door. Most likely it were the main entry door to the dressing chambers, before the air lock.
This door however were not locked and easily parted, which instantly initialized the adjacent corridor lights.
"Ok.... " She didn't know if she should continue or not for a minute.
But no one seemed to be heard coming down the corridor.
Still...
"Uhm... Hello?! ...
Hello, anyone here?" BB called out noticing her voice echoed throughout the empty corridor before she stepped out.

After taking a few steps, she stopped a moment to look back at the chamber with the airlock she had just stepped out of to get her bearings as to the direction she were heading. Getting that, she continued on...blindly really as she had no clue as to where the damn fuel tanks to this mammoth vessel were. Her best guess were somewhere a bit further down and below maybe?...
Shoot...good a guess as any.

"Hello?.." She occasionally made sure to call out as she progressed further in.

 

[Kainan Wolfe]

With: Vyra Silara | Attn: Doctor Røyskatt ”Roy” Besh Verse Branden​

• Aboard the Prospero
• Unknown Coordinates

Decades of experience and training had taught him how to organize information in a hierarchical structure, so that combat-relevant things could be processed as fast as possible. So, the moment his unnaturally sharp senses spotted the new arrival, his reflexes kicked in, synapses firing in quick bursts of activity as his mind took measure of the person. Female. Human. Posture and physical fitness suggesting combat training. Apprehensive, alerted, but not hostile. Not an enemy.

He struggled, for a few moments, to understand the archaic dialect she was speaking. A really old form of Basic, early Old Republic period, definitely. The pronounciation and some of the words were fairly different from their modern form, but still understandable, if a little difficult at times. In a moment of desperation, he considered igniting his lightsaber and forcing these people to cooperate, but he ultimately decided on the diplomatic approach. Violence wouldn't do his wife any good.

At that point, another voice pitched in. Posture suggested civilian of some kind and the way he spoke identified him as a doctor or medical technician of some kind. At that realization, the tension in the stranger's face seemed to lift, relief washing over his features, like he had just escaped an angry Rancor.

"We're not from your ship," he responded. "I'll explain later, but right now, my wife needs medical assistance and I don't know how to operate equipment this old," the stranger pleaded. There was a tired look in his eyes, but his taloned hands were steady and never hovered far from the hilt of the sword at his hip, or the strange, cylindrical object hanging from his belt on the opposite side. And his tattered clothing still bore the cut of a military uniform of some kind, though the design would be unfamiliar to the colonists.

Another wave of nausea and pain washed over him, the darkness threatening to overwhelm his senses. His hand reached out for a bulkhead as he struggled to keep his footing, eyes blinking rapidly to dispel the shadows darkening his vision. Not yet, he told himself. His iron will forced the darkness away, forced his eyes to remain open and his body upright in spite of the exhaustion.

He hadn't slept in... who knew how long and opening that portal... took more than most Force Users could survive. He almost didn't, in fact. But he couldn't afford to fall right now, couldn't rest just yet. Not until he knew Vyra was alright. Right now, that was the only thing that mattered. Dealing with the shock of channeling that much power, could wait.

 

[Doctor Røyskatt ”Roy” Besh]

The Doctor scrolled through the scanners and automated systems in order to get a status on the woman. Whatever was happening with her, it looked pretty exotic to him and something that wasn't found in any of the medical textbooks he had studied over at the Academy. He glanced over at the male and saw the panic in his eyes at the sight of his incapacitated wife. I'm going to need to calm him somehow. Nobody needs to be stabbed today...

"Look stranger, I'm Doctor Roy Besh and I'm going to help your wife but you need to put that blade and what looks to be a Jedi holy hand grenade on the floor. Get him a chair if you could Engineer, this might take a while and he needs to get off his feet before he collapses."
He gives the brunette a "Get on it" gesture as the medical scan starts to work its magic slowly, showing the doc all of the problem spots on the woman's beleaguered body. Her whole body looked in quite the severe state that only immediate surgery could fix. He spun like the head of an alarmed weasel who sensed a threat nearby towards the distressed husband.
"Now, I need you to tell me with details about what's wrong with your wife so I can know how to help her. Can you stay conscious enough to do that for me?"

The energetic doctor starts to ready his array of tools for whatever is going to be needed to help this poor woman survive without another word. This is going to be a long day. I might need to raid the captain's liquor cabinet after all...

 

[Sebastian Krane]

Attn: Barbie Barnabas | Open​

WEEEEP. WEEEEP. WEEEEP. WEEEEP. WEEEEP. WEEE- "Someone shut off that damned alarm," the man commanded as his fingers rubbed at his temple, a slight tone of annoyance in his voice. Manual said waking up from cryo might hive him a headache, but damn... He was too old for this chit. One of the technicians typed in some commands on the terminal and the sound mercifully cut off.

They had woken up only moments ago, unceremoniously dumped out of their cryopods by someone who overrode the computer. Oh, well. That Pioneer, Verse Branden was dealing with that. That was her job. His job was to figure out what the kark happened to his ship. And by the look of the cryo bay, it was something bad. Too many of the pods had failed, with horrifying results. But he could dwell on that later, right now he had ten million colonists to save, so he drafted whatever engineers he could find and made his way to the bridge.

"Do we have sensors?" he asked, impatiently. "What's out there, what are we looking at?"

"Partially," answered one of the wrench monkeys, elbow-deep in the wiring of some sparking console, trying to deal with some technical issue, one of many that seemed to be plaguing the ship. "They're flickering in and out and running at low power."

Of course. Just like the lights, the screens, the panels and dials on the consoles and everything-karking-else. Nobody was having a good day. "Well, what's our situation? Where are we?" the Governor asked.

"In orbit of a planet," answered another techie. "Looks habitable, but... Its not our designated world. Looks like we drifted off-course."

Damn. The realization hit everyone like a bucket of cold water after a hangover. Drifted off-course. That meant their ship had been floating in the dark for God knew how long. That would explain the technical problems. The ship wasn't designed to function for longer than it took to get to where they were supposed to go. Wear and tear must have eventually caused some of the systems to fail, which meant they were lucky to be alive.

"Uhh... We have a problem," someone chimed in.

Add it to the list, the Governor-General wanted to say. But he bit back the retort, instead nodding to the techie to continue.

"There's another ship docked with us. Looks like we've got boarders, deck twenty-seven. Unknown number, the internal sensors are malfunctioning," the engineer said, interpreting the data on his console.

"Must be scavengers," Krane muttered. "Alright. I need a C-Sec team," he said, checking the slugthrower pistol at his hip. "Stay sharp, but no shootin' unless we get shot at. We don't know who these people are or what we're walking into and the last thing we need right now is a God-damned war."

Luckily, deck twenty-seven was relatively close, just a short turbolift trip. And luckily, the turbolift didn't... explode. Or violently decompress. Or get stuck in the shaft. A look of relief washed over everyone's faces as the lift came to a halt and the doors screeched open. Nearby, a woman's voice could be heard, echoing out across the empty corridors.

"In here," he called out, motioning for his squad to keep their weapons lowered, but ready. "I'm Governor-General Sebastian Krane, leader of this expedition. And who might you be?"

 

[Lt. Kastor Rau]

delete

 

[Atlas Drake]

SURVEY SHIP CONSTELLATION
OUTBOUND FLIGHT EXPEDITION
UNKNOWN REGIONS

"These are the right coordinates?"

"Navigation is not an...exact science. More or less."

Captain Drake looked unconvinced. While the Navigator's Guild boasted a reputation for charting client ships through the worst Chaos space had to offer, he was still a bit skeptical of their supernatural methods. A properly programmed navigational computer seemed far more reliable than ancient mysticism but he'd seen enough by now to understand the Force worked in mysterious ways. Out here in the Unknown Regions where hyperspace festered with shifting eddies and rogue gravitational anomalies it was also necessary for survival.

"Well?" he asked, "What is it? What's out there?"

"I'm...not sure."

"You're not sure?" Drake echoed and the alien navigator shook her head, "You said you felt something. Has a mistake like this ever happened before?"

"Never!" she assured him. Exotic metal jewelry dangled from her face and neck in elaborate cultural patterns. Humanoid, possible avian ancestry based on the feathery strands covering her scalp.

"Then we proceed under the assumption that we're not alone. Contact Commodore Liedran Kathause aboard the Pegasus. Still no sign of our phantom signal. Stand by for now."

With a polite gesture Atlas waited for his navigator guide to hesitantly vacate her post before he settled down at the controls himself. He ran a few long range scans which pinged a mass shadow within half a minute. Something relatively close then. Maybe even the source of whatever called out through the Force when Outlander Station's newest subspace relays first came online. Of course it could also be nothing. Smugglers or pirates.

"This is Drake," he opened a shipwide intercom with the other Outbound Flight kybernauts on his crew, "Approaching what looks like an uncharted planetary body. Running scans for atmosphere and tech but you might want to suit up just in case. Who knows what could be out there?"

 

[Barbie Barnabas]

Ship: Star Lancer
Weapon: Sonic blaster
Tagging: Sebastian Krane / Open


"Yikes!..." BB (Barbie B.) jumped back startled.

The blaring alarm had taken her by surprise as it resonated throughout the ship.
At first she Barbie had thought it were her whom had tripped an alarm...or worse, maybe the entire ship was going down, diving toward the planet. But wouldn't Duro duro her droid have messaged her?

"Shoot this is annoying..." She said backing herself against the corridor's wall.
"DD!... Duro come in." She had to raise her voice to overcome the alarm.

"Nothing?...what do you mean nothing?" She asked, hearing that everything outside the big ship was as quiet as can be.
"There's a freakin alarm going off all around me... I think it's all over the ship!"

That was possible, but her droid informed her that he weren't picking it up....perhaps the vacuum of space was-

"Oh shut up!...it not funny...it's loud...too loud!" BB put her hands over her ears, trying to see if she could go elsewhere...maybe through another corridor. One preferably with doors.
"Oh Damn it..." She said after the doors closed behind her. She were in a different part of the ship but still the wailing sirens persisted.

"DD... you still there?"

He was.

"This isn't going to work. The alarm is too loud. Maybe..
Maybe I should go back to the airlock and get into one of those space suits." She said when suddenly the alarms silenced.

"Whew.. thank Berkana (her diety)...
DD it stopped."

Her droid then informed her that it had observed many port windows were lighting up. The ship was coming to life.

"I think It could be me, tripping the electric eyes... the corridors are lighting as I enter them"

On all decks throughout the vessel? Her droid Duro didn't compute so. Perhaps there were occupants still on the vessel it formulated, and for her to be careful....to be nice.

"I'm always nice.."

Nicer, he warned her.

"Sigh... if it'll get us some fuel...I'll be as nice as I can...anyway...stand by. Hopefully whoever they may be, they're going to be just as nice....maybe nicer. Over." She cut her com and realized she were cradling her sonic blaster at the ready.

"They better be nice..." BB clipped the monstrosity to her hip. Lucky for her it were a sonic frequency weapon...light weight.
She then continued on, just as cautiosly as before. Now more aware that there was a possibility of people..hopefully human still that were on the ship.

"Aherm..." She cleared her throat. " Hello?"

BB continued on, one corridor and corner at a time..all along shouting ahead. Nothing seemed to be responding and thus her 'Hello's' got sounding less loudly. Still she continued on...
"Large freakin ship..." She muttered to self.
" Hello?..." she mundanely kept shouting...on occasion.

"Huh?..." BB again stopped dead in her tracks. Did she hear right? Was there another voice answering her?
Sure enough there was.

"Hello?...yes...I'm here too." She replied to the unseen.
"Uhm...I'm unarmed!" she then replied, before realizing the blaster hanging on her hip.

"I mean, I'm not holding a weapon...." She tried to explain before just around a corner a man appeared.

"Hello.." BB said showing her palms. For a second, maybe three she didn't know what else to say. but the man initiated the momentary stalemate..the passing seconds where both sized one another up.

"G-..govenor-general?..." Her tone seemed to fade. Yes, she knew of governor-generals. Only they were the equivalent of Mofs in her system. Her family had escaped the Empire..the Constantine Empire over a decade ago and she were the only one left whom had made it to this portion of the galaxy. Now she were back to square one?

"Barbie....Barbie, that's my name." What choice did she have?
They nabbed her.The military on her system were not ones you trifled with.

I thought this ship was deserted...it was drifting toward the system... got somehow captured by the planet's gravity...and established orbit?" Ok, so now that she thought about it, it did sound a bit ridiculous. A ship or anything just doesn't drift toward a planet and somehow establish orbit.

"Shiet..." She put her hands up.
If these people were anything of the likes her family risked everything to flee from, she were fraked.

 

[Verse Branden]

For someone who'd just awoken from a century long nap, the so-called doctor slide easily enough into a position to give throw orders around. Unfortunately for him, she answered to no one but the Scout Marshal, who themselves had to be chosen from the thousands of Pioneers that traveled with the colony. So for now, it was free rein, everyone doing what they needed to to keep from being vented into the void of space. The man spoke basic, though something about how he spoke was.... off? She couldn't exactly pinpoint what it was. She pushed the thought, as well as the doctor's orders, from her mind, as she approached a terminal within the medbay, and began skittering her fingers across the keyboard.

Soon enough she would begin to see others rushing through the halls of the ship; mostly maintenance and engineering, though she would see one or two C-Sec officers along with one of her fellow Pioneers pass by, no doubt in a hurry to get to their stations. The alarm for the cryogenics rang for a few more minutes before being cut off, a mercy she was mere moments from doling out herself. Using the terminal, she input her authorization to check up on the system statuses, and was greeted by a massive surprise; entire sections of the ship had gone dark in the time they'd been asleep. Just nothing... a sign of major degradation of components and systems. Even worse, life support was showing a 16% absolute failure. That number was huge when you considered that there were nearly ten million people contained within the cryo-pods. Thousands, hundreds of thousands of lives... gone.

Verse would quickly switch gears and begin searching through the Prospero's automated logs. There had to be something there that revealed what happened. Maybe they went through a previously unknown radiation zone that short-circuited the ship? Or maybe they'd been boarded by scavengers along the way, who didn't know what they were doing and made a mess? Something... something...

///::: Accessing Prospero Log.......

Entry #1: Departure from Coruscant. Final checks performed. Cryogenic sleep cycle confirmed. Beginning calendar star date; D1Y1.
........
Entry #2542: Cryogenic sleep cycle stable. 0.00% failure rate. Running routine system check..... Green. Calendar star date; D345Y47.
.........
Entry #60984: Error. Power loss in Sector 12.1. Automated hyperspace shunt engaged. Error. Estimated trajectory altered by hyperdrive shunt. Recalculating. Recalculating. Estimated arrival timestamp; Unknown. Engaging long term cryogenic stasis protocols. Calendar star date; D213Y85.
.........
Entry #2984757: Cryogenic stasis cycle stable. 11.3% failure rate. Running routine system check.... Error. Sector 1.1 Red. Sector 2.3 Red. Sector 43.2 Red...... Estimated arrival timestamp; Unknown. Recalculating. Recalculating. Calendar star date; D32Y3758.
.........
Entry #8498393: Error. Chronometer degradation exceeding 85%. Immediate maintenance required. Error. Reactor 12A, 1N, 5R at suboptimal output. Immediate maintenance required. Error. Cryogenic stasis cycle unstable. Engaging emergency power reservation protocols. Diverting priority from non-essential sectors. Entering emergency energy conservation mode. Immediate maintenance recommended. Calendar star date; D321Y12387.

Verse blinked her eyes several times, simply to confirm just what she was looking at. Her mind was silent, the utter shock and confusion having wiped away all other thoughts, as she struggled to comprehend, and then accept, the information she'd been given. Twelve thousand years. They'd been asleep not for one hundred, not five hundred, not even a thousand years. But twelve thousand. And that number was the minimum. Who knew how long ago the ship had stopped making logs?! For all she knew, that itself could have been fifty thousand years ago!

Suddenly, Verse vision went double, and she saw white flecks in the corners of her eyes as she felt light headed, and fell back onto the ground. "Ow...." she would moan silently to herself.

ATTN: Kainan Wolfe Vyra Silara Doctor Røyskatt ”Roy” Besh Barbie Barnabas Lt. Kastor Rau Atlas Drake

 

[Liedran Kathause]

{Location: ANV Pegasus - C.I.C}
{3rd Expeditionary Squadron - Outbound Flight Program - Commodore Kathause in Command}​

The aging metal beast sailed through a pitch-black sea. Pegasus, or Kat's Wrath as the crew affectionately named her, ran abuzz with the launching and receiving of the active air patrol, with the careful pings of sensor systems, and the slow build up of supply stocks.

The commodore herself overlooked it all, from the safety of her office, and via the aid of the large transparasteel viewport before her. It was at times like these when space could be processed as a visual lullaby, rather than the nightmare it had been throughout her career. But, those were the perks of exploration duty.

"Ma'am, Constellation's just sent out a hail. Reporting a strange force anomaly from what I understand," A voice came over the intercom, and startled her from the trance with its absence of warning

"Sensors showing nothing?" She took an extra few seconds to process the situation, before a resigned acceptance of an element-- one that she had never truly understood-- came to be, "Alright, have Odyssey and Ardent form up alongside the Constellation. Set to Condition Two, and notify the air patrol. I'll meet you in C.I.C."

. . .​

Liedran's relaxed expression had died down by then, her back now formed into a hunch, while tired eyes studied the rotating line on the sensor display. The scanners eventually produced an output, a distant mass shadow waiting just within their instruments' range. Once the processors were thrown into full gear, the detected shape became a planet.

What are you hiding? The commodore's eyes tracked the incoming status updates, intent enveloping each. They still had some time before they reached the end of the supposed force anomaly's trail, but the worst of her imagination was already manifesting itself.

"Prep the marines, and wait for the kybernauts' confirmation," Liedran bit her tongue, and threw a look toward the Pegasus's captain, "Suggestions, commander?"

"I'll wait for the sensors to give me an idea," The barely-younger Pantoran watched with the same mix of fear and interest that she did, "Speak of the devil..."

The planet came into full view, scanners now working to map the surrounding space. At first, a silence of activity seemed to take lease, though they quickly found evidence to the contrary.

"Commodore, Commander. Reading several vessels. One of unknown configuration."

"Confirm with Constellation. Have Huntress load a swarm of ion missiles, halt all ships, and prepare Pillbox squadron for dispatch," Liedran now made the trek toward another console, "Open a channel with Captain Atlas Drake ."

She gave the comms officer a graceful few moments to establish the link, a fraction longer to activate the encryption systems, "{Mister Drake, this is Commodore Kathause, requesting input on the situation.}"

 

[Alia Stryker]

Attn: Lt. Kastor Rau ​

The silver frame of the pod cracked open, folding away slowly with a motorized whirring as the cocktail of drugs entered the injection ports. A good three minutes went by before the tubes disconnected, empty of their concoctions, and withdrew into the depths of the stasis chamber, their task complete. The rest of the process finished without incident, and as the last of the indicator tones and monitoring beeps ceased, the final plasteel shield separating the pod interior from the rest of the world slid away, and everything went quiet.

‘Fresh’ recycled air washed over the pod from somewhere above, a few degrees colder than it should be. The lights in the cell dimmed ever so slightly.


A hand gripped the side, knuckles white.

From the stasis pod spilled a woman.

She landed in a crouch, palms flat on the floor, a mess of dark, damp curls obscuring her face. A strange shudder rolled down her spine, a cold shiver in her limbs, but there was no coughing or retching, no gasping for air, nothing to suggest she had just woken from stasis. She was just… silent.

Too silent.

On the outside, that is.

For Alia Stryker, the noise was all on the inside.

At high velocity and with no mercy, everything came rushing back from the long darkness. Ancient memories, personalities, emotions, thoughts, feelings, plans, it all collided mid-brain, and even for someone as mentally prepared for and familiar with the after-effects of long-term cryo sleep as Alia was, it took every ounce of focus to keep her mind from shattering against the assault. The intensity caught her off guard. She’d spent her fair share of time on ice over the years, never by choice, and side effects were usually worse the longer you were in stasis. This, though… it’d never been this bad before.

Alia pressed her fingers into the floor so hard she couldn’t feel them anymore.

Habit kicked in. GFAF kicked in.

Grab any rushing memory by the throat.

Focus on it.

Ask it questions. Where are you from? When are you from? Why are you here?

Follow the answers to their anchors until pieces come together and things settle down.

It felt like hours, though it was only minutes, but the GFAF process never failed her.


As her mind came together, Alia did a quick test of her facial muscles, grateful for the curtain of thick curls drawn across her face. Every once in a while after cryo, something would come out a little cock-eyed or distorted, a nose off center, dimples in the wrong spots, eyebrows too far apart. After a hundred years, you stopped needing a mirror to correct it, able to feel it out instead.

At three hundred, it rarely happened at all, but this had been a rather mentally traumatic awakening and it was better to be safe than sorry. The only people who knew what she really was were dead, and that’s how she wanted it to stay.

Everything felt in place. Her body, bolstered by the quick healing and rapid adaptation abilities of her species, was ready. She had several personalities selected and waiting in the wings, making sure to temper each one with the knowledge that she was, in fact, a prisoner still. Her senses were a bit over-tuned, but that would calm down the more she moved around.

For the first time since waking just minutes ago, Alia lifted her head.

The curls hanging over her face shifted. Vivid emerald eyes snapped up, darting around the cell as she gathered information.

Man outside. Three other pods. No movement, no life signs. A stench, though. Four beds. Untouched. Lockers. Two ‘freshers, privacy screens, no doors. Small vents in ceiling. Lights on low power…

She rose from her crouch, careful to wince as if stiff, adding a sluggish flavor to her movements. It was bad enough she’d been too distracted upon waking to go through the normal human responses to cryo. Now, she’d have to lay the act on extra thick to avoid any more suspicion.

She was used to it, though. The act usually never came off, even when she was alone. Easier to pretend someone was watching you all the time than to swap mental spaces constantly.

Alia had spotted him on her initial scan of the cell, standing outside the thick glass wall in front of her, but she made a small show of being too uncomfortable to worry about him as she dragged her hands over her cryo suit like she’d just realized it was there. With a bleary expression, she swiveled around, shuffling over to the other three pods. She wasn’t sure what she expected, but… it was truly one of the most disgusting things she’d ever seen.

And she’d lived in the bowels of Nar Shaddaa once. She knew disgusting.

The repulsed cry she released was genuine, and she backed away with her hand on her mouth, turning from the scene with haste. The level of gory decomposition in the pods brought a new worry to the forefront of her mind.

Maybe the guard had answers.

Because he had to be a guard. He certainly looked prepared, she’d noted the weapons.

Building on the inertia from her reaction, Alia left the horrified look on her face as she lurched towards the glass, slapping a palm to the surface and pointing back at the pods. “Why are they like that?!” she gulped, swallowing pretend nausea. “I’ve never seen-.. they shouldn’t be like that, we haven’t been asleep that long.”

​

 

[Lt. Kastor Rau]

delete

 

[Vyra Silara]

Attn: Kainan Wolfe | Doctor Røyskatt ”Roy” Besh | Verse Branden ​

It was Kainan’s voice, gruff, sharp with worry, that found her through the black unconscious.

Her lifeline. It pulled at her senses and she followed it, her battered body slowly shifting in response under the remains of the cloak. Corners draped over her legs and arms slid away at the movement, revealing heavily bruised limbs under a shredded mess of gold and obsidian satin, once a gown fit for a queen, now so filthy and torn it was unrecognizable. A grotesque mosaic of what looked to be bite marks ran up and down her pale flesh, bright red with inflammation. Running from her left hip up and across her back were four long, bleeding gashes, the two in the middle cutting deeper than the others.

Medical scans would confirm some internal bleeding and a handful of fractured (but not broken) bones, as if something had attempted to crush her from all sides. Too fresh, too early for infection to set in, but without treatment, it absolutely would. Surgery to stem the bleeding and repair the pierced blood vessels in her body would indeed be required, as well as closing any large, open wounds.


Vyra struggled, against the screams of agony rising in her throat, against the ash gluing her eyes shut and coating her tongue, against the darkness threatening her mind, against the horrifying scene burned into her eyes before her lord took her limp body in his arms and stepped through the portal…

“Kainan…?” she croaked, barely a whisper, void of energy. Other voices registered in her ears, movement around her, but she couldn’t make the sounds stick in her brain. What little, dwindling energy still remained had to be spent on only one thing. One question. The words that had died on her lips as the walls of the netherworld had closed behind them. She had to know.

Vyra cracked open her eyes with much effort and found Kainan’s form. Even at a murmur, the fear puncturing her voice was obvious. “…Did it…follow us through?...”

​

 

[Sergeant Omen]

N/A