"Wonderful," I clasped my hands together in jubilation and moved from the chair, I look forward to this, now then there appears to be some trouble. More visitors to the system I presume. If you care to join me" I rose from the chair and made my toward the door beckoning for her to follow. The squad I had arrived with filled out with me and the squad who had brought stardust to the observation deck made ready to follow her. I clicked on my commlink to the bridge. "This is the Commodore, patch me through to the Captain."
A moment later
"Sir!"
"I'm on our way up, whats the situation?"
"Sir, our second contact is a vessel calling itself the Spyglass of the Typhoon Squadron, it was behind the moon when we arrived to point beta. Another group of vessels just arrived in system"
"Name doesn't ring any bells from our time"
"Right, I was about say they confirm our time lapse, albeit apparently we are classed as MIA"
"Makes sense, extraordinary circumstances aside, what is the strength and size of both these groups and are they of the same faction?"
"No sir, the Spyglass just revealed it had two other ships with it, I guess that would be the rest of its squadron. I'm patching the third contact's hail to you now, its a little jagged"
The squad and I continued to walk, the steady drum of boots marching in step was the only other sound in the corridors. I held my arms behind my back as I listened intently.
"This is Viceroy Jaster Awaud speaking on behalf of the UTC Diplomatic Fleet, is there a reason a Galactic Empirial Fleet is this far north of the Core Worlds?"
"Negative, if you fly a scout ship my way, you'll see the only other two capital ships in the Typhoon squadron behind the moon. This is the annoying Trade Command stiffs attempting to find an excuse to shoot at you. Feel free to claim that my squadron is your diplomatic escort across this sector. They can't arrest me... for a whole variety of reasons."
Hmmmm, how to respond to this. Our own fleet disposition was sizable in power but these were our only assets. Was Typhoon Squadron some sort of criminal, rebel, or opposing faction to these UTC? What was the UTC? A peace keeping fore maybe? But between who and why.
"Sir, I've maneuvered the fleet so that the Typhoons are on our port and the the UTC Sahara Group on our Starboard, albeit much further away."
"Good, comms let me speak to them both"
"Yes Sir"
"Hail, Spyglass of the Typhoon Squadron, Hail Viceroy Jaster, I'm Commodore Caius Flavian, Commander of Battle Group Retribution. I'm certainly in not much of position to dispute the oddity of my being here. I still haven't found an explanation for that myself, but it appears we have been lost to time and space. As to our relationship from the distance of the Core worlds you've lost me there."
I tapped my receiver which put me on a secure channel to Spyglass "Spyglass, I appreciate the offer, however you'll have to elaborate your status when mention 'arrest' little more than half a millennium ago Imperial vessels would have simply begun attacking anyone perceived to be outlaws. Not to say you are, just that when you use terms like arrest... What reason does the UTC cause you to want to flee?" I switched back to the multichannel line
"Our intentions are neutral."
I then ceased external communications and changed to one way with Captain Zia.
"Miss Zia, keep us close together, remain in condition two."
"Yes Sir!"
[member="stardust"]
[member="Watcher Three"]
[member="William Kerkov"]
[member="Jaster of Clan Awaud"]