Concordia Veil - Cockpit
High orbit above the eighth moon of Neue Jaspis II
With the shimmering blue gas giant looming low over the horizon, the lush, garden world seemed to beckon the crew of the ship with its alluring beauty. Although from the overwhelming number of contacts on their scanners, the crew knew better, but from high above, the moon almost looked untouched by civilization, an unblemished haven teeming with organic life. Liquid water oceans covered most of its surface, and a thick haze enveloped its surface, scattering the light from the distant sun and the ambient reflections from its parent planet like an ethereal halo.
The sensors were locked in on their target's beacon, which had begun broadcasting about a half hour previously, located on what appeared to be one of the smaller continents, or perhaps one of the more impressive islands, dotted with mountain ranges and forests to the northwest, and to the south, a chaparral desert.
"Damn," Sienna commented, leaning forward slightly to peer at the moon below. "Don't see many places like that."
"Yeah," said Amelia. Although she could acknowledge the beauty of the planet, it would still be something she was never going to get used to. She felt much more safe and at home inside a spaceship or space station than a planet.
The captain glanced at the sensor display, and shook her head slightly at the contacts whipping about all over the place, although none of them were close enough for either of the women to see themselves. "Still don't look like they're interested in us," she commented. Throughout their entire approach they had not been forced to make any corrections, as Amelia's trajectory was more or less perfect already, and whatever was out there didn't throw any complications at them. In fact, not once had anyone, or any
thing, even bothered to try to contact them. Either they didn't notice them, which seemed entirely unlikely, or they didn't care.
"Yeah," the astrogator repeated again, her voice somewhat aloof as to what Sienna had said, giving a hint that her attention was still entirely allocated on monitoring the sensors. She switched from different spectrums every couple of seconds to see if there would be any different kind of feedback.
Switching between frequencies and spectrums didn't appear to yield anything new; the contacts swarming about the system of moons around the gas giant were making no effort whatsoever to hide their activities, and were very obviously willfully ignorant of anything outside of their assigned tasks. The only exception were a few of the blips that registered nothing more than heat, with no other energy signatures at all, flying on nothing more than a ballistic trajectory in low to medium orbits around some of the moons. If she had to guess, they appeared to be dummy payloads of some kind, fired into orbit by titanic mass driver installations on the surfaces of a few moons. She picked up one or two in orbit around the garden moon below them as well, although they were sparse.
"Who do you think runs this operation?" Sienna asked absently, her eyes again fixated on the moon below them.
"Yeah," The astrogator droned on, still transfixed on her display. It was then that something clicked in her head and made her realize that it wasn't a yes or no question, making her pull out of the white noise that kept her from being distracted. Amelia's head craned from her seat to regard her captain once again. "I mean what?" she asked.
The captain pursed her lips and shook her head once with a slow blink. "Forget it," she replied, while Amelia sighed and turned her head back to her station. "Crash, do you still have the helm?"
The Ship rolled over quickly in a barrel roll. There was no other answer from the bot.
"Son of a--!" Sienna yelped, barely managing to grab onto the console as she was thrown suddenly to the side, mostly held in place by the restraints as she slammed against them, while Amelia tried to supress a smile as she bounced around in her seat, but was kept in check by her own.. When the ship steadied itself, the captain's upper lip curled in a slight sneer as she glared up at the ceiling. "A simple 'yes' or 'no' would've been fine, jackass," she muttered.
"You did tase him not too long ago," the astrogator commented.
Sienna gave Amelia a withering glare for a moment, then shook her head again as she smoothed her hair, regaining her composure from the unexpected maneuver. "So
he gets to stay sore, while
I gotta take the high road," she muttered to herself. "This Captain shit's for the birds." Leaning forward a little and clearing her throat, she tapped the tracking beacon's location on the scanner, looking at its planetary coordinates.
"I'll talk to him, just don't make things worse than it already is," Amelia said sincerely, looking at the captain. "Meanwhile, let's just get this job over and done with," she added.
"You do that," Sienna replied flatly. "Low angle of approach for atmospheric entry. Head for the beacon and we'll see about finding a place to set down."
"Copy that," the astrogator replied, turning back to her station and quickly working on her controls. "Crash, I am relaying the approach vector to you," she said
A console beeped and the ship shifted into the the appropriate angle to enter the flight path. Once it aimed true. the main engines flared for a few seconds, pushing the ship out of its orbital positon, into one that would start pulling it into the atmosphere.
"All hands brace for atmo," Sienna barked over the intercom, then hooked her thumbs through her shoulder harness straps and settled in, taking a deep breath through her nose.
The haze below them started to rise up slowly as the ship started to descend in a soft angle towards the moon. For a few minutes, nothing happened, but eventually a dull, quiet rumble could be heard, almost inaudible at first, then slowly crescendoing little by little. The whitish-blue halo around the moon rose up to the bottom edge of the canopy's field of view, and soon a bright red-and-white glow could be seen from below. The little freighter started to quake gently, and as it started to penetrate deeper into the moon's atmosphere, the dull vibrations swelled into quivering shakes, and the rumbling grew louder.
Sienna's head bounced softly as she rode it out, the ship's incredible speeds in space being increasingly forcefully braked by the friction of the thickening air around them. Her face remained a blank mask, expressionless and unreadable, and her breathing never deviating much from regularity. At least, that is, until an alarm blared, snapping her out of her state of semi-reverie.
"Alert!" the computerized voice chimed. "Combined field system overload. Shield failure probability twenty-five percent."
"Frak," Sienna snapped, her eyes widening. "Must be from the scuffle at Halna!"
"Diverting non-essential power to shields!" Amelia said briskly, cutting the captain off. Working while the ship shook around, bouncing her in her restraints, made her task twice as hard, but not impossible. All around the ship, lights would start to go dim, being replaced by the emergency red lights, while the life support would also slow down to the bare minimum to keep the air recycled.
At the same time, Sienna punched in several inquiries on her side of the consoles, buffeted about as well by the jarring ride, reading data on atmospheric composition. "Shoulda done this first," she chastised herself angrily, the urgency in her voice more than noticable. "Pull power from the engines if you have to, we're in heavy enough we can afford the loss!"
"Roger!" Amelia exclaimed over the noise, cutting a fraction of the thrust and noticing the small decrese in the noise around her.. If the shields somehow failed, and it was a fairly small chance that they would, there was still the thick armor covering the hull. Still, to have the ship be destroyed like that, of all things, was more than insulting for her.
With the power to the engines cut down. Crash used the manuvering thrusters to shift the angle of the ship, so that it's direction of motion was directly down from the belly of the ship. Once the ship was in the right position the bot started firing the manuvering thrusters again, this time trying to slow the ship before there was too much atmosphere for them to work.
A message appeared on a display of the console.
Code:
> Shift power to the lower sheilding. Close shutter, or you will be blinded by the fiction burn.
Without hesitation, Sienna reached above her head and yanked down a stiff metal lever with a loud, ratchetting sound, and the armored outer shutters on the canopy slowly started to grind themselves over the viewport, plunging the two women into the dim lighting of nothing more than the glow of their instrument panels. The din and roar of the ship ripping through the atmosphere, screaming to slow its descend, remained, however, jostling the both of them to and fro in their seats.
"Shield capacity at... fifty... percent," the computerized voice warned again. The captain gripped the armrests on her seat tightly, watching the shield power readouts in front of her. The rate at which it was dropping had slowed significantly with their rerouting of the ship's power, but it was still falling, and they were still a significant distance above ground level. By this point, both she and Amelia were feeling themselves being pulled more and more heavily down into their seats, as if someone were stacking bricks on their chests and lap.
"God damn it, I hate high-grav worlds," Sienna commented, while the astrogator simply grimaced and rode through the discomfort of reentry, now even more enraged at herself for not doing a proper study of the moon's properties before descending.
The ship rocked and jolted erratically as it continued its descent, and while the drop in the shield reserves was slowly starting to level off, it was still dropping very quickly. "Shield capacity at... twenty... percent," the computer said, and the alarm tone changed to a much more urgent sound.
"Crash, slow us the frak down already!" Sienna barked over the noise.
Without a response the ship flipped ass over head, pointing the aft of the ship towards the direction of motion. After a few moments of buffeting the ship adjusted and settled into the new position. With a loud whine the ship's engines came up to full power. Slamming both of the women into their seats. the burn lasted for nearly a whole minute, before the ship rotated again and pulled it's nose over back forward. Aiming for a more flat flight path the engines powered back up pushing the ship forward. slowly but surly the ship shifted from a free fall to a powered flight. All done with out a single power setting being shifted. There was a great magical power in those graviton engines. More gravity, more power to the engines, less draw from the power core. Crash had once run the numbers, if you dropped and skimmed the event horizon of a Black hole, you could scream away using less power than an adult bedroom toy used.
"Shield capacity...depleted," the computerized voice said in an eerily unsettling calm amid the chaotic noise. A grimace was plastered on Sienna's face as she strained against the forces of the ship's maneuvering in the increasingly oppresive gravity of the moon, gripping her armrests so tightly that the veins in her hands and forearms were beginning to bulge slightly. The cockpit began to get noticably warmer just before the ship flipped back around to a forward orientation again, and beads of sweat started to form on both of the Nepleslian's foreheads.
At last, the alarm klaxon suddenly went silent, and the buffetting started to recede. The air in the cockpit still felt like the tropics, however, and while the jarring bumps and jerks gradually changed into a gentle, if erratic rocking motion, both Sienna and Amelia now felt as if the other was sitting on top of them.
"Warning," the computer chimed again. "Combined field system... offline."
As the ship continued forward, dropping in a lazy decent, a message popped up on the console.
Code:
>Flight plan needs to be revised. Please input new directions.
With a strained sigh, Amelia got back to work. "I'm deactivating the ship's gravity," she said, and a moment later anyone could feel a small relief as the gravitational force receded a fraction. Soon afterwards, the astrogator set back to the primary task, plotting an approach vector towards the beacon that their contact had set up; it took her a few seconds, but once it was done she wiped the beads of sweat from her forehead, them unzipped the front of her jacket before cranking back the ship's life support, giving them more power so that they could fi the temperature inside.
"Frak," Sienna said barely above her breath with a relieved sigh, as much from the tiny amount of weight off of her when Amelia shut down the artificial gravity as from the dire gravity of their rocky descent. She tugged on the collar of her tank top, fanning herself slightly by flapping her shirt as she exhaled through puffed cheeks. Reaching up, she pushed the metal lever back up, retracting the canopy shields.
The vista that unfolded before them was both breathtaking and unnerving. As far around them as they could see, grassy plains and a sapphire river sprawled in every direction, beneath a greenish-gray sky with thick, amber colored clouds. The ambient lighting was dim, as if the world was bathed in perpetual waning twilight even in the full light of day from the distant star. Ahead of them near the horizon was a forest of gnarled-looking, misshapen trees with oblong, flat canopies, stretching nearly twice as far to all sides in seemingly random directions as each plant was tall. The beacon's signal originated near the grove, by the scanner's readings, still more than ten kilometers away. The sensors picked up movement around a bare, rocky outcropping off to the port side, devoid of anything resembling plant life. The outcropping itself was angular and specifically geometric in shape, making it look anything but natural.
Sienna leaned forward and peered out of the canopy around Amelia, pointing with her chin. "Look out there," she said. "You see that?" All over the outcropping, shadowy shapes could be seen moving about in patterns, crawling all over the rocks, and occasional flashes of light were noticable.
"Yes," Amelia answered, lifting her gaze up from the displays. "Are those the resource gatherers?" she asked.
"I'd think so," the captain replied, struggling to resituate herself in her seat against the increased gravity. "They seem about as interested in us as the ones offworld. Probably better keep it that way." She checked the pinging from their target's locator beacon, then glanced up at the ceiling again. "Crash, you think any of them are tracking us?"
Code:
>I'm just the pilot here, not a tactician. As far I can tell there is no hits on our sensors.
"Hell, I figured you'd be right at home with these guys," Sienna quipped.
"They more than likely have already spotted us, but they're not doing anything," Amelia said, flicking through the different sensors. "They're also probably automated based on the comm's pattern I'm picking," she added. The comms between the units were done in short, massive bursts of information, whereas an organic user would do long, less intense bursts.
Sienna nibbled on her lower lip for a few seconds in thought, and dragged her palm across her forehead to wipe the sweat off. Thankfully the ship's climate control system was starting to re-cool the air that had been heated from their entry, but it was still unpleasantly warm. Finally, the captain nodded. "All right," she said tentatively as she unfastened her harness. "You and Crash find us a place to set down as close to that beacon as you can." Slipping her arms out of the restraints, she reached above her with visibly slower movement under the heavy gravity, and gritted her teeth as she strained to hoist herself out of her seat with a grunt. "I'm gonna head back and make sure Oreza and Shrie have the suits ready. I want you and Oreza to be the first ones out when we land."
"Me?" Amelia asked incredulously. All the previous times she had been consigned to staying inside the ship during the operations, and it made her wonder what suddenly changed her captain's mind that time. Sighing in relief once again that the temperature inside the ship was reaching acceptable levels as the vents overhead groaned with the increased air influx, she leaned back against her seat, pulling out her datajockey to type a quick message to crash.
Code:
> can you head to the cockpit or are you still busy flying?
Sienna hefted her legs over the back of her seat and climbed up onto the platform behind them, then turned to look down at Amelia, squatting down on one knee, her elbow resting on her other one, hands clasped together. "Yeah, you," she replied plainly. "You've got a rescue and a kill and a half under your belt already." She tilted her head slightly. "You rather I lock you in here?"
"Alright, fine," the astrogator said, raising her hands apologetically at the captain, although her stomach churned and she felt like there was a lump in her throat at the mention of what happened in the Black Moon docks. The reaction was also pretty visible in her face.
Although there was no apparent change in her expression, the look in her eyes almost looked like a buried smirk. Amelia even
swore she saw the captain wink at her before she turned to leave, but she couldn't be sure.
But as soon as the door shut and sealed an holographic form slowly appeared in the pilot's seat. A young girl with brown hair, a blue shirt with silver stars on it, pink tutu, and a pair of lady bug print rain boots. "Though I do have a bit of run time left over at this time, to create a holo for you..." The voice was one of a young female matching the being in the pilot's seat. "I'm still hard linked to the ship. I will have to remain connected until I set us down."
"I see. Thanks," Amelia said, glad at the perceived company. "Crash..." the astrogator started to say after a while as she worked on her displays, "do you record everything on the ship?" she asked.
"No."
"Then why did you record the captain taking a shower? That was a very private moment," she interjected as the ship continued to fly.
"Why do you record every moment you are awake?" the Chibi responded as it tryed to peer over the control panels and out the window.
"I remember it, but that's different," the astrogator said, gazing at the little girl's hologram. "Would you do the same to me if I made you mad?" she asked.
"How is it different? i record everything i see, they are sorted in my data drives. Change those words to remember, memories, and brain." The little girl looked back at her. "I would not... She was quite mean and quite frankly abusive."
"The captain is trying to make it right and I am giving her this chance, but you are pushing her over the edge," Amelia said, "can you promise me not to do anything to her again?"
"She didn't just do something to you that nearly killed you a few days ago?" The little girl shifted so that she was sitting on her knees with her hands on the console looking at the area they were flying towards. "Let her hit that edge if she thinks she has the right to assault me... As it is, I believe that if she continues this, I will be leavig the ship once we arrive in a civilized location."
"If you leave," Amelia started to say, forgetting about the captain, "who's gonna watch my back? Who's gonna want to go out with me when we're off duty?" she asked the hologram.
"I do not know." Cute little Crashette looked back before reaching forward and started miming the motions Crash was performing digitally. The ship shot past the landing area so that It could see the area and make sure there was a good spot
to land. "But if she continues to physically attack me because she can't take some verbal sparring, then I have to leave..." The girl looked over at Amelia, "You could come with me, I would grow sad if you weren't with me."
"Crash..." Amelia say. "If we both leave, this ship is as good as done. You know that."
"That is true.. so if she has an embolism, I can have my ship back." The little girl smile then stuck her tounge out at her. The ship started to slowly dip in to a orbit towards the landing area.
The astrogator smiled faintly before turning her face back to her displays. "Thanks, just give the captain another chance," she said.
"Fine... but you can inform her the Computer core is off limits to ALL biologicals..." Crash paused as It brought the ship into a final approach. "So what were you going to ask me earlier?"
"Off limits to even me?" the astrogator asked, before pausing. "It was a silly question," she added, still evading it.
"There isn't room any more, I have made it accesable to me.. which means there are wires and cloths going every which way." The little girl smiled. "All your questions have been silly in one light of another." With a smirk she looked back out the window.
"Crash..." Amelia started to say again, although this time in a more annoyed tone as she rubbed her forehead. "Alright, nevermind. I was going to ask if you ever, uh, considered changing back to an
organic body again," she said, watching herself not to say 'normal' instead of organic.
The ship bumped a bit as the girl hologram snapped her head back to Amelia. "That is a great insult.." Crash though, the real spider bot, was chittering as It laughed and laughed. It took a few before the holo verison finaly grinned. "I'm joking. I have never made plans to.. but I did save bio samples if i ever needed to transfered back to a organic body... Why you ask... You wants something more then my witty comments?" The little girl morphed back into a spider, so that the conversation wasn't as creepy was it was in It's mind.
"What? I just asked because you keep saying how it was all the time," the astrogator said after the few moments of tension. "And you really seemed interested in knowing how stuff tasted when we were in the Black Moon," she added.
As the ship shifted from flight to hovering and started lowering the Spider holo skittered up the console and over to face her. "I miss a lot of things from when I was a fleshy being. And if I changed back I would miss a lot from when I was a digital being. The past is the past..." Crash chittered.
"Alright," the astrogator said, looking at the spider's hologram, "sorry for asking." With that, she went back to her job, monitoring the ship as it slowly appraoched its destination on the moon.
The hologram started towards the air vent. The ship it self descended within a meter of the gound when the engines cut out and the ship fell onto it's landing struts. Just before the holo disappeared into the vent. "Though if
you asked... I might." The light being fazed out of existence.
"I'm not going to ask you to do something that you're uncomfortable with," the astrogator said after the hologram disappeared. Crash was already good company just the way he was.
With a digital sigh Crash disconnected the plugs from It's case, and started crawling around on It's new 'webbing' the sheets from the captain's bed was stripped and hung from points in the Computer bay, along with them was exsess or damaged cabling. "Maybe I need to paint it on her wall." the bot spoke making sure the sound would stay only in the room.
