The Province Of Terrans 2
A Starshatter adventure
(Art by Lukasz Matuszek)
If you like what you read, consider buying any of my published works.
Index: Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16
Chapter 4
Dead guests
The FSS Bird Of Hope swirled into a deep dive towards the derelict. Shields glistening from an odd hit and bouncing off swarms of tiny debris, the mighty Spacer starcraft was largely unphased by the literal wall of beamfire coming from the Spire. Nevertheless, other dangers made themselves manifest as soon as Northstone maneuvered towards a jagged hull breach of sufficient size.
He made it a bit more welcoming with a few laser beams shot from his one remaining quad cannon array. Bolts of otherworldly charged energy streaked all around and across space in ever more desperate attempts to hit Bird Of Hope. All to no avail since the Spacer had redoubled his efforts to wage electronic warfare and bested most, if not every attempt of the eons old targeting systems to track his starship.
Diminutive compared to his starcraft, nevertheless, there was a number of humanoid figures stumbling across the derelict’s hull. Armed with various in size and power handheld armaments, these corpsified persons tried assailing Bird Of Hope, achieving no success whatsoever, for their shots were far too weak to overcome the Spacer ship’s overcharged shields. With a few sparing shots of his point defense particle-beam emitters, Northstone swept this gaggle, the powerful beams incinerating dilapidated spacesuits, possessed cadavers, and vile spirits all at once.
“You can witness my extraordinary hardship, even with skill gained in multiple space battles and a masterfully crafted sensor suit.” – said the Spacer and pointed at a number of holo-slides which displayed both chosen data from his onboard computer and beamfire trajectories recorded by his scanner.
“Indeed, this was the safest bet when it came to preserving life-saving fuel and important ammunition. However, the more I dodged enemy fire, the more I thought of how by the Holy Universe would I fly away after my quest was over? To consider traversing an unknown derelict’s corridors, reach, and then sabotage that Spire was rather balmy an option. Dear guests, you’d all agree that, bar the unfathomable in number and shape dangers lurking in the dark of said corridors, the distance to cover on foot or spacesuit engines alone would be ludicrously long.” – explained Northstone as he made sure to pat the pauldron of his elaborately beautified and expertly forged spacesuit.
Indeed, even from the visual scan-data provided by Northstone, everyone present was quite in agreement that even with entirely void of danger corridors, it would take many days to reach the Spire. They all did, of course, never doubt in the Spacer’s determination, ghosts and wraiths galore, to do exactly that if vibroblade hit the bone.
The following set of holo-slides showed something else and The Roundabout’s guests stood in awe.
“I made sure to save shield energy for my descent and landing, with no other systems than the point defense beam arrays and scanners activated. Saving some of the main heatsink’s operational capacity for overcharging a system was also wise. Thus, as soon as I came too close to the hull so the Spire would not dare fire at me any longer, I poured all reserve power into my shield.”
On the holo-vid, the gaping, jagged hull breach swiftly conquered everyone’s view. With his speed lowered and all maneuvering thrusters fully engaged, Northstone swiftly traversed the hole, entering inside the ancient derelict with nary a single scratch. The shield, it was this wondrous invention of galactic civilization which took the brunt of the damage. Floating debris, leftover bits of other vessels which tried the same and failed, and of course, the mummified cadavers who once crewed them. Those had died in agony either from wounds, radiation, exposure to space, lack of food and water, or drained by spectral touch.
With a steady hand, Northstone piloted his starcraft around the bigger bits and finally, expending much less fuel than others in his pilot seat would, landed. Gaseous pockets and blankets of dust-size trash floated away and around his ship as the plasma trail he left slowly dissipated.
Wide and tall, this corridor appeared to have once been used for cargo, ammunition, and strike craft transfer between the warship’s many hangar bays. Giant magnetic rails stretched out into the shadow rich darkness, their ravaged by weapon fire, crashed ships, and scavengers machinery embedded in walls and ceilings. Like skeletal hands, the claws of cargo moving cranes loomed above, as if ready to snatch anything that dared block their warship’s corridors.
“My friends, I, just as any other Spacer, would not simply dash around before carefully scanning my surroundings. Therefore, as you can all see on the following collection of holo-slides, I did exactly that.”
The Roundabout was abuzz with whispers, which followed immediately after Northstone uploaded his holo-slides. Some visitors exchanged words spoken respectfully quiet or outright sent each other text links. Scan-data and visuals of old derelicts were something of a rarity and this ancient warship, it was indeed quite the novelty.
“Surrounded by the shattered, twisted, burnt remains of multiple starships, at first I looked for trouble. Oftentimes, scavengers placed booby traps, automated turrets and such, all in effort to dissuade others from intruding upon their hoard. Though I did discover a few of these, everything was in rickety state and not even worth the salvage. Yet, it was when I scoured the space for otherworldly, immaterial dangers, when these popped up on my sensor screens.”
Northstone sipped from his third pitch of bikar beer for the night, and smacked his lips as more and more whispers danced their curious jig across The Roundabout’s tables, beautified by glittering holo-lights.
The guests witnessed how various humanoid-like ghosts lurked around Bird Of Hope. Always hiding, phased inside the bigger debris, they waited for yet another incognizant explorer to sink their spectral claws into. Suspiciously close and yet, safely far away from her shield bubble, these vengeful specters did and most probably had been lying in wait for centuries.
Their would-be quarry, however, was not of the naïve kind.
“See, I could exit my craft and, trusty beamgun in hand, shoot them dead for a second and final time.” – said Northstone with a wily smirk on his chiseled face, his gun hand’s trigger finger squeezed in the air as if shooting – “Not that day, for I had already augmented my shields and was not eager to waste all that energy.”
The Spacer made sure that everyone saw his previous collection of holo-slides before he uploaded a short video. There, people saw how he was manipulating the controls of his ship’s shield emitters. Slowly, so the spectral ambushers would not suspect a thing, he readied himself to perform a desperate maneuver which most system operators reserved only for a time when their craft was boarded.
“Extending the shields or retracting them, opening holes for something to come or exit, it is one of the most efficient, though rather hard to pull off ways to deal with boarders. Takes extra energy, overtasks your ship’s heatsink, and could potentially result in hull damage... if you are not cautious. All that I knew, yet it was far less costly in terms of imminent danger and power pack wastage for me to simply rearrange the shield geometry. Spectral foes, as most of you know, their immaterial forms suffer greatly when being hit by beamfire and shields.”
Northstone clicked play and The Roundabout witnessed how in the span of a few star-seconds his highly-modified shields smote every single ghost in the vicinity. Hit by a wall of energy, the maleficent ones flickered out of this plane and into nothingness. If there had been atmo, some of the guests whispered to their friends, sentients with heightened awareness for the supernatural would hear desperate, terror-filled shrieks.
Those who were amongst the religious, Universalists and worshipers of noble ascended ancestors alike, they assured others that there was nowhere for these wicked spirits to go to. No hell even, because by their own foul actions, these once living creatures had abandoned any hope of salvation.
“Having dealt with the immediate dangers, I made sure to rest my mind and body. As I waited, the heatsink of my starship mitigated all of the recently accrued heat, thus I was able to perform a detailed, long-range scan. To be on the safe side since I knew not if there were others lurking inside the ancient behemoth, it was a passive one.”
Nodding, those of the sys ops profession, shared their greater understanding of how scanning arrays operated with their fellow conversationalists. While significantly slower to perform, the passive scan was infinitely hard to detect by sensors, and mitigated the chance of one’s own vessel being located.
While Jenn placed a wide plate filled to the brim with deviled eggs, and stuffed with Bulgarian white cheese hot peppers for Northstone to snack upon, The Roundabout’s guests of the tourist kind learned a lot.
“Here, here, and there!” – said the Spacer as he pointed a number of points of interest – “I noticed three areas which weren’t far and, in case of greater danger or some unfortunate accident, I could make my way back to the Bird Of Hope.”
His audience noticed peculiar things about all three of these spots.
The first one appeared to be a camp of sorts, probably used hundreds of times during the centuries by various groups of explorers and scavengers. It provided insulation from the vacuum of space and radiation in the shape of a makeshift shelter. Not overly big, this was a ramshackle dome forged out of ship debris and panels ripped straight from the derelict warship’s very corridors. The most interesting feature of this location was part of the scan-data which displayed a number of supply crates. Various types of ammunition, weapon power packs, explosives, and even food rations; many of these appeared to be usable.
At least from the long-range scan...
The second spot was a small machine bay. This one showed electronic activity of the digital kind. Meaning that something, a computer or another similar device was still operational. That could mean access to a priceless data-storage and perhaps even one of the nearby starship systems. From the long-range scan, it did not appear that there were many or dangerous enemies on the way. Only a dozen shambling corpses and one rickety automated turret.
The third area of interest was the nearby strike craft hangar which could’ve been Northstone’s landing area. Following the long-range scan, it did appear that this location indeed sported a number of automated turrets – six to be exact. There were the hazy sensor outlines of concealed cybernetic organisms, all twelve of them equipped with light arms. Yet the most important piece of data displayed on Northstone’s screens was the presence of intact fuel containers.
For a Spacer, fuel was life.
With a mysterious smirk, and only after he’d tasted all of the snacks Jenn had meticulously prepared for him, Northstone announced:
“There and then, I had to make a snap decision. Information, Supplies, or Fuel. In the dangerous business of derelict exploration, any of the three locations could potentially hide much, much more! Secret stashes hidden by knavish scavengers and, of course, deadly dangerous enemies or booby traps. Yet there was something quite important for me to do before I even considered leaving Bird Of Hope.”
First, Northstone patted his second holster which was at this time occupied by his overpowered Deathknell laser pistol. Everyone present had already witnessed its impressive, laserey might, hidden inside a sleek body with longish barrel, robust heatsink, and elongated grip. This gun did not fit its big power pack in said grip, but on top of it, right behind the beam chamber. Painted bright red with black lines, the Deathknell was truly a pinnacle of Terran-made laser weapons.
Without even glancing at his left thigh where his signature explorer’s beamgun stuck out, mentioned – “No sane Spacer, nor any of you friends, knowledgeable of the many ghostly threats lurking across the gloomy corridors of any derelict, much less an ancient warship like this one, would make a single step without something like this.”
Made by Luna-Arms, Ghost Sweeper 2000, with its extra efficient heatsink shaped the hand guard of old Human machine guns and triangular beam projector barrel, was a gun specifically designed to deal with every kind of immaterial threat. Jet-black, Northstone’s sidearm was once more of the heavy variety, just like his two other favorite hand-cannons.
“Dear guests, would you say that I grabbed my Deathknell laser pistol or... this?!”
He projected a high quality holo-slide of his third, newest, and perhaps most versatile handgun. RPK-81 or raketnii pistolet kalashnikova, it was a multi-munition type, heavy gyro-jet pistol made by Kalashnikov Inc. Painted in metallic black, its elongated bulky shape, promised unstoppable doom by way of high caliber, explosive ordinance. Simple to operate and virtually unaffected by electronic jamming or EMP, this mechanically operated, chemical munition firing weapon was one of the new terrors which Terran arms companies fielded against the Minarchy’s many degenerate alien foes.
Out in the field, Northstone could realistically carry only two of pistols and enough munition for both, including field rations, and meds. Two bandoliers of power packs enabling sixty shots each for the Ghost Sweeper and Deathknell laser pistol, or fifty shots for the Ghost Sweeper and fifty rounds for the RPK-81. Five magazines, ten rounds each; two mags of “regular” explosive rounds; one mag of armor-piercing rounds; one mag of high-explosive rounds; and one loaded with rounds consecrated by the Universalist church.
The Roundabout was once again conquered by a wave of silent comments, the vigorous, yet soft tapping of holo-keyboards adding a background “musical” accompaniment to the choir of whispers. Their interest only intensified more, when, following another healthy sip of beer from his pint, the Spacer uploaded two more holo-slides:
“I would also grab one of these and lock it on my backpack’s extra gear mag-slot. For example, it is always prudent to go out exploring with this portable space tent. You can set it up quickly and then do stuff like maintaining your spacesuit, fix your guns, even cook them space rations into more palatable meals. That extra canister of fuel, however, it could easily refill the entire tank of my spacesuit’s engines! You know us Spacers, we are quite keen on being able to fly straight into danger or... around it.”
Dear reader, what do you think Northstone Firehand would do if you were in his spacesuit?
In this episode, your vote is threefold. Not only are you picking his weapon loadout, but the location which he is going to explore first, and his backpack’s special equipment slot.
Vote (One) for Supplies – if you think that Northstone should go and investigate the ancient shelter area, check the contents of these supply crates.
Vote (Two) for Information – if you feel that our Spacer should first check out that digital activity, and potentially attain valuable intel on the derelict.
Vote (Three) for Fuel – if you assume that going inside the dangerous strike craft hangar and expending ammunition while dealing with its guardians is a worthy exchange for the fuel which is potentially stored inside.
Choose (A) for the Deathknell laser pistol.
Choose (B) for the RPK-81 gyro-jet pistol.
Add (Fuel) to your vote if you want Northstone to grab his spare fuel cannister.
Add (Tent) to your vote if you think that the space tent would be more useful.
(*_*_*)
Dear reader, please do not forget to post your pick in the comments below, and elaborate upon why you think our protagonist should do so.
Dear The Black Knight,
Would you consider adding me to your list of Terrans? I, too, am an Earthling. I also feel that, as we both have a ‘The’ at the beginning of our names, we have a special bond.
Kind regards,
The Pneumanaut.
Voting for One/Supplies, B/jet pistol, and Fuel