Pearl of the Stars

Captain Grace Ifhans stared out of the window, the reinforced glass all that stood between her and the off-black haze of FTL travel. It was said that if you stared at it for too long, you would go insane which made Grace wonder why the windows were there at all.

She averted her gaze and continued to eat her meal. You couldn’t really call it food because that would imply the odourless slop on the plate could be identified. It served its purpose though, and gave the body everything it needed to function correctly.

FTL travel was totally uneventful, and only possible between star systems. If a vessel attempted to travel faster than light within a system, the star’s gravity combined with the energy output of an FTL drive would rip a vessel apart, and had done so on more than one occasion. Every star system be it in Council or Others space had a safe zone at its edge where a vessel could engage its FTL drive worry free. If an uncharted system was discovered, it was down to the technicians to work out the safe zone and input the information into the database.

She glanced at the wall, and the digital display that showed the amount of time left until the Pearl of the Stars would exit FTL. In a little over an hour the Pearl and the rest of the Fleet would arrive at the very edge of the Andos system following six days of travel.

Grace did not rush to the bridge. Instead she headed to the fighter deck to ensure that should they be needed, her pilots were ready to go. The deck was a hive of activity and Grace only stayed long enough to satisfy her own curiosity, not wanting to interrupt the deck chief and his crew.

***

A little under an hour later, Captain Grace Ifhans arrived on the bridge.

“Status update please,” she said, the request directed at a Lieutenant.

“Everything appears to be in order Ma’am,” he replied diligently. “Ready to drop out of FTL on schedule.”

“Prepare to scan immediately upon exit,” said Grace, addressing the same Lieutenant.

“Aye Ma’am.”

The clock counted down and when there was but a minute remaining, a computerised voice announced that fact. The process repeated at thirty seconds and also at ten seconds, but from that point on every single second was counted.

The Pearl of the Stars exited FTL with little ceremony. The first blips to appear on the radar were those objects closest to her, namely the other vessels that made up her unit, followed swiftly by the vessels of the five units.

“Report.”

“No hostiles detected as yet Ma’am,” the Lieutenant replied. “A couple of freighters on a run from the moon of the outer-most planet, and a small security detail.”

“Thank you Lieutenant,” said Grace with a smile. She had not been expecting any trouble so close to home, but one never could be too careful. It was her intention to skirt a little over a quarter of the way around the edge of the Andos system. Due to the vastness of the system, the Fleets presence would not be detected until a half hour before their next jump. It was an unusual scenario though, and off the top of her head Grace could not think of another system on their route that was quite as large. Were the Fleet to travel straight across the Andos system it would take eight days at cruising speed, a tenth of the speed of light.

Even though they would not be noticed until it was too late, Grace thought it best to send a courtesy message to the leaders of the system’s three inhabited worlds, and as she planned in her head what she might say, she lit a cigarette.

Satisfied, she hit the ‘record’ button on the console to her right.

“This is Captain Grace Ifhans of the Council Fleet, just passing through.” It was a good message, if a little impersonal, but short of informing whomever might listen to the message of the Fleets next destination, she could think of nothing else worth adding and besides, it would be obvious to anyone where the Fleet had headed, all they had to do was watch which jump point had been used. She sent the message and stood, ready to head to her quarters.

“Incoming audio Ma’am,” the Lieutenant’s cry stopped her in her tracks. “An burst sent through the jump point from Victoria.”

“Play it,” she ordered but as soon as she heard the message, she wished that she had not.