Homeworld (Odyssey One) (51 page)

CENTRAL COMMAND BUNKER, MONS SYSTEMA, RANQUIL

“ADMIRAL.”

Rael Tanner looked over from where he was working, eyes falling on the speaker. “What is it, Ithan?”

The Ithan swallowed visibly, which Tanner noted was never a good sign for his health.

He sighed. “What is it?”

“Trans-light signals, Admiral.”

“Communications? Bowshock?” Tanner prompted.

The Ithan looked nervous. “Unknown.”

Alright, that’s a sign that I should check this myself.
Tanner was genuinely curious now, Central had records of nearly every trans-light signal ever detected in well over ten-thousand years of observations. For them to find something truly new…it was a rarity. The last time, in fact, was when the
Odyssey
first arrived in the system.

He walked over to the main display for the scanner network, and it was immediately apparent what the young officer was talking about.

That is the largest trans-light signal I have ever seen in my entire life.

The signal looked to be an unbelievable number of arc-seconds wide, spanning at least fourteen of their long-range sensor pods.

“It almost looks like a bowshock wake,” he said finally, “but a ship would have to be the size of a star system, or near enough, to make a wake like that.”

“That’s why we called you, Admiral. We don’t know what to make of this,” the Ithan admitted. “The closest signal match we were able to make was to a squadron, warping space at highest capacity.”

“I’ve seen that signal,” Tanner said dryly. “It is infinitesimally small compared to this. To make a signal like this in that way you would need…thousands….”

He trailed off, his mouth going dry. “Which post first detected it?”

“Post Fierra Two-Five-Nine, in Sector Nine-Eight-Three.”

Tanner hissed. “That’s one of the closest posts we have to the stellar construct the
Odyssey
reported.”

“That’s right, Admiral.”

“What vector is the signal travelling along?” Tanner demanded, heart now racing. “What vector!”

“A-Admiral?” the Ithan stuttered, taking a step back.

“Are they on a vector for any of our worlds!?”

“N-no. The signal is moving deeper into the galactic arm, away from the colonies.”

Tanner slumped, relieved. “Thank who, or whatever, is watching over us.”

He took a few breaths, considering his actions, then nodded. “Track them, send warnings to all ships to avoid their path,
and keep me apprised of the situation. I need to consult with Central.”

“Uh…yes, Admiral.”

Tanner turned and strode out of the command bunker.

IMPERIAL DESTROYER
DEMIGOD
, PRIMARY MAINTENANCE SLIP, THE HIVE

“COMMANDER, WE’VE LOCATED an Imperial beacon inside the slip.”

“Can you identify the source?”

The young officer nodded. “We located an incident recorder, Commander. It appears to be damaged, however.”

“Bring it aboard.”

Ivanth scowled quietly as the device was isolated and pulled into one of the
Demigod
’s cargo bays. He knew that it would take time to ensure that it was not somehow a risk to the ship or crew, but he barely had the patience to endure the wait. An incident recorder was designed to be ejected by an Imperial ship that was under threat of destruction, and was nearly indestructible.

For one to be damaged was a sign of a significant threat in the area, and the fact that the slip itself didn’t appear to be damaged made things all the more confusing.

What in the singular abyss could possibly have put an Imperial ship in danger of destruction, yet not left so much as a mark on the slip?

There were few things in the galaxy capable of that. Almost nothing in fact.

“Sir! Distress call from the
Immortal
!”

Ivanth spun around, face somehow frozen and blazing all at once. “What did they say?”

“Nothing, Sir. It was just a pure noise signal over the distress bands.”

“Get that recorder on the
Demigod
, NOW!” he thundered. “Reverse warp! Best speed!”

“Yes, Commander!”

The ship creaked slightly as the space-warping fields powered up, creating a high-pressure zone of gravity to the rear and a low-pressure one to the front of the ship. Unlike atmospheric effects, high-pressure gravity pulled on the ship while low-pressure pushed, so the
Demigod
began to fly out of the slip with a steady rate of acceleration.

As soon as the ship was clear, Ivanth brought up the feed from the scanners, disappointed to find that the
Immortal
still appeared peaceful and silent on passive scans. Disappointed, but not truly surprised. The distress frequency was a trans-light signal, so anything could have happened in the few minutes lag.

“Bring us about, and ready the ship to warp space-time on course to the
Immortal
!” Ivanth ordered. “Engage with all available power when prepared!”

The ship swept around in the tight quarters of the Hive slabs, putting her nose toward the
Immortal
, and then creaked again as the tidal force of her own gravity generators stressed the metal deeply.

While under full warp, the danger to a ship wasn’t the acceleration stress you might see in more commonly used
reaction flight systems. Ships like the
Demigod
that used space-warp drives for propulsion were immune to acceleration effects because they were drawn into their course rather than pushed along it. Everything on the ship, every molecule and every atom, all accelerated evenly, so there was no impact of acceleration in the way a reaction mass vessel was impacted.

However, the powerful gravity fields did have a similar force that put stress on the ship in particular. Tidal effects could be felt in the superstructure of the ship, stressing the metal badly when under full power, because the parts of the vessel closer to the gravity well felt its pull more powerfully than those parts that were further away.

In extreme cases, this tidal effect could be disastrous, literally drawing out the molecular and atomic bonds in ways they were never intended to be drawn. Human scientists had given this effect the technical term of “spaghettification,” which was a very descriptive and unfortunately accurate word.

The generators on a ship, even one as powerful as the
Demigod
, weren’t remotely capable of matching the tidal force of a stellar singularity, of course. Spaghettification wasn’t a risk ships like that endured, but the tidal force could, and most assuredly would, eventually stress the space frame of a starship to its breaking point.