“Stable orbit achieved”. Arun announced patting the console. Still working even after all of the abuse I’ve put you through. Good girl, he thought.
“I shall check on Savanna”. Alex said leaving the console to Kerrson, who was still hard at work on it.
Arun checked his watch and nodded. He had about 8 hours left. How could he carry on knowing that, Arun asked him self. Of course he didn’t really feel anything, the minimal emotions he showed where the result of sophisticated routines and algorithms. Maybe knowing how long you had was a good thing? Arun wondered if he would be happier knowing he only had days or years left.
“So what do we have on the surface?” Arun asked Kerrson.
“I can’t tell you much more than before. We have a cold and thin, but breathable atmosphere, some liquid water on the surface but not a lot no sign of any cities, satellites, roads or any signs of intelligent life, but there is life of some sort down there. All in all not a nice place to spend the rest of our lives”.
“We might not have too. The jump drive is still basically functional and we still have Savanna, we should be able to jump right out of here when she recovers”.
Kerrson shook his head. “So much faith in people. Well sorry, but it doesn’t matter how much faith you have, we aren’t getting out of here”.
Arun walked over to Kerrsons console. “What have you discovered?”
“We are stuck here, probably for good”. Kerrson said angrily.
“And you evidence for this?”
“I’ve been thinking about this place we are stuck in. Not about the legends, but about how a place like this can exist”. Kerrson said, casting a glance over to Luca. Both her and Savaana where heading for Kerrsons console as well.
“Go on”. Arun prompted.
“Well it’s not a nebula that is for sure. A nebula could explain the lack of stars visible, the dust and gas could blot them out. But for the dust to be this dense enough to blot them out completely at all wavelengths, it would be so thick it would be collapsing now under gravity to make a star system. Plus we have a white dwarf here, you don’t get dying stars in nebula, which is where stars are born”.
Arun nodded. He would have probably come to the same conclusion, but he had other things, like his crew to worry about.
“So that is is out there. Why are there no stars?” Arun asked Kerrson.
“Because there are no other stars out there to see. We are in a pocket universe, cut of from the rest of the universe. I theory it’s possible, it uses the same sort of technology as our jump drive. It would just need to be on a massively larger scale”.
“The sort of technology that man had access to in the age of silver dreams” Kerrson said quietly, but forcefully. Kerrson glanced at Luca, but continued talking to Arun.
“The power to do this would have to have come from the star which…”
“Means the thing orbiting the star was probably part of what did this, since it would have to be within the pocket universe when it was created?” Arun interrupted.
“Yes, well probably. Once the pocket universe was cut or pinched off from our own, it would probably be stable, so you wouldn’t need any power to maintain it, well not over the millions of years between the ages anyway. When the star under goes any big changes, going nova or whatever, you would need power then to keep this stable”.
“But the star is a white dwarf now, something has already happened, unless the star was like that when the started”. Arun said slowly, trying to think on the scale needed to understand what Kerrson was suggesting.
“Possible, but unlikely. Why build a place like this around a dying star? No I think the star was made in to a white dwarf but the process of pinching this place off”.
“Using a whole star. That is truly titanic amounts of energy. Any idea’s how they might do that?” Arun asked.
“No idea”.
“Okay so why does that stop us from getting out of here?”
“Since this is a pocket universe, it must be finite, a small bubble of space cut of from the rest of the universe. Because of that the curvature of space must be much higher here, this means in order to get in to jump space we need more energy. Now I’m not an expert on this, but if my readings are right, we need far more than we could get from the power plant…ever. Even if it where new and working perfectly”.
“But others have made it out of here”. Luca said.
“Oh don’t give me that legend stuff now. I’m talking cold hard facts here”.
“And because your ‘cold hard facts’ tell you we can escape you give up and wait to die?” Luca said barely controlled anger. He stepped closer to Kerrson.
“Faith won’t help us here. You stories are just that stories”. Kerrson looked back at his console.
“Well I chose to have faith that we can find a way back. Maybe I am a wrong and you are right, if you are will that mean you die an happy man? No, you will die a bitter twisted man. I will die with the hope that there is a way back”.
“Well you won’t have long to hope”. Kerrson pointed to the screen as he worked the console. “One of the gunships made it though with us”.
The screen showed the large blocky form of an association gunship rising above the horizon of the planet.

#

“How far out is it?” Arun asked as he quickly slipped back behind the pilots console.
“Not in weapons range yet. They will be within in a minute”.
“Savanna”. Arun nodded to her, but she was already heading from the bridge to the turret. “Any sign they know we are here?”
“They can have missed us…”. Kerrson muttered as he operated the controls. “…but I don’t see any sign of powering up weapons. Power fluctuations all the time however. They must have taken heavy damage”.
“Let’s hope so”. Arun hit the intercom control. “Savanna, hold off powering weapon systems for the moment”.
“Not sure I’m going to be able to anyway, I’m as ready as I can be here”.
“Incoming message from the gunship, they are requesting video?”. Kerrson looked confused.
“Okay, video good, they must be badly damaged to. They wouldn’t use video unless they wanted to talk. Open channel”.
The screen switched to show a long thick, bulky looking man in a grey uniform. He was inured and the uniform blood stained. Arun smiled, he knew the man.
“Annic Nova. Heed to, power down all non-essential systems and stand by for boarding”. The man said without really looking at Arun.
“Oh come on Raven, you can do better than that for an opening gambit in negations”.
The man on screen, Captain Tarron Raven, took a long look at Arun. “Arun Drake, I didn’t believe you would still be alive, but then I get a red message saying there is a high crimes fugitive attempting to run from the Horizon system. And here you are”.
“Better, but you’ve not started negations yet”. Arun was enjoying this.
“The Association does not negotiate with high criminals and traitors”.
“The Association might not, but what will you do. It’s just you here now, there are no battle cruisers and armies of troupers to back you up now”.
“I have troupers and a gunship, that is more than enough to take your pitiful little band…”.
“So why haven’t you?” Arun interrupted, he stood up. “And why are you, the captain sending video? You are badly damaged and are trying to bluff us. We know how badly damaged you are, we know you haven’t powered weapons up. Procedure dictates that you would have done that before now, so you can’t have any working weapon systems”.
Raven glanced off to his side and said nothing for a few moments. “You haven’t powered your weapons either”.
“So at least your sensors are undamaged. Yes, that’s right, but we don’t have standard procedures to follow and you might remember I was never one for sticking to procedures anyway”.
“You are bluffing”
Arun folded his arms and smiled. “Maybe, maybe not. Do you want to take that risk right now? At close range like this, with damage to your hull and us having lots of time to line up a good shot”.
Arun and Raven exchanged glances for a few moments. “No you don’t have any weapons”. Raven smiled.
“If that’s the case then we need to talk. So talk. Do we stand a better chance of getting back together or separate?”
“You will be coming back with me…”
“Yes”. Arun interrupted. “I know The Association needs me alive and you have no idea why that is do you?”
“You are to be returned for trial and you will be returning with us”. Raven said again forcefully.
“You really do have no idea” Arun said with a smile.
“I do not need to know, to do my duty”.
“Good defence that. Ignorance. Anyway you have no weapons and we clearly have something you want, which is why you are talking to me right now and not trying to board us, so talk”.
Raven looked long and hard at Arun. Arun just smiled. He clearly had the upper hand here. Raven sighed, he knew Arun had won this.
“We need life support supplies”.
Arun nodded, his face serious now. “How long do you have on your current supplies and how many crew do you have?”
“We have no more than 5 hours of good air left. We’ll be dead in 7″.
“And how many crew?” Arun asked. He knew Raven didn’t want to tell him because it weakened his position, but he also knew that having asked for life support supplies, Raven could hardly keep this secret. “Seven”. Raven said quietly.
Seven crew out of a normal compliment of 55. They had been hit hard. Arun once again was grateful that he had met the best jump space pilot there was. Arun shook his head, he knew the sort of crew those ships would be carrying.
Arun turned to Luca. “What’s our situation?”
“With 5 extra people, we have…” He worked the controls. “…a day”.
“Mmm…we will have to try and collect more stores from the planet below to have any chance of doing this. We can collect your crew and go down to the surface at least then we can use the atmosphere there while we work things out”.
“No”. Raven said sternly. “I’m not going to give you all of the cards here. We swap crew members, hostages if you like and we go down in your ship”.
“Sorry, but I don’t think you have any cards to play here”. Arun said with a small smile. “We don’t have to help you and if we didn’t you would be dead in 7 hours”.
“Oh but you do have to help us. Firstly I know you remember, you won’t leave my crew to die like that. And if you do, you lose the way out of here and you have to live out the rest of your life on the planet below”. It was Raven’s turn to smile now.
“You would just say that anyway to save your own skin, I know you! And in any case it has been a long time since you knew me. People change”.
Raven nodded. “Maybe, but I’ll guess you haven’t changed that much”.
Arun knew he was right, he wasn’t about to let the seven crew aboard the gunship die slowly like that. Raven could be planing some sort of trap, there could be a lot more crew onboard and he could be planing to storm the ship. But Arun knew there was still something he wanted, beyond Arun, something he couldn’t risk losing in straight fight. I wonder what it is? Arun asked him self.
“5 minutes”. Arun said as he closed the channel and turned to face his own crew.
“You are not going to fall for that are you?” Kerrson asked before Arun could even draw a breath to speak.
“If he is telling the truth, we can’t leave them to die”.
“Why not?” Kerrson asked.
“It is simply not right” Luca told him.
“Yes morals and ethics are nice things to have but when your opponent has none, they are a very expensive luxury. The could cost you your life!”.
“So we need to know if Raven is lying or not. I know the man and my feeling is that he isn’t. But he’s a slippery customer and I need to know. Which is where you come in. Can you get any clue from the sensors if there is any truth to what he is saying?” Arun asked Kerrson. “I need to know now”.
Kerrson sighed and looked at the console. “Yes I can tell. I could look for hull breaches, signs of oxygen gas and water around the ship from leaks, that sort of thing…”.
“But?” Arun prompted.
“Why would you believe me. I could say that he has no problems and there could be a full crew aboard. You would have to say no to him then”.
Arun looked Kerrson straight in the eyes. “And if they did know a way home, you would be stuck here with the rest of us. You have to take the chance”.
“And anyway I trust you”. Arun added with a smile.
“And you are going to do this no matter what I say?”
Arun nodded after a few seconds thought.
“It’s just as well that there is a thin cloud of air and water vapour around the gunship then. But just remember, they will only need you till we get out of here and if they know the way they aren’t going to tell us until the very last second”.
Arun nodded again. “I know that, but we only need them until we get out of here and if they can work out the way back in just a few hours then I’m so so can we. Start thinking on that”.

#

Arun turned back to the screen and reopened the channel. “We will help you restock your life support. The plan is you transfer over to the Annic Nova and we head down to the surface, we gather what we can. You then let us know your idea for getting out of here”.
“No”. Raven said simply. “We will not leave our ship here unmanned”.
“Why? It’s clearly not in a fit state to fly at the moment you are leaking air right now and the we have enough space for all of you. We can refill the Annic Nova much more quickly than we could your gunship. You can’t land, we can”.
Raven was clearly having problems countering Arun’s argument, he didn’t reply for a few moments. “My ship is part of this deal. It is not negotiable”.
“Very well, but tell my why that is the case. Do you have fully functioning power and drive systems? Will you be able to make it back under your own power, when we get back?”
Raven didn’t answer. “Look we have to be partners in all this. You need to drop all of this Association stuff here, it’s not going to work. There is no Association here, it’s just your crew and my crew. So why is your ship part of the deal?”
“It has to be that way. You have to accept that. You are not going to leave us to die here, I know, so accept that part of the deal”.
Arun paused. “Okay, I do. But that still doesn’t change things. All of us come down to the planet surface in the Annic Nova. You ship will still be there and we can return to it when we are restocked, but I’m not going to be a freight service just continually refilling your ship which is clearly a leaking bucket!”.
“I can’t risk leaving the ship unmanned, the systems are to unstable and…”
“A-ha!” Arun cried, triumphantly. “So your ship is basically a wreck. Why is it still important to you?”
Raven gave Arun an evil look. “Forget the ship. We will salvage what we can from here and travel to the planets surface in your ship”. He said bitterly.
“Then you will fill us in on your idea?” Raven nodded.
“Okay. Well will be along side shortly and ready to take you aboard”.
Arun closed the channel.
“You fool” Kerrson muttered. “You have just killed us all”. He turned from his console and left the bridge.
Arun glanced around the bridge. Luca was the only one left there. They exchanged glances for a few moments.
“Do you think I did the right thing?” He ask Luca.
“Its not my place to question you”. Luca said.
“I didn’t ask that. You have your opinions, even if you don’t express them”.
Luca nodded. “True and yes you know in the same place I would have done the same thing. We couldn’t leave them to die there like that. But I fear, Kerrson could be right, our ethics here will probably be used by this Raven to come out on top at the end of this”.
“Maybe, but I know Raven and that gives me the upper hand”. Arun sat back down at the pilots console.
“Lets hope he hasn’t changed much since you last met him”.
Arun thought about this as he started to manoeuvre his ship to bring him along side the gunship. Had he done the right thing, yes he had done the right thing, the moral thing, but in this case was that right for his crew? Was there anything else I could have done? He asked him self. It was pointless to speculate on this he knew, but that didn’t stop him from running things back in his mind. Back to the negotiations with Raven, beyond that to the ‘false’ escape from the Association jump ships and even to the escape from the port authorities on Horizon.
No, he told him self. Doing anything other than what he did would have resulted in death for him and his crew. Maybe that was still certain at this point. There was not guarantee that Raven had a plan, this might all be trap. If he did it might not be workable, even if that was the case, the Annic Nova, might never be able to jump again.
Arun shook his head. All of this because he had helped Kerrson. Yes Kerrson had come along with much needed money at the right time when he needed the help, but Arun had gone far beyond what he had been paid for. Yes the point at which the course of events had become invertible was when he had agreed to help Kerrson. Maybe it was fitting that he could well die here?
Along with the rest of my crew, Arun added in his head.

The Annic Nova was now along side the gunship and had almost matched it’s speed.
Next to the large blocky, slab like design of the gunship, the Annic Nova’s odd anchor like shape looked lightweight and graceful.
As Arun carefully slowed the Annic Nova, the docking ports drew level. The readouts on Aruns’s pilot console told him that they where traveling .2 millimetres per second faster than the gunship, well within the tolerances for the docking tube given the mass of the two ships.
“Okay that’s it. Extend the port”. Arun spoke in the the intercom. The rest of his crew where by the airlock. Arun checked the console one last time and sure everything was safe, he headed down there as well.
As he walked, he still wrestled in his mind with the decision he had made. He had to show to his crew that he was sure it was the right one, but the problem was Arun, wasn’t 100% sure it was. There where very few options open to him and teaming up with Raven and his crew seemed to be the right one. Arun knew that Raven would be looking for a chance to get the upper hand here, but the fact they where on his ship would give him the upper hand, won’t it? Arun worried, there where more of them and if so of his ships troops had survived, they would be very difficult to handle. They where trained for fighting in the confided space of ships corridors. Arun hoped that Raven would be smart enough to see that the more of them there where the better their chances of getting home.
Arun arrived at the airlock.
His crew was there waiting, all bar Annalaver. Kerrson was ready, a nasty looking pistol in his hand. Savanna was armed too, she carried the traditional long narrow blade of her people. Luca clearly didn’t approve of Savanna arming her self, but he had not stopped her, Arun wondered what discussions had preceded that. Alex as of course not armed, his protocols forbade him from carrying weapons. He had managed to clean up his damaged to remove the damaged part of his arm. The stump of it hung loosely from his shoulder. It looked very wrong.
“Not armed?” Savanna asked, sounding very surprised. She pulled another knife from a sheath on her back and offered it to Arun. 
He shook his head. “No thank you. We don’t want to start any thing off by accident”.
Kerrson shook his head. “If you are going to arm your self at least don’t bring a knife to a gun fight”. He offered Arun a small pistol.
“No. By all means arm you selves, but no weapons drawn”. He looked at Savanna and Kerrson.
“But, you don’t trust this man. He has tried to kill us all…” Savanna started.
“No, he needs me alive and at the moment he needs us all. There will be no fighting, no weapons drawn”.
Kerrson holstered both pistols. “He might want you alive, but I have a death sentence on me. If they try that I see as threat to me, I will take action”. His words edged with steel. Arun knew he would do what it took to protect him self, even at the cost of everyone here. Maybe it’s not Raven I should be worrying about here.
For a moment Kerrson and Arun stared at each other. The moment was broken when the airlock started it’s cycle.
“Seven of them as Raven said”. Luca watched the small monitor by the airlock door. “Two troopers dressed in full armour. I can’t see any other weapons at the moment”.
“See! He’s not coming for our help, he’s coming to take us in”. Kerrson hissed as his hand moved to the holster. Arun put his hand on Kerrson’s arm and stepped forward to the airlock door. He was now standing between Kerrson at the door.
“The troopers are behind the others, but they have weapons ready”.
Savanna when for her weapon now. “Steady”. Arun said. “We are not going to start anything here”.
“Oh yes, so we can die, knowing that we didn’t start it”. Kerrson said, his voice dripping in sarcasm.
Arun glanced behind him, but then the airlock door started to open.
Standing in front of the group as Raven. He was tall and thin, his face looking pale and haggard. He was dressed in full uniform, but it was hardly parade ready. The uniform was creased, torn and had been splattered with some fluids, maybe blood. Arun noticed he was armed with the standard side arm. He stepped out of the airlock.
“Granted” Arun said with a little grin.
“What?”
“It’s customary to ask permission to come aboard when boarding another captains ship, but you are welcome. This is my crew Luca, Alex, Savanna…”
“I know all of your names from the warrants for your arrests”. Raven said casting a critical eye of Arun’s crew.
“Oh good. That saves the introductions then. Who are you crew?” Arun asked.
Raven stepped future in and the others came through. Savanna stood back, her hand still on her knife. Kerrson held his position by the door way to the common room, but had his hand ready by his pistol.
Raven sighed. “This ensign Michels, sensor ops and comms. Crew chief Adams, mission specialists Sung and Seaton. Troopers Karrg and Kahn”.
Michels was a small man with short cropped blonde hair and baby blue eyes. He looked very young and oddly nervous for a man of his large, muscular build. Adams was a much older man, his face was worn and scarred, by both age and accidents or maybe battles, his white hair was wild and unkept, but his beard and moustache where carefully tended. Both where dressed in standard ship board uniforms. Adams had baton on his belt, but Michels was unarmed.
The mission specialists’, Sung’s womanly curves where made clear by her tight fitting grey jump suit. She was a small woman, with short brown hair. Arun thought she looked extremely attractive, even in her current state of looking pale and drawn from exhaustion. Seaton, the other mission specialist clearly had some Fabian blood in him, he had he tall elongated shape and upward pointing, almond eyes a pure blood Fabian, but skin was to pink, lacking the strange golden sheen of the true blood. He was a half blood or maybe less. Arun though he and Sung where partners, something in the way they moved together and looked for where the other was. He’d seen the same thing with Luca and Savanna. Love was found in the oddest places, Arun though.
“Ah gentlemen, no hiding of faces here, lose the helmets”. Arun said stepping in front of the two troopers before they could enter the ship properly. Both of them looked to Raven.
Raven looked around the small space, it was now crowed with 12 people in it. “Very well, troopers remove your helmets”.
Even with the helmets off Arun wouldn’t have been able to tell which one was Karrg and which was Khan. Their green scaly skin, vaguely reptilian shaped heads and yellow slit irised eyes where just to different from human norms for him to spot the differences. They where of course Pavarians, normally called lizard men by uninformed humans. Arun had known some Pavarians in the past, he knew that while they weren’t the smartest kind around, they where very loyal and had a very old culture. They where not the stupid barbarians many made them out to be.
“Good. Thank you. First some rules. This is my ship and so my rules apply here. You are still technically under Captain Ravens command, but he is under mine as of now. There will be no need for weapons here…” Arun cast a glance at Kerrson. “…while we are not what you could call friends, we all allies. If you feel the need to carry a weapon then carry it, but the use of a weapon here will be juged by my very harshly. You do not have full run of my ship, for the moment you are limited to the crew quarters, common room and the main corridor, anywhere else is off limits unless you are accompanied by one of my crew. You are not however prisoners. There will be no settling of old scores either, no vendetta’s. We all have lost here today and we have one common task, to get home”.
Arun looked around the room. “Got that?”.
Raven nodded ever so slightly. “Good then, welcome abroad”. Arun said with a grin.

Both Arun and Raven oversaw allocating the crew of the gunship to there new quarters. With that done supplies where brought across. The gunship may have been lacking in air and water, but what it was not short of was food. Rations for 45 wen’t a long way when feeding just 7.
Kerrson watched like a hawk, his hand never far away from his pistol. Savanna however seemed more relaxed now. Arun wondered if she and Luca had been talking about this.
Arun stopped by the sick bay. Alex was there tending monitoring Annalaver.
“How is she”. Arun asked quietly.
“She is still sleeping. Her blood sugar and electrolyte levels are returning to normal. There isn’t anything else I can do now, she just needs rest. But I wouldn’t recommend letting her pilot through jump space for a few days yet. It does take a large physical and mental toll on pilots”.
Arun nodded. “And you?”, he asked with a sigh.
“I’m still fully functional, but my condition and operational effectiveness will only deteriorate with time. I have….”
Arun raised his hand, he didn’t want to know, well he did want know, but not in the clean clinical terms Alex would give him. No one should know when they are going to die that accurately.
“Just let me know when you need to stop and…and I’ll make sure we will do what we can for you”.
“The need for lubricant will be reduced if I restrict my movements. But nothing will…” Again Arun stopped him. He put his hand on Alex’s shoulder. “Okay. You can probably be most use here now anyway. Keep you eye’s on Annalaver and make sure she gets better. She is probably the only one that can get us out of here”.
Arun turned and to leave. He had to know. “And Alex, how long? I don’t need any details, just how many hours”.
“4″ Alex told him. Without turning to face him Arun nodded and the left.

Raven was on Arun’s bridge. That bothered Arun. He knew it shouldn’t, they where allies now, but still it didn’t seem right. The embodiment of the Association at it’s worse, the cold hard logic and officiousness of it, the endless bureaucracy and stupidity of it, was on the bridge of the ship which had given Arun his freedom from it. And it was people like Raven that had made the Association this way. It didn’t use to be so bad.
Of course Raven wasn’t alone. Luca and Savanna where with him. Savanna still didn’t trust the man, Arun could see. Her people where not good at hiding emotions. That’s probably why they became warriors, Arun through.
She was probably right not to trust him. She didn’t know him, Arun did, he had after all been Ravens Captain and mentor for good deal of his officer training. So Arun had even less reason to trust him, but at least Arun through, he wouldn’t try anything until the route back home was secured. Until then Arun could trust that Ravens desire to survive would override his loyalty to the Association.
Luca seemed clam and collected. Nothing seemed to throw the big man. Sometimes Arun wondered if it was Luca’s faith that gave him this. A faith that at the end, whatever happened to Luca, he believed he would move on in to the Star Lords realm.
Raven had his escort with him, one of the Pavarian troopers, still armed.
“Right, is she ready to be left here in orbit”. Arun asked Raven. He just nodded, only briefly glancing an Arun.
Arun detached the docking tube and moved away from the now empty gunship.
“So are you ready to tell us about your way out of here now?” Arun asked, he was sure he knew what the answer would be.
“And have you jettison us out in to space? No not yet. When we have the supplies we need and are back on our own ship. Then I will let you know”.
Arun shurged. He hadn’t been wrong with his guess at Ravens answer. “Okay so you have been in orbit around this world longer, I assume, so do you have any ideas or suggestions where we should land?” Arun brought up an image of the world below them. It was dark, but for the odd faint flashing lights constantly shifting over it.
“Yes, we noticed an area that was clear of the faint lights you see here. We though at first the dark areas are seas and some of them no dbout are, but this one seemed to have a regular structure in it”.
“A building?” Arun asked.
“That is what Michaels thought yes”. Raven said cooly
“Okay, can we get Michaels on sensors here. If there is any sort of civilisation down there that could be a great help”.
Raven just nodded with a thin cold smile.
With Micheals, Adams came to the bridge as well. Kerrson followed them in.
It was getting crowed on the bridge, Arun thought. To many Association people and not enough of my own to watch them. As if Luca knew what Arun was thinking, he nodded to Savanna and she slipped away.
Micheals settled in at the console. It was seemingly quiet different to the one he was used to. He would repeatedly frown, when something didn’t work in the way, but this was followed by the smile of understanding after a short while. All this time Kerrson watched over his shoulder, never offering any help.
It took only a few minutes for him to work out there position over the planet and direct the working sensors to the point where the mystery object would shortly emerge over the horizon. It was a tense few minutes however.
Arun manuvered the Annic Nova to a better position to see the object.
“The object is coming over the horizon…now”. Micheals said. “We should start to get images shortly”. He put the processed sensor data on the main screen. At first the view was just black, no detail at all, but as the Annic Nova’s orbit brought it closer to the object, some detail started to emerge.
The details where sketched out in a glowing green colour. There was a compound, flat and surrounded by a circular wall. Inside the compound there where a number of smaller structures. They where scattered around the compound with now apparent pattern beyond the obvious fact that along one axis of the circle everything was symmetrical. The smaller structures where all blocky in appearance, in stark contrast the the huge 3 sided pyramid that dominated the centre of the compound. One structure sat on the compound wall on the what looked to be the centre line of the place, a gatehouse? Arun wounded.
No one spoke as the detail built up on the screen. “That’s all the detail we are going to get on this pass”. Micheals broke the silence.
“How large is it” Arun asked. Micheals glanced at Raven who nodded slightly.
“The outer wall is 2.7 kilometres in radius”.
“Easily big enough for us to land in”. Arun whispered under his breath. “And that is the only object you’ve seen on the surface?”.
Micheals nodded. “Everything else is either some sort of forest or ocean. Well that we have seen so far”.
“How much of the surface have you mapped”. Kerrson asked from behind.
“29% at this point”.
“It must have been left by the Star Lords” Luca said in awe under his breath.
“What?” Adams growled. “You heathen!” Raven sighed.
“I will not stay in the same ship as some one that denies the obvious glory of the great ones creation. You demean us all by your presence”. Adams stormed towards Luca’s console. Luca didn’t flinch. He just stared at Adams. His look was that of pure hatetred.
“Chief Adams” Raven called from behind him. Adams ignored it.
“You have nothing to say to me unbeliever”. Adams turned to face Raven. “I will not stay in the same ship as this heathen!”
“Then you’ll been needing a space suit to get back”. Arun told him.
Adams turned back to Luca. “Leave, unbeliever”, he spluttered just inches from Luca.
“No. I will not. You have no power over me. Not here, not now. People like you forced my family from their home. You won’t do that again with me”.
“A family of unbelievers! They should to be neutered. We…”
It was the first time, Arun had ever seen Luca, look like angry. Normally the man’s size was enough to dissuade any threats, but Adams didn’t seem to notice that Luca was easily twice his weight and bulk.
Luca grabbed Adams jumpsuit and hulled him up. Adams feet were only just on the floor.
“Little man, I have been chased from my home, by your kind. My family was persecuted and hounded because of people like you. But I bear you no ill will, I believe differently from you, but the difference is that I don’t force my beliefs on others. I would not normally even do this to some one, but you have stepped over a line. Be sure that you don’t step any further of that line or you will get your wish and I’ll send you back to your ship without a vacc suit”. Luca said very slowly and deliberately. The then let Adams go.
Adams hand when to the baton on his belt
“Adams. Stand down now”. Raven ordered. Adams hand stopped over the weapon. “Strike me and you will live to regret it, I promise you that”. Luca said and Arun knew he meant it. He had seen that look in mens eyes before, but never in Luca’s. He didn’t want to think what a man like Luca could do in that sort of rage.
“Stand down!” Raven shouted. Adams looked at Raven and then back at Luca.
Adams muttered something almost inaudibly under his breath. He then turned and left.
Arun wondered if Luca was going to follow him. He knew the man, he trusted him, so he didn’t want to check that he wasn’t going to follow him. But he knew what that sort of rage could do to a man. Arun decided that Luca was calm enough not to follow Adams and he didn’t want to belittle the man by checking that he wasn’t.
“Right let’s get us down on the surface then”. Arun said, his voice breaking the uncomfortable silence.