Ghosts In Glass (Team Beta)

Posted on Fri Apr 6th, 2018 @ 12:11pm by Captain Remas McDonald

5,161 words; about a 26 minute read

Mission: S1:2: Rubicon
Location: Zheng He, interior of the Wreck
Timeline: MD 14, 16.00PM

The Zheng He rose into the darkness and began its spiraling survey pattern through the drum-shaped interior of the wreck. On the large forward canopy, false colour sensor readings began to appear, painting the darkness into bright activity. Most of the buildings along the interior of the drum were only a three or four stories high, with only a few rising into the low teens. These were easily navigated and avoided.

On one of the interior consoles of the runabout, Remas opened a sensor panel, his eyes skittering across the data as he sought out their prize.

“Mr. Lutko, if you were a man building a ship to take Bajoran’s away from the Occupation, where would you put a bridge?” Remas mused with a smile. “If they even had a bridge. Could very well be these people were like the Bynar’s, their sensorium adapted to incorporate digital hallucinations instead of physical interfaces.”

Remas turned to look at Lutko and the others, his head looking tiny coming out of the next o his EV suit without the helmet.

“What do you think? I know a theory without proof is just navel-gazing, but it beats silence,” he said jovially.

Onir looked out the viewscreen at the interior of the ship. "Well, Bajoran design is a bit different from Federation, sir, but I would guess near the front or the back."

"Huum, we Rish tend to put our bridges in the centre of the ship. Never felt right putting the flight critical components up on top just asking for a meteor to do'em out of existing," Remas said with a chuckle. "Would anyone else like the dispute the young Science Officer's notion?"

Bryan Kenneth Braxton sat quietly at the back of the runabout, trying his best not to take up too much space. Generally a difficult task for a heavy-worlder, they ran to giant-like physiques more suited to the marines than being crammed in the back of a science runabout studying the remains of… whatever they were looking at, it was one made even harder in the EV-suit he currently wore. It was the biggest size they did, made him about the size of a tank, and it was too tight.

Leaning forward, he pushed his glasses back up his nose and studied the data on the console by Remas. “From the structure and construction, and given the background, most combat-capable vessels have their bridges…err… on the top at the front?” he said quietly, not wishing to step on anyone's toes. He did that enough with actual feet. “Humanoid design is somewhat similar. The eyes…”

"A point fairly made. As much heritage of our tribal days as anything else, we always pay homage to the head of the table. Let's try out the Lutko/Braxton theory." Remas said, turning his head to give a nod of thanks to Braxton. "Mr. Beck, you heard the men: take us to the top of this world."

"Moving," Beck replied calmly, his fingers tapping lightly on the controls as the Zheng He began to drift. Its lights played across the dark surface of the interior of the wreck, revealing the dim shadow of streets and thoroughfares.

Bryan kept his eyes and ears open as the runabout slowly ascended. It always seemed to fast for him, trying as he was to mentally note everything he saw and heard, but he knew the scans would have caught it all. Still… computers were computers. They were good, but they couldn’t yet make the leaps the humanoid, or equivalent, brain could make.

He’d once had a colleague with a true photographic memory, which was a thing to behold and one of the only times the big scientist had felt truly jealous of someone else. He’d have given his right arm for such an ability, especially in this day and age of prosthetic limbs. Instead, he made the effort to ensure he didn’t miss anything.

“The hull plating appears to be in an overlapping design,” he commented to no one in particular. “And the lack of exterior openings would suggest a defensive design.”

"When you can only make one basket to put all your eggs, you make it count for something," Remas commented from his seat.

"Look, techs and geeks hate to break this to ya'll but we're running out of room, the end cap is three hundred meters out on the port wing," Beck grumbled. With a deft work of his hands, the Zheng He pivoted around, aiming her nose up towards the approaching top of the habitation drum. A sudden sparkling glare lit up the viewport as the ship's searchlights illuminated something.

"Got a large structure up ahead. Towers massive, spanning from one side of the drums to the other right ahead of us at the end," Beck commented. Out the viewport a wireframe projection appeared, supplementing the dim view the spotlights provided. The tower did, in fact, reach up from one side and shoot across to the far side of the drum. The runabouts lights had reflected off a large glass sphere that swelled out of the middle of the tower.

"Looks like an old style lollipop dispenser," Beck commented with a wry tone to his voice.

"As good as any other place to start, even has a landing pad or some such," Remas noted, pointing to a protruding tongue of brass metal that just beneath the large glass sphere. "Land us there with a soft touch. No idea what sort of weight tolerance that has."

"No worries Cap'n, I could land the Zheng He on an egg and not crack the shell," Beck said with his usual verbal swagger.

"Like that optimism," Remas smiled, getting up from his seat and looking back at the others there. "If you've come for some exploration then this is your stop. Mr. Lutko, Mr. Braxton: you two will be our pathfinders here. This could be a command centre, it might be a tourist information kiosk. The former find me data, the later find me a map with the restrooms marked on it."

He then looked over at the exploration teams medic.

"Mr. Finanahad, how are we doing on radiation exposure? I want your eyes on us, the moment's things change you tell me," Remas explained gravely.

The nurse looked at each of his other crewmates,"Nothing out of the ordinary so far," he replied, "but I'll let you know if things change."

"Be sure ya do," Remas smiled.

Bryan gave a single nod, already focused on the mission ahead. He made sure to wait until everyone else had stood, setting their positions in his mind before moving. It was that, or inadvertently crush someone’s foot. Making his way to the airlock, he was forced to duck down to look out the viewport next to it as Beck maneuvered the little vessel down with a delicate grace on the tiny ledge. The yawning chasm below them didn’t bother him as he slid his glasses back up to settle firmly in place on his nose and put his helmet on.

Instead, all his attention was on possible computer access ports. Without knowing the origin of the vessels, there was no way of knowing what they would consider viable computer access. What he thought was an ornamental water display could, in fact, be the main computer terminal… or the latrine system. It was one thing that made trips like this so interesting. One thing he’d found though. There was always a common thread in any language or computer system. Usually mathematics. So, all he had to do was work out what kind of beings had built the ship, work out from there what the likely input method would be and go from there.

His mind going ten to the dozen with possibilities, he slid a glance sideways at Lutko. He offered a small smile as they waited for the door in front of them to open and for the Captain to give them the go-ahead.

Lutko caught the man's smile and returned it with a small one of his own.

Remas moved into the large cargo airlock along with the rest of the landing part.

"Mr. Beck and one of the Expedition Security officer's will stay with the Zheng He, the rest of us will make a surface level examination of this building. Whilst our goal is one of exploration, and not too disabling the field effect crippling the Traveller if we find such a way possible here we will take it," Remas said. As he did so he walked past each member of the landing team, a hand lingering on a shoulder plate or arm. This was no kindly gesture, but a way for his EV suits computer to quietly interrogate each suit to ensure all seals were solid and systems green.

"Mr. Finanahad is the ranking medical officer. If at any point he says you need to return to the Zheng He you do so. That goes double for me," Remas joked, and slapped his gloved hand against the exterior door control.

In silence the door yawned open, its lower half becoming a small ramp that led from the Starfleet grey of the runabout to the dark brass of the alien vessel. Remas was the first off, keeping his footing even and sure.

"Careful now the platform and the sphere above us are in the centre of the drum. That means no gravity here, so if you float off just remember your EVA training and use suit thrusters. Though the mag's in my boots are working just fi-"

Remas report was cut off as the platform began to glow. From the depths of the brass reflective surface glyphs and symbols in an alien language appeared, flickering on and off at speed until a solid golden line lead from the centre of the landing pad straight into the archway ahead.

Loren may have been a pacifist, that did not mean that he was a coward or that he was reluctant to put himself in harm's way. He'd been following closely behind the Captain. Looking down at his specially modified tricorder he said, "Sir, there's just been an uptick in the radiation levels, We're at 175 mrems, that is starting reach dangerous levels."

"When you say dangerous, are we talking lengthy talk in sickbay about the fragility of the mortal condition or very small casket lined in lead?" Remas asked, stepping around the line as the team followed it.

"Well, the EV suits have a filtration system, so right now we're safe for another hour or so at this level. After that, we're talking about a short stay in sickbay. But there's only so much radiation the suits can handle. The radiation levels just doubled in the span of five minutes. If they do that again, that's going to dramatically cut down the time we can stay here.At 800-1000 we're all going to spend a long time in isolation. If we get beyond that number, we're aborting the mission. No questions. Sir."

Lutko nodded, although the statement wasn't directed at him. Rather, he was entranced by the symbols that had appeared. "Man, a linguist would have a field day with that," he breathed, more to himself.

The symbols flickered on and off too quickly for Bryan to get a read on them. They seemed somewhat familiar, but in the way, any symbol did after you’d seen thousands of them over the years. Lifting a hand, he activated the cam on the side of his helmet, focusing on recording anything it could get of alien language. Symbols were good though, it indicated that the species they were dealing with either used visual outputs the way the federation did or were aware that other species did and had set this all up to facilitate communication. Maybe. The golden line could also be leading them into the alien equivalent of a mincer, but… Bryan was always optimistic that any new species was friendly.

The unknown he didn’t like though, was the static on his comms. Frowning, he tapped over where his commbadge sat before realizing he was suited. He kicked himself mentally. He was always doing that. Turning to catch attention, he spoke. “I have static on comms, anyone else?” A simple check would tell him whether it was just his that were affected or they had a bigger problem.

“I have static on comm's, anyone else?”

The static-laced echo sang with an electronic burr that warbled up and down the range of audible hearing. From the stiffened reactions of the others, the echo had been heard over the joint comm channel.
“Mmmmmaaaaannnnnnnn...alinguistwouldhaveafield...ddddaaaaayyyy...withthat.”

“Just EM ghosts people,” Remas said firmly, pointing a gloved hand along the glowing line. “Follow me. Keep your eyes on your footing and your breathing. This is just a broken ship. Seen a fair few of them in my day.”

As they entered into the long corridor from the landing deck the golden light remained confined in the floor, the edges of the line flickering with suggestions of patterns and symbols.

“Follow me…fooooooolow meeeeee…”

With a shrug of his shoulders, Loren took a few steps forward.

The corridors floors, ceiling, and walls were all made of brass plaques. Suggestions of flickering information could be seen on them, even too the point that if someone squinted a rough digital ghost of the Traveller could be seen floating within the metal. Remas reached out and pressed the EV suits gloves to the metal, depressing it slightly with a clicking vibration rising up through his feet.

"Broken ship. Bbbrrrrroookkkeeennn sssshhhiiippp."

"That is getting a might troubling," Remas muttered, casting his helmet lights down the corridor, catching the shadows and lines of a ladder leading up the wall and presumably to the sphere above. "Who'd like to be first up the ladder?"

For all that he was a scientist, not the marine that most people assumed he was given his size and build, Bryan was not lacking in either courage or practicality. He was the biggest of the group, and hence a bigger target which would provide more cover for the rest should the situation get… noisy in any way, shape, or form.

“I’ll go,” he commented, moving to the front of the group.

He put his foot on the ladder and started a slow ascent, keeping his eyes and ears open. The ship or someone on it appeared to be trying to communicate with them. Whether they were telling them that the Traveller or the alien ship was broken though, was anyone’s guess. Could it be some kind of AI system trapped on board after it’s passengers had left… or were there sentient beings on board after all?

“Footing seems secure,” he kept up a running commentary to those below. “Careful on the handholds though. This metal doesn’t seem to play nice with the material of the gloves.”

"Remember what I told you about not making work for Mr. Finanahad," Remas scolded, following behind the burly scientist. But he took note of the warning and found the material of the ladder to be nearly frictionless. Just enough grip to propel him upward in the microgravity.

And then he was Braxton was out, floating above the lower half of the massive glass sphere. From the inside, the dark glass could be seen to be segmented triangles laid out in a intricate grid work. Cables ran from one side of the spheres equator to the other in a loose net, a few hanging limp and slack. Not that Remas, or Braxton, were paying much attention to that.

Because plastered across the entire upper hemisphere of the glass sphere, bathing them now in its teal magnificent, was a flag known to all who donned the uniform and took the coin of the king. But it was a flag that did not deserve to be there.

The United Federation Of Planets.

“Woah…” Bryan breathed, the flag dominating his field of view. “Do we count that as a hello?” For a moment he just looked, then his brain kicked him in the ass. “Unless some system somewhere is parroting back an old signal it picked up, then I would say we’re definitely not alone in here.”

Dropping his gaze from the image above him, he started to look around. Something was feeding that image up there, which meant a way into their systems. His gaze landed on the nearest of the cables and he moved over, careful to keep his steps light and his eye out for any issues with the deck plates underfoot. He spotted a likely relay point and knelt down to look. Always look before you touch, the first rule of scientists and those who didn’t wish to get themselves blown up, he reminded himself before reaching for the toolkit attached to his belt.

"That would be ill-advised Bryan."

An alien was floating next to him. A golden, glowing alien.

Humanoid in the broad strokes, but on a second glance the human form body plan was thrown off by the second pair of arms that sprouted from halfway down the torso. Smaller than the main arms, these ended in long elegant fingers that complimented the more muscular digits of the upper set. The head that was looking directly at Bryan had the classical feature seen across most species lines: eyes, now, mouth. But they were all subtly different. The eyes curled up at the corners like a cat, and the nose was a bare surface detail. The mouth was thin, stern looking.

"You can all come up here." The glowing visage said, a supposed feminine lilt to the voice as she glowered at Bryan. She then effortlessly used the cable rigging to push her self-free and float to a higher set of cables. As she did so her form passed through a severed cable that sent streamers of golden light cascading from the holographic avatar.

Bryan had frozen as soon as the alien being appeared, then stepped back from the cables without a sound. Forget the digital warning he’d been expecting… this was far more attention grabbing. He backed up to the rest of the team, keeping his mouth shut. He already seemed to have pissed the thing off so he didn’t want to push his luck.

It knew his name. A part of him wanted to know how. Telepathic retrieval or had they mined the Traveller’s systems? Either was a bad sign.

"And bring your field medic. I will require more than rudimentary access to their 'diagnostic' equipment," she said hawkishly, a clear note of disdain in her voice. A voice that was coming out of the suit's comm gear.

The nurse had been following the exchange, wondering in his mind what this alien creature might be. Certainly, she, assuming that genders applied to the being, and were not just a mask that it put on, was fascinating, even awe-inspiring. "I'm here," he replied, "how can I help, and how do you know that we had a field medic?"


“You can help by scanning your fellow explorers,” the avatar said, imperiously gesturing to the appear in group. “As detailed a scan as your equipment can manage. The Malignant Matter does not tend to hide easily on this scale, and even your crude electromagnetic scanners should be able to detect its presence.”

“And what should happen if you find it? This Malignant Matter” Remas asked, a guarded tone to his voice.

The Avatar looked down at the Traveller away team, the long braided tail of hair coiling behind her like a snake, and she smiled. It was a small thing, a private gesture of good-natured cheer that turned sourly into the look of a predator. A tight collection of needle-like teeth were arranged behind those demur lips.

“I will excise it most thoroughly.”

Loren wasn't intimidated by the Avatar, or at least that's what he told himself. Still, he thought it a wise idea to take a step back, away from it, and to run a scan with his medical tricorder. He ran it over the Captain, Lukto, then himself and breathed out a sigh of relief, everything was normal. But then he ran it over Bryan. "Uh, sir," he said running the scan a second time, "we have a problem. There's some kind of anomaly in his gloves."

Bryan froze again, looking down at his hands. What had he touched? Nothing apart from the ladder they’d all used to ascend. But his hands had gotten near to that cable...

Lutko, on the other hand, was simultaneously entranced yet frozen in shock at the figure. He looked at Loren when he was scanned, then at Bryan. "Is it, uh... bad?" He asked the alien figure.

The tricorder buzzed in Loren's hands as its screen was suddenly filled with gibberish and nonsense code.

"Crude device," The Avatar spoke, as a soft golden radiance began to feel the chamber. "But effective at infection mitigation. The level of Malignant Matter contamination is low enough that a surface scrub will suffice. I need too many of you to burn away the careless. Hold out your hands to me Bryan."

The hologram extended one of its long upper arms to him, the four muscular digits at it tip opening in a universal gesture. Remas placed a hand on the big man's chest plate.

"I need an assurance of my crewman's safety."

The Avatar let out a long, mocking chuckle.

"You brought your crew into the fallen ashes of the Morning Star Empire. An Empire a million starships strong, a thousand worlds at our beck and call...and yet you stand amid our final testimony to the void," she smiled cruelly, as the black glass sphere around them turned even darker and speckled with bright stars and curling holographic nebula. "You came to walk through the tombs of greater kings and queens then you have ever known Starfleet. You might as well learn of that which laid us low."

Bryan stayed where he was, not moving his hands. The alien hadn’t answered Remas’s question as to his safety but that wasn’t what bothered him. If this thing had brought down an empire, a ship would be small potatoes. Taking a tiny step backward away from the captain, he broke the contact.

“No one touch me,” he murmured quietly, knowing the comms would pick up his voice. “If I’m infected I don’t want to pass it on.”

Loren too had been backing away from the being in front of them, not fully aware of his actions. When he heard Brian's words he stopped moving for a moment. Then he changed course and began walking towards him. his tricorder, thanks to the woman was useless but he still had his eyes to observe with.

To make things easier for Loren, Bryan lifted his hands, turning them slowly so the medic would be able to carry out a visual inspection without needing to touch him.

“Be careful of distance,” he offered in a low voice. “Proximity seems to be the key. I didn’t actually touch those cables. Of course, it could be something else. A defect in the gloves maybe.” He hoped it was. That way, the infection could be just isolated to him.

Lifting his head, he looked the alien directly in the eye. “What is involved in a surface scrub, exactly?” he asked carefully.

If the creature deemed him so much of a threat, he’d probably already be dead. Likewise it had said it needed too many of them… so chances were whatever it planned would not be detrimental to his survival. But still, he wanted to know exactly what he was getting himself into before they agreed to anything.

"Discomfort mostly. Your dermal layer will survive in a fashion. If I did not need you I would be more...active in my work," the Avtar took Bryans hands in her large fingers and closed around them as though in prayer. Golden light flared from between her fingers, and the skin of Bryan's hands pickled with sudden scalding heat. And then it was done, her hands unclasping.

"Your field medic will be able to treat the burns once you are in a pressurised environment. But I would incinerate the gloves to be safe. Malignant Matter can be...tricky," the Avatar spoke as the holographic display continued to evolve, and the arms of a spiral galaxy appeared. But not the Milky Way, this one only had three swollen limbs heavy with bright twinkling stars.

"Andrasti, my home. Though your science now calls it the Bootes Void. A fitting name," she said, as slowly the stars the galaxy named Andrasti began to wink out one by one. "They arrived from another place, another galaxy. Thinking matter whose sole purpose was to shroud every sun in spheres and shells of habitable worlds. Mad terraformers that defeated every armada we sent to guard our worlds, and ignored every envoy. Very plea for mercy as our worlds and ships and people were torn apart to feed their mad cycle of creation."

She reached out a hand, and one of the darkened stars swelled until it floated into her hand. A black crystal shell facetted like a diamond.

"Not a neutrino or photon escapes these shuttered suns. Were it not for their prisons and gravity, you'd never know they were there," she said thoughtfully, cracking the shell like an egg with her hand, revealing the lush green paradise smeared with its inner wall. "150 million miles across by your measurement. Grown from the ashes of an empire. They are gardeners who know their craft well."

Holy sh… Byran managed to keep his jaw locked and his lips firmly sealed as the light washed over him. It felt like the very skin was being melted off his hands, right there in his gloves. Breathing deeply, he shoved he pain to the back of his mind and attempted to concentrate on her words. "Terraforming for colonists to arrive later?" he queried lightly.

"We don't believe so. Given the Malignant Matter's fondness for eradicating local impediments to its work, our greatest thinkers believed they had outlived their creators. Or they were creating Dyson spheres and swarms where life would one day evolve naturally with all of the benefits of being able to capture all that energy. Gardeners tilling the soil, removing the weeds from their evolutionary niches," the holographic galaxy shrank down to a single system filled with what first looked like a crowded sky of stars. But these motes of lights shifted and moved in concert, resolving into the concentric rings and pickets of immense fleets of brassy starships. All of this was centred around a yellow star, with which a single blue-green world resided.

"We fought them for two-kilo years until they whittled our Empire form a galaxy straddling power to a single flickering sun. They took their time, finished their great works elsewhere. It gave us time to forge Ark's like this one. Seventeen were made, each fitted with a gravity drive designed to harness the gravitational point source of a black hole. Traceless we believed to the eyes of Malignant Matter. They are attracted you see to warp faring civilisations, it's a sign that the weeds have become too dangerous to ignore," the Avatar stated.

Then the sun at the centre of the hologram contracted sharply, flinching inwards like a puppy prone to abuse. Then it rapidly sprang outwards, throwing off the great shell of its burning atmosphere and fueled filled heart. Each of the spindle Ark's threw out great violet sails of energy that grabbed onto the nova's shock wave, riding it out into the darkness behind the edge of the Andrasti galaxy.

In their wake was only darkness and the slowly forming final nebula that marked the place where an Empire took its final act.

"For another kiloyear we sailed in the darkness of trans-galactic space. Simulated Consciousness's like myself kept our Empire alive within the flotilla, keeping the light of the Morning Star burning. We thought ourselves safe until first of Ark's went silent. And then another, and a third. We were being tracked, hunted by packs of wolves as dark as night and pitiless. I am Clee'san, the final Ark of the Morning Star Empire. My final act was to order the population of this Ark to board our sublight scouting and landing craft. We were still kilo light years from our destination, but it was a chance. They aimed for Messier 4, or the grand swirling mass of your galaxy. I stayed behind, and now..." Clee'san, the Avatar of golden light, looked down at her four hands. "...I am being consumed. The Malignant Matter swarm I have kept in abeyance for so long has been given the advantage by your arrival. I am preparing a suitable statement of discontent to be delivered shortly. I would suggest strongly you and your ships flee this combat space. I cannot guarantee your safety."

From the base of the spherical chamber, a brass cube arose from the floor. It glowed dimly, flickering with compact computational fury.

"I would request, on your voyage, you take possession of this. It is a compacted copy of my Consciousness. I cannot leave, but this can at least be of use. If you find my people, descendants of the survivors I sent off on a thousand sublight sprint for safe harbour in the swarm of stars you seek, deliver me to them. Tell them that I died still fighting, still proud to be the blazing light of the Morning Star."

And then the light was gone, the holographic simulation ended, leaving the exploration team floating in semi-darkness only illuminated by their suit lamps and the glowing foot long cube.

"That was...not what I expected today would turn into," Remas said, looking over the team. "Seem's we're on a deadline. Form a bucket brigade to help shuttle this data cube back to the Runabout. Down the shaft, and then along the corridor back to the landing deck. Remas to Runabout, prepare for a rapid boarding and ingress."

Beck, the pilot of the runabout, did not respond.

"Remas to Runabout," the Captain said, frowning as his eyes flicked up to the HUD communications panel. "My comm gear's in fine fettle. Can anyone else try and raise the Runabout?"

 

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