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“It’s a trap,” Noah said with a smug expression.
Ariana turned away from the display in the cramped flight deck to give him a direct look, “Of course it’s a trap.”
“Then why are we heading into it?”
“Because it might not be.”
Turning back to the display, Ariana instructed the computer to calculate its point of origin. Sitting in the helm seat below her, Olivia already had the FTL calculation charts open. After a few seconds of work, the computer identified the system of origin for the signal. It matched the information encoded in the distress signal itself.
“Looks like we’ll only have to make one jump and it doesn’t take us far off course,” Ariana said, studying the charts over Olivia’s shoulder, “We can check it out without losing any time getting to Triask.”
“That system looks to be pretty barren,” Olivia said.
“Perfect place for an ambush then. No witnesses.” Noah added, “You know they are counting on someone playing the Good Samaritan.”
“I’m sure you understand exactly how they think from your years as a slaver.” Olivia said, with clear maliciousness in her voice.
“Listen up kid because I’m only going to say this once.” Noah’s voice was flat and quiet, but it sent a shiver down Ariana’s spine. She and Olivia turned to face him, and the direct gaze he leveled at Olivia reinforced that feeling of threat.
“I’ve made a lot of questionable decisions in my life, some of them even I regret. But I have never willingly participated in slavery. When I steal, I steal things. When I kill, I kill people trying to kill me. When I hire a whore, the whore gets the money. I don’t use people who have no choice. You can go on hating me, but make sure it’s for the right reasons.”
The silence when Noah finished hung heavy in the air. Olivia’s contemptuous expression softened a little. Ariana gave the tension a good minute to work its way out, hoping the animosity between the two died before it could start to fester.
“Noah, secure Serene as best you can, and then get ready to either receive injured, or repel boarders. Bring Mesu down to the porter with you.” Ariana ordered, “Olivia, plot us a jump and get the next jump ready in case we need to make a quick exit. Keep us on course for PUG HQ.”
The decision made, Ariana left the flight deck and headed for the weapon control room. On the way, she reconnected her earpiece to the ship’s network, “Vlasa, your reactor modifications holding up?”
“They are operating at an acceptable level of functionality.” Vlasa intoned. The no-nonsense tone of his voice gave her a small smile. She had missed his calming effect.
“Good. I don’t know what we’re going to be jumping into, so I want full power to the new shields. But I also don’t want to leave us defenseless.”
“As you know, the reactor cannot sustain both the shields at the new power levels, and the weapons. Not unless we took other systems offline such as the FTL, sublight engines or environmental systems.”
“Shutting down environmental systems wouldn’t kill us for a few hours.”
“With the damage that system has sustained, shutting things down would impart extra strain on it to restore optimal conditions. That might result in additional, potentially fatal, damage to the system.”
“Okay, so let’s not do that. How long can the weapon capacitors hold their charge?”
“The capacitors are not designed for long-term energy storage. They could probably hold enough charge to be able to fire for about ten minutes. But that would only allow for one discharge from each.”
“One is better than none.” Ariana said as she took her place at the weapon controls, “I am charging the weapons now. Squee, when they’re ready, bring the shields up to full, and then we’ll jump.”
Several minutes of work passed before everyone reported they were ready. Ariana charged Seraph’s weapons, including the newly installed tri-cannon. Once the capacitor showed maximum charge, she disengaged the power flow. When Squee reported the shields ready, she ordered the jump and got herself ready for whatever would be waiting for them.
To her infinite delight, they didn’t jump into the middle of a minefield or a waiting barrage of weapon fire. Fortunately, space was big and setting up a minefield to catch a ship right after a jump, was prohibitively expensive. You could make an FTL jump to anywhere. Better to put any mines or weapons where you knew someone would go; such as right around a ship emitting a distress signal.
“Olivia, give us a full rotation.”
Due to the continued absence of functional sensors on the starboard side, Olivia had to put the ship into a gentle spin to see everything. The incoming data on the source of the distress signal was intermittent and lacked much detail. But even their limited sensors could identify their target.
“I’m reading one ship adrift. No evident power signature. No objects large enough to be drones or mines within range to be considered a danger.” Ariana reported to the rest of the crew. “Closest other detectable object is an asteroid point two AU.”
“That’s a Kestrel class, Captain!” Olivia shouted with evident glee.
Ariana inspected the sensor readings more closely. She recognized the profile almost immediately. There were a few minor differences, but the ship was the same base model as Seraph.
“So, if they turn out to all be dead and not bait, does that mean we get to loot her for parts?” Noah asked.
“Let’s focus on those first two things. Olivia, move us close enough to get an interior reading. We need to know if there is an atmosphere.” Arian ordered. She then switched her headset to a new network channel and started broadcasting a message into space, “Attention disabled ship. This is the Seraph. We have received your signal and stand ready to assist you. Please respond.”
The two ships moved closer together, and the sensor information slowly became more detailed. Ariana repeated her broadcast every minute until they were close enough that she would have been able to see the other ship with her own eyes if there had been a window to look out of. Then she stopped trying.
“I don’t think anyone is there to respond, Captain.” Vlasa said, “There is a major hull breach that goes all the way through. Sublight engines appear destroyed as does the FTL.”
Ariana focused her display on looking at where Vlasa had mentioned. Something had evidently punched a hole completely through the other ship. That single impact would have breached the pressure seals on at least a third of the ship.
“Analysis, Vlasa, any chance of survivors?”
“Depending on how long ago this occurred. Someone could have survived in the sealed parts of the ship for about one day. Maybe two if they had an environmental suit with them. Unfortunately, the distress beacon does not contain a timestamp on its activation.”
“That’s a pretty common tactic for pirates. That way it can transmit as long as necessary to catch someone without needing to be constantly reset.” Noah said.
“It’s also common for an off the shelf emergency beacon set by someone who doesn’t know what they’re doing.” Ariana countered, “What condition do you make for the rest of the ship? Anything worth salvaging?”
“Aside from the single hull breach, the rest of the hull appears to be intact and undamaged. Replacement sensor clusters and hull plating would be easy. Likewise, environmental controls are not in the damaged section of the ship and would have compatible replacement parts we could use.
“And if that is an M700 series as I suspect, I would very much like to get to the reactor. With certain components, I should be able to get the second reactor online. Then we could keep the shields and the weapons active at once. At least, some of the weapons.”
The prospect for restoring Seraph to working condition was very tempting. But the potential for disaster also hung heavy on Ariana’s mind. Leaving this ship alone without looking for survivors was unconscionable, and leaving behind the parts she needed to keep her ship running, would be irresponsible. But so would getting caught in a well-laid trap.
“Noah, if you had left this ship here, in this condition, what would your plan be?”
“Well, this is a relatively out of the way system. You won’t see much traffic, so you don’t want to have to wait for who knows how long. I would set up an alert to trigger when someone happened by.”
“FTL comm signals can only travel a few light years. Do you think they’re local or in a neighboring system?”
“Probably inside the nebula. Much easier to hide a base. I’d probably rig up an ion pulse mine to the ship itself. Undetectable by most commercial sensors set up like that, but powerful enough to disable damn near anything. And because of the nebula, almost any traffic you get passing through here is going to be a big score. After the mine disables something, they would have plenty of time to get here before the unwary victim got their ship functional again. And it would keep the booty intact. Battle damaged ships make for good bait, but have terrible resale value.”
Ariana frowned. An ion pulse mine was not something she wanted to contend with. But she couldn’t just leave either, “Do you think you could find and disable any rigged relay or mine that might be over there?”
“Identify, sure, if I was over there. As for disabling it, not a chance. But I know someone who could. Though, you aren’t going to like it.”
Letting out a slow breath, Ariana said, “Let me guess, Serene?”