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Chapter 14 - Space Part 1
Claire had been confined to bed after her injury at the hands of Franklin, the injury was healing well but much to her chagrin TJ had forbidden her from working or doing any major exercise for at least a week or so. So she was bored out of her mind. She had been allowed to do some target practice with her newly modified energy pistol which she carried with her all the time now but that was about it.
Vanessa had dropped in to talk to her as often as she could and Eli came to visit her a few times but when they left Claire quickly became bored again so she asked Young if she could accompany him to Earth via the stones.
"Sorry Claire but TJ made it very clear that you were to rest here on Destiny till she gives you the okay" he said and she almost groaned in annoyance, she felt fine and nodded before heading off to her quarters hoping to try and sneak some work in. She was nearly there when she heard some noise to her right and looked over to see Colonel Young being restrained by Scott and Greer and rushed over to help the two men while Caine took the stone off the pad and immediately Young stopped struggling and looked around to see what was happening
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"You might have imagined it" Camille said as the senior staff of Destiny met in Young's quarters to discuss what had just happened. Apparently Young instead of going back to Earth had ended up in some kind of alien facility or ship and one of them had possessed his body.
"My imagination is not that good" Young said "So the question is what the hell is going on? How are these aliens interfering with the stones and how to resume contact with Earth?" and he looked at them expecting an answer
"Maybe they have a communication system that works along the same principle as the stones and the signals are getting mixed up by accident or…" Claire suggested as the ranking scientist, wishing they knew more about how the stones worked. Scott who was to her right didn't like the way she had hesitated and neither did the others
"Or what?" Scott asked and Claire grimaced before saying
"That they intentionally hijacked the system to disrupt our communication with Earth and put a member of their own people on Destiny" Claire said grimly hating to have to consider the possibility, the last thing the crew needed was an enemy. They were only just learning how to manage the ship and still could not control it.
"If they attack could we protect ourselves?" Wray asked who had recently started to exercise with Claire, Vanessa, TJ and Chloe.
"Depending on what level of technology they have possibly" Claire said before explaining "We can only bring roughly half of the ship's weapons online at the moment as well as the main battery and the shields should protect us for a while but given the condition of the ship I would advise against a battle if possible" Claire told Young giving her opinion.
Young looked at her and nodded before saying "Right Claire from now on you're in charge of the science team see if there's anything you can do to" and she nodded before leaving to go and attend to her new duties.
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Claire arrived in the control interface room to see most of the team already present and in deep conversation, so deep that they hadn't noticed her yet and Claire was about to announce herself only to stop when she heard what they were saying
"It's got to be Young, Rush was a threat to him and he had Scott leave him behind" Brody was telling the assembled civilians. Claire gritted her teeth as she heard the engineer trying to stir up trouble with his suspicions
"Come on, the Colonel might be strict but exiling Rush to a lifeless planet for the sake of a grudge" Lisa Park said not wanting to believe that their leader would commit such actions
"Yeah right like he wouldn't do something 'for the good of the crew'" Brody said sarcastically and Claire saw the looks of doubt and uncertainty on the faces of the others scientists at Brody's words and Claire decided to stop this in its tracks. She stepped into the room and cleared her throat. They all turned to face her surprised and uncomfortable giving what they had just been talking about.
"Claire how are feeling?" Volker asked her and she gave him a tight lipped smile before saying
"Fine now what have you guys been talking about?" she asked testing them. The reaction was instant they looked down so to avoid her gaze except for Brody who looked her straight in the eyes and said nothing
"Well then let's put the record straight shall we" Claire said with a cold edge to her voice that sent a chill down their spines "There's no conspiracy, there's no plot, the simple truth is that Rush got caught in a rockslide and Scott couldn't get him out in time so the Colonel ordered Scott back so he didn't lose both of them clear?"
The rest of them looked ready to accept Claire's version of events but Brody seemed determined to play conspiracy theorist and he spoke out
"All we have is Scott's word" and Claire cut him off angrily making the other people in the room jump
"Scott doesn't have it in him to pull off something like your suggesting, leaving a man to die with no way on purpose. Why are you going on about this Adam?" she asked shortly "Just before it happened we had put Rush on trial for all the things he's done and still you hang on his word" she finished and the group looked at him expectantly but he seemed unable to answer. He believed in Rush, he couldn't explain why it was just a feeling, a subconscious impulse to do so. He couldn't explain it.
"Good because I will not tolerate that kind of mob attitude on my team" Claire told them and they looked at her shocked "Yes its official I'm the head of the science team now"
"That can't be right, you're too young" Brody said startled but the look in her eye clued him in that she was telling the truth
"Well tough because you work for me now, if you think I'm going to tolerate any shit then think again. If you have a problem you can also leave" Claire told him firmly meaning every word. Some of the people in the room were good scientists and engineers, she didn't want to lose them but she wasn't going to tolerate any insubordination and trouble making when she was in charge. She looked at the assembled group like she was daring anyone to try and challenge her but they backed down and Claire gave them a smile saying
"Good, now then let's get to work" she said and assigned them their tasks.
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A few hours later the ship dropped out of FTL and came into range of a planet. They dialled it up and sent a Kino through and found the planet had a habitable atmosphere with purple vegetation.
"Purple Plants. Are you kidding me?" Scott asked in the gate room when they looked at the image the Kino had sent back. Claire, Brody, Young and Scott had gathered around the console.
"Well purple chlorophyll is sensitive to red and infrared light. The planet's probably orbiting a red dwarf" Brody explained and Young took note of the readings
"Well the Kino says there are breathable atmosphere, water and oxygen" Young said questioning Brody on how it was possible.
"Well I'm concerned about potential solar flare activity. Spot radiation" Brody told them and Young took his concerns to heart
"Right then let's suit up" he said planning to send an expedition to the planet they'd have to be in environmental suits so he and Scott left to get ready and Claire went to help when Vanessa came running down the corridor out of breath before saying desperately
"Sirs! You've got to see this" and they all ran to the observation deck and their breath nearly stopped in their lungs as they looked out of the large viewing port "It just showed up" Vanessa told them as they saw two alien ships hovering close to Destiny.
Claire, Scott and Young all left the deck and headed to the Control Room where Eli was on duty
"Bringing it up" he said when they arrived and Claire went to work at the other console and the holographic screen appeared showing the alien ships. They all stared at the image while Claire tried to recall her first contact protocols that Daniel had taught her hoping that this would go well.
"What's it doing?" Eli asked and Scott reported
"Nothing yet. It's just sitting there" and Claire asked
"Should I open communication channels?" and Eli said
"There's no way they'd understand us" but Young turned to Claire and said "Do it"
Claire went to work on the console while Eli, Young and Scott looked intently at the image of the ships and Scott remarked
"Two alien encounters in one day, what are the odds" and Claire decided to tell him as her suspicions mounted
"Out here millions to one" and Young took note of the tone in her voice and nodded as he was thinking the same thing "Sending greeting now" Claire told them as she worked the console and sent the message hoping that they would understand it and not be a hostile species. It would sure be nice to meet a species that didn't want to kill or enslave them for a change.
"There's no way this is a coincidence I bet you I was on that ship this morning" Young said
"You figure you piqued their curiosity, they came here to check on us?" Scott asked but Young had his own theory, one that Claire shared
"I think they've been checking up on us for a while. There's no other way they could have found us so fast" Young told them and then the console reported they had received a response Claire called it up on the display just as Wray came running in and asked
"What's going on?" and Eli told her "They answered back" but when they looked over at Claire they saw the look of fear on her face
"What did they say?" Wray asked her and with considerable anxiety Claire told them
"Just one word…Surrender" and the expressions of those in the room became even tenser as the word sunk in "And they answered in English"
"How the hell is that possible?" Scott asked and Claire said
"I don't know"
"What do we do?" Wray asked and Young told Eli and Claire
"Get the weapons online" and turned to Wray before saying "Can you get the crew to the designated areas?" and Wray nodded before heading off to do just that while Eli and Claire went to work on their consoles rising the ship's defences and the colonel ordered Scott and Greer to go to the shuttle before Scott rushed off. Brody rushed in to help in the control and took up the post next to Claire while the crew rushed to get ready. Then Eli noticed something
"I think their launching smaller ships" Eli said and they saw on the screen as eight little fighter like craft left the mother ship and then they were told that only 30% of the weapons could be brought online at once because after what had happened to Riley they were still trying to find out what weapon batteries worked and which ones didn't so Rush had put limiters on in case of an overload. So the three scientists in the room went to work trying to override them so more weapons could be brought on line.
All over the ship the crew prepared as quickly as they could for battle, the civilians moved to the designated safe areas while military personnel manned their posts and Scott and Greer launched the shuttle.
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In the control room, Young pressed them to get the ship ready faster
"Hey, hey first real space battle over here" Eli said annoyed as he, Claire and Brody worked their hardest to get the ship ready and then on the monitor they saw the shuttle engage the enemy fighters. The shuttle destroyed a few of the fighters but most of them got through and on Destiny Claire and Eli powered up the turrets dotted all over the ship's hull Claire managed to bypass the lockout on the main battery and they opened fire. The first wave of fighters were shredded but through the gaps in fire from the turrets they managed to get online and started to fire their own weapons at Destiny which bounced off the shield. The ship rocked from the impacts and Eli, Brody and Claire clung to their consoles to stay upright as they worked. Sparks flew from panels as power surges ran through them from the strain being put on the shields. Brody desperately tried to boost power to the shields as they began to fail as the alien weapons drained them with every shot while Claire and Eli tried to fend them off but their own shield energy was being drained by their own weapons as well as the enemy.
In a corridor near the observation deck a panel blew and its exposed conduit electrified the whole corridor. Eli reported that it was the same all over the ship and that the weapon system was ready for this. Young didn't help matters by reminding them again that the whole crew was depending on them and Claire snapped at him
"It's important we know, the additional pressure we do not need" and Young just looked on without replying as the three civilian scientists went on with their work, hampered by the system lockout placed there by both Rush and the Ancients.
Then the situation went from bad to worse as a key conduit to the shields started to give out. Claire told Brody "Take over I need to fix that conduit" and she left the room, l running down the corridor which had gone dark and was about to reach it when she ran into Chloe and Dunning. But before they could talk a red circle appeared on the ceiling and a perfect circle of bulkhead fell revealing a brilliant white light, but as Chloe and Claire crept nearer to it they heard a clinking sound like you would from an insect before something circular was dropped down from the ceiling and all the heard was a screeching sound before they fell unconscious.
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As it climbed down from the hole it had made, the alien known as the Nakai saw the two unconscious creatures on the floor. It pondered for a moment as it considered its options; its orders where to retrieve a specimen of the other gender that this species had to complete the knowledge they had gained from the other one they had. It decided to take them both so they could gain as much data as possible. So it picked up the unconscious females and carried them back onto its small craft before heading back to their mother ship.