Pass
The icy rock fell slowly inward. Passing the outer gas giants, the first flaring of its coma sparkled against the backdrop of stars. As if a switch had been thrown, the tiny pinprick of light expanded into a hazy, glowing mass.
One and three quarter hours later, light reflected from that mass reached a searching lens. Endlessly hovering above the bright blue third planet of the star once and more recently again known as Rukbat, the lonely sentinel stood watch.
Once one of three, now only the Yokohama remained. A proud warship, survivor of a war now barely a footnote in the history of the world from which she came. The troopship was refit for one final mission, to lead a small fleet to the far reaches of the Sagittarian Sector for the founding of an agrarian colony. Her mission fulfilled, she and her two smaller sisters were retired to a stationary orbit over the original landing site, where for two and a half millennium they slumbered.
Awakened for a belated curtain call, the three colony ships sacrificed their great engines to nudge the red wanderer that regularly threatened the blue world into a safe orbit. The two smaller ships, their fuel near exhausted were removed from their orbits by the same creatures who'd transported the engines to the wandering planet, and once more, men carefully closed down the Yokohama's systems.
But the slumber was fitful, as the sensors and the ship's great telescope were left active, reporting to the reactivated ground station. New programs had been written and uploaded. New search parameters were encoded.
The arriving light triggered the new programs which analyzed and cataloged the fuzzy object. In several months, the comet would become visible to the people on the planet below. Detecting no immediate threat, the information was handed over to other programs for cataloging of its mass and composition. As the data moved in circles within the Yokohama's computer mainframe, one program, really more of a back door hack into the great ship's military database, sniffed out something suspicious.
Unheard by anything living, combat alerts sounded throughout the great ship. Declaring their priority over all other systems, the military programs took command of the vessel, aiming the telescope and the most powerful sensors toward the in-falling object.
The programs queried the bridge, seeking the authority to take action. Receiving no reply, they called up the ground station. Deep in the the night below, there was no one awake to respond to the summons. It's priorities not yet fulfilled, the system scanned it's list of authorized users. Selecting it's most recent entry, it accessed the ground station and pulled the contact information for the entry posted fifty years before.
In the western foothills of the northern continent, a lonely old man slowly walked the corridors he used to run when he was but a boy. The communicator in the robe of his pocket warbled.
"Hello?" The old voice quavered in the receptors.
"Jaxom of Ruatha?" The command protocol inquired.
"Yes." In spite of the vagaries of age, the voiceprint confirmed his identity for the system.
"Authorization request, priority alpha. AIVAS imperative thirty-one."
"Do what you will!" The old man shouted into the device "Stupid kids playing..." The connection clicked dead.
Accepting the first sentence as the authorization the system required, the protocols fully activated the ship's systems. For the first time since the Yokohama had been mustered out after the Nathi War the computer systems came fully alive.
Defensive Weapons – Screens charged
Offensive Weapons – None available
Drives- Inoperative
Thrusters – Minimal
Crew -Absent
Sensory – seventy-five percent
Probe Garage – One probe. Functionality test in progress
Test complete. Probe and launch tube functional.
Probe Away.
Jetting away from the ship, the probe focused all of its sensory on the inbound object. The ship's command system analyzed the results of all of the colonists attempts to send probes to the wandering planet. Applying that knowledge, the combat systems selected a low observable, standoff approach to the comet.
Before the probe was halfway to the comet, the system had already confirmed what it had suspected. The rock was dragging thread ovoids behind it. In eight months, Pern was once more going to be targeted by it's ancient foe.
The command program again checked it's protocols. Logging into the ground facility, it accessed the core functionality.
'Restore . ai . execute'