NationStates Jolt Archive

The soft light of a holoscreen lit the room with eerie shadows. But Bill was used to darkness and shadow; he lived in them. Every government has an underside, the black ops that made sure that, no, you really, really didn't want to smuggle those elves, and sorry about this, but we've got to kill you. The ones that did what the public side of the government couldn't. Bill was the leader of that group, and had been called The Black for ... had to have been two centuries by now. He was resting on board his ship, a rare luxury these days. It had just finished a full reconditioning and refitting, it seemed these days that the only things that stayed the same were the AI's and the name, Apparition. Reports danced across his screen, intelligence, news, history, battles, and the inevitable budgets he had to approve.

Eventually he punched off his terminal and stretched. He walked slowly, his new knee was still working its way into his bone and the stiffness had yet to fade. It was also true that these days the only things that were the same about him were his brain and his name, Bill. His first name anyway, he'd long discarded his last in favor of Black. It gave him the somewhat ironic same initials as Big Brother, which some of his crew teased him about. He stared out at the stars that were his only real home. He remembered growing up on a planet, but its name eluded him now and he no longer really cared for planets anyway. They were really only refueling stops to him.

The Apparition was still a ship of the line though, though it had never been directly acknowledged by Naval Command as being real. He'd been living aboard it for the last 3 centuries as it's captain, and while the crew had changed and the stars had traveled in their paths, he was still the old man at the helm. Kept alive by replacing the bits of him that were falling off, most joked that he wouldn't die until he went down with the ship. It would probably be true.

<<Pardon me, Captain?>>

Bill sighed and turned around as the lights came up in the cabin and a head projected itself from the holoscreen. “Yes Alpha?”

<<I have an incoming message from Command, they want us to meet with a ship from Atlantian Outcasts about reestablishing ties. I think you've met the Captain of the other ship before, one Admiral Vega>>

“Heh, he's still alive?” Bill slipped into a quiet remembrance about battles fought long ago, then straightened. “Tell command we'll be at the meeting point. What name do they want us to masquerade under this time?”

<<Err, The Dark Horse.>>

“Got a real kidder at Command these days I guess. Tell the helmsman to lay in a course and execute. What's the ETA?”

<<2 days>>

.... 2 days later....

The Apparition, it's name changed to Dark Horse, hung in space at the rendezvous, waiting.

#TAG# *then goes to sleep*

A large vessel slid silently through space, shaped as a pyramid like structure. And older class of vessel, but still a good design. Its name was the Olympia, but not the same one that commanded Atlantian forces ages ago. The old one was gone and lost to wars long over.

Admiral Vega, now suprime commander of all Atlantian forces, ground and space, sat in his chair, waiting for the ship to arrive at its destination. Jump Nodes where a quicker technology then Warp, but it ment you could only travel to certian places.

But Atlantians could get by with that.

"We are approching the desegnated coordnets" said Sing, the communications officer. "Leaving hyperspace"

The flagship of the fleet, a Titan class Battleship, appeared out of a blue-colored worm-hole like structure.

"There they are" said Sing.

Vega smiled "Open a channel"

"Attention ship-this is the Olympia"

Bill had been waiting on the bridge, feet kicked up on a display that was probably for something somewhat important, but for now serving double duty as a footrest. His bridge crew consisted of an Elf and a Destronian, the Elf Fuso was at helm, and the Destronian Danx was at the engineering/science station.

<<Incoming ship from Warp. Putting it on the main screen>>

Bill started a bit in recognition. A low whistle escaped his lips, “That thing must be nearly as old as the App... I mean Dark Horse.”

<<Incoming transmission>>

<"Attention ship-this is the Olympia”>

“Alpha, reply on same channel. This is the Dark Horse, Captain Bill Black speaking. Vega, is that you ya old son of a gun?”

Bill felt strangely different, a smile had cracked his face, shuffing old worry lines and making him seem decades younger. The past few years had been full of messy jobs and quiet losses, but it almost seemed like he was back over a century ago, still setting in the captain's chair and fighting the good fight while bouncing around the galaxy with a set of blank orders.

Vega, now in his hundreds, felt his smile grow. He appeared only in his late 40s, had he been a mear Terran. But, it was not uncommon for an Atlantian to see past 200.

"Hello, Bill. Its been awhile"

"It's certainly been a while. But we can reminisce later, in person. Do you want to meet on my ship or yours?”

Meanwhile Danx was hunched over at his station, puzzling over some odd readings from the sensors. They seemed familiar, like something he'd seen in school or something, but he couldn't remember what exactly they meant. He punched a button and had the readings sent to Beta for analysis.

"Whichever is fine with you" said Vega.

"Yours then, the Dark Horse is a lovely ship, faster than anything else in the fleet, but it wasn't really set up for diplomacy. I assume there's some docking port we can connect the Dark Horse to yours, send the data and I'll be over in a jiffy." Bill stood, turned and grabbed the false-leather jacket he used instead of the... in his words 'stupid' one that the tailors at fleet attempted to force on him.

"Will do" The commlink shut off there. Info about the docking ports where sent though to the Dark Horse, and the Olympia moved in, slowly....

OOC: I'm going to have the worm hole break open/form just before they dock. Your sensors should say about the same thing mine are.

IC: <<Red Alert, full acceleration forward immediately.>>

Bill turned around as Fuso followed orders, he'd learned not to disobey an AI when i. "What the hell are you doing Alpha?"

<<Sensors indicate opening wormhole nearby. We don't really want to be caught in the opening wave. I've sent that information onto the Olympia. It's exceedingly rare for something like this to happen; especially at the scale this seems to be at.>>

Bill paused for a minute. He'd been through a wormhole once or twice, but they were rare and rarely went anywhere good. "Open channel to Olympia, send transmission. This is Bill, your guys telling you what mine are?"

Weird readings thought Rathma, the sciance officer, to himself. He spoke up "Sir, I think you should see this"

Vega got out of his seat and walked over to the control planel.

"What the Hades...."

"This is Bill, your guys telling you what mine are?" said the now open commlink. Information was down being downloaded into the computer.

"Um...ya. Looks like a more stable version of jump nodes. But that would mean......a wormhole?"

"That's what my AI's telling me. He also tells me its a once in a lifetime occurance, especially if you're in the way of the wormhole when it's coming out. I would get moving if I were you." Bill watched in facination as the wormhole began to slowly emerge from... well, wherever wormholes emerged from.

The Olympia slowly moved from its position, but the wormhole was too fast. It opened quickly, and sucked the Olympia inside. In an instant, the blue monster had swollowed an entire Atlantian flagship.

Bill watched as the Olympia dissapeared into the expanding maw of the wormhole. He paused for a second.

"Is the wormhole stable?"

<<Unknown, computer models show it existing from anywhere between 100 hours and 100 years.>>

"Where does it go to?"

<<Unknown, none of the probes aboard will survive the journey.>>

"Will we?"

<<99% probability of travel with minimal damage.>>

Bill sighed. He then looked up and smiled. "Well, I don't know about you guys, but I didn't plan on living forever anyway. Well, anytime soon at least. Fuso, give the helm to Alpha. Alpha, prepare to take us through the wormhole. Beta, send a message back to Commmand. Tell them what we're doing and why. Tell them if they don't hear from us in 99 hours to send the Heradel fleet after us. We'll send back a message in a bottle about where we are."

Bill moved with the energy of a man 1/6th his age. He nearly flung himself into the Command chair. "Alpha, take us through."

From rest the Apparition darted toward the wormhole. It was soon enveloped in the space/time fold.

---
From his station Danx watched one of the exterior cameras. He had hit record all on the sensors and would pick through the readings later. It was beautiful outside, though not in the way most people thought it would be beautiful. It was the vast blackness of space streaked by stars going from a blue shift to a red shift without any apparent middle ground. It certainly gave the impression of movement better than the usual view in slipstream.

---
But soon they had left it behind, and the regular black tablecloth with scattered salt view reigned supreme again. The Olympia was on sensors a few klicks off.

"Computer, send message. Vega, you all right over there? End transmission," Bill leaned forward in his seat, waiting.

"Where are we?!" Vega demanded to know.

"Sir....there are no local stars in the area....I don't know!" sais SIng, sounding slightly panicked.

"Commander, we're getting a message from the Dark Horse" said Xol.

"The more things change..." Vega muttered to himsef "Put it on"

Vega, you all right over there?

Vega responded "Ya, we're fine. Any idea where we are?"

Bill cocks his head slightly, "Alpha, where are we?"

<<Analysing star patterns, give me a few minutes>>

"Computer, send message. No clue, I've got one of my AI's running an analysis on the star patterns. But I've got a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore." Bill pauses a second and pulls up the long range sensors, "It looks like we're a few AU's from the nearest star system. The Apparition will need a new coat of paint when we get back to spacedock but otherwise we came through fine, how about you guys? End transmission."

Vega looked around. The ship had held up suprisingly well.

"We're good"

OOC: Ok....what now? :p

bump