The Rock Read online

The Rock

  By Tim Morrison and Shaun Streeter

  Copyright 1993-2015 Morristreet

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  It had drifted for longer than life had existed in the galaxy it was approaching. Having been flung from the system of it's birth, it had been through many, many galaxies, and within each galaxy had passed through countless star systems. At it's velocity, measured as an appreciable fraction of light speed, it was able to traverse most of the known universe in it's ageless journey. And now it was coming into the Center Worlds.

  "Drives are charging for transition to Vortex thrust." The lucid tones of Jihon reported.

  "Jihon, prepare my navigation bubble." Aya said. "Bubble is extending. All systems prepared for transition in thirty seconds and counting."

  Aya unclasped her restraints and pushed upwards in the null-G environment of the bridge.

  "Aya, you be careful out there, the radiation is getting pretty high at this velocity." Willem said as she drifted past him.

  "Don't worry Willem. You keep watch over your own tail, I can handle mine."

  A door iris opened in the ceiling of the bridge, and she slipped though it. A caterpillar gravity field propelled her upwards until she emerged in a fully transparent bubble which extended out of the life-system of the ship. Ahead of them stars were a blindingly bright blue-white color, forming a glowing blue rift in space, behind was darkness, and motes of deepest red. The ship had now exceeded 95% light speed, and was preparing to jump.

  She pulled a radio comm headset from a recess in the floor of the bubble and slipped it on, then began a slow pirouette of the bubble, seeing in every direction, and let her senses extend beyond the edges of her mind.

  "Nothing in direct range. Mass should be unaffected by extraneous objects." She said dreamily, only a small part of her consciousness intact as she explored the huge zone of space around the hurtling star ship. A powerful electrostatic field had now formed around the outer hull of the ship. This field, used to draw hyper-spatial particles near enough to the hull to accelerate insertion into other-spatial realms, interfered with normal sensors to a degree that the computer would literally be flying blind for the last thirty seconds before a jump. And at 0.95c, that covers an awfully large distance.

  Back on the bridge, the door slid open, and the fourth member of the crew, a very tall, voluptuous felinoid stepped in, ducking as she had to clear the top of the door frame. She quickly made her way to a chair against the back wall of the bridge, and clicked the restraints in place. "All things are ready for the shift?" She asked in a pure contralto of sound.

  Captain S'Hara nodded as she continued to monitor the power buildup on the systems monitor in front of her. Making the jump from near light speed to Vortex was always a problem, so many things could go wrong, and this had to be done properly.

  "All systems now primed and ready for drive switchover." Jihon reported.

  "Aya, grab hold, we're about to transfer." Willem said, then tapped out a command on the console in front of him.

  A piercing whine began to rise in pitch, and the outer hull of the Rebel's Cause shifted through the spectrum from it's normal golden color to a dimmer amber shade. As it achieved this color, tiny blue-white sparks seemed to appear from nowhere and gather around it, sticking to a barely visible shield that overlaid the surface of the vessel. The layer of sparks grew thicker and thicker, taking on a deep blue shade. They achieved some sort of threshold after about ten seconds, and the ship slipped through a direction not comprehensible or understood, out of Real space, into a realm beyond space known as the Vortex.

  Aya, watching all this from the transparent navigational bubble, saw the rift open up, and the ship slip into it, then her vision went blank as she looked into the nothingness of the Vortex. She stayed up in the bubble for some more minutes, still scanning to ensure no extraneous masses entered as they had, for this could be catastrophic if it had occurred, then she pushed up with her hands, and floated back down into the hull. The door iris slid shut above her and her vision returned with a sudden, sickening lurch. She drifted down onto the bridge again, and rested against her chair for a few minutes, deeply breathing to regain her composure.

  Idova's head was tilted back, eyes tightly shut as she was in deep concentration. She had extended her mental shield to surround and shield the others to protect them from the psionic nightmares which were a side-effect of the powerful energies which made up the zone of flux known as the Vortex.

  She acknowledged Aya's presence with a nod, but did not open her eyes, continuing to project her shield around the crew.

  The Rebel's Cause is around three hundred and fifty mets long, shaped somewhat like a flattened cigar, with it's skin molded and shaped so that it has full lifting surfaces. It was built by Confederacy shipwrights over a century ago to test some new engine designs, and it made an uncontrolled Vortex jump on it's first test flight. Without a crew on board, it was lost.

  The ship was found a century later by the rag-tag crew of a pirate vessel gone wrong. Commander S'Hara E'Surr, formally of the United Suns Marines, 14th Division, a female member of the feline T'Ressi species. Standing 1.8 mets tall, with short luxuriant orange-red hair, and amply proportioned for a feline. An earmark of her species is her unique double tail which she is quite proud of.

  Aya Nandreclevac Camelin, a Taran concubine on the run from Emperor Maselic of the Taran Confederacy. She stands at just over a hundred fifty centimets high, her skin an olive-golden color, appears to be finely constructed, and is very limber and athletic. Her hair is the oddest shade of indigo, verging on black, with metallic silver all through it and very intricately braided.

  Idova of the K'Traanis. A member of an exotic hermaphroditic species. From Idova's description and personal display and usage of psionic energies, possibly the most powerful psionic species in the Center Worlds to date. The Rebel's Cause is trying to find her home, but as they have little idea of which part of the Center Worlds it is in, they have a monumental task ahead of them.

  Willem Hyens, an ex-pirate who aided in the takeover of his former crew. He threw his lot in with these other three and together they managed to escape. He is extraordinarily tall for a Hablis, standing at 195 cm, and is the self-declared protector for Aya when she is in need of such, which could be fairly often.

  The fifth member of the crew is the ship itself. The Rebel's Cause's primary computer, referred to as Jihon. A fully articulate AI system capable of a myriad of tasks. It defends the ship and it's crew, as it has no information in regards to the fact that it was lost. The computer had not yet had it's higher functions activated when the ship had been lost, but was activated by Aya when the ship had been found.

  Six minutes later, Jihon announced transition back into real space was commencing, and everyone secured themselves. The ship surged backwards as it dropped the electrostatic field which enabled it to attract and hold particles, and with a sickening lurch, returned to the realms of Real space.

  "Transition complete, Vortex drives charging down. Neospace drives reengaging for deceleration from threshhold velocity and standard flight mode. All systems are nominal and no damage is reported." Jihon announced.

  "Excellent." S'Hara said. "Willem, extend navigational sensors and begin locating us to confirm we are in the next sector. Aya, I think now would be a good time to over
haul the Vortex generators, you had said they needed a slight recalibration. OK, people, let's do it. We've got a system to find."

  Willem manipulated his console, and at six points along the outer hull of the Rebel's Cause, six flowers seemed to bloom. These flowers were high energy navigational arrays, and they immediately began to feed data into the computer simulators so Willem could generate an intricate star map, and match it with existing ones. Aya unstrapped and floated back down the length of the bridge, then careened off the captain's console and was out the door before S'Hara could even react to that slight bit of insubordination.

  It turned, slowly spinning on it's axis once every thirty-six hours. It was only about five hundred kims in diameter, a core of crystallized