It took hours even at the high acceleration Hook could output, but we finally reached the location.
“Are we good to jump Hook?”
“All systems register as green Captain Cofey.”
“Alright... engage.”
“Engaging drive.”
I felt a thrum go through the ship, and with my synchronization saw a glowing purple sheathe envelop the hull of the vessel.
I nodded to myself, causing the sensors to subconsciously follow my reaction. All the while I could feel a rising thrum permeate the ship.
“Transit in three, two, one...”
And suddenly... we were nowhere.
Gone was the black dotted by stars.
It was just... nothing.
Nothing occasionally illuminated by multicolored flashes, revealing nothing...
No, that wasn't true, as the ships sensors turned all over the ship at my desperate observation of the void. When I focused on one specific spot, the when the light revealed the void once more, there was nothing... but the second time I could swear I saw something... undulating in the dark.
“That is terrifying.”
“What is?”
“This.” I sent Hook a still from the sensors of what I saw.
“I don't see anything Captain.”
“In the flash, I saw something moving.”
“There is no flash Captain.”
“What?”
“It is all dark void, there is nothing.”
“No... there are fairly regular flashes going on out here.”
“Captain Cofey, I believe transit is having an effect on your unique nuerological makeup. I recommend being placed in a medically induced coma until we exit. I believe what you are 'seeing' may in fact be a seizure brought on by the transit.”
My blood went cold at this. I had been feeling so good that I had forgotten, I was still sick, the implants were just treating me as fast as the symptoms were appearing. That did not mean they were not doing damage.
“Wake me five minutes before we exit transit, or however long you believe it will take me to get my bearings after waking. I don't want us to be defenseless on exit, and I will just tank whatever damage the transit does to me for the last few minutes. Better bleeding out my ears than blown to pieces by a pirate missile.”
“I hope it will not come to that captain, once you are unconscious hopefully you will suffer no further damage from the transit.”
As Hook said the last part another flash illuminated the shape I had seen before. A long, snakelike body, stretching away into infinity.
“I'll be out for how long?”
“Unknown, transit can take anywhere from a few hours to a few days. The longest transit was one week, but that has only happened once.”
“Do it. See you in a few days.”
And that is the last I remember of my first transit.
***********************************************************************************
“...tain Cofey.”
I awoke, still in the captain's seat, still fully synchronized with the ship. My sensors were shut down, so my awareness was only of the ship, ensconsed in a black void.
“Captain Cofey.”
“I am awake. How long from emergence?”
“Three minutes Captain!”
“Alright. Should I be worried about anything on the other side?”
“We should be emerging near to an asteroid belt, the next jump point we need to get to will require us to maneuver past the asteroid belt.”
“How long was I out?”
“Just under two days, I woke you as soon as the sensors indicated to me that we were nearing the end of our transit perod.”
“Got it.”
I focused on collecting my thoughts and running checks across the ship. I avoided turning on the ships sensors, The disturbing things I had seen before in the distance coming back to my mind.
In fact I swear I could still see them, hazy images beyond the ship, even though the sensors were out.
“Emergence commencing.”
I flipped on the ships sensors so we wouldn't be taken unaware.
Just before the transition, I saw a flash in the distance, a great eye opening...
And then we were back in real space.
The jolt from the eerie nothing of the transit to realspace left me reeling, but I was able to gather my wits relatively quickly.
“Okay... That wasn't so bad... anything happen while I was out?”
“I was monitoring your brain activity.”
“And?”
“Even unconscious, and in a coma, you were having some... reactions to the transit.”
“Record it, I am certain the doctors will need to look at it, can you tell if there was any damage?”
“Not from my scans no, but we will have to see what happens when you descynchronize. That being said... I don't think we should do that now. Asteroid belts are known to have traps and thick ones like this often contain pirate bases.”
“So I probably should not desynch till we are through... How long should that take?”
“At full burn? A day or so. I believe you could risk desynchronizing once we are anhour out from the jump point, we will be far enough from the asteroid field to avoid being ambushed, and far enough from the jump point that no one will drop on us unawares without us knowing.”
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“I see... anything in this system I should know about?”
“One of the inner planets has a mining colony, but as of last sensor data it was too small to be considered a true planetary civilization, the factions are leaving it alone for now.”
“I see... how many of these colonies fail?”
“Most. Of the 120 original colony ships that came from earth to this sector of space, only 40 eventually became full fledged colony worlds able to produce a surplus of life sustaining resources, and that was with massive vessels prepared for every contingency to support them. New colonies rarely have the same advantages.”
“Wouldn't a C.O.G. Colony be able to handle things pretty easily?”
“It would, but most members of C.O.G. Prefer to live in space instead of on a planet. We have massive space stations, but there are only two worlds that have a significant population dedicated to C.O.G., that is with a significant amount of implants and have achieved augmetic transcendence.”
“I'd think it would be more popular.”
“It is, but the people it is popular with tend to leave the planetary population for the stars.”
“I see, almost self selecting yourselves out of the gene-pool as it were.”
“That subject has been brought up before in C.O.G. Circles. It is one of the reasons collecting your ark, despite how old and outdated everyone and every thing on board is, was considered important to several members. Captains Joe and Bait were not the only individuals looking for your vessel in the outer reaches.”
I took some time to go over the ship and make sure everything was in order. There were some variances that I could feel throughout the ship that were not there when I went to sleep, and I sent drones to investigate. I pinged our combat drones and got a surly response from Cat-Bot and a happy bark of code from Dog-bot.
“Whats this name of the inner colony?”
“It is broadcasting as New New Butte”
“New New Butte? Is there a New Butte?”
“There was, according to my records, but it apparently died out and became a ghost town ten years ago. The colony here was founded... fifteen years ago”
“Ominous... should we contact them?”
“Generally speaking They would. Most colonies out this far see ships only rarely, and transmitting data packets for mail and the like is common courtesy, sometimes even with a reward of some kind attached, normally in that particular planets currency or hard goods. That being said... Our light reached them some time ago.”
“So it IS weird that they haven't contacted us yet.”
“Yes and no, if we were running in the open and broadcasting yes, but I think subconsciously you have been keeping us in stealth since emergence. We aren't emitting anything, just using passive sensors.
“Can you send a message directly to New New Butte, see if they need anything.”
“I will open a hailing frequency, it will take 15 minutes before we can expect a reply back.”
“Speed of light delay is still a thing I see.”
“Yes, only transit points allow FTL travel, everything else is at the mercy of relativity.”
“Let's get moving towards the asteroid field while we wait.”
I engaged the main drives, hurtling us through space, angled down directly through the ecliptic of the system, to pass through the asteroid field and get to the opposite side, where our next transit point awaited.
I spent my time going over the reports that the drones found, warped metal in parts of the hull, burnt out electronics... and what I swore looked like clawmarks.
“Is this usual for a transit.” I asked
“Yes, though not to this extent. I am at a loss as to how this happened.”
“Could I have subconsciously done something during the transit that caused this?”
“Possibly. You have a higher level of access to the vessel than I do, so not all of your activities are known to me at all times. Still, it is strange, you should not be able to affect the ship while unconcious even while maintaining full synchronization.”
“I... am not sure I want to be unconcious for another transit.”
“I unfortunately concur Captain Cofey.”
I waited impatiently for the response from New New Butte, it came some twenty minutes later, I received a transmission that felt like a little tickle. The instant I turned my attention to it a window opened with a video file.
A well dressed woman in a well worn, and oft repaired, office spoke. “Thank you for entering our system, We have a mail packet to be delivered onward, and we are happy to compensate you with materials we have in surplus.”
I read through the packet sent to me, there were a lot of video packets, and buried under that even more texts and messages meant for other people. At the very end was a promise of payment.
“It says five tons of 'common metallics' and a ton of 'rare metallics'. Is that a lot or a little?”
“It's not a lot in the grand scheme of things, generally most empires prefer already processed goods, but it is likely this colony isn't up to that point yet. Thankfully for C.O.G. Vessel making use of raw refined metal is much easier than the other factions.”
“So accept?”
“If we don't who knows when their messages will be able to get out.”
“Alright...” I sent an acceptance message back while I was downloading the mail packet.
