[@White Feather];[@HounderHowl] [b][i]Machina system, FD Trigati, few hours prior to the contact[/i][/b] “The first system appears to be deserted as far as our probe can see. The extreme distance of the node from any of the planetary bodies prevent extensive scans of the system though, we will have to go deeper in. The Rampart is ready to proceed at your command, Admiral.” Astra said, showing the data to Cygnus. The admiral appeared troubled though. “No. I will handle his myself. I am temporarily reassigning you to the Faira Hexus. We need to see what potential applications will RLC tech have for us, and you are our brightest. We are already stretched thin, fortunately the RLC is holding the fort here. Otherwise we’d have to split our fleet in two.” Cygnus disagreed. “Admiral, if you are doing this to protect me, it is not necessary. I am well aware of the risks and probably most aware of the capabilities of our ships. All the data points to-” Astra tried to fight back, but the admiral’s stern look told her to quit it. the Captain sighed. “I know, I know! It’s just… I want to see what’s out there!” No matter how fast years flowed, Astra still seemed like a child to Cygnus. Sighing, the admiral nodded. “Alright, fine. This time. Any further and the rest of the admirals might not even allow us to go at all anyway. I’ll give you the Nagato for this one, the frigate’s sensors are more powerful. Anything happens, call us in. Please be careful, Astra.” [b][i]Unknown system, FFg Nagato[/i][/b] [hider=Location][img]http://fs-online.4fan.cz/tempfiles/map1.png[/img][/hider] The frigate emerged from the subspace node and was immediately bombarded meteorites from the nearby asteroid field. “Divert power from weapons to shield and engines! Get us out of this mess! Report status!” Astra trusted the shields to take the impact of a few small rocks, but the cygnus class did not have the power output to withstand kinetic bombardment for long. After a tense minute and a half, they were clear. “All systems nominal save for sensors and shield. Sensors operating at 89% efficiency and clearing, shield down to 65% charge. I don’t think anything smaller than a picaroon is going to even make it through there alive.” her XO gave her the report. “Alright, take us further into the system and start on active sensors. Let’s see what’s out there.” For several hours nothing happened, but then the screen suddenly pinged and alarms pointed to something on approach. “How did we not spot it before?” Astra wanted to know. “Ma’am, it’s… well, it’s either too low tech or stealth! We didn’t prioritize scanning for these signatures. Even now we’re not getting big enough signature for a weapons lock.” The Captain massaged her temples. “It’s approach is worrying, it could be a weapon. Signal the Trigati. If it’s a weapon, I want a bigger point defense screen. Get us back to the node and spool up our jump drive.” Astra ordered. [b][i]Unknown system, FD Trigati[/i][/b] The fuss appeared to be for nothing. Still, better safe than sorry. “What are we looking at?” Cygnus asked, with Astra temporarily in the seat of her XO. “It’s a ship. By our standards it’s… prehistoric. Shall we attempt to communicate?” the Captain inquired, her tone betraying that she didn’t see much merit in doing so given the potential gains. “They’ve seen us already. There is no point in trying to hide or avoid them. The least we could do is to get up to date navigational data from them. Do what you did back in Machina. Let’s see if they respond in some way. Astra nodded, sending the diplomatic package and attempting to ping them using several communication methods. And then... [b]“Hello? This is Chancellor Innes of the Paardveid Republic. Requesting permission to board?”[/b] “We have contact, audio only, using radio transmission.” astra confirmed, “Not big enough of a sample to translate. recommending allowing them onboard to gather more data.” cygnus nodded, and Astra followed the same logic as before, shutting all of the external lights on the destroyer save for the hangar. “Now we wait and see.” The one engineer robotic on the bridge stood in silence off to the side. Not wanting to be in the way, yet intrigued by the bizarre turn of events. To meet two species in such a short time. It was borderline heresy. As the request was given, ENG #1 silently ordered the other two robotics to move to the cargobay. They entered the cargo bay, unbeknownst to their gracious hosts, the Engineers were armed and ready. They had a seamlessly built in weapon compartment on their thighs, each one holding a submachine gun. The Engineers also had their hidden wrist mounted plasma blades. They stood at attention with no weapons drawn. The first Engineer remained on the bridge and waited for further details and information to appear. ENG # 1 relayed a final order, which was something along the lines of. “Obtain all information possible, fire only if fired upon. Begin language breakdown as soon as they enter, and assist our hosts in anyway possible.” The two Engineers acknowledged. They both had left their small backup memory drives on the desk they were working from. A momento of who they were if the inevitable were to happen. On their way to the hangar, the two RLC engineers were joined by Astra, who was checking her suit. In the time since the Faira met the RLC, she tinkered around with it, adding and replacing a thing or two. Right now it hat an ugly box bolted to its back holding the RLC small power unit. Astra was amazed just how much juice the machines were able to squeeze out of that thing. with it, she could expand the suit’s shield to protect even the two engineers and still hold under fire for long enough to get to safety. They arrived at the flight deck and waited whether the contact would guide itself in.