[color=00aeef][h2]UEGNC Battlecruiser [i]Paramount[/i] (BRC-404)[/h2][/color]

[color=00aeef][h3]OCTOBER 26, 2852 (MILITARY CALENDAR)[/h3][/color]

The footsteps of the captain's rubber soled boots resonated on the metallic floor of the bridge. He leaned over central command controls and stared into the blue and black void of a RIFT tunnel, watching several streaks of blue light pass by. He sighed, and leaned over to look at the bridge crew, each one manning a holographic terminal. "How long till destination?" He asked.

An ensign looked up. "Around half an hour, sir." He said. Captain Powers looked back out the viewscreen. "Good to know.” He nodded as he walked back to his perch up above. It had been more than a year since the decisive battle of Tribute, a battle where humanity would finally push the hostile alien race known as the Vaskrans back to their own little corner of space, a battle where the Vaskran War would finally come to an end after more than eight years of blood, sweat, and tears. 

On the bridge of the [i]Vengeance[/i]-class battlecruiser known as the [i]Paramount[/i], a man dressed in standard UEGNC Navy officer's uniform of a crisp white, gold, and blue, leaned on the guardrails on the central command platform, a platform raised in the air above dozens of bridge officers working at their stations. The platform only had several command consoles, and a medium sized holotable. The man gave a sigh, staring into the black emptiness of a RIFT tunnel, watching as several streaks of light few and far in between passed by. The Relative Intra-dimensional Field Travel, or RIFT, is the UEG's answer to Faster-Than-Light Travel. It works by basically making an incision in the fabric of space and time large enough to fit in whatever ship it needed to. The ship would then enter this incision to an alternate dimension known as the RIFTVOID. This dimension contains mostly nothing. However, the physics in this dimension work completely differently than in realspace. Objects in it can go at nigh-impossible speeds, making a ten-thousand lightyear journey in as little as ten days. You could say it is like a wormhole. 

The man turned, showing his ID plate. His name was Captain Leonard Powers, the captain of the advanced four-kilometre long starship. He was middle-aged, at around fifty or sixty years old, seventy at max. He had served in the war, all eight years of it. He was used to these kinds of travel. Still, Powers gave an empty stare at the tunnel ahead of him.

“Oh, is something troubling you, commander? No worries. You can drown your sorrows with vodka!” A drunken Russian-accented voice loudly spoke behind Powers, causing him to turn around. A small red hologram of a man wearing World War II-era Red Army clothing was standing on the commander’s holotable, chugging from a flickering bottle of vodka. He was Nikolai, the advanced Artificial Intelligence that had been assigned to the [i]Paramount[/i]. These kinds of A.I.s could control whole fleets of ships and oversee most of their functions. The [i]Paramount[/i] was no exception.

It was a pity he was just so annoying. Powers sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Really? Again with the vodka?” Nikolai belched. “Why yes! Drink is the joy of the Rus!” He held up the bottle, which soon disappeared into several particles of light. Powers opened his mouth to say something, but klaxons and alarms suddenly sounded all over the ship, along with flashing red lights as the bridge officers down below scrambled to get to their stations. “What’s going on?” Powers questioned.

The drunken look on Nikolai’s face had disappeared and was replaced with one of horror. “Something is interfering with the RIFT tunnel! It’s… My coordinates are going haywire! We’re getting transported to another location!” 

“Emergency RIFT exit, now!” Powers commanded as the whole ship began to shake. Nikolai frantically tapped on his holographic console. “The RIFT drive is not responding!” The area in front of the ship began to rip open, and the last thing Captain Powers heard was Nikolai’s screaming before he lost consciousness. 

“Fuuuuuuuccccccckkkkkkkk!”

[center]---------------------------------------------[/center]

"...tain... ers... Captain Powers!" Powers awoke with a start and jolted upright, feeling the cold metal floor on his body. Nikolai was looking over him, concerned. "What... what happened?" He rubbed his forehead, feeling a warm and wet sensation on his fingers. He drew his hand back and was surprised to see than his fingertips were red with blood. The captain groaned as he stood up, looking over the command platforms. Bridge officers down below were doing the same, some still lying on the ground unmoving as other nursed their wounds.

"I don't know. Something interfered with the RIFT tunnel." Nikolai answered, examining a holographic representation of the ship. “We’ve got damage to several decks, Particle Cannons one and two are offline, drone compartment A-6 has sustained EMP damage and is inactive, and Sector 3 of A Deck isn’t responding. The shields took the brunt of the damage, and are at seventy-seven percent and holding. We've got no reported deaths... yet.” Nikolai stopped tapping his holographic interface and turned, an uncharacteristically worried look on his face. “But the RIFT drive is heavily damaged. The trip must have interfered with its dimensional quantum transportation matrix. As of now, I can't say how long we will be stuck here, commander.”

Powers took a deep breath to calm himself down. “Okay. Get the engineers and maintenance drones to repair damages ASAP. Right now we need to find out where we are.” Nikolai nodded. “Already on it. Wait… Give me a second. Oh, that can’t be right.” The little A.I. disappeared from his place and reappeared a second later. He flashed orange for a brief second, before reverting to his usual red. “We are in void space in between the Milky Way and Andromeda Galaxy.”

Powers' breaths quickened. "What?! How? The RIFT drives can't take us that far!" He exclaimed, not noticing that his head wound had dripped and stained his crisp uniform with little drops of red. 

Nikolai shrugged. "I don't know. According to my calculations, I assume that we must have travelled too close to a dimensional wormhole. It's plausible, but I can't be sure." He turned and pointed to Powers. "Also, you're bleeding quite a lot there."

The captain blinked and touched his forehead, noticing that it had indeed been dripping without him noticing. "Right." He reached into his pocket and pulled out a handkerchief, dabbing his skin and turning most of the material red. "See if you can get primary functions online."

"I am on it. However, sensors picked up several objects emitting radio signals several thousand kilometres from here." The A.I. disappeared and was replaced by a blurred hologram of what appeared to be several ships. Powers furrowed his brows and leaned on the holotable. "Have they hailed us?" 

Nikolai's voice continued to he heard. "Why, yes, in fact. I'll play the recording right now." A two-dimensional hologram of a woman in clearly ancient naval wear appeared. The recording was a [i]very[/i] low quality one, in grainy, blurry imaging.

[quote=Broadcast via UHF and VHF Radio/Television][color=ed1c24]"Greetings from the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. I am Commander Venera Romanova. We were on a mission of peace and love before being thrown through a passage in spacetime. Make no mistake, however, this ship is armed, and we are capable of defending ourselves. So, prove yourself friendly, and we shall be friendly in kind. Prove yourself hostile, and we will bury you."[/color][/quote]

She emphasised the last part by banging her hands on the table. 

Powers' eyes widened. "They're... [i]human?[/i]" He then raised an eyebrow. "The... Union of Soviet Socialist Republics? What's that?" Nikolai suddenly reappeared with the most offended look Powers had ever seen. "Commander, how could you [i]not[/i] know what the Soviet Union is? It was the [i]glorious[/i] superior government of [i]Mother Russia![/i]" The captain gave a confused look. "What?" 

Nikolai sighed. "Oh, never mind." Powers gave an annoyed grunt. "Look, she threatened to 'bury' us if we proved to be hostile, and I'm not taking any chances. Bring weapon systems online and warm up Cannon 3. Put Warhawk squadrons Amber and Cranium on standby. As for me, I'm going to hail them." He tapped a button on the table, making sure his message was broadcast on all channels.

[quote][color=0072bc]"Unidentified contacts, this is Captain Leonard Powers of the United Earth Government Naval Command battlecruiser [i]Paramount[/i]. Please identify."[/color][/quote]

Powers' rough voice resonated through the hail. Next to him, Nikolai looked rather gleeful. "I can't wait to meet these fellow [i]communists![/i] The ship is within viewing range of onboard cameras. I'll show you." A much clearer hologram to the ship appeared. Come to think of it, Powers realised that the 'ship' looked more like one of those ancient moon rockets made by that equally ancient space travel organisation, NASA, if he recalled correctly. The captain rubbed his chin in thought. "That can't be. That rustbucket looks like those rockets humanity first used more than nine hundred years ago!" Nikolai reappeared, sitting on a miniature ballistic missile painted red and yellow. "Correct. That is what is so interesting. Commander, I think we have met some [i]true[/i] Soviets!"