[Preview]Renegade Ravager Vol. 3 -- Chapter 13

Chapter 13 – 01738.107 AA

Captain Fernandez’s voice came through the ship’s speakers. “Exiting sub-reality in ten minutes.”

Seated with Josefine in her greenhouse, I couldn’t wait till the jump ended. Shutters had come down over the glass hull above us, but I could still imagine the unnatural colors of sub-reality streaming just beyond the protective barriers. The air was supercharged with unnatural energy like the world could fly apart at a moment’s notice.

Zoto whined, his pleading cry carried by the rest of the horde.

“Shhhh,” Josefine comforted him. “We’re almost out, I promise.”

The Yord woman looked just as troubled as her pet. The xenos were unused to traveling in sub-reality; even after several jumps, Josefine’s horde still hated the experience.

I couldn’t blame them. Though I’d never admit it, I still had nightmares about the horrors I had witnessed when the penal ship I had been on had crashed in sub-reality. The prisoners around me had exploded, their bodies bloating and bursting before the entire ship was destroyed when it collided with the Outrider station.

Their screams haunted my dreams.

Resisting the urge to count down the remaining time in my HUD, I focused on our current objective.

Quest Update! – Return to Earth, Discover the Link Between the Saints and the Outriders

Aggy was certain we’d discover the truth behind the Saints and the Outriders on Earth. The Saints were nothing like the men and women she had known. Something must have changed them, corrupted them.

The Saints had originally acted as her advisors, a swath of scientists, bureaucrats, economists, the experts she’d need to build and run a government. Unlike the lies preached by the Saints, they were not her closest confidants. Aggy reserved that honor for her bodyguards – Legion Zero – but she still trusted them to help her establish the nascent Republic.

She had no idea how they had been warped from staid but trustworthy bureaucrats into xeno-tained tyrants. Certainly, the creature we had fought above Xiphon-8 had looked nothing like a human being.

“Exiting sub-reality in sixty seconds!” the speakers blared.

The Liens Lumineux shook as we passed through a pocket of unnatural turbulence. The shaking became worse; I could hear the ship’s fuselage groan in protest as it was put under stress. Sparks and unnatural lights seeped through the shutters.

“Brace for a bumpy ride,” Elspeth warned us through a comm line. “I don’t know what’s going on, but we’re in for a rough return to reality!”

Reaching out, I held Josefine’s hand as the flagship careened through sub-reality.

=======================

“Scans reveal no hostile targets in our immediate area,” the specialists manning the ship’s sensors reported.

“Maintain general quarters,” Captain Fernandez ordered. “We’re not dealing with cowardly xenos or desperate pirates. From what Lady Agrippa has told us, we are against foes beyond sanity or reason.”

Entering the bridge, I was glad for the crew’s vigilance.

“Champion Browning,” the guard by the hatch announced.

Balan crept in behind me, once again acting as my shadow.

Aggy and Elspeth were already on the bridge. The Chief Engineer was double-checking the ship’s systems after the rough sub-reality jump while the AI was going over the sensor readings.

“What happened?” I asked Elspeth.

Our exit from sub-reality had been particularly jarring. I’d had gentler trips while crash-landing in burning gunships.

She shrugged, looking harried. “I don’t know, I’m still trying to figure it out! I’m just happy we made it through without major damage!”

Leaving her to work, I checked out the scene from the external cameras. They showed that we were in an empty abyss between the stars. There were no pickets, space stations, or defensive platforms.

There was nothing at all, just a void. Emptiness spanned where the Sol System should have been. It was chilling to look at like staring at an open grave.

“Nothing,” the specialist repeated. “It’s just like, there’s nothing there, not even the smallest spec of space dust or a trace of cosmic radiation.”

Without the navigational data taken from Aggy’s memories, we would have never even found the Sol System. Turbulence had plagued the last leg of our trip through sub-reality before we had been ejected back into the Milky Way. Any other ship would have been torn to pieces.

“We know where Earth should approximately be,” I said. “Is there anything stopping us from just advancing via standard propulsion or with a short sub-reality jump?”

“I’m pretty sure if we try to a sub-reality jump, we’ll crash into the astral equivalent of a brick wall,” Elspeth said as she came over to stand with us. “We barely made it here in one piece. I’d rather not wreck the Liens Lumineux after putting in so much hard work fixing it up.”

The sailors looked spooked at just the idea. To them, the Liens Lumienux was the divine chariot of the Martyred Goddess. They might have accepted Aggy’s words and her mission, but belief was a hard thing to break.

And though I’d never admit it in public, I’d never want to experience another crash while traveling in sub-reality. One was enough for an entire lifetime.

“Keep up the analysis,” I ordered the specialist. “There’s got to be something out there. Maintain general quarters.”

Fernandez nodded. “It will be done, Champion.”

Elspeth and Aggy continued to analyze the strange void surrounding the Sol System, but it defied examination or definition. Any probes sent into the abyss disappeared, never to return.

They couldn’t even find where the boundary began or ended.

Iuno, already in armor, joined us on the bridge after a few hours.

“I’m getting itchy. Why aren’t we out there, kicking ass and killing xenos?” she asked.

I gestured toward the shadowy scene ahead of us.

“Fucking cowards, they’re hiding,” she growled. “I really wanted to meet an Outrider, to see if it was as fucked up and crazy as you keep saying.”

“Lady Agrippa!” the head operations specialist called. “One of our probes has found something. It visually detected an unknown object – it appears to be stationary, just outside the range of the phenomena.”

“Put it on the main screen,” the AI ordered.

The main display in front of the bridge blinked to life. The image returned by the probe was grainy and pixellated, full of digital noise. It showed a low-contrast, black-and-white image of a rocky object floating through space.

I instantly recognized it as the unknown, terrifying object from Aggy’s corrupted memory modules.

As the probe drew closer, the image resolution shot up. It quickly revealed a gigantic asteroid. Someone or something had carved a structure into its stony surface. The broad pillars and blocky facades put me ill at ease. It was hard to tell through the video feed, but the building seemed to squirm and move, constantly changing each time I blinked my eyes.

Debris, the wreckage of a hundred different ships, floated around the asteroid. The Liens Lumineux instantly identified them as ancient vessels like itself, pulling registry data from its days in the UTG fleet.

There were more modern wrecks as well, including several Republican warships.

The operations specialist shook his head. “I’m sorry, Champion, but the sensor data I’m getting back doesn’t make sense! I can’t even confirm the object is there, but –”

He trailed off, at a complete loss.

Iuno, who had been gauging Aggy and I’s reaction to the asteroid, chuckled to herself. “Guess we’re going to get a chance to go xeno hunting after all. When do we leave?”