Chapter twelve

     We finally made it past the minefield when the main screen in front of me flickered and an indistinct blurry outline of a man appeared on it.

     "Warning! You are about to enter a restricted area! If you move any further, we will be forced to take lethal action against you."

     I was surprised by the sudden unauthorized communication, "Alfred, what is going on?"

     "It seems that my communication protocols are being overwritten. Their hacking abilities are too great, my firewalls are crumbling under their assault like soggy tissue paper."

     "Is this a two way connection Alfred?"

     "Yes."

     "Alright then, I'll try talking to them. Greetings to the Compendium. This is Captain Callaghan of the Ship Vishnu and I have come here following your instruction."

     The outline started to flicker and distort violently, "Error...error...inconsistencies found in memory bank. Integrity compromised. Going into emergency protection mode."

     Sandy's panicky voice came from behind me,"Captain, our scanners are picking up fifteen incoming vessels. Judging by their speed and the signature they are giving off, they are compendium ships. They are opening fire! Captain, what should we do?"

     I knew that this whole thing smelled a little fishy but was all of this just some plot to get rid of us using a borrowed knife? No, I'm sure that no one was capable of a hoax of this magnitude. Plus there was the suspicious way that the blurry outline on the screen was acting.

     The thing was probably an A.I. that was in charge of the compendium's perimeter defense. Inconsistencies found in memory bank? Integrity compromised? What did this mean? An A.I. belonging to the compendium being hacked? And on the day we arrive? Coincidence? I don't think so. Something was definitely going on. No one in the known universe has the capability to hack into an A.I. that belongs to the compendium so who was doing this?

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     The first volley of attacks arrived before I even had a chance to react. We were still inside the meteor made of Telerium, the same meteor that weathered through the combined attack of the federation and the corporation, the same meteor that let us pass through a minefield. After all of this, the meteor was still almost completely intact but after a single round of attacks by the ships from the compendium, cracks started to appear on its surface which scared the crap out of me.

     "Retreat! Retreat immediately! Go back into the minefield!"

     "They're still following us Captain," Sandy's voice was getting squeakier with panic.

     "Alfred, what is the status of the meteor?"

     "Seven percent of the outer shell has already been removed. The structural integrity has been reduced by thirty four percent. I calculate that it will break up after two more attacks."

     He had just finished speaking when another volley of attacks rocked our ship violently. Our scanners were showing us that the Compendium ships were powering up to deliver their third and final volley when they suddenly stopped. The glow of their weapons vanished and the weapons themselves were retracted back into their teardrop shaped body.

     "Captain....are we dead? Are we in pirate heaven?"

     I looked back to see that Sandy had her eyes closed tightly shut.

     "No, we are still alive."

     "What? How?"

     "That is something I also want to know."

     The blurry figure on the screen flickered again and we heard an angry female voice shout, "Athena you conniving bitch!"