Back on the Hubble that was drifting slowly through the void of space after provoking a major power outage, Robin, Niu and Sevastian stared at the enormous ship in front of them. Like most ships of the Cetro it had a cube-like form, however this model surely had a long history under its belt. Robin could make out four big blocks aligned behind each other, connected by thick pipes going from one to another. All cubes probably once were standalone ships as each one had its own thrusters. Now they were merged together to create one huge mothership.
* Estimated size of each cube: ~80x80x80 meters
* Overall length of the ship: ~390 meters
“We are fucked, right?” Sevastian wailed and threw his arms in the air to underline his level of annoyance.
“Well, it really didn’t work out as we had planned.” Robin agreed.
“It worked out exactly as planned! It’s just that these techno fanatics have entered the fight with unfair means. Who the hell brings two such ships to catch a small research vessel?”
“I think the mothership shouldn’t be part of this raid. We just stumbled over its hiding spot at the sidelines.”
“So, what now, captain?” Sevastian sighed.
“Now? Now we are moving on to plan B!” Robin replied with a grin.
“Plan B? We had more than one plan? What is it about?” The hothead asked.
“Niu, how long until we can open a channel and contact them?”
“Uhm, five minutes? Six… maybe?”
“And internal comm?”
“Same… probably.”
“I’ll have to talk to Landom and Keran. Sevastian, get ready!”
“Ready? For what?”
“Oh, you will be taking on the role as the captain in the upcoming negotiations.” Robin said and made his way to the door.
“Are you crazy? Why would I do that? I have no idea what these assholes even want from us. Why would I waste my time with them? Let’s just think of a way to get on their ship and I’ll gladly play the role of someone who kicks ass!”
“Not that I wanna interrupt your rant, but you are floating off…” Niu said deadpan.
“What?”
“The gravity. It’s missing right now, so you are drifting away from your seat.”
Sevastian looked around and noticed he was already floating half a meter above his chair.
“Ah! Fuck this! This whole trip totally sucks!” He complained and began to flail his arms, trying to move around.
“You really want this idiot to play the role of captain?” Niu asked incredulously but Robin had already left the bridge to find his security officer.
***
“I’m still not convinced…” Keran, who stood in the back of the bridge next to Robin, muttered.
“Do you have a better idea?”
“No, not yet.”
Shrugging, Robin turned to Niu.
“Happy, communications?”
“Any moment now.”
“Sevastian,” He addressed the man who already managed to climb into the captain’s seat, “I know you can do it. You are pissed and annoyed right now, aren’t you? If that isn’t enough, just think about how Patience is beating you up like a bloody rookie every time you step into the ring.”
“What? Fuck, it’s not like that! I just don’t wanna be too rough with her…” He exclaimed in indignation.
“That’s what we are looking for!” Robin cheered, “Now, let off all the steam on whoever is on the other side of the comm, okay?”
“I’m not getting beaten like a rookie!” Sevastian still complained when finally some systems turned back online and Niu immediately contacted the big ship that had followed the drifting Hubble without showing any kind of aggression so far.
“Ah finally my friends, this proud ship is the-” An amused person said after the channel was opened. However, Sevastian rudely interrupted the introduction.
“Yeah, yeah, I don’t care who the fuck you are. Get me your head priest on the line, now!” He barked in annoyance.
“...” There was a short silence on the other side when the communications officer was totally caught off guard.
“Uhm, are you aware that-” He began anew.
“No, but are you aware just how much you fucked up my day today? Why the hell would you even attack your partners? Now go and get me the head priest of this flying tin can!”
“I… One moment please.” The confused man said and Sevastian used this time to turn and look at Robin and Keran with a questioning gaze.
“You are doing great!” Robin said and gave him a thumbs up, “No worries, I’ll later cover your back and delete all the videos of fights where you lost to Patience because of the goodness in your heart. Patience will be so touched when she learns about that.”
“What? No! I mean…-”
“So you wanted to talk to me personally, ‘partner’?” A new voice entered the comm channel.
“You are the head priest of these idiots?” Sevastian turned back and blew off some steam, “I’m Robin Tulward, captain of the UAS IPR Hubble. Why the hell did you think grabbing our tail to pull us out off superluminal travel would be a great idea? Damn, at least identify yourself instead of giving off the vibe of some cheap pirate who wants to raid us.”
“I think there might be a misconception of the situation you’re in.” The head priest said, his voice turning cold.
“Yeah, I thought someone was assaulting us. That’s why we retaliated. The dead fighter pilots are on the idiot who began shooting torpedoes at us!” Sevastian barked, still angry as a Burlag who got poked with a stick in his sleep. He then took a loud, deep breath to calm himself.
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“Okay, bad start. Let’s put that behind us for now. What news do you have that is so important that you risk direct communications just before we arrive at the UAS asteroid?” He asked.
“Who the hell are you?” The head priest asked, now really thrown off by Sevastian’s random rant, “Are you messing with me? You think this strategy will work?”
“Huh?” The Hubble’s temporary captain was taken aback, “You aren’t here to bring news about TechnoBlood?”
There was a long silence and Robin immediately knew that his bluff could work out as long as they didn’t mess up on the last meters.
“What do you know about these traitors?” The head priest angrily hissed.
“Well, right now not much more than what Jannet from the Red Sun told us when we accepted the contract.”
“The Red Sun? From ElectricGlory?”
“Yeah, head priest Ageoid didn’t tell you? We are to find the defecting community under the lead of Hash Spaden. We came here because we salvaged some leads from the UAS reports about Cetro in these outer rims of the Mereus Cluster.” Sevastian said while looking at the little note Robin and Landom had quickly put together so he doesn’t mess up the names.
“Well, Cetro we found, I guess…” He loudly mused.
Once more there was a long silence.
“I’ll have to confirm your story with priest Ageoid.” The man finally said.
“Uhm, so this was all one big misunderstanding on your side? You didn’t stop us because of new information?”
“A misunderstanding, very well. We’ll need a few hours to get in contact with our brothers and sisters from ElectricGlory. If they confirm your story, you are free to go.”
“Mate, I’m not going to sit around here and waste my day. We are expected at CBXX-5 later today and will be already late for that. We have an UAS official from the main HQ aboard and I would love to get him off at the asteroid before we have any more suspicious dealings.”
“...” The head priest kept quiet for a moment. He didn’t have much to lose but a lot to gain. If he was getting tricked and the Hubble wasn’t working for the Cetro, they would have one failed raid to note down, but if they told the truth, it was their chance to put more pressure on the traitors. He got a report not long ago with some hints about their location, but couldn’t go there himself. Cetro weren’t exactly welcomed on UAS planets.
After weighting the pros and cons a bit, the head priest finally conceded.
“Fine, you can leave. I also have the update you are looking for.” He said, “We heard rumors of TechnoBlood hiding in the forests of Seavis.”
“What? Damnit, just when we arrived all the way back here…” Sevastian mumbled.
“Tulward…” The priest called and Sevastian needed a moment to remember that he was meant.
“Huh?”
“If you have sold me a huge bag of bullshit, I’ll definitely visit you again one day…”
“Yeah, I figured as much. Anyways, it was nice to meet you - seeya next time!”
Niu’s eyes went wide when she saw him cut the line just like that.
“You.. wow you did well, Hulky!”
“Thanks, now get us out of here. I really don’t want to be nearby when this circuit-fucker had his talk with that Ageoid-dude.”
***
“In the end, it went better than expected. We even got an update on TechnoBlood’s location.” Robin said with a happy grin. He sat at the table in the conference room together with Keran and where discussing how things turned out.
“You are way too reckless!” Keran scolded, “Even allowing Niu to take such a risky route to retreat is madness, but trying to shit-talk yourself out of this situation with the head priest of such a big Cetro community is straight up crazy.”
“But it still worked! We had all the needed names to fool them and Sevastian was the right one for the job.” Robin pointed out.
“Yes, it did work. However, you have to learn from such encounters. You won’t always get as lucky as today. What do you think would have happened if they hadn’t bought the story after Sevastian already vented his frustration and offended their priest?” Keran asked but didn’t wait for an answer, “We wouldn’t sit here and talk, we would be frozen corpses drifting through the void! While the Cetro try to minimize the actual damage they do, they have their limits. Considering they opened their assault with a barrage of torpedoes, I don’t think they would have hesitated at all to blow us up.”
“There weren’t many alternatives I could choose from.” Robin argued, “I definitely didn’t want them to capture us.”
“And that was the right evaluation of the situation. I don’t think we would have gotten out of this unscathed if we had set foot in their ship - we have a damn Eltaran aboard! However, there are always different ways to approach a problem. You could have tried diplomacy before trying to run, we could also have worked on strategies how to temporarily disable their ship if we get close enough - like you did at the end with overloading the shield generator, effectively creating a small scale EMP bomb.”
“We didn’t have much time and decisions had to be made quickly!” Robin said, getting a bit angry now. It wasn’t as if he had time to sit down and do a workshop with the crew about how to get out of the impending trouble.
“Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying you made the wrong decisions. Quite the opposite, you showed qualities of a great captain when you made decisive moves in stressful situations. Many others would have frozen on the spot, fearing to take the wrong step. However, I want you to reflect on the encounter. You took too many risks because you lacked better options. Learn from it and think about what you could have done better so next time you come into an extreme situation you find more options to choose from, better options.” Keran explained and Robin had to agree at least partly. He still wasn’t convinced that they had many options, but he saw value in learning from the experience.
“You will be on your own in the next section of this mission.” Keran said when their meeting was coming to an end, “You still have much to learn, but to be honest, I see great potential in you. The loyalty towards your crew, the way you respect and value each of them with their own talents and shortcomings and your uncompromising course when protecting crew and ship - all that makes you a good captain. Get more experience, learn to find less risky paths and reflect on important decisions afterwards and you will become a great captain.”
“Wow, thank you for your honest evaluation.” Robin said, “I know you and I still have some things unspoken, but I appreciate the support you are giving me.”
In response, Keran gave a hollow laugh.
“Most of the time I was knocked out, so I didn’t actually perform my role as intended.”
“You still have provided needed feedback and, like just now, are setting my head straight. But do tell, what do you mean ‘I’ll be on my own’?”
“Let’s be honest. I don’t fit in here any longer. We had different… ideas on how to solve the situation with the Eltaran. Too much trust is gone, you all are suspicious of my next move and my motives for doing things, while I quite dislike being the only one on the ship who knows nothing about what really happened that night on the Discovery.”
“...” Robin wanted to argue but deep down he knew it already. Keran had no place on this ship any longer.
“Don’t worry, I’ll just switch to the ship of my team and we’ll be right behind you. We’ll meet after arriving on Terulos and finish this mission, okay?” The researcher said and a longing look crept on his face, “It isn’t too bad to see them again a bit earlier than expected. It has been more than 3 years since we’ve all met together.”
“Communication will be a major challenge, though. We shut all the systems down that would allow tracking by the Cetro, which includes the comms. After we leave the Mereus Cluster we’ll be stuck in superluminal travel, which also disables communications and after arriving in the Goya System… Niu said we should prepare for major system failures, scanning issues and many other nasty things.”
“I know. But even if we weren’t on the same page in how to solve different things, I’m sure you will have no problems reaching Terulos in the given time. We will manage, right?”
Robin looked at the man and after some time he stretched out his hand.
“I know you just want the best for mankind and the UAS. Even though we sometimes have different priorities, rest assured that I would never act against those interests.”
Keran shook his hand with a grin, “I know. That’s why it isn’t that kind of a big deal to switch ships early. You’ll do your part. Good luck on your travels.”
“Good luck, mate. Send greetings to your team. We’ll meet in a few weeks.”
***
Without much more delay the Hubble reached CBXX-5, a huge asteroid that looked similar to the ‘moon’ where the Cetro mothership was hiding. They only stopped at the little outpost to let Keran join his team, which would follow shortly afterwards, and restock some supplies before the Hubble, now with one cabin empty, left again.
They were in a bit of a hurry as they wanted to get away from the Cetro who had probably realized by now that they got scammed. With their communication systems offline, they left without even sending a last message to the UAS - or receiving one at that.
The Hubble quickly entered superluminal travel and was finally on its way to the Goya System.
As such, Robin’s first inter-system journey started.