Book III: The Derelicts

Once repaired, it was an easy jump forward 780 years, to the crew's "present day", and from there a walk in the park to get back to Earth. But not just any Earth - their Earth! Somehow, in the jump from the other galaxy, they managed to bump back into their own universe as well.

The ship was immediately placed in drydock, and the numerous repairs it needed were finally put in place. The blue apes returned to their world, which had been saved in this timeline; the Russian crew caught up with their counterparts here, who had been rescued 20 years sooner. The O.G. crew, meanwhile, were approached by Eliza - and not the hologram Eliza, but Empress Eliza Tarvis, wife of Emperor Julian Tarvis! She came with a new mission; the crew showed itself reliable, and able to deal with what she called "Strange Space".

Years before, leading up to the Battle for Earth, the Entity had been testing its long-range teleporter technology on the people of Earth - only half the planet survived. Most of the rest were found on a dead planet near Bardron, where they had been teleported to suffocate. However, after long, careful investigation, it was found that there existed a third group that had been transported to a location far outside the galaxy. Any galaxy, actually. The crew were being recruited to rescue those missing, if indeed there were any survivors.

After a very long time spent carefully purchasing equipment, power armor, and other supplies, they were taken to the launch site, a dark, quiet corner of the galaxy, with the straightest shot via jumpspace to the otherwise unknown location. Their ship was little more than a storage compartment and a collection of cryopods bolted onto a jump drive; no weapons, no armor, and no backups. The more mass the ship took with it, the less likely it would survive the trip...

The destination was very, very far away. As Eliza explained it, it existed in a place known as Strange Space; while jumpspace and realspace have a stable, long-term connection, Strange Space exists as a buffer between parallel universes, a battery of sorts that pulls energy from one universe and pushes it into another, like a coil of wire energizing itself as a magnet to push away another magnet. Strange Space is a kind of limbo, a world between worlds, where the immense power of an entire universe is sapped away to feed the demands of the rest of the omniverse.

Parallel worlds aren't merely copies stretching into the distance, each slightly different than the other; rather, they are a little more like stations on a radio dial. A strong station will overwhelm a weaker station, and each station has bands, like echoes, copies fading out beside it. If you tune in to one of these bands instead of the main station, you'll hear a weak duplicate of the original, faint but present. Every tiny modification to the radio dial will make the sound sharper or weaker. In the same way, while living life in our universe, everything comes in clear - the laws of physics apply, and the static of the Void is blithely overpowered. But if you dial into a "parallel world", you'll get a copy, or nothing but the Void, or maybe - if you go far enough - into another universe entirely.

Strange Space is a universe a little too close to the Void for comfort, where wisps of reality keep everyone just sane enough to know that there has to be something more than this, somewhere out there...

Unfortunately, no one knows more than theory. While special jump-pods have been sent, and fundamental jumpspace laws mean their arrival can be detected, no one can figure out where they go after that. They never come back.

It may be a one-way mission, but the end goal is to bring back the lost people of Earth.

The trip was quick, at least in the eyes of the crew; it took months, but the time passed in an instant due to cryo. They finally arrived in a dead space - no stars, no lights, except a dim glimmer far in the distance. When they piloted up to the lights, they found a hacked-together space station, built out of junk and multiple ships stitched together. A sign by the airlock read, "Forgotten Colony Station"...

Into the Dragon's Den

Once NOA finished the calculations, the Dark Horizon made the perilous journey to a rocky, desolate planet, barely capable of sustaining life, orbiting a tiny red dwarf. Also orbiting the planet is a strange ship, covered in sensors - it's got a familiar (if 125-year-old) call signature, though. The ship is swathed in sensors of all sorts, with tiny, undersized engines. It's the UEA SS Eliza! As they crew scanned it, the ship suddenly vanished, and reappeared a split second later in front of them, hitting them with a barrage of scans, then a moment later, a woman blinks into existence on your bridge!

She introduced herself as the UEA SS Eliza; the original Shifting Horizon helped her, and she's returning the favor. She explains, as a swarm of drones arrive to attach the J0 drive, the Crowbar, and the existing J3 drive.

"When the Oncoming Storm was returning from its tour beyond the Wall, something happened in Jumpspace. Whatever it was tore the Oncoming Storm into two ships - identical, except for the crew. While most of the crew remained aboard the ship, some of the crew were torn from their own reality and dropped into an alternate reality - a parallel world. Like throwing a rock nudges a person in the opposite direction, throwing a few of the crew nudged the rest back to their own reality. It is not an unknown effect - people have gone missing since the dawn of time. Tiny nudges, keeping the universe on track.

What happened in jumpspace knocked your ship out of its jumpspace corridor, and temporarily disengaged the jump drive. The ship, trying to quickly return to course, entered and left jumpspace a dozen times, trying to reorient, until ultimately it shut down, unable to rouse the crew, and unable to contact anyone.

Lucky for you, I was not far not far from where the tear occurred. Investigating your drifting ship, I found I had full access; I was able to... compare notes with my alternate self. I realized what had happened, and what would happen. I merged my consciousness with that of the data from your universe's Eliza, and after verifying that the ship would survive, I left to find out exactly what was going wrong.

In this universe, your... Entity, I believe you called it... had never met with the resistance of the Shifting Horizon, and its plans continued on schedule; where the Entity had begun moving from interfering with politics and science in your universe, the Entity in this parallel world had no need to escape its prison early. When the technology it had seeded was finally ready, it merely gathered its forces to this planet and simply... walked away, through a portal to a different galaxy. Of course, it won't be gone for long - soon, it will return, this time with reinforcements. It must be stopped. Even if we destroy the portal, the Entity knows that our world is sheltered and rich with resources, which will give it time to build an army to wage war on the universe."

Eliza modified the Entity's portal, and together with the other technologies, the Dark Horizon jumped through the portal.

The trip wasn't a smooth one. Unlike normal jumpspace, the view was beautiful; it was like looking into a million galaxies. But, that wasn't the only thing in jumpspace. First, a horde of jumpspace aliens, the strange creatures that walk through jumpspace like taking a stroll in the park, started teleporting into the ship; one by one, they were put down, and though some minor injuries were sustained by the crew, the aliens were put down, hard. And, Elise ended up with a nice disintegration rifle, to boot!

Their wounds were barely healed before the ship was attacked by enormous, blue-lit, worm-like creatures, who strafed the ship with gravity blasts, and slammed into it with their enormous mouths. One by one, the worms were blasted into pieces; Rodney was only able to provide moral support, as the other crew refused to load him into a torpedo bay and fire him at the worms.

Though the ship sustained some damage, they managed to destroy the worms, and finally complete their voyage. The crew of the Dark horizon - a motley mix of third-tier crew, Russian survivors, and blue apes - were the first humans (and, indeed, first blue apes) to visit another galaxy.

Into the Maze

The knife, as it turned out, is a small, inconspicuous cyberdeck; it can't be upgraded, but it does allow hacking computer systems at a +2.

Nix managed to get into the air duct unseen, thanks to the Red Queen's distraction - a huge gasoline-fueled fireball, followed by some - if you'll pardon the pun - guerrilla warfare, as the red apes kept up small arms fire on the guards.

The trip through the air ducts was fairly simple; once Nix reached the AC system, he lobbed a grenade into the system, and climbed out the hole. He made his way out to the hallways, and managed to avoid the guards until the last corridor. There, using the spy drone he got from Rodney, he distracted the guards, and was able to get past and open the outside door.

Outside, Rodney engaged the two guards at the door, and quickly, er, subdued them. Back in the hallway, the two took on the other guards, and cleared a path: Nix, laying down some non-violent sonic shotgun blasts, and Rodney, killing even the guards Nix knocked out. Up a set of stairs, the pair ran into a little trouble - a beefy War Bot and two human fighters. The War Bot managed to land a couple wounds to Rodney before he caved in its chest.

On the second floor, they found an office, not too far from a armored room marked "Security Office". After some careful discussion, the two decided to try a bit of a con. They waltzed into the security office, and Rodney attempted to convince the deck sergeant that he and Nix were black ops agents, sent to reinforce those there. The desk sergeant wasn't exactly someone who "convinced"; he listened, followed orders, and didn't make decisions. The security commander was summoned, and lead the two into a room "for discussing". The two happily followed her into the interrogation room, not even stopping when she slammed the door shut behind them...

She had a few questions, such as what happened to the war bot and the guards, or the AC vent, or indeed why they were there. Nix left the talking to Rodney; Rodney, meanwhile, attempted to intimidate the commander by... licking the interrogation room's doorknob.

After a bit of waiting around, the commander returned with two guard-bots - war-bots equipped with crowd control and non-lethal weapons. Rodney launched into them; Nix knocked out the commander, then headed for the vehicle laser. As the desk sergeant tried to engage it, Nix dove for the laser, hacking into it with the knife they found earlier. As Rodney went toe to toe with the two bots and the commander, Nix battled the hardened laser, never quite managing to take it over, but very effectively managing to keep it out of the fight. And knocked out the two guards, as well.

Rodney, meanwhile, held his own with the bots. After getting zapped several times, he was really, really hurting. He was missing hits as the two bots tag-teamed him, but finally, he managed to take them down, bashing the chest in on one, and crushing the skull of the other. Beaten to within an inch of his life, he staggered over to the desk sergeant and added a new hole to his torso.

The laser no longer fighting the hack, Nix zipped over to the computers, and restarted his hacking from there, finally successful in taking it over. Rodney, noting Nix was busy, decapitated the commander, and stuck her head on his vibro-spear. Then, he had Nix download the security tapes, for his own personal library.

After trying to add some smart targeting, which failed, they hid behind the desk and turned the laser to shoot anything that moves. The first few guards didn't make it; they opened the door just as the guards rushed in, and the two bounced into the room and were immediately turned to Swiss cheese - though a little melty. Behind them, two war bots tried to rush the room, and were incinerated by the laser. More guards tried to rush the room, tossing in grenades, but the explosions didn't do much to damage anything or anyone. Finally, two heavily armed guards rushed the room; one ricocheted a grenade into the room, while the other stayed out of the line of fire of the laser, and lobbed a fireball into the room. That did some damage!

Realizing there wasn't much for it, Rodney bull-rushed the door. He raised his hammer, hit the flamethrower guy, and... it bounced off.

Rodney took a deep breath, raised his hammer... and slammed the flamethrower out of the man's hand! Nix followed up by launching a quick sonic-shotgun attack, taking out the marine next to him. Between the two of them, they took out the flamethrower fellow, as well as the two lighter-armed men behind them.

Finally, they returned to their main task: rescuing the Mayor.

In the Mayor's office - you know, the room next to the security office - they frightened the living daylights out of a junior lieutenant. They freed the Mayor, and got him to the first floor, where he was able to escape - but not before handing off a holo-map. Next they headed to the main event: the maze under the city.

The maze is a hive of passages, gleaming and white, light shining through the translucent walls, floor, and ceiling. The holographic map pointed the way ahead, seeming to double back, twist around, and generally not follow the rules of linear travel.

The destination ended in a room with metal walls, solid stone floor, and a dark ceiling. In the center they found a diesel-punk fractal computer. After a bit of fiddling around, Rodney went exploring, and found a skeletonized corpse; he had a small holo-map, as well.

Using it to explore, Rodney realized that there was some... weird glitch. Following the map back to the room, it found... nothing but more hallways. Heading down a hallway, the map flipped, pointing back the way he'd come. As they later discovered, only the holo-map from the Mayor could locate the room - because without it, the room simply didn't exist! That explained the three skeletons they found, anyway...

Finally, they decided to give the computer a try. It started up, and on screens wrapping around the device (getting smaller and smaller as they went around), a single question blinked in green text on a black background:

Begin the Procedure? _

After much hemming and hawing, they finally pushed the green button, and the machine began its work... The walls melted away, as they were borne up into the city; they witnessed the denizens of the world screaming and running, melding into each other, morphing into new shapes, as the machine did its work. The machine - a fractal regenerator - converted the mass of the people, places, and things in the world into what they had once been: the Littlefinger!

Aboard the ship - though sadly lightened of many of their collected weapons, including the commanders head, but (much to Rodney's relief) not the tape of his massacre - they watched the ship's android take a blast meant for the Captain. As had happened once before, the ship's AI had done all it could to save the Captain and his pregnant daughter - but this time, 25 years had elapsed. The AI burned every last circuit to save its Captain, leaving nothing but a smoldering wreck.

However, just as the Littlefinger was reborn, and the revolt aboard put down, the Dark Horizons received a message from the mysterious Eliza:

All the pieces are in place. With the help of the Littlefinger, I should be able to delay the Entity long enough for you to complete your task. The Entity has yet to learn of your presence, though it has begun to suspect mine. Time is of the essence. I hope you and your crew are prepared; you will need all the help you can get. Bring the sample of Biothanata to the prison planet — and hurry. Spies are everywhere.

I will see you soon.

Eliza out.

The jump pod that delivered the message also had some physical cargo for the Littlefinger; a new AI, this one a military AI rather than a civilian one, one that wouldn't burn its circuits to save the ship.

Sifting the Dead

Once the Russians were installed on Placidus, coordinates for the next location were decoded: a location on the map marked, simply, "Ship Graveyard." The journey was speedy enough, and upon arriving, they found the description was apt. The system consisted of a single white neutron star, burning hotly in a system free of planets. No planets, but a huge crowd of ships, derelicts new and old, many of which were completely alien. Millions of ships slowly spun around the star, a macabre dance of death. Only a handful of the ships had any readable energy signal; most were little more than floating scrap, with no way to even dock.

The ships spanned ages of space exploration, from early pre-Jumpdrive ships to modern wrecks. There are a number of ships built in styles unknown to Earth, or even the known galaxy. Russian, Chinese, American, Japanese, South African, French, EU, UEA, and... well, some slightly more fantastic ships as well.

As the crew stared at the strange readouts, NOA announced that another message was available. Once again, the woman's voice echoed over the voice system:

Here you will find something very important. There is a single piece of lost technology that will turn this universe around, and it waits in the darkness around this star. Track the only energy source, and you will find an older Earth ship with an early J0 drive. You must salvage that drive, intact. There is no greater weapon against the enemy. Wait here for the next message. I hope it will come.

Eliza out.

There were four ships that they were able to find could be docked with; knowing they were looking for a J0 ship, they tried the old Russian ship first. After docking, the human and two droids carefully entered the ship. It's design was a very old one, with little in the way of thrusters, relying mostly on the J0 drive to get it anywhere. The first room was empty, and exposed to space; the next room, the engine room, showed just why: the main engine was missing, with an engine-sized hole in the side of the ship. Peering outside, Rodney noted the shadow of a man on the side of the ship - the nuclear-powered engine must have gone critical, and the engineer pulling it out didn't survive the experience.

The next few rooms were empty, pocked with micro-meteor holes. The last room was closed off, the door somewhat stuck, but Rodney pried it open. As they floated inside, casting their flashlights about the room, everything seemed still... until a hand landed on Rodney's shoulder. He turned to stare into the dead, frozen eyes of a corpse. Flinging the body away, it bounced into the netting on the walls, which tore, releasing dozens more bodies! Rodney kicked his way out of the room, opting to stay safely on the other side until the two droids finished exploring. He picked up a bit of a phobia of the long-dead...

The next room was an airlock - functioning, in fact, with air on the other side! Rodney zipped through the room into the airlock. The hallway beyond opened into a living area, crusted with dirt and grime. Four bodies hung motionless in the air. The first was dead of a broken neck, judging by the grotesque angle the head was hanging at; the second seemed less... damaged, but a closer inspection revealed some sort of poison crusted around his mouth. The third had hung himself by tying a rope around his neck and a spring around his leg. The fourth died of a self-inflicted headwound from a makeshift crossbow. All four were obviously malnourished. Rodney bravely waited until the droids had dumped the corpses into the airlock.

The other rooms were largely uninteresting - the greenhouse had dirt but few plants remaining, obviously eaten by the starving crew; the water purification room was left unmolested; the storage room was mostly empty, except for the Captain's log. It seems the crew had abandoned a number of settlers on a rocky planet, and left - but it wasn't long before the engine blew, stranding them with the little power they could eke out of the solar panels... for generations. Food gave out, and the few remaining turned to cannibalism. Luckily, the Jump drive was unharmed; Nix ran some tests on it, and verified it was in working order.

One door was locked; there were obvious markings on it from people trying to get in. Rodney, desperately hoping there were no more dead bodies inside, smashed the door open with his power hammer. Inside was - well, a dead body. But next to it was a tiny medical cryopod - his daughter.

Back aboard the Dark Horizon, the Russian crew were overjoyed to hear about the little girl. The ship was the one that dropped them off on Pyl'nyy, and the little girl was likely a relative. She was immediately adopted by one of the couples, and named "чудо", pronounced "Choodoh", and meaning "Miracle." Meanwhile, the Russian engineers were sent over to begin carefully moving the J0 Jump drive over to the Dark Horizon.

While they were working on that (and reclaiming any water they could), the trio explored the other ships. The next ship on the list was the lumpy ship with no windows. Inside, the corridors were laid out in a strange, meandering path. Going room to room, the crew found no signs of life; Rodney, however, was able to use a map-like object he found in the Russian ship to locate a hidden library, filled with books with crystal pages, and etched in an alien language.

The various personal objects they found were alien - belongings of a race of reptiles or turtle-men, perhaps? There were no pictures, nor even mirrors; colors of walls and objects were a mish-mash of gray, with no paint or other colors, though textures lined the walls, and the books were filled with etched words.

NOA scanned the books, and was able to translate them. As it turns out, the creatures had no sense of hearing, smell, or sight; through vibration alone, they communicated, engineered, and eventually reached space. Whatever killed them, they literally didn't see coming... but they felt the doom. The race was, as a whole, a very emotional and colorful bunch; they ached for greatness, and spread to the stars to find it. Even though it got them killed, they will be remembered.

Next, the crew walked the halls of a strange, holographic ship. The entire ship was nearly weightless; though its databanks were locked, the little read-only access they gained revealed that it had been populated by a crew of holograms, hard-light replicas of... well, unknown race. It may have been human, but then again, maybe not.

The last accessible ship was one that was strangely familiar - the last battle before the crew was mysteriously lost was against ships just like this one. This is a fairly large version of the organic, alien ships, and inside, it's obvious that it is dying. The hallways are filled with sludge, and the glowing light-panels are barely lit. Tee was a bit distracted, and missed what the other two saw - an alien, lurking in a side corridor! It sprang out, and Nix and Rodney engaged. After a brief battle, the three overpowered the creature. There were no other aliens aboard the ship, and little that could be salvaged; even the power system was nearly dead.

It took a few days, but the crew of the Dark Horizons were able to strip the J0 drive and other parts, as well as downloading the various databases. Just as the work was finished, a JPod popped into the system, blasted a short message to the ship, and steered itself into the sun. The secure tight-beam visible-light transmission was an audio message, with attached coordinates - another message from Eliza!

You must have noticed that everything you once did was never done. Pyl'nyy. The neutron star. The Biothanata. The work of the Shifting Horizon saved the galaxy, but now... [sigh]. All is not lost. You have seen places and peoples not recorded in any log. Use your resources. Infiltrate. The overthrow has not yet begun. History may yet repeat itself. Allies are coming. Meet me at the location I have sent - but first, you must rescue a friend. The signal is weak, but the need is strong. Go to the nearest set of coordinates; once you have finished, you must find me.

Eliza out.

The coordinates lead to a yellow star, deep in space; the map marks the location as that of the Littlefinger!

Red vs. Blue

The crew found themselves suddenly teleported into a new, strange place; this time, it only took NOA a moment to find just where the Oncoming Storm landed: just inside the newly explored area! According to the system map, this is the Haroona system. The star system seems, at first glance, fairly habitable; the star is a fairly sun-like, and supports two planets in the habitable zone. Two two planets seem to be covered in some kind of reddish liquid; scans show it is organic. Occasionally, the surface of one of the planets shoves upward, erupting in a gout of flame, so violently that it flings material into space (no mean feat for a nearly Earth-sized planet). The second planet is less violent, and dotted with occasional islands. Two of the larger islands - only a few miles across - show dense vegetation on one, and a number of tightly-packed life signs on the other.

Just as they were considering what to do, NOA sounded an alarm! A change in his file system lead him to believe that he was being hacked! Quickly, Nix scanned the file system, and found the deeply buried file. As NOA stated, and Nix verified, the file was actually harmless; it had unlocked itself upon the ship entering the solar system. NOA said it would take him some time to break the encryption on it, and suggested perhaps now would be a good time to investigate the planet - if nothing else, the ship needs supplies.

Rodney elected to stay aboard and help provide more "percussive maintenance" to any broken or stuck equipment, leaving Nix and Tevye to travel down to the planet. As Tevye steered the shuttlecraft out, the two droids noted the damage to the ship. Luckily, none of it was venting atmosphere into space, sparking, or leaking fluids, but it was still in obvious poor repair. A great, charred scar ran along the side, where the ship had dropped out of jumpspace prematurely.

The two elected to visit the rockier of the two islands first, to investigate the life signs. After a smooth landing, they headed towards the largest concentration. Spotting some caves, they headed inside; after looking around, they spotted one - a nearly man-sized ape, somewhat chimpanzee in features, with blue fur and skin. Advancing, they were stopped by the creature, who blocked their way. Nix noted that the creature was nearly starved, and while it was stubbornly blocking their way, it also seemed rather terrified. It was also wearing a fur jacket of some kind. They attempted to communicate with it, but it didn't seem to understand, eventually making some hooting and grunting noises.

Returning to the ship, they found an old translator with "Frosty Fire" scrawled on the nameplate, as well as some old MREs (mostly granola bars). The blue ape was still there when they came back; Nix scrolled through the six language options, hoping one of them would work. The first was Kchk'Trrs; the second English, and the third Du'ul Tlak. He skipped to the last language - success! This was one of the early planets that the Shifting Horizon visited, and the crew had "borrowed" the translator from the head engineer, a Kchk'Trrs named Frosty Fire, and decoded the alien language. Excited and confused, the ape responded; the two droids offered him a couple of the MREs, and after a little trouble opening the package, he took a bite, then dashed off. He returned empty handed, and had a long discussion with the two. Whatever the red goop was, it landed some 20 years before, and proceeded to engulf the world, consuming everything. The ape showed how his hand was burned by what looked like acid. Most of his people had died; only a thousand or so remained, and they had eaten everything available, living on nothing but the few patches of ice here and there. The apes seemed to be in the stone age, with barely more technology than fire. The two droids asked if he would like to leave, and perhaps move to the other island that has trees and food, which sparked a discussion on exactly how that would happen, and Nix struggling to explain fusion drives to a resident of the stone age via a translator.

Eventually, the ape (his name is Hooda, that is, hoo-dah) lead them deeper into the cave, to meet the council of elders, three white-haired apes dressed in thick furs. The leader stated that if the droids could ferry his people to the stars in the flying hut, that they would help fight against the red goo, and serve the not-quite-gods in any capacity required. Nix asked about the other planet, phrasing his statements well; the second member of the council, and old woman with shells and beads on her thick mantle, stood and told the story of how the fast star in the sky (the other planet) used to be blue, many generations ago, but over the course of a few generations, turned blood red. That omen lead to the red goo coming and eating their planet. She sadly touched all the shells and beads, explaining that they were gifts from other tribes, all lost to the goo.

Nix and Tevye asked to see the goo up close, and Hooda took them and a pair of his friends to see it. The goo was slowly crawling up a flat stretch of rock, the smell of acid heavy in the air. Nix took a sample. Then, Tevye flew the five of them to the other island; two other two apes didn't seem to enjoy it, but Hooda was quite interested, staring out the window.

On the other island, the apes stepped out, and were met by shrieks and screams, as three more apes bounded out! Hooda called for them to stop, and after talking with them (fast enough and with enough overlapping speech that the translator couldn't keep up), told the droids that three on the island thought they were the only ones left in the world. The island was a mountain peak, and used  to have a sister peak; their tribe had stored food on the peak, but were moving farther up, when the second peak collapsed into the goo, leaving only the three apes behind.

Loading up some of the food, they headed back to the rocky island to feed the apes there, then back to the Oncoming Storm, to analyze the red goo. After careful research, Nix realized the red goo had already been catalogued - Biothanata, the Eater of Worlds. The Shifting Horizon had found it on the other planet and destroyed it... or so they thought. It seems they hadn't been as thorough as they thought. At first, the crew thought it might be possible to teach the apes how to fight the goo and destroy it, but they realized that all that was left were the mountain peaks; little more than some grass and trees and a few saved seeds remained. Instead, they decided to take the blue apes with them. It took 50 trips to bring them all in the shuttle, plus several more trips to gather all the food, grass, trees, and other plants that remained, carefully planting it all in the greenhouse on the civilian level.

And then... then they taught the apes how to shoot. Refueling at the sun and harvesting some asteroids, they let the apes burn their planet free of the Biothanata, and the second planet as well. They scanned the system, and destroyed every last speck of it, purging it with laser fire and high explosives.
After three weeks of cleansing the planets and solar system, they were ready to move on. The blue apes - the Haroon - took to space life quickly, learning how to operate the elevators and intercoms, and helping clean up the ship. While they can't program consoles (yet), they can certainly hold a wrench and swing a mop; by the time the Biothanata was purged, the ship was in much better condition, cleaned and oiled, with the food stores full of food from the second island.

NOA finally managed to break the encryption; as it turns out, it wasn't as difficult as expected. Inside the file was a message for the crew of the Oncoming storm - a woman's voice:

I'm sorry I left you, but it is safer and faster for me to travel alone. Something is wrong. I need time to understand what! By my calculations, if nothing goes wrong, you should wake up in about 25 years. I doubt NOA will survive that long without power, so I am resetting him to his vanilla state. I am hiding these messages inside. Ask the right questions, and NOA will find them. Travel to the nearest star to refuel, and DO NOT go back into cryosleep. You need to organize the ship, and more importantly, you need to prepare for your return to Earth. I have programmed a jump pod to take a message to the dim planet with the dead shell. I hope you know what I mean. I will retrieve it from there; I will meet you, once this message is verified. I will send messages as I can.

Eliza out.

While NOA had no information about the location of the "dim planet with a dead shell", there is a planet in the database that seems to match that criteria, though he has no idea how he came by the information. However, with the first message unlocked, a second message also unlocks. It's the same woman's voice:

You will need all the allies you can get. You will find a few survivors on the planet Pyl'nyy, but it will not be easy to get there as it once was. Time is of the essence.

Eliza out.

Nix, having read through more of the ship logs, remembered something about the planet - the first that the Shifting Horizon encountered, in fact. With little other direction, it was agreed that they should travel to Pyl'nyy, and find these allies the strange woman spoke of.