Starborn: Origin of the Stars

“Mason, is it done?” Rain Trevil asked one of his men in annoyance. He sat at his little desk in the strategic room of the Discovery. His mood was at the bottom already and now he even had to go to such lengths just to make sure that this mission will be successful.

‘It’s all because of this damn technocrafter…’ He cursed in his mind for the umpteenth time this day and threw an angry glare at the profile that was visible on his datapad, ‘Just what is it that the UAS sees in him to give such an evaluation?’

“Yes Sir, all communication is shut down. Remoore is in Dreamer’s Hope and reports to the UAS that our systems were damaged by a tree shortly after the landing.” The only other person in the room reported stiffly.

“Well, now that they are unable to send us new orders, we've at least ensured the mission’s completion, even if the paperwork will be hell afterward.” Trevil said but saw his man hesitating, “What is it, Mason?”

“Sir, was this really necessary - killing all means of communication? The Commander already confirmed that our people will ensure that the UAS won’t be able to decide on any directives for at least 24 hours.” The man said and looked at his watch, “15 hours left. We will be gone in three, plenty of margin of safety.”

A low clattering coming from the back of the ship made them both look over.

“Probably Miles, he wanted to check if the priso… the Eltaran wants something to eat now.” Mason said with a shrug.

“Seems like he kicked it out of his hands again. He really didn’t take it well that we prepared some ‘safety measures’.” Trevil chuckled, “Back to your question. Have you read Tulward’s profile?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“Ever seen someone marked as ‘ High Value Contact’?”

“No, Sir.”

“If you ever see shit like that, remember to always have a backup plan! If the upper echelons suddenly decide to hurry up their asses and ignore the stuff our people are throwing at them, we will be fucked.” Trevil explained with a sigh.

“But Commander Ramones…” Mason tried to argue.

“Commander Ramones personally told us that we have enough time, right. But do you really believe he will care about that, if shit hits the fan?” Trevil gave a hollow laugh, “No, if something goes wrong, he will lash out at the first person he can blame. Who do you think that will be?”

Mason paled at the thought of sitting in the first row when the Commander got one of his famous outbursts.

“I didn’t think about tha-”

Suddenly, as if to give more weight to the topic and set the right mood, the lights went off and everything was swallowed by darkness.

“What the fuck?” Rain Trevil angrily exclaimed, before it hit him like a racing ship.

“To the brig, secure the prisoner!” He yelled and jumped to the door.

***

A few minutes before…

Two people crept quietly through the forest. Their black armor made them merge with the darkness, even though their helmets were exchanged for simple black caps.

“I see nothing…” Robin muttered under his breath, missing the night-vision.

“The helmet would nullify my enhanced hearing and also, in combination with our suits, we would be pretty easy to recognize. Now shut up and keep looking where you put your feet. You trample like a Notobruk!” Alena hissed, walking a few steps ahead of him.

Robin raised his arms in defense but didn’t respond. After a good 15 minutes the woman stopped and hunkered down behind some bushes. She pointed ahead and began to whisper.

“There is a small clearing in front of us; their ship is parked over there. Where is ROMAS?”

Robin pointed upwards and couldn’t suppress a grin, when he saw Alena flinch after she realized that the drone was hovering not even 5 meters above her.

“That thing is made for stealth, shit!” She cursed and concentrated back on the clearing, “I’ll go in and try to check if I can get a read!”

Without waiting for his confirmation she moved forwards and soon became one with the darkness. Robin took her former spot and tried to make out the ship. With the moon hidden behind a layer of clouds, he didn’t see much, only a rough shape of a triangle, 25 meters ahead. Nervously he shifted his weight around while he waited for Alena to return.

‘Calm down, Damnit!’ He chided himself, ‘We have a solid plan, nothing can go wrong… not much, at least. She checks where the crew is and where they keep Ang’Tue. Then ROMAS goes in and opens his door. Lights go out and poof the old man becomes invisible. That’s all!’

Time ticked down and after a few minutes Robin’s already shaky beliefs slowly turned into worries. He even tried to check the clearing with his mutation, but unfortunately his range was too low to get any results.

Only after what felt like an eternity did Alena suddenly appeared like a ghost by his side. Even in this darkness he could see that she was drained and on wobbly legs.

“What happened?” He quietly asked.

“I couldn’t get a good reading. I had to use my skill…” She said between low huffs.

“Burn in plasma! How long and did you get anything out of it?” Robin asked.

Alena’s mutation, like most G-Anomalies, came with its own skills. Her Class C - Sharp Senses enhanced vision, smell, hearing and touch to the level of a Class E mutation and with her skill, Overload, she could kick them up to the level of a Class C mutation. For up to 5 minutes she would become a monster in her sensory perceptions, outclassing most off-the-shelf sensors you could find. With hearing and touch alone she was able to get a pretty good picture from the insides of any building, vehicle or small ship. On the downside, her senses would drop way below the level of a normal human after turning off the skill. Recovery would take five times as long as the skill was used.

“Close to four minutes…” She said with a grimace, “But I think I got what we need. Two people are in a big room in the center of the ship, one in the cockpit and two at the back in what I think are the cabins.”

“Fuck, we can’t wait that long - this intel will be useless in 20 minutes. Do you know which one is Ang’Tue?”

“No, but probably one of those in the cabins.”

“Yeah, I figured as much. Okay, let’s get this started before the last one comes back from Dreamer’s Hope.”

Robin closed his eyes and watched the video-feed from the UAV. With the drone’s night-vision he had a pretty good view from above while closing in on the Discovery. ROMAS knew exactly where it needed to go and quickly flew to a small hatch atop of the ship’s hull. This will be a tight entry, as the hatch was only 2m wide, just slightly bigger than the drone. However, that was the same for the whole ship as the scout didn’t have a roomy interior and the short hallways only measured up to 1,5m at some points. ROMAS would need to tilt the drone to fit through, luckily they didn’t plan on wandering around on the ship for long.

When the drone came close to the hatch, it immediately opened up. Robin was once more reminded that ROMAS wasn’t just some random AI but an invention of the Drel themselves, even if it was downgraded right now. Controlling the drone gave it a much wider selection of actions than what it was able to do on his Neuro-Chip and fooling a ship into believing it was one of its own drones was obviously no problem at all.

While Robin was still thinking about the amazing technology that allowed the creation his companion, the UAV entered the ship. The little bay was cramped because two other drones were already inside. He observed as ROMAS moved to the service-door and tapped on a pad to the side with the metallic arm.

This was one of the most critical parts of his plan. They had no idea what was behind the door and someone might just be passing by. Alena’s intel could only be trusted for so long.

Weapons activated

A small message at the top of the video notified him that the stun guns were powered up. He really hoped they wouldn’t need them, though.

The door slid open with a hiss and the drone found itself in an empty hallway. They got lucky!

Slowly ROMAS piloted the UAV through the ship. He tried to stay away from the front and headed directly to the cabins. After a few minutes they found six closed doors. The drone switched to thermal-vision and even though it couldn’t see what was going on in the rooms, it at least could differentiate between occupied and vacant cabins because of the slightly higher temperature inside. Quickly they ruled out the empty rooms and ROMAS randomly decided on one of the remaining ones.

Without any hesitation it tapped the pad and the door slid open. It was a small, dark bunk and on the bed a person was sleeping. Before Robin could even fully grasp the situation, the door was shut again and the drone turned around.

“Okay, wrong room. Must be nice to have such fast processing capabilities!” He muttered.

That’s why I was given the name ROMAS

“Say what?” Completely surprised by this, he couldn’t react fast enough and instead of answering, the drone opened the other door. It was the same bunk, but instead of lying in the bed, the person inside was sitting on the ground in a meditative position. Robin quickly identified Ang’Tue who opened his eyes when they entered, but ROMAS turned around and began to tinker with the pad inside, probably to make sure they would be able to get out again, if the door closed behind them.

Robin saw the metal claw remove the casing of the pad and rummage through the cables. After cutting a few of them, the drone tapped on the dangling pad and the door closed. It turned around and came face-to-face, well face-to-camera, with the Eltaran.

“Open comm!” Robin quickly ordered.

Unfortunately the BWT-connection was only working for ROMAS, so Robin couldn’t directly stream his voice. But the AI could easily make the drone’s sound-module say whatever it wanted and just relayed his words.

“Hey mate, it’s me, Robin! How are you doing?”

The old man tilted his head, examining the drone.

“That is unexpected!” He said and Robin could hear the relief in his voice.

“You didn’t think we would leave you behind, did you?”

“This is not what we agreed on. You are taking risks…”

“How about we discuss this at a later time in a more suitable environment?” Robin asked.

“Very well.”

“Great, here is the plan. ROMAS, the drone, has unlocked your door. We will leave first and look for an access point to connect to the system and turn off the lights. Then you can just become one with the shadows and get the hell out of here!”

“That would be a solid plan…” Ang’Tue said with an awkward smile on his face and raised his hands.

Robin hadn’t noticed it before, but it seemed like Trevil and his men had cuffed him before they dumped the Eltaran in the cabin.

“So much for being an ‘honored guest’. Will this be a problem?”

“Yes, these cuffs prevent the usage of most mutations.” Ang’Tue explained.

“What, there is such a thing?”

Suppression-Shackles

While they cannot actually suppress a mutation, they scan the body.

As soon as they detect the usage of a mutation, painful electric shocks are sent into the prisoner.

The sudden pain breaks the concentration of the user, stopping the skill’s activation.

Doesn’t work in any situation but is still one of the most reliable options to prevent someone from using a mutation.

“Wow, that is some nasty, fucked-up tech!” Robin exclaimed. Sure, it wasn’t failsafe as there were many skills that worked instantaneously and didn’t need the user to continuously concentrate on it. In addition he could totally see some people train to withstand the pain and keep their mutation active even under such conditions. But for the everyday Jack? Yeah, this would definitely do.

“Damnit, what now?” He mused. How would he get Ang’Tue out of the ship without anyone noticing? The same way they went in? Maybe - why not? If he could get the Eltaran quietly to the drone-bay, there would be no reason for anyone to check his cabin. This would be even better than his original plan, which would alert everyone aboard that something was wrong. However, there were risks. The Eltaran would be completely defenseless on his way out.

While he was still pondering about their best course of action, the door suddenly beeped and even before it had completely slid open, ROMAS had turned the drone around. One of the crewmembers stood outside, a tray with food in his hands.

“I came to-”

He didn’t get any further since a blue, crackling energy bullet hit him directly in the chest. Like a dead log he fell forward face-first, the tray slipped out of his hands and dropped to the floor with a loud clatter.

“Hurry to the drone-bay! Right, left, left, right.” ROMAS said without waiting for Robin to formulate a plan. Ang’Tue hesitated only for a moment, checked if the dude had the key to his cuffs or a weapon and rushed out of the room when he didn’t find anything useful.

The drone also exited the room and closed the door, before following the Eltaran. Seems like even ROMAS still saw a chance that no one heard the noise. However only moments later the drone spun around when the other cabin’s door slid open.

Unfortunately he couldn’t see what happened next, because someone forcefully shook his shoulders.

“What is it?” He hissed angrily when Alena tore him out of the video-feed at such a crucial point.

She just held a finger to her lips and pointed at the clearing. The moon was freed from the clouds by now and after his eyes readjusted to the lighting he could barely make out a person that was slowly walking to the ship.

"Fuck!" Robin cursed under his breath. From his position the man had a perfect view on the spot where Ang’Tue would hopefully pop out of the hatch in just a few moments. And if he wasn’t mistaken, then the man wore a proper helmet, meaning he had probably his night-vision activated.

Alena on cooldown: -00:06:40

“Damnit, damnit, damnit!” Robin mumbled and pulled the cap deeper into his face. He quickly grabbed a stone and threw it into the woods behind the man.

When he turned around to the rustling noise, Robin began to tap into his mutation and sprinted forward.