"I'm aware I'm acting beyond my authority and this report in no way impacts operational details. However, I'm a suspicious crone."
"Takahashi's personal package turned up quicker than I - or, apparently, she, anticipated. By the divine will John made contact with me whilst I was on patrol in Sigma 19. He revealed that he had Takahashi's "orb", and initial photographic confirmation fitted the physical description aptly. A blue grey, near atomically perfect sphere of bioorganic crystalline construction. About as interesting as Hawaiian tourist tack."
"On the way to make the pickup John advertised the item with so many MacGuffin attributes you'd think he'd be marketing it for a IND executive's ransom. He alluded to the sphere as an energy storage apparatus, although he states the one in question is drained of its charge. I was skeptical as to the utillity of what (he says) is a dead bioorganic power cell, but from his description it has an energy-to-mass storage ratio higher than that of its equivalent mass in antimatter, which defies so many laws of physics as to write its own constitution. I humoured him, and he narrated the career of an Anglo scientist who was experimenting on using the cell's constituent parts as a superconducting element in some kind of revolutionary planetary bombardment weapon, apparently inspired after a similar weapon which was used on the Order Overwatch some years in the past. John was short on specifics, but he referred repeatedly to a planet called 'Toledo' in 'Omicron Minor'. It's a stretch in credibility, but the name is evidently Hispanic it's likely the Outcasts have the system mapped, if you can be bothered to verify what is most likely hokum."
"Obviously this drew my focus in the light of the present threat, but John is not the most lucid of individuals even when he's not playing the lecher. However, he appeared to genuinely care about his subject matter which inclines me to believe -at least partially-, there is some exceptional quality to the orb. Now, I'm no Darche, but I can read a scanner output when it fails to identify the elemental structure of an object. Even the ship can't identify what this orb is comprised of."
"In addition, John provided us with a nonstandard particle weapon, the design of which I've never seen before. It's power demands exceed my ability to mate it to my own ship so it's been sent of for component testing. Hopefully it'll be something that we haven't seen yet."
"The orb is currently in the possession of the Hatsyume, until we can deduce its value. If I am wrong and it does indeed have a practical materials purpose, John claims to be able to provide an unlimited supply of the cells at a fixed frequency. It's likely he'll wish to be compensated for his exertions."
"Mind you, I haven't yet paid John. I'd advise that ran treats the orb judiciously, and doesn't drop the bloody thing."
THE SYNDIC LEAGUES
(A co-operative of Rheinland's Shipping Unions, retired from a life of piracy.)