A Step Too Close

[Antonio]

It was yet another standard patrol ahead of GMG squadron Gamma 8, or so it seemed. The new directives from freshly appointed Guildmaster Yukari involved much deeper and longer patrol paths, so they estimated the whole trip to take a bit less than 5 hours. The patrol consisted of 1 GMG Gunship, the Saijin-Maru, and 4 Karasu Heavy Fighters. The GMG Gunship in particular, a newly manufactured ship and the only capital vessel GMG designed, was appointed only because most of the route was inside Sigma-21.

Sigma-21 is a recently discovered system where GMG's presence is very limited, and the system itself hasn't been properly explored yet. Prophylaxis against the unknown, their leftover from the 80-years-war Bismarck Daishouri, was placed near the familiar jumpholes leading to Sigma-17 and Sigma-59. Perhaps it was put there intentionally in case the Rheinlanders find it, serving as a reminder to what happened all those years ago, considering Sigma-21 was a southern Sigma and a connection to Rheinland or Rheinland-claimed Sigma-15 was a realistic possibility, and perhaps it was there because it's the single biggest warship GMG owned.

Leader of the squadron, commander Sakura, was very optimistic ahead of their task. He was a young and stubborn man, having only recently become a commander of Saijin-Maru. The stubborness is what got him into that position in the first place, although it also got him in trouble a few times where he risked his and his crew's lives when he shouldn't have. One such fight was against Corsairs in Sigma 17 during the back-and-forth battles that were happening in the system for the Kunashir Cloud, when he was still a fighter pilot. Only he and another wingman survived the encounter, him receiving a clear scar on his right cheek because of the impact of a missile on the hull of his ship. The scar is an everyday reminder of what happened that day, where his ignorance lead to all his teammates getting killed. Something he never told anyone, and never will, because the only other survivor died from injuries a few hours later.

Sakura gave the order and they launched from Niigata. He still can't believe someone built such a massive installation, especially someone not considered as one of the leading powers of Sirius. Yet here it was, him comparing the size of his gunship with the station, stunned from its beauty and mightiness. The route to Sigma-21 jumphole was standard and secured, so they took a direct path. As they jumped, the captain decided to make a small detour by approaching the Mekong Cloud, a beautiful purple nebula and their main patrol task, from the west rather than east. Since GMG is exploring the system clockwise around the two suns and close to Planet Saigon and its satellite, it was recommended to go through that path. As stubborn as he was, that mattered little to him.


It's been an hour into their trip already, and they just passed two planets on the other side of the suns, the gas giant Hanoi and a much smaller Hai Phong. Surprisingly nothing has popped up on their scanners yet, which demonstrated how desolated this system still is. Emptiness and beauty of the system and its planets made a very pleasant, yet uneasy atmosphere. It's the captain to" blame" for choosing the non-recommended route, but none of the 4 fighters or crew members had the authority to challenge him.

They were venturing into the Mekong Cloud as their visual range started dropping to the purple mist. All that emptiness and nothingness slowly started to cause a weird atmosphere, something they weren't used to. The captain took a deep breath and informed his squadron to stick close. This was the true task now, exploring what was barely explored before, with little to no visibility and scanner efficiency. Only God knew what lied ahead.

It wasn't even 5 minutes entering the cloud when all that tension that could be felt in the air suddenly became a reality. One of the fighters yelled "Incoming cruise disruptors, 9 o'clock!". Their engines got disrupted within seconds. "What the hell was that? All men, be ready to open fire on anything that moves." - said the captain, and sent a clear message. "Unknown ships, identify yourselv-" the captain couldn't finish the sentence before the ships themselved appeared in front of him. He was stunned for a second, but a bit relieved. In front of him stood three Kusari Naval Forces Heavy Fighters. "KNF ships? Here? What the... I'm glad you're not hostiles, gentlemen. I was worried for a second."

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SNAC Montage Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Thruster SNAC

[Antonio]

There was nothing but silence. Captain repeated: "Do you copy? Over."

Again no response. The captain leaned his head towards the XO standing next to him and whispered: "Tell the crew to move to battlestations. I don't like this." He was getting worried. As if the emptiness of the system and the dense cloud weren't creating enough of an uneasy atmosphere already, all he needed was silent KNF ships on top of it. He took a deep breath, hoping they'll reply, and said: "KNF vessels, please respond. This is GMG patrol Gamma Eight en route fr-" "We read you, Gamma Eight".

Sakura was relieved. As he was about to press the voice comms button he got interrupted again: "Please follow us. We'd like to show you something."

The captain was skeptical about the message. Why did these ships who suddenly appeared in front of him and hesitated to hail back want his squadron to follow them? The KNF ships had no power nor authority to command him, as well as being outnumbered. The crew wasn't too eager to blindly fly a mysterious non-friendly entity either, which resulted in the captain refusing to comply to their request.

Chimaeras went silent again. The captain was losing patience. Being relatively young and inexperienced, he never found himself in a similar situation. All of his tense moments were mostly with criminals such as Corsairs or Outcasts on well known and scouted areas inside the home Sigmas. As he was ready to tell his crew to get the hell out of there, and fight if need be, he suddenly stopped and watched what was happening. More and more ships started popping up on their inefficient scanners and surrounding them, this time not just KNF Heavy Fighters. There were Sabres, Sunriders, Eagles and even a Kusari Explorer. Within two minutes they were heavily outmanned and outgunned. "If you would be kind enough to follow us now, please. Do not do anything foolish and you won't be harmed."

The situation was crystal clear. Sakura was trying to remember stories someone told him a while ago about a group posing as Kusari Naval Forces and using their technology but with much darker agendas, however those stories only came from Kusari. Only rarely would those ships go into the Sigmas and the GMG has little to no physical evidence of them. It had to be them, surely KNF pilots would hail them otherwise by now, but the captain couldn't stop asking himself one question - how the hell did they end up here?

It didn't matter all that much, they had no choice but to follow. The whole group fired up their cruise engines and ventured deeper into the nebula. As they were moving through they saw more patrols of various ships moving through the cloud. Half an hour later, the leader of the initial squadron responded: "Careful now, we're almost there." In front of them showed up an asteroid field with weirdly and perfectly shaped objects. It took very little to realise they weren't asteroids, but mines. Mines they never saw before that looked far from human.

Soon they approached a blurry mass which looked more and more like an installation inside the mining field. The captain and his squadron were very nervous at this point. XO suggested opening fire, but Sakura knew it'd be to no avail. They could either kill themselves or embrace whatever's in front of them. Slowly freaking out, he yelled: "Where are we? What do you want with us? Who are you!?" "You're in a place where many have been reborn. Welcome to your new home." said a deep dark voice from the station. The communications of Saijin-Maru and the rest of the squadron went silent.