“Well, this is it. An Avenger, called Silver_Dawn, top of the range.”
“So why’s it coming to a rookie like me?” Silme asked as she ran a hand over the hull.
“Well.” The LPI Officer said as he glanced down at his datapad. “The ship was found drifting in Kansas. We never found the body.”
“Kansas?” Silme said with a frown. “A bit out of the way isn’t it?” What wasn’t he telling her?
“Fine. You want the reason we're giving you this ship. It had a run in with a Nomad.”
Silme shivered. Nomads. Alien scum. No wonder the ship was being given away. She was at the bottom, it was this ship or nothing; everybody higher up the chain must have passed it down.
“So basically, everybody thinks it's haunted.” She stated. Not that she was superstitious. No; not at all. It didn't however stop her from pulling her hand back from the hull.
The Officer opened his mouth, shut it, and then said, “Basically, yes.”
“Right. Wonderful.”
“We, ah, also have the recordings from the cockpit.” He suggested as he moved away, tossing a data chip in her general direction.
It was not till later that she was able to plug the chip into a computer terminal and listen to the recording.
== “What?”
In the left of the recording various lights flickered to show cockpit controls, one of them lit up to show the comm. unit had been quickly switched through the various frequencies.
“Strange.”
A second voice joined in. “Either I'm hallucinating or...” the other voice trailed off for a moment. “... There is a Nomad here it seems.”
“A Nomad... it has to be.” The pilot sounded scared as the comm. unit was toggled again yet showed no incoming messages apart from the other human pilot.
A pause, the harsh breathing of the police man the only sound.
“I'm sure I have something on my scanners but I can't see anything out the cockpit.”
Another flicker of light in the corner of the recording, the collision warning, to show the ship had been knocked.
“I...” He trailed off into panicked breaths.
“Trust your scanners I say.” The other pilot said into the gap.
“I'm not feeling too well. So... tired.”
Another pause, longer.
“I. Sleep. Yes.”
“Snap out of it and tell us your location by private comm. Silver_Dawn.”
Another silence as the Silver_Dawns former pilot failed to respond. The blinking light showing a living body in the recording data the only assurance that he was still alive.
“Snap out of it.” The other pilot snapped out, worry finally seeping into his tone.
“I. What?”
Another of the minutes of silence.
“I have to leave.”
“To... leave?” the other pilot asked, puzzled.
“I have to go... Have to go. Somewhere. I have to find it!”
“Find what?” The other pilot asked, almost as if he didn't want to know the answer.
“Home. I have to find Home.” ==
The recording flickered, an investigation note from the LSF suggesting that the comm. unit was broken somehow as several messages from the other pilot went ignored from this point. Instead he simply left his patrol in New York and presumably headed to Kansas where the ship was recovered. What happened between the recording and the ship recovery remains a mystery.
“Got the ghost ship did ya?”
Silme ignored her fellow recruits as she hauled herself up the ladder and dropped into the cockpit.
