Prologue
Neelar Drayge stood quietly behind the
master control station in the astrometrics lab, intently pecking away at the
interface. What had started as a
routine, five-minute check of the sensor data had somehow blossomed into a
three-hour study of one of the greatest mysteries in the cosmos… And that was only the beginning.
It had started simply enough. After the less-than-exciting morning staff
meeting, Drayge wandered to the bridge and seated himself at the conn, intent
on a quiet, relaxing day free of death and destruction. But as he poured over his station’s myriad
controls, Drayge summarily noted that his sensors were slightly out of sync
with those in astrometrics.
Eager for a change of pace, he asked for,
and was subsequently given permission to visit astrometrics to make the necessary
repairs. Much as he had expected, it
took little more than a few minutes to make the repairs, and he was well on the
road to completion when the master control station chirped.
The young Bolian slowly craned his neck to
see if anyone was present to check the calling station—but he soon realized
that he had been alone in astrometrics the entire time.
Slowly, he rose to his feet and made his way
to the workstation at the top of the platform where the sensor alert was making
itself known. It appeared to be little
more than a few anomalous readings in a distant, unnamed nebula—certainly not
something to warrant concern. Hence,
Drayge added the blip to the sensor log and started for the bridge—when
something caught his eye: the nebula he had been staring at was unnamed for a
good reason—when he last gleaned the sensors yesterday, there was no such
nebula known to exist…
Quickly, Drayge’s interest in returning to
the bridge deteriorated, and his deft fingers hastily crawled over the myriad
controls to further study this newfound nebula. He quickly determined the massive red cloud to be composed of two
things. The first was hydrogen; it was
nothing out of the ordinary, and had that been it, Drayge would have dropped
his investigation right there. But then
there was the second component…
“Dark matter,” he whispered under his
breath.
It was believed that more than ninety
percent of the universe existed as dark matter—a mysterious substance that
emitted no light on any wavelength, making it virtually undetectable. Had it not been for the hydrogen, the nebula
would have most likely gone completely without notice.
What had caused this incredible
concentration of dark matter to suddenly appear? Three hours after prompting the question, Neelar Drayge was no
closer to an answer than when he had started—and so he finally relented. “Drayge to Tompkins,” said the Bolian after
touching his communicator.
“This is Tompkins.”
“If you’re not busy, could you please report
to the astrometrics lab, Commander? I
have something I want you to look at.”
“I’m on my way,” replied the chief
engineer a moment later.
“Captain.”
Lieutenant Bator’s voice had caught Alan
Christopher off guard; he had been wandering aimlessly amidst his thoughts for
the past several minutes waiting for the Starlight to rendezvous with
the Athena to meet with Admiral Grayson on the status of the fleet—but
despite his wandering, Christopher was certain that they had not yet reached
the Athena.
Slowly, Christopher abandoned the warmth of
his command chair and rose to his feet, quickly coming about to face his
tactical officer. “Yes, Bator? Have our friends, the sensors, found
something?”
The Phobian nodded to affirm the
statement. “Indeed,” he said
flatly. “I am detecting a vessel
heading one-nine-eight mark six.”
That was most likely not something to get
excited about. Still, Christopher had
faith that his tactical officer would not bring up such a point without good
reason. Making certain to keep interest
in his face, Christopher folded his arms and waited patiently as Bator gazed at
the sensors.
The Phobian’s eyes widened slightly. “It is of unknown origin,” he added a moment
later, his voice brimming with curiosity.
Immediately, Christopher’s gaze shifted from
Bator to meet Commander Harrison’s blank look.
“The vessel is traveling at warp 9.3, and is headed straight for
Federation territory. Weapons, however,
do not appear to be armed.”
The unidentified starship was practically
calling Christopher’s name. But then
again, so was Admiral Grayson, and the Captain had a good hunch that if push
came to shove, the Admiral would win out in this instance. “What’s the nearest starship?” he inquired.
“The Reliant,” said Erin Keller a
moment later. “They’ve already set an
intercept course.”
Slightly crestfallen, Christopher shrugged,
his sullen gaze briefly locking with Talyere’s before returning to the command
chair. He moved to seat himself, but
before he had the chance, Talyere cleared his throat. “Captain,” he said softly.
Christopher froze, his gaze slowly retracing
its steps to the mission ops station where Talyere was situation. “Yes?”
“I recognize that vessel,” he said. “It is Burmecian in origin.”
“What do you know about them?” asked Harrison before Christopher
had the chance.
“Admittedly, very little,” said Talyere. “At the height of the Elorg Bloc 200,000 years ago, the
Burmecians were just beginning to assert themselves as a galactic power. At the time of the fateful Battle of
Sorrows, the Burmecians were negotiating an alliance with the Bloc. However, the Iconians banished us into
subspace before the alliance was finalized, and that was the last we heard of
them.”
“And now they are back,” said Harrison.
Christopher turned to him with an eyebrow raised. “One small ship isn’t going to do them much
good, I’m afraid.” He paused, and then
turned to Talyere. “Is it?”
Unfortunately, the Elorg provided little in the way of
answers. “Two hundred thousand years is
a fair amount of time, Captain. In the
interim, they have undoubtedly advanced considerably…”
Christopher understood completely. “Then we need to know how far they’ve advanced… and who’s side
they’re on…”