Unknown Asp Scout, near Tewanta A 6 E - 3305-10-06 07:51, Galactic Standard Time
Hiroko and Albert walked towards the primary bridge their head torches sweeping across the every surface and into every nook and cranny. Every sound on the ship got their attention, both acutely aware that it could be due to the little stowaway who left a bloody hand print in the FSD maintenance tube. They didn't know what it was, what its capabilities were, or how aggressive it was. That was way too many unknowns for Hiroko. After getting power back, she decided that she was going to dig into the ship logs to see if there was anything that could bring answers to her questions. They reached the door to the main flight deck and Hiroko started working on a power bypass for the door as Albert checked there was nothing down the ladder to the copilot's flight deck. He stood ready while she worked and watched the area around them for threats, autopistol drawn with the safety off. The door to the flight deck opened and Hiroko peeked around the door fram to check corners: the area was clear. Hiroko walked to the pilot's seat, sat down, strapped herself in out of habit, and brought up the user interface. Thankfully it wasn't biometrically locked. Most systems had been powered down and the those with power were working at minumum power. There was damage to all the modules, though that was consistent with an FSD failure. The FSD itself was damaged the most. Hiroko brought the life support up to full power, activitated power to internal doors, lights, and communications systems.
"Lieutenant, you should have power to the door now."
"Thanks Hiroko."
Just then, there was a loud crashing noise from the crew quarters. Albert, standing at the door to the flight deck, swung his autopistol around to cover the crew quarters door.
"Hiroko what was that?""
"Something in the crew quarters."
"I am on my way up", said William18
Hiroko jumped out of the pilots seat and moved to the doorway to cover the crew quarters door. Together with Albert, she waited, hardly daring to breath. William18 drifted up the ladder tube and pulled himself out into the corridor. He pushed himself down the corridor with his cybernetic left arm, his right arm being used to aim his assault rifle at the crew quarters door. With a few complicated twisting motions he re-oriented himself so that his feet were pointing to the floor. He lowered his feet and activated his magboots, barely making a sound in the process. He assumed a ready stance with his assault rifle and nodded to Albert who opened the door with the door's control panel. The two of them surged inside.
"Clear!", said William18, "It looks like the galley's food extruder control panel blew when the power came on, for some reason. It's a proper mess in here. Every drawer has been rifled through and there is food paste everywhere. Our little friend has been busy in here. And I think I know how it is getting around."
William18 gestured up to the opening where a grille for the air conditioning system should be. There was a small sticky hand print of food paste beside the hole. Amongst the debris, Hiroko counted three protein bar wrappers, five empty carbohydrate gel packs.
"Whatever it is, it was hungry.", said William18
"Yeah! The wrappers alone account for three and a half thousand calories.", said Albert, "Why in a particle stream cone does it need so much. This ship can't have been here for more than twenty four hours."
"Lieutenant! This is Hiroko! The disturbance was a control panel overload. Be careful now that the power is on. Our little guest may have caused damage and left things in a dangerous state. I am going to get back to the flight deck, run some diagnostics, and see if I can find anything in the ship's logs."
"Roger that, Hiroko. BIll18 and Albert can you check the passenger cabin and the copilot's flight deck. We are going to finish up securing the munitions and then go check out the other cargo bay."
Hiroko returned to the flight deck and got strapped in again. The main interface showed the ship name to be called, 'Shadowdancer', ID RDQTGQ, owned by Chad Barker. She started a few diagnostic routines and then had a look at the system logs. There were a handful of low level security log alerts, invalid access credentials provided with a system request about twenty hours ago. There were a spike in packet loss due to network packet corruption shortly afterwards. Not long after that the FSD was shut down right in the middle of a hyperspace jump. That shouldn't be possible. Hiroko brought up the detailed message. There was a power overload detected near the FSD control circuitry and fail-safes kicked in to prevent a partial frame field collapse: it was better for the entire ship to drop out of hyperspace than half of it. The overload itself made no sense to Hiroko. It shouldn't have been possible, but it had happened: the main damage to the FSD was in that area. There were some puzzles here, but the ship didn't look to be in any immediate danger. Hiroko then went to look for the controls to active jammimg equipment: there wasn't any. That was curious. She brought up the Transaction logs next: one open passenger mission from Riedquat to Karitas via Ovid, and a 57k bounty in Ovid. Hmmm, she thought. She looked into the passenger mission details: two passengers to transport, business class, from Riedquat to Karitas. The primary passenger was Richard Smith, and was wanted in multiple systems. The detour to Ovid was added en route.
"Hey Manpreet! I have two things for you. First, this ship is called Shadowdancer, piloted by Chad Barker, and is wanted in the Ovid system. Can you pass that on to Wilson Port operations. They might be able to figure out what this ship was doing."
"Will do! And the second thing?"
"There was some weird nework activity on the ship just before it arrived here. Shortly afterwards it had an FSD abort during an hyperspace jump. The conduit collapsed and threw it normal space here, way off course. Could you take a look at the network error logs and see if there is anything I missed?"
"Sure! Send them over."
"Done."
"What did the captain have to say about this?", she said to herself.
Hiroko opened the ship's captain's logs. Up until Ovid they were terse text log messages, routine stuff. However, after landing on Ovid B 2 A, there were a few audio logs. She clicked play:
I normally don't record these - its bad for business - but in this case I want the record to be straight in case something happens. I may not be the most honest pilot in the galaxy, some might call my smuggling a crime, but I never murdered anyone. Whatever happened on Ovid B 2 A, I had nothing to do with it. I suppose I should start at the beginning. I got a passenger smuggling job on Riedquat: a Mr. Richard Smith and associate Mortimer Sanchez needed to go from Riedquat to Karitas, no questions asked. Well, I am the master of not asking questions and in my experience most criminals like this are more likely to be victims of a corporate stitch up than cold blooded murders. In this case I think I was wrong. We arrived at Ovid B 2 A and Mr. Smith gave me coordinates for an unlicensed surface installation. I flew them to the coordinates and was almost was about to give up on finding anything there when I saw it: a HUD indicator for Wing's Emporium. I brought the ship down beside the small domed building and my two passengers donned spacesuits and walked over. Thirty minutes later, they returned pushing a gurney with a single cargo cannister on it: biological samples. We loaded it into the small cargo bay and took off. We were barely into orbit when I received notice of the 50k bounty on the ship. That's a murder. Probably a few murders. I am afraid. I think I might be next.
Hiroko hit play on the next log.
We stopped at Vasilyev Port in Aganippe to pick up some narcotics: at this point I am just doing what they say and hope they think I am part of the furniture. We'd just taken off I and was getting ready to make the next jump when they started arguing. Something called a nossamot had gotten free and Mr. Smith was very angry. When noticed me listening he told me to mind my own business and continue with our journey. The two of them headed down to the cargo bays with laser pistols. The sooner I can get rid of them the better.
Hiroko started a search for 'nossamot'. While she was waiting, she opened the last log.
It's all gone to hell. We've had an FSD malfunction that threw us out of hyperspace and the FSD has been seriously damaged. If that wasn't bad enough, my two lovely passengers have managed to detonate one of the plasma grenades that I was smuggling, putting a hole in the ship and vaporizing themselves in the process. So I have a hole in my ship, I am wanted for murder, my paying passengers are dead, and there is some creature loose on the ship with me. If I get out of this alive, I am going to head off to Colonia and go straight. I'll fly survey missions, or shuttle cargo around. Randomius help me. I am going to go to the FSD and try and get it up and running again.
A result for her search came back via the network from Kirschtorte a few seconds later:
Nossamot: A highly social lemur like primate originally from swamplands of Waterloo in the Riedquat system, but now extinct there, that was noted for its active bioelectric senses. It was genetically engineered to increase both the sensitivity of the sense and its bioelectric projection ability, as well as its intelligence, by the LHS 2936 Network corporation, in a program of research aimed at studying adaptive bioelectric search and jamming systems. The test subjects escaped into the wild and have plagued stations, ships, and settlements in the area around LHS 2936 ever since. They are considered a serious hazard, due to their habit of repurposing of electrical equipment to set booby traps around their dens. However, they are prized both by researchers and by rich collectors in search of an unusual, very rare, and interesting pet. Galactic average price of a live nossamot is approximately 500kCr.
"Lieutenant! I think I know what we are dealing with. It's a nossamot."
"What in Randomius's name is a nossamot?"
"It's a genetically engineered primate with a highly developed bioelectric sense, uplifted intelligence, and a tendency to set booby traps."
"Add electrical mimicry to that list.", Manpreet added, "I did an analysis of the network errors and the pattern resembled a network intrusion scan by a very slow and sloppy automated intrusion system. It seems to have figured out some of the ship's basic protocols. On many ships, this wouldn't have been possible, but the owner of this one seems to have been particularly lax with network security."
"That explains the calorie intake then. If it is actively generating an electric field to effect ships systems and mask itself from Kirschtorte's sensors then it will be burning calories at a huge rate."
"Oh joy! I guess we are going to have to do a very careful search of the other cargo bay. Bill18, Albert, can you come down here?"
"On our way!"
"Hiroko, you monitor things from up there and see if you can figure out what it is doing to mess with Kirschtorte's sensors."
"Will do lieutenant."
Hiroko got to work checking all the ship's systems, searching for a stray signal. She needed the more specialized console at the back of the cabin so she got out of her seat and walked over to it. She ran a series of diagnostic tests on the ships systems. This was comforting and engaging work for her and after a few minutes she started humming a tune to herself absent mindedly. A high pitched voice harmonized with the tune behind her. Her blood ran cold. Slowly she turned around. By the door, holding on to the door frame, was a small furry creature about 20cm in length with a similarly long tail. It stared at her with big round eyes, that dominated its face. It sang a few seconds the tune again and started to shrink back behind the door frame. Nervously Hiroko harmonized with the song, slowly removing her helmet. The nossamot sang a more complex melody. Hiroko changed her song to match, lowering herself slowly to sit on the floor. Slowly, gradually, the nossamot approached. The two of them continued singing. It climbed up onto her lap and snuggled up beside her. Gradually its sing got quieter and it fell asleep.
Hiroko opened a channel to the rest of the team. "Lieutenant! I have the nossamot here on the flight deck.", said Hiroko, quietly.
"What? How?"
"Long story! The short version is that it is curious & friendly. But it is asleep now. I think I will name him Colin."