In case you are interested in reading this from the beginning:
Thanks for reading!
As ever, reality and practicality always wins.
We needed to know what was going on. We couldn't just stay in hiding forever. The original idea for coming to Angmar were valid. We needed a place to lie low for a bit that would provide an atmosphere so we could open the ship and get our new weapons mounted and sensors installed. As a bonus we found the Old Pack Mule, and was able to fix her up to use as a scout vessel. Back in her day, the Old Pack Mule would have been considered a medium freighter. In today's universe, it would probably fit inside a medium freighter's cargo bay. It's still a little bulky for a light freighter, but it would pass. There are thousands, if not millions of old freighters flitting around space that are just as old and older.
Sadly, the "kids" - PO Smart, Shelly, and Barns - managed to find out what became of the Old Pack Mule's original crew. Against common sense, but I guess not against orders that nobody thought were needed, our three youngest crew members decided it might be fun to do some exploring of the manufacturing facility that we found ourselves in. At least they weren't completely stupid, they took an ample supply of water with them, we had plenty after all, and marked their path so that they would be able to find their way back. What they found was a lot of empty rooms, and a trail of evidence that someone had been there before. They followed that trail down to the very deepest part of the facility where they found the desiccated remains of the original crew.
The harsh reality of Angmar is that Angmar wants to kill you. It doesn't matter who you are, your wealth, your status, Angmar is equal opportunity that way. After a good look at the old engines, and a few hours of patching hole after hole, the Old Pack Mule's story is as old as Angmar itself. They were running from something, or chasing something. Probably running - nothing I saw gave any indication that they might be chasing - and it looks like either whoever they were running from caught up, or they ran into some of the local denizens of the Angmar system and got their ship shot up. They didn't have much of a choice but to land. Instead of landing at the settlement they decided to hide in one of the empty facilities. This one. They were too damaged to repair and try to slip away, so they stayed. Eventually the water ran out and they did the only reasonable thing, they headed down as far as they could go in hopes that Angmar would have mercy.
Except, the only mercy that Angmar VII offers is death.
The part that confuses me is the shuttles. Sure, they were crated for storage and needed to be assembled, but my guys got them put together and flying in no time. They almost had to have been state of the art back when the Old Pack Mule landed. While they are no longer state of the art - PO Smart is already dreaming of upgrades - nobody would be surprised to see them in use as they are. Shuttle tech just hasn't changed that much in the last hundred years. So, why didn't the crew of the Old Pack Mule use the shuttles to save themselves? We'll probably never know.
It's never easy to split a crew in half. No matter what we tried, our crew just didn't split neatly into two pieces. In the end, I ended up with the higher ranks, and Barona ended up with the kids. First, I took Dorn. He was right, the OPM - see, now they have me doing it - doesn't have weapons to speak of. Putting Dorn there would be a waste of talent. Then I got Lt. Tine because, once again, Hauley has this nice new sensor suite, and OPM gots nothing. Chief Williamson has warship and weapons experience, where PO Smart has mostly served on diplomatic and transport ships, so I got the Chief, and Barona got PO Smart. Since Barona needed more than PO Smart, she got both Barns and Shelly.
True to her word, Barns had tears rolling down her face when she found out. I assured her that the Old Pack Mule wasn't forever, and she would be back in her spot at the Haul-o-caster's helm as soon as we could make it happen. The truth is, Barns was the hardest call. Everyone else seemed to slot in where it made sense. On the other hand, both ships had pressing reasons to have Barns on board. Barona won because there was just no way she could handle the Old Pack Mule with just PO Smart and Shelly. I just hoped we wouldn't regret that decision because I would sorely miss having Barns at the helm if we got into a tussle. I'm sure Lt. Tine is a fine pilot, he just wouldn't hold a candle to Barns, I'm not sure anyone could.
Mother Ahmisa decided to stay on the Haul-o-caster. Cmdr. Barona asked her to join them on the Old Pack Mule, but Mother Ahmisa said no. The most pressing use of her talents would be for damage control if we got into a fight, and the Haul-o-caster was the more important ship to protect. I stayed out of it, anything involving Mother Ahmisa, in my opinion, is Morganite business, and none of mine.
Angmar is pretty out of the way, so it was going to take us months to get back to Morgan space, or at least near Morgan space. A trip made longer by us skulking about, spending time dropping siphons into gas giants for reaction mass, and avoiding settlements and space stations as much as possible. We didn't know what Tarkin and his cronies were sending against us, so we wanted to be careful.
Like all fun things, skulking about like a fugitive couldn't last forever. Eventually we needed supplies. When planning our round about trip back from the Angmar system, I anticipated this and scheduled a stopover on Pendragon III. The Pendragon system was named long ago by a long forgotten Arthurian fanboy, something that it seems to have rubbed off on the settlers of Pendragon III. Or maybe the settlers of Pendragon III were already a few cards shy of a full deck. Who knows? The market just off the spaceport on Pendragon III was one of the few places that Pete would let me get off the Haul-o-caster and roam free. It is one of my favorite places in the universe. The people all wore such extravagant costumes, all vaguely Arthurian themed. Pete always told me that if I wore my cloak and hood, the people would like me more and I would get better deals.
I know now that Pete was just getting me to hide my cyber device, or at least make it less conspicuous, but back then it was pure fun.
When we were finally on the last legs of the journey to Pendragon system I spend hours talking to my crew about the costumes and pageantry. As luck would have it, I was stuck with the three old men, none of whom wanted to talk about beautiful costumes and gallant finery. Mother Ahmisa finally came to my rescue - or maybe theirs, depending on how you look at it - and listened while I babbled on about dresses I'd seen and let me show her the pennant I won at a ring toss booth.
I'm pretty sure she was just humoring me.
I was all smiles and fidgets when we finally entered the Pendragon system. I was so excited that I couldn't hold still. The lone jump point in the Pendragon system was pretty far out, so it was a couple days to get to Pendragon III, but I was so excited that I already had my cloak and hood out, ready to go.
"Captain, there is a problem." Lt. Tine reported not long after we transited into the system.
I glanced over at the board. One red light, but that one wasn't surprising. That one had been popping red every jump since we left Angmar. It was just a monitor for a backup system, and the primary was solid, and always went green. Something to fix, but not an immediate problem.
Then Lt. Tine called Mother Ahmisa to the bridge. Last we had heard from her she was off in the galley making dinner.
"Lt. Tine, report." I asked just as Mother Ahmisa arrived.
"Captain, we are receiving weak distress calls from Pendragon III." Lt. Tine reported. "Passive long range scans are showing quite a bit of radiation and weapons residue consistent with an attack by the 'rus."
"No."
"All hands battle stations. Dorn get the guns powered up. Tine go active on the sensors, find out what's going on and if there are any 'rus still in the area." I ordered. Mother Ahmisa positioned herself at the comm system. We hadn't really talked about where people would be if I called battle stations, which I realized was yet another failure. Tine was at the sensor console rather than the helm, and Dorn was at the weapons station. So I slid myself into the seat at the helm and pointed us towards Pendragon III. Someone had to do it.
"Mother Ahmisa, get me the Old Pack Mule." I said, not sure yet what I would say.
"OPM Actual on the comm for you Captain." Mother Ahmisa announced.
"On the big screen" I said, then "OPM, dive for cover. Haul-o-caster is going to take a look and see if the way is clear."
"What's going on Haul-o-caster?" I had forgotten that the Old Pack Mule's sensor suite, that used to belong to the Haul-o-caster, was nowhere near as powerful as the one Hauley now carried.
"'rus attack on the settlement as far as we can tell. Find a place to lie low. I'll update you on the situation as soon as we know something."
"I'll head for these coordinates. There are some rocks there that'll help us hide. Once we get there, we'll play like a hole in space." Cmdr. Barona said. Well, Captain Barona now I guess. A set of coordinates popped up on the screen.
As I am fond of saying, space, it's big man. So a ship, especially one as small as Hauley or even a medium freighter like the Old Pack Mule which is about three times Hauley's size, can usually power down and make themselves a lot harder to detect. Nearly impossible for passive sensors alone. Things like powered up engines or running reactors will ruin that effect, so in order to hide a ship must power down almost completely. Powering down like that can be a little nerve wracking, but it isn't too bad. Most ships have a power bank that is kept charged by the reactor when it is running. That power bank is used for emergencies or when the reactor needs to be brought down for maintenance. The power bank on the Old Pack Mule is old and crusty, but it should be able to run the ship for a few days at least.
Barona and the Old Pack Mule taken care of, I pointed Hauley towards Pendragon III.
The damage was terrible. Debris clouds where space stations and orbital manufacturing stations once had been. The cloud scoop on the gas giant was gone, one can only assume it was sucked into the giant itself. Pendragon III, where we had hoped to land and purchase supplies, was a mess.
"Captain, radiation is consistent with 'rus weapons, but some of this damage looks like KEW strikes, the 'rus are not known to use kinetic weapons." Lt. Tine reported.
"Do you detect any ships? Are any of the attackers still around?"
"None that I can detect Captain." Lt. Tine answered, "Although they could have gone dark to avoid detection."
"Survivors on the planet?" I asked, although I didn't have much hope. The surface of Pendragon III had been rendered all but uninhabitable.
"It's hard to tell, it's practically nuclear winter down there. I'm seeing evidence that there might be a few pockets of survivors here and there." Lt. Tine reported.
"Not much we can do for them, we don't have supplies to drop and we definitely don't have room to evacuate anyone if we did want to land on the surface, which I don't suggest. The atmosphere is a mess down there. We would be just as likely to crash as land, and getting back to space if we did make it down isn't sure either."
I felt I had to defend my ship. "I think Hauley is tougher than you give her credit for." I said, but had to add. "But you aren't wrong. For what little help we could provide, I don't think the risk is worth it. Any other ideas?"
"We make for the Fleet." Lt. Cmdr. Dorn said. "I know it's a risk, and we might be arrested, but only the Morganite Fleet would be able to help these people now."
"Mother Ahmisa, Get in contact with Barona. We'll rendezvous with them and transfer you guys to the Old Pack Mule. No sense in getting us all rolled up. I'll see if I can contact the Morganite Fleet alone."
"Won't work Captain." Lt. Tine said. "You're a fugitive, and you aren't Morganite. The Fleet wouldn't listen to you. Take me with you, they'll listen to me, and I have the added distinction of being acknowledged by the Fleet as a member of an oppressed people. They have to give me at least a certain amount of leniency due to Morganite Law."
