Tanya stood on the Genesis bridge, staring at coordinates that represented a terrible idea. The system designated TK-847 glowed on her display with it's white dwarf and with its supergiant companion, sitting in the middle of contested space like a prize neither side wanted badly enough to fight over. Either they didn't understand what it contained, or didn't care.
"This is stupid," she said aloud.
//Then contact the others, // Sage suggested.
"Can't do, I'm sure Davidson is monitoring our communications, and I haven't heard from him since we got back. We have to hide this ship from him." Tanya pulled up the flight plan she'd been refining for the last six hours. "If he finds out about Genesis, we'll have bigger problems than fuel."
//Your logic is sound. Your methods remain concerning.//
"I don't disagree, but if we want to use the workshop for the new project, this is the only way." Tanya began initialising the vortex drives, drawing power from the workshop in carefully metered bursts. "Quick in-and-out run. Deploy the drones, harvest the fuel, return before anyone notices. Simple."
//It will not be that simple, this ship will show like a beacon once you enter the system.//
Tanya was sure there was a hint of exasperation in Sage's voice.
"Then it's a good thing I've gotten better at handling complicated." She ran through pre-launch checks with hands that were steadier than she felt. The Genesis wasn't ready for combat. No active shielding, just centuries-old armor plating that groaned whenever the ship moved. But the defensive systems were functional enough.
She powered up the forward laser array for point defence. Left the railguns and mass driver offline, not only would they draw attention she didn't want. They also had more permanent consequences. The capture torpedoes, though... those were interesting. Electromagnetic and gravity-based systems were designed to disable rather than destroy. Non-lethal options that gave her choices beyond "shoot" and "run away." If she didn't think too hard about why this ship was armed to the teeth with them.
"There," she said, confirming the weapons status. The crabs had been able to bring them back online. "Options without escalation. That's responsible planning."
//You are justifying improvisation through careful preparation,// Sage observed. //It remains improvisation.//
"That's what I do best."
The vortex drive finally finished spooling up. The massive vortex window appeared, but she still couldn't get over the size of the window required for the ship.
The Genesis emerged into the upper atmosphere of a world that defied easy description. A supergiant gas giant, easily ten times Jupiter's diameter, swirled in storms of crimson and gold beneath the harsh light of its white dwarf companion. The star itself dominated half the sky, a blue-white ball of compressed matter that bathed everything in radiation harsh enough to sterilise normal worlds.
But this wasn't a normal world. The extreme environment created conditions that shouldn't exist with magnetic fields strong enough to trap antimatter, radiation pressures that forced exotic matter into stable configurations. Beautiful and deadly in equal measure.
"Deploying drones," Tanya said, fighting to keep her voice steady.
The teardrop-shaped harvesters launched in shining arcs, their Element 126 hulls catching the white dwarf's light as they dove toward the crimson clouds below. Twelve drones, each programmed to navigate to the planet's polar regions, where ferrus-contra accumulated in the intense magnetic fields.
Five years' worth of fuel, if this worked. Enough to run the Genesis's antimatter generators at full capacity while they figured out more permanent solutions.
For twenty minutes, everything went perfectly. The drones transmitted clean telemetry, diving deeper into atmospheric layers that would have crushed conventional craft. The Genesis maintained position in the upper atmosphere, using minimal thrust to ride the edge between space and sky.
Too perfectly.
The wrongness registered through Tanya's body before her mind, as goosebumps crawling up her arms, pins and needles flooding down her legs like her nervous system was detecting something her instruments hadn't caught yet. Through the bond with Sage, she felt his attention sharpen in parallel alarm. "You're feeling this too—"
//Dimensional distortion detected,// Sage interrupted, his tone flattening into something that sent cold fear down Tanya's spine. //Expanding field geometry suggests deliberate construction. This is not natural.//
Before Tanya could react, space itself twisted.
A lattice of energy unfolded around the Genesis; it was invisible until it wasn't, blue light weaving through reality in patterns that made her eyes hurt to track. Binding the ship in a cage that had no physical presence but an absolute effect.
"What—" Tanya tried firing manoeuvring thrusters. Nothing happened. The Genesis sat frozen in space, held by forces she couldn't see or understand. "What is this?"
//A dimensional net,// Sage said. //Similar principles to your dimensional shield but inverted. Rather than creating shielding it locks an object in space. Sophisticated technology.//
Tanya tried engaging the vortex drive. The system powered up normally, calculations completed, coordinates locked. But when she initiated the jump, nothing happened. The drive spun uselessly, unable to open a window through the cage that held them.
"Can you break through?"
//Not immediately. I need to locate the source and bypass it systems, but—//
Alarms screamed across every console.
Human made defence drones were stirring throughout the system. Automated platforms that had probably sat dormant for decades suddenly powered up, sensors locking onto the Genesis's signature. They launched in waves, hunter-killers designed to eliminate unauthorized visitors. It seemed this system was a shoot first, ask questions later kind of system.
"Of course there are automated defences," Tanya muttered, her hands already moving across the weapons console. "Because a dimensional trap wasn't enough."
The first wave came in fast, ion cannons spitting coherent energy that splashed against the Genesis's armor. The old plating held, but Tanya could feel the ship shudder under impacts it wasn't designed to sustain indefinitely.
She returned fire with the forward laser array, tracking targets with precision that surprised even her. The defence drones were fast but predictable, following patterns programmed into them. The Genesis targeting computer, along with Sage's enhanced processing, anticipated their movements and cut them down with surgical precision. She was glad the net had not prevented the weapons from working.
Debris rained through the atmosphere, burning up in storms that had raged for millennia.
But more were coming. The automated platforms kept launching drones, an endless supply meant to overwhelm any intruder through sheer numbers.
"This isn't sustainable," Tanya said, sweat beading on her forehead as she managed weapons, shields, and ship control simultaneously. "Sage, how long until you can break the net?"
//Unknown. However—//
New contacts appeared on sensors. Not automated this time, as these had human life signs. Three ships, probably patrol vessels, drawn by the same alarms that had woken the drones. They were accelerating toward the Genesis's position, weapons powering up. They must have been on standby nearby, making her wonder what else was in this system.
"They're just doing their jobs," Tanya said, watching the approaching vessels with growing dread. "Investigating unauthorized activity in contested space. They don't know what this ship is, what I'm doing here—"
//They will attempt to board or destroy the Genesis,// Sage said flatly. //You have approximately two minutes before they enter weapons range. Options are limited.//
Tanya's jaw clenched. She didn't want to fight them. They were probably Republic or Collective patrol crews, following protocols, protecting territory that technically belonged to everyone and no one. Just people trying to do their jobs.
But she also wasn't about to hand the Genesis over to anyone. The ship represented too much—too much knowledge, too much responsibility, too much danger in the wrong hands.
"Fine," she muttered, targeting solutions forming in her mind. "We do this my way."
The capture torpedoes launched like miniature rockets they were, electromagnetic pulses and gravitational ripples expanding in carefully calculated patterns. They wrapped around the approaching vessels with precision that came from studying the Genesis's weapon systems and understanding their purpose.
The torpedoes didn't damage. They disabled. Readying the victims for capture.
Electromagnetic fields locked weapon systems in stasis, preventing firing solutions from completing. Gravitational distortions froze drive systems mid-burn, leaving the ships drifting but intact. Emergency power would keep life support running, but offensive capability was neutralised completely. At least for a little while.
No one died. But no one could follow either.
"Sage?" Tanya asked, already moving to handle the next wave of defense drones.
//The dimensional net's control systems have been detected. Overriding control protocols now.//
The Genesis shuddered. Trying to cope with the sudden lack of pressure being exerted around it. Tanya felt the ship groaning around her, armor plates shifting, structural supports creaking.
The wrongness she had been feeling from before the net formed snapped like a broken wire. Tanya's skin stopped crawling, pins and needles dissolving into rushing warmth that flooded from her core to her fingertips. Her body knew freedom before her mind did.
The blue lattice shattered. Fragments of impossible geometry dissolved into nothing, leaving only lightning afterimages across the sensors. The dimensional cage was gone.
"Vortex drive, now!"
The Genesis flew forward as the drive engaged, opening a window that seemed a bit jagged but it would do. The ship burst free, limping from the strain, hull scorched where weapon fire had licked at the old armor.
Tanya didn't look back. She focused on escape coordinates, on getting the Genesis back to its hidden location before more patrol vessels arrived, before automated defenses could adapt, before someone with authority decided the ship was worth capturing at any cost. She had to escape into the vortex and travel were only she could.
Only in the quiet aftermath, as the Genesis drifted through vortex space and Tanya's heart rate slowly returned to normal, did she notice the alert on her console.
Drone bay telemetry. A few of the harvesters had returned during the chaos, automatically docking while she'd been fighting for survival. The drones status showed green with the fuel successfully harvested, containment field stable.
But there was something else. A secondary reading that made no sense.
Lifeform detected.
"What?" Tanya pulled up the drone's internal sensors, sure she was misreading the data. But the signature was clear. Inside one of the harvester's containment field, something was alive. Something that had been collected along with the ferrus-contra during the dive into the supergiant's atmosphere.
She routed camera feeds to the main display, magnifying the drone's interior.
Something translucent floated in the containment field. Roughly spherical, maybe half a meter across, with internal structures that pulsed with bioluminescence. It moved with purpose rather than random drift, surfaces rippling as it adjusted position within the field.
It was watching her.
Through the camera feed, across the ship's systems, the thing seemed to notice her attention. The bioluminescence pulsed in patterns that felt like communication with rhythm and frequency that reminded her uncomfortably of the crystal tuning work she'd just completed.
"Sage," Tanya said quietly, unable to look away from the display. "Is that what I think it is?"
//Confirmed,// Sage said, his tone carrying something that might have been wonder. //Xenobiological organism. Non-human origin. Apparently indigenous to the supergiant's atmospheric layers.//
Tanya's first living alien.
And it had just hitched a ride home.
She stared at the creature as it pulsed with light that might have been curiosity or might have been something else entirely. In all her plans for fuel harvesting, dealing with dimensional traps, evading patrol vessels. She had never once considered what might be living in the clouds of that impossible world.
"What do I do with it?" she asked.
//That,// Sage said, //is an excellent question.//
The Genesis drifted through vortex space, carrying a cargo more complex than antimatter fuel: one exhausted shipwright, one ancient AI, and one completely unexpected passenger.
Tanya had thought getting the fuel would be the hard part.
She was beginning to suspect she'd been very, very wrong.