Blood Impulse

Part 19.1 - THREE OBJECTIVES

Archer Sector, Centaur System, Battleship Singularity

Blinking into existence on the edge of the Centaur System, the Singularity hardly seemed to hesitate. Her sensors mapped out her surroundings near instantaneously, the wavelengths of knowledge hitting her arrays at the speed of light. The passive sensors easily recorded and deciphered the data of the solar system's natural light and radiation emissions without the ship having to actively transmit a signal of her own.

A solitary, middle-aged sun lay at the core of the Centaur System. Most of the gasses and naturally occurring rock debris had compressed to form planets eons ago, leaving the system mostly free of obstructions.

In CIC, Ensign Walters kept his head down. "Jump complete."

"Alright," Zarrey smoothed back his hair, "Get visual feed on Sagittarion. Galhino, what are we looking at?"

"Passive sensor data from this position is over four hours old, sir." The photons read for that data were limited by the speed of light. "In it, I'm reading an unusual amount material around Sagittarion." Given the planet had no natural satellites to shed ice and dust, it was anomalous. "There is too much mass for it to have all originated from Base Aquair and other known orbital facilities... High proportions of refined metals: titanium, iron and copper, as well as other elements: phosphorous, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen and carbon."

"Ship building metals." Titanium especially found its use in ships, not orbital stations. As an element, it was light and strong. Stations used cheaper, heavier elements that could be easily mined, the mass and durability less of a constraint.

"Sir?" Zarrey turned to the Admiral, surprised to hear the man break his silence. Except to give necessary orders, he'd been silent since the incident earlier. The other crew remained somewhat uneasy, but Zarrey was over it. It was clear he'd be dead if the Admiral had wanted him dead. As long he kept his hands to himself, he doubted the issue would ever resurface.

Answered by the strange hush that fell upon the bridge Zarrey lifted his gaze to the viewscreen where a wasteland of material spiraled in and out of view. "Hell fires in heaven."

Perforations and scorch marks littered the visible debris. The Admiral recognized this visual all too well. "The phosphorous would have come from projectile weapons." Phosphorous compounds were used in the manufacture of incendiary rounds, not to mention the tracers of artillery. "Nitrogen, hydrogen and oxygen from ships' atmosphere and water." They were looking at all the components of a graveyard in space.

Zarrey felt an unhealthy twist in his stomach. "And the carbon?"

"The human body is 18% carbon by mass."

Squinting up at the viewscreen, Zarrey could see shapes that looked vaguely human, limp but present. "Corpses." For them to pick up the unusual amount of carbon from the edge of the system, there must be thousands.

Admiral Gives was unfazed by the wasteland. It would be the first of many if Reeter had his way. He looked to Lieutenant Galhino, "How many ships?"

"It's impossible to resolve individual parts and compositions from here, sir. But accounting for the mass of material, and the average size of civilian transports known to frequent Sagittarion, I'd say we're looking at the remains of nearly 300 ships." The rubble stretched much farther out than the ship's telescopes could focus at this range. The wreckage, presently condensed around Sagittarion, was slowly dissipating outward, trailing behind in the planet's solar orbit.

"Civvies?" Zarrey snapped his head to look at her, "All of them?"

"Again, it's impossible to truly know from this range, but I'm not seeing any parts that would constitute a weapons system." There should have been turrets, gun barrels or even point-defense laser focusing lenses, but she'd seen nothing. "These were unarmed ships."