ReachingOutOfTheStarsReaching Out of the StarsThere is no day in space, per se, of course, but it is a glorious day aboard The Long Distance Voyager. After the latest visit to the Galactic Republic, its time for Kieran Elharn Kerrigan Percival Barimen Webster Douglas to visit Mom and Dad back in Keltia. The trip from the Galactic Republic to Keltia is not an especially long one even in the worst of times. It does seem to be variable, perhaps more a function of the vagaries of traveling on the Shadow Path established by Mother and Father than anything else. This seems to be highlighted as the ship crosses into one of the uninhabited shadows along the route. Kieran's glorious day is punctuated by an announcement. "Kieran" comes the voice of one of the droids on the bridge. "I have detected an ion storm behind us, intense and large...and traveling considerably faster than we are. It just appeared on the sensors out of nowhere." "Maulk!;" Kieran swore under his breath, trying to hold on to the hydrospanner he'd just nearly dropped. As the tool and the hand holding it were in the cramped engine compartment of his fighter, it would not be an easy task to find let alone retrieve the tool if it fell from his grasp. Once he'd gotten the tool and body parts free of the tiny fighter's even smaller compartments, he glanced up at the hidden hangar bay's ceiling and called out. "Harmony? What's going on? Track the storm... is it following us? Go to full power, if you haven't already. Standby to lock in the emergency power. Where's Paril?" "Confirmed." comes Harmony's voice. "The ion storm is following us. I am already moving us to full power and we will achieve it within 60 seconds." The adjustments he'd been making to squeeze a little more performance out of the engine were nearly completed and the ship could fly when needed. He quickly shut and locked down the access panel and then tossed the spanner into the toolbox. "Don't tell me he hasn't 'woken up' yet from last night." he said mostly aloud. He and Paril had been up late drinking and playing music, again. He sighed, then and started heading towards the bay's inner door. Paril just wasn't as young as he used to be. "Paril is not present on the bridge." Harmony responds. "Compute 81% probability that he is in his quarters." Kieran motioned for his astromech, R2-G8, 'Gate' to hurry up as well. "C'mon Gate, let's see what this is all about. The little 'mech tweetled something and dropped its third leg down from its cobalt and copper colored cylindrical body. The copper dome rotated to track Kieran as the pair hurried down the corridor. "Take the lift, Gate, I'm for the ladder." So saying, Kieran ran down the remaining length of corridor and used a bit of telekinesis to jump up the height of the access ladder to step up on to the main level of the ship. From there, it was just a short trip to the bridge compartment. He entered the bridge at a full run and angled for the pilot's chair. "Status?;" he called out while taking in the information from the sensors and viewscreen. By the time Kieran reaches the pilot chair, the beeping of Gate indicates that the lift has reached bridge level and he is approaching. From that pilot's chair, and a check of the scanners, Kieran can see that the ion storm is wide, and deep, a roiling expanse of charged particles held together by the very electromagnetic fields created in its swath. There are enough ions of metals and other exotic dust particles to give the storm a purple-blue appearance, with streaks of energy running through it like electric currents in a shorted wire. Parts of the purple-blue cloud glow a strange light blue color overlaid on it. Of course, the entire thing is silent in the vacumn of space as it continues to dog the Voyager. Even at nearly full power, the ion storm seems faster. It is still some thousands of kilometers behind the ship but it is still creeping closer. "Captain." the droid brain Harmony says. "I am detecting Cerenkov radiation coming from the Ion storm. Against all physical laws, it must be traveling faster than light in order to do that." A series of beeps from Gate suggests his agreement at the strangeness of this. "You know things can get strange once we travel past the Wild Space region of the Republic, Harmony;" Kieran says to his ship's droid brain. "This is... just weirder... than normal." A worried shrug of the shoulders, then; "Not that I'm liking this at all. No." Surviving a trip through an ion storm is not fun or easy, and best to be avoided when at all possible. "Gate, Harmony;" he says aloud; "Scan nearby space for any planets, moons or hunks of rock big enough to offer us some protection from the storm and shut down all nonessential systems and reroute power to the shields and engines." Gate gives off a series of beeps of assent. "Confirmed, Captain. Transferring power to shields, engines and scanners." comes the voice of Harmony. The lights on the bridge dim slightly as the power flow changes as Kieran requests. How close to the next Shadow is the Voyager and her crew? Does Kieran feel like he can find the Shadow Path if they were to get off it at some point? The border to the next Shadow on the path is some distance away, perhaps an hour of flight at best speed. Going off the Path is riskier. Kieran has been taught some of how to handle that by Mom and Dad, of course on how to feel his way back to the mainline. Assuming yes to the second question, Kieran begins putting the ship through a series of course changes to see if and how the storm reacts to them. He's not using all his skills nor all the speed and maneuverability of the Voyager, yet. The minor course changes that don't change the overall flight path of the Voyager do not seem to affect the storm or change its swath. It continues to implacably sweep toward the ship at trans-light speed. He'll also begin laying in a series of micro jumps into the navicomputer. Most planned hyperspace jumps can take up to several minutes for the navicomputer to compute and accept. Micro jumps, are just that, really short trips into hyperspace. Like go to lightspeed for 30 seconds on this course and then pop back out. Micro jumps are great for losing pursuit in real space, after all, normal space is huge. Trying to find a small ship in all that volume can be extremely difficult. Some of the micro jumps he's keying up (a number are preprogrammed for just such emergencies) are: Travel up/down the 'z' axis for 30 seconds, and the same for the 'x' and 'y' axis'. Kieran can start to keep up these jumps in the computer, even as his mind might be on other things. The storm does continue to make progress toward the ship, and a readout from Harmony that catches Kieran's eye shows that Harmony is still busily looking for shelter as it can be found. There are a few preliminary candidates that Harmony has not officially announced as yet, however they are far all off the Shadow Path. Your Move, Kieran. Just how massive is this storm? Does Kieran have an idea, preliminary sensor data, etc. that would give an indication of the depth of the storm? The storms are not thin, the data being fed to him by Harmony would definitely sense if this was a wide, thin wave. Precise numbers beyond "not thin" require more data. If he feels like this question can be answered by micro jumping up the 'z' axis for 30 seconds or so at lightspeed, reverting to real space for a quick scan, then micro jumping along the 'x' axis for 30 seconds or so in their original direction of travel, reverting to real space again only to micro jump down the 'z' axis for 60 seconds to once again revert to real space for another quick scan, he'll do so. In addition to gaining data on the dimensions of the storm, he should also learn how the storm reacts the Voyager's hyperspace movements. And possibly pick up more data on possible safe havens. As he sets in these small jumps to obtain more solid data on the storm dimensions, the other portions of his mind work on the dimensional door and the invisibility illusion spells. After a minute or two of work gathering information for Harmony, Gate, and himself to process, he recognizes that the storm is very large, a square AU in its cross section, perhaps in the ninetieth percentile of size of storms that he has seen. Its nearly as deep as it is wide, too. A leading tendril of the storm changes its extrusion from the main body of the storm as Kieran employs one of those sudden jumps to avoid its swath. Its as if the storm is reacting, sluggishly, to Kieran's movements. Kieran looks over at Gate, Gate swivels it's dome to focus its primary optical sensor on Kieran. "Not grapping good;" he says. Gate whistles a low, mournful agreement. A bit of luck, though, comes from Harmony. The best safe haven found is almost preternaturally good. A Jovian planet in the star's habitable zone, with a quintet of planet sized moons and an undetermined number of minor, producing a lot of places to try and ride out the beast of a storm. Two less perfect but usable havens within range also come across the readout--a tidally locked double ice planet/ice moon, and a heavy, iron-core rocky world close in to a G class star. Kieran studies the incoming data and quickly reaches a decision. He takes a quick, navigational fix of their current position and locks it into the computer. It's still on, or close to, the Shadow Path. He sets the computer to record their course from this point on, so as to be able to follow it back later on if needed. "We're heading for the gas giant;" he warns them as sharply turns the ship onto an intercept course for the planet. "Narrow forward scans; try and see if any of the moons are habitable, or at least find one with caverns, old lava tubes or anything large enough to hide us in. Kieran will push the engines to their limits and go through a series of micro-jumps if the distance to the gas giant is great enough, in an attempt to get to the gas giant and it's systems of moons in advance of the storm. The Voyager shudders a bit as Kieran starts laying in jumps and maneuvers to push the ship's speed toward the Gas Giant and its family of worlds. It does turn out that a micro jump or two proves useful to close the distance, and confirm the lead time over the storm. Harmony comes back with much more data on the Gas Giant family as the ship reaches the outermost orbits of the smallest moonlets of the Jovian planet. There is a thin ring system within the Jovian's Roche limit. If Kieran wanted to risk the radiation, there are no end of places to hide within the rings. 5 large moons as detected seen before. The closest is also well within its radiation belt and is lifeless. Nitrogen-Carbon Dioxide atmosphere with a lot of sulfur compounds--the planet has a lot of vulcanism. The second closest registers as a Nitrogen-oxygen atmosphere, a bit smaller than Keltia or Scota. Moons three and four are large-moon sized, the fourth with a large polar crater with high curving walls that might be useful for shelter. The fifth is a solid mass covered by a (mostly) frozen ocean of water. Harmony reports 12 (and counting) moonlets of smaller sizes ranging outward from the main quintet. The spells are ready to fire, and the wave of the storm will be here within a half hour. As long as the shields held, the radiation shouldn't be a problem, Kieran ponders as he considers the rings. For that matter, he could take the Voyager into the upper atmosphere of the Jovian planet itself. Bespin's Tibanna gas miners do that all the time. Of course, they have ships specifically designed to do that, so its not without risk. The main drawback to the rings is while they offer great concealment, they offer little or nothing in the way of protection. Still, if he flew into the rings and worked his way back out on the far side of the giant from the storm... Kieran wonders how the storm and gas giant will interact with one another. Hiding in the rings on the far side of the giant... hmm. What in the way of magnetic fields has Harmony detected from the moons and gas giant? Does the gas giant's field overwhelm/annihilate whatever fields the moons might generate? Is the ring system completely within the Jovian's magnetic field, if there is one? The Jovian has a standard magnetosphere which extends through the ring system, all the way to the edge of the orbit of the first moon. The second and subsequent moons show unusual magnetic fields thanks to the presence of the Jovian's, although the second one in particular does have one, peculiarily aligned. The preliminary plan, pending additional data, is to make for the second moon (the one with the breathable atmosphere). If the storm's tracking him, somehow (perhaps through the exhaust from the engines or possibly him), for some reason, then there's likely to be some sort of intelligence behind it. Said intelligence is likely to think Kieran would chose that moon in the event Voyager is damaged/stranded there. At that point something else occurs to Kieran and he has Gate run a diagnostic of Voyager's comm system and scan for any signals originating from inside Voyager. Perhaps the storm is following a tracking beacon or other signal. A full scan such as Kieran desires takes a few minutes for the droid to accomplish. Its a subtle, quiet signal, but Gate finds a source of comm, on a band far outside the usual communication range (and thus never picked up by Harmony on routine maintenance. Altered to it, Harmony suggests that until the source is located, it should be jammable, unless Kieran *wants* the signal to continue to broadcast.The second Moon looms ahead, Voyager ready for insertion into orbit around it if that is still part of the plan. Kieran considers this for a moment or two then instructs Harmony to tune Voyager's comm system to that frequency and then to broadcast it into the nearest section of the ring field. With a bit of luck, the signal will bounce around and scatter in the rings and muddy the waters for a bit. He has Gate program the comm systems in both of the escape pods with that signal as well. He also instructs Gate to load two preprogrammed flight paths into the escape pods. One pod will have flight plans to either land on the second moon or fly under the rings to a point roughly *one quarter of the way* around the gas giant from the second moon. The second pod will have flight plans to travel to the fifth moon and land or to fly under the rings to a point opposite the first pods position under the rings. In a pinch, the pods should serve as decoys. With beeps and whistles as acknowledgements, Gate and Harmony start to get to work. Voyager slides into orbit around the Moon easily in the meantime. The storm continues its inexorable approach. He also has Harmony and Gate, once it has the escape pod/decoys set up try to locate the signal. Part of their attempt to locate the signal should be to check the power grid for any unexplained drains on the system. All the nonessential systems should be shut down at this point, making it easier to trace if it's tied into the ship's power grid. It takes several more minutes to finish the prep with the pod and the false signal before Harmony can turn attention to looking for power drains. There is no power drain on the ship reserves, all of the Voyager's power is accounted for. If there is enough time before the storm arrives, he'll retrieve a portable scanner, set it to the signal, and begin quickly scanning for the signal himself. It shouldn't be coming from any of the scanner resistant compartments of the ship; they're designed to block those sorts of things. He'll use Third Ear to 'listen' for any other lifeforms aboard the ship. There should only be two; himself and Paril. And that reminds him of something else; he'll have Harmony locate Paril and relay that and any other information to him via his personal comlink, not over the ship's intercomm. And the hunt is on. Harmony and Gate continue to maintain the ship's position in light of the storm's approach as Kieran heads back with scanner in hand. Third Ear confirms that there are no life forms aboard besides himself, and Paril. Kieran's command to have Harmony supply him with information results in grumbling that Kieran can hear with Third Ear. The portable scanner hits a jackpot in one of the more lightly shielded portions of the cargo section, as Kieran is lead to some bric a brac that he recalls Paril buying. Inside one of the crates is a smooth cylindrical object about the size of a loaf of bread. As it is exposed to view, the black object with electric blue accents emits an occasional beeping sound. "Captain, the Storm has reached the orbit of the third moon, and is now approaching our position." comes the voice of Harmony. "Ah-ha!" Kieran exclaims upon discovering the device. And then exclaims; "Maulk!;" as Harmony relays that time is running short. He grabs the infernal device and sprints for the bridge, using TK as necessary to speed things along. As he's running along, he comms Harmony to have her roll the ship relative to the moon's surface as he's going to need to see the surface for what he plans and cease with the false tracking signal. On the long stretches between the hold and the bridge, TK does help perfectly in covering the distance in a more rapid manner. A warning from Harmony indicates that the ship is indeed rolling, a fact that is confirmed by a view from a viewscreen Kieran passes. Escape pods aren't cheap, and moreover, now that he's outside the shadow of their origin, locating a replacement might not be an easy task, so he'd prefer to save them in the event they're truly needed. Once on the bridge, Kieran uses Third Eye to locate a spot on the moon's surface. What are the surface conditions like; i.e. atmosphere, air pressure, temperature? The moon has a somewhat thinner than Keltian standard atmosphere, air pressure and temperature. Sea level on this planet is roughly equivalent to conditions on five thousand foot mountains on Keltia or Scota. And the highlands of the planet are even thinner. Kieran will use the Dimension Door spell to open a small portal from the bridge to the moon's surface and toss the infernal device, err... beacon through and then close the portal. And away it goes onto the planet. There is a bit of tension with the air pressure and temperature change, but its nothing that can't be handled. Then the Mental Illusion is cast to render the ship invisible, and Kieran pilots Voyager into and then under the ring system, heading for the far side of the gas giant opposite the second moon at the best possible speed once through the ring system. Voyager runs ahead of that foul storm, which slows as it engulfs the orbit of the second Moon, and its progress in fact comes to a near stop. Without too much difficulty, Voyager, invisible, reaches the ring system, and then the shadow of the Giant. Like a pair of eyes, two storms rotate into view as Voyager reaches a point directly opposite the second moon, and the now slowly creeping storms. "Storm intensity has decreased 45% from observed peak. Storm speed has decreased 97%. Storm mass and size still remain within observed size." Harmony informs Kieran. Two storms? Kieran maintains his concentration on the Mental Illusion spell, dropping Multi-Tasking, Third Ear and Third Eye, but keeping Faithful Mind. Further analysis shows that the original single storm seems to have bifurcated into two ones as its intensity decreased. "What is going on, Kieran?" Paril, arriving on the bridge, asks. "Track the storm and what its doing to the second moon, Harmony;" Kieran says to his ship. "Gate, give me a long range scan, the best you can anyway, given the circumstances, of our flight path. Let's see if there's anything else following us today." "Affirmative." comes the voice of Harmony. Gate responds with a series of beeps and chirps. "Morning Paril;" Kieran says after giving the droids their orders. He points to the sensor screen and then to the view outside the bridge. "You've heard of people who like to chase storms? Well, we found a storm that likes to chase starships. Rather, it found us. We should be okay for a little bit, long enough to plan our next move anyway." "Storms don't chase ships." Paril says. "Not unless I'm drunker than I thought I was." Kieran chuckles and shakes his head; "Normally, I'd agree with you. But this storm did chase us." He stops there, not relating the part about the tracking device just yet. Kieran glances at his longtime friend. 'Hair's all a mess and in need of a shave, as usual;' Kieran thinks to himself, absent mindedly raising one hand to scratch lightly at his own three day old facial hair. 'Jumpsuit's all rumpled, must have... fallen asleep in it. Again.' "Hungry? Some caf?;" he asks his friend. "Yes and Yes." Paril agrees readily, falling into a chair. "Too much of a bender, I think, old friend. Both would do me good." "The storms seem to be generating unusual weather effects in the atmosphere of the moon." Harmony announces. "I can detect tornadoes, typhoons, a hurricane and an ice storm all attributable to the atmosphere's disruption." Gate is still analyzing the flight path, although a screen shows a rapid series of images as the droid plots out the projected path. "Harmony;" Kieran says while still gazing at the storms. "Restore power to all systems but keep the shields fully charged. Rouse the chef droid in the galley if you would and have him cook a couple of breakfasts for us and bring us a couple of pots of caf." "Affirmative." A humming sound emanates in the room as the power relays change and the Voyager is restored to a more standard power flow. Kieran watches and tracks the storms for a while, trying to determine what the storms are doing. He'll also start laying in a course on the navicomputer to take them back to the Shadow path, avoiding the storms as much as possible. Gate finishes the flight path analysis, in time for Kieran to lay a new course to the shadow path. There do not appear to be any obstacles on the planned route. The storms have continued to mostly stall at the orbit of the second moon. Harmony continues to give updates on the weather effects the storms are having. Its not pretty. "Sounds like the storms are trying to wipe out anyone and anything on that moon, Kieran." Paril comments as the smell of food indicates that the chef droid is approaching, with food and drink. "That's because the storm, or rather the guiding intelligence behind it;" Kieran says to Paril; "believes the Voyager is on that moon. Someone managed to get a tracking device on board during one of our last few stops before heading out this way and the storm was using the device's signal to follow us." Kieran smiles thinly; "Luckily, I found it in time to ditch it on that moon and get us well clear before the storm arrived. My guess is the Baronness' been having another go at tracking us down and eliminating us. Don't know if he's in one of those storms or not, so we wait and see what they do before we move." "Never heard of the Baronness being able to control storms, but she does have unusual abilities." Paril says doubtfully. "Still...she certainly dislikes us enough to try something like it." "Yeah, well last time I saw her;" Kieran replies; "she was on an out of control starship heading more or less for an ion storm." A thin grin appears briefly; "The fact that I was responsible for said starship being out of control in the first place...." Kieran's voice trails off for a moment, then he shrugs his shoulders. "Still, if she survived that run in with an ion storm, she may have learned something. Though that would be remarkable for her." Kieran really doesn't like the aforementioned Baronness. "It would be most unfortunate if she picked up that trick only after that incident." Paril agrees. Kieran turns as the chef droid walks in with the tray of food and caf. "Thanks, Chef;" he says taking the tray and setting in one of the extra seats on the bridge. He pours himself a cup of caf and waves Paril to help himself to the food first. With the hunger of someone dehydrated from too much alcohol, Paril drinks more than he eats, pouring and drinking the cup of caf quickly. He pours another as he takes some of the food onto a plate, arranging some scrambled eggs and minced sausage on an oval heel of bread before taking a bite or two. "Storms have resumed motion." Harmony announces aloud. "Storms are moving along axis of prior motion, retrograde to previous vector. Moon is now clear of storm activity" "Can't Harmony just say they've headed back the way they came?" Paril asks, after clearing his mouth of a bite of food. Gate answers Paril with series of whistles and beeps. Kieran loads up a plate for himself and then moves back to his seat. He grins at Paril's comment. "Where would the fun be in that?" Then his expression grows serious. "Harmony, how long before you can determine if the storms are on the exact same course?" His fear now is that the storms will separate with one of them heading back down the Shadow path and the other going along it in the direction Voyager originally was on. Harmony waits a moment or two before responding. "Anticipate 50% confidence in projection of paths after observation of trajectories for 30 standard minutes. Anticipate 95% confidence in projection of path of Storms after observation of trajectories for 60 standard minutes. Significant increase in confidence with longer observation is not projected possible due to randomizing factors." Gate gives his agreement with a couple of beeps and whistles. Kieran considers this while wolfing down his first plate of food. After getting seconds and another cup of caf, he takes a few bites and then sets his plate aside for the moment. "What do you think?" Paril prompts. "Not liking this;" he says to Paril, frowning at the sensor screens. "Not one bit." He shrugs his shoulders and reaches for the controls, slowly accelerating the ship up to full speed. With Voyager already 'under' the ring system, he keeps with the idea of using the gas giant and ring system as cover in addition to the spell. He dives down and forward under the giant and angles off to one side so as to get them back to the Shadow path ahead of where they left it. Thinking in three dimensions proves to be effective, as there is no sign of the storms reacting to the new course for the Voyager. Can the ship's sensors detect the Shadow path? It takes some work on the part of Harmony, Gate and the ship sensors to find its exact line, but 10 minutes or so of work, and a series of beeps and whistles from Gate indicates that the droid has found the path. "Captain" Harmony interjects. "The two storms have begun to show a 2% divergence from projected current course along x-axis." "Sounds like they're slowly turning around." Paril says, looking at Kieran. "Yeah;" Kieran grumbles. "Grapping marvelous." He brings the ship to a halt at the edge of the gas giant's mini system. "Gate, get to work on the navi computer, and lay in a course to take us from here to the path once we're free of the giant's gravity well." Gate responds with a short whistle and a few beeps of assent. He picks up his plate of now cold food and begins to eat it anyway while watching the storms and waiting on Gate. He'll check to see how well his illusion spell is holding also. "She's not done with us yet, if she IS behind this." Paril says, as he picks at his plate as well. "Shouldn't have thought it would have been that simple. Kieran gives Paril a long look before answering. "It's never *simple* with that woman." He sighs; "Not even if I'd managed to bring her around to my way of thinking. But how the hell is she doing that?" He gestures at the storms through the cockpit. "If she's doing that. I've heard of Force-users being able to control storms, but not ones of stellar proportions." The illusion spell, to Kieran's senses and training, still holds in place. Hmm... use Multi-Tasking then to work up another Mental Illusion spell of the Voyager; visible this time, set to 'rabbit' upon being discovered (or when Kieran initiates it) and fly back into the ring system of the gas giant and disappear. Twelve minutes later. The spell is readied. "Storm divergence is now at 5% from original course." Harmony announces. On a screen, a plot of a suggested route from the Gas Giant back to the path is on the screen, accompanied by Gate whistling and beeping his success. Thanks to the gravity field of the Gas Giant, it will bend in a curve slightly in the direction of the storms, and then in a parabolic arc swing away and onto the path and escape them and the system for good. "Show us the storms projected paths versus our proposed course;" Kieran instructs Gate and Harmony. "Constant update. Do you have enough data to get a feel for the... handling characteristics, if you will, of the storm? Can you determine at what point in the storm's turning back towards the gas giant and us would be the best time for us to jump into hyperspace and the worst for the storms?" Kieran looks over at Paril; "The problem thus far hasn't been out maneuvering the storms, it's been out running them. When it chased us to here, it was hyperluminal, which it shouldn't be capable of." "Faster than light." Paril says with a moue of distaste on his face. "The sooner we're out of here, the better." Kieran's gaze goes unfocused as he ponders the matter. "What's good for the goose..." he mutters aloud. If he's been using the Force to disguise their presence, Narek could well be doing the same. But two storms now? Two Force users? Or just her? But the damage to the giant's moon was real... Hmm... a large enough ship could certainly wreak havoc with an orbital bombardment and cause much the same damage. Mask the effects of how the damage was wrought and... "Harmony, scan the moon once more. Show us the scans;" Kieran says. "Yes, Captain." The information takes a minute or so for Harmony to resolve and compose into pictures. The images show the moon in the wake of the bombardment. The atmosphere has been disturbed, the climate wrecked. What is telling, however, are the craters. Perfectly circular craters that were definitely not there before, mostly in the region of the moon where the beacon was gated. There is a scattering of others in the same hemisphere. Kieran has seen this damage before. Its the telltale of orbital bombardment by means of one or more mass drivers. "Damn;" he says looking at the devastation. "There's a ship hiding in one of those storms;" he says aloud to Paril. "Its got to be Narek." He shakes his head; "She just won't let it go." "With prejudice." Paril says. "She's willing to bomb a world for a chance to take you out; her desire to put an end to you is as clear as a nova." Kieran sighs; "Either she really cares or she's really pissed at me; still." A pause, then; "Possibly both." Kieran stretches out with the Force (Third Eye) and zooms outward to check out the storms up close from a relatively safe distance. Zooming on the first storm is a long and fruitless exercise, as far as finding a ship is concerned. The ion storm is pretty to look at, from an aesthetic of deadly beauty. But it holds no secrets beyond those. The second of the two storms looks much the same. At first glance. Something doesn't look right to Kieran's eyes. It's more of an absence, a gap, a wrongness in what Kieran sees. A wrongness and gap that is just about the length, and breadth and width and form of a starship. Kieran brings up Third Ear as well and ghosts in towards the starship shaped gap. If the gap is in fact caused by a starship, Kieran will ghost towards the ship's bridge and observe who's there and what's being said and done. Kieran is able to bring up the Third Ear with relative ease, and ghosts in closer to the gap. It's definitely a starship. While actual voices inside the ship seem to be muffled, baffled or reduced in volume, the sounds of a spacecraft are much harder to disguise. The slow firing of rockets. Attitudinal controls, and the like. As Kieran approaches closer, close enough to hear the voices, there is the glimmerings of a mental contact and voice Female, amused and very familiar. "Why, if it isn't Kieran Douglas. No roses? If you are going to call on a woman, you should always bring flowers." Kieran continues to ghost forward, following the mental contact, such as it is while also bringing up Multi-Tasking once again. Kieran takes a look around once he enters whatever compartment the woman is in. Any viewscreens, data displays or the like that Kieran can observe and gather information from? The Baroness is on the bridge of her ship. Viewscreens and data displays are about all around the ghostly form of Kieran, as does her crew, of course. Many of the readouts are of ordinary business, although at least one is a scan of the bombed moon, and another seems to be a rendition of the status of the ion storms. Kieran studies the screens particularly noting those relevant to the ship's speed and course, armaments and defenses and general layout. Is Narek's ship from what Kieran refers to as Republic space, or is it from elsewhere? The ship looks, at least as a chassis, to be a Republic space model. What little he can see from the screens, though, suggest that the ship has been customized and modified, extensively. And uniquely, too, these modifications are not typical of changes he's seen in the Republic. Once inside and if the woman's voice belongs to the person he believes it to; "Unsurprising this is and technically, you've been attempting to call upon me. You're a long way from home, Narek Meanth. Better hope you can find your way back." "You will have no fears of that, Kieran." she smiles thinly. "Let's just say I'm not going to lose any sleep over this;" Kieran rejoins confidently, still ghosting about the ship. Meanwhile, back on Voyager... Kieran points to the second storm and says to Paril. "She's in that one, right about here;" he points to the approximate location. "Move us back a bit, keep the edge of the ring system between us and this point as long as possible." "Confirmed." Paril says. "I just hope you know what you are doing." Thrusters fire, and the course starts to change as requested. It would be bad form to say 'Me too' so Kieran refrains doing just that. He does reply in a confident tone though. "Oh the party's just gotten started, my friend. But its not going to be a long one that's for sure." "Right." Paril says, with more confidence than he shows. And then Kieran starts working on a Dimension Door spell, a big one. The dimensions of the opening gate would height roughly equal to the depth of the Jovian's ring system and width as wide as he can make it. Exiting gate vertical dimensions the same as the opening one's width though maybe 50-75% of the opening. In effect creating a tunnel or funnel. If he has to drop the stored Mental Illusion that's fine. Dropping the active Illusion spell, if necessary, is okay once Voyager has backed up a bit. He'll definitely have to drop the Illusion to get this started. Once the Voyager pulls back a bit, the spell can be started. In the meantime, back as his psychic projection... "Speaking of fearing a way back, don't you fear, Kieran, having your mind and soul trapped here while your body sits back on that ship of yours?" She doesn't face Kieran as she speaks, as if not quite sure where he is located precisely within the ship. "In fact, if I can't have your body, I'll just take your soul for now." Kieran's senses detect walls of psychic force start to form around the outermost edges of her ship. Its not a threat to entrap him or cut him off from returning--just yet. And even when it is up, its very possible he will be able to ram through anything she can build. "Oh, we're in one of *those* moods again are we, Narek?" Kieran replies, his tone of voice conveying the impression of being accustomed to her many moods, having had to suffer through them all too often. Narek does not respond to Kieran's barb. "To answer your question, if needs be, I'll borrow the body of one of your crew and work my way out physically. Not that I expect to need to resort to that action." he tells her. He ghosts over and studies the walls of psychic force without coming close to them. "Is there something in particular you wanted or are you just stalking me again?" he asks after a moment. He just needed to keep her occupied and off guard for a while until his surprise was ready to be unveiled. "Isn't it enough." she says with a tone of sweetness overlaying the venom he knows she is well capable of "that I am here, now?" Kieran chuckles lightly at her tone; "That's more like the woman I know." "That you are here is no mean feat, granted, but the reason *why* you are here is of far more importance, don't you think?" he says with a hint of true curiosity in his voice. "Are you still looking for vengeance, still trying to bring me in before Palpatine? Or is it something else?" Narek does not answer at this point. The walls of psychic force,as already constituted, are stronger than he would have expected, given his last assessment of her potential with the Force. "You and your arrogant faith in your abilities." Narek says. "Haven't you realized that I have learned, too?" "Indeed;" Kieran replies calmly; "I can see that you have. And from sources outside Republic... or suppose I should call it *Imperial* space now. Most impressive. Again, I have to wonder why though. Talk to me, Narek. Or are we beyond that possibility now as well?" "If we were beyond talking, Kieran." Narek responds with that sweetness and venom. "we would not be speaking even now. Our conversation would be at an end." "I've discovered some things, Kieran." she adds. "Interesting things, and not just about you. Although one has to wonder about the coincidence..." she trails off her voice in a hum as her concentration evidently goes elsewhere The walls of psychic force around Narek's ship are now complete and are strengthening moment by moment. One of the displays changes its readout to some subsystem or device labelled "Psionic Field". Readouts suggest that whatever it is, its powering up, a simple bar gauge showing its power rising. "Yes, you did call me Kieran Douglas;" Kieran says his demeanor grown more serious. "The last name shouldn't be known to you. 'Twould have been simpler for all if you had learned it from me. Though it does provide a clue as to the identity of your new... master, shall we say?" "No man is *my* master." Narek responds fiercely. The emotion is palpable, strong, dark. Kieran nods, to himself of course, for some reason her declaration is at least a little reassuring. Not much under the current circumstances, but a little. "My apologies then;" Kieran says to Narek. "No insult to you was intended." "You do realize that I am watching what you're doing Narek?" he says while gauging the psychic wall's growing strength. Does he think it will grow strong enough to hold his psychic projection here? From what Kieran senses, yes, it will eventually be too tough to get past. Kieran is working at a remove here. In a matchup fully face to face, Kieran would be the superior. However, Narek is clearly strong enough to hold his psychic self, though. And what does he think that's going to mean if she should manage to hold him here? He sighs sadly; "Still pursuing this path? And here I thought you wanted to continue our peaceful conversation. You sure you want to test your skills against mine, yet again? Are you sure you can believe, that you can trust what your master taught you will work against me? Are you certain he told you all that he knows about me? Can you be sure he knows... all the things he claims to know? And that those things are true?" "Kieran" comes the voice of Harmony, back at his regular body, on board the Voyager. "Narek's ship is showing unusual energy signatures, visible even at this distance. Configuration of ship device unknown." "I know, Harmony;" Kieran replies back on the ship. "The device is labeled as a Psionic Field. Continue to record what you can pick up from her ship. Everything set to go to hyperspace once we're clear of the ring system? This is going to be over soon." "Preparations are complete." Harmony chirps. "Recording will continue." Kieran glances up at the rings and pictures where he wants the entrance gate to the Dimension Door spell to appear. On Narek's ship, he visualizes a point about 500 to 1000 meters in front of her ship for the exit portal to appear. Close, but not too close, not enough range to give her ship's sensors and crew more than a moment or two to register what's about to hit them. He knows the majority of the material in the ring system is just ice and dust particles, which in and of themselves would do very little or no damage to her ship, but there are also the equivalent of rocks ranging in size from pebbles to baseballs to boulders on up to moonlets the size of a mountain. All of that rushing out of the exit gate at the ring's rotational speed about the gas giant is going to have the potential to dish out a lot of damage to Narek's ship. Kieran's aiming to overload any shields around the ship and pound the grap out of the hull, especially the engines/drive sections as the ship's crew invariably maneuvers to steer clear of the ring material heading straight for them.If Narek continues to ramp up her device and it gets to the point where Kieran feels he won't be able to bust his psychic projection out, then the Dimension Door spell goes off. The power increase on the walls slows to a stop. They haven't come down, but Kieran feels escape is still easily possible given his abilities. The Psionic Field gadget, whatever it is for, is still powering up. Other displays suggest that the ship is changing course on the z-axis, moving to a polar orbit around the Jovian's system. At the moment, this is bringing the ship further away from the Voyager. "More than that, Kieran." Narek finally answers Kieran's question "I know something about you that *he* doesn't know." Narek says. "Enough to bring me out here." Is her ship still in the midst of the ion storm then? And, perhaps more importantly, is her ship going up or down on the z-axis relative to Voyager? Down would not be good by way of Kieran's thinking. The ship is still within the ion storm. One of them, anyway, the other is now completely independent. Narek's ship is currently going up, not down, on the z-axis relative to Voyager. The second storm, though, without her ship, IS moving down on the z-axis relative to Voyager. "And what would that be, Narek?" Kieran says, knowing he's asking the question she wants him to. He's still watching the field strength of the wall and Narek, for that matter, for any changes in her facial expressions and/or body language. The field strength fluctuates and moves with obvious, strong emotion that comes not only from Narek's voice, but also from her psychic personality and the expression on her face. "Simply this, Kieran Douglas." she finally says. "You are not who you appear to be. You are not whom you appear to be, or have claimed to be. You may play at being a Jedi, but you came from, and have a life elsewhere." Narek pauses. "Just as did I." Kieran's first thought is to protest her statements regarding him. After all, he is as he appears to be, and then names he's used are his. Technicalities, true, but still the truth, from a certain point of view. He frowns in thought, though Narek cannot see him of course, and finally says; "I'd clap but you'd not be able to hear it, so I'll have to settle for simply saying; 'stunning, as usual, Narek'. But I feel I should point out a few things; there may be more to me than meets the eye, but I am as I appear. Kieran and Elharn are among the names given to me upon my birth; my parents gave me a number of them. And I did take the Jedi's oath, even if I did circumvent most of the padawan stuff. So it all was true, from a certain point of view." "A certain point of view." Narek agrees, thinly. That she knows this much is disturbing, Kieran thinks. But does she know it all? After all, she hasn't mentioned Amber, the Pattern, or the family name of Barimen. Yet. "Did, Narek?" Kieran asks regarding her last statement. "By your choice or someone else's?" A trace of amusement. "Ah, and here I thought that you knew..." she breaks off the vocalized thought before completing it, her attention turning to a display of the ship's course. What's the ship's course now? The ship is still taking the z-axis polar course as its main vector. However, it has added another vector of motion in the y-axis in the current position of the Voyager. "No, sorry, I don't know;" he replies. "Should I?" He regards her face and body as if for the first time, trying to figure out if she resembles anyone in his rather large family, both Amberite and Keltian. The base ship came from the Republic shadow, are there any features or design characteristics on the modifications that Kieran would recognize? "You're the long distance voyager." Narek replies, amused. The modified design characteristics are unknown to Kieran. They aren't Keltic, or any of the usual adversaries in Keltic space either. As far as Narek herself...no, she doesn't look immediately like family, of either type, but that's no ironclad guarantee of course. But there is no overwhelming resemblance. "Who knew the Moody Blues would make it this far from the shadow of their origin?" Kieran quips. "Other than me, of course, I've only borrowed a few of their songs from time to time." Kieran drifts over to one of the crew members using a computer terminal and studies the person for a few moments looking for any devices that might block psychic contact, or evidence to suggest psychic blocks are in place. The crew member that Kieran picks is not quite human at all. Her white eyes and general appearance suggest at a first glance that she is perhaps an Arkanian. A gentle probe to check for psychic blocks and devices reveals that there is indeed a minor psychic block in place. Kieran could easily get through or around it, if he wished. What is trickier, Kieran feels, is doing so without Narek noticing. Kieran refrains from tampering at the moment. Are the other crew members similarly blocked? The second crew member that Kieran checks is similarly blocked. A check of another crew member, this one human and sitting at a different console, shows that she is not blocked. A general survey over the few minutes shows that most are blocked, a few are not. "You've gone quiet." Narek observes. "Still enjoying your visit?" she says. "I would break out the wine, but you couldn't drink it." "Enjoying time spent with you was never the problem, Narek;" Kieran says. In a much colder tone he adds; "It was your spending time with others while we were seeing each other that was the problem." And then those psychic walls around Narek's ship suddenly start rising in strength, again. "And speaking of time, our time together ends now;" Kieran says while triggering the Dimension Door spell as per previous plans. Once the spell is in motion and the debris starts hitting Narek's ship, Kieran uses his psychic projection to shatter the block on the Arkanian and pushes her to access the data on the psionic field generator. And so it goes off... The gate appears around 700 meters in front of Narek's ship, ice, dust and other material pouring out of the spell-built gate. Nothing overly large comes out at first, giving the crew a few moments to react. And also giving Kieran a free moment to break the Arkanian's block and get her to bring the psionic field generator. Larger pieces start coming through the gate as information on Narek's toy starts scrolling on the screen. It's definitely not Empire technology, given how its curled around the frame of the ship in an alien fashion. Kieran can read the data on the specifications and get the gist before more pressing matters causes the Arkanian to look at shield strength assessments instead. Larger pieces have started bombarding the ship's shields. Narek starts shouting commands for the ship to change course and reinforce shields. Her lack of attention on Kieran has caused the psychic walls to fluctuate. And then comes the really big piece. Certainly one of the largest pieces of ice and rock in the rings, a small-comet sized fragment,big enough to barely fit through the gate's opening, streaks out of the gate toward Narek's ship. Kieran ghosts past Narek on his way out through the fluctuating psionic shield walls. "You said I should bring gifts when I came calling, Narek. Well, here you go. The same sort of gift you intended to give me. You sought to destroy my ship and crew, now I'm returning the favor." He pauses before adding; "Stop following me Narek. I cared about you once and you betrayed me. I can't, I won't let you do it again." And then he forces his way through the psionic shield wall 'flies' out to observe what happens next. "Kieran!" Narek shouts, physically and esoterically, as Kieran manages to escape through the shield, and escape her ship entirely. From this perspective, he can see Narek's ship try and dodge the large fragment of ice. Her ship is nimble, and she gamely tries to get the ship out of the way. However, Kieran's gate put the fragment too close for Narek's ship to successfully dodge. The piece of ice strikes the ship in the rear quarter, causing it to spin as it plows through its shields and impacts the hull. The glow on the engine suggests that the engine has taken a hit as well and the ship may very soon go critical. "Don't grap with the Jedi Master, Narek;" Kieran says mainly to himself before shooting the psychic projection back towards his body. Back on Voyager: Kieran looks over at Paril and says; "Time to go. Hit it and go to lightspeed ASAP." And with the jump to lightspeed, the psionic construct that Kieran has used dissipates due to distance. The Jovian system, with its storms, and Narek, are left safely far, far behind. Still, Kieran is left with a headache from his efforts, esoterically, magically and otherwise. Through the pain and the haze he can hear Harmony saying something about there being no signs of pursuit or obstacle on their course. Kieran cradles his aching head in his hands for a time, eyes tightly (okay not so tightly as that hurts even more) squeezed shut. After a time, he says softly; "Paril, Harmony, Gate keep us on course. Let me know if the universe is about to end, 'cause I'd like to watch, otherwise I need to relax for a while." "You got it, Kieran." Paril says, with a volume that in ordinary circumstances would be normal, but with Kieran's headache is as loud as the crowd at a hurling match. Harmony doesn't respond, but Gate gives off a series of beeps and whistles of acknowledgement. With that Kieran stands up and staggers out the hatch and down to his cabin to grab some extra strength aspirin and toss the tablets back with a glass of water. Then he grabs his guitar and heads for the lounge area. Plugging the guitar into the sound system there, Kieran starts playing music. At first it's soft and slow, but as he relaxes and the headache begins to fade, it gets louder and angrier. Stuff like; 'She Hates Me', 'Psycho', and 'Blurry' from Puddle of Mudd; 'Do This Anymore' from Nickelback; 'Prayer', 'Breathe', and 'Stricken' from Disturbed. Eventually, the musician droids on the ship pop out of their cubby holes and start accompanying him. They know his favorites all too well. Kieran's not happy with himself, or Narek for that matter, and playing music so loud the hull plates on the ship vibrate is his way of coping. While the musician droids accompany Kieran on his jam session, Paril, Harmony and Gate leave him firmly and completely alone for a couple of solid hours of playing. In point of fact, 2 and a half hours after Kieran staggered off the bridge, Paril comes into the lounge... And for that, we'll start a brand new thread. Backlinks |
