A Pilot's Diary - The darkness beyond the stars.

[LoneTiger]

Liberty Special Operations Command (LSOC) - Section 6
Battleship:....Name ERROR. CLASSIFIED.
Location:.......Location ERROR. CLASSIFIED.

The soft humming sound running through the walkways and corridors echoed with the steady vibration familiar with a starship cruising through a jump gate at speeds several times faster than light via a man-made wormhole that connected the multitude of populated star systems within the Sirius star cluster, just commonly known as Sirius for everyone else, home of humanity for the last 8 centuries.

The lone figure sitting down next to a door looked very alien in what should be an activity-bustling ship, yet that figure was completely alone, a pilot wearing still the regulatory Liberty Navy pressure suit yet every single patch, ribbon or id marking has been stripped or removed completely leaving only the bluish gray fabric and the closed helmet hiding the identity of its user. Occasionally a technician or a crew member of the battleship passed by the hallway but never giving the seated figure so much of a nod, he was wondering why all this secrecy, after finishing the last patrol the message appeared on the NAV computer to head to a designated sector of space on California system and dock with the battleship there, to remove every single marking from his suit and board the battleship without removing the helmet, normally he would have asked questions, but the final part of the message endorsed by the LSOC stopped such thoughts.

The LSOC or the Liberty Special Operations Command was the branch of the Liberty military assigned to carry covert operations, sabotage, infiltration, deep space espionage and reconnaissance, they were the moles inserted into the enemy's midsts to weaken and reduce the strength of a threat towards Liberty and its surrounding systems. Officially LSOC did not exist and so far there has been no evidence that it actually exists more than rumor or 2, even the office of intelligence publicly admitted that there was no such thing as LSOC at all and that it must be a rumor started by non-liberty factions in order to undermine the government's authority and power.

When the pilot followed the orders in the message it deleted itself from the main computer alongside any and all NAV data, the ship's AI itself had been fried completely, so every single cell in his body told him that this was far from a rumor. The line of thought suddenly was interrupted as the sound of a sliding door reached him, turning around an aide appeared from it watching him and the mirrored plate of his helmet "They are ready for you, please step in" was the only thing he said, straightening up and stepping within the room the outer door closed behind him leaving the aide outside, a secondary door opened to what seemed an enclosed office stepping inside the door once again hissed closed and the soft quiet clicking of electronic locks told him the room was completely secure.

The room was quite austere, there was a desk, 2 lamps all mounted on the table, a small port window showing the wormhole energies flowing alongside the hull of the ship, but nothing else, then he caught on the two other people inside the room, and caught himself on the spot saluting immediately as his eyes recognized the 4 stars inside a circle of a rear admiral "Rear admiral, Sir!" the admiral straightening some from speaking next to the other person on the table watching him and returning the salute, only then he finally saw under the soft light of the room who the other person was, without lowering his arm from the salute "Madam president, Sir!".

President Barbara Jacobi was well known for her expertise at politics and the force behind Liberty's might. Not only is she a political powerhouse, she is also a practical and elegant dignitary; poised and reserved when the occasion calls for it, and with the latest events that happened in the last few months her might only showed how strong a leader she really was; already on her way to become a legend on her own worth and Liberty's history, Rear admiral Samuel Peters was a legend of its own, every cadet and officer on Liberty Navy have heard his name and several of his accomplishments, fighting in the war, Taking his fleet into battle and coming victorious, he was supposed to be retired for the last 6 years, but seeing him here only made him feel that whatever was happening was more dangerous than any secret assignment.

"Take a seat son and remove your helmet, this room is secure and no word that is spoken here will leave these walls" the admiral said, as the pilot sat down and unlocked the helmet removing it placing it on the table watching the two most powerful people in Liberty stare at him he wondered if it would had been safer to leave the helmet on just in case, with the president and the admiral's eyes upon him he had a very hard time relaxing.
"What is your name?" Jacobi said with a gentle tone that demanded an answer.
"My name is Steve Lexter, ma'am"
"A good name Mr. Lexter" Jacobi continues "I have read your file and both admiral Peters and myself agree that you are the perfect candidate for a new mission, however the mission is extremely risky and with very low chances of survival; I assume you know about the Nomads?"
His voice caught up soon as he heard the casual explanation, he was chosen for a new mission? the Nomads? before speaking "Yes ma'am I have heard of them, the left overs of an advanced race, extremely hostile and dangerous with organic technology, all reports indicate that the Nomads were sent away by The Order in conjunction with Liberty Navy and a combined force of Rheinland and Kusari armies."
"Almost accurate son yet the truth is somewhat more complex than what you read on reports censoring several key details" Admiral Peters spoke, listening to him here was like being a nail facing a hammer "The Nomads are not entirely gone, they are still here, and they still want to destroy anything or anyone in their way, what Nomads were drawn away by the order were those close to the portal when it was opened, but there are thousands or maybe more that are still in Sirius and from what every single piece of intel we can gather, they are rebuilding their forces... Yes son, the Nomads are coming back for a rematch"
"The admiral speaks the truth" Jacobi resumed "They are here still and growing in numbers, unknown to everyone and in hiding waiting for the right time to strike, and when they do there will be very little we can do to stop them unless we are all united together in a single force. I do not just mean Liberty's, Rheinland's, Kusari's, Bretonia's armies, but every single army and space ship available in Sirius, yes I mean even rogues, corsairs, outcasts, every single independent power that can fly a ship in space will be needed for the oncoming battle, and trust me, there will be battle, otherwise we face extinction just as humanity's at Sol were destroyed we face the same threat."

Listening to the president and the admiral speak his head literally flipped with every word hitting home sputtering a few words before managing to put his wits and thoughts together "Ma'am, permission to speak freely?"
"Granted" the president said.
"Ma'am, with all due respect I do not think that is possible, every single government has its own agenda and pretty much that agenda includes itself and maybe some allies then everyone else, the corsairs are intent on dominating the space near Rheinland' territory they won't listen to anything else, the Outcasts near Kusari so filled up with cardamine want to make everyone their 'clients' with their drugs, Bretonia barely can manage to control its borders and its rebuilding its fleet probably to keep Liberty and Rheinland away, I really do not see a way for everyone to join together under a single flag"
The president only gave a soft smirk as her hands laced together over the table "Let me give you a few news, after the incident with the Nomad gate Me and the new Rheniland Kaiser joined together in secret and began to discuss our options, after 2 weeks Kusari and Bretonian leaders were brought in, every leader knows the threat and we agreed to start works to bring all nations under a combined council, the current stress you see between our nations is the result of said effort, everyone thinks its the prelude to war, they are only half right, its the prelude to the biggest war in Sirius, we know about the other pirate factions, and that is where you come in."

Admiral Peters continued "We need pilots like you who are extremely proficient at deep space scouting to collect data from the outskirts and borders of Sirius, pirate information, systems, defenses, tactical, stars, jump holes anything and everything, pilots with no 'official' affiliation with the government, pilots that act with every single trick in their sleeves to complete the mission and gather the data for the oncoming conflict"

Steve body leaned back on the chair as the immensity of the task ahead slowly started to dawn on him, licking his lips before speaking he nodded to both of them.
"Where do we start?"

President Jacobi and admiral Peter's smiled and that smile send a shiver down his spine.
After the shiver ran through him the admiral took the lead "Your entire file will be changed, updated and will show that you have been reassigned to a far reaching wing next to border of Bretonian space, it will also show that your ship and your wing will be destroyed and killed by Molly's, all records of you will be erased, only the president and myself will be aware of your situation, but in reality you will depart from New York on a Starflier and start making your way towards the out lands, use any mean necessary, make sure to head outwards, if you are captured or killed we will deny any knowledge of you, however you'll be assigned a codename and encrypted frequency to send your reports to the closest LSOC cell"

"Also" Jacobi turned to Peter's who nodded "You will do everything in your power to ensure the success of your exploring mission, if that means breaking liberty laws so be it, but mind your judgment, we want information, not more rogues. Don't let your feelings get in the way of the greater good, we know you will make us proud Mr. Lexter".

"One more thing" admiral Peter's said pressing a button on his pad as the lights dimmed some in the room and a holo-screen appeared over the desk where images began to display showing the great 5 sleeper ships 800 years ago escaping the war "You need to know what is at stake..." his tone didn't hold any warmth as the scene played on the screen...

General Rockforth's video log

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After Steve left the room with his helmet on and the orders to carry out Jacobi leaned back on her chair rubbing her temples with the fingertips "What do you think of him?" there was no need to say which 'he' she meant.
"I think he'll do well, I think he has enough grit to carry on the orders and besides Barbara we have very few options if worse comes to worse we still have the exile option"
"Exile... 800 years ago we left Sol because of war between ourselves Samuel... I will be damned if we leave again for another war. Lets hope we have time enough to prepare, how many pilots are left?"
"7 more Barbara, we should hurry to finish and return home."

(To be edited and continued...)

[LoneTiger]

Location: Liberty Space, New York system, Planet Manhattan.
10 days later.

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After returning to liberty and the shuttle took me to Manhattan to a secluded warehouse and cargo area my new papers were given to me, as far as the world knew Steve Dexter was gone and dead, the new file and id had no name on it only a call sign... "LoneTiger" interesting choice considering he always enjoyed the company of felines, and the name of that old specie long extinct back on earth had a predator feeling of it. I was feeling a little dizzy and sleepy, I know i was drugged during the way back probably to keep the plausible denial from the government in case things went south.

But enough of that, striding towards the local equipment store I had the good fortune of finding out all paperwork for the new ship and equipment needed was ready, even the new id that made me stand as civilian, would prove useful to obtain advantage of the local law enforcement for the plans ahead, I did find myself wondering how the president and the admiral would keep this hidden, the answer came the moment I put my fingers on the bio-metric readers, it displayed the information, the most simple information anyone could have, just the call sign, the picture, place of birth and current ship registration, even body markings that were not there before, only then i noticed that my fingerprints had been changed, probably during my sleep, wonder what else they did to me...

No matter, first things first, the shop keeper was not very helpful but took me o the Starflier Class A ship location and told me I had 48 hours before the parking lease expired, more than enough time to put everything together. I entered the cockpit and connected the wrist interface to the ship's computer and began to run tests, checking and double checking the status of the ship, overall it was not a bad ship, not good either, but not bad, it would have to do for now. Opening the case that contained the rest of my 'equipment'... 5000 credits, a trade & transport pad log with routes and goods, 2 hand pulse blasters with 3 clips each all charged, a... now this is a surprise; an AI data chip most probably assigned to me, that could prove very useful. Taking the small chip and putting it on the computer reader port of the ship and starting it the chip began to glow with a green bluish light, on the 10x10cm holo-pad to the right a small red dot appeared with a blue dot circling around the red one slowly and steadily; an hydrogen atom.

The 'atom' on the holo-pad pulses a few times creating more virtual electrons, neutrons and protons before a low steady female but firm voice with a noticeable slavic accent spoke from the com speakers "Counter intrusion routines initialized, Starflier class-A ship being secured" I turned around with a start as the access door and every single opening outside suddenly closed and even the cockpit was pressurized as the ship's insides separated from the world outside, before I could protest the voice spoke again "Ship secure, greetings LT, I am Veca and I have been assigned to you for your mission to assist you in any and every possible way, I apologize for taking control of the ship like this, I was instructed to do so at the first opportunity."

"I realize you have questions, but let me assure you I am here to help you and assist you, I have full knowledge of your mission and only you will be able to speak freely of it with me, if anyone else is close no mention of the mission will be made at all

This AI really had no idea of how many questions but the most important one came to mind... "Wait just a minute" I said "If you are here it means there are other people who know about you, more so technicians, programmers not to mention anyone involved with your development, if you are an AI by being this size should be hard enough to keep security off a project like yourself itself." Which made me check by the side the port panel to make sure Manhattan security was not about to fall on my head.

"That is only partially correct LT, my series of AI is a prototype developed by LSOC in conjunction with The Order intelligence, just like your identity mine was scrapped and deleted from every single secure terminal and LSOC also issues a mass purge of any data related to me, as some humans would say, 'we are stuck together' even though my processing capabilities are not equal or greater than a full system AI my design allows me to be easily transferred and carried and limited equipment control."

As the AI spoke I leaned back on the pilot's chair gazing through the glass-steel polymer window towards the wall of the landing pad, it sounded risky but the AI might be able to make things easier "What about capture or hacking or deactivation? what happens if I die and you are captured by someone alongside the ship?"

The holographic atom on the pad sprouted several little electrons that seemed to collide with one another "If that were to happen my memory core will melt down in 0.0056 seconds destroying me completely, also my functions are linked directly to the primary and secondary coil drives of the ship, the ship, the data, the cargo everything in it will detonate alongside any ordinance the ship might be carrying, capture is not an option, however I will do my best to ensure the safety encoding, encrypting and delivery of any data you and me have gathered to LSOC"

It took me a few moments to realize the implications of this AI, but then again as the saying goes 'Don't look at gift horse in the mouth' as he spoke "Very well, show me current data of trade routes and items between Manhattan and the other planets and stations in system, and please an overlay of the time between travels via transit lanes".

A moment please... processing... data on screen.

Leaning back on the chair I gazed on the display, arms crossed watching the data and the current prices of merchandise...
Good this ought to give a good start to gather information, most of this is already known through Manhattan, but perhaps something else could be learned. Pulling a datapad and taking a few notes ordering some extra items to be bought for the first trades he needed and supplies for the ship.

This could work well, but will take some time.