FA+
Shop
1078
Views
Views
41
Favorites
Favorites
Category
Artwork (Digital) / Fantasy
Species Unspecified / Any
Size 719 x 708
File Size 72.3 kB
Report this content
More from Kikatsu
Listed in Folders
Ambiance: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mWTs1CJveHc
Huge chunks of melted and charred metal slowly turned in place, one occasionally flashing up in a burst of fire as it fell into the atmosphere of the nearby barren world. The rest of the space around the planet seemed to match the dusty color; pale dark tan fog filled the void, blotting out all the stars save for the old gold beast that the planets silently glided around. The hulk of a battered ship lay in the middle of the junk ring that had formed in orbit of the planet, the only geometry remaining that was identifiable was the long and angular superstructure with what was left of two massive wings near the aft end of the hulk, the port side wing had been sheered away a third of the way down. The entire mess slowly pinwheeled in place as a comparatively tiny ship slowly approached, raking a search light over what was left of the hull.
“What a mess.” Emile eased the thruster stick back slightly and moved the flight stick to the left, gently moving their ship away from a hull panel that had broken loose. The faded olive drab color and the shape of the hull signified that it was once an Austican ship- military, either a Type-52 or 53 judging from the configuration- a battlecruiser. Not exactly an easy ship to take out of commission, but Emile figured from the sheer number and spacing of the holes melted into its hull that there had to be more than one attacker.
“Doesn’t look like much of this is worth salvaging; most of the critical systems on the ship have been shot to shit.” He felt his chair move slightly as his oversized captain laid her hand on his headrest and leaned in to look out the view port.
“It’s a military ship, there is probably some stuff onboard worth taking off, optronics, heatsinks… Kijuuki are you getting any beacons from this thing?”
“Nothing, it looks like their antennas took a direct hit. There are no lifeboats left onboard, and the radiation and decay suggest that this wreck is not too old. It is very likely that the lifeboats landed on the planet below, and have had trouble getting their distress beacons going.”
“Get a more detailed scan of the ship.”
“Working on it.” The Ibycai crane poked his head out from behind the electronics station where he was situated. He briefly cracked a smile at Alma before realizing that he should pay more attention to his instruments.
“I wonder what this thing is doing out here. We must be at least three hundred and fifty light-years from the Austican border.”
“Whatever the reason they sure were not welcome.” Emile gave a dry chuckled before quickly thrusting the ship to starboard-dorsal to dodge another piece of metal.
“No kidding, I-”
“Got the scans, Alma.” The bird leaned back and pointed at the amber screens.
“Just read them, Keej.” Alma kept staring out the window at the derelict.
“It was a bit hard to get clean readings with the amount of DM and EM radiation from the wreck, along with the number of scanner reflections coming off the debris… looks like multiple high EM laser impacts from at least… at least three other ships, hard to tell, the energy signatures are hard to make out. Also plasma residue mixed in with some of the slag here. The weapon impact points confirm attack from multiple angles, and there is some metal that does not match the Austican ship’s hull, likely from the attackers. The ship survived the main battle, but she was mortally wounded. Most critical systems have been hit; several magazines have been destroyed, along with the dorsal and ventral IOBM turrets. They had a fire in their main reactor, the chamber is completely destroyed but the reactor assembly itself was ejected before it went critical. Critical damage to their oxygen processors, weapons power plants, shield generators, moderate damage to their engines. The HCL guns are completely blown away. All lifeboats jettisoned, ablative armor has been depleted, reserve reactors are dry and…. Hunh.”
“What is it?” Alma looked back at the bird.
“Well the ship is nearly destroyed, weapons fire from all sides to all systems… but… there is no damage to the cargo hold. That part of the superstructure is devoid of damage.”
“They were going out of their way to not hit it… what is in the cargo hold?” The heavyset gator lumbered back to the scanning station.
“Can’t get a reading, it’s hard-shielded.”
“Now you see, that is worth looking into!” Alma put her hands on her hips and looked back at Emile in the pilot seat.
“Wouldn’t that cargo bay be picked dry already? If there is even anything left, I mean this ship is barely here as is, it will probably fall apart around our ears.” Even as Emile spoke there was the hollow thud of a piece of metal hitting their deflector shield.
“I am pretty sure that this wreck would not be here if whoever shot it got what they wanted. And if it was cracked open we could probably be able to get a scan, even a partial one.”
“There’s nothing in there,” the pilot sighed.
“There is obviously something in there. Find a docking port, Emile. I don’t want to jump over through open space with this much debris.”
“You do realize that whatever is on that ship might have gotten it destroyed, right? And either the ship’s owners or attackers are going to be back soon.”
“I want to know what is in there. Shut up and get a docking port.”
Emile bit his lip in frustration as Alma hit the back of his chair. This wreck was just screaming death, trap, and get lost to him. The floating metal and scrap traced shadows over the cockpit, blocking out the star in the distance for brief moments before bouncing off another piece and floating off into the void. This whole place seemed wrong to him. It was claustrophobic, the dust clouds blocking out the stars, the radiation and the scrap stopping him from seeing any farther with his sensors than he could with his eyes. These were the artificial walls in space that unsettled him. Space should be wide open, asteroid fields were not bad; you can always see the stars from them, but not from these dust clouds.
The Honest Mistake moved up above the wreck, slowly lining up with the spin of the derelict so that it would not swat them aside. The Honest Mistake now spun with the derelict, the star and the planet moving slowly rising and falling over the artificial horizon of the cockpit’s view port as they matched the pinwheeling. Sporadic shadows slowly came towards the pirate ship along the hull as Emile continued to shine the search light across it. The dorsal-fore docking port had been destroyed, but there was another mid-ship which was unscathed, it would work with their docking port. Alma had already left the cockpit to get ready for the excursion, leaving Emile and Kijuuki alone in the dim red lights and the bright amber screens, one or two controls occasionally beeping and a light changing color on the control panels.
First entry in a very long story, I will be posting it in chunks with a picture to go with each part. Kudos to
barrel-o-tf for helping with editing.
Huge chunks of melted and charred metal slowly turned in place, one occasionally flashing up in a burst of fire as it fell into the atmosphere of the nearby barren world. The rest of the space around the planet seemed to match the dusty color; pale dark tan fog filled the void, blotting out all the stars save for the old gold beast that the planets silently glided around. The hulk of a battered ship lay in the middle of the junk ring that had formed in orbit of the planet, the only geometry remaining that was identifiable was the long and angular superstructure with what was left of two massive wings near the aft end of the hulk, the port side wing had been sheered away a third of the way down. The entire mess slowly pinwheeled in place as a comparatively tiny ship slowly approached, raking a search light over what was left of the hull.
“What a mess.” Emile eased the thruster stick back slightly and moved the flight stick to the left, gently moving their ship away from a hull panel that had broken loose. The faded olive drab color and the shape of the hull signified that it was once an Austican ship- military, either a Type-52 or 53 judging from the configuration- a battlecruiser. Not exactly an easy ship to take out of commission, but Emile figured from the sheer number and spacing of the holes melted into its hull that there had to be more than one attacker.
“Doesn’t look like much of this is worth salvaging; most of the critical systems on the ship have been shot to shit.” He felt his chair move slightly as his oversized captain laid her hand on his headrest and leaned in to look out the view port.
“It’s a military ship, there is probably some stuff onboard worth taking off, optronics, heatsinks… Kijuuki are you getting any beacons from this thing?”
“Nothing, it looks like their antennas took a direct hit. There are no lifeboats left onboard, and the radiation and decay suggest that this wreck is not too old. It is very likely that the lifeboats landed on the planet below, and have had trouble getting their distress beacons going.”
“Get a more detailed scan of the ship.”
“Working on it.” The Ibycai crane poked his head out from behind the electronics station where he was situated. He briefly cracked a smile at Alma before realizing that he should pay more attention to his instruments.
“I wonder what this thing is doing out here. We must be at least three hundred and fifty light-years from the Austican border.”
“Whatever the reason they sure were not welcome.” Emile gave a dry chuckled before quickly thrusting the ship to starboard-dorsal to dodge another piece of metal.
“No kidding, I-”
“Got the scans, Alma.” The bird leaned back and pointed at the amber screens.
“Just read them, Keej.” Alma kept staring out the window at the derelict.
“It was a bit hard to get clean readings with the amount of DM and EM radiation from the wreck, along with the number of scanner reflections coming off the debris… looks like multiple high EM laser impacts from at least… at least three other ships, hard to tell, the energy signatures are hard to make out. Also plasma residue mixed in with some of the slag here. The weapon impact points confirm attack from multiple angles, and there is some metal that does not match the Austican ship’s hull, likely from the attackers. The ship survived the main battle, but she was mortally wounded. Most critical systems have been hit; several magazines have been destroyed, along with the dorsal and ventral IOBM turrets. They had a fire in their main reactor, the chamber is completely destroyed but the reactor assembly itself was ejected before it went critical. Critical damage to their oxygen processors, weapons power plants, shield generators, moderate damage to their engines. The HCL guns are completely blown away. All lifeboats jettisoned, ablative armor has been depleted, reserve reactors are dry and…. Hunh.”
“What is it?” Alma looked back at the bird.
“Well the ship is nearly destroyed, weapons fire from all sides to all systems… but… there is no damage to the cargo hold. That part of the superstructure is devoid of damage.”
“They were going out of their way to not hit it… what is in the cargo hold?” The heavyset gator lumbered back to the scanning station.
“Can’t get a reading, it’s hard-shielded.”
“Now you see, that is worth looking into!” Alma put her hands on her hips and looked back at Emile in the pilot seat.
“Wouldn’t that cargo bay be picked dry already? If there is even anything left, I mean this ship is barely here as is, it will probably fall apart around our ears.” Even as Emile spoke there was the hollow thud of a piece of metal hitting their deflector shield.
“I am pretty sure that this wreck would not be here if whoever shot it got what they wanted. And if it was cracked open we could probably be able to get a scan, even a partial one.”
“There’s nothing in there,” the pilot sighed.
“There is obviously something in there. Find a docking port, Emile. I don’t want to jump over through open space with this much debris.”
“You do realize that whatever is on that ship might have gotten it destroyed, right? And either the ship’s owners or attackers are going to be back soon.”
“I want to know what is in there. Shut up and get a docking port.”
Emile bit his lip in frustration as Alma hit the back of his chair. This wreck was just screaming death, trap, and get lost to him. The floating metal and scrap traced shadows over the cockpit, blocking out the star in the distance for brief moments before bouncing off another piece and floating off into the void. This whole place seemed wrong to him. It was claustrophobic, the dust clouds blocking out the stars, the radiation and the scrap stopping him from seeing any farther with his sensors than he could with his eyes. These were the artificial walls in space that unsettled him. Space should be wide open, asteroid fields were not bad; you can always see the stars from them, but not from these dust clouds.
The Honest Mistake moved up above the wreck, slowly lining up with the spin of the derelict so that it would not swat them aside. The Honest Mistake now spun with the derelict, the star and the planet moving slowly rising and falling over the artificial horizon of the cockpit’s view port as they matched the pinwheeling. Sporadic shadows slowly came towards the pirate ship along the hull as Emile continued to shine the search light across it. The dorsal-fore docking port had been destroyed, but there was another mid-ship which was unscathed, it would work with their docking port. Alma had already left the cockpit to get ready for the excursion, leaving Emile and Kijuuki alone in the dim red lights and the bright amber screens, one or two controls occasionally beeping and a light changing color on the control panels.
First entry in a very long story, I will be posting it in chunks with a picture to go with each part. Kudos to
barrel-o-tf for helping with editing.
Category Artwork (Digital) / Fantasy
Species Unspecified / Any
Size 719 x 708px
File Size 72.3 kB
Listed in Folders
Oh gosh man, you just hit the ambiance nail on the head with this one. You really captured the feel of the mystery of space and their situation in general I think, and the whole thing just looks super slick. I particularly like how you did that wreckage in the background. Looking forward to the next part for sure! :3
Not in this universe no, that opens up an entirely new can of worms story wise... I don't want to deal with that here, so this is set in a different galaxy from where we are. I have some other scifi stories with humans involved, but they are not anything to do with Alma and her crew
Comments