[snip]

On sensors a larger reality bubble brushed against the runabout’s shields, it lit up the shield barrier but did no real damage at the contact other then to bounce off. “..They want answers to the loss of form..” MiniFayth echoed.

Anxiety shot through him as he felt the jolt from the energy collision. In a tiny voice, he murmured, “Time to go?”

—Caelian Weir, Engineer—

Sharah breathed, closing her eyes, a hand on the wall, the grief in the shuttle overwhelming for a moment, and she wished for a moment she wasn’t there. But she was there and she was in charge of this little … whatever it was. “No, not yet.” she said to Weir. Sharah avoided physical contact as much as possible, but she laid a hand on Weir’s shoulder, “We don’t know enough, it wasn’t your fault you did your best, and that’s all we can do.” It was the truth, but she didn’t expect it to help much. But she knew Weir had done his best.

She turned back to MiniFayth. “You are like me,” she knelt down to get eye to eye, as much as she could, with her smaller self. “It’s called telepathy, where you can speak without words using just your mind. Do you think they would allow me to speak to them the way you are? I will try to answers their questions.”

Lt jg Fayth, CSO

There was a furrowing of her mini-brow as MiniFayth seemed to consider this and how to reply. While this was going on two more large reality bubbles bumped in to the runabout from either side sending it drifting a little before the autopilot corrected them to a stop. Again no shield damage was reported. “..Tell me, I will try to tell them in turn as best I can. This....” MiniFatyth seemed to ponder her own words, “..form I think? Is different then the form before.” she added.

GM CockRoach

Poor little one, V’alura thought. Brought into this world only to experience such loss. It broke her heart, but she cannot let that grief control her now. V’alura placed her feelings into a mental box, and slid that box into a side room of her mental landscape. Both inwardly, and outwardly, she projected a feeling of calm. The scanners were going crazy and this needed to be addressed. “The reality bubbles seem to be sharing a low electro-static connection that is acting like a magnet.” She reported, watching the ‘vibrations’ through her console screen.

After the first larger bubble knocked into them V’alura turned to study their shields. “Shields are holding.” Which was great, but there was so much they don’t know about these bubbles and they had proof of their unpredictability. When the two other bubbles knocked into them, and sent them drifting, V’alura did not like the delay before the autopilot stepped in. And with the shuttle powered down for the diagnostic. She turned back to the scanners, and thought this little game of bumper cars was far from over. For even though they can bring their shuttle to a halt, more and more bubbles were being pulled in. “More reality bubbles coming in. . . I could adjust our shields so that they generate a reverse electro-static polarity to the bubbles. Even a weak one could keep the larger ones from knocking us about so much.” Shields were one of the systems with full power still.

Ensign Belmont (Science)

Fayth steadied herself as the shuttle rocked slightly. “First can you ask them to stop bumping the shuttle? There is a protective shield around it to protect us to protect us and those outside the shuttle from hurting each other. I don’t wish them to get hurt against the shield.”

MiniFayth nodded after a moment, then was quiet for a further moment with her eyes shut with a relaxed loop to her tiny features. She then opened them and nodded to the bigger Fayth. “..I tried to tell them in ways I can communicate in this new form, but it is difficult. Languages like you use are not something that translates, nor do thoughts.” She explained evidently trying her best to act as the go between.

“We are scientists, that means that we dedicate our lives to learning. We encountered the others on our bigger ship. We wanted to know what they were like and so we brought you and another here to this shuttle so we could learn. But then we realized we might have hurt the other brining it here. We tried to return it to where it came from, but something in our machines went wrong. We are so very very sorry. It was an accident.”

Lt jg Fayth, CSO

”..An....accident, that is something not meant on purpose right? Where something beyond your control went out of control?” She asked in a way to clarify.

When there was a pause, Mazi spoke up. She had been reading her console over and over trying to see where the glitch had occurred. “Ma’am… according to the records, Cael had been on the right track to discharging the entity back into space, but there was a momentary drop off in power that disrupted the transition. That was all it took to hiccup the system and disrupt the abort sequence.”

She sighed and shook her heat at the mini Fayth. “I am sorry. We were trying to send your friend back out into space and our technology failed. There was a time when our technology failed and I lost a dear friend of mine as well. I am sorry for your loss, as well as the others are. And we have all lost someone in our past and know your pain.” She hoped the little one understood. Sometimes technology failed. And she also hoped the others wouldn’t think they had done it on purpose.

Mazi Eng

Turning to Mazi, miniFayth seemed to try to take in the words said, it was clear she was struggling. Though obviously now intelligent the rush of new experiences and the accident and emotions she now felt were obviously in conflict with her own thoughts. The rush of emotions and thoughts coming off MiniFayth was like a hurricane or damn readying to burst.

Trying very hard to tune out the repeated expressions of remorse, Caelian focused on the task at hand: locating the source of the problem. While a part of him appreciated—even needed—the encouragement and reassurance, it also drove the twinge of guilt deeper. It had been his engine design, his responsibility to anticipate possible errors, and his duty to check the runabout before they departed. While he knew full well that something could always go wrong, it had still come through him and because of him. Shaking his head, he glanced over his shoulder.

“Sir, with the situation we’re in—and until I can find the source of the spike—we should switch back to standard power systems.” It came out a little more firmly than he would have liked, but he pushed the regret aside. Softening his tone he continued. “I should be able to cycle out everything in turn to avoid our shields being down for more than, say, a few milliseconds. I’ll do my best to tighten that window so we’re not exposed, but with the guests knocking at our door for answers it may not be possible.”

After a heavy moment, he added. “The longer we’re out here working with an unproven system and in an environment we don’t fully understand, the more likely it is that something else will happen.”

—Caelian Weir, Engineer—

Then as if the universe was still trying to complicate matters, there was yet another beep beep on the console!

Turning Mazi could see they had picked up a guest, or visitor in this case. Another small ship had arrived about .15 light years away and was near a concentration of small Reality Bubbles and Boridium out side layers to the nebula they were nearby. An mutli-phase ion pulse began to be emitted by the small alien ship not much bigger than their own Fulcrum runabout in fact. MiniFayth shuttered and there was a wash of anger and panic coming off her now. “..They are trying to take the .....the little ones! Those aliens!” she explaimed.

GM CockRoach