[snip]

Scans of the inside and outside of the ship showed the planet’s recent exchange in near orbit was affecting the local area of space. With now being in a standard orbit pattern they were as it turned out near a thick patch of radioactive waste which had it seems become attached to the ship’s hull near the ship’s laundry room.

Comm traffic continued in fits and spurts, the public access radio traffic was a mess naturally and chaotic to fully make sense of, in short they were in some form just calls for help or mercy from one side or another. Interestingly some references to Earth based culture were also picked up here and there, a lot of it surrounding the area of land where Hollywood at once dwelled.

Military traffic was also chaotic, but more organized, filtered through a series of low orbit satellites which in turn were being attempted to target by both sides it seems to sow chaos in the ranks. The low level missile, laser, and plasma bolt fire in the orbital planes below them was a sight to see for sure, but long as they remained undetected they shouldn’t have any problems there at least.

GM CockRoach

El replied back after a few. [O] Bridge, this is Engineering. We seem to have some radioactive space debris or waste on our hull in that area. Science might be able to confirm, but polarizing the hull might repel it. I’m sending out a team to the laundry area to scan for radiation levels, secure affected areas and begin a decontamination procedure. [C]

El Eng

Isaac got the system ready to polarize the hull Plating. He was also rotating the shield frequency to try and keep themselves from being seen by the satellites and becoming a target themselves.

“Captain if we get any closer the satellites may be able to see us. I am rotating Shield frequencies to mask our approach and I am ready to Polarized the hull plating on your command”

“That should have happened a lot sooner than now,” Jonathan muttered to himself. Standing up from his seat, he moved over towards Locke and Ferguson at the science station.

“In between all of that, you think you have a moment to help pinpoint either when this civilization showed up here, or how in the world they learned English?”

Cmdr. McKnight - XO

Ari nodded as Jonathan voiced her question first. “Back us up to safe distance and polarize hull to see if we can kick that debris. Get us out of ‘magnetic’ range. Don’t need to be grabbing every bit of space trash they send up this way.”

Ari glanced at Jonathan then at the CSO. Her voice strained with trying to remain calm. “Check the records for prewarp Earth. There should be readings from the last wars. See how they compare. Whatever we can get. From radio shows and transmission records to air and population records.” She looked back at McKnight with a worried look on her face. “I don’t like where my head is going with this. Please tell me I’m wrong and it’s not possible.” For the first time in a long time, Ari wished she had a security or even a cooking background. The trouble with a science mind… it wandered into places it shouldn’t.

Ari CO

The lift doors opened and the Intel Officer stepped onto the bridge. Baumann stepped off to the side and, as he did so often, simply observed the exchange between sections and listened.

Baumann, Intel

Polarizing the hull did indeed ‘knock off’ the radioactive junk near the ship’s laundry room.....mostly. The residual effects in the ship’s hull and metal would need to be decontaminated at some point soon but for now the immediate emergency was hopefully handled.

It seems fate was not going to be kind to the Bonaventure though as no sooner had they activated the ship’s hull polarization system then in a slightly lower orbit two weapon based satellites that had been moving into a different orbital plane to go after another two probably enemy satellites it seems picked up this change in their limited detection range and opened fire. The left one was armed with simple pulse laser weapons which did little to the ship now protected other then case a shutter from the spray of impact. But the right one was of a higher quality firing slow firing but more damaging plasma based pulses. On their own they weren’t too dangerous but they were of sufficient energy output that if they decided to not move or return fire to either one the ship would eventually take damage. Tactically speaking now that they were under fire the plasma based satellite output was equal to Earth based cargo vessels about 5-10 years ago in armament. Again on their own they weren’t a problem but in groups it would be an issue if such developed. That said the three consecutive impacts shuttered the ship again dropping the polazation system along the lower hull to 95% effectiveness.

Also picked were primitive radio broadcasts also from both attacking satellites, by comms, thankfully it was in the strange alien language and English mix. =/\= Mil-Sat 323 reporting, unknown energy signature, assuming enemy force contact, engaging =/\= It stated. This was echoed by the plasma based second one =/\= Mil-Sat 426 reporting, unknown energy signature confirmed, joining in attack formation, elevating to higher orbital plane =/\= It stated. From the sound of things they were remotely controlled from operators on the planet. Not too different then remote piloted drones on Earth.

GM CockRoach

“Damn it!” Ari growled and moved back to her chair after a short side step for catching her balance. “Damage report! Back us up out of range, Helm. I don’t want to have to pick those things off if we don’t have to. And Science, see if you can figure out that other language. Maybe it will give us a clue who else could be involved in this.” She bit her lip, and shook her head. The last thing she wanted was to have to fire on the satellites. But if too many of them got together, and it was them or her ship, they were going to lose some of their hardware.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Baumann. Turning her head slightly, she nodded with a half smile. Part of her was glad he was here. But another part, that wanted him safe, wished he wasn’t. Thankfully, the former voice in her head won out and his presence made her feel a bit more centered.

Ari CO

Isaac looked up from his Station “sir I think I have an idea how to disarm the satellites without destroying them. On earth they used something called a taser it was a very early type energy weapon were the gun fired out two prongs that will hit someone with a copper wire Attached to the prongs then an Electric current was ran through the wire two shock the person to immobilized them. If we use the Grappler to fire at the satellites and run a current through the cables it will temporarily over load there systems”

He said not knowing if they will be using the plan but a plan was better than no plan.

Lt. Isaac Black (AC)

Damage reports coming in from about the ship were basically nill at this point. At worst from the recent round of impacts they would have some minor hull scuffing, nothing major. Once the person at helm would decide to follow through with maneuvering them to a higher orbit, the satellites below opened fire again. Again the laser pulse impacts did little to no damage from the four out of five bursts that hit them since they weren’t yet doing evasive maneuvers. Conversely though another three round burst of plasma fire also hit, which gave the bridge crew another round of jostling and the hull system going from 95% to 92% this time in overall effectiveness along their lower quarters of the ship’s hull.

Over by comms another burst of radio transmissions got picked up to and from the two attacking satellites. =/\= Mil-Sat 323 reporting, reporting no damage to unknown intruder. Attempts to assess target reveal no visual sightings, assuming some form of stealth deflection by advanced MAC-ARM forces. Attempting relay to ground control to Eng-Com control for further orders, error uplink failed, attempting secondary relay uplink.... =/\= the laser based one said.

Conversely the plasma based one also was transmitting =/\= Mil-Sat 426 reporting, secondary attack patterns confirmed, reporting minimal damage to unknown target. Target lock is down to 25% certainty, fuel reserves for maneuvering limited for a higher orbit. Attempting uplink to primary Eng-Sci-Com control for further instructions, primary uplink failure, attempting secondary relays, error, secondary relays burned, attempting tertiary uplink......uplink confirmed downloading. =/\= It said, the comm link they had linked into showed the plasma satellite was downloading crude energy emission recordings of the Bonaventure, no visual images were forthcoming as by chance or luck the satellites sensing systems were probably damaged or too limited to fully pick the ship up on visual scans.

Meanwhile as this was going on, the Bonaventure’s higher orbit was achieved and despite another round of laser and plasma fire, it seems both satellites had lost contact with the ship, this was confirmed by further comm traffic. =/\= Mil-Sat 323 reporting contact loss with unknown target. Secondary scans report failure of contact, resuming original patrol as per Eng-Com orders 3-122 pattern beta. =/\= It stated, firing maneuvering jets to resume an attack course on the lower orbital plane for another likely enemy satellite.

Conversely the plasma satellite also transmitted =/\= Mil-Sat 426 reporting equal loss of contact with unknown target. Eng-Sci-Com control orders confirmed to resume attack pattern 3-122 pattern alpha with Mil-Sat 323 =/\= It said before too firing maneuvering jets and following Mil-Sat 323 towards enemy satellites.

It seems for now they had avoided being fully detected, though someone likely had gotten a partial energy emission readout from the Mil-Sat 426 download to whatever the tertiary Eng-Sci-Com control HQ was. Following it to the source on a rough pattern placed the download site somewhere in the northernmost continent out of the three major land masses on this mystery planet. It was sited about 20 miles outside the blasted remains of a large coastal city site, which was now mostly burning from low level nuclear strikes to the city and ballistic missile strikes to likely former military bases along the coast.

GM CockRoach

Lt. Sanks sitting at the comms desk relayed all the information of the reports of ship damage to the captain. and opened the channels to receive the transmissions from the satellites.

Lt. Sanks, Linguist

Baumann’s heavy German accented voice could be heard over the chatter of the bridge. “Captain, just some advice. Whomever we are dealing with attacks on site with no cause other than they do not know who or what we are. That says a great deal about their priorities. I recommend caution going forward. The desire to survive can make groups… well, let us just say unpredictable.”

Baumann, Intel

Ari nodded. “I agree. Let’s just hope the attack on us was from scared automatic impulse at the unknown and not someone who recognizes us and doesn’t want us here.” The former, she could live with. The latter… well that presented a whole new set of issues.

Ari CO

GM CockRoach