August 2942
Drake Herald 'Soothsayer'
Horus System
Noviate Brian Chambers jumped into 'Soothsayer' and immediately began approach to the jump point to Indra. He had no desire to end up facing more hostile Xi'an, especially alone in such an ill equipped combat vessel, so he started a sensor sweep of the area. He preferred the cockpit of his Gladius 'Ample Spring' but knew sensors and communications were key to this mission.
"Debris field detected." the artificial voice reported from his sensor suite.
"Hmm. Better do one more, a little deeper this time." He quipped at the non-responsive computer system. Several seconds passed as he let the system do its thing. Meanwhile he patched a channel to the Celestial Unity.
"Preceptor, I've." The artificial voice cut him off. "Life sign detected."
"One second sir." He began pushing a series of buttons and plugged in some coordinates. "Preceptor, I've found wreckage from a battle. Appears to be Xi'an in nature and we have a survivor!" He paused.
"I've sent coordinates."
"Excellent work Noviate. Proceed with your orders, the Unity will proceed with Search and Rescue."
Several minutes later...
Matthius stood on the bridge of the Unity watching as the utility rescue craft navigated the debris field to the lone survivor. Minutes felt like hours. He perused the scanning reports from the Scry and the Unity. A lot of hardware lay in a shambled mess at this jump point. Most appeared to be Xi'an, and it looked like they had gotten ambushed.
"Sir, we have the Xi'an. He's in pretty bad shape. He's near death." Initiate Janice Askew reported.
"Ok, get him over to the Scry asap, I'll meet you there." Matthius jumped up from his chair and headed back towards the ships hangar. "Disciple, you have command." He walked out of the bridge.
"Gedion, we need to get back over to the Scry." He initiated a channel with the seer.
"Good thing I'm still in the hangar bay." Relen replied.
"Yeah, I feel a bit like a yo-yo." Matthius chuckled.
Onboard the Scry...
Initiate Askew, a trained paramedic, looked over the patient as the Seer and Preceptor entered the room. The Xi'an spoke no words, though it appeared he was trying to. His hand however kept repeating the same motion over and over.
"What's that?" Relen pointed at his hand.
"I don't know Seer. He's been doing it since we picked him up." Gedion stepped closer and watched the hand repeat over and over.
"Doctor, any chance he survives?" Matthius turned to Anistacia Hasan. The Arabic doctor served on board the Scry and Matthius knew she was his best chance for survival.
"H…" She started to speak, but thought better of it. Looked at the Preceptor and nodded what Matthius had feared. He could see it in her face, the alien would not make it. Her brown complexion couldn't hide the sorrow of losing a patient despite really having no shot at saving the man's life.
"Thanks Anistacia." Matthius attempted to comfort her.
"I've got it!" Gedion proclaimed.
"Let's go to the bridge Relen." Matthius urged, wanting to move the conversation out of the medbay.
"So the symbol appears to be that of a burning flame." Gedion couldn't wait till they reached the bridge.
Matthius stopped, Gedion followed suit.
"A flame…" He puzzled. "What the hel…" he let his thought go silent. "Why would a Xi'an fighter pilot be trying to tell us about a fire?" He looked dumbfounded.
"Preceptor, we have a priority one message incoming from the Indra system." The Initiate comms officer cut in.
"Feed it to the bridge, I'm on my way."
As the two entered the bridge, Gedion hurried over to a station to repeat the symbol he had seen and Matthius head over to the communications station.
"Preceptor, Noviate Chambers reporting in." The voice recording played. "Have made contact, reported attacks have been occuring all up and down the Xi'an, UEE border. Xi'an are closing their borders to humans because of it."