Low Stellar Orbit around Invictus
Enter D.E.W. Winstrate, Esquire. Mr. Winstrate, a certified Grandmaster Engineer with the Royal Astronautical Society, was one of three Grandmasters employed by the station. He was fundamentally responsible, eight hours out of the day, for everything that happened aboard it. He could be raised at any point in the intervening 16 hours, natually. At the moment, Mr. Winstate was involved in supervising the delicate work of Process Collection, engaged with slide-rule and hand-cranked Ordinator in the difficult work of scheduling all the orbit adjustments the vessel was going to need to collect the various foundry-bouys that, today, would have returned from stellar freefall to rough orbits with their precious payload.
The ship's superstructure groaned, causing Mr. Winstrate to look up from his work. Straining an ear, he sipped his tea one more time before turning his attention to a tape printout on the far side of the control room.
Somewhere, deep below, a star belched. The Man was practically bisected by the Coronal Mass Ejection. Naturally, work was to come to a standstill.
It was difficult to say how much time had passed. Gloria Hewitt-Potter awoke bruised, battered, and slightly bloodied in the corner of her work compartment, where, prior to whatever the hell had happened, she had been engaged in the repair of a Phlogistonic Transducer. The small tools were vital to the performance of basically every engineering duty on the ship, and so finely crafted that in many cases they were worth a small tug into and of themselves. Some, such as this one, were Ship's Property. Some, such as the one strapped into a holster on her thigh, were Masterworks. The Guild required all Phlogistonic Engineers to construct a transducer as part of the qualifications for Master status.
She let her hair down just long enough to regather it, and, by the dim light of the emergency gaslamps, checked over her injuries. The blow to her head was relatively minor, the cut little more than a small abrasion that couldn't help but bleed profusely, given its extreme proximity to her temple.
Bloody brilliant.
With no easy way to do anything about the wound, and given that it was pretty damn minor, she glanced to the wall clock, frozen in place as it was. Her watch had advanced a few hours further, before it too had stopped when the springs had wound down. She stood, buckling on her gunbelt, checking the charge on her raygun and what capacity was left in her emergency breather, should she wind up needing it. The air was pressurized, but stale. Stepping into the corridor, she could tell the phogiston was still at least flowing through the glassy enclosures around the strips of matrix that brought its energy throughout the ship.
It took her the better part of an hour to make her way to the radio hut, which she found abandoned - it was not typically manned, and surely there were more than a few injuries aboard ship which were more serious than hers. She sighed, sitting down and examining the controls of the board, speaking out loud on the off chance the ship's recorder was still working.
"Switching broadcast to broadwave scan mode. Transmit to automatic. Set recieve channel 3. Activate distress recording."
SECURITE SECURITE SECURITE POWER OF MAN CALLING ALL STOP DECLARING STATE OF EMERGENCY STOP AUTOMATED MESSAGE STOP WILL REPEAT IN TWO MINUTES ALL STOP
Gategun Invictus Construction Zone
Fifth Lagrangian of Invictus Quintus
40 AU from Invictus Proper
Such an undertaking could only be the ultimate focus of activity in a young colony like this one. It made for a busy environment in the Systemwide Spacelane Control Centre that was part of the station, most of which was still under construction. She was crewed by radiomen borrowed from the 111th Squadron, Away Fleet, in anticipation of the station's later comissioning as an actual vessel in the Royal Star Navy. Such radiomen were usually quite busy during this phase of operations, but there was always an exception made for the poor bastard who would get lumped with the duty of watching the inner system, which, prior to the opening of the Gategun, was almost always devoid save for a few stellar rigs and the odd cargo hauler.
We now join Able Astronaut Richard Pinkman Upton, already in progress. Mr. Upton's job, such as it was, consisted of taking down the messages from inner-system ships and, twice per watch, walking them over to the Table of Orbits and updating their parameters. On very rare occasions, he would also have to step out and deliver messages to other parts of the station, but for the most part, his work (and, by extension, he himself) was the lowest available priority.
Today, as the message from Power of Man scrolled out of one of his tickers, and the colour drained from our Able Astronaut's face, that was about to change. He tore the message off, translating it quickly into the King's with deft, angular penmanship, before bolting out of his chair and down the corridor to Squadron Command, where he handed off the message card in breathless silence before bolting back to his proper workspace, pushing a junior enlisted out of his way at the Table of Orbits, and consulting his wrist chronometer on his way back to his table.
SYSTEM CONTROL CALLING POWER OF MAN STOP MESSAGE RECEIVED STOP 111TH SQDRN RESPONDING STOP AUTOMATED TRANSMITTER DEACTIVATION CODE FOLLOWS ALL STOP
SECURITE SECURITE SECURITE SYSTEM CONTROL CALLING ALL VESSELS ALONG SYSTEM INGRESS/EGRESS LANES NINE THROUGH FIFTEEN STOP PRIORITY SAFETY MESSAGE STOP DEVIATE FROM STANDARD ROUTE ACCORDING TO PLAN SAMSON IMMEDIATELY ALL STOP
"Mr. Upton, this is Captain Landsdown. Report immediately to the Situation Handling Room."