The lights of jump space flashed by, no rhyme or pattern guiding them. Unknown and unknowable to any of the people in the Vaskigan Alliance, the lights were unknowable because no sensor equipment was able to enter and transmit back to the ship. Anything breaking off the ships that had entered jump space simply disappeared when leaving contact with the ship. No sign was ever to be discovered of the object that floated out of contact. I wish those damned lights could have helped us, Admiral Michael Kensington thought to himself. It was useless to try to distract himself from the events that had transpired to get him here.
It started with a distress call, as cliched as it was. His fleet had been dispatched to the Flintlock system in reply to calls for assistance, calls which had seemed urgent and real. In reality, well they were real, but they had neglected to mention the fact that an entire Cooperative fleet had been lying in wait at the jump point when the Alliance fleet had entered. Mines were covering the exit point and fully a third of the escort ships had plowed unwittingly into it, destroying them. Only quick thinking had allowed the capital ships to maneuver out of the way and into the hungry arms of the enemy. Attack pass after attack pass had crossed over the Alliance fleet, shattering it to pieces in about an hour of sustained fighting. The fleet had cracked under pressure and disintegrated, no longer holding station and Kensington lost complete operational control over his fleet. Ships panicked and vectored in all directions, desperately trying to make for any jump point. Two destroyers had managed to stick with Kensington's flagship, the battlecruiser Indefatigable, and all three had roared to the nearest jump point. Previously uncharted by any Vaskigan Pathfinder, this jump point was altogether unknown to anyone in the Alliance and the destination was unknown. However, anywhere else, was better than here, so the three ships had jumped out, leaving behind an obliterated fleet.
Should he have stayed and gone down with his fleet, Kensington had kept asking himself that for the last week they had been in jump space. Every time he thought this, he had balled a fist up and smashed it into a bulkhead. He wasn't going to forgive himself for this at all. He had lost his entire fleet as far as he was aware. "Admiral, 1 minute to exit," the navigational watchstander notified Kensington. Giving his acknowledgement, the Admiral sat back and let the Captain of the Indefatigable issue orders to his crew. The man was slightly shorter than Kensington but that still made him tall by any standard. He was barrel chested and sported a huge moustache that the clean shaven Admiral envied. Looking back at the display, Kensington braced for the exit. It didn't come long. The exit was smooth, smoother than the exit into Flintlock. and for once in real space, there was no shooting and everyone could sigh in relief. He waited for the status screen to update. The system, about 8 light hours across, meaning anything they saw was 8 hours old and whoever was here would not see them for 8 hours.
Three rocky planets rotated lazily around an orange giant, and two gas giants orbited further out. The second planet looked like it could support life fairly comfortably, albeit a bit chilly, and the other first and third were both too hot and too cold respectively. Several ships orbited the world and held station there, while cargo haulers and mining ships transited between the asteroid field separating the gas giants and rocky planets, and a station near the third planet. "I want a status update on our damage and casualties immediately," Kensington ordered. Time for communication would be later. For now, repairs took precedent.
