So we are recording now? Okay. You're not the only one writing a book on this, you realise? I've had a few people interview me. "The first to see the ship!" and of course, everything that followed. So where were we? Ah, yes - how it all started.
So the ship. We know now that it was the Jarquir. I didn't know that when I first saw it, looming out of the mist. It'd rolled in overnight - from the sea. Mist isn't unusual for that time of year. The dock was pretty cold, I remember that. I remember thinking about heading back for a thicker coat.
I knew it was a damn warship, I'll tell you that much. I'm not exactly an expert in warships, so I couldn't tell where or when it was from - only that it was really, really old and trying to dock in completely the wrong harbour. Blue Star Rising dock hasn't been a military harbour since the Orion Conflict. And back then, any harbour was requisitioned by Nineday House if it was needed.
I remember seeing the damn thing - its guns sticking out of its deck. A small plane resting on something that looked kind of like a crane. Of course I raised the alarm - and a good half hour later... well, you know the story. We all know it now. Military trucks rolled up within the hour, the entire damn dock was quarantined and I was asked to leave.
It was only a couple of days later I learned about the Jarquir. Now I looked it up as soon as the press released the name. It was a frigate apparently - one of Caracasus's main fleet. Back in the bad days - during the Orion Hegemony conflict - well, as you know Caracasus was losing and losing badly. The Jarquir wasn't a well made ship. It was part of a class that has long since been decommissioned or sold off to slightly dodgy allied nations. The odd thing here is that the Jarquir had been reported missing, presumed sunk by an Orion submarine, seventy years ago. Now how did a, let's face it here, glorified bathtub with guns stuck on it survive seventy years with barely a patch of rust? The ship I saw gleamed as if it had just left the dry dock.
Of course there are odder things. Nineday House's refusal to release any information on the vessel for one. That's not unusual in itself - any old ordinance or uncovered remains of the Orion Conflict is always locked down. What is unusual is they released no information and utterly refused to clarify if anyone was found on board the ship - nothing. There was fifty sailors on board. What the hell happened to them?
I'm not sure whether the other incidents - sorry, events they're calling them now - in other countries happened at the same time, or if the governments of the other countries just sat on them. We couldn't - you can't exactly hide a 70 year old battleship reappearing as fresh as the day it vanished. Anyway, I'm sure you have other people to interview, so I'll let you get on with it!