Into the Horizon: A New Home Part 1
#13 of Into the Horizon
Into the Horizon: A New Home Part 1
The rest of the trip to the new base was relatively uneventful. Normal maintenance kept Scott and Ron busy on their perspective ships. Bane spent his time on the Bridge of the Siberia working on battle plans. They didn't know if Admiral Williams was being honest with them about his intentions. If he was then they were excited about the prospect of finally having a base to call home. It would provide them with some stability, and they could better organize themselves. If not then a Wolf armada would be waiting on them. Either way they had no intentions of getting caught off guard. They would be prepared for any possibility. Max took great notice of Bane's work, in fact all of the captain's did. Bane had really taken a leadership role in the alliance. None of the others said anything to him because he had skills second to none. With this said, Bane had not been ignoring his new responsibilities to Scott. They had made sure to take time to spend with each other as often as they could. Being as they were warping into a potential trap meant that it wasn't often, but a little time was better than no time. Max sat in the bridge of his ship, they would arrive at the coordinates very soon. He hated waiting, he had become less patient with age.
"Captain," reported an officer at the navigation station, "we'll be arriving at the coordinates momentarily."
"Good," began Max, "now we can see what we have walked into. What do the sensors say?"
"The scanners report that there are no other ships in the system besides ours."
"Sir," began Bane, "I say we go to yellow alert. Ships could be hiding behind the planet to avoid being detected."
"You heard him, yellow alert. Signal the Justice and Titan and let advise them to do the same."
As all three ships dropped out of warp, a large planet filled their viewscreens.
"OK, can anybody tell me where the hell we are. I thought we were supposed to be going to a base," said Max.
"I think we are looking at the base," reported Bane.
"Bane's right," began the officer at the sensor station, "scans of the surface of the planet show a very large underground building complex. There also appears to be very low levels of power being produced, but I can't tell what's generating it."
"Max I'll lead an away team down to investigate, but I'd like to take Scott with me in case we run into something technology related that needs to be fixed or removed."
"OK Bane, take Scott and go investigate, but I'd like it to just be the two of you. I'm still not convinced this isn't a trap and I don't want to have a lot of personnel down there. If we're attached we'll need everybody we have at their stations."
Bane didn't like a two man away team, but it was Max's decision and he wasn't about to argue in front of other personnel. They would be taking a shuttle pod down to the surface. They could use the teleporters, but they both would rather have the extra firepower of a shuttle should there be an army waiting on them. It wasn't out of the books that there were cloaked ships in orbit waiting to blast the three unsuspecting ships apart.
As the shuttle landed on the surface of the planet, Scott and Bane exited the craft and looked around. They had landed in a mountainous area of one of the larger landmasses. The area itself where they landed was a valley, but they were surrounded on all sides by large mountains. They were actually in a bowl. The problem was that although all sensors said that they were directly above the base, they couldn't actually find a way inside. After spending twenty minutes walking around the general area with their hand scanners, both sat down on the ground and leaned against the side of the shuttle.
"OK," started Bane, "how the hell do we open the door?"
"Well," replied Scott, "I'm detecting that small energy signature, but I'm also detecting another signal. It seems to be on a repeating pattern and I'm guessing that has something do with opening the door. The problem is that I don't know how."
Bane layed his head against the shuttle. He knew Scott would figure it out, and say no reason to stay awake in the mean time. Just as he started drifting off to sleep, he felt the ground beneath him begin to shake. As he jumped to his feet a large entryway rise from the ground in front of them. Bane turned to Scott to congratulate him on solving the riddle, only to find that he had a very confused look upon his face. As the entry way stopped rising, a strange animal walked out of the now exposed entryway. It walked over to the trio and simply watched them. It was unlike anything that either had ever seen. It reminded Scott of a species of animal on Earth called the Cheetah, but what one was doing this far away from Earth he had no clue. However, just as the two thought that things couldn't get any stranger, it suddenly did as the Feral Cheetah suddenly became less Feral.
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Who and what is this mysterious figure? Have they walked into a trap? What will the future hold for them? Only the next part will tell.