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Chapter 5 - Starship Down

Location: Everonth Mountain Excavation Site

He always wanted his own set of hand-cuffs as he got out of the black transit van, stepping down onto the dusty excavation site. The agents led him out of the van despite his hands being bound in the hand-cuffs.

Diamond was not quite sure why he had been brought here exactly. Last time he was hear, there was a murder that he had been connected to, the prime suspect? Maybe they were bringing him back here to show him the crime scene.

All he remembered was being asleep inside a small cell, wondering if he was ever going to be set free. It had been a week since Remmy's murder and he had ever part of his body swabbed for DNA or any sort of the proof that he had killed him. Fortunately they had found absolutely nothing.

However that had not stopped them from mistreating Diamond by keeping him locked up within a rather lavish cell with plenty of food.

But it was still a prison.

Then, last night, two agents, who Diamond had got to know well as the two that had first questioned him, entered his cell while he was sleeping, slapped hand-cuffs on him and bundled him into a transit van for a ride outside of Chentrilla.

Diamond asked repeatedly where they were going but to no avail as both of them sat silently, the inside of the van like a tomb while Diamond sat in the back mumbling to himself. He had heard that some employees of Phoenix Grace had been likely to "disappear" which concerned him that company might try to terminate his contract.

Literally.

He watched with interest as one of the agents pulled out a key and proceeded to unlock his hand-cuffs. What are they doing? Thought Diamond with his head racing to the possible outcome of this situation. He could not really go anywhere, this excavation site had even more security in the aftermath of Remmy's murder.

"We are sorry..." started one of agents, he was still wearing the same back sunglasses that hid his eyes away from Diamond's vision. The horse just stared at them both, wondering if he was going to be pushed off the cliff or shot. "...for the inconvenience of the last few days, we have found no evidence that your were involved in the murder..."

A sigh of relief washed over Diamond as surely as the tide lapping over the shore during a storm. He had half wanted to fall to his knees crying, proclaiming his gratitude to the agents however he felt that may be a little too pathetic. Even for him.

The agent continued to speak as Diamond felt the warm mountain air caress him with the sun helping to warm his spirit. It was mid-day and he was so grateful for still being alive. "However in exchange for leniency, the company have decided that you can do a job for us."

His ears immediately pricked up as he looked down his elongated snout at the agents standing before him. What did he mean by "exchange for leniency"? He had been cleared of the charges against him on the count of no evidence. Diamond guess that meant that he was not completely off the hook. "Right...?" he nodded showing that he understood. Refusing their offer would have been extremely unwise.

"We would like to begin decrypting the computer systems aboard this ship."

What! How can I do that when I have not even seen a schematic for this vessel!? Your asking me to decrypt a system that I know nothing about! These thoughts raced through Diamond's mind however he was exceptionally careful not to show it, denying their request could be dangerous and he would have much rather be left alive at the end of the day.

Diamond nodded once, giving a look as if somebody had insulted him as well as an intrigued smile. The agent did not smile, in fact he had not changed his face expression of calm and professionalism, once since Diamond had seen him. It was kind of eerie.

He felt a nervous itch under a wing on his back and covertly scratched it. "You have been under house arrest for a few days so I will brief you on what has happened." Diamond nodded in acknowledgement, bracing himself for a long explanation which somehow he felt that Agent Giles was not going to make it interesting using the monotonous sound of his voice.

"Yesterday, one of our science facilities came under attack..." explained the agent, who coincidentally was called Giles, the most bland and boring name in the dictionary. It seemed like his parents had predicted this line of work for him and had named him accordingly.

Diamond listen intently as Giles spoke, sitting back done on the base of the open transit van to hear more and how this affected him. "...all fifty science personnel were killed. They were studying the artefacts recovered from this thing..." he pointed back at the crashed wreckage behind him.

"...however one the artefact contained an unknown biological organism which seems to be responsible for the destruction of the base. Phoenix Grace want you to analyse the computers aboard this ship to see if we can find a way of stopping this... I'm not really sure what to call it... it was a species we have never seen before, it definitely classes as alien in origin."

Diamond looked perplexed at the thought of some alien weapon attacking a research facility. It all seemed like something out of a bad science-fiction movie that you would see at the cinema.

Giles immediately handed Diamond a wad of small, A5 papers that he produced from under she black blazer that looked oh so professional. Diamond sighed and looked over the papers, they appeared to be biological reports from the labs computer. Some of the data was missing however it did indicate that there was a confirmed biological signature inside one of the artefacts. The rest of the papers were just random reports and scattered information of claimed sightings from all over the planet.

"This thing..." continued Giles while the other agent had left the array, probably to do other duties leaving the two alone in the immediate area. "...has telekinetic powers. Base security..."

"Wait, wait, wait" whoa'ed Diamond in disarray, making the agent almost stop robotically and stare back down at Diamond. "Telekinetic powers... come on... that's a bit ridiculous isn't it? Arn't some of the guys at the lab playing a joke or sommthin?"

The agent pulled himself together, his facial expression was still the finest example of professionalism that Diamond had ever seen. "...as I was saying" he repeated. "the biological organism appeared in the form of a female, she had telekinetic powers and easily destroyed the based. Eyewitness accounts state that she left the base and proceeded to the mainland."

The expression on Diamond's face turned from jovial triviality to a look of horror. He really was not kidding. There really was a monster on the loose!

A scientist came out the tent nearest to them, he was a curious looking grey wolf who looked rather young to be working at this secure a facility. He nodded as Diamond, who was not paying attention sparked up a cigarette and then looked over to the scientist coming towards them.

This guy was short, so short in fact he even managed to make Diamond look tall. He was young, you could tell from his over enthusiasm and slightly stilted and unsure movements. He wore a white coat that obviously pointed to the fact that he was in the scientific profession but something about him was different, it was not the white streak of fur that was lapped over his grey muzzle like a scar, it was something in the way he moved.

He seemed way too jovial.

"Ah!" said Agent Giles showing more emotion then he had done all day. "Diamond Celestalis, allow me to introduce, your partner."

What! He's just a kid! Thought Diamond as he nodded politely to the scientist that was approaching him.

"Lance Herrenyson" smiled the wolf as he approached to shake Diamond's hand. There was a sense of annoyance almost instantly in Diamond. He could not work out if this was a joke or not? But judging by the look on Giles's face, he would guess the latter.

"Now that the formalities are dispensed with..." chanted Giles, looking rather uncomfortable himself with Lance's over-exuberant smiling. "Maybe you two would like to get to work inside the Valkyrie. You will start as what we have identified as some sort of command centre."

"Great!" cheered Lance. "I'm eager to get to work, arn't you Diamond... its exciting?"

Diamond just sucked on his cigarette and sighed, it was going to be a long day.

* * *

"Hmmmm... now where to start, where to start?" Lance tapped the console nearest to him in the darkened command centre. The room was large and circular but felt considerably smaller from all the decay that had taken place over the years that it had been laying smashed over the mountainside.

There was a leather chair in the middle of the room, obviously for the captain or commander and mostly broken and smashed consoles along the walls of the room. The only other console was at the front, facing what was now a gaping hole allowing beams of sunlight to illuminate the inside of the bridge, barely.

Outside, this part of the Valkyrie was at the front of ship and was handing over the vast cliff. From inside, all that Lance could see was forest and sky stretching far out until they met at the horizon. It was breathtaking.

Unfortunately both himself and Diamond had to navigate around the numerous decayed skeletons that had laid buried for hundreds of years. Diamond scoffed, there was something really morbid about this place, he set up his laptop computer over what he had presumed was the helm console. All the consoles had no buttons, so Diamond considered that it might have used touch screen technology.

Lance looked like a kid in a candy store as he explored this magnificent room. He had been excited all the way, crawling through the broken and twisted corridors into this room which looked relatively well preserved considering what the ship had been through.

"We should conduct a few scans before we start fiddling with stuff..." scoffed Diamond, for some reason Lance's constant happy attitude annoyed him. However he could not argue that this was not a magnificent find. He loaded his laptop and activated active scanning.

After a few seconds of silence between the two, the scanning cycle was complete. Most of the scan had come back undisclosed or unknown but from what Diamond could tell, there was limited damage to this particular console.

"Seems like this one might still work!" he said, calling Lance over to him who had been examining one of the remains that remained on the bridge. He looked over at Diamond with a worried, almost terrified expression that Diamond had not seen before.

"Eh... Diamond?" asked Lance with uncertainty. Diamond quickly rushed over to where Lance was standing, looking at a corpse lying of the floor. He approached the corpse, his eyes widened with the same fear that Lance had experienced.

"What the fuck...?" he exclaimed.

Both of them were looking down at the corpse of a wolf, they could both tell from the bone structure of the skull. But... how was that possible. As far as they knew, they were the only Terrans in existence and three hundred years ago, the Terrans had never even come close to this level of technology.

Diamond looked at the kneeling Lance and then back to the corpse. He wondered if Phoenix Grace had any idea what was going on here?

"Diamond... its... its... a wolf!" exclaimed Lance, uncertain.

"It certainly looks like it..." sighed Diamond. He was completely lost for words how a 300 year old corpse could possibly be on an alien ship and be Terran.

His computer let out an unexpected beep making both the slightly stirred Diamond and Lance both look up. Diamond walked back to his computer, looking at the words on the screen with a puzzled expression. Something strange was definitely going on here.

"Download complete"

"Huh? My computers downloaded something... but there's no connection here?"

Lance looked up from the other side of the bridge, he was equally confused by the strange behaviour. They were miles from anywhere with internet access.

Diamond's computer suddenly whirled and chirped at twice the speed it had ever heard before. "... my god..." exhaled Diamond as the entire operating system of his computer had been changed to some more advanced and faster Terran version which was still recognisable. Lance came back over towards Diamond and peered over his shoulder.

"Must be a higher copy of Phoenix-Window?" laughed Lance, unable to concentrate in such a strange situation and attempting to lighten the mood.

Diamond shrugged the bad joke off and let out a short lived grin while inwardly thinking that he could not put up with him any longer and do his job at the same time.

For the next twenty minutes, Diamond and Lance worked separately at different places on the bridge. Lance had the strange idea that he could attempt to repair one of the damaged consoles on the bridge but somehow Diamond did not really hold out much hope for that. However they continued talking to each other, Diamond at his laptop, trying feverishly to understand what had happened to his computer and Lance under one of the consoles to the side of the bridge.

"Well... most of the systems on the Valkyrie have been destroyed, or damaged beyond repair but this library computer system here is not and we could..."

One the consoles on the bridge suddenly shot to life as if somebody had stuck a defibrillator up to it. Lance was underneath it reconnecting the wiring and somehow he had managed to actually repair it.

"Wait... a second" interrupted Diamond. "You fixed that?"

"Well... yes" said Lance blushing slightly.

Diamond looked at him, he was barely twenty-one and he already had learnt how to manipulate computers that well!? He really was a clever kid.

"Well done..." he said smiling.

Lance immediately blushed a deep shade of red and tried to hide his shame. "Thank... you" he whispered quietly.

Diamond looked down into his eyes and felt something that he had never felt before, he felt like he was calm and nothing else mattered but he shook the feeling off with; "As you were saying?"

"Well a lot of the file headings are still intact within a backup drive of the computer. It looks like it uses some sort of voice recognition technology which I can activate..." he looked down at the console for a few seconds before looking up. "Aaaa....ha! Try it now" he said smiling.

Diamond looked back at Lance. "What am I supposed to say?" he asked him completely confused. Lance smiled, his jaw widening to show his perfect row of white teeth in his muzzle.

"Computer" he said looking over at Diamond excitedly, the was silence for a few seconds and then a mechanical chirp in acknowledgement. Lance immediately jumped in the air.

"Dammit I am so good!"

"Unable to process command.... Pl.pl.please re...re..re..re...restate" said a computerised female voice that seemed to be coming from all around the room. It was stuttering vastly which seemed to indicate a problem with its processor however there was nothing Lance could do about that, this place of over three hundred years old.

"Um....." said Diamond taking over from Lance and waiting. "Computer, do you have um... the general specifications for... this place?"

The computer beeped in acknowledgement. "Aaaaafirmativve" Diamond looked over at Lance and Lance knew instantly that Diamond wanted him to try and fix the stuttering computer and stabilise it so he set to work on bypassing the damaged speech processor which seemed to do the trick. After a few minutes he nodded at Diamond to try again.

"Computer" called Diamond slowly, the computer made the same beep of acknowledgement. "List the general specifications of this... um... Vessel?"

The computer took a few long beeps to gather the necessary information before talking one long monotonous voice without stuttering.

"Terran Starship UMSS Valkyrie, Nimbostratus Class, NX-10353..." the computer stopped for a minute still working as Diamond looked over at Lance confused, they were now sure that this thing was what was mentioned in the ancient records and that this thing was Terran made? But Terran had never come close to this level of technology, they had not even developed speech recognition software yet.

"Primary systems and specifications include;" the computer began listing after a few seconds of silence. "Octal-reflection Shield Grid, 22 automatically, self-recharging pulse energy weapons, 10 torpedo tubes for high-class "Phoenix" homing torpedoes, Pegasus Drive Multi-dimensional Propulsion System, 10 automatically flushing..."

"Alright, thank you computer, we get the idea" said Diamond and the computer made another acknowledged beep and sighing. "Well apparently Terran engineering includes making computers that babble too much."

Lance made a little chuckle and then looked at the computer. "It looks like a lot of power is going into the computer core since we activated it..." he looked up at Diamond confused.

"We have about 10 minutes of power left what are your orders."

"Well Agent Giles wanted all the answers that we could find for him and I say that we have learnt quite a lot from this..." Diamond felt ridiculous for saying it. "Starship. So I say, lets continue our investigation."

Diamond actually smiled at Lance, between the two of them they had actually accomplished something and maybe he had misjudged this kid. He looked down at Lance , watching his young face and realised something. He was cute!

Lance nodded and waited for Diamond to ask the next question. "Computer?" called Diamond again with a bit of embarrassment in his voice, he was speaking to something that was not there and did he not feel stupid for doing that. "Can you tell us the commanding officer of this vessel?" The computer chirped and Diamond looked over at Lance. "Seems like a good place to start and then we will find out as much as we can about that girl."

"Commander Kestra Valentine" chirped the computer. Diamond suddenly had a realisation, he had heard the word Kestra before but where... yes... on the random computer message in ancient Terra-Nova when he was studying it the night that Remmy was murdered. He had a strange feeling about this, as he brushed back his main.

Lance suddenly made him jump back from the world of thought and speculation with "Hey!

There's a picture on file and some sort of other file, it is separate from the main computer system, almost like it's on a pen drive."

Diamond kept his calmness but was getting more intrigued by the moment. "Lets see it."

Lance tapped the controls to access the separate file which because it had been isolated from the system, there was specifically no power drain or corruption on it.

The Pegasus and the wolf studied the revealed picture carefully that depicted a female species that neither had ever seen before dressed in a black military uniform, she had green hair and powerful green hair.

"She is quite attractive" said Lance looking at the photograph. "I wonder what race she is?"

"Echidna" said a female voice which made both of them jump and turn round in surprise because standing right in front of them was the same woman in the photo. Commander Kestra Valentine.

"Wh...wh...what!?" shouted Diamond as he looked over at Kestra, his face was full of surprise as he moved next to Lance who was also shocked.

"Okay.... Guess you aren't from the Alliance" said Kestra smiling slighty. "Well... this will take a little time to explain... first of all." Kestra looked at the two men, analysing them silently. "Hmm... my recognition subroutine reads you as Terran? Are you civilians?"

Diamond whispered over at Lance. "What shall we say?" he asked to Lance's ear. Lance turned his head round and shrugged at Lance while Kestra tapped her foot impatiently and appeared to flicker like a mirage or illusion.

"I'm waiting..." she said looking down at the floor. "God, how hard is it to answer that question?"

"Um.... Yes we are civilians" said Diamond taking charge and snapping back at Kestra quickly.

"Oh... I see... and you have never encountered an isomorphic projection before?" complained Kestra.

"Eh.... No?" said Diamond unsure of what to say next.

"Great...!? I was hoping the Alliance would find me, not two dim-witted would be bondage slaves."

"Excuse me?" said Diamond in annoyance. Kestra has grinned and looked down at Diamond and Lance's black uniform trousers which were very tight and left nothing to the imagination. "Hang on..." she questioned. "I have seen those uniforms before...Oh great!

Phoenix Grace... Intruder Alert... SECURITY!"

Diamond giggled slightly at Kestra, she obviously had no idea where she was or that the ship was in ruins but he was also slightly concerned as to how she knew about Phoenix Grace. "No...No...No, you do not understand..." Kestra continued to wail out, shouting about intruders. "WILL YOU PLEASE SHUT UP AND LET ME EXPLAIN!"

Kestra seemed shocked by Diamond's shouting and shut up but only to appease him, she was as stubborn as an old horse.

"We are from Phoenix Grace but the company is only a shipping company... why are you considering us a threat?" asked Diamond who glanced at Lance who was already burying his head into one of the panels of the ship attempting to learn more.

"You were responsible for the massacre on the Erika, siding with the Viro'Leese occupation of Terra and you have committed other crimes and atrocities over the years."

Diamond was shocked about what he was hearing but it seemed to confirm his fears about

Phoenix Grace, he pondered for a few seconds only to be interrupted by Kestra talking.

"The bridge looks like a right mess, did we win?" she asked making Lance poke his head back out of the console.

"Win what?" he asked, his eyes transfixed on Kestra.

"The war with Asgard..." said Kestra looking over at both of them in confusion. "No... we didn't, did we?"

"What is "Asgard?" asked Diamond while staring at Kestra while snapping out of his deep thought. "Does that have something to...?

"Right... boys... I will tell you to truth and all you need to know but there are some things I cannot tell you to prevent history repeating itself..." Both Diamond and Lance listened intently. "I am an isomorphic projection, a "hologram", I am not the real Kestra Valentine however if what has happened is what I think I has happen then I was unsuccessful. I would have reverted to my Valkyrie form during the battle which is a human girl and "she" must have succeeded. You have to find and kill me or your world is doomed and Ragnarok will begin again!"

Diamond had a million and one questions that he needed to ask the holographic Kestra. Why were you created? What is Ragnarok? What is a Valkyrie? But he decided to start smaller...

"What...?"

There was a large shake that shook the bridge hard and knocked everyone over. Diamond put his had on a railing to pull himself up and looked at Kestra who was just standing there motionless. "What was that?" he called out to her.

"Hang on a second" she exclaimed before closing her eyes. "Accessing external sensors... working."

There was another big shake which seemed to get closer as metal fell from the ceiling, Diamond grabbed Lance and pushed him out of the way of a falling beam. Lance got up from the floor feeling ruffled and smiled at Diamond, he had saved his life.

However somehow they were under attack!