I couldn't sleep because of the insomnia of DOOM! So you get a short interlude
But this is the last of this story for now, do you hear me? The last! I have spoken!
GS year 2403.5
Relay 314 System
Onboard STG Stealth Cruiser Darkwatch
"Entering 314 system, slowing to sublight," the helm officer reported crisply. Captain Rinaf Varalan of the Special Tasks Group cruiser
Darkwatch didn't reply, as he saw no need to waste time talking when his people were more than competent at their jobs. Around the bridge, several people were monitoring the dozens of sensor systems the cruiser could deploy, ranging from optical imaging equipment through passive terahertz detectors to scanners in the hard gamma range, with every conceivable variation utilized to the maximum. The STG prided itself on having the best sensors in the galaxy and spent a truly atrocious amount of money keeping their equipment at or beyond the bleeding edge of what was possible.
Moments later the ship dropped out of superluminal travel, the bizarre forward view that had been showing heavily blue-shifted stars even with the computers compensating reverting abruptly to a normal star field. They were a few light hours out from the primary, having used the normal procedure of entering a system on the other side from the Mass Relay and any likely observers. From here they would passively scan the area to ensure there was no one watching, before taking a number of short FTL jumps to various locations around the star while gathering survey data. After that they'd inspect the Relay itself for any signs of activity, not that it was likely due to the extremely heavy punishment meted out to anyone who activated a dormant unit.
Relay 314 had been known about for over a thousand years, but it was at the far end of a chain of Relays that led from the civilized parts of the galaxy directly towards a very large and very isolated region of space that only had two known routes into it, both dormant. At least, that was the publicly available information. The STG knew it actually had a third Relay that linked to somewhere inside that area, but they'd kept it quiet for over two hundred years. It was also dormant, of course, but it was always wise to be careful with who you told about certain things.
The unknown zone was huge, and there was no currently accepted theory as to why such an enormous area of the galaxy would only have two, or indeed three, links into or through it. It took a number of Relay trips to go around it to the other side, and the STG had mapped as much of it as possible from many locations throughout the accessible galactic Relay network, although they were well aware that this process would undoubtedly produce data with vast gaps in it. Unfortunately, being several thousand light years across, it would take years and insane amounts of effort and resources to penetrate beyond the last active Relay, while actually making it to the other side with conventional FTL was completely ridiculous to contemplate. Not even the Turians would spent that much time and money to poke around on the off chance they'd find something worth the trouble.
The end result was that there could be almost anything lurking inside that vast expanse and no one had the faintest idea what it might be, or if it even existed. Possibly it there was nothing other than a couple of hundred million barren star systems. Conversely, it might conceal something even worse than the Rachni, and even now people still had nightmares about
that horrific result of poking into something best left alone a thousand years ago.
There was a very good reason opening dormant Relays was completely forbidden without knowing where they went. And as 314 was a long distance one, there was no practical method to acquire that information absent activating it in the first place. A classic no-win scenario.
Because of the sheer size of the zone and the unknown nature of what might lie within, every major government kept a cautious eye on both (or all three) Relays leading into it. They were all aware that those Relays also led
out of it, and there was always that little worry that one day someone or some thing would open one of them from the other side…
The STG regularly patrolled the dormant relays as a result, as did the Turian navy on a somewhat different schedule they thought no one else knew about. The Asari also checked up on them although somewhat more randomly. Even some of the other species such as the Drell were known to occasionally have a quick look, if only to settle their worries.
And now they were back for the latest status check. No one expected to find anything amiss. This system was sufficiently far from anywhere interesting that even the Terminus pirates wouldn't normally bother to come here, as there was nothing and no one for them to attack. The system itself had no habitable worlds, there was no eezo present, and while there were a couple of impressive gas giants and several rocky planets, those could be found anywhere and they had nothing to make them stand out. It was only the presence of Relay 314 that caused anyone to ever come here in the first place.
"No sign of any other ships on passive instruments, no eezo emissions within range," the sensor officer said. "Deploying active scan probe array for first sweep." He tapped a couple of controls and the displays that showed the status of one of the sensory systems changed. "Probes away, ten minutes to correct position."
Events proceeded normally, as they expected. The array of nearly a hundred small independent probes spread out in a spherical pattern around the cruiser to a distance of a couple of light seconds, then began collecting data. The main computer received this and correlated it with other information from shipboard sensors. Two hours later they finished and recalled the array, which docked into the relevant locations on the hull. During this time, the crew busied themselves with various tasks, as there wasn't much else for most of them to do. Life on the
Darkwatch tended towards long periods of boredom occasionally livened up by some discovery or emergency. No one on board was the type to chafe for excitement, or they'd have transferred to a different assignment long ago.
Once the array was recovered, Captain Varalan looked up from the report he was reading and said, "Next location, repeat scan."
"Aye, Captain," the helm officer said without looking around as he manipulated the controls. The ship briefly shuddered very slightly as the fusion torch lit, making Varalan frown a little.
"Log a maintenance request. That was unacceptable."
One of the engineering teams tapped on a holographic keyboard for a second or two. "Logged. Readings show misalignment of inertial compensator."
"Noted. Proceed with course."
They again accelerated hard, the drive working at close to maximum, went FTL for a few seconds, and decelerated again at the next survey location. Once more the probes were launched after a passive scan cleared the area.
This process repeated another sixteen times as they made their way around the system, spiraling slowly inwards and mapping everything. There were no meaningful differences from the last survey, not that this was surprising. There never was.
On the next course change, though, that somewhat suddenly changed.
"Captain!"
"What?"
"The Relay..."
Varalan snapped his attention around to the officer who was speaking, the man currently staring at his console. "Active?" It was a worst case scenario, one they all dreaded running into, as unlikely as that was.
"No." The crewmember looked around with a very strange expression on his face. "It's missing."
Everyone on the bridge stopped what they were doing and stared at him. He looked back, seeming bewildered. Captain Varalan got up and walked over to look over his subordinate's shoulder. "Show me," he commanded.
Prodding a control, the officer brought up a series of displays. Varalan studied them carefully. The coordinates were definitely correct, that telescope should have been pointing directly at the Relay, which even at this distance should show up clearly. "Instrumentation error perhaps?"
"No, captain, self check passes. Instruments fully functional."
"The Relay can't simply vanish."
"Yet there is no trace of it."
"Debris?"
"No."
Staring at the console for another thirty seconds, Varalan came to the obvious decision. "Abort survey, set course to location of Relay 314, bring weapons online. Full active scan for other vessels. Ready emergency message probe for launch, upload complete records of mission."
Several people acknowledge the orders and moments later the ship was moving at many times the speed of light towards where the Relay should be and apparently wasn't.
A few hours later, they were faced with the indisputable fact that it really
wasn't there. They couldn't find a single molecule of evidence that it had ever
been there. Varalan even went to the extreme of ordering a complete shipwide recalibration of all instruments, which took an enormous amount of very careful effort, followed by a total navigation diagnostic to be absolutely
certain they were in the right system. Of course, they were, that was such a basic mistake to make no one would actually do it, but he wanted to eliminate all variables.
"Thoughts?" he asked his science team when they were finally gathered in the main data lab, studying several holographic displays of the star system, one of which had the predicted path of the missing Relay's orbit around the primary shown. "Where is it, and how was it moved? Or was it destroyed?"
"Not destroyed, no," one of the scientific staff replied immediately. "Energy release from Relay destruction would disrupt entire system. No signs of damage, no traces of debris, therefore Relay was not destroyed. It was moved by unknown method."
"To where?" someone else asked.
"Also unknown. Out of system, but how far and which direction..." The man shook his head. "No way to tell. No way to be sure when either other than after last survey."
"What options do we have?" Varalan asked after a few seconds.
"Run search pattern outwards. Depending on time since it was moved, may be able to look back with telescope from outside system, but no more than two light months due to limitations of physics and hardware. If not found quickly, it won't be found at all. We're only one ship."
He thought for a little while, then nodded. It was worth a try. They needed to have some information to take home, even if it was only a list of everything they'd tried that hadn't worked. It would at least give the STG something to build on.
How could they misplace an entire Mass Relay? That was the part he was really having trouble with. The things were absolutely enormous, far outmassing any ship, even a dreadnought. Moving one with conventional methods would be madly difficult and most likely end in disaster, as it was known that the machines didn't like being moved. Only one previous case was on record of someone attempting to do that, to make it more convenient to use, and the end result had been horrific even if no one was sure exactly what had gone wrong. There hadn't been any survivors to ask.
But here, the thing had simply and silently evaporated by all the evidence. It was like it had never existed even though their records clearly showed it
did, and for that matter he'd been here himself a decade earlier and seen it with his own eyes. None of them had any explanation and that fact didn't make them happy at all.
The captain had a momentary recollection of his earlier musing on what might be lurking somewhere inside the great expanse of unknown space and shivered despite himself.
"We'll search to half a light year. If not found in that time, we report back and let STG deal with more extensive search," he finally said. Everyone acknowledged the order, then moved to execute it, while he went back to the bridge and sat down, looking at the main screen which showed the distant primary of the 314 system as a very bright star, and not a lot else. While his crew worked around him he wondered where the Relay had gone and who took it. And for that matter why.
A week later they left the system, not having found the slightest trace of the thing. They'd been able to use speed of light delays to show the Relay had been missing for at least six weeks, but that was it. There were no signs at all of any perturbations to the orbits of any of the planet, no exotic radiation, absolutely nothing that gave off even a hint of a clue. It was just... gone. Not one of them liked the implications and there had been a lot of arguments about what the cause of the disappearance of the Relay could have been.
And several people, among them Captain Varalan, were glad to see the back of that particular star system. They'd spent the entire time feeling like someone was watching them even though there were no traces of any other ship out there anywhere.
It was eerie, disturbing, and in conjunction with the lack of something that couldn't possibly not be there, made all of them sleep badly for quite a while after the mission finished.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
GS year 2403.9
Quarian Migrant Fleet Exploration Ship Tralket
Captain's Office
Rael'Zorah looked up from his desk and the report he was reading as someone knocked on the door, before opening it. His aide Lih'Sal entered the room, glanced around, then carefully closed the door. "Captain, I've got something you need to see," he said quietly but urgently. Intrigued, Rael'Zorah motioned him to come over. The man handed him a data unit, which he took and looked at curiously.
"And this is?"
"Data from a contact I have on Sur'Kesh. An old friend. He knows someone who knows someone…"
"Ah. One of those." Rael'Zorah nodded a little.
"The STG found something a few months ago. Something that may be important."
The captain looked sharply at him, before pulling out his omnitool and connecting the data unit to it, then entering his personal encryption key. Once he'd satisfied the device that he was who he claimed he was, it finally unlocked a file. He read the contents while feeling his heart jump erratically.
When he finished going over it twice, he looked up at Lih'Sal, who was looking back with an air of concern and possibly apprehension. "You said that if Relay 314 vanished too, that was the time to worry..." his aide commented in a low voice.
"I did, didn't I," Rael'Zorah sighed. He looked at the display again, shivered a little, and turned it off. "Thank you. I'll make sure this gets to the right people."
The other man nodded, then left, radiating a sense of unease. Rael'Zorah knew exactly why. He got up and walked over to the porthole, standing in front of it and looking out at the thousands of glittering lights forming the Migrant Fleet, the largest collection of ships in the known galaxy. After a while he looked beyond the remnants of his species towards a section of space with, now, no way in or out.
"Who are you, and what are you doing?" he whispered, putting a gloved hand on the window.
It was a question he had no answer to, and would puzzle over for a long time.
