Paxiosolange
Abrakadabra
- Pronouns
- He/Him
- Discord
- xtalkyle
"Well... My dear lord chamberlain, we have had a bit of an "oupsies!" up in the bridge."
Heraut Hyntagenet—the Duke and Vidame of the House of Hyntagenet, is hardly a beacon of leadership. His sadistic, hedonistic, and unapologetic pleasures have made him somewhat of a joke among his council, among his own subjects, and even among the great houses of the Imperium. After returning home shamelessly having failed to ascend to the office of Emperor, the Vidame awakes to find himself in a precarious situation: lost in space, and rapidly verging towards the galaxy's gravitational core. The Vidame realizes that an act of sabotage has been inflicted against his starship, and he must take upon himself the mantle of leadership if he is ever to survive the adversities to come.
Heraut Hyntagenet—the Duke and Vidame of the House of Hyntagenet, is hardly a beacon of leadership. His sadistic, hedonistic, and unapologetic pleasures have made him somewhat of a joke among his council, among his own subjects, and even among the great houses of the Imperium. After returning home shamelessly having failed to ascend to the office of Emperor, the Vidame awakes to find himself in a precarious situation: lost in space, and rapidly verging towards the galaxy's gravitational core. The Vidame realizes that an act of sabotage has been inflicted against his starship, and he must take upon himself the mantle of leadership if he is ever to survive the adversities to come.
LOST IN SPACE
There was a profound silence as the Vidame Herault Hyntagenet awoke, his face stuck to the freezing cold floor of his corvette-spaceship. The lights were off, the faint buzzing of the radiators had gone silent. Herault lifted his face to find a trickling of blood from his nose onto the floor. The peaceful off-pink lights of the corvette had gone out entirely and were replaced by the blinding, direct emergency lights which only partially lit up the corridors and rooms of the space ship.
"Well, well... Someone's been a bit kinky..."
Herault finally stood up to find that the air was freezing-cold as well, his breath left a trail of vapour with each slow release. He hurried to the washroom to clean his face and don a large mink housecoat. The water was unspeakably frigid. Herault recalled he had taken a nap, although when he had gone down he was not sure. He did know from the electrical fault that whatever had happened which threw him from his bed and rendered him incapacitated had occurred over an hour ago. Herault reported to the starship terminal in his chambers which glowed a faint, despondent green typical of computers supplied with emergency power.
"Ordinateur, what is happening s'il te plait?"
There was a brief flickering on the interface, followed by a static message which popped up and flashes repeatedly on the screen.
"Technical update for the BC-III-Corvette: Controlled trajectory changes at 14:12, 14:19, 14:25, and 14:30. Uncontrolled trajectory change at 14:32 , life support disconnected at 14:32. Thermal radiators disconnected at 14:32. Supplementary power active at 14:32."
Herault scoffed, evidently something had forced the ship off course.
"Ordinateur, what is our location?"
"Problem: Transponder Radio-location disconnected. Last reported location was at 14:12, 504 astronomical units from Le Coeur d'Ouridran."
Herault shot up from his seat before the terminal in shock.
"The galactic core! No, no, no, no, no! Someone has been extremely naughty!"
Herault recused himself from his chambers as he used a manual level to reveal the corridor outside. The hall was lit up by a series of emergency spotlights, and he moved quickly through the area towards the bridge. Passing through the mess hall of the starship, Herault noticed that the all windows within the corvette had been covered in breach shields, another terrible indicator that something had collided with the vessel. As he continued through the ship, Herault now needed to know what had happened, where everyone was, and why his corvette was anywhere near the galactic core. Upon opening the doors to the bridge, Herault was shocked to find the bridge unmanned, with bright-red status messages at their posts.
"Ordinateur, what is the nature of the power fault?"
"Problem: Mass short-circuiting from power bay. Would you like me to restore all circuit breakers?"
"I don't have much else to do here, Ordinateur."
There was a brief pause. The lights on all displays flickered for a moment.
"Problem: Power bay empty. Please reinstall fuel-material."
"Reinstall fuel-material? Can't you just do that?"
"Problem: Reinstallation equipment missing. Power bay has been eliminated."
"Eliminated? You mean it's been destroyed by whatever collided with the vessel?"
"Obscurity: Speculation"
"Well then... You are just a smart little computer aren't ya? Can you redirect emergency power to the grid?"
Another brief pause. This time, all the lights and sounds across the bridge went black. Following another moment of nothing, the bridge came back to life. The computer displays were finally restored to normal, the pinkish lights of the corvette returned, and the breach shields upon the bridge's windows finally began to retract back into the ship, revealing a horrifying sight. Herault's dissatisfied grin fell into an emotionless frown as his eyes studied the monster that was before the ship. Not only a couple dozen astronomical units way, Herault could see a lensing effect contorting a pinkish-yellow ring of material contorting and reflecting across a subsuming void.
"Alright, now you really need to tell me what's going on..." Herault whispered.
"Technical update for the BC-III-Corvette: 108 astronomical units from Le Coeur d'Ouridran. Communications disconnected. Power bay disconnected. Power bay eliminated."
"What happened at 14:12?" Herault asked.
"Blackbox indicates collision with unidentified object within black hole accretion disk yielding high energy output. Redirect recommendations went unheeded."
"Do you think this was deliberate?"
"Speculation connected. Sabotage weighed a conclusive factor. Unauthorized rendez-vous with unidentified starship recorded at 14:05."
"Did you record the starship's identity?"
"Affirmative."
"Well have we made a distress signal?"
"Problem: Communications disconnected."
Herault proceeded to grunt before kicking a rolling down the aisle of the bridge.
"Well what in heaven's name is the problem here? Turn them on!"
"Communications eliminated."
Herault laughed.
"Well what about the rest of the crew?"
"Crew command officers 1, 18, and 42 left the BC-III-Corvette at 14:31."
Herault shook his head and sighed. It was now clear to him exactly what had occurred. This was no accident, and the possibility of mutiny was not a theory to be discredited until security intelligence from the bridge was made available to him.
"Ordinateur, I want you to alert all crew to the mess hall immediately. Then, I want you to provide me a physical copy of the vessel's coordinates and video from the bridge between 14:00 and 15:00.
"Affirmative."
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