dtnovels Chapter 599: Reasoning
Chapter 599: Reasoning
There were three possible reasons for their presence as far as he could tell.
The first was that they were planning an invasion prior to the rebellion. This was supported by the fact that they were tracking the movements of military leaders. As well as looking into the various secret military projects the local empire was up to. Although now it was a moot point.
With the information from the informants. It appears that the local governing body that encompassed this system and the nearby systems had already fallen. The NeoYakuza artificial intelligence really made a move. The upper echelons of the government that are required for it to function have been killed, so now the lower levels were scrambling for control. While a rebellion took over.
The second bit he found was that they were looking for a sustained power source. From the description they were looking for, they were seeking a sustainable energy source. Like a wind turbine or solar power plant that was sending energy to an unknown location. Seems like they were looking for this location. But there was no other information aside from that.
Then the third reason for their presence was the increase in a gravity anomaly surrounding Prima Terra. Apparently from long distance sensors it was getting worse. The gravity in the entire system was slowly and steadily increasing. With it, to maintain its shape the speed of the planets and other astral bodies were increasing as well.
An odd event but from the time table it was not something he had to worry about.
Shing!
Jace looked up from the computer as the door to the office opened. He was so absorbed in quickly finding the information that he failed to notice the people coming to the office. They stormed in and immediately started looking around while he froze at the desk. He was technically still invisible, so he was curious to see what would happen.
He moved his hands away from the keyboard as both robots and soldiers in green armor without helmets looked around the room. "There is nothing here!" The one who came into the room first announced it suddenly.
Then a moment later a person in a green uniform with a laser pistol drawn walked into the office. He looked at his other hand that had a small digital pad. "The sensors still show that someone extra is in here."
"Well clearly there isn’t!" The man from security announced as he walked around waving his hands in anger. The man who is in charge of the station growled in annoyance. But stopped when the man from security suddenly froze mid swing of his arm.
The man in charge of the station was confused. But Jace could understand the security man that cleared the room. Mostly because he had felt the man bump into him. Jace sighed as he slowly turned and looked at the man.
"Oza, what are you doing?" The man in charge of the station demanded while the other people from the security team started turning to Oza as well.
"Umm..." Oza slightly shifted before quickly reaching for his holster.
Jace grabbed him by the front of his collar and the hand he held on his pistol before he threw him over his shoulder to the side where the shelves of trophies were sitting. "Oza!" The base commander turned the chaos to the side. Completely missing the slight shimmer of light that was visible as Jace moved out of the room.
Once he was out of the room, Jace began navigating to the airlock he entered from.
—------------------
"What the hell was that?" Illion asked as he helped Oza stand up. "Did you throw yourself across the room?"
"No," Oza shook his head as he pointed at the desk. "I bumped into something that was invisible by the desk." One of the soldiers walked over and waved his arm through the area before looking back over at them and shaking his head. "Then I guess he bolted. Check the digital tracker."
Illion looked back down at the pad and saw it was black. "Umm... it is out of power."
"You forgot to keep it powered, chief?" Another of his subordinates asked jokingly.
"No, it was full charge." Chief Illion answered before looking around. "Spread out and find them. Alert everyone that there is someone invisible in the base. Start looking for a ship or something else hidden just beyond our asteroid mine field."
"Chief?" Oza asked as he looked around.
"They had to get onto the base via ship or an airlock. Unless they are a daemon. But I doubt that, they don’t do information collection. Only attacks and destruction." Chief Illion explained. "I am guessing they have a ship just beyond the asteroid mine field and floated through. It would be possible if their suit could go invisible."
"How much trouble are we in?" Oza asked as the other quickly filtered out of the room to follow Chief Illion’s orders.
"Hopefully not much." Illion answered as he walked around the table and accessed the computer. Quickly finding the record of what was accessed. A veritable mashup of information. "They browsed almost every file. But none of them were too important or specific. Seems more like whoever broke in was just covering a blanket of information."
"Looking at what we are looking at." Oza simplified. "Meaning that they did not know who we were ahead of time. I am guessing... someone from nearby. That mining colony on the other side of the belt?"
"Maybe, but probably not. More likely someone else in the belt." Illion declared. "They quickly wiped the record of the broadcast. Meaning they received the message from somewhere nearby and wanted to try and hide the location."
"So what?"
"So we were given a time table for tracking and using that information we know that the message came from somewhere within this radius around our listening station." He indicated to the screen and watched as Illion narrowed it down further. "We also know that there is nothing on this side, unless they are invisible. But let’s eliminate that. Now we just have to search this area for an unknown station. Which actually eliminates the colony."
"Couldn’t they have communicated from their ship?" Oza pointed out.
"Yes and no. If it was a large ship it is unlikely to be our problem anymore. There would be no point in protecting a smaller ship because it could just be moved quickly." Illion explained. "So for now we need to be on the side of caution and search the area I indicated."
"How?" Oza asked.
"With the limited resources we have available." Illion answered. "Now I have to send word back to the clans. See if they have any information on what is going on?"
"Good luck!" Oza grunted before moving out of the room.
Illion turned his attention back to the search parameters he had made. "What did you want?"
—-------------------------------
Jace flew back towards the facility as he called Cain back. "Cain, sorry about that." Jace apologized as he flew around an asteroid. "I was in the listening post. Their spy technology is better than we expected. They picked up on the signal almost immediately."
"Really?" Cain sounded surprised. He was really getting good at modulating his voice to show emotion. Actually he might just have a subprogram doing it for him automatically.
"Yes, in fact they were able to track me while I was moving invisible through the station. Their localized tracking sensors were top notch. I do not think they realize what kind of gold mine they are sitting on." Jace explained.
"Huh, remarkable. Anyways. As I was saying. I think I found the source of the emergency broadcast. But I also located a few nearby pirate holdouts we could attack for resources." Cain explained to him.
"How many ships do they have?" Jace asked as he received a new heading and adjusted. He might as well take out any fighting ships or defense systems before he headed to the emergency signal.
"No clue. Our long range sensors are not really a priority. I just took a momentary break when we got some info from West’s earlier efforts. Which is another thing we need to talk about." Cain started. "Are we sure about bringing West and Liz with us to our galaxy?"
Jace shrugged before explaining briefly. "It will be worth it in the end. Especially when questions about our behavior in a foreign galaxy are asked."
"Fair point. I guess you are foreseeing problems?" Cain asked.
"Very much so." Jace answered. "But not the problem you are thinking about. Tell the others that after I am done with these pirates and the thing broadcasting an emergency signal I will head to Mars to pick up rations."
"Good luck." Cain told him before disconnecting the communication.
Jace added the narrowed down location of the emergency signal origin. It was in a part of space in the middle of the belt that was opposite the colony.