Mantrin Imperial Guard - 003 The Infinite Depths of Space

Chapter 5: Far Beyond

The Drej. The mysterious energy beings whose origins were rumored to lie beyond the boundaries of the universe itself. Simply calling them by name sparked fear in many. With the Drej there was no diplomacy. Their intentions should always be regarded as hostile. Systems had suffered under the destructive power of their fleets. Even worse, entire worlds had been split apart by their motherships.

The theory was that the Drej acted to preserve the balance of power in the galaxy. Preventing entities from becoming too powerful on their own. Powerful enough to resist them. But if the Drej were indeed the all-powerful beings they appeared to be, capable of transcending the boundaries between this reality and countless others, why did they choose to return time and time again to this universe and this galaxy? It was but one of the many questions regarding the Drej that had been left unanswered.

"If that's a Drej ship, they've hired new designers," Houn commented, flattening an ear.

His long tail, sticking out from under the backrest of his seat, had been making excited sweeps the entire time. It had now retreated below it. As he watched that happen, Raeth realized he had been squeezing the armrests of his own seat. Too many things were happening too fast. The number of ships that had exited the portal had multiplied.

"Well Baika?"

The Orkeht girl squinted as her eyes glided over the readings on the different panels of her console. Muttering under her breath she shook her head with some hesitation.

"That blue aura looks suspiciously similar, but the energy signature is entirely different. Like nothing we've ever seen before from the Drej. Drej ships also use much more angular shapes instead of these smooth rounded curves. I'm counting eighteen ships in total, of three different types."

With the primary and secondary viewers focused on the unknown fleet, Raeth had no trouble distinguishing them from each other. Two ships stood out by being much larger than the others, about as big as the 800 steps long Laeisia class. The other sixteen were either slightly smaller or marginally bigger than the Myr'shala. After exiting the portal, the ships had assumed formation and held position.

The portal itself was still active, the blue glow in the center still present, but the lens-like aperture had been reduced to a fraction of the size it was after stabilization, not large enough for any vessel to move through aside from shuttle-sized craft.

"Docking hatch is sealed," Le'tan said. "Standing by for separation."

"Do it," Raeth ordered. "And back us off."

Raeth felt the mild tremble under his feet as the docking clamps retracted. Le'tan began to maneuver away from the station on thrusters as Houn plotted a course to fly the Myr'shala through the busy traffic to a safer distance.

"Detecting another power buildup coming from those ships. They are--"

Baika's sentence was cut off as a powerful scanning beam hit the ship. Emanating from all of the unknown vessels, the beams swept across space like searchlights, targeting every artificial object. Lights and consoles flickered as the beam appeared to disrupt power.

"I'm losing helm control," Le'tan said with a calm voice, despite the circumstances. "Console is not responding to my inputs."

The bridge filled itself with all kinds of major and minor alerts that the crew tried to silence, while attempting to regain control.

"Collision alert!" Houn warned. "We're gonna hit that freighter if we don't change course soon."

"Engineering to bridge! What's going on out there? Main power is fluctuating, and systems are unresponsive."