Phantom Star

My anxiety was getting to me, my hands folded into themselves in a constant twisting as I looked at the man opposite me.

“Do be more at ease my dear I beg, you are making me anxious.” Chief Engineer of the Octavius, Eugene sat across from me gently sipping his drink. We were at the Hab deck on the station, and we were even sharing a meal of sorts.

I just felt so awkward. I was doing everything I could to pretend some of the parts on the Phantom Star weren’t stolen, but I think the old engineer had noticed it right away.

“Looking at this, I can be reasonably sure your Thermal Lance is functional. Absolutely astounding, to put such a weapon together yourself. Thank you for letting me get a look at it.”

“I found plenty of the parts on old ships, most of the rest was just manufacturing the parts.”

“Yes, yet that’s no simple task. I don’t suppose you’d let me peek at your manufacturing method? No, no I can already see that you won’t.” He spoke with a laugh, before I could even say anything, smiling at me as if he was sharing a good joke.

That only made it more awkward, because I didn’t want to share the joke! I wanted him to stop trying to figure out all my secrets!

“Well enough of me enjoying myself.” He said looking almost fondly at his Tab as he set it down. “As much as I loved going through the construction of your delightful vessel. I’m here as the Chief Engineer first. The Baron in his wisdom wishes to offer you assistance.”

“I don’t think I need help? Probably.” I whispered and the man smirked as he took a moment to grab a bite from his meal.

“I don’t just mean an offer for one of our repair teams. Although if you would be willing we would assist you. This is a serious situation after all, but I was particularly speaking of spare parts.”

“Power Cables.” I said instantly. The damn things were never long enough!

“Ah yes, I’ve been in that situation. Never enough of them is it?”

“No.” I grumbled, my anxiety slowly dropping as he laughed in shared misery.

“Well that I can assist you with, the Octavius of course has large stocks of the things, but this wonderful station will be sending a delivery with quite a few of them soon. It won’t be any trouble to have them reserved. I’ll have a tech start dropping off some cabling in front of your ship's airlock if that works?”

“The Crabbits can take it from there, yeah.” I said, and the Crabbit on my shoulder chirped happily not interrupting the conversation but letting me know she had told the others. I reached up to pet her chassis, she wouldn’t get much from it, but there was a very human instinct to pet things.

“Delightful! Then let’s talk-”

“Kat?”

“Mom?” I asked, turning as I saw Mom walking towards me. She seemed worried for a moment, until she seemed to recognize Eugene.

“Oh! Chief Engineer greetings to you.” Mom offered with a curtsy bow thing that she had tried to teach me a few times but I just wasn’t good at it. “I hope my daughter is on her best behavior?” Mom asked a little pointedly.

Which wasn’t necessary! I was always on my best behavior!

“Oh she is simply fascinating, and no insult has been given. Eugene Kilver.” He offered, and Mom smiled.

“Lina Ferrous, although I rarely get to use the last name.” She explained and Eugene offered a laugh.

“It’s an odd custom, but not unusual for large families like this I’ve found. I was just speaking to your daughter about her ship.” Eugene offered, and Mom lit up.

Mom, even more than Dad, was proud of me for the Phantom Star.

A ship was more than just a ship after all, it was power. Power, and freedom, something she understood very well.

“Yes, Katherine wowed us all with it. She’s always been good with technology, but I certainly never expected…” Mom had thrown an arm over my shoulder as she rambled, with me sitting she was just the right height for it.

“Oh I doubt anyone expected what young Katherine has put together. I find myself jealous of her talent as well. A nebula of talent.” Eugene complimented me, and Mom obviously liked that.

“She is. I’ve always wanted her to be something great, and she’s well on her way.” Mom said proudly, and then reached out and tugged on my cheek a little. “Now if only I could get her to care for the important things. You went to a University, didn't you Eugene?”

“I did indeed, in fact. Filtborn, on Kellis. A fine institution.”

“The best in all of the Kurtz Sector from what I hear. I’d love for Kat to get in.” Mom said, and I know what this was all about.

“Mom. I’m not going to a University. I’ve got my ship, and I’m a Captain now.” I grumbled.

“A captain can still go to a University, and get an even better job, or a noble title.” Mom said, and I rolled my eyes.

“Hah! A difficult prospect, but for a girl that can forge her own ship perhaps possible.” Eugene said smiling, but he had sat back a bit in his chair, seemingly putting some distance between himself and the conversation.

Rising to nobility wasn’t an easy task, and considering his position it was probably something he himself was working towards.

I just had no interest in even trying to join that rat race. I had my ship, and I’d have the stars. I didn’t need land to call my own, or the title to shackle me as much as it would give me power.

Power I just didn’t care about.

“I could always contact my old Alma Mater, and see if they’d be interested.” Eugene offered, and I instantly sent him a death glare, telling him that he better not!

He winked at me, as Mom went into a fluffy tirade about my accomplishments, and how well I would do at a university.

Mom was super embarrassing.

—-

“Come on baby, talk to me.” I whispered as I just closed my eyes and listened to the song. There was something wrong in the system, and despite fixing problem after problem, it felt like I only ever pushed the problem further away. What was I missing?

The song chirped and swirled. Happy noise flowed through the ship even as every part of the song in part had some discordant note.

It was working overall, the ship was flying, but there was always some part that wasn’t working.

I felt it then, a faint note that sounded off that was throwing off the rest of the melody, I turned and headed down the hall.

Now where was that? I continued on walking past Crabbit that were digging through the cabling along the walls and in the floors. Sparks were going off as they welded the ship together. Or fixed one thing or another.

Finally I stopped and looked down.

I tilted my head as I looked at the pile of cables and felt my eyes narrow.

What was wrong here? I reached down and ran a hand through the power lines and finally I felt it. Like an electric shock, as the discordant note ran under my fingers.

“Why are you broken?” I asked as I sat down and got comfortable, feet dangling into the open floor panel as I tugged up the cable and started looking it over. It looked fine.

“Crabbit, give me a power check.” I asked the shoulder Crabbit for the day. Watching on as it pressed a few tools against the place where the cable connected to another.

“Negative transfer! Error!” It called out and I hummed, bending down I looked through the tunnel where the cabling ran through.

“Go down and find the next connection node for this line, and check it.”

“Roger roger!” It chirped and crawled over my shoulder and floated down to the crawl space before slipping inside.

Was it a bad cable? That would be a surprise, these things were supposed to be checked before they were used. Because a bad cable in a starship could be life support.

I waited for a bit before the Crabbit called out.

“Error found! Error found!” Crabbit called out and I sighed, slumping a bit.

“Fiddlesticks. Alright bring it up, let’s see.” I called out and a few moments later the cable's other end was offered up to me and I whistled.

“Yep. That’ll do it.” I muttered Looking at the connection at the end of the cable that hadn’t handled power going through it. “Give me a scan on this. What’s it made of?” I asked, and a moment later the results displayed on the Crabbits face screen. I could only shake my head at what was revealed.

Someone somewhere was trying to make a quick buck. They used a metal that wasn’t rated to handle plasma flow. So it held power for a short time. Long enough for the first flight, but that had burned out the connector.

“Alright. I’m going to get this fixed. Add a new work order. Every cable needs to be checked to make sure they aren’t this junk.”

“Uuuu. Roger roger.” My Crabbit whined, its little arms resting on its head like it was trying to hide from work.

“I know. It’s a lot of work, but we have to make sure it's safe.” I said and then turned and hopped over the open hole in my flooring and hurried to the hangar. I had stored all the Nanopaste there for now, and it would be good enough to break down the broken connector and then make a working one.

—--

*Station UNK-L, this is Phantom Star.*

*Go ahead Phantom Star.*

*Requesting docking release.*

*Release is Green… You leaving Kat?* I laughed at the worried tone.

*Only a shakedown cruise Aunt Milly. I’ll be back in a few hours at most. Just doing some tests.*

*I’ll let everyone know. Safe flight.*

*Thanks you too!* I said and then blinked at what I had just done.

“Uuuu.” You too? She wasn’t going anywhere moron!

Shaking it off I walked from the communications console over to my captain's chair. It wasn’t a good chair, but it would do for now. Still needed to either find a good chair, or make one. But for now, I could sit, and I had the controls I needed.

I plopped in and with a breath started activating my girl.

The Diamond Drive was already on, so I didn’t need to reignite it, but I turned on the engines. A quiet noise filled the ship as the engines spun up. Plasma flowing through conduits to turn the two Nacelles into my ship's legs.

The gravity engines activated, but it was the Plasma thrusters that made the ship rumble, as I tapped the throttle to push the Phantom Star away from the Station.

I just let her drift for a while, as we slowly moved into the black.

“Give me a status report!”

“Function positive!”

“Working! Issues negative! Yay!”

“Weeeee!”

“Crabbit! Stop floating around! Get on station.” I called out to the Crabbit that was in the air spinning around.

“Ah! Yes! Sorry sorry!” It stopped and scrambled for its station.

Silly bot.

“Communication request!” One of my Crabbit called out, and I tapped on the Tab I had set up to be my captain's chair console.

*This is Phantom Star.* I offered once I opened the line.

*This is Octavius operations. Phantom Star, what is your flight plan?* A bored voice spoke out and I frowned a bit. Swallowed my instant desire to tell them to stuff it, because it wasn’t their business and remembered that things were a bit tense because of worries over pirates.

*Just a shakedown cruise out to the asteroid belt for some tests. Should be no more than a couple hours.*

*Understood. Flight plan logged. The Baron wishes to extend a warning to be careful around the asteroids. They are often used by Pirates as hiding places.*

*Understood. Thank you for the warning. I’ll be careful. Phantom Star out.*

I closed the line and nodded.

“Alright! Crabbit! Prepare to shift to flank speed!” I called out and that got a lot of motion as all my Crabbit throughout the ship started checking to make sure the ship could handle it.

When everything came back green. I put my hand on the Tab screen, and slowly pushed the throttle forward. The rumble of Plasma Thrusters died out, as the Gravity Drive took over, the two Nacelles formed a field of Gravity around the ship, and we started accelerating.

I glanced at the sensor map and saw the Station, the place I had lived my entire life, rapidly began dropping out behind us as we moved.

It was just too bad, it wasn’t as fast as she should be. I was still down two more Nacelles that would make a much much stronger Gravity field.

“Report!”

“No issues! Working! Yay!”

“Uuuu, keeps failing!!” I nodded at that report, that was our deflector dish. Unfortunately our shields were still… Not really there. The amount of Shield Emitters the Phantom currently had operational could be counted on one hand, and that was mostly for testing.

She was bare naked, but at least her skin was tough.

The deflector though, was required for non warp travel, to push, and deflect any space debris from just smashing into the ship. It was… Functional. That was the best thing I could say about it.

I checked the Tab reports and nodded. Our acceleration had maxed out. Our actual speed of course would keep increasing if I just kept gunning it, but the two nacelles could only give me so much acceleration which was the better indicator of a ships actual ‘speed’ in combat situations.

“Alright. Everything is working out… It’s my time to fly.” I said, smiling at the words as I adjusted my hand to hit all the controls.

“Exhale.” I whispered and then shifted the controls, feeling the Phantom curve into a long left turn. She wasn’t a fighter, but when she was done, with all engines, and flight panels with the extended sides she’d be zippy for a ship her size.

For now she was a bit lazy in her handling. As I arced her into a long turn I could feel her giving less turn than I asked for.

The Crabbit would be taking the data down though. I could check it later, and see if there was anything I could change, but for now?

I grinned as I tilted the stick and just laughed as the stars spun around and around.

“Warning. Asteroid’s detected.” Crabbit called out, and I nodded.

“Alright, Plot me a path through at current speed.” I called out, and I giggled as every Crabbit on the bridge turned to look at me like I was crazy.

“Hey, don’t give me that look! I need a path.” I demanded, and all the Crabbit turned to look at one of them.

Ah, they were sharing a data stream.

Snrk.

I had to do everything I could not to break out into cackles, as the Crabbit basically freaked out at my orders. Very quickly a plot through the asteroids started filling in, but I nearly instantly denied it.

“Belay that! The ship can’t make those turns at this speed. Do it again.” I demanded and the Crabbit stilled before blurring around its console.

Slowly I could see the asteroids ahead of me getting closer and closer.

“C’mon girls.” I reminded, and then the plot came out and I looked it over.

Still amateur. Even I could see that, and I had only flown shuttles that were basically the equivalent of electric scooters.

But I could do this. I reached out and made two adjustments, sent it back and then got confirmation from the Crabbit.

“Alright. Girls. Hold on.” I told them, and grinned as I first shifted the Phantom into a harder left turn, then I turned her nose back the way I had turned from, and the acceleration took me into the asteroid belt, skimming past the first large rock on my starboard side.

“Ohhh. I can’t look.” One of the Crabbit said throwing their little arms over their optics, which wouldn’t do a damn thing to stop them from seeing, but it was still cute.

With that I was off. Adjusting course, and pushing the ship as I weaved into a field of asteroids that had likely never had a human come within a million miles of before.

And yet, despite still missing so much. The ship didn’t stutter. The Gravity Drive shifted the Phantom Star left and right, at a touch, and I was spinning and adjusting without issue, following the plotted course.

The Crabbit were making little noises of concern, or excitement depending on what their proclivities were, but it was all in good fun. I wouldn’t have done this if the Phantom wasn’t capable of doing it safely.

Even if I did smash into something, it would suck, but we’d be fine. Starships, even ones that I made in an old freighter with a scrap hull, were stronger than some old space rocks.

And then, with a dizzying spin, that I didn’t even feel thanks to the inertial dampeners I broke through a cloud of micro asteroids, which caused a burst of light from the deflector and shift the whole field of rocks in a wave off my bow and I was free of the asteroid belt.

“Not bad.” I whispered to myself, because that had felt… Amazing. I shifted left and moved into an arc to just fly alongside the asteroid field. “Alright! Let’s find a target! Start scanning.” I called out, and the Crabbit jumped to do that. They were much more relaxed now and back to their chatty selves.

“Scanning Scanning! All the rocks, get a scan! That rock, that rock. That one too!” The Crabbit on the sensor console sang away and I just hummed along with her as we continued.

Type 4 Sensors would be able to find what we were looking for, an acceptable target for the Thermal Lance. Flying around was fun, but in the end, it was merely a fun side activity while giving the Phantom Star some time to stretch her legs so to speak.

As we were on a safe course I looked towards my Tab and started going over what reports I was getting.

Yep. Some things were failing, or causing issues. I could hear the song of the ship giving me light discordant notes, but nothing dangerous. She’d get us back to the station without issues, but there were definitely a few things I’d need to fix.

As I was working I let the chatter of the Crabbit flow through me. They were learning their jobs quickly. The song about what she was finding in the asteroids was cute, and informative.

The status reports they were sharing with me, and each other was good information. The port sensor panel was on the fritz if it was giving this much static, sure the central system was kludged together, but it shouldn’t be this wavy. I added it to the work order.

Some of the plasma cabling was struggling with power, so we’d need to adjust the power flow. That I sent to the Crabbit in the engine room right away. They were still learning the proper power pathing, and adjustment.

Someday they’d be able to send more or less power to different systems when needed, but for now, I was more concerned with just not blowing anything.

“Hmmm? Hmmmmmmmmm.” The Crabbit on the sensor suddenly stopped singing.

The shift of her song had me looking up. “What is it?”

“Sensor error?” It called out, and I got up and walked over. Looking over the console. I saw what the problem was. There were some returns that weren’t right. Was the port side Panel getting worse?

“One second.” I called back to the pilot seat, and then I just spun the Phantom Star. letting the starboard side of the ship face the weird problem.

“Sensor error?” Crabbit repeated and that made me frown.

Walking back I glanced at the console.

No, that wasn’t right.

“The starboard sensor panel is on the fritz now? That’s impossible.” I said and then checked my port panel that was causing issues and confirmed.

It was fine now.

“Fuck.” I whispered, as I placed both hands on the console and started fiddling. Something was interfering with my sensor returns, and my stomach instantly went to the worst possible thing.

The Pirates. Had I seriously just stumbled on them? In space? I refused to believe that was probable. Space was too fucking big for this!

“Crabbit. I want you to register the exact area that we are getting that weird return from.” I called out as I headed back to my captain's chair, and then started basically wiggling the Phantom Star. I was letting different Sensor panels read the bad return, which since we were getting more data…

“Confirmed! Return! Optical imaging.” The Crabbit called out, and along the viewport, a window popped up that then zoomed in over and over and I saw it.

I breathed a sigh of relief.

Not a pirate. Not a ship in fact.

“Do we know what that is?” I asked, and got a bunch of negatives from the Crabbit.

Of course they wouldn’t know. I reminded myself. “Okay. Gather the scans, and mark this location.” I ordered. I looked at the asteroid that had a massive crater on the side of it, and what looked like veins of metal running through it, but the metal was actually pulsing a little with some sort of odd yellow light.

—--

“A small cache of Tier 1 sensor baffling Meta Materials.” Aunt Sheila answers me instantly as I show her the data when I got back home.

“Oh.” I muttered. Meta Materials weren't something I had much experience with. The closest we got to any was when we were stripping parts that used some of them.

“That’s a nice little find. I’ll let-” She cut herself off instantly, stiffening a bit before she took a breath and relaxed, changing what she was about to say. “You could try to sell the data to a mining corp, but I doubt you’d get any interest. Tier 1’s are pretty common. The Baron might have some interest though.” She added after a moment, and I gave her a long look with a raised eyebrow in turn.

“What was that?” I asked, after she seemed to refuse to speak.

“You aren’t someone I can just decide things for anymore kid. Hell, you're a captain. In every respect you outrank me.”

I blinked at that. Ranks. It wasn’t something I thought about much considering most everyone on station was family, or were random workers, so that meant by definition they were lower rank than the family.

But I did live in a sector of space with titles of Nobility, and rankings changed how you were treated by everyone. As a Captain. I was up there. Only Great Uncle Kyle, technically, was still above me.

I shook it off, and decided to ignore it, because I didn’t want to think of people like that.

“That’s stupid. I still want your advice. What would you have told me before I had the ship?”

“Honestly? I’d have told Uncle Kyle, and grabbed shuttles and gear, and we’d have mined it up ourselves. Won’t make much, and we can’t refine it easily, but a trader stopping by might be interested in picking up some cheap Metas”

“Okay. Cool… I guess I could open up the Stars hangar too. It would be safer than our shuttles.” I muttered, tapping a finger against my chin as I considered, but then stilled and shook it off. “But we’ll have to think about it after the pirates. I wouldn’t want to bring so many people when we could get attacked.”

“That’s true. But kid. Things’ve changed now. You should really start thinking of getting creds for yourself, and what you are going to do. You’re a Captain now. And you aren’t flying around a little shuttle or something. That beast of yours isn’t a civilian craft.”

“I’m still me. Phantom Star or not. And I won’t let something like that just change who I am Aunt Sheila. That’s stupid.” I argued instantly even crossing my arms into an X to show how serious I was. “Will you talk to Great Uncle Kyle about it for me?”

“Nope.” She said instantly and I slumped, because I knew what she was going to say next. “Do it yourself. You have that right, and you should get used to talking to Station Managers. Go on then.”

“Uuuu.”

—--

“An interesting find.” Uncle Kyle offered looking over the data I had handed him, but he shook his head. “But even if I wanted to, we can’t.”

“Yeah the pirates, I know. I told Aunt Sheila the same thing when I considered using the Phantom’s Hangar to help.”

“You’d let people on board?”

“I mean… The hangar bay is mostly complete, I wouldn’t let them further in.” I argued looking away, and he actually chuckled softly.

“Well Katherine, I appreciate you informing me of this, and not just selling the data. This is close enough to the station if anyone did come in to mine it, there could be… Complications.”

“Yeah, I was just flying through the closest field to stretch my legs when I noticed it.”

“Indeed. Could you find more?” He asked and I had to consider that.

“Technically I stumbled across it because I didn’t find it.” I said slowly, as I considered. “My sensors were bugging, and the Crabbit noticed it…” Could I upgrade my sensors to better find Meta Materials? I mean… There were as many Meta Materials as there were stars.

Anything that could be… Mutated? I’m not sure what the official description of them was. But when something had some interaction with subspace, and came away different.

It was honestly kind of weird, and this was the first time I had ever really come across them naturally, but Meta Materials were kind of weird. Especially since nearly anything could become one. I’d even heard of water becoming a Meta Material. So it wasn’t just minerals that could change.

“Alright. Well, I suppose it’s something we can talk about after everything has been settled.” I decided. And Uncle Kyle nodded.

“That’s right. How did your test flight go? If you don’t mind sharing?”

“Good. I uh… Forgot to test the weapons though I got distracted, so I’ll have to take her out again to do that… But that’s a good thing! More tests!” I argued quickly to make sure he didn’t think I was a ditz or something! I just got distracted by the glowy rock!

“That’s good.” He offered and that was signal enough for me to get out of there.

—--

Of course, the tests had shown some problems even so. Power management was still coming along, and Crabbit was learning, so a few power lines needed to be rechecked as they had way too much energy flowing through them.

Checking the damn power cables was becoming a constant thing, it was a good thing this was my own ship, and the cables working was a requirement for me not to die, otherwise I would be getting irritated constantly checking the damn things.

Digging through the walls of the ship, one section at a time as I ran my hands over every segment, pressing a tool against the ports, and getting readings I worked down the ship.

I was humming quietly, as I worked, the readings were all coming back good, which was a relief. I had been worried that we might burn out some of the plasma cable, but it was actually looking okay.

Plasma Cable was tough stuff thankfully.

But suddenly everything changed.

“Warning!” Crabbit on my shoulder shrieked loudly, and I stilled. There was only one reason for them to give me a warning!

I turned and ran, dropping the tools in my hands and just moving. I had to get to the bridge.

Leaping over the jumble of messes in the hallways, I ran into the ladder to the bridge and nearly slid right past it as I grabbed hold and started climbing.

“Communication! Communication!”

Was the response I got as I climbed into the bridge.

“Send it through.” I yelled as I jumped into my uncomfortable chair.

*Phantom Star, this is Octavius, respond.*

*Octavius, this is Phantom Star.*

*We have multiple contacts coming out of warp sending you data now. Please slave your computer to us. We will be sending objectives.*

*Got it. I’ll do that.* I agreed and the line went dead, as the request came over.

Battle. It was time to battle.

“Crabbit! Connect to the Octavius as they requested. The rest of you, batten everything down, we are moving!” I called out, and then switched over to the Station.

I was almost surprised I was still connected to the station, as most of the time if this sort of trouble came around, they would have jettisoned me immediately so the Station Shields would have better coverage.

But I guess even with everything, I was still one of them.

*This is Phantom Star. Requesting docking release.* I called out, and nearly instantly I was unlocked.

*Accepted… Be careful Kat.” Aunt Penny was on duty today then?

*I will.* I promised as confidently as I could. I gently pushed the throttle up and moved to join the Octavius, the Barons Frigate. I tried to ignore how clammy my hands felt. Or how the humming of the Phantom Star below me, which felt so comforting a moment ago, now felt uncomfortable, as I could feel the imperfections in the ship's noise.

She wasn’t ready for a battle.

I wasn’t ready for battle.