Space Odyssey: Spectre

Jace watched from the central chair on the bridge as the Centuria ship pulled away and then turned invisible. "You are right, we can still detect a slight electrical signal. But if I did not know for sure that it was there I would have thought that it was just a random blimp." Jul'an groaned as he looked over his station.

"Figures," Jace grumbled, "mark it and make a note of it. Nila, have you figured out the controls enough to do a long range communication with the Venture?" Jace asked as he spun in the chair, it would be difficult to not spin in these chairs. They were just so spinnable.

"Yeah, give me a moment. But are you sure you do not need to figure out what that Centuria chick did to you?" Nila asked with a trace of annoyance in her voice as he chuckled slightly in amusement.

"No, it successfully interacted with my system. So I can only assume that it is something that will have a positive impact on me. Until I know more, I think it would be best to refrain from sharing an excess of details." Jace answered honestly.

{You could answer honestly. The fact that I basically bound us together. I must say the Xenar really did have a primitive version of our technology just sitting around. But the fact that it works so well with your base human biology is baffling, although it might work just as well with the other species.} Shilla pointed out, speaking directly into his mind.

Shilla was the chieftess' niece. She used that piece of metal to bind them together. It was not actually metal but a block of nanites. Now his system was completely confused since the two different systems were interacting.

That is right, the Centuria had a system running through their own bodies. Apparently it was significantly more advanced, but willing to be benevolent. But the system he had in his body was just as confused.

[Error! Additional system detected! Error! The system does not understand!]

Messages like this latest one kept popping up and he had to ignore them. Meanwhile he could feel the foreign nanites were mostly crowding around his wrist. It felt like the burning sensation when he got the weapon tattoo and marriage tattoo, but this one was taking a lot longer to finish. Almost like they were waiting for permission.

So at the moment he was acting as a meeting point between the two systems and it was honestly driving him crazy. {Please stop Shilla, I may not mind. But you are going to confuse Salem.} He pointed out as he responded.

{Fine.} He then felt the door between their minds close softly. But he could also tell that she was still 'looking' at him.

"I have General Isaiah on a call for you. But it is going to be audio only since we do not have a proper holoviewer." Nila pointed out as he could see a box with an audio line appear on the screen.

"General Isaiah this is Spectre Jace. We have found our objective. Are we meeting up with you?" Jace asked as he spun in the chair again. That was going to end up being a bad habit if he did not kick it. So he stood up before the General responded.

"Negative, Cerberus Squad is to return to Waterswan. We will meet you there. We arrived at Grackle and destroyed the moon after confirming the last traitorous Elders were there." Jace tried to not make too much of an expression as he listened to the General, even if the general could not see him it would just end up another bad habit. He was hoping they would not destroy Grackle since there was likely valuable information and technology that they had. Which was likely the reason they were sent on this out of the way mission in the first place. "Now we are on clean up duty here, and then the Venture will meet you in Waterswan."

"Understood General, is there a particular reason we are heading for Waterswan and not helping Victorium forces with cleaning up the last pockets of rebellion?" Jace asked as he moved around the room. There would be a reason that they wanted them back in Vexical Empire space. He just hoped the general was willing to share it over the call.

There was a sigh on the other end. "It seems your Director believes that several civil wars are about to break out in the human regions. Starting with the one in your empire, so we are heading there to assist as a sign of our alliance while our military finishes with the rebels."

Jace nodded, that would be a good reason for them to return early. "We will head out now. But we should notify you that we encountered the Centuria and we-" He could feel the glare from Nila, "I mean I was able to successfully gain their… friendship? I will provide the actual file when we meet up again at Waterswan."

There were a few moments of silence as he was sure that General Isaiah was grappling with what Jace just told him. "Very well," he could hear the general sigh. "Head to Waterswan and get prepared, you might end up leaving before we get there." He then ended the call.

Jace nodded, "Okay, Nila." He turned to the accer sitting at the bridge's communication station. "See if you can raise Director Fenrir or Vexical's Military Intelligence and Logistics Division on a communication channel. I just sent both contact numbers to your station." He did, the moment he thought up his idea he sent her the respective contact numbers.

"Give me a few minutes." Nila nodded her beak up and down.

"Why did you not tell the General what we found?" Jul'an asked in confusion from his own chair. He kept having to adjust because he kept sliding out of the chair. "I figured it would be pretty important to notify him of a human relic this deep in Victorium territory."

Jace shrugged. "No point, it would just end up going to MILD anyways and talking about it might compromise information to anyone that was listening."

"But you are about to tell this Director Fenrir, correct?" Jul'an asked.

"Nope." Jace shook his head and looked at Nila.

"No can do, we are out of range or something else is going on. I can send a message if you want." Nila told him.

"That should be fine. Do I need to record it or are you going to send an encrypted digital message?" Jace asked as he walked over to her station.

"Encrypted digital, the other might not go over well. Especially since we were barely able to communicate with the Venture and that was audio only." Nila pointed out as she moved away from the station so Jace could plug in the message.

"Okay then," Jace began typing, "I am telling them to a research team, a pilot and crew to come pick up an item at Waterswan which we are on route to." Jace explained and then looked over at Jul'an. "Is that okay?"

Jul'an raised his hands in self defense, "I apologize. I was just curious if there was a reason. I will remind you that I prefer the battlefield to any of this underhanded stuff."

Jace shrugged as he moved back to his captain chair. "I know, that is why I am here. Asana, take us to Waterswan. Tell me when you want a break we will have to switch off since the journey will take a few days."