Realm of Silence

Refrain of Silence

The Tacey Colony

When Ashtart Turax cursed aloud, the whole crew was startled from what they were doing. And when those curses grew in volume they knew something had to truly be wrong—never had they heard the twenty-something year curse, and yet she was doing so loudly. Most of the crew decided that it would be wise to avoid the young mechanic specialist, while two of them debated on who they would send in to check on the woman.

“Better she you like,” Joseph Bravered whispered to his partner and co-pilot. His words slurred in what many would consider out of order, but few knew that the Common Tongue was not his first language, his so-called butchery of the syntax was actually an extremely amazing aspect compared to how others from his home simply butchered everything when they attempted to speak out of their tongue. Truth be told his syntax was normally far better than it was at the moment, but when he was worried he slipped out of his well practiced phrasing. “Check you, yes?”

“Seph, I don’t think she likes me better! In fact I’m pretty sure she’ll be more open with you. And you know what? If she does tell one of us what’s wrong, at least you’ll understand the terms she throws out.” Normally stoic Cassidy Sekhmet grinned while slinging his arm over his co-pilot, the 6’2” man began to steer the shorter on towards the room that the curses still echoed from. “But you know what, Seph? I go with both of us checking up on our dearest Ash, that way she can’t kill anyone because she’ll have to many targets!”

Joseph, Seph, gave a bitter laugh that echoed over the curses as he allowed himself to be lead to the room where the mechanic cursed at her computer screen, her face reddened from lack of breath. He couldn’t help but sigh before he entered the room, a calming sigh so that his Ord wouldn’t be butchered beyond understanding. Upon entering the room, the pilot was relieved that they had both came into the room to inquire of their friend.

Ash sat hunched over the small monitor on the table, cursing although she was obviously breathless. Lilac-white bangs were plastered to her face as curls drifted over her shoulders, contrasting sharply with the deep burgundy of her jacket, her pink mouth set in an unforgiving scowl that did not seem proper to be gracing her face. Needless to say, the two pilots knew that, beyond a doubt, something had gone horribly wrong with the probe. Seph made no move towards the girl, his face pale in fright from the aurora of anger that gripped his friend, he simply stood in the door way—that is until Cassidy pushed past him, striding into the center of the room. The girl continued to ignore them, entranced by what ever the screen revealed to her, she continued to do so until Cassidy turned her around on a stool casing her to simply glare at him.

“What?” She snapped, her right eye twitching as she let her mind calm down a notch in aspect of her friends having disturbed her ‘peace.’

“Kiddo, you’re cursing has the crew scared! Think you could keep it down?” Cassidy leaned against the desk, palms behind him as he took the chance to observe his friend even more, something must have really gone wrong to have made her this short.

“Something ate my bloody probe, Sid. What do you think?”

Her probe? The small robot she had kept with her since before joining the Mnemosyne’s crew? That defiantly would describe her mood, she went every where with the sphere, and Cassidy had an idea that it was all she had left of what ever her home had been. “Wait. What do you mean by ate?”

“I mean that it was absorbed. Don’t ask me how, don’t ask me why… Although I have a hunch to the second one. The sensors picked up a spike that Fri didn’t acknowledge because it was to brief, and seconds later? Fri’s ground-bound and the screen’s going out. I can’t even get a fix on her system any more.”

When Ash paused to take a breath, Seph took his chance to interject into the conversation. “Does this mean that the disappearances might actually have something to do with the station?”

Shaking her head, the mechanic sighed, her gloved hand pinching the bridge of her noise. “I don’t really know, but I can say that what ever has been grabbing ships defiantly had a hand in the lack of crew on the Tacey.”

“So it has a name know, does it?” Cassidy pushed himself up and off the desk, his tone more serious than the others tended to hear—emotion showing through his exterior shell, letting them know that he thought something was truly odd about the Station they had run across early in the day.

“I found it almost instantly after Fry got past the docking area and into the actually Station… And Sid, its worse than the Cap’n thought. This isn’t just a station, the Tacey is a colony.” She waited for the impending downfall, one of the two pilots would say something about that—hopefully they wouldn’t bother to asking how far in she had gotten before in to the Station before something took her probe out. Luckily she didn’t have long to wait… A smirk could not help but cross her face and Seph paled before he began to shake uncontrollably.

“Kidnapped only not have these mishka crews and ships, colonies now too?” For the second time that day Seph had slipped back into his mistaken syntax, and even slipping words from his Nishalian tongue into his speech. Ash, along with every one else on the, and even slipping words from his Nishalian tongue into his speech. Ash, along with every one else on the Mnemosyne, didn’t speak (nor understand) most of the spoken tongue, but Ash knew that mishka was not a pleasant thing to be called. Not in the least. “Why but station did leave they?”

“You’ve got me, Seph… And I’m sure you have one up on Ash as well. Both of you wait here, we don’t want this to get out to the crew.” Cassidy didn’t have to signify that he was going to get the Cap’n, Ash knew well enough that as the Cap’n’s ‘big brother’ he was able to get in and pull her off duty when ever he felt like it. Although, that action could also have to deal with the fact that the pilots had the most power on the ship next to the Cap’n herself, but no one thought that—to the crew it was just the ‘family’ relationship, and they were okay with that.

Swirling the stool around, Ash once again faced her desk before reaching out to grab a rubber band. Flipping her hair back and up, she quickly pulled her mane of curls into a loose ponytail, and then finally she turned back to the screen on her desk. She didn’t have to turn, and even with out her hearing being so good, to know that Seph had walked up behind her where he proceeded to lean onto her shoulders looking over her head. “You me show Fry what see?”

This time Ash couldn’t help it, she began to giggle. His syntax was bad when he was overly emotional, but when Seph butchered it on purpose his speech was nothing less than hilarious. The mechanic knew he was trying to make her feel more at ease, and some how it was working. The Outcast and the Prodigy, what a pair they made! Add in the Female Cap’n (the only one of her kind) and the Broken Noble, and they defiantly made up some sort of circus, but Ash was alright with that. She enjoyed the companion ship she felt with the powers on the ship, and even the rest of the crew made her feel welcomed. Unlike her own family. That thought soured her mood quickly. Punching a few buttons on the screen she brought the video up, moving it towards where the surge had happened. “You have to watch carefully to even catch the spike, but its there.”

Seph nodded to her, not bothering to word his thoughts, his eyes firmly fixed on the screen before him. The Nishalian man watched the screen with an eerie fascination as the scene unfolded, and as the picture grew dark he leaned back, silent contemplation written on his face.

Panilla Nisha, Captain of the Mnemosyne, first female Captain of a space-craft in recorded history, and Partarian half-breed, could not help but pace as she waited on the bridge for any of her people to find some hint as to where ships were disappearing to. Hopefully they would not only find a clue, but instead find the culprit. Find the ones who were causing the vanishing acts so that she could find out where her family had disappeared too. Now Pan was not normally given to pacing, but it was impossible for her to stop doing so—not when they were dealing with everything being an unknown factor in the mission. Not that it was just another mission to the Captain, it was far more than that, after all these people had taken it too a different level when they had taken the Lethe. Their were few ships that were on friendly terms with the Mnemosyne, the Lethe was more than just another ship, to the crew of her ship- and to the Captain herself- they were like a sister-ship. It was almost as if they were two ships that comprised (what they wanted to become) a fleet.

The hiss of the door opening did nothing to break the Captain from her thoughts, and she continued to pace, her white boots clicking with each step while her orange skirt whirled with the minimal amount of air that pressed against it. Four long strands of black hair cascade down from the buns that held the rest of her hair in place. As she paced the black tail that arched from underneath her jacket top began to twist and turn, swishing to and fro telling of her worried thoughts. Thoughts that were broken into as a hand reached out to tap her shoulder. Startled she turned around to snap at who ever had interrupted her, after all her crew would normally use the intercom system to tell her of any finds, but she froze when she saw who it was.

Cassidy grinned, an apology that only she could see hidden in the thin of his lips. “You need to come down to Ash’s place, she has something you really ought to see.”

Waving for her to follow him, Pan fell into step behind her surrogate older brother, all why wondering what exactly the Mnemosyne’s mechanic had found that it was placed in such secrecy—surely if it truly dealt with the disappearances they wouldn’t hesitate to tell the whole of the crew, and not keep it hidden between only a few. The Captain had always been hesitant about keeping things from the people working under her, but one could contribute that to the fact that any member of her crew had gained her trust—either by proxy of one of the original members of the crew (the original crew being herself, Cassidy, Seph, and soon after Ash), or by doing something to show to her that they were noble. She felt that they all had a right to know of any danger they may come to face, but she also knew that at time secrets were needed in order to keep the mass amount of the crew safe, although there were few of those type of secrets that existed on the Mnemosyne

Something began to worry her even more, Pan decided that what ever it was she could do nothing about because she couldn’t identify what exactly it was. The Partarian decided that it was a hidden unease some where hidden in her crew, she couldn’t pinpoint who the feeling was coming from but she knew that she would discover it soon enough. Worried, Pan increased her speed to where she was literally walking on Cassidy’s heals, and much to her surprise the pilot reached back to pull her forward and into the comfortable nook of his side—and then she had to suppress a shake as the memories of the actions origin hit her full in the face. The situation had been similar back then, back when they first met. Strange disappearances that went unexplained, that time it was in a single location, and the town leaders had decided to call in some members of both the Mersy’s (Mercenary’s) and Bounty Hunter’s Guilds. That’s where the two of them came in, Pan by herself on loan from Mersy’s while Cassidy with a partner named Chemosh from the Hunter’s; things hadn’t gone all that well for any one, even if they did solve the disappearances. That was the start of Cassidy’s babying of her (much to the dismay of Chemosh), and that was what lead her to seek them out once she’d apprehended a ship. Those events where what caused the first blossom of truth that she’d ever felt, and in her ‘big brother’s’ arms she felt like a weight was lifted. And now, with the warmth that radiate off of Cassidy’s body, she felt like she could deal with what fate might throw her way. After all, what could get to her with some one like Cassidy protecting her?

AN- Details:
Ord- basically the "universal" language

Partarian- one of the three races from the planet Arion, they are humanoid beings that poses attributes of cats. Depending on their breeding they can look vastily different from one to the other. Some have a full body of fur, while others have only the slit-ed eyes of a cat, they are a race heavily influenced by instinct. Pan is a half-breed so all-in-all she acts more human than most other Partarians, the only thing truly indicating her race as something other than human is her tail (her eyes slit on occasion when she is truly angry)

Nishalian- a race that is spread over the far reaches of Space, some think that the Nishalian’s are the origin of humanity.