Erisa followed Melia down the corridor. She had a bad feeling in her gut. A feeling that only grew with each step. Something was wrong. She knew it, she could feel it. Erisa had questions aplenty about what they were doing in this part of the ship, but Melia had not said a word about why she had come this way. Nor had she elaborated on what she wanted to look at. Like much of the ship before they had arrived here, this section was dimly lit. The lights coming on to this low level automatically. It had required a great deal of guessing and tampering with the controls in other sections to get them up beyond a minimal level. It seemed the ship was stuck in a power save mode of some kind. 

Melia turned a corner, and Erisa sped up so as not to lose her. She turned the corner just in time to see her disappear into a room just a few doors down the corridor. It took her only moments to reach the door and enter the room. There she found Melia using alien tools to work on a strange sphere. Where the tools came from she had no idea. Nor did she have any idea what Melia was doing. The sight however was suspicious. It was clear from her movements that she was not just poking around in an alien system. She moved with purpose and handled the strange tools as if she had used them before. Erisa knew she had never used them before. In fact, Erisa had never seen anything like those tools before. The tool she was currently using was small and round. It emitted some kind of glowing energy beam that simply separated the alien alloys. It was not cutting. She had no idea how to describe it, but the previously solid and smooth metal surface split apart. 

In just a few moves, she opened a path into the sphere, and then switched tools. As she started to work on the alien circuitry. Erisa watched for a moment before she found her voice. “What are you doing?”

Melia didn’t even look back, “Restoring the ship’s ability to self-repair.”

She stared blankly for a moment not expecting such a straightforward answer. She stuttered out a response, but apparently, she was intelligible enough. As Melia answered, “How? The ship taught me. Told me how to fix it.”

“The ship? How could the ship have told you that?”

Melia looked back for a moment, “That chair was equipped with a neural interface. I interacted directly with the ship’s AI core. I know everything about this ship now. The ISS Constellation is a Sovereign-class battleship built to serve in the Imperial Solean fleet. Sovereigns were the mainstay battleships of the Solean fleet, powerful and highly versatile. No single ship in their size class was a match against them. Be they ally or enemy in origin, they underscored the vast superiority of the Soleans over the other precursor civilizations. They were the oldest, and most powerful of the ancients. Their empire at its height stretched across nearly two and a half thousand galaxies. Ships like this one played a significant role in how they protected and maintained that territory.”

Erisa had no idea what to say. That feeling in the pit of her stomach grew. There was something about this that was not right. She looked around quickly for some reason expecting an ambush but seeing no sign of one. Melia was already moving to work on the wall. She sighed, and asked worried about the answer, “Why did the ship tell you all this?”

Melia didn’t look at her as she continued working and answered, “I had something she wanted, and she gave me something in return.”

Erisa gave Melia an incredulous look, “You made a deal with an alien AI? What exactly did you trade, and for what?”

Melia was silent for a moment or two. Focusing more on her task then the conversation, but finally, she answered, “The knowledge of the Ancients. That’s what I traded for. I know everything about the Soleans and their technology. Along with everything they knew about their allies and enemies. From the highly advanced Alteans, Dekalans, Demarians, Ushnok, and Vorimar, to the relatively young Erisay, Nekari, Vorinae, and the Ludole.”

Erisa didn’t recognize all those names. In fact, none of the first group of names meant anything to her. She had never heard those names spoken before. The second group of names however were all familiar to her. They were the names of the Elder races. The Ludole Contingency was a particularly powerful elder race whose nearest border outpost was nearly a year away if you took the shortest jump node path. The mysterious Vorinae were a secretive race that were only known by their actions. She knew of none who had actually met a Vorinae or even one of their ships. All however knew to avoid their territory as trespassing was certain death. Although it was widely known that the Vorinae and the Ludole were at war. The Erisay were an isolationist group that preferred not to interact with the galaxy at large. For the most part, keeping to themselves, but they were allies of the Ludole. 

As for the Nekari, they were too far away for any meaningful information to reach Erali worlds. What little she knew about them, indicated that they were a friendly, benevolent race. The races near their border benefitted from their guidance and protection. At least until they grew wise enough to defend themselves. Also if two protected races choose to war with each other, the Nekari would not interfere.

None of it however really answered her first question. Well, half of it anyway. It seemed Melia was avoiding answering that half of the question. She had a sinking feeling about the answer but pressed on the question. Pushing her other questions aside.

“What did you trade for that knowledge?”

Melia used a tool on some alien crystals and then looked over her shoulder for a moment. Her reply was short, but the meaning was fairly clear, “I gave her everything.”

Now she was very worried, and asked her, “What exactly do you mean by that?”

A part of her wished she did not ask. After Melia explained, she merely stared at her back in silence until she found her voice. When she did, Erisa practically shouted at Melia, “Are you Stupid!!!? Do you even have a brain!? What kind of FOOL would trade away their free will?”

She never got an answer to her rant. Melia ignored her as she went on. Then suddenly she heard a strange sound, followed by pain. Intense hot spikes of pain shot through her, and the world faded. She could not think, and nothing around her existed except the pain. Well, it did, but it failed to register in her mind. As such, she did not notice what was happening in the room.

If she had been able to, she would have noticed a strange alien drone float into the room from the doorway. One her back had been turned to. However, she did not see the drone nor did she sense what it did to her. Although she would quickly become aware of that.

When she returned to her senses, sometime had evidently passed. Melia was closing up the holes she had opened in the alien equipment, and the room was shaking intermittently. The shaking was accompanied by odd rumbling sounds. She rubbed her aching head, and asked, “What is going on?”

“A Neku fleet came out of hyperspace five minutes ago. Our ships are using the Constellation as a shield, and attempting to outmaneuver the Neku forces long enough for reinforcements to arrive. They already sent a distress call, but at best it will be two hours before a response fleet can get here. The shaking is from Neku torpedoes impacting the hull of the Constellation. Nothing to worry about.”

Erisa felt like worrying. She was impressed by the alien hull being able to withstand a barrage of Neku torpedoes. Neku plasma torpedoes were devastating, and while newer ships could take a few hits to the hull. Those hits were often crippling. She did not think the alien hull could hold up for much longer. She pushed herself off the floor and moved to grab Melia. “We need to get out of here before they breach the hull!”

Melia scoffed, glared, and authoritatively demanded that she sit. Erisa sat. It was so automatic that she was briefly confused about why she had sat down. However ,Melia was speaking before she could even voice a question about it. Leaving her a bit distracted about the question in the first place.

“We are in no danger of a hull breach. Those primitive plasma torpedoes could not hope to penetrate the hull. It is made of a neutronium based alloy, and enhanced by structural reinforcement fields. It would take a considerable refinement of the plasma warheads, and a significantly better focusing mechanism for them to have any effect on the hull. 

It would be centuries before their technology evolves to that point on its own. With their mysterious benefactor it may happen sooner, but we have several defensive options to deal with the fleet before they can report back and start that research.”

Erisa gave her a look, and asked, “What defensive options?”

“Well let’s start with the obvious. While most of the ship’s weapons are offline, one of the main cannons is still operational. It is not an option either I or the ship would recommend though. It was designed for use against capital ships, and supercapital ships. It fires hyperdensity plasma bolts in three round bolts. The Constellation mounts eight massive triple barreled cannons of this type. As for why we don’t recommend them, well they were not intended for use on such small fragile targets. They barely have the tracking to target the larger ships in the Neku fleet. Although that isn’t really a problem for the Constellation’s targeting computers, they could score a hit with them on a maneuvering fighter. Not an easy shot mind you, and not an efficient use of the weapons either. These cannons can destroy planets in short order afterall.

“Another obvious option is the torpedoes. Most of the launchers are intact, and while the bays are depleted that is not a problem. The ship has a number of energy intensive factories onboard for replenishing supplies in the field. They are not normally used to replace spent torpedoes in combat but it is possible. Normally the energy is better spent on the shields, weapons, or hull regeneration, but in our case the shields are fried and with the exception of a single cannon, all energy weapon mounts are down. However this isn’t the option the ship is considering.”

Erisa frowned, “The shields are fried?”

Melia nodded, “The shield generators overloaded when they were hit by subspace shockwaves during the battle that disabled the Constellation. The damage is actually repairable, but it will take time. Too much time for the shields to be an option. Otherwise, we could just regenerate the generators and extend the shields around the allied Erali fleet.”

“Then what is the ship planning to do?”

“The ship has a number of secondary weapon mounts that aren’t heavily damaged. Without too much trouble, power can be restored to the disruptors and a few of the PPBs. In fact, the ship is already regenerating the needed systems to bring them online.”