The Inner Ring (gxg)

Chapter 22

The bridge was glowing with a faint light. It wasn't a big thing, but every panel along the wall was suddenly lit by the screens coming to life as well as the buttons and knobs having glowing lights within them. Overhead, the dome itself had what appeared to be a ring of lights flowing around it, glowing softly to provide more illumination. It wasn't bright, but more like emergency lighting.

"Holy fuck!" Vanessa exclaimed, taking in the sight once their eyes adjusted to the light.

"Damn, this is amazing!" Agreed Pepper.

"I guess I pressed the right button, huh?" Nessa laughed.

"Maybe? Or maybe the bridge was in a standby mode and waiting for something to be used? If the engines were never damaged, this whole ship could still be functional." Pepper thought aloud.

"Yeah, except for the giant hole." Nessa joked.

"True. That means those smaller ships are probably all functional too. The weapons took out all of the living aliens, leaving the ships intact."

"But something destroyed that other ship." Nessa pointed out.

Pepper sighed in frustration. "Yeah, but we don't know what. We may need to bring Lena over here. Or any of the pilots really, they would understand a bridge more than we do."

"Do you think this one can move?" Vanessa stared around in wonder.

Pepper joined her in gazing at her surroundings. "No, I don't think so. If the enemy knew how to destroy the ship in one shot, then over where the hole is was probably where the flight controls were. But that doesn't mean that a lot of the instruments can't still be used. We may be able to do a lot with that."

"Do you really think this is a colony ship of some sort?" Vanessa asked quietly.

"I do. Unless they were running an interstellar cruise ship while packing weapons, it is the most likely explanation I have." Pepper theorized.

"Then let's say you're colonizing a new planet. You'd bring a lot of information from your home world, right? Cultural information, technical documents and specifications, you name it!" Nessa was getting excited at the prospect of learning more than they ever could have by just grabbing a few weapons. "This is where the real wealth is."

Pepper sat back and realized she was right, there should be so much information accessible to them right here. They didn't even need to explore the rest of the ship! "So, we need to let everyone else in on this, right?" She asked nervously.

Vanessa thought about it for a moment. Normally, she would have already been calling her father about the discovery, but his actions lately, and even before in talks about destroying ships to leave nothing to other companies, made her hesitate. "I think we need to, but not yet. I want to see if we can get the information ourselves first. Maybe we take some pictures and show them to Lena first and see if she can help. Or, if we're lucky, she can come over again with us after Emily is done with her work."

"This information needs to be saved," Pepper decided aloud.

"Right. That is why we're keeping it quiet for now."

"Well, let's go see what all of the different screens show, it might give some clues about what we're dealing with."

As they moved about the room, they studied each of the screens. Most showed some sort of data readout, though without understanding the language and numbers it wasn't possible to know what they were measuring or displaying. One panel on the far side had several screens, each of which had a view from a different camera, and the girls stared at it, entranced. One camera showed their ship, another the planet below. Two showed views of space, most likely above and below the ships, and the last two showed views both fore and aft in the ring itself. The forward view was trained on the smaller ships in front, and the large bulk of the ruined ship beyond.