The Inner Ring (gxg)

Chapter 25

"Well, the system could be set up with one color for the alien ship, and then another color for unknowns, and then a third for enemies," Lena surmised.

"Fine, but hear me out," Pepper continued. "If the big ship is blue, that confirms they're not the same race as the fox aliens from this ship, right?"

"Right," Vanessa confirmed, as Lena nodded along.

"But the odds of that ship being damaged, and not the enemy is slim, right? Unless there are two races attacked by a third, which is a stretch."

"Oh shit," Vanessa sighed, realizing where Pepper was going.

"So that means, that for whatever reason, this computer thinks that our ship is the same as the enemy one over there," Pepper stated. "They were fighting humans."

"That can't be right, can it?" Lena wondered.

"Well, not humans from Earth, but the system obviously recognizing them as the same."

"That is going to be a shit show when Earth hears that theory," Lena chortled. "Let's go call the press!"

"We may not want to mention this to people, not until we explore the other ship," Vanessa suggested cautiously.

"That is a good idea. We could be wrong after all, and if we get people worked up over nothing it could lead to a lot of unnecessary stress," Pepper agreed.

"And violence, knowing how people react to unexpected news," Vanessa said with a snort of laughter.

"I'm fine with that," Lena nodded.

"So, what do these other controls do?" Vanessa asked, pointing to the other buttons on the radar display."

"Well, if they're like the tablets, the one on the left is like a rewind, and the one on the right is a forward," Pepper suggested.

"Let's see if it can tell us where it came from then," Lena said, pressing the left button. As she did, the screen blanked, then another press and the blue line disappeared. "Well, that makes no sense."

"It does," Pepper commented. "It was probably in standby mode for a long time, so it wasn't collecting data when we were approaching with our ship. It most likely will only show things from when the ship was active."

"So, it might show the battle?" Vanessa offered.

"Well, a small digital version, but it just might." Pepper agreed with a shrug.

"I'm going to rewind a bit then, and let it play, see how it looks," Lena stated. "Maybe it will make some sense to us." She kept pressing the button until the big blue planet was gone, and then let it play.

The display showed the large triangle, surrounded by a swarm of smaller triangles, approaching Uranus from outside the solar system. They entered the orbit, and then the large blue ship appeared. It was no longer a circle, but more of a lollipop shape, slipping onto their scopes from behind the largest moon, Ariel. It came in from behind the little fleet, and the size of it was more than triple the large diamond ship. As soon as it appeared the triangles started to slow. The display didn't show any weapons firing, but it seemed obvious that the larger ship was disabling the ships of the foxes. The holes must have been appearing in the ships at that point.

It was a classic ambush. Hiding the large ship behind a moon, then attacking from the rear before the enemy could react.

And then everything changed.