A Vault of Stars

Stellis Gloria

2102

Pluto Base

****

Pluto base, Jackson thought tiredly, was what happened when you were connected enough to command something and the brass hated you. Nothing went on there except receiving inbound from the scattering of colonies out there and riding herd on a ton of astrophysicists. It might have been more interesting if they got outbound traffic as well, but that would imply that outbound traffic needed the herding. Inbound came in through Pluto, outbound just went ninety degrees to the eliptic and put their foot down. It was a better deal than being a Super-Weenie, though. Once you got on the Supercarrier track in any of it's myrriad forms, you were locked down until someone died or retired. The only advancements that were going on right now were in the Warp-capable commands, and base staff. It could be worse, though. The scientists could be Up To Something...

"Pluto Base, this is Charon Center. We've found Something. Something Big."

Jackson could hear the capitol letters. The scientists had just Done Something, and his carpal tunnel could just feel the paperwork incoming. Rot the bastards in XBR, XCOM Bureau Records, who wanted signed paper backups of everything bigger than a milk run. Grumbling, he slipped into his suit of Mark III Carapace armor and locked in the backup survival gear. Scientists were stuck on Charon because so many of them loved playing with explosive things, like the never-to-be-sufficiently-damned railgun rounds. Jackson knew the concept of VMPT rounds, but cramming a capacitor, plasma generator, and mass-variation system inside a half-ton slug without reducing the slug's stability was not easy. Something hinted to Jackson that this wasn't about the railgun ammunition, though.

****

Ten Minutes Later

****

"Alright, I know I'm just the base commander who makes sure you guys don't level anything important, but I'd like to know what exactly this thing is." Jackson stated calmly as he looked at what could only fall under the terms "Thingy" or "Fiddly Bits".

"We don't know." The head scientist said, looking around nervously. This was not a good day for him.

"Alright then." Jackson said, rubbing his temples, "What isn't it?"

"Excuse me?"

"What isn't it? You obviously don't know, so tell me what you know about what it is not. For example, is it a weapon?"

"We're reasonably sure it's not a weapon."

"Yes or no answers, please."

"No."

"Did humans build it?"

"No. Defiantly no."

"Does it have any Vahlanic alloys?"

"No. It's all fairly elementary. Doesn't even use any of the Base Ten matrices."

Jackson raised an eyebrow. The scientist grumbled, and explained.

"Base Ten matrices are the most basic Vahlanic matrices that produce a Vahlanic alloy. They use the energy present in Elerium to create massive unlikely chemical combinations reliably, as well as what anyone not in the branches of molecular science would describe as 'fiddly bits'. The end result is two chemical formulas that are the same, but produce wildly different substances."

Jackson grunted, looking at the item again.

"Can you find out what it does?"

The scientist grinned.

"I already called up  XRD. I hope you can hum the tune to 'Modern Major General' Mr. Jackson."

"To be technical, it's Commander Jackson."