The
Inquisitor's mission seemed to be going better than possibly expected. They were prepared for a month's long search for something, the crew (like Billy) were never informed what. The
Inquisitor was an armed exploration and survey cruiser based on the proven
Broadsword class Mercenary cruiser.
Onboard were an group of scientists and academics. Some had expertise in different space sciences (Dr. Goezghae, Dr. Heinrich Chandragora, Dr. Lurushar GIlenkaar and Dr. Vledistart Mirost). The expedition head was an archaeologist (Prof. Lorain Messandi) and her 2nd in command, Dr. Talian McKenzie, was a Xenobiologist. They expedition brought along a miscellaneous support crew with personnel hard to classify but probably ex-military or scouts of some kind and "interstellar travellers" of some unspecified sort.
Billy himself was a new hire to the crew. He'd been hired on contract as a crewmember for the
Inquisitor. The Captain was an old Imperial ex-scout, Cyrus Shagguurap. Most of the crew knew each other and stayed together for the 7 weeks in transit. A few newcomers like himself were also new and kept themselves apart. "Lucky Jack" McIntyre was a belter, Lexi Garcia was a cutter gunner and Jeri Marrenda was a cutter pilot. The
Inquisitor carried 2 Eagle-class modular cutters:
All Billy knew was that the expedition aboard
Inquisitor was looking for something, something very old and archaeology-related. Not the semi-mythical Ancients but something relating to a minor human race nicknamed the "Sky Raiders" that preyed on the worlds of this area. They were a common myth among the scattered worlds of the Vlazdhumecta in Far Frontiers dating back several thousands of years. Many Worlds in this sector were settled by the Vlazdhumecta, a minor human race that was descended from and split off from the Zhodani, then for some reason went into steep technological and social decline. More recently, waves of Imperial colonists arrived and so many planets now had majority Solomani, Vilani or mixed Imperial populations. The Worlds of Far Frontiers were a mixture of Zhodani and Imperial clients with several independent star empires and neutral planets, and the Consulate border ran through the coreward subsectors.
Strangely, the scientists of the expedition didn't seem to be looking for the Sky Raiders on planets but were instead scanning deep space with powerful telescopes and sensors. They seemed to know where to look and quickly located their target, jumping into interstellar space. What they found was a massive asteroid ship, a nickle-iron body ten kilometres long, slowly spinning on its axis as it continued along a lonely course at a fraction of the speed of light that in less than a century would take it straight across the Zhodani border. It seemed fantastic but this ship had been travelling for thousands of years. Once it had held a population of millions in uncounted chambers and tunnels bored through the asteroid. Drives were not just Bussard ramjets supplied by (now-absent) electromagnetic fields but actual mammoth Jump drives likely fed by millions of tons of hydrogen gathered from from the ramjet intakes and water ice collected en route by small craft. There was likely a fantastic treasure trove aboard. Some power sources seemed to still be functioning, possibly nuclear and fusion backup generators.
Thomas had gotten the feeling something was off. Just before the final Jump from Saulente in the Memnosyne Principality, a joke from Ken about Zhodani space marines being smuggled aboard provoked a paranoid reaction from Captain Shaggurap. Unfortunately, they couldn't prove anything. Investigations into ship's records was stymied by intrusion security and while the cargo bays assigned to the expedition were open to inspection others for ship stores were off limits. Although Billy was unaware of this, as a crew-member had access to most ship areas but couldn't access the secure storage bay, locked out by a code possessed only by the Captain and senior ship's crew. The
Inquisitor matched course with the massive Sky Raider mothership and a preliminary landing party was formed.
Some of the expedition boarded Cutter 1 and descended to the surface: Lucky Jack, Jeri Marrenda, Lexi Garcia, Prof. Messandi, Hanno Sakawa, Ken Jenkins, Neva Morosova, Linus Spruance and Blake Renfield. Talia, who Thomas first met on the expedition to Mirayn, asked him to hold back, to help keep an eye on the ship while Lorrain and the rest of his crew were down there. At first, things proceeded according to plan. Because the Sky Raiders were thought to have commonly booby-trapped all all air locks and ship locks, plus automatic defenses could be active, an impact crater deep enough to allow access to subsurface tunnels was selected to provide an entry point.
GM Note: Ok, where do you want your characters to generally be located? Talia is on the bridge.