"Sounds like fun all around," Grunt replied, "But I'm not really the heroic type. If we can't go smooth then we take the Gordian approach. If that doesn't work we bug out and they can kill it however they like."

He looked around.

"Sorry, but I don't do the motivational, light a passion in people stuff. We're all professionals, stick to the plan when possible, fall back to your training when it isn't, and above all keep a cool head. In spite of what the civilian kibtzers say, C3 hates throwing away resources."

"Gordian, who's this?"  One of the soldiers asks.

"I think he's a God down on 5th Engine,"  Frank tells the other soldier.  "Good words Grunt, sir.  Since you're not normally attached to our squad we have a nonstandard code."

The other soldiers start nodding.

"You hear the word 'grapnel' it means start bugging out to a more fortified area but slowly, no causing alarm.  'Pivot' means the opposite, get ready for a sweeping aggressive advance.  No questions asked, no recriminations later.  We've survived some stuff in the past because of our gut instinct."

"Mine are standard. And Gordian is an old story about cutting through a knot," Grunt told them simply, "I lead from the front, first in each breach. Not a rock but tougher than most Air Aspects."

"Alright.  You're the pointman, then, and will take the brunt.  Suits us fine,"  Frank says with a nod, "Think we're gonna get along fine.  Alright everyone, lock and load, we're heading to the Salk."

Grunt is given one last chance to load up for anything he needs.

Knife, shotgun, the usual handful of breaching charges, a small collection of tools for getting access panels and such open... Grunt was as equipped as could be considered reasonable. The confines of the ship meant that big emplacement weapons were impractical.

So he finished the last adjustments and went to wait for the hard vacuum crossing, glad that at least that part was not his responsibility.

The Salk is a comfortable ship, as far as quarantine-ships go; a Nike class cruiser is by necessity designed for both form and function, and a comfortable crew is an efficient crew.  They're loaded into a medium-sized tug, big enough for all of them, which Wail is to pilot to get them closer to the Royet.  They load up on either side of the tug.

"Sensors on, engines on, essence shields minimal," Wail announces.  They all chuckle.  The minimum on a tug is also the maximum. "Departing hangar- I have sensors on the Royet.  Engaging thrusters."

They're quiet for some time,

"Sensors are detecting life.  Algonquin, can you take a look at this?"

Algonquin heads up to the cockpit.  He mumbles something in a hoarse voice, "Take readings of the engines.  Grunt, come up here too.  Does any of this look familiar?"

He's hardly an expert, but he'd seen some of the readouts of ONYX SPIRE and some Immaculate ships from the Konnidan and some of the Buchenwald before their tug was destroyed.

None of the engine readouts look familiar.  They don't look like a standard ship's, nor do they look like any of the Abyssal vessels he's seen.  Most importantly, he's pretty sure they don't match Immaculate records.

"I'm no expert, but it doesn't look like any of the weird shit I've seen before," Grunt said as he manipulated the display a bit, trying to get a feel for the thing. The life signs might change his tactics a bit once inside.

(Assessment of engines: 9, 7, 7, 6, 6, 2 & 2
Craft: 22 + 10 = 32
Tactics: 26 + 10 = 36
Float the 7s)

Grunt has no idea what the hell is going on with the readings.  The display shows those large rocky growth-tumors clustered around the engines, dark and heavy, like awful stony barnacles growing on a shell.

"Life signs are stronger there,"  Wail observes.  "Strongest near the densest conglomeration."

"Then the growths are possibly alive."  Algonquin says with a sour voice. "But the engines will output the most warmth.  It's possible survivors of the Royet could be holed up there as well."

"Life signs are pervading the Royet,"  Wail corrects him.  "There are some fluctuations.  It's not matching up perfectly with the tumors."

Grunt has seen something that would fit there- the flesh-walls of that horrific alternate reality- but this feels altogether different.  The flesh-walls were calculated cruelty, a last mocking laugh at life; this is something grown, which the Neverborn are quite unlikely to do.

"Maybe we'll get lucky and whatever that is happens to be benign," Grunt said dryly as he reset the display to the default, "I see no option other than up close investigation. My vote is treat as pathogenic for now, so no direct contact if we can avoid it and closed air supplies."

He checked the seals on his own suit with a nod.

"Okay, all signs point to this being weird and that means nightmarish. Business as usual, don't break line of sight or formation, and keep in communication."

And with that, he got on with it.

"My thoughts as well,"  Wail agrees, "But I don't want to get that close to the thing.  Void gap it.  Sorry guys.  But we're not touching it."

Algonquin purses weathered old lips.  "Have a bad feeling.  Personally... I say it should get blasted.  Here and now."

"That's not what the higher ups want."

"I know."  Algonquin grimaces.

"Seals up, everyone," Wail announces, "Prepare for a void gap jump.  I'm bringing us to a holding pattern."

They feel the ship shudder and shake as she burns retros, maneuvering them close enough to the ship that they can't accidentally jump, miss the ship, and end up in the void of space.

One of Grunt's men has a small pack on his back- a retropak designed to retrieve someone who goes flying.  All of his men are already suited up.  One of them, Grunt isn't sure who, gives him the thumbs-up as the O2 starts getting pumped out of the ship.

Grunt returned the gesture and took his place by the airlock. He gave the experts enough of a lead to do their job, then followed.

As soon as they were inside he switched over to tight beam communications. No point in going loud while they were all in sight of each other.

"No improvising," he told his unit dryly as they crossed the gap and did the first visual sweep of whatever this ship had become.

Teams A and B head out first, with Mastiff and Grunt following behind them.  They jump the void gap perfectly, landing on the middle-spine of the ship with care.  Team B has the torches:  they cut a hole in the spine slowly while Team A sets up a 'portable airlock', a cute little device that keeps the whole ship from explosively decompressing.

Mastiff is first in.  Grunt's job is to be in second.

When he steps into the ship his sensors go all screwy in an instant.  They have cut into a locked hull segment.

"Humidity 100%.  O2 is just above Earth normal, a trace less CO2.  Temperature is 31.7C,"  Mastiff announces into a recorder, his assault rifle hefted in his other hand.  "Doors are locked down.  Someone tried to compartmentalize the Royet and wasn't able to do so.  Vents are still open.  There's not enough room here for our teams, we'll need to open one of the sides first."

"May as well open the one we need to pass down first," Grunt voted as he looked around, "We have blasting charges, although a bit early for that."

He keeps his weapon at the ready, covering for Mastiff while the other Terrestrial is attending to the log.

"In agreement.  Mastiff to recon team.  Attempting to open aft hallway door."

Mastiff advances on the door, checking the keypad.  He frowns as he tries one of the passwords they'd all been given.

"Nobody from the Royet shut down this section of the hull.  It would've required a thumbprint or essence donation to activate the pad.  Ship's computer is reporting neither was used to isolate this section of the hull.  It's also pretty well locked down from the other side.  I'm going to need to hotwire."

He puts down his prized assault rifle.

"Grunt, when this thing opens, it's going to open quickly.  We may have to save those breaching charges, just in case.  I got a feeling we'll need it on the outer hull."

Grunt gave Mastiff an exaggerated nod so that is was clear through the environment suit. He moved slightly to the left, raised the stock of the gun to his shoulder, and insured that he had a line of fire with no friendly elements when the door opened.

"Agreed. I'll be much happier when we secure whatever system is running things," he said, glancing at where a security camera would be expected for a moment before bearing down on the task at hand.

"Alright... just a second..."  Mastiff works on the panel, "There, in three, two, one..."

The door snaps open.

The hallway leads to a broad open hull segment.  Most Mercury-class transports are capable of holding cargo containers- hence the name- and so they can be deceptively big.  The Royet, as a mining vessel, would have had a catwalk looking over multiple containers.

Instead there's... something else.  The containers have been opened, making the transport a giant open container- an easy modification for some water tankers, albeit a risky one.  The wide-open expanse teems with weird life, balls of flowering fruit raising from an unknown substrate, reddish trees swaying in the distance, unknowable fungoids growing from nothing.

"I hate when I'm right," Grunt said, eyes tracking the strange forms but shotgun held steady, "Tight beam this back to command, anything starts drifting close I'll try to move it back."

Yes, he wanted to destroy all of it but given how weird some spirits on their side were this might be benign.

"Assuming this is all new since they left the growth rate really is epidemic."

"This certainly shouldn't be on the Royet,"  Mastiff says dumbfounded, picking up his assault rifle. "This might need to be full quarantine.  Limit number exposed.  Potential mission scrap.  Your opinion, Grunt?"

"Working on setting up a comm relay,"  Flametongue's voice is a crackle, "We're seeing very limited stuff on your end... there's a lot of interference..."

((Wu Wei, 59 or higher))

(Yeah, Wu Wei came nowhere close. Float the 1-1)

Grunt froze for a moment.

"Snap a local picture and get out," he told Mastiff, clearly not a request, "Whatever this is we are not ready to recover."

"Roger that, taking pictures-"  Snap, snap.  There's a wind in the tunnel of the Royet, a soft sigh, and then they both hear their comms squeal with feedback.

"Tho- abort-" Algonquin's voice crackles, "-bisect-... airlock!"

They hear a snap, POP POP, as the temporary airlock does... something.  Mastiff is the first back to it.  He inspects it quickly, assault rifle pointed up.

"It's melted shut, Algonquin, do you copy?"

"---forg--- -cast-"

Flametongue's voice now.

"------ommspike ---thinner aft"

"Can you get this bulkhead closed again and try the other?" Grunt asked Mastiff, not wanting to think about what could have melted something that precise, that quickly, "Because if we have to blow into the void I'd rather we not be next to those...spores."

"Good thinking,"  He says, quickly working on the wiring, "I made certain not to stick it in place... alright..."

The bulkhead closes.

"Good news is it's closed.  Bad news is I can't keep it that way if something knows how to open the door.  I can repeat the process for the other one."

He heads over to the hatch, "At least this way we can get to the bridge.  See what happened." The moment he touches the hatch that leads to the bow of the ship the door sliiiiiiiides open smoothly, almost smugly.

"Fuck."

"Yep," Grunt drawled in answer before he looked at the camera, "Fine, lead us where you want us, but we will rupture the hull if you try shoving us into whatever that-"

He pointed to the just closed hatch.

"-is. No need for the dramatics."

"The hell is going on, Grunt."  Mastiff says to him, shouldering his assault rifle.  Ahead of them is a crew lounge, a circular room with a table, a circular sofa, and a half-finished game of chess.  White seems to be losing.  There are still a few drinks sitting around, including one stale bottle of beer.

Mastiff makes no move to go forward.

"We got played. Don't know who, what, or why. They want to just deal with us," Grunt answered, clicking the suit to tight beam communication just in case, "Have to play by their rules for now."