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The little clock symbol on the message crawled up to time zero, the white on black fleet intelligence symbol was replaced with an image of elderly Panatrak, his avian form patterned grey and black, and contrasting again with the brightly colored loose robes he wore. The background setting was strangely inconsistent, instead of the wood-lined office and antique furniture that Johan was expecting, and secretly dreading, the speaker was apparently in a modern glass and chrome office with a view to a large waterfall behind him. The heard voice was actually the Panatrak’s own, which seemed accustomed to using the rather more crude human languages, though there was a certain melody as his own mother tongue influenced what he spoke.

‘Good day, I trust I have not caused a major interruption, we felt that we would give you a bit of a warning first.’ His voice was calm and soothing, and the waterfall in the background added to the sense of serenity.

‘No, not at all’ said Johan, though in a rather lost tone, he was quite relieved at this rather relaxed communication, he was expecting a stream of commands and instructions administered by a speaker as sympathetic as a hurricane.

‘Anyway I must get to business, the story is quite long, and it would be useful if you adjusted you ship to fly along this vector, at your top sustainable speed if you please’

Meredith was typing out the confirmation code into the touch display navigation console before he had finished the sentence.

            Around the ship the turbulent storm that was holding them captive was slowly closing in, and becoming rather more severe.

            ‘Mag. You got any ideas?’

            Magellan, the non-corporeal member of the crew of two, was feverishly measuring the walls of their cells, though regions of the wall seemed to become semi-plausible to cross for transient moments, his ability to respond to or even predict these areas was sorely deficient.

            ‘No I have no better ideas than you, I think all we can reasonably do is wait and see, though I suggest for your safety you put your self into the stasis pod, no point in you being turned into a thin red film because you had no good ideas.’

            ‘I don’t want to leave you to it, I mean something might come up...’

            ‘It’s a very kind suggestion, but its really for the best, if you really want to help you can sit in the chamber and use your neural interface to communicate, and I promise I will not switch on the unit until it is absolutely necessary.’

            ‘I am not going to win a better compromise am I?’

            ‘No.’

            Calica got out of her freely swiveling pilot seat, as it had now realized that violent shaking was not high on the cards. The ship although quite big for its class, being a little over fifty metres, had very little crew accessible areas, the reason for this was the craft was built for speed, and that a large amount of the ship was stuffed full of the systems that allowed to go fast, the huge driver coils, and the large power plants were only one side to the designers nightmare, the heat handling, fuel conditioning and storage systems took up large portions of the ship as well. Calica took the small ladder down to the deck below, where the vestigial surgery of the ship resided, she always thought it rather a grim space, with its surgery table overhung with robotic arms and sensor mounts on telescoping rods. Beyond this clinically clean nightmare were the three large stasis cabinets, one of which was full of the various biological perishables that had to be kept under stasis, the other two she had organized into the first to give two completely clear cabinets, in which she could shelter in if necessary. Her foresight did her credit. She tapped a few commands onto the panel to the side of one of empty cabinets, handing it over to Magellan, and pulled open its thick door. She stepped inside, she let the door slowly close to.

            ‘Ok I’ve got you, can you here me?’

            Calica heard the disembodied voice coming through her pilot’s headphones. She was wondering about how much air this chamber had, the small life support unit above her head did not seem large enough to process the air.

            ‘I hear you, any change?’

            ‘No I am afraid the walls are still coming in, I can’t even see normal space outside it now, the turmoil is so great.’

            ‘Marvelous’

            There was the briefest suggestion of a flicker.

            ‘I had to turn the unit on for a few minutes, but it is safe to come out now, outside space has returned to normal’ his voice was almost cheerful in light of current events, Calica raised her hopes a little

            That was the greatest annoyance of stasis, she speculated, time for you ceased to exist, where as the rest of the universe ground on regardless. When you were returned back you not only felt out of joint as things had moved on a bit, but also that horrible feeling that the experience for you had been continuous, which it had.

            Calica pushed open the smooth surface of the cabinet and began to climb the ladder she had only moments before, at least in her experience.

            ‘Ok bring me up to date’