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The speaker on the screen in front of them paused to try to think of a suitable way of putting together the events he was trying to convey, the moment that he paused he was completely motionless only the cascade behind him indicated that the communications had not jarred to a halt.

‘Where to begin, where to begin, about seven hours ago we had a ship cross our inner borders, but this ship was unlike the thousands that traverse it every hour, in fact it has proven to be rather a mystery’ the speaker paused again, Johan was compelled to speak, as he felt that it was expected of him.

‘But it is a federation vessel?’

‘Yes, of course, as far as we now, but that is rather the point. The ship is actually part of our exploratory team, not one of the large vessels, but a much smaller reconnaissance vehicle, with a crew of only one person, and an artificial intelligence, this ship has been away on a mission for over a month, a mission that was only to take twenty days.’

The speaker paused, Johan was beginning to believe that it was for dramatic effect, but he rolled on.

‘Though this in itself is not unexpected for a reconnaissance mission, the fact the ship has refused all communications for most of this time is the greater surprise. No one, until about a day ago, knew where the ship was, it had even cancelled its ident beacon so even crude positioning could not be made.’

Another dramatic pause followed, but it seemed to have a point, the speaker’s image was replaced by some footage of a space engagement, images highlighted with labels, and numerics.

‘The ship is one of the fastest we have designed, this however has proved a problem as no one has been able to intercept it, a few hours ago a ship on the inner frontier tried to establish contact with the ship, none was received, but the ship did broadcast a message. Attempts were made to capture the ship, but these failed, the ship had slipped into a cloaking mode, the sensor network has managed to just about keep track of it, something we would not be able to do if we hadn’t known its course. But here is the culmination of my communication, we have lost track of it, and we think it is in the system you are in.’

The last little speech had been hurried, as if a very crude summary had been made from many important events, but the last sentence had brought a horrible degree of realism to the story, Johan began to see the shape of the near future.

‘Which I think brings us to what we would like you to do. The craft is thought to be carrying vital information, we need to recover it as soon as possible, your ship is very close to the point where we lost tracking, we would like you to assist in locating the ship, and if possible the recovery of the craft with the vital information, there are five ships which will be able to help or assist in the operation within the hour, but you are our rapid response team. Relevant information has been transferred to your computer, this channel will close at the end of communication, but any information can be sent through to other fleet intelligence channels, please keep us informed.’

‘Have you told us the full story?’ Johan said, the burst of information was slowly sinking in, but it still felt as if he had slipped into some strange fantasy world.

‘Everything important yes, ordinarily we would leave it to the pursuing craft, but the recovery of the ship is of paramount importance, though we recommend you proceed with caution.’

‘Can we expect trouble?’ Meredith replied, the situation in the last few minutes had shocked her, but still retained a sense for the protection of her ship.

‘The ship is by all account the one we sent out, the sightings at the border confirmed this, but the behaviour is out of line with expected, though we do not believe the ship has been taken over. In terms of defensive capability if she turns out to be hostile, the ship has received much damage, all weapons systems that were installed seem to be out of operation now, or at least shut down, though we still advise caution. If ship starts adopting defense back out, and leave to the other ships. I am sorry for interrupting your mapping expedition, but the urgency of the situation... well you know.’

‘Ok,’ said Meredith ‘we shall see what we can do, and shall keep you informed.’

‘Thank you, we are sorry to have caused an inconvenience’

Before she could think of a reply the channel had closed, in its wake the computer started to display the rest of transferred information, ship parameters, trajectories, and procedure outlines.

‘Well that was…’ Johan started.

‘Yes’ Meredith said in a similarly lost voice.