Stepping off my ship's ramp to the FC's flight deck, I was assaulted by the worst smell anyone could dream up in the worst kind of nightmare imaginable.. A mix between organic flesh, burned to a crisp with an oily undercurrent of putrefied guck to the sweet smell of freshly cut gravediggers, those sulfurous egg like conch plants so common among the stars.. A definite rotten egg smell with dead meat in the mix.. Gagging, I quickly slip on a rem-lock mask, to preserve my nose and sanity.

Where can that be from? pulling out my genetic sampler, not sure I can even take a sample of the odor, I fire it up and hold the collector nozzle in the air. To my surprise, it actually registered some DNA samples in the air, so strong is the smell or presence of some unknown organic plant life.

"Alien life detected" purrs my collector, "more DNA required for complete analysis" the automated system tells me.. Alien life ? how.. it's just a smell, just a bad odor..

How did that get aboard? better yet, how does that have anything to do with my missing crew ?

I head to the concourse, no one there.. Check Vista Genomics.. no one there either, bar, supply shop and offices empty... I head down to engineering someone has to be somewhere.. all the while taking new samples with the inevitable Collector 'more diverse DNA required' shpeel.. Once I hit engineering, the collector chimes "second DNA sample acquired.. more DNA required for complete Analysis" Exiting engineering, I take the main corridor towards the engine room.. lights here are flickering on and off and a strange feeling comes over me, like the old saying 'someone just walked on my grave'. I shiver and keep walking... the main door to the engine room seems to be partially open, the top left quadrant stuck about 6 inches open. Seems to be fingermarks on it, in dirty brown.

That's when I see it, or feel it.. I am not sure.. something tickles my senses, auditory, visual, tactile, both or all three or none, not sure, can't be sure... it seems I can smell that odor even through my rem-lock.. it's more pervasive, more powerful, like a musk..

I can..hear..something, a voice.. my voice ? -"Your attention please.. everyone please make your way to the engine room, we have a guest and we need to welcome him appropriately.."

What ..? how..?

To be continued....!

Exacting space retribution is not something for the light hearted, it may come as a shock to most of you, but sitting in the flight seat of my DBX was NOT where I was wanting to be.. I had left My carrier, The Rhea back at the bubble on a whim, an itch you can not help but scratch, Professor Pahlin assured me that 5000 Light years out, was more than enough to allow him to start working on my drives since that was the chief reason for me to seek him out. I was not prepared however for the want to continue, once I started hitting Neutron star after Neutron Star, I came to, in Colonia wondering how that actually happened... like a fever, the 'bug' to explore, what is just beyond the next jump.

I digress, The Rhea, yes.. my home, was scheduled to rendez-vous with me in Colonia, after spending some downtime in a deep space system, having only 13 jumps left to Colonia, it went ...missing... I hate not being aboard when it jumps.. Just in case.. But I've already mentioned that.

Having not arrived on it's expected ETA, I set out at 1200 hours towards it's last know location. Once there, no sign of it, of course the jump wake had long since degraded, but there was no debris, nobody, nothing.

Not sure what to do from there, I returned to Colonia, hoping that somehow it would be there. and it was...

as I jumped in, scanned for the myriad of FC's in the system, I was so happy to see it show up on my Nav panel. I headed straight for it, once in range of the Comm link is when things started to really get weird.

Instead of my Traffic controller's voice over the comms, the automated response system was running, requesting docking and letting my auto-dock take it from there, I rapidly scanned for life signs and tried my Captain on her personal line.. nothing, no response. No life signs aboard my Carrier, no one.

I sit in my cockpit, wondering what to do.. life support seems to be functioning... but there is no life to support. No one home

Disembarking...

Addendum: I will be keeping a voice log as I go and inspect the carrier to see if I can find what happened to my crew.

Sitting at the bar in Jaques Station, Colonia, thinking....worrying... I have always hated not being on board during Carrier Jumps, just in case something went wrong, comms delay is already bad enough with the delay 6400 lights years away, Captain Boyle always sends me the report after each jump, I knew they were departing the Stuelou AT-J c25-24 system early this morning, system with little of note, except maybe for the Penal Ship Omicron in the system. 13 jumps to Colonia.. 12 reports from Captain Boyle.. then...nothing.

It's been 5 hours passed their ETA to Colonia, missjump ? the Rhea never had a missjump since I've owned her. Escaped prisoner from Omicron ? Doubt it. CMDR Ringers is in charge of Security, I don't think anything could slip past him. No, something else happened, not sure.. what is strange is no Comms at all from them and no reply to my 3 messages.

Well, if by 1200 hours I still have no answer, I'll head out towards the Kashyapa system, their flight plan didn't even pass by there, but I have to start somewhere and the Prometheus took a pretty hard beating from the trip here, so I will need somewhere to resupply and I just might know someone at Vihara gate that just might know something, if he'll even talk to me.

Update pending....