"Corruption of Time"

I stood looking with grief at my wrecked other half. I still was thanking whatever god watched over me for the shield that had absorbed a lot of that Photon Beam, and my new armored hull as well took some of the energy. What didn't get absorbed however burned my nice red finish and nearly slagged my new engines. Their advanced rectangular shape had looked really nice when they were first installed and now they looked terribly ruined. I turned to look at where I had neatly 'landed' us. We had missed the ocean and were now with my other half's nose in deep in the soft sands. I was lucky the weapon ports had closed when the reactor shutdown or I'd be shooting sand instead of laser and particle beams.

"Janice?" Her second poked her head out of the hatch and shook her head unhappily.

"The reactor charger was the cause of the reactor shut down but the heavy energy drain that cut out the engines was caused by a tachyon field." She jumped out and walked over to me with a grim look.

"Tachyon? Was that a communication tachyon?"

"We don't know, but whatever it was it was powerful. Oh, we'll be restarting the reactor in a few minutes, Nina found a cracked injector and is replacing it."

I merely nodded looking about us. There was a sense of the unfamiliar in the air and it made me feel nervous. Janice silently turned and started to the hatch when a high pitched whine met our ears. I felt the reactor activate the power in it growing stronger with every second. I ran the diagnostics noticing the nanites had finished the internals of the Starboard side engines. Weapon systems were working with the exception of the Photon Cannon, life support was minimally damaged, the anti-gravity units were with their bigger cousins the engines. A big old inoperative status for all mobility systems.

"Janice," I cried stopping her as she took the first step inside the ship. "Get Lillith out here with a gun and have Josie get the airwing prepped for a trip."

"Where are you going, Alis," Janice asked concerned.

"I don't know, really." I sent my scanners across the ten miles that I could acquire in this state and noticed a city's boundary to the west. "There is a city to the west. We'll check it out. If it's got repair materials, I have you transported to the city for it.

"We'll wait for your signal."

I nodded and turned to the bay hatch as I opened it. The vehicle that we were going to use was a short range air wing with low fuel and no defenses, but it could takes us where my ship couldn't go. Within the hour Lillith and I were screaming across the green landscape to the city that was inset in the earth. We stopped the vehicle at the edge of a cliff where a road crossed inside. There were no other vehicles out though giving the city an eerie look. I for one was confused, when I had arrived yesterday to confront Constance there had been no city of this size and level of technology on the entire planet. This city sprawled like a spider web of gleaming steel and glass. Something that I found alien on this world. Not even the mighty city of Nortune was this magnificent.

"Do you want to enter? They look like they might have the metal that we need," Lillith asked tossing her red hair in the light breeze.

I nodded, "Let's go, but doesn't it seem strange to you?"

"What," Lillith asked climbing into the vehicle. "A large city, with no one running around in the wee hours of the morning?"

"The city period," I climbed in beside Lillith and took the control stick. "There was nothing this advanced here yesterday."

Lillith nodded silently as I started the vehicle along the road into the city. I had seen cities like this before, eerie and abandoned, people's belongings lying forgotten in the streets, during the times of my service to the Alliance. One of the fringe worlds had rebelled destroying the Alliance station high in orbit, the Free Worlds had sent warnings to the populace and they had abandoned their wondrous cities only to be atomized in their world's atmosphere. I hated to remember those days when I had struggled between loyalty and morals and loyalty had won. Things were different now, thanks to my crew, thanks to Fei, Elly, and their friends, they had shown me what was right and gave me the strength to break from the Alliance.

"Where do you think everyone is," Lillith asked looking with concern as they approached a park where clothes, cars, and other things lay almost in a pile at the city's center. I shook my head feeling the hairs on my neck raise. Using my scanners on the ship I searched for life but I was forced to stop after a few minutes, there was heavy tachyon particles in the area and it was conflicting with my sensitive scanners.

"This is very disconcerting," I said mainly to myself. I turned following signs that I recognized as Zeboim marked. I had downloaded everything about this world from the Alliance databases when I had broken from it. I wanted everything pertaining to the world that my invention had creation had nearly destroyed. Dues. I brought my thoughts back to my driving as I nearly crashed us into a set of overturned industrial trucks. I slid the airwing to a halt cursing all the while. Lillith looked to her captain with wide eyes but a smile grew on her face as she jumped out and ran to one of the trailers. A slab of shiny metal was hanging out of the trailer and she drew out her tech scanners and tools to test the metal.

"Alis," the young woman cried looking up, "This is duranium! The same metal that your old hull was created out of. Sure it is inferior to the Tridura-steel that is used now in your hull but it should do fine for…" A flash of light halted her words blinding us but once we had opened our eyes once more there was activity and noise. The two overturned trucks were back on their wheels and on top of that a man was pulling out one of the metal slabs handing it to a bewildered Lillith.

"Lillith, what happened?"

Lillith took the slab of metal with a grunt and with the man's help took it to the back of the airwing and attached it to the external cargo tray. Once the man was gone she came to my side and showed me the scanner. I raised an eyebrow a look of intrigue cross my fair face. Trilumin-steel a far more advanced metal and rare to boot, the Alliance had lost many of the worlds that held this metal to the Free Worlds but there was no money to build the refineries to make this metal in the Free Worlds. My question was how did duranium become Trilumin-steel in the span of a second and why was there all of a sudden people in the city?

"We'll send more to your ship with in the hour," the trucker told them in a gruff voice as he shut the doors to the trailer. I nodded and turned to Lillith very unnerved.

"What is going on here," I demanded sharply but I knew that she didn't know the answer to that. "We better get back to the ship," I replied with a stressed sigh, "if there is an entire shipment coming to us I want to be there when it happens."

"Agreed. This is getting to spooky for me," Lillith said jumping into the airwing and grabbing onto her large cannon of a gun.

I spun the airwing around and headed back using the road that led us inside the city. This time however there was heavy traffic, radio signals buzzed, traffic and law enforcement aircars watched the citizens wearily. I stopped us suddenly once we were sitting on the ledge that looked over the city, there was something that bothered me about this picture. "Lillith do you see something different about this," I asked her my eyes scanning the entire city.

"Nope, not a thing. Just that there are suddenly nearly a million people running about as if nothing had happened here," her tone dripped with sarcasm.

The central building looked different, I was sure of it. Perhaps it was just the unique color to it, all black and ominous looking. The red flag that swung in the air. I gave a rather angry snort as I sat turned away from the city, I then droves us back to the ship full of worry and confusion. Once back I was surprised to note that a naval vessel sat just a quarter mile away from shore. Nina and Janice were talking to a clean shaven man that stood beside a boat and wearing a strangely familiar uniform. When he saw our approach he alerted Janice and Nina to us. The two young women waved for us to join them which we did. I winced as I passed the still terrible looking engines and I hoped that with this new metal the nanites would fix it.

"Captain, this Commander Dresden of the Zeboim Naval forces," Janice said with a cautious tone. "Commander this my Captain Alis and this is my comrade Lillith."

We nodded in greeting but I turned quickly to Janice and whispered into her ear, "Lillith has some readings she wants you to look at. Also there is a truck coming to supply us with replacement materials." Janice nodded and took a hold of Lillith's arm with a very excited tone to her questioning voice as they left heading towards the airwing. I turned back to the Commander with an apologetic look. "I'm sorry for my rudeness, but there are things that need to be taken care of."

"Think nothing of it, Captain. As I was telling your second there is word of trouble coming from the capital city. There is talk of treason and such and it would be unfortunate if you and your crew would accidentally get involved."

"Treason? The city looked pretty stable when I went in," I asked with genuine distress. This day was getting to long. I was beginning to think that I should've stayed in bed and dry dock.

"The word hasn't be put out publicly over the Satnet yet, but it is true," He replied with a sigh. "It seems that the secretary to the Emperor was found trying to destroy the empire. Something this huge will disturb the people greatly and blame will be put on strangers."

I nodded glad that things hadn't gotten bad on our way out of the city. "Thanks for the warning we will more than likely leave after repairs are done."

The commander nodded his eyes drifting to my red and blackened by Photon energy ship. "That's a strange vessel you have there, where are you from if I may ask?"

I suddenly remembered that these people may not know about me or that I was interstellar, "Development and exploration based near Babel Tower."

"Ah," he replied, "Independent or Government."

"Independent," I replied quickly throwing back my red hair that was being blown by the sea breeze. "I'm testing out a new aerial propulsion system and Geo-synchronized navigation method."

"Interesting. Battleship sized too." A signal from the ship alerted me directing my attention towards the rise that overlooked our position. Three truck stopped with a hiss of air brakes and a whine of servos. Nina left without needing my prompting heading to where Janice, Josie, Lara, and Lillith waited. I turned back to the commander with an apologetic look.

"I'm sorry, but our repair materials have arrived and I need get my vessel airborne once more."

"I understand," he pushed his boat into the gentle waves of the sea and jumped in, "If you need any help just call my ship the Vengeance. The personal radio signal is 4512.4."

"Thanks," I called back waving as he started his small motor and aimed the vessel to the larger gray ship. When he was out of sight my smile changed to a frown and I lowered my hand. What was up with him, he was way too interested in the ship and my crew. I didn't like him and I doubted very much that I would need his help in the future. I went to my crew who was busy helping the truckers unload the metal onto anti-gravity carts and toting it over into a neat pile beside the ship's aft quarter. Once the truckers had left and the naval vessel was finally gone from our sight we began to integrate the new metal into my hull. I had gone through the same process last year when I converted duranium to Tridura-steel. It felt funny, it made me even feel icky and itchy, and all that because I was linked to the ship far more intimately than a woman should be, and it left a silvery liquid mess underneath the ship, much like a snake it seemed.

Janice turned to me with a concerned look, they knew how much I really hated this process. "Why don't you go get some sleep? This'll take a good half a day, and you didn't get any sleep last night."

"You guys didn't either," I argued but shook my head. Nina and Josie had started placing the metal against hull and watched it as the nanites disassembled reassembled it in my hull. All ready it was rubbing my nerves raw and Janice could see it. "You'll find me in my chamber. Don't be surprised if I turn all the ship's functions save the Anti-gravity systems off."

"You just get some sleep. Well take care of you."