Since departing their meeting with the U.S.S. Callisto, the Yamato had departed on its mission of exploration. A quick stopover at DS17 led them off into the Typhon Frontier where they had spent the previous few weeks charting out various sectors. Most had been empty, some had had uninhabited star systems. Until they had started detecting distortions along the edge of one of the sectors.  Which had led them to their current position, just outside the distortions.

“All stop.” the Captain ordered, leaning forward in the command chair. Her eyes studied the viewscreen, which only showed normal space ahead of them. If only the ships sensors were as sure.

“Answering all stop, ma’am.” the helm officer replied. Sol’s eyes flit over to the operations station where her operations offer sat perplexed.

“Mr. Soren?” she asked.

“Nothing, ma’am. Sensors can’t penetrate the distortions.” he reported.

“‘Distortions’ is putting it mildly, Mr. Soren… I’ve never heard of distortions this strong covering an entire sector.” Sol said, standing. “Can you tell just how far they extend?” she asked. Soren tapped a few controls.

“At least three light years directly ahead of our current position, and potentially further, sensor resolution is poor.” he reported. Sol frowned.

“Helm, come about, keep the distortions off our port side… let’s see just how far they extend.” she ordered. She stepped over to the operations station as the ship banked to starboard. She glanced down at the sensor readings as the ship traveled along the exterior of the distortion field. Soren looked up at her then back to the display.

“From what little I can tell… they don’t appear to be hazardous to anything. We could enter if we wanted there would just be no telling what we would find with sensor resolution so low.” he said.

“Thats not something I think I want to risk quite yet…” Sol said, shaking her head. She stepped back from the station, stepping to the center of the bridge, she crossed her arms, watching the stars. She looked over to her XO.

“Let’s map the boundaries of whatever this is first… and then go from there.” she said. Her XO nodded.

“Aye, Captain.” she agreed.

“You have the bridge.” Sol said strolling across it to her ready room door. She paused as it opened, looking back at the view screen. “Keep me apprised…” she added before disappearing through the door.

“Captain to the bridge.” Amaya announced, causing Solaris to appear from her ready room door. Amaya stood, relinquishing the command chair as the captain crossed the bridge.

“You have something to report, Commander?” she asked, looking to the view screen, greeted by the same basic starfield that had been on it when she had entered her ready room hours earlier.

“Yes, ma’am. We have completed mapping the boundary of the distortion field.” she said, pausing for a moment. She gestured toward the rear of the bridge, where extra stations had been installed, align with a holotable. Sol followed her, leaning against the railing as Amaya brought up the display of the readings the Yamato had taken on its survey. Sol pushed off the rail and drew closer studying the results.

“I was only joking when I suggested it covered the entire sector… but I didn’t expect I’d be right.” she said.

“The entire sector, plus some…” Amaya corrected, pointing at several areas where the distortions actually extended beyond the sector borders. Sol nodded.

“Indeed… and we can’t detect anything deeper within the sector?” she asked. Amaya shook her head.

“Not with any certainty… bits of garbled readings mostly. Nothing concrete.” she confirmed.  Sol frowned. That wasn’t exactly what she wanted to hear. She sighed quietly to herself.

“Well I didn’t expect it would make the choice any easier… but I hoped we might get some more information…” she said. She leaned in closer to the hologram, as if peering into the depths of the ocean, eyes scanning the readings. “What is our current position?” she asked. Amaya pointed to a location.

“Right here, roughly where we started from.” she stated.

“Well, we made good time…” Sol commented. She looked to her XO. “I’m open to suggestions… we could go in there, but without knowing exactly what is in there, we’d be taking a pretty big risk.” she said.

“And we’re alone out here for the moment…” Amaya added. “But this is what we came out here to do, explore the unknown.” she pointed out. Sol nodded slightly.

“Sure… but that doesn’t mean we have to be reckless about it.” Sol countered. She tapped a few controls on the holotable and shuffled the sensor readings out of the way, bringing up a listing of ships available to assist them. She frowned when the list was mostly empty. “So much for calling for back up…” she commented, clearing the display.

“I guess we know what it feels like to be the only ship in range…” Amaya commented. Sol laughed.

“I guess so… but I still don’t want to go in there without backup…” she said. She crossed her arms, tapping a finger on her elbow as she thought. “Hmm, I wonder if…” she trailed off, mind working on a plan. She looked back to ehr XO.

“Amaya, send a subspace message to Captain Ceix on the Callisto… asking him to contact me at his earliest convenience.” she said. The Callisto was sure to be engaged in its own mission, but on the off chance they were free Sol knew the Luna-class vessel was more suited to scientific missions and had more focused sensors that might be able to cut through the distortions.

“Aye, Captain.” Amaya said with a nod. She stepped away from the holotable and moved back across the bridge to her station to o as she was ordered. Sol took much the same path, but instead returned to her ready room to contemplate the next course of action. With luck the Callisto would be available to assist them in unraveling the mystery of the sector they found themselves just outside of.