#crystaldc

Visual tracking from SNS Entulesse confirms the remaining bulk of the moon exploded at 09:24:00 Fleet Standard Bell.  Communication with SNS Meneltarmir was lost two hours later.  Considerable Dossimir echo was observed and out of phase comm traffic recorded at this time.

The exploded moon cast significant quantities of crystalline debris and shards into both sub-orbital and local space accompanied by a shock wave.  SNS Andustar was lost to visual contact 02:10:34 after the moons explosion.  

Final observations indicated no signs of operational systems [see subsection 3.132.00 for visual survey of Andustar prior to and during shock wave encounter.]  

Additional visual observations of the planet indicate the substantial portion of the red mood was reduced to minor shards and impacted the planet over the next 19:20:00, during which a large scale nexus of energy release was seen in the air and moving across the surface.  The pattern indicated guided movement and directed thermal energy releases.  

Spectrographic analysis matched thermal and energy signatures in Password Gated historical archive [Files Topics Arch Nemesis Drake and Balrogath]  

~ After Incident  Report, "Zodiark's Hammer" High Password Gated Sub Report "Nemesis Scyth."

08.7.90.000

Dio had an age jump due to how traveling to the First works or doesn’t work.  @althea-lapointe helped me out with getting his eyes back to how they used to be and now he’s lookin’ 👀💦 

“Portents drove our White Ships and kin to the stars, they have drawn us to this system and these worlds.  We cannot ignore and glide through local space past what we have seen and dismiss the inexplicable truths we are only starting to realize.  Nor can we forget our mandate to reach our journey's end.  

Accordingly on my orders Forostar, Andustar, Meneltarmir and Entulesse will take station over Arda 922, which we now know by it's given name of Hydalen.  The remainder of the fleet will assume high orbits about the local primary as they arrive in the system.  All vessels will begin a deep cycle of refurbishment and replenishment of stores which are in ample supply.  Operations will extend an additional 36 months.  During this time it will be determined if the fleet or our kin will continue it's journey in total or in part.  

In the interim we will continue our works on the world which is at the root of our being here.  During the past 48 months we have learned much which has served to illuminate ancient truths yet deepen as many more mysteries.  We have learned names we now call this blue world and it's many peoples by.  We have discovered names and writings true to our bloodlines and native tongue which ought not exist among people of Hydalen. We have taken up trade and relations with these people.  We have joined in their struggles as our forefathers did for the free peoples of our own home.  Some of Hydalen I have commissioned with taking up our name in struggles these years.

It is possible we are seeing shadows we are sworn to oppose manifest here on Hydalen.  It maybe Hydalen is simply a waypoint on our longer collective journey.  It may prove our collective destinies have reached a fork which carries us forward along two paths.  I will make planetfall personally and determine if our mandate will hold us honor bound to remain here to continue to stand with these people as one or as two Kinships.

Numenor Prevails.”  

~ CAG Fleet Communique for Open Distribution.

Notes from the Appendices on the White Fleet's journey to Arda 922.

“The ships of the White Fleet departed their home as a group.

However in making a generations long voyage close formations were deemed unwise.  There were practical considerations as well. Over time, slight differences in velocity and trajectory created great distances spanning from the lead vessel to the last.   This was purposeful.  As rogue worlds or whole systems of planets and stars came and were passed, the lead vessel would often use slight assertions of propulsion to enter and orbit.  Expeditionary ships and landers would explore worlds and survey them for whatever purpose.  

As the fleet passed through, if required other vessels would similarly orbit and harvest resources before using gravity wells to sling themselves free of the system.  Each vessel would follow a carefully laid out plan and timing.  The first vessel to enter was usually the last to leave.  And as this cycle repeated periodically over time, each vessel would in its time be the first and last to visit a world, star or stellar object.  It was in this manner that the White Fleet arrived

In the system they labelled Arda 922 the Scions of Numenor reached their middle way point on their long journey.  Years hence some but not all would venture forth as they had before after visiting a new system.

~Ossimira Miegs, notes on “Technoperspectives.”

"For some it was akin to something out a scary story from our youth.  As if old toys had come to life and would only find rest if some super natural feat appeased a spirit of some sort."

- Bondermir Exidines, "Stuff I Saw Too."

Ancient icons of their past coming to life after millennia.  A world and moon clearly inhabited and rich with resources not seen beyond their home.  Or at least for the moment.  Andustar's latest track of it pointed to the red moon being drawn deeper into Arda's gravity well and for no reason that could be attributed to natural explanations.  There were the great mysteries of existence and there were these.  Nothing about these mysteries could be happenstance.  Nothing about the fall of the red moon could be natural.  The precision with which all things were occurring as the White Fleet came to this place itself could only be purposeful.

Benjimir sat back in his reclining chair in front of his quarters generous viewing panel.  His eyes immediately caught the red moon.  He knew crews throughout the White Fleet had given names to it, all of ill omen and foreboding from beyond living memory.  He had his own preferred term for the moon he did not give voice too but he shared the consensus feeling about the angry dot in space.  He looked at a viewer and accessed the latest metrics status from Andustar.  "Moon holding CBDR relative to Arda 922 track point of intercept, 05:14:3291 GR.  Dossimir disturbances consistent and growing."

Shifting the viewers screen Benjimir began to tap out outlines of orders.  He knew the rumors running through the Keepers divisions.  He knew the anecdotal comments passed onto him from off-watch officers and station minders.  By mid-watch the next day Keeper Miegs would have a well formed report she had been writing in parts few days compiled into a full report.  It would detail disturbances in their communication systems, which were based on Dossimir Effect crafting, that kindred signals were detectable but undecipherable at that time.  The structure would make it leave no question of the crafting skills of whomever the peoples were giving life to the lights, roads and settlements on Arda 922.

All of these details would make the orders he drafted and immediately ordered seem prophetic and impactful.

“Obrick held that if you quantified all the eventualities which might manifest ill, than by the precepts of Dossimir's Statute it would be so.  

Obrick was an optimist."

-Benjimir Thursby, The Analects.

The Silithar was attached to a mount suspended within a spherical cage made of a metal mesh.  Benjimir watched as the Craft Master Keeper, Osimira Miegs, activated a computator cycle.  A pulse of energy surged into the bottom of the Silithar and at once a ribbon of light burst through the top of the crystal with a snap and hiss.  The ribbon remained rooted at the tip of the crystal and undulated.  

"The cage is unnecessary so far as we've observed.  The energy never extends beyond this length at this setting."  

Benjimir nodded, glancing down at the gauges measuring how much power had been input through the crystal.  

"It's an amplified arc...or ribbon.  Hows it contained?" he asked.  

Miegs nodded and replied, "Not contained, there is no field effect being used.  The energy flows out, then back to the crystal.  No thermal energy loss.  No radiant electron field emitted."  

Benjimir flared his brow,

"Dossimir?" he asked.  

"No sir, this is something different we have not yet given name too.  Whatever the force is, the initial energy surge triggers the ribbon, but virtually all of it remains in a sort of cycle we think.  It requires a slight negative energy draw to deactivate the ribbon.  But there is no correlating link to another crystal, so far as we can tell."  

Benjimir looked impressed and asked.  

"And the other ancient weapons, the shimmer and glow?"  

Miegs hedged with a tip of her head but nodded.  "We think it is the same effect if by means and origins we haven't determined yet.  We can observe and possibly measure the force guiding the energy, adding to it, but there is something beyond it which we cannot quantify."  Benjimir nodded slowly in response.  

The ribbon had seemed to slow it's movement, projecting largely straight and away from the leading tip of the crystal.  Fixated on the image he asked,

"Can we replicate this, with new forged weapons, devices?"  

Miegs drew a breath and answered slowly having gone over records of past crafting efforts dating to the century after the original effects such as this had diminished then ceased.  

"Yes.  In a fashion.  Already some lesser artifacts from weapon crafting during the decline and end of the past recorded .....manifestations of the effect are showing similar qualities to this. If less efficient.  We don't dare use the eldar crystals, so our past and new efforts use rited derivatives."  Benjimir continued to focus on the ribbon which was nearly steady.  

"Rited?"  

Miegs silently forgave Benjimir his study of history over the crafting lore and explained.  

"-ite, a suffix to the core substance, meaning created or derived from synthetic or natural materials.  Dossimirite, Dolimite, Kyberite, Etherite, etc."  

Benjimir pinched his lips and nodded,

"Aye, forgot, I studied...."

"...history...." Miegs echoed, finishing his reply.  Miegs answered his next question as she continued.  

"Yes sir, a noble and underappreciated field of the liberal arts.  As you can see, the ribbon seems to stabilize under observation.  We've noticed the stability varies depending on whom or what is observing, but it appears to be a proof of "Obrick's Blind."  Where the figurative trump card in a persons hand can be high or low at the same time, but you don't know which until you turn the card."  

"I never realized Dossimir played at cards."  Benjimir glanced away and as he did the ribbon swayed again.  

"Obrick's Blind holds that it requires an act of observation for the Dossimir Effect to take hold." Miegs added.  

"So you are saying a person can control the ribbon?"  Benjimir asked.  

"Or possibly the crystal, maybe both, we aren't sure." Miegs said.

Benjimir broke his attention away from the ribbon which began to sway freely as it had before.  He pressed the viewer symbol for shut-down and the ribbon withdrew into the Silithar which flared bright blue before resuming a soft glow.  

"Very well.  Secure the Silithar in my quarters.  And immediately have your team begin to check our comms systems, look for any off-nominal performance, especially anything correlated to the observations tied to Arda and its moon."  

He turned and with a courtesy nod as Miegs bowed slightly he walked to his quarters.  The Andustar's telemetry report had arrived with high resolution images of the surfaces of the moon and Arda 922.

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