“Then we should leave, not stop,” Deia’s words were sharp with a slight quiver to them, her distress becoming immediately apparent.
“No,” I turned to Orthus, “if this is some sort of trap, then we’re already in it.  If we suddenly try to leave we may spring it.”
“I don’t think I understand Laura MacPhaid, you think someone is trying to trap us.” Orthus’s question asked what everyone wanted to know, yet he had quickly entered the command to stop the Piti and remain in place.
“I don’t know for sure, but someone has left us a warning, one that only humans would understand.”
Ishni stroked his forehead thoughtfully, “could you maybe explain to us non-humans what’s going on then please.”
“Okay, so,” I hurried my mind to find the right words in the right order, “Admiral Ackbar is the name of a fictional character who is famous for saying the line “it’s a trap”, in one of the most famous movies on Earth.  I think that’s why it’s painted there, someone is trying to warn humans specifically, that there is something or someone about to attack us.  We need to stop because we don’t know what will trigger the attack or where it is.  We need to figure out how to leave here without being tracked, captured or killed.”
“Alright,” Orthus continued tapping away at the controls, “we are now stationary.  What do you recommend we do now Laura MacPhaid?”
Everything in me was fighting for me to tell them that I had no idea, that I was probably wrong, that we should just keep going.  The urge to let someone else take charge was overwhelming.  In all likeliness, I was wrong, I had simply let too many episodes of Farscape, Star Trek, Firefly and Dark Matter seep into the part of my brain that was dealing with the reality of what we were doing.  I was acting out the role of a scifi hero.  Those scenarios were not relevant to what was actually going on.
But if I was right…
I refused to allow myself the weakness that ignored the risk.
“We need to scan,” somehow, my voice was resolute and sure of itself, “for any signal that shouldn’t be there or that is broadcasting unusually.  There has to be something scanning the area, it’s possible that we’re far enough away that we haven’t been detected by it yet.”
Every pair of eyes looked highly dubious, yet nobody said anything, no one challenged me.
Gheetoh joined Orthus at the controls and began pulling up what she could find onto the wall before us.
For several minutes, she simply observed them, looking for an irregular pattern.
“There.”
One set of numbers and words became enlarged.
“There are several emergency systems throughout the wreckage; lighting, beacons, air supply… that sort of thing, that are running on what’s left of the power.  It’s the air supply that’s not doing what it should, and not just because it’s damaged.  Desmosa,” the alive’s head turned sharply towards the sound of her name, so absorbed had she been with looking at the numbers, “can you identify what this signal’s true purpose is?”
“Yes,” Desmosa looked somewhat startled at being needed, “it communicates like a sphere.”
A groan came from more than one mouth.
I looked over at Bernard and he simply shrugged.
“A sphere?” I addressed Desmosa.
She nodded, “yes, spheres are used for many different purposes.  Mostly they are used as beacons or signal boosters, but pretty much all of them have heavy defense systems.”
I must have continued to look puzzled so she continued, “they are the size of a court ball and are usually left at specific places in deep space so they can do whatever they were programmed to do.  They defend themselves with directional electro magnetic pulses, which can disable anything with a power grid that is below a certain amount.  They disable whoever tries to tamper with them and can send a signal to either the nearest lawful authority or their owners.  I would imagine the latter is true in this case.”
Ishni piped up, “they’ve probably got a ship orbiting the nearest gravitational body waiting for the signal.  It’s a fairly common way of ambushing targets, they’re used by law enforcement and criminals alike.”
“Wouldn’t the e.m.p. cut out all of the power on their targets?” apprehension was rolling around like a thunderstorm in my chest, yet I would not let on, “wouldn’t they be dead before they could arrive?”
All eyes turned to Gheetoh who shook her head, “all ships that pass their proficiency tests must have thermal insulation and analogue air supplies that would last for at least ten units.”
“Wonderful,” despite the anxiety, or possibly because of it, my sarcasm was still in tact, “is there any way that we can deactivate it?”
“I could try,” she replied, “but it’s likely that it is protected against connection attempts.  Accessing it without the correct codes or identification will more than likely trigger either the e.m.p. or possibly a self-destruct defense.  We don’t even know what the trigger is, if there even is one.  For all we know this is a Community sphere, monitoring the area.”
Desmosa shook her head, “the signal would be different.  There would be some sort of Community signature to it, whereas this one lacks any kind of identification at all.”
“Do you know what would trigger it at all?” regardless of who owned it, I needed to know if we were going to be able to get away from it.
“It’s either a proximity alert which will trap any ship that gets too close,” Gheetoh spoke, “or it’s programmed to respond to a specific ship’s identity, perhaps both.”
“Well, whoever left that warning, left it for a human,” Bernard thought out loud, “no other beings would get the reference.  Then again not all humans would definitely get the reference either.”  He looked straight at me, “I think it was a warning for you specifically.”
I felt my eyebrow rise, “you think someone’s after me?”  I shook my head and raised my hand, “so there’s not just a being that’s after me, but another being that tried to warn me, and both knew that I would be coming here?”  My hair-line suddenly became somewhat itchy, “this is all getting a bit much.”  I turned my attention to the data before us, searching for something that I could understand, “so we’re probably stuck.  What are our options?”
“We can’t be entirely sure that we’re caught at all,” Gheetoh seemed unclear as to whether she actually refused to believe that we were on the verge of being ambushed, or she was simply feeling defiant towards the idea or, more likely, me, “we need to run an in depth analysis of the sphere before we act.”
“What if that sets it off?” my voice somehow came out a lot more steady than I felt, “I’m trying to help my people, winding up with a contract of my own helps no-one.”
“And what if this whole thing is a huge misdirect?” her voice had risen to something less than a shout, “we sit here debating things whilst the slavers sneak up on us?  How do you know that they weren’t the ones who put that name there to confuse and send you in the wrong direction, away from whatever clues may be on board the wreckage?”
Withholding a sigh that would have emptied my lungs and forcing my teeth apart so that I was not speaking through them, I replied, “we could try sending out a distress signal.”
She snorted, “if you think that a scan will set it off then a distress signal, or any signal, will do the same!”
“So, what?” I pushed my frustration into my fingers, bending them as though I were squeezing invisible tennis balls, “you think that we should just go ahead and spring the trap?”
“Of course not!”  
She buried her face into the palm of her hand and for a split second I was secretly elated that the gesture was more universal than I had previously hoped.
“Perhaps we should.”
The calmness of Ishni’s voice caused everyone to slowly turn their heads in disbelief towards where he was drifting, seemingly upside down to our collective perspective.
“You think we should fall into their trap?” all the frustration that had been building, drained into confusion in an instant.
Ishni’s eyes bored directly into mine, “yep.”
“So that we can get a look at who’s after us, or me.  To take them down from the inside.”  It was not a question, it was realization.
“Yep.”
The idea had been with me since I had understood the warning.  The easiest way to infiltrate an enemy’s stronghold would to be taken in willingly.  From the inside clues or evidence against them might be found.  With the use of extreme telekinetic ability, an escape could then be made or a reversal of capture.  The proof could be presented to the Community and the human slaves would be freed.
Simple.
Except that it would all come down to me.
My capture, my abilities, my responsibility.
If I were able to pull it off, my task would be finished.
If I failed, my companions’ lives would be at risk, as would their freedoms, not to mention any hope of collecting the proof that was so desperately needed.
Such a burden I had never felt before.
The burden of possibility.
The weight of Earth and humanity was a cloak that had been placed over me by the past.
The weight of possibility was something that, if I truly wanted to, I could avoid, that I could put aside before it even existed.
The smoothest path was undoubtedly the longest, with a time span that stretched on past my own timeline.  Time during which more lives would be made more miserable or erased completely.  Time that would be lost between friends, families and loved ones.
I knew what had to be done.
“I think we should.”
My voice barely came out louder than a whisper yet I knew that they all heard me.
Silence prevailed for only a few seconds.
Culpin’s words appeared in my mind, “what precisely are you proposing?”
I took a breath, “we’re going to need one hell of a plan.”

Locating the sphere was an impossible task.
Fortunately, it found us first.
The moment that we began moving again, the signal that had been disguised as the air supply maintenance changed.  Only a trained eye could have noticed it and there were at least a couple of those on board the Piti.
For a while nothing happened.
“Let’s try to leave,” Ishni suggested, “perhaps it waits until it knows we’re not going to be joined by anyone else to act.”
“How insightful, let’s give it a try,” I breathed a laugh through my nose, “what’re you?  A bounty hunter or something?”
He simply tilted his head and gave me a smile, the meaning of which was lost on me.  Not all gestures translate precisely, I told myself whilst my mind began making up stories of the adventures of Ishni Weisot, mercenary.
Orthus input the coordinates for Virrion and had barely confirmed the destination when everything went dark.
To avoid noticing the pounding of my heart, I focused on restraining myself from telling Gheetoh that I had told her so.
The emergency lighting system lit up dashed, pale blue lines along the edges of anything that might be collided with.
The unnoticeable hum of the Piti’s system was immediately noticeable as missing.
True silence fell.
No distant noises to remind us of the world that did not surround us.
Just the sound of our breathing and heartbeats resonating against the walls that were all that separated us from the vacuum.
For several lals we simply waited, not a word uttered between us on the chance that the sphere had some sort of recording feature.
Along with the power, my left eye had also been put out of commission.  Desmosa assured me that my nanobots would gather enough bio-charge to restart it, however that would take at least a full auxe.
Absolute fear clenched my hands into the softness of the chair that I was steadying myself on, along with a lack of depth perception.
To a small degree, I was able to use the energy to confirm my surroundings, however such a thing brought little comfort as Bernard’s emotions raged a few feet away.
He was battling between fear and stubborn courage.
The relief as his bravery was slowly ascertain its dominance made it a little easier to breathe.
The deeper the breaths I took, the more I could feel myself relaxing.
A wave of yawns washed around the room, catching my lungs by surprise.
Eyelids were beginning to droop and grips were beginning to loosen.
Such intense exhaustion crept into my system that it quickly dawned on me how long the unit had been.
My own emotions were still ragged and with each time my eyes closed, I saw one face after another of the occupants of the cargo bay.
The non-existent gravity pulled at my eyes, closing them for longer with each blink, until I could no longer open them at all.