The ship settled into patrol rhythm quickly. The concept of day and night or a 24-hour day did not apply in space. The three watches rotated through the watch schedule in turn, one six-hour watch in an eighteen-hour day. Each individual was on six hours duty, then 12 hours to sleep, relax, do off-duty maintenance on the ship, and study for rating exams. The captain, Kelly, and Chief Watson weren’t in the watch schedule, but they tended to stick with a different watch team, the captain with the red watch, the chief with the yellow watch, and Kelly with the blue watch.
Kelly wandered the ship during his watch. He would relieve the helmsman occasionally by taking over the helm controls from his position. He sat position in the sensor section to gain a better understanding of the sensor grid. He never tried cooking again, but he would now and then filch a snack as he passed through the galley. Chief Pennypacker ran drills for his gunners and Kelly would periodically sit in to keep his gunnery skills up. Chief Miller, at first, merely tolerated Kelly’s presence, but after Kelly beat him to the solution of electronic problems a few times, a new respect took hold, as long as Kelly didn’t come into engineering with his coffee cup.
After four days of cruising, they arrived in their patrol area. The captain, Kelly, and the chief had worked out a course that would allow them to sprint and coast through their patrol area. The plan was to come up to speed and throttle off the engines. They would cover the greatest distance, have the greatest sensor range and sensitivity, and emit the least signature.
They followed this pattern for thirteen days before they got the slightest indication out of the ordinary on their sensors. It wasn’t much, but anything unusual was subject to investigation. Kelly called the captain to the bridge.
“What do you have, Exec?”
“We’ve got emissions from across the frontier in open space. Something is over there. I recommend that we move to these asteroids to starboard, park next to one of them, and monitor this area for any further activity. Those emissions could be nothing more than our K’Rang counterpart doing what we’re doing, but it's the first activity we’ve seen.”
“Good call, Exec, move us over to the K’Rang side of that big rock and park us above it.”
Kelly ordered, “Helmsman, all stop, move us slowly over to that asteroid to starboard and position us 100 meters above it. Use thrusters only. Keep us parallel to the frontier.”
“Aye aye, sir.”
The ship moved slowly under thruster power to a position 100 meters above the asteroid. Kelly went aft and found the entire sensor section up and monitoring their systems. Kelly had Chief Blankenship send two-thirds of them back to their quarters. This watch would go on for hours, maybe days. It wouldn’t do to have the entire sensor section dead on their feet this close to the K’Rang Frontier.
Kelly moved aft. Chief Blankenship knew her job. She didn’t need him hovering. He went to the galley, refilled his coffee, snagged a handful of cookies and went back to gunnery. Kelly found Chief Pennypacker.
“Chief, keep one gunner on the top turret at all times. Rotate them through to keep them fresh. If something comes through the frontier at us we want to be ready.”
“Aye aye, sir.”
Kelly went back to the bridge. The captain was waiting for him.
“How are things, Exec?”
“We’re good, Captain. I had to send most of the sensor section to bed. They all were back there monitoring their systems. I told Chief Pennypacker to keep a gunner on the top turret and rotate them through to keep them fresh. There are fresh chocolate chip cookies in the galley. Here, have a couple.”
The captain took two cookies. “Thanks. Good work, keep everyone on the watch schedule. This will be a long patrol. We need to keep the crew rested and alert.”
The intercom buzzed. “Bridge, Sensors. We’ve got movement across the K’Rang frontier. It hasn’t reached our side of the frontier yet.”
The captain headed back to Sensors. Kelly keyed the intercom and said, “Sensors, the captain is on his way.” Kelly keyed up Sensors on his monitor and tried to analyze what they were up against. He overlayed the two frontiers and buffer zone on his screen and plotted in the known locations of the target, gaining a rough course plot. The target was moving from several hundred thousand kilometers beyond their frontier. If it kept on current course and speed it would cross the frontier in an hour. It was in no hurry.
“Sensors, Bridge. Is the captain with you?”
“Exec, this is Timmons. What have you got?”
“Sir, this guy is taking his time coming through the frontier. He’s slowed down, probably scanning for someone like us. I recommend we settle down onto the asteroid to make it harder for him.”
“Good call, Exec, take us down. Don’t bend anything in the process. I’ll stay here. If we start to lose too much sensor coverage, I’ll tell you and we can ease back up slightly. Take it smooth.”
Kelly instructed the helmsman, and watched the sensor fields on his monitor. The Vigilant settled onto the top of the asteroid with only a slight bump. This helmsman was smooth. He would remember her if he needed a delicate touch on the controls in the future.
He keyed up his mike and said, “Bridge to Sensors, we are settled on the asteroid.”
“Thanks, Exec. No reaction from our friend out there. I’m headed back forward.”
LCDR Timmons resumed his seat on the bridge. “Exec, why don’t you turn in? This guy is going to be in no hurry to cross our frontier.”
Kelly didn’t want to turn in, but he had been up for about 16 hours and he needed some rest. He turned his position over to Chief Blankenship, who was chief of the watch, and retired to his quarters. If anything happened he was only 20 feet away. He keyed up his terminal and set Wanda to alert him if the target crossed the frontier. He pulled off his coveralls, crawled into his rack, and fell asleep almost instantly. He awoke several hours later, checked the tactical situation on his terminal, saw there was no change, and then made a run through the galley. The lunch meal was being served so he had a sandwich, milk, and potato salad, then returned to the bridge. Chief Watson was the chief of the watch.
“Where’s the captain, Chief?”
“He’s in his ready room. He’s in there with Chief Blankenship. He said for you to go in once you came back on duty, sir.”
Kelly knocked on the ready room door and heard the captain tell him to enter. He did so and saw Chief Blankenship and the captain studying the wall display screen.
“Exec, come on over here. Chief, set up the spectral and visual data for the Exec.”
Chief Blankenship went to the terminal, punched a few buttons and said, “This is the phenomena we’re looking at.”
A blown up shot of the region of space containing their quarry showed up on the screen. Kelly could make out something roughly cylindrical on one end (he assumed it was the bow), with a fat midsection, and three cylinders toward what he assumed was the stern. The rear glowed red, showing heat, and the front was purple.
“Chief, what does the purple around the bow of the ship mean?”
“I don’t know, sir. That’s what the captain and I were trying to figure out. The purple implies extreme cold, but that doesn’t make sense if that is a cockpit.”
“Chief, how big is this thing? I can’t tell scale from this image.”
“It’s about half our size, sir. It’s about 50 meters long and 20 meters wide at the widest part. One of my guys drew up a rendering of what he thinks it looks like. Here, I’ll bring it up on the screen.”
She clicked a few buttons and a picture of a small scout-class looking ship appeared on the screen. It looked slightly conical, with a small cylindrical bow, a fat conical midsection, and three cylinders, presumably engines, at the rear.
Kelly said, “Chief, put the two images side by side.”
He waited while she manipulated the images, putting the rendering in the same orientation.