Capsuleer's Log, YC117.3.29 "Caue de Lumine"

6U-MFQ
F-W6B4 - Oasa

The loss reports gave a name to our fears.

Apollo Tyrannos.

Seventy-two hours ago, one of our forward patrols detected an unidentified wormhole in a system near our base of operations. We'd been seeing Circadian Seeker activity there for weeks now, and the location of the Jove tower had been tagged as soon as its cloak had failed-- the wormhole however, was a new development and I'd ordered eyes on it around the clock as soon as the report had come in.

The Seekers continued to behave as they had since their appearance, warping around the system and scanning objects for reasons still unknown. They paid no particular attention to the Tower itself other than the occasional scan, and the odd Sleeper installations surrounding the wormhole received much the same sort of scrutiny since we'd noticed their presence. The wormhole emission signatures matched nothing in our databases, and our observations of conditions at the event horizon suggested it would be unwise to attempt a jump. I wanted it watched nonetheless.

I was twenty-seven jumps out, preparing to light a cynosural beacon for a supply logistics op when the scout came across my priority comm channel.

The voice was heavily accented, his cadence deliberate. "Commander Stahl, a battleship has entered 6U-MFQ via the wormhole. Eyes on target at two-hundred eighty-seven clicks, standing by." 

My Russish was a bit out of practice, but I'd been working it out since The Red Bridge had backed our claim to sovereignty and taken our alliance flag as their own. I keyed up. "Keep your distance and report movements. I'll have a CovOps squad on your position inside of ten minutes." I quickly gave the go-ahead to jump the freighter in on my beacon and put word in to the squadron back home to scramble bombers to the scout's location. 

I'd seen the Rhea off on the next leg of its journey and set my course back to Oasa when the squadron leader reported they had arrived on the scene, six strong. Red Bridge had sent a wing to support their man, making for eleven ships on the field, silently observing the Drifter vessel from behind their cloaks. 

The bizarre ship made lazy circles in the vicinity of the wormhole and Sleeper structures, occasionally warping to the Jovian tower to do the same. It did not appear to exhibit any of the inquisitive behavior of the Seekers, in fact, it didn't seem to take notice of much beyond the mysterious Jove construction. I ordered my squad to close distance on the wormhole to one hundred kilometers when the Drifter warped away to the tower again. My inability to be on location was beginning to eat at my patience.

The bombers were forming up on their new perch when Red Bridge reported the Drifter ship inbound on the wormhole. I was fourteen jumps out and burning hard to get a look at this thing with my own eyes. Tukoss' warning and the destruction of the Rex had done nothing to deter me, much to the contrary, my curiosity had reached a fevered pitch.

Suddenly, pilots were swearing in my ear in two languages. The battleship had dropped out of warp right on top of the bomber wing, breaking their cloaks and sending them scrambling into random evasive maneuvers. The squadron leader was struggling to give the order to break off and regroup over the cacophonous comm chatter when the ship erupted in golden light.

The Red Bridge report of the event states the Drifter vessel deployed several free-floating energy weapons upon exiting warp and destroyed the six bombers with six consecutive volleys without hesitation or provocation. Appended to their narrative of the event are the six loss reports naming the pilot of the battleship as one Apollo Tyrannos.

No records exist of such a pilot in CONCORD databases or Empire census logs. A deep query of historic and technical records revealed a rather interesting connection-- both search terms appear to originate from a dead language dating back scores of millenia. The words predate the empires, to a time before the Eve gate, when we were all of one star, one world. After several passes through a linguistics engine, the logarithms finally teased out an intelligible translation of the name:

Terrible God of Light.

It with an unsettled mind that I send my reports to the Arek'jalaan Project and Society of Conscious Thought. Of the few actions within my capacity, sharing data in hope of determining the motives and intentions of these mysterious beings seems to be the most prudent. Whatever the Drifters want, one thing is clear:

They are more than capable of taking it.

This is Gunner Stahl, Captain of the warship Quantum of Fury, signing off.

END TRANSMISSION

Capsuleer's Log, YC117.3.22 "The Changing Tide"

[REDACTED]
[REDACTED] - Oasa

There is a wisdom that is woe; but there is a woe that is madness. -H. Melville, The Whale

In those rare moments of quiet, I look to Caroline's Star. From my current vantage point deep in the drone lands, all that remains of it glows a yellow and ochre smudge against the mundane backdrop of the Oasan nebulae. The superluminal event had sent me down a thousand wormholes looking for answers, but all I'd found were more questions. And an obsession verging on insanity.

In my madness I had lost the El Dorado to raiders while returning from a meeting with Hilen Tukoss himself. I'd been furious over Tukoss' refusal to leave his hideaway and join me on an expedition to a nearby anomaly, one of the massive structures that had recently appeared all over known space. He'd sent me away with a warning to avoid even traveling through systems fostering the mysterious towers, and when I inquired as to why, he spoke but one word:

Drifters.

I'd set out alone to investigate the structure, and with my attention focused on searching for intel on the Drifters, the sound of my warp drive shutting down was the first indication that I was in trouble. I killed the search terminal and pulled up my defensive overlays. I had two interdictors spitting out warp disruption probes while burning hard into optimal range, and a Loki trying to close in to hold me down. Goonswarm. I kicked on my afterburner and set my Geckos on the 'dictors, in an attempt to keep them off of me long enough to get out of range of the probes. I was scrambling to avoid the Loki's webifiers when the fighters dropped out of warp. My long range scanner pinged a Nyx in system! I overheated everything I had in a last ditch attempt to get away but it wasn't much use against a squadron of Einherjis.

I climbed out of the clone vat in Perimeter with a bad taste in my mouth. In my months of searching, I'd turned up nothing and nearly gone bankrupt and insane in the process. I couldn't go on like this. The Scope report on the loss of the Rex to a Drifter superweapon cemented that idea in place. I regretfully sent a notice of separation to the Signal Cartel. I had enjoyed my time with the organization, but I can't play a passive role in what is to come. The destabilization among the alliances and deafening silence from the Empires is turning New Eden into a more dangerous place by the hour, and in times like these I need my guns more than principles.

I'm still an explorer at heart, but I'm a realist above all.

My fixer put me in touch with some old associates of mine that were in the midst of reforming their corporation and offered my assistance to their cause. The Drifters had shown how effortlessly they can destroy capital ships, and their willingness to do so-- this tells me it is the strength of numbers we need in the face of such a thing.

We will build an army. We will secure our sovereign systems. We will survive.

This is Gunner Stahl, captain of the warship Quantum of Fury, signing off.

END TRANSMISSION