Chapter 88: The Last Precursors
Flying into the swirling chaos of the Collapsed Star god was like trying to pilot a paper airplane through a washing machine during an earthquake.
The "Odyssey" bucked and groaned, its advanced systems pushed to their absolute limits. Gravitational waves, like invisible tsunamis, washed over them, threatening to tear the little ship apart.
"Hull integrity at ninety percent!" Emma called out, her voice tense. "The gravity is trying to flatten us! I’m reinforcing the structural fields, but I don’t know how long they’ll hold!"
"Forget the hull, I’m more worried about the Marauders!" Zara shouted, pointing at the main viewscreen. A fleet of ugly, spiky Marauder capital ships was forming a blockade between them and the tiny bubble of safety at the storm’s center.
"They’ve been waiting for us," Scarlett said, her knuckles white as she wrestled with the controls. "It’s a trap."
The tiny, flickering light of the Precursor Enclave seemed a million miles away. They were so close, yet so far.
Ryan looked at the chaotic scene, his mind a whirlwind of calculations. They couldn’t fight their way through. They couldn’t sneak through. They had to do something different.
"Emma," he said, his voice cutting through the tension. "The gravitational waves. Are they random?"
"No," she replied, her eyes scanning her console. "They’re waves. They have peaks and troughs, just like on an ocean. They’re chaotic, but there’s a rhythm to them."