Chapter 4. New Victims.

As their ship approached Saturn, Alice and Vicky searched for a vessel using the telescopic equipment. Judy and Hilary used the communication system to determine its status.

"I've located their ship," Alice revealed. "It's orbiting Saturn near to Enceladus inside the E-ring. It doesn't appear to be damaged. However, I'm not seeing any crashed vessel on Enceladus."

Everyone glanced at the main screen which displayed the vessel partially immersed in the ring of Saturn that emissions from Enceladus is contributing to. The ice crystals that made up the tenuous E-ring sparkled in weak sunlight as if it were composed of glass fragments floating in a gossamer silky sheet.

"Maybe the crashed vessel imbedded into the iced surface," Charles said.

"I think that would leave a noticeable mark on the surface."

"Yeah, that's true."

"I don't recognize that type of spacecraft," Carl said. "It must have been introduced after we left for Proxima B."

"Inform them that we're going to pull alongside their ship," Charles told Alice. "Tell them that they should get into spacesuits. We'll use a shuttle to pick them up."

"They said to hurry," Alice said. "They're very low on oxygen."

Charles stood up. "You can take over getting the ship close to theirs, Carl. I'll take Hilary with me to get them into a shuttle."

Carl nodded. Hilary stood up and followed Charles into the elevator."

"I'm not qualified on shuttle procedures," she said, her face twisted with concern.

"All you have to do is open and close the shuttle hatch and work the air supply."

She nodded, even though her eyes were wide with concern.

When Charles and Hilary arrived at the hanger deck, they headed to a locker that contained spacesuits. Getting into them consumed several minutes, but once they were in them and their oxygen supplies activated, they were ready to begin the rescue process.

"They're standing at an open hatch," Carl told Charles over the communication system. "They say they don't have much oxygen left."

"Yeah, I see them. We're taking the shuttle out now."

Charles maneuvered the shuttle out of the hanger and over to the stranded ship, which was barely a fifth the size of theirs. He had to be careful in adjusting the shuttle's attitude relative to their hatch. After he accomplished that, he used little jets on his backpack to cross the distance between the shuttle and their ship. He grabbed a female astronaut and used his propulsion system to get her back to the shuttle. He repeated the process with the other female. Then he returned to take the male to the shuttle.

Once he had them in the shuttle, he took over to move it back into the hanger deck.

"Ok, Hillary, return the atmosphere to the deck."

She grunted her reply before she activated the recompression of the hanger deck.

After the deck was compressed with air, Charles removed his helmet, prompting the stranded crew he had just rescued to follow suit.

"You're just in time," the male told him, huffing as if deprived of breath. "We were minutes away from being asphyxiated."

Charles extended his hand, "I'm Charles Westin." He gestured to Hilary. "This is Hilary Dans."

The male smiled when he shook hands. "Dave Holsten." He gestured to the two females. "This is Beverly Tenison and Mary Wilson."

"You can get out of your suits. We store them up here."

Once they had done that, they rode the elevator down to the command deck.

"We're not familiar with this vessel," Dave said. "When was if activated?"

"March of 2105. It was designed to get us to Proxima B at near the speed of light."

Dave's brow furrowed. "I don't recall that project."

Charles suppressed a subtle grin. "It was over six years ago."

"That doesn't make sense. "We're in the year 2085."

Charles rubbed his jaw and looked away momentarily before turning back to him. "Ah, did you happen to experience a blackout recently?"

"Yes. . . We were plunged into darkness that we couldn't mitigate. It lasted about an hour but then went away."

Charles didn't react. He realized that what they experienced was some sort of galactic effect.

The elevator opened and they entered the command deck. Charles introduced the rescued crew to his crew." He looked at Hilary. "Take them to their quarters. The system has probably assigned them to their quarters by now."

"Really? They just got here."

"The system listens and watches us twenty-four," Charles said. "There are no secrets on this ship."

Hilary gave him a sigh. "Bummer." She gestured to the rescued crew members. "Come with me, please."

They left the command deck and Charles sat down next to Carl. "They experienced the black out. It means that it was a galactic phenomenon."

"What makes you think that?"

"According to them, we're in the year 2085. That's before we went on our mission."

Carl looked at him as if he had flipped out. "That's crazy."

"Agreed."

Later the two crews gathered for a supper of vegies that resembled meat. The meal also included apples and pears along with biscuits. They also enjoyed beer recently brewed by the bots on the agricultural deck.

Dave held up his glass of beer as a salute. "First time I've had something like this on a space mission."

"This vessel includes an agricultural deck where robots plant and harvest our food stocks," Charles replied. "I suppose the beer was programmed by the techs that designed this vessel."

"You say that you launched your mission to Proxima B in a year that's in the future," Beverly said. "How is that possible?"

Charles sighed. "Yes, I agree that it doesn't make sense. I believe that this blackout incident is a galactic event and that it caused time changes that could only happen if space time itself was altered."

"How could we verify that?" Dave asked.

"Let's wait until we return to Earth before we get into that," Charles said. "Maybe Space Command can figure it out."

"You said that half of your crew didn't survive the journey to Proxima B," Dave said. "What happened to them?"

"My guess is that it was age," Charles replied. "Their physiologies couldn't handle the long hibernation stress."

Dave tilted his head as if he had trouble accepting his reply.

"They were six years older than us," Charles continued. "Space Command didn't take age into consideration when they came up with the hibernation concept."

"Did you give them a Space Command burial?" Beverly asked.

"No," Charles replied trying not to display his disgust. "We really didn't have time for that."

"May I see them?"

Charles looked at her for moment before replying. "Sure." He stood up. "They're in the back of this deck."

Despite the disgust that the rest of the crew members felt, they decided to join Charles and Beverly as they preceded to the hibernation chamber.

Charles led them to the hibernation modules that were all the hibernation modules were opened. What he saw made him realize that something was very wrong.

"Where are they?" Dave asked. "I thought you said you didn't dispose of their bodies."

"What the hell!" Carl blurted. "They're gone!"

Charles pointed at him. "This has to be a change that the blackout caused."

"We had a similar anomaly," Dave said. "We were unable to locate our crew members that went down to Enceladus. We couldn't sense their locator signals. It's as if they just vanished."

"Shit!" Charles blurted. "This is getting even crazier than I thought!"

No one could argue with his assessment even though it wasn't logical.