What Fresh Hell is This?

There is an art to a proper jump.

A good jump is precise, calculated, and smooth, ensuring a safe transition between two points in space.

A misjump is unpleasant, disorienting, and tends to make the laws of physics seem like mere suggestions.

A jump in a stolen Thrashing Oar raider ship is something else entirely.

The Oghman ship emerged from jumpspace with all the grace of a brick being fired from a potato cannon. It staggered into normal space, hull creaking and lights dimming, like it had just survived something unspeakable.

The viewscreen cleared.

Morwen, who had plotted the jump, frowned. “Where the hell is Torpol?” she said, very calmly, in the way one might ask where their coffee had gone during an earthquake.

Caitlin leaned over her shoulder, eyes narrowing. “Please tell me that’s a temporary sensor malfunction.”

Morwen checked the readings with disbelief. “That... might be Tlazolteotl. We just jumped nine parsecs in the wrong direction."

Maltz, the Vargr engineer, raised an eyebrow. “Isn’t that the nightmare planet where the locals worship carnivorous weather?”

“Among other things,” Quinn the android offered calmly. “There’s also the human sacrifices, the prophetic mucus, and the seasonal flesh tides.”

Scarred-Snout the Aslan, peering at the planet, gave a thoughtful growl. “It has a certain honourable bleakness.”

Caitlin sighed. “We were supposed to jump two parsecs. From Oghma to Torpol. That’s it. That was the plan. One fecking jump.”

Maltz cleared his throat. “Well, see, the ship isn’t exactly… standard. I mean, we did steal it from Oghman raiders.”

“Who calibrate their drives using skulls and shouting,” Caitlin snapped.

Then the M-drive alert blared.

It wasn’t a normal warning tone. It was the kind of sound that suggested the ship had seen something unspeakable and was now trying to warn them by screaming continuously until someone put it out of its misery.

Maltz winced, his sensitive ears flattening against his skull. "Alright, alright, hold your bloody horses," he muttered, lunging toward the diagnostic panel.

A flurry of clawed typing followed. Screens flickered – first a heat map, then a drive integrity readout showing numbers so low they were practically apologizing, and finally a diagnostic chart that burst into static. With a soft and deeply judgmental bong, the screens went black.

Maltz stared at the display. Blinked. Tilted his head. “Well, that’s not ideal,” he said slowly.

Caitlin turned, expression bleak. “How bad?”

Maltz scratched behind his furry ear, a sure sign of imminent doom. “M-drive’s gone. Burnt out, possibly melted, maybe ejected itself into low orbit. And the backup relay..."

“We had a backup?” Quinn asked, faintly hopeful.

“No,” Maltz said. “That’s what the warning’s about.”

A shudder ran through the deck. Not metaphorical. The floor actually trembled, as if the ship itself had just realized where it was and was now trying to crawl back into jumpspace out of pure existential dread.

“Can we land?” Morwen asked, tightening her crash harness.

Maltz made a noise somewhere between a whine and a laugh. “Define land. If you mean ‘hit the ground in one piece that doesn’t catch fire immediately,’ maybe.”

Caitlin was already strapping in. “I'll take it.”

A console lit up with a flashing rune and a computerized voice snarled in the Oghman dialect: “Makergod is watching. Brace for glorious impact and death!”

Scarred-Snout drew his blade and sat cross-legged, as if preparing to duel the ground itself.

And then the ship began her descent towards arguably the worst planet in the Trojan Reach.