The little destroyer had been trying to flank one of the enemy’s smaller ships when the captain saw the battleship STARBURST caught in a cross fire between two of the enemy’s capital ships and taking heavy damage, the captain knew if the flagship of their force was destroyed all hope was lost.
The destroyer would not last long against either one of the enemy’s capital ships , the only chance that the little destroyer had of inflicting any substantial damage on the lager capital ships was to ram one of the enemy’s ships.
With a grim determination she made her decision and ordered the AURORA to ramming speed but the AURORA hadn’t even gotten to within 2 miles of the enemy ships ,when the two ships seeing what she was doing targeted her with full broad sides and slammed her out of her original trajectory .

The destroyer fell out of her original path as explosions ripped through her 3 mile length , venting her precious atmosphere from dozens of holes.
Its weapons silenced and engines blown the AURORA was in its death throws,
The captain of the AURORA steadied herself by grabbing the end of the communication relay board and then glanced up to see the main screen flicker for a moment then fade out .

Warnings and alarms rang through the ship from all directions , she had already given the order to abandon ship when the main reactors blew killing everyone in the engine rooms and taking out half of the medical wing.

The little destroyer was not made for front line battle, she was a scout ship and had only returned to port to refuel before scouting the next quadrant but when the order came to launch-out as the enemy fleet had been detected the little destroyer took her place beside the heavy destroyer NEBULAS FIRE , dwarfed by the bigger ship the AURORA was only one tenth her length or girth .

The battle had come swift and furious , the outcome was almost set in stone from the beginning as the fleet that they were to face had already dismantled their main fleet that was sent out to stop them weeks earlier.
After that central command had been reeling from defeat after defeat and everyone knew that it was only a matter of time before they showed up at their home planet.

There was no doubt in anyone’s mind that no mercy would be forth-coming form these aliens, they had already wiped out all of their outposts with the only survivors being the ones who were able to flee before they showed up.
The little blue planet that they called home was on the verge of annihilation and they were the only ones left to stand against them , all they had were a dozen capital ships that had returned from previous battles and still needing further repairs and twice that many escort ships but any ships that could be had were sent as everyone knew this was their last stand .

Another explosion wracked the ship and the captain was thrown violently to the left , she had tried to break her fall by reaching out with her left hand to grab the railing but the force was too much and she could feel the weight of her body slam into her arm , crushing her wrist.
She fell to the floor and gasped for breath as she had the wind knocked out of her and the air was getting thin , she wanted to stay down but the weight of her rank on her shoulders wouldn’t allow it and she pulled herself up with her good arm and cradling her crushed wrist , made her way to the defence pane screen, it was glowing a soft red light with a bright blue outline for their ships and a dull yellow for the enemies ships.
She could barely stand to look at it as she could see a lot of yellow and very little blue .
She was having to gasp for air now as the air was getting too thin to breath, she turned to look at the star chart pane and lightly touched it to turn it to the chart of their home solar system and touched the right hand side of the screen to zoom in on the little blue sphere that was their home “only a weeks flight to get there” ,the thought ran through her head over and over and she wondered how many would escape before the enemy fleet showed up to turn their home into a burnt out cinder, she couldn’t even imagine a safe haven that they could flee too.
She felt a shudder run through the ship as another internal explosion buffeted the ship and felt herself go weightless as the life support went out.

Her last thoughts were of her daughters who were still in school.

April 7 3010 – aboard the U.S.S.A. intrepid ,
Lt. Lenix Healy looked at the battered alien ship, it seemed like a dark black leviathan, he had been sent with a group of scientist 4 years ago to inspect the ship, It had made even him sit up when he saw the images handed to him by the general in his briefing.
It had taken them 3 and half years to get here , It was a long time to be gone , his kids would be out of high school and most likely starting their own families by the time he got back but as he had known before they left if he hadn’t gone he would have regretted it the rest of his life.
A long range probe had discovered the ship 9 years ago and it had taken another 5 years to build a long range ship capable of reaching the place, half way to the Andromada galaxy.
He had been told that he and his crew were to make first contact with the people on the vessel but there was no ‘first contact’ or any of that Hollywood ‘we come in peace’ nonsense, all they had found was a dead ship that was pockmarked with huge gaping holes and a large portion ripped away at the lower rear of the ship.
He gazed at the enormous star etched into the side of the ship and wondered for the hundredth time what it stood for, it was barely recognizable as a star as it only had a faint outline left .
The only real data that they had on the ship after they showed up was that the age of the ship was 1.8 billion years old.
He had them check the readings from the instruments three times and then ordered them to do a full diagnostic check on the equipment before he sent the message back to earth on how old the ship really was.
The only clear understanding of the people who had manned the ship was that their technology was beyond their own.
They had gained access to the ship through the gaping holes that could have only been explosions but not much was left inside the ship even though there was no atmosphere or heat but after such a long time anything organic had long since turned to dust, only metal now remained and what looked like computer banks and storage holds had degraded and crumbled to sift in the bins, only the strange semi transparent ’panes’ as they had come to call them still existed but even those fell apart at even the slightest pressure.

They had spent 3 grueling months cutting open bolt hatches and surveying empty rooms and searching every nook and crevice that they came across for some answers to who these beings were that had existed on this ship, even some small plaque or art work that could have survived would have been a godsend,
but all that had changed last week as they had accidentally stumbled into the ships command center.
They were as always eager to get a peak in a new room but this one was different as it was ten times as large as any other room and was filled with the ‘panes’ they had seen earlier.
They had all slowly and quietly slipped through the door way without making a sound as they all knew that this room was different than the others that they had seen.
One of the group had gotten very close to the railing and stopped to grasp at something .
“What is it Sargent?” Healy asked,
“I’m not sure sir ,it looks to be a symbol of some sort” she said
The Lt. walked over and looked at the strange little item, it was 4 bars over a semi-circle, and wondered if this had been someones rank.
“SIR” one of the men shouted.
He looked up and saw one of the panes slowly turning a dull red it was hard to see but there were symbols and lines all over it.
Everyone had stopped and watched it without saying anything till the Lt. shouted ’start mapping it’ and a mad dash of rushing out equipment and high-tech cameras had ensued.
He had spent 2 hours studying that map , he didn’t know what triggered it to come on , whiether it was a motion sensing battery that hadn’t been exhausted or it was just leaching energy from their Tesla batt-packs in their equipment, all he knew was that for 2 hours it had remained barely lit and then slowly faded out.
He had spent the last week reviewing and deciphering what it said and there was not a doubt in his mind what it said or what that particular ‘pane’ was…..
It was a navigational pane that logged the ships movements and where it had been .
After reading and deciphering what it said, at first it had caused him to wonder if he had read his notes right but after studying them over and over he was convinced.
The ship had come from their solar system 1.8 billion years ago from the third planet from the sun but according to the navigational logs that planet had no moon.

*EPILOG*
I had written this story after watching a program on the history channel on how a runaway moon/planet the size of Pluto had given the earth a glancing blow and created our moon, the program said that the earth was completely destroyed and became a molten ball again.
I couldn’t help but wonder if life had existed before the impact and if it did, how far did it advance?