Perfectly normal behavior, and Deedlit wanted to observe briefly while her ship analyzed and tried to pinpoint Pirotess' location.
Had this been a typical Japanese series, it would have gone unnoticed. Space being very big and all and the primitives below being, well, primitive.
Unfortunately, this was a detail that Mihoshi had failed to consider - that just because in her home universe giant spaceships could hover over Japan and never get the attention of anyone - it might not be the same case everywhere.
SETI was looking for signals, and as Deedlit's ship wasn't transmitting anything like a EM signal - they didn't notice.
The United States Air Force Space Command, which tracked debris and satellites, was a different kettle of fish altogether. When the optical and radar telescopes in the Indian Ocean picked up a blip measuring nine hundred meters by two hundred meters, even with an oddly "soft" pattern - they quickly began the task of determining what the heck that was. Woomera in Australia sent a tentative "Is that one of yours or should we panic?" message to their colleagues in America.
It took awhile, even with the current cozy state of national friendship, for a reply to get back. Part of it being the official "we don't see them, they don't exist" policy of that very governmental agency doing the tracking.
That it was just another earth-grazer asteroid was transparently false. Any time an asteroid decelerates and changes course, it gets considerable notice.
People in high places in America turned to their top secret documents titled "Declaration of Principles Concerning Activities Following The Detection Of Extraterrestrial Intelligence" which had been written by a committee of scientists with no sense of humor and darn little imagination. They'd been carefully screened to prevent people with those qualities from getting involved.
The Brookings Report was consulted again, and the primitive species woke other members of their primitive species in order to deal with the perceived emergency.
As there was no exhaust detected, it was assumed to use some form of nuclear power - possibly fusion. NEST (Nuclear Emergency Search Team) members were scrambled to bunkers where they could be dispatched. The Plum Island facility was made ready. Since an extraterrestrial would likely be nonhuman but alive, putting the potential disease-bearing creature in a Level 4 Biohazard facility was deemed necessary.
When another course correction was noted, the course was mapped and plotted out immediately.
"Princess, we are being bombarded with many intense electromagnetic signals. I believe the natives are attempting to make contact."
"Why would I want to talk to a bunch of primitives?" asked Deedlit. "Hmmm. Well at least they've gotten past the 'banging rocks together' stage. Let's hear one of them, perhaps some of their music?"
The ship complied.
"Correction. I thought they were past the 'banging rocks together' stage. Is that a cat being strangled?" Deedlit frowned. "If Pirotess is there, perhaps we should just tow away her ship and leave her stranded. It seems a perfect fit for that uncultured barbarian."
A display changed. "Princess. I have an engine trail. It appears that she landed near that large island."
"If the natives regard that as music, then they are primitive enough to be easily panicked. Let's wait until night and then land in that ocean. I'll take a personal flitter and track her from there," decided Deedlit.
"Just a warning," said the ship. "Statute of limitations on her more serious crimes runs out in two days. After that you're stuck with a bank robbery charge that... excuse me the bank robbery charge was retracted. Jaywalking."
Deedlit looked disgusted. "Why would an international bank retract the charge?"
"According to Officer Trellain's ship - it looks more suspicious than a Bug selling used spaceships."
"Agreed," reluctantly said Deedlit. "Okay, as soon as that part of the globe is in their night cycle we'll start."
Ri Kohran looked over her room. Small but clean. Small by Western standards at least. By Hong Kong standards it was fairly large. And it was hers. All hers. No sharing with five other people. Nice.
The smells of something nice cooking were enough to indicate that the provided meals would be adequate. Now if she could just get to work on this little steam-powered Clank she'd worked out.
That night:
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(Posted Fri, 11 Jun 2004 10:30)
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