Hancock Incident

The Hancock Incident was a international incident in July of 2150, when the crew of the Blue Star Federation heavy cruiser BSS John Hancock mutinied and began to prey on civilian shipping. With her transponder being unreliable for tracking, BSS Constitution, BSS Enceladus and BSS Blackfin were sent to hunt down the ship at all costs. One of the pivotal moments in the leadup to the Second Solar War, information surrounding the mutiny was kept heavily classified until 2217, and some elements of the incident are still heavily redacted.

### Background

In 2150, the Blue Star Federation and United Soolan Republic were in a state of uneasy peace. Although tensions were low, many on both sides still blamed each other for the destruction wrought by the First Solar War. Unease about working with the USRN on aid and humanitarian work was still high within the BSFN, and both sides were often unwilling to work with each other. In 2149, 700 sailors in the BSFN were court-martialed for insubordination against superiors when ordered to work with USRN sailors in joint exercises, while Army, Marine Corps, and Red Mare Project personnel experienced similar things.

On the civilian side of things, major tech corporation Phoenix Industries had released their first brain-implant device for civilian use in 2138, the first of its kind since the Neuralink of the 21st century. Capable and extremely useful, the implants were extremely popular among young people, many of whom were now in the military. Security concerns surrounding the implants had been on the minds of senior leadership for some time, but no action had yet been taken. However, in the fallout of the mutiny, Phoenix Industries was under significant scrutiny, as a majority of the crew of BSS Hancock had the chips and of those who had the implants, 80% had participated in the mutiny.

### Events

At 0300 GMT on July 15th, 2150, multiple Federation communications centers received a distress call from S.S. Sirius, a Earth-based civilian cargo ship. The Sirius reported being attacked without warning by a warship carrying the flag of the Blue Star Federation, along with reporting multiple hull breaches and a large number of compartments exposed to vacuum, before the message went silent. Attempts to raise the Sirius on comms failed. Simultaneously, Carrier Battle Group 7 reported that their escorting cruiser BSS Hancock had not dropped out of warp with them after a 22 hour, unlinked Faster Than Light cruise. Unable to pick up Hancock's transponder anywhere, the Navy ordered BSS Constitution and BSS Farragut to render aid to the Sirius and then track down BSS Hancock.

Upon arriving at the scene 2 hours later, *Constitution* found only a debris field, no survivors, and absolutely no sign of another ship. Even searching the nearby spacetime for the telltale sign of a ship leaving the area under warp power turned up nothing. Upon checking the Federation's tracking net for Hancock's transponder signal, it was nowhere to be found, and CBG-7 reported that the ship had not shown back up. Admiral Bane now faced a dilemma; continue to search for BSS Hancock, or return to Earth and hope that the ship turned back up. Upon reporting their findings to Command, the Navy amended *Constitution's* orders and sent them back to Earth for refueling.

At 0900 GMT on the 30th, a fleet of United Soolan Republic fuel carriers sent out distress signals, again reporting being under attack by a single Blue Star Federation Navy warship. Farah immediately threatened that the USRN would take care of the rogue ship if the Federation didn't find out what was going on within 5 days. Again ordered to investigate, *Constitution* entered the scene just in time to see her sistership warp away, leaving behind a huge debris field and 20 survivors. After rendering aid to the survivors of the attack, Constitution rendezvoused with a Red Mare Project task force consisting of BSS Blackfin (under the command of Aiyakah Novahich) and BSS Enceladus. The 3 ships made the Rendezvous at 1900 GMT on the 30th, and with BSS Blackfin came their orders: take BSS Hancock intact if at all possible, but if no chance for capture was presented, destroy the ship and crew.

10 hours later, there was another attack, 50 light years away from where the attack on the USR merchant fleet had occured, a far larger distance than Hancock could travel in 10 hours, proving that Hancock was not moving normally, which explained her odd transponder outages. Unable to predict BSS Hancock's movements, Admirals Thomas Bane and Aiyakah Novahich set a trap, using a nearby Red Mare Project signals intelligence ship disguised as a civilian freighter for bait. Around the civilian freighter laid a minefield of warp disruptors in order to hold Hancock in place.

At 0722 GMT on August 2nd, a disturbance in space time described as a "wormhole" opened, and through it came BSS Hancock. After ensuring that the ship had fallen for the trap, the three hunters closed in, with the first shot being a torpedo fired by BSS Blackfin. After the torpedo hit, heavily damaging the *Hancock*'s shields, Constitution and Enceladus opened up with their railguns, while Blackfin provided point defense for the larger ships as well as placing railgun shots from her keel-mounted, ventral, railgun.

Caught between the three ships, BSS Hancock took the abuse, and then began to fight back. Although considerably outmatched by the 2 Red Mare Project ships as well as Constitution, she fought back with a keel-mounted energy weapon; a solid beam Phased Particle Accelerator. When it came to bear on the *Enceladus*, it completely dropped the light cruiser's shields, damaged her hull, and took her out of the fight instantly. *Constitution* recieved several glancing blows from that weapon during the fight, and BSS Blackfin took a railgun shot that knocked out her shields, temporarily exposing *Constitution* to torpedo volleys. Although Constitution's own point defense was able to dispense with the torpedoes, the ship's crew was shaken by how close it had come.

However, the next events would be completely unexpected. As BSS Hancock brought her energy weapon to bear on *BSS Constitution*, the wormhole opened again, spitting out a second ship, which immediately placed itself between the fighting ships; taking the hit from Hancock's fixed PPA cannon, and then hailed all the ships in the area before entering the fight as well. The new ship announced itself as "The starship USS *Constitution*" which caused mass confusion aboard BSS *Constitution*, since the new ship was of a configuration vastly different from any Blue Star Federation starship as well as being significantly more technologically advanced. With the arrival of Constitution was proof of the *Hancock'*s activities. The wormhole that USS *Constitution* had arrived through was created by *Hancock* an hour prior in the *Constitution*'s home reality, where *Constitution* had followed the unknown ship through after catching her raiding merchant vessels in her home reality.

Once the situation was understood, the far more advanced USS *Constitution*, BSS *Constitution*, and BSS *Blackfin* disabled BSS *Hancock*. A joint boarding party between the three ship's marines and security personnel was created, lead by Thomas Bane, Aiyakah Novahich and [name redacted] - the captain of the non-BSF *Constitution*. Upon boarding the *Hancock* they were met by a gruesome discovery, that most of the crew of the Hancock had committed suicide or murdered each other. 30 survivors were found locked up in the brig, among them was Captain Hansen and several of her senior officers. The members of *Hancock*'s crew who hadn't mutinied had been consigned to the brig by the rest of the crew.

After securing *Hancock*, conversation then turned to getting *Constitution* back to her home reality. Inspection of BSS *Hancock*'s engine room revealed a device that proved to allow her to travel between realities with ease, although it was damaged. The device was essentially a miniature and inside-out version of the Federation's Reality Warp Gate that had allowed the Federation to explore Beta reality for the past decade and a half. The two *Constitution*s set out to retrieve the power crystal needed to control the device, while *Blackfin* and *Enceladus* worked to get *Hancock* ready for a tow back to port.

Unfortunately, it didn't end there. Upon their return to the location of the fight two days later, *Constitution* and *BSS Constitution* were met by a United Soolan Republic Navy task force, who had seen the arrival of first *Hancock* and then *Constitution* through the wormhole on long range scanners, and were there to prevent *Constitution* from going back into the wormhole. Upon making contact with the two Human ships, the USRN ships opened fire. BSS *Constitution* defended USS *Constitution* as she entered the wormhole.

### Aftermath

In the immediate aftermath of the incident, all mention of USS *Constitution* was buried and suppressed, while the entire incident as well as the mission reports of Adms. Bane and Novahich, Capt. Hansen, and all other officers were classified. The United Soolan Republic lodged a complaint with the Federation over Bane and Novahich's violation of the Exa-Reality Accord, a treaty signed in 2128 to prevent more cavoda events, and restricting reality travel to Beta Reality. The complaint resulted in a temporary reduction in rank for the two admirals, where Bane was demoted to Admiral from Fleet Admiral and Novahich was demoted from Admiral to Vice Admiral.

In December 2150, Admiral Bane was court-martialed over the engagement with United Soolan Republic Forces, as Farah had also complained that the Federation ship had fired first when escorting USS *Constitution* back to the wormhole, however the charges were dropped when mission logs from all ships involved proved that the USRN starships fired first, without provocation.

Among the mutineers, the only common denominator was that a majority of them had Phoenix Technologies implants. This, along with Captain Hansen's testimony that the members of the crew turned as if a switch had been flipped, with a friendly conversation continuing on until the moment of the mutiny, along with onboard security footage proving that every mutineer had turned instantly, pushed Bane into removing members of his crew who carried the implants. The rest of the Navy brass dismissed his actions as paranoia, and ignored him about the security risk of the implants, which continued to frustrate him until well after the events of the Battle of Earth L2.

Two years after the Hancock Mutiny, in May 2152, Red Mare Project Team 5 goes rogue, attempting to assassinate the president of the United Soolan Republic, plunging the Galaxy into another war. After learning that every member of the team involved with the incident also carried the brain implants, the Federation finally acts, with a mandate to have every chip phased out by 2160, and paying for the removal costs of the chips for the individuals that need them out, as well as mandating that every member of the BSF Armed Forces have chips removed within 4 years. Unfortunately, it was too little, too late. 13 months after war broke out, both nation's navies and armed forces turned on themselves in the doomsday order, and by the end of June 22nd, both nations were gone, replaced by the Phoenix Empire, proving Bane's conspiracy theory right while plunging Earth and Farah into 28 years of fascism.

There was a positive borne of the incident, however. In 2156, Bane began to develop what would become the *Armstrong-class* Heavy Cruiser, which was based on plans that Bane "borrowed" from *USS Constitution*. During the fight with Hancock, Bane had been impressed by the other *Constitution*'s ability to bring half her weapons to bear on any angle and sought to develop a ship for the Blue Star Federation with her unusual configuration. Although *BSS Armstrong* would not be launched until 2185, after the Federation had been restored, the encounter with USS *Constitution* helped build up the Federation's new fleet.