Silence settled on the bridge, each officer quietly double- and triple-checking the manifold systems currently running quiet. The radio officer watched a screen full of numbers and trembling histograms, alert for any unusual patterns.

Harking sat back, letting some of the tension drain away, and simply waited. There were hundreds of thousands of objects their size in a similar orbit; only intense scrutiny – possibly aided by the brief spike of drive emissions from the all-stop – would give them away from their entry point.

Their drift and orbital velocity carried them first tens of kilometres, then hundreds of kilometres away.

The bridge lights started to dim for the start of the night cycle, screens shifting to low-contrast night settings.

The systems officer throttled back the reactor from active-overload to normal operation, discharging the capacitors back into the core cycle.

And still they waited.