Well, having decided that having all of Manhunt in one piece needed a complete re read, I found myself drawing up one of the (only semi) dreaded stream of conciousness comentaries.

So, on to Part 1:
> A few hundred yards away, a shape at once immediately familiar
>and so out of place it momentarily defied recognition lay on the rocky,
>snow-draped ground, tilted toward them at a slight angle, its leading
>edge crushed into the face of a cliff.

Deanna, you hit the tree... again!

> "Is... is that what I think it is?" one of the ODSTs asked.
> "If you think it's the saucer section from a Constitution-class
>Federation starship, then... yes," the passenger replied.
> "What's it doing here?" the ODST wondered.

a really bad job of parking, but a great job of getting down in one piece!

>You didn't send Orbital
>Drop Shock Troopers, men and women trained to be the very tip of the
>point of the Royal Salusian Marine Corps spear, to investigate something
>like this, let alone to nursemaid some... -civilian-.

Ah, but Grissom is no ORDINARY civilian.

> "That doesn't make any sense," the other ODST, a woman,
>objected. "What Starfleet captain would just sit around with his
>shields down and let somebody tag him at least three times?"
> "One who didn't have a choice," the corporal declared.

Sort of a Duh comment, but it so sets up the rest of this nicely...

> "Main power failure?" Orman hazarded. Sorenzu nodded
>agreement.

or sabotauge, though clearly the ODST's have no reason to think
that way. I wonder if the though momentarily crosses Grissom's
mind, or if he, like me, so buys into the happy happy joy joy
version of the Fleet that one doesnt think ANYONE would consider
such a thing?

>"We've had some unconfirmed reports of pirate activity in the area.
>It's not too likely, but it's just possible that we're not as alone on
>Xawin as we think."

You've got the saucer section from a ship who's normal contingent is like
500 people there Adaji! Unless they all died in the crash (or have grabbed
a pirate vessel and fled) it's pretty damn certain your not alone down there!

> "I've spoken to the Starfleet Bureau of Ships - their equivalent
>to the Royal Navy's Construction and Commissioning Office. There -is-
>no USS Invincible. No Starfleet vessel has ever had that name. Second
>fact: Our mystery ship's hull number, nebula comet comet one seven one
>seven, belongs to a ship that was destroyed 50 years ago."

Heh. Gee, a ship with slightly different markings bearing a name that
the RNCCO would be more likely to use than 'Fleet and the number of a
ship lost 50 years ago. Gee, just what COULD that mean?

> "I suspect the truth in this case will turn out to be simpler...
>and stranger." Grissom got up. "I need to get aboard that ship. There
>may be answers in there - and possibly survivors who need help."

again, a DUH, but still so well done one doesnt care!

> "Whatever the specifics mean," Grissom mused, "the fact that
>they're wearing uniforms at all tells us one important fact." He made
>eye contact with Adaji and went on, "These people were professionals."

Not only professionals, but professionals with sufficent discipline and
esprit d'corps that NOT looking after their dead shipmates with an eye
too eventual retrieval and proper internment is as alien as the insides
of Hunter S. Thompson's head...

> "A computer that size couldn't be powerful enough to operate an
>entire starship," objected Orman.

That would be because you've not run across the true power of Clueless,
Corporal. Actually quite understandable, given that you were probobly
just past the pottie training stage "When the Fun stopped"

> Grissom nodded. "Warp core rupture," he said.
> "That's how we read it. That ship entered the system with a
>serious drive malfunction, and just outside the city limits, so to
>speak, it looks like they went over the high side."

BIIIIG Boom... of course the question stands was it a deliberate act
of retuning the engines for a jump, or was it a
VERY lucky side effect of the hits they took in the pre jump fight?

> The ship's bridge was much like the rest of it: superficially
>familiar, but upon closer examination, not quite right. It had the
>expected layout, but Grissom had never known a Federation starship's
>bridge to be so... white. Not that it was so obvious that it -was-
>white, with all the streaks of soot and other clear indications, as if
>any more were needed, that this ship had been in a fight; but white it
>was, with accents of royal blue and black-faced consoles.

Only thing that isnt clear here is if we are talking about 'Abrams' type
layout or TMP type layout. Not that it really matters except when one
keeps trying to insist its one over the other...

> "Starfleet Medical maintains a complete DNA database of serving
>officers and crew," he explained to Orman as he swabbed what he thought,
>assuming the consoles in this bridge were laid out as he expected, was
>the weapons officer's station.

Oh. I take it back, clearly its the infamouse "Mode select" movie style;
its the only layout that had a separate weapons officer station.

> "Mm. But the seat's internal tractors must still have been
>working," Grissom said. "Otherwise, the captain would've gone straight
>into the main viewer on impact. This seat doesn't have physical
>restraints."

Damn nice touch that explains why people DONT go flying all over the
the bridge when they get slammed around, since TMP is the only movie that
showed ANY of the seats having ANY sort of restraints!

> "The captain's safe is empty, it was standing open," Orman said.
>"But that's not the odd part.

True. If they had time to dismount the commissioning plaque
the captain should well have had time to clean out his safe, which would
have been SOP from back when navies sailed the briny blue rathe than the
depths of space.

>The odd part is that there's another keypad inside it."

Yeah, I could see that NOT being standard unless it came from a REALLY
paranoid culture.

> "What kind of starship captain has the space below his quarters
>converted into a hangar for a single Veritech fighter?" he wondered
>rhetorically.

One who both has a Valk and someone who's used to having to make real quick
escapes over the past 90 some years...

> "None," Grissom said. "And what's more, no Corellians, no
>Zardons, nobody of Zentraedi extraction, and no one showing any signs of
>21st-century Earth's colonization engineering"

such as if earth was in the middle of a super soldier war instead of fitting
colonists to planets at that time...

>WANTED FOR: MURDER (MASS)
> MURDER (MULTIPLE)
> MURDER (SERIAL)
> RAPE
> KIDNAPPING
> GRAND THEFT
> ARMED ROBBERY
> AGGRAVATED ASSAULT
> AGGRAVATED ASSAULT UPON A POLICE OFFICER
> IMPERSONATING A POLICE OFFICER
> IMPERSONATING A MILITARY OFFICER
> IMPERSONATING AN AGENT OF THE CROWN
> UNLAWFUL FLIGHT TO AVOID PROSECUTION
> EVADING PURSUIT
> RESISTING ARREST
> USE OF FALSE IDENTITY DOCUMENTS
> USE OF FALSE STARSHIP REGISTRY DOCUMENTS
> POSSESSION OF CONTROLLED TECHNOLOGIES
> LESE MAJESTE

Lese Majeste? Who'd Repli Gryph dis???

> "Mm. Courtesy of our civic-minded friends at the GENOM
>Corporation," Grissom added dryly. "What puzzles me is, if that -was-
>Benjamin Hutchins's ship, and someone shot it down... why has that
>someone not come forward to claim this reward?"

cause they're on the wrong side of the dimensional barrier... or worse.

> "I'm all ears, Commander," Grissom said.

a statement that will be doubly ironic once he gets Humanized...

> It's almost like somebody set off an SDD out there,
>but no wormhole."

IOW, the aftermath of a dimensional crossover, intentional or otherwise...

>he would endeavor not to ride in an M29 Grizzly again

The Grizzly AFV is from Halo? which if not?

>was the distinctive
>blocky shape of an Ares Corporation Landmaster hostile environment
>vehicle.

the one from the Movie version of Damnation Alley, right?

>Inner door, same story."
>
> Sorenzu had seen the way Starfleet Marines operated. It wasn't
>so different from the way the RSMC did things, come to that.

A perfect, all but seemless transition into the sort of monochromed
"this is what happened" sort of reconstrutive shot CSI is now soo well know for
just as much as the TMI cam...

>Then, elevating her chin slightly, she said in a clear voice, "Valeris.
>Lieutenant, Starfleet, MX39352769."
> "This isn't a military interrogation, Lieutenant," Grissom told
>her.

Maybe not, but you asked who she was and she answered.

>There's also the
>interesting fact that you were left behind. Why was that?"
> Valeris hesitated, then said, "I have a message."
> "What message?"
> She shook her head. "It is not for you."
> "Well, who -is- it for?"
> Her face shut down again.

Not you, and apparently she doesnt want to say for who...
Or has been ordered, or has a clue that whoever it was...
isnt someone she should be mentioning to legal beagles,
err, Squirrls...

>I'm reasonably certain it was a Telgorn DX-9 military
>transport

Did you just pull this out of your increadible creativity,
or is it an image reference I'm just not parsing?

> "She's a material witness - "
> "To -what?-

To what is going to be the biggest paradigm shift in galactic power structures
since Sonset....

> "Grissom reporting," he said. "Positive indications he was on
>Xawin, in the Strenuus system, within the last two weeks. He's not
>there now, current whereabouts still unknown. Unable to provide further
>information at this time. Full report to follow."

Now that its all in the can, Who was it that Grissom was reporting too?
Meh, I guess it really doesnt matter, though now I have a serious suspicion
it was her royal nibs, given that she commisioned Mars Division to help her
investigate, something they were already doing...