by Chris Hechtl
“Not until Prometheus launches, ma'am.” Newly promoted Commander Shelby Logan said, smiling. “I'm more of an engineer at heart, ma'am. I think I can do well there.”
“I think so too. And now that we've got a work around, let see if we can finally pull a Captain's chair out for you permanently.” She smiled slightly. Her exec had been promoted to full Commander and was going to skipper Xavier for the ride back to Pyrax. She would be greatly missed. Renee didn't like the holes in her crew, but she understood the need. She just hoped she got most of them back when they returned to Pyrax. “Getting this chain of command thing sorted out was going to be a headache. Wait until Vargess hears about this.” She grinned mischievously.
“I forgot about that. And daddy,” Shelby grimaced. “I mean Captain Horatio Logan.”
“Your father hasn't been entirely too comfortable with over-all command. I think a change may be in order, for the good. Although my being in system command will make things interesting,” Firefly grimaced.
“Aye aye, Commodore,” Captain Mayweather said with a smile.
“Yes, that is definitely going to take a bit of getting used to,” Firefly replied. The Captain chuckled.
“I've received files from Commander Sprite. Most are encrypted for Captain Logan and the staff. We also have an all ships header to look for Kiev 221.”
“Yes, I remember from the dispatches. She's still overdue?”
“Yes. She still hasn't arrived in Pyrax.”
“Ouch. Well, we may have to look into that, Firefly or another ship.”
The AI nodded.
“Anything else?”
“Yes, some file updates, and I do have one personal message for a civilian.”
“A civilian?”
“I think I know who,” Commander Logan said, smiling coyishly. “Miss O’Neill if I don't miss my guess do I?” she asked, looking at the AI avatar.
The AI nodded.
“Thought so. Boy he has some explaining to do,” Shelby said, smiling slightly wider. Her eyes twinkled with mischief. “And come to think of it, she's going to be just a bit put out because we turned down her request to come along.”
“She'll get over it,” the Captain growled. She poked Shelby. “I believe you have a ride to catch, Captain Logan.”
Shelby blinked and then nodded. “By your leave then, Captain?” she asked with a smile.
“Go on, get out of here. Get Xavier sorted out; we've got a long ride ahead of us.”
“Aye aye, ma’am.” She turned and nodded to the AI. “Sir.”
“My compliments, Captain,” the AI said, with a return nod. “Smooth sailing.”
“Aye, sir,” Shelby replied, saluting the AI, and then the Captain. They returned the salutes and then she about faced and walked out of the compartment. Renee just caught the small smirk on her former exec's face.
“Think she'll do okay?”
“She'll do just fine, ma'am. It's past time to push her out of the nest,” Firefly responded.
“Yes well, that does open up a bit of a hole in our chain of command though,” she shook her head. Newly promoted Lieutenant J.G. Tr'j'ck her JTO was off on the prisoner liner, acting as her Captain. Ensign Sampson her senior communications officer was off on one of the frigates, as was Ensign Rator'll her sensor officer. Both had been promoted to Lieutenant JG and then frocked to Lieutenant rank to handle the Captain's slot on the ships.
It was temporary; there was no way she'd sign off on either of them getting a two-grade bump in rank. She was a bit concerned about that Veraxin; he was still a bit jittery and hadn't quite settled down enough in her opinion. Hopefully his time in the hot seat would mature him. Chief Chowler was on one of the freighters. Manning bridge watches on Firefly, frack, all the ships was going to be fun for the midshipman and ratings, she'd have to keep a close eye on them. At least she still had Janice and guns by her side.
“I'm still a bit confused about why our resident tac witch declined a posting. Janice I can understand, I asked her to stay since we're the flagship and all the other ships in the convoy are going to take their lead off us. I need the best at the helm. But I'm a little concerned that Purple Thorn declined a prize command.”
“I am not certain about her motivation, Captain; you'd have to ask her. But it could be she has concern about her relative size. Projecting command is difficult for an elf when those under them are of larger size.”
“Which is about everyone here. She doesn't seem that troubled with Ensign Tr'j'ck or her department though,” the Captain replied thoughtfully, playing with her bottom lip.
“No, and she does fine when she mans a bridge watch as well. I would suggest talking to her about it.”
“I will,” the Captain said, nodding. “But I'm not going to look a gift horse in the mouth. We've got you, Lieutenant Lu, and her primarily. Janice will be too busy manning the helm and navigation to take a watch, I suppose I'm going to be manning a watch...” She grimaced. “This is going to be tight. I'm glad it is a short flight.”
“Aye, Captain. Short for us perhaps, but for those who are even more shorthanded, it could be a very long flight indeed.”
“True,” the Captain mused.
---( | ) --- ( | )---
When Jethro woke he felt remiss, he frowned. He'd toured the whole ship but he knew he'd forgotten something, something important. As his sleepy mind probed the sore spot like a tongue probing a bit of meat stuck between his teeth, he got up and got himself squared away. Finally he realized what he'd forgotten and felt like kicking himself. His tail flicked in annoyance as he stood there near the unused bed. He closed his eyes and pulled up the ship's net and the TOE.
Oasis's Table of Organization and Equipment was depressingly short. There were four squads of Marines on the cruise liner to go along with the twenty enlisted and six officers including the two Marine officers. PFC Hart had it right; the Veraxin Lieutenant J.G. Tr'j'ck was their acting Captain. He had three other naval officers with him; one frocked from a chief petty officer from Firefly. CPO Evans was now an acting Ensign and department head of ops.
That left Jethro as senior ranking noncom on the ship. Also, apparently doing double duty as chief of the boat. Joy, Jethro thought. And apparently Spitterman was left on Firefly to deal with the noobs. Jethro wasn't sure if he should pity the good Staff, or the people under him.
He snorted at his train of thought and then got back to reading. The other two naval officers were also department heads, both former noncoms frocked to the rank of ensign. One was Ensign Winter, a small pale human female with blackish purple hair. Her skin was almost iridescent, changing in color from a pale off white to a bluish depending on her mood. Scuttlebutt said she had some water chimera genes in her history. She was their chief navigator and helmsman.
The newl- minted Ensign Rofl was a Neo chimp, a nice guy, but quiet. He'd served in various departments on Firefly and other ships, or so the grapevine said. He loved to learn but hadn't wanted officers rank; it had been thrust upon the simian. Hopefully he didn't let his new rank go to his head. He was filling in a variety of roles, but he was listed as acting XO for the ship as well.
As senior officer Lieutenant Valenko was the head of the Marine contingent as well as the ship's acting security chief. Technically the grizzly outranked the other officers on the ship, but he was a Marine, therefore he wasn't supposed to command the ship. Jethro had expected that; after all, the bear's calling was the Marines. But to his surprise he found out that each of the senior officers, including the Marines, had to man a bridge watch. He frowned. That probably had them a bit nervous, and it showed just how strained they were. He checked the other department heads and then snorted.
Ox as their most experienced engineer had been pressed into acting chief engineer, much to his amusement. Ox's squad was the second squad on the ship; half were helping the big Tauren in engineering or manning life support. The other half were manning posts in the galley. Unglamorous for sure but necessary. The
food replicators and small crew should limit the need for many people there though, Jethro thought.
He frowned, then cocked his head. No, he thought carefully, that wasn't true. Sure they had replicators, but the prisoners didn't. That meant...he sighed and shook his head. He'd have to look into it later.
Valenko's squad was mostly drawing the security duty alongside most of the mechs. Not all the mechs were security the panther realized; a few were engineering remotes. He nodded. That was good, it gave the Tauren an extra set of hands.
His squad...he frowned. His squad was mostly on security duty. He was...he frowned, not sure about their status. Either a few were helping out in the other departments or they were laying low somewhere...or exploring the ship. He'd have to look into that.
Ensign Esh'z was going over the intel they had. He had an agenda, and apparently nothing except a direct person-to-person order from the bear could get him out of his narrow mindset for long. He was barely attending to his squad, but apparently the grizzly had taken over for him. He'd tried to assign them duties in his intel projects, but the bear had overruled the ensign and put them to work on other more pressing duties.
They didn't have a ship AI, no AI at all. Jethro felt a flicker of indignation and realized its source. “Sorry,” he muttered to Bast. “Okay, so we've got one AI. Do you want to come out and act like an AI? Maybe help? I'm sure the crew would appreciate it Bast,” he said. Bast just meowed and then looked at him with sad eyes. He sighed and shook his head. “Yeah, thought not,” he said.
Jethro stretched. He had slept in the suit again, and despite Bast's comforting presence he was getting tired of sleeping in it. It felt like he was trapped, stuck in it. He didn't like the idea of being stuck in it for another...he frowned, cocking his head. Finally he gave up. They'd post the schedule for when they were set to depart, and when they would arrive in Pyrax eventually.
The crew was light, but apparently all experienced spacers. That was good, they had their work cut out for them. But they had a problem, by the time the manning of Oasis had been thought out they'd been light in the engineering department. In fact Ox only had six ratings to help him and the other Marines out. That was a problem Jethro thought. He winced when he checked. There was one active reactor; it and the sublight drives were being monitored remotely since they didn't have anyone to man the watches in person.
One thing he did know, they weren't going to trust the prisoners in anything but the brig. Hell, he didn't even trust them there! He shook his head. It was definitely going to be a long trip.
Many of the crew he'd seen or met during his aborted exploration of the ship. The panther noted none of the new Marines from Admiral Irons or the new recruits from the other ships were on board. The crew and Marines were all old hands, veterans. There was some friction there, between the navy crew and the Marines, but that was to be expected.
Jethro decided enough was enough and went to breakfast.
When he got there he grabbed a tray from the stack, then hit the food replicator. He turned, listening with an ear to the ongoing debate in the dining hall. There were a few people off duty; they had compared notes and then got into a discussion. Some apparently want to explore the vast bowels of the ship, others want to restore the ship to her former glory. The panther sat, thinking they were cracked, that was way out of their meager crew's ability.
Others didn't want to touch anything so the media could see it all for themselves. As Jethro finished eating his egg and sausage concoction a compromise on that suggestion of just improving the areas they needed to be in was reached. “Make them livable, like here,” a tech said, waving a hand. The others apparently agreed.
Jethro snorted softly. Apparently the Admiral's return had revived spirits and renewed an interest again in not just living, but improving and rebuilding things. Of not just accepting things as they were as if they could never be changed.
“I'd like to see the Horathian flags down,” Jethro said idly. That sparked a guilty look from a few of the crew. They looked up to see the draperies and frowned. Grimly a few nodded. One even got up and started ripping the things down. He had to go up on the balcony to get to some of the red swirls of cloth.
---( | ) --- ( | )---
Firefly had taken light damage. She had lost one force emitter pod, she had light damage to one bow graser mount, two missile tubes had been destroyed, and one counter missile tube damaged in the engagement. Some of the parts made up the damage, but they hadn't had time to focus on the ship. Since her damage wasn't drive oriented, priority had gone to the other ships. Once the other ships had their own crews Firefly attempted to at least do some repairs to the ship. After all, once they were in hyper they wouldn't have the opportunity to do external repairs.
The hull repairs were slowed when buckling around the damaged sections was found. The areas had to be carefully stripped down, the damaged sections cut out, and then replaced. It was judged a yard job, so they locked the repairs down for later.
Firefly's crew had repaired most of her internal damage and had stuffed parts and replicated equipment into every nook and cranny on the ship by the time it was time to leave. They were gratefully off-loaded to the freighters and other ships in the scratch fleet. Some put the material to immediate use in their own repairs or upgrades while others stored them to be installed when they were in transit.
A day before they were set to depart the queues had run out of material but had not been refreshed or stopped. Firefly directed crews to reload their material hoppers while directing repairs. The delay had cost them an hour to transport the material; a precious hour that could not be replaced.
Firefly would act as the flagship of the returning ships. The Apollo class corvettes dubbed Tweedle dumb and Tweedle dee, had been slated but had been swapped at the last minute for the single Apollo class named Charley. She would be out on the convoy's port flank. The gravely wounded Manta frigate, Jumping Jack, would be on their starboard flank. There was some concern that the two ships could handle the duty, but both bridge crews had managed to pass the sim she'd thrown at them. The reefer turned stasis ship Gypsy Rose with a mostly volunteer crew, the Lagroose bulk freighter Minerva Alabama, The Oasis of Space XCIV, the Clydesdales, Colombian Express and Sabrina 99, the Express class light freighter Speedy Express Delivery 81374, and the Moth class Spaceways Whale 14 were in the pocket. Four of the six civilian vessels were loaded with their civilian refugees. The Arboth class Xavier would play rear guard. Four gunships were attached to the large warships, two each on Firefly and Xavier. All were Terran HK models.
Firefly was to be the point ship, which meant she had to hold her speed down to the slowest of the ships. The other ships would take their course and bearing from the heavy cruiser. Some had barely trained bridge watches on board; they'd be hopelessly lost without Firefly to guide them along their way. The transit would be in the low octaves of beta; the best speed ships like Oasis could handle in their current state. That would double their transit time, putting them behind in Firefly's scheduled arrival time.
Firefly and Captain Mayweather had debated sending a ship ahead but decided against it. Most of the ships were damaged, and there was a very real concern that any ship other than Firefly who emerged would be fired upon the moment they exited hyper. Which meant the cruiser would have to talk fast when they emerged, and stagger the other ship's arrival sufficiently behind them so as not to get them destroyed by the defenders in Pyrax.
All that was planned and discussed as they made their final preparations to move out. Renee was heartily sick of all the talk and excited to get moving by the time they were done. She couldn't wait to see the reaction in Pyrax when they arrived, not only whole, hail, and healthy, but with additional ships and people and the news of the Admiral with them. Pyrax was due for a major shakeup, and all she could think of was that it was about damn time.
---( | ) --- ( | )---
“So, everything as it should be, Gunny?” Valenko asked when they fi
nally crossed paths.
“It's getting there I suppose. I'm still not happy about a few things though, sir, but we're working on it,” the panther said. He'd been unhappy about the division of labor and put all the Marine enlisted on a practical watch rotation. That had gotten a response from Ensign Esh'z who hadn't liked what he'd termed the panther's poaching.
Valenko had backed Jethro agreeing that all the Marines should have a watch both as part of the ship's crew but also as a guard. They couldn't afford to be lax, especially with their deadly cargo. One slip up because someone was over tired or just plain sloppy could lead to very deadly circumstances for many, if not the entire ship.
“Getting far with the armor?” The grizzly asked.
Jethro looked at the eyes on the HUD. They were sleepy, almost but not quite closed. “Somewhat sir. It's...under control I guess you could say. We're working it out.”
“I see. I was told light duty. You've been busy though,” he said. Jethro nodded. He'd let Bast take over and tested her out by having her move them through the ship on a course he set. While she walked and looked about he'd tried to assimilate the files the Admiral had uploaded to his implants.
The stuff he could understand were very basic...Most were public domain material on the history of the Cadre. Some were declassified general intel meant for forces that were chosen to interact or serve with Cadre in support of them.
There was little there he'd like to know, and most of it was dry reading. There were a few mentions of famous actions before the Xeno war, but that was just it, a mention. A name of a planet, or hostage crisis, even a couple pirate incidents and an incident with the Salamanders, but no details. Each had been resolved though.
He knew what was there wasn't the whole story. Bast had reacted in amusement when he'd read the general specs for instance, so he knew there was more to their shared abilities then what the public had known. That was to be expected.