[IC] Echo Legacy: Burdens of Honor

CIC
EDF Atlas

Standing over the main tactical display, Elena Ramirez reminded herself of joyful days when she poured herself into a single task and the rest of the world melted away in favor of an absolute concentration creating a singularity of perfection in a moment of focus. Code decryption had been a particular favorite task of hers in the days before the rigors of command demanded that her attention split evenly between at least a dozen tasks at any given time.

“Captain, deck reports Roamer and Blades are back aboard.”

“Who is out on patrol now?”

“That would be…Sunset and Two-Tone, sir. Also, Commander Morrow said he needs to speaking with you personally about his flight report,” the staff officer said.”

“Very well. Inform him I will be in my quarters in a few moments.”

The captain swept her eyes across the CIC for a moment. To most of the crew, the Atlas was a testament to the advances made over the last few years across the rest of the fleet. Compared the flagship Endeavor, the Atlas was damn near antiquated. Hell, the technicians and deck crews were working double time just to integrate all of the equipment sent by other ships just before this one made the trip to the Karas System.

“One of the new auto-loaders on the deck has been malfunctioning,” another staffer reported in short order. “Tore the stabilizer fin completely off one of the service Boomers.”

The report brought about a sigh from the lips of the commanding officer. “Take if off the line and tell them that we’re going to have to do it the old fashioned way for a few days. Inform Colonel Narita and let him remind them of how this Fleet kept its birds in the air before autoloaders.” Both of them shared a half-hidden smile at the thought of unleashing the XO on some unsuspected deck hands.

“Finally, sir, we’ve been getting complaints regarding the ventilation system down in Slum…err…down in the cargo bay housing the civilian population at the moment. The cold isn’t making it any easier on our medical staff to fight some of the illness that is spreading down there at the moment and the restlessness is getting worse.”

Flattening one hand on the tactical display, Ramirez reached up and pinched the bridge of her nose. Running a crew and ship with no possibility of support was hard enough with a belly full of malcontent civilians unable to appreciate the severity and importance of the mission facing the ship and everyone forced to accompany it.

“Perhaps it’s high time that I visit these Slums for myself,” she said with a renewed sense of vigor for a moment. It was high time that the Captain involved herself in more than just signing reports in the middle of the CIC. “Inform Commander Morrow that he is to report directly to Colonel Narita. I, on the other hand,” she stopped, allowing her voice to trail off for a moment as she began to scan across the CIC once more.

After a few seconds, her eyes spotted the diminutive frame of Midshipman Dennis Heldane. She’d taken note of him scurrying about the CIC for a while now with whatever he’d been tasked to fix. Keeping up with everything broken on the Atlas was beyond any of time at this point. The ship should have been in dry dock before the Battle of Melchoir and now was being ask to live on in combat conditions. Alone.

“Midshipman,” she spoke with a level and direct tone that wasted no syllable or emphasis unneeded to attract attention and emphasize her point. “It has been brought to my attention that there are a number of guests down below who are unpleased with the amenities we’ve provided. Why don’t you accompany me down below and we’ll see about putting a mints on the pillows?”

Midshipman Dennis Heldane
EDF Atlas CIC

With his equipment packed up and the logger updated, Dennis was just showing himself out the pressure lock. His eyes and mouth softened into a neutral scowl as he put on his best "nothing to see here" face as to avoid any unnecessary eye contact with the rest of the crew. He hastily made his way to the airlock when every action he was engaged in was suddenly arrested by one word.

"Midshipman," the unmistakable voice of captain Ramirez chimed in cold, scientific efficiency from the tactical display.

The title of 'midshipman' was the same as any other rank, rating; just an occupational title. From Dennis's perspective, given his history, it meant so much more than that. 'Midshipman' had become Dennis's identifying title amongst the top brass; seen through the lens of his uniform and not his person, because that person carried too much baggage to form a healthy relationship. Just like the wires and metal Dennis himself worked on, so too was he treated by his superiors as an unfeeling machine.

Yet Dennis certainly felt emotion and right now he felt fear. The captain had an air of authority about here that was unquestionable even amongst the more socially acceptable members of the crew. For the lowly Dennis though Captain Ramirez was more than authority, she was a high tower of judgment and discipline that lorded above him as an alpha lioness asserts power over a pride-less male cub. There was an old Terran saying that Dennis had long ago committed to memory: "there's always a bigger fish". Well on the Atlas, they were all fish, and Ramirez was the kingfisher that circled the waters above them with ever piercing eyes. Eyes that now stared down and clearly through the soul of one Dennis Heldane. The very thought made his right upper lip begin curling into that infamous rictus smile with sharp, jittery twitches. If he didn't fight it now then...

Mind over matter. Dennis silently mouthed. His face transformed into the hardened gaze of a soldier as quickly as it had deformed just a second earlier. He wheeled around to face his commanding officer and saluted smartly. "Yes SIR!" Dennis replied with a tad more force than necessary. It wasn't in spite, he would never raise his tone in anger to a superior. It was something Dennis did for himself, to keep himself from stuttering during periods of extreme stress.

“It has been brought to my attention that there are a number of guests down below who are unpleased with the amenities we’ve provided. Why don’t you accompany me down below and we’ll see about putting a few mints on the pillows?” the captain invited/ordered coolly. Again this sent Dennis into a slight panic. His current billet assigned to him by Chief Wisetale had Dennis slated to fix the airlocks on the lower decks and now the captain herself issued him a conflicting order? It wasn't easy serving two masters with differing agendas, but one must naturally differ to the higher power. Of course Dennis had no idea what the captain had in mind for him to do. He was an ET not a jack of all trades, what was he to do if she assigned him some HVAC job, or logistics, or--god forbid--public relations?

There was an easy answer to this question. Over millennia of military history there was a simple answer to every order. No matter the circumstances, no matter the conflicts, no matter the cost in material or human life, there was one, two word answer to any order. It was the answer that Dennis, like millions of soldiers before him, chose.

"Yes sir."

Captain Elena Ramirez
Transit, EDF Atlas

When the class of ships led by the Atlas had been the forerunners of the EDF Fleet and the standard by which the rest of the space-faring Terran progeny measured itself, Elena Ramirez walked the same halls as a courier on the message run between the flagship and the other pieces of the convoys lumbering from point to point, carrying orders and manifests to be approved and signed by commanding officers day in and day out in the finest tradition of military efficiency.

Now, she walked the hall as the commanding officer of the only friendly ship for farther than she could calculate and the decision of whether to act was solely in her discretion as a commanding officer in a time of war. The times had certainly changed.

“Scuttlebutt across the CIC is that the civilian population is asking about the possibility of integration with the crew given our ‘difficult’ situation. Can you imagine trying to keep anyone’s head on straight?” The senior officer mused with the enlisted man as they made their way through the corridors to their eventual destination of the main cargo bay full of malcontent and scared civilians.

Col. Kaito Narita & Lt. Cmdr. Aiden Morrow
XO’s Quarters, EDF Atlas

“…and I don’t know the full extent of the damage that was done the Angels, but it’s going to be difficult to get close enough to learn more without exposing our ships and our pilots to more danger. We were lucky,” Morrow spoke, standing before the metallic desk separating him from the seating figure of the ship’s executive officer and his former commander at Triton Station. The pilot’s posture was straight but relaxed as he delivered the report, leaning forward and taking a long drink from a glass of water poured for him.

“I see,” Kaito Narita spoke as he shuffled through a number of orders that Morrow had carried down with him after running into a duty officer and being informed that Narita was in point command while the captain sought to alleviate the tense situation brewing in the belly of the ship.

“Whatever the ship is, if it were going anywhere it would have done so long before you stumbled across it. All the same, reroute the standard patrol to keep a regular contact on it and put a relay Boomer so that we’re in constant connection with whoever we have out there.”

“What if it decides to make a move?”

“Order your pilots to maintain visual contact. If it starts advancing on our position, disable it.”

Morrow did his best not to flinch. Ramirez would have never given such an order but rather would have redeployed the Atlas rather than fire the first shot in a situation like that. Still, it was the colonel’s call.

“Also, Commander,” Narita spoke with his normal rigid deliver even in the most informal of circumstances, “start drafting up a plan to get us close and inside that thing. Dismissed.”

“Yes, sir.”

Lt. Mackenzie Hawkins
Flight Deck, EDF Atlas

After a hot shower and the best excuse for a hot meal she could scrounge up in the mess, Mackenzie found herself wandering about the ship with too much energy for the rack time t hat her body probably needed but refused to allow. Had the mission ended an hour earlier she probably would have been sound asleep by now, but instead she was restless.

Clad in an Endeavor-issued pair of black sweatpants and a grey sweatshirt that bore the Alpha Company insignia from her days as a cadet at Triton Station, the young officer ducked through a hatch and into the open air of the flight deck. The place was never quiet, never really clean, and never really sleeping.

More than any other place on the ship, it felt like home.

Sliding down on the ladders leading up from the higher decks and traversing across the action area to where some of the wounded or servicing birds were tucked by the repair docks, she quickly spotted the familiar tail markings of the Angel that served her since her transfer to the Atlas. The bird that had been her personal fighter aboard the Endeavor was still out of touch for a while, having taken a wicked wing shot during the Melchoir encounter and still needing a refit or two to deal with the older launch mechanisms of her new ship.

“My kingdom, my kingdom for a grease monkey,” she said aloud, inspecting a munitions rack next to the parked Angel.

Midshipman Dennis Heldane
EDF Atlas

The gauntly quiet metal corridors echoed with each step Dennis and the captain took as they made their way to the forward companionway. The hatch was located a mere twenty meters from CIC yet the agonizing walk there through the sudden silence seemed to stretch on for eternity. Normally every forward deck was abuzz with officers and crew whether it be intelligence and tactical officers ferrying documents, marines running CQB drills or maintenance and techs like Dennis himself doing their regular sweeps. For some reason though today was different. It was as if through some Byzantine conspiracy that Dennis was alone in the forward corridor with the captain. Deep-seated discomfort roiled within the scrawny-looking tech. He did everything he could to rationalize, distract and otherwise suppress the fear that was eating away at him by the second. He stared at the floor, he held his MUT in his hand, he reviewed his basic and technical training, and he mentally uttered his personal chants.

Walk the perimeter. Check your six. They invade your mind through your dreams. Samsung Technologies C4ISR Model B battle computer installed on capital ships as a fire control mechanism for directed energy weapons. Walk the perimeter. Check your six. They can't get in if you lock them out. Dennis reviewed internally as he fought his quivering upper lip with every step. Occasionally he glanced at his blank MUT as if checking a passive diagnostic suite. Dennis knew that if others saw him at work they were less likely to pay attention to him. It was a trick that worked in the past and it was working again now. He did it for himself as much as he did it for others, to distract himself from the reality that he was even being scrutinized in the first place. It was working.

The captain's question brought all that effort to a shuddering halt.

“Scuttlebutt across the CIC is that the civilian population is asking about the possibility of integration with the crew given our ‘difficult’ situation. Can you imagine trying to keep anyone’s head on straight?” The commanding officer's voice carved through Dennis's mental stasis like a pulse gun through paper. In one blinding second every coping mechanism he had been bringing online in order to maintain his concentration came crashing down in a ruinous collapse.

Then the other questions came to Dennis that he had been ignoring. What was the captain planning on having him do? What could he do beyond what he had been tasked to? What would be the consequences if he failed? Now another question came to his tortured brain. What was the captain asking him? Did she want his honest opinion or was it a rhetorical question? Was there a right or wrong answer if she was asking for Dennis's opinion.

Better safe than sorry. Dennis thought as he threw together a response for the captain. "No sir, I think tha-that issue is a-a-ABove my pay grade." Dennis mustered the most dignified answer that came to mind as his face contorted in labor with each stutter. He hoped the answer he gave was the right one. They came to the forward hatch where a marine, Pvt.Salinger, stood at attention. She saluted smartly to the captain and opened the hatch. The captain climbed in and Dennis followed. They made their way down the companionway, five decks to the lower maintenance corridors. They exited the companionway again with the captain leading the way. Within minutes they came to the guarded freight doors leading to the port side cargo hold or the "Slums" as they were becoming known. The two marines on station saluted, then opened the doors at the captain's order.

Upon entering the slums Dennis was assailed by the crushing atmosphere of the despoiled, festering living arrangements. Simply the presence of so many people wore on him, and the idea that for every person there was a pair of eyes that could be trained on him. Or rather would be trained on him; he was standing next to the captain after all, a glorious beacon of authority in a land of lawless squalor. He took in the angry pain of this place, felt it at a visceral level. Felt that pain and anger being directed at him.

His lip jumped a little.

Civilian Tenny Merrick
Cargo Bay Slums, EDF Atlas

A young woman who looked and felt perhaps a decade beyond her twenty-five sat, slightly hunched, on a crate that served as a chair in the make-shift home that she shared with a family of four. Her shoulders were rounded, her torso bent over her lap as she pulled the uniform closer to her eyes, squinting in the dim light to inspect her stitching. With a sigh, she lowered her arms and straightened her spine. Rolling her head over her shoulders, she closed her eyes and let out a quiet sigh. The pay, when it was there, was awful. It didn't matter, really; it was more than most made. She did it because there was nothing else to do, in all honesty. She couldn't sit and think about...

She couldn't just sit and think.

Tenny had begun to hallucinate, she thought. She would hear voices - or rather, a voice. Peter's. Telling her to be strong, mostly. It happened when she was overly hungry or almost entirely exhausted; when she was straining beneath the weight of the life she now led.

Shaking her head, she curved her shoulders again and looked closely at the patchwork she had yet to finish. A few moments passed before the shadow of one of her living companions blocked her light. Suppressing a groan, she tilted her head back to look at the haggard form of the mother. The woman had obviously, once, been rather plump. With a lack of food, decent or otherwise, she had lost weight quickly. Her skin sagged in a particularly unflattering way, ruddy with lack of proper hygiene. Tenny imagined that her hair had, once, been beautiful. Now it was frizzy and pulled back, nothing of note at all. For a moment, the younger woman felt sorry for her housemate. Hovelmate. The shell of a woman that stood before her.

"Captain's here," Irena spoke flatly, nodding her head in the general direction of Out There. "Barely arrived. I heard hollerin' about it and thought I'd tell you."

Some people took the the slums like Irene and her children had; they, after a fashion, embraced the simplicity (and degradation) that the life offered. In this respect, Tenny found herself bonding with Irene's husband, Bryce. Neither of them felt they belonged, in any fashion. They existed, yes; but they had no life there.

"Must be about that rabble of the other day," Tenny spoke, mostly to herself, and stood. Her body screamed at her but she barely winced, turning to place the sewing she had been doing down upon the crate she had vacated. Tucking the needle safely in the pocket, she warned Irene to not let her children play with it for fear of sticking themselves.

Without a thought to her appearance, Tenny made her way towards what could only be described as the "path" through the slums. She did not know what she intended on doing, but she could only remember briefly glancing the captain previously. It would do her no harm to take a rest from her work.

Lt. Mackenzie “Blades” Hawkins
Flight Deck, EDF Atlas

Crew members from different parts of the ship always wanted to claim that their area was the real heart of any capital class ship. Bridge officers and crew members assigned to the CIC held that the brain of the ship controlled every other function, that literally nothing could happened without orders and decisions issued from the centerpiece of the magnificent setting. The reactor crew held tight to the contention that the neither the CIC nor any other place on the ship matter much if the ship didn’t move, the lights didn’t turn on, and the oxygen didn’t flow. The deck crews took pride in the ownership of the real teeth of any capital ship in the form of the ships she deployed, even though they grudgingly had to share a taste of the glory with the pilots.

Still, pick a fight with a “boltturner” reactor technician or a “grease monkey” deck hand and see just how far pride could carry one in a fight.

Sliding a wheeled ladder into position and bounding up to the edge of the cockpit of the Angel-class fighter, Mackenzie Hawkins dug around, muttering to herself something about flightsuits from the Endeavor and their miraculous leap in technology that involved not having the holes in the pockets that she’d began to discover in her standard re-issues upon transfer to the Atlas. Then again, anyone who spent enough time with the young officer would quickly learn that if she wasn’t cursing someone for something, she wasn’t happy.

Lifting her head up from the scrounging and blowing back a few rebellious strands of dark hair, Mackenzie reeled about at the sounds of footsteps in her area. The tucked-away section of the flight deck was largely relegated to crafts undergoing maintenance and modifications, namely Angels like Mackenzie’s that were originally from the decks of other ships and still needed some work to be modified after the transfer of personnel and equipment. It wasn’t that the projects weren’t important, it was just that the crew had a lot of better things to do. And the fact that pilots like Blades were constantly bitching about their personal pet projects didn’t sit too well with the deck chief or anyone else forced to listen to the ranting and raving of the officers.

Around thirty feet away, a deck hand walked around one of the Boomers that had been used in the original exploratory mission down the Karas II. The crewman tugged at the belt of his utility jumpsuit and checked down at a clipboard several times. His steps carried him with all the determination, confidence and focus of a six year old distracted by pretty lights in the ceiling.

“If you’re looking for the one that you really need to fix, it’s right here,” Mackenzie called out as she climbed down from the ladder and took a few easy steps in the direction of the young man. Her words and very presence obviously startled him as he turned around and almost fumbled the clipboard to the ground before pulling himself into a tight stand and delivered a hasty and sloppy salute.

“Easy, killer,” Mackenzie said, fighting the urge to cock her head to the side and easing the crewman with a short and dismissive salute of her own, saving the issue of relaxed flight deck standards for another day. She was still adjusting too much to the Atlas to have a full grasp on things.

“Y- yes ma’am,” the blonde-haired young man, clutching the clipboard tightly. “Just doing my job, ma’am.”

Mackenzie crossed arms over chest as she nodded a reply, the instinct to tilt her head to the side as she studied the nervous ticks in the man. The finest the EDF had to offer on a tub like this, no doubt. The pilot had already made a mental note to give Digger hell about the quality of the staff.

“Well, from the looks of things you boys will be pretty busy for a while. Let’s have a look at those orders and see if the Chief is every going to get around to getting my bird back in the air,” Blades said with an extension on her hand, motioning for the clipboard.

“Oh, I’m just supposed to work on,” the man said with a suddenly-alarmed stammer, recoiling the clipboard closer to him as his eyes scanned for any other personnel in the area before locking onto the Boomer next to them, “this one. Right here.” The explanation wasn’t enough to satisfy the pilot.

“Look here, petty officer. Hand that over, now. That’s an order,” Blades said with a glare and growl that was seldom welcome in any setting and could unsettle the calmest of nerves even when things were good. Slowly, the man extended the clipboard, which she snatched away immediately, expecting to find nothing more than that her bird had been left off the list entirely as a parting shot for her attitude.

The clipboard didn’t have a list of tasks. Instead, it was a map. Crudely drawn, yes, but drawn by someone obviously with knowledge of the twists and turns of a capital ship of this class. It showed how to go through a back hatchway and into the flight deck in a way that wouldn’t normally be seen.

And it showed an X marked over the reserve fuel storage pods fifty feet away.

Blades lifted her eyes to match those of the young man, the nervousness now mixed with a sense of desperate determination that almost challenged her to make a move. Her eyes suddenly noticed that bulging wrap around the man’s midsection which had been masked by the loose fitting utility jumpsuit until now.

“Oh shit.”

Mackenzie couldn’t completely piece together what happened next. Her hands reached out in an attempt to catch the man, to stop him, to voice some sort of protest. The sensation of being lifted out of the air and thrown back ended with a harsh landing and a few rolls. A powerful sensation of heat merged with a splitting ringing in the young woman’s ears as the entire world started to sway back and forth, images blurred and sounds muted in favor of the infernal ringing. The world turned and turned again like a flat spin from which there was no recovery.

Somewhere in the recesses of her brain, part of Mackenzie Hawkins told her to panic. The rest of her just wanted to go to sleep.

Captain Elena Ramirez
Cargo Bay “Slums”

“…concerns which we are working to address in the most efficient manner possible. This is not a civilian passenger liner or another other type of ship that is designed for the long-term accommodation of groups of this size. Your health and safety are a primary concern and we are doing everything in our power to answer your questions and see to your needs, but in turn we need to your trust, cooperation and patience…

The words continued with a sense of diplomacy mixed with unrelenting control bleeding from the woman’s mouth as she addressed a large crowd gathered before her in the “Slums.” Elena Ramirez didn’t bother mentioning the dirty feeling and the bad taste in her mouth left by this action, feeling more like a politician than a serving line officer commanding a capital ship during a time of war. This was beginning to feel more like the job of a cruise director.

“What about crew integration?” A woman called out from the crowd, holding young boy who appeared to be close to two years of age. “I was told that there would be room for some of us with special needs to take vacant rooms in the ship. My child…”

“I understand your concern. At the moment, we are still addressing the situation and making the best allocation of our military assets to make sure that we are in the best position possible to complete our assignment and get everyone home safely. I realize that –“

The captain’s words were suddenly terminated as the ground beneath them began to shake violently with the rocking impact of a blast somewhere else on the ship, enough so that the noise reached them decks and decks away. The lights suddenly dropped, plunging them all into darkness as screams and commotion erupted around them for a few seconds.

By the time Ramirez was even able to contemplate calling for one of the Marines to her side, the lights resumed as the chaotic scene began, ever so slowly, to dissipate.

“Everyone, please remain calm. Sergeant Lively, please confirm damage report with –“ Her word were cut off again, this time not by a blast but instead by a number of individuals, having rushed their Marine guard in the darkness and now raising rifles to point with at lethal point-blank range at Ramirez and the others.

“What is the meaning of this?” She spoke, the edges of her unrattled calm finally seemed rattled.

“A beginning,” a grey-haired man spoke, clicking the safety off his pistol aimed at the captain’s head.

Lt. Aiden “Roamer” Morrow
Pilot’s Ready Room, EDF Atlas
Melchoir System

The junior officer ducked into the ready room with a half-zipped flight suit, leaning back to make room for one of the more senior pilots in transit through the hub of the Wing. Eventually, the young pilot found his way to a seat near the middle of the stadium-style room and immediately felt a comrade’s punch on the meat of his arm.

“Hey Row-mah,” the pilot called “Rabbit” greeted through a wiry grin and Northeastern accent that no amount of training could ever wash away from him. “D’ja hear that we’re gonna fly some joint patrols with the Endeavor and the Oceanus? Might even do some cross-training? Some major babes on those boats, I’m tellin’ ya,” the red-haired young man chuckled as he leaned forward. His knee bounced up and down as he did his best to sit still. It didn’t take long for people to understand why they called him Rabbit.

“It’ll be a cold day in hell before one of those spoiled brats hits deck on our baby here,” Aiden said with a firm but loving pat of the back of his ready room chair. “No way any of those kids can keep up with us.”

“Alright! Settle down, ladies and gentlemen,” a voice sounded from the front of the room. The random conversations slowly came to a close as eyes focused forward and settled on the uniformed-figure of Commander Martin “Warlock” Cortez, Atlas Wing Commander and senior combat aviator. The sheer appearance of the man screamed fighter pilot, even as he edged forty and the salt-and-pepper mix of his once midnight hair was quickly turning more salt and less pepper.

“As you know, we’ve pulled into formation with the cap ships Endeavor and Oceanus along with the civilian fleet they’ve been escorting through this system as we build a little breathing room between our people and the front line.” Cortez spoke with a tinge of his cultural accent, though most of it had been washed and his formal style of delivery and command reflected that he was from an older generation of EDF officers than many of the young pilots sitting before him now.

“Central Command has routed the entire theatre through the Endeavor and Fleet Admiral Benson Perry is personally in command of the flagship.” A few low-muttered comments and whistles sounded throughout the room. Lots of officers served their entire career without coming this close to someone with the prestige and history of someone like Perry. “The Oceanus is just coming off a six-month overhaul back home to update these old Titan-class boats so be compatible with our new caps. We’re due next as soon as this leg of the colony transfer is complete.”

A few cheers broke out in the room at the sound of “home” for many of them and shore leave while the {i]Atlas[/i] got a much-needed facelift.

“I have coordinated with the Wing Commanders of the Endeavor and Oceanus to synchronize our patrols in order to best cover the civilian fleet. Lights, please,” he quietly ordered, the room going dark as a projector came alive to display the new flight rotation as well as the layout of the civilian fleet and the overlapping responsibilities of the crews from the three military capital ships.

“Row-mah,” the voice behind him spoke again, this time in a whisper while the briefing continued, “think maybe when we home you can introduce me to that sister you’s always writing?”

“You mean the one that just turned sixteen, you bastard?” He wheeled around to deliver a knuckle-extended punch into the other pilot’s leg.

“Lieutenant Morrow!” The thundering boom from the front of the room caused the room to break in dead silence save for the sound of a few dozen flight suits shifted in their seats to look back at the young officer now the target of an intense death gaze from their commanding officer. “I’m sure that your vast tactical experience would be invaluable to us in planning these patrols so, by all means, do share anything you have to add.” A few muffled snickers echoed out.

“No, sir. Ahh…just making sure we’re all on the same…page, sir,” Aiden said with darting eyes looking for any escape route out of the situation.

“Brilliant tactics analysis. Thank you, Roamer,” Cortex said with a smirk as a few other pilots laughed before the briefing continued again.

“Row-mah,” the voice spoke behind him one last time in another low whisper. “So that’s a maybe?”

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Combat Air Patrol, Combined
Civilian Convoy Escort
Melchoir System

Easing the throttle as the Angel passed the large and lumbering body of the large passenger ship, Aiden could almost make out faces through the windows looking into the depths of space. The civilian convoy and the military patrol escorting it were spread into a wide pattern – far wider than the commanding officers cared to see their patrols stretched, but there the civilian ships didn’t have the expertise to handle flying in a tighter formation. They had enough to worry about without risking an incident because some trucker fell asleep at the wheel of a bulk freighter.

“This is Atlas patrol designation Echo-Sierra-Seven, call-sign Roamer,” he spoke into the communicator, reaching down with his non-stick hand and transmitting his friendly transponder codes to the two Angels flying forward and below him. “Looks like we’re flying together today, over.”

“Glad to have you with us, Roamer,” a male voice on the other end responded. “Postman here. Let’s see if we can’t herd our feeble herd of sheep home.”

“The Atlas?” Another voice cut into a transmission. The one was young, female, and didn’t sound like much of one to stand on protocol. “Holy hell, I was half-expecting to see that thing of yours spinning a propeller! It’s like an antique show out here.”

Roamer fidgeted in his seat, at least as much as the cramped confines of an Angel cockpit allowed for him to move around. Considering the G-force a craft like this had to pull in combat maneuvers, the less that a pilot’s body could shift in the course of flight, the less likely they were to snap their own spine during a sharp course change.

“You’ll have to excuse my little jay-gee here,” Postman said, putting a little extra emphasis on the colloquial term for a lieutenant, junior grade. “Anyway, tell your Wing Commander that that the dub-cees for our ship and the Oceanus have a bottle of scotch on the line for whoever’s Wing pulls in the most kills while we’re ganged up like this.”

“So you can go ahead and tell me congratulations now if you want,” the female pilot sounded off again.

“Okay, that’s enough of that, Blades,” Postman issued. “Standard trident formation,” he continued to line out their patrol.

“Just hope that you’ve got a good hold on that leash, Postman,” Morrow cracked.

“What did you just say?!?!” Blades’ voice erupted. The other two pilots simply laughed.

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Flight Deck, EDF Atlas
Melchoir System
Battle of Melchoir

“God damn it! What the hell happened out there?!” Roamer roared as he slid down the ladder from the grounded Angel-class fighter, damn near collapsing on the ground from exhaustion.

“It’s ion storm, sir,” one of the technicians informed him, wiping a large splotch of grease from her face. She looked as tired and ragged as Morrow felt. “It’s mucking up the guidance and targeting systems on our birds, but it looks like they haven’t been able to track and follow us, either.”

“Well, that’d be just great if didn’t frakking cost us two pilots!” He exploded again. Aiden could barely see straight at this point. Every single combat-available pilot had been running solid for the better part of fifty-hours now without sleep, every one of them shot up beyond the normal limit of stimulants to keep their bodies and minds running beyond the point of exhaustion.

“Okay,” he breathed slowly, trying to gain his wits although the stimulants coursing through his veins made him feel as though his blood wanted to boil and freeze all at the same time. “Will someone please tell the Chief that we need to bypass the auto-targeting system and just let us go hands-on eyes-only with the weapons? Please?”

“Chief can’t do that without the dub-cee’s authorization, sir,” the tech apologized.

“Somebody find Warlock and see if we –“

“I’m afraid that won’t be possible, Lieutenant,” a calm voice spoke behind him, causing the pilot to wheel around and come face-to-face with the deep and intense gaze of Captain Elena Ramirez. The woman cupped her hands behind her back as she spoke. Considering the chaos of the situation, she was at a remarkable peace and composure. For two days now, The combined forces of the Atlas and Endeavor had been fighting nonstop to shield away onslaughts from a Thalian attack force, wave after wave descending upon their fleet. The third wave had claimed the Oceanus and several thousand lives.

“Captain,” the junior officer responded, climbing back up to his feet and doing his best to maintain a strong posture. “I need authorization from Commander Cortez to bypass the –“

“He’s dead.” No preface, no warning, no extension of sympathy from the woman, just the cold-hard fact that a senior member of her crew was gone along with countless others. How many times that day had seen be confronted with the news of death? How many more were they going to lose before this was over?

“I – that can’t be right, Captain. Warlock wouldn’t have just let himself get shot down.”

“He took a hit and his IFF transmitter went out. The Endeavor’s anti-aircraft guns registered him as unidentified and opened fire.”

The young pilot stood speechless.

“Mr. Morrow, effective immediately, you are now the Wing Commander of the Atlas. I know you’ll do your ship and your captain proud,” she spoke with an unrelenting tone.

“What?” Aiden’s hands shot up with open palms as if a clingy girlfriend had suddenly asked when he was going to proposed. “Captain, wait. No. This can’t be right. There’s got to be someone else that can do this. I’m not ready for –“

“This is not up for discussion, Lieutenant Commander. Do your duty. There are still ships who need escort into the ion storm and thousands of lives counting on your pilots. Are we clear about this?”

Aiden Morrow felt time slow to a crawl as he broke gaze from Captain Ramirez for the first time. The Flight Deck was a sea of terror and chaos. The Deck Chief’s voice could be heard barking orders in an attempt to land birds while clearing the deck of others, all the while issuing to do as little as it took to get them back up in the air again. A fire control team worked to bring the flaming engine of a downed Boomer under control as a medic literally cut the flight suit off the pilot who’d somehow managed to bring it back down to the deck. Another hand was frantically trying to clean an oil slick from the ground near the loading back. Only it wasn’t oil, it was someone’s blood.

Something inside of Aiden Morrow clicked in that instant, something setting him on a path from which there would be no return. Bringing his exhausted feet together and raising his hand to his head in spite of his own pain, Morrow offered a salute to his commanding officer.

“Yes, sir!”

As Ramirez turned away, Morrow turned back to the tech and to a number of suddenly watching eyes, all lost in the frantic shuffle.

“Okay, here’s what we need. I need a flight team stripping every bird…”

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Captain Elena Ramirez made her way through the hatch combing that would eventually lead her back to the CIC. As she ducked under, she was immediately greeted by the always grim and serious expression of Kaito Narita, her executive officer.

“There are two more senior pilots we could have transferred over from the Endeavor, either one of them with almost twice as much experience,” the noted without any apology or permission to give his own opinion on the situation, exercising the prerogative of an XO mixed with his ability simply not to care.

“Maybe so, but he’s one of us.”

“He’s scared.”

“Well, so am I,” the captain said frankly as they moved in transit.

Her executive officer sighed, knowing they was one battle he wouldn’t be able to win. Then again, he mind flashed back to a scared and confused young pilot herding bodies into a Boomer and flying them all out to safety before watching Triton Station incinerated. As much as he didn’t want to admit it, he almost trusted Morrow.

“Admiral Perry is on the line,” he informed the captain. “He has a mission for us.”

Midshipman Dennis Heldane
EDF Atlas, Cargo Bay "Slums"

It had all happened so fast. The last minute Dennis was doing his best to answer any technical questions directed at the captain by the civies, now he had a shotgun leveled right at his face by a girl with short-hacked black hair who looked no older than eighteen. Certainly not a soldier, certainly not law enforcement, she was holding the weapon all wrong and from the looks of it she was somewhere halfway between wanting to be here holding this tiny officer hostage, and being as far away from this place as possible. Maybe it was the latter that spurred the action which led to the former, or at least planted the seed. The mob had pushed her to germinate that seed. What was it called, Dennis had read it somewhere. Group absolution, that was it. Group absolution and individuation. The power of the presence of the group could make human beings do things they would never do alone. Statistically, 98% of human beings were viscerally unprepared to engage in human aggression in a predatory manner on their own. But the power of the group, the mob, the tribe could overrule such instincts.

With an ever so surprised look on his face, Dennis risked a slow pan to the right and saw six, no seven civilians pointing guns at him and the captain. The others seemed ready to back up the guns with pure manpower from the looks of it. Panning to his left he saw three more within a couple feet of the marines, guns trained on them. Clearly the civilians had made a mistake though, they did not tell the marines to drop their weapons. Dennis turned back to look at the girl before him and the crowd behind her. God they seemed angry, they looked mad as a bull. Only desperation created that kind of anger in a group like this.

They just wanted just wanted to go home, Dennis was sure. The tech's eyebrows hardened as a bolt of anger shot through him.

Well fuck, he wanted to go home too, only he didn't have the luxury of a home to go back to. He never had a home, he had a jail with amenities at first then he had a bulk-press barracks. Now he had a flying, metal cigar filled with nearly a thousand or so people who all hated him.

What the fuck did the civies want so badly that they had to raise their weapons against the men and women who were sword sworn to defend them? The ones who in bleeding to death unsung on land or choking on nothingness in silent agony in the void, who endured hardships these God damn civies couldn't imagine so they could live their cushy life? What the hell bad happened to them in life? Oh, you had to sit aboard a cold tin can, twiddling your thumbs and eating gruel while you waited for your ticket home for a few months. Wow, that's such a sad story, sorry you couldn't get your blankets warmed by the heater every night. What did they know about hardship? About Dennis's hardship? Brutalized by a dictatorial parent, bullied throughout his life and career for the flesh he had been encumbered with. Then ever seeking the respect of others, trying and failing and trying and failing, each time worse than the last and doing so only because he had nowhere else to go. No one else to talk to. He didn't have a shoulder to cry on. He was a soldier without an army, one that disowned him. Can this girl imagine that? Belonging to a family that doesn't want you, but you must stay with because you have nothing else? Because you are obligated to do so by the law?

Tell me, what do you know of pain!? Dennis scathed mentally. His lip was quivering in anger now and his gaze was hotter than molten steel. He thought about checking his anger, knowing that others would depend on how he handled himself. Then suddenly he found he didn't care, he didn't care what happened to the captain, that damn o-ganger, those jarhead brutes. They had disowned him, why should he feel responsible for them? Why the hell was this woman pointing her gun at him anyway? It wasn't his fault they were all in this situation. Dennis just tried to do his job, took his orders and didn't complain about them. It was those fucking o-gangers, the ever so high and mighty brass, lords and masters of all they surveyed. They pointed at the sound of the guns and the rest of them marched to death and glory. So what gave this bitch the right to point a weapon at him? It wasn't fair.

It wasn't right. By all the power at his disposal, Dennis was to right wrongs.

Anger has a way of blurring time, blurring action. Dennis's body moved without provocation at a speed nobody was prepared for, not the captain, not the mob, not the marines, not the girl. Before he knew it, Dennis had wrestled the shotgun from the girl and knocked her cold with a back swing. She lay curled in a twitching mass on the floor, her spine had snapped. Dennis remembered now he felt it when the butt of the shotgun connected with the side of her head. Adrenaline is a hell of a thing. Maybe it was because of adrenaline that he didn't feel bullets sear through him. That coming to mind, he checked himself, not a scratch. Was he invincible?

His lipped stopped twitching.

Then Dennis looked up and saw the wide-eyed horror on the faces of the mob--no--herd of terrified sheep as they looked upon the gurgling, writhing mess on the floor. %95 of humans cowered in phobic terror at the thought of human aggression directed at them. It was clear at that very moment that %100 of this crowd were composed of that %95. That made sense. The remaining %5 of that spectrum were the 'warrior breed', those who could confront violence, and commit to it. Most of those individuals became soldiers, police officers and other occupations that required the individual wield deadly force. True blooded warriors.

Then there was the %2 of society that was contained within that %5; the "%2 who like it". Psychopaths and the mentally deranged; humanity's "wolves" that enjoyed bloodshed. They felt no remorse for those they killed. They were incapable of empathizing with others. "Guilt" was not in their repertoire. Dennis smirked at the crowd as he stood over that twitching body. All the attention was focused on him, not on the captain, not on the marines, him. He did this, he left his mark. He loved it. Finally people were seeing him for what he was: a force to be reckoned with. The death of the girl was just that, a death. People die on the road to greatness.

Hopeful pride swelled in Dennis's heart. Had he done good today? Did he save the captain? Did he save the boat? Was he a hero?

Or was he just a murderer?

If there was one thing that sleeping in a big, metal box did to you, it was make you a light sleeper. Especially the technical minded folks. On the Atlas, absolute silence was generally bad. Silence meant that something wasn’t functioning right, that a power core or a propulsion jet wasn’t functioning as planned. Silence meant tension in the core workers and shock among the medical staff. Silence meant that the Marines were too stunned to return fire and the CIC were praying to the gods. In essence, silence meant that the proverbial shit was about to hit the metaphorical fan.

Because of this, Jason didn’t sleep well unless there was that ever-present hum that reverberated through his bunk as he slipped into unconsciousness, even when he was on shore leave, tucked between the sheets. It was too still; he much preferred to be vibrating slightly, because vibration meant calm. It meant that all was right with the world, and that he could catch some much needed Z’s.

Such were his thoughts as his head hit the pillow.

In his dreams, there was thunder and anger, non-distinguished shapes floating through the air. A woman’s manicured finger pointed down at him, flicking him on the nose. An angel descended through the heavens, flames licking her back as she screamed, plummeting towards the earth. He wanted to reach out and save her. He wanted to pull her back towards him. Yelling rose from dozens of voices, and another, louder, explosive thunder clap shook through him, vibrating his body until his naked torso hit the cool metal of his cabin, and he was suddenly wide awake.

Very awake.

His prothesis was slapped on and tightened, his uniform shoved over trembling arms and sweat-soaked skin, his toolbelt hung limply from his waist. The floor was still vibrating with aftershocks of the explosion as he moved on auto-pilot, unaware of his surroundings, unaware of anything as he made the trip down the service elevator, punching the button with a numbness he hadn’t felt since his early days on the Atlas. He saw crew members running by on mute, the thuds of regulation shoes on the floors not reaching from his ears to his brain. Something rendered him sad - so impossibly sad, though he couldn’t quite define what it was.

The elevator doors slid open, and he stepped inside the hall, his footsteps carrying him around the corner, towards the flight deck. There, two workers were spraying a small welding tool, forcing the doors apart. He stopped abruptly, the belt of tools that had been hanging from his waist falling to the floor with a muffled thump. His eyes, skittish and wide, took in the scene - a burn victim, two men struggling with another, a woman howling at the ceiling - all without audio. All in black and white.

He closed his eyes, counting.

One.

He had dealt with nothing like this before. Nothing like this had even been recorded; not on the tests, at least.

Two.

He mentally reviewed the flight deck. There were very few flammable devices in his little haven of the Atlas - at least, there were a lack of devices that could explode unstably. There were plenty of things around the deck that could catch fire. Which meant that this was intentional. Someone had brought the fire starters to him. And he’d missed it.

Three.

He was going to be sick. He felt the bile rising from his stomach, threatening to spew out his mouth at the sight of the crisis. Nerves paralyzed him, fraying his feet and adding twitches to his hands.

Four.

He inhaled, exhaled. Inhaled, exhaled. His heart rate slowed, the panic began to ebb away, and his last exhale was one of calm, certainty, tranquility.

Five.

Okay.

He opened his eyes and was moving as the audio kicked in, the screams of the pained and panicked, the grunting and the shouted orders. A marine was attempting to use a welder on the door, and making the situation far worse than it was. The melted, twisted metal of the blast doors made grating sounds as they attempted to open, screeching against each other. The marine seemed to think that heat + metal = good things - a moronic assumption that had Jason grinding his teeth in frustration. He hiked his toolbelt back onto his waist, clicking the buckle into place.

Let’s go to work.

His prosthesis clanked against the metal floors, his arm shot out and grabbed the marine by the scruff of his uniform, hauling him backwards.

“What the fuck!?” The kid shouted, twisting and almost putting the welding torch into Jason’s eyes. Jason responded with a prompt rabbit punch, putting all of his considerable size and weight into the jab, sending the marine crashing deckward, the torch turning off as soon as contact was severed. Kicking the tool aside, he drew plasma cutters from his tool belt, and checked the battery.

“Two people, right here.” His voice was loud and clear, free of the phlegm and gruffness that it usually held. Two techs moved to take up a position, bracing their weight against the blackened metal.

He hefted the cutter, igniting it with a flick of his thumb, and pressed it against one of the bolts, a clumsy and inefficient method of opening the blast doors. He remembered, back when they were in a condition to ask, that he had submitted a request to upgrade the system, but the request was denied in the favor of better food for the crew. He had argued that a faster door would mean increased efficiency, so that the crew may not have to eat as much, and why the hell was the crew eating anyways when they could be working?

It hadn’t flown. Coincidentally, Ramirez still didn’t have a sense of humor.

With a firm push, the lancing heat between the prongs of the cutter sliced through the bolt, and with another firm sweep, the second one gave way. The automatic supporting system that was attempting to open the doors was severed with a simple slice of the gears and motors that were tugging at the doorway, and suddenly, the steel blast door was no longer supported. Switching off the cutter, Jason hobbled to where the two techs were holding the door, and added his weight to theirs.

“Heave!”

Another few bodies added their weight to the door, and with a mournful cry of metal against metal, the door collapsed inwards. It swung like a great door before collapsing against the floor, leaving a great, searing gouge in the once-shiny metal with a drawn-out cry. Jason didn’t waste any time; the deck chief was hobbling onto the scene, wading through techs that were standing in shock, staring at the scorched ground and twisted metal. At least a dozen bodies were about which he could see, in various states of injury.

Turning in a full circle, he appraised the group of people that were still staring, some crying, others just pale faced and tight lipped. He knew that he wasn’t the highest ranking officer here - was that one of the Marine Captains? - but there seemed to be a distinct lack of stepping up among his superiors.

He tried not to let them see his shaking hands.

“First priorty; the trapped bodies and the fires. This half of the room, get fire blankets, extinguishers, any water you can find, and start putting out the birds. The rest of you, get the people out of the flight deck, out into the hall, and lay ‘em down. Any medical staff should stand by to help them if need be.

“Once you’re don yer task, we need to check the birds for damage. What we can salvage; what we can’t.” He hated uttering those words; to Digger, a piece of junk was just an untapped resource.

He blinked at them, taking in the lack of movement as the thirty or so eyes stared back at him. He sighed, and then clapped his hands, the sound splitting the air of the deck.

“Get to work, ladies!” He roared. There was movement as the crew poured out to their respective tasks, arms laden with equipment - medical and non-medical. He turned back and joined those looking for survivors, starting with a female form trapped underneath a piece of wing - itself scorched black and unrecognizable - from an Angel. If he knew his babies - and he did - then Marissa was no more.

He crouched down, awkwardly scraping his false leg to check on the woman, looking directly into her face-

Oh god. Blades.

He moved like a man possessed, flopping onto his back and removing the hard steel of his prosthetic leg in a single, sudden movement. When the leg was firmly in hand, he balanced awkwardly on one knee, shoving his false limb underneath the piece of wing that had the woman trapped. Looking around, he found another piece of twisted metal and fit that under the false leg, testing the makeshift lever. Satisfied with the amount of leverage he got, he pushed down on the end of the leg with all of his weight, feeling the rising panic of the situation. He hadn’t even really had a chance to talk to her; she was just the new girl, the pilot who overcompensated and was probably here to abuse his staff about the upgrades to her bird. He pressed harder, leaning his full upper torso on the false limb, watching with satisfaction as the wing plate finally - finally - gave in to his demand. With a groan, the plate lifted enough for her to be dragged out.

Without needing to call out, a man was there, his uniform one of a pilot. With efficiency that hinted at his discipline, Blades was dragged out from underneath the wing and flipped onto her back. With a grunt, Digger dropped the leg, scrabbling on hands and knee over to her.

“Looks like this is row-mah’s wingman.” The pilot said, his hands hovering over the prone woman, as if scared to touch her lest he break her further.

Yelling filled the room as Jason reached a hand to her throat, fumbling for a pulse. It was there, but it was weak - she’d taken a heavy hit. As he struggled onto his one knee, he looked at the pilot, taking in his rumpled appearance, and the bunny ears above his left breast pocket.

“Thanks for the help,” Digger said, his voice low. “Can you help me get her to the hallway? We need to get the medical staff to take a look at her.”

The pilot had the gall to laugh. “Please, chief. You’re not even in a position to move her. I’ll take care of it; you keep doing what you’re doing.” The man’s eyes strayed to Jason’s bad leg, his gaze falling on the folded cloth of his jumpsuit pant leg.

Jason’s nostrils flared, his temper flaring with them. “I can help you-”

“Nope. This one’s all me.”

Jason growled, and conceded to the point. He took a moment to gaze around the deck, averting his gaze from the man lifting Blades into a fireman’s carry and making his way back to the hall. Most of the bodies had been cleared away efficiently; to his relief, most of them seemed to be standing on their own and joining the rest of the crew with the larger of the fires. In the corner, three techs worked frantically over a single female body; one was compressing her chest while another was wrapping a cloth around her bleeding left leg. Similar scenes hovered over the remaining bodies, strewn about the flight deck. Over the sound of the quiet roaring of fires and the ever present hum of the flight deck, the panicked shouts and grunts of the crew reigned supreme.

“Chief?”

Jason looked up at the voice, his gaze meeting one of the better of his techs, Holland. He was holding a crutch in one hand, the ruined leg in the other. Jason grabbed at the base of the crutch, hauling himself to his feet with an unsteady but confident lurch, managing to twist himself around to face his crew member.

“Thanks.” He mumbled, noting the gash above Holland’s eye and the haunted look in his green pools. They’d all be losing sleep because of this one.

With his free hand, Digger grabbed his prosthesis from Holland, lifting it up to the light. The joint hung off at an awkward angle, the ankle was dangling from a single bolt, and the metal of the calf and thigh both had a large dent in it from the strain. With an unsatisfied grunt, he tossed it aside, and began hobbling towards the wreckage of an Angel, smoldering in the dimming light. As he moved, Holland kept pace with him, and Diggers decided then and there that he’d found himself a new assistant.

“Anything damaged that you’ve seen?”

“Re-capturing doors are shot.”

“How badly?”

“Five days.” The technician replied. All of Diggers’ crew had stopped using specifics when talking about damaged equipment; their deck chief had relegated them to giving the best assessment of the situation based on the number of days it would take them to fix it. It saved time, and nobody in the brass wanted to hear about disruptor fields and magnetic cohesion anyways.

“Shit,” Diggers responded, approaching the crippled bird. At first glance, the Angel was completely irreparable.

Jason had long since stopped taking equipment at first glance.

“Stephanie,” He breathed, running his hand along her wing. “Holland, I want you to do me a favor. Head up the decks and grab every damn doctor on this boat and bring them down here, stat. We have a lot of wounded, and I don’t want them working; they’ll bleed all over the equipment.”

Holland smirked. “Aye, chief.”

“I mean it,” the older man said, climbing onto the wing of Stephanie, moving onto her back with a balance that came from years of crutch practice. “I don’t give a shit if the doctor’s in the middle of saving Ramirez herself. You find a way to get them down here. If they shake you off, you make them understand the situation. I need every available man. Without those doors, we can’t launch patrols. Without patrols, we’re all dead.”

He was preaching to the choir, but Holland hung on every word. “Aye, chief.” First assistant to the Deck chief. The kid’s going places.

As the youth scampered off, Diggers dropped to one knee, using the crutch as a balancing rod as he began to dig around in a spare panel of Stephanie’s back. Prying it open, he ran his hands over the smooth metal that the panel unveiled, his touch reverent, gentle.

“Easy, girl,” he muttered, both to the machine and to himself, amidst the cries of pain of the deck. In the corner, one of the technicians threw his gloves in frustration as the female form he’d been compressing gave up the fight for life. Across the deck, a marine and a pilot pulled a charred skeleton from the ashes of a pile of cable. Amidst the chaos, Diggers stroked his beautiful bird, continuing to whisper, calming himself, the fighter, the deck.

“We’re all gonna be okay.”

Cargo Bay Slums, EDF Atlas

Heldane, the short-statured lowly technician who'd come into the Cargo Bay like a young child
being dragged by the scruff of his neck by the den mother that was Captain Elena Ramirez, was
the last person that anyone would have expected to serve as their hero, their rescuer. The only
thing more surprising than his act of bravery was the speed and vicious nature with which he
attacked. In a few seconds, a young woman, a woman lay dead at the hands of the midshipman the
first blood of the conflict had been shed by the wrong side.

Anger. Revenge. The little man had just taken one of their own and his life was forfeit. Immediately, one of the men who'd come forward from the crowed raised the short-barrel rifle to his shoulder, took a quick aim, and fired his shot. The shot probably would have been the end of Midshipman Dennis Heldane instantly had it not been for their leader, who surged forward and smashed the technician on the back of the neck with the butt of his own weapon seconds before.

The sudden discharge of the gun brought about a series of short screams followed by absolutely silence.

Except, of course, for the sound of a body sliding back against the wall and down to the ground behind the main area where Heldane and Ramirez were standing. There, Rick Warren slid to the floor with a bullet through his head.

"That is enough!" Ramirez roared with a sudden sense of authority and command for someone with at least one gun still trained on her by someone who obviously felt no problem pulling the trigger. "Order your men back," she said to the grey-haired leader who established himself wiht a step back after pistol-whipping Heldane.

"You're not here to give orders anymore, Captain," the man said with steely eyes and a composure all too high for someone to have just been party to a murder, surrounded and outnumbered on a military ship in the middle of nowhere.

"No one is going anywhere. If you're wanting to appeal to reason, killing innocent civilians isn't going to garner you any respect."

A long silence proliferated.

-------------------------------------------------

"Hello, beautiful," a man sneered as he pointed the sawed-off shotgun directly at the off-guard expression of Delilah Medina. His clothes looked to be second-hanf fatigues that had been passed out during part of the relief effort, his hair longer than any military man would have been allowed to keep. A small gap between his two front teeth appeared prominent as he smiled down the weapon at the officer he'd caught trying to sneak into the Cargo Bay.

"Had a feeling I'd have more trouble keeping people from getting out, not trying to sneak into this party." With that, he turned his attention down the railing to where the main altercation was happening below them. "Boss, got another one!" He said, eyes training on the grey-haired man standing on the platform.

Midshipman Dennis Heldane
EDF Atlas, Cargo Bay "Slums"

The frail body of Dennis Heldane lay motionless, sprawled face-first on the cold, hard deck. Muscle and bone fought with unresponsive nerves to send messages to the brain. Messages of pain. Pain that outwardly the body did not show because the commanding organ was sleeping on the job. What a lazy-

Son of a bitch! Burst into a throbbing conscious jump-started by a body in pain. Despit the effort Dennis’s mind fluttered in and out of conscious thought and settled on a torturous middle ground of foggy ambiguity. Dennis could hardly make out the sounds around him. Most of what was heard was unidentified. Most of what was said was not comprehended. Dennis made no effort to rouse himself; he couldn’t fight the agony. Every time a muscle group fired, neurons screamed in visceral retort. His head felt as if it was cajoled by a sledgehammer; he likely was suffering from a concussion. Nope, until he could receive proper medical attention, it was best just to lie here.
Plus the floor was much more inviting than cold steel with vengeful scowls behind it.

”You’re not here to give orders anymore, Captain.” Dennis heard a gruff voice—the man who formerly had a pistol to the Captain’s head—claim.

Although it was intriguing to hear someone, especially a civilian, try to cut the Captain down to size Dennis knew it was a futile gesture. The blast doors were not the only way into the cargo hold. Over a dozen kilometers worth of maintenance passages, emergency corridors and HVAC ducts honey-combed through just the starboard, aft of the Atlas and many of them had access hatches in this cargo bay. Dennis knew them well enough having come down here enough times and he was fairly certain that the XO was not unfamiliar himself. Once damage control was complete the Lt. Colonel would assume temporary command of the warship. First thing on his agenda would be to reconstitute the command structure. That meant getting the captain out alive and if he had to personally plunge a knife into every last troublemaker here, he would. Plus there were marines stuck in here, held at gunpoint like the other hostages. Marines “never leave anyone behind”, so the Lt.Col, a marine himself, would be leading a contingent of impetuous marines to liberate their beleaguered comrades. Then the XO would execute those here who just stood by and let this piss-poor plan of an uprising get under way.

Your funeral, buddy. Dennis remarked internally as the thought of Kaito’s boot, slick with the blood of insurrectionists, stood upon the mob leader’s head as the body lay still, riddled with bleeding holes. Then another voice, a cold, diamond-hard voice, cut through the thick silence, and Dennis’s delirium.

”Code White has been issued.” A voice Dennis knew all too well from his prior “visits” to the infirmary. The doctor’s voice made his blood pressure and heart rate spiked and the pounding in his head intensified in response. The voice of Lt. Commander Medina; tinged with the metallic edge of all the self-righteous venom Dennis knew roiled within her.

Of all the damn quacks on board, why her? Dennis begged of an unknown, omniscient force as he reminisced on all those prior confinements that he had since managed to avoid. Medical attention was now far lower on his personal priority tree.

Of course he wouldn’t have need of it had he not botched his aggressive negotiations so badly. If he had turned the weapon he acquired on the mob leader instead of basking in his glory like an idiot. The mob that downed him in furious revenge. Revenge bloomed from the blood of the martyr that Dennis had made in his efforts to acquire that weapon. A martyr who before was just a damn civie with a gun to Dennis’s head.

Dennis had tried to be the hero. He tried hard. Then he failed.

Failure.
Failure.
Failure.

Despite his tenuous grasp on reality there was much Dennis as a tech could do at this point. He could open his radio frequency to all channels. He could trigger local fire alarms. He could shut down the local lighting. Anything to give other personnel the edge in putting down this angry mob. Yet, he just lay there doing nothing, attempting nothing. His action would probably just result in another mess, so why even try?

Lt. Mackenzie "Blades" Hawkins

Eyelids slowly opened to a constantly shifting and flowing world of underwater waves. Darkness was broken intermittently by slicing beams of light cutting through the depths of the water. Lifting her head slowly, Mackenzie saw the surface of the water above her. Too far to reach with her arms, but enough that she could see the burning light of day above her. The suddent comfort of the light rays above her was suddenly stolen away by the realization that they weren't getting any closer. She reached, but foudn herself still no closer. It wasn't until she tried to kick her legs that she realized why.

Something was pulling her down.

The intial panic caused the young woman to flail some, the lack of fresh oxygen pouring into her lungs causing her chest to burn as she struggled to pull loose from whatever it was that secured her beneath the surface, away from the sweet breath she so desperately craved. The more she struggled, the tighter the grip pulling her down, down down. The darkness prevented her from seeing her captor or anything below her own waist.

A blinding burst of light from above drew her attention for a fleeting moment, just long enough to distract her from the internal panic of conserving what little breath she had. The light burned so brightly through the flowing waves that Mackenzie lifted a hand to shield her eyes. Still, she could see the beams. They were getting brighter. And closer. After a few more seconds, the pilot's eyes grew wide with horror as she suddenly saw the flames.

As the flaming mass slammed against the surface of the water with weight and force on the magnitude to displace lakes, Mackenzie didn't even have time to register that her imprisonment in the darkness was broken before the sheer force of the impact of the massive, flaming bulk into the water hurled her into a twisting and spinning fury. Up become down. Down became up. The disorientation became so great that the young woman forgot about the burning light, the need to breath, and the confusion how she'd gotten here in the first place.

As soon as the world stopped spinning, Mackenzie found herself finally gaining her bearings, the sick spinning cycle suddenly coming to just long enough for her to open her eyes to a whole new horror that made her wish for the darkness.

Before her, the length of the Earth Defense Force Titan-class carrier Atlas plunged into the darkness. The twisted, scarred frame of the ship had been through hell and back again. Long, jagged tears ripped through the hull of the ship as she sank, the product of her own momentum and the sea's hungry pull down into the depths. The carnage wreaked upon the carrier was so severe that even the main launching flight pod was almost completely detached from the ship like a broken, twisted and mangled limb dragged down with the rest of the body.

Then Blades saw the bodies. They drifted out from the ship, burned and mangled themselves. The fires that consumed the ship had started from the inside, at least enough of them to char the remains.

Everyone was dead.

As the ship sank deeper and deeper, the great weight it displaced in the water beneath the suspended frame of the young pilot suddenly began to affect its own pull in the world, the vortex effect that began to suck everything down along with it.

The Atlas was well on her way to a watery grave and she was taking Mackenzie Hawkins with her.

When the girl opened her mouth to scream, no icy water penetrated her throat like daggers. No cold, deep darkness embraced her in silence. Instead, she screamed in the bustling corridor of the Atlas, home again. As much as any of them were home, anyway.

Every inch of her body hurt like hell.

Cargo Bay Slums
EDF Atlas

"Code White has been issued." Captain Elena Ramirez had spent the better part of her career in and out of the Combat Information Center of capital ships across the EDF, sending pilots in the crafts known as Angels out to protect them from whatever command deemed to be evil at any given moment. Now, her new angel came in the form of Delilah Medina. It was hard enough not to control the situation, but to have even the knowledge of the inner workings stripped from her was almost diabilitating. Medina was the angel to bring back some semblance of hope.

"Here's how this is going to work," the silver-haired man spoke, lifting his voice so that there would be no lack of clarity in Medina's ears. "Drop that weapon and give up the little fight you've got going on or I put a bullet between your captain's eyes. And that's just for starters."

The sidearm in his hands gave true aim directly at the stoic commanding officer.

"Put that weapon down. Every second you spend fighting back is a second that you're killing someone else," he spoke again.

--------------------------------------------

CIC, EDF Atlas

"We have a major situation, sir," the deck officer said, reporting to the ship's executive officer, who in turn glared across the main operations deck of the CIC at Aiden Morrow.

"Our commander, chief medical officer, and several others are being held hostage. I can't launch any birds because of a suicide bomber. Can you think of anything else that could possibly go wrong at the moment?"

Despite himself, Morrow smirked.

"Good day to earn that paycheck, sir," he replied before they went on launching a plan of their own.

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Unidentified Ship
Karas System

The data from the sentry drones began to flood back through the loops in the system, bringing mainframes out of hibernation and beginning to the protocol to bring the ship out of stasis.

Something was waking up.

(Posted on behalf of Arlathina)

Amber watched passively as chaos rang out in the hordes of refugees below her. From her perch in the side terrace she heard the rebellious refugee's futile attempt to control the masses. From within the crowd a voice rose over the cacophany of panic. "Shutup! Shut the hell up!" When the commands went unheeded a man stepped forward and pointed his firearm in the air, firing thrice.

People stood paralyzed by shock and fear, a woman's agonized weeping was the only thing that could be heard. Amber watched as a man step forward and begin to speak. "Now I don't know about the rest of you, but I don't stand on stayin down here rottin away like trash while those scum up there get the king treatment!" He said with an angry scowl on his face.

EDF Atlas CIC

"What do you intend to do? Fly this ship? Handle the 1000 officers beyond this hold? We are in the middle of fucking nowhere! No response from commander! We’re in enemy territory. We’ll all die and no one will care. No one will know. If you fully expect to seize this ship and then command it with your sorry lot you are sorely mistaken. They could just as easily open the hold and dump us all out. All of us. Including the innocents, which there are more of than you.”

The static-burst sight and sound of the young medical officer filled the CIC as the bridge officers watched with bated breath. As Medina released her weapon, she was immediately charged and secured by two men none too please with her show of heroics thus far.

"Fool girl is going to get herself killed," someone muttered from behind a dark panel in the CIC.

"If they were going to shoot Medina, they would have done so the first time she took down one of their men," Narita responded with a gruff smile. As much as he and the ship's chief medical officer dressed one another down and as much as he personally would like to take a swing at the woman, he had to admit that she would have made on hell of a Marine.

"Make a log entry. Effective immediately, I am declaring that Captain Ramirez is incapacitated and am hereby taking command of the Atlas. Note the time."

"Aye, sir."


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Cargo Bay Slums

"Glad you could join us, doctor," Ramirez spoke. The area that had once served as the makeshift civilian medical clinic for the Slums was now used as a convenient way to hide away the high-profile hostages used in the impromptu attempt to take over the ship. Zip-ties bound hands together. If there was a way to escape, it certainly was doing a good job of hiding itself.

"Mr. Heldane took tough blow to the head. Lost some blood," the captain said, her eyes drifting between the crewman who'd accompanied her down into the Bay and the small exit to the curtain-enclosed area to which they'd be relegated. Two guards, both armed, including the one who'd taken the gunshot that claimed the life of a civilian, the body just on the other side of the curtain before being dragged away.

Somewhere beyond the curtain, a phone rang. The silver-haired man took measured steps toward the ringing device, making sure that his team shifted in position to compensate before he answered.

"Speak."

"This is Lt. Col. Narita. I demand to speak to the person in charge."

"You are speaking with me, Colonel."

"Very well. You know my name. Who are you?"

"You can call me Perses for now."

"The Titan of Destruction. Amusing. Very well, Perses. You are illegally holding members of my crew. I demand that you release the personnel immediately."

"You and I both know that I'm not going to do that, Colonel. Not until I get what I want from you."

"You and your crew are in an indefensible location with not alternate route of egress and surrounded by lots of very angry Marines. You aren't exactly in a position of power."

"Shame, shame, Colonel. Did you really think that the little rumble on your Flight Deck was an isolated incident?"

"You're bluffing."

"Let's test that assumption, shall we?"

Seconds later, fire alarms begin to light on the board in the CIC, causing one of the duty officers to bolt from her position and nearly trip down the stairs as she reported to Narita.

"Sir, a fire just broke out in secondary atmospheric control. I was able to shut down the system, but it's going to be offline for a while now."

Slowly, Narita raised the CIC phone back to his ear and caught the phone on the other end again.

"That was just a baby. His big brothers are attached to your engines, fire control systems, and maybe even one right under where you are standing. This is the part, Colonel, where you ask me my demands."

"...I'm listening."

"I want a group of Boomers large enough to take a group of 30 men down to the surface, packed with weapons and supplies. I want them waiting in your auxiliary hangar and ready to go within three hours, otherwise you find that your position commanding this ship becomes permanent and your first duty will be to explain the deaths of a whole bunch of civilians."

"That doesn't give us much time. I'll see what I can do."

"You do that, Colonel, and maybe I'll see about keeping these people alive while I'm waiting. Just don't make me wait too long."

With that, the silver-haired man hung up the phone and nodded to one of his associates, who took his position as the leader walked into the curtain-enclosed area and tossed a small medical kit down on the floor between Heldane and Medina.

"That should be everything that you need to patch him up," he said with a surprising sense of sympathy. "We aren't monsters, you see."

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EDF Atlas CIC

Invoking the image of his predecessor, Narita pinched the bridge of his nose softly as he contemplated his options in silence. After a few seconds, he locked eyes across the table to the waiting face of his Wing Commander.

"You better get to work."

With that, Morrow bolted out of the room with half a plan and no time to waste.

"Ensign Grey, have a fire team assemble in the auxiliary hangar. And if you're not to busy, now would be a good time say a prayer."

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EDF Atlas Flight Deck

"Make a hole, make a hole!"

The last time Aiden Morrow ran that fast, he'd been an Echo cadet contending for the Cup. The stakes were just a little higher now. Flying down the manual hatchway and barely touched the rungs of the ladder as he crashed onto the Flight Deck, he skidded in front of Jason "Digger" Mieczyslawa, grabbing the chief by the arm and jerking him to face the officer.

"You're with me, Chief. We've got about five hours of work and half that time to do it in," he spoke at a million miles an hour. "When's the last time you took a walk in space?"