The Liberty Navy's Vice Admiral, Valence Harper, stood on the balcony of a terrace overlooking a grand dinner hall at Newark's general dining area. With the ion storm looming over all known space, he leaned on the railings.
"Darned paperwork, always getting in the way..." he muttered under his breath.
The thought slipped away, as he glided down the stairs, and smiled towards several young ladies whom he passed.
Outside the cockpit window's protection was a swirling mass of matter dark as pitch, beating against the hull of Giovanni Cordova's Switchblade Heavy Fighter. All systems down, he had a mask pressed to his face that delivered the precious oxygen he needed to survive -- life support had been disabled. The inside of his ship was beginning to be coated by thin layers of ice, as the heaters were also offline. Luckily, Cordova wore a bulky jacket and there was a small flame going before him. Always fly prepared, and every pilot with an ounce of sanity flew prepared for such a storm.
Only this was by far the worst Cordova had ever been in, and there was only so much oxygen gas, food rations, and, above all, Cardamine, to last him. Not for the first time, and definitely not for the last, his eyes glazed over as he looked inward to the past and fantasy, imagining the fiery redhead girl once more...
Omicron Delta, drifting
A peculiararity, a Liberty Navy Cruiser drifted through the waves of darkness that had descended upon all of Sirius. The ship itself seemed to give off a dark aura, as if born of Hell and borne along by the dark power of Lucifer himself. Patches of purple played across the hull of the mighty ship, entire turrets consumed by the parasite that called itself Slomon K'hara. The ship, far from civilization and those that hunted it, bided its time. In what had once been the command deck, a lone man sat and stared out the viewscreen that illuminated nothing. He could feel the movements of the crew as they prepared the ship once more.
There was always work to be done, and after such inactivity, they must be ready to move immediately. Robert Foster smiled slightly to himself. Much work to be done.
Omega 11, drifting
Karly Richter kicked the wall. Hard. She didn't seem to notice the pain, but what she did notice was that they were stuck in some damn dark matter wave that seemed to have no end, what few communications that came in predicted many more days of this, she was bored as hell, and she was out of booze.
Throwing a tantrum like a child, she knocked over a chair. Manfred just sat back in his chair in the small mess hall of their transport and laughed at her as the aged ship creaked and moaned.
Seth sat on the Liberty Navy Dreadnought San Francisco and cursed as the ship shook again. The battlegroup had been trying to huddle together for the last 2 hours now, with varying success.
The four gunboats had all managed to attach cables to the San Franciscos engine area, and had tugged themselves in close, extending docking hatches and coming on board.
The 2 Cruisers were almost done. The LNS Golden.Gate was struggling, and Seth smiled as the clunk of the docking port connecting was heard.
He relaxed now that they were all relatively safe, and then groaned as he heard his deck chief run by in the hallway screaming "MASSIVE PARTY IN THE DOCKING BAY!"
Sonya chuckled next to him, and stood.
Seth looked up at her and muttered "You're not seriously going are you?"
Sonya just smiled and walked off of the bridge. Seth shook hios head again as loud music started playing. With the crews of 4 gunboats, 2 cruisers, 3 wings of fighters and a wing of bombers joining the crew of a Dreadnought... It would get messy. He walked over to the panel showing food and drink storage of the ship and sighed as he watched the "Alchohol" bar rapidly drop.
He squared his shoulders and prepared to have a talk with his bridge crew about inappropriate circumstances, but when he turned around, it was to see the last of them walking off the bridge to go to the party.
"OI!" He yelled, and only got a giggle in response.
"Damnit." he muttered, looked around the bridge a final time, and then proceeded to the docking bay for a damned good party.
//Seanne... trust you to have the Vice Admiral be a total flirt.
Saker sat with his birds. The Peregrine sat in space, buffeted by the storm outside.
They sat in the nursery, and the soft pulsing of the children around him was comforting. The room was dark, except for the large masses of metal floating around him and his feathered friends. Sometimes a child would come up to them, and Saker would attempt to hug the front end of it, like a beetle trying to hug an elephant.
Giovanni Cordova looked longingly at his last Cardamine cigar as he lit it up and pulled the oxygen mask off his face to inhale some of the smoke. This was it. After this would start the messy process of withdrawal, which would eventually lead to his death.
What a way to go... he thought, closing his eyes.
When he opened them, the dark matter was clearing.
His eyes jumped open, and he slammed the 'On' button and the cruise button at almost the same time, lurching towards a visible Palermo. 20k to all the Cardamine he could want.
Encheta Shimoa stared blankly at the even blanker main holoscreen. All that could be seen through the Spatial's cockpit and external cameras was darkness. Thankfully the deep space explorer was designed to withstand a storm such as this.. Just. Encheta and his 2 other crewmembers barely got the craft braced for impact when the dark matter wave came. The hold manifest now said the ship was carrying a fatal exception - he was sure he didn't pick one of those up during this voyage..
Encheta sighed and turned around to a subcomscreen displaying his engineer.
"This doesn't look like it's going to let up anytime soon Charles.. How's the engines looking?"
"Better than they were before sir" The stocky man replied.
"Number 5 is still offline - I think the fusion chamber in it's cracked so there's nothing I can do about it.. Number 2 is at around 70% efficiency and I'd rather not push it any more than that. The others are fine and dandy though."
Encheta grumbled as he cut the connection to engineering, wondering if his week could get any worse. As he turned himself back to face the main screen again his scanner Op popped out from the hatch.
"Hey Ench, I was jus--"
"Don't call me that Jackie, you know I hate people shortening my name" Encheta snapped
"Hehe.. Well look who's grumpy." Jacqueline teased, throwing him a shiny energy bar packet.
"You haven't eaten in ages, have that and maybe you'll feel better. It's just that you always shorten mine so.."
"Ok ok, I apologise. These doldrems are just getting to me I guess. Coming up to do your regular sweepscan right?" Said Encheta, opening the foodstuf as the young woman nodded in reply. Strawberry pork was never his favourite flavour, but it wasn't all that bad. He took a bite as Jackie started working on the scanner console.
Things had been uneventful since the dark matter came. Almost all the normal duties the exploration team had came to a grinding halt, as near to all of them were concerned with the space around them. Only daily systems checks and what repair work the wave created was left to do. Life was, for the lack of a better word, dreary.
I high pitched beeping, along with a yelp from Jackie, brought Encheta out of his reverie.
"Ay, hello hello! I'm picking up somthing finally!" The scanners Op chirped with glee.
"The dark matter's clearing. Things outside should be visible in a few moments.."
Almost as she said that, the view from the cockpit turned from black to a murky grey. Within the space of a couple of minutes the whole system, featuring a bluey white sun, asteroids and a far off planet, could be clearly seen.
"Well, looks like this week is going to get better after all" Encheta stated, swallowing the last of the energy bar.
"Jackie, can you go down and tell Charles to prep the engines for a testfire? I'll start setting for a course back to Java asap."
Jackie saluted idly and clamboured back down the hatch, and Encheta let out a slight grin as he turned back toward the main console once more. He knew Syana would yell at him for not completing the chart of this system, but frankly he just didn't care. All he wanted to do right now was get to that stations bar as soon as he could and forget about this whole ordeal forever.
Deputy Chief O'Brian looked out the Viewport at the Ion storm that was blowing and decided that he didn't want to be alone. He dressed and made his way to Sunbuck's, where most of the rest of the LPI had gathered due to emergency power only being available. The Chief was asking if anyone knew any Ghost Stories.
Formerly known as LPI Police Chief Hull O'Brien.
Creator of Sgt. V. Price, 207th Precinct out of Chula Vista Station
Hurray, we have been having reports that the Wave is clearing.
At last i can finally get off this stinky dump...
I mean seriously, four days, this battleship isn't a cruise liner. The cleaners have their work cut out now.
I cant wait to get back to my good ol' Sekhmet.
Well, im heading down to the cargo bay now to meet some friends, hopefully this will all be over in a few hours
-----Recording Off----
-----Deactivated-----
*Lee let out a sigh of relief as he hastily turned of the personal diary and ran out of his cabin.*
"Fore!" He shouted as he hit the golf ball with the club, rather hard. The ball flew up and hit the ceiling before bouncing down with deadly accuracy and speed. "Bloody hell! Watch out that ball is wild!" He shouted laughing as the ball bounced down to the other end of the field.
Finally it stopped bouncing and rolled straight to the hole, but stopped on the edge. "Oi! Is it in?" He shouted, to an Ensign down the field. "Nay, Sir! Barely in." The Ensign had shouted back.
"Buggery. This bloody game is hard." He mumbled as he placed another golf ball on the tee. Then he took his stance and smacked the face of the ball with the club, sending it flying. The Ensign saw the ball coming directly his way and broke into a run to get out of the way. The golf ball landed in the spot that the ensign once occupied, then it rolled backwards hitting the other golf ball, knocking it into the hole.
"Oi! Lieutenant! You got one of them in!" The ensign shouted pushing himself up from the ground.
"Hmm...why did he bloody jump?" Austin mumbled as he proceeded down the field. "Why did you bloody jump lad? It clearly would of missed you." He said with a sly grin. Ofcourse I wish it did hit you, you're bloody annoying. He thought to himself, concealing it behind his grin.
"Erhm, Sorry sir, quick reaction."
"No worries lad.." Next time don't bloody move! "Aye, Sir."
"Right, are we allowed to launch fighters yet or is that blasted storm still going?"
"Sir, it's cleared up in some areas, however...not here yet."
"Right then Jonesy."
"Sir, it's Jones."
"Leeroy you say?" I know what your bloody name is lad....
The Ensign sighed and began to walk off. "Have a good day Jimmy." Austin said grinning,
Oh bloody finally...Jones leaves, lovely! Now I can go back to my game...He thought as he turned around and looked at the ball. "Come here you sneaky little..."
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