ShipCore

USD: 6 days since Ertan Fleet surrender and clearing of the orbitals.

Location: Meltisar, MIL-1A, Academy Concourse

Alex passed the fountains in the academy’s concourse, her eyes scanning the crowd for a familiar face as she moved towards the cafeteria. A weight felt like it had been lifted off her shoulders; the decision to head back to the Frontier had been something she needed.

It felt like she was taking back control from the chaos that had been swirling around her since... she wasn’t sure when it had started. Certainly while Elis was in a coma, but before that, too.

The conversation with Tia had taken several hours, but most of the things had been hammered out. Repairs to the moonlet were already underway, and she’d be taking the Iron Horse along as a parasite.

Along with a few industrial units, which would almost certainly be needed to get things going. Thea’s Hackjob wasn’t exactly a industrial plant, but with NAI technology already integrated into the asteroid, it was more than capable of being a mobile base of operations for creating an industrial base.

Much more than the Shrike had been, and she hadn’t had many problems with getting things done with the smaller federation corvette.

The scale of things was going to be much larger, but she was confident with Thea’s help she could manage it.

And if the Frontier was closed to them for whatever reason, nothing stopped them from avoiding it entirely.

There was an ocean of unconnected stars after all, and with the wormhole drive they weren’t limited to the arbitrary jump lanes.

A thought had even come to her that she needed to talk to Elis about... the possibility of using the drive to return to where everything had started... or ended, depending on your point of view.

She’d confirmed Nameless had the coordinates stored in his memory, and that they were still valid.

Now she just needed to recruit the rest of her crew. The human part of it anyway.

The cafeteria was busy, but she spotted the person she was looking for sitting at a table near the back. Alex’s eyes lit up at seeing Rachel’s face. Other than briefly returned chat messages indicating that she was fine, the other girl hadn’t talked to her.

Part of that was no voice or chat messages were allowed in training, but the entire incursion by hostile fleets had thrown everything out of normal. The time Alex had tried to call, she’d got a busy-signal from Nameless.

Alex started to make her way over. Rachel was sitting beside several other cadets in uniform. They were all talking and laughing, but Alex’s eyes narrowed as she reached the halfway point.

A blonde-haired girl was sitting beside Rachel, much too closely. Alex blinked. Jessica? The girl who dropped out from basic? It felt like it was so long ago, she could barely remember.

Jessica said something to make Rachel laugh, her hand resting on the other girl’s arm. They turned toward each other and kissed.

Alex froze. It took a moment for her to realize that her stomach had twisted into a knot. She turned and walked away, her heart pounding in her chest.

[Warning: Elevated Avatar stress bio-signs detected. A 387% spike in computronic matrix maintenance is occurring.]

Alex tried to take a deeper breath, but it felt like her chest was constricted. There were more than a few people who were looking at her as she power-walked out of the space and back onto the concourse.

It... It wasn’t like she had any claim on Rachel. Actually, they’d agreed from the beginning that this was possible. Rachel had explained things to her. She’d been very clear about it.

At the time, she had agreed to everything, because she was just so happy to have a friend. Rachel was nice.

But... it still hurt.

More than she could have imagined. She’d felt nothing like it before.

Agreeing to it had been a mistake.

She should have said no.

A second attempt for a deep breath succeeded. Slowly, the pounding of her pulse in her ears was replaced by the drone of the hubbub of the concourse.

The impulse to dial Rachel’s comm and ask to talk to her landed like a brick... only to evaporate almost immediately.

Rachel was who she was. She had been clear about what she had wanted and that things were always supposed to be temporary and that she was going to be with other people.

The lack of communication after they had been separated stung, though. The lack of substance in Rachel’s replies to her little messages was clearly not because she was too busy to look at them.

“Nameless, can you please send me the list of required requisitions for the next supply shuttle to the Hackjob? I want to see which ones we can accelerate,” Alex asked.

[Affirmative: Request dispatched. An optimized list for repair requisitions will be available in 3.5 minutes.]

“Great,” Alex mumbled. She squared her shoulders and marched back toward the travel checkpoint so she could get back to her ship. She had a lot of work to do before they could get out of Meltisar, and she didn’t need to be distracted by... things.

***

USD: 7 days since Ertan Fleet surrender and clearing of the orbitals.

Location: Meltisar, Iron Horse, Primary Cargo Bay

The Iron Horse’s cargo bay was a hive of activity. The crew was busy unloading the last of the supplies and equipment that would be needed for the trip to the Frontier.

The industrial units were already being prepped for the journey, and the Iron Horse’s crew was working to ensure that everything was secured for the trip.

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Thousands of repair drones were active on the moonlet’s surface, scrubbing away the damage that had been done during the battle.

Nameless had taken to the task of operating the station while Thea remained back on MIL-1A with Elis. Her sister was going to need a few more days to recover, which was a miraculous speed.

Alex tugged her blue collar and supervised the crew. Everything was being managed by the ship’s NCOs and junior officers, so really, she was just getting in the way.

Commander Talbott really had the ship running like a well-oiled machine.

So she kept her interference to a minimum. She had a lot of things to think about, and figuring out how to gain the trust of a human crew for real as an actual captain...

Well, keeping aloof as the owner of the ship, while essentially hijacking a massive Meltisar military asset as an ex-Ensign was good enough.

There had been some shouting in the background when Tia had commed her and confirmed things.

The Meltisar personnel going with them had been put on leave and assigned to the Ironfist Mercenary Company for the duration of their mission.

She didn’t have any illusions to their loyalty, and they were likely there to make sure that the mission didn’t go off the rails and abandon Meltisar or something.

“Nameless, can you please give me a report on the moonlet’s full systems?” Alex asked.

[Affirmative: Thea’s Hackjob info dump is being transferred to Avatar HUD.]

||| MNS Thea’s Hackjob Specifications |||

|| General Overview ||

| - Type: Moonlet Super-Sized Ship |

| - Role: Mobile Command Station / Repair and Logistics Hub |

| - Operational Status: Post-Battle Recovery, Mid-Repair |

|| Dimensions & Structure ||

| - Base: Natural Asteroid, 50km in diameter |

| - Modifications: Extensively modified to support military operations and living quarters |

|| Propulsion & Mobility ||

| - Bi-phase Military Class Linear Drive |

| - Magneto Plasma Thrust Vectoring System, Class BASE, Ports: 3186 |

| - FTL Capability: Prototype Wormhole Generator |

|| Defensive Measures ||

| - Double D-Field Generator: Supplemental, Directional, Rotatable. 90-270 Degrees |

| - Omni D-field: 256m Ax-lens |

| - Point Defense Systems: 425 auto 22mm PDC-K defense turrets for missile and small craft defense |

| - Electronic Warfare Capabilities: Including EW drones, chaff clusters, and smart flares |

|| Operational Facilities ||

| - Repair Drones: Thousands operational for external and potentially internal repairs |

| - Cargo Capacity: Large-scale automated warehousing system, accommodating supplies and equipment for extended missions |

| - Manufacturing and Workshop Areas: Extensive industrial tooling for on-the-go production and repair of military assets |

| - Central Bay Configuration Wharf Mounting System: Capacity for 12 IS cruisers and several hundred smaller vessels internally, mooring for capital ships externally |

|| Crew & Personnel ||

| - Accommodations: Quarters and space for 10,000 humans, with amenities installed for 1,000 |

|| Other ||

| - NAI Computronics Module Rack System, Condensed, 878 modules |

| - NAI Avatar: Alex |

“How much of this is actually operational?” Alex asked.

[Informative: 78% of indicated systems are operational.]

“Well, that’s something. It looks like we are light on armaments as well. I’d really like to see some PDC-L turrets installed,” Alex mumbled. “What’s the chance we can make some modifications without delaying?”

[Notice: Acceptable power systems are present for the installation of 87 PDC-L turrets. Additional laser specific heatsink systems will be required for installation of these turrets.]

Alex shook her head. “Eighty-seven? Are we talking triple 24s or single 8cms here?”

[Informative: Battleship grade 12cm triple and quad turret mounts were indicated. A larger number of smaller turrets could improve PDC coverage, however, installation times for new mounting surfaces would create a delay.]

“No, that’s fine. I’d rather have the twelvers. They can double as anti-ship and have decent range. Who are we robbing to get them?” Alex asked.

[Notice: Available PDC-L turrets are slated for repair and replacement for the 1st Fleet.]

“I’ll need to send Admiral Parks an apology message. Hijack those for us, please.” Alex said.

[Affirmative: Request dispatched.]

That was maybe offloading more heat and work on Tia, to appease requisitions, but... well that wasn’t something she wanted to deal with. She’d be out of the system, anyway.

A loud crunch echoed through the Iron Horse’s hangar, followed by a chorus of curses. Alex turned to see a group of crew members trying to manhandle a large container into a cradle after it slipped out.

She jumped down from the catwalk and jogged over to help. The container was heavy, and her HUD highlighted it with a red warning sign.

|| A-Grav Plates 1000 Units ||

The crew were in the process of getting a crane into place to lift it, but Alex waved them off and slipped under the container herself. A pulse from her ANUF systems reallocated her strength into remote manipulation and a nanite field surged up from the floor to lift the container back into its cradle.

It took another minute to confirm it was secured and then she carefully returned the nanites back to where she’d got them.

That second bit was important, if she didn’t want to leave holes in the ship everywhere.

Also, the most time and computronic consuming.

The crew members continued to work around her and then one of the junior officers hurried over.

“Captain! I’m sorry, we should have had that secured before you arrived,” the young man wheezed.

Alex shook her head. “It’s fine. I just thought I’d help out.”

Ugh, she’d messed up. Now everyone in the bay was going to get an earful, weren’t they?

“You’re doing a great job, lieutenant. Keep it up.” Alex patted him on the shoulder and then turned to leave the bay.

Maybe a cup of cocoa in the crew mess would help her relax?

[End A4]

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