The Pegasus

Date: 18/07/2352

Location: Serenity class cruiser Pegasus, in the Katara system

The ship was old, very old in fact. Hell they'd stopped using Serenity's almost 15 years ago and the Pegasus had been one of the first of the production line. The few Serenities that had been left in service had been refitted into the improved Miranda class; and even those were being systematically replaced with the new Akira's.

All of this Taichi Kamiya had known when he bought the ship but none of it concerned him. He had also known that he couldn't afford a better ship. He didn't care though. This ship, with its bare metal corridors, scorched and battered hull, obsolete weapons and ancient engines had an almost antique charm to it. It had given him the second shot at life he'd always wanted. A chance to explore the galaxy and, dare he say it, seek out new life and new civilisations. Whether it was beautiful or not, it was his home now.

Tai, himself, sat on the bridge in his large and comfortable captain's chair. Actually he was more slouched in the chair, his eyes closed, half asleep; lulled by the gentle hum of the bridge console and control panels surrounding him.

Tai Kamiya was 30 years old. He'd been born on the Imperial Terran colony of Tandara, The first child of Susumu and Yuuko Kamiya. His younger sister Kari had been born, about, 3 years later.

At the age of 18 he entered into the imperial national service, as everybody had to do. He'd remained in Starfleet for 11 years receiving a considerable amount of medals for courage and a series of field promotions. However after an incident on Cypress Prime which had left 15 Starfleet personnel dead Tai was, falsely, held responsible and he was forced to resign from Starfleet.

Tai wore his favourite blue T-shirt with yellow edging. Under this was a long sleeved dark blue shirt. A pair of goggles hung around his neck, a good luck charm from his youth. His trousers were rough grey cargo trousers held up by a standard issue Starfleet belt. It wasn't exactly the smart Starfleet uniform he'd worn for 11 years, but it served its purpose and, if he said so himself, was fairly popular with the ladies.

Directly in front of Tai, past the navigation console which was currently on auto-pilot, was the main view screen. At the moment it was blank, nothing but endless space with a spattering of stars. Not a ship or planet to bother him. He could relax.

With that thought in mind he snuggled deeper into the chair content to just sleep here for the foreseeable future.

His Dreaming was rudely and abruptly cut short by an incessant beeping from one of the consoles. At first Tai tried to ignore it, it might stop by itself.

It didn't.

Reluctantly Tai's right eye flicked open. The dark brown orb scanned the room for whatever it was that had disturbed his slumbers. There it was. He had pinpointed the source of his irritation. A small light on the navigational console was flashing on and off accompanied by a loud beeping.

Yamato Ishida was the only other person on the bridge and he was apparently unaffected by the beeping. He had his feet up, a cup of coffee resting on the tactical console and a leather-bound book on his lap. Casually he flipped the page with one hand whilst the other picked up the cup allowing him to down a small amount of that, almost, pitch black liquid he called Coffee.

Yamato, or Matt, as he was more commonly known, was the same age as Tai give or take a few months. He was taller as well; not by a large amount but it was noticeable when they stood near each other. His outfit was not very dissimilar to Tai's. A long sleeved grey shirt with a dark green battle jerkin worn over and a pair of dark blue trousers. His most distinguishing feature however was his hair, long, blonde and gelled into an almost indescribable shape.

Tai now had forced both his eyes open and glanced at Matt hoping he would do something to stop the noise.

He didn't he merely continued reading his book apparently ignoring Tai as much as the flashing light. Forced to take action Tai let out a deep sigh giving the light the dirtiest look he could muster.

When that didn't work in shutting it up he was forced to take drastic action, anything was preferable to getting out of his comfy chair.

Slowly his right hand glided down the side of his chair to the pile of stuff on the floor, searching for a projectile.

A plate with the remnants of some unknown sauce on it, nah too delicate. He groped further. His phase pistol, it must have fallen out of its holster as he had leant back, tempting but Izzy would kill him for it.

Perfect. An empty lemonade can. Scooping up the can he hurled it at the navigational console, in particular the flashing light.

He missed by about 20cm and the can proceeded to bounce off and clattered onto the bridge floor. But it was close enough to get the damn thing to shut up. Blissful silence again filled the bridge.

Then it was broken again, this time by Matt who sounded less than impressed with Tai "Izzy's not going to be happy with you"

"Izzy isn't here" Tai responded with a cheeky grin and with that the bridge returned to silence and Tai returned to sleep.

Daisuke Motomiya, or Davis for short, glanced down at the cards in his hand, before retuning his gaze to his opponent sitting right in front of him. Kazu Shioda had a reputation as one of the finest card players in the empire, and his face showed it. He was cocky maybe even slightly arrogant (Traits which had also been applied to Davis) and there was something about Kazu which scared him. It wasn't his voice or the way he acted, no it was his clothes lot's of black and grey and dark blues. That added to the fact Davis, like everyone else had heard about the Ticonderoga and anybody who had lived through that deserved at least some respect; Even though he did think Kazu was a bit of a dick.

Davis scratched at his mass of brown hair, slightly shifting the goggles that sat on his forehead, a trait he'd picked up from Tai. Davis was 3 years younger than Tai at 27 apart from that the two were very similar, sure Davis was a bit smaller, his hair was slightly darker and his skin more tanned but the two acted in an almost undistinguishable way, and they'd both been described as obnoxious.

Finally he relented that there was nothing he could do with the cards he had that would improve his chances of winning. He would have to wait "Your go" he muttered dejectedly

Kazu annoyed him further by grinning like a maniac at that. From that look alone Davis knew that Kazu's reputation was still secure.

In one flowing movement Kazu plucked a card from his hand and slammed it onto the metal table with as much smugness as he could muster. "Gabumon warp digivolves to MetalGarurumon and P'owns you're ass"

Davis's groans of defeat were soon drowned up as Kazu leapt to his feet sending his chair flying backwards "WOOOO!! UNDEFEATED!!" he looked down at Davis the grin now larger than anybody had thought was humanly possible "Who's the king of Digimon?" he stabbed a thumb at his chest "That'd be me. 4 years undefeated"

Kazu was well known for being 'gracious' in victory unfortunately for him Davis was a very bad loser

"Oh yeah, let's see how well you do in a rematch"

Kazu leant close and whispered "You're on Chumly"

With both Kazu and Davis unlikely to call it quits this was going to be a very long card game.

Takato Matsuki sat alone in his quarters, a picture of his childhood sweetheart his only companion. Her name was Jeri. He had last seen her almost a year ago, when he'd still been in Starfleet. He lightly brushed one of her cheeks. He sighed deeply to himself, could it have worked between them, or was it just fate? He placed the picture down and took a long deep breath, his eyes floating round his room.

He was 21 years old, officially the youngest person onboard. He too wore a pair of goggles on his forehead, like Davis he almost idolised Tai. He wore a plain blue hooded top and pale grey trousers. The hoody had been a gift from his mother, a sort of going away present when he'd been called up for national service. He hadn't seen his mother or father since and the hoody itself was looking very much worse for ware through its almost constant use.

Three large knocks sounded on the door behind him, taking him more than a little by surprise. He wondered who it could be. Kazu was the only person he talked to on a regular basis and he was busy "securing his reputation" in cargo bay 2, surely he couldn't have beaten Davis already "Yes, come in"

The door opened and Sora walked in "Hey Takato, I was starting to wonder where you'd got to" she smiled "You've been in here for a while"

Sora was a nice woman, Takato could admit that. She was very beautiful but she was also Matt's girlfriend and Takato knew Matt well enough not to make any moves on his woman.

She had kind, caring eyes and short red hair. Takato almost smiled at it, the only other woman he knew with red hair was very different from Sora.

"So what have you been up to" she was still smiling, a gentle friendly smile

"Oh just thinking" Takato was more than a little nervous. He hadn't really spoken with Sora since he'd come onboard less than a year ago. Now, however, was not the time for socialising. He just wanted to be alone right now.

"I thought you might be hungry so I got you a sandwich"

"Oh thanks" Takato gingerly took the plate from her "That looks nice, I see Matt's a lucky guy"

She smiled a bit nervous herself. She noticed the picture on Takato's desk "Girlfriend?"

"Sort of" Takato bit his lip "Not anymore"

"Oh I'm sorry"

"We were at school together, went to the academy" Sora could hear Takato's voice starting to waver at the mere mention of it. Whoever she was he must have really loved her, that or something really bad had happened.

She could understand that feeling, she couldn't even imagine what she'd be like if she lost Matt and although she didn't know Takato that well she knew he was a gentle and caring person.

Takato exhaled deeply, trying to calm himself "We'll I'd best probably see how Kazu's doing, Thanks for the Sandwich" he scooped it off the plate, taking a bite as he did "Hm that's really nice"

"Glad you like it" she said warmly

Takato nodded "Thanks. That was just what I needed"

On the Bridge Tai still sat in his chair watching as Izzy read screens and fiddled with controls. Izzy had removed on of the control panels, complaining at great length at the amount of dent in the console as a result of Tai's refusal to get out of his comfy chair.

Matt stood by the door, arms partly folded leaning slightly against the wall, apparently still not interested in anything except that damn book of his. Tai would have to find out what Matt was reading. It had to be a bloody good book since he was rarely seen without it.

Izzy was a year younger than Tai, nonetheless Tai knew that Izzy was much more intelligent than he could ever hope to be. He was noticeably shorter than Tai, with short red hair. He wore a dirty orange shirt worn open over a grey T-shirt, both of which stank of booze.

He continued pressing switches and glancing at screens for some time. Tai knew not to interrupt him when he was like this, but he did anyway partly because he was bored and partly because he enjoyed winding Izzy up. "Do you know what set it off?" Izzy looked up, with a more-than-slightly irritated expression on his face "No, not yet, probably an asteroid or starship in our flight path but I can't be sure"

"It's only been 10 minutes" Matt added bitterly

Izzy scowled at him "Look this equipment is ancient; half of it doesn't even work. I need to cross reference all the sensor buffers so I can say for sure if there is something out there"Tai sighed deeply, but inwardly chuckled.

As he sat there watching Izzy fiddling with things Tai couldn't even guess as to what they were, Sora walked onto the bridge with a tray holding 4 cups of coffee "I thought you guy's might like a drink"

Matt finally paid attention to something other than that damn book. He lifted a coffee cup of the tray "Thanks"Tai followed picking up the cup nearest him, without getting up of course "Ta" She offered a cup to Izzy who took it and placed it on one of the flat monitors, which had a dark coffee stain on it already. "Have you found out what it is yet?" she asked trying not to sound too bothered Tai had raised his coffee cup to blow on it and grinned wickedly "Not yet, were just cross referencing the thingamabobs right now"

Izzy scowled at that "We?"

Tai smirked "I'm making sure you do it right"Sora tried, unsuccessfully, to stop herself from laughing. Tai couldn't help but join in. He really envied Matt to have won over such a woman.

Izzy, meanwhile, took a small sip out of the old flask of whiskey that he always carried "in case of emergencies" before wiping a sleeve across his mouth and giving a deep sigh of satisfaction. That caught Tai's attention. He rose from his chair in an attempt to peer over Izzy's shoulder "Anything?"

Izzy's head twisted slightly, looking up at Tai "Hm… Oh it's a ship"

Tai waited "And?" Obviously he was expecting a slightly more in-depth analysis from the ships genius.

Izzy flicked a few switches "I can't tell you anything more from this range" he looked back to Tai "We need to get closer for a more detailed scan"

Tai had hoped for something more exciting, but then again the scanners were always picking up something. He remembered 5 times they had made course corrections to avoid, what had later turned out to be, dust. "You're sure it's not just dust in the scanner again" He dealt the console a few hefty whacks

"Hey! Stop it!" Izzy shouted whilst trying in vain to stop a pile of computer disks from falling to the floor. The disks clattered noisily as they landed and Izzy swore "See what you've gone and done"

Tai stooped and picked up one of the disks. He flipped it between his fingers giving it a brief examination "Their just Disks Izzy. It's no big deal. Hell I don't even think people use these anymore"

Izzy muttered something and bent over to pick them up. Tai glanced down at Izzy and couldn't help noticing that, like everyone else on the ship, his shirt wasn't tucked in and as he bent down he revealed a large amount of his naked back. Tai's eyes moved down Izzy's back before landing on his…. 'No Tai' he subconsciously told himself. 'That is not part of a guys body that other guys are supposed to look at'. Izzy stood up straight and placed the pile of disks back on the console "Try not to do that again" he asked simply before taking another gulp form his flask, apparently waiting for his coffee to cool down "Anyway I just checked the sensors. Their fine"

"Should we avoid it?" Sora wondered trying to get in some contribution to the conversation

Tai clapped his hands together "Well I say we investigate" he twisted round to look at Matt "How are our defences?"

Calmly Matt looked up from his book "Well our phaser banks are at 40%, mind you they were made almost twenty years ago so even at full power they couldn't do any damage; we have three particle torpedoes that went out with the dinosaurs and our shield generators melted"

Tai gazed off into a corner of the room, scratching the back of his head "I'll take that as a not good"

Sora smiled at that "That's one way of putting it"

Takato had spent surprisingly little time in the Armoury. Then again who would willingly spend their free time in a stuffy glorified cupboard lined with ridiculously overvalued metal tubes whose soul purpose was to spout death? That and the fact the armoury had traditionally been Matt or Kazu's realm had provided him with no reason to go there on a regular basis.

It was a dimly lit metallic room, maybe 4 by 3 meters. The floor was nothing but a bare metal grate which showed the myriad of pipes and cables that ran under the Pegasus's floor. There were no computer monitors or power relays, so there really was little reason why Izzy should have been in here, Sora plain didn't like guns, Tai had his own and Davis wasn't trusted enough yet. So why, Takato was asking himself, was he here? The simple answer was he needed to be here, now.

There was something he wanted to get off his chest and only one person he could talk about it with; only one person who understood his situation. Kazu held a small data pad in one hand tapping in some notes as he surveyed the various weapons. The centre of the room was dominated by two long tables which held two open metal crates. One of these crates held two rows of neatly placed Phase pistols. The other had two new phaser rifles inside with a third lying on top off it; the other two phaser rifle stood upright on a rack beside an odd assortment of other rifle weapons. Kazu, clearly in a good mood over his crushing victories over Davis, gave Takato a friendly grin before looking back at his data pad. "Hey" he said casually

Takato managed a small smile as response.

Kazu continued typing "What eh…." he checked a small screen on one of the phaser rifles "Brings you to this neck of the woods"

Takato hesitated for a split second "I wanted to talk to you"

"Beautiful Weapon" Kazu smiled

Takato was more than a little taken aback. Of course he should have been used to Kazu's limited attention span after all he'd known him since primary school. But he couldn't help but ask "What?"

Kazu continued "These phaser rifles" he gestured at the two weapons "Beautiful" Takato was completely lost; A gun was a gun to him he saw little difference between them. "Take the ARC 47 there" He pointed at a long semi-automatic rifle standing beside the phaser rifles. "It fires a burst of three high calibre bullets per second that pass through a man like a hot knife through butter. It's got a good range, optional shotgun attachment or scope. Your all purpose infantry weapon. Now the phaser…"

Takato cut him off "I didn't come here to talk about guns" it was all he could do to keep the impatience from his voice. He had never shared Kazu's interest in fighting and weapons and really had no interest in the various weapons kept in the Pegasus's small armoury.

Kazu spread his arms "Well we are in an armoury" he laughed "Yet somehow I doubted that you had" he went back to his notes "What do you want to talk about then Chumly?"

Takato smiled again. He couldn't stay angry at Kazu. He was his best friend. They been through the closest thing to hell together and Kazu had come out relatively unscathed. Takato however….

There was a long pause as Takato thought hard about what he was going to say. There was no other way to put it "It's the Ticonderoga"

Kazu froze momentarily. He looked up into Takato's eyes; his childish joviality replaced with a deeper look of sympathy and regret "The Ticonderoga…… Or Jeri?"

Takato had hoped he wouldn't ask that. "I still have nightmares about it" his voice was wavering as he tried to just laugh it off. Here he was a grown man having nightmares about something that happed a year ago. "I keep asking myself, what if I'd done this? What if I'd done that?"

Kazu held his gaze refusing to break "And do you get an answer"

Takato, close to tears, shook his head "It's always the same"

Kazu bit his lip "It was long time ago" he looked Takato straight in the eye. With that solitary look Takato could instantly tell Kazu meant what he said. Kazu's voice was a reassuring whisper "People change"

There was a deep silence before Kazu spoke again "We can't change what happened in the past we can only learn from it and move on"

Takato shook his head vigorously "You can but I can't" he looked down at his feet as if they would provide him with some help Kazu couldn't "I'm not like you"

Kazu watched his friend, as a solitary tear struck the grate on the floor. Why was Takato being punished like this? He'd never done anything wrong. He'd always been the kind and gentle one of the Trio.

There was nothing else he could do. He sighed deeply "Takato. She's dead. You have to accept that" It was cruel, even heartless but it had to be said. Kazu had only managed to get on with life by accepting the facts that the Ticonderoga and everyone who had been onboard except them was gone and there was nothing he could do about it. "What's done is done"

"I just wish…" Takato gulped heavily trying to keep his composure "We'd had more time"

Kazu couldn't even manage a smile "I know"

The room was silent again; Takato took a long deep breath. He turned and headed out of the room

"It gets easier" Kazu added as Takato stood in the doorway "With time"

"I just don't know what to do"

Kazu placed the Data pad he'd been working on, onto one of the crates "Loves not simple Takato. There isn't a walkthrough that tells you how to do everything. Something's you have to work it out on your own, and sometimes it doesn't work" He turned away looking into a far corner of the room "just don't give up on life"

Takato tried to smile but couldn't manage it "Thanks" he whispered

There was no going back now. No matter how much he wanted it he couldn't change what had happened.

The ship was almost as old as the Pegasus. An ancient Colonial class starship, about 300m long and equipped with enough fire power to annihilate the Pegasus in a few seconds, not that that would have been much of a challenge for any ship.

Tai stroked the rough stubble on his chin and sat back into his comfortable command chair "Well Izzy what have we got?"

Izzy's eyebrows twitched as he scanned the almost incomprehensible block of text which sprang up onto his monitor "Colonial class, I can't seem to get any identification from it. No life signs though"

"That's damn peculiar?" Tai leant forward in his chair contemplating his next move.

"Is it possible they were attacked?" he asked, glancing in Matt's general direction

Matt looked over his console "Their shields aren't up and their weapons aren't charged, so if they were attacked they didn't put up a fight"

"I'm also not detecting any damage to the ships structure" Izzy added

What should he do now? An imperial ship apparently abandoned. Part of Tai said to leave it, the empire always recovered their ships plus boarding a Starfleet ship without authorization was a criminal offence. That said there was nothing he loved more than solving a mystery and a big juicy one had just landed on his lap.

"Well…" He lent back into his chair "It seems we have ourselves a mystery" The eyes of the crew were on him, what should he do now? Play it safe or gamble "Izzy prep the Transporter. I want Kazu and Takato to join us on the boarding party, Matt's in command until we get back. Keep a transporter lock on us at all times, in case things get sticky"

Matt nodded watching as Tai and Izzy left the bridge, preparing to investigate the mysterious ship.

He managed a smirk, the ship was all his for now. Time to "Relax" with Sora.

After all, what was the worst that could happen?