DISCLAIMER:

1. It is with deep regret that I don't own Inuyasha. If I had then I'd have tons of money….plus Sesshoumaru! LOL!

2. Star Trek is not mine as well. I also apologize for using some Star Trek-like techie jargon here.

3. This story as well as my other stories was delayed due to the fact that I am in professional limbo right now (aka-jobless). And, if that's not enough, my monitor decided to get an early retirement. It took a miracle before I found one that is cheap and relatively new. So now that I've got a new monitor I'm banging merrily away on my keyboard to give you this story.

PS~~I will be updating two more chapters later on.

INU NO WAKUSEI

IMPERIAL CHRONICLES

INW COORDINATE 3542: SOL SYSTEM

IBS (Imperial Battle Ship)TETSAIGA

"You!" Inuyasha grabbed one crewman by its cowl and shoved him brusquely at a nearby transport lift "Tell engineering heads will roll if I don't have power ASAP!" the captain didn't wait for the dazed ensign's nod after punching the close button. "And where the hell is my viewer!" The silver-haired young captain fumed stomping back to the middle of the bridge. Tetsaiga rocked yet again by asteroid shower. It sounded like someone insane was banging on metal.

"Give me five minutes!" the chief of repairs shouted from under the viewer panel, her face dark from soot.

"In five minutes we'll be debris!" Inuyasha winced as another piece of asteroid slammed against the hull, a little bigger this time from the sound of it, followed by smaller ones. He looked up expecting a breach. The lights sputtered and blinked then some sort of white powder and solid things fell down from the ceiling. "Where were we before that thing died, Sho?" he turned to the pilot, pointing to the dark screen.

The navigator wiped his smarting eyes with the side of his palm. It got sweltering hot when the engines failed. "We're in the thick of the asteroid cluster, sir."

"Dammit." Inuyasha's jaw stiffened when another batch of smaller rocks pummeled their hull. It felt like he was the one being battered. He loved this ship.

The convoy was about to cross the border for the jump when the entire ship systems began to fluctuate and their shields went down. After the secondary systems began malfunctioning it crashed in a cascading effect despite the effort to reroute functions. The chief of repairs and her people were deployed all over the ship trying to repair one system after another. It was then that Inuyasha realized that a virus infiltrated their computer core. Nothing short of systems shutdown was needed just to debug the entire ship, which was impossible for that could only be accomplished in a repair station.

Calling the fleet for help came up empty. Inuyasha had a bad feeling that everyone was each to his own from then on. For all he knew some of the convoy might have perished. Damn those birds! When they get back he'd launch an all out offensive against their home world.

"What about sensors…" the chief of repair's voice came out from the viewer panel.

"It's out too!" one of the bridge personnel shouted back, his control panel blinking like crazy with the virus going rampant inside the ship computer.

"Thruster's back, sir! Whoa…whoaa!" the sweating navigator frantically grabbed for his console when he and the deck tilted sideways. Inuyasha held on to the chair and seized the almost unseated pilot with his other hand. There's nothing he could do but gnash his teeth in infuriation from being at the mercy of this virus. They drifted off to this section of the asteroid belt because thrusters were firing on and off from all directions. Tetsaiga was reeling like a drunken date after the crescent moon festival.

Since they also lost inertia a crewman or two lost their fight to stay upright. Off the two went tumbling down to the lower bridge, shrieking in fright. They landed without any injury, save for their dignity and some minor bruises, but they scrambled to get up holding on to the wall to go back to their posts.

"Permission to dive the ship while we still have control, sir!" Sho hastened to explain, "Before we lost visual I remembered the lower area of the belt is almost free from debris. We may avoid more collision."

Inuyasha didn't waste time as another rock clanged on the hull. "Good idea." He punched the audio on the pilot's control pad. "Ship wide broadcast! Hold on people, we are going to dive!" He slapped the pilot's shoulder in approval. "Do it." Immediately he felt vertigo as the battleship Tetsaiga dived like a whale in deep blue waters. He hoped they were not instead diving in just to slam headlong onto another rock.

"I got it!" the chief of repair yelled as the viewer flickered to life.

Feedback was grainy. People sighed in relief but quickly turned to exclamations of horror and terror as the viewer displayed a hulking black rock half the size of their ship veering their direction. Everything seemed to be in slow motion, the thrusters were sluggish, fighting him. The helmsman's fingers danced on his control panel hoping it follows his inputs. He had to re-encode the command at least twice. His chest feels heavy with dread and the bridge is sopping with tension and the thick scent of fear.

Inuyasha looked around his bridge in case it would be the last time. Everyone who's facing the screen had jaws hanging open in terror, body braced for impact, eyes wide. Inuyasha looked back at their hulking nemesis cringing at the thought of that monster colliding with his ship. All he could do was grip the back of the helmsman's chair and pray to the gods they survive this day. As he pilot struggled to swerve the ship away, for a moment there, all of them had this insane thought that the rock looked intent on following them and would catch up.

Good thing the feeling subsided when the ship was coaxed to a safer flight none too soon because they were about a hairbreadth away when they went past it on the way down. They flew so close to it they could see the topography of that black surface in stark detail. People gasped and sighed their relief.

"Shit!" Inuyasha's hunch was right. "Dammit! That was too close for comfort!"

"Sir!" Sho's head snapped up. "The helm's frozen, sir!" was all the pilot could choke out before the blunt blade like edge of the metallic rock bore down on them and made contact.

"Work! Come on!" the pilot almost pounded his board in panic as once more the entire ship shook as the asteroid scraped the hull with an ear splitting sound. The image was starkly terrifying to see bits and pieces of the hull being torn and lifted off like an animal being skinned alive. The pilot didn't want to see what would happen in case they got a major hull breach. He concentrated on his board intent on coaxing the unmoving control commands to life. He wished he could close his ears to the harrowing sounds of the ship falling apart around them.

"Hull breach at level two! Area closed off." someone reported. "No casualties."

A blinking dot alerted Sho. All thrusters operational! Abandoning the status report to his captain the pilot worked swiftly in case the virus tampers with the commands again. Not even when the ship began to glide down faster this time could he feel any bit of relief as he kept his fingers pressed on the control icons. The feeling might change yet again.

Sho's world narrowed down to that small area of his work panel.

It was just a few seconds that passed but it felt like forever before the megalith broke its deadly contact with Tetsaiga's upper hull. Apparently the ship came out of the rock's trajectory pattern and they were able to…

"We broke free!" the entire bridge erupted around him in celebration but Sho didn't let up with the dive. He wanted to make sure they were in a very, very safe distance from any hard object small or otherwise before he could take a breath again. The ship slowed down, banked and leveled. They could see the asteroid belt far above their ship. This area is rock free.

"So-sorry sir…" Sho turned to his captain, perspiration soak his uniform cowl coldly. It was his decision to dive blind and they almost got wiped out. Twice. Lord Inuyasha was known for being a 'hit first ask questions later' kind of a captain. The pilot waited for the hit.

"What the hell, man, it's not your fault." the captain slapped the pilot's back to the great relief of the latter. The helmsman exchanged a relieved glance with another crewmember beside him. Inuyasha was reassured as well when he doesn't hear and feel as if they would be breathing their last. He surveyed their new location. "Okay, now that we're out of that blasted area. Where are the other ships?"

"I couldn't find them yet sir." cut in a bridge personnel manning the sensors. "Transmitter sensors are still down."

"No problem. That one's next." The chief of repairs opened the panel and stuck her head in then half of her body in the console. The panel suddenly sparked and the chief cursed. Flame began to lick the edge of the board while it fizzled and popped. They waited for the automatic fire extinguishers but it must have been damaged as well for it didn't kick in. The fire merrily flickered on the panel filling the air with acrid plastic burned smoke.

"Get out of there!" Inuyasha grabbed the woman's ankle intending to pull her out but she shook his hand off of her leg.

"No! Wait up!" she anchored her other feet to get deeper into the panel and to avoid losing ground.

Cursing at stubborn and about to be fried chiefs, Inuyasha stepped back as the crewman quickly grabbed a fire extinguisher canister and sprayed the flames on his own burning panel. Thick white smoke covered the area until the blaze died down from lack of fuel. Inuyasha and the crewmember waved away the smoke to clear the area. Now the captain feared his chief is a smoking pile of toasted flesh. Frowning, he hunkered down as more colorful cursing was heard and then coughing. Her muffled voice sounded as if she was threatening the wirings and everything attached to it with death en masse if they do not cooperate with her. The young captain heard her pounding something under the bowels of that console section.

"There!" giving the wiring or whatever she was slaughtering under there a last thump she crawled out from under that hole so fast Inuyasha almost bumped heads with her. Inuyasha helped up the coughing chief of repairs, her face got blacker from all that soot.

"Koyu, did you get it? What did you do?" Inuyasha asked as he slapped a burning area on her uniform.

"Thanks sir." Koyu spared a glance at her clothes, nodded her thanks. "Yeah, it will hold for now but it's bloody troublesome, sir." she took a small towel from her belt and quickly wiped off the soot from her face. "I set up some temporary batteries for the individual systems like thrusters, visual and weapons." she glared fiercely as her fingers stab the unresponsive interface.

"Come on you piece of…" Koyu smacked the dark console hard and it suddenly blinked to life. Inuyasha smirked at the interaction between organic life and machine. "That's more like it!" she crowed. "I repair one area and the next one falls apart so I disconnected them and bypassed everything." she sighed while she tried to seal up the gaping panel with the palm of her hand. She looked under the console to see if it was plush. The chief backed away and let the crewman ran systems check. "That'll have to do for now." Koyu is already opening another cover plate as she grinned, her tool whirring. "You now have communications as well, sir." Koyu said before she threw aside the panel cover and dove into it.

And true to what she said the communications officer yelled. "Captain! Incoming message from Lord Sesshoumaru!"

Inuyasha strode to his chair and thumbed the hail button. "Yep? Where are you and the rest?"

"Have you solved the problem yet?" the voice of his older brother, came on calmly as you please as if asking for the weather.

"I just want you to know that we ran into onto that rock and lost some skin but thank you very much for asking." he groused. "No, we have not. Everything went haywire out here thanks to that virus."

"Inuyasha, with the way you're flying that ship it was a wonder it had not been reduced to a pile of wreckage." Sesshoumaru arrogantly stated.

Inuyasha was saved from retorting an equally acidic reply when his first officer gave him thumbs up. "Well, whaddya know,' He grinned after he nodded back "fear could repair jump drives after all." Everyone breathed another sigh of relief at the thrum of the engines under their feet.

"It is a wonder to me how you were never slain by your people."

"What do you mean? I get that left and right everyday." the captain of the Tetsaiga laughed when he saw his crew grinning at him. It's good that the crew easily bounced back from the life-threatening scenario a few minutes ago "these people are vicious!"

"Not vicious enough, apparently." the dry tone of the captain of Heaven's Sword drew chuckles from Tetsaiga's own crew.

"Hey! Get back to work, you laggards!" he shouted but everyone had already dispersed or had lowered their heads to their consoles. "Hold on." he thumbed off the link. "Yuta! Take over. Get that shield repaired then get us out of here-alive!" he shouted to his first officer as he exited the bridge. Before the door closed Yuta was barking commands to the crew from the upper area of the bridge.

~0~0~0~

"Tell me you're joking!" Inuyasha shouted as he almost lunged at the speaker on his desk. Video was still spotty so he made off without it. But as long as they were not fully blind and not smacking into any ship-sized asteroid a lack of a convenient feature such as a desk video is fine.

"I have also wondered the same thought myself." Inuyasha raised his brows at Sesshoumaru's admission

"Why him of all people?" Inuyasha continued to rant amidst the crackle of interference. "Whose idiotic idea was this anyway?"

"Mine, runt." Inuyasha was startled at the deep baritone of their emperor.

"And who gave you that idea, father?" Inuyasha had half a mind expecting the empress to butt in next.

"Hey! And what made you think I didn't think of that all by my lonesome?" but Inuyasha's wise-ass comment was cut off by the emperor himself "He called and offered me his services."

Someone snorted. "And of course, out of politeness, you agreed." Inuyasha was right; the empress was there.

"I don't trust that guy." Inuyasha sniffed and crossed his arms.

"Trust him or not he has the people who know these things." the emperor argued. "Besides, he helped us during the battle."

"Wait a darned minute. Where is our own computer expert?" Inuyasha asked. "Didn't we bring a department full of those nerds with us?"

"Unfortunately he and his people died from the hull breach at Shippo's." from his office Sesshoumaru heard Inuyasha's colorful expletives despite the static. "Tenseiga refused to revive them." the report from the captain of Heaven's Sword silenced everyone for a few minutes.

"Hey. Is Shippo okay?" The captain of Tetsaiga was suddenly concerned for his childhood playmate. They became friends when they were small.

In the academy, other kids were not too keen on being friends with a halfling because he was a product of a full-blooded inu-the emperor, and a lesser caste youkai concubine-his mother. But Shippo didn't care. When one of his classmates taunted that Inuyasha was an unfortunate product that happened during the emperor's moment of weakness because the moon was on the wane, boy, did he and Shippo give that asshole and his snotty friends a dusting they couldn't forget.

"Yes, runt." the emperor replied to his youngest. "His ship's badly damaged like yours. Don't worry, his ship's being repaired as we speak." Shippo is the son of a powerful kitsune lord and the emperor's good friend and loyal follower as well. His father would also be looking out for his own friend's son like his own.

"How many people did you lose Inuyasha?" the empress inquired.

"Amazingly, none. We're lucky. The only injuries were so far the usual bruises, cuts and broken bones. None life threatening but the virus gave us cascade failure. We lost visual and we got scraped on an asteroid in our attempt to avoid the asteroid shower."

"Oh my god…" the empress hissed. "We had to wear life support suits."

"I am receiving the fleet's individual reports. I am providing you all with your copies." Sesshoumaru cut in.

"Hm." the empress sighed. "Damage was varied and serious but temporary. Look at this, my koi...this and this." green light highlighted a portion of the report.

"Ahh, you were right, my love." the emperor crooned to his mate, some rustling was heard. The empress giggled. Inuyasha rolled his eyes and couldn't help shudder in some revulsion. He could just imagine how Sesshoumaru is as ill at ease as he is about their parent's passionate name calling and this might escalate into….ewww! Inuyasha's shoulder shuddered some more.

"Mother. Father," Sesshoumaru's terse voice cut in the ether. Inuyasha smirked wider, he was right. "It is apparent that these attacks were just enough to delay us from following the Hagetaka." Sesshoumaru hated to point out the obvious but goose bumps were rolling on his skin. He sighed. Parents. It's the same dilemma for children everywhere. Your parent's sex life (shudder) was not something you want to think about. But their parents seemed to be oblivious how uncomfortable their children feel. Well, the Western lord thought morosely, I'm not going to point that out.

"Yeah, they wreak havoc on everything and the next time it might target the primary systems." Inuyasha seconded, not because he agreed with his elder brother (though he is right), but it's just to distract the elders from more amorous (shudder) inclinations.

"I agree." the emperor agreed with a business-like tone. Both sons breathed easier. "We cannot gamble on that happening while we're in transit." Everyone grunted their assent since they couldn't see each other. That alone made them aware how vulnerable they have become. It is unacceptable.

"All right." Inuyasha growled his reluctance. "I can't believe I'm agreeing to this."

"I defer to your decision, father. On one condition."

"And what is that Sesshoumaru?" Empress and Emperor Taishou looked at each other from their naked glory in their bed wondering what condition their firstborn is demanding now.

"Do not make me marry anyone from his clan."

{~0~}